Year End eh?

I've had a number of ideas on things to write about over the past few weeks but events got in the way.  So it more or less boils down to this....

Last might I met up with a drinking buddy for a round at a snack called "Nishiki".  It's a nice little place with interesting decor.  On one wall are a couple of plaques with the Chinese characters 福 and 發 written on them.  On the frames are the cardinal directions, again in Chinese characters, written in somewhat mixed up order.  I asked the proprietress what the meaning of that order was but she replied, "I don't.  I just like the look of the plaques.".  Okay.  So much for an attempt at enlightening conversation.

During the course of last night's drinking my buddy mentioned an example of an "Only in Japan" situation.  He had heard that there is a scissor maker, presumably down in Tokyo, who charges an exorbitant amount for a pair of scissors.  In addition, it takes about three years to make a pair.  Supposedly customers are willing to wait a year and a half to receive the scissors they've ordered.  The price of a pair?  三百四十万円..."three hundred and forty man yen"...¥3,400,000.  By my calculation that presently is over C$35,000.

He then went on to describe how the scissors are made.  First the handle is made.  Then the steel for the cutting edges is layered on to the ends using a technique similar to that employed by Japanese samurai sword makers.  The scissors are then hung outside to age for three years.  At the end of three years they are brought inside.  Since they were hanging outside for three years the scissors had of course rusted.  At that point the blades are sharpened and polished.  Then the scissors are shaped.  If I heard the story correctly, the scissor handles are polished to a bare metal finish and clean of hand oils.  They will be lubricated with the oil from the hands of their eventual purchasers.  And because of the aging process, the blades will be virtually rust free.

The justification for the high cost?  The scissors are indeed unique.  They're hand made with the finest of craftsmanship.  And for a traditional crafts person who uses them for a lifetime, the high cost of a single pair of these scissors offsets the cost of using lower quality pairs which will wear out and need to be replaced.  My friend's final thoughts were that "These aren't just scissors...they're heirloom pieces".  "Quite amazing" is about all I could add....

"Cop"

On Saturday morning I reached the bottom of the staircase at my apartment building which is closest to the parking lot.  I noticed a pair of scissors with a plastic cover over them and a strip of yellow tape next to it.  On the tape was the word "CAUTION".  I thought that was a bit odd.  Reminded me of the yellow tape that police forces back in North America use to cordon off a crime site.

As I walked to the drugstore next door I noticed a large number of police cars parked in the store's lot.  There obviously was something going on but I didn't stop to try and figure out what the fuss was all about.  I took the above photo and sent it by Line to our office manager.  She had taken the day off to attend a friend's wedding in Sendai so she wasn't around to see all the police cars.  I attached a teasing caption which read "They're looking for you".  She fired back a reply of shock and I added "....joke".  (I found out of Sunday from her that she had initially thought something had gone wrong with the heaters she had set to fire up by timers.  Oops!  Bad coincidence.)

Anyways, in one of my morning classes I mentioned the gathering of "cop cars".  The students may or may not have understood what I meant by that.  So I went into a short explanation of the origins of the word "cop" as it pertains to the police.  That was edifying for the students.  They seemed to appreciate it.

Later in the day my co-worker James mentioned that a police officer had visited the school asking to speak to me.  I had been teaching at the time so he advised the officer that I was busy.

When I got home that evening a couple of people were speaking to my neighbour.  They were just finishing up and they turned to me next.  They identified themselves as members of the Yonezawa police department.  There had been a robbery the previous night and they wanted to know of my whereabouts (I hadn't gone out the previous night and had gone to bed around midnight).  I mentioned I had heard people rushing about at some hour early in the morning but I hadn't checked on the time or things in general.

Last night I was called upon at home by two different police officers.  The first officer showed me his badge.  That was the first Japanese police badge I'd ever set eyes on.  They apologized for the inconvenience of calling at a late hour and asked if it was okay if they could ask a few questions.  In particular they wanted to know if I'd be willing to identify the shoes I usually wear.  I produced them and pointed out which pair I wear for work and which are my leisure wear pair.  The second officer took them aside to take prints of the bottoms of my shoes.  The first officer explained that they had found the suspects shoe prints and they wanted to ensure that they eliminated the shoes of the occupants of the building.  Once they took the prints they asked me to certify them.  That was done with a signature and a finger print (I had misplaced my registered name seal so a finger print was the acceptable substitute).

Hopefully that will mark the end of my participation in the police investigation.  As for the actual crime, I only have heard the following: the victim works in a bar, she only had ¥3000 in her wallet that night, and the incident happened around 1AM.  In addition the victim had feared for her life at the time of the incident.  So I presume she was assaulted.  The scissors I had seen on Saturday morning likely might of been her assailant's weapon.

Someone else I know had been the intended victim of an attempted purse snatching a number of years ago.  Like the incident at my apartment, it had happened as she got home to her apartment after a night's work.  In her case the want-to-be robber was wearing a tiger mask much like one worn by a character from a popular wrestling manga.  She had hung onto her purse for dear life and managed to beat off her assailant.  When we talked about the incident at my place, she reflected on the outcome of her case.  "They still haven't caught the guy", she said.  Hopefully the outcome in this case will be different.

-*-

Post script:  A news story, in Japanese, describing the incident can be read here:
http://headlines.yahoo.co.jp/hl?a=20151215-00000286-yamagata-l06. The article mentions additional details such as the victim works at a nearby eatery, she had an inkling she was being followed, and the assailant had said "I'm going to kill you".  All in all, a very traumatic incident.

Further on the previous post...

Supposedly the story I read online was missing a few details:
- I heard from one person that the child died about six months ago.  That would explain the mention of "six months" the first time I heard the story.
- I also heard that the story came to light after the mother came forward to the police to file a domestic violence complaint.
- Furthermore, the death of the baby didn't take place in Yonezawa.  It took place in another city whose name I can't recall right now.  The couple moved to Yonezawa to live with the husband's grandparents after the child's death.

Of course, all of the above is what I've heard second-hand. 

-*-

I believe I've finished all my X'mas shopping.  Now it's a matter of getting everything wrapped up and shipped off.  Interestingly, last time I sent a parcel to Canada I discovered that the cost of sending it by EMS (Express Mail Service) parcel mail was lower than that for sending it by parcel airmail.  I wasn't quite expecting that.  I thought the opposite would be the case.

I've found that parcels sent by EMS get to North America quite quickly.  I think the record had to be for one I sent to a friend in New Jersey.  It got there in about two days.  The last one I sent to Canada got there in 4 days.  I paid around ¥1600 for postage on the second one.  I'm quite sure I wouldn't get that kind of service from Canada Post....

Stunned....

I went out on Monday night for a nightcap at a snack (i.e.: a type of bar, typically run by a woman, where patrons are served Japanese appetizer dishes along with their drinks).  That may sound like an expensive proposition to anyone who is aware of the going rates at snacks but the place in question is a bit different.  The base rate is ¥2100.  A new bottle of what I usually have on keep there is about ¥2500.  Not too bad since the other two places I go to charge ¥3000 for the same stuff.  The "mama" is a young woman in her early thirties who once worked at another snack I occasionally go to.

