Who Loves the Sun? Who Cares that it is Shining?

I love the sun, and I care that it is shining.

The sun was out for three consecutive days. To my Santa Barbara and Thailand brethren and sistren this is as uneventful a statement as, ‘time continued to pass’, but for pale Toyama folk this is miraculous. What tidings of comfort and joy the sun gave us.

At all times, I have to cover all the windows with heavy blankets due to my house's laughable insulation, so in the mornings I can’t really see what kind of horrible weather I will have to walk to on my way to school. If it’s rain I can hear it. But if it’s silent and it looks bright, that means one of two things.

1). It’s a nice day.
2). It’s snowin’ like a motherfucker.

But for three days it’s been nice. Not Santa Barbara flip-flops and farmers markets nice but nice. Today’s pretty rotten, but for 3 days it was, well, bearable.

A Long Response to the Question I'm always asked

question: I'm thinking about living in Japan do you have any advice?

Well you caught me at a rather strange time to ask how I like Japan. If you’d have asked me at any other time I’d have said, “sell the house, sell the car, sell the kids and get over here”. But lately I’ve been a little pissy due to the lack of sun and native English speakers Plus, I’m finally getting over a particularly nasty flu. Being quite sick away from home is not much fun. Japan is totally strange. The exterior looks like the West, but the mindset and daily life of Japanese people is so totally removed as to make it difficult to find a place to get started. To you a Friedmann-esque medifore, the hardware is the same (except the toilets) but the software is different.This also makes Japan a kick ass place to visit/live, if you can get through it, and don’t mind being totally confused 90% of the time. There are lots of great things to see and do, especially in the big cities of Kyoto and Tokyo. Shrines, temples, and just generally wacky shit are everywhere. I live in a backwater area called Toyama, where nobody speaks any English at all, and I’m the only westerner (gaijin) in my town. Nothing is printed in English so I’m picking up nihongo (Japanese) fairly quickly. People are frightened of me like they think I’m gunna rob them, but a quick smile is disarming. I’d recommend staying in the big cities; the ‘real Japan’ is a little too much like the ‘real Dinuba’. Where is Dinuba? Exactly.

But enough about that… Getting a job is pretty easy, and the pay isn’t too bad. You don’t need a TEFL certificate. I have a CELTA from Cambridge that certifies me to teach to adults, but you don’t really need that to teach, just being a native speaker is more than enough to get a job. