Start of Week 3

The ride home from Naruto Higashi Junior High School, which is normally a 15 to 30 minute commute, took me just about an hour Saturday afternoon. An exciting fact about rural Japan, at least the rural Japan I am now a resident of, is that there aren't street signs. Anywhere. So, when you decide to try a shortcut, it would be in your best interest to memorize the colors of cars parked along the roads, because a rice paddy is a rice paddy wherever you see it.

In my defense, I probably wouldn't have gotten lost had I not run into a student from my school. In my efforts to carry on some semblance of a conversation, I didn't pay attention to the back roads she was taking until I felt like we were off the quick map Nakamura-sensee had drawn for me just before I left for the day. After a bit of wandering I stopped and approached a woman working not too far off the road. Any Japanese I do know leaves me quickly whenever faced with a Real Life Situation, so I mimed my way to some sort of understanding with her. She then hopped on her bike, and I followed her a minute down the road. One chotto matte ("wait just a second") later, and the resident of that home came out, only to fret that she couldn't help me either. She then rushed back inside and brought out a younger version of herself. Younger Version and I walked a bit down the road, I showed her my map and once again invoked my charades skills and simple Japanese. I was able to get the point across that, yes, we are here, yes? And me, I (point) there. I went the way I thought she had instructed, then turned around when that didn't seem right to me. I tried to backtrack, but that proved fruitless as well. Eventually I found a large road where things started to look familiar... yes, I think I've passed this graveyard before... bend in the road... success!

And so I got home. It is now Monday afternoon, and I have squandered my first free day, since starting work one week ago, ramen-cooking, laundry-doing and Internet-browsing. There are definitely things I need to be doing, like studying Japanese, going to the store and the like, but until now I have not had a free day to myself since being in Japan. Ahh. I think I will have to save most of my work-related ranting for another entry, mostly because I don't want to think about it now. This is also one of those situations where there is so much to say you don't know where to start.

So, the basics: I officially live in Sanmu, a city in the prefecture of Chiba (a prefecture is somewhat akin to a region, or state). I say officially because the town that I actually live in was absorbed (along with three other neighboring towns) to make the city of Sanmu a year ago. So, where I really feel like I live is a place called Naruto (I might sometimes say Naruto-machi, so know now that the -machi just means 'town'). According to the sparse information available on the Internet, Naruto had around 25,000 inhabitants in 2003. It is still a small place.

For living in a small place, our apartment is situated in a good location. We live in a little residential area, with what appears to be the main street a couple minutes away by foot. We also live near the train tracks, which actually doesn't seem to pose any kind of annoyance because Japanese trains appear to be very quiet. And because we live near the train tracks... we also live near the station! Our connection to the rest of Japan is about six minutes away by foot. I am reminded of having gone traveling while living in Germany, and coming back a month later to find my bike lock frozen shut at the train station.

We haven't found what I would consider a real supermarket yet, though we've visited a few different markety-type stores. Yac's Drug, a drug store that also has some food, is our closest link, being just a few minutes away by foot. Both the post office and city hall are a short walk away, and we even have our very own neighborhood 7-11. If there was anything I wouldn't have expected about Japan, it is the frequency with which one encounters convenience stores. Granted, I have only been in two cities so far (Mito, where our training was held, and Sanmu), but both were rich in 7-11s, Happy Lawsons, Save Ons and Family Centers. My next mystery drink is ever only a few minutes away.

As you might have inferred from my pronoun usage, Hylton and I are currently sharing an apartment. I think one of us gets to move into the room next door in November, which will mean more rent money due, but also more space. The apartment isn't nearly as tiny as I imagine it could be, but it is still quite small. Luckily for us the place came "partially furnished," which means that it wasn't just a bare room when we walked in. Next to the front door (where one must remove their shoes) is a washing machine (!!!), which is next to the kitchen. There we have a sink, a single electric burner, and a tiny open cupboard for our few dishes. There is also a refrigerator which apparently is supposed to serve as storage space, because the real refrigerator/freezer combo is just to the left. We also have a microwave, a closet large enough for both of our suitcases, and a TV. There are two little bathroom-rooms, one for a western-style toilet (!!! and more on this later) and the other for a sink, bathtub and shower. The toliet, apart from not being a hole in the ground, is notable in that when you flush there is a water spout at the top and small sinkish area where you can wash your hands in the water that is going down to refill the toilet bowl. Quite smart. The shower room is interesting because apparently you can either shower while standing in the bathtub or just in the middle of the room. I've heard talk that it is Japanese custom to bathe oneself first by rinsing off in the shower, and then soaking in the tub. I haven't done the research to see if that is case, but doubtless someone reading this will know and set me right.