I had been settled into my seat for at least an hour (and after an old acquaintance had come in...whereupon neither of us could remember the others name) when the mama started off a "Did you hear the news..." story.  She mentioned "chissoku".  I asked what that meant.  She explained it to me.  Suffocation.  "Wait a second", I said to myself, "She's talking about an infant".  I managed to piece the picture together.  The father is 23 and the mother 17 years old.  The child literally was a new born.  Only 16 days old.  The parents let the baby suffocate because they were more interested in playing a video game.  It goes without saying I was stunned.

When I got home the first thing I did was look for an article online covering the story.  Found it in no time.  Yes, the horrible event had taken place in Yonezawa.  I browsed the comments below the story.  Nothing there helped me come to grips with the tragedy.

I brought up the story in a couple of my classes the next day.  One student mentioned that a friend of one of her co-workers was a relative of the deceased baby's father.  Somehow I was expecting something like that to come up somewhere along the line.

I don't have anything more to report on this story.  Perhaps somewhere down the line I'll hear more from someone else.  This a small city and the rumour mill runs fairly well....

-*-

Here's the URL to the story I found online: http://www.japantoday.com/category/crime/view/16-day-old-girl-dies-after-being-put-in-trash-can-by-parents

Just got home....

I was on a Yamagata Shinkansen train this morning heading back after a couple of nights spent in Tokyo.  As I gathered my bags (yes, I had bought a fair amount of stuff) I decided I'd take a taxi home.  The thought occurred to me then that I've seemingly always gotten a driver who knows where to go when I request to be driven to my apartment building.  Thinking of the sheer number of places one could go, even in this small city, I realized it's quite surprising that so many drivers would know the building.  This morning when I got in a cab it wasn't any different.  I gave the neighbourhood name and the building name.  The driver confirmed she had heard.  Before we pulled out from the station though she turned and asked to confirm where exactly it was I wanted to go.  "There's so many apartment buildings", she remarked afterwards.  The ironic quality of the moment had me laughing quietly to myself....

Exit Through the Entrance and Vice Versa

This is a copy of a post I put up in a forum I frequent:

The local AEON shopping centre has a number of ground level parking lots.  I prefer to park in the one closest to the building and which has separate entrance and exit ways leading from/onto the main street which runs in front of the store.  Today as I started to turn into the lot someone pulled into my path...to exit from the entrance.   I pretended to turn into the nose of their car (advanced about a meter or so), and stopped...I wanted to make sure I froze the other driver in their tracks.  Then I drove into the lot on the right hand side of the entrance. Probably freaked out the other driver a bit.  Remember, we drive on the left side of the road in Japan.

When leaving the parking lot I swung to the right side of the exit and angled my car to about 45 degrees to the curb to wait for a gap in the traffic...and sure enough someone wanted to drive into the parking lot through the exit.  Since I was blocking the right side of the exit, which would be the left side for incoming traffic, the other driver had to wait.  The problem was their car was short and the lane they were in is wide.  So their car didn't block cars coming up behind them.  I had to wait for a break in the traffic to get out of the lot.  Meanwhile the other driver inched towards me and then braked.  Not sure what that was about.

So there's my traffic gripe of the day...people who enter a parking lot through the exit and others who exit the lot through the entrance.

Karaoke...Dragonflies...And more Karaoke

October is rushing by at quite a clip.  I look and see today's date is the 21st.  Doesn't seem like that long ago when I had spent a Sunday afternoon sitting through the 2nd annual charity karaoke presentation at the Yonezawa Civic Theatre.

There was no real lead up to that afternoon...aside from one of my co-workers deflecting queries a month before from his students about an upcoming karaoke presentation he was going to participate in.  He had let that item slip out in class and found himself being badgered to divulge details.  He held his ground, refused to give out any details, and the matter failed to get any further mention.

That is until I went out for drinks on a Saturday night and mentioned the matter to the proprietress of the establishment.  She smiled and told me she was going to be performing at the same event...and would I like to buy a ticket.  I said "Sure, why not?" and thus found myself the next afternoon sitting through three hours of enka tunes with a bit of dancing added in. 

My co-worker came by to say "Hi" before the show started.  He was nervous as heck and had a drink in his hand which he was consuming in an effort to calm down his stage fright.  I'd hazard to say that seemed to do the trick as he was able to do both his numbers, a duet and a solo number, without any glaring problems.  He got a more than warm round of applause during his solo effort (after being egged on by the MC with reminders of "Don't sing in English!").  Naturally, I did make a short video clip of each of his performances...to show to his students.  Hey, what are friends for eh?

-*-

Thursday last week was sunny and quite pleasant.  I drove to work that day since that's what I always do on Wednesdays and Thursdays.  As I reached the outskirts of town I noticed that were a number of dragonflies in the air...some of them coupled.  I remembered that a co-worker had said that he was afraid of dragonflies.  I had thought then "Well, I can sort of see that".  Well, as I drove along their numbers increased.  There could've been dozens of them flying past me as I drove up the road.   By the time I reached the next town their presence was starting to get a bit unnerving.  The good thing is that I didn't get any stuck on my vehicle.  I had had this happen to me last year when driving up to Tendo to watch a soccer match.  There's nothing quite as distracting as seeing a big dragonfly stuck on your windshield wiper as you drive along.

-*-

Going back to the topic of karaoke:  What does one get when you mix two drunk guys (I wasn't one of them) with a song neither of them were asked to sing...but felt they had to because someone had requested them to sing it?  Typically the response would be a polite round of hand waving and "Sorry I couldn't possibly do it" followed by a quick jab at the "Cancel this song" button.  But this past Sunday the response was more along the lines of "Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead!".  I don't recall the title of the song but it was a duet, an aria-like number which was quite popular about 15-20 years ago.  On a wild guess I'd say it was made popular by Pavarotti or, less likely to be correct, Sarah Brightman(sic).

Nonetheless, that night the song started and the two guys found themselves wondering what they were going to do given their inebriated states.  One fellow got the baritone part and the other got the tenor part.  It started off with the male lead singing the first verse.  Our baritone singer immediately flubbed up the words (they were in Italian) and all he could manage was a bit that sounded a bit like "con so...".  That quickly became "kon-so-me", as in "consomme" soup.  Needless to say not a single word of the original lyrics came out from there on.  It was a steady string of "kon-so-me" and "wakame" (yes, it's that wakame, the seaweed one often finds in miso soup) sung by both fellows until the end of the song.  That was accompanied by gales of hysterical laughter from the everyone else in the establishment.  The whole thing was irreverent, jack-ass-like stupid, a touch inspired, and so atypical.  It's not every night where one encounters bust-a-gut laughter in a snack....

Silver Week

They call this time of year "Silver Week".  Except when I said it in class with a flat North American accent, none of my students initially caught it.  When I repeated myself one student exclaimed "Ah...shi-ru-ba u-ii-ku".  Well, I could've said it that way but using my Japanese method of saying English words wasn't the point of the lesson.

Nonetheless, we get to enjoy three weekday holidays all in a row starting from Monday this week.  This stretch of days off is called "Silver Week" in contrast to "Golden Week" in May.  None of my students have offered up an explanation but I suppose the reason is as simple as the order they happen...gold is first and silver is second.  There.  Simple, eh?  Not sure about the accuracy of my guess though.

Today is Tuesday and, thus, the middle of the stretch of the three days off.  With the weather being quite warm and sunny, I went ahead and did a load of laundry in the morning.  After immersing myself in a computer game, I then headed out in the early afternoon to check out an event at a local park.  An acquaintance had mentioned it when she spotted me at the supermarket the previous night.  She said was going to be doing some "ani-song" DJ'ing.  "Ani-song" meaning "anime show song".

