Hounen Matsuri

Last weekend I had an opportunity to attend the Hounen Matsuri (commonly known to foriegners as the Penis Festival). This event takes place every March in Komaki, a town north of Nagoya. The main attraction is a parade that includes a portable shrine that houses a giant chalice. I would imagine that I am only one of hundreds of foriegners blogging this event because there were tons of them there, so I’ll save the explanation of the meaning of this unique event . The festival featured the typical matsuri food venders as well as some specialty items such as food and wood carvings in the shape of the special body part of the day. There was also a sucker combo pack that included both male and female parts.

While the parade is the most famous part of this event, what turned out to be even better was the the mochi throwing. Mochi is a big blob of pounded rice that is generally tasteless and inexpensive but on this day it was a most sought after item. There must have been over 1,000 people packed into the corner of a shrine courtyard in hope of catching a mochi blob when hundreds of them were thrown from the grandstands above. We waited for about 35 minutes in anticipation of the start of this event. Some people passed out, either from claustrophobia or sheer excitement. Finally, the honored guests ascended to the balcony and began hurling the blobs into the crowd. Men, women and children jumped, pushed and crawled on the ground in hopes of securing mochi.

For anyone looking for a truelly unique Japanese experience, the Hounen Matsuri is a unique event that I would recommend for anyone who may be in the area of Aichi-Ken in March.

Transa- Caetano Velosa

I will try to post info about albums that I have been listening to recently. The first album is Transa by Caetano Velosa. This album was recorded after he began his political exile. This album is more soulful and less psychedelic than his earlier albums. The songs are mostly in English and the lyrics don’t make much sense, but the songs are perfect for an afternoon of housecleaning.

Track: Nine out of Ten. There is some chump named Matt on amazon.com who claims that this album and specifically this track are crap but he is sadly mistaken and not to be trusted.

Restaurant Review-Osaka

My girlfriend and I recently visited a popular restaurant in Osaka. It is an “Alice in Wonderland” themed restaurant where everything is Alice oriented (including many oriental Alices for waitresses).
While we were there I was struck by the keen business sense of the place because as they served us tiny quantities of food, they explained to us that it was from the part of the story where Alice was very big and everything looked really small. Pretty clever.
There was one part of the meal where they brought two shells breaded with stuff on the inside. i was jealous of my girlfriend because her shell had a fat piece of seafood in it and mine was all soupy and no meat. turns out that I ate the soup that we were supposed to dip our shared seafood in . It was pretty funny. i was thinking as i was eating it “i usually don’t have trouble with chopsticks anymore, but this is unbelievable.”
Atmosphere: B. I was pleasantly surprised by the laid back and not too whimsical interior design but was disappointed by the Disney soundtrack hits playing on repeat the whole time.
Food: C+ Quantities were small and the food was average. Often when ordering western food at Japanese restaurants I find that things are a bit bland and not as flavorful as the original recipe. The redeeming factor was the presentation. Everything was in cute little goblets or shapes. Mashed potatoes came in the form of a cute little bunny rabbit with celery for ears. I was shocked when my girlfriend was quick to split the bunny’s head in half with her spoon after taking a picture. I slept with one eye open that night.

Overall, it was not bad. Fun experience witch gave us a lot to talk about during our meal. I had heard before going that it was a place someone might enjoy “only if they liked Alice very, very much”. There is some truth to this due to the fact that Alice was the only character from the story represented at the restaurant. No Cheshire cat, no Mad Hatter, etc. Some of the Japanese Alices were cute though.

Tokyo Christmas

The Hostel:  We stayed at a hostel the owner assured us several times was the cheapest in Tokyo.  It was actually in a completely different prefecture, but not far from the city.  We had to read several disclaimers about how we should not expect much from a place that only charges $12 a day to stay.  We stayed in a room the size of my bedroom that had about 9 bunk beds packed into it.  We hoped to meet some other travelers to hang out with, but everyone else there was kinda weird and remained completely quiet the whole time.  We were hoping to visit a place called “Homie Bar” which had pictures of breakdancers on the sign, but we were completely exhausted by the time we got back to the hostel every night.

The food: We ate some delicious Korean and Brazilian food as well as some tasty Coconut Curry.

Shopping: It’s pretty much what you do in Tokyo.  We did alot of it.  I barely bought anything but if there was something I wanted, Tokyo would be the place to find it.  I was hoping to do some record shopping, but the directions I found to all the good spots were less reliable than I had hoped.

Entertainment: We didn’t go out and party much because we were exhausted but we did go to a  hookah bar that was pretty cool. It was about the size of my kitchen and aside from the hookahs, the only decorations were two pictures of Jesus placed right next to each other.  Only about 9 or 10 people could fit in the place but it was packed the whole time with video game nerds and music snobs.  Also, the guy working there was the most inanimate and dull person you could ever meet.

Trains:  We took about a million of them.  They are pretty cheap and reliable in Tokyo and a good choice of transportation if you don’t mind possibly being forced into an overpacked car  by a station attendant so it can leave on time.

Other interesting stuff we saw:

a Japanese guy at Shinjuku station wearing a Grayslake high school cheerleading sweatshirt

A shady looking and possibly possibly dangerous blowfish restaurant

A bottle of booze with a snake coiled in it

Lots of white people

Best album ever recorded in Japan?

I don’t know enough about Japanese bands to be able to comment on their albums, but the best album ever recorded in Japan, to the best of my knowledge, is a live album from by Mies Davis recorded in Tokyo in 1974.  The album is named Pangea.  Pangea is a double vinyl album that consists of only two songs, clocking in at nearly one and a half hours.  The first song, “Zimbabwe” is an uptempo, funky jam with great percussion.  The masterpiece on this album is the second song, “Gondwana.” This song is by far the most underrated Miles Davis jam of all time.  Even if this was the only song on the album, I would still consider this the best Japanese recorded album of all time.

