Like City Lights, Receding

すごい!

2009-03-13T23:33:00.000-07:00

One of the members of my ESS club at Akashi Senior High School belongs to the school's prestigious art course. She has an online portfolio, and her work is pretty amazing. Here is a sample, but you can see many more on her website:

Source: siloly

Once again the outstanding talents and creativity of Japanese high school students shine through. I can't wait for bunkasai!

A belated travel post: November 2008 trip to Shimane

2009-03-10T18:43:00.001-07:00

Well, Emma certainly struck gold with her go-between at Maiko High School, Shibata-sensei. Not only has he been an immense help in organising holidays for us and finding the best deals, but he has himself taken us on two road trips. The first, last May, was to the Kii Peninsula in Wakayama Prefecture, and you can read all about it here. The second, last November, was to Shimane. (On both occasions we were accompanied by Iwao-sensei, another Maiko teacher who has also helped us out with travel arrangements.)

Japan is a very train-friendly country, but travelling by car has definite benefits. It can be a lot faster--unless of course you're travelling by bullet train, which can't take you everywhere. And a car (or in this case, van) can get you to those "hard to reach" places for which train and bus travel just won't cut it--not unless you enjoy wasting a whole day just getting from place to place. Part of the reason for this is that Japan is a very mountainous country. West of Hyogo, where we were headed, lies the Chugoku region, which is serviced by two major JR routes (though that's not to say there aren't lines running between them): the San-yo, which lies on the south (Seto Inland Sea) side of the mountains, and the San-in, which lies on the north (Sea of Japan) side. Stick to the trains, and there is a lot in this country that you miss out on.

Day 1: Hiruzen-kogen Highlands and Mt. Daisen

Hiruzen-kogen (Click image for slideshow)

Case in point: our first stop, for coffee and a bite to eat, on the Chugoku Expressway not very far west of Kobe. I made certain to scribble down the name of the place at the time, intending to blog about our trip as soon as we returned, but you know what they say about good intentions. (UPDATE: The name is "Gongenko," and it lies north of Kakogawa.) Suffice it to say, I don't remember (it might have started with an "O"), but here at a truck stop very far from any train line was a beautiful lake, glimmering in the morning sun, and framed by susuki, Japan's national weed.

(Actually, in the slideshow attached you will see a weed with yellow flowers. That isn't susuki--it's an introduced species--but it's gorgeous all the same. And my not being able to remember stuff accurately will be a regular occurence in this post, given that the events described happened five months ago. Sorry.)

Our first major stopover for the day was the Hiruzen-kogen Highlands in Okayama Prefecture--another place that would have been difficult to reach by JR. In the Rokko Mountains behind Kobe there is a hobby farm--a kind of theme park where the locals can see and touch cows and sheep and horses, in a land bereft of that kind of agriculture, owing to the lack of grazing land. Hiruzen is similar, but on a far grander scale, where you can see herds of Jersey cows grazing on lush green fields nestled against the red mountains of Daisen-Oki National Park. There is even a small horse farm (the farm is small, not the horses), complete with country and western music blaring through the loudspeakers.

Mt. Daisen (Click image for slideshow)

A stupendous ghost!
Looking eastward from the great bridge over those sharply beautiful mountains, green and blue, which tooth the horizon, I see a glorious spectre towering to the sky. Its base is effaced by far mists: out of the air the thing would seem to have shaped itself--a phantom cone, diaphanously grey below, vaporously white above, with a dream of perpetual snow--the mighty mountain of Daisen.
--Lafcadio Hearn, Glimpses of an Unfamiliar Japan

After lunch at a soba restaurant nearby (the buckwheat flour which is used to make soba is grown in the area), we proceeded to Mt. Daisen in Tottori Prefecture. With an elevation of 1,729 metres, Daisen dominates the region in the same way that Mt. Fuji dominates its surrounds, and can be seen from as far away as Hiruzen. It seems to be a well-kept secret: before coming across it that day Emma and I certainly had never heard of it (but what would we know?), but its gentler slope seems to be popular with local skiers in the winter months. Incidentally, did you know Daisen is a hermaphrodite: its gentler slopes apparently constitute its "female" side, its rough, cliffy face is its "male" side. Make of that what you will.

Day 2: Shimane Winery and Izumo Taisha Shrine

Matsue and surrounds (Click image for slideshow)

We spent the first night in a very narrow (but comfortable) hotel in Matsue, the capital of Shimane Prefecture. After a seafood-intensive izakaya dinner we had coffee in the lobby of an upmarket ryokan, where the English-speaking waiter proceeded to regale us with tales about Lafcadio Hearn, a gaijin legend in the area, of whom I'll say more later. By Japanese standards Matsue is a small city, nestled on the shores of Lake Shinji. And though in the morning we didn't have a lot of time to explore the city, it does have a picturesque riverfront area, somewhat reminiscent of the view from the Peace Park in Hiroshima.

Heading west for Izumo, we made a brief stop at a bird-watching park on the lakeside, equipped with binoculars and telescopes for the purpose of--yep, you guessed it--watching birds. Continuing, Shibata-sensei noticed a winery by the side of the road, I guess somewhere in Izumo, and we thought . . . why not? The free guided tour of the facilities was mercifully brief, and then it was on to the proper business of our sojourn: wine tasting. There would have been maybe twelve giant-sized punchbowls full of the various wines sold or manufactured by Shimane Winery, an ample provision of plastic cups, and no upper limit on how much you could sample. Put simply: FREE NOMIHOUDAI! Only in Japan.

(How to get there if you don't have a car: take the Ichibata Dentetsu train (the Taisha line) from Matsue to Hamayama-koen Kita-guchi Station. I just found the scrap of paper where I wrote that down!)

Izumo Taisha (Click image for slideshow)

Izumo Taisha Shrine, a.k.a. God Central, is one of the oldest and most sacred Shinto shrines in Japan. During October, so it is claimed, all of the gods gather there to party like it's 999. The shrine is dedicated to the Shinto god of marriage, and we actually saw one (a marriage, not a god) during our visit--though I suppose in Japan the local shrine is as good a place as any to have one's wedding photos taken, there being no Kings Park within easy reach. Whenever I visit a historical site in Japan I always shudder at the thought that I am standing in the presence of something older than many European nation-states. Izumo Taisha dates from the middle of the 7th century, but, as is the way with wooden structures in a humid country, it has undergone reconstruction since then, and the present structure was built around 1744, practically a spring chicken. (Apparently the original sturcture was much bigger.)

Matsue historical precinct (Click image for slideshow)

In the afternoon we returned to Matsue to explore the historical precinct, including a museum dedicated to Lafcadio Hearn. Lafcadio who? I hear you ask. I'll give you the thumbnail sketch. Hearn was a Greek-Irish journalist and writer who moved to Japan after working for 20 years in the newspaper and travel-writing industry in the United States. Though he wrote for a Kobe newspaper and taught English Literature at Tokyo University, and introduced Japan to the Western world through his writings, he is most famous for his 15-month stay in Matsue, where you might say he became the first JET. It was in Matsue that he taught in a middle school, and also married into a local samurai family, becoming a naturalised Japanese citizen and taking the name Koizumi Yakumo. He is, as I mentioned previously, the bomb in Matsue. The Hearn museum is located in the old samurai quarter, so we were also able to catch a glimpse of how the ancestors of Hearn's in-laws used to live.

That evening, we did as Japanese teachers do and stayed in a hotel that resembled a police headquarters in a 1970s crime drama. But the rooms were cheap, clean, and massive, and offered a good view of Matsue. Actually, I think the building is operated by the teacher's union, and the rooms serve as lodgings for teachers who attend conferences there. The receptionist, who sported neither sideburns nor mutton-chops, recommended a good restaurant in a nearby hotel. There, for a very reasonable 2500 yen or so, we enjoyed a delicious kaiseki (Japanese haute cuisine) and played Taboo and fool with our Japanese companions. Anytime's a good time for an English lesson, right?

Day 3: Matsue Castle and Sakaiminato

Matsue Castle (Click image for slideshow)

Reading up on Matsue Castle for this post, I was surprised to learn (from Wikipedia, so you should have a grain of salt handy) that it is the second-largest castle in Japan. I was certain that, of the other castles I visited, both Himeji Castle and Osaka Castle were larger. Actually, Matsue is the second-largest of the few orginal castles still standing in Japan--those that haven't been burnt down and reconstructed over the centuries (and Osaka Castle falls into the latter category). And to tell you the truth, while it certainly is beautiful, Emma and I made the mistake of visiting Himeji Castle first, and after seeing Himeji-jo all other castles tend to elicit a resounding . . . "meh". Still, there were cats there.

Our main port of call on the last day of our trip was the fishing town of Sakaiminato in Tottori Prefecture, where we encountered another one of those "Only in Japan" phenomena: an entire street dedicated to the work of a local manga artist, Shigeru Mizuki. Statues of various characters from his GeGeGe no Kitaro manga series lined the street, someone in a Nezumi Otoko ("Rat Man") suit walked around schmoozing with the tourists and passing out his business card, and even the police station and local JR train were decked out in Shigeru Mizuki's manga motif. And if that wasn't surreal enough, in the midst of all this, across the road from the police station we saw a car-park full of bogans (or yanki as they are known in Japan) showing off their hotted-up cars.

Sakaiminato (Click image for slideshow)

Sakaiminato, which lies on the Sea of Japan, is famous for its fishing, and our Japanese companions wanted to visit a fish market to pick up some of the local produce for their families. I'm not a fisherman myself, and I don't know what the local fisherman are using, but those fish (and squid, and crabs, and octopus) were BIG! Revoltingly, disgustingly big--especially the octopus which was almost as big as me, and from whose Schwarzenegger-proportioned tentacles I imagine you could fashion takoyaki the size of beachballs. I can't remember what gargantuan sea monster Iwao-sensei bought (it wasn't an octopus), but I think Shibata-sensei bought a buri, which set him back about 8000yen and had to be cut into smaller pieces before it could fit into the space behind the back seat of his van. All those grotesque, outsized cephalopods gave us quite an appetite, so we stopped for lunch at a kaiten-zushi restaurant, where I learned the meaning of the phrase sakana o tabesugita!

So once again, Emma and I must extend a big thankyou to Iwao and Shibata-sensei, whose companionship and local knowledge has enriched our experience of Shimane and the other places we have visited together.

The Science of Japan: Hana mizu

2009-03-08T19:30:00.000-07:00

If you've spent any time in Japan during the colder months of the year, you will undoubtedly have fallen victim to a phenomenon known to the locals as hana mizu ("nose water"), and to Westerners as a "runny nose." Actually, "watery nose" would be a more apt description, given the consistency of the nasal discharge which tends to be far less viscous than the common garden-variety greenie. As you doubtless will also have discovered if ever you have fallen prey to a bout of hana mizu, the watery drip often makes a stealthy and unwelcome appearance at the most inconvenient of times and locations, being marked neither by the weight or pressure of normal mucus which usually gives the sufferer fair warning.

We in the West have a mortal fear and disgust of bodily fluids. Their proper place, we maintain, is inside the body, and should they make even the briefest of appearances on the outside of the body, such that (gasp!) other people can see them, well that constitutes a social faux pas for which there is almost no recovery. It racks us so with shame and guilt and mortification, that other people should learn that our bodies contain mucus and blood and urine and faeces; we can no longer look our fellows in the eye, but must walk with our heads downcast, disgusting, vile wretches that we are. We can feel the stab of their pointing, accusatory fingers in our backs as we pass: "See that guy? He gets boogers! EWWWWWWWWWWWW"

The Japanese don't seem to have this hang-up quite to the same degree. Just the other day on the train I saw a man in a suit, perhaps on his way to an important meeting or to sell mobile phones, casually brush the tip of his nose, and (picture this in slow-motion if you will, for that's certainly how this shellshocked Western onlooker apprehended it) as his gloved hand pulled away from his face to turn the page of the book he was reading, there appeared a bridge of mizu spanning the chasm between his fingers and his nose, glinting in the morning sunlight. Didn't seem to faze him. But then these people do eat natto.

So, like, what's the deal with hana mizu? Let's start by looking at the malady known as rhinitis, of which there are two kinds. The first is called allergenic rhinitis, and it occurs when an airborne irritant triggers the production of antibodies. These antibodies bind to special cells known as mast cells, which in turn release histamine; and histamine causes inflammation and mucus production in the eyes, nose and sinuses.

The other kind is non-allergenic (or vasomotor) rhinitis. Inside your nose you have blood vessels which contract or dilate in order to control congestion. Sufferers of vasomotor rhinitis have particularly sensitive blood vessels, and certain factors--including changes in weather, certain chemical irritants (e.g. smoke or aerosol sprays), spicy food, and even emotional shocks--can cause overreactions.

(Thankyou, Wikipedia.)

But since not everybody suffers from allergies or hypersensitive nasal blood vessels, why is it that our noses run in cold weather? Julie Mitchell, Associate Professor of Medicine at the Medical College of Wisconsin explains:

While the obvious job of the nose is the sense of smell, the nose's other big job is to ready the inhaled air for the throat, voice box and lungs. The nose warms up and humidifies the air, and it filters out dust, germs, smoke and other particulate matter. Inhaled air picks up heat and moisture as it contacts the inside of the nose, which has grooves and ridges to make a large surface area.

The lining of the nose has glands that secrete water and mucus and, just under the surface, there are hundreds of yards of blood vessels that supply a constant source of heat. (You can see why it's easy to get a bloody nose.)

Under ordinary circumstances, the nose and sinuses produce as much as four cups of mucus every 24 hours. This mucus is constantly being swept back into the throat and subsequently swallowed. On a very cold day, when both the temperature and relative humidity are low, the nasal blood vessels dilate so more blood reaches the nose and thus its mucus and heat machine. Because more liquid is being produced in the nose than can be swept back into the throat, the nose "runs."

On one occasion while I was in Beijing and the outside temperature was in the vicinity of minus 10 degrees Celsius, about a cup of the aforementioned unexpectedly exited my nose as I was stepping down off the tour bus. Luckily nobody saw it happen, and I didn't see where the liquid went, but Emma was reduced to fits of uncontrollable giggling when I told her about it afterwards. A cautionary tale.

(BTW, IANAS, nor am I a doctor.)

Power of Fruits

2009-03-01T19:59:00.001-08:00

Having graduated with a Bachelor degree in English Communication and Cultural Studies, I consider myself relatively well versed in the politics of political correctness and importance of symbolic meaning. Matt and I were very amused, then, when we saw this ad on a Japanese train.

I will now hazard an explanation with an aim not to offend.

Firstly, in Japan, the way of looking manly, for the younger generation at least, widely differs from that of the typical Australian man. In Australia, applying a bit of wax and the odd spritz of cologne is now considered only slightly “poofy” for Y-generation males. However, the shaved and sculpted eye brows, carefully arranged and meticulously maintained hair-dos, and highly stylised and fashionable clothes sported by the young Japanese men in this photo would definitely land an Australian boy with the title “gay.” Of course, in Japan, dressing in this way is not an indication of your sexuality, it simply means that you care about your appearance or that you want to look like your favourite music idol. Secondly, in Australia the word “fruit” means homosexual when it is used to refer to a man.

So, when we saw these effeminate (by Australian standards) looking men coupled with the slogan “Power of Fruits,” our giggle buttons went into overdrive.

Turning our giggles into full-bellied laughter was the realisation that the purpose of the ad is to advertise a gift that can be redeemed when a particular number of wrappers have been collected. The gift, or rather the “Power of Fruits,” being a diamanté encrusted gum case. What else would you expect, really?

Beijing trip--December 2008

2009-02-13T21:14:00.000-08:00

Forgive us, readers, for we have sinned. It has been about two months since we lasted updated this blog. Gommen! Unfortunately, work and travel commitments being what they are, not to mention the time it takes to edit and organise photos, we won't be able to update as regularly as we like. When we do, you'll hear about it through Facebook.

On Christmas Day 2008 we flew to Beijing. We were with a tour group, we were the only non-Japanese guests, and the tour guides spoke only Japanese and their native Mandarin. We'll let the pictures speak for themselves, but we had a fantastic time, though Emma did end up catching some kind of flu on the way back and was laid up in bed for the following week.

Click here to see the photos. (The tab on the left runs the slideshow.)

I hope, but I won't promise, to put up photos of other trips in the near future.