Having completed my visit to my acquaintance's event, and consuming some chowder whilst doing so, I sauntered back home and decided it would be a waste to spend the rest of the afternoon indoors.  So I grabbed a book and hat, then wandered over to the park by Uesugi Shrine.

As it turns out preparations are in swing for the upcoming Fall Festival.  The Yonezawa Fall Festival bills itself more or less as a festival which is held just because there's time to have a festival.  Or something to that effect.  Nothing too complicated eh.  Most of the tents have been laid out but only a portion were raised and occupied by folks selling various types of food.  I wasn't particularly hungry so I made my way to the grassy knoll in the park and set myself down in the shade of a tree to do some reading.

What followed was nothing exciting: I just read, checked out a Wikipedia page about Alice Munro and Munro's Books, and listened to an album by The New Pornographers.  I became immersed in the book, Alice Munro's "The Good Life", and was shielded from the music being played over the nearby PA system by what was flowing out of the earphones I had on.  I essentially lost touch with my immediate surroundings.

At some point in time I suddenly realized that the points of reference on my person had slightly jarred me from my physical location.  I was listening to music in which I could readily understand the lyrics, I was gazing upon print I could readily read, and the web page showing on my iPhone browser was the Wikipedia entry for Munro's Books, a place which I've quite enjoyed visiting in the past.  Those elements put together had me disoriented for a moment.  It was like I wasn't in Japan but I was back in Canada.  The PA system was streaming out Western music then and the sun was in my eyes.  Once I glanced around, that feeling of having been teleported vanished, just as quickly as it had arisen.

Commuting to Work....

Twice a week I commute to work out of town.  The destination being the town of Takahata.  Initially my commute there involved walking or driving to Yonezawa station, riding the train to Takahata, and taking a taxi to my final destination.  That changed earlier this year when our school came into possession of a former teacher's car.  That teacher had driven used the vehicle up in northern Yamagata.  Once she returned to her home country the vehicle was freed up for use by another school.

My commute consists of a drive up Route 13.  This road runs up the centre of Yamagata prefecture along its north-south axis.  At the southern end it's a two lane road which goes through what more or less a series of car dealerships, convenience stores, small eateries, warehouses, and small industrial sites.  I would hazard to say that its closest relative in Vancouver would be Kingsway...which is another road I drove upon frequently (coincidence perhaps?).

Anyways, I spotted a car dealership sign a few months ago which had me scratching my head a bit.  The name sported on its signage is "Metis".  Yes, that's exactly what's spelled out on the sign in the English alphabet.  About a month later I conjectured that the name was an incorrect reading of an English word which had been imported into Japanese.  Two weeks ago I spotted the Japanese katakana rendering of the company's name.  It read "Medeisu".  Okay, there went my theory that it was supposed to be "meteisu" or "maties".

Another feature on Route 13 which caught my eye is an abandoned two story building at the south end of a bridge not far from the southern border of Takahata town.  It's been stripped of fixtures such as doors and windows but hasn't been completely covered in scaffolding and tarps...a sign in Japan that a building is being demolished.  I had no idea what it used to be and I often thought it may be a building which is awaiting renovation.

A few weeks ago I drove up to Tendo to catch a Montedio Yamagata match with a friend.  He used to live in Yonezawa but presently works in Niigata.  When we passed the above mentioned building he quipped that it had once been a love hotel, a hotel catering to couples who needed a private room to engage in amorous activities, which had a brightly coloured sign on top that featured an image of a pink Godzilla.  I've seen plenty of uses of Godzilla in advertising products and services in Japan but I must say that was the first time I've heard of Godzilla, furthermore a pink version, being employed to advertise a love hotel.  Certainly must of have stood out a lot in comparison to the demure sign for the Faeries Hotel down the road. 

Something Heard A While Ago

I don't remember when exactly I heard the following story.  It had to be about a week or so after I returned to Japan from my trip to Canada.  By my calculations it would've been July 15th when I last visited the place where I heard it which is a "snack" (a ubiquitous type of bar which usually serves drinks on a time based fee rate and always features a karaoke system) called "Ruru".

The lead up to the story was where the proprietress mentioned to the customer sitting two seats to my left that I worked as a conversational English teacher.  The fellow went off on the usual segue about not knowing how to speak English.  The next part of his monologue went into the only trip he had made to an English speaking locale.  The place in question being Oahu, Hawaii, and the time was his honeymoon about 25 years ago.

As was typical in those days, he and his wife went to Hawaii on a honeymoon tour.  That meant the newlyweds went on their honeymoon with other newlyweds on a group tour.  He mentioned that the tour company had supplied the group members with food vouchers which could be redeemed at establishments which catered to Japanese tourists.

After three days of that fare this fellow had had enough.  He wanted something different and his wife was in agreement.  So the two of them went off on their own to find a restaurant in Waikiki which looked "Western"...that meaning the place didn't have menus or signs in Japanese and it wasn't on the list recommended by their tour company.

They found themselves at the entrance of a nice looking restaurant.  The couple looked at each other and thought that a meal there would set them back a bit.  But they were determined to experience something unique so they didn't turn back.  The maitre d' didn't speak Japanese and the storyteller didn't speak much English.  All he could manage was "dinner", "honeymoon", and "please"...not in exactly in that order.  Nonetheless, it was enough to get a message across and they found themselves seated at a table in a dining room which featured a floor to ceiling high aquarium tank.  They also found themselves with a problem of trying to figure out the menu so they could place an order.

Fortune was on their side that night.  The maitre d' returned with an African-American kitchen staff member in tow.  It turned out that the kitchen staffer had been stationed in Okinawa during his tour of duty with the US military.  So he knew a bit of Japanese.  He was more than happy to help explain the menu to the newlyweds.

The meal the newlyweds had was delightful and they were more than pleased with their turn of luck.  In addition they were extremely grateful to the staff for being so accommodating.  They quite literally had had the time of their lives...as I could tell as I watched the man tell his story and he smiled to himself....

Sunday Surprises....

Yesterday (July 26th) was a pretty interesting day.  It started off slow.  Woke up and did laundry whilst distracting myself watching a series of top 10 video lists served up by watchmojo.com.   By the time I finished my two loads of laundry it was early afternoon.  My washing machine had sprung a leak which I had noticed before my departure to Vancouver.  On return I could see the condition of the machine had not stabilized.  The amount of water on the floor after each load was increasing.  So the final load of the day was done using the machine in the coin laundry room of my apartment...which is located in the rear of the real estate company and property management building on the other side of the parking lot...which also meant sauntering out in 35C temperatures outside.

Nonetheless, after finishing chores I walked over to the Matsukawa Riverside Park (which somewhat confusingly is not next to a river called Matsukawa - Pine River - but is next to the Mogami River) to take in a music festival and the so-called "Y1 Grand Prix".  The latter had nothing to do with auto racing.  It was a food competition.  One could visit and try the wares at any number of the food stands set up by local restaurants.  Customers were given a bean along with their food.  At the event administration tent a series of boxes with photos of food dishes attached to them were lined up to collect the beans.  At first I wasn't sure what the beans were for but sussed out their purpose after spying the boxes.  Oh yeah...I tried the following dishes: a roast beef donburi (I heard it was the eventual winner), tempura mochi soup, garlic and beef pizza (with minimal cheese but plenty of garlic), and a rice flour waffle (topped with whipped cream, ground roasted local bean powder, and black sugar sauce).  Needless to say, I didn't have dinner later that evening.  I satisfied my late evening hunger pangs with an order of melon soda and popcorn at my local cinema.