Tree Story

pa050929.jpgSo, yesterday a teacher approached me with a favor.  He asked me if I could cut all the branches off the trees in the courtyard.  Apparently this time of year is when bees begin to become a problem and they were inhabiting the trees, so they needed to be trimmed. Of course, I agreed and went out to cut them.  The groundskeeper did not help, but did hand me a machete style cutting utensil for the job.  He also gave me an object that looked like a bazooka to blast hornets when i spotted them.  

So there I was, sawing away at the trees in the middle of the school day in my shirt and tie; students peeking from their classrooms at me.  At one point I noticed several teachers watching with amused expressions from the staff room, one being the vice principle. I had some help from the office lady who is about 5 feet tall.  Turns out that she was originally contracted to do the job, but she did not make it very far before suggesting that I should be on it. After significantly altering several trees, I stopped to request some gloves for my hand which had began to blister.  The office lady took it as a cue that I was ready to quit and told me the work was done.  So, I entered the staff room covered in tree shavings and sweat in my shirt and tie, and the teachers are staring at me like a crazy man.  One guy asks me what I was doing out there (even though I had seen him watching me).  I told him that I was cutting the trees and he relayed the message in Japanese.  “why?” he asked.  Then I realized that they were unaware of the orders I had received and had no idea why I was outside cutting the trees up in the middle of the work day. Even though they thought that what I was doing could possibly be a bad idea and should be discussed before acting upon, they watched through the window as I cut the branches off all the trees without saying anything.  As I explained about the bees, they seemed to agree that something needed to be done, but continued to be mystified at why I chose to take this task on without seeking assistance.  Fortunately there was a teacher passing by that knew the situation and explained the whole thing.

What I learned from this:

1. sometimes communication is not very good in the office

2. even if they feel I am making a huge mistake, people may choose to observe in horror instead of correcting me

3. wood chips are itchy and should be avoided in the workplace 

Interesting facts about my school

Japanese students are great.  During assemblies not one person makes a sound.  They sit on the floor in perfect rowes in silence.   Sometimes one falls over in a nap and is bopped on the head by a teacher. 

Japanese students clean the school.  No janitor is necessary here.  After school a song plays and students come into each room with little brooms and dustpans.  I mentioned to them that this is not common in America and they were amazed.  One student said “that’s excellent!!” in a way that was remeniscent of an early Kianu Reeves movie.

Students stay in the classroom and teachers move from room to room throughout the day.  I don’t think this would work in America.  Students there should not be alone without a teacher in a classroom for any amount of time. I often forget about this and tell my students that they can go after class.  They become utterly bewildered and even more confused when I try to explain why I made the mistake in the first place. 

 I am glad that I decided to teach my students slang terms like “What’s Up?”  Ｉam regularly rewarded for this achievement by students who say “what’s up?” to me in the hall as opposed to “Hello!” which is the most some students will ever say to me.  Also, I will occasionally walk by a classroom of students quietly at work and hear “What’s Up?” followed by laughter and the student being scolded by their teacher.  The one negative aspect of this is that it can be difficult to control their use of such an ambiguous term.  I should never have told them that there are many ways to effectively use this handy phrase. Many times in class I have asked students a question like “Do you have a part-time job?” or “what are you going to do this weekend?” and after a long pause (which tells me that they have no idea what I am saying) they reply “What’s Up!?!”

Russia

Japanese students are sometimes taught that Russia is in Europe while Americans believe that it is in Asia.  This caused some confusion in my last class.  Seeing that I couldn’t even remember all the oceans and continents correctly, I almost took their word for it, but I am pretty confident that Russia belongs to Asia in the American Geography books.  This does not mean that either is wrong, but it never occured to me that there is more than one theory on the matter.

A Trip to Toronto

Observations from my second trip to Toronto:

• Toronto has a vibrant music scene.  Almost everywhere we went there was music.  Concert flyers around the city advertised better concerts than any I’ve seen for Chicago this summer. 
• Toronto has a more enterprising homeless population than Chicago.  While not one homeless person approached us for money, there was no shortage of street performers.  The performers were generally not of the caliber that can be found in Chicago (the drummers were pretty lame compared to those found on 35th St. after a Sox game) but even a crappy drummer is less annoying than continuously having to avoid beggars.
• It seems that the booze market in Toronto is on a different clock than it is in the states.  The liquor stores close at 9 p.m. which makes spontenious late night beer runs out of the question, but a visit to a family diner at 10 a.m. will reveal more tables decorated with pitchers of beer than anything that can be catagorized as “food.”
• Canadians are pretty nice.  Even in what was described to us as “a bad area” by a native, it never even occured to me or my travelling partners that we could be in any kind of danger while in Toronto.  However, if you do visit Canada and feel like you have entered an alternate universe of clean cities and happy people, visit the office of the Toronto Parking Authority.  We recieved a parking ticket within minutes of arriving in Toronto and were forced to wait in a line nearly all afternoon with about twenty other parking outlaws that were no happier than we were.  (In the end, we barely got one sentence out to the clerk and she ripped the citation up and dismissed us)

In all, Toronto is a great place for a vacation. I can’t complain about a city where the music is good, the old men drink pitchers of beer for breakfast and the sex workers (which were conveniently located near our hostel) can be haggled down to ridiculously low rates. 

About Me and My Blog…

I am a 24 year old native of Illinois.  I am currently preparing to leave the U.S. for a job with the Jet Program.  I will be working as an Assistant Language Teacher (ALT) in Gifu-Ken, Japan.  I have about one month before my departure.  With this blog, I would like to share my experiences in Japan.  Also, I will provide a variety of links and information for Gaijin as well as other, random stuff that I feel is worth posting.