Daisen Snow and Stay, or: Mackey turns 22 (plus an onsen aside)

Over my birthday weekend (that's Feb. 7th-8th for those of you keeping track at home) there was a large gathering of JETs at Mt. Daisen (the "Big Mountain" I hiked back in the fall) for a ski weekend. Daisen is the biggest mountain in Japan West of Mt. Fuji, and despite Japan being so mountainous there is not a ton of skiing to be had; Daisen is one of the better slopes out there. A group of maybe 20 of us (including some native Japanese friends) stayed at a ryokan on the mountainside on Saturday night (a ryokan is a Japanese-style inn: think a large, communal bath area*, tatami mat floors, and yukata--light cotton kimono. Wonderful after a day of skiing). Naturally, we had easy access to the hills first thing Sunday after skiing for most of Saturday.

I wish I could put Daisen in better context, but all I know is Dartmouth's ski mountain in New Hampshire--it's definitely a big ski area, with a few mountainsides contained in the "Daisen" ski resort. However, outside of some deep moguls at the very top of one of the mountains the area is generally a bunch of wide open ski fields, so the degree of difficulty was not terribly challenging. That said, most of us there were not terribly great skiiers (and snowboarders--the split was maybe 20-80 skis-snowboards, with myself in the 20), so the mountain suited us perfectly.

After half a day of icy slopes on Sunday I drove back to the Eastern side of the prefecture with some friends (about a 2 hour drive). Being my 22nd birthday, (and 22 being a pretty uneventful age after you've run the 16-18-21 significance gauntlet) I didn't have plans to do anything special but a friend insisted and we went out for some delicious dinner at an okonomyiaki place, and followed it up with some delectable cake from the inauspiciously-named Pandora's Box for a full weekend and a happy birthday.

*Easily one of my favorite facets of Japanese culture. In one's home you have a single bath which the whole family will use in a given night--you clean off before you get in, and then soak in the hot water to relax. It's blissful. Onsen--your bath houses or large hotel baths--are the same thing, but instead of a one-man bath it's a large open area.

Got to go to a really big one a couple weeks back--this one has the feature of being co-ed (bathing suits), and had a good dozen baths, including one outdoors, a small-sized pool complete with water slide (which was AWESOME!), sauna with a freezing bath to chill yourself right outside, and a massage bath with strategically placed jets you could use. America could do with some more bath time, I think.

"My School Life"

Year end is swiftly approaching. I've all but finished seeing my 9th graders, who take their entrance exams next week (if they haven't already) and have their graduation ceremony the week after; things are similarly winding down with a lot of my other classes, but I'm at least bolstered by the knowledge that I'll get to keep working with them, if in a slightly different context.

At one of my schools the 9th graders wrapped up their year of English by writing about their experiences the past 3 years in junior high school, and ending with a message for their classmates as they all move on. There were some great ones, ranging from long narratives about experiences and feelings to the following:

"DESTINY
I joined the baseball club.
DESTINY!!
I became class leader.
DESTINY!!

Message is sausage."

Various other non sequiturs were had by some of the other jokesters with only so-so English, to hilarious end (another interspersed his memories with "oh, no, I dropped my cola"...bolded and at least 2x the size of the rest). Really been enjoying the time with my students, and I'm really gonna miss them when they move on!

In Sickness And In Health

Last week was reaaaally slow at one of my schools.

Flu season comes here as naturally as it does in America, with one big difference--you can tell it's flu season because people start showing up to school/work with face masks (think surgeon's mask, not hockey) to prevent the spread of airborne pathogens. It's always kind of a fun guessing game to figure out whether they're (a little) sick or trying to avoid becoming sick, but I think it's pretty great that the culture embraces such a thing.

Anyhow, last week, at one of my schools the 7th and 8th grade classes were apparently so decimated by the flu--maybe 1/5 of each grade, with potentially more to catch it--that, instead of having class and later having to play catchup with so many, classes were canceled. At least the 9th graders held on--another school in the area had school canceled entirely because for the same reason.