I actually hadn't planned on going to see a movie until around 8:45pm.  I browsed the movie listing online and decided on a promising looking entry called "Umimachi Diary" (海街Diary).  I had enough time to glance at the plot synopsis (the story starts off with the father of a trio of sisters passing away and they go to his funeral in Yamagata) and read the names of the actresses (Ayase Haruka was the only one I recognized).  I left home in a hurry and got to the theatre with time to settle down into my seat with my drink and unexpectedly large looking "small" order of popcorn.

I had had a small slip of tongue when I purchased my ticket and picked a seat next to a sold seat.  I usually don't do that but figured it wouldn't be a big deal.  Well, just as I had settled into my seat I heard a female voice exclaiming "What the heck?!".  I looked up to find out the source of the remark was Ami, our office manager.  I think we were more than mutually surprised to meet up there.  Mark one up for pure coincidence. 

Anyways, the movie was very nice one.  Slow paced, carefully crafted, and sensitively acted.  About a quarter of the way through the film I started thinking to myself, "This is like a Koreeda movie".  So I got a small surprise when the end credits rolled by and there was Koreeda's name listed as the film's director. 

I went out for a nightcap drink and whilst walking home noticed something zip by my feet.  This happened just outside the entrance/exit ramp to a parking lot.  My initial thought was that a small lizard or skink had run by me.  I took a look around and noticed a small green creature.  It was a frog.  At last I had spotted one of those frogs whose chorus of nocturnal croaking in rice paddies and parks is often very, very loud.  I took a photo of the little character and was told later it was a specimen of "amagaeru" (Japanese Tree Frog).  Anyways, I figured the entrance to a parking lot wasn't safest place for a frog so I chased it into the neighbouring park.  I found out the next day that handling them isn't a good idea.  Their skin is covered with a poisonous substance which isn't fatal for humans but probably isn't a good thing to be in contact with.

...And that's my list of Sunday surprises.....

-*-

Postscript:  This is a link to a short video recording I made of Japanese tree frogs:  https://www.flickr.com/photos/8936205@N02/18522618686/

It's Only Been Four Days...

I arrived back in Vancouver on Monday and was met by family at the airport.  I cleared customs and got my luggage so quickly my sister wasn't halfway to the airport on the Canada Line Skytrain.  Yes, arriving ten minutes ahead of schedule can make a difference.  The interesting thing is that the plane arrived ahead of schedule in spite of our departure from Narita being delayed.  We sat on the runway a bit while a plane two ahead of us was being checked out.  Just as its pilot was revving up the plane to start a take-off run the plane was struck by a bird.  So they had to rush a couple of engineers out to check that all was okay.  It turned out that the plane was fine so they were able to proceed on their journey.

I've been busy over the past three nights.  Attended a Round of 16 match at BC Place Stadium on Tuesday night.  I had the pleasure of watching Japan emerge victorious over the Netherlands.  Wednesday night's feature was a reception to welcome Mayor Fumiko Hayashi of Yokohama city.  I had luckily managed to scoop up an invitation through a friend who I had phoned the night of my return to Vancouver.  Toss in a dentist appointment the following morning and a barbecue that night and I find myself just relaxing and typing away on my computer on Friday morning.  I've been through a small whirlwind of activity and it goes without saying I'm working on staying alert to make sure I can keep tabs on what is on my calendar.

The next ten days will see me go through a number of dinners and parties with friends and family, a couple of 2015 FIFA Women's World Cup matches, and O-haka Maeri the day before I leave.  That final item being where one attends to the graves of family ancestors as part of the practice of rituals tied to Obon, the annual period when the souls of the dead are believed to visit.  Canadian Jodo-Shinshu Buddhists typically hold their Obon events in early July whilst in Japan they are held in August.  The cause of this difference comes from a decision someone made in Canada to adjust the date for Obon to the Gregorian calendar.  The same was done for Hanamatsuri, the festival celebrating the birth of Shakamuni Buddha, which is observed in April.  The instances where the adjustment wasn't made is for the spring and fall observances of O-Higan, the spring and fall equinoxes.  No need to make any changes there.

Ran Out of Gas....

I had an observer in my final class today.  The girl is a 2nd year junior high school student.  As luck would have it she's in the same school year as the girl who presently is enrolled in the class.  Goes to a different school though.  The class went relatively well but as it progressed she seemed to run out of energy to keep up with my intermittent Q&A barrages.  I chalked that up to the fact that most junior high and high school students show up for classes after a long day at school.  I've seen students almost fall asleep whilst in the middle of writing a sentence.  Anyways, by the time the class had finished her mother had done all the paperwork to have her enrolled.  Which is a good thing as far as business goes.

The standard practice in our school is that the office manager leaves an information slip on a teacher's desk when we have new or prospective students coming in.  I had glanced at the name for this new student, thought it was a unique name, and left it at that.  Ami, our office manager, had said something about the girl having taken English lessons in the past but that didn't leave an impression on me.

After tonight's class Ami asked how the observer had fared.  I said "She seemed to have run out of gas".  Ami didn't understand what that meant but I didn't have time to explain because we had students clearing out after class.  Taking the time to say goodnight and thanks for coming is de rigueur.   Afterwards I explained that the girl seemed to have run out of energy to speak and her facial demeanor had become a bit stiff and expressionless.

I was seated at my desk when I relayed that information to Ami.  I looked over to my co-worker James and then it struck me like a lightning bolt: that girl was his former student.  I had also taught her a few times a couple of years ago.  She had been a rather silent student back then.  Apparently not too much different now.  James got excited, pulled open a desk drawer, and produced a photo taken three years ago.  Yes, she was in that photo.

So my challenge going forward is to start off with a clean slate.  The desire to tell the girl that yes, I do remember her from three years ago is strong but I figure it's best not to haul all that stuff back out.  Being thirteen is tricky enough without having to deal with embarrassment caused by adults whose memories are too long.

The Konbini Event Horizon(?)

Stuck in the deep recesses on my mind is a small segment from Douglas Adams' "The Hitch-hiker's Guide to the Galaxy".  The part in question was only included in the radio play version and it features a student interacting with his teacher over some form of electronic teaching paraphernalia.  The topic of the lesson is related to the history of the planet which the main characters have found themselves on.  I don't recall the name of the planet but I do remember that it was covered with a thick layer of solidified muck which archeologists had found to be made up of compressed shoes.  The lesson shed light on the reason behind this: "The Shoe Event Horizon".  In response to the final question of his lesson the student proclaims that "The economic cycle goes on until it reaches 'The Shoe Event Horizon' where everything is involved in only the production of shoes and nothing else but shoes!"(sic).  If I recall correctly the population of the planet became so fed up with shoes they evolved into a race of bird people, never to set foot on the planet's surface again.

