Are you sure this is Africa?

Did you know that when you step foot in an embassy technically you're stepping foot on the soil of that country? Well, when one of my AET friends, A.T., who is Ethiopian-American, invited me a few weeks ago to attend a Japanese-Ethiopian culture night celebration with him and his wife at the Ethiopian embassy, I was more than ready to go. I wouldn't get a stamp in my passport for walking through the doors. And the scenery would look a whole lot more like Tokyo than Addis Ababa. But I'd be attending a state party in Ethiopia!

When yesterday arrived for our 12-member party to travel for the event, we had to make the decision of whether or not to go due to an incoming typhoon. Many of us would have preferred to stay home. But A.T. was so excited to share his country's food, music, and dancing with us that none of us could tell him no. So we piled into two vehicles and took off for Tokyo at 1pm Africa time, which means that while we were supposed to leave at 1pm, we actually left at 2pm. Unfortunately, that late departure was an unknown-at-the-time foreshadowing of how our travel to the party would go, for when we finally arrived at a metered parking lot that was as close as we could get to the embassy, A.T. told us that the party wasn't at the embassy at all but at another location instead. After another hour of cell-phone-GPS consulting, hailing a cab whose driver couldn't find the building, and pulling one of two Ethiopian guys who were walking on the street into said cab to lead us to our destination, we arrived completely frustrated. But thankfully the event was very enjoyable and most of us were able to forget about the stress of our travel during the course of the evening.

The event was attended mainly by Japanese people, naturally. However, there were several Ethiopian expatriates at the party. And A.T. introduced our group to the ambassador from Ethiopia. Unfortunately, I only got to see him rather than meet him.

The Ethiopian food that we ate was good but very spicy. Having become accustomed to much milder food this past six months, I don't know if I would have found the food to be so spicy if my U.S. palate were still intact. But my mouth was on fire with just a few bites and I was unable to finish my meal.

The Japanese dancers doing both traditional Japanese as well as traditional Ethiopian dances were quite good. But the best part of the evening was when the people attending the party were invited to join in with the dancing.

H.V. and N.N. dancing on the sidelines, although H.V. earlier in the evening had been one of the people to get up and perform with the dancers.

Ethiopian dancing heavily involves moving the shoulders, which the two Ethiopians in this picture were able to do quite well. J.M. couldn't quite manage the shoulders, although he would have been more than happy to show us the hips-driven Latin dances that he learned while growing up in Honduras.

I never made it to Africa last night. So I guess I'll just have to go at some point in the future. But at one of the traffic lights on the way home, I saw what is surely the world's smallest liquor store (and its bored-looking employee). If I'd wanted to lie down on the floor to measure the store's width, I would have touched the exterior wall with my head and the interior wall with my feet. (Please don't fail to notice the store's name.) When you live and work in a city as crowded as Tokyo, you make the most of every square inch.

Until next time...

Agape Ministry

The foreigner population at church has been studying the Gospel of Mark since the beginning of September. In our study each week, we read through one chapter eight times and reflect on that day's reading using the lens of a different question, e.g., Where did Jesus go?, What did Jesus do?, What did Jesus see?, etc. Along with independent reading and small group discussion each week, we also have a discipleship challenge to correlate with something from that week's reading that was particularly noteworthy. For this week's challenge, my discipleship group decided that we would help with the Agape Ministry at church.

Once a month, some members of my church join with some members of the Catholic church to serve curry and a short Bible message to the homeless of the city. I don't know why the homeless in the city are homeless, since Japanese families typically live multi-generationally under one roof. And I don't know the ministry's long-term goal regarding the homeless of the city. But I'm very glad that my group decided that we wanted to help with the short-term goal of meeting physical needs this week. It was rather awkward, since I can't speak Japanese, to work alongside strangers (especially when it came time to introduce ourselves and I was the first non-Catholic in the serving line to do so and didn't know how to say anything other than my name, which none of them had been saying!). And when I reflect on the fact that Jesus not only gave food to the hungry but actually ate with them, I feel that my curry-dishing skills weren't enough. But after living here for almost six months, I've come to expect that I will have numerous awkward encounters and that I won't be able to do what I'd like to do as a result of the communication barrier. Regardless, partnering with members of the Catholic church, when there often is still religious tension between Catholics and Protestants in the U.S., in order to show love in the name of Jesus, was a wonderful experience. I hope to be able to be involved in this ministry on a regular basis.

