January 2004
Thursday, Jan. 1, 2004 — Exploring Hanoi, Day 15
We all woke up late. Sally and Chanda went CD shopping for most of the morning. I half-heartedly looked. When I returned, Sally was still browsing so Chanda and I went wandering. We meandered through the Old Quarter’s sewing-materials street. Chanda bought some handmade paper who sold calligraphy materials. She spent $1 for 15 sheets. Then she said she had no idea what they’d do with it.
When we met up with Sally, we headed toward the lake. I bought some nice sunglasses for $6. The ones I’d been using up until then were barely hanging together. We returned to the Old Quarter for lunch. I had a sandwich and fries. Sally’s pizza took forever. Apparently it wasn’t something the café actually stocked; we saw the staff sneak it in. The waiter gave Sally a discount for taking so long. She felt bad for griping.
In our itinerary, we’d wanted to go on a two-day tour of Ha Long Bay. We returned to Tamarind to check out its travel agency, which came highly recommended in Lonely Planet, but we rejected it for being too expensive. We went to the agency across the street, ET Pumpkin, and arranged for the tour there. The travel agent seemed friendly and competent. We signed up for a $28 Ha Long Bay tour that lasted two days and included three meals and a hotel stay.
The employee told me he’d just guided some Texans to Sapa in northwest Vietnam. They had told him everything is bigger in Texas. I told him everything IS bigger in Texas.
We left and rushed to see the water puppet show. It was okay. Afterward, I insisted we go to the Vietnam Airlines booking office to reconfirm our flights. But after walking all the way there, we found the office closed because it was, DUH, New Year’s Day.
On the way back, we got ice cream at Fanny’s, an ice cream shop highly lauded in the guidebook. I had coffee-flavored ice cream. We went to the lake to enjoy our ice cream. Sally and Chanda had wanted to draw but it wasn’t long before Sally was approached. This time, it was a young Vietnamese woman. She was a tricky one. Rather than come right out and ask if Sally wanted to buy her pictures, she got Sally involved in a very long, drawn-out conversation about art and language. I left after a while; I didn’t feel any compunction to buy any more than I already had. Sally and Chanda ended up both buying some of the girl’s intricate paper-cuttings.
At the hotel, I helped myself to watching The Fast and the Furious on HBO. Eventually Chanda joined me and Sally came later before we went to sleep.
Review
• Sun & Moon café/bar/restaurant in Hanoi — Thumbs up. Even though this café took forever with Sally’s food, I didn’t have any problem with my meal, which was quite scrumptious. They make an excellent toasted ham and cheese sandwich. (49 Hang Be St., 82-4-2229)
Friday-Saturday, Jan. 2-3, 2004 — Ha Long Bay, Day 16-17
Our tour was supposed to pick us up between 7:30 and 7:40 a.m. We scrambled to eat breakfast before then. I missed breakfast because I was busy calling Vietnam Airlines. The airline lady on the phone told me our flight had been cancelled. My stomach dropped out.
I stupidly asked, “What does that mean? How will we get home?” I was stuck in a foreign country and didn’t know how to get back! I felt utter despair stealing my appetite.
The airline lady told me she could reserve seats on the same flight for us. But I had no time; the tour bus was no doubt waiting downstairs for us. The lady gave me a reservation number and said we had to call before 10 a.m. There was no way that was going to happen.
I made my way downstairs. I was freaking out. Jerkily, I spread Laughing Cow cheese on my baguette while relating the story. The tour bus had already come once, Sally and Chanda told me, and would be returning for us once more. We waited for the bus, our minds racing about what to do. We didn’t even pay for our hotel; we told them we’d square it on our return. We left our luggage as collateral.
Finally a guy showed up at the hotel, sans bus. He told us to follow him. We walked to a travel agency — NOT ET Pumpkin — down the street. They told us to wait inside. The three of us were a bit confused. Had we been picked up by the wrong people? There were countless Ha Long Bay tours going on, so I could see that happening. They told us we were in the right place. Apparently many of the travel agencies band together to collect enough passengers for one tour bus worth rather than each operating their own vehicles and tours. Dodgy.
For the next hour, we waited. I listened to the staff bicker and yell at each other at full volume in Vietnamese. I was disgusted by their lack of professionalism. They had no idea where the bus was.
In the meantime, the three of us decided to try to get in touch with our travel agent in the downtime. The staff told us the bus would be here at 8:30 a.m., that we had 15 minutes. At an Internet and long-distance phone place down the street, we called our travel agency. But the line was busy. Chanda sent a terse e-mail using a keyboard with a jammed “A” key. The lady manning the Internet place generously didn’t charge us anything for either service.
The travel staff poked their head in. The bus was here, they said. Sally refused to leave because it wasn’t 8:30 a.m. yet and we were in the middle of contacting our travel agency. Resigned, the staffer left.
Later, the agency staff reappeared with the waiting passengers and impatiently waited for us to follow, too. There was no bus. We had to WALK to the bus, which was several blocks away. No pick-up service here. The female tour agency employee lading us walked so quickly, we lost two passengers, a man and his baby. We spent 10 minutes on the bus listening to the staff yell at each other for losing him. He somehow found his way eventually. His wife muttered that he should apologize to the rest of us, which shocked me. He didn’t.
On the drive to Ha Long City, the tour guide gave us a brief spiel about the tour. I was in a foul mood by then because of all the mishaps that morning. So her bad English and her constant habit of nodding her head and saying, “Yeah” to punctuate every other sentence just added to the irritation.
At our destination, we ate at an open-air restaurant. One couple, a Japanese man and his Vietnamese girlfriend, ate by themselves even though we had two seats available for them. A German guy traveling by himself ate with us. He was a child psychology who worked with abuse victims. From there, we were carted to the docks. We waited for our bus (much of the tour was spent waiting) and when it was ready, we clambered onto the top. I thought those would be the best seats and view-wise, they were, but they were also the chilliest. It was also hard to see the famous limestone formations because of the fog and mist.
Sally went downstairs to the sheltered dining room. Chanda and I stayed to chat with Mike, the man with the baby. He turned out to be a pool builder from Los Angeles.
We stopped at some sort of cave. Thinking this was a stopping point — the tour guide had done little to clue us in — I lugged my backpack with me. We climbed steps to get to the cave. I spent the journey mentally cheering myself on every step of the way to get myself there, cursing my stubbornness about bringing my backpack. The cave took a backseat to the weight on my back.
Following the cave, we set sail again Tired of straining my eyes to see the formations, I went downstairs to play cards, first with Chanda (speed), when with Sally (speed, spit and V.C.) and then Sally and Mike (V.C.) and then Mike and Chanda (V.C.). I was just happy that I’d been justified in bringing my X-Men playing cards.