Christmas in Japan

2008-12-16T04:08:00.000-08:00

So true . . .

Via Pharyngula

The Science of Japan: Is it really dangerous to use your mobile phone on the train?

2008-12-07T19:29:00.000-08:00

If you take a bus or train in Japan you will nearly always see a “No Keitai” sign, and for good measure the bus driver or announcer will usually remind passengers to switch their phones to “manner mode” and to refrain from using them. I recall taking the bus home from work about a month after I arrived here, standing in the aisle and nattering away on my newly-acquired phone . . . only to realize—the ambient noise having dropped from its usual silent to “deathly silent”—every other passenger staring at me, and the bus driver furiously waving the dame! wave. And if the endeavours of the public transport personnel fail to persuade you, other passengers—particularly senior citizens—can be relied upon to enforce the no-keitai rule. One morning on the way to school I saw a young woman thumbing an email message into her phone, only to be greeted by a sharp “Gommen!” by a grumpy old man seated nearby. With nary a glance at the complainant, she calmly put the phone away.

Why is mobile phone use proscribed on public transport in Japan? Well, for one thing, it’s considered “rude” (as is talking at the boisterous volume to which we barbarous Westerners are accustomed) . . . and over here that should be the only reason you need. But it is also believed that the radio waves emitted by cellular phones can interfere with heart pacemakers, and therefore passengers are asked to switch their phones off in the vicinity of priority seats. Is this concern justified?

It is true that mobile phones emit electromagnetic energy. Many things do, including the Sun and the earth, as well as televisions and radios. Electromagnetic radiation is non-ionizing, meaning that it does not have sufficient energy, unlike ionizing radiation such as UV rays, to detach electrons from atoms and cause tissue damage. Exposure to very high levels of electromagnetic energy can cause tissue damage, according to the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency (ARPANSA), but such levels would be well above what the general public encounters (in Australia at least; I can’t say whether it holds true for Japan). And worries about the risk of developing cancer from long-term exposure are generally what inspire people to protest the installation of towers or the use of handsets by children, but the jury is still out on how well-founded these concerns are. Nevertheless, the risk of tissue damage isn’t the main concern on Japanese buses and trains.

Concerns about cellular phones interfering with pacemakers and implantable cardioverter-defibrillators (ICDs) are well-founded, but the nature of the risk requires a little teasing-out. The purpose of a pacemaker is to ensure that the heart beats at an adequate rate, while a defibrillator will monitor the rate and rhythm of a heart and correct it if it is beating too slowly or too fast. Both essentially work by delivering electrical impulses to the heart muscles via electrodes, which in the case of the ICD is also used to detect heart activity. According to ARPANSA, both the signal transmitted from the phone’s antenna, and any magnets inside the phone can affect the operation of implanted medical devices, if the phone is held and operated sufficiently close to the implanted device. The organization therefore recommends that phones be kept at least 15cm from the pacemaker or ICD, which can be achieved if the patient avoids storing the phone in a pocket over site of the device, or if the patient uses the ear furthest from the site of the implant when he or she uses the phone. ARPANSA also notes that electromagnetic interference from mobile phones appears to be temporary; the device can be returned to its normal operation by simply moving the phone away.

So unless you’re on a really crowded train or bus, or unless you are actually sitting next to someone with an implant, it seems that he or she is unlikely to be harmed by your using your phone. Still, the host of the dinner party is unlikely to be harmed by your refusal to remove your shoes—unless you have been wading in toxic waste—and yet in the interests of maintaining peaceful and harmonious relations with your fellow creatures, and not looking like a complete and utter jerk, you are best advised to do as your host requests and take off your shoes. It is a good idea to do likewise on the train (put the phone away, that is; you can keep your shoes on), and save yourself much embarrassment—not to mention the ire of the ojiisan and obaasan, who can be far more intimidating than their diminutive appearance would suggest!

Matthew Stott, IANAS*
(*I Am Not A Scientist)

Tarumi at dusk

2008-10-22T07:52:00.001-07:00

I can see the world's longest suspension bridge from the balcony of my building.

I like that.

An Autumn Attack

2008-10-18T07:40:00.000-07:00

I threw the curtains open and golden light danced upon the tatami mats. Autumn had finally arrived. I looked out to see clear blue skies, and a balcony full of pink and white blossoms. Filled with calm, I closed my eyes and enjoyed the sun’s warmth on my skin. I had failed to notice I was being watched.

The preying mantis has a nifty camoflague, its green stick-like form lets it go unnoticed amongst the stems of many shrubs. An attribute this preying mantis had fully exploited, for when I opened my eyes I found it climbing out of the flowers and onto the balcony rail. Excited by its alien-like shape I rushed to get Matt and the camera.

Armed with our camera, and the desire to document our visitor, we ventured ever closer to the preying mantis. Happily we took close-ups of its almost translucent body and were filled with glee as it turned its head to pose to give us that coveted frontal view. So intense were we with our camera work that we failed to notice the interest our model had in us.

At lightening speed it launched itself from the rail to the camera, which Matt abandoned in an empty flower pot before quickly retreating to the safety of the closed screen door. Our hearts beat wildly at the unexpected attack, and a few minutes later we went to retrieve the camera.

I glanced at the camera in the pot and the preying mantis was nowhere to be seen. I opened the door without caution only to find those little alien eyes staring directly at me! The preying mantis had scaled the wall and was waiting for our return. Before it could launch another attack, I quickly closed the door.

Not to be beaten by an insect only the size of my middle finger, I fetched the broom, opened the door slightly and flicked it away from the door, which was again quickly closed.

Again it sat perched on the rail, and still the camera sat in the empty pot. We waited till its attention was directed away from the house, only then did we dare to retrieve the camera. At the sound of the door opening, it immediately turned to attack position . . . but it was too late. All that was left to attack was an empty pot plant and a closed door.

Click photo for slideshow

A Tarumi Afternoon

2008-10-14T06:10:00.000-07:00

I Know What We Did Last Summer

2008-09-30T05:37:00.000-07:00

Japan’s summer is very humid. The air seems to be full of water invisible to the naked eye, but which magically seeps into the skin and materialises as droplets of sweat all over the body. Everything is sticky, clothes, handbags, chairs and people. The thick, wet air connects us to everything and makes us all a little irritable.

Our little group of friends has devised two methods of coping with this horrid weather: the beach and karaoke. The beach speaks for itself as a solution. It’s a stretch of sand to get hot and sweaty playing Frisbee on, and the great big ocean to sink into to cool off in. However, as we were initially unaccustomed to Japan’s more rocky seashore, we managed to cut out feet during our first Frisbee playing marathon (we played continuously for about 4 hours). Yet, no minor cut could deter us, so we got ourselves some beach clogs and have been a-beaching every weekend for the past month. Special mention should go to Matt and Goran for their excellent Frisbee skills!

Click image to see slideshow

Karaoke is not such an obvious solution to the summer’s humidity, but when you consider that it takes place in the air-conditioned comfort of a karaoke booth, its appeal becomes obvious. Karaoke is particularly fun if it has been proceeded by a wine and cheese affair, which, three weeks ago, is exactly what happened. Luckily Kobe is quite an international city and we were able to buy affordable international wines (including Hardy’s, Brown Brothers and Rosemont) and some delicious cheeses.

Click image to see slideshow

In short, in the company of good friends, any weather can be made into the backdrop for great fun.

"You can leave your apart-ooo . . ."

2008-09-14T06:19:00.000-07:00

While I sit around dreaming up things to write about on this blog, other JETs get really creative.

The following is a production of Shimane AJET and features Emily McBride, a member of the WA contingent who came over to Japan with us in August 2007. Enjoy.

A belated farewell

2008-08-28T06:09:00.000-07:00

First things first: yes, we have been neglecting this blog, but there's no point in apologising, because I can't see us breaking the habit anytime soon. And in anycase, there has been little of note to report since the trip to Fuji. We climbed Fuji. How are we ever going to top that?

But we have lost some dear friends along the way. Don't worry--nobody died. Nor did we have a falling-out with anyone. (Actually, I was going to open this post with another Nietzsche quote: he has this great aphorism about how in the grand scheme of things the friends you make will always have been your friends, even if you had to become enemies with them on earth. I like it, but it doesn't apply here. The part about being enemies, I mean. (It's late.)) But three of the friends we've made on the JET programme departed in August to two of the four corners of the earth: Michelle and Cassie to Perth (so we'll see them again eventually), and Dan K to the United States. And I've been putting off writing this post for the usual reason: I wanted to include my usual slideshows of sixty-odd photos, but this generally takes hours owing to the arduous process of Gimp-ing (I'm referring of course to the photo editing software, not the unfortunate leatherbound soul in Pulp Fiction) and uploading the images we want to use. Not that you guys aren't worth the effort--but I do have to get up in the morning. Plus if you're on Facebook you'll have seen pictures not unlike those I intended to post, including karaoke photos. Karaoke's awesome, but readers of this blog will have seen enough pictures of gaijin singing the Aladdin theme song to get the message. Anyway, where was I . . .?

Cassie and Michelle were members of the 2007 contingent of WA JETs. Poor Michelle--she came half way around the world from a country town in WA only to be placed in an even smaller country town in the hills of Hyogo. (This, I believe, factored heavily in her decision not to re-contract. Oh yeah, and she got engaged too :).) She's a high school Japanese teacher by trade, and on our very first day in Japan she rescued a very disoriented Matt and Emma from the Akihabara JR station. In karaoke she sang like an angel . . . almost as good as Emma! So devoted was Michelle to the team that she thought nothing of making a three hour journey to Kobe or Osaka to attend festivities, and I think we should have made more an effort to visit her in Aogaki, though Emma and Cassie did just that shortly before Michelle's departure.

Cassie is a shop-a-holic by trade, but she also moonlights as a primary school teacher (we all have our peccadilloes). I'm a typical Australian male when it comes to shopping--drag me into a women's clothing store, as a very exasperated Emma will tell you, and I suddenly become autistic like Dustin Hoffman's character in Rain Man, and getting me to offer a useful opinion on a dress or skirt you may have your eye upon is like getting a cat to hum Bach's "St Matthew Passion." So Emma really appreciated Cassie's companionship. UPDATE: Oh, and did I mention the scrapbooks? I didn't, did I? 'Cause I'm a rude bastard. Cassie, being the scrapbooking queen that she is, made for us and for a few other ALTs beautiful picture books of the year that was. She has a post about them on her blog if you want to see what I'm talking about. And both of them--Cassie and Michelle--were really good for a yarn, and two of the most down-to-earth people you're ever likely to meet. (And Cassie--it's safe to admit this now that you're back in Perth: I was secretly watching Project Runway with you and Emma.) We miss them, but they're Perthies like us, so we'll see them again soon.

Dan K is from the east coast of the United States, but shall remain an honorary West Australian--insofar as it lies within the power of we WA JETs to bestow him with that status. He lived in Goran's apartment building in Miyodani, and when the two of them first met at (I think it was) Yashiro, it was (platonic) love at first sight. In fact . . . boys, the following YouTube is dedicated to you:

Seriously, with their powers combined these guys were the very definition of genki, and could be relied upon to be the life of any party. Speaking of parties, Dan's a mad-keen Obamaphile, and that earns him an automatic tick in my book. And he's been Emma's hero ever since he was able to secure for her an e-book reader she's been chasing for months, a Sony item which for some reason is unavailable in Japan, and which can only be purchased within the US. (That's like Australia manufacturing Vegemite solely for the Bhutanese market.) Nice work!

Thanks for sharing this experience with us, guys . . . it has been an honour to know you. Auf Wiedersehn!

Fuji

2008-07-28T06:08:00.000-07:00

"A few hours’ mountain climbing turns a rogue and a saint into two roughly equal creatures."
-- Friedrich Nietzsche, The Wanderer and His Shadow

Australia is the oldest, driest, and flattest continent on the planet. Most Australians know next to nothing about mountains and mountain-climbing, having never seen them before, and most Western Australians know even less. For those of us who grew up in Perth, our idea of a mountain range is an escarpment known locally as the “Darling Range”, rising as much as 300 metres above sea level in some places, a greenish blur on the eastern horizon. Our idea of mountaineering involves hauling a full esky over a sand dune or across a sloping lawn. So it’s fair to say that since we learned of our acceptance into the JET programme last year, Emma and I had our hearts set on climbing a real mountain, the biggest in Japan. And therefore our journey to the summit of Mt Fuji really began in Whitford City Shopping Centre (of all places) in the weeks prior to our departure from Australia, where we acquired cold-weather gear and, more importantly, decent hiking shoes. The intervening year has been spent in anticipation of the day when those shoes, already road-tested in places such as Mt Rokko, Mt Shosha, Sumaura, and the mountains of Wakayama, would tread the slow trail to the top of Japan’s most iconic landmark.

Of course, kudos must go to Emma and her go-between Shibata-sensei, without whose careful planning--including an extensive array of Google Map printouts spread out across our living room floor the previous weekend--this trip would not have been possible.

Day 1: Kawaguchiko

(Click image to see slideshow)

The bulk of our party converged at the bus station in Mishima: Emma and me, Shibata-sensei, Amanda, Suzie, Aimee, Dan C, Dan K, Louis, Chris Molina, Steven, Wendy, Case, Sean, Goran and Kin. (Dan K’s friend John, after what sounded like some arm-twisting, joined us later in the evening.) We were taken from Mishima to Gotenba by the angriest bus driver in Japan: he yelled at us gaijin for frivolous bell-pressing (when the actual culprit was an elderly local who had moved too slowly to reach the door before the bus pulled away from her stop), and his mood was not improved by two idiot motorists who were desperate to learn the meaning of “give way to the right” the hard way. Eventually, and hungrily, we reached the mountain lake resort of Kawaguchiko, and after a brief trip around the lake we found our lodgings for the night: a kind of Japanese bed-and-breakfast without the breakfast.

(Click image to see slideshow)

There amidst the mountains we did the Australian thing and enjoyed a barbecue, and watched the sun set over fields of blueberries. (Sucks to be you, doesn’t it?)

The ascent: Fujiyoshida to the 7th station

(Click image to see slideshow)

We’d planned an early departure on Sunday morning, but as there were no buses running at that time we bribed the proprietor of the B&B to drive us all to Kawaguchiko station, from where we made our way to Fujiyoshida at the base of the mountain. (We also parted ways with Shibata-sensei, who had decided not to climb the mountain.) It was at this point that about 5 members of our party decided to take the bus to the 5th station and climb from there; the rest of us started walking. I remember, looking ahead at the mountain, faint but looming, two thoughts occurring to me: (a) “We’ll be at the top of that by sunrise tomorrow,” and (b) “How the hell are we going to get there?” (The "Mount Doom" chapter from The Lord of the Rings also entered my mind.)

Much of the climb from the base to the 6th station was spent in cool and pleasant forest. There were a few surreal moments—-coming suddenly out of the bushland upon a noisy expressway, watching a team of rollerbladers skate up the hill, and being overtaken by joggers. At a place called Umageshi, a name which means horses can go no further, though that would fail to account for the horse droppings we found later on beyond the 6th station, some kindly old ladies beckoned us to their hut to enjoy some free o-den, and to have our water bottles filled. (I guess they were volunteers of some sort.) In the vicinity of the 5th station, which we somehow managed to bypass, a thick fog descended upon the trail, and we knew we had reached the clouds. After a late lunch at the 6th station, where Emma and I bought climbing sticks (a.k.a. "Fuji sticks," which can be branded at each station and kept as a souvenir of the climb), we passed beyond the clouds and, for the first time, caught a clear glimpse of the peak, shining red in the afternoon sun.

At this point the woods were beginning to thin out. They finally disappeared at a bus station, probably 2 to 2.5 kilometres above sea level, where climbers were disembarking coaches from a route known as the Subaru Line. They were the first sizeable numbers of people we had seen since Kawaguchiko. We had reached the desolate upper slopes of Mt Fuji, rising from an ocean of cloud. Ahead, the path climbed the face of the mountain in sharp zig-zags, and beyond that, we could see the series of huts, one seemingly on top of the other, that comprised Stations 7, 8, and 8.5. Closer to the 7th station, where we would be staying for the night, we had to do some actual climbing, which is not a simple proposition when you’re hauling an 8kg backpack. (It was even less simple when we had to do it again in the dead of night.) At 6pm, we dragged our aching and protesting muscles into our hut, where a cool 7500 yen apiece got us a TV dinner, a bento for the road, and a comfortable few hours sleep inside a small cupboard lined with futons. It was remarkable to observe how much we had all bonded throughout the day. There we were, soaked from head to foot in a day’s worth of road grime and sweat, and well inside each others’ personal spaces, and nobody seemed to mind. Some of us weren't even ashamed to get semi-naked in front of our comrades in order to wet-towel ourselves clean and change into warmer clothes for the final stage of the climb; though Goran was gentlemanly enough to provide a makeshift dressing room for Kin with his quilt.

