The End of Josei
11/30/08
Morioka, Japan

Well, last Friday was my last day of host school. After eating instant yakisoba (yakisoba is a type of Japanese noodles) so often I learned to hate it, I received a bag full of instant yakisoba as a parting gift from the owner of the school shop. He said he was sad to see such a good customer leave. Then my students gave me more instant yakisoba as well as some yakisoba-based snack foods. Looking back, I wish I had made clear my interests beyond yakisoba. My principal asked me if there was anything I wanted, and I told him I wanted a signature stamp (In Japan instead of having signatures, they use stamps with their name on them). After earnestly assuring me it would be impossible in such a short time, he set to work making it happen.
On a similar note, my host father took me to eat more pizza. On the way we saw twenty apples being sold as a set for $200. My host father tried to assure me that the apples were delicious enough that they were worth ten dollars each, but I don't believe that such deliciousness is physically possible in an apple.
Well, I've read your requests, but I don't really think "Leon with Pizza" is going to be particularly dramatic. How about "Leon with Sam?" I don't have time to make sage reflections about life, the universe, and Japan right now, but I'll be sure to do that next update after I've gotten back, or maybe on the way. I've completed 101 Bichon Frise, but the image is much too large and detailed to work well with my primitive image viewer. If you want to see it in its glory, go ahead and email me at Leemasa@earlham.edu and I'll send you a file that you can download and look at in whatever viewer you please. I know some of you could just as easily download it from this site, so it's right here if you'd like to do that instead. Leon is a male dog, by the way. The wankosoba pictures last week were of the finished bowls. I may or may not have a Japanese final exam tomorrow. I'm really not sure, so I should get to studying. See you soon, those of you whom I will see soon.

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101 Days in Japan
11/23/08
Morioka, Japan

Today I was told that the brass band we were seeing would take two hours, but it ended up being more along the lines of four. Even after we arrived an hour early, the band itself decided we wouldn't mind if it decided to play for an extra hour. We were watching this band because Daniel was in it.
I've finally figured out what to make my host family for the "thanks for letting me live with you" gift, and boy is it hard! I'm making the case for a fictional movie called "101 Bichon Frise" in which Leon plays all 101 Bichon Frise. Unsurprisingly, trying to do much of anything with an image of a dog as fuzzy as Leon is a challenge. Not to mention, Leon's talent for inconvenience makes things harder as well. See if you can find the two pictures where he drops the ball just as the picture goes off. However, it's coming along quite well so far, and I think they'll like it. Of course I'll put up an image of it when I'm done.
By the way, I finally got to eat crazy Japanese pizza. For everyone who likes to try crazy food, though, be forewarned that this food is, rather than crazy-delicious, just crazy. Given the high price of cheese in Japan, rather than being a powerhouse of mozzarella, the Japanese pizza throws in myriad other flavors to hide the limited cheesy goodness. While this may be acceptable in Japan, as a proud citizen of the United States of America I was disappointed. In any case, the pizza did fulfill every expectation of craziness. I had corn pizza, broccoli pizza, and some mushroom-chicken-corn-mayonnaise pizza. The crusts alternated cheese puffs and detatchable hotdogs.
Oh, and I ate Wanko-soba recently. Wanko-soba basically involves eating as many bowls of Soba as possible. I was feeling a little sick that day so I stopped at one hundred. That night the street lamps looked like they came straight from the set of "It's a Wonderful Life." I'm really trying to refine which pictures I upload. This time there are only fifty. I know an awful lot of them are of Leon, but you should have seen how many were of Leon before I refined them. I am making a gift out of pictures of Leon, after all, so it should come as no surprise that I'm taking a lot of them. I hope people aren't overwhelmed and deciding not to look. Is there anything people would like pictures of or would like to read about?

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Leon ate my homework
11/16/08
Morioka, Japan

