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Published: March 18th 2007
Every month, every week, every day, every hour. It's never the same. Sometimes I long to be back in Canada. Other days I am just so excited for the next festival or weekend trip. Then there are the days when I just want to sit at home and enjoy my lack of work-related stress. Of course, it's to be expected that a year working in a completely different country and culture will draw varying thoughts and feelings. It's the vast range of them and extreme contrasts within short periods of time that are a little disconcerting at times. The past month or so provides very good examples of some of this roller-coaster ride.
A few weeks ago, ACC had some pretty significant staff turnover. I didn't expect that people coming and going would affect me too much. But some of the co-workers I had come to know and love are now gone. And with new staff here, I'm feeling a little like a vet. It's interesting trying to help people get to know a new country and city when it's really only been home for a matter of months. In some ways it makes me realize just how much I've
Fire Festival
Before the burning.learned already this year. Kelp and Cecile, the two new teachers from Vancouver, are really great too. Sweet girls. As I get to know them better, I'm also watching Simran, one of the first friends I made here, prepare herself to go home to Canada in the next two weeks. It's strange. People say to me that I only have about three months left. It's as though someone is calling me old and my time is running out. But it's exciting sometimes too to think of being back home again with the people (and cat) that I love so much.
In the midst of all this thinking and contemplation of life, I'm still enjoying this Japanese experience immensely. A few weeks ago a few of us spent a very girly weekend together. Onsen in Anjo, then a sleepover at the Yamamoto abode where we partook in a little green tea liqueur and some Sex and the City DVDs. How fun is that?!
I took in another festival with Miyoko and Satoshi, a student. It was the Hazu Fire Festival and it was friggin awesome! They have two teams of men, again split up according to the unlucky ages.
Fire Festival2
There it goes! These 25 and 42 year olds really have to work hard to ditch the bad luck curse! There were two apparatuses made of bamboo branches and dried leaves (no Levi, it's not apparati, I looked it up). Inside each apparatus there was a huge branch. They set the apparatuses on fire, and then the team had to race to take them apart, flame by flame, and retrieve the branch inside. It was insane watching these men climb right into the fire to chop off pieces at a time. A little scary almost... but very cool.
I spent last weekend in Nagano prefecture. My students, Chieko and Mayumi, were making the trip with Simran and Lesley on Sunday, so I went up a day ahead by myself and met up with them early Sunday morning. I had a quiet train trip as far as Matsumoto on Saturday, where I stopped to see its infamous castle. Many castles in Japan were destroyed in the second World War. From what I understand, this is one of four in Japan that still has its original interior. The walk to the castle alone had me dumbfounded. This city seemed to have culture and all
the amenities of a thriving Japanese city, but it was extraordinarily quiet. With the added beauty of a mountainous backdrop all the way around, it was just a wonderful place to be. The castle in the midst of this environment was breathtaking. Definitely two thumbs up for Matsumoto!
From there, I spent a few more hours on the train to get to Yudanaka, a small town where people catch the bus to get to Jigokudani National Park... also know as the monkey onsen. This is where you can go to see snow monkeys bathing in hot springs like people! How cool is that?! I'll tell you, it's not very cool when the damn thing closes at 4:00PM. Especially when you arrive in Yudanaka at 3:50. This is when the emotional roller-coaster takes one of those steep drops. Maybe it's traveling alone. Maybe it's the difficulty of trying to deal with the problem in a very broken second language. This moment seriously took me from, "I'm happy! Matsumoto is amazing! The waiter said I speak good Japanese! I get to see monkeys!", to, "Fuck this shit!". Pardon my French, but that was my honest reaction. The slightest things can elate
me, while the next small things can fill me with dismay. I got back on the train and headed for Nagano City just to get myself out of my funk. Though I must say, I think there may be a correlation between my sad little story and the translation of Jigokudani to "Hell's Valley".
I spent the night at a cute little ryokan in Nagano City. Going to brag a little here too... I booked my room by myself, over the phone, with a completely non-English speaking staff. Yay Kara! Anyway, the following morning the girls came to pick me up and we headed to a temple on a mountain where we learned about and practiced zazen - seated meditation. It was really fascinating to learn about this practice. The more I learn about Buddhism, the more I really like it. It's also really interesting to find how many parallels there are between Buddhism, Christianity, and other world religions. Though there were times I thought I might permanently lose feeling in my legs, this was a great experience.
From our meditation, we headed to Zenko-ji, the main temple in Nagano, famous for it's openness to any denominations, as
well as to women. Again, the backdrop of snow-tipped mountains just really adds to the beauty of anything you see in this area. One really cool thing about this temple is that it is the home of what is believed to be the first Buddha statue to be brought to Japan. The statue is hidden though, and only displayed to the public once ever seven years. There is also an underground tunnel through which worshippers pass to try and touch a sacred key that leads to enlightenment. The difficult and somewhat freaky part is that the tunnel is completely black. Not a route for the claustrophobic among us, but I touched the key and I already feel a little lighter!
We drove a little way after Nagano City to get to Iida, where we visited a yummy bakery and ate a little too much. Then the girls took us to a little touristy shop town with a beautiful mountain view. Lucky for us, the cold drove most tourists away that day, so it was not only gorgeous, but peaceful too. Mayumi and Chieko are absolutely wonderful to travel with. Not only are they tons of fun, but they really
know their way to the small treasures of Japan!
This week, I've stuck a little closer to home. My voice actually did more traveling than me! Ha ha ha! Allow me to explain... On Thursday, Mr. Adachi told me that I'd be going with him to the airport the following day for a voice recording. My reaction, "What's that now?". Yeah. So we headed to Nagoya on Friday to record some ACC advertisements that were played through very loud speakers from a low-flying plane today over Hekinan, Nishio, Toyoake, and Kariya. Next week, Okazaki and Nagoya. As you can imagine, my gaijin voice attempting to sound professional in Japanese is now recognizable to everyone. I actually had about five people stop me at the yamanaka today to ask if that was me. I'm signing autographs. You know, working on hiring a body guard. Pretty exciting stuff happening to me out here!
I did do more this weekend than just sit outside waiting to hear the sweet sound of my own voice. On Saturday night, the lot of us headed to Dojin bar in Nishio for Simran's going away party. It really sucks that she's leaving. She is probably
one of the coolest people I've ever met. Make the best of the time we've got though. The great thing about going away parties is that everyone wants to be there, so it's generally more a happy time than a sad one. We all dressed in green for St. Patty's day, of course, and we had a really great time.
Today, I headed to Obu with Hana and Selina to watch Tommie's dance recital. These are my fellow ACC people from Handa, where I work on Mondays. We always have a really great time working together, and Tommie's generally at the core of all the fun, so undoubtedly, we all wanted to be there for his big day. He was so cute too... all nervous for his performances. I'm really glad I got to see these traditional Japanese dances. The little kids were so sweet and the dances were really graceful. No question for me though, Tommie totally stole the show. I felt like we were his proud family, sitting there snapping pictures. He was awesome!
Right now, my eyes are heavy and my belly is still full after Miyoko made the most wonderful sukiyaki for Mariko and
I tonight. Seriously, this woman never ceases to amaze me. She cooks, she paints, she makes pottery, plays the piano, takes English lessons, runs her own hair salon, is an awesome grandma, and still makes time to daily heighten my Japanese experience. Love this woman!
Now, off to bed on a high note...
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Levi
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Awesome-ness
You're cool Kara.