The final stage: 7th station to the summit

(Sunrise from Fuji--click image to see slideshow)

Whether it was the anticipation of a gruelling climb and a breathtaking sunrise as a reward, or the noisy departure of another party of climbers at 930pm, it is doubtful that any of us got more than an hour and a half’s sleep. We left the hut at 1130pm on Sunday night, and immediately proceeded to scale the steep mountain face. In the dark. My headlight, purchased for the princely sum of 100 yen, was precariously clipped to the brim of my visor. I was half asleep, and I kept knocking the light to the ground with my Fuji stick, whereupon it would break open and the batteries would fly out. I was a more than a little panicked at this stage, and needed every ounce of Emma’s moral support. Emma actually lost her headlight long before I discarded mine in disgust, but it didn’t faze her, seeing as the moon was full and there were dozens of other climbers around to light the way. I had collected my wits by the time we reached the first hut of the 8th station, and was a little more confident of not dying before sunrise. To tell you the truth, if there was any dying to be done on Mt. Fuji, it certainly wouldn’t be caused by falling off. The path was steep, and narrow, and we had to clamber over rock, but there were rope fences on either side to guide the way, and at certain points thick metal rods had been driven into the stone to assist us.

On the previous day we’d walked for ten hours, and it seemed like we’d covered ten hours’ worth of ground. Beyond the 7th station, the journey seemed interminable, and the summit seemed forever out of reach, like that neverending hallway in the movie Poltergeist. The 8th station alone went on forever, and the higher we climbed, the more climbers poured out of the huts to join our route. By this stage we’d passed Aimee, Steve, Wendy, Amanda and Suzie, and the others had raced on ahead. Somewhere along the way Emma started hallucinating—-she began to think that the headlights worn by other climbers were pretty little birds—-so we stopped and ate the bento. We were still hopeful of reaching the summit by sunrise at 4.40 am; Emma checked the map at one of the huts and estimated that we would get there at 3.50. But we began to notice how crowded the path was becoming, and when Emma pointed out a tinge of golden light spreading across the eastern sky, things were looking ominous.

Well, we saw the sunrise, but not at the summit. After the 8th station came the "Real 8th station" (all the other 8th stations were just imitating), and then the 8.5 station and the 9th station, by which point we might as well have been queueing for a ride at Tokyo Disney. It didn't make a lot of difference, anyway: the sun rising over a foam of cloud looked just as magical a few turns above the 9th station as it would have done at the summit, which we eventually reached at 5.15am. Two members of our group had already had their fill of the mountain and departed by the time we arrived, and another two had to leave early due to work commitments. The others waited for the remaining climbers to reach the summit, among which included poor Amanda, who had twisted her knee at the 7th station and still managed to complete the climb. As we were on a tight schedule, we didn't have a chance to walk the whole way around the crater; I explored the northern and eastern face while Emma rested. At 7.30, it was time to descend.

Falling down the mountain, end up kissing dirt . . .

(Click image to see slideshow)

Our map indicated that the journey down the mountain, along the Subashiri route, would take no longer than a couple of hours. Sweet. We'd have time to shop for souvenirs at the 5th station, catch a bus to Lake Yamanaka, and hit the nearest onsen. Too easy.

The map was lying.

I can sum up the Subashiri descending route in one word: Mordor. Try this on for size: we had to half-walk, half-slide down a trail of loose rock and ash (technically known as "scree"), in blazing sunshine, for six hours. It was a good thing Emma and I were wearing the surgical masks that are popular over here, because dust was getting into every orifice that wasn't covered. I must have fallen over about four times--once into a nice drift of mud that had earlier in the day been melting snow. One stretch of the track could best be described as a two-kilometre landslide. The overpriced drinks at the 6th station added insult to injury. And spare a thought for Amanda, who had to negotiate all that with a knee injury. She was assisted for most of the way and put on a brave face, but the experience can't have been pleasant. When we finally reached the 5th station, we barely had time to board the bus to Gotenba. No souvenirs, I'm afraid, unless you count the most severe case of sunburn I've ever had in my life, which to this day has me molting like a cicada, but we'd all had quite enough of the mountain by then.

Oh, and the cyborg Goran, who waited around behind us on the summit until he could find Kin, caught up with us about half an hour down, and proceeded to jog the rest of the way (with Kin in tow). How does he do it?

Would we do it again? Yes, I think, as long as time and money allows. But we did come to Japan with the aim (or hope) of scaling Fuji at least once, and now we've achieved that. And there are a lot of other places in this country we would like to explore. We are glad, at any rate, that we have such memories to bring back with us to Australia, and that we were able to share this experience with good friends.

Vale Nagata Shōgyō

2008-07-17T23:08:00.000-07:00

Like many Hyogo JETs, I have been teaching at more than one school. Kobe Takatsuka has been my base school, and until now I have also been teaching one night a week at Nagata Shōgyō, a commercial high school. Nagata Shōgyō is something like a Tuart College or Canning College, in that it caters to mature-aged as well as high-school aged students, though in this case most of them will be entering the workforce rather than going to university. Students can elect to do a three-year or four-year course, and in the final year they must take English Oral Communication. I taught with Tsuji-sensei, who was always willing to let me do my own thing as far as lesson planning was concerned, and would always look for ways to incorporate my material into his exams. To me, this is the mark of a good team-teacher and JTE: allowing the novice to take the lead, take risks, make mistakes, and learn from them.

As you can imagine, the classroom dynamics at a commercial high school are very different from a normal senior high school, given the diverse ages of the students as well as diverse levels of interest in learning English. Last year, I taught a pretty wide spectrum on both counts: students ranging from 16 years old to 60, some of whom were very shy, some of whom were very loud, some of whom were always willing to participate, and some of whom would sit facing sideways and listen to their MP3 players for the entire lesson (and flee the room whenever it was time to play a game). The 60-something fourth-year student was always keen to participate, and at the end of the school year he gave me a thank-you card.

My 2008 fourth-year class

This year, or rather, this term--because it was sadly my last at Nagata Shōgyō--my classes were much smaller, much more genki, and much more interested in my lessons. I don't know how much of this can be attributed to the fact that I was much more generous in doling out KitKats, but in any case the attitude of the students was superb, and it motivated me to constantly look for ways to keep them entertained and engaged. I really appreciated their willingness to work with me, rather than against me as can often happen in Australian classrooms. It's a shame that I was only able to teach them for one term.

My 2008 third-years

But all good things must come to an end. The Hyogo Board of Education reduced its intake of new JETs for the coming year, which meant that it had to reallocate those JETs (like Emma and me) who won't be going home in August. Emma will be teaching at Seiryo as well as Maiko from August, and I'll be teaching at Akashi in addition to Kobe Takatsuka, which means that a different ALT will take over from me at Nagata Shōgyō from Term 2. So last Wednesday I taught my last classes. I gave my farewell speech during the staff meeting (don't tell anyone, but as I don't speak a word of Japanese I had to "adapt" an existing speech I found on the Internet), and then exchanged farewells with the students in the lessons. Both classes had prepared beautifully-decorated farewell cards for me, which was very touching. I'll miss them a lot, and hopefully I'll be able to see them next year at graduation.

Emma and I are staying with the JET programme for at least another year, but last Wednesday was a small glimpse of what returning JETs must be feeling as they deliver their valedictory speeches in their schools' gymnasiums or staff rooms, and wipe clean their blackboards/whiteboards for the last time.

The city lights are showing little sign of receding

2008-07-11T08:52:00.000-07:00

This is a satellite picture of Japan at night:

So that's why I feel so safe walking the streets at night here. Compare Australia at night, which is much dodgier:

These images come from a composite satellite image of the Earth at night.

Unfortunate title for a J-Pop CD

2008-07-08T07:26:00.000-07:00

Unfortunate name for a Japanese rock music festival . . .

2008-07-07T03:23:00.000-07:00

Pa, Pa, Pants Man!

2008-06-28T07:33:00.000-07:00

Back when I was a toddler, one of the local television stations used to screen cute cartoon community service announcements on the importance of vitamins, of eating a balanced diet, of personal hygiene, of not being a "ding-a-ling," and so on. What was missing from my education in those days, however, was a cartoon character teaching me how to use the toilet:

At least now I know I've been doing it correctly for the past thirty years. (But methinks Shimajiro could use more fibre in his diet. Cabbage never fails for me.) There's a squat toilet version also, but the English subtitles are, well, less "faithful" to the original Japanese, and given the audience of impressionable young students I've acquired of late, quite inappropriate.

Bunkasai: the day I fell in love with Kobe Takatsuka High School

2008-06-16T04:04:00.000-07:00

Anyone who knows me well knows I'm not prone to gushing, but in this case I will make an exception.

Last Friday and Saturday, Kobe Takatsuka held its annual bunkasai (cultural festival), probably the biggest event on the school calendar. Bunkasai is basically an open day (or couple of days), during which students display the fruits of their club activities, serve festival food, and put on live entertainment for their families, members of the local community, and alumni. There is something of a division of labour between the first, second and third-years: the first years (ichinensei) work together in their home rooms on an art project; the second year (ninensei) home rooms each put on a couple of song-and-dance routines; and the third years (sannensei) do the catering. Because I had only arrived in Japan in August, I missed last year's bunkasai and did not know what to expect . . . and the language barrier can make it difficult for teachers to describe such things in sufficient detail. I was also at a loss as to how I could contribute to the festival, my English Speaking Society being in a transition phase having lost its only two members from last year's ichinensei, and having gained two recruits from the fresh batch of ichinensei only very late in Term 1. I did end up contributing in a small way: Manto-sensei, the English teacher who sits behind me in the staff room, asked me to help out with her ichinensei home room's Mona Lisa mosaic . . . and you could hardly notice the discoloration to the right of Lisa's hands (and we won the poster prize, anyway, so shut up). And Okada-sensei (the calligraphy teacher) framed a kanji "masterpiece" I had been working on for much of this term, and added it to the Calligraphy display. To a local eye it doubtless resembled the handiwork of a kindergartener, but hopefully it will impress all my gaijin friends.

Ichinensei art (click image to see slideshow)

There is a stereotype about Japanese students that suggests that they are quiet, docile and reserved. My students at both Kobe Takatsuka and Nagata Shogyo have been (fortunately) gradually chipping away at this stereotype over the past year. But last weekend, at bunkasai, they hogtied that stereotype, wheeled it out into the middle of the baseball field, set it on fire, and danced around the fire like wild Indians. I had never seen the students like this before. I never realised how much talent, how much potential, how much enthusiasm they possess. I knew the brass band were good, but in the darkened gymnasium on Friday and Saturday morning, they were spectacular. Shiver-down-my-spine spectacular, at least to my untrained musical ear.

The brass band were just the opening act, however. The main attraction were the ninensei--students whom I had taught last year as first-years in my Oral Communication Classes. What the ninensei had to do can be compared to a Rock Eisteddfod, with the exception that the home rooms were competing against each other rather than other schools. There are seven home rooms, and you might ordinarily expect that to tax the patience of a gaijin who doesn't speak Japanese, and isn't always enamoured of J-Pop, especially the saccharine, boy-band variants. But my former students (I don't teach them this year) put on a show--make that seven shows--that kept me glued to my seat from start to finish. I should perhaps have seen it coming: groups of boys had been using the Language Lab after school to practice dance routines choreographed by an Exile DVD, and while foreigners like you and I may consider that a little, well, "camp," the swooning, screaming female students in the audience that day would beg to differ. It wasn't all sunglasses, backflips and elbows, however. There were also a cappella gospel choirs, cross-dressers, mimes, and of course the Waterboys who, dancing in their swimming trunks to the strains of "Misirlou" (the theme song of Pulp Fiction), brought the house down. Hang on a minute. I taught these kids only a few months ago. Where did this come from? There were prizes given the the top three home rooms, and I thought this was a little unfair, given that they were all fantastic and obvious the result of long preparation and much dedication.

I took photos. They didn't come out very well, because my camera doesn't have a powerful enough flash for indoor shooting, but I'm posting them anyway. I want the memories. (Click the image to see a slideshow)

Friday was more for the students and staff, though students from a local school for the disabled paid a visit as well. Saturday was open day proper, and well attended by families and former students, some of whom came up to say hello to me (they had been in my English Conversation classes last year), and very few of whom I recognised, given the local custom of dying one's hair any colour other than black the moment one graduates from high school. The sannensei had food stalls set up outside the gymnasium, and while even with my notorious appetite I could not consume everything on offer, I did keep a promise to some of my English Conversation students and bought soba meshi and takosen. Needless to say . . . oishikatta desu! Ditto the cookies and cakes sold by the home economics club. After lunch I returned to the gymnasium to see some of the school bands. I was even lucky enough to get my programme autographed by the all-girl group ANNNY, members of which formerly belonged to my ESS club.

Assorted arts and crafts (Click image to see sideshow)

Well, now I know what a bunkasai involves, and I'm much more inspired to get my ESS (assuming I still have one) involved next year. And I take my hat off to the students of Kobe Takatsuka for putting on such a great show. You guys rock!

Plum Hanami, Bird and Flower Park, Golden Week

2008-06-12T05:45:00.000-07:00

It’s been a long time between posts, so it’s high time we filled you in with some pictures of what we’ve been up to.

(Click image to see Aboshi plum festival)

The first blog-worthy event that has yet to find its way into a post was a lovely pre-spring outing spent among the plum blossoms in Abeyama plum grove park, which is south or Himeji city and sits high on a hill overlooking the Seto Inland Sea. The preceding night Matt and I had our fun-loving group of JET pals over for a delicious nabe dinner and obligatory karaoke session. A little worse for wear, we set out in the morning for a nutritious Mister Donuts breakfast and took off on the hour and a half train and bus journey with bento boxes in hand. Unfortunately, as the day was warm and nearly cloudless we were joined by a large number of plum blossom viewers, which in itself is not a problem, but when a large number of these people are squished onto a slow moving bus which is still running winter heating, well let’s just say it’s a tad uncomfortable. Nonetheless, we survived and had a delightful afternoon under the plum blossoms over looking the sea.

(Click the image to see more bird and flower action)

The second blog worthy event happened during my parents’ visit to Japan. After enjoying a tour of a sake making factory we headed off to Port Island’s Bird and Flower Park. The advertisement for this place showed a pretty spectacular flower display, so spectacular we thought it was photoshopped. However, upon arriving we discovered there was no need to photoshop as teams of fuschias in full bloom hung from the ceiling, giant water lilies lay on the ponds and cancans soared freely around us in their spacious enclosures. I felt like I was on the set of the original Willy Wonka film or in the technicolour land of Oz.

(Click to see more Golden Week photos)

The third blog worthy event was huge and simply can’t go without a mention. I speak of Golden Week, so named because there is a succession of Japanese public holidays, and companies often give their employees the entire week off. My Golden Week(end) was spent with the Golden Girls (the young ones in Japan, not the old cronies living in Florida). We all trooped into Osaka and met up with Aimee in Shinsaibashi the huge shopping mall. Unusually, we were not there for shopping; more girly things awaited us, namely, food, chat and massages. I am sure I don’t boast when I say I am as good as a professional at eating and chatting; however, this was my first encounter with a professional masseuse and it was gooooooood! After a lot of girly talk and a little sleep, we headed into Nara the next day. Here we encountered a rather international Colonel Sanders, plenty of deer and a whooping great big budda. Not to mention my favourite—festival food. Then, after even less sleep than the night before, we met with the boys to do some more eating and singing. This year’s Golden Week got full marks on the funness metre.

Wakayama

2008-05-19T05:25:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago Matt, I and two teachers from my school went on a journey that took us south of Osaka’s seemingly endless urban sprawl. We went to Wakayama. This trip was meticulously planned by my go between at Maiko high school, who also doubled as our expert driver for the trip. Waking with the birds we left Kobe city at 6.00 am, cheated our way through Osaka’s crowded streets by taking the elevated expressway and arrived in Wakayama prefecture by 8.00 am. Here we strolled around the grounds of Wakayama castle, confirmed that Mos Burger doesn’t have a breakfast menu and had MacDonald’s for the first time in Japan.