Finally we arrived at our destination for the evening: Cat Ba Island. They herded those of us who were spending a night on the island off the ship. The rest stayed behind to sleep on the ship. Our tour guide handed us into the care of another man. We waited around for a long time in the chilly air before they told us to get on a bus, which took us to a hotel that looked like it had just been built. The island itself, what little I saw of it, was a stony and desolate place rife with meandering packs of dogs.
We were told dinner was at 6 p.m. The three of us doggedly walked up three flights of stairs to our room, which included two queen-sized beds. I offered to share the bed with Sally or Chanda but as usual, they declined. Apparently they’d gotten used to sharing a bed and Sally’s occasional unconscious attempts to spoon Chanda. Sally half-jokingly told me later they knew I needed “my space.” Chanda had also discovered how I woke up badly when someone tried to wake me up. And by “wake up badly” I mean “wake up gasping for breath and terrified.”
I made use of the shower only to find it ran out of hot water halfway through. Grrrr. Also, the sink had some sort of fancy (or perhaps primitive) drain that I’d never seen before in which you have to PUSH the plug to get it to pop out and allow water to drain.
Dinner was a do-it-yourself affair: a pot of vegetable soup was placed on a stove in the center of the table, and you put in what meats you wanted to cook in the boiling broth. We sat at a table with an older Canadian couple from Quebec who had moved to Hanoi. The husband worked as a science teacher at a school in Hanoi. The wife spoke of having to adjust her cooking habits to the appliances and ingredients available in Vietnam. We discussed English-language education. Sally spoke some French with the couple.
That night we walked down the street to see if we could once again try calling Vietnam Airlines. I had been blacklisting our travel agent in Osaka the entire day, worried about our cancelled reservations. We found an Internet and international long distance place down the street from our hotel and tried calling Vietnam Airlines but their offices were closed for the day. We tried to access our e-mail but the Internet speed was disgustingly slow and eventually gave up.
Chanda decided she wanted to walk around the town some more. I was tired and Sally wanted to return to the hotel, too, so we parted ways. On the way back, I went into a small food store to buy some Choco Pie. Sally had already bought some at a more mainstream store earlier on and had hers with her. The sharp-eyed vendor spotted it immediately and asked how much Sally had paid for it. Sally said 15,000 dong. The saleslady said she’d sell her Choco Pie to me for 12,000 dong. I chuckled at how abrupt and direct the woman’s manner was.
That night, as we slept, I kept hearing the barking, growing and whining of dogs. Breakfast for me was a baguette and Laughing Cow cheese and juice. The bus took us back to the flock of boats waiting at the docks. The people who had spent the night on the bus looked well-rested as we did.
The weather had cleared up and it was much easier to see scenery that morning. The water was a rich blue-green. I could easily see how summer tours include people jumping into the water for a swim. Whereas the day before had been somewhat chilly, the sun radiated some heat that day. I pulled out my beaten copy of Robert Jordan’s The Eye of the World and read for a while on the top deck of the boat. The boat took us an alcove sheltered from the wind by the stone formations and let people try their hand at kayaking around. Sally even jumped into the water. I just did kayaking.
Lunch was served on the boat and afterward, it began chugging its way back to Ha Long City.
The bus that brought us to Hanoi stopped once again at a glorified rest stop where young women made embroidered artwork. We resumed the trip back to Hanoi, along which I spotted a motorcyclists cruising by with a cage that had suspicious-looking carcasses in them. I had seen some signs on the trip back that had said what I thought was, “Dog Meat” in Vietnamese, but I’d shrugged off the notion, thinking my translation was surely incorrect. As I stared dubiously at the carcasses in that cage, I wondered if I had, indeed, read the signs correctly.
Once we got off the bus, which dropped us off in the Old Quarter, we hightailed it for the Vietnam Airlines office. We wanted to talk to an airline agent directly rather than risk calling them again. We speedwalked to the other side of the lake where the office was located. Once there, we got a number and waited our turn in line. Chanda was hopeful it would go well because all the airline agents were female, young and looked nice.
So it was just our luck that was got the one agent who spent her time listening to our dilemma with her eyes glued to her cell phone. While I mid-way through explaining our problem, she interrupted by saying, “Do you have tickets?” impatiently. We pulled our tickets out and, 10 minutes later, our flights were confirmed. There hadn’t even been a problem with our flight arrangements! Curse that hotline airline agent. All that worrying for nothing! Then we went across the street and arranged for a airport taxi to come pick us up the next afternoon.
Now that we could breathe easy, we took our time going back to the lake. Chanda and I stopped for some ice cream at Fanny’s. Sally went to draw by the lakeside. I went back to the hotel. Some time later, so did Chanda and Sally, along with an armload of loot they had bought. Chanda had acquired a musical instrument (whose name she did not know) as well as some silk dresses. Sally had bought a family of percussion frogs as well as some more wall decorations.
Review
• Sunflower Two Hotel on Cat Ba Island — Thumbs down. This hotel is brand new and still had an unfinished, sterile quality to it that I didn’t like. We had to get them to turn on the hot water as well as unplug the bathroom sink. Staff not very responsive to requests. (084-21-887709)
• Vietnam Airlines office in Hanoi — Acceptable. The airline lady who handled our confirmation barely ever looked us in the eye, preferring instead to focus on her cell phone. She did, however, confirm our flight without any problem. A big Thumbs Down for the airline’s phone-in line, however, which told us our flight had been cancelled. (25 Trang Thi St., 84-4-934-9660)
• ET-Pumpkin tour operator — Thumbs down. Although I have to admit this travel agency had a smooth front man who seemed quite capable, we were instead put in the hands of a bickering, disorganized lot who seemed to have no idea what they were doing. We spent a lot of time just waiting around on our Halong Bay tour. (82-85 Ma May Street, 04-926-0739, www.et-pumpkin.com, quangtuan@et-pumpkin.com)
Sunday, Jan. 4, 2004 — What is wrong with me, Day 18
I woke up this morning and knew I was sick again. Boooooo. I told Chanda and Sally to go ahead without me and do their own exploring rather than go to the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum together as we had planned. They had wanted to wake at 5 a.m. to do go to Lenin Park and watch the people exercising, but Sally had slept through the alarm. Eventually they headed out.
I stayed in bed until 2 or 3 p.m. alternately sleeping, reading or watching TV. I still felt a bit tired, but better off than I had in the morning. I decided to go walking around portions of the Old Quarter that I’d not yet seen.
I hadn’t realized Hanoi was home to so many silk stores. There merchandise was so alluring, with their bold colors and soft texture. I enjoyed window-shopping and occasionally popping my head into a store. I went by one store with sports apparel with a jacket that caught my eye. I went inside and asked to try it on. The store was quite high-class compared to other clothes shops I’d been in, something you were more likely to find in Japan or American than a third-world country. The jacket proved too big, so I asked if they had a smaller size. While the lady went in search of one, I took a peek at the price tag: 1,300. That didn’t mean 1,300 dong, my friends. In some shops, they drop the last three 0’s entirely because nothing’s less than 1,000 dong. That meant the jacket, which I think was an Adidas, was 1.3 MILLION dong, or about $80 or $90.
