Japanic!

More Lasts

2007-07-06T17:23:00.001+09:00

I feel like I've been mentally saying goodbye for about two months, and now I'm actually saying goodbye.

Monday night Aikido crowd. I had an awesome practice. Beforehand I determined to train with everyone and have as much fun as possible without worrying about getting all the techniques right. I had a blast. After class, my eyes started to tear up when I asked Murayama Sensei if we could take a group picture and he was totally apathetic to my impending absense. I'm going to miss the two girls in the back. Okay, I'm going to miss everyone. They just get extra mention because they gave me goingMonday I said farewell to the of her mother-in-law's old kimono and yukata and we picked out a couple. The other lady in the picture brought me a very nice hand towel that I've been using to wipe away sweat during practice. It's funny, if I were blind, and someone in the picture grabbed my hand, I would know exactly who it was but I'm ashamed to say I don't know everyone's name. 'Cause we neve away presents!!! Ishida-san (back, second from left) brought over a bunchr talk. We just throw each other around and I make inappropriate jokes in such a serious place. I love it. I will write more on the individuals later, so I don't forget them.

Wednesday I said goodbye to the Wednesday crowd. (Same "dojo"- as in same head sensei, but different people). I'm going to miss that group. They seemed a bit sad to see me going.

I'm really going to miss my karate dojo though. Although I've only done karate for 6 months, as opposed to my 2 years at aikido, I feel like I'm part of the group there. Everyone stands around and talks before and after practice, they have barbecues and go out together. It feels like a community. As Kevin once said, the Himeji Aikido people train like they're going to work. The Karate people train because they love it and love to be there with that group of people.

So last night was my last night at karate. In parting, they decided to give me juninkumite, or ten people sparring. One on one for 1 1/2 minutes each separated by 30 seconds. I died. Seriously. In my last match (with kancho Sensei) I got knocked to the ground so much I felt like I was going to either cry or throw up. Maybe both. It was absolutely exhausting. I took so many low kicks to my thighs I can hardly walk today. My right shin protector slipped to the side at some point, so that part of my leg is covered in bruises. I got a very nice email from my sensei afterwards, saying I did really well and he was impressed. I have to sit down and write him a nice letter, but it will take some time to think of what to write and then I'll have to translate it into Japanese 'cause Sensei doesn't really speak English, at all. Well, he says things like "full powaa" and "Allison, rush rush!" I love it. Afterwards they gave me an honorary black belt Although I'm still skill-wise a white belt. I guess I can wear it around my apartment and feel cool in the safety that no one else will see it and challenge me to a fighto fighto.

I was supposed to go out clubbing with Lexi tonight. We had to
modify plans seeing as I can hardly walk, let alone dance. I'm not sure how I'm going to make it through my absolutely last night of Aikido practice tomorrow. I guess I'll Gaman- persevere.

First of my Lasts

2007-06-24T09:31:00.000+09:00

Last night marked what will probably be my last matsuri in Japan. I love Japanese festivals- the bizarre food stalls, game booths, costumes, energy and of course people and yesterday's festival was no exception.

This was, of course, the Himeji Yukata Festival which I reported on last year. Himeji was more packed with people than I have ever seen it before. What would normally be a five minute strole along the shopping arcade expanded into a 30 minute exercise in winding through throngs of yukata clad women and men in their jinbe's. The big difference between this year and last was the absense of the bosozoku, or motorcycle gangs. Somebody said they showed up late at night, but I didn't see them at all.

My preparation for the matsuri really started a few weeks ago, when I began browsing through the racks of yukata for one I liked. The start of summer sees shops putting out huge racks of yukata, ranging in price from 2000 yen to 30000 yen or more for a designer one. I must have looked through hundreds of yukatas before I found mine on Thursday, just in time for the weekend! I started to get ready around three, and was fortunate enough to have an entire team of people helping me to get ready. Lexi helped me put on the yukata and tie the obi, or big poofy belt, and this awesome girl Julie (visiting from the inaka of Japan) did my hair. Then later my friends Chiaki and Sue helped me retie my yukata when it started to slip down. (The initial fear for people wearing yukata for the first time is for it to open up. I guess there are things called "yukata slips", but of course I didn't have one. So if my yukata happened to fall apart, I'd be standing in the street in my underwear and a tank top... Not a pleasant experience I'd imagine!) Everyone in the building got ready together, had a few snacks on the deck, and then we all got separated trying to make it downtown.

I wandered around the matsuri at first with Chelsea, Michelle, and Julie. Then we ran into Maya and her boyfriend Ryan. Soon afterwards I found Jon Ho, who is one of my favorite people in Himeji, and we went and saw these cool breakdancers he met last week perform on stage. In short, I just ended up jumping between people to wander around with. Rather than go on at length, I'll just summarize the night with a few pictures.

Right- A variation on the goldfish game. Kids try to catch baby quails. If they win, they get to keep the bird. Unfortunately, I think a lot of baby birds are killed in the process of trying to catch them. And probably many more are killed once the kids get them home. I thought these boys were adorable though. They were so happy with their new chicks!

Running into Karen's students on miyukidori. These girls are wearing jinbe, which are loose top and bottom combinations. I want one! They look so comfortable!

Running into Inaoka Sensei and Iizuka Sensei in front of the station. I worked with Inaoka Sensei at Toyotomi, she's an amazing teacher and person. Iizuka Sensei was the director of English education in Himeji but recently switched positions and is now the vice principal at my school. They were coming back from a seminar on English education when I ran into them.

As the festival started to wind down Lexi and I headed over to Tiger and met up with people. Regrettably, Taube, Julian, and the other Shirasagi people were elsewhere. I think most people were at this ramen shop that I didn't quite know how to get to. I wanted to join them, but I was a little worried about wandering through the "red light" district of Himeji on my own, and my feet were killing me. It's now Sunday morning, there's a steady rainfall softening the sounds of cars passing by and driving people indoors. I imagine it's washing away the remnants of yesterday's matsuri, the empty cups and sticky food trays, from the city streets downtown. The thought of never going to another Japanese matsuri is bringing tears to my eyes. It's going to be hard to leave what has become my home.

Waiting for the bus

Chopsticks. Chop Chop.

2007-05-11T19:29:00.000+09:00

Inevitably in teaching English I have to teach the students how to say "hashi" in English. The new word, chopsticks, is always followed by a detailed explanation in Japanese of how upon first contact with hashi, it appeared as if people were stabbing and well, chopping at their food. My junior high school students usually abandon their glazed over, utterly bored demeanor for one of befuddlement at how anyone could think hashi were meant for sawing through bowls of rice or tender fishies. Usually the explanation ends with all the students taking a sidelong glance at the only representative foreigner around (me), wondering how my ancestors could be so obtuse. Now, this phenomenon has always irritated me. In consequence, I recently did some research (translate- googled) the etymology of chopsticks. What I found begins with what might be the coolest phrase in the English language. Let's begin

Chop Chop.

One theory is that "chopsticks" comes from chop chop, meaning fast. Chop chop probably originated in Pidgin English, which was spoken for nearly 300 years as a means of communication between English and Chinese traders. "Chop" alone comes from a derivation of Chinese meaning "fast". Hence "chop chop" equals fast, or in a hurry. From Wikipedia:

The Mandarin Chinese word for chopsticks is kuàizi (筷子) or kuài'er (筷儿/筷兒). The character 筷 is composed of two parts, "快" meaning quick and “竹” meaning bamboo.

In Chinese, the old word for "chopsticks" was zhù. However, zhù became a taboo on ships because it sounded the same as another word meaning "to stop" (住). Consequently, it was replaced by a word of opposite meaning, kuài (fast, quick). This gradually spread until it became the word for "chopsticks" in most varieties of modern Chinese. The character for this new meaning of "chopsticks" (筷) for kuài has the character for bamboo added to the character meaning "fast" kuài (快).

How cool is that? I would say pretty awesome. Now I will end this blog entry chop chop.

MALAYSIA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2007-04-25T23:39:00.000+09:00

Yo! I'm in Malaysia! How crazy is that? Actually, I'm not in Malaysia yet. This is a pre-post. I'll be leaving tomorrow April 26th and will be back in Japan on may 5th. Times!
Bye!

Hanami!!!!!!!!!!!

2007-04-19T16:56:00.000+09:00

Well, it looks like I'll never finish up reporting on my Thailand trip... So moving on!

We just finished up Hanami, or Cherry Blossom Viewing, here in Himeji. Japan is covered with cherry trees, which all open up at the same time, blanketing the country in pink and white. This beauty is best appreciated by sitting under the trees eating and drinking for an afternoon or evening. After a few hours of socializing, everyone stops and takes a whole lot of pictures of the trees and friends.

This year I had several Hanami parties. The first was at Himeji castle. Every year on the first Saturday of April, a hundred koto players set up in the park and play together starting at 9. In the afternoon, the koto players are replaced with a string of taiko drummers with groups rotating through for two hours. I slept in through the koto to show up for the taiko and sake drinking- which was excellent. Among the foreigners, I have to believe that the sake is the top attraction to the festival. Every year, Himeji sets up a sake booth. The booth boasts six different sake's from local breweries. For 500 yen, you get a souvenir sake drinking box/cup with the first drink. Each additional drink is only 100yen. When I went for my first drink, I encountered some rather drunk Americans who recommended a rather spicy sake and another dry one. Each turned out to be excellent.

My second Hanami was out with the Aikido dojo. This was an extremely difficult day. We started out with class at 10 out in Aioi- a town outside of Himeji. After a good sweat we moved on to drinking at noon, and continued on until five. At which point we moved on to drinking at a local ramen shop. Monday was very painful.

My last Hanami in Japan I spent with my Shirasagi friends in front of the castle. I couldn't drink much, as I had karate shortly afterwards. But the flowers were beautiful and the park was relatively quiet.

THAILAND!!!!!!

2007-04-02T13:18:00.000+09:00

Josh and Al, big idiots around the world.

Grand Palace, Bangkok

Josh and I had a wonderful journey to Thailand, I just woke up from a nap recovering from all of our adventures. We both fell in love with the country, causing us to dread our return to Japan and think of ways to remain in the country. In my case, I think I will have to talk my family into spending Christmas in Thailand.

Day 1
Josh and I flew out of Osaka Sunday afternoon. We made our plans for the week on the flight. We made several goals.
1- ride elephants
2- see kickboxing
3- get massages
Other than this, we had no idea where we were going. We found a bus from the Bangkok airport to Khao San Road, a hippie, ex-pat hangout where my friend Cecy planned to meet us. Thankfully, she was there and had made a hotel reservation for us. Hooray! Together, with her Indian but living in the land of Thai, friend Ronny, we got some dinner and went to a few bars. We ate dinner at a table on the street. Meanwhile, a pair of hippie-looking kids entertained us playing accordion and violin as part of a traveling circus.

Riding Elephants, Chiang Mai
Muay Thai Kickboxing school!

Thai Cooking Class

Wat Doi Suthep, North of Chiang Mai

SUMO!!!

2007-03-21T22:26:00.000+09:00

I went to SUMO today!!!!! Yay! Sumo matches occur six times a year, three times in Tokyo, and once in Osaka, Nagoya and Kyushu. Each tournament lasts 15 days. The matches start in the morning around nine with the lower ranked wrestlers and progresses through the ranks until the day's matches finish at six.

I called Cecy just before noon, rallied her out of bed and we took off to Osaka. We didn't know just how much sumo we could watch in one sitting, but estimated it at less than an entire day. We got to the gym around 1:30, just as the higher-ranked rikishi, or wrestlers, were arriving. People lined the streets, creating wall of digital cameras and cell phones to snap photos as the wrestlers stepped out of the taxis. They arrived wearing yukata, or lighter versions of kimono, with their hair pinned neatly atop their heads.

After snapping a few photos, we found the ticket window and were dismayed to learn that all of the cheaper tickets had been already sold. All that were left were the 8500 yen tickets. Figuring that this was my last chance to see sumo in Japan, and that we had already made it to Osaka, we bought our very very expensive tickets. We wandered off, got some lunch, swung by a convenience store for snacks and made it back to the gym.

At the ticket gate, a very energetic woman attached herself to us as a guide to our seats. As Cecy was using the restroom, I confessed that although I like to watch Sumo on TV, this was my first time seeing it live. Upon hearing this, my guide rushed off and came back with some secret presents for us- promotional photos of the yokozune Asashoryu that they had handed out the first day. After stuffing them in our bags- so no one could see them, she excorted us into the sumo hall.

Dohyo-iri or "entering the ring" ceremony. The rikishi, or upper division, wrestlers enter the ring wearing their silk aprons.

Yokozuna Asashoryu, attended by lower ranking rikishi, one holding a sword, performs ritual stomping in the dohyo-iri.

Ozeki Kotooshi (far side) and opponent. A Bulgarian, this is Cecy's favorite wrestler.

I'm not sure who this is. But he is performing the yumitori-shiki, or "swinging around a bow" closing ceremony.

It was soooo awesome! That's all I have to say.
Love, Allison

It's March!

2007-03-15T19:24:00.000+09:00

Hi Everyone!

In updating the settings on this blog, I realized that some of my very favorite people in this world had been leaving me messages that I had accidentally blocked! This whole time I thought no one was reading this thing so I sort of started slacking on my entries. Sorry! 'Specially to Jim Sensei, Tom Newhall, and my Mumsy, who have all left me wonderful messages recently.

Not much new to report here. It's cold and rainy right now. The Japanese teachers have been harassing me for not learning how to make Japanese food while I've been here, so I'm about to undertake teaching myself how to cook Japanese food. I just attempted to make my first ever Japanese style bento (lunch box) for tomorrow at school. I think it's pretty.

Ingredients:
-Nanohana (Rapeseed Blossoms) in Mustard-Miso Sauce
-Japanese simmered pumpkin and carrots in a mixture of mirin and soy sauce
-Baby Tomatoes
-1 hard boiled egg

-Rice with Black Sesame Seeds

The Nanohana dish is pretty good- but I think I made the sauce a bit too strong. The simmered veggies are good also, but I think the flavoring is a little to weak. I'm no Iron Chef, but I'm learning!

I really need to learn to make Tamagoyaki- the rolled sweet egg omelet- to make this an official bento. I bought the special rectangular pan that one needs to properly roll the eggs after school today, so hopefully I can start experimenting soon. There are all sorts of variations I want to learn, like dashimaki- made with nori and katsuo dashi (dashi- traditional broth is usually made from a combination of seaweed-nori- and dried bonito flakes-katsuo), and norimaki eggs- made with nori rolled inside. Shouldn't be too hard once I get the hang of it.

Moving on from food.

Sooooo, Sunday was my Birthday! I didn't really do anything for it. My dojo had testing for belt ranks so I was at the dojo all day. I was asked to take ukemi for the kids class in the morning, then I went to the adults class in the afternoon, and the really long eating/drinking party afterwards. The really cute boy in the dojo led everyone in a round of Happy Birthday (in English)- and this made me pretty happy. I'm having a big dinner party at the local pan-Asian restaurant tomorrow night then we're going out for drinks.

Birthday Flowers from Naoki!

Well, off to Karate! I really love my dojo. My Sensei is so awesome and nice. Although they regularly hit and kick me really hard, they're really nice about it. I haven't seen Mafia-Sensei in a while. He's the teacher that usually stands around kicking students until they limp away. He only caught me once! and well... my leg hurt for the next week... Yay for karate! Off to the dojo!

Ciao!

BACK!!!

2007-02-04T17:59:00.000+09:00

Just flew in to Osaka and am waiting for the bus to Himeji. It was so nice getting off the airport here. I don't know if it's the relief that I'm almost home, that the stress of a week travelling is about to end or what, but I am so glad to be back.

I think my NW interview went okay, I have no idea what they're basing their acceptance on though. they interviewed 750 people and are taking abouy 170. Decisions will be made February 20th and I'll be notified at the beginning of March whether or not I got in. I really hope I do. Northwestern has a really good reputation, but what struck me more was the quality of the other applicants. At IU everyone was from Indiana and were generally straight out of undergrad and weren't all that interesting. At OSU more students were from around the US and seemed a bit more engaging. But I was really impressed with the diversity of the students at NW. In my "panel" interview- an interview with 3 other applicants- one gentleman was Korean-American from Pomona in California, one was half Singaporean (?) and half from Hong-Kong, but grew up in Tokyo, served in the Singapore conscript army, and went to Tufts in Boston. The third person in my group was from Peru, moved to Miami, and I forget where he went to school. I think he had the least chance of getting in, he was a little lacking in confidence. But everyone I talked to had these amazing stories of where they grew up or who they were. NW has the reputation of being pretty full of itself, it's students and staff, but I didn't get that from the med school at all.
So in short, I was pretty impressed with NW and hope that I get in. I don't think I have much of a chance, but if I'm at least put on the waiting list then I think I might still have a shot.

