I am so bad at updating.

I’m not sure why. Every day here in Japan it seems something funny happens involving me and running into a new cultural barrier. And I want to write about it as soon as I get home, but I never do. I figure at the very least I should post some pictures.

First Japanese people seem to love to dress up their dogs:

I went to the top of Sunshine 60 to look out on the crazy Megaopolis that is Tokyo.

The colorful mayhem of Shinjuku

I went to Senso-ji, possible the most famous temple in Tokyo (certainly one of the busiest)

Since I’ve exhausted my supply of TV shows (is it really another month until new Office and 30 Rock?) I’ve turned to movies, and last night I watched “Becoming Jane”. I’m a sucker for Jane Austen movies and I’ll tell you why: curly-haired guys in puffy shirts. Really, what is it about long (preferably curly) hair and puffy shirts with the frou-frou collars? I mean, look!

Matthew MacFadyen is good looking and all, but with the short hair and modern clothes, he looks a little too much like Tom Hanks. Run, Forrest!

But once he has the long hair and foofy collar in Pride and Prejudice . . . .

Most agreeable, indeed, and enough to tempt the most prudent of maids (that’s bad-Austen-speak for “he looks good”)

This is not the only actor who is somehow enhanced by the odd magic of the puffy shirt. (Continue reading…)

I can’t lie, something irks me about Eli Manning. Maybe it’s because I still remember how he pouted like a 5 year old whose mom didn’t buy him that toy he wanted when he was drafted by the Chargers. But despite that, I have to thank him because the Pats had won today, we would have been constantly bombarded with videos and commentaries about the greatness of the 2007 Patriots quite possibly until the end of time. But they didn’t, so maybe we won’t. Thank you, Eli.

(but something about you still irks me)

Are you noticing a trend here? The last post was called “October in Japan”, now I’m writing a post called “November in Japan”. The creativity is just pouring out of me!

October 31 and November 1 was the Saitama JET Mid-Year conference. Now, if you were to ask me, “Lauren, when do you think the Mid-Year conference is?” I would answer, “Well, by virtue of it being called the ‘Mid Year’ conference, I would say it would be roughly 5 or 6 months after I get to Japan.” “Sorry, Lauren, it’s actually going to be 2 months after you get to Japan.” “Blerg!”

After I got over the fact that the Mid Year conference wasn’t mid year at all, I headed to Omiya and followed the trail of foreigners to Sonic City. (Continue reading…)

So I’ve been here for 3 months, and I’ve been very terrible at updating, geez. So here’s what’s going on in my Japanese life.

I got sick, like wicked sick and was homebound for 2 weeks. I have this annoying tendency of getting only one symptom at a time when I get sick. So it’s like 2 days of a runny nose, then 2 days with a sore throat, then 2 days of coughing. This means I’ll be sick, but still functional. I would much rather get everything at once, spend my 2 days in bed, and have it be done. Anyway, I spent my birthday at home sucking on cough medicine and watching the Million Yen challenge.

My school had it’s “Culture Festival” on Oct 27th. I don’t know if I would call it a festival, it was more like a singing competition with a little mini-exhibition of art and science projects and things of that nature thrown in. Oh, and Mr. Donuts. The week before all the teachers were asking me, “Did you order your Mr. Donut Donuts? You know you have to get your Mr. Donut Donuts. They ran out last year, so order your Mr. Donut Donuts early!” Ah! Fine, I’ll accept the sugar dough your pushing on me! I was fully expecting these donuts to change my life, the way everyone went on about them. Sadly, they didn’t, but they were tasty.

(Continue reading…)

lots more on my zooomr account

YouTube apparently has it out for this video, good thing there’s DailyMotion. Enjoy the Sexy.

or “Random Japanese Observations 1″

I have been in Japan for 2 months now, and I thought I would share some random things I have observed from being here.

“Oh, so that’s the American Style”

I’ve always heard Westerners are all about the individual while Asians are about the group, but I don’t think I’ve really understood that concept until now. A day rarely goes by where I’m not asked a question like “What is this like in America?”, “What do you do during such an such a time in America?” I feel like I have to answer carefully because after being raised all my life to not make generalizations, I suddenly am representing a country of 300 million very different people.

A teacher at my school asked me to draw a baseball on the board, so I drew one with curvy lines on the board. She was completely fascinated since apparently the only way a Japanese person would draw a baseball is with two perfect arcs inside a circle. “Is that the way Americans draw it?” she asks. “Um, it’s the way I draw it,” I reply. That was enough for her to have me draw a baseball in all the classes to illustrate the different between a “Japanese” baseball and an “American” baseball. I don’t feel comfortable representing American baseballs, but by virtue of being an American in Japan, I just do.

You won’t need this paper until the day you forget it at home

You know Murphy’s law, the whole “If something is gonna go wrong it will” thing? In Japan, nothing fits Murphy’s law better than the 65 thousand random pieces of paper you will get. If you think that piece of paper is absolutely insignificant, then leave it at home, I dare you. Because that likely will be the day you were suppose to bring it to wherever you were going.

Don’t think you’ll get sympathy for not being able to produce any particular piece of paper at any given time either. The day I got my cellphone I got chewed out for not having my electricity bill. I brought an official document to get my ID card, but it wasn’t the official document I was suppose to have. My supervisor came to my school to ask if I had some insurance form, and was utterly befuddled when I tried to explain that I hadn’t ever seen the form, but it was probably with the two dozen other forms I got at orientation. “So you don’t have it now?” he said. The lesson? Take that piece of paper with both hand and bow, then make sure it never leaves your person for the duration of your stay in Japan.