Until next time...

Park Week

You know how the Discovery Channel hosts "Shark Week" every year in July or August? Well, Japan must host "Park Week" every year in October, for I've been to three different parks with three different groups on three different occasions this past week. And outside of going to the park where my brother played his baseball games every summer when we were growing up, I can't remember ever going to a park three times in one year, let alone in one week.

For those of you familiar with Let's Start Talking (LST), my church here in Japan has begun this year's English Bible Class (EBC), which is similar to LST. For those of you unfamiliar with LST, it's an organization that equips Christians to go into non-English speaking parts of the world to teach English by using the Bible. EBC has met twice thus far, and will continue to meet twice a month through March. I'm so excited to be able to do the EBC program, since I had such great experiences with my readers when I did LST in Japan during that summer after college graduation. But EBC experiences are for a different post. So let's get back to "Park Week".

On Saturday, approximately 40 people went to the seaside park that I wrote about being unable to visit back in May. The group was a mixture of EBC teachers (who are many, but not all, of us AETs), EBC readers, church members, and friends from our schools. The park is beautiful; and we spent four hours there, roaming around to look at the autumn foliage, having obento (the Japanese version of a brown bag lunch), and enjoying each other's company.

I tried my first chestnut at this park. The first bite was unremarkable. The second and third bites tasted like roast beef. And the rest of it was once again unremarkable. I assumed that a chestnut was something like an acorn, since you roast them over an open fire at Christmas and the drawings that I've seen of them since arriving here make them look like that. But did you know that a chestnut's exterior looks like a super spiky, bright green kiwi? And why in the world would it taste like roast beef? (Now I could really go for some Cracker Barrel.)

**On Tuesday, I joined my third graders for a trip to Kasama, the (un-)official (?) ceramics capital of Japan. (Not all AETs are allowed to go on field trips with their students, so shhh!) There we had the opportunity to make a cup or a plate, visit a ceramics museum, eat obento in a park that had cooler artwork than the museum, and play on the most amazing playground I've ever seen. But the word "playground" doesn't do it justice. The slides are amazingly huge - think a couple stories tall and a hundred or more feet long - and are connected to a decking system with numerous play stations shooting off from it that most definitely required an engineering degree to design. (My seven-year-old nephew would love this park!) Unfortunately, I was too busy having fun sliding to take pictures from my ride on it.

**At the bottom of the second slide, shortly before I took this photo, I was caught in a pile up with a bunch of students and teachers from my school as well as from other schools. After trudging up the huge hill two times, my first time to slide to slide became my last time to slide.

**This air dome is WAY more fun than a trampoline, although one of the many rules for using it is don't jump on it. (What else is it meant to be used for? And what kid can resist jumping on an air mountain?) I was asked by one of the students to play on the dome with her. But I thought I was too big or old, take your pick, and was noncommittal. Later, when I saw how much fun they were having, I decided that I could be a big kid at heart and play on it with them. I'm so glad I did, since they told their teacher that I'm so fun!

**This zip line looked like it was a blast for the kids to ride. So after watching them on it for several minutes, I decided to give it a try. Only, it wasn't as fun for me as the slide or the air dome since my legs are so long that they dragged along the ground and slowed me down.

On Wednesday, I arrived at my one-day-a-week kindergarten and was surprised once again with that day's plans - no English classes and a trip to a park. I'd been told we'd walk to the park because it was close. But once we arrived at the park, I can't believe we dared to undertake the mile- or two-mile-long trek with close to 100 four- and five-year olds, even with ten moms to help with the outing. (There's no way that would be allowed in an American school.) But the amazing thing was that not one of the kids complained or got hurt on the way there or back. Once at the park, we spent the next two or three hours sliding down the hill on cardboard boxes. (So fun!) Since I'd expected to teach English that day, I didn't have my camera with me as I'd had at the other two parks. But suffice it to say that from the top of the hill, where I spent much of my time as a pusher, it looked like I was bowling with kindergartners!

Japan is a beautiful country; and now that the life-sapping heat and humidity of summer are gone, I hope to be able to enjoy more of it's scenery.

Until next time...

**UPDATE (11/22/10): Photographs containing school children have been removed per the instruction of the teachers' consultant.

