Interesting Japanese Resources - Erin's Challenge

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I found this webpage, Japan Foundation's project called 'Erin's Challenge! I can speak Japanese', during my year off. If not that I had been so busy studying for the final exam, I would have spent hours there!

https://www.erin.ne.jp/en/

It's a really nice webpage 'even the beginners can enjoy'. More advanced users will also find it helpful, as it's pouring with real-life dialogues (beginner and advanced versions), effective vocabulary-building exercises and my most favourite section, これは何？, which presents the series of weird Japanese items. The dialogues contain the script and the series of exercises to deepen the understanding of the dialogue.

Prefectures of Japan - puzzle game!

Walking randomly around a hyaku-yen shop called Flet's (usually open, as the door claims, 'from 9 to 25', whatever this means...), a certain item caught my eye. I got even happier when I discovered what it actually was - a jigsaw-style puzzle map of Japanese prefectures! 

I don't know about your experiences concerning the Japanese prefectures, but mine were just terrible. I remember reading zillions of books about Japan before the exams for the Japanese Studies in Poland (most of which was just a complete waste of time, as none of the 'exams' actually checked any of your knowledge on the subject anyway). These books were not only seriously dated (majority from around the seventies), but also weirdly translated or simply poorly written, with daunting newspeak of jibberish and incomprehensible terms. Most of them pouring with not explained pieces of vocabulary, as if every reader ought to know everything about Japan prior to getting the book (what an irony, almost like with the actual Japanese studies in Poland!). One of these unexplained words, and one of the most annoying, because obviously directly translated, was 'prefecture'. Whenever a place was mentioned, you had this hated 'prefektura' next to it, which didn't even explain you anything, as there was no map of Japan with prefectures provided in the book!

My next encounter with prefectures happened when I realized it would be a nice and useful way to study some weird kanji on top of the regular load. I do think it was very effective kanji-wise, but it still didn't solve the problem of not really knowing where these actually were located. Of course, the more you know about Japan and Japanese, the easier it gets, as you learn that Hokkaido is a single prefecture, Osaka, Kyoto and Tokyo create ones as well (although they don't carry 県 (ken) after the name). When you read texts in the textbooks, sooner or later some character will mention Chiba, Hyougo or Gunma prefectures, as they are not that far from Tokyo, or Shiga and Nara prefectures - close to Kyoto. Then from the history books you can probably remember Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which are the main cities of prefectures with the same names. And recently, Fukushima prefecture and its location made it to the news because of the Great Tohoku Earthquake just over a year ago. But I was looking for an effective method of seeing where each prefecture is, more or less, located in Japan. 

I couldn't find a better way than a kid's puzzle, with not onlu kanji, but also the hiragana readings and all the capital cities indicated! (Most of them share the prefecture name, but sometimes you might get a surprise :-) ) !


I thought this is too good so as not to share it - for everybody who studies Japanese, for the children of the expats, for the teachers of Japanese, or just everybody interested. I took pictures of both the map and the pieces, as close to A4 format as I could. My plan is to put each of the puzzle prefectures here, with brief description and printable version that you can print at home, should you wish to. With 1-3 prefectures a week, I should finish the cycle in about 3 months.


Anybody in for the Game of Prefectures?

A Major Breakthrough, or: the case of digusting Japanese food

So, you're going to Japan. If you're interested in all the rumours of the dieting world, you've probably heard of the benefits of so-called 'Japanese diet', and looking forward to all the pounds you're going to shift. Let me enlighten you on the subject here: unless you're lucky enough to live with a host family where the host mother doesn't work and devotes herself to cooking the elaborate Japanese dishes all day long, or you have a hell lot of money to spend on food in 料理屋, riouriya, traditional Japanese restaurants, chances are that instead of being head over heals with great Japanese food, you'll be eating unimaginable crap. And I mean - CRAP. 


If you happen(ed) to know me in the real-life, you'd have probably noticed with fair clarity that I'm an omnivore. More to that: I generally am a really non-fussy eater, every host's dream - a kind of omnivore that would not only eat two portions of everything, you placed in front of them, but even lick the plate clean. Equiped by Mother Nature with no interest in the field and very limited cooking skills performed occassionally and VERY reluctantly (mostly because of my most hated activity that inevitably follows the process, meaning washing the dishes), foodwise, I really don't expect miracles. I am far from giving food the extraordinary healing powers and life-changing qualities. I can't be bothered with unnecessary efforts or diets. I do hold respect for the people who can tell the difference from shiitake and porchini mushrooms (remembering this this episode of Sex and the City, girls?), but it doesn't make me stop laughing at them. And I seriously can't produce a dish tasting exactly the same each and every time, probably due to my recipe dislexia. Hence - I didn't have massive expectations about Japanese food. Sorry, correction here - I had none.