Don’t forget to bring a towel

I was warned about this before I came here, but it hasn’t prevented me from forgetting on several occasions. Public bathrooms don’t have towels. There’s sinks, and soap, maybe a trashcan if you’re lucky, but no towels to be found. The only towel you’re going to find is in your bag in the form of a washcloth that you need to have with you at all times, also with those 65 thousand forms. Bring a towel or risk walking through the station with damp hands.

And now a Japanese lesson

Just some words that I barely remember from my school days, but hear all the time now that I’m here:

Narasu 慣らす: become accustom, get used to. I am asked all the time if I am used to the Japanese lifestyle. I think the fact I’m asked this a lot means that they don’t really think I am use to it yet.

Mada まだ: yet, still, more, besides. The Japanese don’t really like to say “no” which is where phrases like “chotto” and “mada” come in handy. When I haven’t done something, I give them a “mada” and they seem to accept it. Totemo benri desu (very useful).

Sate さて: well, then. I hear the female teachers at my school say this all the time, generally when they are trying to think of the next thing they need to do.

Chanto ちゃんと: neatly, tidily, in good order. Another word I hear all the time at school.

That is all for this weeks Japan observations. Stay tuned, maybe I’ll do this regularly?

Yesterday was my birthday, and to be honest it kind of sucked. I’m on the tail end of a horrible cold, I spent the day teaching an utterly pointless English lesson to Japanese 1st graders (they’re adorable though, so that kind of made up for it) and to top it off, I got an email from YouTube saying they pulled Michael & Dwight: Sexyback.

Yep, after nearly a year and 1.4 million hits, NBC decided it was time to take “sexy” away. I’m not sure why, I know technically it’s copyright infringement, but so are the hundreds of Office fanvids that as far as I can tell haven’t been pulled. I never intended copyright infringement, nor did I ever make a penny off the video, it was just a crazed Office fan trying to share her obsession with other Office fans. And lets face it, fanvids are like free advertisement, which is why I think NBC lets them slide to begin with. Plus considering their ratings and this apparently impending writers strike, I wouldn’t think NBC would want to alienate fans of their shows, but maybe I’m wrong.

They may take sexy away, but I will do what I can to bring SexyBack!

Wow, have I really been in Japan for 6 weeks? I’ve been bad about updating people on my adventures here in Japan, but I blame lack of internet. I tried to get YahooBB, but they’re “full” . . . I don’t know what that means! I just got the NTT broadband today. I guess it’s not as good as YahooBB, but they also didn’t tell me to tell me to call back in a month or two, so yeah. I now have home internet, I am so very happy about that.

The first couple weeks were kind of awkward just because the kids were very quiet, either because I was new or they were still in “summer mode” or I don’t know. Some classes were more active than others, but generally the 9th graders were the quietest. I also sang two Carpenters songs and a Monkees song every day for a month. Ack!

My 3rd week here I got to go to an elementary school with the other JET in town, Calum. We did a lesson for all the 3rd through 6th graders. After being around a bunch of awkward teenagers who are too self conscious about their English to talk in class, it was a treat to be around the younger kids. We pretty much conducted our lesson in Japanese (which means it was mostly Calum talking) but they were still so excited. He would ask them how old they thought he was, and pretend to collapse when they would say things like “36!” or sometimes even “100!”. Also we would introduce our families, and he has a younger brother with glasses and all the kids would go “Harry Potter!” I printed out the one picture I had of my family from my graduation, and they would sometimes point to my gown and shout “Harry Potter!” But pictures of my cat Aiko were a big hit; they would shout “Kawaii!” (cute) and would rush up to look at pictures after class. I’ve discovered that the Japanese think it’s really weird to name pets people names, so they either kind of giggle when I tell them her name is Aiko, or just furrow their brows and say “um, why?”

On one of the days, we played outside with them during recess, and I witnessed a Kancho. I don’t know if you’ve heard of this, but Japanese boys like to lace their fingers together with the index finger still pointing out, go up to unsuspecting ALTs and poke those fingers in the ALTs butt. It was funny because this 4th grade boy tugs at my shirt to get my attention, puts his hands together, and I was like “What are you doing?” So he goes up behind Calum, and as he starts swinging his hands up, I realized what he was gonna do and was like “Nooooo!” But it was too late and Calum got Kancho’ed. The first time Calum was like “ha, ha, you got me kid” but the second time, he actually started to chase the boy around the field, threatening to Kancho him.

The Sport Festival at my junior high was a couple weeks ago. The classes competed against each other in some stuff that I recognized (like relays and dashes) and other that I didn’t (there was one where the whole class would jump rope together, and another relay thing that involved a log, it’s hard to explain . . .). One of the English teachers asked (read: told) me to do this traditional Japanese dance with the girls, and I think I finally won some of them over. While we were cleaning up, they were asking me questions in English. They were 9th grade girls too, who are by far the quietest in class. Calum warned me that questions would probably get inappropriate, and it almost got there when one girl asked “Do you love . . . . Uchiyama-sensei?” (whose the 9th grade English teacher, and while very nice, he’s probably in his 40s and has a family). I laughed just because I was so put off by the question, and they’re kind of like “Oh, wow, you do!”

There’s plenty more to tell you about, but I now need to try to get rid of this head cold. Maybe I’ll type up more later as I watch yet another show about eating or some game show with this guy. Thus is my Japanese Life.