Crate & Barrel, Japan Division: February 2011

Cultural Humility

Thursday, February 24, 2011

This is an enormously small example of a lesson in cultural humility, but I think it's worth mentioning.

Here in Japan, kids settle small disputes with constant games of janken. Though the windup and pre-throw words are different, it's rock-paper-scissors. It's used even more commonly than in the United States, popping up whenever there are teams to be decided, tasks to be doled out, or sacrificial English lesson volunteer lambs to be offered.

A few times I've tried to teach the game in English, with the English words and rhthym. My students usually think this is hilarious--a few have learned it before, but always as "Rock, scissors, paper, 1, 2, 3!" for some reason.

So here's the thing. I always assumed that rock-scissors-paper was an American game, transferred over to Japan during the occupation. Why did I assume this? I'm not too sure--somehow it just seemed very American, but then of course it would, as I grew up there. I even told my students several times that it was an American game adapted to Japan. They were dubious, but most accepted it because I'm a teacher.

Rock-paper-scissors was invented in China, and popular in Japan in the 18th century. You know, before my arrogant homeland was even a country.

Teachers, do your homework before you say something's true just because you assume it. Students, your teachers are sometimes huge arrogant puffballs, don't take what they say at face value.

Famous Snow Monkeys and Monkeys on Famous Snow

Wednesday, February 16, 2011

This past weekend I took another winter trip to the Hakuba area of Nagano prefecture to go snowboarding. It was a three-day weekend, and a few of us used the Friday to visit the famous monkey onsen at Shiga Kogen.

There are all kinds of pictures of this online, but the experience of being there is pretty stunning, in both broad and detailed ways. An onsen, in case I haven't described it before, is a Japanese hot spring bath. With enormous amounts of geothermal activity all through the relatively volcanic country (there was an eruption on the southern island just a couple weeks ago), onsens are plentiful. Originally they were just outdoor stone baths, and now they are a cultural fixture, with bath houses even in places without true hot springs. The communal and incredibly relaxing nature of onsens is something I will miss dearly when I leave.

A vent straight out of LOST.

Nagano prefecture is in the middle of Japan--high, dry, and quite cold in the winter (very much like Colorado, really, which is probably why I feel so at home in that part of the country), so the animals there have to find ways to deal with the extremes. Very much unlike Colorado, there are monkeys in Japan, and those in Shiga Kogen take full advantage of the geothermal baths.

This tendency has been taken advantage of by touristic interests, as the bath we saw was clearly constructed by humans to be bigger and more regular and accessible than it would be in nature. After a short 20-minute walk through the forest we arrived at the monkey onsen.

Several things were quickly apparent. One, the monkeys couldn't care less about the humans staring at them. In fact, they seemed clustered around the area where there were the most photographers and gaping man-apes. Two, we evolved from monkeys.

This appeared to be a family. The little ball of fur is a baby's head while nursing. He'd come up to the two adults, who were grooming each other, and started jumping up and down and chattering at them. After a moment of ignoring, the mother (without even looking at the baby directly) stretched out a paw and brought him to her breast. To be honest, I feel a little wrong about having taken a picture of such a touching and personal moment.

Speaks for itself, I believe.

Yes, that's something I was aware of before this, but watching them sit, walk, jump, preen, sleep, nurse, fight, jabber, watch, and express love over the 30 minutes we stayed around the pool, I'm unsure as to how humans ever thought the species were unrelated. There were precocious, over-social children. There were obnoxious, boundary pushing adolescents. There were calm, watchful mothers and a quietly powerful patriarch. Having been in onsens many times myself, it was sort of hilarious to see the monkeys acting more or less exactly the same way: easing into the water, hanging over the edge, relaxing next to friends, getting out, walking around, getting back in, zoning out.

See the resemblance?

No matter the touristy implications, I think it's wonderful to get a chance to observe this kind of thing up close. And I mean UP CLOSE. The monkeys would often just stroll around the people, and the youngest baby actually latched onto a woman's leg and hopped up and down a bit, which was almost fatally adorable.

In the visitor's center, they had a framed picture of all the clan patriarchs dating back to 1963. There was a fascinating description of how orderly and non-violent the transition between leaders is, contrary to stereotype. One of them was named "Tom", inexplicably...

The cluster of buildings below. The four white dots on the right are four towels on the heads of man-apes bathing in an onsen. Of course.

This. Picture. IS. Japan. Period.