(Click images to view slideshows)

Wakayama Castle

For the rest of the day we travelled along Wakayama’s coast making brief stops at some interesting and beautiful places. First, Tore Tore Ichiban is a fish market well known by locals for its delicious fresh fish. Here you can watch giant tuna being diced, pick your shell fish fresh from the tank and even pick up some whale meat, however, ask for a fish head to use as a table decoration and you will flatly be rejected.

Tore Tore Ichiba

Second, Engetsu rock which gets its name from the circular shape at its centre (en meaning circle and getsu meaning moon). Third, Senjojiki beach which gets its name because its wide open space seems to have room for a thousand tatami mats. Fourth, Sandanbeki cliff that bears some resemblance to southern Western Australia’s coastline. Finally, Kushimoto, the most southern part of the mainland Honshu island. Here we encountered a choral group singing traditional Japanese songs and many more unusual rock formations.

Engetsu

Senjojiki

Sandanbeki

Kushimoto

At the end of our long day we made our way to a Japanese style hotel called Arafune. Despite its less than impressive façade, the interior was newly refurbished. To Matt’s great delight not only did the hotel have hot spring baths and pool table facilities, each room came replete with Western style toilets!

Arafune Ryokan

However, the most interesting aspect of the hotel was the food. Upon sitting at the dinner table, we were served what can unequivocally be classed as the freshest of fish—shrimp and muscles to be precise. A tiny BBQ sat in the middle of our table, its flames licking at the open grill. What happened next could easily have been lifted from one of Peter Singer’s nightmares, for as the shrimp and muscles were placed on the BBQ they started moving! Indeed, they were still alive and trying to break free from their now searing hot shells. This intolerable cruelty lasted for about minute at about which time they settled into their endless sleep. Such an experience is almost enough to make one vegan.

Zankokuyaki

The next day we returned to Kobe via mountain passes. First we stopped at Mt Nachi and walked up an ancient pilgrims path (some people hired costumes so they could walk it in traditional kimono) to the temple which also commanded an view of Mt Nachi’s magnificent waterfall.

Climbing Mt Nachi

Mt Nachi

Mt Koya

After stopping for lunch we went through the mountains--this was the adventure part of the weekend! The road around the mountain was littered with many large fallen rocks and was only wide enough for one car despite being for 2 way traffic. Also, it was incredibly windy: the only way to check if there was a car approaching in the opposite direction was by looking in the misty mirrors. This was all good while the sun was still up, but as it began to set my go-between became anxious to get out of the mountain area and went into speed racer mode. As we careered in straight lines around sharp corners I quietly recalled all the special moments in my life and thought of all the people who had touched my life, while clutching desperately to the handrail to control my nerves. Luckily we did not need to rely on the slight metal rail to protect us from the almighty fall down the mountainside as we made it home safe and sound.

Highlight from Week 3: Hiroshima

2008-05-10T21:57:00.000-07:00

Apologies to Kobe, but Hiroshima has to be my favourite Japanese city thus far. The last time we visited was via six long, slow hours of JR rail in the middle of winter. This time, in the first days of the cherry-blossom season, we travelled in speed and style aboard the Shinkansen, and therefore still had the whole day to sight-see.

Shukkeien Garden
(Click for slideshow)

Much of our sight-seeing was done on foot. We crossed the Kyobashi-gawa river west of the JR station, and made our way to Shukkeien Garden. Originally built for the local warlord in the 17^th century, the Garden was destroyed in the 1945 bombing, after which it was rebuilt. Teachers have told me that Shukkeien isn’t the best Japanese garden in the country, but we thought it was pretty spectacular.

Hiroshima Castle
(Click for slideshow)

After lunch under a grove of cherry-blossoms, we walked further west to Hiroshima Castle. Like Shukkeien, and much else in Hiroshima, this 16^th-century building also fell victim to the bomb, and what stands in its place is a 1958 reconstruction. The foundations of pre-1945 buildings can still be seen, and the tower itself houses a museum and observation deck giving a decent view of the city. In the outer bailey there was a food stand where we introduced Emma’s parents to takoyaki, and beside the moat stood an Australian eucalypt which had survived the bombing.

Peace Park and Memorial Museum
(Click for slideshow)

From the Castle we walked south to Peace Park. The first image to greet us was the A-bomb Dome itself, silhouetted against the cloudy sky. The Dome stands at the northern end of what is a spacious and magnificent urban park—the “Kings Park” of Hiroshima, if you will. At the southern end is the Peace Memorial Museum, which provides a harrowing guided tour of the events and aftermath of August 6, 1945 (though it provides too little detail of the reasons for Japan’s involvement in the war, in my view). We came here in January, but were pressed for time, so it was good to be able to give the exhibition a more thorough viewing.

Our flashy hotel, the Grand Prince (no slideshow)

We ate dinner at Okonomi-mura, which is a complex of okonomiyaki stalls housed on two floors of a building in the Shintenchi district, then caught a tram from the station to our hotel down by the harbour. In defiance of hotel policy we smuggled in conbini food for breakfast, rather than taking out a mortgage for the privilege of eating in the hotel dining room. The next morning we took a ferry from the hotel to Miyajima.

Miyajima (Click for slideshow)

I was glad to return to Miyajima, because on our last visit we arrived later in the day, and I wasn’t able to climb the 500m+ Mt. Misen. This time I hiked up the northern face, while Emma took her parents to the summit in the cable car. I don’t think the photos really tell the story, but the view from up there is spectacular. Once again we encountered the friendly local inhabitants—the monkeys and deer—though the latter were a little too friendly, sadly, for Emma and her dad.

Mt Misen
(Click for slideshow)

Hanami

2008-05-04T16:58:00.000-07:00

This is going to sound awfully clichéd, but have you ever been somewhere and felt as if you’ve stepped into a fairytale?

Japan’s brush with sakura is fleeting. It has to be. To paraphrase Robert Frost, nothing this impossibly, wonderfully pink can stay.

Through summer and autumn you don’t even notice them. They’re just trees like any other trees. And, like any other trees, they strip themselves bare of their leaves in the winter. Just ordinary trees.

And then . . . a single petal. A single blossom, half-glimpsed, perched on the end of a twig. The tourists queue to capture the memory on film. Within a week, the cherry blossoms have spread, like a rumour, to the four corners of Kansai. Standing ancient, majestic and alone at Kyoto’s Yasaka Shrine. Bending their sad limbs over the waters on the Philosopher’s Walk. Raising their black arms into a canopy of pink and white in the Peony Garden at Himeji Castle.

And beneath the canopy, and beneath the evening blue sky that can be glimpsed between the petals, a carpet of blue tarpaulin, upon which the locals gather to look at the flowers, and sing karaoke (badly), with their eskies full of beer and sake, and steak sizzling on their barbecues. The Japanese have never looked more Australian.

This, my friends, is why God invented the digital camera! Click the images below for slideshows . . .

The beginning: Kikumasamune Sake Brewery, Nada-ku

Tenryuji Temple, Arashiyama

Heian Shrine, Kyoto

The Philosopher's Walk, Higashiyama

Yasaka Shrine, Gion

Evening at Himeji Castle

Osaka Castle

The last of the cherry blossoms: Sumaura

Lightning doesn't strike twice, but it appears earthquakes do

2008-04-17T13:51:00.000-07:00

Yesterday morning, at about 1am, a small earthquake struck Osaka Bay. It woke us both up; but Emma couldn't recollect it happening the next morning, so I put it down to a vivid dream until I asked some teachers about it later in the day.

It happened again just after 4am this morning. Only very minor--we're both intact, and more importantly, our bottle of Lambrusco is still sitting happily on top of the buffet. To put things into perspective, around 20 percent of the world's earthquakes happen in Japan. I couldn't find any information online regarding yesterday's local earthquake, but it appears a larger one also struck north of Tokyo. I guess we should be surprised, then, that we hadn't encountered a tremor sooner.

Highlight from Week 1: Kinosaki

2008-04-13T04:16:00.000-07:00

On the Bantan line

This day afforded us a rare glimpse of the “backwoods” of Japan (i.e. fewer skyscraping tenements per square kilometre), as we journeyed on a slow and rickety train from Himeji across central and northern Hyogo. Our destination was the resort town of Kinosaki, which is famous for its many onsen, though unfortunately, given the miserable weather, we didn’t get a chance to visit any of them. Instead, we took a ropeway up Mt Onsenji, stopping along the way to look around Onsenji temple.

The view of Kinosaki and the surrounding area from the summit of Onsenji is said to be breathtaking: on a clear day you can see the Sea of Japan.
This was not a clear day. (Click the image above to see a slideshow of Kinosaki and Onsenji.)

But even in bad weather, Kinosaki is a picturesque little village: very European-looking (though I really have no basis for comparison), and Emma and I hope to return soon. We made the most of things by soaking our feet in a small hot-spring by the side of the main street, with the intention of visiting a few onsen after booking into our hotel, but that didn’t eventuate. The hotel in question, a ryokan, turned out to be a fair distance away from Kinosaki, and the constant rain (it never pours, but it rains in Japan) stranded us there. And so began our first experience of traditional Japanese accommodation.

(Click the image above to see a slideshow of the ryokan)

It would be putting things mildly to describe the ryokan as austere. From the outside it looked like the kind of establishment that in a Western country would normally play host to marital infidelity and drug deals. We were greeted in the lobby by a friendly old lady who spoke no English, but with the aid of Emma’s Japanese was able to show us upstairs to our rooms. These consisted of a tatami room for sleeping, a small anteroom for removing your shoes, and another anteroom by the window containing a washbasin, a mirror, and an inoperative fluorescent lamp. The youngest item in the room was Emma. At the end of the hall were the toilets, all of which were squats (but more on that later). The old lady returned with tea and informed us that dinner would be served at 7pm, so we changed into our yukata, had a few photos taken with Mum, and then headed downstairs.

We were expecting to eat in the dining room, but our host showed us instead to a smaller room off an adjacent corridor. There we found, to our delight, a mountain of noodles, rice and vegetables, and a nabe pot bubbling away.

Better still, since this part of Hyogo is crab country, there was crabmeat on the plate in quantities for which you’d have to mortgage your house in Perth. We ordered 3 beers, and our host returned with longnecks, at no extra charge! Though Dad found the concept of cooking for yourself in a hotel confusing, the ryokan all of a sudden did not seem as overpriced as it first appeared.

Copious amounts of beer and a very full stomach forced me to confront an aspect of the Japanese lifestyle I had somehow hitherto managed to avoid, though I knew someday it would catch up with me. Yes, I was obliged to use a squat toilet. I’ll say two things about using the squat toilet, and leave it at that. (1) The squatting position definitely makes for a very fast and efficient method of “purifying oneself,” so to speak, which may explain why the Japanese haven’t yet abandoned it. (2) The Japanese believe that the squat toilet is more hygienic than the Western toilet, since you don’t make any contact with the seat. This sounds like a good theory, but it actually takes a great deal of logistics and forward planning to make it work. Your pants and underwear are bunched around your ankles, and you want to avoid having these touch the rim of the toilet. On the other hand, squatting puts a lot of pressure on the bladder, meaning that number twos are usually accompanied by number ones, and you definitely don’t want your underwear getting in the way of the stream. Your spare third and fourth arms, the ones you keep packed away for just such an occasion—these you use to balance yourself against the walls. Since I was only wearing a yukata at the time, and since the cubicle had high doors, I ended up stripping naked. And that’s probably more information than you need.

The second best feature of our ryokan experience—the crab nabe was definitely the best—was the fact that it contained a hot spring. Nothing too fancy—no sauna or iron bath or anything like that—just a simmering hot bath that stayed hot. Like being boiled alive—the nice way. I had the place to myself, too: there were very few other guests in the ryokan, and Dad wasn’t game enough to try it, though Mum joined Emma in the women’s onsen.

The next morning we were called to breakfast in the dining room at around 7am. I wasn’t expecting crumpets and Weet Bix, but nor was I expecting a whole dried fish to greet me as I sat down to eat.

And you know what? I ate it—well, everything except the head. (It was delicious.) The raw egg, on the other hand, was a bridge too far even for me; Mum found a use for it in the miso soup. We had planned that day to stop in Amanohashidate on our way home, but it was still raining and we decided it wasn’t worth it. Emma, making small talk, said as much to the host, who replied with “Ame no hashidate!” Even the Japanese can make Dad jokes.

We're back!

2008-04-13T04:13:00.000-07:00

Usually when we take this long to update our blog it’s because we’re bone lazy, or are busy with more pressing matters, but this time we have a good excuse. We’ve been on holiday for the last 3 weeks, and have spent most of that time traipsing across western Japan with our parents in tow. We won’t blog every last detail—that’s just not our style—but we do want to tell you about the highlights. So stay tuned . . .

The Japanese Cuisine Conspiracy

2008-03-11T06:17:00.000-07:00

Dogs are the best people

2008-03-07T03:18:00.000-08:00

Emma and I are partial to a daily early morning constitutional, such as the philosopher Kant liked to take through the streets of Konigsberg back in the day. On Wednesday morning, we hadn't even travelled 100 metres from our front door when we're greeted with the following sight. One of the locals was standing in the middle of the road while her dog was, you know, going about its business. "It had to see a man about a dog," as the saying goes. Anyway, there she was with a handful of tissue, about to do her civic duty, we thought, by scooping up the evidence when the dog was finished. Well, she scooped it up, and put it in the bag, and that, we thought, was that.

But no. That wasn't that.

After depositing the droppings in the plastic bag she carried with her (what do they do with that stuff when they get it home, I wonder?), she then took a wad of tissue in one hand, lifted Fido's tail with the other, and proceeded to wipe its bum. I shit you not. I mean, this is a country in which you're not allowed to use your phone on the buses and trains. You can't hold a conversation in public above a barely audible whisper. If you have a touch of the flu or the common cold, they don't want you using a tissue. But taking that same tissue and using it to clean the stinking, fetid detritus from a dog's anus--that's OK.

I mean, what was this woman worried about? Hasn't millions of years of evolution taken care of this anal hygiene problem? Or was she worried that, in the absence of grassy lawns such as we have in Australia, Fido was going to wipe his bum on the tatami mat?

Club Pure Feb 2007

2008-03-05T05:19:00.000-08:00

Club Pure . . . yes, well, the less said, the better. There's a Charlie Brown cartoon where he wakes up one day and all his friends are telling him what a great time he had the night before--he even got to dance with the red-haired chick he has a thing for--only he can't for the life of him remember it. That about describes my second visit to Club Pure (sans the red-haired chick, of course). Apparently we went to Club Pure, and somehow made our way from there to karaoke. And while I'm buggered if I recall the events of that evening, we have photographic evidence (most of which we'll eventually get around to Facebooking) that suggests they did indeed transpire. Weird, huh? Anyway, I'll let the slideshow below tell the story.

(Click image for slideshow)

Note to self: while the cocktails at Club Pure are watered down to the potency of weak cordial, the vodka shots aren't.

(P.S. Don't get the wrong idea: we had a fantastic time with our friends as always, and Wendy and Aimee were kind enough to put on a great nabe the following day. Emma was a little worse for wear--though it was nothing to do with the nabe, I hasten to add.)

Chūka man: Japan's answer to the meat pie?

2008-02-29T04:11:00.000-08:00

The Australian Meat Pie: A shell of baked pastry, filled with any of the following: beef, buffalo, camel, cattle, deer, goat, hare, pig, poultry, rabbit and sheep. The manufacturers will make a special point of telling you if the meat involved is beef; otherwise it's just a "meat" pie. "Meat" can include snouts, ears, tongue roots, tendons and blood vessels. Manufacturers are obliged to tell you if they use offal (but noses and ears are OK). Meat pies are usually served with a sachet of "dead horse" (that's tomato sauce to you), and can be purchased at just about any deli, office canteen, supermarket, tavern or servo.

Chūka man: A steamed bun, (usually) filled with pork mince (sorry--I don't know anything more specific than that) and vegetables, and accompanied by a sachet of very hot mustard. You'll find these in just about any convenience store, and also in many supermarkets. I don't know if you can get them at the service stations over here, but, like the meat pie, they can also be purchased cold and whacked in the microwave.

