いってきます - I'm going and coming back

I've learned more in the past few months than I could comprehend, explain, or sum up and I feel like the Japanese culture far exceeds any type of living that I've ever experienced… I'll fly back home soon in a week and do what I'm expected to do in America but it's not really going to be the same..  As it's starting to get cooler here with a decrease in temperature I have to understand that I'm flying back to lots of snow, and I'm not looking forward to that.  I’m also just not looking forward to going back to my American lifestyle and facing reality.  I've made Hirakata Japan my home and wish for more than anything that I could have more time here. Some of my views and outlooks on life have changed dramatically and I’ve started to adapt to different perspectives.  My impressions of Japan have wondered and changed more in the last month as I feel like I can finally stand my ground here.  When I first arrived I was fixated around the fact that I stood out and would get noticed for having blonde hair and being a foreigner, I didn’t like that people would point and stare. And although standing out was intimidating and challenging in the beginning, I was able to quickly adapt and blend in with everyone else with time.  And with the more Japanese I learned and could use throughout daily conversations, the more comfortable I felt with my surroundings. After being able to understand and pronounce commonly used words and expressions, the development of the rest of the language followed naturally to me. Being able to communicate with Japanese people was a great advantage, giving me confidence and allowing me to experience what the country had to offer first hand.

I’m upset that I’m leaving at the peak of my fluency and comfort.  I’m sad that I’ll be leaving all of my new friends that I’ve made from all over the world.  I’m sad that I won’t be able to eat authentic Japanese food whenever I want to, or bike to Kapa sushi at my convenience.  I’m sad that I’ll be leaving behind my Japanese roommate who has taught me so much about the culture and has influenced me beyond her knowledge.  This list could go on and on and I could talk about all the things that I’ll miss but in the end it’s not really the end.  I’ve learned that I’d really like to come back and live and work in Japan at some point.  I’m so thankful to have had the opportunity of this study abroad experience and want to encourage other students to travel and open their minds up to other cultures. When you really just emerge yourself in the culture that you’re living in, that’s what gives the value to your abroad experience.  “When one looks back over human existence, however, it is very evident that all cultures has developed through an initial resistance against adaptation to the reality in which man finds himself.” – Beatrice Hinkle

Hipu Hopu

Music has been important to me all my life. I love singing, I love dancing, and I love exploring anything that influences me. I can say that I like some country and rock, but I’ve always gravitated towards the genre of hip/hop and rap.  That being said, for the last four months I have been surrounded by the increasingly popular culture of hip-hop here in Japan and I didn’t hesitate diving right into the scene.

 

This picture to the right was taken on my first night out ‘clubbing’ in Osaka.  After a couple hours they stopped the DJ and about five different rappers came on stage and started performing.  It was an awesome surprise because none of us knew that there was going to be a rap battle and we were right up front to see it!

 

I have always wanted to learn how to DJ and who knew that I could make this dream come true right in Japan!  After listening to one of my friends spin at a small and local bar right in front of Kansai Gaidai’s main gate I was hooked.  So I asked my friend if he could teach me and then followed it up with the manager of the club who was more than happy to let me play with the records and the equipment.  It’s been a great opportunity being able to practice and being able to share my music with everyone else!

I gave a presentation on Japanese hip-hop for another class and really learned about the influence and effect that it’s had on people throughout the last decade.  From the break dancing to the rise of DJ-ing and rapping, the Japanese have fully adopted hip-hop as a culture to fit what they feel, see, and live.  Every culture evolves over time and for something as great and influential as hip-hop, I think it’s a given that it will continue to affect different parts of the world.

This Post is for your Convenient

What I meant by, ‘This Post is for your Convenient,’ is exactly what I meant.  It might not sound so grammatically correct to native English speakers like myself, but you can still understand the context and message behind it.  I could have written, ‘for your convenience,’ but that defeats the purpose of the topic of this post.  I’ve noticed that the longer I’ve been in Japan and the more I study Japanese, the farther I stray away from using correct English.  Not so much that I’m forgetting how to speak English all together, but mixing both Japanese and English have put me in situations where I’m left puzzled at what just came out of my mouth.  Like if I say, “grocery store I go with bike now,” I will have really meant to of said I’m going to the grocery store by bike now.  The words might be mixed up in the wrong order but you get the gist of it.  The use to English can come in unexpected forms in any foreign country.  I’ve learned that a lot of people label grammatically incorrect English as ‘Engrish,’ which can be seen quite frequently throughout Japan in the way people speak and as it is written down.