Almost Famous?

Today I went to McDonald's for breakfast before school. As the cashier was placing my iced coffee on my tray, she said, "Rebecca?" I've never met this person in my life; so I was a little taken aback that she somehow knew my name. (This is a cash society. There's no such thing as a debit card. So she didn't get my name off of anything that I gave her.) When I confirmed that, indeed, I am Rebecca, she told me that she is the mother of one of the elementary school students whom I teach. After having another one of my students tell me that his mother delivered a package from my mother to my school several months ago and then they discussed it over the dinner table, I guess I should have remembered that being a gaijin (foreigner) in a small town in a homogeneous country like Japan doesn't allow for anonymity. Maybe the next time I venture out I should take a tip from Ke$ha.


Until next time...

Really, Pam? Really?

Pam Jones, Bridget's mother in the movie Bridget Jones's Diary, when talking about Mark Darcy's Japanese ex-wife, calls her a member of a "cruel race". While this likely is done for plot and/or comedic purpose, it may also be a commentary by the screenwriters about Japan's aggression in China and the Pacific before and during World War II. While some nations feel that the government of Japan still owes amends for its war crimes (a topic that is not the focus of this post or this blog), in my trips to Japan, I've found the people of Japan to be anything but cruel.

As mentioned in a previous post, on the first day that I went to my one-day-a-week kindergarten, I was unaware that I needed to pack a lunch since I eat kyuushoku (school lunch) with the students at my main school. Upon learning that I had no lunch, the jimuin (teacher's room manager) left school in cats-and-dogs rain to buy me something to eat and then wouldn't allow me to repay her. 

During my first month or two of being here, I needed to see a bank teller to handle a transaction since my bank card had not yet arrived. So T.-sensei, my jimuin, took me to the bank one day after lunch. As we were walking into the bank, I smelled the most heavenly scent coming from the bakery just across the street. And as we were walking out of the bank, I told T.-sensei that I would like to go into the bakery to see what smelled so wonderful. While I was looking at the cases trying to decide if I wanted anything, T.-sensei was making a purchase of six madeleines, yummy French pastries, that she then proceeded to give to me, for they had been the source of the wonderful smell.

In working to transfer N.P.'s scooter into my name, I asked several other AETs for assistance. Some of the AETs were kind enough to help me directly. But others said, "Talk to...." And when I would talk to..., he or she would say, "Talk to..." and before I knew it I was circled back around to the first person with whom I'd spoken. It was frustrating since I had no idea what I needed to do and felt that the scooter experts in the group were passing the buck. But when I told K.-sensei, my school nurse, about one of the questions for which I needed help, she and N.-sensei, the jimuho (handyman / groundskeeper), spent an hour online searching for the scooter's model number so that I could fill out the change of ownership paperwork.

My nephew's seventh birthday is this weekend. And I searched many stores here and in Tokyo over the course of several weeks in order to find just the right gift. The special education teacher called a couple different stores to ask if they had the items for which I was searching so that I wouldn't have to traipse all over the city once again. And when the one item that would complete the gift remained elusive, K.-sensei said that she would keep her eyes open for it. I told her to not worry about it, since I knew that it meant she would make a special trip to find that item. As anticipated, when I arrived at work the next day, not only had she found that elusive item but she'd also found several extra-special bonus items and wouldn't accept money for any of it.

I find the Japanese people to be more Christ-like in their actions than many Christians I've met, including myself. And it's not just the people at school who know me who've been so kind. They think of others before they think of themselves. They apologize for things that they personally did not do (e.g., attack at Pearl Harbor). And they go out of their way to help a person in need. In my experience, Pam Jones doesn't know what she's talking about.

Lessons learned on Guam

I spent most of the first week of August on Guam with three other English teachers for our use-them-or-lose-them five days of tokkyu (summer vacation). We flew out of Japan on Sunday's red-eye and flew into Japan on Friday's first flight out and packed all of our waking hours in between with sight-seeing, shopping, and stuffing our faces with American food. Although the trip wasn't a cheap one, I am proud to say that I was able to eat for four days at just around $100, thanks to splitting every meal but breakfast with my friend, H.V. (I highly recommend the California Club pizza at California Pizza Kitchen. But I strongly advise you to stay away from the CPK Cobb Salad. It's way too rich.)