Off to catch my bus.
GO COLTS!!!!

There's this cute quintet of Japanese sitting behind me speaking in a mixture of Spanish, English, and Japanese. They keep saying "Let's speak English!" (Hablamos en ingles!)

Extra pics

2007-01-20T13:02:00.000+09:00

I thought I'd post a few more pictures from fall leaf viewing in Kyoto.

Sanjusangendo Archery!

2007-01-20T12:51:00.000+09:00

Last Sunday I went to Kyoto's Sanjusangendo Temple to observe their annual archery competition. January 8th is Coming of Age Day, when 20 year olds become adults. Thousands of 20 year olds who study archery (Kyudo) on the Japanese long bow come to this temple to compete every year. Twelve archers shoot at the same time. They have two shots to hit their target, which is really far away. If they make both they get to move on to the finals. I don't think many people move on the target is so far away. The men mostly wear black hakama (pants) and a white top. The girls all wear their formal kimonos; they look absolutely stunning.

Osaka! Trance Party!

2006-12-31T16:30:00.000+09:00

Last night I went to Zepp, an enormous dance club in Osaka with my friend Shun. It was a wild night, my ears are still ringing but after seven hours of dancing and getting home at 9:30 this morning, I amazingly feel pretty good. I'll start my story at the train station. I met Shun in Himeji, and we caught a late train to Osaka. This is where things get tricky. To get to the club, we changed trains three times throughout Osaka. Eventually we left the station on what might have been a manmade island, I really have no idea where we were. Anyway, we left the station and the streets are still. No one is around. We're in a new town, no old buildings, no trash on the streets. The sidewalks are new bricks and the roads are wide. A few tall skyscrapers and expensive apartment buildings break up the landscape of empty lots awaiting development and new streetlights hang out over the deserted streets. We follow signs, written on computer paper and taped to walls for the club. Soon through the darkness I can discern a faint pulse of bass creeping through the night and penetrating the stillness.

As we get closer I see the building, it's an enormous warehouse style building with a red neon Z emblazoned on it's side. We pay the (extravagent) entrance fee and head in. The entrance feels like we're walking into a sports stadium, there's a drinks counter (bar) and a small table selling fried chicken and ice cream. Moving past that, we go through some large black doors and enter the heart of the club. The first thing that occurs to me is that I feel like I'm at Universal Studeos. There are several tiers of floor space. It's slightly terraced going down to the main dance floor and each level is divided by a large hand rail. Maybe 200 people are spread out across the floor already, but the space is so big it feels empty. Up front there's a stage, with maybe ten hexagonal screens projecting out above the DJ booth and kind of Mind's Eye computer graphics swirl. The whole effect makes the DJ booth seem like a bizarre neon altar. The dancers all stand facing forward, no one dances together, as people dance by themselves en masse. I feel like I'm in the Thriller video with techno zombies. Shun and I have a few drinks (is this a gin tonic or just a ginger ale? I think the latter) and hit the floor. As the night gets later, people appear out of nowhere.

I'm entranced by the Japanese girls fashion and the boys' hairstyles. Nowhere in the world do men have better hair than in Japan. The girls all wear tall boots, short tight skirts, long dangly necklaces and have enormous hair. Oh, and everyone is in black or gray with a touch of white. It wasn't until about 4 am that I saw another foreigner in the club, a guy from Canada that let me go ahead of him to get a bottle of water. I head back to the dance floor, Shun tells me that the DJ is really famous, "Chianti", one of the 5 DJ's playing that night from Israel. The floor is packed, which is amazing to me considering the size of the club. It's also littered with bottles which were once filled with sports drinks and oolong tea. Everywhere I move there's a new smell. Men's cologne, girls perfume. Cigarrettes and marijuana. I'm having a great time, I lose myself in the music. I'm smiling as I dance. I look around, the people having the best times are those like me, just there to dance. I make eye contact with lots of cute boys. Man, are there lots of them! The Japanese girls I make eye contact with smile at me, amused to see a foreigner in their midst. I don't feel like I stand out too much. Well, yes, I stand out immensely, but I don't feel out of place. I'm very glad that I wore sneakers to dance in and not boots like all the other girls there though.

I go back in the hallway to use the bathroom and I realize how seedy this place really is. Many of the girls have tatooes showing on their shoulders, I notice one of an angel weeping. The men too. Normally tatooes in Japan are a symbol of the Yakuza, the Japanese mafia, so I try not to stare at them too long. Girls in too much makeup and too little clothes slouch against the wall, exhausted or depressed. Maybe lonely. I head to the bathroom and find men coming in and out. Huh. Then I see couples going into the stalls together. Sometimes two girls, sometimes two girls and a guy. Sometimes two guys and a girl. Uh huh. I leave the bathroom and look for a less popular toilet to use.

Shun and I keep dancing until five. We both feel exhausted as we get our jackets out of the lockers and leave the club. On the train back to Himeji we sleep, surrounded by businessmen in their suits and old ladies in woolly hats. Staring out the window, an elderly lady stares at me as she puts on her gloves and waits for the next train. I smile at her, she smiles back at me, a genuine smile. I close my eyes and wake up at 9 in Himeji. Shun and I get a bowl of Donburi, rice covered with stuff. Today's "stuff" is a Chinese- inspired mix of cabage and seafood. A little bit mushu-style. We wash it down with a cup of miso soup and a plate of tsukemono- pickled things. I say goodbye to Shun and head back to my apartment, crash in bed, and wake up four hours later. And that's the end of my Osaka story.

What a great night. It's New Year's Eve, I don't feel like going clubbing with everyone. I think I'll bike to Mt. Shosha, climb the mountain and pray at the Buddhist temple at the top.

I hope all of you have a wonderful evening tonight, the last of 2006!

Happy New Year Everyone!

Omojii

2006-12-04T16:53:00.000+09:00

Katsura Imperial Villa

Last weekend I headed off to Kyoto for maple leaf viewing. I went to Tofukunji (a shrine) where the crowds were overwhelming but the leaves beautiful. The next day I toured the Katsura Imperial Villa in the rain. If anyone makes it to Kyoto, they should definately check out the garden there.

YATTA!!!

2006-12-04T16:49:00.000+09:00

I got in to med school!
I got in to med school!

Yes, it is official. The school where I left my interview to go throw-up (OSU) has admitted me. In other news, I've been rejected from CASE and am waiting on four more schools to see if I will get interviews.

Thank you to everyone who has helped me out in during the application process and put up with my stress-induced mood swings!

Love,
Al

Hellooooo Japan!

2006-11-19T18:15:00.000+09:00

Sorry for the long delay between posts, I really have no excuse. I've had some good adventures and a few nice trips. I'll try to recount them later.

For now though I'm sitting at the Starbucks at the Osaka Airport (KIX) waiting for the next bus back to Himeji. I've just returned from less than a week in the US, doing med school interviews and having a mock thanksgiving with my family. Well, part of my family. Courtney couldn't make it down from Montreal and Sigrid and the cousins were still up in Chicago. My apologies to my friends in the US. I didn't really tell anyone I was coming back. I knew I'd be busy with school stuff and wouldn't have time to see anyone

For those waiting curious about my interviews, I had two last week. On Monday I rushed out to OSU in Columbus and on Wednesday I interviewed at IU. Had I known I was having an interview on Monday when I scheduled my plane ticket, I probably would have skipped my students' speech contest on Saturday and flown over a day earlier (I left on Sunday and arrived on Sunday). As it was, I didn't sleep much Friday night, then Saturday I took some friends' advice and stayed up all night, thinking I would sleep the whole way to the US and be a day ahead adjusting to time zones. As it was, I didn't sleep at all on the plane, and only got 6 hours Sunday night. I was exhausted for my interview, had a pounding headache, and fought off nausea all morning. Throughout my interview I don't think I answered questions very coherently, as my only thoughts were how much time was left and trying to fight back vomitting. As it was, my interview said, "So, do you have any questions?" My answer, "Where's the bathroom?" So, I'm not sure what sort of chance I have after that. Let's just say, they won't be forgetting me soon.

At my IU interview, I didn't throw up, I didn't pass out, and no one died. So I guess it went better. I'll find out about OSU this week, and IU in either March or May.

I got an interview invitation from Northwestern this week though!

HALLOWEEN!!!!

2006-11-02T17:29:00.000+09:00

Once again, my building of Himeji's resident gaijin teachers hosted a Halloween party for the local kids. Last year we planned for 75 kids and over 110 showed up. So this year I wasn't really involved in planning, but I said I would help at the actual event. I removed myself so far from responsibility that I didn't even plan on wearing a costume until 1:00 on Saturday. With the party starting in 4 hours, I rushed around Himeji trying to put together a costume. I had one idea, to make myself a treasure chest- paint a big cardboard box, wear it like a skirt with brown pants, and glue 1 yen coins all over my shirt, find a bunch of cheap party jewelry, a tiara, and so forth. Everyone else thought this was really stupid, which I'll admit it was. I think I just really wanted to glue shiny stuff to myself. Anyway, without any time I decided to go as a pirate, since I was already wearing a stripy red/white shirt and had a pair of brown boots. I searched all over this little city for some face paint and supplies before returning home. I think I did decently well. Goal: Scary.

Yo yo yo!
DEAD PIRATE RECIPE:
Lots of white face paint
Red paint for slit throat
Fishing lures for fish still stuck in hair after emerging from the sea
Cut and pin random plants in hair for seaweedy-look
Sash. And/or belt

Not pictured:
Big tall brown boots
Eyepatch

HANSHIN TAI-GAAAAASU!!!

2006-07-07T16:49:00.000+09:00

"I am a Hanshin Tigers fan."- half of my students.

Now I sort of understand why all my students and the entire population of my prefecture makes the above statement. Thursday night I skipped my Japanese lesson and went to Kobe with my friend Naoki to see the game. We got seats in the way outfield, next to the visitor's section. The stadium is in Kobe, with Rokko mountain towering in the background.

This was the most amazing game I have ever seen. Wait, I take that back. The game wasn't that interesting, but the fans were amazing. Now, Japan is fabulous at organizing it's population for anything, from making perfectly straight lines out of chaos to orchestrating an entire stadium of baseball fans. I'm serious. Each bleacher section had it's own conductor wearing a bright yellow shirt with white gloves. At a signal from the leader, they'd lead the crowd's chears so that the entire section is together. And they didn't just stick with one song. EACH PLAYER up to bat had their own song that everyone knew. And when the crowd wasn't singing these individual songs, they would sing just general chants.

The Yokohama Bay Star's visiting section was equally well organized. They brought five trumpets, a drum, and flashcards. The flashcard guy would hold up the right chant, and their section of 100 people would all sing it jumping up and down in temple with the whistle and band.

At the bottom of the 7th, instead of singing (which they'd been doing the whole time anyway) the entire stadium broke out packets of balloons and released them on Yokohama's last out. If the Tigers win, they release a second round of balloons at the game's last out. Fortunately, they won.

After the game, the whole stadium sings the team's song, then goes through all the players' songs once more. And everyone knows all these, well, except me!

Tiger's Song:
Rokko Oroshi

Rokko oroshi ni sasso to
Soten kakeru nichirin no
Seishun no haki uruwashiku
Kagayaku wagana zo Hanshin Taigasu
O-o-o-o Hanshin Taigasu
Fure-fure-fure-fure

Toshi hatsuratsu tatsu ya ima
Nekketsu sude ni teki o tsuku
Ju-o no iki takaraka ni
Muteki no warera zo Hanshin Taigasu
O-o-o-o Hanshin Taigasu
Fure-fure-fure-fure

The Wind of Mount Rokko
(The official English version, but not a direct translation.)

Dashing swiftly through the wind blowin' from Rokko
Like the big sun soaring in the clear blue sky
Mighty spirit of the youth shows the victor's grace
The name that shines in glory "Hanshin Tigers"
Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Hanshin Tigers
Hooray, Hooray, Hooray, Hooray!

Weeeeeeee!

2006-07-06T11:44:00.000+09:00

I'm coming home!
ETA: July 11th.
ETD: July 31st

Himeji Yukata Matsuri!

2006-06-24T11:51:00.000+09:00

Summer has finally arrived to my part of Japan, and with it Matsuri season. "Matsuri" translates basically as summer festival. Usually, they include long lines of Japanese fair food (delicious!), fair games (example- catch goldfish in nets!), and people walking around in Yukata. The food ranges from yakisoba- grilled soba noodles in sauce with cabbage and stuff, takoyaki- eggy octopus balls, to crepes and slushies. The games I'm not so knowledgeable on, there's one where kids get to keep little baby turles, which are adorable, and one where they get to catch goldfish. Now, everyone know the Japanese kimono, but usually these are pretty heavy and hot. The summer answer to this problem then is the yukata. They're about the same bathrobe-looking cut of a kimono, but they're made out of cotton, come in fabulously bright colors, and are designed for maximum cooling. The Himeji festival lasted for two days this year, more on that later. It was pouring on the first day, Thursday, so it was basically one day long.

I started off getting to the matsuri late. I borrowed a yukata from my neighbor Lexi, and we struggled to get it tied to me before I had to run and catch a bus to Japanese class. After class, I wandered the streets looking for Lexi and ended up running into Taube, Julian, and a few of their Japanese friends. Link over to Taube's blog to see some great pictures of girls in their yukata, I was an idiot and didn't take any good pictures of them... The Japanese kids in their little yukata's are the cutest thing in the world. They're running around in bright flowery robes with big bows on their backs. They look like little presents. I just wanted to take one home! I later ran into one of my favorite students from Toyotomi who graduated this spring, Aya. She's one of the girls I helped coach through speech contest last fall. I've actually missed her quite a bit, so I was excited to see her. I got her number, so maybe I can see her again.

So after the festival, we wandered over to the bars for a drink or two and hung out there until about one a.m., when I got a call from Lexi. The "bosozoku" were rioting down by the station trying to pick fights with the Japanese riot police.

The bosozoku are motorcycle gangs of youths under about 25. Some of them graduate the bosozoku to join the "yakuza", or really violent Japanese mafia. But my friend Naoki was explaining that most of them will eventually leave the gang, get real jobs, and start families. I guess this is supposed to explain the police-bosozoku relationship. This seems to be the bosozoku coming up, screaming in the cops faces, throwing anything and everything at them, and seeing just how far they can push the police. For their part, the police reaction seems to be to hold their ground, and try to talk the bosozoku into going home.

When I got down to the station, there were probably about 200 riot police encircling these big buses for hauling people off. They lined up side by side with their big rectacngular shields forming a mobile barrier between them and the crowd. They needed these shields and helmets to fend off the advances of the bosozoku. The bosozoku were all dressed up for the event, wearing long embroidered coats and matching pants, and orange/blondish dyed hair. I've been warned against taking pictures of them, so I have no visuals. But the bosozoku were throwing everything and anything they could find at the cops, who would occassionally make a rush at the crowd. It was kind of scary, but there were as many spectators as cops. There was one girl, probably with a bosozoku, who had her two young daughters running around near their strollers through all of this, so I figured it couldn't be all that unsafe. It really looked more like a sports game than a riot- which I guess it couldn't reall be designated as one. The bosozoku seemed to know just how far they could push the cops before backing off, and the cops seemed to hold their ranks well and not get to pissed off of excited through all of this. Eventually I had to use the bathroom and was bored so we left. There are just some things about Japan that I don't think I'll ever understand.

Climbing Miyajima!

2006-06-16T18:52:00.000+09:00

Peanuts?

2006-06-16T16:45:00.000+09:00

May 3rd.
The family visits Himeji Castle, and confuse the Japanese.
If only the camera was working, you should have seen us in front of the imperial palace! Human pyramid anyone? There's a reason the Japanese kept foreigners out for so long.. and we're a prime example of it.

Aikido is awesome.