I wanted a jacket, but I didn’t want one that badly! So when the lady returned saying she regretfully did not have a smaller size, I was like, “Ohhhh too bad … oh well!” and beat a hasty retreat.
Once it grew dark, I made my way back to the hotel, but not before stopping at the clothing street to peruse the sweaters. I knew it would be freezing when we returned to Japan and that my lone sweatshirt wouldn’t be enough to protect from the cold. I bought a red zip sweater for $4.50 and returned to the hotel. We ate at Tamarind Café again to mark our last night in Vietnam.
Review
• Taramind Café in Hanoi — Thumbs up. Delicious vegetarian food and generous portions. A little pricey by Vietnamese standards, but I still paid just $6 for a dish and a drink. It bought me a big bowl of rice and donburi and a smoothie one night, and pizza baguettes and a drink another night. They even do delivery. (80 Ma May, 84-4-926-0580, tamarind_cafe@yahoo.com)
Monday, Jan. 5, 2004 — Heading home, Day 19
It was nice to wake up late this morning. We woke, showered and packed up our stuff before hauling it down three flights of stairs. The hotel let us leave it in a back room. After all the security precautions we’d taken, we’d still grown used to leaving our stuff around in open spaces like that for lack of lockers anywhere. I wouldn’t mind doing that in Japan, but this was Vietnam. Nevertheless, we never had any problems doing that.
We took a taxi to the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum. Before we got in the taxi, we asked how much it would cost. By now I had given up trying to speak Vietnamese with taxi drivers; I just used English. It was safer that way. I wanted to use a language that enabled me to be in control of the conversation. The driver motioned to his meter to explain that the cost of the ride would be determined by the meter. We shook our heads and asked about how much. He quoted a price of 30,000 dong. We assented and got in.
When we arrived at the mausoleum a short time later, the meter only read 19,000 dong, which was a pleasant surprise. But as we were collecting the money, he switched the meter off. We gave him the money but he shook his head. He took out 30,000 dong to tell us that that was what we were supposed to pay. We stared back at him. What? The meter — up until he’d craftily turned it off — had clearly read 19,000. We tried arguing with him. Then we just sat in the back of car looking at each other, wondering what we should do. Finally we just got out and left him with the original 19,000. By then, his wordless arguing had become somewhat half-hearted, I suspect because he knew he didn’t have a case. It was irritating to have to deal with people who did that, though.
Then came our next surprise: The mausoleum was closed, the military officer guarding the entrance told us cheerfully. We shrugged our shoulders in resignation and decided to walk around the neighborhood for a bit instead.
Our meandering took us to a small outdoor market. Out of the corner of my eye, I caught sight of a animal carcass in a butcher’s shop. It looked odd for a pig carcass. Then I noticed the feet.
Those weren’t hooves. Those were paws.
A sign reading what I had now confirmed as “Dog Meat” in Vietnamese hung in the window.
We turned the corner and came upon an old woman with a small store of rice and other dried goods. Sally was instantly enamored. She doesn’t like the rice in Japan and wanted to get some “proper rice” as well as leeks. With me trying to act as interpreter, we inquired into the price of both.
The old woman thought I was Chinese and said to her daughter, “Wow, she speaks Vietnamese so clearly!” which cracked me up. I had to explain to them I was Vietnamese, just from the other side of the pond. But big numbers in Vietnamese throw me off, so after some verbal fumbling I finally asked a young girl at the store that was watching the conversation unfold to write down the number for me.
She was quite sweet and obliging. After a while, while Sally bargained for a smaller portion, the girl knew to write the numbers down for me. Eventually we departed, both sides quite content with the transaction.
We caught a taxi back to the hotel and then went in search of omiyage, food souvenirs, for our teaching staffs. I bought some coconut candy for my schools. Sally went in search of tea. Chanda bought some coconut candy, too. We split up for a while; Chanda needed to do some last-minute things. Sally and I went to the lake to relax before we all went to the hotel.
Our airport taxi came right on time. We loaded our luggage, which had multiplied exponentially in mass over the course of the past 19 days, into the trunk. The trip took longer than I’d expected, a good 30-45 minutes outside the city.
The Hanoi airport was much cleaner and newer than the one in Saigon. When we first arrived, Chanda and Sally had to unpack their stuff to juggle some of their items around. I had to give Sally my pocketknife to slip into her luggage, since I wasn’t checking in my backpack. During this entire time, a man wearing a military uniform lounged in the chair across from us, his bare feet hiked up on the bench, his shoes forgotten on the ground. He stared at us the entire time, making me uncomfortable. Military people in general make me uncomfortable but especially in Vietnam.
At the check-in counter, one of the airline agents who seemed to simply be lounging around to make conversation saw that I had a Vietnamese name in my passport so I had to explain one last time. She asked if I would ever come live in Vietnam. I was a little too honest. “No,” I told her. Straight up. Then I hastily rushed to repair the affront by saying I enjoyed visiting but I would be lonely without family, which really isn’t the case seeing as how I’m in Japan by myself.
Seeing places like Vietnamese make me understand why Japan appealed to me: because the quality of life is on par with the United States’. Barring the lack of insulation, central heating and cooling systems, an the language barrier, etc., the lifestyle here is quite comfortable as compared to other places as, say, Vietnam.
Our flight took us back to Saigon, where we would transfer to another flight bound for Osaka. It was weird coming out of the terminal. We’d been in the exact same place nearly three weeks ago but this time we had a much better idea of what we were doing. It felt good not to be so clueless anymore. The wait to re-check-in was tortuous and involved getting to the front of the very long line and then finding out Chanda and Sally had somehow not gotten stickers saying their luggage had made it through security, so they had to rush back to get it. I stood at the front of the line and tried to weather the glare of the people waiting in line behind us. Tempers were on a short leash. The mom of the family at the counter next to us was flipping out and verbally assaulting the agents there.
We learned our transfer flight was going to be an hour or two late. But, though the lines were horrendous, the airline employees were quite accommodating. The nice, if slightly harried, lady at the counter switched us to another flight to Osaka that left at a better time. However, this did mean giving up our luxurious Japan Airlines berth for Vietnam Airlines, meaning no individual monitors and movies.
But before we could board, we had to first pay an unexpected airport tax of $12, which I happened to have. Then we went through immigration again. It’s interesting how everywhere in the airport there was at least a low murmur but at immigration it was dead silent. I’m sure it has to do with the grim expressions on the faces of the government workers who scrutinize our passports. Once past that hurdle, there was another abominably long wait to go through another metal detector. It was insane and harrowing.