How surprised were I to discover that the Japanese food sucks. Yes, I'm standing my ground here - it SUCKS. It sucks for me, person brought up in the country of proper cuisine and culinary traditions (Poland), and then although British at heart, following mostly Italian/Mediterranean diet with few international exeptions, because it suits my pallatae best.

Firstly, It's the taste, or rather the lack of it. Japanese food is just bland beyond my understanding. Let me just say that there is the reason why Korean and Chinese food are so popular here, and every Japanese knows what キムチ(kimchi) is... It's even more surprising when you realize it somehow manages to stay this tastless despite  the fact that it's ouzing with salt and the really salty say sauce.

Looks quite innocent, but believe me - that was one of the most disgusting things that ever came from under my fingers, made exactly according to Japanese specifications.

Secondly - it is plain boring. It's just rice with rice, on rice. Or with rice-made dessert, which almost always contains anko, sweet red bean paste, no other filling, unless you encounter some カスタード (kasutaado, custard - believe me, it has nothing to do with the real thing) or チョコレート (chokoreeto; in theory chocolate, in practice ib idem). Occassionally you'll find some noodles here and there, that are mostly a/ overcooked, and b/ you've guessed it, bland. There is no variety when it comes to carbohydrates. It's just rice and occassionally Chinese-style noodles. The bread and other baked goods here are absolutely inedible and bland, and it drives me crazy when they call it 'French' or 'European'. It proves the ignorance, I guess, the closest I can think of, with full respect, is American, but they would choke on the lack of taste as well.

Thirdly, it's too time consuming to prepare for what it's worth. It might look simple, but unless you apply the precise amount of ingredients in a specific order, dig them under the full moon in a damp soil and add a very secret ingredient that not only costs an arm and a leg, but is completely useless for any other recipes but  one - it will simply not work. If you're very visual like me, and prefer Nigella Lawson's style of cooking (just a bit of that and that, now that, you can replace that and that, no worries, just relax and cook), you will come to this conclusion, too.

I managed to somewhat recycle the shrimps from the previous culinary disaster, though. This 'curry' invention was surprisingly edible.

Fourthly, the ingredients are riddiculously expensive. Food is really expensive here. Few trays of meat cost less than a basketful of three choosen vegetables, unfortunatelly the meat is far from particularly tasty as well. It's mostly pork (豚肉, buta-niku) or pork and beef blend (牛豚肉 gyuubuta-niku), a chicken here and there (鶏肉, niwatori-niku). The better beef is more expensive, and usually imported, from Australia or New Zealand. I've once encountered American, but it was an exception confirming the rule. All in all - it makes Japan one of these weird places in the world where, illogically, eating out is more affordable than preparing food at home. But it does not necessarily mean it's any good, though.

Fithly, the Japanese don't use the oven. That leaves most dishes to be boiled, fried or, you guessed it, deep-fried. They do boil and steam some foods occassionally, but oil-ouzing deep-fried goes a long way here. And it's really dripping with oil. When I get a piece of deep-fried chicken occassionally, it takes 5-6 sheets of kitchen paper to absorb the excess oil. There is something here called microwave oven, which basically combines a microwave, toaster and an oven, but unless you spend significant amount of money on a very good one, I doubt the results will be remotely similar to our ovens, even basic electric ones. I do have a microwave oven, and it was a very good decision to get one as soon as I got here, but the food prepared there is a far cry from what you can make at home, unfortunatelly.

Mushroom and beef curry, it was... edible. Enjoyed from a tupperware lid due to the on-going dishwashing crisis and aversion to the activity. And yes, I know it looks like a chicken that fell into a pit of manure...

Sixthly, there isn't enough space to cook/keep the ingredients. Japanese kitchens tend to be really tiny and crammed, with little or no kitchen equipment. Just to give you the picture, my 'kitchenette' that probably is a symbol of a proper kitchen here has one electric stove for only one pot. Cooking requires not only putting things together, but also thinking about the order of cooking stuff and the space to put them. The stove surface heats up quickly and uncontrollably, mostly burning your things, then cools down forever, so no fine cooking with subtle temperature variations is even possible- no 'bring to boil and then boil on a low heat'. (And then, after half an hour of cooking, some emergency switch turns it off automatically without a warning, leaving you wondering why the heck isn't that curry ready yet. Probably the best option from the viewpoint of the student house management, according to whom students are too stupid and drunk to remember to switch the boiling pasta off.) Even when you're one of these who don't heat up their food, I'd like to see where you'd put all that vegetables, assuming you could afford them. I'm not a big veggie fan, but I still need to keep this symbollic amount all around the room, because there is not enough space around kitchen area. 