Well, he tried to, anyway. I caught him before he could get much further than the "instructor comments" section of my art history final paper. Leon has also figured out how to throw his squeaky toy over the little fence that keeps him in the living room. He then whines and paws at the fence until we get the toy for him. His talents don't extend far beyond annoying Chieko and me, though. For example, it's not unheard of to see him trying to get a toy through the bars of his cage even though the door is wide open.
Many of you may have heard of the strange pizzas available in Japan. Well, I am here to tell you that despite how much people complain about it, strange pizza is actually very hard to find. So far I've only been able to have strange pizza once with my host family. They served me pepperoni and corn pizza. One time I found something that the restaurant advertised as a "Salad Pizza." It really would have been more accurately termed, "Salad placed inexplicably on top of a plain pizza crust." This unfortunate soul may once have been pizza, but by the time I saw it it was already much too far removed from pizza-hood to really be counted as anything but a monstrous mockery of pizza-kind. This was unfortunately before I got my camera, so I didn't take a picture of it.
Speaking of pictures, I've taken to weeding out the worst ones, so you won't have to wade through pages and pages of unrecognizable blurs to see good images. For example, I've uploaded more monsters created by my students.
Please allow me to explain the monsters, as I've realized I failed to do so when I first began to upload them. For Halloween my friend Jenny (shown sleeping with her mouth hanging open in the pictures) had the idea of describing monsters to her students in English and having them draw them. I borrowed this idea, and added a voting system for each class to pick a monster that I would put on my information board. My favorite monsters have been uploaded to this site. Also, I gave my students comic strips devoid of dialogue and asked them to complete them in English. First I tried a Penny-Arcade strip, but it proved too confusing for them, so I switched to Dinosaur Comics. Mostly you'll find the ones I liked were Dinosaur Comics, but one student did succeed with Penny Arcade, so that's there, too. Penny-Arcade and Dinosaur Comics are two comics found on the internet.
I found my way to the used manga store that Damon told me about. He warned me that it would be easy to spend too much money there, but I find I can't spend enough money. After stuffing my basket until it was overflowing with Manga, I was thinking to myself that I would have to put something back if the total exceeded $100, but it turned out to be less than $50.
Oh, I think I'll answer a few questions raised in comments I've received. I have tried neither Ginkgo nuts nor crab guts. I have eaten breakfast out of a crab head, though. Grandmother, your request is not specific enough, so I'll be sure to make you a nebulous and inscrutable Japanese meal this summer. Just kidding, that's a plenty specific request, I'm talking about "how was Japan" kind of stuff. I'm not sure I know any Japanese recipes, but maybe I'll figure something out. Mostly what I've learned that can be applied to american cooking is the use of american ingredients in novel ways. Think ketchup.
Yes, Rebecca, that was a fruit tart with candles in it. It was delicious.
Alex, Shodor is an organization dedicated to promoting math, science, and computer science education. It does so through both online applets and classes within the building itself. The applets are for all ages, and primarily focus on math and science the applet section of Shodor is known as "Interactivate," and it is where I have been most productive. The classes themselves are for middle-school students and focus more on how to use computers to learn math and science. There is also an apprentice program which leans heavily toward computer science, although the basic skills needed to be employable in a white-collar position are also taught. After apprenticeship, successful students are offered positions as interns. An intern continues to learn, but more as a young employee than as any sort of student. I am currently at the intern level.
Finally, my mother mentioned that after the passing of the family dog Maggie, the family cat Midnight suddenly became much more affectionate, almost to the point of being annoying. This is intensely bittersweet, as it indicates that despite giving every indication since Maggie's arrival that she found her little more than a dull and troublesome housemate, she actually did appreciate her presence. Indeed, Maggie was the only creature in the whole house that was always there for Midnight. Even as the rest of the family shut themselves in their rooms or went to work and left her alone, Maggie would be right there with her. Now with Maggie gone, she no longer has that friend to brighten her loneliest hours. I really think that everyone should hold our cat Midnight in the light and show her affection whenever possible. I swear she's significantly mellowed out since those old scratchy days of yore.

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Corrections
11/13/08
Morioka, Japan

Thank you very much, loyal readers, for your helpful feedback on last post. In addition to my u-key sticking and failing to register the "u" in "vague," a number of other issues arose from my rush-update. I have corrected the date and the subject, and I have updated my information box to the current count of days in Japan. Thank you again for reminding me that you're all paying attention. I will be especially sure to try and put together an extra long post this coming Sunday in order to meet the stringent demands of "The Public."
For the record, for all of you who may be doubtful that my u-key is unreliable, please feel free to check it yourself when I return to The United States. You will find that it has a distinctly different feel from the other keys on my keyboard.

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No news is good news
11/11/08
Morioka, Japan

Nothing particularly interesting has happened recently. I'm kinda busy, though, what with the end near approaching. I like Japan, but it will also be nice to be home. By the way, I have been keeping this blog for the purpose of fielding generic questions about my trip, so please be specific! Upon my return, vague questions will receive answers somewhere between nebulous and inscrutable! Consider yourself warned!

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And now for some good news
11/2/08
Morioka, Japan

For one, I discovered that I had, in fact, not fulfilled my theoretical arts requirement, which means that Julie May's wacky art class is, rather than nonsensical and infuriating, is delightful and fortuitous. Not to mention, it was not quite as difficult as I first thought. Especially since the questions on her homework assignments have changed from specific, closed ended questions such as "According to Anderson's definition, is this art?" to open ended questions that I can reasonably spend a page answering, usually not questions at all, just asking me to "discuss" something. I have received full credit on the last three.
Ikkun and Machiko made a surprise visit this weekend. I suspect it was only a surprise to me, though. This time Machiko's husband Kazuya came as well. We went to a fish restaurant where a huge tank full of fish surrounds the eating area, which is shaped like a giant ship. Anyone who wishes may fish in the tank, and staff clean the caught fish and make it into the customer's order. Ikkun caught a tuna ("Maguro" in Japanese) and, about fifteen minutes after seeing it pitiably gasping for air in the waitress's net, I was eating tuna sushi under the baleful glare of its ornately carved corpse. Hopefully this is as close as I will ever get to the horror stories I've heard about eating live animals in various parts of Asia. I don't have a picture of it alive, as my camera sometimes likes to pretend it's out of batteries before it actually is.
I plan to collect a great deal of Japanese manga (comic books) so that I can continue my independent japanese study in the states. Manga is an excellent source of new vocabulary. So far I've learned the word for "pirate"(Kaizoku) and four new rude ways to say "You!" (Kimi, Temei, Omae, and Kiisama). I think in the future I'll keep track of the new words in a notebook or something. Right now I've just been looking things up as they come and moving on. This gets me through a book, but it doesn't result in any long-term learning. Learning Japanese will expediate my reading of manga which will expediate my learning of Japanese. Unfortunately at the moment I'm quite busy, so I haven't been reading manga much.
Oh yeah, there was a halloween party. Masks were made, candies were eaten, and Bomberman masks were worn. Damon went as a Japanese gangster, and Kevin went as a nerd, which has no equivalent in Japan. Nevertheless, he was funny enough that he won first prize in the costume contest anyway.