Our place also came with two futons, some bedding and a small wooden bed frame big enough for one of the futons. Unfortunately we haven't been using the comforters provided for us because we think they might be the cause of Hylton's mysterious asthma attacks. Hylton has never had asthma before, and it wasn't until a couple of days into our stay here that it really became apparent that he was very allergic to something. We still aren't sure that the comforters are what is causing the attacks and his general breathlessness, but that is the only thing I can really put my finger on. He was doing the best the few days we put the comforters in the back of his car, and he is generally the worst in the night and early morning--- when he is at our apartment. I've been really worried about it because although we have travel health insurance that should cover anything major up until we can get national health insurance here, he probably wouldn't be covered by any doctors in our area. Apart from that, if he is allergic to something in this region even just 7 months would be a long time to have to deal with it. The weather has been changing fairly rapidly the past two weeks, which could also have something to do with it, though I couldn't really tell you what.

I keep thinking of silly little anecdotes, but I am rather attached to chronological reporting, so I will save that for another time. I said I wouldn't get into work-talk just yet, but I will give some basics just so things flow smoothly from here on out. I have worked one week (full week, seven days, bleh) at Naruto Higashi Junior High School. Two afternoons a week I will teach at two different elementary schools, Nango Elementary and Naruhama Elementary. I don't start at Naruhama until the 19th and at Nango until October 5th. That sort of weird scheduling is only the beginning of the scheduling hassles I have encountered the past week, and will likely encounter for the remainder of my time here. The sooner I can be okay with never having a clue what is going on the better, but I think it is okay to admit at the beginning that it is really frustrating.

I should note that when I say I've worked a week, I mean I have been at school from 8:30-4:30 (or 8:00-4:00 sometimes). I have so far only taught one class. I have Sports Day to thank for a week of confusion. The event, which was yesterday thank God, caused every single day to be different. So even when I would find out from one of the three English-speaking teachers at my school what would be expected of me the next day, I would come in just to find it had all been changed up again. I will appease myself with the notion that as I learn the ways of the school and it's teachers things will get easier.

One last thing I will say about my first week at school is that I was completely unprepared for the reaction I would get from the students. At our training in Mito all the new ALTs (Assistant Language Teacher) were warned that we, as Westerners, would get all kinds of reactions from the Japanese. This wasn't really news to me, and even after just a day or two in Mito I had been around enough to recognize what is popularly known here as "the gaijin stare." Gaijin means foreigner in Japanese, and for a nation of around 127 million people, probably just about 3 million (if you try to factor in illegal immigrants) are foreign citizens. That means Japan is pretty ethnically homogeneous. That also means that if a Japanese person, whether 5, 15 or 50 years old sees one of these relatively few foreigners, they might unintentionally give them a more lasting look. This isn't to say that everyone is staring at you all day, because from my experience it seems like the majority of people just don't look at other people as they walk by. I think I've only encountered maybe a few negative looks, and the remainder, well, they range between delighted and stupefied, but all were pretty amusing. My students, however, have proven that if you are a kid you have some license to take it up a notch.

I think the peak of my surprise occurred on Day 3, when four third-year (our 9th grade) students whom I had met the day previous bounded up and proceeded to pat my belly and scream Japanese around me. I can't really relate how weird it was. I mean, in context, it made sense, it was just that I hadn't seen my day going that way.

With really minor exception the only students who have talked to me have been girls. Some of the boys give the obligatory nod, fewer smile, less still say a few words, and the rest walk by without noticing me. The girls, however, are much different. The first day I had a couple pairs come up shyly to me, the next day more, and the next day more, until at Sports Day practices whole packs would come up and ask me things in Japanese, and we would spend the next few minutes figuring each other out. All in all I'm still fairly charmed by it, because I would much rather be working with kids who are interested in what I have to say than bored, or worse, have a negative idea about me or my subject. I don't doubt that I will have lots to say on this topic in the coming months, but for now I will leave you with

The Things That Are Exciting About Me to (Female) Japanese Junior High Students:

6. Tall: Not really as big of a deal as I might have been lead to believe. A lot of the junior high boys are decently tall, and some of the girls too.
5. Slim: Kind of an awkward subject, because I am not sure if it is being said as an observation or as a kind of compliment, so I don't know whether to contradict it (as apparently is the polite thing to do) or... change the subject?
4. Ride a Bike to Work: All the other teachers drive cars, apparently, and most of the kids bike. When I tried to buy a bike helmet at the bike store we were told that only schoolchildren wear helmets.
3. Live in Naruto: Like most of them, probably.
2. Have a Boyfriend: Oh my gosh, I told this to two girls who asked, and for the next two days I had girls I hadn't even talked to before coming up to me to ask me about my boyfriend. Even Saito-sensee, one of the English teachers I work with, got super excited when she found out my boyfriend was the ALT at Hasunuma Junior High School.
1. Have a Slim Face: This one is kind of weird but I cannot express to you how big of a deal this is to most of the girls I've talked with. I mean, yeah, most of their faces are fairly round, so it makes sense that something different would be interesting, but honestly. Its like you are a celebrity for those five minutes that you're surrounded by schoolgirls oohing over you.

I hope it's not just my ego that makes me like these encounters. I really need to learn Japanese in order to have real conversations with any of these students, but a lot of them are friendly or shy but interested, and it really does warm your heart to think you could have some kind of positive impact on them. More on that later. :)