Category Archives: Random

White Noise With Texture

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I horrified my colleagues today, although not for the usual reasons.

Typhoon 18 (aka Typhoon Etau) hit the center of Japan today and we in the Tokyo area were cursed with all the rain but none of the train cancellations. This meant I had to go to work. I didn’t get horribly wet when I went to work, as the rain was in “start then stop then pour then stop” mode (I believe this is an actual scientific term).

In fact, I didn’t get wet until I went to the grocery store at lunch time and my umbrella decided to express its inside-out self.

What horrified my colleagues was my decision to walk to the station when it was clear that the sky was about to fall. I predicted it would fall about 10 minutes after I left the office. They pointed out there was a bus and I pointed out that 1) I’d end up like Totoro standing in the rain waiting for the bus or 2) I’d get packed into a hot sweaty bus full of students and end up wet and stinky rather than just wet.

What I didn’t tell them, because this would horrify them, is that I actually don’t mind walking in the rain, as long as I’m going home. (Walking in the rain going to work is a different problem.)

Because I can’t smell it, rain to me is sound and touch. The constant burr of rain on my umbrella and the road and the taps of rain hitting my shoes and my legs and the water splashing as I walk and the cold water on the back of my legs combine as a kind of white noise with texture. A heavy rain also washes out the colors on the street which makes the experience even more about noise and texture.

My walk home. (Not an actual photo.)

A depiction of my walk home. (Note: Rain not to scale, but that’s what it felt like.)

Then I get home and have to peel off my shoes and figure out a way to dry them (unless it’s raining again tomorrow which means I’ll just wear the same shoes since they are already wet) and I leave wet footprints across the floor.

By the time I get dried off and changed and sat down with a cup of coffee I feel as if I’ve had a shower and am much more relaxed than I would have been from just walking home. I sip coffee and hope it’s not going to be raining when I go to work tomorrow.

Manners and Fat Men in Diapers Feeling Pain

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I spent the morning ruining my knees (again) whilst watching fat men beat the crap out of each other.

Through a former colleague, I was invited to join a very rare tour of Takanohana Beya, the current sumo stable of former Yokozuna Champion Takanohana. The “stable”, in this case, is a three story building where the rikishi live and train.

My former colleague runs a business helping people acquire sumo tickets and has, of late, been attempting to expand by creating closer links with the Sumo Kyokai, the body that manages sumo (for better and for worse). By a mix of persistence and luck, he was granted permission to bring a group of foreigners to watch a practice.

Although some stables open practices to outsiders (for a small fee) it’s very rare for foreigners to be granted this honor as there are lots of rules 1) no video 2) no flash photography 3) no cellphones 4) no talking 5) no visible tattoos and 6) don’t point the bottoms of your feet at the ring. We were going into their home and possibly interrupting their job so they only wanted people present who would not disrupt things.

Because of all these rules, and because a major tournament starts next week (meaning this was an important practice), my former colleague invited me along because he thought he’d have at least one adult in the room. (He really, really should read this blog before thinking things like that.)

After we arrived we got to see a few stages of practice over about 90 minutes. First there were some practice matches where the winner kept accepting new challengers and then Takanohana Oyakata (elder) arrived and began watching and, on occasion, directing the practice.

Takanohana (blue kimono) sips tea and watches a practice match.

Takanohana (in the center wearing the blue, flowered kimono) sips tea and watches a warm up match.

The warm up matches were followed by continuous attack practice in which one young rikishi (wrestler) pushed another across the ring whilst the other resisted being pushed. At some point, the younger rikishi being pushed was replaced by the highest level rikishi in the stable. At that point it got intense. If a pusher fails to get the other out, the rikishi being pushed forces the pushers head down and forces him to walk in a squat. (Sometimes, if they go in too high, they grab the pusher around the neck and sling him around until he falls.) There’s then a ritual where the rikishi being pushed throws the pusher down and they start over. I don’t know how many rounds this is supposed to go, but several young rikishi were reduced to grunts and wails by the end and could barely stand up. This was intense to see.

When they were finished, they then had to go off to the side and do leg practice.