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To which all good things must come
10/26/08
Morioka, Japan

Yesterday marked the bittersweet end of an era. The large, universally beloved dog that once was omnipresent in our household is no more. That's right, Marmaduke printed its last strip yesterday. Never again will that wacky great dane outwit his shakily-drawn owners. No more will he bark at that stupid mailman. His burying of bones in the neighbor's yard is at a close. He has chased his last cat, eaten his family's last dinner, terrified his last lunch guest. Let us all say goodbye to our dear friend Marmaduke.
Whoah, hey, calm down. It's just a joke. Marmaduke's fine, geez. Really it's my large beloved dog Maggie for whom the end has come. She lived a full and happy life, so this isn't so much a tragedy as a sad inevitability. Nevertheless, my world is now short one wonderful dog, and I was not present to say goodbye. I cannot think of a better descriptor than tragic, although to compare it to real tragedies in recent memory seems at best inconsiderate and egocentric. It is sad. Very, very, very sad. Sad for me. I am sad. Goodbye, Maggie.

Deaths in the family aside, that's no reason to deprive you nice folks of a big, juicy post replete image collection.
This weekend was hardly a weekend at all. We spent from eight until four manning a rice-krispy treat booth. Profits were $200. $200/16 hours = $12.50 an hour. Not bad wages, if it weren't split between ten people, making it $1.25 an hour. The work was fun, though, and money is not an issue.
We were part of an international festival at Gandai. Our America booth was, in a demonstration of the planning committee's poor knowledge of world events, next to France and Vietnam. France's vegetable soup and ratatouille quickly met a sound defeat against our mighty legion of rice krispy treats. With France as a protective buffer between us and them, Vietnam just spent the whole time singing loudly in Vietnamese. I'm not sure if they came to sell things or just to annoy us. They did turn a burner on once, but they forgot to turn it off again, and the whole tent smelled like kerosene for a while.
We took our $200 and ate at a tex-mex/irish pub style restaurant where I got a mug of water about the size of my head. Yuki tried some of the spicy chicken wings, and then to ease the burning pain took some of Julie's regular chicken, which, as it turned out, she had put hot sauce on. Yuki then ate Damon's salad for relief, only to realize he'd put habanero sauce on it. Fortunately Yuki had by this point finally learned her lesson about stealing other people's food and just drank water until she recovered.
Um, I guess this post wasn't as big and juicy as I had expected. Well, it is kinda juicy, but not very big. Sorry about that.

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New Cell phone, etc.
10/18/08
Morioka, Japan

I have sent in my ballot, which is good because Dan told me that anyone eligible who wasn't voting and was in punching range would be punched. By him, I assume. Speaking of Dan, when he was with the Mori's Leon wasn't around, so he spent all his time with Ikkun, who had not yet moved to Sendai.
Also I got a new cell-phone. My old cell-phone's screen got a big crack in it. When I went to Softbank myself, they told me my warranty was invalid and repairs would be $150. So I went again with Yuki, who they told that I could buy the new model for $58 and they would transfer all of the data over. My new cell-phone is pretty cool.
Jenny and I went to a children's museum fairly near my middle school. There was a sign on the way that claimed to lead to the museum, but it was pointing the wrong way. The museum itself was quite nice, and even included a planetarium! The planetarium used its surround-image advantage to greater effect than I had ever seen before! Before that day, the most impressive special effect I'd ever seen in a planetarium was about power-point caliber (i.e. an image of a dinosaur moving statically across the screen). The 3D effects were delightful and fun. It almost seemed like one really was flying around in Egyptian tombs.
I took some pictures at Josei. The students thought it was hilarious for some reason. I have included pictures of Mr. Doughnuts Doughnuts as well as the infamous Melon Soda. We went to a craft village where I made a cookie and ate it. I also bought some more omiyage. We also got to foray in iron-working. I made an incredibly ugly design (not deliberately), but the iron-working guy said he would try to fix it. I should get it in about a month.

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Birthday Entry!
10/11/08
Morioka, Japan

What better way to celebrate my birthday than to take dozens and dozens of pictures with my new digital camera and post them up on my blog? I'll take pictures of everyone and everything, and I'll try and make an image-viewer so you don't have to just keep hitting refresh to see them all. Or rather I'll make a better image viewer. I have one, but it's not so good. I'll expand this post later today and add the images.
Here we go! Included are some bad photos of some Mario action figures I got at a flea market, pictures of Ikkun (my host-nephew) climbing over people and posing for photographs, images of doughnuts from Mr. Doughnuts, and pictures of my friends, family, and me. Clicking on an image will bring up the image viewer if it's from a folder. If an image takes you nowhere, it's just that image and not a folder. Internet Explorer users will still find it much uglier and harder to use than Firefox users, but that's what you get for using IE.
Thanks everyone for twenty great years! (Well, for the ones in which I knew you, at least.)
Ps. After a few long weeks of collecting dust, my TMFD (times mistaken for Dan) meter has shot up to a record seven times! Twice Ikkun called me Dan. He was corrected by family members both times.