Review
• Prince I Hotel in Hanoi — Thumbs up. Solid service and nice lodging, but kind of pricey. It was about $30 a night total for three people. But breakfast is included. The staff is very friendly. The hotel also has two computers with Internet access for guests. (51 Luong Ngoc Quyen Street, 84-4-828-0155, www.hanoiprincehotel.com, ngodzung@hn.vnn.vn)
• Ho Chi Minh City Airport — Thumbs down. Horribly organized. Long lines, interminably long waits. Kind of run-down-looking. Unclear airport tax of $12 demanded of you.
Tuesday, Jan. 6, 2004 — Traveling is tiring
Our plane pulled into Kansai International Airport at about 5:30 a.m. It was such a relief to be home again, you have no idea. We’d been flying or at an airport for a good 12 hours. In the airport, we ran into some other Tokushima JETs who had also returned, some from Cambodia, Vietnam and the Philippines. We all boarded the same bus back. Three hours on the bus. I caught the next train back to my apartment, which took another 10 minutes.
Home again.
Wednesday, Jan. 7, 2004 — Safe and snug
I'm back. Oh Japan, how I missed your orderliness, your punctuality, your cleanliness, your predictability, your parasite-free meat and your drinkable tap water!
Thursday, Jan. 8, 2004 — A flower amongst the clover
While I was in Vietnam, I bought a red sweater because I knew it’d be bone-chilling cold when I returned to Japan. I’d just brought a sweatshirt with me. Today was the first day of school for the third semester. As usual, it was kicked off with a brief opening ceremony in the gym. While in the gym, I looked at the teachers and students and realized that I had on the brightest article of clothing. My sweater stuck out like a sore thumb in a veritable forest of navy blue, brown and beige.
I’ve never been a flashy dresser, so I find it amusing that here in Japan, where everyone dresses in dark, muted colors, my choice of clothing sticks out so garishly.
Friday, Jan. 9, 2004 — New Year’s cards
In Japan, it is custom to send out postcard for New Year’s wishing friends, family and associates a Happy New Year. I got a couple myself from some of my students and teachers in the mail when I returned from Vietnam.
But I wondered why all of them had these numbers, like serial numbers, printed at the bottom of the front, where the address was. Turns out New Year’s cards are bought at the post office and those numbers are for a lottery. After New Year’s, they draw numbers and if all six digits of your card matches, you get some amazing prize. I don’t know what it is, though. There are second through fifth places, too, for people with partial matches to other numbers. They get things like stamps. I just thought the New Year’s card-lottery was a pretty funny idea.
Saturday, Jan. 10, 2004 — Soldiering on to Nagano
Did I mention I’m going to Nagano at the end of this month to try my hand at snowboarding? The kind JETs of Nagano-ken apparently organize a ski trip every year for their fellow JETs across Japan. They get us discounted rates for ski and snowboard rental as well as arrange our accommodations. We stay at pensions (a fancy word for “hotel”) that are just a few minutes away from the many ski resorts in the area. I’m told Nagano and Hokkaido are the best places to ski in the country, so I’m psyched.
Several from Tokushima-ken are going, including me. Many of us will be trying snowboarding for the first time. I’ve wanted to try snowboarding for some time, so I’m eager to get to the slopes and sample the powder. I’m just glad I’m not the only beginner.
This afternoon, we met downtown to go in search of transportation to Nagano. We ate at Big Brothers — I had some garlic fries and mayo, YUM — and then started hitting the bus companies. I had already tried a similar route to no avail that involved checking with two different employees at TOPIA (one a Japanese employee and one, a CIR), both of whom gave me very complicated suggestions like, “First you take a bus, then a shinkansen, then another bus and then ANOTHER bus ...” etc. I’d also been shut out at the one bus company I’d tried: “There is no bus to Nagano.”
So with the safety of the group, we hit two more bus companies, both of which had no direct busses to Nagano. But we found exactly what we were looking for at a travel agency on the fourth floor of Tokushima Station. There was even an English-speaking agent. A lot of times Japanese people pale a little when they see a big group of foreigners approaching them, but this lady helped us without breaking a sweat.
We arranged for an eight-hour overnight bus-trip to and from Nagano. There is little sleep to be had on an overnight bus but I figure the prospect of snowboarding will revive me.
Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2004 — What THE-?!
This morning I woke at 6 a.m. to the disorienting feeling of my bed SHAKING. I opened my eyes just as the rumbling and moving subsided. Not an earthquake, but a twinge of the earth. That was it, but it was enough to make my stomach turn. I now rank earthquakes right up there with tornadoes as to natural disasters that I fear most. I gotta get myself an earthquake emergency kit.
After six months of listening to my bicycle squeak, I finally bought some oil to grease the gears. It was so weird riding to school this morning in silence.
Wednesday, Jan. 14, 2004 — Rushing the teacher
Usually when I teach at Kamona, where I am now, the first-grade teachers split a class in two and each take a half. That means we teach 20 students at a time rather than the usual near-40. But for whatever reason, they decided this time to teach all the students together. I braced myself. A classroom full of first-graders produces more energy than a nuclear reactor.
We put together a game called, “Go to sleep,” that involves dividing them into teams and assigning each student on the team a number. I make everyone “go to sleep” by laying their heads on their desk. I ask for the No. 1’s to put their head up. They have to remember a word I write on the board. They go back to sleep. Then the No. 2’s wake up. They get another word. These words, when put in order, form a sentence. So when every student has received their word, they have to work together to piece the words together in the right order.
The students really got into this game. The moment we let everyone wake up, they’d immediately huddle. When they thought they’d figured their sentence out, they’d come to me. I always made one of the team members read the sentence aloud, albeit softly. But “come to me” is too gentle a way to put what these kids did. It was more like a surge, when all six or even seven members would rush toward me at once. Like sharks. It was actually a little unnerving.
One team, in their excitement, shoved the teacher’s podium right into my side. Hard. Ouch. But I didn’t have the heart to remonstrate them. I’d rather have über-genki kids than the alternative.
Thursday, Jan. 15, 2004 — A pleasant surprise
Back to half-classes with the first-graders. The game we’re playing with them this time is “Categories.” The teacher and I decided the categories ahead of time: colors, animals, sports, fruits and vegetables, words that start with “s,” words that start with “b,” words that start with “g,” household items, things at school, things at their desk.
Perversely, just to see how’d they fare, I also threw in “characters from Harry Potter.”
We divided the kids into three teams. One team picks a category and gets 20 seconds to ruminate. They get one minute to spit out as many words they can think of that fit the category. Then, when they’re finished, the remaining two teams get another minute to add any related words that haven’t yet been uttered. We decided to do it that way so that everybody would have to listen rather than just the kids on the team whose turn it was.