Eventually, the practice moved to leg work. Some rikishi stretched whilst others hopped around the ring twice, then turned around and hopped around it twice in the other direction.

You are probably not this flexible. The blurs in the back are hopping around.

You are probably not this flexible. The blurs in the back are hopping around in a low pose.

After the practice there was a break and we got to see a demonstration of how the wrestler’s top knots are prepared by an expert hair stylist.

Smoothing the wrestler's hair. This usually takes place up stairs.

Smoothing the wrestler’s hair. This usually takes place up stairs.

Cleaning the wrestler's hair and spreading the wax.

Cleaning the wrestler’s hair and spreading the wax. The wax has a scent that is supposed to attract women.

After the hair styling demonstration we got a chance to eat Chanko Stew prepared by the younger wrestlers. We were eating the same food the wrestlers were eating upstairs and could even get seconds.

The stew was good, but salty, which is what you’d expect from men who’d just spent 90 minutes sweating and crying.

It was all much more interesting than I was expecting and I think all 15 or so guests were well behaved and my former colleague will have a chance to get invited back.

In the end I realized that although they can keep the weight, I wish I was that flexible.

End of Summer Rituals and Wretched Refuse

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Today is the last day before the last weekend before the autumn term starts. This means I have several rituals to perform and lots of crap to clean.

The first ritual is to go to the school where I work and start counting days off until the end of the term. This ritual is important because the most important part of any job is figuring out when you have days off. At the beginning of the school year I go through the annual schedule, totally unofficially of course, and figure out when exams and school trips are and try to work out how many classes I have with each section. After that, at the beginning of each term, I double check, usually with the hope that I missed a day off.

Unfortunately, this term that backfired. I found a cancelled class that makes my life more difficult because it means sections in the same grade meet 23, 22 and 17 times. That right, the others get around a third more class time or about three weeks’ worth of additional classes. Since I’m in charge of this grade, I’m the one responsible for planning for the short class whilst trying to figure out how to entertain the long classes. This leads me to seriously considering keeping a couple bottles of bourbon in the bottom drawer of my desk.

(Note: For about five years, in the old building, one teacher had an unopened bottle of wine sitting above his desk in plain sight of the room and students visiting the office; therefore having bourbon around might not be so odd. I’m not saying it’s a good idea, yet, just that it’s not that odd.)  

The second ritual is writing the days on folded sheets of A3 paper. These “folders” go inside clear files and as I carry the “folders” to each class, they serve as my official notes and log for each class. I record the term and, in case of trouble, the homeroom teachers’ names. Although I also have an electronic schedule, there’s nothing as satisfying as seeing the days on the front page get crossed out, especially once we cross the halfway point. (It’s also a great chance to test pens on regular copy paper.)

There’s also satisfaction in tearing them apart at the end of the term and saving the blank half as scratch paper and shredding the front half.

The third ritual happens both at the office and at home: the cleaning of last term’s refuse. As a teacher, paper tends to accumulate both slowly and all at once. I have my notes and rough drafts and leftover handouts that never got used and mistakes that should never have been printed. Those get sorted and tossed in the recycle box. At home I’ve got more of that and all the stuff not related to school that got acquired over the summer.

For about two weeks the desks both at home and at the office are clean and well organized. Then they start getting messy again and stay that way until the next ritual.

You Got to Obey the Rules to Break the Rules

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I was both mistaken and misled today, I also did some misleading.

First, my supervisor at the school where I work chastised me very slightly for having mucked up a pretty good plan. Without going in too much detail about the plan and the task behind it, let’s just say I was asked to agree to do something I thought was a bad idea because doing the way they wanted it didn’t actually help me out. Unfortunately, my supervisor didn’t hear my teeth sucking and heavy sigh and thought we had an agreement. This was my fault for not speaking up more clearly.

Instead, because I thought the usual “yeah it’s okay for you to do your job” process had already started, I waited for a phone call or a very rare email (the company I work for likes to leave a light paper trail) that never came. Instead I contacted the company I work for who went “Huh, what, really?” and that started a series of phone calls that led to my supervisor at the school where I work getting some extra work. I apologized for the trouble. If I’d know my supervisor at the school where I work hadn’t contacted the company I work for I wouldn’t have contacted them.

