Back from Retirement

(Kyoto Tower. It's kind of like the Space Needle. That is, if the Space Needle was universally hated by every Seattleite.)

First, I should apologize for my blogging hiatus for the two months. Do you remember when Dave Chappelle went crazy with his fame and fled to Africa without telling anyone for a year? Well, it was like that for me. Except I'm not famous, I didn't actually go anywhere, and it was only for October and November. Actually, a Japanese celebrity did this recently, too. Asashoryu, a sumo champion, apparently went crazy with the pressure and returned to his native Mongolia. He was supposed to be convalescing, but he injured himself playing soccer (the Japanese media caught it on tape). He is coming back to compete again, but his honor is forever tarnished.

Since I don't really have any one thing worth talking about, I will just continue to ramble aimlessly on a variety of topics until you run out of patience.

Point Cards:

Yeah, that's right, point cards are at the top of the list. Of all the inscrutable aspects of Japanese culture (Hello Kitty, Maid Cafes, Hostess Bars, seasonal KitKats, and pizza with mayonnaise on it come to mind), point cards top the list for me. For some reason, Japanese people don't think they are getting a good deal unless they are receiving points for it, or at least a stamp on their card. Frustratingly, though, they are never worth the trouble / plastic they are made from. My first experience with this custom took place at the Kyoto Station's Subway (sandwich restaurant, not the underground transportation system). I was with several other JETs, and one of them was very excited. She only was able to come to Subway rarely, and this time she would finally fill out her punch card of ten sandwiches. God knows how long it took her to buy ten Subway sandwiches given the fact that there is only the one Subway in the whole prefecture. And considering that each sandwich is probably about 5-6 dollars, she was looking at a 50-60 dollar investment. After eating her tenth sandwich, she excitedly went back in line to redeem her bonus sandwich. Turns out, however, that ten sandwiches don't buy you a free sandwich, but rather 10% off your next purchase. In summary, she spent on the order of 60 dollars in receive a one time 60 cent discount. Living as a foreigner in Japan is all about the small victories, and to see this JET's victory turn into her Waterloo was heartbreaking.

I can relate. I have a dry-cleaning point card (dry cleaning is everywhere in Japan, so I chose the one with best sounding name: "Carnival." It's like the circus is always in town, and they also clean your shirts). This point card has a complicated system, so do the math with me. Every time I spend 100 yen (about a dollar) I receive 1 point. When I get 150 points, I can redeem them for a 500 yen discount off my next purchase. 150 X 100 yen = 15,000 yen (150 dollars) = 500 yen discount. So basically, after I spend 150 dollars at this particular dry cleaning establishment, I get five dollars back. Hell yeah! That's like 3% off all my dry cleaning. But wait, it gets better. I get 10%(!) off all my dry cleaning on my birthday. Screw the bars and parties, I know where I am going when June 22 rolls around.

I have one more point card (I could easily have fifteen if I had a mind to apply for them). It is for the supermarket, Kitano, that I frequent. I get 1 point for every 100 yen I spend (exclusive of tax). Every point I accumulate counts as 1 yen towards a future purchase. I have currently about 650 or so points in the bank (enough to buy a cheap six-pack). 650 X 100 yen= 65,000 total yen spent. For a 1% discount, is it even worth me getting the card out of my wallet? Japan says "yes," and so do I.

Edinburgh:

Promptly following my adventure in the great state of Oklahoma (boomer sooner), I returned to find that preparations were frantic for the arrival of a delegation from Edinburgh, including the Lord Provost (Mayor) and his wife. We were celebrating the anniversary of the friendship relationship between Edinburgh and Kyoto with a museum gallery exhibition related to Scotland and Edinburgh, as well as taking the Lord Provost around the prefecture to see the sights. I am not a interpreter, let me point that out right away. However, there was a ton of stuff going on at the time with the Edinburgh delegation, the museum exhibition, and random other stuff that was occurring at the same time, so I ended up interpreting. Worst moment: I was part of an incident that involved the Lord Provost cutting the ribbon during the ceremony to open the museum exhibit a full second or so before the other two ribbon-cutters (the governor and the head of the prefectural legislature). Technically my interpretation wasn't incorrect, but let's just say it led to a misunderstanding. Actually, I don't really want to talk about it.

