Thursday, October 23, 2008

Pictures

Purple Flowers

Random Summer Pictures

Random Summer Pictures II

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I'm finally feeling better about the Japan thing. I knew I would start the climb back up the culture shock curve at some point, I just wasn't sure when.

I think what did it was getting the chance to talk to talk to several other JETs at the practice day for Mid-Year Seminar. Almost every single Shizuoka JET who is in their second year or longer was together on Tuesday. I took some pictures because we are so rarely together, and I haven't seen some of those people since last years' MYS. I got to talk to so many people about what I was thinking about Japan and being an ALT and recontracting and my school...it was great to get to run some things through out loud and to hear from other people how they were doing.

That played a big part. And talking to someone who was real and not having to fake something for appearances, or worry about how I was going to come across.

And a big part of it was a simple reminder from my friend Will that my faith is strong enough for me to stand on. I was on my knees yesterday morning before rushing off to school giving it all up and asking God to cover all of my needs.

I was actually relaxed at work for the day. I read articles about Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz. Today I read a bunch of my Politics of U.S. Foreign Policy textbook. Gotta be well read for that FSOT. (And I finished Airframe by Michael Crichton tonight...not quite sure how that helped...)

So yes, I'm feeling much better. I feel ready again to take on the world. I got 7 1/2 weeks now until I'm on a plane back home and before then I got a long weekend in Tokyo, 2 days in Kakegawa, a longer weekend in Tokyo, a long weekend in Hiroshima, and 5 days in Nagasaki. The rest of the time is just filler.

It will be interesting to go back on all these blogs and plot the culture shock curve. Or the "missing home" curve. Or the "Luther's feeling sorry for himself" curve. Or the "lonely" curve. The loneliness hasn't left necessarily, I'm just ok with it. It's not like I've isolated myself - sometimes it's possible to be alone even when you're surrounded by lots of people.

Well, hopefully I can come up with some good stories for you. I should at least write down a list of story starters - some "1-liner ignition." I have a million things to tell you, and most of them will come up in moments ignited by asides; not finding any towels in a public bathroom, passing by a tree in bloom, the smell of fish in the air, students in uniform or the sound of a crossing signal. Anything could start them off. I want to hold on to moments though and call them back to you at anytime. Not that you want to know, but I know, I don't want to forget.

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Monday, October 20, 2008

Lyrics

Ingrid Michaelson - Far Away

I will live my life as a lobsterman's wife on an island in the blue bay.
He will take care of me, he will smell like the sea,
And close to my heart he'll always stay.

I will bear three girls all with strawberry curls, little Ella and
Nelly and Faye.
While I'm combing their hair, I will catch his warm stare
On our island in the blue bay.

Far away far away, I want to go far away.
To a new life on a new shore line.
Where the water is blue and the people are new.
To another island, in another life.

There's a boy next to me and he never will be anything but a boy at the bar.
And I think he's the tops, he's where everything stops.
How I love to love him from afar.

When he walks right pass me then I finally see on this bar stool I can't stay.
So I'm taking my frown to a far distant town
On an island in the blue bay.

Far away far away, I want to go far away.
To a new life on a new shore line.
Where the water is blue and the people are new.
To another island, in another life.

I want to go far away.
Away away, I want to go far away, away, away
I want to go far away, far away.

Where the water is blue and the people are new.
To another life, to another life.
To another shore line
In another life.

Thursday, October 16, 2008

A gone day

People say to me, "Good Morning" on my way to work and "Good Evening" when I'm on my way home.

I think the reason why Japanese people bow to each other instead of shaking hands is because they don't wash their hands after going to the bathroom. And I mean ladies and gentlemen, #1 and #2. It's really disgusting. It baffles me and grosses me out every time I'm in the bathroom washing my hands and someone comes out of a stall and just walks right back into the teachers room. And I know that's guys and girls because the little girls' room is inside the men's bathroom. Most public places don't have soap and I know 99.9% of the population doesn't carry a pump-style bottle of dial in their pocket. We at least have soap at school - the nurse started an initiative several months back to put soap by the sinks - but I don't think the bottle has even needed to be refilled yet due to infrequent use. And I've even seen the nurse walk out of the bathroom without washing her hands.

I seriously considered playing hooky today. It was sooo nice out. And the sun was already below the horizon on my bike ride home. It's testing week so I had no classes today. I get to sit at my desk and let my mind wander... Like that book about an ALT, Tonoharu. I still hear it in my mother's voice as she read the first few pages to me over skype. She sent it to me later. It's pretty gosh-darn, dead on accurate. CLAIR should buy a copy for every JET participant and send it to them before they arrive.

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On a clear day in Kambara you can see Fujisan thrusting high into the air, immense on the horizon. I often see just the top of Mt. Fuji over the various hills and factories that inhabit my town. But biking over on the river side I can see all of Fuji - from my feet all the way to its snow dusted top. Today I was biking to lunch and looking at the horizon where there was a wall of cumulus clouds in the North and East. It wasn't a high wall, but it was enough to completely cover the mountain. It was then that I suddenly realized how big the sky is. Here I'd been contemplating the immensity of Fuji, only to find it masked by a thin stretch of clouds covering only a fraction of the sky. I looked up and saw a brilliant blue. (Blue? That is definitely the color I would choose to paint the sky if I were a surrealist.) And then I looked around at the different shades as sky faded towards horizon. The sky is huge! I mean, you can't even see it all if you keep your eyes in one place.