"What do you call this kind of music?" "Uhhh...classic rock."

One of my co-teachers is on a really big kick of using music in class lately--this week we spent some time introducing such contemporary artists as the Beatles and the Carpenters to the 7th and 9th graders, complete with videos ripped from youtube to provide some watching material. (Hm, old groups the kids had never heard of singing music in a language they didn't understand all that well? You'd be proud, Dorsey-sensei).

We're at that point in the year where we're running out of material that has to be covered, but there's still some time before the end of the year (remember, school year ends at the end of March here), so we can totally get away with this sort of thing--we'll do maybe one song that's listen-able with lyrics, followed by a few more for them to simply enjoy.

The last two songs we studied: "What a Wonderful World" by Louis Armstrong (kids got a BIG kick out of his facial expressions when he sings) and "I Just Called to Say I Love You" by Stevie Wonder (which, at the end, I was made to sing solo--this is what I get for trying to encourage the kids to come out of their shells by example).

Winter weather update

A week or two ago one of my co-teachers informed me that winds from China were blowing over the Sea of Japan and warming Tottori. Apparently the locals call it "Kiroi Kaze," or "yellow wind," because the warm winds come from the Gobi Desert and carry small bits of sand with it ("don't dry your clothes outside today," he informed me). It's taken to be one of the first signs of spring.

Of course, since then we've had a wee bit of snow (not enough to stick) and the temperature has plummeted back down to the single digits on and off, but we are slowly shifting towards spring here. Finally got pictures of the street sprinklers in action; see attached.

Driving in Japan

One of the more jarring/disturbing/counter-intuitive aspects of living here in the winter is the way that some roads are cleared and maintained during and after a snowfall. On many main town roads, such as the one that runs right outside of my house, there is a line of sprinklers that runs down the middle of the road. They're pretty small and unobtrusive (you can drive over them, obviously), but when there's a snowfall or freezing conditions these sprinklers spring into action, spritzing water onto the street.

"But wait," you say, "Water? On the ROAD!? When it's FREEZING?"
Yes, water. The roads are on a slight slant from the sprinklers in the middle down to drains on either side. Water is sprayed, it rolls down the sides of the road, and then it falls off. It's not terribly warm water, but perhaps my friend the Physics Ph.D./Duke Alexander B. Crew can tell you that if water is moving swiftly enough it won't freeze—and what's more, thanks to water's high heat capacity, even relatively cool water can still facilitate the melting of any snow on the road. It moves, it melts, and it's disturbing as hell to drive on—but in practice, it's a big step up from the rest of the roads.

Plowing is infrequent at best (I don't believe I've seen a plow yet, merely snow piles—evidence of their wake), and salting/sanding is unheard of, so if it's not one of the magical watery routes, it's more than a little harrowing to get around. Particularly on back country roads, normally so narrow that 2-way traffic is cautious as best; the roads might be cleared, but their new form is narrow enough with snowbanks as to make 2-way traffic all but impossible. I quickly learned this my first day back, with many a roadside pull-over to let traffic pass on the way to work.

Oh, and parking lots are similarly neglected much of the time—my usual spot, a short walk from my house, was one of the neglected, and my second day back was kicked off by 20 fruitless minutes spent trying to simply get my car out of its spot. The snow that was already underneath the wheels combined with another foot of accumulation overnight to make my itty-bitty Vivian strain and groan with no release. Eventually an unknown good Samaritan came and helped push from behind as I finally got off the snowfield and onto the street for another round of wet, slow going. At least all of the white stuff everywhere made for some pretty scenery.

How Japan Deals with Cold Weather

Let me start by saying that Japan (at least, my part of Japan) has a very poor concept of insulation, and no concept of central heating (at least, not out in the countryside, and especially not in my 40-year-old house). With that, my living arrangements have shifted from a 4-room house with a kitchen to a 2-room arrangement with a very cold kitchen, as I close off the compartments to save on heating expense.