Best moment: I ended up interpreting for a tour guide at the Kyoto Guest House. The Kyoto Guest House is on the same grounds as the old Imperial Palace in the center of Kyoto, but was only built something like ten years ago. It's a huge complex built with modern techniques in order to make it look like it was done in an old style (Howard Roark would hate it). Germany's Prime Minister Merkel was recently there, and so was George W. a few years ago. You can see it on Google Earth at (35° 1'29.68"N 135°45'55.01"E). If you do look at it on Google Earth you will notice that it is still under construction in the satellite image. Also, you will notice that in contrast to the Imperial Palace slightly to the left, there are no photographs of the Guest House. That is because the public is not allowed in, and photographs are forbidden. We had to go through security before being allowed inside. I wish I could have taken pictures because it was absolutely beautiful. The attention to detail was remarkable in such a huge complex. There were people from the Edinburgh College of Art there as well, and their expert opinion was pretty much "wow."

While I have Google Earth open, my workplace is (35° 1'15.56"N 135°45'17.73"E).

Tokyo:

A few weeks ago I went to Tokyo for the CIR mid-year training seminar. That was for two days, but I spent the whole week there, staying with my old host family. It was weird to see all the same sights that I used to see every day, but haven't seen in several years. I forgot how much I like Tokyo. Kyoto is a great city with a load of culture and a good amount of sightseeing as well as city life amenities (bars), but Tokyo is like something out of this world. The scope of the city is just beyond imagining. Kyoto is organized on an orderly grid-like pattern based on Chinese notions of geomancy, and also has a restriction on buildings over a certain height so as to preserve its old-world charms. Tokyo on the other hand is enormous in all three dimensions, and seems to have expanded haphazardly without any kind of plan at all. The narrow streets are all at odd angles to each other, tall buildings limit your view to that which is immediately surrounding you, and even the system by which addresses are assigned is erratic. Rather than assign street and house numbers by geography (starting with low numbers in the south, for example, and going up as you go north), Tokyo assigns them by chronology, i.e. the newest buildings have the highest numbers. Therefore finding anything, even if you have the address, involves walking into the general area, and wandering from map to map (Tokyo has maps placed on its streets to help those who are lost) until you are close. Then you find a police box, which is a mini police station (more like a kiosk), and ask the cops to give you directions. That seems to be the main function of the police in Tokyo. I used to like Tokyo the best, then I found an appreciation for Kyoto, but now I couldn't tell you which is better.

(Taken from the Tokyo government office building. The view is similar no matter which direction you look. That, my friends, is a big city. )

Books:

I have read a lot of English books since arriving in Kyoto. My predecessor left some for me, and I have been utilizing Project Gutenberg (http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page) to get free books whose copyrights have run out. I also, uh, don't have a TV (which I get a ton of flak for, coincidentally, people in this country just don't trust you unless you have a TV). Also, due to their prohibitive price and all-around scarcity, foreigners in Japan don't really choose the books they read so much as those books fall into their laps.

Books read since coming to Kyoto:

"Lucky Jim" by Kingsley Amis - Very funny book, in a very (very) dry British way. Lots of cigarettes, pints of beer, and jokes about stuffy intellectuals.

"Shooting History" by Jon Snow - Apparently Jon Snow is like a big name in British journalism, or something. I have never heard of him (although I also have never heard of the jewelry company Cartier, which I guess is a capital crime). This book is an autobiography of this journalist, tracing his career through the major events to shake the world since the 60's. Interesting to read about recent history through the lens of another country.

"Treasure Island" by Robert Louis Stevenson - In Oklahoma we stayed at a Country Inn and Suites. They have a promotion wherein guests can take books from the lobby collection with the promise that they will return them to another Country Inn the next time they stay at one. The theory is that if each Country Inn has a different set of books, then soon there will be a wide variety of literature at each location. I wonder how many of these "Country Inn presents" books are in Japan. Probably just two.