This game really opened my eyes to my kids’ vocabulary. They’re first-graders and they may struggle to string a simple sentence together but their mental word bank is quite formidable. I’m pretty sure I didn’t know the same words when I was in my first year of Spanish.
For animals, they’d name everything from skunks to koalas, lizards and whales. For fruits and vegetables, they named tangerines, cabbages and lychees. Pretty impressive. For the sports category, I was always amused when they’d forget their own national sports like sumo, judo and kendo. But it was quite gratifying to find out these kids do know a lot of words in English, even if they’re not yet sure how to put them into a sentence.
As for the Harry Potter category, that was a hit or miss because it depended on whether the kids on the team had read the book or not. But there was always at least one kid who’d read the book or seen the movie. But what was more difficult was deciphering their pronunciation, since the Japanese translations use katakana English. Thus, “Dumbledore” becomes “Dumburudoru” and “Crabbe and Goyle” become “Kurrabu and Goyaru.”
There were times when I’d have to make the poor kids repeat themselves four or five times because I’d have no idea what they were saying. Sometimes I’d just give them a point for trying and take them on faith. Most teams scored about 40-50 points by games’ end. One team really blew the competition away with 80-something points. That was also a good feeling because there was one kid on the team who usually is disrupting class and not paying attention and he contributed a lot of words in the game.
Friday, Jan. 17, 2004 — The rising tide of letters
My second-grade teacher at Kamona wanted to see her kids making more use of me, so she decided to pursue an assignment that requires them to talk to me or write me letters. I wholeheartedly approved of the idea. Morita-sensei gave all her students a card with six blanks. Every time they write me a letter or chat with me outside of class, they get a sticker.
I was really enthusiastic and made up a brightly-colored “mailbox” to put on my desk. I attached a little note on the front: “Purikura please!” as a way of asking my kids for their print-club stickers. I eagerly awaited when I’d get to start writing replies to the students.
Then the letters began to pour in. I began to realize the magnitude of the endeavor to which I had committed myself. Consider that Kamona has 600 students. That means about 200 second-graders. Say, half of them actually do the assignment. Morita-sensei had asked for three letters. Oy.
I soon found myself struggling to keep my head above the rising tide of letters. I write 20-30 replies a day. Every minute at school in the teachers’ room, I devote to writing replies and sticking on their requisite stickers. But the assignment has been worth it: The students really seem to enjoy getting letters from me. Their English may be limited but their interest surpasses what they can say.
Some of the letters are so funny: “Do you like Mrs. Morita?” one of them asked me. The letter was accompanied with a picture of a snarling Mrs. Morita and a smiling Vivi. Another said something to the effect of, “I like English. But English is difficult. Last week, I took test. Bad points! Why?”
When I get the letters back — Morita-sensei said I could keep them as a souvenir — I’ll post some of the letters for you to read.
Saturday, Jan. 18, 2004 — Apparently it CAN get colder
I woke up this morning and was floored when I pulled apart my curtains and opened my mini-blinds. White! WHITE! It had snowed last night! There was an inch-thick layer coating everything. It was melting, to be sure, and only stuck around until mid-day, but I was still quite shocked.
I think my reaction came from having no idea it was going to snow. In Abilene, I checked the weather constantly online. Good ol’ National Weather Service. I saw the weather reports on TV. I knew if there was even a chance of snow. Here, I don’t know anything until it hits. I’m so ignorant of and blind to everything. It’s quite the 180.
Later that morning, I made a kerosene run. Ah, blessed warmth.
Sunday, Jan. 19, 2004 — Where’s a Bath & Body Works when you need one
With all this cold weather, I have been using copious amounts of lotion to keep my skin moisturized. I finally got to the point where my bottle of Jergens cucumber-scented lotion was near empty, so I needed to find some more lotion. Easier said than done, I soon found out.
I’m pretty particular about the lotion that I use. I like it lightly scented and, if possible, this time I wanted to find some with SPF since I’d probably be using the same bottle into the summer.
I searched at department stores and groceries and pharmacies. I was surprised to find that Japanese stores don’t have all that much selection when it comes to lotion. In American, you get a whole shelf of them. Here, there was a shelf section, and not a particularly sizable one that that. Plus, everything was in, well, Japanese, so I didn’t really know what kind of lotion I’d be buying. Ultra-moisturizing? Facial moisturizer? All-purpose lotion? Night-time lotion? And then there's the little cultural preference for pale skin: Some lotions have chemicals that bleach your skin!
Nor are the Japanese too keen on scented lotions. There were no fruity scents from which to pick! Everything smelled … functional. Another problem: There were no substantial-sized containers of lotion. I wanted a big bottle to last me. But everything came in tiny, small and medium.
Finally I relegated myself to the situation. Importing any lotion would be too expensive. I bought a small bottle of lotion with SPF at the pharmacy down the street. All I could read on the label was, “Curel medicated” and the SPF number. It had a moon icon on the label, which I suspected meant it was for nighttime use, but I figured I’d take my chances.
When I brought it home, I poured some onto my finger. It wasn’t even the consistency of lotion!
I still have no idea what it is I bought.
So today I went in search of some more lotion. But first I had some errands to run. Having nearly reached the end of my treasure trove of videos, I went to Melanie’s to pick up eight more tapes. On the way back, I stopped by a liquor shop that also had imported food. I bought some cheese. Then I mailed some letters to the United States at the post office. Five bucks for cheese and seven bucks for postage. I’m amazed by the prices a person becomes accustomed to in Japan.
For my lotion, I decided I’d get it from a mom-and-pop place rather than a chain store because those shops are always cheaper. I went inside a cramped pharmacy in between my apartment and the station. I was surprised to be greeted by a man inside with a hearty, “Konnichiwa.” The lady behind the counter wore a pharmacist technician’s coat. She looked hopeful and said something to me. I assumed she was asking if she could help me.
Because there really wasn’t much method to the way the items were stacked. Usually I like to browse at my own pace but didn’t get the chance to here. That’s the price you pay when you go into stores the size of your closet. I surprised myself by starting my sentence with, “Anooo, ‘ro-shon’ wa doko ni arimasu ka?” In America, we’d say, “Uhhhhh …” or “Ummmm …” and in Japan, they fill gaps with, “Etoooo …” or, in my case, “Anoooo…” It cracked me up that I used that. I asked where the lotion (or, in katakana English, “ro-shon”) was.
The lady asked if I wanted it for my face. I said no, my hands. I didn’t know the word for “body.” She pointed me to a bunch of hand-cream containers. Not precisely what I wanted, but I figured I’d take a look. I turned around (carefully, since the aisles were narrow) and found some Nivea lotion. I grabbed a tube of hand cream and the lotion and brought them to the counter. She gave me a 20 percent discount. Sweeeeet. I had spoken Japanese AND gotten a discount. It was a good day.
