05-10-04 > 11-11-04
October Obfuscations
Welcome to the October instalment of my diary. It has been an odd month, so
bear with, and enjoy the ride.
The first school I went to was Karehama Elementary. I had to take the train there as it is quite remote, and near to the seaside. On arrival, it looked the same as any other Elementary school: space for a few hundred pupils. The teacher informed me that I would be teaching the entire school in my lesson. I was intrigued, and slightly worried: keeping the attention of that many kids for that long might mean that I would have to resort to crude magic tricks, or even rude gestures. As it happened, however, the entire complement of the school was 26 pupils. It was good fun, but really odd: the entire school was smaller than one class in one of my usual schools. To add to the confusion, the school itself was but three years old: either someone had made a huge mistake when looking at the requirements, or this was another example of Japanese inflexibility.
One only has to watch the average Japanese driver to see that they cannot handle a situation that they have not been trained for. This is a fundamental problem, compounded by the fact that Japanese driving tests (and training) are taken on a test course, with no real traffic. This means that the vast majority of Japanese drivers have never been trained to drive in real-world situations. This attitude of fitting prototype situations to reality, rather than thinking of creative, novel solutions to problems covers many facets of Japanese life.
The rest of the week was spent at Ichikawa (One River) Junior High School. I spent the first couple of days in the classroom, teaching the kids about English names. Okay, so some of the names were not strictly English (Xavier, anyone), but we had a lot of fun, and the children were re-Christened with English names. On Friday, we had an exciting excursion...
I was asked to join Ichikawa on their trip to Lake Towada, where I had been not a week before. The Oirase Trail leading to Lake Towada is famed for its beauty in Autumn, when the leaves change from green to reds, browns and golds. We were going to the Trail to hopefully see this transition. I turned up at the school at the crack of dawn, literally, having left the house at half past six. After the obligatory military-style opening ceremony, we all boarded coaches and headed for Oirase.
On arrival, we disembarked, and walked the trail, in a very, very long line. I could wear what I wanted, but of course the kids had to do it in full uniform. The walk provided not only beautiful scenery, but a wealth of anthropological information. I myself am guilty of taking too many photos, as it is plain to see, but this was another level. As well as a glut of photographers with the all the gear, balancing precariously over tripods positioned on rocks below waterfalls, there was even a painter. The photographers seemed happy to annex themselves from their families by hoisting their still-extended tripods around with them, and dashing off to each and every photo spot. Perhaps they needed an excuse to escape.
Half way along the trail, a party of American children from the base at Misawa came the other way. I am used to being stared at by Japanese all the time, but the gawping from these kids was unexpected. They walked past, abset-mindedly saying their Konnichiwas, and so when I said a hearty "Good morning!", exclamations of shocked silence were the standard response. When the children from Ichikawa engaged in potentially dangerous activities, such as balancing on tress in the middle of the river, the teachers made no effort to prevent them. In fact they expressed their amusement at the situations that developed, such as children falling in and getting their feet wet. This felt right: there was a danger, but not letting the kids do something for fear of parental, or worse, legal intervention, is detrimental to the children's development. As expected, nobody was hurt, although a couple of children ended up at the other end of the trail looking like they had been dragged through muddy puddles, as in fact they had.
We had lunch on the lakeside, which consisted of a bento box with Western-style food: spaghetti bolognese, a ham and cheese roll, gherkin, as well as some more Japanese fayre, such as the breaded shrimp, and balls of undiscernible origin. I came upon the fabled lesbian statues by the lakeside. The statues are of a couple of rather butch ladies touching hands. They are on the milk cartons here, and I was beginning to wonder if something was going on at the company. According to my teacher, the statues form part of a war memorial. Why a couple of ladies touching hands, in the nip, encapsulates war is anybody's guess. Maybe something was lost in translation.