Any ways, I was out for drinks at one of my haunts and the snack "Mama" and I got onto the topic of new construction in town.  Aside from the new library (we reached the conclusion it won't revitalize the old downtown area), most new construction we took note of in our conversation were for stores or restaurants.  One is going to house a branch of a chain of yaki-niku (grilled meat) restaurants.  Her comment was along the lines of "Who'd go there given that the local competition serves local high grade beef and the chains usually use lower grade imports?".  The next site to get picked on is next to a local church and kitty corner across from a ramen shop.  Apparently they're putting up another 7-Eleven store.  Our verdict on that was a solid "What for?".  It's not like there's a shortage of convenience stores (aka: "konbini") in town.

My tongue in cheek thought is that the city is headed for the "Konbini Event Horizon"...where all economic activity in town will revolve around supporting the profitability of convenience stores.  For instance, there is one street in town where one can come across two Family Mart convenience stores only a block apart.  If you're not paying attention you'll think you've entered some alternate dimension because you've passed what seems to be the same street corner twice while you've been travelling in a straight line.  Then there was the time when I missed a turn on my way to the cinema because a new 7-Eleven store had popped up on the corner where I should've turned.  The snowy conditions and lack of expectancy (to seeing a new shop) contributed to that navigation error.

All in all though, I don't believe Yonezawa will approach the concentration of ABC convenience stores in Waikiki.  I recall a tour bus driver referring to them collectively as "Another Bloody Convenience" store.  It was almost like the joke about Vancouver where you can't throw a rock down a street without hitting at least two Starbuck's coffee shops.  Aye...I suppose we're still safe in Yonezawa from reaching the "Konbini Event Horizon".


PS:  I listened to "The Hitch-hiker's Guide on the Galaxy" on CBC Radio back around 1982.  So there is no chance that I can recall the exact words to lines from the radio drama.  None whatsoever.... 

It's April 7th...

Yesterday was an interesting day of sorts at work.   It seemed like every class I taught had a little surprise....

First off was my early afternoon intermediate level class.  Normally there are two men and two women in the class but one of the ladies has gone AWOL after heading down to Tokyo for a little trip back in mid March.  Of the two fellows, one joined the class officially this week.  I had chatted him up a bit the previous week during the warm-up stage of the lesson and found out he was working on getting his teaching license.  Currently he's teaching at a private cram school.  This week I found out a bit more about his academic career.

If I recall correctly he had originally been enrolled in a private university down in Chiba.  He went abroad to England on a ten month stint as an exchange student.  While he was abroad he became a bit homesick and proceeded to search for all manner of things Japanese on the Internet.  A certain subject caught his fancy and when he returned to Japan he transferred to a different university to obtain his bachelor's degree with a major in that subject.  The subject in question being Buddhist statuary from the late Heian period to the end of the Muromachi period.  Needless to say that isn't a major which will open doors to opportunities in the corporate world so he now finds himself in my English class.

The following class was a beginner's class.  All the students are adults and four out of the five are retirees.  The newest student who joined about a month ago is a quite spoken lady in her sixties.  A few weeks ago she mentioned in a rather straight forward manner that she's a Christian.  So this week during the warm-up portion of the lesson she read through her prepared text and mentioned that it had been Easter this past weekend.  I chuckled a bit to myself when I heard that.  Last year I had been caught unawares when I had gone down to the Canadian embassy only to find it was closed on account of Easter Monday (whilst my American co-worker was able to conduct his business successfully at the US embassy).  Anyways, this student presented the rest of us with a container full of Easter eggs and some German style cookies (the name of them which escapes me - they're the variety with nuts in them and they're rolled in powdered sugar - a late Austrian friend of my mother baked them in crescent shapes).  Needless to say this was a most pleasant surprise!  On closer inspection afterwards I found that the eggs had been decorated in a peculiarly Japanese fashion - their artwork was printed on plastic sleeves which could be removed in the same fashion as the plastic sleeve labels can be removed from commercially sold PET drink bottles.  Somehow or another they had been made to fit the eggs exactly.  My guess is that the plastic sleeves were made to shrink and fit the eggs snuggly by placing the hard boiled eggs in them them when the eggs were still hot.

The last class with an element surprise in it was an evening class taught at a client's site.  The first student to arrive was tardy and he apologized for being late.  Then he went on to say "It's April 7th...do you know what today is?".  I was completely stumped.  "It's the day the Yamato was sunk", he carried on.  "Ah...I see", I said to myself.  I had been tipped off by my predecessor about this fellow.  He had mentioned the student's somewhat right leaning attitudes.  So his little piece of trivia wasn't a total surprise.  Yet it was in spite of my interest in the conflict which included the sinking of the Yamato.  The irony in my case is that I've read a couple of books about the ship's last mission but I'd never taken it upon myself to remember what day it had been sunk.  I can remember details such as the struggles of the men in the water after the ship sank or the role of the Japanese-American crew member but not the day.  Nonetheless, I followed his comments with a brief discussion on technical details of the ship.  That's a relatively neutral topic and it served well to avoid going down the rabbit hole of nationalistic feelings attached to the ship.

I didn't get caught off guard in my last class of the day so more or less it was business as usual there.  I say "More or less" as I was able to catch my student off guard when I gave her the last remaining Easter egg.... 

"Magical Chain"

The following is from a post I made in small forum I help moderate.  There's very little activity on the forum so I haven't had to do much moderating there in ages.  Nonetheless here's my blurb about the concert I attended last night....

I got to see Ulful Keisuke in concert last night. Lady Luck was on my side this time.  I think the gig sold out in about 30 minutes.   I saw a poster with the "Sold Out - Thank You!" sticker on it at Billy's Bar back in February.  I mentioned to a friend I had seen him in concert last year and it looked like I was going to miss out on his show this year.   She said she had heard that someone had six returned tickets from cancellations.   So I asked her to put in a word for me.  A few days later she got back to me and said she had managed to secure the last ticket for me.  Needless to say I was extremely pleased with the turn of events.

I've been to Billy's Bar for concerts in the past.  It's not a big place so I've learned the lesson that it doesn't pay to show up just before shows start.  So yesterday I showed up 15 minutes before the doors opened.  Even then I has at the back of the queue.  Luckily it wasn't a long one.  So I managed to nab a good seat about a meter behind the soundboard.

Opening act was MinxZone (http://www.last.fm/music/MinxZone).   They're a trio who originally were based in Osaka but they're now based in Tokyo.  Since they don't have a bassist they had to rely on taped bass track on their opening song.  After that they chugged along as two guitartists and a drummer.  They're an upbeat feel-good pop-rock unit.   Similar to the band I saw last month, Zukunasi, they include elements of audience participation in their set.   Their output isn't limited to music as they had knick-knacks, books, and art T-shirts on sales too.

Ulful Keisuke is the guitarist for the now reformed Ulfuls.  The band started out pre-1993 in Osaka and were known for an irreverent and tongue-in-cheek style of rock and roll in the beginning (the name of the band came from dropping "so" from "soulful").   Commercial success followed in the mid nineties.   I remember seeing them on an edition of the annual Kohaku Uta Gassen (Red-White Song Battle) in the mid 2000s.

I believe Ulful Keisuke has been doing his annual tours through the Tohoku region for a number of years.   He's visited Yonezawa three years in a row.   I was at last year's show and it was a good one but the venue was too small for the size of the audience in attendance.   This year the layout of the venue was better suited to his style of show.  He likes to take an occasional stroll up the aisle to stretch out a guitar solo.  His selection of songs are his own ones which he may or may not have collaborated on with members of Ulfuls.  He definitely doesn't mine the Ulfuls catalogue. He likes to chat things up between tunes too.  Not up to the length of the monologues done by Yamada Koshi though (another person whose shows at Billy's Bar sell out too).  The selection ranged from a cover of an old Stones tune (though written by Lennon and McCartney) to a couple of ballads and a lot of peppy and energetic rockers.