"Wuthering Heights" by Emily Bronte - Ditto. But don't worry, I will return them the next time I stay at a Country Inn and Suites.

"The World is Flat" by Thomas Friedman - A pretty stunning defense of globalization. Thomas Friedman always writes my favorite articles in the NY times and I recommend this book to anyone with an interest in the subject. When I was taking the Edinburgh delegation to the airport on their way back (I had to wake up at like 4:30 on a Saturday to do it), one of the members was complaining about the outsourcing of Scottish services to Indian call centers. I recommended this book. So if you see a spate of globalizing measures from Scotland in the near future, you'll know who to thank (blame).

"Harry Potter" numbers six and seven by J.K. Rowling - I don't know what to say, I am weak. I read these books like an alcoholic falls off the wagon. I try to stay away from them for as long as I can on principle, but in the end I have to admit I am powerless against them. When my kids find out that I liked the series, though, I can't decide if they will be horrified that I fell victim to the fad (like finding old pictures of your parents in bell bottoms, or that your older brother liked Vanilla Ice), or if they will be impressed that I was able to read them as soon as they came out (like finding out that your parents saw the Beatles in concert).

"Flatland" by Edwin Abbot - Some of the oldest science fiction I have ever read (1884). But unlike the Jules Verne adventures I think this is book holds up better. It's about a entity that lives in a universe with only two dimensions. The narrator explains all of the social and political implications that arise from having only two-dimensions. An entity from a universe of three-dimensions then tries to explain how limited his world is, and then shows him the universes of one-dimensionality and zero-dimensionality. It doesn't have the pizazz of dinosaurs and giant squid that Verne had, but it still remains an undated and interesting read (not to mention a good take on culture shock).

"Crime and Punishment" by Fyodor Dostoevsky - I was talking to my fellow JET friend, and he mentioned that he, too, read this after coming to Japan. Not the best of decisions, we both decided. The book is about a young Russian student who leaves school, lives in a tiny cupboard of an apartment, feels alienated and unable to communicate with the society around him, becomes irritable with even his own family, lives increasingly in his own head, and ends up killing an old pawnbroker. Um... moving right along....

Work:

Work has certainly slowed down since Edinburgh ended. I was supposed to spend all of my Fridays at the Prefectural International Center, but because everything was so busy, I have only been there a handful of times. I have been told I will be writing a blog from their website as well. So if you want all the hot blogging action, you are going to have to check that one out too. (Actually, if it is possible, my International Center blog is even more boring than this one, though thankfully it is much more brief). If the fancy strikes you, go to http://kpic.or.jp/CIR/index.html and click the link at the top of the page right next to the word "CIR."

I will also be teaching a class about the Seattle sports scene starting in February. Here's a preview:

Mariners: A terrible team since their inception, the Mariners pulled it together behind a mix of ridiculously talented superstars (Griffey, Rodriguez, Johnson) in 1995, then went on to lose all of those players to other teams. We won 116 games in one season, then couldn't even go to the World Series. Now we are terrible again. But we have Ichiro, so that's something.

Seahawks: You don't care about American football, I know, but the Seahawks were another terrible team that recently pulled it together. They almost won something called the Superbowl, but had it stolen by poor officiating. Now they are doomed to eternal mediocrity.

Sonics: Used to be good, but after suffering a series of tough losses in the 90's, they went on to range between terrible and mediocre. Finally, they are lucky enough to land the player with the highest ceiling the sport has ever seen. Oh, but the team is probably moving to Oklahoma, so they won't be on the final exam.

On second thought, maybe I should do a class about coffee or something.

Unrelated pictures:

(I was walking to a well-known temple, and of course because I am no good at directions, I got lost. On the plus side, instead of going to the tourist infested tourist spot, I took this side path into a forest that turned out to be the best decision of the day. There were only like three people, and I got to watch the sunset from the top of this hill.)

(Kyoto is in a basin surrounded by mountains. Apparently it is a very auspicious position. It certainly is nice to be able to see nature so close to the huge city.)

(A different kind of Japanese beauty. I say we bring this guy over, give that man a contract. It says, "The happiness of a lot of cheese." Oh, take away my pain, Cheesy Elvis!)