After re-reading what I wrote above about the Aussie meat pie, I think it's safe to say that I'm off meat pies from here on in--and I'm sure many of you are as well. (You can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear, but you can, evidently, make a meat pie. Even so, you can't make me eat it.) Chūka man, on the other hand, are absolutely fantastic. Especially at the end of a night on the tiles (kebabs are rare in Japan), which makes me regret not getting one last Saturday night. If there's anything I should know about the mince, please keep it to yourself and don't spoil this for me.

(P.S. For some reason I've been calling these things gyōza.)

169

2008-02-27T04:20:00.000-08:00

(That's the number of kanji characters Emma has memorised. Matt has not been nearly as diligent.)

Just a brief update on what we've been up to . . .

Making preparations for when our parents visit in about three weeks. (Yes, both sets are coming. No, they won't be here simultaneously.)
Being re-contracted as ALTs for a second year.
Introducing Kobe Takatsuka students to Australian slang. They are now familiar with the terms "dropkick," "bogan" and "goon." My English Speaking Society girls have also been apprised of what "Goon of Fortune" entails (and no--I didn't give them a demonstration. What you must think of me!)
Learning a new card game from Goran and Dan K that should keep us happy on long train journeys.
Not remembering a good portion of Saturday night's journey to Club Pure and karaoke in Osaka--which is probably for the best.

Now, for the necrophages among you, see if you can guess which extraterrestrial organism's brain this Japanese delicacy is made from:

A spot at high school

2008-02-21T03:00:00.000-08:00

Imagine, you are fourteen. You have been brought up hearing the tragedies of the Hanshin-Awaji earthquake. Your parents tell you of the screams and the flames and the fear. You’ve resolved to be prepared, to be trained.

Now, at your junior school you hear of a high school that specializes in teaching youngsters these very skills. You are very excited. No longer will school be the painful drudgery of a prison, it will be the ship carrying you to your fulfilling adult life. Unfortunately, this ship only has place for 40 passengers, so you will have to earn your passage. With three of your like-minded junior school friends, you set about studying every night. Each night the hours roll past and your eyes grow heavy, but you are determined.

The exam day arrives. You are prepared. 69 other students sit around you in the high school’s examination hall. There are only 40 places. Their pens swiftly move from one question to the next. Their ease makes you uneasy. You go home worried that your efforts, your ability, will not suffice. For 4 days you worry.

Finally, today you will know. You arrive at school, frazzled: excited and nervous every time the clock’s rotation brings the minute hand closer to lunchtime. In your teacher’s car with your three classmates, you make your way back the examination hall. You stand in the courtyard before the building. Icy winds lash your bare legs, you are hardly able to clutch onto your examination number. Parents and teachers watch from the side, watch you and the other hopefuls huddle, exposed, in the centre of the courtyard. With the stress, anticipation and tiredness you start to sob. Try to look up at the second floor balcony. Try to blink those tears away before the numbers are revealed. Try to breath.

This story has one of two outcomes, either your number appears and you drop to the floor in a fit of free-flowing ebullient tears, or stoically you dry your eyes on your sleeve, bow your head and quietly leave the courtyard. Unfortunately, for 40 of the students the latter was their outcome. Unfortunately, for one girl as her three classmates cried with joy, she left the courtyard alone.

I hear mental illness and suicide is a problem here in Japan.

The Japanese Room

2008-02-16T04:08:00.000-08:00

Ever heard of the Chinese Room Argument? It’s a thought experiment by the philosopher John Searle, who wanted to argue against what he called “strong AI”, which is the idea that, if programmed sufficiently, a computer can think and understand. This is related to the Turing Test, in which a computer is deemed intelligent if it can sustain a conversation with you without you realising that you’re speaking with a computer. Here’s how Searle painted the scenario:

Imagine a native English speaker who knows no Chinese locked in a room full of boxes of Chinese symbols (a data base) together with a book of instructions for manipulating the symbols (the program). Imagine that people outside the room send in other Chinese symbols which, unknown to the person in the room, are questions in Chinese (the input). And imagine that by following the instructions in the program the man in the room is able to pass out Chinese symbols which are correct answers to the questions (the output). The program enables the person in the room to pass the Turing Test for understanding Chinese but he does not understand a word of Chinese. [ . . . ] The point of the argument is this: if the man in the room does not understand Chinese on the basis of implementing the appropriate program for understanding Chinese then neither does any other digital computer solely on that basis because no computer, qua computer, has anything the man does not have.

I feel like the man in the Chinese room. I keep blitzing these Japanese Language Course tests, but I still feel no more fluent in Japanese than I was when I first arrived here.

Of Snow and Snowmen

2008-02-14T05:49:00.000-08:00

Without doubt, the sense most excited by snow is touch. From the gelid air tickling our exposed noses to the frosted ground seeking warmth through the souls of our shoes, the experience of snowy weather is a winter treat. At least this is what Amanda, Matt and I thought on Sunday when we reached the top of the Mt Rokko Sanyo Cable Car station and were greeted with freshly falling snow. However, this awe did wane a little later when our toes started to smart as blood retreated to our torso in an attempt to protect the organs vital for living.

Yet what really surprised me was the way snow affected each of my senses. Unlike touch which is stimulated by the presence of extreme cold, snow engages the senses of smell and sound by their absence (at least in my limited experience). By way of an example, Matt and I ventured up Mt Rokko last summer. The wretched air hung thick around us; our curry lunch stinking in the putrid heat; our sweat habitually wiped in attempts to disguise the odours (best left undescribed) emitted from our pores. And, the cries of children, distressed by their discomfort, the only complement to the day’s cacophony. In contrast, a snowy winter’s day on the mountain side was bereft of such things. All smells (and sweats) concealed beneath a delicate layer of snow, my sushi keep fresh and odourless by the cool temperature and the only sound—silent snowflakes waltzing to rest on the mountain’s edge.

Then there is sight. The sense that had brought us to the mountain. Kobe city holds an annual ice sculpture competition: huge chunks of ice are hauled from the Japan Sea and plonked on the mountain for skilled ice sculptors to have their way with them. Some were truly magnificent, as you can see in the slideshow. Also, you might notice our own attempt at snow sculpture—bringing our past and present together in the form of the snowman koala.
(Click image for slideshow)

Finally, arguably the most important sense of all, taste. I enjoyed many a tasty snow cone in my childhood, those shaved chunks of ice flavoured with sugary red raspberry and green coola cordial, but that’s not what I’m referring to here. While enjoying our bento lunch, Amanda and I watched this little boy pick up soft fluffy snow and lick it from his fingers for 5 minutes straight. Not quite brave enough to get that in touch with snow (as the snow was covering the pathways I had no way of knowing what had been tredding on it), I settled for eating this snowman. I’ve been eying him off for a week in the shop window and decided today was the day to take the plunge and taste a “snowman.” He was a delicious little fellow made out of bread, filled with regular and chocolate custard, and covered with white chocolate and icing. I especially appreciated his smile which he kept even as I brained him with my teeth!

How can I describe the taste of UCC Blend 117 instant coffee?

2008-02-14T03:43:00.000-08:00

You know how there's this really rare and delicious kind of coffee that is made from beans that have been fermented in the digestive tract of a civet cat? Well, UCC Blend 117 tastes like the manufacturers didn't bother to wait for the beans to drop.*

Mind you, UCC drip coffee tastes fantastic. But as far as instant goes, Japan's going to have to dig deep to top Mocha Kenya, Moccona Classic or Nescafe Gold. (There is a "Nescafe Gold Blend" available in Japan, but it's just not the same.)

*Pablo. That's what it tastes like. Pablo. Probably great for smuggling cocaine through Customs, but nobody in their right mind actually drinks the stuff.

Setsubun

2008-02-12T02:19:00.000-08:00

Two weekends back, Goran, Dan K, Emma and I visited Nagata shrine for the Setsubun festival. Technically, there is a setsubun at the beginning of each season, but the one at the beginning of "Spring" (I use the scare quotes deliberately) is almost like a second New Year, when the locals cleanse themselves of ill fortune by throwing soy beans at Oni (a.k.a. demons).

Nagata Shrine lies close to the commercial school at which I teach on Monday afternoons, and according to legend it dates back to the 4th century CE, when it was founded by the Empress Jingu. On February 3rd of each year it plays host to the Tsuina ceremony, which involves the exorcising of demons by means of seven youths wearing demon masks and dancing to the music of a conch shell. If that description hasn't sold it for you, maybe the slideshow below will:

(Click the image above to see a slideshow)

Upon entering the shrine, we armed ourselves with soybeans in the hope of arcing them at some bad boys from Hades, but alas! no beans were to be cast that day, either on stage or off it. So Goran amused himself by squeezing his head into an Oni mask that was far too small for it, and frightening Japanese children (and Emma). The rest of us sampled some of the wares at the food stalls that always accompany Japanese festivals, including a delicious fish-shaped pancake waffle known as taiyaki.

The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist. (Click the image for a slideshow)

For windy winter worriers

2008-02-11T04:46:00.000-08:00

(P.S. This post was written by Emma)

I’ve always suffered in winter. Its frosty mornings, biting cloud-covered middays, bitter evenings, with nothing but night’s miserable cold for bookends. Indelible memories of moments in high school classrooms spent trying to will blood to return to the ends of sore blue toes will be forever attached to its very utterance.

It was with caution, then, that I approached Japan’s winter, undoubtedly much more severe than any I had experienced in Perth’s temperate climate. And now after 2 months of winter already past, I feel (hopefully not prematurely) assured that not only will I survive Kobe’s worst, but indeed thrive in it.

Now, it’s not that my circulation has improved or that it’s unseasonably warm, it’s that my outlook for winter dressing has changed. (Actually I am told that it is a little warmer than last year, but with maximum temperatures not exceeding 5 and 6 degrees, I feel safe in saying that comparative to Perth, it’s cold).

During a Perth winter, wearing stockings, knee-hi socks, wool fully-lined pants, long-sleeved nanna vest, turtle neck, wool jumper, wool cardigan, hooded knee-length down jacket, scarf, insulated gloves and beanie would get you laughed all the way to Tasmania. But here in Kobe . . . well actually I get laughed here too for my super doper heat retaining shield (commonly known as clothes), every single day in fact. However, the difference is that here in Japan I am a foreigner, so it’s perfectly acceptable for me to be “soft.”

Nonetheless, and this is a lesson I will be taking home with me, when it’s cold it’s okay to wear too many layers because, as I have learnt, being ridiculed pales in comparison to having a happy winter!

For those Perthies wanting to take the “Keep Warm this Winter 2008 Challenge,” here’s the bare minimum of layers needed to stay toasty warm no matter where you are:

Do this and you to and kill the winter blues!

While we probably should be watching Japanese TV to pick up the language . . .

2008-02-08T18:52:00.000-08:00

. . . we've been occupied with this instead:

Life on Mars is a British cop drama set in 1973, but with a twist: the main character is from 2006, and as far as he is aware he is in a coma after having been hit by a car. Brilliant acting, great storylines and--the theme music aside--a fantastic soundtrack. Here are a few samples:

David Bowie -- "Life on Mars?"

Wings -- "Live and Let Die"

Slade -- Coz I Luv You

Hiroshima

2008-02-02T06:14:00.000-08:00

Oh dear!

It’s the end of January and we still haven’t posted about Matt and Emma’s et al. Excellent Adventures in Hiroshima. Well with the same crew that attended the nabe feast at Goran’s pad, we headed down to Hiroshima on the 1st of January. There were a few tired and sore heads on the 6 hour train ride (Cassie might want to develop her own spin off show called Cassie and Cassius’ Night to Remember in the comments), but nothing can stop ESL teachers enthusiasm for word games—on this occasion our penchant lead to a word association game marathon—or our joy at passing through valleys walled by snow topped mountains.

After a fabulous okonomiyaki dinner, the oyster topped one being my personal favourite, we strolled down one of Hiroshima’s delightfully wide streets. Being the festive season, there were many figures dressed in different coloured lights lining the street, they made up a presentation called Dreamination. While the first figure of a red phoenix was spectacular with its imposing puffed up breast, none of us would have been fazed had it suddenly come to life and breathed hot fire in our direction as we would have quickly quelled it with our equally icy hands.

(Click image for Dreamination slideshow)

The next day we went to Miyajima Island via tram. This mountainous island is listed among Japan’s three most beautiful places and no doubt it is. At the ferry station we were greeted by Miyajima’s beautiful silhouetted peaks juxtaposed against the clear blue of the winter sky. Approaching by ferry, some of the islands mysteries were unveiled when the red floating gate, for which the island is famous, came into sight as well as the appearance of its snow topped trees. Finally, once we docked, the last of the islands endearing elements came to the fore as gentle deer wandered around nuzzling at our hands and bags.

(Click image for Miyajima slideshow 1)

(Click image for Miyajima slideshow 2)

(Click image for Miyajima slideshow 3)

(Click image for Miyajima slideshow 4)

Our group split so we could pursue our different interests, some went to scale the mountains, others went to shop and wander around the ferry area, but Matt, Amanda, Tamara and I took a leisurely walk around the lower hills and temples. There we found that not only is the island itself beautiful, but so is the view it commands of the mainland. Also, that not all temple statues inspire awe—check out the Anpanman look-alike (the god of bread perhaps?).

By night we returned to Hiroshima city and walked around Peace Memorial Park, the site of the Peace Museum and the Atomic Bomb Dome. The latter is the remaining shell of the Hiroshima Prefectural Industrial Promotion Hall, which was the building closest to the centre of the atomic blast that stayed standing. The structure was eerily lit with green flood lights. Rubble, which had once been the hall’s walls, lay at its base. The destruction we witnessed here was only the start of what was to be a harrowing morning at the Peace Museum the next day.

The museum had a combination of facts about nuclear weapons and their effects, Japan's involvement in the Second World War, the history of Hiroshima, peace efforts and anti-nuclear treaties, and remains of people who were killed by the bomb. This last section of the exhibition was the most moving as it included (translated) oral accounts of the day of the bomb, the charred remains of school uniforms and supplies that were worn by children who were killed in the blast (often a name tag on a school bag or lunch box being the only way a parent could identify a child as their own), life size models of people with their arms outstretched showing what the melted and hanging skin from their fingertips would have looked like, and the steps of a bank located at the centre of the blast upon which is a permanent shadow--the only remains of a man who sat there waiting for the bank to open on the day of the blast. Finally, and perhaps the most devastating because of the lingering suffering they imply, are the collection of fused spine joints, mops of matted hair, ulcerated tongues, blackened fingernails and skin, pictures of swollen scarred skin, and the recollections of desperate mothers who watched their beloved children spew blood, all of which were aberrations in the human body caused by exposure to radiation. It was quite a sobering morning.

Australia Day 2008

2008-01-29T04:24:00.000-08:00

On Saturday I decided to get into the spirit of things and tune in to the Triple J Hottest 100, and found that I didn't recognise most of the songs--including the winning song. ("Knights of Cydonia" by Muse--which isn't bad after a few listens.) That could only mean two things: I'd been living in Japan for a good part of 2007, and I'm getting old.

Well, 31 isn't exactly old, but then age is a relative thing. I realised this one of the last times I set foot inside a nightclub in Perth, and felt like I had stepped into a child care centre. So it was with some trepidation that I ventured into Osaka's Club Pure with young Emma and the other Perth JETs on Saturday night. You see, when I think of thirtysomething males in nightclubs I think of bearded and be-stubbled men wearing tight black jeans and those Chinese/Hawaiian-style shirts that were popular for about 5 minutes at the end of the 1990s (after which most died an honourable death in the local Vinnie bin before resurrecting themselves on the backs of Centrelink clients), dirty-dancing to Gwen Stefani with some pre-pubescent muffin-top. Honestly, boys, it's like watching someone do the "Lambada" with a fetus. And I don't want to be one of those guys!

Fortunately, I was able to overcome my neurosis long enough to have a really enjoyable night with my JET friends (the Daniels C and K, Goran, Aimee, Michelle, Susie and Amanda), as well as chat with (chat with, people, not chat up) some of the locals. There was a dodgy character haunting the dancefloor like the unmistakable odor of eructated garlic ramen--someone who doubtless would have felt right at home at The Shed or The Craic (for those of you with long memories) or Gobbles (for those of you with really long memories)--but the female clientele, gaijin and otherwise, were wise enough to give him a wide berth. The cocktails--watered down though they must have been at $25 for all-you-can-drink--were strong enough for me to lose my inhibitions regarding uncoordinated dancing and seriously off-key singing. Emma, as you know, needs no help in either of those departments, but she appreciated the chance to let her hair down all the same.