2006-06-16T00:04:00.000+09:00

My friend Masahide and my sensei Yamada Shihan, demonstrating in Yamaguchi ken.

We're all going to hell!

2006-06-15T23:49:00.000+09:00

Really!
Corko, Dad, and I took a special tour of a few of the hells in Beppu. Beppu is a small geothermally active town on the northwestern coast of Kyushu island. For centuries this area has been famous as a hotbed (har har har) for spas and onsens (public bathing houses), taking full advantage of the naturally heated water. We however, got a kick out of it's more recent development as an epicenter for gimmicky tourist traps. Check out one of the nine jigyo's, or hell's below.

Blood Hell. Featuring Dad and Courtney

Takayama

2006-06-15T23:43:00.000+09:00

There's an explanation for this...

HakoNEH? Part II

2006-04-12T19:36:00.000+09:00

After the museum, we took the cute little red train up the mountain even further to the town of Gora. There we transfered to a little shuttle train that ran to the top of the mountain where we boarded a cable car. Although out in the mountains and off of the peak tourist season, there was by no means a dearth of people. We were packed into our little swinging car with as many people as possible so that not everyone was completely sitting on a bench. No matter, the view was spectacular. Travelling through hakone was one of the few times in Japan that I haven't been completely surrounded by concrete. Our train rides and now the cable car offered a glimpse of Japan that hadn't been turned into the neverending sea of concrete that stretches continuously from Tokyo to Himeji. Real trees, not overly pruned replicas of trees, and actual forests stretched out before us. Pretty soon however, the cabin started to reak like rotten eggs. Below us, the formerly dense forest of cedars and bamboo groves disappeared and was replaced with a landscape of tan and yellow rock, hissing sulfurous gases into the air.
Our gondola swung into the docking bay at the top of what could only be one of Japan's first tourist traps. We soon ran into masses of people, not just deboarding from the gondolas, but streaming out from the parking lot filled with big tourist buses. Everyone was going to the same place. We were swept up in the stream of people and made it to the source. A short walk up the mountain a little path ran around some of the more impressive steaming pools of geothermally heated stinkpots. And this is where people were congregating.
People were engaged in two activities, buying black eggs hardcooked in the sulfur springs, and having their picture taken. Often, the latter involved the display of having successfully completed the former. We took part in both. Our purchase of half a dozen black eggs turned out to be brilliant. Although we didn't eat any of them at the time, they travelled excellently and turned out to be the perfect thing for a healthy snack while travelling.

Black eggs in hand, we reboarded the gondola and swung out past the sulfur springs and on to yet more sights!

SHODAN DESU YO!!!!

2006-04-08T23:08:00.000+09:00

Solid proof. It even has a watermark.

HakoNEH? Part I

2006-04-08T17:42:00.000+09:00

Ehhhh? Henry Moore? In Japan?
Indeed. Tuesday started out with a visit to the Hakone Open Air Museum (and indoor Picasso painted ceramics museum). This turned out to be one of my favorite parts of our trip. The museum started out with this amazing statue on a big column, looking out over a valley with mountains on either side. Modern sculptures with parts that rotate and spin in the wind, sculptured tunnels that dip underground, and traditional sculptures of girls sitting on benches fill the grounds at every turn and wind in the path. The museum is also beautifully landscaped, with small koi filled ponds surrounded by ferns pushing their fiddlehead starts out of the ground underneath cherry trees just waiting for the next warm day to burst forth. The museum contains work from artists from all over the world, Russia, Brazil, England, America, and of course Japan. What the museum is really known for though, is its rotating collection of Henry Moore pieces. For all the other non-artists out there who might be thinking, "where did I hear this name?" One of his pieces recently made headlines for being purloined in England (I think). Notably, for being stolen using at least a small crane to lift it. It was enormous. Anyway, the museum was awesome, one of my favorite pieces was this big spiral staircase encased entirely in stained glass. I also really liked a piece called "the hand of god". Which I assure you is amazing in real life, even if pictures can't capture it. OK, I gotta run off to Aikido . Later I'll recount our journey across steaming sulfurous landscapes in a cable car followed by pirate ship ride. I'll leave you with those thoughts.

Ooooooosaka and the start of Hakone

2006-04-02T22:32:00.000+09:00

PARENTS PARENTS PARENTS TRAVEL TRAVEL PARENTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yay!
Sunday, March 26th, my mother and my aunt arrived at the Kansai International Airport in Ooooosaka JAPAN! Since their arrival, we've adventured and traveled all around the Kansai and Kanto regions of Japan. We've traveled through the inaka (country) and through the bustling district of Shinjuku, Tokyo, seen the See no Evil Hear no Evil Monkeys at the mausoleum of Tokugawa Ieyasu, traveled in a pirate ship at the foot of Mt. Fuji (obscured in clouds), eaten the black eggs of Oowakudani sulfur springs, and lastly, we've spent more time communally naked than is imaginable. All this in one week! Lastly, we trekked out to Kyoto but by this time I think everyone was on serious shrine overload.

Days 1 and 2.
Sunday and Monday in Osaka, later Hakone.

The adventures began in Osaka. After an afternoon of hanging out with Lexi, cruising the covered shopping arcade, sipping beer at the Kirin brewery and tasting restaurant, and general people watching, I picked my parents up at the Kansai international airport. They were pretty wiped out from the 14 hour flight, so we checked into the hotel and turned in early.
In the morning, we made a short trip to the UMEDA SKY GARDEN, which is a marvel in space-techy architecture. The building attracts lots of tourists to take a glass elevator up to the almost top floor, then ride an escalator encased in glass to the top. The roof is open to walk around and gives a pretty amazing view of Osaka (which I'm not showing here!)

That afternoon, we packed up our bags and caught the Shinkansen up to Hakone, which is a region up in the mountains famous as a day trip out of Tokyo for Onsen-ing (hot spring public baths) and hiking. My Momsy made all our travel plans last December, which was before the accident. About four years ago, my mom had her knee replaced and she was doing pretty well until January. While out throwing toys for the dog she slipped and tore up all the connections she had worked so hard to strengthen. At first, she was unsure whether or not she would even be able to make it to Japan, but thankfully she did! However, my Mom's not one for big cities so we spent a lot of time in the countryside, which unfortunately, we couldn't hike very well. After getting off the Shinkansen, we transferred to a small, two-car, cute little train that ran us through a series of switchbacks and tunnels through forests and up the mountains. It was beautifully scenic. I felt like I was in a cross between "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom" and "Donkey Kong" (where you ride around in those little carts).

We got off the train at Miyanoshita, which is a small tourist resort town, and made our way down the steeeeep road to our hotel, the historic (famous?) Fujiya. Hauling our luggage up to the hotel later became my mother's favorite memory of Japan. After struggling all day with bags, the last hill to our hotel seemed pretty overwhelming to my tired relatives. That is, until the two porters spotted us, sprinted down the hill and whisked our luggage away. It was in the lobby and on a cart before my mother could take another step. (Note to anyone visiting Japan- don't over pack! There is no where on trains to stow bags. In fact, you would travel best with only a small daypack. I would recommend packing nothing, but your traveling partners might complain after a few days). The hotel was very large, and old. On the way to the room our baggage handler proudly informed me that John Lennon had stayed there for three months. The royalty of Sweden, Korea, Japan, and a handful of other countries had also put in some time at the Fujiya.

We got in around dinner time, so we put on our shoes and hit the streets to find somewhere to eat. Nothing. Absolutely nothing. We passed dozens of little street restaurants that had all closed up by 6:00 and an Italian restaurant. Since we didn't feel quite like spaghetti, we headed back to the hotel's grill and were woefully underdressed for their fancy French grill and restaurant. French? Yes. French and Expensive. So we had the cheapest thing on the menu, a salad, squash soup, and curry. I would say the soup was excellent, the curry so-so. (Japanese curry in a French restaurant in Japan should not exist).

The next day we visited the Hakone Open Air Museum, which was my favorite part of the trip (maybe), but that will have to wait. I'm off to Hanami, or Cherry Blossom Viewing, in the park with my school and cannot stay and write more.

Shinsa!!

2006-03-15T20:29:00.000+09:00

I’d been fluctuating between dread and anticipation for months, and this weekend it was upon me. So Saturday night I spent my 23^rd birthday not out in celebration and revelry, but quietly at home. My Shodan test was the next day.

Sunday morning I woke up and fortunately go to talk to Jim Sensei in Ohio, who gave me some wonderful words of encouragement,

“You’re going to pass. It’s just a matter of how well. Own the f***ing mat. That mat’s yours. Tell them that, but be sure to do so in a peaceful and harmonious manner”.

A bit before noon I hopped on my bike and sped to the south side of Himeji where testing would be held. Now, testing didn’t actually start until about 3 but I was dressed and on the mat by noon. There were a few people to throw around with at first. One of my favorite teachers, Kuramoto Sensei (unfortunately from a different dojo), and one of his (very cute) students, Takuya, were there. I threw around with them and the successive aikido practitioners that wandered in until about 1:30, when the official, pre-testing class started.

This class could really be changed to “seiza” practice, ‘cause that’s what it ended up being. An hour of sitting in the most painful position possible, listening to lecture I couldn’t understand. Ahhhh Japan. After seiza, we had a short rest before testing started, beginning with the lowest grade of white belts and working up.

For the aikido people, my test consisted of suwariwaza ikyu through yonkyu, zagi kokyu, a minute of hanmi handachi jiyowaza, and four minutes of standing jiyo waza. In practice my problem has always been tensing up and doing the same techniques over and over again. So for my test I really tried to be relaxed. Didn’t work though. I felt like I was being very rough on Kobayashi-san, my uke (partner attacking me), on the seated techniques. I should have slowed it down more, worked on precision of movement. For the jiyowaza, I got a bit nervous and was very stiff, although I never stopped moving, and I felt like I kept doing the same techniques over and over again. The four minutes went by very quickly. Before I knew it my Shihan had called out time. My thoughts at the time were something like, “Over! I’m not quite ready for it to be over, I could do better. I could be more flowing, have more variety, lead more. I was just getting into this. Oh well. Over is good.” Pass or fail I did it, I took a shodan test in Japan. That’s good enough for today. I sat down, bowed to my partner, bowed to the Shihans, bowed to the Shomen, and jogged off the mat.

I had no idea how I did, I was just happy to have gotten the chance to test. As I sat back down in the rows Kuramoto Sensei gave me a "Okay" sign behind his back so the Shihans couldn't see. (Kuramoto Sensei is a story himself, he's part of the J-Tai, or Japan self defense forces and leads 2 platoons).

Two other people tested Shodan at the same time as I did, and one more tested afterwards. There was one last nidan (second degree black belt) test and the promotion grading was over. Afterwards, Nakamura Shihan (testing official) gave a lecture, which of course I couldn’t understand, and suddenly I heard my name. I had no idea what it could be, did I do something wrong? Did I pass? What could he be possibly be talking about? After class I helped sweep the mats before seeking out my boss and sempai, Iizuka Sensei, to act as translator. Apparently, after testing Nakamura Shihan praised five peoples' tests. Mine was one of them. Iizuka Sensei told me I should feel honored to be praised. Yay!

After testing, and any special practice, we usually have a drinking/dinner party. At Japanese drinking parties, it’s polite to go around and pour everyone drinks and sort of chat them up for a little while. So finally Iizuka Sensei translated between Nakamura Shihan and myself. Nakamura Shihan told me that I had the top Shodan test of the day. I couldn’t believe it. It’s really hard to say, “no no no, I’m not that good”, when you just want to grin like an idiot.

Another thing about Japan, they love speeches. They love to make foreigners give speeches too. No idea what they're about though. No one bothers to translate them to English, so I have no idea what I'm supposed to be saying when I’m asked to stand up, but what I say gets translated. So I had to stand up and give my impression of testing, or the dojo, or maybe the state of international affairs. I really have no idea. So I stood up, thanked everyone for their teaching, their ukemi for my test, and the warmness and welcome they showed me. I think I was on track with that one. So I sat down, and Iizuka Sensei announced that Saturday was my birthday and he somehow got the whole dojo to start singing "Happy Birthday" to me in English. Afterwards, my Sensei gave me a birthday present! I got 2 "Burberry" brand silk handkerchiefs his wife picked out, a box of cookies, and a towel/cloth that Jikuhara Sensei was given for participating in the World Aikido Exposition in Tokyo last year. I love my dojo! I don't know if they've given anyone else presents, but I felt loved. Somehow everyone knows my weakness, sweets. curses.

So after a few more speeches, the drinking and pouring of drinks started up again. I sat down to pop a few sweet fried tofu enwrapped rice balls into my mouth and realized that Iizuka Sensei and Nakamura Shihan were talking again. Iizuka Sensei turned to me and asked, “So, do you want katakana or romanji on your certificate?” I had been asking Iizuka Sensei if I’d passed all night, but he kept telling me I’d find out later. Now, no one is actually "told" that they pass until/if they get their certificate. But after Nakamura Shihan’s question about my certificate, Iizuka Sensei said he was positive I passed. So I'm not "officially" a black belt for another month. "Officially".

Though writing this blog Wednesday night, after class Monday and Tuesday, they’re calling me a Shodan at my dojo now. Which just makes me really happy.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

And with that, I think the best birthday presents came from my dojo. When Yamada Shihan was stepping off the mat, he held out his hand (surprisingly, not to throw me in some bizarre and totally painful way) and said "Yokkata". Or, Good Job. Now, don't jump on me about "defeating the ego" or "Shodan's only the beginning" quite yet. I know these things! Let me talk about how great I can sometimes, if very rarely, be.
(The mere mention of pain reminds me of Yamada Shihan's new favorite pin we've been working on this week, kneeling on the shin between muscle and bone of uke. This is from a front leg "sweep" from shomenuchi ikkyo. Try it, it hurts!)

The second best thing was the birthday present from my dojo. It sounds weird to most people I'm sure, but it meant a lot to me. In Japan it feels like I'm always on the outside. Not speaking much Japanese, it's kind of hard to communicate and I often feel kind of awkward and out of place.

One last thing, want to see something really funny? It's my hakama. Well, precicely the kanji on my hakama. Or, the amount of kanji on my hakama. Check it check it out yo.
Okay, so the story is this. I realized that I needed a new hakama. Mine (Alex's old one) was a bit too faded to be acceptable in Japan. However, ordering one posed a bit of a problem because the shop owner of course, spoke only japanese. (this being japan). Soooo, I asked my friend Kobayashi to come with me. Kobayashi doesn't speak English very well, but he's enthusiastic. Anyway, so we were at the shop, and he asks, "What kanji? ummmm, hakama?" So I reply, "Well, what do people normally get?" Kobayashi, "Name, dojo" Me, "Okay, how about that." Kobayashi, "Himeji dojo, or Hyogo Aikido". Me, "sure. that sounds good. Whatever you think would be alright." And well, this is the result. Lots of Kanji. Lots. Lots. I was thinking of cutting out everything but my name, but that would leave it off center. But would that be better or worse than having a plethora of kanji?

Leave your comments yo! I always feel loved when I get a new message from someone out there!

Love, Allison

Yatta! Yokota Shihan from Tokyo visits Himeji

2006-03-01T19:16:00.000+09:00

Okay, so I haven't been posting the best entries lately for a couple of reasons. To start, I've been lacking in inspiration and also have forgotten to bring my camera around with me. Hopefully I can come up with some interesting things to mention, but unfortunately I haven't brought my camera with me to anything. So no pictures.

I'll start with the amazing aikido seminar this weekend. Our dojo hosted Yoshiaki Yokota Shihan (7th degree black belt) out of the Tokyo home dojo. I got to the budokan (building dedicated to martial arts) here in Himeji at 11:00 Sunday morning to have lunch and help set up for the seminar. It's a beautiful brand new building, with several enormous rooms for large martial arts demonstrations and seminars. Let's just say it was amazing. Yokota Shihan had this amazing fast, smooth, powerful aikido. At one point he was jumping behind his attacker/partner before tossing him across the room.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. We were supposed to be putting out mats, about 250 of them or so, but somehow I got assigned to serving tea to the Shihans with another girl, Miho.

