experiences – Page 62 – goinggaijin.com

Hot and Cold

I like hot weather, always did. I start getting comfortable somewhere above 25°C, whereas everything below makes me reach for a sweater. Very fondly I recall my visits to the Egyptian desert – vast, empty, and hot. Or those two hours I spent in the blistering summer heat at Dante’s View, looking over Death Valley and writing on my travel diary.

Humidity is something entirely different though: When your body is constantly sweating and you’re sticky already ten minutes after showering… ugh. So, this week was trying, to say the least. Air temperature slowly converged towards body temperature, finally exceeding it today with 39°C, all the while with a humidity of at least 60%. People cope with the heat by staying indoors – a majority of the buildings here has airconditioning now – and go out only in the morning or early evening. House owners around here often wet the streets in front of their houses – which does provide some temporary relief at least, but unfortunately does not help with the humidity.

Me? I have changed some of my habits.

Firstly, am taking cold showers now. Cold meaning 37°C instead of my usual 42°. It helps insofar as I am not emerging from the shower giving off hot steam, so I believe it helps with the sweating for a short while.

Secondly, I have to say that I’m not enthousiastic of electric fans, and in fact I am quite happy that Ebisu’s doesn’t have airconditioning. However, when on Tuesday night at 10 pm the temperature was still up at 30°C, I reluctantly retrieved the fan for the first time to help me fall asleep that night, and I’ve been using it ever since. Of course, I keep the windows open now at all times, but unfortunately, as Kyoto is enclosed by mountains on three sides, there is not much of a cooling breeze coming up the hill here.

Finally, I have taken to flee the house in the afternoons. My room faces West, and while this offers perfect views of beautiful sunsets ranging from pale pink to flaming orange, it also means that the sun heats my room like a furnace from about 2 pm until the sun sets. I leave the house at around 2:30 to look for a cooler abode. The university, with its airconditioned lounge and library is only ten minutes away. However, in this weather I prefer to be outside, and thank goodness, just between the house and the university there is Yoshida shrine, dedicated to the university, by the way. Its numerous buildings are dotting the hillside and there are many trees and shadowy spots. It is quiet and comparatively cool, and I go there to read, write, and study until they close in the early evening. So far, nobody has minded me sitting there, and I think I’ll go there regularly as it the closest and most convenient spot.

Noh

As promised last Wednesday, I went to a Noh performance yesterday. It was a special performance by students of the International Noh Institute in Kyoto, and there were many international performers (including women) which makes this a special event indeed, as most Noh actors you see here are Japanese. This has to do with the fact that Noh schools (like many other traditional arts) have been run by the same family for centuries and the children are groomed from a very young age to take over the school.

a traditional noh stage — traditional Noh stage

Anyway, there were a large number of different plays, three full Noh plays, and several smaller excerpts, scheduled from 11 – 17 o’clock. I already knew there was no way I could stay even remotely focused for all of six hours, so I decided beforehand to only go to the first two, the first one with a variety of dances and songs from different plays, the second one the full play Kiyotsune.

Of course, before going I did some research and read about Noh. I know now that the art originated in the 14th century, and that it remains essentially unchanged until today. I found out that any professional actor starts training as a child and must know all the parts – from chorus to lead actor – and must be able to sing them. And that the ensemble for a particular play will only rehearse together a single time before the performance. So, I went there with certain expectations. Not that I could tell you exactly what they were of course, but I certainly did not expect what I got to see. Okay, where do I start?

There were several groups of people on stage: the musicians (up to three different drums and a flute), the singers of the chorus and the actors. The musicians play the music, but not all the time, and sometimes during playing they shout as well, which I found distracting, because the were even louder than the actors at times. The chorus more or less explains the background and tells the story itself, and its members probably have the largest part to memorize. Both groups are dressed in standard, dark Japanese attire.

The actors themselves – most elaborately dressed with bright costumes and, in case of the main actors, wearing masks and wigs – engage in dialogue with each other and dance as required. They may also act out certain parts of the story, fighting for example. And this acting struck me as most peculiar. I expected it to be very formalised and stylised to begin with, but in fact, over long stretches of the play there was hardly any movement. Restrained would be a good word here, even sparse. For example, the wife of the dead warrior was supposed to cry over the death message; this was only indicated by her raising her hand towards her masked face.