Michelle stayed at our place that night, and the next morning was telling me about the mukade (that's giant centipede to you) she encounters in her house from time to time. I showed her a site listing the 5 Most Horrifying Bugs in the World (language warning). The mukade doesn't make an appearance, but another insect commonly encountered in Japan does: the Japanese Giant Hornet. Watch as 30 of them massacre a hive of 30, 000 honeybees.

Christmas & New Year 2007

2008-01-12T22:20:00.000-08:00

Do the Japanese celebrate Christmas? Yes and no. Christianity (kirisutokyou, "The teachings of Christ") is a minority religion here, observed by only 1% of the population, so there is little emphasis placed upon the religious aspects of Christmas. (We didn't see any nativity scenes, for instance). Here the emphasis is more on the non-religious iconography and traditions of Christmas--Christmas trees and gift-giving, for instance--as well as its commercialism. Christmas paraphernalia appears in Japanese shops almost as early it does in the West. And while Christmas cards are widely available, card-giving is more generally associated with New Year, which in Japan is far more important than Christmas--as any Westerner working here soon discovers. December 25th is not a public holiday in Japan (though December 24th is: it's the birthday of the current Emperor).

Emma and I both had to work on Christmas Day, and did our celebrating on Christmas Eve. It was the first time Emma got to open presents on Christmas Eve without protest from me! Here are the presents Emma gave me, including a drip coffee-maker:
And here's what I gave Emma (pillows not included):

Since many of our JET friends were either out of town or otherwise occupied over Christmas, we opted to celebrate on our own with a traditional Christmas dinner:KFC . . .

. . . followed by chocolate cake (cake is actually traditional Christmas fare in Japan).

The following Sunday, we went to a nabe feast at the apartment of a fellow JET, Goran, in Myodani. Nabe may be described as a broth, kept bubbling in a special ceramic or cast-iron pot over a small burner, to which may be continously added all sorts of meat and vegetables. Everyone sits around the pot, refilling their bowls and adding more ingredients to the broth as necessary, inculcating a feeling of "community" and sharing--which, since all present were travelling together to Hiroshima later in the week, was most likely the point. As you imagine, the more ingredients that are added, the tastier the broth becomes. This is one Japanese tradition I can see us bringing back to Australia (depending on the availability of portable burners back home).

Amanda, a fellow JET from Perth, with Emma at the nabe feast

We had a great time on New Year's Eve, which kicked off at an izakaya in Sannomiya--a kind of restaurant best described as "only in Japan." After paying a set price of around $30 a head, we sat around a long, low table, at either end of which was located a digital menu with a touchscreen. From this menu we were free to order--within a time limit of 90 minutes--as much finger-food and alcohol as we could stomach. It was, needless to say, a rowdy affair, and put most of us in the mood for karaoke afterwards. (Click on the image below for a slideshow)Most Japanese spend New Year's Eve quietly with their families, only to congregate around local shrines close to midnight to see in the new year. Emma and I were unfortunate to miss this spectacle, because we had to be up early the following day to rendezvous with others journeying to Hiroshima, and there were no trains running back to Tarumi after midnight.

Have a look at what they're whinging about back home!

2007-12-29T07:06:00.000-08:00

In the Sydney beachside suburb of Newport, the locals are complaining about the noise of the summer cicadas, which they claim are louder and more irritating than in previous years:

"It's such a loud noise you hear it within in your head," said resident Brett Fulton. Merle Hurcombe said she was unable to hear the radio or the television even when she was sitting right in front of them.
But it's not just the sound that's irritating residents —they say going outdoors now comes with the added risk of being coated in cicada spray.
"It's pretty terrible. You can't walk down the driveway without getting cicada wee all over you. It feels like its raining everytime you walk outside," said local Sky Lund.

I don't think I'd ever even seen a cicada until I came to Japan, let alone heard one. And I can't say I've ever had the pleasure of being urinated on by one of these creatures. Fingers crossed: maybe next summer.

Things you don't expect to hear in Japan . . .

2007-12-18T05:28:00.000-08:00

. . . a MIDI version of Kylie Minogue's "I Should Be So Lucky," playing in the local supermarket.

And just last week, my ESS girls gave an impromptu rendition of the same song.

Japan's annus horribilis?

2007-12-16T12:39:00.000-08:00

Nise, Japan's kanji of the year

When you're a tourist in a non-English-speaking country, there seems to be a lot happening right under your nose. Assassinations. Political scandals. Major earthquakes. Nuclear power plant leaks. Food scandals.

Read more here.

Ode to Okonomiyaki

2007-12-15T20:25:00.000-08:00

Oh food in Japan it’s a wonderful thing,

It tastes so great, it makes me want to sing.

Okonomiyaki, means as you like it,

Always ready for adventure we thought we’d try a bit.

Our first taste was humble, bought from a conbini,

The shop was called Lawsons’, they are like Aussie delis.

However, despite this offering’s soggy microwaved texture,

We were caught by its delightful flavour: hook, line and sinker.

Taste buds whetted, intrepidly we searched,

Till we reached Osaka where a man sat perched . . .

Stentorianly crying, “Okomiyaki, come try ours first!”

Order we did, quick and with delight,

Our cabbage, bacon, egg and pork mixture cooked in our sight.

Satiated we sat at the street vendor’s stall,

Enjoying the ring of his booming call.

We’ve since recreated okonimiyaki’s magic,

And luckily our attempts have never been tragic.

Above is a picture of our favourite Japanese dish,

And a link to the recipe, to make for yourself if you wish.

Tokyo Disney Sea

2007-12-07T04:02:00.000-08:00

(Preface: You'll find that if you double-click most of the photos in this post, you'll be taken to a slideshow)

Day one in Tokyo: Matt hearts beer

Tokyo Disney Sea is cool! All my reservations, that a visit to the Disney franchise as an adult would mar precious childhood memories of delightful days spent exploring the original theme park in Los Angeles with my brother and parents, were immediately dissipated upon our entry. Once inside, we met with a shiny blue and gold globe that was dancing on water, and from that point on we were dancing on wonderment and pure childish enjoyment.

Mediterranean Harbour & American Waterfront

The whole attraction is called Tokyo Disney Resort and is made up of two theme parks, Tokyo Disney Sea (for adults) and Tokyo Disney Land (for kids), which are connected by a monorail that sports very cute Mickey silloutte shaped windows. However, separate tickets are needed for entry into each park, and we only had one day to play with, so we opted for TDS as some of the other ALTs we went with had already been to TDL.

Mysterious Island

Mermaid Lagoon

Arabian Coast

While the place just screams rampant commercialism, and everything is shiny and perfectly painted, it was incredibly easy to forget any niggling bleeding-heart/critical-thinking instincts and get caught up in the spectacle and excitement. The best bits were the Indiana Jones ride (in the "Lost River Delta" section of the park--click the image to the left to see the slideshow--where we had to wait 100 minutes in line), Journey to the Centre of the Earth ride (luckily we got a fast pass to this one earlier in the day and it only a 10 min wait), Raging Spirits roller coaster with its 360 degree turn, the Little Mermaid live show (which involved puppetry and a lot of suspended rhythmic gymnastics) and Aladdin’s Magic Lamp Theatre. Thankfully this last show came with a DS Nintendo style translator to allow us to understand the story, as well as allowing us to sport some obviously couture 3D glasses which brought the genie's magic to multi-dimensional life, not to mention the automated seats that gave us a surprising kick up the butt.

As you can tell, we had a fantastic long weekend, and we really appreciate Shibata-sensei's help in organising the trip. Matt's last day could have been better: evidently something he ate at Mister Donuts on Sunday morning--probably the frankfurt-in-pastry thing the clerk neglected to heat up--strenuously disagreed with him. Fortunately he made it home still bearing the contents of his stomach, but he tells me that it was touch-and-go on the flight from Tokyo to Osaka, where he was seated next to an old man who possessed a very vocal digestive system and whose red wine and beer nuts were repeating on him at the most inopportune of times. Still, it wasn't all bad news . . .

Matt hearts the election result

Mt. Shosha, Himeji

2007-12-06T17:29:00.000-08:00

About a week or two following our trip to Kyoto, we returned to Himeji. The occasion? An all-you-can-eat Thanksgiving dinner: ostensibly for American ALTs, though we managed to get ourselves invited anyway. Given that we had a day to kill, a few of us--namely Dan K, Goran, Amanda, Emma and myself--decided to meet at the JR station early(ish) in the morning and hike up Mt. Shosha.

(As with the previous post, click the images to see slideshows.)

Though I doubt it's a tidbit of information I'll be proud to relate to my grandkids in years to come, Mt. Shosha is famous for being one of the locations of the Tom Cruise vehicle The Last Samurai (which was mainly filmed in New Zealand). At its summit lies Engyo-ji Temple, which in my view ranks alongside some of the temples of we saw in Kyoto in terms of its beauty, and has the added benefit of being situated at a reliable distance from downtown Himeji. It took us a little while--not to mention the aid of the bilingual Dan and a helpful local--to find the path leading up the mountain, and on the whole I'd have to declare it a little more difficult than Sumaura. (But no less enjoyable.) Fortunately, Emma and I are obliged to scale a mountain to get to our bus stop each day, so we were more than capable of handling this little hillock.

At the top of the mountain, and at the door of the Engyo-ji complex, we took advantage of a lookout. Himeji looks amazing from this vantage point, flanked by rolling green mountains, and with outlying hills rising like islands from the surrounding metropolis. This is the kind of view that makes hiking up a mountain--as opposed to taking the ropeway--all the more worthwhile. You feel as if you've earned it, somehow.

Engyo-ji itself is a massive complex, and the temple proper is a fair distance from the gates, but at this time of year (autumn) the hike is a reward in itself. The path leading from the gates to the temple buildings is lined with buddhas, and close to the gate there is a large temple bell which visitors are welcome to toll. (It is supposed to bring good luck.)The buildings themselves are impressive. Depending on which route you take from the gate, the massive main building appears before you very suddenly, over the crest of a hill. Behind the main temple are the lecture theatres, arranged around a wide courtyard. It was here, evidently, that the scenes from The Last Samurai were shot. (I was inspired thus to regale my fellow travellers with the curious beliefs of the Scientologists, which are summarised here.)
But IMHO the main attraction of Engyo-ji is the flora--chiefly the red momiji (maple), and I'm afraid that our photography can't really do justice to the combination of bright greens and yellows, and brilliant, sharp reds, that we saw there that day. (Even after Emma's great editing work.)
It's one of those things that you have to see for yourself.

Let's see . . . what else did we do that day? Well, after hiking back down the mountain (precariously), we made our way to an onsen (hot spring) in the CBD. Neither Emma and I had been to one before, and I was a little concerned that I would be denied entry because of my tattoo, but nobody seemed to mind. Goran and Dan showed me the ropes: the art of a good onsen, as I understand it, is to subject your body to extremes of heat and cold, and repeat this process until you're ready to be flayed alive and eaten. (That's if the sauna doesn't cook you first.) Then you take a dip in the hot spring briefly before fleeing the hungry locals.

At the Thanksgiving the Australian table (with two Americans along for the ride) was the life of the party, naturally. Although the party was held at a restaurant the food was homestyle--though in a good way (go to Miss Mauds in Perth if you want to try it the bad way): mashed potatoes, chilli con carne, stuffing (mmm . . . stuffing) and turkey (of course). Dan and myself did ample justice to the all-you-can-eat terms of reference, downing six plates between us. Afterwards a group of us finished the evening at a karaoke bar--it is the law here, after all--in a raucous session truncated (to half an hour) by the fact that we all had trains to catch.

Kyoto

2007-12-01T06:26:00.000-08:00

I wish I could tell you that from now on we will endeavour to update this blog more frequently, but that's not a promise we feel we can keep. Although we've been to quite a few interesting places over the past month or so--including Himeji (again), Osaka and Tokyo--today's entry concerns our travels to Kyoto.

Kyoto, apart from being famous for the eponymous Protocol to the international Framework Convention on Climate Change that the new Australian PM has promised his government will ratify, is (as most travel guides will tell you) the cultural heart of Japan. Go to Osaka or Tokyo and you will see one side of Japan--the side immortalised in the novels of William Gibson and which inspired the iconography of Blade Runner; go to Kyoto, and you will see the side of Japan immortalised in The Karate Kid movies (I know--none of them are set in Kyoto). For many centuries, Kyoto was actually the capital of Japan until the latter part of the 19th century. (Thanks, Wikipedia.) The city was spared bombing by the United States during World War II because of its great beauty, so unlike many large Japanese cities it has retained many of its prewar buildings. (Thanks again.)

Click on the pictures below for slideshows, and click on the subtitles for further information about each temple/location.

Kinkakuji

Kyoto certainly is a beautiful city, except for its river, which runs along its eastern side. Have you ever seen The Host? That's what the river reminded me of. A choking mess of reeds and weeds from which I kept expecting, as I looked upon it with some disquiet from a bridge, a giant mutant fish monster to spring. I'll never whinge about Perth's foreshore again!

Ginkakuji

The real attractions of Kyoto lie mostly on its periphery. During our two visits to Kyoto--one sometime at the end of August, the other in early November--we visited temples to the north (Kinka-kuji and Ryoanji), south (To-ji) and east (Ginkakuji, Honen-nin, and Nanzen-jin). To get to these locations we were unfortunately obliged to negotiate Kyoto's buses.

Honen-in/Nanzen-jin

All I can say is, if you choose to board one of these vehicles, take a seat if there is one available. Even if it is one of those custom-deisgned-for-the-diminutive-Japanese-physique seats they usually place over the wheels, and you have to wrap your legs around your own head. You will still be more comfortable than standing and lurching to and fro--as if you were on an ocean liner that had crashed into an iceberg--while the bus takes corners at breakneck speed and incessantly pulls in at bus stops that can't be more than ten metres apart. That's if you're lucky. Most of the time you'll find yourself standing in the aisle in conditions resembling those aboard Australian container ships bound for Saudi Arabia. In Perth, there are regulations governing the maximum amount of people a bus is allowed to carry. Once the limit is reached, the bus driver cannot and does not pick up anyone else. In Kyoto, the prevailing wisdom seems to be that you should pack in as many people as is humanly possible. Oh--and I should mention that if you do decide to brave the buses, you can buy an all-day pass from Kyoto's ponderous train ststion--be warned, however, that it won't be accepted on buses going to and from the outer suburbs. (We discovered that the hard way.)

Philosopher's Walk

The temples, in any case, are well worth the trouble getting to them. Many of them look as if they have sprung to life out of fairytales, and they really brought home to us the sense that we weren't in Australia anymore. Kinkakuji's famous golden temple, which we visited on a day trip at the end of summer, has got to be one of the most photographed buildings in Japan. On the eastern side of the city lies the more serene but no less popular Ginkakuji, the "silver temple" which isn't actually silver. (Depending upon who you ask (we asked the rickshaw driver who took us there), it was so called either because it was going to be coated in silver but the job wasn't completed, it was covered in silver but the silver was stolen or removed, or the "silver" is the effect of moonbeams reflecting off the white sands surrounding the building.)

Ryoanji

Toji's pagoda is the tallest in Japan, but even more striking are the giant buddhas housed in the lecture halls (in which visitors are unfortunately forbidden to take photos), and watching the locals stop to bow their heads or genuflect before the statutes gives those halls an almost "Catholic" ambience. The Zen temple Ryoanji is famous for its rock garden, which consists of "15 rocks arranged on the surface of white pebbles in such a manner that visitors can see only 14 of them at once, no matter what angle the garden is viewed from." You achieve enlightenment, apparently, if you see the fifteenth rock. On the day we visited, it was too crowded to see more than three or four! But for us tourists, it would probably be a great place to meditate, if you're into that kind of thing.