Serving tea.
Somehow this turned into a very sureal experience. At one point I was wandering the corridors that were circling a room filled with 100 people in kendo armor beating each other with sticks, holding a tea kettle and trying to figure out where the shihans were. How did I get to this point in my life? Now, normally things in Japan seem to run extraordinarily smoothly. Probably because stereotypically, they practice for events over and over and over. I'm not kidding. Anyway, after a long hunt for the Shihans, a search for tea cups, another search for Onishi-san, who had the hot water, a tray to carry the tea cups on, and ten minutes spent trying to open the bag containing the tea, we finally got the tea and all served. Note- Miho almost walked in on a room full of male shihans changing clothes before quickly backtracking and muttering "abunai, abunai, abunai" (dangerous!).

No suits!
Another delightful morning occurance was that everyone, not just me, showed up underdressed. Yatta! Normally, JETs and other foreigners all have an experience or two of showing up in jeans or something casual, to be the only person not in suit and tie. At which point they feel mightily embarrassed and the feeling of not fitting in really sinks in. But there was something uniting for me in having about 10 Japanese people all wishing they'd gone more formal. Really, this discussion about what to do lasted all morning. But that's really just a point for other people in Japan.

Practice!/ Keiko!
Anyway, so after serving tea and all we started practice. First there was a kids class, which about 100 people (not kids) participated in. It was great. We had a short break, then the adults class started. ahhh! It was amazing. Yokota Shihan was just tossing his ukes around. A couple of times he came over and tried to give me some pointers. I felt special. A little background for the non-aikidoists reading this... At seminars, here and in the US, there is always some point the teacher is trying to make about a technique. So the teacher speaks and demonstrates, then I quickly try to find the closest black belt to me and bow to them, forcing them to work with me. So I got to work with some really great people and aahhh, they are so good. So after class we picked up mats, sociallized, changed and moved on to drinking.

PARTY!!!!
After cleaning up mats I went to the locker room and changed and hurried off to dinner. I sat down next to Murayama Sensei and two seats down from Jikuhara Sensei and some more people from my dojo. I love these two guys. They are both completely hilarious in totally different ways that they are totally unconcious of. Murayama sensei is a 4th degree black belt and Jikuhara Sensei a 3rd. Murayama sensei will be totally quiet for a bit, then will really really rapidly say or do something. Jikuhara sensei always tries to speak with me in broken English and only now seems a little less nervous in doing so. Like, everyone here can speak a little bit of English (except Yamada shihan), but they all get really nervous and jittery at the prospect of doing so. It's great.

Anyway, I should wrap this up- this has gotten to be an absurdly long entry and I doubt anyone is still reading this. I mean, I wouldn't be. Last thing- the party. Food was uncharateristically scarce, the "viking" food selection ran out pretty quickly. "viking" here means all you can eat/drink. I'm still trying to figure out how they came up with that one. Anyway, at least the beer/sake didn't run out. At Japanese drinking parties everyone sort of makes rounds and socializes/ kisses up to seniors and pours everyone drinks. I got to talk with Yokota Shihan for a bit, he was really enthusiastic about practicing English. Apparently he'll be in Chicago at Midwest Aikido in the fall, so everyone back home should find out where and when that will be.

I also got to talk to this guy, Fujita Sensei, who's running a dojo in Kobe. I talked with him at our last drinking party in November. (Another thing, Japanese people all remember if they've trained with me, talked with me at a party, anything down to just seeing me entering a convenience store. I mean, how many blonde foreigners do they see? I'm memorable. But dammit, how do they expect me to remember every Japanese person I meet?) One of Fujita sensei's favorite activities is grabbing any of the shy Japanese men that are terrified of talking to foreigners forcing them to "practice english" with me. At one point, he was holding a college student down in his chair because the student kept trying to jump up and run away. We have fun.

Oh my God! I almost forgot, the best part. My dojo keeps suggesting I come up with a nickname, but I'm determined to make them pick one for me if I'm to have one. So Sunday they suggested one. Ar-chan. Which is HILARIOUS. Because they all call me Arison, due to some confusion about last/first names and Japanese pronounciation. So Ar-chan would be an abbrieviation of the mis-pronouciation of my first name. I hope it doesn't stick. I think it's worse than Baaksan, which is what my vice principal at school shouts across the staffroom when he wants me. Anyway, this is an incredibly long entry, so I'll cut out now. Did anyone make it this far?

Dr SAKE!!!

2006-02-15T20:30:00.000+09:00

So, I was just talking with Randy, and he reminded me of DR SAKE!!!!
Props out to Tom Newhall.

In Control?

2006-02-15T20:02:00.000+09:00

Soooo, in tryint to get a hold over my student loans, I emailed the Oberlin Controller's office to look into the status of one of my loans. The response email I received was nothing short of hilarious.

This is the result of our dialogue:
Me to office:
I am the proud holder of a Perkins loan, which I think has
unfortunatelycome into remittance. However, I don't think I've gotten a bill for it yet and don't know if you need my address again or anything like that. If you could please update me on the status of this loan, I will forever be in your debt.

The office to me:

Allison,

Last year on May 26 you sat through an exit interview session regarding the repayment of your Perkins loan. You were encouraged to keep the white exit packet with you at all times because it provided all of the repayment information you need including ACS' website (https://www.acs-education.com ). You were also told that you are required to keep our department or ACS informed of your current address. On your Personal Information Sheet you indicated you were employed through the JET program and working in Japan. If this is true, that is why you are not receiving any mail - your mail isn't going to Japan. Therefore, if it is necessary to update your address, at this time please access ACS' website, click on "How to Register", complete the Borrower Registration page, and update your address on your Account Summary Page. While on your Account Summary Page you can find all the information you need to remind you of the repayment information. Per the information provided you in the exit interview session, your first quarterly payment of $120.00 is due on June 1, 2006. Unless you have continued your education or if you have received some type of def erment or forbearance through your Stafford lender. If so, please let me know and I will provide more specific details as to what you need to do.

First- I would like to note the condecending and aggressive tone this letter presents.
Second- I'm in Japan. Of course I'm not going to take a huuuuuge packet of papers with me in my 60 pound luggage limit.
Third- Note the "you aren't receiving any bills, 'cause you're in Japan..." followed by "your bill will start in June." These two statements seem to be in complete contradiction to each other.

Good job Wedge....

Chris burns is amazing

2006-02-11T18:37:00.000+09:00

If for nothing else, than for linking to Dr. McNinja (http://www.drmcninja.com/). Where, I have spent the last hour- not wasted mind you! Spent! In Joyful entertained bliss! By the adventures of Dr. McNinja, who is now my new hero. I'm thinking about asking Courtney (my sister) to draw one of the cartoons on a t-shirt for me for my birthday. That would be amazing. Just like Chris Burns. But in a wash and wear sort of way.

How to get yelled at, without actually being yelled at.

2006-02-11T16:44:00.000+09:00

Is this some confounding Zen koan? It sounds like it could be, but isn't. At all. It is entirely possible.

Apparently, I made a big social blunder at aikido last night, got yelled at, and didn't even know it. Japan is a strange land indeed. I mean, how can I possibly get lectured and yelled at by my awesome and totally cool but last night terrifying Shihan and not be aware of it? I mean, I know I can be a bit spacey... but let me explain.

In preparation for my upcoming shodan test, I got permission to train an extra night at a different dojo (under the same sensei, he's a travelling teacher) without having to pay the extra monthly fee. One of my dojo friends, Masahide, has been trying to help me out, giving me pointers on what I'm doing wrong and working with me after class. Anyway, I told him about my training Friday and he said he'd go to the dojo with me. So we sit down to bow in, and my sensei pulls him aside and just lets into him. Terrifying. Yamada Shihan is first of all, really really good at aikido, and really powerful. And terrifying when angry. I have no idea why he's yelling either. So my friend waits at the side of the mat all through warm ups, then only sort of half-way participates in class, and never with me. Usually I have to try to get away from him to train with other people. But not last night. After class he's talking with another aikido student, and I ask what they were talking about. Apparently he wasn't supposed to be training last night because he only paid the dojo dues to his home dojo (in the nearby town of Ako), and not for the Friday dojo. But this doesn't quite seem complete to me. I figured it would be impolite to push it and so I drop it.

This afternoon I was talking to a foreigner, not from my dojo, but who has a solid understanding of Japanese dojos and how the Senseis here tend to think. Apparently, my Sensei was also yelling at me, but indirectly. I had been granted a favor to train at that dojo, but my friend had not been invited. He had assumed that it would be alright to show up and practice but it wasn't. And since we had come to practice together, it was also my fault. I didn't get yelled at directly 'cause I'm not Japanese and don't know all these unspoken rules (probably also, I would have no idea why I was being yelled at.) But by publicly being angry, he was also warning me.

Now, was this a big mistake? Tomorrow when I see Yamada Sensei, will he still be angry? Did I get my friend in trouble? Am I in trouble at all? I feel bad, but who knows? It's Japan! Weeeeeeee!

Late Pictures

2006-02-08T19:19:00.000+09:00

Soooo, looking for a new background for my desktop I realized I had some pic's from my trip to Kyoto with Josh and his sister Ellie that I forgot to post... Ooops. So these are older pictures from January right after New Year's. Josh and I embarass Japanese people everywhere with our photo taking antics...

Is it bigger than a Redwood?

The Silver Pavilion,
as seen through a pine tree.

I don't have much to add to these, I haven't taken my camera out really in a while. Also, other than school, studying, and Aikido I haven't been up to much else!

Should I stay or should I go now? (cue the Clash)

2006-02-07T16:23:00.000+09:00

Well, I reached a decision on renewing my contract. After emailing my Oberlin Biology Advisor on Tuesday, and getting no reply, and calling and emailing the pre-med advisior at Oberlin (and getting no reply) I called the esteemable Peter Rhese who gave me som excellent advice. Peter Sensei, who not only is a fantastic Aikido teacher at my secret dojo, but also is a researcher in protein crystallography and is working here in Japan. Based on this advice and as George Ledyard (maybe it was him) put it, following my bliss, I've decided to stay here another year. The vegetarian cult thing will have to wait awhile. But half a week after making that decision I'm feel like it was the right one. Thanks to all who contributed their advice and cult leader applications.

Ganbarimasu!!!!

2006-01-31T18:55:00.000+09:00

So last night after Aikido, my Sensei called me over to begin filling out the stack (well, 5 sheets) of papers for my shodan test. One of them was a summary of the fees, which translates to about $250.
Before this, the class had ended with my Sensei telling us that Sunday he witnessed some Dan testing under our head Dude. The testing looked pretty good to him, but apparently Head Dude thought otherwise. "Goodluck (Ganbatte)", he wished those of us testing.
So, after giving me the price breakdown, he explained that $240 of it will be refunded in the event that I fail.
Ganbatte.

On Recontracting

2006-01-29T20:10:00.000+09:00

So... This Friday my papers for RECONTRACTING are due. Which is terrrrriffying. Anyone who knows me knows that I hate making decisions. I am currently leaning 64 1/2 towards staying and 35 1/2 towards not re-contracting. Which could lead to any number of options, this includes, but is not limited to; backpacking around SE Asia until my funds run up, returning to South America until my funds run out, coming home and getting a "real job" in a lab while I apply to graduate school, or opening a combination vegetarian restaurant/cult headquarters in Phoenix, AZ with Mac. He'd run the restaurant, I'd manage the cult. We just need an inspirational/insane leader. Maybe I could get Josh to join us.
I'd like to make a short list of the reasons to stay or reasons to go, so that my Dear Readers can offer their advice, experiences, or vegetarian recipes for our new restaurant.

Should I Stay or Should I Go (now...)
Stay:
1. Japan really isn't that bad, once you explain that yes, bacon does count as meat and yes, garlic is OK.
2. Aikido. I love my dojo here, the training is great and I just want to be on the mat as much as possible. Also, in the event that I fail my shodan test I can try again in September. (Joku desu)
3. I think I'm just starting to scratch the surface of things to experience while I'm here. I think the first half of my year here has been finding out about the cool things to do; now I just have to do them. For instance, my prefecture apparently has great skiing North of Himeji, but I've been too busy preparing for my shodan and MCAT tests to make it up there yet. Next year I want to learn how to snowboard. Another example, I met a Shokuhachi master (Japanese flute) on Thursday who offered to teach a few of us twice a month. There is also any number of beautiful old places to visit, temples to see, I want to get into some parks and things this summer.
4. Learn a little more Japanese. I've been a bit too busy to study much, but after April want to really catch up on my studies.
5. I've met a lot of really great people here that I'd hate to leave so early.
6. I want to travel outside of Japan more on my holidays, use this place as a base.
7. Having a place that feels like home. After a few nights out of town, I can walk out of the train station, see the castle up the road and let out a sigh of familiarity. These are the streets I know, these are my favorite restaurants, this is where my friends hang out.
8. Having people visit me and show them my town!
9. Having one more year to sort of goof off before starting "real life".

Go:
1. Central heating. Japan winters are killing me. I wore the wrong shoes to school the other day, and the top layer of skin on my toes is all ouchy hurty 4 days afterwards from being numb all day.
2. I'm ancy to get back in school/ start an actual "career path." Most of the people over here as ALT's have degrees in things like English, East Asian Studies, and the like. Or they are actual teachers. I feel like I'm wasting my degree in Biology by not putting it to use. Is that silly?
3. Japanese schools. I really liked the last school I was at, Toyotomi, but this year I started at a different school which I don't like as much. It's twice the size and the teachers seem more rushed and less friendly. Maybe I just need a period of adjustment to the new place. But I have no assurance that next fall I will go back to Toyotomi (I will change schools twice again if I re-contract). I could go to a better school, or a worse one. I really like the kids though. The girls always come up to me and try and talk, and try even harder to get me to remember their names. I occasionally run into them in town and they yell "Oh! Allison Sensei!" But, work is work, right? I love teaching at elementary schools though. There isn't this pressure to maaaake the kids learn English, we just play games and it's great. Last week the teacher wanted to teach "Shall we..." So instead of a big rigid lesson, we played "Shall we go to the Zoo?" And all the kids got to pretend to be animals. I taught the penguin dance to my favorite group of girls (class 5-4). The really ADD kids all wanted to be monkeys so they could shriek and jump up and down and scratch their armpits.

So... yeah. I'm leaning towards staying another year. Take the MCAT in April, work on med school applications from here, fly home for interviews twice in 2006, and see the family and my dog... Thoughts? Leave your comments, and I may or may not take head of your advice.

On The mysteries of Yuzu Cha

2006-01-29T19:51:00.000+09:00

I'd heard about it.
I'd seen it myself.
I had to try it.

Yuzu Cha.

It sounded aweful, a tea made by pouring hot water over orange marmelade. Why would anyone drink this stuff? I had to find out. This afternoon I swung by my favorite hideaway in Himeji, Sento Maaakusu Cafe (St. Marc's Cafe) and thought I would pass up my usual cup of coffee, and go for something less dehydrating. I got my cup of orange marmelade tea, climbed up the stairs into the (gasp!) Non-smoking section (these are rare in Nihonland) and took my first sip... Terrible. Flat out bad. It was sort of syruppy and very sweet, but with the bitter taste of orange rind, which came from the huge pile of orange rinds not surprisingly found at the bottom of my cup. I mean, what else would I expect from a tea made of orange marmelade?

Although disappointed in my experience with yuzu-cha , it will do nothing to diminish my quest to try everything weird but non-meaty in Japan. You might think, there aren't that many non-meaty weird things in Japan. But you would indeed be wrong! A new favorite of mine is this bizarre cold black barklike thing... I have no other way of describing it. It looks like thin black shredded roots (it might be) with gyunikku (some weird jelly type thing), beans, and sweet tofu. mmmm. It's delicious. I suggest anyone who is in Japan or visiting find it and try it. With that said, wish me luck on my quest of finding weird, delicious things to eat in Nipponland!

ahhhhk! aAAAAaaaaAAAAhhhhhhh!

2006-01-25T18:28:00.000+09:00

Ok, so before I can write anything else in my blog I must share this dear readers... Saturday I went to my Himeji dojo with Tom and had a splendid time being thrown across the mat. After class, I was figuring talking with my friend Masahide when one of my Senseis, Jikuhara Sensei, came over to relay some news. It went like this:

"?????(japanese)???? testing ???(japanese)???? you ????Shodan?????(japanese)??????? March. Okay?"