That said, the solution to all these layers of I contact A who contacts B who contacts D to tell D to contact me and explain what I’m supposed to do would go away if the school would just hire direct. If they don’t, then I don’t really mind causing a little extra work every now and then by simply following the rules.

Second, I went in today to proctor a make-up exam for a student who’d failed. I had a sneaking suspicion that he wouldn’t be there. As predicted, at exam time, I was the only one in the room. I planned to stay the entire 50 minutes, but the teacher in the room next to me also didn’t have any students so he came over to my room to say hello. When he saw the room was empty he told me I had to stay 30 minutes and then could leave.

I stayed 30 minutes and left, and then 15 minutes later came back when I found out I’d been misled. It turns out the 30 minute rule only applies to end-of-term exams but for make-up exams the students can come in at any time, although they only have the authorized time to do the test. (For example, if they come in with five minutes left in the period, they have five minutes to finish the test.) Mind you, at no point did anyone tell me this and the only person who told me anything misled me.

I didn’t complain, though, because I’d already caused some trouble.

Not So Summery Summer Days

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Things finally reset today, and I’m not sure if that’s a good thing.

It is a tradition in Japan that every summer the Japanese press go to one of the major airports and film the reactions of foreigners as they walk out of air conditioned comfort into a level of cruelty they didn’t anticipate. There are legends of people arriving to Japan to work, suddenly rushing back into the airport to get tickets home after encountering the heat and humidity at even 9:30 in the morning. I’m convinced at least one of my friends was broken by the walk from the terminal to the bus and that ruined his entire tenure in Japan.

The previous 10 days, though, it’s been cloudy and cool and the foreigners have probably been more worried about where they could find a sweater or a good fleece jacket.

This has forced the press to the beaches to interview die hard beach bums and parents who couldn’t convince their young kids it was a bad day to go to the beach.

To give you a sense of the difference, the temperature the last 10 days has averaged, by my personal records, a high of about 23.1 Celsius (73.5 Fahrenheit) and, despite random rain, it has not been very humid. The usual temperature for this time of year is “Scorched Earth” (35 Celsius or 95 Fahrenheit) with a humidity level approaching liquid.

Today, the humidity returned with a vengeance and the sun appeared, after an annoying morning rain, to let us know it was still kind of important to the survival of the Earth and to make us annoyed that we had to carry umbrellas for no reason.

The temperature also returned and it got up to 30 Celsius (86 Fahrenheit) which is great if you can sit on the veranda sipping mint juleps but is bad if you actually have to work or move.

What worries me the most is that, despite the gloom (we didn’t see the sun for 10 days) the cool weather had everyone in a good mood (well, at least I was in a good mood) but the return of hot weather will put me in a bad mood just in time for the start of classes.

Maybe that’s for the best, though. A Scorched Earth mentality isn’t a bad thing to have at the start of the term, especially after summer vacation.

Lazy Days Followed By Drinking and Blather

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I spent the day being lazy and then somehow managed to get showered, dressed and leave the house with pants and shoes on. I then ended up in a place that was kind of odd but kind of fun, in a very superficial Japanese kind of way.

The morning was spent doing very little. I sketched out a few ideas and answered a few emails and then watched other people play games. (Long story.)

Right before She Who Must Be Obeyed came home I got dressed and waited for her to arrive. For the record, this is not a very productive thing to do. After she arrived home there were a few minutes of pleasantries exchanged and then I headed to Tokyo to meet an old acquaintance for a few drinks.

Our initial plan was grass, literally, and we ended up in a strange grotto of food vans, tents and tables that didn’t sell food until 5:00 but were more than happy to sell us bottles of wine and beer.

(Note: this is a brilliant plan as it lets the beer munchies set in before food is even available.)

My acquaintance and I then spent a couple hours boring her significant other with tales of Japanese Woe and English Teaching Woe. He was awesome, though, and very patient.