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Koji
10/11/08
Morioka, Japan

Hi, every one. This is Koji.

As Sam has previously announced in this blog, I will write a little bit about my recent life.


I am a junior at a university called Keio University in Japan. It is one of the oldest universities in Japan.

My major is Economics. It is not what I initially wanted to learn. I wanted to learn theoretical physics like quantum mechanics or super string theory. However, they have something in common. That is, they both try to explain matters in the world by using mathematics. So, now that I think about it, learning economics is not so bad after all. I actually am enjoying it.

Right now I am busy writing my diploma thesis. The paper is on the global food crisis. It is really difficult, but sure is fun and worthwhile.


I miss the Leeman-Munk family. I miss James, Oriana, Eli, Ty, and all the other friends from the Quaker meeting. I miss monopoly, settlers, stratego, and other fun games I played with you all. I miss a lot of things.

I wish there was a way to go back in time.


Kindest regards, Koji

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Back home in Morioka
10/7/08
Morioka, Japan

I think that it is interesting that my trip to Japan is so large that it contains another sub-trip to different parts of Japan. I suppose that that makes Morioka more of a home-away-from-home than just a travel destination. Pretty strong relationships can form living with a host family for four months. The Moris even flew to Earlham to see their last host son's graduation. Of course, that was Daniel.
As for Koji, he's still working on that little description of how he's doing*. Staying with him was truly an adventure. Specifically one in dining for the fabulously wealthy. I already described to you the Spanish dinner, but the next day we had a Chinese dinner and on Monday a yakitori (Japanese Barbecue) lunch. We consistently ordered too much, although only on the Chinese dinner did we need to take food home. After we barely fit down the dish of sweet and sour ribs, two plates of fried rice, and eighteen dumplings, we remembered that we had also ordered an entire duck.
Now back in Morioka I'm at Josei Junior High again. I just discovered that the many times teachers had dashed off without me and then sent a student to come get me wasn't because they had wanted a little time to prepare before I showed up as I had thought. In fact, they were apparently in such a hurry they just didn't have time to let me know it was time to go for class, and I was supposed to get up and look for class myself all those times. Highly embarrassing, but I'm glad that I now know the proper action to take in these circumstances.
Occasionally, my students burst into applause for me. They do it either when I speak English extremely rapidly (which I shouldn't do) or when I speak Japanese properly. Anything that indicates that I have keen abilities in English or at least a remedial knowledge of Japanese thrills these children to no end. Also, a group of girls keeps introducing the same girl to me over and over. I think this may be one of those "so-and-so has a crush on Gaijin sensei (foreign teacher)" things.

*meaning he probably hasn't started yet.

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Comments!
10/4/08
Tokyo, Japan

Ha ha! Ha ha! I have completed a rudimentary comment system! Please feel free to provide your keen and well-thought-out insight or your crude, poorly spelled sexual slurs*. Whichever feels right to you. I would like to repeat that this system is rudimentary. Let me provide a short list of tips to help you get the comment you want.

  1. Please include your name on your comment if you wish to be identified. I am aware that people will be able to use this to impersonate others, so do not fear. I will assume that anything stupid said in your name was forged. Let me know if there is a comment in your name of which you do not approve and I will delete it.
  2. The comment system supports html. If you use this to make an ugly comment, I might try to make it pretty or I might just delete it.
  3. The date of your comment will be automatically included.This is according to the Shodor server, which is in the New York timezone.

*Please do not bump up the PG-13 rating on this site. I will delete anything inappropriate, regardless of how well or poorly it is spelled. Seriously, guys. Shodor is federal webspace, and there are legal limits on what can be put on federal webspace. Please don't get me arrested by the feds.

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Koji Hagiwara
10/3/08
Tokyo, Japan

Well, I made it to Tokyo on a night bus yesterday. Very fun, not very restful. When I got there it suddenly became apparent that I had forgotten to copy Koji's number from my Gmail to my computer. As such, it was direly important that I find wireless internet of some sort. Apparently the center of technology Tokyo is now so advanced now that that ancient dinosaur wireless internet is a thing of the past. After some fruitless attempts at various coffeeshops, I was directed to a wireless-enabled McDonalds. After selling me a sausage egg McMuffin and a hashbrown for four hundred yen, the clerk told me that it wasn't the McDonalds itself that had wireless, just occasionally one could catch a passing signal from the outdoors. When I failed to catch a passing signal, he helpfully asked me please to stop eating the banana Starbucks sold me before telling me they didn't have wireless. Fortunately, Julie happened to have Koji's number on a travel plan I'd been asked to submit earlier, so I called her and got it. After only another short fifteen minutes of wandering around we managed to find each other.
I'm sure you're all wondering about how Koji is doing. However, rather than misrepresent his recent exploits with one of my harebrained rants, punctuated by the occasional half-witted joke and awkwardly long sentence, I've commissioned him to describe it himself in a special entry of my blog.
Now, to continue with my harebrained rant. If you don't like it, you can go read the blog of some guy who doesn't wildly overuse appositives, or maybe someone who cares whether or not his readers know what an appositive is. Obscure grammar aside, those of you still reading get to hear about how delicious Tokyo spanish food can be. Very delicious. Koji and my dinner last evening was as follows(and these names are crudely translated from Spanish) delicious Mushroom Salad, not-so-delicious oysters soaked in delicious butter-like olive oil, mysterious yet delicious egg chaos, extra delicious Spanish fried rice, and finally oranges soaked in delicious deliciousness. I later learned that the delicious deliciousness was liquor.
Koji tried to convince me that Tokyo was exactly like New York except worse in every way, insisting that every building in Tokyo was just a smaller, shabbier replica of one in New York. He also told me that New York is the center of world culture. His argument was that since artists tend to be liberal, and New York tends to be liberal, all the artists flock to New York. I can't believe I ever forgot how much I love Koji.
We then went on to discuss Japanese politics. Let me go over Japanese politics in a nutshell. The Democratic Party is liberal. Sound simple enough? Good, let's move on. The Liberal Democratic Party is conservative. Please use this sentence as an opportunity to reread the previous sentence. The Liberal Democratic Party, being conservative, practices liberal economics. Confused? I don't really get it either. Hold on, though. If you think that Japanese politics are stupid, remember that here in the United States our bitter rivalries apparently stem from the fact that we can't decide whether we belong to a democracy or a republic.
Koji's father, Seiji Hagiwara, has left local government and now works in the Japanese Diet. Unlike in America, where this would put him somewhere between a hard-boiled egg and a ham sandwich, In Japan the Diet is a critical part of the Federal government.