The one upshot of the lack of central heating is the prevalence in homes of the (somewhat legendary) kotatsu. For the uninitiated, you can check Wikipedia for a full explanation. Short version: think table, with a blanket covering every side, and a heater underneath. Think warm pocket of air trapped underneath the table. Think warm legs…think of how inviting it is to slide further under and warm your body…think of how easy it is from there to drift off to blissful, toasty slumber…that's the power and beauty of kotatsu.

So, while my days in school (don't even get me started on the hallways) tend to be cold, my evenings at home are generally nothing short of wonderful. Throw in the occasional hot bath (another cultural artifact in Japan that is under appreciated in the states), and you have a recipe for warmth and happiness in the cool Tottori winter.

The winter is not all that bad, by the way—coming from the still North and hill winds of Dartmouth, Tottori is downright pleasant much of the time. With the recent uptick in temperature (up around 10 degrees Celsius), the snow has swiftly melted off and the area has again taken on more of a late-fall flavor (though I'm hoping the ski mountains maintain a chillier climate for obvious reasons). I imagine we're due for more snow and colder weather now that February has come, but I could see why people who live around here are not too driven to insulate and heat more effectively.

Yakisoba in Wakasa

From my town of Funaoka, Wakasa is maybe a 20-25 minute drive away. Another JET lives there, and as I'm the closest to her and Japanese-competent (she's just started learning), she invited me to go with her to one of her town's restaurants for yakisoba.

She lives in a small town, the sort where your neighbors will ask you about the veggies you got at the grocery store last Friday, and had heard from one of her coworkers that this yakisoba place was THE place to go for yakisoba. So we went, ate, chatted up the couple that mans the grill, nothing too extraordinary.

...Her students have yet to stop asking her about her "boyfriend," and this was a few months ago now! What's more, when I was on a trip with my co-workers one weekend after the fact, we ran into a similar tour group from Wakasa and I was introduced to their principal at one point. "Oh!" He goes. "You're the one that got yakisoba with Marianne-sensei!"

School Culture Festivals

This was a while back (before the election), but I went to culture day activities for both of my middle schools on consecutive weekends in early November.

The schools were very different in what they put on—while one of my schools had myriad performances (including taiko drumming, koto playing, and, during lunchtime, tea ceremony), the other one centered largely on plays that were put on by both of the 9th grade classes. They were pretty hilarious to follow; both were based off of the well-known American stories, Snow White and Alice in Wonderland (apparently not well-known in Japan), and both had great twists from the students. My personal favorites from each: a scene at the end of Snow White in which the prince and Snow White duke it out with the witch and her henchmen to the battle theme from Final Fantasy 7 (and with similar arrangments of the characters on either side of the stage), and a scene at the start of Alice in Wonderland in which Alice's sister reads her a story—in this case, Spirited Away, as a dozen students run out on stage and act out various scenes simultaneously.

Both schools ended the day with a chorus competition, as each class performs the school anthem and another song of their choosing. I got to help with the judging at one school, and at the other I got to jump in on the singing (which was a unique challenge—sight read music I'd only practiced twice before, in hiragana. I would pick my spots to jump in with full voice, and spent most of the rest of the time following a half-second behind the guy singing next to me in a weaker voice). Events culminated with the best class receiving a prize (mostly bragging rights)…pretty entertaining on the whole.

Obamawesome.

ALL of my students of course know "Obama" at this point (though I enjoy asking them to tell me his first name: "…ba…la-ku?"), and everybody knows the "Yes we can" chant. It's kind of hilarious and adorable, especially when my elementary school students whip it out on me. Way back when Obama won the election, the following week at an enkai (banquet) my kocho-sensei (principal) ended his toast for the previous day's culture festival with "I know this is supposed to be about culture day, but…'Yes we can!'" and we all toasted to "Yes we can!"

If you're stuck stateside and have any doubts about the man, know that his election = instant credibility in the international community.