Over the weekend, Mike and I headed into town with Elly and Liz, originally meeting at Bon, a rather special bar run by a rather special chap in the middle of Hachinohe. Kappa, the proprietor, said he would give me a didgeridoo, as he makes them. I did not plan on holding my breath, but I was warmed by the gesture anyway. After bon, we headed to Utaemon, the top karaoke bar in Hachinohe, and sang our hearts out. Liz was going back to Blighty for a whle, so we gave her a good send-off. Half way through, some Japanese guys burst in and stormed the room, obviously having been attracted by my cute bunny suit. On the way back, we obtained some appallingly named confectionaries. What I want to know is this: if you write something in Roman script, then you presumably want to make it look like it is English, or to sell it to English-speaking people. Why then, would you call said products "Asse" and "Collon"?
Next weekend was the fabled Rokkrasher festival. Brainchild of Mr Alex Barker, this project's ambitious goal was to host a party on the beach in Rokkrasher, host not only to Alex, but also the Rokkasho Experimental Thermonuclear Research Facility. Excellent. No issues with night-lighting then. After a couple of weeks of preparation, things came to a head. Kappa, the genius, provided us with PA speakers, an amp, and a generator, for the party, as well as Tiki lights for the beach (it tarnspired that the beach did not glow in the dark after all). He also furnished me with a didgeridoo. What a guy!
On the day of the party, we headed down, my car weighed down with speakers, Alex and various noise, heat and light-making devices. We followed Chris and Mike to the venue. After we had arrived and set everything up, and the party was getting going, I was gripped by an irresistable urge to sleep. This was probably aggravated by my lack of sleep in the previous week, and the fact that the kerosene fumes in my car were pretty funky, not to mention the fact taht my school's culture day started at 8AM the next morning (Sunday). Whatever, I went for a lie down.
At 2AM I was awoken by calls of "Charlie". I regained consciousness and clambered out of the tent, ready to go. It appeared that the party had wound down. I offered to do a set on the "decks", but it was rather too late. We packed up, and headed back. I am assured that the party was 'ripper', and I am sure it was. Since everything went to plan, there will probably be another next year, when it is actually warm and there is some sunlight.
After packing everything up, I made my way to my base high school, Higashi, for their culture day. On arrival, unshaven, wearing the clothes I was wearing at the party, smelling strongly of kerosene, I headed for the staff room. Everyone, inclluding the PE teacher, who usually wears a tracksuit, was dressed immaculately. Thinking that this was a really excellent start to the day, I headed for the gym, where the opening ceremony was. There followed approximately three hours of spectacle, almost all in Japanese, including a play about nuclear war that lasted eighty minutes. All very uplifting stuff. The high point was when three third-year girls danced to a hip-hop song. Their dancing was good, but the lyrics were outrageous. Seeing a room full of people, aged from 11 to 60, seated, clapping along in blissful ignorace to lyrics such as "Suck my dick, bitch." was one of the most surreal moments of my stay so far. #
After this, I took a look round the various classrooms, all of which had different attractions. I took part in a tea-ceremony. I took a look at a class, all of whom had made identical flapping sea-gulls and CD racks. I also saw some lovely little stories in English about the kids' experiences. My gleanings are below.
During the following week, we had a session of office golf when Jaya, Dahlia and I all had an office day. It was surprisingly good fun, despite being indoors. Most of the players were the kids who come to school at the centre, all of whom have difficulties getting on in the normal school system. They were largely well behaved, if a little shy, but notice the boy on the left of the group picture, who wanted nothing to do with the proceedings, and was not afraid to show it. This is another interesting quirk of Japanese culture: children do not tend to abanodon school entirely. Here, rebellion is still going to school, but not actually doing anything when you are there. Hardcore eh? I also noticed a frankly disturbing poster, which featured a boy with a cat between his legs: I believe the phrase rhymes with pot the luck.
That weekend, Elly and I visited Jesus' grave. It is a little-known fact, but Jesus was actually buried in Aomori: it says so on the plaque:
When Jesus Christ was 21 years old, he came to Japan and pursued knowledge of divinity for 12 years. He went to Judaea at age 33, and engaged in his mission. However, at that time, people in Judaea would not accept Christ's teaching. Instead, they arrested him and tried to crucify him on a cross. His youngest brother, Isukiri casually took Christ's place and ended his life on the cross.