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Friendly Deer
9/26/08
Hiroshima, Japan

Trip! There were many very friendly deer on the island of Miyajima yesterday. They rather aggressively begged for food, but would settle for maps and flyers when donated, voluntarily or involuntarily. We took a gondola to the top of the mountain on the island, and despite the promise of monkeys, saw none. Jenny reflected that if she were a monkey she wouldn't show herself to us. She certainly wouldn't take us to her magical land of bananas.
Today we visited the Hiroshima museum. I don't think I could do it justice with a verbal description, so I won't insult it by trying. It was very striking, though. The survivor's story was deeply moving, especially the after-effects long after the explosion. Not only health effects, the survivors were actually discriminated against. People apparently thought she would give them cancer, so it was very difficult for her to get a job, and even more difficult to get a husband. At 76, she was still single, not by choice. She was incredible, though. Even without the debilitating effects of radiation gradually but noticeably weakening my body, I wouldn't be able to go out and relive my hardest memories daily for the sake of world peace.

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The Trip
9/26/08
Morioka, Japan

I presented on LOLcats yesterday. Everyone enjoyed my presentation, and I think I even managed to get the complex concept of a meme across. We then went to a nomikai (drinking party) with Gandai (Iwate University) students that helped us with our presentations. The non-alcoholic beverages were relegated to a tiny rectangle in the corner of the menu. As it turned out, a quarter of these "soft drinks" were actually wine. I'm not sure how that works out, but I had a Gandai student help me not to accidentally inebriate myself.
There is a small office shop run by one of the teachers in the teacher's office in my school. A few days ago I bought, in the absence of any better drinks, a small glass bottle bragging about the presence of 3000mg of something in it. My next class was in two hours, so I figured I could shrug off any adverse effects before that class started. After finishing the liquid in the bottle (cough medicine consistency, tastes like smarties except a lot stronger) I was told by an apologetic teacher that she now needed me for an immediate class, not only that, Julie and Yuki would be watching my performance. Well, as far as I could tell, it was an energy drink, so I was a little bit jittery, but I managed to handle the class just fine anyway.
Oh right, a trip. The SICE group is going on a trip for the next couple weeks (until October 6). I'll be in Kyoto, Hiroshima, and Tokyo. In Tokyo I'll be staying with my old exchange student Koji Hagiwara. It's been approximately four years, so I'm excited to see him again.
Uh, ok. Now for a special edition of "Stuff I should have said before, but will say now instead!"


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Dogs, etc.
9/19/08
Morioka, Japan

Dogs. I'm going to talk about dogs. Today I met a fifteen year old dog who couldn't see or hear, and was understandably not comfortable being touched by the silent darkness. This Helen Keller dog was wandering off when an old man gave a little girl and I a quest to bring it back. Obviously, this was a challenge, considering the dog couldn't hear when it was called, couldn't see where its master was, and was liable to bite anything that touched it, as we discovered when trying just to pull it back by the collar. Fortunately, the poor old dog would start wandering away from whoever was touching it (just touching it slightly didn't make it bite), so I sheperded it fairly close to the old man's seat and borrowed the leash, gingerly hooking it to the dog's collar. No rare items, but a generous XP bonus. I don't think I gained a level, though.
I've been living with a 7-month old dog named Leon who is rather rambunctious. He's an indoor dog, which apparently in Japan means he never, ever goes outside. He doesn't even go for walks. He pees on a little paper mat that we then throw away and replace. He drinks from a hamster bottle. Everything one does with this dog inevitably becomes the "don't let Leon bite you" game. People are so happy about their Japanese grade schoolers, but I'm learning Japanese with Leon, too! I now know how to say "Don't bite," "Don't bark," and "The inside of my nose is not an OK place to lick," all in Japanese. I'm still working on "Stop deliberately putting your ball where you can't get to it. I'm not going to get it for you again."
One of my SICE mates had a beloved pet die yesterday. My dog back at home is at that point in her life that every time I leave there is a distinct and significant possibility that she won't be there when I get back. That would be sad if I wasn't there for her in her last days, but I spend so much time away from home now that it's almost inevitable.
On the bright side, I put lots of effort and thought into my last Art History assignment, and just glancing at it Julie said that it was exactly what she was looking for. Wary of false optimism I asked her not to congratulate me until she'd actually gone over it, but agreed that even superficially this homework was notably different from the previous two.
On the dark side again, my first ever cell-phone broke about a week after I got it. I used it while my hands were slightly wet, at which point it pulled a Wicked Witch of the West and the screen's colors became permanently screwed up. I'm almost surprised it didn't scream "I'm MELTING!!!" I went to the Softbank shop, and the lady behind the counter's first question was "did you use it with wet hands?" Apparently that's a violation of warranty, so it would be $400 to fix. Fortunately I can still use it, I just have to suffer intense agony while doing so.