I definitely want to come home. I'm really glad I booked a ticket to come back for 19 days in December. But I want to be back for good. I'm homesick. Probably the most homesick I've been since I've been in Japan. I am having fun here and there's no way I would break contract and come home - there's too many things I need to see and do still while I'm over here. But I know that I don't want to be here as an ALT forever. This is just a temporary thing. I'm ready to move on to the next phase in my life.

And I'd like to be able to do the hobbies I enjoyed back home: playing catch with a football, playing disc golf, lifting weights, not being 30 minutes to an hour-and-a-half commute from friends. And I'd like to be able to communicate with unlimited possibility with the people around me. I'm so hampered by my situation. When I get home I'm going to be talking silly to just about everyone.

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Wednesday, October 8, 2008

words

"I'm walking with something sharp in my shoe, smokin' like I always do."

Is there anything better than rain on your roof?

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Saturday, October 4, 2008

Later

Men who age. Women who strut their stuff. Young high school girls in skirts with hair on their legs. This is the sound of moving; this is the sound of coming home.

I made the decision to come back for good at the end of this year. It's not a hard decision because I don't sign my name to anything until February. But this thought has started a movement within me, slow gears of power in their steady acceleration. Just having an end date in sight has started this shift. I now have some kind of overall goal. Before I was just lackadaisically moving through time in Japan thinking "well, I'm going to be here again, I'm going to be here next year, I'm going to be here indefinitely" and that thinking gave me no spunk (oh no, Sarah Palin's vocabulary is filtering into mine...), no drive. But now, well now, I have things to do! I'm going to be home in 10 months! I gotta see the world! I gotta make friends! I have to appreciate each moment, never miss a weekend, never miss a day, never pass on a chance to see the ocean.

And I'm coming home over Christmas again. Yeah. It's good. I just paid for my plane ticket.

Sometimes I think these posts are really insufficient. Heck, I know they are. I should somehow be able to capture all of this into words, into a photograph, mold them into a living breathing thing and mail it home. (I'd poke holes in the box). What can hold this experience? Not even my own brain, I forget so much of it.

Thinking about coming home has made me understand that I am going to miss this place sooo much after I'm back. Even every crazy and awesome thing aside, I'm going to miss my ocean, my block, my neighborhood. My view. The chance to jog up into the hills and look over the vastness of the ocean and see how the world curves down over the horizon. There are so many things that are just uniquely here.

I'm moving along with a steady future now. That has made me a lot happier.

A couple of mandates to add:
-Invite often and invite early.
-Before you can be resentful you must first be unsatisfied with what you have.

I'm so tired. I gotta quit typing things.

Luther

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Loving, moving, smuthing, soothing - get it out, round it out, run away, find a way - let's make tomorrow another day - I wish you well, I wish you on, fourteen years, gone.

Westward. Onward. Westward-ho. I see another, so make it so. Let's see beauty, let's see pain, sometimes they're one and the same. I'll read about it, I'll tell you so, then throw back the covers and let is show - we're moving forward, moving on, and I'll break for the morning if our night is gone.

Rising, breathing, taising, seething - mad is for the hapless, sad will take the rain, holy father what's the game? I've thought about it, I got a lot, and where my hand breaks - I'm letting go.......................g...o...n...e.

Wednesday, October 1, 2008

Taking a Poop

And by the way, why do we use the verb "take?" Usually when you take, you gain something. But here...well, you know.

I felt the urge sitting at my desk (shitting at my desk, as the Japanese would say - they pronounce "si" as "shi" - it's quite funny when you come across "City Apartments." In my town's case, they really are...) so I wasn't shitting yet but needed too, so I headed off to my regular stall, the one with a western style toilet seat. I took one step into the bathroom and saw that the janitor was cleaning at that moment. It was really quite unlucky because usually the kids have to do all the cleaning around the school and they only do that after 6th hour or before school if they get in trouble for something. (And here "trouble" means they shaved their eyebrows or touched a motorcycle or something like that.) So our bathroom was getting its semesterly cleaning. Great. I'll have to find another western seat.

Now, I don't mind the squatters. They're actually quite conducive for the intended activity; however, I wanted to take a bit of a rest, maybe a nap, so I headed off. I went to the guests' bathroom on the other side of the building, a place that I thought was a duplicate of the teacher's bathroom upstairs. And I think it is except for the space between the front of the western toilet bowl and the divider to the next stall. I didn't quite know what to make of the situation upon opening the door. I had to like, pull my pants down while at the same time start to sit, then slide the whole get-up over the seat, timing everything to come down at the same time so that I fit with pants around my ankles. Having squeezed into this position I now found my legs spread to the point of straining and my nose literally 3 inches from the divider. And I couldn't scoot back any further otherwise I'd miss over the backside.

I started jogging about 3 weeks ago and with it, started stretching too and now I'm really glad. I don't think I could have done it without my recent gains in flexibility. Coming up after business hours was quite the time as well - I celebrated my success by laboriously tucking my dress shirt into my skin tight uniqlo pants. The Japanese didn't account for my Scandinavian muscles when they designed their clothes, and they certainly didn't design that toilet stall for a Western-style toilet. Go inaka.


(PS - That's "countryside" for all you living outside Japan. Which really means, that's for my mom and my great-grandma, the only people who read my blog...lol)


Goodnight. So much for that 10 o'clock thing.

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