And lastly, the (pro)portions are weird. I wouldn't call them too small (although my Texan friend would disagree on this one), but... ill-proportioned. There seems to be too much carbohydrates in the relation to protein and fibre. This doesn't satisfy me and my energy needs. I am too active, both mentally and physically, to eat just 80% instead of 100% stomach capacity, especially when it's in a form of rice that seems to burn out in an hour after a meal. And it's just unbelieveable that something that calorific (it has a hell lot of calories, when you compare it to other sources of carbs) can leave you that hungry so quickly after a meal. I guess Asian diet is just not for me.

SO, can you actually imagine my delight when for the first time in my life in Japan I actually managed to cook something that was not just edible, but also didn't give the fright of possible diarrhoea AND was satisfying on the deeper, emotional level? I even remember the date - November 3rd, 2011. Here it is, in full, long-ago eaten glory: an okonomiyaki-style homemade invention. A major breakthrough.

I was prepared for yet another disaster... but it was so nice to eat something so edible and even tasty!

From Tokyo with Love

Regards from Tokyo at the height of the cherry blossom season, where the blossoms are simply everywhere, followed by the Japanese - eating, drinking and excessively photographing them from underneath! I'm so lucky to be able to witness the season twice this year - here now and in a week in Kyoto!

 
On the footnote - Tokyo is much more fun than I had expected. I really like it a lot! (an this is an unlikely phrase you ever get from a grumpy traveller - proves how impressed I actually am).

Haroo-o or: Why Does the English of the Japanese Suck

- I'm always impressed - said my German friend on the way back from our local supermarket - by how good the Japanese students' German is. I mean - some of them speak so well, just after a short year abroad in Germany!

I nodded thoughtfully.

-Of course - he continued - they studied before they went there, but still... German is such a complicated language at places, and the pronunciation...

I muttered approvingly, myself being a slightly traumatized victim of this very, em, specific language.

- And - he added - it's so surprising after you hear their English, which simply...

- Sucks? - I finished. We both agreed on this one.

Just recently I've been happily riding the bike with my Italian friend when we encountered a group of annoyingly loud Japanese schoolgirls. The moment they saw us, like the flock of greyish crows they croaked: haroo-o! The smile went off my face. I looked at them wanting to say something hurtful back, or to smack them at least, not really knowing what infuriated me most - the fact that they dared to disturb me and my space for no apparent reason when I didn't wish for it, or the fact that their English sucked so badly.

I've noticed myself that the Japanese students who study foreign languages other than English generally seem to excel a typical language student, let it be an American, Polish or Scandinavian. Diligence, study techniques, perserverance and passivity, all developed as a result of countless years in Japanese school system pay off nicely, and the Japanese seem to acquire their new languages in no time. When they start talking, they usually do that correctly and without a strong accent, maybe occassionally losing a sound or two. Then it's just a matter of practice, really.

Now, volumes of internet wisdom have been written on the subject of Why Japanese People's English Sucks, most of them with possible solutions to the problem. Native speakers that spent sufficient amount of years here in Japan often refer to their work in the field as trully Sisyphean labours the result of which tends to be slightly haphazardous. I came up with my own theory after trying to teach some Japanese students The English Language. Do you want to know the real reason why the English of the Japanese sucks? Answer: because they don't really care.

Now, before you stone me, let me defend my opinion here. What's the difference between English and other languages? You'll not convince me that French, German or even Spanish are easier to master by the Japanese than English. Yet somehow the level of acquisition of the other languages juxtapositioned with their English is incomparable. What's the difference here? The conscious WILL to study. They WANT to study their other languages. If they do study them, the tuition is generally on the highest possible level. As for English...   

They start being exposed to it really early. Too early, in fact, because some of them start, ekhem, 'studying' as early as kindergarten. And it's not even any proper English, it's the horrible katakanized pronunciation-English, as only very few places can afford a native speaker in an early education centre. Having poor teachers from the very beginning (majority of whom not only having received poor English education themselves, but is also impaired linguistically by not being able to differenciate between 'l' and 'r' sound, very Japanese problem) usually result in the poorness getting transmitted easily. Having mediocre pronunciation themselves, the teachers hold mediocre expectations towards their students' pronunciation. The student continues to receive poor language year after year, not even making a conscious decision about studying the language, poorness of it being only fortified by the system that reinforces the passive skills like reading and listening by continuous testing and no possibility to have any real language practice. Even if they're lucky enough to encounter a native English speaker in their high school years, it's usually too late for any real change and applying any real corrections. There is still hope for the chosen few with wealthy parents and a possibilty to go abroad for a year, but that only works till a certain age (the puberty language acquisition theory) and only if no other Japanese goes with them.

It seems like a question of practical language use is on the far end of priorities, if it is there at all. Seems that more important is doing it incorrectly for many years and take pride in the fact that Japan has one of the longest obligatory English education systems in the world, the system that results in acquiring a hybrid, Japanglish that cannot be understood or used as a communication tool unless you're a Japanese or an English-speaking student of Japanese. Sad, but true for the Japanese. Good news for the pilgrimages of more and less authentic English natives flooding Japan each year, as there will always be a demand and nice money for those, minus the work satisfaction.