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Festival
9/16/08
Morioka, Japan

I'm late. Sorry. I know it's been more than a week. I'll write an extra long post.
I went to a festival with my family today. We were going to go see Dan sing, but we accidentally missed it. Nevertheless, a great majority of the festival seemed to center around Dan. At one point they suddenly focused on me, but it turned out that they had momentarily confused me for Dan. Nevertheless, I had a chocolate banana and managed to enjoy myself.
However, over the next few days it became increasingly apparent. As a white bespectacled male with brown hair, my claim to fame in Japan is a passing resemblance to a prefectural celebrity. In order to keep track of the number of times I've been asked for Dan's autograph, had someone ask me to sing Rakugo (as it turns out, Dan is very good at Rakugo, contrary to a previous post), or had my hand shaken in reverent awe, I have added a new counter to the info box. There are still one or two aspects of my life that don't reside in Dan's voluminous shadow fortunately, so I will discuss a few of the events of yesterday and the day before.
Carrying a Mikoshi (Japanese Shrine), if it ever was, is no longer my idea of a good time. Especially when the event is hosted by the Morioka Yakuza. Fortunately, rather than being dragged back under the hard, painful slats of the shrine over and over again until I fainted from exhaustion and lack of air, my ignominy offending the Yakuza so much that they kill me, I managed to go in only once, which was plenty. As it happened, that once was between Caitlin and Christine, both significantly shorter than me, me being significantly taller than everything else. So, even in my hunched over position I carried the brunt of the shrine, surrounded by hot, sweaty, yelling people and being repeatedly pushed into the proper Mikoshi carrying position by the quintessential mob-boss (Elvis haircut, Dragon tattoo from the neck down, smile that looks like it would keep smiling while a bunch of burly guys in dark sunglasses and tuxedos break your legs.) Fortunately there was a system that cycled people out, after which I carefully stayed ahead of the shrine, so as not to get grabbed and shoved in again. Julie decided that the kami (gods) were probably pleased enough with my gaman (obedient suffering) that they wouldn't mind if I didn't go through again.
That was the day before yesterday. Yesterday I hauled a dashi. A dashi is rather like an American parade float except that it's not motorized. Rather, about a hundred people pull on two long ropes to take it around town. This was about a fraction of the intensity of the previous night. In fact, it was downright boring at first, pulling that thing around for about three hours. After the break though (an hour and a half long, now that's a break!) it was dark, and the float's lights came on. The subsequent parade was quite pretty, and was much more fun. It turns out that one of the radio towers in Morioka (maybe the only one, I don't know) is lit up at night. The color changes about every fifteen minutes.
Speaking of pretty stuff, I found a bike path behind Josei (my middle school) that's gloriously scenic and goes on for a really long time. Eventually it becomes just a regular road, but it's beautiful the whole way through. Also, a number of people take their little dogs to walk on the path, so connosieurs of small canines should check it out. There's a children's museum nearby, too. I'm going to check that out sometime. Not this week, though. I've got to figure out how to analyze art properly and get an A in art history. Wish me luck.

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Iwate-San
9/8/08
Morioka, Japan

I've been walking backwards down stairs for the past two days. Up is fine (well, tolerable), but forwards down seems to offend my thighs, which have no qualms vocalizing their concern. While on Iwatte, I could clearly hear my back grumbling loudly. Unfortunately, it used various words that are not appropriate for my PG rated blog. My feet have been very polite about the whole ordeal generally, although they do occasionally yelp with pain when I put on my sneakers.
I decided against bringing my laptop with me, and I don't have any other camera, so here are some pictures Eric took. Eric is Julie's husband. You probably are all wondering why I don't have a picture-viewer yet, and the answer is I do but it's still much too buggy for the site. Internet Explorer mysteriously decides that it is no longer interested in paying attention to CSS positioning scripts, for example (Even 7.0!).
These pictures really don't capture the majesty of Iwate-San, which is a way of saying mount Iwate in Japanese, by the way. Sorry that some of you probably got an ugly page. I didn't realize that a few of the pictures were vertical and would be too tall for an entry this short, so I'm lengthening the entry. Lucky you!
When preparing for Iwate-san, I didn't think to bring candy and chocolate. My family asked me if I wanted to bring candy and chocolate for the trip, but I had no clue what candy had to do with mountain climbing. All of my friends brought candy, though and were happy to share. The candy ranged from interesting chocolate-cracker cakes made by the Pocky company (if you don't know what pocky is, it's little cracker sticks coated in chocolate) to literal blocks of sugar. No joke. Those, by the way, were brought by someone from Japan who happened to be on the same hike as us.