What? errr, no? Wait, what? March? Not the more distant/preparable September?
Oh my god oh my god oh my god. Can't be right. Maybe they're just testing me. I'll just go to class Monday and see if anyone mentions it. So I made it through class without it coming up, until after class Masahide comes up to me:

"sooooo, shodan. Zagi one two three four. Hamni Handachi one minute. Standing four minutes."

Ahk! It's worse than expected! Maybe I can start going to the Friday Shodan's only class to help prepare. ahhhhhhhh. This and MCAT in April. ok, off to nihongo lessons.

wish me luck, or as my supervisor said, ganbatte... I'll need it.

On Aikido frustrations- followup

2006-01-22T17:30:00.000+09:00

So.... I ended up going to class on Tuesday, and it was wonderful. Not that I did particularly well, but I went to my not so ouchy hurty dojo with a very open mind and it was great. Thanks to everyone for their advice and experiences on my last entry.

My friend Tom Newhall from Oberlin College Aikikai has been in Japan since the start of January, and finally made it down to the Kansai on Friday night. So we met up in Nara to train at Sanshozenji Zen temple and Aikido dojo (www.aikinara.jp). Why? Our wonderful sensei from Oberlin, Jim Klar Sensei, trained their about 15 years ago and we felt we should make some sort of "pilgramage" out there. The dojo is a short ride on a local train out of Nara, Tom and I promised to meet at the train station near the dojo. I got off the train, and started looking around for Tom and/or the right direction to the dojo when a little old man noticed that I was looking a little lost. I asked him for directions, but they were a little too complicated for me to coordinate with the ones Jim Sensei had sent us, so he offered to drive me and Tom there as soon as I found him. Tom soon showed up, and we piled into our new aquantance's car. The drive took a little longer than we expected, but we managed to try to make small talk (in Japanese!). Tom and I stepped out of the car, and walked into the temple grounds.

We wandered into the complex, if only to try to pick out which building was the dojo, which was the monk's quarters, and which one we would be attacked by ninjas if we entered. We decided the first one looked like a residence, so in the darkness we proceeded down the gravel path through an ancient cemetary trying to identify the dojo. We eventually found it, but the lights were out and no one was there yet. We sat down on the steps in the dark, surrounded by ancient graves, and broke out some onigiri goodness, followed by chocolate covered almonds. Dinner of Champions. Twenty minutes before class the first car pulled into the parking lot and the first aikidoka greeted us and led us into the temple...

More later...

On Aikdio frustrations

2006-01-16T23:22:00.000+09:00

It seems that the more I practice Aikido, the worse I get. I just got back from an extremely frustrating aikido class, took out and sorted my 8 types of tonight's recycling (the other 2 plus burnables goes out friday), came in, and had a delicious grape chu-hi. Now, I was speaking with Randy earlier in the night, who made the claim that I have one of the biggest egos of anyone he knows. Maybe tied with Josh. Now, I couldn't figure out if he was joking or not, but it certainly might explain why I was so frustrated with myself in Aikido tonight. It might be something like this... So I majored in biology, because it was really easy for me, and thus made me feel really smart. Now I'm doing something that I can't sleep through and get an A, and I am not handling it well.
It's easy to say, "I'm not a shodan (insert nidan, sandan... shihan) therefore I can't do this technique". But then I tell myself "Allison, you've been doing this for four years now. Certainly you're better than this. FOCUS!!! Why aren't you focussing? Stop yelling at yourself and focus!" A more focussed Allison emerges... "Ok, my partner has got this timing thing down pretty well, try to adopt that and see what happens." I try to pick up what he is doing and mess it up, leading to: "why don't you have timing Allison? You aren't getting this at all! AAAAahhh stop thinking and just train".
This thought process (process? there is no process here) continues throughout class, with me never being able to get my head straight. So now I can't decide if it would be better to take tomorrow off, and go in Friday (or saturday) really missing aikido, or if I should go to class tomorrow, and take the attitude that training is training, get on the mat and stop complaining.
At any rate, I should get to bed and stop procrastinating taking a shower, which I have done because my towels are in the washer.
If anyone has any suggestions or comments, either about my aikido, my excessive thinking on the mat, or on the size of mine (or Josh's) ego, please leave me a comment! Remember, real friends leave messages!
Al

Happy New Year! Episode III, Revenge of the...hmm. I hope no one's seeking revenge...

2006-01-07T22:35:00.000+09:00

Well, I could go in chronological order, and update this blog according to the list I made earlier, but I'm much too excited to tell you all about my wonderful New Years Eve to do that. so here we go, out of order.

Saturday, December 31st- Sunday, January 1st.
Ahhh New Years. It seems like I have been rather short on good New Year's Eve experiences, most of them having been pretty lame in the past. So this year I was really excited to do something fun. My first thoughts were to go to Nara or Kyoto, join in the throngs of Japanese people out ringing in the new year and ancient shrines and temples. I just had to find someone to go with, as not to be alone. Well, it turned out that everyone wanted to go to Oooosaka clubbing. Scratch shrine visits. Taube, Julian, Mac, and their visiting friend Gwen from back home, had headed out to Osaka already on Friday. Lex and I joined them Saturday afternoon.
We spent the afternoon and early evening wandering around the shopping districts and in and out of arcades, where I saw one of the most bizarre things yet. Electronic Horse Racing. No, they are not betting on horses via computers, they are betting on virtual horses. Check it out:
There was also a big table, where little horses ran around a track, apparently by magnets, which people also bet on.

After wandering around with Julian and Mac, we regrouped and split up again. Julian left for the airport to pick up another one of their friends coming in, Shay. However, his flight got cancelled and he didn't make it in until Sunday. Anyway, Lex and I split off and had dinner, Lexi convinced/inspired me to get some awesome (read- hilarious) big yellow sunglasses, which I am both proud and embarrased to say I wore all night. I am starting to confuse the distinction between really ridiculous and a good idea. Then we met the rest of our crew outside our chosen club, the Underlounge. it's apparently a big foreigner bar, but it was our Japanese friends who were meeting us picked it out (Koki and Hanako).

Anyway, we had to drop our stuff off in a locker outside, so unfortunately I have no further pictures for you all. Maybe Taube will put some up on her webpage, I think she brought her camera in. I didn't want the baggage of a purse and coat and things in a crowded and hot bar and dance floor. So we all finally get in, after checking all of our stuff, and get our first drink of the night (yay!!). I pretty soon joined the growing throng of people on the dance floor, occassionally making it out to Kampai (Japanese for Cheers!) with everyone and pretty soon was pretty toasted myself. The crowd on the dance floor kept growing and growing until no one at all could dance, and it was like a big cheery happy mosh pit. All anyone could do was jump up and down together, and randomly throw hands in the air to chants of what sounded like "Oi Oi Oi". It was great.

I couldn't believe what happened next. Gogo dancers and crossdressers. The club had apparently hired them to dance on the bar and this elevated table/dancing top thing at the back of the dance floor. The guy guys were huge, and not in necessarily a good way, but were wearing weird stripey outfits that were cut like high school wrestling uniforms, and they wore funny hats. The "girls", or maybe crossdressers, wore sort of space agey rocket girl outfits and would occassionally shoot little laser like toy guns at the crowd.

Right before midnight I realized I had to find Mac and the gang, but there was absolutely no way to get to the bar from my position, so I stayed with the crowd. There were a couple of Japanese dudes around me who kept grabbing my fist out of the air to the chants of Oi Oi Oi. So when Midnight struck I might not have had someone to kiss, but I did have someone's arm around my waist and ended up getting a mouthful of confetti. I think I might have swallowed some of it. And here I thought Japanese boys were to modest to touch in public, especially strangers.

So after midnight, everyone kept drinking, Gwyn and I made numerous forays out onto the dance floor, and the crowd dissipated a bit so there was some room to dance. Lexi suggested we, "we" including myself, climb onto the stage on the back and dance in front of everyone. I guess this would be another example of me confusing "ridiculous" with "good idea", but we had a lot of fun. I guess the gogo dancers were on break, but they came back and wanted their spots back, so we climbed down and explored the rest of the club. In the back, we came across a crowd of people playing pass the bottle of champagne (later we would find two of the boys dancing on tables without their shirts on), more people wearing sunglasses inside, and a fellow JET! He was sort of mean though, so I didn't talk to him much.

After a while, Lexi split and headed out to another club to meet some other people. I was coming out of the bathroom (more on that later) when some random dude comes up to me. He introduced himself as Donnie (I think it was really Tony, but over the music and accent, I couldn't really hear). Tony was French, but he was in japan for kickboxing, muay thai to be precise. I thought it was strange, I mean, I would be in Thailand if I did muay thai. But I didn't ask, we got some champagne and joined Mac and the crew. We finished our drinks and headed to the dance floor. After dancing together for awhile, I thought he would get a kick out of one of the fine features of the club.

So we headed to the bathroom. Now, the women's bathroom has a bit of a corridor for the line. The men's bathroom has a big long mirror above the urinals. Now, this is no ordinary mirror, it's one-way. It cuts off at about chest height, but if a girl were so inclined she could watch all the different expressions on boys' faces as the pee. Some of them are really hilarious. There's the "ahhh, thank god, finally!", the "okay, let's get this over with", and of course the "checking myself out, hairs okay?" face. So I explained this to Tony, and he went in the men's room to check it out. There was no way he could get to the women's side to see what was going on, so after he was done peeing, he banged on the mirror, and I banged back, thus causing all the Japaneese dudes still peeing to flip out. All to the amusement of the Japanese girls watching. Don't worry, don't worry, the mirror cuts off at the chest. The way to and from the bathroom passes the VIP entrance, which I had been ignoring, until on the way out Tony grabbed my arm and we walked in.

Spread out on several couches, taking up virtually the entire space were a bunch of huuuuuge dudes. Tony introduced me and poured me some more champagne. They were all French. There was a Jerome, a Christian, a Mark (I later found out he was Canadian or American- I forget which), and a couple of others. After talking to some other people in the room, I found out the French dudes were really really super famous K-1 kickboxers in town for a big match earlier that night at Oooooosaka Dome. Oh. Alright. The lounge was pretty quiet, so I dragged Tony back out onto the dance floor for awhile. We returned to the lounge (I am by now, quite drunk) and the French contigency decided it was a good time to find somewhere else to go.

I alerted Mac and the others that I'd be following the French for awhile and we headed out the door. We got outside, and stood around while figuring out where to go. I started talking to Mark, and it turns out he did Aikido! Yay! Aikido! He trained some French version, which sounded softer than the American Ki Society. So while we were discussing the myriad versions of Kotegaishi (sp?) the others in my new group decided that they wanted to go back in the Underlounge. Okay. So we went back in. The night wound down, I found my way back to Himeji, Tony to his hotel and an early morning flight to France.

Getting back to Himeji, I paid a visit to the local shrine and then climbed to the top of the castle. Then home, a few phone calls home, and finally bed at 10 am.

Yesterday I googled "Osaka Dome Kickboxing," and I guess one of the guys I met is Jerome Le Banner, who apparently is one of the best fighters in the world. I mentioned this to my supervisor, Iizuka sensei, after aikido tonight. He was really excited and immediately translated it into Japanese for the rest of the dojo. A lot of the aikido people were really impressed. Iizuka Sensei told me that all Japanese people know who Le Banner is. The things I miss not having a TV. I guess if I ever run into them again, they will remember me as the totally clueless drunk girl wearing ridiculous sunglasses. Wait, by "ridiculous" do I mean "totally cool"? I have no idea anymore.

Lanterns set up for the New Year visits

happy new year!!! Part II

2006-01-07T17:09:00.000+09:00

What's next on the blog catch up schedule? Mmmmm. I think Ruminashion. Which, while it might sound like a bovine activity, is really a giant light extravaganza/ memorial for the Kobe earthquake.

Tuesday, December 19th.
I was getting on the bus after staying at school late. I had been fighting another cold and was looking forward to getting home, skipping aikido, and getting in a good sleep. I sat down on the bus seat and by cell chimed sweetly to tell me I had another message. I checked my phone, it was Lexi. "Illumination ends Thursday," my phone read, "Let's go to Kobe." Well, scratch plans to get some sleep. I got back to the apartment, rounded up Mac and Lex, and we headed off to Kobe.

We didn't know where to go when we set off, but the giant crowds and megaphone wielding city workers easily led the way. It started off as a big exercise in herding management. If there's anything to make you feel more like you're part of a flock, this was it. Huge swarms of people proceeded from the train station, down streets lined with crowd barriers, and police officers lazily keeping watch to make sure no one was line-jumping. "Lazy" extends so far that I caught one officer sleeping on his feet. We paused in the stream of people so that I could take this picture of a traditional Shinto torii gate, which is used to delineate 'sacred spaces' from the ordinary. They are usually around shrines and such, but occassionally they'll be in the middle of busy, modern streets. What makes this one great is not only it's size, but the name of the cafe next to it.

"Patisserie Tooth Tooth"

We made it past the gate and the sleeping guard, and continued with the herd. The route took us past all the high end shops, Channel, Gucci, other places I know nothing about. When we got to the lights, it was phenomenal.

There were all these individual, enormous gates filled with colored lights, going on forever.

After constructing this enormous tunnel of lights, I guess they just couldn't stop. And so... they built an enormous electric cathedral of light and blasted operatic versions of christmas carols in a park, filled with hundreds of Japanese people snapping pictures with their cell phones. It was a little surreal.

Crowds at the start

After the show, Lex and I sampled the usual variety of Japanese fair food and headed back to Himeji. Well, Mac left while we were eating, I left after sampling a fish cracker, with brown sauce, uncooked egg, puffed corn, and mayonaise (uck) and a delicious crepe. Now, why anyone would put an uncooked/semicooked egg on top of a cracker and give it to you to walk around with is completely beyond me. How anyone manages to eat this contraption without being completely covered in egg clearly knows more than I do.

Hey! Look at the enormous fish head!
Fish heads!!!

And so concludes today's blogging.
Happy reading, love Al

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

2006-01-06T16:45:00.000+09:00

Resolution: Post more new blogs.

Okay, so I know it's been awhile and a lot's happened. "Boyscouting" in Kobe with Lexi, Illumination (sounds like ruminashion in Japanese) finishing at Toyotomi Junior high school, Christmas in Ehime with Josh, a trip to Nara and Kyoto, and chillin' with some French kickboxers on New Years. I meant to post earlier, really I did. I think this will have to be done in several installments.

Let's see, December... So being raised in the suburbs of Indiana, then attending Oberlin, I haven't ventured out much into the world of "clubbing". So one fine Saturday evening, Lexi and I embarked on a journey to the delightful city of Kobe. We had a late start to the evening, as Shirasagi Residence hosted a going away party for the Australian ALT's who had to return to their country. After stuffing ourselves with the most delicious variety of both Western and Japanese foods, Lexi and I 'got ourselves dun up' and caught the train to Kobe. By "dun up" I mean dressing up as Lexi's version of J-girls. I was sporting my jeans and black boots, a black and grey stripey shirt with a designer T over it, topped with a tealish colored poofy vest with a faux fur hood. Lexi however, outdid me, as per usual. Let's see, I believe her gettup included cowboy boots (with heel), purple hose, a ruffled camo miniskirt, neon yellow tank under frilly black tank under black vest with fir hood. I feel like I'm leaving something out... I don't quite understand what we were wearing and was pretty cold, but Lexi assured me that we were pimpin it Japanese style... I have no idea. At least it was amusing.

The first half of the train ride we spent trying to ignore a really drunk old Japanese man who kept escaping from his friends to jump across the aisle and sit next to us. Once sitting down, he would try to access his extremely limited English vocabulary, which consisted of "nice body" while gesturing at Lexi's chest. We got off the train, and wandered around Sannomiya for awhile. Kobe seems to be a much friendlier city, we had lots of (guys) yell "hi" to us, some really crazy dudes from Osaka invited us to a college party (in Osaka), but they weren't students. We saw a guy dressed as Hard Gay (a TV character) in a really really expensive car, the driver waved to us, and the Hard Gay guy (dressed in S&M black biker leather gettup) pretended no one could see him. Anyway, we eventually wandered into a bar Lexi knew. Now, this was no ordinary bar, it was distinguished largely by the crassness of the hosts, which is fairly uncommon in Japan. Lex and I performed a karaoke rendition of Eminem (Em Dirty) where the Japanese host boys chimed in on the PeeWee Herman chorus (eh eh eh eh eh eh). After we sang, we hit the streets again to find a club to hole up in. We wandered back down to the station and picked up a couple of boys on the way. One was cute, but quiet. The other was very friendly, thought less cute. We asked them where a club was, and they took us up the street to some disco, where they left us at the door. Apparently, the cuter one was only 18 and couldn't get in yet.