Tooji

The highlight of the two journeys to Kyoto for me was the Philosopher's Walk, which I had been looking forward to visiting since I read about it back in Australia. The Philosopher's Walk is a 2 kilometre path beside a canal lined with cherry trees, and is so named because it was the constitutional of the Japanese philosopher Nishida Kitaro. We tackled it very early in the morning in order to avoid the crowds, and despite the cold, it really is the only way to appreciate it, I think. A testament to its popularity is the amount of cafes that line it--there is even a cafe named in honour of the late astronomer Carl Sagan (where we would have stopped for coffee if it wasn't so overpriced). We did run into crowds eventually, but fortunately it was towards the end of the Walk and they were coming the other way.

JR Kyoto train station

I'm not sure when we'll return to Kyoto--but since it's part of the same conurbation as Osaka and Kobe, it's no great hassle to reach by train. (And you should see Kyoto's train station!)

"Watching" cricket in Japan

2007-11-17T21:22:00.000-08:00

Well, this has turned out to be a good weekend. Yesterday we scaled Mt Shosha and visited the Engyō-ji Temple complex--famous for being the location of certain scenes in The Last Samurai--before venturing into an onsen for the first time. We also joined other ALTs in Himeji for a Thanskgiving dinner, and finished the day in a karaoke booth (also for the first time since our arrival in Japan). Unfortunately, further details and pictures are going to have to wait until a future post.

Today Emma is being treated to a guided tour of Kobe's shopping districts courtesy of several female members of her ESS club. I'm supposed to be occupying my time learning Japanese--but instead here I am, procrastinating, as usual. Maybe I would be able to concentrate if I was able to tune into the cricket match currently underway between Australia and Sri Lanka in Hobart, but unfortunately due to rights restrictions the ABC stream of its radio coverage of the game is only available to listeners within Australia. So I am forced to resort to the second-best option: a ball-by-ball text coverage of the match provided by cricinfo.com. For those of you who are interested, Australia currently has Sri Lanka bent over the bonnet of a Holden Commodore sedan, with their pants somewhere around their ankles (again); Australia having declared their first innings at 5 for 542 and having recently dismissed their hapless (and pantsless) opponents for 246. Interestingly, Ponting decided not to enforce the follow-on, and Jaques and Hayden are currently occupying the crease and scoring at about 5 an over.

If only the Japanese followed cricket more ardently than they do. (One good reason for this might be that it is virtually impossible to watch live cricket here, despite Japan having in recent years been elevated from Affiliate to Associate membership of the International Cricket Council.)

Cricket is played in Japan, by the way:

Matt and Emma's (Very Brief) Guide to the Federal Election (Senate)

2007-11-13T05:14:00.000-08:00

Emma and I have recently received our postal vote forms, and we've been discussing who we will vote for (and in what order of preference). For those JETs who are reading this, the Australian Embassy in Japan website has information on overseas voting, but you basically have a choice of either pre-poll voting at your nearest Australian consulate, voting at the Embassy or at a selection of consulates on polling day, or postal voting (a form for which is available here).

If you want detailed information on how to vote, your best bet is to consult the relevant pages at the Australian Electoral Commission website:
How to vote for a Member of the House of Representatives
How to vote for a Member of the Senate
But the long and short of it is that at the polling booth (or in the mail, if you're postal-voting), you'll receive a green House of Representatives ballot paper and a white Senate ballot paper. While on the House of Reps paper you must mark all of the boxes in order of preference, the Senate ballot paper is slightly more complicated. There you have the option of either marking all of the boxes below the big black line in order of preference, or placing a "1" in the box next to the party you want to vote for above the line (leaving all other boxes unmarked).

Now, remember: Australia has a preferential voting system, and this includes voting for Members of the Senate. Each party (actually each "group" on the Senate ballot paper: candidates for a particular political party are grouped together, but so also are some independents) lodges with the AEC a full ticket of preferences to all candidates who appear on the ballot paper. It's called a group ticket. Why is this important? Because if you vote above the line, you're consenting to having your preferences allocated according to the group ticket. Apparently more than 95% of voters use this option--this is why you hear of various parties doing "preference deals" and so forth--and I'm betting that relatively few of these are aware of its implications. If you're thinking of voting above the line, I suggest you take a bit of time to look at your state's group voting tickets first.

Anyway, here are the websites of the parties (and independents) that appear on this year's Senate ballot paper:
Nationals
Citizen's Electoral Council
Christian Democratic Party
Non-Custodial Parents Party (Equal Parenting)
Democratic Labor Party
Liberal
Australian Democrats
One Nation WA
Family First
Senator On-Line
Carers Alliance
Australian Labor Party
Eric Wynne (Christian Independent)
Kevin Fitzgerald (Independent)
Climate Change Coalition
Socialist Alliance
Jennifer Armstrong (Secular Party of Australia)
Michael Tan (Secular Party of Australia)
What Women Want (Australia)
Conservatives for Climate and Environment
LDP
The Greens
Richard McNaught (Independent)
Edward Dabrowski (Independent)

Oh yeah: the blog header

2007-11-09T14:39:00.000-08:00

. . . hasn't worked out as well as we hoped. Anyone familiar with GIMP or Paint.Net and who might be able to suggest how we can get the text to stand out more from the image, we're all ears.

October

2007-11-06T07:27:00.000-08:00

OK, I have a backlog of three weekends worth of touristy adventures to get through (not including the current weekend), so here goes:

October 13-14: Akashi Planetarium

A 3 minute walk north of Hitomarumae Station on the Sanyo line (or 15 minutes east of Akashi station), this is an astronomy education centre housed in a building that looks as though it should be gracing the cover of a 50s science fiction novel. The planetarium features exhibits on the stars and planets, as well as the signs of the Zodiac and the history of timekeeping. Why the history of timekeeping? Because Akashi Planetarium stands exactly at 135 degrees east longitude, and is used to determine Japanese Standard Time. We would have gotten more out of the exhibits if we understood Japanese, but they were interesting nonetheless.

The Imax-style skyshow itself would have been more enlightening if we understood the language, but we followed as best we could. The narrator highlighted and discussed several planets and constellations visible in the northern hemisphere night sky, and at one point played a short cartoon depicting the tale of one of the Greek mythical figures for which many of the constellations are named (I forget which one), underscoring how far human astronomical knowledge has come from the days when the significance of constellations was taken seriously. After a short while I tuned out the drone of the narration, and simply allowed myself to become lost in all those stars and planets. It was very peaceful and relaxing.

The building also sports an observation tower, giving a 360 degree view of this particular corner of Hyogo—including fantastic views of Awaji Island and the bridge. You can take an elevator to the top, or you can act like you’ve got a pair and climb the spiral staircase, tracing the history of life on Earth as you go. Click here for a slideshow.

October 20-21: Sumaura Kooen/Suma Aqualife Park

When I first espied Sumaura Kooen on my first day in Kobe, I thought to myself "I'm so climbing that!" The hill (actually called Hachibuse-yama) is an outlier of the Rokko Mountains, and at 248m it dominates the skyline of the adjacent Suma and Tarumi areas. While there is the option of taking a cable-car up to the summit, we opted for one of the thickly-wooded trails that wind their way to the top, having purchased hiking boots in Perth for just this kind of activity. The hill features various ancient shrines and commands amazing views of Kobe city (and beyond) to the east, and the Akashi-Kaikyo Bridge to the west. In Perth I used to spend hours on end wandering the tracks that run through Kings Park; in Sumaura I think I've found a replacement.

How to get there: take the Sanyo line to Sumaura Station. A cheaper option would be to take the JR line to Suma, then walk 15 mins. west.

Slideshows:
Climbing Sumaura
View from the summit
Sumaura area

The following day we returned to Suma to visit its well-known aquarium. (Plus we had coupons for discount entry.) This was my first visit to an aquarium since I went to Underwater World when I was about eleven or twelve years old. Suma has many advantages over the aforementioned: it is far more reasonably-priced, its giant fish/shark/ray tank makes for one breathtaking entrance-statement, and nobody has yet slipped Suma's dolphins any happy pills, so you can still see them performing regularly. The tropical fish are amazing, and thanks to Emma's nifty camerawork (and image manipulation work) we've hopefully managed to capture that for you.

How to get there: From JR Suma Station, walk 15 mins east. In warmer months I suggest walking there along Suma Beach, which is apparently a very popular spot with the citizens of Kobe and is highly reminiscent of the beach in William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet (albeit minus Harold Perrineau firing pistols into the water for no apparent reason whatsoever). Take the beach route back to the station as well if you're returning in the late afternoon: it's worth it to see the sun setting over the shoulder of Hachibuse-yama. Click here for slideshow.

October 27-28: Oji Zoo

I learned something new this weekend. In fact: I learned three new things. First, while pink flamingos might be charming in a kitschy kind of way as lawn ornaments, a pen of live birds has to be one the foulest smelling things on Earth. Second, I was wrong about the first point: the foulest smelling thing on Earth has to be Japanese brown bear urine. Third, Amazonian pythons doubtless seem intimidating when encountered in the wild, but when you coop them up in a glass cage, they just look really, really bored.

Come to think of it: the same could be said for most of the animals we saw that day. That could explain why the European timberwolf, which is really just a dog in the “state of nature,” was playfully following children from window to window. On the other hand, it might have been hungry.

Click here for the slideshow.

Oji Zoo is about a 10 minute walk north of Nada Station on the JR line.

Things you don't expect to happen in Japan . . .

2007-10-31T18:41:00.000-07:00

. . . such as the Jehovah's Witnesses knocking at your door. Or in our case, peeking in through the open door while we were putting away the groceries on a Tuesday night.

In a country that is not only overwhelmingly Buddhist and Shinto, but in which a syncretic approach to religious observance predominates, the experience of having the JWs tap on your door as they would in Australia is a tad disorienting, to be frank. Had this been Australia, I would have relished the opportunity to engage these people--I am not as reluctant nowadays to debate the Saturday morning religious callers as I once might have been, for reasons which you'll have to ask me in private. On this occasion, given that our visitors were Japanese, I settled for as polite a "No thankyou, I'm not interested" as I could manage. I hope I didn't seem too rude.

There are apparently more than 200, 000 JWs in Japan. Suppressed by Imperial Japan in the interwar period, proselytism by American missionaries in the 60s led to a rapid growth in Japanese converts over the last three decades of the 20th century. (Growth has fallen off significantly since then.) The country was visited by the founder of the sect, Charles Taze Russell, in 1911, on a world tour to convert the "heathens." He described the prevailing Japanese attitude towards religion as "toward infidelity, doubt and atheism." My kind of place. :)

Watching An Inconvenient Truth in Japanese

2007-10-26T19:29:00.000-07:00

Last Wednesday I joined the first-years in the gymnasium for a screening of An Inconvenient Truth. Since I'd already seen the film last year, I didn't mind that it had been dubbed into Japanese. Plus, such is Gore's dexterity with Keynote (Apple's version of PowerPoint)--not to mention that crane he uses--that his presentation would be easy to follow in any language.

I found it compelling (and polls indicate that about 70% of Japanese are concerned about global warming); but I did notice a few students seizing the opportunity of a darkened room to catch up on some shut-eye. They usually have to wait for my classes in order to do that!

P.S. On the subject of global warming, here's a YouTube that has been doing the rounds:

Last weekend's journey to Minas Tirith and Rivendell . . .

2007-10-14T04:42:00.000-07:00

. . . a.k.a. Himeji Castle and Kokoen.

Last Saturday Emma and I took a train to Himeji to see its famous castle--the first castle I had ever visited since Kryal Castle in 1988. (Kryal Castle is Australia's most well-known medieval castle--which is interesting, since Australia was only first settled by Europeans in the eighteenth century.) I won't say too much about it--I'll let Photobucket and Wikipedia do most of the talking--other than to remark that one of the first things you notice as you emerge from the train station and gaze down what has to be one of the widest streets in Japan (one of the JTEs at my school informs me that said street was purpose-built for a visit by the Emperor soon after the Second World War), is that--despite the fact that Himeji is a city of half a million people and is abundant in tall buildings--the eponymous castle really dominates the landscape.

The other thing you notice is that Himeji itself is roomy--big in the way an Australian city or large town is roomy--which is most unlike the Japan we had hitherto experienced. (Well, certainly unlike Tarumi; though I suppose Seishin-chuo, the Joondalup-esque area of Kobe where I work, is roomy in its own way.) Japan is one of the world's most populous nations, and all of those people have to squeeze onto a set of very small islands--so often you find yourself on very narrow streets, hemmed in by towers and tenements. Central Himeji just doesn't feel like that.

Anyway, here a couple of Himeji Castle slideshows. (I apologise if they slow down your browser.)

And here is Nishi-Oyashiki-ato Kokoen. It is adjacent to Himeji Castle, and used to be the residence of a samurai lord, apparently. Now it comprises a series of serene and beautiful gardens (let's just say Jamie Durie and Scott Cam couldn't hold a scented candle), along with a teahouse. (They don't do Devonshire, alas, but the lady at the desk is very helpful and speaks excellent English.)

We also visited Himeji's art gallery, having bumped into Daniel Carter at a park along the way. (Where the three of us discovered that not only are some dogs just as skilled at frisbee as humans, they are also permitted to drink from our water fountains. Now, that's just wrong.) The gallery featured an exhibition on Surrealism to which we arts graduates--true to form--couldn't say no. ALTs: if the exhibition reaches an art gallery near you, it's well worth the admission.

School sports day

2007-10-07T21:33:00.000-07:00

Being averse to most forms of physical activity in my school days, I always hated school sports carnivals. (Well: except for the Year 8 carnival, where I won first, second, and third place ribbons in the 100, 200 and 400m. I was in 'C' division--one or two divisions above wheelchairs and zimmer frames.) I always considered school sports as a form of psychological torture designed to shatter the self-esteem of those students who, like myself, lacked the agility and hand-eye co-ordination of our peers (some of the latter who had few qualms about pointing these failings out to us in no uncertain terms), causing them to seek solace in eating disorders, heavy metal music, fantasy role-playing games and so forth. (Maybe that's how the whole 'emo' trend got started; I don't know.)

But I have to take my hat off to Japanese students, who to a girl and boy participate in their school carnivals with far more gusto than I could ever manage, and (to a foreigner's eye, at least) with far less self-consciousness. Apparently, school sports days in Japan originated in the Meiji period, during which Japan emerged from isolationism and endeavoured to become a world power on a par with Western countries like the UK and the US. The Victorian preoccupation with health and fitness was mirrored by the Japanese education minister's decree that sports days be held in all schools "in order to improve the physical abilities of Japanese people, who were seen as poor at sports compared to Westerners." In any event, the Japanese continue to take their sports carnivals very seriously.

Case in point: they have Olympic-style opening ceremonies, complete with competing factions marching into the arena behind their own banners, the raising of the school and national flags, and the school band in full song. Oh, and I almost forgot . . .

The definitive you-know-you're-in-Japan-when moment: the principal leading the entire school in an aerobics session. All they are missing are the business suits.

For much of the day I kept myself occupied honing my skills as a sports photographer, but as you can see . . .

. . . there's only so much a $250 digital camera can do. But I did get involved in other ways.
This is a picture of me desperately trying to stave off cardiac arrest, as I run around the oval with my partner. The event in question involves participants racing to either of two tables in the middle of the oval to collect a placard, on which is written a set of instructions, e.g "Find a person wearing glasses." (Or, in my case, "Find a person from a foreign country.") The players then must search the crowd for a person fitting that description, collect him or her, race to another table where both are fitted with a coloured length of ribbon, and then run with their victims around the oval.

Much of the day's events consisted of races and relays: there were no field events, like high jump or long jump, such as one might expect to find at an Australian school sports carnival. But there was half-time entertainment, in the form of traditional Japanese drum music (courtesy of a troupe from the local elementary school), and the school cheerleading squad:

(I'm told those kids are about 5 or 6 years old, on average.)

And there were many lighthearted activities to keep fans and participants entertained, from conventional tug-of-war to a form of tug-of-war-meets-rugby-union involving lengths of bamboo cane.

And I'll never forget the image of 40 students jumping a massive length of rope--an activity in which I had not participated nor seen anyone else participate in since the early of years of primary school (and even then on a much smaller scale).

I don't know how comfortable I'd feel about Australian students whacking each other with sticks a la kendo, but that bamboo cane rugby game is one that definitely needs to be added to the schedule!

Sake and sardines

2007-10-03T05:15:00.000-07:00

It turns out we arrived in Japan right in the middle of public holiday season: three out of four weekends have been long weekends. This has given us a lot of time to explore our local region, Kobe.