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This is an Ordinary Box
9/5/08
Morioka, Japan

As it turns out, Dan was on TV because he was leading the float-building committee, the first foreigner ever to do so. Every time I see him on TV, I want to apologize to my family for not being fluent in Japanese and famous across Morioka (Geez, that guy sets the bar high). I'm joking by the way, when I made this joke with Julie Sensei (The SICE program leader this year) she tried to give me a pep talk. Sometimes dry humor can backfire, story of my life.
This post isn't about Dan, though. This is about my junior High School, Josei. So far in the classes I've just been a human tape recorder that occasionally introduces himself. My last time there I was given ten milk boxes. I recently figured out that they probably had the surplus because the entire second-year class was on a field trip. Today in one of my classes a student was so impressed by my English that she would repeatedly whisper to herself "Suge! Sugoku pera-pera desu ne!" (Wow! He's so fluent!). She would also say "Yosh!"(Awesome!) when I told her "yes, I do like X" where X is whatever she asked me if I liked. This continued until the teacher reminded her "Of course he's fluent, its his native language!" I might have pointed it out myself, but I really liked her enthusiasm, silly as may have been.
Today I put up my first English poster about The United States, and I put up my mailbox. My mailbox is actually an envelope, but I put a Japanese label on it saying (in Japanese) "This is an Ordinary Box". Under it in English, I put "Obviously, this is not a box at all." Then I put instructions for mailing me and promises of a secret prize for three mails. The instructions are in English, but the way I see it, they're so well-connected that only one needs to figure it out, and he or she'll tell the rest how to do it. I certainly hope this works. Absurdism as an education tool would make my SICE trip, as if it hasn't been made already by...
A presentation on LOLcats! That's right, we were asked to pick and present on an aspect of our culture, and so in a couple of weeks I'm going to tell my Japanese class all about the internet meme known, among many other names, as LOLcats. For those of you unfamiliar, when one takes a cute or strange picture of a cat and puts a silly, internet-language (ie: I can haz cheezburger) caption on it, a LOLcat is born. I'll be explaining the various permutations and sub-subcultures within the subculture of LOLcats, as well as other LOLs such as LOLdogs, LOLpeople, and the infamous LOLrus. Included is my current wallpaper: a LOLpanda.
Ps. It couldn't have come at a more opportune time.

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TV
9/3/08
Morioka, Japan

Well, I never would have thought it possible, but Japanese Aflac commercials (the one with the talking duck) are actually weirder than American Aflac commercials. When the commercial occasionally pops up, it consists of little more than a girl in front of a mirror grooming the Aflac duck. It's set to an incscrutable soundtrack of ducks quacking. Today on TV (my family watches a lot of TV) we saw one of my family's previous SICE students, Daniel DeGrasse. The news segment was, as far as I could tell with my limited knowledge of Japanese, about him being bad at Rakugo (Japanese performance art involving fans).
Seriously, though, Daniel's Japanese is fantastic. Though I certainly do not know, given my Japanese ability, I would guess that he is fluent. Obviously he did something worth televising. In addition to flubbing his Rakugo lines, it showed him teaching children English, dancing, and saying some things in really (really) good Japanese. Although this does not make it any less impressive, he lived in Japan for a few months as a small child, which I've heard may have contributed to his talents.

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Sorry!
8/31/08
Morioka, Japan

I must apologize for my lack of updates until now. Many thanks to my mother for defending me under the claim of technical difficulties, but really that was just the catalyst that started a fit of laziness. In any case, I have resolved the technical difficulties, and am now ready to commence regular updates. Weekly at the very least. Please allow me to start by going over the events of the past fortnight.
Upon arriving in Japan, we stayed at an american style hotel for one night. The next day we took the Shinkansen to Morioka where we stayed in a Ryokan (traditional Japanese-style hotel). The included pictures (of which you will see one randomly every time you load the page, Someday I might add an image-viewing page where you can scroll through them at your leisure.) are of the outside looking through the Shinkansen's window. There's also one picture of Korn, short for Supakorn. He's a fellow SICE student from Thailand. We stayed at the Ryokan for about a week, being oriented and enjoying the hostess's excellent cooking until we were ready to head out to our respective host families.
My host family consists of my host mother, my host father, two host sisters, and a host dog. Both of the sisters are my elder sisters, and one of them is married and living with her husband and my host-nephew. The other, Chieko-san, works at a school for children who refuse to go to public school because of excessive bullying. My host mother works all week, and is only home for sporadic bursts of time, even on the weekend.
My family is a veteran of the SICE program. Nothing fazes them. I never have anything to contribute when people start talking about all the crazy stuff their families asked them. Well, I do have one thing, but I can't contribute that same thing over and over again. I'll tell you guys once, and then you can read it over and over again if you really want to.
When I first met my host family and came into their house, their dog, Leon, barked viciously at me from his little pen in the greeting area. I considered trying to pet him, but decided against it when informed that he would bite. When we came into the main living room, my family said to me (in Japanese) "When Leon comes in, he is going to bite and attack you. Is that ok?"
"Um, yeah, I guess?"
So they did, and Leon has only drawn blood from me three times since.
Ok, that's it for the narrative. Now I'll just do another list of highlights.