To defend the Japanese, I can only tell that it's not entirely their fault. If you were brought up in the system that didn't really care about making your English correct, why would (and should) you? It's really sad for those few that probably painfully realize all the above, and as adults try to re-acquire English, this time properly. Chances are that even then, their English is always going to suck this way or another. 

But even in this sea of really terrible katakanized Engrish here, one occassionally encounters a rare jewel that despite all odds managed to somehow learn some proper English. I guess this is an example of these who at some point consciously realized they WANT to do study it properly, instead of going with the easily obtainable flow of poorness.

PS. As for brazen people who dare to 'Haroo-o' me on the street without a warning/invitation, I developed a survival mechanism. Unless they're really little kids waving cheerfully and calling me おねえさん, onee-san, older sister (different story when it's おばあさん, obaa-san, auntie - then my reaction might be slightly different), I reply in very calm Japanese: 発音は違うよ。ばかやろう。Wrong pronunciation, you moron.

I might be an evil creature, but, as my Italian friend would put it - they SO deserve it! Who knows, maybe one or two would go home, shocked after hearing the above, and actually ask themselves: what's the correct pronunciation of Hello? 

Star Base at dusk; one of the few trully snowy days in Kyoto, winter 2011/2012

A pleasant surprise

While shopping for yet another glass (yes, I admit, I am a glass smasher... it was the third since I came to Japan) in my favourite hyaku-yen shop, Daiso, I noticed some thin glasses that looked extremely familiar, exactly the shape that my granny used to serve me tea in. Intrigued, I came closer to discover that they were indeed made in Poland. Who would have thought! (and how did THEY manage not to smash it during such a long journey, I wonder!)

The Japanese version of the golden box says 'Made in Europe' instead of  'Made in Poland', mentioning Poland in the further description.

This one says 'Made in Poland - heat-resistent glass mug'. I need to get some, by the way.

Meet Harrold, an abandoned omiyage

My (now not so) recent discovery of Recycle Shops (shops where you bring anything unwanted, from old electronics and misfitting clothes to some hit-and-miss gifts, so they can find a new happy owner for fraction of the original price ;-) ) resulted in me finding a new furry friend - everyone, let me introduce Harrold <sic!>, the Harrods teddy bear. (By the way, do you know why our toy bears are called 'teddy'? It's a nice story, I've learnt it by complete accident while watching some of my countless documentaries. :-) )

Isn't he just handsome? :-)

All signs on earth and sky suggest that poor Harrold is an example of an abandoned お土産 (omiyage), a souvenir from the place that one visited. It roughly translates as our souvenir, the characters read 'something created/born on (certain) soil', and is in fact a proof of one's travel as well as a token of one's relationship towards the person that receives a gift. It's a custom, so it is in fact expected of you to bring some little things for everybody that knows about your travel, starting with your family and friends, and ending on your boss and work colleagues. The things don't need to be ridiculously expensive. Most commonly, some local sweets or food products are given, something that is relatively original and characteristic for the area. Little toys are also popular (although nowadays they barely prove any local craftsmanship apart from the one of the Chinese workforce).

For instance, this is a lovely お土産 that Hiroha-san kindly brought me from her workplace:

It's sweets that imitate a 日の丸 (hi-no maru, the name of the Japanese flag) お弁当 (obentoo) lunchbox, a lunchbox made of rice, vegetables, some little sausages and mushrooms. Haven't tried the original yet. bit the sweet copy was delicious!

 And this is another nice gift from Hiroha-san, Sam, the Loose Moose (huh-huh-huh, I couldn't resist a lame joke, sorry :-) ), an omiyage from Canada. (Thanks to its bright yellow antlers the time I usually wasted looking for my keys shortened dramatically!)

Isn't Sam just endearing?

Now, coming back to Harrold's case, I have to admit that apart from some kitsch red double-decker teapots, over-exploited shapes of St. Paul's Cathedral, London Eye, Tower Bridge (notoriously named 'London Bridge' by the tourists), and Parliament tower so eagerly and wrongly called 'Big Ben', immortalized for posterity and future excavation grounds in a variety of completely useless and random forms and materials, (oh, let's not forget my personal negative favourite, 'I ♥ London' items - the person that invented that slogan should be surrounded with items carrying it for eternity), I simply can't think of any better and more 'London' souvenir from London, UK than a Harrods bear. (I've decided to make a clear distinction here after meeting too many foreign students from London, Ontario, which they themselves call 'a rip-off of a real thing'.)  