We continued on to Hakuba, where we had two days at a ski-in lodge at the Happo-One (pronounced "hahpo-ohney") resort. Happo-One is where the downhill events were held in the '98 Olympics. The second day was just incredible snowboarding because of at least 8 inches of fresh snow on Saturday night. Some of us hiked up the hill in the dark and took short midnight runs, an experience I don't expect to repeat too many times.

Monkeys on the chairlift.

Four happy monkeys.

Colin's powder track seen from the following chairlift ride. He had to stop and hike back out to the trail because he suddenly realized that ahead of him was an untracked valley/cliff that wasn't exactly on the program for the day.

Descent Into The Second Kanazawa Winter, And Big News

Monday, February 7, 2011

This post should catch me up to today, February 7, 2011.

After getting back to Japan in the fall, I began school again. I know all the teachers and kids, I know the scope of the curriculum and I'm more comfortable with my role. That, of course, has brought its own brand of fatigue as I am frequently frustrated by how little is asked of me by certain teachers. I try to reach out to kids when I get the chance and try not to get too hung up on my deep dissatisfaction with the Japanese English-teaching system.

I practice with my rock band Beargasaurus every Monday and I go to karate every Tuesday. I have a pretty concrete rhythm and routine down. By no means have I mastered Japan or Japanese, but I can get around with real ease and I have a great life here. I'm able to get involved in art, culture, and sports pretty much at will and I'm trying to deepen my participation in each of those areas. On a special art tour last week I was interviewed by the local TV station and got on TV for the third time (the other times being a "Ramen Week!" commercial and another time that my students said they saw me walking in the background of a news report). I was a model for a travel company and got dressed up in full Japanese wedding regalia (OK, I lied, this post won't catch me up, I have to post those pictures at some point).

I went home to Colorado for winter vacation, and I had a fantastic time, although I had to spend ANOTHER extra night in Los Angeles on the way back because of a 6-hour delay in Denver. It wasn't my fault this time, though! I'm making progress.

Winter has been harsher this time around, with almost three weeks straight of snow that were only recently broken by sunshine. However, being in walking distance of my schools and not having a car makes that a fairly minor inconvenience in the scheme of things.

So now for the big news--though many of you who read the blog know this already.

While I love my lifestyle in Japan and I'm still learning quite a lot, the job has worn on me, and I often have the impression that I'm not getting a lot of traction in terms of building something with my life. I came to Japan to have an adventure and to find perspective on a life that I often coasted through. I have done both of those things in no uncertain terms, and I'm excited to try and put them in action back in the US (or wherever I end up, I suppose...). While I don't have a specific plan, I think moving on at this point is absolutely the right decision

But there's still 6 months of life in Japan to go, and I still have to see the southern islands, get up to Hokkaido, climb the second-holiest mountain, see the last of the three famous castles...stay tuned.

Scattered Images From Fall 2010

Saturday, February 5, 2011

Here are a few of the pictures I took at other times during the fall at events near Kanazawa that didn't really fall under the category of a separate post.

In October I went on a 26 km walk with one of my schools. Always an interesting experience to walk around an area you've only previously traveled by car or train.

These strange concrete shapes are everywhere on the shores here. I guess they're guards against erosion, but they lend a very manufactured feel to some of the oceanside.

At a small and eccentric festival near my apartment.

My attempt at an artsy shot downtown.

I got some good pictures from the fall light-up of Kenrokuen garden, when I was able to stabilize the camera properly.

A particularly nice sunset from the bridge I always cross on my way downtown.

The White Giant

Friday, February 4, 2011

In late September, a big group of JETs went to go hike up Mount Hakusan, the third holiest mountain in Japan. It's a couple hours to the south of where I live, but still in my prefecture. We got on the road at 5 AM in order to make the transfer from car to bus to trailhead and managed to make it up and down with time and light to spare. It's 2700 meters tall; the name means "White Mountain", and it plays a big part in the history and mythology of Ishikawa. It's seen as a giant protector, scientifically borne out by the fact that it's the main reason that typhoons never do much damage to this region of Japan.

It was really a breathtaking hike. After doing Fuji and Hakusan, I only have to climb Tateyama (very close to me to the north) to complete the big three.

Early wake-up, driving in the pre-dawn hours.

Bridge at the trailhead.

Mist and fog through most of the first half of the hike made for some pretty special views.

I remain blown away by the Japanese commitment to infrastructure, even 2000 meters above most of the rest of civilization. A big complex of buildings with a lunch hall signaled the last stop before the top.