Guam is an American territory that sits closer to Japan (three-hour flight) than it does to the United States (eight-hour flight to Hawaii). As a result, 75% of its tourism is comprised of East Asians (historically Japanese but increasingly South Koreans and Chinese); and the Japanese written language can be seen alongside its English equivalent on restaurant menus and mall directories and the spoken language heard just as frequently if not more predominately than English. Its interesting history has resulted in a blend of Chamorro (native), Spanish, Asian, and American family and location names. But rather than write a post that is a history lesson, I'll let you read more about that here and here. Guam has beautiful scenery; and I took too many pictures to post on this blog. So please click here if you'd like to see some of the views I saw while there. Instead, I'll use this post to enumerate lessons I learned/opinions I developed while on Guam:

1. Diet Coke really doesn't taste good and should never become an acquired taste.
2. The world's largest Kmart, while very nice, can't be all that boastful if it carries only two George Clooney movies (one of which is Return of the Killer Tomatoes!) and no York Peppermint Patties.
3. Stomachs shrink after living in Japan; and American restaurant portion sizes are sickeningly huge.
4. Omiyage, the Japanese art of gift giving to honor relationships, is a racket designed by Japanese companies to keep themselves in business.
5. Liev Schreiber almost wins the award for the perfect villain's voice. Sadly for him but happily for us, he's beaten out by Alan Rickman.
6. Touring World War II battle and memorial sites with Japanese people is somewhat awkward, even though the war is most probably the fault of neither of us.
7. Americans are very loud and need to be more discreet about or, even better, not discuss at all their spouse's reproductive problems and their "bastard child(ren) in the Philippines" over Chili's chips and salsa.

Until next time...

Teachers' Trip Activities

On the last Saturday of July, approximately 20 teachers and I went on the annual teachers' trip that occurs at the end of each summer term. We met at the school at 7:00am for the bus ride to Tokyo and returned at 8:30pm. I was uncertain about what to expect, since many other AETs have talked about their schools' party committees renting buses stocked with alcohol and some of their teachers embarrassing themselves and others when they over-indulge in beer, wine, and cocktails. But as I have been discovering with each enkai that I attend, the teachers at my school enjoy alcoholic beverages responsibly. Perhaps this is due to the influence of my school's administrators or party committee, I don't know. But it's a huge relief for me, nevertheless.

Upon arriving in Tokyo, we immediately went to the Nippon Television Network to see a clock weighing 28 tons, standing 36 feet tall, and measuring 54 feet wide. It was designed by Hayao Miyazaki, the man who runs Studio Ghibli, an animation house which created the recent Ponyo and the Oscar-winning Spirited Away. For fifty-five minutes of every hour, the clock is a regular, albeit steampunk-looking, clock. However, at five minutes to the hour during a certain window every day, the clock begins its magic, as seen in the clip below.



After watching the clock, we went to lunch at a restaurant in the Keio Plaza Hotel, an upscale hotel in Tokyo's Shinjuku ward. The meal was served buffet-style. But if you're picturing Golden Corral, you're doing an injustice to this restaurant. Yes, a salad bar and carved roast beef were provided. Would a buffet be complete without them? But picture also main dishes such as black spaghetti (which gets its color from squid ink) tossed with Genoan ham, green peas, and pesto sauce and Japanese beef curry served with rice; an assortment of gourmet cheeses; steamed whole shrimp and other Japanese seafood selections; white wine jelly (gelatin), a variety of small cakes, and vanilla or pumpkin ice cream for dessert. As I can never eat my money's worth at an American buffet, there's absolutely no way that I ate my money's worth at this buffet!

Had I known when I said I would go on the teachers' trip that the main event of the day was watching comedians rather than watching the filming of a Japanese game show, which is what I originally thought we would be doing, I wouldn't have gone on the trip since I was also leaving for Guam the next day and could have used that time to finish preparing for the trip. As it was, while the teachers watched the comedians, I fruitlessly searched all the shopping centers in the area (There were at least four in a one-square-mile area.) for a certain gift for my nephew. However, my principal was impressed with the fact that I came on the trip. So since he's the one who can make or break my future employment with this program and I did enjoy the time I spent with the teachers on the bus and at lunch, the trip was ultimately worthwhile.

Until next time...