But finding an abandoned omiyage, just lying there made me reflective. How utterly unimportant such little gift must have been that somebody just got rid of it? Don't tell me it was taking that much space. How about the person that actually went to London and spend so much money on obligatory souvenirs, and then carried it through half of the world back home, just to give it to somebody that doesn't really care and appreciate the gift? One can of course discuss that if they didn't care at all they would have just thrown it to the bin instead of carrying it to the リサイクル, risaikuru, recycle centre of shop, but trust me, the rules of disposing the rubbish in Japan are so detailed and strict that they probably wanted, but gave up after they discovered there is no way of telling which parts of the bear should go to which category of rubbish - inflammable (可燃, kanen), non-inflammable (不燃, funen) of maybe organic? Maybe it contains some recyclable plastic, or God forbid, paper or metal? What about the tag, what actually is a tag made from? Paper? Fabric? Plastic? Is there any chance it has some iron or non-ferrous metal inside? Or maybe it's a special rubbish collection you have to arrange? You know what, it's easier to just drop it into the recycle shop and leave it.

But you know what was the best thing about finding such a symbol of London in the middle of Japan? Apart from the serotonin rush and a nostalgia wave - the price. Yes, the reason why I never treated myself to the Harrods bear myself was it's price, as I seem to have a natural talent to like only the most expensive things in every shop. An expensive taste, as some people call it. Even such a tiny bear could cost at least 10 quid, and I'd rather treat myself to some diet coke, frozen Pizza Express and some apples and bananas for exactly the same price. So what was my surprise when I flipped the tag to discover that:

Yes. It literally is 31 pence. 36 Euro cents. 50 American cents. Or 1.57 zł.

Mocking at Tim Wonnacott, the presenter of the BBC antique show Bargain Hunt, highly popular amongst the older female population of British antique-freaks and hereby present bored to death student of Japanese who needs some distraction while revising that bloody kanji:  ' And THAT is <dramatic pause> what I call <another dramatic pause> A BARGAIN ' <even more dramatic silence>. :-)

I wonder how old my bear is...

What is it? これはなに？

Time for a new challenge! Ready? Steady... Go!

What is it?

a/ a miniaturized kanji memorization notebook;

b/ a set of oil-blotting sheets;

c/ a portable paper bookmark set;

d/ a chewing gum wrapping paper;

e/ a block of hand-sanitizing paper;

f/ a block of disposable shoe deodorizing pads.

Good luck with guessing! 

(answer below)
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it's...
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The Ice Cream Story

Browsing through my local supermarket yesterday, I suddenly felt a strong urge to treat myself with an ice-cream. It was so strong that I decided not to fight it, but instead to move towards the freezer section of the supermarket and try to find something nice.

The amount of colours, textures and flavours was baffling. So were the prices. I couldn't possibly carry the most economical and also heaviest 2 litre tub (approximately 900 yen) as I had other groceries too, so I picked myself some single-wrapped cone with chocolate on top (approximately 230 yen, picture below).

It looked very edible and scrumptious at the time. Plus, I have to admit I got curious to buy it after I noticed the manufacturer - Lotte, a pretty famous Japanese sweets company that recently bought Polish chocolate company E. Wedel. (Name, Lotte, refers to Charlotte, the heroine that Goethe's character Werther was withering with unrequited love to, and eventually committed suicide in such an unskilled way that as a result he was bleeding out for days. Sounds fascinating, I know, but nevertheless 'The Sorrows of Young Werther' (original title 'Die Leiden des jungen Werthers') is considered the masterpiece of Romanticism). 

Sorry for the digression, back to the story.

When I finished my shopping, I moved to the cashiers. I always try to pick either the man or the old woman, as I find their Japanese the easiest to understand. But let's face it - doing shopping in the self-service supermarket is not the most stressful experience requiring smooth talk in any language, as long as you know what you're expected to do.

This time I've picked the most interesting lady so far. I'm not joking, she must have been at least 98, if not older. She was absolutely lovely and helpful, chatting with me in Japanese (most of which I didn't grasp, of course, but covered that with very Japanese noding), while she was skillfully jostling the products from basket to basket. (That's how they do it here - they carefully take the items from your basket, scan the barcodes, and then put the items into the next basket, so that after you paid you can take your shopping to the special bagging area and pack your bags without any hassle or any impatient clearing throats of people in the queue. Ingenious.)

-Would you like some dry ice? - she asked. (ドライアイス、dorai aisu)

Probably looking very stupid, I asked whether she could repeat the question.

- Dry ice- she repeated, and then looked ahead, looked in the basket of already scanned items and pointed at my ice cream.

Still not really understanding what she could have in mind I've put up a brave face and agreed hopelessly, and with serious relief noticed that nothing else is being expected for me for the time being. Till after I paid, when the lady gave me... a token. It was a cheap aluminum token with surprisingly not misspelt 'fresh' embossed on it (Japanese do not distinguish between 'r' and 'l' sound, that's why it's so hard for them to grasp the concept that it actually makes a difference in English or any other language whether you say one or another). 