Christ, who escaped the crucifiction, went through the ups and downs of travel, and again came to Japan. He settled right here in what is now called Herai Village, and died at the age of 106.
On this holy ground, there is dedicated a burial mound on the right to deify Christ, and a grave on the left to deify Isukiri.
The above information was given in a testament by Jesus Christ.
So there you have it: whilst Jesus did not in fact die on the cross in the Middle East, but evidently he was able to rise again after his death in Japan to give a testament to the people who wrote the sign.
On Tuesday 26th October, I visited Hachinohe Elementary school, to tell them about Halloween. When I arrived, all the kids in my first class were dressed in Halloween cotumes. Okay, so some of the costumes consisted of a bin-liner, but it was cool. The kids were very upbeat, as they always are in elementaries, and I managed to educate them on tricking startegies for trick-or-treaters. Japan will never be the same again...
That weekend, we celebrated Halloween in Hachinohe, and Mandy had arranged a pumpkin carving session, to get the City involved. In the morning, we carved pumpkins. I had never done this before, but as expected, it was a piece of cake. I wore a gladiator costume: a legacy from Cathy, one of the ALTs who left just as I arrived. Cheers Cathy! Dave made an alien pumpkin, and then we all went for coffee. Mike lost his pocket, and I helped him extricate it, with the effect of making compromising photos. After this, we had a very tame session of trick-or-treating, with each of us assigned to a shop on the main drag of Hachinohe. We all had a High School student each too. Internationalisation at its essence.
The next day, I decided to go for a bike ride, on which I befriended a sea gull, who I christened Percy. He was a little slow I think, but all the more friendly for it. We did a quick photo shoot, and I decided to leave before Percy started to think I was his mother. Whilst cycling over the bridge, I noticed an odd collection of padlocks attached to the bridge at its high-point. I looked closer, and it would seem that someone comes to this point every new year, and attaches a padlock, with English writing on it. Either the person is English, or they are perpetrating some sort of elaborate hoax. I wonder if they throw the keys away, or hang on to them. Either way, it is pretty cool. The sort of whimsy one might see in a French film.
We had Wednesday off, since it was a National Culture Day. To celebrate this, we went to Misawa (site of the American airbase), to Reed's house, to destroy ourselves, then watch the election results roll in. We were looking forward to the ousting of Bush. Well, we all know what happened. It was a great night out though. I also found a rather odd hat in a children's clothing store, manufactured by the "Daddy, Oh Daddy" clothing label.
In the course of the following week, I visited a remote-ish elementary school, and as always, they were all for photos, so here they are.
Over the weekend, we made an excursion to the beach near Misawa, which was rather grim, but we did find a television secreted in the formation of tetrapods. For some reason, people are unable to ignore the presence of tetrapods, despite the fact that they are a ubiquitous coastal defence in Japan. People always seem to make reference to them when they are about, and there is something very impressive about them. I resolved to find the place where tetrapods come from, to see if I could find any answers there.
As we headed back to the Hach, I received a text from Micheal van Zander, saying that he, Mary, Charlie, Ewan and Lorraine were out in Hach, and that more protagonists were welcome. We agreed to join the festivities. When we arrived at Bon, Ewan, the irrepressibly rude Scottish chap, was on the guitar, and proceeded to play excellent music and sing most tunefully, interspersing the songs with interludes of saying that he did not in fact know any songs.
After Bon, we headed to our favourite hip-hop bar, complete with faux-DJ and gay barman. We stayed there for a while. In fact, we somehow managed to end up leaving at half four in the morning, after a thoroughly good time. The photos show the frolickery that was had.
click here to see all of the photos
On Sunday, Dave and I went for an exploratory bike ride. We ended up in an industrial zone: it is quite difficult not to here, since urban zoning does not really exist, and different types of land use are scattered arbitrarily over the city area. The Holy Grail awaited us on our quest: we found a tetrapod manufacturing facility! Unfortunately, it was deserted: just the moulds. I think that one of the tetrapodists must have seen us approaching, and closed the operation down, in the style of The Sting. Do not worry though: I will get to the bottom of the tetrapod conundrum during my time in Japan, you have my word.