Tuesday, Jan. 20, 2004 — Lack of discipline is scary
Thus far I’ve touched upon the discipline expectations (or really, lack thereof) in the classroom. Here the principal is not the end-all, be-all authoritarian of the school. In fact, the principal doesn’t take part at all in disciplining students. There’s no even such a thing as detention.
Discipline, if there is any meted out, falls on the shoulders of the homeroom teachers. But the thing is, most of the time the homeroom teachers aren’t around — they’re in other classrooms teaching. In Japan, the kids stay stationary and the teachers move every period. That means a student is misbehaving, there is very little the teacher at front can do.
That brings me to “control of the classroom.”
When I was in school, you raised your hand to talk and the teacher called on you. There is some of that here, but many times, it feels like a free-for-all. The kids talk when they want to, at whatever volume they choose. Many times I have wondered — while trying to speak above the roar — “Why doesn’t the teacher just tell them to SHUT UP?” But would the kids listen, I wonder? The teachers don’t seem to mind. Perhaps that’s because loud classes are welcome respite from those that are deathly quiet, which arise just as frequently. As an ALT I’m not supposed to do anything discipline-related because I’m the assistant. I have to defer to the teacher.
But I see kids blatantly ignoring the teacher and talking or reading manga or slacking off in general all the time. There’s at least one in every class. The teachers do what they can and in the end, cut those kids way more slack than they deserve.
That lack of teacher’s authority arose with crushing clarity today. We were playing Categories in one of the first-grade classes. It was going relatively well. Suddenly I saw a folder and papers fly across the room. I didn’t even know where it’d come from. The teacher asked the boy who was targeted what he’d done. The kid is pretty good-natured, but he’s also one of those kids who disrupts class a lot, too. He’s a scrapper. He said he hadn’t done anything. I hadn’t seen him do anything, either.
Then the boy who threw the files stood up and started yelling at this kid. The thrower was really, REALLY angry. I’ve noticed when Japanese men — or, in this case, boys — get really angry, the sound of their words gets really rough and they roll their R’s much more. I wonder if this has anything to do with yakuza-talk. Yakuza, the Japanese mafia, are known for speaking that way.
Anyways, so the thrower was aggressively yelling his target. The targeted boy took is for a few seconds and then got really angry, too. He threw some stuff back at the thrower. The next thing I know, the two were hurtling toward each other, fists swinging.
I started, open-mouthed, waiting for the teacher to do something. But nothing happened! She watched, along with all the other kids in the class. She did look a little worried. The kids, on the other hand, watched with interest.
The moment the thrower and target clashed, the biggest kid in the class — and he was quite big; I could easily mistake him for a high school student or older — pushed them apart and got between them. He used his body as a barrier that they couldn’t get through. When the two fighting kids struggled to get him to move out of their way, he moved with them. I was impressed how he took that upon himself. It looked like he’d done that before. Another kid, the class clown, threw himself around the targeted boy to hold him back.
And so it went for a few minutes. The two kids would tussle and then get pushed/pulled apart. Tussle, pushed/pulled apart. Finally, the big kid shoved them outside the classroom. I was so relieved. The teacher told me to continue the game we’d been playing and she went outside to deal with it.
I tried to continue the game but the students obviously weren’t focused on that. Eventually the thrower came back in, still looking angry. I still had no idea why he was angry. He started talking with the students, who just absorbed his every word. I started cleaning up all the stuff that had been thrown to the floor when the targeted boy came back in. That’s when the thrower got angry again and shoved the teacher’s podium right into me. I scrambled back. I was okay but shocked he would do that. I don’t think he even realized what he’d done; all his attention was on the other boy.
They started trying to pummel each other again. At one point, the target-boy knocked over something that belonged to the class-clown boy, who was still trying to help. Amazing, the target-boy paused to bow his head a couple times with earnest apology in his eyes to the class clown. Then he went back to trying to pound the other boy. Eventually, though, he stormed out of the classroom, which was enough to satisfy the thrower.
After class, I asked the teacher what the heck had happened to warrant the fight. That boy who’d thrown the papers had seemed so furious. The teacher said apparently at some point he’d said, “Ganbatte!” to his teammates, which means, “Do you best!” and then the other boy had mimicked him and said, “Ganbatte!” too. I marveled. THAT was IT?! I could easily picture the targeted boy unthinkingly copying another student without meaning to annoy or enrage. Ridiculous.
Wednesday, Jan. 21, 2004 — Senchado, and Japanese TV redeemed
I had tea ceremony at Kurohashi-sensei’s this evening. First Yoko and Reika practiced the tea ceremony. This week we were doing senchado, which is the tea ceremony using green tea leaves. Chado uses green tea powder. Then Kurohashi-sensei asked if one of us wanted to give the ceremony a try. I volunteered Dan. Dan, a Tokushima ALT from Dover, England, has started coming to calligraphy with Sally and me.
Dan made quite the tea-server. It was such a hilarious and incongruous site to see this big, tall guy handling these delicate tea cups that look no bigger than a doll’s set.
Later that night when I went home, I happened to have the TV on past 10 p.m. I almost never watch Japanese TV but I happened to have the TV on since I’d been watching a tape. They were showing Alias. ALIAS! It was dubbed in Japanese, but I just switched the original English dialogue. It was the episode where Jack Bristow tries to put the fear of God in intrepid reporter Will Tippen as a way of protecting both the overly nosy Will and Jack’s daughter, CIA double-agent Sidney Bristow.
I am pleased.
Thursday, Jan. 22, 2004 — The Dowa Issue
Today was Day 2 of the Tokushima-ken ALT mid-year conference. It’s a two-day seminar. For the ALTs, really the only thing about it that we looked forward to was getting to see each other. It’s not often when we’re all together in the same building.
Yesterday I gave my talk on “Effective Team Teaching.” Apparently the speakers are chosen based on a rotation by schools. My schools were up this year. I was terrified. I’d only been here half a year and I still had no idea what I was doing in the classroom. All the other ALT speakers did a joint workshop with an English teacher. As none of my English teachers even came to the conference, I did not. I began my talk with, “So let me get the obvious out of the way. I’m giving a talk on team-teaching. I’m up here by myself. I realize that.”
I had an hour and 10 minutes to kill. I spoke for 20 minutes to a group of about 30 ALTs and English teachers. Luckily there weren’t any heads lolling on the table by the time I was done. Then I broke everyone up into small groups and had them discuss team-teaching issues. I’d prepared a sheet with some of my own questions regarding team-teaching. I told them to use that as a springboard. All in all, I was quite pleased with how things went. I was happy to see people putting actively participating in the discussion. Now that it’s done, I won’t have to give a talk at the conference again.
Today we ended the conference with a fascinating lecture from Kenichi Inamura, who works with the human rights education division of the Tokushima Prefectural Board of Education. He had been asked to discuss human rights issues particular to Japan. He focused his talk on the Dowa Issue.