- ドライアイスのため (dorai aisu no tame, for the dry ice) - she explained kindly.

And then I understood.

Next to the exit of the supermarket there are two weird machines. They are big, black and surprisingly understated when you compare them to the usually bursting with colour Japanese vending machines. I approached them, and to my relief I've spotted ドライアイス written on one of them. There was a nice picture tutorial on it, telling me to hang the plastic bag on two hooks inside, to absolutely make sure that there are no hands inside before switching it on, to close the door, put the token in the slot and then press the green button. So I did.

The noise was horrible. It reminded me of some big industrial vacuum-cleaner that got blocked. And then something filled the bag, the bag itself disappeared in the cloud of unidentified mist, and some mist even started to find its way trough the closed door. I took a brief look around but nobody seemed to pay the slightest attention to me, which calmed me down a great deal and ensured I haven't done anything wrong. (Foreigners are always under some observation in Japan as exotic species, but as long as they don't do anything seriously wrong/ funny/ inappropriate, the observation is very discreet and don't evolve into staring.) I waited for the mist to disappear, and then opened the door. The bag was now filled with some powder that reminded me of artificial snow. I touched it through the bag - it was so cold that it almost felt like burning. I put my ice cream inside and tied the bag tight. 

At home I took my ice cream, opened it and ate it. It wasn't anything special. To be honest, it was one of the most mediocre ice creams I've ever had, and I've eaten some really plain ones in my life. In theory it was supposed to be vanilla and chocolate with some nuts on top, in practice it all tasted like cold sugar. Or rather - a cold sweetener, as it wasn't that sweet at all.

But the observation of the powder that seemed to gradually disappear without any trace (or water residue) took me most of the evening. Who would have thought that a plain urge to eat an ice-cream would lead to my discovery of such interesting invention!

   

I've just checked the freezer - the substance disappeared completely, regardless of being kept in the cold. I still have no idea what it is, but I simply can't wait to buy some more frozen goods to check out the weird substance again! Is it some form of nitrogen, I wonder? Need to ask my best friend to ask her mum, the Chemistry PhD :-).

Bad Hair Day

Japanese young people, especially male students (but girls don't fall behind, no-no-no), seem to have the particular interest in getting their hair the messiest and weirdest- colour possible. It might be fashion, but I think it's rather letting some steam off after years of obeying the strict school regulations (I'm not sure whether there any particular rules about hair though - need to ask Hiroha-san). Japanese kids and then teens need to wear uniforms for all their school years, starting sometimes as young as kindergarten. Clothes can be changed easily, so even if you like to dress extravagantly on the weekends, on Monday you just jump into your regular uniform without anybody knowing. If you decide to have your hair dyed pink, it would be much harder to hide that fact, and would end up with a serious talk at principal's office. After all, in the image-concerned Japan, a pink-haired student wearing the uniform of given school is not the most perfect advertisement for the serious school he's supposed to attend to.

Don't get me wrong, there are perfectly 'standard' hairstyles too, especially long and semi-long female hairstyles and up-dos. But if the person wants to stand out- believe me, they really do. The colours range from all shades of the characteristic, bleached Asian-hair orange blonde, orange blonde then dyed pigeon blonde, resulting in mould-green blonde, blonde with pink and teal streaks, black with rainbow-coloured bangs or ends. Even if the hair looks black, brown or dark-brown, a closer look confirms a pretty expensive cut and four or five different shades applied.

And then of course is the entire range of hair-styling products one can use - waxes, gels, jellies, foams and whipped (sic!) creams. The general rule is - the rougher and spikier the hairstyle - the better.

I've never been much of a hair-concerned person. Most of my life I've never had any special hairstyle - I was leaving my hair loose or catching it in a ponytail or some up-do. I don't even own a hair dryer. Getting my hair done has never taken more than washing it, and the products used are just a shampoo and a conditioner, plus occasionally some hair dye. Seriously, I am as far from having my day ruined because of the bad hair as the North Pole is from the South Pole. I've always thought there are more important things to be concerned about, really.

Before I came to Japan, for that very reason, I've come to the conclusion that getting a haircut in Japan will be far too much a stressful experience to be worth it. So I went to the hairdresser's and ask for a short haircut. Theoretically it was supposed to look a bit like these: 

In practice it looked like nothing like it, but at least it was short and didn't suppose to require any hairdresser's influence for a year, as it would grow back nicely and more or less evenly. Oh, forgot to mention that it was supposed to be easy to take care of. Well, WAS supposed, meaning that for the first time in my life I get up wondering what sort of hairstyle I'm going to have after a well-deserved night rest, and whether it would be hard to smoothen it easily.

Yesterday, getting up slightly later than I expected and not having enough time for a shower before going out, I realized with some concern that my hair had somehow managed to achieve their weirdest state ever. Looking like Christopher Walken in 'The Legend of Sleepy Hollow' I set off for school, hoping I could fix it temporarily till lunchtime and then wash it quickly during the lunch break in the time I'm usually idling away anyway when waiting for the pasta to boil.