It was interesting that actors who did not appear in a certain scene did not leave the stage. Instead, they took a sitting position somewhere (doubtlessly precisely indicated by tradition) and faded into the background, motionless. Otherwise, props that were not needed anymore were immediately removed by a stagehand and put outside. This means that in the end, when everybody has left, the stage is completely clear again. Also, the musicians and the chorus barely moved, except for the taking up and putting down of their instruments and fans, respectively. And all through the performance, the chorus had to kneel on the hard wooden floor – quite a feat in itself, I know how much that can hurt!

Altogether I found it a very interesting experience. I was glad for the summary of scenes and explanations I picked up before the play, as there is no way of understanding it – old Japanese, remember – and the tiny clues indicating feelings or movements otherwise. For the next time I’ll have to do even more research. I don’t think this is an experience I need to repeat anytime soon, but the next time somebody suggests going, I’ll surely say yes!

Finally, to give you an idea of what I’ve been talking about, here is a very brief summary of the play Kiyotsune together with some pictures:

Taira no Kiyotsune is dead. He drowned himself at the imminent destruction of his clan. His retainer, Awazu no Saburo, travels to the capital to inform Kiyotsune’s wife of his death

He hands her a keepsake of her late husband, a lock of his hair.

After he has done so, Kiyotsune’s ghost appears.

His wife is happy to see him, but soon laments his death, and the fact that she is now left alone. They begin to argue.

Kiyotsune recalls the last days of his life and explains why he had to kill himself. Kiyotsune battles again in the afterlife before he can finally enter paradise.

Lazy

Today it was raining most of the day, it seems that the rainy season has finally arrived. It came a bit later than usual, so far it has been fairly dry. Let’s hope it’s not getting too wet – I don’t enjoy going out when it rains…

Hence, I spent a very nice and very lazy day at home today. I revised my Japanese grammar and practiced Kanji. In between I was treated to the vocal exercises of the latest addition to the guest house: A young German who is practicing for his Noh-Dance performance the coming weekend. Noh is a traditional, highly stylised Japanese art form which developed in the 14th century and is still practised almost unchanged today. This includes the performances being done in Old Japanese, which many modern Japanese cannot speak anymore, so apparently many of the audience read along with the libretto – without actually looking at the stage. I will go and see some of the performances this weekend – it seems like something one has to do at least once. I shall report after the fact.

Oh, in a short pause of the downpour, I did go out for my groceries. And, this time I was able to locate unsalted butter in my local supermarket – and some (almost French) baguette too! So, to sweeten the terrible weather, I finally ate (too much) of my Nutella on an authentically tasting baguette with unsalted butter – the perfect treat for a lazy day!

Ambiguity

The other day I was chatting with a friend in the Kyoto International Community House, when its manager came by and joined us. My friend is a Muslim, and the manager is interested in Arab culture, so they can always find a topic to talk about. At some point, the conversation shifted to religious differences and the Yugoslavian war, and all of a sudden the manager asked: “Why is there so much division because of something so simple as religion?”

We looked at him, he was completely serious. Don’t get me wrong, this man is very intelligent and highly educated, speaks several languages and likes to travel abroad. He was indeed serious when he said “I don’t understand.” In fact, he asked a truly Japanese question.

In Japan, religion is a non-topic. There is no state religion and people enjoy complete religious freedom, up to the point where not even the state asks anybody what religion they follow. The traditional religion is Shintoism with lots of local deities and tiny shrines. The main goddess is Amaterasu, the sun goddess who is still worshipped in Ise shrine to this day, and the emperor has been considered a god himself until the Americans took this status away with the new constitution after WW II. In the Heian period, after 800 CE, Buddhism was at its height. It was first introduced from China to the imperial court, and while the emperor was considered a Shinto deity, it was not seen as a problem for him or his court to practise Buddhism as well. Today, Christian traditions and festivals become more and more popular, for example celebrating Christmas, despite only about 1% of the Japanese considering themselves Christian. In the life of an average Japanese, a newborn baby is presented to the local Shinto shrine (and later on at several other occasions), a wedding is often conducted using Christian rites (although not always overseen by a real priest) and the vast majority of funerals are Buddhist. New Year’s is celebrated by visiting the local Shinto shrine and the second largest holiday in the country, the festival for the dead, O-bon, is celebrated with Buddhist rites. In short, you can be everything and do everything at the same time, and that although about 50% of Japanese say they are not religious, and only about 25% declare themselves Buddhist. Hence, a certain religious ambiguity is introduced, and the Western idea that we must choose sides and strictly obey the division, sounds strange to Japanese.