On one particular long weekend we journeyed to a sake museum. For those readers who don't know, sake is an alcoholic drink made from fermented rice. When done poorly, sake tastes like what methylated spirits smells like; when done well, it tastes really quite nice. After a very informative English video on the ins and outs of making sake (on which I am now "full bottle") and touring the relics of traditional sake making materials, I almost drank a full bottle of sake! To sell their wares, the museum gives samples to their visitors and I think they got a little excited to have foreign guests, as they got us to try just about every available sake drink they had on offer. However, in retrospect, perhaps this was just a clever ploy to get visitors to buy more products, the logic being the more tipsy they are the more likely they are to buy. Indeed, it worked--as Matt and I are now the proud owners of some sweet plum sake! Check out the pictures below as it really was a delightful place; cameras, unfortunately, are yet to capture smell, but take it from me, the subtle smell of aged cedar mixed with the dim shadows that pervaded the place really transported us back to a different world. (Where men were men, and real men got naked in giant vats of steaming rice.)

Then it was off for sardines; however, not the eating kind. Kobe is a port city, and typical of port cities it has a highly concentrated population with the employment that international trade brings. However, this is compounded by the fact that Kobe is wedged between a mountain range and the ocean. This is where the sardines enter the picture. We traveled up Mt Rokko, the highest mountain in the region, and from here we got our first birds-eye-view of Kobe's geography. (And I mean literally--on the floor of the museum at the top of the mountain there is a giant satellite image of Kobe and the Rokko Mountains.) As you can see from the pictures below, possibly the best way to describe how the city appears from such a height is by comparison to sardines squished into a tiny tin. It is a truly foreign way of living to the eyes of Perthites used to flat landscapes and hectares of backyard. It's a magnificent sight and especially great when viewed from the top of a mountain where the air temperature is 6 degrees lower than the sauna we've been enduring at sea-level.

Cleaning up the schoolyard

2007-10-01T22:50:00.000-07:00

For some reason, spending an afternoon with 60 third-years bearing rakes, forearms and plastic bags, converting little piles of leaves and grass and twigs into big piles of leaves and grass and twigs, put me in mind of the ancient myth of Sisyphus.

And whatever that wriggly, bug-eyed silvery-grey thing was that lurked beneath one of the disgustingly cool and moist little mounds of compost (one which I subsequently avoided), I'm sure it was perfectly safe for droids . . .

ESL idea #2: Intonation Listening Quiz

2007-09-30T03:38:00.000-07:00

(UPDATE: The following is probably going to be of interest only to those few other JETs who stumble across our blog from time to time. I find that the readers of blogs are like domestic cats: if you don't leave a regular supply of Friskies out for them, they'll happily leave and find someone else who will. And faced with the option of blogging about what I had for breakfast or did in the toilet today, and posting an ESL idea that someone, somewhere might actually find useful, I opted for the latter. I promise we'll have more interesting stuff--photos, etc.--soon enough. -- Matt)

Recently I've been teaching intonation in my third-year English conversation classes. I found an online audio quiz which, with some modification and pre-teaching, proved quite effective. The mulitple-choice quiz involves listening to a dialogue between a husband and wife: the wife has some news to break to her husband, and students are required to interpret the emotions/thoughts of the speakers from the intonation they use.

As I mentioned, you will need to pre-teach the concept of intonation as a way of conveying emotions and personal information in English, before you even think about using this quiz in class. Furthermore, the quiz questions as they stand are probably beyond even the average third-year student, so I suggest you make up a worksheet with alternative questions that make the differences between the choices more stark.

I found that this worked most effectively when I split the class into two teams and gave them 5 questions each (there are 10 in total). I also had the benefit of a wonderful JTE who translated the questions into Japanese for me. (I know, I know--that's not strictly vegan kosher, but the point of the exercise is to test student's ability to interpret English intonation, not vocabulary.)

There is a downside: you need a projector, and a computer with a good set of speakers. But if you would like a copy of the lesson plan and worksheets that I used, feel free to email me.

ESL idea #1: Noughts and Crosses

2007-09-21T05:23:00.000-07:00

Now that I have taught high school students in two countries, I suspect I may have discovered a universal law of secondary education*. Whether you're in Kobe or in Kallaroo (actually, there's no high school in Kallaroo), if it's the final period of the day on a Friday--especially before a long weekend--the last thing the kids want to do is work. And who can blame them? Work also happens to be last thing teachers want to do at the end of a long week. So you have to improvise if you want to hold their attention for more than ten consecutive seconds.

It doesn't help, of course, that I've decided to introduce them to the rather difficult concept of intonation. They breezed through intonation patterns in questions--i.e. where wh- questions are uttered with a falling intonation, and yes/no questions are uttered with a rising intonation (did you know that?)--but now I'm having to walk them through the use of tone to express feelings, and as I'm having to walk slowly, I end up with a lot of spare time to fill in my lessons. And I hate uncomfortable silences.

Fortunately, I have on my desk a wonderful little book called 96 Games for Beginners in ESL. It belongs to Emma, and she wants it back, but it saved my bacon today. I found a game that is a little like Noughts and Crosses meets The Einstein Factor. The object of the game is pretty straightforward: you have to get a row of three Os or Xs going either across, down, or diagonal. But each square contains a category: past tense, Australia, fruit, spelling, pronunciation, abbreviations, girls' or boys's names, special places and occupations. The class is divided into two teams, and as each team chooses a square it is asked the corresponding question (e.g. "What is the past tense of give?", "What is the capital city of Australia?", "What is the name of a fruit beginning with the letter 'O'?"). If the team cannot answer, the other team is given a chance to answer it and claim the square. As with normal Noughts and Crosses, teams take turns answering questions, until one of the teams has won, or the result is a draw. No materials are required for this task except a whiteboard marker and a whiteboard (my favourite kind of lesson activity), on which is drawn a 3x3 grid.

I discovered today that my students were actually unfamiliar with this game. (Rocks, paper, scissors they are aware of; just not noughts and crosses.) So I quickly drew another 3x3 grid and ran through the rules, before playing a game against them. To give them encouragement, I let them win. They enjoyed the actual games a lot, though one of the last-period-of-the-day teams made a costly strategic error and handed victory to the opposing team on a plate. I'm putting it down to fatigue!

*Logicians please note: this is an example of a hasty generalisation fallacy.

Suppose I gave a lesson and nobody came?

2007-09-18T21:57:00.000-07:00

I think I just experienced my first "Don't-ask-me-I-just-work-here" moment.

Well, there I was in the Language Lab, all set for today's lesson. The exercises were written on the whiteboard. The worksheets were waiting on the students' desks. The Powerpoint was primed. All that was missing were my students, and the JTE.

Don't panic, I told myself as I collected some of the worksheets that had blown off the desks. Maybe they're just late back from phys. ed. I mean, it's not as if they switched to Monday's timetable because of some soccer thing, out of the clear blue sky, and didn't tell you. That's just crazy-talk.

End of whine.

Perth Music II

2007-09-18T05:05:00.000-07:00

You know . . . as keen as I am to learn the language, it's positively frustrating that Blogger appears in Japanese. If anyone knows how to fix this, I'd much appreciate it.

Anyway, I just want to be frank with you about something. As my last post probably made abundantly clear to any cognoscenti who happened to be reading it, I know next to nothing about Perth music, and even closer to nothing about Perth music of the current decade. Nevertheless, I'm going to post what in my ignorance I believe to be some of the highlights of Perth music in the years 2000-2007 (in no particular order). If you have any more suggestions, please leave a comment below.

Karnivool (2005): "Themata"

The Panda Band (2005): "Sleepy Little Death Toll Town"

Downsyde (2003): "El Questro"

The Bank Holidays (2004): "Tread Easy"

The Waifs (2003): "London Still"

Pendulum (2005): "Slam"

Little Birdy (2003): "Relapse"

End of Fashion (2005): "Oh Yeah"

Eskimo Joe (2001): "Wake Up"

Bob Evans (2006): "Don't You Think It's Time?"

Birds of Tokyo (2007): "Wayside" (Live)

The Panics (2003): "Kid, You're a Dreamer"

Fourth Floor Collapse (2003): "Sun"

John Butler Trio (2003): "Zebra"

Jebediah (2001): "Fall Down"

OK . . . that's enough for now. On a future occasion, after I've surveyed the opinions of some of my students, I might post some Japanese music.

Perth Music I

2007-09-16T19:19:00.000-07:00

If you're a JET who happens to be feeling homesick right now, I suggest skipping this post and moving onto the next one. (When it comes.) If you're a Japanese visitor whom either Emma or myself have directed to this site, the following is Part One of a collection of YouTube videos from popular Perth and WA musicians that I have posted for the satisfaction of your curiosity.

I should mention that this particular selection reflects my own biases and age, so don't expect to see anything by Cosima deVito.

First up, Ammonia: the band that put Perth back on the map as an exponent of fine Australian rock music. (I could be mistaken, but the last Perth band to enjoy a similar level of radio airplay was V-Capri, fronted by a man who would later find success as a TV weather presenter.)

Ammonia (1998): "You're Not The Only One Who Feels This Way"

Ammonia, sadly, broke up in 1999 ("creative differences" & c.). I saw their last ever show at the Big Day Out. At the same festival I also saw the great Jebediah. This one goes out to our fellow JETs.

Jebediah (1997): "Leaving Home"

At around the same time as the members of Ammonia were going their separate ways and Australia was falling in love with a band whose lead singer sounds as if his vocal chords are located in his nose, there emerged a band by the name of Eskimo Joe. Nowadays, sadly, they have embraced commercial rock (Who Sold Them Out? hehe), but this early song is an absolute classic:

Eskimo Joe (1998): "Sweater"

In the late 90s, an art student named John Butler, originally from California but who grew up in Pinjarra, began busking on the streets of Fremantle for some extra cash, and soon enough The John Butler Trio was born.

John Butler Trio (2001): "Better Man"

Following the success of these groups, Perth in the opening years of the twentieth century went from being a musical backwater to quite an exciting place. (In other respects it arguably remains a backwater.) Symptomatic of this newfound fame is The Sleepy Jackson.

Sleepy Jackson (2003): "Good Dancers"

More in the next post . . .

Talking Tarumi

2007-09-15T05:03:00.000-07:00

Well finally we have emerged from internet exile! Surprisingly, given Japan's amazing technology (for example check out this mobile phone with a built-in tv), we have had great difficulty getting the internet connected at our apartment. However, let's not dwell on all that. Rather, let us give you a little window into our lives in Tarumi.

Tarumi is smack bang in the middle of suburbia. But, don't go conjuring any images of Perth's ever expanding suburban sprawl which creeps for kilometers up and down WA's coast and has a two dimensional feel with its love of the spacious one storey house, because here in suburban Japan everything is cluttered--land, sea and sky. For instance, below is a picture of the street we walk up every morning to catch the bus to school--here, to illuminate this example, I will include a little anecdote which will hopefully also provide another gateway into our humble lives in Japan. Matthew and I work at two different high schools, I'm at a school named Maiko Senior High School and Matthew is at a school called Kobe Takatsuka Senior High School. My school is approximately 45 minutes closer to our apartment in Tarumi than Matt's. Nonetheless, being the hopeless romantic that I am, I like to catch the bus to school with Matthew in the morning even though this means I arrive at the rather ungodly hour of 7.30 am despite not being expected to arrive until 8.30 am. However, as I write this blog I am struck by the idiocy of my romantic gesture. This street, which is typical of all suburban streets in Japan, is very narrow. So narrow in fact that it is only wide enough to fit one person and one car, here my idiocy may start to become apparent. As this street is in the middle of suburbia, and as it services two-way traffic, and as suburbanites tend to commute by car to work in the morning, I can't truly say that Matthew and I walk together up the street to the bus stop. A more accurate description would be to say that we battle our way between the electricity poles, the huge open half cubic meter drains and the on-coming traffic in single file. Needless to say every morning is quite an adventure!

However, this is not to take away from the incredible landscape, architecture and gardens we are privy to even on this small walk. Take a look below and see the perfectly trimmed hedges of a local house, a view of the amazing Akashi bridge from the top of the street and the glorious mountains that create a ledge for the sky to sit upon--it is truly a beautiful place.

But of course what we have the most affection for in Tarumi (after each other and the local cats) is our "cosy" apartment--euphemisms are fun. Luckily we were not set up with a an apartment in one of the mega complexes, instead our little homestead is nestled in a group of only eight apartments or "mansions" as they are called here (I laugh every time I say I live in a mansion--and not a quiet laugh but a full bellied gawf). Interestingly, despite having four apartments on the bottom floor and four apartments on the top floor we live in apartment 2 (floor 2) 05 (apartment 5). Why not 04? Well, in Japan the number four is shrouded in suspicion and is the source of great distrust, not least because the Japanese word for four, shi, and the word for death are the same, so to overcome the problem they simply forewent the number 4 and jumped straight to number 5. Our apartment has four rooms--two tatami rooms which are sectioned off by sliding doors, a kitchen and bathroom/laundry/toilet area. While it is small it is very comfortable and not to mention very functional--the size really encourages one to put things away. And, as those politically correct people say, a person's home is their castle or in this case their mansion.

Postcard from Shinjuku

2007-08-07T00:47:00.000-07:00

At or around 630 in the morning of Sunday, August 5th 2007, we landed in a William Gibson novella. (Which one? Probably "The Gernsback Continuum.")

For someone who--as I keep informing anyone who cares to listen--had never ventured beyond his country's borders before, let alone experienced air travel, and who had hitherto spent the overwhelming bulk of his years within the Western Australian postcode of 6025, nothing could have prepared me for the vista that greeted us as we traveled along the expressway between Narita Airport and Shinjuku. (Incidentally--just to give you some idea of the enormity of the place--that's a journey of 50km.)

Skyscrapers. Skyscrapers, skyscrapers, skyscrapers. Stretching from horizon to horizon. Not your dull, prosaic, conservative Western Australian Bankwest-style skyscrapers either, but the very definition of Samuel Taylor Coleridge's "stately pleasure domes." As far as the eye can see. (Did I mention that already?) Case in point: the view from our hotel room in Shinjuku, an area to the east of central Tokyo, looking east and south-east. (I think.)

That's about as many pictures as I can post for now. All of our photos are on Emma's computer, which is currently out of battery power, so I'll have to give you the grand tour of Shinjuku on a future occasion. And rest assured it is even more breathtaking at night.

On the downside, we haven't really had much opportunity to explore Tokyo, given that yesterday was officially the first day on the job and we have been locked up in seminars for most of the past two days. On Sunday, jetlagged as we all were, a group of us JETs headed across to Akihabara (a.k.a "Electric Town"), which is apparently a mecca for electronics enthusiasts. (We saw the very same camera we bought last year in David Jones in a Wanneroo Market-style stall, selling for approximately what we paid.) Unfortunately, Emma's stomach did not agree with the nine-and-a-half hour economy-class flight from Sydney the previous night, and when we stopped at a sushi bar for lunch, the fragrance of pork and rice, along with the salty miso soup, somewhat stretched the friendship with her still-upset entrails (which was a shame--I thought it was delicious--the meal, that is, not the entrails). And I have forgotten to mention the absolutely stifling Tokyo summer heat, which wasn't helping matters much either. So we headed back to the hotel early--having tried and failed to identify which train to catch (we were rescued at the last minute by a fellow JET, Michelle, who had been to Tokyo previously). But we have since sampled Tokyo's nightlife--including a venue strangely reminiscent of the Hip-E Club--but more on that in a future post.

Tomorrow we board the famous shinkansen (bullet train) for Hyogo prefecture and our new lives. But we definitely plan on coming back to Tokyo.

Welcome to our Japan blog

2007-07-03T09:33:00.000-07:00

The image above is the Akashi Kaikyo Bridge, which at almost four kilometres in length is the world's longest suspension bridge. And in just over a month's time, this bridge will be one of our local attractions.

You may or may not be aware by now that Matt and I have been placed as JETs in Kobe. The purpose of this blog is for us to keep our friends and family apprised of our adventures in Japan, both in pictures and in words. Though we can't yet be sure what the internet access is like over there, we will try to update it as often as possible.

Feel free to drop us a line!

P.S. The title of the blog is a rather poetic line (well, we think so, anyway) from William Gibson's Neuromancer. Gibson has set many of his novels in Japan--albeit a very futuristic and Western image of Japan (think Blade Runner)--but so far it's the only Japan we know. We are about to get "schooled."