I drained half my wallet again on CD purchases.  Got them autographed by MinxZone and Ulful Keisuke respectively.  I complemented Ulful Keisuke, in English, on his T-shirt selection. It was a Monty Python T-shirt that names the members of the troupe and then, for no particular reason, goes on to list "Spam, Spam, Spam" and other nonsense.  Ulful Keisuke did a double take when he asked what my name was as he was about to sign a CD for me.  Guess he wasn't expecting to get an English name delivered in a flat North American accent in the middle of a sentence in Japanese....


Footnote: I found out last week that the ticket I purchased came courtesy of Pinky-chan (real name Eriko) who sings in the house band Brilliant Shine at Billy's Bar.  I bumped into her at Yasukuni about three weeks ago when I went there to catch an acoustic night gig which I found about from our office manager.   She remembered me from when she made her rounds through the audience after Brilliant Shine finished their set when they had opened for Zukunasi.  That was back in late February,

A Change

I'm not sure what made me decide to purchase a new laptop to replace my early 2011 model Macbook Pro.  I suppose it was the realization that it wasn't performing as quickly under the weight of the latest edition of Mac OS X.  Or perhaps it was the fan spinning away madly while I was playing some game.  Nonetheless, the decision was made a few months ago.  I let a co-worker know that I was looking for a buyer for the old machine and he expressed interest in it.  So the die was cast, so to speak.

Once the new 2015 Macbook Pro models were announced about a month ago I signed onto the Apple Japan online store to place my order.  I checked the option to pay in 6 interest free installments.  With that I was led to a website to submit a loan application.  I dutifully started filling out the form but by the fourth page the questions were getting more difficult to interpret and the information requested harder to obtain.  So I ended up phoning Apple to cancel the order, make changes to what I had ordered, and resubmit it.

Unfortunately there was a problem with the payment option I had chosen.  The e-mail telling me about the issue was delivered to an e-mail address I check somewhat infrequently.  Thus I failed to take action in time and the order was cancelled.  Once more I submitted the order.

Today I'm working away on my new purchase.  It's an interesting example of computing hardware evolution.  The machine has no optical drive and the mass storage device is a flash memory drive.  So it's dead silent.  I had it customized by having it assembled with a US keyboard and additional RAM.  The assembly work was done somewhere in China.  That I know from the tracking information of the package it was sent in.

I had some issues transferring my data from my old machine to this one on account of the smaller capacity of the mass storage device on the new machine.  The initial attempt to transfer the data using Apple's migration assistant failed to complete successfully in spite of the fact that there was ample space on the new machine.  So I ended working on it until the early hours of the morning.  After waking I went about restoring the old machine to its initial condition: Mac OS X Snow Leopard and no user accounts set up on it.  I shot a video of the "Welcome" video and shut down the machine down for the last time. Thus I parted with a machine I had hauled back and forth across the Pacific Ocean five times.

Footnote:  When I was shopping for the original Macbook Pro a friend suggested choosing a Macbook Pro.  I thought about it but decided not on account of the slower processor speed, smaller mass storage device capacity and lack of an optical drive.  The Macbook Pro I purchased this time around is like a Macbook Air...on steroids.  Faster processor, more memory, and the mid-size mass storage device which is the top-end mass storage device on the Air.

A "Congratulations Graduates!" Concert...and Miscellaneous Things

I attended a concert several years ago where a number of the participating musicians were students who were soon to graduate from their respective educational institutions at the time.  The poster advertising that show didn't make mention of that fact...it sort of came out as the night's proceedings carried on.  This past Saturday I attended a concert which was organized by a certain Mr. Shimanuki and was visibly identifiable as a concert for three graduating students who also have connections within the local music scene.  The three musicians, a male and two females, represented three levels of local schools: the fellow is a university grad, the first female is a women's college grad, and the next a high school grad.  The middle section of the concert featured these three musicians: the fellow played keyboard in a band and the two young ladies were acoustic guitar playing singer/songwriters who each did a solo set.

In regards to being nervous on stage, the fellow had the advantage of being a member of a band.  He wasn't at centre stage.  Instead he was stationed near the front on the audience's right hand side of the stage.  The solo artists were dead centre on stage and both admitted they were quite nervous.  Actually, if I recall correctly, both asked Goro-san who was manning the sound board and lighting system to not use the stage lights which shone on the audience.  Megu, the older one, managed to finish her performance with only a minor hitch but the younger one who goes by her stage name of "Yatte Mo-taro?" hit a big bump.  Prior to launching into one her songs she announced that she wasn't going to perform it any more.  That became apparent once she started singing and playing it.  It was a song about high school life and wondering about the future.  As a high school graduate, the time and place for the song had passed.  Things went fine until the third verse.  She stopped mid-song, froze for a second, and said "Oh.  I've forgotten the lyrics (to the next verse).  Does anyone know what they are?".  There was no one around who could yell out the start of the verse so it was few awkward seconds until she was able to recall it.  After she finished the song she removed the school necktie from around her neck (she was on stage in her school uniform) and tossed it into the crowd.  She quickly stormed off stage, leaving a few in the audience wondering what to expect next.  I heard someone say "She's probably changing out of her uniform".  Sure enough that was the case.

After they had finished their sets, the three grads were assembled near the stage to receive congratulations and bouquets.  Ms. "Yatte Mo-taro?" was given a potted flowering plant.  I'm not sure if there was any significance in that.  There was plenty of bowing, words of appreciation, and taking of photos.  Then things were handed over to the last flight of bands to finish off the night's proceedings. 

The last band to take to the stage was from Nagai, a city north of Yonezawa.  They go by the name "Vanishment This World" which Mr. Shimanuki provided a loose translation of.  I didn't get anywhere close to thinking "Yeah, but it doesn't really mean anything in English".   Their music is a form of "speedcore" but they advertise themselves as "A three piece, bass less, downcore" band.  Labels aside, they were loud and fast.   The vocalist was hardly didn't sing so much as he belted out guttural sounds that resembled low frequency yelling.  What was more noticeable were the youths who took to the floor to "dance" to their music.  It wasn't dance so much as it was high intensity bursts of mock fighting moves.  When four of them were going at it in the space in front of the stage, the rest of audience having wisely backed off by about a couple of meters, it was a miracle that no one came out of all that flailing about without taking a kick in the mid-riff or a swinging fist in the back of the head.
 
By the time it was all over the whole event had clocked in at around 5 hours in length.  I had arrived after the first hour and a half but it was still a long night after a day of work so I was quite tuckered out when I got home.

-*-

On Sunday, the next day, I was in the mood to wander off somewhere again but wasn't exactly sure where or for what purpose.  I hastily came up with an idea and found mention on the Internet of a shop which seemed to fit the bill for a place to check out.  Its location was in Nagai city which is north of Yonezawa.  To get there one heads up to Akayu and then hangs a left to head west for a short distance.  I don't think it took me more than 45 minutes to drive there.