This sort of ambiguity is also present in the language. Most of the time, a subject is not used, for example “Eki ni ikkimas – Station to go” is a perfectly correct sentence in Japanese, although it does not mention who is going. From this simple sentence, we cannot even find out if the speaker talks about himself, somebody else, or even a whole group of people. This we can only find out from the rest of the story. Of course, there are also Western languages where a subject is not needed, Spanish for example. But in “Es Austriaca – is Austrian” the verb gives away that we are talking about a single third person and the noun ending -a tells us immediately that a woman is meant, so there is much less left for guessing.

Another form of language ambiguity is that Japanese don’t like to say an open “No, I will not.” Instead, you hear “It’s too difficult, not possible…” which will provoke the Westerner to look for a solution rather than to politely bow out of the situation, and hence, this will considerably prolong negotiations. However, I’m getting sidetracked.

Of course, Japanese people, stuck inside their culture, do not understand when they are called ambivalent by Western people stuck in their ways. I don’t think many of them even understand what we mean by that. I don’t think the manager was very pleased with our ultimate answer that we must choose sides, must make decisions, and can’t be sitting on the fence forever. A typical cultural misunderstanding, partly lost in translation …

Antique Fair

I spent all afternoon at Kyoto Antique Fair and I still have the feeling I didn’t see it all. There are about 350 antique dealers trying to sell literally millions of items in three days before they move on to the next venue. This fair is travelling through all of Japan and stops over in Kyoto a few times a year. The sheer amount of items for sale is overwhelming, and if you just go there to browse, without something specific in mind, it is possible to spend all three days there just looking at stuff. Most of the things on offer are at least vintage, if not truly antique.

There were thousands of pieces of jewelry, probably mostly costume pieces although I cannot ascertain that. One person sold real jewels, cut already, but without mounting, and although he offered me a “good price” for one of the jewels I coveted (a large, beautiful tourmaline, changing its colour from green to red), it was still beyond my financial capabilities.

Another favourite of mine are old chests and cabinets, especially those that were once used for medicine and have lots of little drawers. There were so many of them, some of them in mint condition – and unaffordable, of course. A very small one, with four drawers in A4 size cost less than EUR 20 but I decided not to get it because I don’t want to clutter up my room at Ebisu’s with more things than necessary. There will be other such pieces, I am sure. In a similar vein, I have seen lots of little sewing chests and one stunning writing desk which was even more expensive than the jewel I talked about above…

Much cheaper were the kimonos and obi, some of them used, some of them brand new. In fact, there were quite a number of dealers who sold brand new wares as well, especially clothing, ceramics, and Buddhist prayer beads. Other cheaper items included equipment for calligraphy, hanging scrolls, and sake cups. Of the latter there must be millions of different designs and shapes and sizes. It’s probably very dangerous to start collecting those – you are never finished. Ever.

Last but not least, there were plenty of swords (both katana and wakizashi) in all price ranges, together with accessories (tsuba for example) and a handful of complete samurai armour. Unfortunately I cannot assess the value of such items, so I would probably fall prey to a smart salesman who could tell me anything about the thing in the full knowledge that I would not be able to prove him wrong. Besides, a sword would not really help me fighting the cockroaches in our kitchen 😉 I do confess that I fell head over heels for one particular little weapon I found by chance… and I still love it so much that I am tempted to go back and buy it after all… The problem is: I’m not good at haggling, and so far my online attempts to assess its value have been fruitless.

Temptation… it’s always out there, it’s just a question of how to deal with it…

Day’s End

Did you ever have one of those days that already start terribly and the best, no probably the only, way to prevent complete and utter disaster is to turn around and go back to bed?

In fact, it already started last evening when I went to the community house to see a friend – who wasn’t there. I thought we had wanted to go out for dinner, but I may have mixed up the dates, so I had another one of my takeout sushi meals.