Lex and I paid the cover charge and stepped into an enormous club where Japanese reggae and hip hop pounded out of the speakers. We exchanged our money for drink tokens from the vending machine and put our orders in with the bartenders, all wearing black suits with white collared shirts. The bar was packed, but not around the bar. Everyone was crowded around the dance floor, watching what was going on. I squeezed my way through the crowd, to see what was going on off the reflection of a mirror. Girls Girls Girls. Girls in the skimpiest thing that could ever be classified as "shorts" doing some of the raunchiest dancing i have ever seen. Apparently we came on an "event" night, the "event" being these hip hop dancers. Anyway, that went on for awhile. Don't get me wrong, the girls were really good, I just never expected to see that kind of dancing in Japan, or outside of a strip club.

After the performances, I guess the club returned to normal, Lexi and I danced in a corner of the dance floor. We spotted a Japanese dude in these awesome faux aviators. A little later he came over and danced with us, and damn he was good. Later in the night, he started dancing with me, so I put my hand on his hip, with the result of him running. Like, fast. I looked around, and although the floor was packed with both girls and guys dancing, absolutely no one was touching at all. Ahhhhh crap. Note to anyone reading this- no touching while dancing!!! Not if you don't want to terrify your new friend and embarass both them and you horribly. Ahhh well. I saw him later and appologized, and he seemed cool with that. I'll um, count that one as a learning experience. The club closed around four, four thirty and lexi and I once again trekked down to the train station, where we grabbed some soba noodles and waited for the trains to start running again.

And so ended A Night in Kobe.
Next up, Illumination.

It's Saturday!

2005-12-03T10:52:00.000+09:00

Yay! I'm not in school! I had been planning a really really productive day today, but have yet to make it out of my apartment. Instead I've been busy searching the web for ideas for a present for Thomas's birthday, and am making some progress. I've also cleaned, and had some toast. I desperately need to go grocery shopping, maybe I'll head out and do that next... hmm. I keep meaning to make it to Nara, but eh, I'm tired. I need to make plans with someone else so I'm being depended on. I've had a pretty much packed schedule for at least the last week- I've had one or two activities every night after work, and have even been really busy at work (shocking!)
Last Monday I had off from school (as compensation for working saturday) and hiked up Mt. Shosha with our "Resident Dude," Julian, and the fall colors were fantastic. I didn't manage to get too many great fall leaves pictures, but here are a few shots we did get. The first one is just a little garden area, the second pic is me in front of a belltower, the third is a shot of the main temple building from below. Monday was just a beautiful day, sun shining, not too cold. We got on our bikes to head over to the mountain, but having only a vague idea of which mountain we wanted, it took a bit of wandering around, searching the tops of mountains for the little gondola that runs people up the mountain. Dialogue:
J- I think it's this way.
A- Wait wait, this is that baseball field you can see from the top, we should go that way.
J- dude, that's a golf range.
A- oh. I still think it's this way.
J- Dude, it's probably on the other side of one of these mountain ranges.
A- Should we ask directions?
J- Uh, no.
A- Hey! there's the lift!
J- That way!
This was then followed by a bikeride across town, a search for the footpath, and a beautiful hike up the mountain, which only took about 30 minutes once we actually got to the mountain. So we got up there, paid our 300 yen admission, and wandered around awhile. The walk in is up a long path lined with about 50 different Bodhisattva statues, which are pretty cool.
After getting below the main complex (pic 3) we sat down at these adorable little tables outside and had great great kitusne udon for ~$5. These are thick egg noodles with a bit of sweet fried tofu on top and is one of my favorite noodly dishes here. We went up to the main area, realized it was getting dark and that we still had to make it down the mountain to our bikes, dashed back down to the restaurant area, and got some great chocolate icecream in waffle cones. In Japan, you're really not supposed to walk around and eat at the same time, but we were at a big tourist complex, so we figured we could get away with it. Especially since by this time the place was pretty empty anyway. There was however, this hilarious Japanese couple up there. The girl was walking around these dirt pathes in big high heels and dressed a little like it was the 1970's, all brown tones and such. I think they were there just to take pictures of her with the leaves in the background. It was really fabulous. Ok, I'm going to go do something productive now. Just you watch and see. Crap. looks like my laundry is done.
Oh hey, everyone write Josh and congratualte him on his aikido ikkyu test, which is happening in about five hours and he has been working real hard towards.

Oh yeah, here's a great pic from the Nada fighting festival that was about mid October...

soup!

2005-11-29T15:35:00.000+09:00

Ok, I made this soup a few weeks ago and people here were asking for the recipe, so I thought I'd put it up.

Allison’s Black Bean Soup
Disclaimer: There are many variations on Black Bean Soup. It’s a highly versatile recipe, so add or remove whatever vegetables you want from the list. Also, I didn’t measure anything, so all “measurements” here are really guesses as to how much I used. I probably added more than is listed here, as I was waiting for things to cook and got a bit bored. Use your own discretion and suit this recipe to your own taste.
Cooking time: maybe an hour Serving size: about five

You might want:
1 can black beans
1 Tbs olive oil
2-3 cloves garlic, chopped
1 onion, diced
1 red bell pepper, diced
2 smaller green peppers, diced. (these happened to be in my fridge and I wanted to use them up)
1 large tomato, diced
3 cups water
1/2 cube vegetable bullion

2 Tbs tobasco sauce
Black pepper- maybe ~ 10 dashes
Salt to taste
Basil, ~4 dashes
Oregano ~2 dashes
Strange, orange hot spice, written in Japanese. I don’t really know what it is.
Paprika, ~2 dashes
A bit of sugar, maybe 1/2 a tsp? (Optional)
2 hard boiled eggs, sliced
1 cup of dry rice (cook)
1/2 cup mozzarella cheese

“Instructions”
1. Get rice cooking.
2. Sautee garlic and onions in olive oil until onions just start to turn clear, add peppers. Add tomato when you remember you have it sitting in the fridge, waiting for this occasion.
3. While this is going on, bring water to a boil, add bullion. (I also threw in some broccoli stems I had in my fridge, to hopefully give it more flavor and make it more of a vegetable stock. Remove before adding anything else.) Add can of black beans. Add tobacco sauce and spices, sugar (if desired). Bring to a boil.
4. Add vegetables to beans and stock. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat and let simmer approximately 40 minutes. Add eggs at some point during the simmering.

A lot of the spiciness cooks out of this, so you may want to add some more hot spices after cooking.
Sprinkle cheese over soup. Serve over rice with tobacco on the side.

thanksgiving!

2005-11-24T19:28:00.000+09:00

Okay, this is a quick post, hopefully I'll get more up later. Things are going well still here in Japan. We had a thanksgiving here in my apartment building yesterday, about 7 Americans and 7 Australians. I made three pumpkin pies in a medium sized toaster oven. I would say they were alright. They were really good considering I hadn't tried out the internet recipies before, and I worked with very basic ingredients, no crisco, baking soda or powder, lard, etc.

Also, Julian, Taube, and Mac deepfried a turkey and made stuffing (I was told they were good). Taube made a vast amount of mashed potatoes. Other people pitched in veggies, salad, fried Japanese potatoey things, wine, juice, cranberries, and corn. Oh yeah, and Mac made some delicious homemade soda bread. Gayleen made these cheesecake pie, the filling was really good. There were a bunch more meat dishes, but I didn't really pay a whole lot of attention to those...
Everyone did an awesome job cooking!

We had a little "what we're thankful for" discussion before dinner. It seemed really wrong to be doing that without Gramma leading the table and asking us all to reflect on how fortunate we are. Also, Although we managed to find 15 matching plates, we did not have a dish for every course, the salad, the butter, and so on. It was rather bizarre not to be digging out the family china and trying to figure out what all the different dishes are for.
Half the group, from left: Terry, Izzy, Karin, Bridgette, Mac, Steph, Gayleen (cut out), Lexi, Me. Not pictured: Julian, Taube, John, Kyoki, Peter, Adrian.

Hugs to my family and friends back home. Although we did an awesome job pulling this off and I love the people here, I am most thankful for the people back home. I'm thinking of you all, have a good thanksgiving and give me a call!

The Awesomeness which is.

2005-10-23T19:43:00.000+09:00

This weekend! Wahooo! So, as you may have deduced, this weekend was amazing, and must be broken up into several segments. So here goes.

I. FRIDAY- more buttcheeks than you could ever imagine
So Friday night there was a local festival in the nearby town of Aboshi. After a few delays of finding someone to go with me, I found my friend Lexi and we boarded the train and took off. We exited the train, and took a look around- we had no idea which way to go. So, we wandered out of the station, and towards some cops directing traffic- when in doubt, look for a crowd of people and follow. Well, we found a crowd, and no ordinary crowd was this. It was a huge mass of men in a circle, wearing traditional loinclothes (fundoshi) in the cold, holding long bamboo sticks. In the middle, one guy was singing/ chanting, and at certain moments, everyone would answer. Then suddenly, everyone on the outside of the circle would rush in, bang their sticks together, and form a huge mass. Within the mass, they would try and push each other, still with sticks raised, then suddenly it would dissolve and everyone would peacefully go back to the edge of the circle. After awhile, the mass of fundoshied men would proceed down the street to the next major intersection to hold up the maximum amount of traffic. So we followed the "booty trail" and fell in with the rest of the town that was trailing them. We then befriended this hilarious drunk old guy who was running around trying to irritate everyone he could find it seemed like. First he ran up to this lady, "my wife"- she yells at him. This other old guy "my father"- who then proceeds to whack him with his bamboo lantern. Then he bought us some sake, and gave Lexi a beer, and we stopped and watched the circle stick whacking singing thing again. We stopped to meet up with some other friends at a 711, and lost our old guy, but then a new group came after the first group. This group had a gian, 7 foot tall lantern in the middle of the circle. When it was time to rush the circle again, they all rushed in and beat the crap out of the paper lantern until it was smithereens. Lexi and I decided we should follow this group, cause they had another lantern we wanted to see smashed, so we set off after them. We soon found ourselfves out in the middle of nowhere, between two ricefields in the dark. We kept getting all these strange looks, I think because it was a country town we fell in with, and there weren't any other foreigners around. Eventually we stop, and people trade in their bamboo whacking sticks for identical sticks but with paper lanterns attached. While all this is happening, a few of the older men start talking to us- the standard, where are you from, where are you teaching, etc etc. but then they hand us our own lanterns on bamboo sticks, and now we're part of the town! yeah! So they push us up front to be with the junior high school kids (all with their own lanterns) and we go marching along, until the path opens up, and suddenly we're in the middle of this bright huge festival in front of the shrine and all these camera crews show up to get pictures of the foreigners with lanterns. I tried to ignore them and act "natural" but then they shouted at us to pose, I'm a celebrity! So we push our way through and realize only the boys have lanterns. So all the JH school boys make a circle, and start banging their lantern bamboo poles on the ground fiercely, causing the candle to go out, then on some signal, they all rushed in and completely smashed their lanterns to pieces.
We managed to lose that group again and headed for the festival food stands. I tried some excellent little balls that were covered in sesame seeds and had some sweet red bean paste in the center. Something else called "hashimaki"- or chopsticks roll. It was like a flat piece of dough with Korean kimchi (spicyness!) in the center, rolled up on the chopsticks, with some sweet sauce on the outside and grilled. Gooey goodness! Although early, we had to head back to the station to catch the last train, so we started to leave and who should we find? Our drunk old dude friend!
So we started following that town again, and they gave us their happi coats to wear while walking with them and tied theiry bright yellow bands on our heads- this of course attracted more cameras who wanted to take pictures of us. So then the next time the group stopped, they had us pose with the mikoshi (portable shrine) and act like we were carrying it. So we finally left the procession, and about 5 or 6 of the dudes walked with us to the train station, which was great beacause we were totally lost. They insisted we keep the happi coats- which was really really nice of them, and they gave us these necklaces with a wooden square that says the town name on one side and "protection" on the other.
So Lexi and I made it back to Himeji, which was completely dead, and we stayed up far too late cruising the bars, looking for any people out.

II. SATURDAY-
Started off as the most relaxing and peaceful day imaginable. I biked around town awhile, it's just the start of fall and the weather here is perfect. I wandered down to starbucks, wrote some letters, studied Japanese and waited around for Lexi to call me. I needed her help- desperately one might venture to say. I needed Lexi to help translate at the hairdresser for me. I haven't gotten my haircut since leaving the US, about 3 1/2 months ago, and things were out of control. I made it into the salon chair, and sat horrified for an hour as more and more hair started flying off. We had figured out that we would keep it long, but- we didn't establish how much hair to keep long. Yes, I now have a Japanese hairstyle. Parts of it are still long, but most of it has been severely layered so that most of it is still short. It will be less work I imagine, but I already miss my hair. It made a huge pile on the floor, they had to do a mid-cut sweep. I'm a bit sad- I wanted to donate my hair when I finally got it cut- but it happened without expeciting it, and I didn't know quite how to tell them that I wanted to take my hair with me.
Anyway, I'll take a picture and post it- then you can leave your comments. I missed aikido Saturday, due to a combination of the haircut taking forever, my dogi (uniform) still being wet from the wash, and not feeling well. So I was going to stay in and go to bed early, make sure I didn't aggravate whatever I was fighting, but then my friend reminded me about the Mitsubishi party. Mitsubishi party? you ask? Indeed. So my friend Makoto picked me up and we headed over to our friend Mike's apartment, who lives in the same building as all these foreigners who are here working for Mitsubishi. Let's just say that Lexi and I were the life of the party. We had a great time amazing the Japanese guys with 1- my sad attempt to speak Japanese and 2- Lexi's ability to speak Japanese. I don't know how it works both ways, but who cares? Anyway, so we arrived, and there was this guy without his shirt on out on the porch- it's raining and really cold out. We could already tell this guy was going to be a riot. While he still had his pants on, most of the guys made fun of him and tried to drop ice down his pants. When successful, he would hop around the kitchen until the offensive piece of ice fell out. So throughout the night, he ends up losing most of his clothes, and is just walking around in his boxers. I think some of the guys wanted to strip too- but they were too shy. Mad props to naked judo guy. So I made it home by 2:30, thanks to Makoto for the lift and went to bed, which leads us to...

SUNDAY- much less interesting than the last 2 days, but maybe worth a mention.
Ahhh, sunday, the day of the week where I call my Japanese tutor and cancel on him. Well, today I couldn't get a hold of him, so I went to meet him anyway, although I could only stay for the first 1/3 of our time. I had an aikido date to make. I showed up at the Sanyo train station 10 minutes early to meet my dojo contact, but alas! no show! so I called my aikido translator, who informed me that crap! I was at the wrong sanyo. I was supposed to be at Sanyo junior high school. crap crap crap. So I biked like mad to get there, then ended up waiting 'cause my contact had already left. So my translator called, said someone would come and meet me, so I'm waiting for my ride, and a dude on a motorcycle shows up. Awesome! I was so excited I would get to ride on a motorcycle! But no, this was not to be, I was to follow the motorcycle on my bike to the other dojo. Crap! Again! So I had another mad sprint on my bike, this one uphill and chasing a motorcycle to get to the dojo. I show up, now 45 minutes late for lunch, and while finishing up my shrimp and egg ricey dish, I find out that today is no ordinary training! Today was apparently 2ndkyu and up (I'm 1st kyu- or blackbelt minus one test) training. Which means we beat the crap out of each other. I was soooooo lost and confused and in pain. Ahhhhhhh. So then I came back, had a work meeting, and cooked some dinner- something with these konnyaku noodles, eggplant, carrots, onion, and some wierd Chinese sauce I bought. It was delicious! And now I'm heading to the shower and bed.
And, lest anyone forget- today is Courtney's (my sister) birthday! everyone call or write her and wish her a happy 25th!!!! So, goodnight everyone!

Rambles

2005-10-11T22:15:00.000+09:00

End of Tuesday here, just getting home from Aikido class- where I was totally spaced out and therefore kept messing up and landing wrong and so on and so forth. I can't tell if my fellow teachers are a little upset with me. Three weeks ago my first year school teachers, who I sit with in the staffroom, asked me if I could go to dinner with them on Friday. I was really excited about this, and so instantly agreed. Last Wednesday, the English teacher said we were all pitching in ichiman yen, or the rough equivalent of $100. Ergh, right. So, I thought about it for a while, and decided it was too much money to spend on an evening where I wouldn't understand anything being said, and sitting next to the nurse who always gives me a slight 'I don't like you' vibe, I decided to cancel. So now I hope they aren't mad at me.
Anyway, I had a nice weekend, cleaned my apartment, did my laundry, relaxed. Went to this really boring thing for aikido. went to a few bars- nothing really cool though. Oh wait! How could I forget! So, maybe it was a week ago, I was out with my friend Alexis, and we were looking for the cool bars where Japanese people our age go. There isn't really a guide book for Cool Bars where People in their Early Twenties Go, so we are left just trying out different places. So, we were out cruising the bar districe of Himeji on our bicycles, the only Gaijin in the area, dodging taxis and Japanese outside of the dozens of Snack Bars, when we saw our bar- The Twelve Apostles. At which point, we immediately start cracking up. So, having no idea what the place is like, we climb the stairs and walk in the door and onto the set of a bar in Frasier. It looks like it would be full of east coast snobs, but we sit down at the bar and glance over the menu. Now, bars in Japan aren't just sake and sapporo- most of the one's I've ventured into have a more extensive collection of American whiskeys and imported liquors of any bar I've seen in the states. So we both order a drink- about the same cost as any other bar in town, and just start talking. After our first drink, I start getting bored and am waiting for Lexi to finish up to head out, and another girl shows up to bartend. The original bartender comes over and tries to explain that he called up his friend, who studies English, to come in and work- to talk to us- because he doesn't speak English. Service? Yes, I believe so. But Lexi speaks Japanese, so then the evening turns into this great night of talking to the bartenders, them trying to speak English and us trying to speak Japanese. It was great. They even brought us a little plate of three different samples of different bar snacks carefully arranged on a napkin on a little square plate.
Then one of Lexi's Japanese friends showed up, turns out he was also hoping the Red Sox would win on Saturday (sadly, they didn't- my condolences Chris). Now I don't really know who to support- I mean, I can't go for the white sox, because the Cubs are my Chicago team, and I can't support the Yankees, 'cause come on- they're the Yankees. Sigh. Last Wednesday we went for a beer after Japanese lessons, and this Japanese guy who thought he was black kept trying to hit on me. I really wanted to tell him that he stood no chance, if only for the NY yankees hat he was wearing. But also because he kept crossing the bar, interupting my conversation with other people, to ask me to go dance at another bar with him, after being refused several times. There are a couple of bars in town that have a surplus of Japanese people who think they are African American. It's weird. They play all this unedited rap music in this city- they have no idea what the lyrics are- like, everywhere. Shopping malls, phone stores, not the grocery though. I think Kroger's back home is the only grocery where I've heard them play Morissey- and for Fishers I thought that was pretty bizarre.
There's this bar, Fab Space, that's full of Japanese only. One night I went there with Lexi, and they were projecting a biography of Bob Marley on the wall, and dj'd reggae and techno all night. It was a bit of a bizarre combination. We met all these cool Japanese dudes, at about 3 am, we;re sitting down, exhausted from dancing, and one guy tries to pass me something kind of cylindrical looking, and at first in the bad lighting I thought it was a joint. But then I realized he was eating it, sort of gnawing at the end, and I realized that it was some sort of dried, processed fish. Ahhh Japan. Just when I'm expecting illegal substances they break out the dried fish.

Kansai annual training...

2005-10-03T13:10:00.000+09:00

with the Doshu Sensei!
So today I got up early, ironed my clothes, ironed my gi, and went outside to catch the bus. Went back inside for my belt. Missed the bus, and biked downtown. Whatever, I still got there 45 minutes early.
So today, my Himeji Aikido dojo and I went to the faraway land of Osaka (oooosaka) to have a special class with all of Kansai taught by the Doshu Sensei. It was, quite frankly, awesome. It was about as crowded on the mat as training with Saotome Sensei in Chicago. Maybe a little less, but the mat space was way the hell bigger. I like to play the game, try to figure out what Sensei is talking about. sometimes it goes better than other times. So afterwards, we had a banquet in a nearby hotel, my dojo drank a ton, and, and, and, I had my picture taken with the Doshu Sensei and his son (seperately), and poured Doshu Sensei some beer. It was the first really social time I've had with my dojo, and quite frankly, I love them. One of my teachers was falling asleep, so I went over to harass him, and we spent forever trying to communicate the idea that he was especially tired because he was doing sword cuts before class. Not just any sword cuts though, apparently he trains with an extra special long sword- that they then explained was not practical to use, since it's too long, but it's good to train with 'cause it's extra heavy. One could then say (I didn't) that training with any sword may be impractical for anything other than training. Then we boarded the train, and everyone slept on the way back to Himeji and my gaijin friend Steph woke me up.
Picture, from left: Yamada Shihan, Steph, Colelan, The Doshu Sensei, Iizuka Sensei, me.
Yamada Sensei is head of Hyogo aikikai, and is my teacher here in Himeji. Steph just started aikido last week, with her husband Colelan, who started in January. Iizuka Sensei is a 4th dan at my dojo, and my supervisor on the board of education (eeks!). And me. I need to get a haircut.

Rice Cooker Magic- Conclusion

2005-10-02T09:00:00.000+09:00

Alright- so I need to fine tune my rice cooker muffin making skilz- but it still tastes good! Muffin came out delicious- though a little wet and maybe undercooked on the top, or maybe I overestimated the amount of water to add (I'm measuring cup deficient here).

Right- large purplish muffin and rice cooker

Kyoto continued

2005-10-02T08:16:00.000+09:00

Okay,
So while I'm waiting for my muffin to finish cooking, I thought I would try and get a little more down on Kyoto before I forget anymore.
So let's see... Wednesday we headed down to Toooooooo-ji temple/shrine to check out a ginormous fleeeeee market that was happening that day. It was pretty cool- there were a ton of booths selling anything from boxes of tiny tiny baby fish and prawns by the gram/bag, fruit stands, takoyaki (octopus balls), to kind of antiquey shops selling old sword tsubas, kimonos, pottery, junk, flowers.... anyway, I didn't see anything I liked enough to buy and then hall around Kyoto, so we just browsed. Oh wait! I lied, I got a bag of pine nuts for 5oo yen, or about $5 and made an enourmous batch of pesto I put in my freezer (it's a little weak- the basil I used had already gone to seed) and still have 3/4 a bag left. So Tooooooo-ji is famous for its pagoda- the tallest one in Japan I read. We didn't get to look around the temple much- just the market.
Then we walked (~35 min) down to Fushimi-Inari Shrine, which was my favorite place we saw in Kyoto. It was originally built to the Kami of Harvest- which is a fox- but now I think it's used more for wealth or prosperity. At any rate, the place is completely covered in bright bright orange tori gates. Inari is a big complex- there are shrines and cemetaries scattered all over the side of a mountain, and they are all connected by paths through the woods, and awash in gates. I lost Tobi and Mac somewhere on the grounds, and just hiked around the woods on the paths for a few hours, and it was one of the most serene and beautiful places I've been. At one point, I got away from the tori gates, and into the woods, and there would be times where there was bamboo forest on my right, and big cedar forests on my left. I even saw a snake!! He got away before I could get my camera out though. But I hiked up the mountain and had a great view of Kyoto spread out under the mountain, and had a hilarious time trying to ask some Japanese who were repainting tori gates if they'd seen Mac. But instead of asking if they'd seen an American, I forgot to make it a question, and instead said "I/you/anyone sees a/many American." We all found it rather funny I think.
So then we all found each other at the base of the temple complex, and caught the next train north. We wanted to go to Sanjusangendo, but getting lost and separated at the temple took more time than we had allotted to Inari, so we skipped 33-gendo, and went to Kiyomizu Temple instead, and got there just before closing. It had a beautiful view off the side of a mountain, and had another enormous temple complex, but we didn't have enough time to really explore it well. It was packed with tourists.
I'll add more later, I get restless writing all this out and must take a break.
Allison

Rice Cooker Magic!

2005-10-02T07:49:00.000+09:00

Well, at the suggestion of one of my friends, I am experimenting with my rice cooker. Having come to Japan with a muffin and a brownie mix, and finding no oven with which to bake, I was rather disappointed. However, ingenuity prevails! And I am trying to make triple berry muffins in my rice cooker. As I don't know how to quite work this contraption- it's all in kanji that I can't find in either my "Kanji survival guide"- or in my dictionary- I never quite know how to turn on this little machine. But- I just checked on my enormous muffin, cut off a slice, and it was delicious! But a little undercooked on top. So the muffin is back in the rice cooker, and I'm waiting for final results before heading out for the day.
I only have 3 hours before I must leave for aikido for the night- then tomorrow I'm heading up to Osaka with my dojo to train with Doshu Sensei! So maybe another quite night in.
Off to check on my muffin again,
Allison

Kyoto, and Sports Day!

2005-09-26T09:16:00.000+09:00

My appologies for the absurdly long time since my last post. I've been amazingly busy here, and any free moments I've had have going to cleaning my room and washing clothes. The first task is immensely important, as I have concluded that Japan is weird bug capital of the world. last Sunday we had Sports Day, which was awesome. Monday was a holiday, and I got tuesday and wednesday off as compensation for working the weekend. I took thursday off, and friday was a holiday. So, my friends Mac and Taubee and I went to Kyoto for three days.

Kyoto adventures!
So, Tuesday we caught the train to Kyoto, which is about 2 hours from here on the "Shinkaisoku"- also known as "the fastest train that you don't have to pay extra for". I slept most of the way. This is primarily what trains in Japan are for- sleeping. I don't think you're supposed to talk at all, and definately are not supposed to use phones. Everyone just gets on the train and sleeps. So we got to the train station, found the tourist info center, and had them book us a room at a "ryokan"- or Japanese style hotel. Ours was pretty cheap- not the cleanest or newest of places, but centrally located (right next to Gion) and only 2200 yen a night (~$20). "Japanese style" means basically, tatami floors and futons. We also opted for the public bath, which, is the best invention known to man, right behind escalators and the bicycle. Anyway, so our first night in town we tried to walk down to this temple, "Sanjusangendo", which is supposed to have some mighty impressive 33 (san ju san) buddhist statues. We walked through this really awesome little alley/market area, where I found giant fish heads for sale, and a dog with its fluffy tail dyed pink and yellow- one of the strangest things I have seen thus far in Japan.
Well, we got a little lost and ended up at this other temple/shrine complex, Chion-ji. You can't really get very far in Kyoto without finding some sort of hundred year old historical buddhist or shinto structure of some sort. It had a lot of cool enormous old buildings. But the best part was what happened in regard to the cemetary. The cemetary grounds go all the way up the side of a big hill behind some shrines. Well, Mac decided he wanted to explore the area, and Taubee and I waited at the bottom for him.

<-- Mac next to Choin-in temple bell- the biggest bell in Japan. Lonely Planet reports it takes 17 monks to ring it on New Year's.

Not long after Mac departed, some Buddhist monks came running across the balconey of one of the temples and urge us to leave, as the temple closed to tourists already. So some guards escorted Taubee and I out, and we left Mac behind to finish exploring and make it out. mac made it out a little while later- but he had apparently been locked inside the cemetary. To get out, he had to scale the cemetary wall, sneak ninja style over the tile roofs of one of the buildings, and jump back down. I guess the guards saw him and laughed- which is probably a good thing since he could've gotten in a bit of trouble.

Taubee and me in front of Choin-ji temple entrance gate.

More later! I must pause to hang up my laundry (not in my shower-dryer) outside while still light out.

typhoon season?

2005-09-08T07:53:00.000+09:00

So earlier this week, typhoon 14 hit Japan. I was really excited, because my teachers said I didn't have to come in if an emergency was declared (they all do). However, the typhoon came in the night and I slept through it. It was really windy for about 2 days, and a bit of rain in the evening, I guess the action all happened at night. So in to school anyway.

A good deal has happened since my last blog, some exciting, some less so. Today was my first day in elementary school. Both the junior high and elementary schools are preparing for "sports day", so classes are irregular for the next two weeks. So today I went in and taught one class, of 100 elementary students. It was a lot of fun actually. The teacher I work with is a big really energetic lady. So I showed up an hour early to prepare for the lesson, and I find out we're working with puppets. We started the lesson doing a dialogue between Lion and Rabbit (hi, how are you? I'm fine thank you, and you?...) and then played a counting game, and sang a song. Then we went and just hung out in her "word room" where she teaches Vietnam students Japanese. She kept trying (successfully) to feed me cookies and fruit. Then we had lunch, and I found out she had called me a taxi. So, I think my JH school was expecting me back, but this was not to be. So it is now 2:00 and I am home.
So since I wrote last I have visited Mt. Shosha, the second and last of the attractions in Himeji. It was built over 1200 years ago, at least. But it's more famous for being the site where Tom Cruise filmed The Last Samurai. it was really really awesome. It's a big mountain Buddhist temple complex. After getting off the bus, there's a cable car to the top of the mountain, after entering, I proceeded up a path littered with buddhist statues, mini-shrines to different boddhisatvas and buddhas. There was an enormous bell that I rang before starting, you grab a rope at the end of a large hanging log, pull back and release it to swing into the bell and toss in ten yen. and maybe make a prayer. anyway, after walking past a good number of small shrines, there's a little path through the woods that suddenly opens up, and there's an enormous temple out of nowhere that just takes your breath away. I went in, and tried to talk to one of the monks there for a little while (very little english+ no japanese= small dialogue). He was really really excited that I was trying to ask him questions. I guess he must get kind of bored just doing calligraphy in people's temple books. Anyway, we finished up there and headed into town. I went to aikido and the rest of my crew went to play frisbee for a while.
Not exciting part of blog- I got really really sick last week for the first few days of school. Had a fever for 3 days. I finally went into the doctor on Saturday. he made a clip art rendition of my medical diagnosis on the computer, told me I had tonsilitis, and gave me some antibiotics. At any rate, all better now.
more later, going to go run some errands, buy a bike, while shops are still open.
Allison

new post!

2005-08-22T10:51:00.000+09:00

Sorry it's been a little while since I put anything up. I still don't have interenet in my apartment, and it's getting to be a hastle running downtown just for internet. Been having a good time here, I was in a small town called Yashiro last week for a JET orientation. went to Kobe on saturday night. Was a little bored last night. Need to make it to aikido some more. We only have class twice a week, one of the classes being saturday night. With all my travelling, I haven't been to class in almost two weeks, I'm so disappointed in myself. Yashiro was good for me, I know a lot of poeple on my group didn't like it, but I had fun. It was good to be surrounded by people in the same situation as I am, for the most part. This guy Ami showed us where there was an international foods section, I bought a bottle of maple syrup, some popcorn, coconut milk, and cheddar cheese for about $16, which wasn't bad. Kobe was cool, I can see why the call Himeji the country now, the buildings are all really tall and city like. Himeji is more spread out, more like big sprawl than an actual city. I met some really intelligent boys from... Texas there, probably the smartest people I've met since leaving the US (note- not Republicans, though Texans).
Lets see, I think the coolest thing that happened in Yashiro was the kitchen staff. We got to Yashiro on a Monday. There's no nightlife in town, and we have a lockdown at 10, we have to be inside the compound whent the gates close. So Tuesday the kitchen put on a show for us, they were amazing. They set up a band, three guitars and a drummer and were amazing. They played Beatles, Elvis, and all these "oldies" songs. Someone even dressed up as Elvis, I heard later that Elvis was really a school principal somewhere.
But now I'm back in Himeji, I have to go find the city hall to get my alien registration so I can live here legally, and get a cell phone.
Well,
cheers!