Once I got to Nagai I parked my car in the lot of a park more or less in the centre of town.  I headed off to find the shop...and discovered it was no more.  Hence my statement that "its location was in Nagai".  Nonetheless, I took the time to stroll through the side streets back to my car.  I stumbled across a soy sauce shop where they make and sell it in a rather traditional looking building.  Interestingly enough it was located next to a fire bell tower.  Another interesting building featured a thatched roof.  A local temple had a small structure on its ground which housed an altar and had massive 2 meter long straw sandals hanging on its walls outside.  So I didn't go home empty handed.  Well, literally yes, but that didn't matter.

-*-

Over the years, every now and then I have heard a particular song being blasted over a PA system.  It's no more than a single verse and chorus but it is quite loud.  At some point in time I thought it was related to an election campaign but I kept hearing it after voting day.  Until recently I thought it came from a nearby nursery school.

This morning I went for a walk over to Uesugi Shrine and thereabouts.  On my return leg, as I turned onto the street leading up to my apartment a large truck passed me.  And then I heard that song!  It was delivery truck for a local co-op food service.  Ah!  Mystery solved...more or less.  I may time my next walk so that I can shoot a short video of the truck and its song.  Then I can listen to it to my heart's content to try and figure out what the heck its about....

The Peanut Butter Score...Amongst Other Things

A few nights ago I met a friend at a local snack for a few drinks after work.  At some point in the evening we got onto the topic of peanut butter.  I think she said she had heard of peanut butter jam sandwiches from an American TV drama she had watched.  She was a bit curious and wanted to find out what they tasted like.  On the TV show she had seen them make PBJ sandwiches using blueberry jam.  So she slapped together peanut cream and blueberry jam on bread and took a bite.  It wasn't to her liking at all.  Much too sweet.  I laughed and said that made perfect sense as peanut cream (a sweetened peanut tasting spread) tastes nothing like peanut butter.  I rattled off the places in town where I buy peanut butter.  She asked "Isn't it expensive?" but I pointed out that a medium size jar of the stuff, which probably is a small jar back in Canada, could be purchased for less than ¥500.

The places where I go to get peanut butter in Yonezawa are the Gyomu Supermarket and Yamaya.  The stuff they sell at the former is imported from India.  At Yamaya they sell Skippy brand peanut butter.  There was a while of about 6 months where they weren't selling it but they've started carrying it now.  Actually, the choice has improved a bit there as they now sell both the creamy and crunchy variety.  Yamaya isn't a supermarket though.  It's a liquour store.  They sell imported foodstuffs also.  I once surprised a student (her family runs a liquour store) when I told her that liquour stores in Vancouver don't sell snacks, soft drinks, and other related foodstuffs.

This past weekend (my weekend is actually Sunday and Monday) I ended up taking a couple of short trips out of town to eat at places I don't usually go to.  On Sunday I drove up to Akayu to have ramen at the main shop of the locally popular ramen shop chain Ryu Shanghai.  Someone asked me how long it would've taken me to get there.  Since I hadn't gone there directly my answer was 30 minutes if. 1) I hadn't turned off to check out Inamori Kofun, an ancient burial mound, and 2) I hadn't gotten lost.  I don't know the layout of the streets in Akayu and I wasn't stopped long enough at traffic lights to be able to get a good bearing on my iPhone map application.  In the end I pulled over into a convenience store parking lot to check my map.  I had if fact driven past the intersection which lead up to my destination.

On Sunday night, before going to bed, I got it into my head to check out the Denny's restaurant in Fukushima city.  I don't know why but I suppose it was one of those "Why not do something different?" moments in life.  I checked the train schedules, the location of the restaurant, set my alarm, and went to bed.  The next morning I caught the 8:08am train to Fukushima.  I had taken longer to get dressed and ready to go so I had one of those frustrating spells of indecisiveness where I couldn't decide whether to drive to the station or walk.  I compounded the frustration on account of taking my car keys with me.  I started off, turned back, checked the time, and finally headed off to the station briskly on foot.  I made it to the station with ample time to spare.

I've never before taken a local train on that stretch of rail between Yonezawa and Fukushima.  So it was a nice change of pace.  I tried to catch sight of the station which is closed through the winter but failed to do so.  There's still that much snow there.  Breakfast at Denny's was uneventful.  Their menu is not the same as what is offered back home in Canada and the US.  No Grand Slam Breakfast to be seen there.  The rest of the visit to Fukushima was uneventful.  I did a bit of shopping, rode the Fukushima Municipal Transit line train, wandered about a bit, and did a bit more shopping for White Day goodies (White Day is the Japanese reciprocal Valentine's Day - men folk are supposed to give chocolates to the ladies who gave them chocolates on Valentine's Day).  The second round of shopping found me at the Fukushima Jupiter store.  Jupiter is a chain of stores which specializes in coffee and imported foodstuffs.  Their stores are not as snazzy looking as those of their competitor Kaldi(sic) but I like Jupiter's selection better.  In the battle of peanut butter selection they win out for they carry Smucker's Natural Peanut Butter.  That variety is the type where the peanut oil has separated from the peanut mash (I suppose that's what one would call it) and you have to mix the two back together before eating it. 

-*-

Post script:  I didn't get a chance to take a look around at the Inamori Kofun as it's closed during the winter.  I'll go back up there after the spring thaw is over.

It's That Time of Year

I suppose with a title like that there might be someone who will think this post will be about cherry blossom viewing in Japan.  Sorry to disappoint but that isn't the case.  This past winter's snow has just started to melt off and while most sidewalks are now clear, thanks to residents shoveling away the last bit recently, there's plenty of it left elsewhere.  Plus we don't expect to see cherry blossoms around here until well into April.  No, the title comes from a comment made at a "live bar", a bar with a stage where a band can squeeze onto, that I visited last Saturday evening.  That night's show was "Acoustic Night" and the last act to take to the stage was a one man act.  I didn't catch the guy's name but he was a bit of a sight to be seen.  A relatively tall fellow dressed in black jeans and T-shirt with a bright red jacket.  If I recall correctly he might have had a thin mustache.  But his hair was unforgettable: he had used plenty of hair gel to get it all standing on end so that it was part lion mane and part Sid Vicious.  Toss in the acoustic guitar and you have the makings of...something.

Anyways, at the end of his set this fellow announced that he'd like the audience to join in and sing along with him.  I have no idea what the title of the final song was but the singer made sure everyone knew what it was about.  "It's that time of year", he said, "It's graduation time...".  So naturally his selected song was about parting ways and looking towards the future.  And yes, the audience, including myself, did sing along with the acoustic guitar wielding punk.

Next day I didn't have any plans in particular.  Around noon the idea of heading up to Yamagata city to do some shopping popped into my head.  So I checked the train schedule, had a bite to eat, took a shower, and then found out I didn't have enough time to walk to station to make the 1:45 train.  So I drove down to Max Value supermarket close to the station and walked over to it.

When the train I was on arrived in Takahata a number of high school students boarded it.  I noticed corsages and boutonnieres being worn by some of the students.  The comment from the previous evening popped into my head.  Indeed, it's graduation season.  Most of those students got off a few stations up the line.  One girl got off the train and stood around on the platform to wave goodbye to her friends still on board like it was the last she was going to see of them.  Then a fresh batch of new graduates boarded a stop of two later.  Most of them traveled on to the train's last stop which was Yamagata.