A Man presses a "reject" buttion — courtesy of PinkBlue @ freedigitalphotos.net

When I read my emails later in the evening, there was a reply from a potential employer, an international company in Tokyo – cancelling the skype interview that was set for Thursday afternoon. I had made the mistake of asking for an interview in English, not being confident to do it in Japanese, and was informed that Japanese fluency on native level was essential for the job and hence, no interview needed. Mind you that the advertisement only mentioned “Japanese communication ability” and not how much of it, and that the job description talked about travelling and doing business with foreign people in English, not Japanese. The email was brief, but it said that they were “impressed with [my] background and experience” (but just not enough to conduct an interview and find out how bad my Japanese really is) and that they wished me “success with [my] delightful career and future”. That’s what you get for talking only to some snotty boy from human resources, and I bet “English native level” was not one of his job requirements… Anyway, at least we didn’t waste each other’s time, but I am indeed a bit floored by this, as I am sure that that desk in that company had been custom made for me already…

Today around noon it started to rain heavily, with lots of wind that pushed the water against my main window. I had not closed it as it was so hot the last few days, and my blanket which I put up to air out got all soaked by the time I was back to close the window. As the humidity goes up quite a bit when it rains, and it also cooled down a few degrees, my blanket couldn’t dry properly and is still damp now.

In the afternoon I got an email from my real estate agent essentially telling me that I’ll have to reduce my price for the house considerably in order to be able to sell it. Once I will have paid all sorts of fees and taxes, the remainder will only buy me a one room apartment in Japan. I have not yet decided what to do, if and by how much to reduce the price. That will require more thinking.

Finally I just went down to refill my water bottle and I had to face two cockroaches in the kitchen. Only one of them was polite enough to wait for the washing-up-liquid treatment, the other one disappeared. I hope one of my housemates will come across that one – I did kill the bigger one after all.

Those were my last 24 hours (and a bit) and I’m glad they are over – it can’t get worse, can it? To alleviate the pain I spent the day surfing the internet, playing lots of stupid games, and reducing my stash of chocolate to zero.

Dang it, now I’ll have to go out tomorrow in the rain to buy new sweeties…

Dinner

I have told you about unwelcome house guests in my post of last Friday. Today’s post is of a similar vein, but this time the guests are much more tolerable, no, even cute.

Last night, when we were sitting and chatting with the window open, we suddenly noticed something moving across the screen. It turned out to be a small gecko, maybe 7 centimeters long. It was running up and down the screen hunting its dinner – probably all the mosquitoes that were attracted by the light in the room. It seemed very busy, so I hope it could diminish the local bug population considerably.

It was fascinating to watch; and I have to confess that I posess a soft spot in my heart for those little creatures. The type that lives here has a yellow, sand coloured body, a triangular head and a very intelligent look in its eyes. A few years ago a gecko got trapped in a kitchen cabinet of mine, and I had to catch it so I could put it outside again. I knew that they can run on vertical window panes, but only when I tried to pick this one up did I realize how much they actually stick to the surface – any surface that is. It took me a while of gentle pulling until I could finally lift it up, and with both an apology for the rough treatment and a “please don’t call again” I set it free again on my balcony.

I hope the little one who visited us yesterday will stick around for a while – and that he’ll get big and fat on all the mosquitoes he eats… I don’t really count on him to diminish the cockroach population, but maybe the lizards that live on the stairs outside of Ebisu’s can help with that?

Wildlife

As I have written before, summer is here with sunny, hot and humid days, blue skies and wonderful sunsets, and people complaining “azui – hot” all around. And on top of all that, insects finding their way into the house…

So far I have had what feels like a million mosquito bites (they don’t seem to care about the window screens), I dispatched of a number of wood lice, and saw two enormous spiders in communal rooms (thank goodness in a fossilised state already, but I am sure their live offspring will soon descend unto the house) and a number of other assorted bugs. My landlady is terrified of mukade, centipedes, some ten centimeters long, with wide, thin legs and a nasty bite, and my housemate told me about the time when he found a praying mantis following him up the stairs.

To be honest, I don’t care for insects very much, especially spiders freak me out (but I find praying mantis kind of cool). I don’t mind them outside so much – there is usually enough space to avoid each other, but I prefer not to meet them inside. And the fact that my disgust will not deter them from entering does make me feel somewhat queasy about sleeping on the floor, eye to eye with them, so to speak. For those reasons I have already told my housemate that I consider him to function as the resident exterminator, insect department, while I will happily deal with lizards, snakes, anything furry… I believe this is a fair division of labour – unfortunately it breaks down when he is out…

Which was the case Wednesday night. After writing my post for the day, I went to the kitchen to get me some more water. It was dark, so I trod lightly, turned on the lights and carefully watched where I placed my feet. Turning to the sink to fill my water bottle I stared into the eyes of a cockroach. It was not very big, a non-flying variety of maybe 3-4 centimeters, but still. I am glad I had spoken to my housemate before that:

“What do I do?”
“Never squish them.”
“Why?”
“Eggs…”
“Eew… but then…?”
“Washing up liquid!”