 

 

I came across this sign in a bathroom in Tokyo one afternoon and snapped a picture of it because I thought it was one of the greater uses of English that I had seen so far in Japan.   I happened to be in a handicap bathroom because the rest of the stalls were taken and was drawn to the sign immediately as it was right in front of me.  Most handicap bathrooms will have an emergency button in the stall in case of an accident and I’m use to seeing, ‘press this button in case of an emergency,’ or just simply, ‘push here for help.’  Just seeing this sign caught me off guard because I found that the words used to express the message were out of the norm for me.  You’re not necessarily depressed if you’re feeling bad in this bathroom stall, but might need to PRESS the button if you are!

 Good looks?

F e S t I v I t I e S

There is so much beauty that can be found within the human spirit and this energy can be contagious when we are encouraged to be apart of something.  Besides the established public holidays that are officially marked down on the Japanese calendar in an effort to stimulate the economy, there are many other festivals and gatherings that celebrate historical tradition, culture, and even lighter and simplistic aspects of life in Japan.  I have always been one to enjoy celebrations and the festivals that I’ve been to in Japan have completely blown me away.  Since my stay here thus far, my favorite festival that I attended was the Daimonji Gozen Fire Festival in Kyoto.  “Records from the beginning of the Edo era show that the Daimonji Festival was already in existence, and it is said that the tradition originated when the monk Kobo-Daishi, praying for an end to plague, lit up the character representing 'large' in flame.”  The fires are lit as a way of guiding spirits from the dead back to the Buddhist Pure Land (Kyoto City Web).  It had been raining all day and my friends and I had been contemplating whether or not it was a good idea to travel all that way to only watch the rain put the fire away…  However, we were informed that it was not going to get cancelled and as we were so interested in seeing kanji characters get lit on fire, we decided to go!  And the rain was by no means of hindrance!

 

Daimonji Gozan Fire Festival in Kyoto.  August 16, 2011

We arrived too late to watch the kanji get lit up in the mountains, but there was enough fire in ‘large’ amounts for us to experience.  It was an incredible sight to see!

 

Although I wouldn't consider a ‘ramen show’ to follow along the lines of a historical ceremony, it can be looked at as a renown celebration.  Every year, the most famous ramen shops from around the country gather together and host the Tokyo Ramen Show.  I just so happened to be in the right area of Tokyo the weekend that it was being held and got to encounter the local specialties of 27 different booths of ramen noodles.  There were thousands of people at the show indulging in famous ramen, shopping in the gift shop tents, drinking beer, singing, and most importantly just enjoying life.

Komazawa Olympic Park

 

 

Takii Station

When we were each assigned a train station to visit on the Keihan line, I didn't have a preference as to what station to venture.  I did however know that I wanted to explore an area that I hadn't been to yet, so I kind of just closed my eyes and picked a random station.  The random station that I chose was Takii Station, located in the city of Moriguchi in Osaka prefecture.  I liked the name of it because it was short and simple to pronounce.  And also as simple of a straight shot it was suppost to be to get to this station with no transfers, I still managed to get lost.  I got on a limited express cart which did not stop at my station and took me beyond where I needed to be.  I always seem to make things more complicated for myself!  I realized that I needed to be on a local train which stops at every station so I went back the other way and did it right the next time around.  When I first stepped off at Takii station I felt like I was in the middle of nowhere.  There was no one around me and the station was so small.

There was actually one man sitting and waiting on the side of my tracks who looked foreign and I wanted to understand why he was at this what seemed to be 'ghost station.'  With some awkward eye contact I think he thought the same thing.  I said hello and after he replied with a hello in English I felt comfortable talking to him about my study of the station and asked him what brought him to Takii.  He said that he was shopping at Sembayashi Shotengai, which is a popular shopping street next door located right outside of the Sembayashi train station.  He went shopping to kill time before he met up with a friend for dinner at a ramen restaurant right outside of Takii Station.  When I got out of the train station to do some exploring on my own I was a little scared.  The neighborhood didn't feel safe and there was graffiti drawn all around the station.  There was nothing around except for a few restaurants and I could see that Sembayashi was right down the street.

Being an artsy person though, I really liked the graffiti and thought that it added character to the small city.  Japan has the reputation of being a very clean country so it was interesting for me to see that this neighborhood did not really fit the mold.