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The Boeing 777
Beyond Space and Time
A Masslossal Airplane

Judging by the clock on my computer, it has been seven hours since we departed the Earth's surface. My personal experience of time at this point is measured primarily in the aches and pains of my knees from my cramped position. My cabin-mates, or those of them that I can see, have lost all desire to see the world outside. I cannot blame them. After so long in the dim quarters, the once beloved light of the Sun has become cruel and unforgiving. Those foolish enough to crack open our windows' protective shades are rewarded with half a minute of searing sightlessness, but only those who immediately retreat are so lucky.
One of my fellow passengers claimed to have withstood the pain long enough to see heaven. Upon intense inquiry, he finally explained that heaven apparently looked just like the mountains of Alaska. An hour or two later I was saddened to learn that he had been rushed to the sick bay for severe tremors and incoherent babbling.
On a lighter note, our celestial prison, in addition to being mind-bogglingly vast, is equipped with all of the finest luxuries. We even have our pick of enough in-flight movies to entertain us for the next week at least. By the way, I strongly recommend Kung-fu Panda. I could probably go on a few paragraphs about how incredibly awesome it is, but long story short, It is not anywhere near as unimaginative as the title would suggest. I strongly doubt that this will also apply to the upcoming movie "Space Chimps," but good movies can surprise you.
My aisle-mate either does not speak much English or simply doesn't feel like talking much. Occasionally he will be clearly having trouble deciphering some bit of English. At these points I will try to explain to him that "Dijonnaise" is just the name of a brand of spicy mustard, and he will smile broadly and say "spicy mustard, thank you, thank you." I tried to tell him in Japanese how fancy I thought it was that we each got our own movie screen, but he didn't seem to take to that, either.
Not my first botched attempt at using Japanese, unfortunately. Waiting for my flight to Chicago, it occurred to me that a number of the people may be there for the connecting flight to Tokyo. I found evidence for this when I saw one family speaking japanese, then my hypothesis was further confirmed when I heard another family speaking Japanese, and so when I was in line I tried to help a confused asian family using my Japanese skills, but they turned out to be Korean.

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On My Way
8/17/08 11:00 AM
Somewhere above the Midwest

Ok, I'm off to Chicago, where I'll catch my flight to Narita. I saw three Japanese families in the RDU airport waiting for this flight. I wonder if I'll see any of my fellow SICE folks in the Chicago airport.

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OhMyGoshFriday
8/15/08
Chapel Hill, NC

I think I promised some of you that I would give you the location of the blog today. If you're reading this, good job! If you're on my home page wondering where the link is, shame on you. I was too lazy to put the link on my homepage yet, so you should just have followed the link I sent you in the email. (shame on me, too for being lazy.)
Anyway, today is Friday the fifteenth, and that means I have two days left in the United States of America. I feel like my trip to Japan has gone very suddenly from the distant future to the immediate, no-more-time-left kind of future. Fortunately, I have most of my packing done, but still this is making me quite apprehensive.

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Back from the Retreat
8/11/08
Chapel Hill, NC

I'm back from the retreat. Some highlights:


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Last Day of Work
8/08/08
Shodor Durham, NC

My last day. I head out for a retreat in about an hour, and then spend a week getting ready to leave for Japan. It's nice working at Shodor, I'm going to miss everyone. Of course, I'm going to come back next summer, and if my schedule permits it work remotely from Earlham (not at Japan, my schedule definitely will not permit it).
I got a second letter from my host family. They thanked me for the letter I sent them, and sent me a photo of their dog, Leon! He's one of those white, fluffy dogs with extremely curly hair. Bichon Frise, that is. I'm going to try and scan in the photo of Leon and put it up.
UPDATE: I don't know if I have my host-family's permission to upload their photos, so here are some Creative-Commons non-copyrighted photos of the breed. Leon looks quite (if not exactly) like these.
UPDATE 8/31/08: New picture! There are three pictures now. One of them is picked randomly each time you load the page. See if you can guess which one is the real Leon.
UPDATE 9/9/08: Something is wrong with the random number generator. For some reason the pictures picked in older posts are notably less random than newer ones. Sorry guys.

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I Wish Luke Were Here!
8/07/08
Shodor Durham, NC

Today is Thursday, the day of the office potluck. Unfortunately, half the office thought it was going to be Friday. Hilarity ensues. For example, I made the mistake of suggesting to Hun that he make his banana into banana chips to serve at the potluck, and spent the next hour trying to convince him that the office toaster oven would not be able to cook them properly. Luke would have loved a situation like this, but apparently he left last week. :(

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My Uncrazy Cat
8/05/08
Carrboro, NC

My cat is no longer crazy! It all started when she bolted out of the house and under the porch.Now, this is the same cat that before would only faintly venture outdoors untilsomeone saw her, at which point she would slink back inside as if we had yelled at her. So, this was understandably strange, but we didn't really get worried until she started hanging out under the porch for hours at a time. One night she actually sat under there all night, only coming out the next morning for food.
Next this elevated to her simply leaving the house and wandering who-knows-where, coming back only at food time. One time she broke through a screen window to get outside. Finally she would sit in her litterbox for hours at a time, when confronted, she'd act as if it was completely normal for her to be living inside her toilet.
Eventually I took the top of her litterbox and shook it, scaring her out. While being pet she rolled over, and I saw scores of fleas crawling on her belly! Evidently the flea medication was insufficient. So we gave her some anti-flea pills, and in the absence of the fleas she eventually settled back down to normal. Yay!

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