Walking briskly I heard some rumours behind me. I'm not faint at heart, but I've never liked the noisy groups of young males. They are so unpredictable that one must always be prepared, should the confrontation occur. Wondering how to behave if they decided to start bothering me (pretend to be deaf? mumble something under my breath? starting chatting vigorously in Japanese for an initial shock effect?), I heard that they try to convince one of them to go and say something. I started to wonder why is it taking them so long. After all, if they wanted to just bother me, they would have done it without much thinking. They obviously wanted to talk to me, yet they were too shy to ask. In the end the bravest one, now bright red, started:

 　

- あの・・・ (Anoooo, the Japanese expression used to attract the attention of the recipient, while at the same time showing the speaker's hesitation)

 Me:　- はい、どうしたんですか？(Hai, dooshitan desuka?) What happened?/ What's wrong? (the expression showing more concern towards somebody/their problem; encouraging the speaker to say what's bothering them)

The huge wave of relief came upon him, as he had obviously panicked that he stopped a foreigner and would need to talk in English (which he can't despite studying English for at least 8 years). 

Pointing at my hair he asked with serious admiration: 

- How do you do that?

Honestly, nothing in Japan has yet made my day so much as this encounter! :-)

Vivat the Headless Horseman! :-)

In Our Time: Shinto

Browsing through the BBC iPlayer (http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/radio) that I definitely like too much (unfortunately, outside the UK only the radio programmes are available... <covers face with a kimono sleeve to hide the running tears... ok, just kidding>), I came across this very interesting audition about shinto:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b014qnld#synopsis

It's really informative, and presents shinto in historical, mythological and religious context, juxtaposing it with other religious systems. Program is free to listen, and available from any country in the world - just click the 'listen now' button on top of the synopsis. Podcast lasts about 45 minutes. Oh, needless to say: it's in English.

One of the guests is Ms. Lucia Dolce - Senior Lecturer in Japanese Religion and Japanese at my home university - the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London!

Enjoy!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/

Socializing in Japan... and how inavoidable it is for the foreigner to socialize with other foreigners

Before I came to Japan, I've been repeatedly told that I should absolutely never, under any conditions and circumstances, socialize with non-Japanese people. Well, bearing in mind that one was about to live in Japan for a year, it not only did seem logical, but also like a relatively easy thing to do. No - the only right thing to do, even. Now, living in the international students dorm and simply not having any native Japanese students in my dorm to hang out with, I would only say: easier said than done.

The thing is that in such situation you might play a Virgin Mary of Japanese language if you wish, sitting in your room and not even paying attention to anybody because they are not Japanese. You can cram all day long and then watch your daily episode of  Jドラマ, j-dorama, Japanese series/soap opera. You can scrutinize the labels of food in the supermarket and read awkward manga in the afternoon. But then, sooner or later you're going to realize that you're all alone in the far-away country and there is nobody around to simply talk to. You're going to save your Japanese so much for the 'real' Japanese, only talking to the teacher in class and occasionally outside that the year will pass, and you probably wouldn't open your mouth more than few dozen times, and when you do - well, nobody would either understand you very well, or genuinely want to listen to you.

Why not talking to international students in Japanese then, you ask? Well, that's a good point. It seems like a good way of combining the two, right? Well, not really. Firstly we are all at different levels of language ability. There are really good people who studied Japanese for years, but there are also people who have never seen any Japanese before. Even when we're so-called 'intermediate' in Japanese, we all have different strengths and weaknesses: there are people who can speak smoothly, but don't have enough vocabulary and get stuck; there are people who can read very well, but can't speak at all; there are people who's kanji ability is incredible, but have very little grammar supply; and last but not least - there are people who drop out from higher levels and need to go back to lower groups because their kanji is so poor that their perfect spoken Japanese is simply not enough. 

So an effective communication in Japanese is slightly difficult. But this is not the worst bit.

As non-native speakers, not only can't we correct our own mistakes, but surely pronounce many things incorrectly and keep repeating the same sentence patterns all over again with little dose of flexibility. But foremost - we are always at risk of transferring our own mistakes and teach the less-proficient people something wrong, which will consecutively take them significant amount of time to correct in the future. Of course, when we are certain of a particular pattern/ vocabulary, we do speak a bit in Japanese. But for smooth and mistake-free exchange of information speaking in English is simply essential.

One could close in their room for the entire year abroad, but why? There are so many interesting people around, each with lots of interesting stories to tell. (Unavoidably, there are also extremely uninteresting types, but one doesn't need to be friends with everyone, right?) 