Pikachu

When filling out my housing application to live in one of the seminar houses at Kansai Gaidai, I asked if I could live with a Japanese roommate.  I figured that having a roommate from the country that I wanted to explore would give me a great source of cultural insight, so when I first arrived to Japan and found that my request was approved I was more than ecstatic!  Yuko Suziki greeted me with a smile and was eager to talk to me in English.  There is nothing negative I could ever think of when describing Yuko.  She’s polite, driven, kind, outgoing, and very organized.  She is always considerate of me and the rest of our suite roommates and goes out of her way to cook Japanese food for us.  It’s great that she’s enthusiastic about my interest in Japanese and get’s really excited when I learn new phrases from class and am able to add them to our daily conversations.  Yuko grew up in a Buddist temple, so as you can imagine she had a very traditional Japanese upbringing.   

But my roommate has broken all of my stereotypes about what exactly a typical Japanese person may be. Yuko is one of the funniest people I have encountered in Japan.  She is always laughing and making jokes and everything about her is silly.  She surprises me everyday with her awesome sense of humor, especially because cross-cultural jokes don't always go over well.  When I brought home a Pikachu mask and explained to her that it would be my Halloween costume, we both cracked up about it and continued to joke around about our share love for Pikachu.   

Easygoing is a perfect way to describe her, yet at the same time she manages to be extremely driven.  She commits countless hours to studying, to oncampus clubs, and to her part time job. Yuko is an exceptional human being and I consider myself very lucky to count her as one of my best friends here.  The fact that she’s Japanese helps me appreciate the culture in a more personal light and gives me the opportunity to learn through her emic view of her own country in which she grew up.

In the Hood

The neighborhood in Hirakata that I've been living in has a name that is quite difficult for me to pronounce.  But I can say that Katahokohigashimachi has been a very inviting community and I feel safe within my surroundings.  When I ride my "Jitensha," or bike around, I find that it's almost impossible for me to pass a civilian without wanting to say 'o ha yo go za i ma s,' good morning, 'co ni chi wa,' good afternoon, or 'kon ban wa,' good evening.  One of my favorite places to ride my bike is the path along the canal right near our seminar house.

 

When you follow this path it leads to Makino train station and also to one of my favorite parks.  We call it cat kingdom park because there are wild cats that hang out everywhere.  It has one of the biggest lakes in the area and the scenery is beautiful when the sun sets.

This is a picture of my friend Tommy petting one of the cats at the park.  

It shows that they are comfortable inviting us into their "kingdom."

Where ever I go in this neighborhood even if it's just on the way to school, I can appreciate the simple differences like the architectural styles of Katahokohigashimachi buildings to what I'm use to back home.  The only thing that concerns me is how narrow the roads are.  It's difficult maneuvering around cars when you are walking or cycling and have no room to the side of you. 

 

This picture is of one of the main roads leading up to school from the seminar houses 

Despite this, I am impressed with the precision of the drivers; they always seem so close to hitting people or things but never actually do.  All in all, I know that I'm in a comfortable area and this helps me with my overall adaptation process here in Japan!

Early Impressions of Japan

It hadn't hit me yet that I was no longer staring out of an airplane window of what seemed to be an endless trip across the sea.   When I first arrived in Japan, my initial consciousness of there being a language barrier didn't seem to affect me in a negative way at all.  I was more excited than nervous to be out of my comfort zone and was ready to start exploring right away.  When I got to Kansai Gaidai University and moved into housing, I was thrilled to find out that I’d be sharing a room with a Japanese roommate!  She was so interested in getting to know me while practicing her English, I immediately felt comfortable practicing my Japanese as well!  She explained to me that she was leaving for Hawaii for a week because she was still on vacation but wanted to cook her favorite meal for me as soon as she got back.

While my roommate went off on her own adventure in my home country, I decided to explore Japan on my own.  Well, not really on my own… I was with several other international students, but none of us were accustom to the area.  I think one of my favorite introductions into the culture was when we made our way into Kyoto our second weekend after figuring out how the transportation system worked.  We had a beautiful weekend and did a ton of sightseeing!

Women dressed as Geishas right outside of Kiyomizu Temple in Kyoto.

I’ve been told that are many shops in Japan where curious tourists can go and have makeup applied and dress in traditional Geisha Kimonos to experience the culture first hand. 

As promised, my roommate came back from Hawaii and made a delicious (oishii) meal =) Okonomiyaki !!  It’s a tasty Japanese grilled pancake mixed with ingredients including shredded cabbage, bacon, vegetables, eggs, flour, dashi, and I can’t remember what else but it was sooooo good!  Japanese food has always been my favorite and I know that I won’t have any problems while I’m here if I continue eating spectacular meals like this one!