Hence I took the bottle and tried to squirt the liquid on the cockroach – I can tell you they are fast moving beasts! It took quite a while and much too much of the precious liquid until the insect was covered, flopped over obediently and died. At least it didn’t move anymore. I felt like a hero! The feeling of relief quickly evaporated when I realized the next problem: What to do next? I mean, there was a dead cockroach in my sink, which was not going to hop into the trash can on its own devices anymore, and I was so not going to touch that! Flushing it down the drain was not really an option either – with the liquid washed off, will it spontaneously resurrect and come after me? Finally I used a piece of cardboard to sweep it into a plastic bag, which I tied closed – twice! – and put into the trash can. Let’s just hope the beast doesn’t revive itself and starts gnawing its way out of the plastic bag…

In the end I can say: I regret nothing and I’d do it again in an instant. Especially now that I know that the method works so swiftly and that I have found such a clean way to dispose of the remains. But I still hope my housemate will be home next time to be the brave knight to respond to this damsel in distress. And I mustn’t forget to buy more washing up liquid. Just to be on the safe side…

Homeopathy

I admit it – I broke down. After five weeks of being in Japan and eating the local fare (some slight cheating with the bread from a “German” bakery which tastes like the real thing), I caved in and bought foreign food – imported from Italy. It does come with a nice Japanese label though – does that count?

This must be the smallest jar of Nutella ever produced, not counting those spoonful packages sometimes seen at hotel breakfast buffets. It is tiny, plastic, and contains only 220 grams. I cannot be the only one to call this a homeopathic dose, and already I am wondering “What do I eat tomorrow”? The price is fitting for the drug status Nutella obviously has in this country – 399 YEN per jar, which, even at the current exchange rate, is outrageous and makes every spoonful a real treat.

So far though, the jar is still unopened. I’m so proud! It’s not the price that’s putting me off or the fact that I’ll probably have the thing empty in two minutes anyway… It’s more that I’m facing a logistic problem as to one other necessary ingredient of the perfect “good morning” toast. Nah, the bread is easy to get, and we even have a toaster at Ebisu’s. The question is much more profane: Where the heck do I get unsalted butter?

Target

Being an obvious foreigner in Japan has its pros and cons.

The pro is that you are neither assumed to speak the language properly, nor expected to know all the little intricacies of correct Japanese behaviour. If you are friendly, people will often go out of their way to help you, up and beyond standard customer service (which is very good in Japan to begin with). I recall an instance a few years ago where we – a group of about 10 foreigners unable to communicate in Japanese – descended on a nice restaurant in Sendai and demanded dinner. After some back and forth with the waitress, in which it became clear that we could not really get together, she finally pulled out her mobile phone and had the phrase translated “How much would you like to spend?” We agreed on a price – and had one of the best dinners I ever had in Japan. Talk about service…

The con of being a Caucasian in Japan is – school kids. When alone, they are too timid to be a threat, but most often unfortunately, they come in groups and then there is always one who is plucky enough to yell the first “hello” in the direction of the unsuspecting foreigner. From there you are subjected to all sorts of well studied phrases: “Where are you from?” – “Do you like it here?” – “I love America!”, or just a general giggling of the girls. A friend of mine who lives in Korea and speaks Korean very well has learnt to counter these verbal advances with a smart “Do you want to marry me?”, which usually leaves the girls speechless and him time to escape.

Hence, my slight annoyance when, on an errand near Kyoto station, I passed a group of junior high kids starting to go “Hello!” just to be stopped by two slightly older girls with notepads in their hands a few meters later. I expected the worst, when the girls explained that they were students and wanted to ask a few questions for their homework. Not being able to retreat, I agreed. Imagine my surprise when the first question was: “What do you think about the death penalty?” The girls studied International Communications at the local university and had a few more questions in that vein: “Does your country have it?”, “What if it happened to your family?”. They wrote down my answers and opinions without further comment. For a moment I was tempted to ask what they think about it – Japan does have the death penalty – but I didn’t want to put them on the spot after all. What an interesting encounter!