India has its caste system and South Africa has its apartheid. Japan has the Dowa Issue. Not many people outside the country are familiar with this discrimination problem here.
“Many non-Japanese who hear about the [Dowa] issue for the first time question how such a human rights issue can exist in Japanese society, which is almost entirely homogeneous,” he said. “In fact, I also wonder the same thing. Standing two Japanese people together, there is no doubt based on their appearance that both are Japanese, yet one will be discriminated against and the other will not.”
In Japan, there exist certain regions known as Dowa regions. People who hail from these parts continue to face discrimination from the rest of Japanese society. It is a prejudice, known specifically as bunraku, that dates back several centuries.
The government has taken measures to fight it but problems remain, Inamura said. Cases still crop up where families oppose impending marriages because one of the partners hails from a Dowa region. It also causes problems in employment matters and even day-to-day activities.
The Dowa regions were formed by the people who were relegated to the lowest social class during feudal times. They weren’t allowed to live alongside or associate with others. They weren’t treated as regular human beings, Inamura said in his lecture.
To understand bunraku, the feudal, class and inheritance system of feudal times must be examined. During the Edo Period, which took place from 1603 to 1868, people had no say in their social status; they were born into their class and occupation. People were divided into three main classes: samurai, villagers (which included peasants and farmers) and townspeople (merchants and artisans).
There was another group of people regarded as below these classes. They were forced to live in specific regions — which became Dowa regions — and to take the least-wanted jobs. They worked as cleaners, jail guards, torturers and executioners. As cleaners, they not only kept the village tidy, they got rid of corpses and dead animals. In Tokushima specifically, many of the local bunraku people worked in the leather industry. This job was apparently shunned because it dealt with dead cattle and horses. In the past, the religious felt great fear and loathing at touching dead things.
“Bunraku discrimination is an extremely peculiar discrimination in that one’s life was dictated by who’s child you were and the region in which you were born,” Inamura said.
The bunraku people found themselves an inadvertent scapegoat. It was a time when land taxes were high and farmers rebelled to have them lowered. The farmers were considered heroes by their fellow villagers. And when these uprising participants were arrested, it was the bunraku who tortured and executed them. The bunraku found themselves having to take the brunt of the populace’s discontent while the ruling classes contentedly watched.
The stability of the Edo Period’s feudal system enabled the discrimination to take root, Inamura said. War, and the disorganization and upheaval that comes with it, would have made it impossible to identify someone by their birthplace.
But that was more than 130 years ago. The end of the Edo Period marked the end of the class system. The next era, the Meiji Period, was supposed to have marked the beginning of Japan’s modern age. Yet the prejudice remains. According to a 1993 survey, Japan had 4,400 Dowa regions are home to a total of 890,000 people. Some people cite as many as 6,000 regions with a population of 3 million.
The national government has tried to intervene in past years. In 1965, it received a report on the Dowa Issue. It enacted a special law in 1969 hoping to resolve the discrimination. The decree identified Dowa regions as places “where the stable advancement of the living environment is impeded due to historical and social causes.” The government became investing a great deal of effort and money in trying to fix the damage and disparities suffered by the people in these regions.
The law expired in March last year. Dowa regions are no longer recognized by law. It is through human rights education that the country seeks to eliminate the deep-seated intolerance.
Saturday, Jan. 24, 2004 — Rehearsal and the Burns Supper
Every year, the JETs of Tokushima-ken write and stage an original music for the people of the prefecture. In past years, they’ve done warped versions of Cinderella and Grease. This year is the production’s 10th anniversary. The writers have fashioned a version of Shakespeare’s “Taming of the Shrew” and set it in present-day with the main story revolving around two brothers rather than sisters. One brother, Bruce, likes to drink beer and play with his smelly dog and the other, Groomio, is a stylin’ kinda guy who wants to get married to his girlfriend but can’t until Bruce gets hitched first.
They’ve named it, “The Taming of the Brew.”
As I mentioned before, I volunteered to work on the crew. We had our second rehearsal today. I went to the first, but only five people including me showed up. Today’s rehearsal was in Mikamo in the west. The rehearsal took several hours but gave me a chance to write down what props would be needed. As a way of easing the Japanese audience into the story, two of the more Japanese-fluent ALTs plan on doing an opening dialogue dressed as Japanese schoolgirls. One of them is a guy.
It started to snow as we came out to the parking lot of the Mikamo Town Hall parking lot. That’s the fourth time I’ve seen snow in a week. This poor Houstonian just can’t handle it.
Once we were finished, we prepared to move on to the next event of the night: the Burns Supper. The Burns Supper is apparently an annual event in Scotland that pays tribute to the country’s most famous poet, Robert Burns of “My love is like a red, red rose,” fame.
We have four Scottish ALTs in the prefecture. I learned from the lone Scottish girl, Ellie (also the director of the musical), that there’s lots of protocol at a true Burns Supper. Haggis is eaten, a lad gives an address to the lasses and a lass gives an address to the lads, and of course Burns’ poetry is read, among other things. The Scots wanted to have a Burns Supper in Tokushima. There would be haggis and poetry.
They arranged for us to spend the night in some cabins. We — ALTs, significant others and a few brave Japanese souls — gathered in a main cabin for the dinner. Because of the mad-cow disease scare, they weren’t able to import true haggis into Japan, so they had to settle for vegetarian haggis instead. It was okay. One of the ALTs commented, “It doesn’t have the blood aftertaste that real haggis has.” Gosh, I can’t wait to try haggis now.
While we ate our pot-luck dinner, we recited poetry. It was such a cool event. I enjoyed listening to the mix of poems. One guy read stuff written by an emcee. There was “The Raven” and Shel Silverstein poem. Some Robert Burns stuff, of course, read by the Scots. Some limericks. A poem by Lorca. Even some Japanese poems, sometimes with English translations.
I had brought a poem I’d written about my trip to New York City for the one-year commemoration of Sept. 11. I had wrangled with myself whether it was too heavy a poem but finally I decided to bring it because I knew there’d be some light-hearted stuff to counter it. There was a lot of humorous stuff but I think my poem still surprised people with its levity. This is what I read:
New York City, One Year Later
I have never known and
God willing
will never know
grief like this
grief that silenced a city.
I stared at the gaping concrete wound left behind
where twin spires once pierced the sky
and I tried to understand the why and the who and the how.
That unassuming day, one year ago, this metropolis became a city underseige.
In the space of a late-summer morning
families were left incomplete, bodies broken and lives unmade
In a place of 4,400 high-rise buildings,
the two tallest toppled to the earth that day.
I made this pilgrimage here, to this pulsing city of light and life
to rest my eyes on the ghosts of terror and war
to learn something of true sadness and loss
and, while gazing at that cavernous void that gleamed bone-white in the night
remind myself of my own insignificance
of the pettiness of my own worries.