Rain on my parade

2005-08-08T04:56:00.000+09:00

"Have you been to the castle?" has without fail, been one of the first questions anyone from Himeji comes up with, right after "where are you from?" Yesterday was our town festival, I think it's called the Castle festival, probably because that's really all the town is. I was quite happy when I got there, to find that there was free admition for the day (normallly about $6) and initially started out with a group of Japanese boys who had some sort of English knowledge. Anyway, the castle was pretty cool, the main tower is 5 stories high plus a basement. Just about anywhere they could think to stick a weapons rack they most certainly did. However, only a few of these still had any weapons on display. The inside was all made of enormous wood beams, and the whole inside smelled like an old wood mill. It's a pretty impressive building, with most things having english translations. After the castle, i exited the main keep and the big park in front of it was filled with big groups of people dancing and playing instruments. After a little while, I realized they were just warming up for something, so I grabbed my bike and headed out of the castle grounds. Just south of the castle is the main road in town, leading away from the castle down to the train station. Now, in the US people bring their own lawn chairs but here, the city unrolls big blue plastic ribbons down either side of the road, about two and a half feet wide and extending down the extent of the parade route. When I arrived, the road was filling up as people took off their shoes, and found a place on the blue tarps.
What ensued was one of the longest parades I have ever seen. I think about half of Himeji must have been in this thing. It started out with a couple of marching bands, some baton twirlers, lots of people dressed in yukata (summer kimonos) dancing with long bamboo rods with big ribbons on them. Everything was very coordinated. The most impressive, skill-wise thing I saw was the elementary school children's unicycle brigade. No kidding. has anyone ever tried to ride one of those things? It's damn near impossible. But there were about twenty of these kids, most on regular sized cycles, but four on extra tall ones, probably about three or four feet up. And they were all doing formations. The smaller kids would ride in line, then make circles, link hands and spin each other. And at the same time, the taller unicyclers would be circling the smaller cycles, then someone would blow a whistle and they'd all rush into a new formation. It was amazing. Then there were lots more yukata, lots of synchronized traditional dancing. I was very impressed with the umbrella twirlers. I have pictures. Then there was a big show of everyone who owned a Jeep. Then I was very confused, but a big line of special motorcycles, a few with American flags on them, but all Japanese people. One guy wearing a darth vader mask. Lots of Taiko drumming off of trucks. Cute kids banging small drums and dancing together. And slow. They were very spread out, they would wait for the last group to get halfway down the street before starting the next group "moving" or proceeding very very slowly. At one point it started to rain, but it quickly cleared up and the parade went on.
Then to the side they had lots of tents set up with fried things and Japanese fair food. I had the mushy octopus balls again. I should have tried the whole squid, maybe next time.
Then everyone sort of disappeared from the area, and I followed the crowd down to the other end of the street, and it was filled with mostly women in matching yukata by group. I have no idea what they were doing,but there must have been at least two or three hundred of them. They were all lined up, on either side of the street. At "san, ni, ichi!" they started playing some song in Japanese and everyone starting doing the same dance slowly walking around in this big rectangular loop. Everytime the song would end, it would loop back around and started over. I got very bored watching, this, it seemed to go on forever. So I found the center of activity, and there was some sort of booth watching all the groups, I don't know if it was some sort of competition or what. Anyway, it turned out that there wasn't a tape, it was one guy singing the same thing over and over for at least half an hour. Then it stopped, more japanese announcements, and then it started up again. I was about to leave, then I thought I would stick around and see if I could figure out what was happening. Well, I couldn't. After another extraordinary long period it all of a sudden stopped, and people just sort of wandered off. Most of the people looked extremely bored to be doing this, they had blank faces and just sort of waved their hands in the right direction. Occasionally, there would be an older person, who had no idea what was going on, and would either just be wandering like a zombie, or completely out of sync with the group. Occassionally there would be the enthusiastic person, but they were the exception.
After this ended, they had a big screen come in on a truck, which played a slide show of himeji sites to a big drum and japanese flute player.
Oh yeah, another interesting part of the parade were the people playing some sort of curved recorder instument with baskets on their heads, that was weird.
Afterwards, I went to this local bar that one of the Americans at my apartment works at, and hung out with him and the owner. At one point, they got really busy and ran out of glasses for drinks, so I ended up behind the bar washing dishes. In exchange for my services, I got a free drink, yay! which is good, because the cheapest drinks here are $5. And that is how I ended up washing dishes at an African American bar in Japan.
Allison

Pictures!

2005-08-07T18:10:00.000+09:00

Haha! Picking up someone else's wireless, some more pictures for y'all to go with this morning's blog.

me in front of castle, umbrella twirlers, unicyling children, and strange flute players. I really wish I understood what was going on here.

Wednesday

2005-08-04T05:52:00.000+09:00

Well,

It's dawning on me how difficult it is to completely uproot yourself and move to a country where you don't understand anything that's going on. Even such a simple task as finding bandages for my knees, or finding some rope to hang my laundry seems to take a good number of hours. Last night I got "directions" from one of the Americans in my building for the electronics store, so I could finally go and set up my internet. After riding around all morning looking for the store I finally gave up and got some lunch.
Now with lunch, I am faced with an entirely new problem. First, checking to make sure I'm not ordering some pork or chicken dish, two- making sure there isn't "hidden meat" in it. Third- making sure the meal doesn't cost too much, as I'm not sure when I'm getting paid. So, riding my bike through the covered shopping distict, I saw a small stand selling round little balls of some sort. So I locked my bike, went to the shop and said "Nikku dame?" or, "meat, bad!". At which the girl at the counter giggled and signalled one of the guys over who looked at me, looked at the little brown steaming balls and said "octopus". Well, that settled that. I ordered the little octopus balls, got some sort of japanese gatorade out of a vending machine and rode off to find a bench to eat on. I popped open my little plastic box and set to with my chopsticks. I picked up one little ball, about the size of a round egg, covered in chopped green onions, some sort of white paste, and fish flakes, and sat there with it in my mouth for what seemed like forever. I had overlooked the piping hot nature of the cakes, and could not chew them, or I would unleash more of the heat which was so burning my mouth. slowly I managed to swallow down bits of it, rather like a snake trying to shift about some object in my mouth without actually chewing it. I was more careful with the next seven. Though being rather bizarre, and full of chunks of little pink octopus, they were rather tasty and now I am quite full for 500 yen.

So, I think I'll head back to my apartment, knock on everyone:s doors, see if anyone at all is home to help me with internet and telephony. Or, if they will answer their doors when I ring. I guess we'll see.

I went in to my school yesterday, a few teachers tried to show me around but didn't speak much Englsh. The principal told me not to come back until Friday, because all the English teachers are out and there will be no one there to help me around. I tried to tell them I could just work on Japanese and work on my self introduction at my desk, and they asked me if I could do that at home. So, I believe if later I want to take my vacation days I might have to tell them off for it. I mean, I know that the other teachers at school aren't doing anything at their desks but at least I would be able to see some familiar faces everyday. Ahhh well. back to harass my apartment building.

Allison

sunday II

2005-08-01T14:39:00.000+09:00

Ok, here are some more shrine pictures I took on Friday. Some random place I found on my bike.
Not that I have internet yet, I'm picking up on someone else's signal I've been trying to access all week.

I went to aikido last night, it was really great and everyone was really friendly and helpful. We did lots of ground techniques, and I lost the top few layers of skin on my knees and they're sort of oozing. gross huh? I was sort of sad though, apparently this dojo doesn't go drinking after class. My supervisor, who's a fourth degree black belt, and who took me to class, was very surprised to learn of "second" or "third" class training.
The dojo is in the gym of one of the local junior high schools, except it's a gym devoted to martial arts training. It has built in mats and everything. no bathrooms though. My god, it was hot in there. I don't think my gi has ever been so soaked with sweat. I hung it outside to dry before putting it in the laundry basket, and it broke the ropes I have out for laundry it was so heavy.

It's sunday morning, and pouring and thunderstorming out. maybe it will take some of the humidity and heat out of the air. so much for another trip to the 100 yen shop to buy some brooms and such. maybe later in the afternoon if it clears up.

going to post this before I lose my signal again,
cheers,
allison

sunday!

2005-07-31T09:36:00.000+09:00

Hey, here's some torii gates leading to a shinto shrines on the castle grounds I visited on Friday. I'm facing away from the shrine, the other side doesn't have the kanji on the posts.

saturday!

2005-07-30T15:37:00.000+09:00

ok, feeling much better today. i think i have finally caught up on sleep and am feeling much better oriented in the city. when i left today there was a sign up in the apartment about a local festival, in which our groundskeepers's "hawaiian band" is supposed to be playing. I rode around on my bike for a little while, but couldn't find it. but I like riding around here in no particular direction, so that's okay. the neighborhood streets are all very narrow, and always lined with flood canals and everyone seems to have perfectly trimmed little trees and bushes peeking up from behind walls. then also admidst the buildings are little rice paddies. really, they:re about the size of a Fishers' house but they're in the middle of the city. one of the guys in my apartment said its because the Japanese government places high tariffs on imported rice, which drives up the price of rice in japan. this allows people to use city land for farming and keeps rice prices high in the grocery, which they surprisingly are.

I've learned how to orient myself in this city, so i'm pretty much free to wander around. My system works by using the castle. seriously. you can see it from anywhere and can pretty much determine compass directions from looking at it to find where you are. My apartment's a bit northwest of it, and downtown is directly south from the castle's front. thus, by looking at the castle, i can instantly tell where I am and which direction i need to go. which is convenient because apparently the japanese don't use maps or label their streets. wait wait- not label them, name them. they don't name their streets.

this afternoon i found the *cultural exchange center*, which has free internet and a few books in english i might check out in a bit. from here they don't look too appealing though.

love,
allison

Friday!

2005-07-30T08:13:00.000+09:00

Argh! I just got the most wonderful email from Josh, who is having a wonderful time visiting all the local schools in the area with his supervisor and interacting with the office staff. Hopefully I:ll get to go into my school on monday. Normally JETs go into their schools for the summer, and sort of sit around for awhile not doing anything in particular. Well, my supervisor told me he wants me to take all of my vacation days (paid and non-paid days) now, as in immediately, as in, when i don:t want to and am unprepared to take them. as in, i get 7 summer vacation days, and 23 *nenkyu* or paid vacation days and he wants me to use up about 17 days now. At any rate, its kind of upsetting and I called him up and sort of demanded he take me to my school, or someone does, so hopefully I:ll be going at the start of next week.

when i called him he invited me to aikido class tomorrow night, which was very nice. so i hope he doesn:t kick my ass for harassing him. he:s a fourth degree black belt. if that:s not motivation to behave well... also, i:m having dinner at one of the :aussie:s: apartments tonight, which should be good.

I biked to the 100 yen shop today, picked up some household stuff and what not. then I thought I:d try to bike downtown. I accidentally took this winding back road, going through all these residential buildings and stuff and all of a sudden I came upon this big shrine\temple. It was really beautiful and unexpected. I walked around to the side of it, and there was an enormous steep staircase going up this big hill. so i started climbing it and turned around so I could see over a nearby wall and there was this big cemetary with all sorts of graves crammed together. so i turned around and started climbing again. I got halfway up and a little dirt path shot out from the side of it. i followed the path, and it took me to another temple,with a small note in english introducing the temple. it was built in 1716 by Masaｋuni Sakamori, or something like that. it was really really beautiful. the roof and sides had all of beautiful. the roof and sides had all of these buddhist carvings. I have pictiures, will get them up once i get internet at my place. anyway, i got to the top of the hill, and there was the most stunning vew of the city and the castle in the distance. I walked up all these stairs thinking that there would be a great shrine or something up there, to ｍｅｒｉｔ　ｔｈｅ　ｈｉｋｅ，　ｂｕｔ　ｊｕｓｔ　ａ　ｓｐｅｃｔａcular view of the castle. oh well. so i went back down and biked back to the castle, biked around the outside grounds, came upon some more little shrines. there was a big buddhist looking temple, and right next to it, two smaller shinto shrines. the shrine in the back had all these red torii gates leading to it. (i have pictures). all these places are completely empty too. no one has been at any of them. not even a monk or nun or anything. just empty. so on my way hｏｍｅ i went back to the same internet cafe Iwas at yesterday, and am there now typing. this keyboard keeps screwing with me.
oh, hey, i have my phone number! 0792-955-387. I hope that works.
do you want the rest of my address too? how nice.. It:s, #205 shirasagi residence, 3-8-1 shinzaike- honcho. 670-0092, himeji, japan.
I think once i settle in and get to school things will start picking up. or at least i hope so.
got to run, internet cafe time is up!
love,
allison

positive things?

2005-07-29T08:20:00.000+09:00

Oh, so I thought I:d list some of the bizarro things in my apartment. first- the shower. there:s a shower room, with a bathtub in it. I tried to take my first shower there this morning, but couldn:t figure out how to keep the water reasonably spraying into the bathtub, in which I was standing. Until, i figured out that the whole room is the shower and it:s ok if the water gets outside the tub. also, I have no dryer. what am i supposed to use to dry my clothes? my shower room. seriously. I:m supposed to hang them in the shower, and turn on the dryer/shower, which pushes hot, dehumidified air through the bathroom for a set number of hours at varying temperatures. I also have a camera door answering thing. Someone rings the bell to be let in, and a camera puts them on a small monitor on my wall. Its really weird. I also have one of those toilets that sprays water at your bum, i forget what they:re called. they:re in all the hotel bathrooms and stuff, I guess the japanese really like them. I have yet to get up the courage to use it. they have hilarious diagrams of the jets of water and a butt drawn on all the buttons. there:s also a little sink, that:s all i can figure out what it is, on the back of the toilet, like on top of the tank. it automatically turns on when I flush. but there isbn:t anywhere to put a bottle of soap or anything, so I:m not sure what to do. It also runs for a really long time. also, although my building is only for english speakers, they have left all the instructions for the air conditioner, stove, washing machine, drying shower, etc in japanese kanji. Which means i can:t read any of it. All from here, I think my internet cafe time is running out, I will try to figure out the international calls system soon. Until then,
Allison

Himeji, begin!

2005-07-28T08:03:00.000+09:00

So, first full day in Himeji city. I got in yesterday afternoon to my new apartment building. The city has clumped all the foreign english language teachers together in one very western building. I:m not sure what to think of that, or where the apostrophe key is on this computer. Pluses- large support network, being able to share ideas for classes or activities, instant friends. Minuses- doesn;t feel like japan, no shoji doors (traditional japanese architecture), no futon, none of the `japanese` things I was looking forward too. No Japanese neighbors to exploit language learning or learn native culture. I went out to dinner with a few of the other ALT::s in the building last night, they seemed fun. I met a few other people in my building, there are a couple of older people who seem like they might be more useful for information and stuff.
So today I went and got my alien registration card, opened a banking account, and got ushered randomly onto a bus by my building:s custodian, Saito-san. I was trying to ask him if I got to the grocery by walking down the street, but I think he somehow thought I was trying to get downtown and pushed me onto a bus that was at that moment passing by. So here I am, downtown. Downtown is mostly a shopping and eating area, with a big `outdoor` mall with covered streets, which i soon tired of. so I left and walked to the area outside of the castle, which is at the center of the city and is huuuuge. I mean, its on a hill elevated, so you can see it from pretty far away, but then there:s these huge castle grounds and moat that take up a ton of space. I was going to go in, but I want to take a full day for it, and with camera in hand (as in not in my kitchen).
My supervisor seems pretty nice and helpful, I wish someone would help me find me a bike though. All the other people in the building are off at work and can:t help me out now though. anyway, no one is supposed to take me to school for another week and a half, so I don:t know what I:m supposed to be doing until then. I:d like to go, even if I don:t have anything to do when I get there. I think it:s a trick by my supervisor to make me take all my paid vacation days now, instead of later when there:s something interesting I want to do. mmmmmm. I:m going to have to figure outa way not to let them do this.
\also, there doesn:t seem to be a bus route map. there are plenty of bus schedules, but i even went to the himeji tourist center, and they didn:t have one. Wish me luck,
Love,
Allison

ROUND 2: BEGIN!!!!

2005-07-27T15:45:00.000+09:00

Hey! I'm in Japan!
Got in alright, just finishing up my post-departure (arrival?) orientation in Tokyo. Been out a little bit, will write more about the kabuki-cho (red light district), toilets that play music as you go, and other discoveries later. Pretty exhausted, getting up early tomorrow, so I'm going to head off to bed pretty soon. I'm heading to my new apartment in Himeji City, Hyogo prefecture, JAPAN tomorrow. Will post more when I next have internet.
till then, bye!