Once I got past the ticket turnstiles at Yamagata station I passed by groups of students once again sporting corsages and boutonnieres.  Outside there was hardly any snow to be seen.  The air wasn't too cool either.  One could have imagined that spring was just around the corner waiting to make its entrance.  Alas, a few days later back in Yonezawa, it snowed again....

-*-

Post script: I picked up a sushi bento at the Max Value supermarket on the way home.  I picked one which had been discounted by ¥200.  I didn't notice until when I had gotten to the self-serve checkout that the "inari sushi", sushi stuffed into little pouches made from deep fried tofu, had Hello Kitty faces on them.  I took a picture of them and sent the photo to my sister and second cousin back in Vancouver.  On Tuesday I showed the picture during my evening class to the junior high school student in attendance (she being the one whose teacher had said her English pronunciation was too good).  She chuckled and said "It's Hinamatsuri sushi".  "It was on sale by ¥200", I fired back defensively.  Nonetheless, she still thought it was silly.  After all, in English, Hinamatsuri is "Doll's Festival" or "Girl's Festival"....   

The Day After the Festival

Yonezawa's annual Snow Lantern Festival took place this past weekend.  Unlike the previous year where snow had to be hauled to the main site of the festival by dump trucks, this year there was plenty of snow available.  Similar to last year, it snowed during the first evening of the festival.  Once more, like last year, I trudged down to the site that first evening to pay my respects at the memorial which sat at the top of the small hill on the grounds of the former Yonezawa castle.  The memorial is a column of snow whose design changes from year to year.  I don't know exactly in whose memory it is raised but I have a vague idea it has a connection to the stone one nearby.  That one, if I recall correctly, is dedicated to those who sacrificed their lives in military service.  I'll have to check that site sometime after the snow melts.

I spent the next evening at home having decided not to visit the main festival site two evenings in a row.  I ended up whittling my time away in front of my computer whilst listening to music played through iTunes.  I have a sizable collection of music so I challenge myself each year to listen to each track at least once.  To make things a touch more manageable, those tracks which have lost favour with me over several iterations of this challenge get moved to an archive library.  I've tried different strategies to work my way through the remainder such as listening to tracks organized by the albums their on where the albums are listed in alphabetical order.  Another was to listen to tracks according to the alphabetical order of their recording artists.  This year I'm going through albums listed by the first letter in their titles.  The letters are chosen at whim.  So when I was listening to albums starting with "I" on Sunday night I hadn't worked my way through the alphabet from A to H.

One album I was listening to on Sunday evening was "Inflammable Material" recorded by the Belfast punk band Stiff Little Fingers back in 1978.  But I didn't hear a track from that album until 2008 when the song "Alternative Ulster" was included in the soundtrack of the film "Fifty Dead Men Walking".

"Inflammable Material" is in my mind a product of its time and place.  That time and place being Northern Ireland in the late 1970's.  The fact that thirty years later a track from it would ignite my interest in it attests to the energy and power it encapsulated. 

While listening to the album I cast my mind back to the film which had lead me to it.  It was a reasonably good flick that was quite tense for its first half or so before wrapping up in a flurry of action.  The following night after that listening session I went back and read a bit about the film it had been featured in.  In particular I checked up on the points where the film differs from its source material which is the book written by Martin McGartland.  Those differences were so great the author disowned the film and is quoted on a Wiki page as having said "The film is as near to the truth as Earth is to Pluto".

Now reminiscing and reading about a record album and a movie it's connected to, while sitting at my kotatsu in my apartment in Japan, didn't give me any new more insight into The Troubles.  But it did bring back a memory.  Not a vivid one since it came from an evening of drinks at the Rose and Thorn pub in Vancouver back in the early 1980s.  I'm not sure when.  Perhaps the summer of 1982.  I surmise the occasion was someone's birthday.  Or perhaps not.  But the gist of the memory is the face and words of a fellow from Northern Ireland who joined our table at some point in the evening.  I don't know who he was but I can remember vaguely his expression and gestures as he spoke about an incident from his past.  He had had the experience of being interrogated while he was living in Northern Ireland.  It's been a long time and the details of the story are murky.  I believe he stated his interrogators were British.  While he related the story he acted it out a bit.  He told how his head was locked into an upward direction.  He was facing a bright light and he was unclothed.  I don't remember how long he said he was forced to endure that situation.  But needless to say it wasn't a happy memory for him. 

That happened a lifetime ago.  I wonder now if that fellow is leading a happy and prosperous life in Canada.  Perhaps he connected with other Irish immigrants such as a former co-worker's husband who made it a point to grab a group of buddies and to go drinking after a game of hurling (or was it Gaelic football?) at the British Ex-Servicemen's Club on Kingsway.  If I recall correctly, my co-worker said they did that in jest...and to be annoying.  Or perhaps it was done just to be annoying.  Who knows, eh?

Postscript:  As I walked out of the local Mister Donut shop earlier this evening I glanced at something that was a hideously bright green.  It was a sample of a set of six different coloured handbags which the company is offering to patrons as part of a promotion for a line of pastries they're currently selling.  The bag was hanging on a sign with the words "Caribou Green" above it.  I said to myself "Caribous aren't green".  I have no idea how anyone connected caribou with the colour green.... 

The Extremely Delayed Second Part to "At the Movies, 2013"....

I more or less never did come to a satisfactory conclusion on whether or not I liked "Eien no Zero".  The film has been criticized for its politically right leaning baggage that is quite plain to see.  That characteristic certainly didn't appeal to me.  But I found it interesting for a different reason.  It brought back to me a quote from the movie "Patton".  I believe in the first monologue of that movie the good general spouts this gem, "Now, I want you to remember that no bastard ever won a war by dying for his country.  He won it by making the other poor dumb bastard die for his country."  I don't have the energy right now to go to great lengths to explain the connection I formed between the two movies.  I suppose what I find interesting about "Eien no Zero" is how it inadvertently shows the tactical, strategic and behavioural flaws of Japan's military back in WWII.  The tragedy being that most of the audience don't seem to have recognized them in the movie. 

Household Gods

A little something from a conversation I had with two people at a local cafe about two weeks ago....

I don't know how we reached the topic of traditional customs which have seemed to vanish but we got there nonetheless.  I was at Crescendo, a local cafe, for dinner.  Somewhere along the line the owner, a customer and I were engaged in a discussion about things which people used to do in Japan.  One part of that conversation was about household gods.

Nakazawa-san, the owner, recounted how her family would set out offerings of mochi, cakes of pounded sweet rice, to household gods around New Year's.  There were probably more than a handful.  The kitchen, the entrance, and certain rooms were on the list.  The mochi was freshly made so inevitably it became moldy.

That moldy mochi did not go to waste.  The practice of "saikyo yaki"(sic), building of a community bonfire to burn New Year's decorations, may still be carried on but mochi is not on the list of things which are tossed into the fire.  So, back in those days it had to be eaten.  The mochi was cut, washed, and scrubbed clean of mold.  I presume it may have found its way into some variety of dishes. All said, it may have still smelled (and tasted) a bit moldy but it wasn't going to be thrown out.  Simply put, it was mochi, it had been offered to the household gods, and throwing it out was out of the question.  Such waste could not even be thought of.

I suppose this lost tradition could be categorized in two ways: old rural homes just have that aura of having household gods (whilst modern ones don't) and, tongue in cheek, moldy mochi, even if it had been offered to the household gods, wasn't a terribly popular dish....