That day, I made my way to the southern tip of Manhattan
by the very subway that’d stopped running one year before
when it, too, became a victim to the tumult and the bedlam
“World Trade Center,” the subway sign still read.
A crush of people poured onto the streets of downtown
and at 8:46 a.m., as the faint sounds of bagpipes dissipated in the air
the bereaved gazed toward the emptiness
a space once laden with the breath of 58,000 people.
I watched how their eyes shut, their mouths tightened,
their hands clutched and their heads bowed
while other people brusquely pushed their way through the multitudes
intent on nothing more than getting to work
just as we all had that same day, one year ago —
before the skyline filled with smoke and ash and panic.
When I finished, the room was completely silent. Nothing. I thought to myself, “I KNEW it! It IS to somber a poem for an event like this!!!” and cursed myself. Then they all applauded before lapsing back into silence again. My face burning, I sunk down. Thankfully, someone with lighter fare finally volunteered to go next.
Sunday, Jan. 25, 2004 — Full-service gas stations
I spent the night in Mikamo after the Burns Supper and woke this morning hoping to do some skiing in Tokushima-ken. But my friends proved too lazy to rouse themselves, I guess because we’re going to Nagano next weekend. So I got a ride with a friend to the nearest train station. On the way, he stopped at a gas station to fill up his tank.
I don’t think I’ve discussed Japanese gas stations yet. My friends with cars love them. Unlike in the United States, almost all of them are full-service stations. I only vaguely remember what it was like to use full-service stations from when I was little, and I certainly never used one when I had my own car. I really only remember people at the U.S. gas stations simply filling up the gas tank.
In Japan, you pull in and the attendant directs you to the pump. You roll down your window and tell them what kind of gas you want. As they’re pumping your gas, they also clean your windows and take out any trash you might have. Sometimes, after you’ve paid and they’ve given you your receipt, they’ll even give you a little free gift like tissue or, in the case of one of my friends, toilet paper.
What my friends like most about the attendants is that then they check out traffic for you as you depart. Rather than having to monitor the cars, you just wait for the attendants to motion you to pull out into the street. Sometimes the attendants will even go into the street to stop traffic for you. Then, as you pull away, they’ll bow to you and to the traffic that they stopped.
Tuesday, Jan. 27, 2004 — Forgive me my sins
I ate whale meat today.
Whale meat! IN THE SCHOOL LUNCH!
I just may be sick.
Wednesday, Jan. 28, 2004 — More details
The whale meat tasted like barbeque. It was served as a slab of meat with French fries in a bowl.
Thursday, Jan. 29, 2004 — Vandals strike
I arrived at school this morning and found all the students heading to the gym rather than their homerooms. Great, I grumbled, they forgot to tell me about this meeting. I went into the gym and tried to stay warm as I sat in the back listening to the vice principal speak at length to the students.
I asked one of the English teachers what was going on. Turns out someone had broken into the school the night before, broken some windows and sprayed three classrooms with fire extinguishers.
Because it was a first-grade classroom, a second-grade classroom and the cooking room that were affected, the teachers sent the first- and second-graders home for the morning. The third-graders, since there was nothing wrong with their classrooms, had to stay and take one of their interminable exams. Listening to their grumbling, I bet they wished someone had vandalized one of their classrooms, too.
All the morning lessons were canceled. Since all three of my lessons had been scheduled for the morning, that meant I had no classes for the day. I read at my desk and studied Japanese. Half-way through the morning, the teachers got into a big discussion. I think it was the game plan for how to clean the classrooms. Since schools don’t have a cleaning or janitorial staff, it’s up to the teachers and the students to keep things tidy.
The teachers began pulling on face masks and gloves and wrapping their heads in towels. They ignored me. When all of the teachers had left, I approached my English teacher and asked if I could help. She looked both surprised and even reluctant. Finally she nodded and instructed me to pull on the requisite gear. I followed her up to the third floor, where the teachers were working on a the first-grade room that had been affected.
On the stairs along the way, I noticed a Japanese girly magazine on a step with a numbered placard on it. My teacher directed me not to touch it since it was evidence for the police. Apparently a few of the publications had been scattered around the school.
The classroom was in bad shape. Everything was covered in a fine, pale-orange powder. One of the window panes had been broken out and glass laid on the floor. We pulled all the desks and chairs into the hallway. That’s when I was introduced to “traditional Japanese cleaning.”
Some of the teachers brought up reams of newspapers and dumped them into the communal sinks in the hallway. “Traditional Japanese cleaning!” one of the vice principals told me. “My grandmother cleans this way!” I didn't know whether she was being sarcastic or earnest, so worked hard to school what otherwise would have been a very skeptical expression. They soaked the newspapers in water and then proceeded to methodically throw wads of the wet newspaper onto the floor. The rest of the teachers pushed the sopping broadsheets around using brooms. I watched dubiously. The newspaper seemed to be picking up some of the powder but not very much. There had to be a more efficient way. Hadn’t they ever heard of mops?
But eventually we got most of the orange powder out of the classroom. That’s what we cleared out; the students would return that afternoon and finish the job.
I had my weekly ALT meeting that afternoon. I turned in my re-contracting form. That means I’m here for one more year. The JET program requires we turn in our contract forms this early so the program can determine how many new JETs will need to hired. Didn't I mention I plan to stay for three years?
Friday, Jan. 30, 2004 — A long day
Because I had no classes Thursday, I ended up having five classes today. The day went so quickly. I’ve never had more than four lessons in a day.
I got hit by a car on the way back home that afternoon. I was biking on the sidewalk like I usually do when I passed in front of a van that was waiting to pull into traffic. It was stationery when I saw it but as I crossed paths with it, it started to pull forward. In my alarm, rather than put the bike between myself and the van I put my arm between myself in the van. My arm, not surprisingly, bounced off.
I wobbled forward a little before I got my balance again. I circled back to let the driver know I was okay. And, in a particularly Japanese touch, I bowed and said, “Sumimasen” (“excuse me”) before fleeing the scene.
As my sisters like to tell me with a condescending pat on the shoulder: Good job, Vi. Good job.
In the back of my mind I was thinking about how I’m always hearing about how mountains of paperwork must be filled out whenever there’s a car accident, even when no one’s injured or the accident is minor. I thought to myself, I don’t have time for paperwork! since I was leaving for Nagano that night. Hastily I pedaled away before someone decided to call the police.
At home I took a bath. My right forearm was a little sore but otherwise fine.
Our bus to Nagano was scheduled to leave at 11:10 p.m. At 10:20 p.m. I biked downtown to meet up with my friends. There were 11 Tokushima-ken JETs going on the trip. The bus wouldn’t arrive in Nagano until 7 a.m. the next morning. It was going to be a long night.