The odd thing about it all was the location. It seemed to be an attempt to recreate food truck culture in what was, more or less, the equivalent of a joint beer garden in a parking lot. There were several permanent food trucks surrounding a tent and several tables. When we were able to order food, it was delivered to our table when it was ready rather than being slopped out as quickly as possible.

It was all very bizarre, but there was a stage with a DJ who actually played a pretty solid set. By the time we left the place was starting to fill up so they must be doing something right.

I do have a few suggestions for them (craft beer, plates of finger food, water) but that’s for another day, and other friends.

 

That Which Must Not Be Answered

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The other day She Who Must Be Obeyed walked into my home office (aka The Temple of Half-Finished Projects) and asked “Do you want to see a bunch of high school girls?”

My first reaction was a silent “It’s a trap!” followed by a quick scroll through my file of standard responses to traps “You look great.” “It looks beautiful.” “You look beautiful in everything.” “No, they make you look too sexy.” “I’m sorry, did you say something? Wow, your butt looks great in those jeans!”

Unfortunately none of the standard responses seemed suitable to the situation.

Then I realized I might be walking into a different trap. One of the things the Japanese do that sets foreigners on edge is ask questions that seem like traps. The classic example is:

Japanese Person: Are you doing anything this weekend?
Foreign Person: No, I’m just hanging out doing nothing until pay day.
Japanese Person: Do you want to help us set up for sports day this weekend?
Foreign Person: I’m sorry did you say something? Wow, your butt looks great in those jeans!

To the Western mind we’ve been set up and walked into a clever trap. Now that I’ve confided in you and given away any chance of saying I’m busy, you ask me if I want to do something. Damn you, trappy and clever Japanese person.

In truth, the Japanese person is doing the opposite. To their way of thinking, they are being courteous. They don’t want you to feel obligated to do something, especially if you are already doing something. If you’re not doing anything, then they offer you something to do. (I hope that makes sense.) (I also hope you realize it doesn’t make the situation that much less infuriating even if it does make sense.)

In the case of She Who Must Be Obeyed’s question I had to decide if it somehow involved our oldest who will be attending high school next year–she’s a 9th grader which, in Japan, is junior high school–or if it would somehow involve the reading group SWMBO volunteers with, which occasionally reads at schools. If I wasn’t careful, I could be turning down the chance to help her out with something.

Or, she could be walking me into a clever trap.

I opted for the latter and said “Of course not” and then added “unless it’s really, really necessary and I totally won’t take a camera.”

It turns out it did involve our daughter, who is visiting possible high schools. She Who Must Be Obeyed, I suspect, didn’t want to play escort and was trying to get me to do it. In the end, our oldest went with her friend and both of us got to stay home.

The funny part is that if I’d gone, I’d probably have had to take a camera.

The Autumn People in Summer

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Shirley Jackson has a famous story called “The Summer People” about a couple who decide to stay in their summer home past the end of summer and find the town folks’ attitude toward them has changed in very sinister ways. That’s kind of how I felt today when I went to the school where I work.

I mostly stopped in to pick up a folder I needed so that I show up to work on time next week. I also used it as an excuse to get 5 kilometers (3.1 miles) of walking in on a reasonably cool day. (This turned out to be a trap, but more on that later.)

When I got to the school I noticed that most of the lights were out and no students were roaming around. Since I was dressed business sub-casual this was probably for the best. I saw one teacher from a different department who was dressed up in a tie. He gave me a funny look. Then I saw a teacher from my department whose reaction was more like this:

Suddenly feeling a bit unnerved, and desperately trying not to fall asleep, I checked my mailbox and was surprised to find a stack of changes to my  high school class rolls.

 

In the office I said hello to two colleagues who reacted with little more than grunts and I had to put on glasses to make sure I wasn’t home talking to our oldest. (I wasn’t.)

I asked one of the colleagues if the changes meant that I had students going overseas and we then had a conversation that was straight out of a Samuel Beckett play where each of us was having a different conversation. He told me we don’t change high school classes, which was not what I’d asked because I already knew that which led to me asking about specific students which led to him reading the Japanese next to their names and telling me what it meant which I already knew which lead to me thanking him and going about my business.

When I left, I said a goodbye and didn’t even get a grunt.