What is called for is the golden mean. Of course the best thing you can do is to hang out with Japanese students, but you see, it's not that simple. Japanese society is highly hermetic, and without breaking the language barrier first it's extremely difficult for a foreigner to meet and make friends with many Japanese students. I was lucky so as to have a lovely Hiroha-san assigned to me as my guide for the first few days in Kyoto, and that she was and still is eager and kind enough so as to hang out with me every week and put up with my crappy Japanese. But not many foreigners are that lucky. Being a foreign exchange student, unless your Japanese is really good so as to allow you to follow a regular lecture for the Japanese students, you will have all the classes with other foreigners only. If you have particular interest in something, you might try joining the サークル活動, saakuru katsudo, clubs and circles of interest, but bear in mind this will be a club where the Japanese enjoy themselves in Japanese and don't really want to 'babysit' a foreigner in their club. (The clubs are taken really seriously in Japan, requiring at least 6 hours of weekly contribution). If you don't speak well enough so as to express yourself freely on the subject and to get all the jokes - you will feel awkward.

Giving oneself a break sometime, and hanging out with people who are the closest to you (foreigners) is not such a bad idea. Maybe not every day, not every weekend night-out, but just staying in touch. The truth is that for the time of your year abroad they will become like a second family, and they will sympathize more with you and your problems than even the closest of friends back home can. 

So why not hanging out with foreigners? It's the matter of priorities. If you're so ambitious to perfect your Japanese that there is absolutely nothing more important for you in the entire world - go ahead, ignore all non-Japanese, watch these J-dramas, study all day long, don't even say hi to your classmates. But if you want your year abroad to be a fulfilling experience on other levels as well - try to open up for people, regardless of the language they prefer to speak in. Who knows what gems are hidden out there.

Speaking of which - look what I found today exploring the buildings of my school: 

 

It's a real park! And all that found because my 好奇心(kookishin, curiosity) told me to open a plain toilet window! :)

読本２： 松尾大社について

 松尾大社のパンフレット

 

松尾さんの庭について

松尾大社 － The Great Shrine of Matsunoo, 18/09/2011

The view from the 松尾橋 (Matsunoo hashi), the bridge leading to the shrine over 桂川 (katsura gawa), River Katsura. In the background - the omnipresent mountains that surround Kyoto from all sides.

Front 鳥居, torii, a gate marking a sacred space of the shinto shrine.

手水や, temizuya, a purification pavilion in which a visitor is supposed to wash their left, then right hand, and then rinse their mouth. This shinto shrine was built in the place where a turtle was spot bathing in the mountain brook at the foot of the waterfall, so the motif of the turtle is repeatedly used.

The area of kamidana - in this case small 'houses' provided for 神,kami, sacred spirits of shinto. The kami can live in places, things, areas, but they can also travel and visit other shrines. In that case they use the hospitality of specially purified and evil-protected places (marked with an enclosing shimenawa, sacred rope, with attached shige, paper streamers).

絵馬 (ema), small wooden placks on which people leave their wishes and prayers to the 神.By leaving them attached in close proximity to the 本殿 (honden), main building enshrining the main 神, they make sure the prayers will be read. Instead of ema, the wishes can be also written on the rice spoons.

The 本殿, honden. In order to attract the attention of the kami, you need to offer them some money, then pull the rope till the bell rings 2-3 times, and then clap your hands twice. Then in silence you can tell them your wishes or express gratitude. In this shrine there are 3 enshrined dieties: Oo-yamagumi-no-kami (male), Nakatsu-shima-hime-no-mikoto (female) and Tsukiyomi-no-mikoto (male).

亀の井 (Kame-no I), The Turtle's Well in the First Garden. The water is supposed to be very tasty and beneficial, curative even. One can bring their own bottles and take it home, should they wish to.

霊亀の滝 (Reiki-no taki), The Waterfall of the Mysterious Turtle. Very beautiful, quiet and incredibly tranquil place.

An example of an 石灯籠, ishidooroo. stone lantern. Their shape is supposed to embody all 5 elements of the universe. Initially used only in Buddhist temples to light the pathways, in Heian period (794-1185) they started to be used as decorative items in shrines and private dwellings. 

曲水の庭 (Kyokusui-no niwa), The Garden of the Bent Water.

A view from the tea ceremony pavilion.

Time for a treat!A teacup of freshly 'beaten', bitter 抹茶 (matcha),and some local sweet treats, all with the great view over the second garden. The dumpling with red bean paste was sake-flavoured, the green one reminded me of sour Haribo jelly, and the pink one tasted like pink powder candy :-)

Another sacred space in the enchanted forrest.

The Turtle's Well from behind. I simply adore the mystical atmosphere of this picture.

No Japanese pond would do without some 鯉 (koi), Japanese carps. These certainly knew how to beg for food!

First autumn leaves of 紅葉 (momiji), Japanese maple. Perfect marking of today's 秋分,shuubun, the first day of Autumn!