In his defense, it was warm in the office as the cool weather has almost certainly led the school to set the air conditioner to “maintain humidity”. Although it was cool outside, it was muggy which made moving around and working less pleasant.

I’ll go back next week when it’s probably safe to do so. Until then, I’ll try to get some sleep.

 

Note: you can get the “The Summer People” and other stories here. 

The End of Summer Approacheth

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Tomorrow, and few days next week, I’ll actually have to do things resembling actual work. This is both good and bad.

First, it lets me get out of the house on a regular, predictable basis which is not something I’ve been able to do this summer. (More on that someday.) Unfortunately, despite being able do that, I still won’t be able to finish the handful of projects I’d like to do that can only be completed by visiting places in other towns. (More on that someday, too; until then a few hints: knife makers, pen makers, Jesus and Moses.)

Second, because the girls are starting school, it will give me a couple actual days to myself. This is a vital thing for me, especially before the start of autumn term. Unfortunately, it’s not enough time to complete the projects in the previous paragraph as I still have to go into work a couple days and do some work at home.

Third, and perhaps most important, it gives me an actual excuse to put off the things I’ve been putting off which makes me feel better about putting them off. Nothing helps put you back in denial more than having a solid excuse to avoid doing something. If, for some reason, you have a day off from that excuse, well, you still can use it as an excuse because you don’t want to spend that day off, which you totally deserve, doing things that resemble work.

Lastly, it puts me back in a more stable rhythm. I go to bed at a regular time and get up at a regular time and have a regular(ish) morning routine. Unfortunately, after about a week or two, the old in-office rhythm sets in at work and I start getting little done.

Oddly, I then start looking forward to the holidays when I can get trapped in the house and put things off. I’m weird that way.

 

Customer Service in Various Forms and Speeds

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Today is the story of two customer service experiences. One was oddly slow, one was surprisingly fast. One unfortunately necessary.

The Prodigal Knife Returneth
I’ve mentioned before the tale of The Phantom Knife and how I was dreading making an international call to find it. In the end, instead of calling, I made one last ditch effort to use the company’s website contact form. I kept my temper when writing (at least in my heart I believe I did) and whatever I wrote finally got a response.

They claimed they had some trouble with my email and had been trying to contact me. I do not believe this, but having been in Japan as long as I have, I didn’t make an issue of it and instead apologized for any trouble. They told me the old knife, a Benchmade Mini-Ambush couldn’t be replaced (it’s discontinued and they no longer make the parts for it) but they still would honor the lifetime guarantee and would be happy to send me the modern equivalent of that knife as a replacement if that was okay with me. I was like, well, um, I don’t, well, yes, that would be perfect.

A couple weeks later I received the replacement, a Benchmade Mini-Griptilian and it’s such a step up I almost feel guilty about accepting it (well, at least I would have if it hadn’t taken four months for them to answer an email). It’s already one of my favorite pocket knives. I like it better than my larger Griptilian (long story behind that one).

Once More Into The Mail
I’ve also mentioned before how the TWSBI Diamond 580 Black Rose Gold became my new workhorse pen and how I wasn’t a big fan of the TWSBI Mini, especially after having encountered two different quality issues with it.

Well, about a year after it was delivered and put to use, the new cap on my TWSBI Mini broke in almost identical fashion to the original one. (A crack around the top of the cap.) I emailed TWSBI about a possible replacement and they responded in about 20 minutes with assurances that a new cap would be sent. The next day the factory contacted me to let me know the new cap had already been sent.

None of this will cost me a single yen.

Blistering fast customer service, but it does pose a conundrum:

Is it better to have blistering fast customer service or is it better not to need it? (Answer: Yes.)

Although I still like the TWSBI 580 and, knock-on-wood, haven’t had any problems with it, I can’t recommend the TWSBI Mini for people looking to move up from cheap fountain pens or looking to try a smaller, more pocket friendly fountain pen. For the same money there are better choices.

As for me, I’ll probably clean the Mini up and try to sell it. At a used price, and with a brand new cap, I might be able to interest someone in it, at least for a year or so until the cap breaks again.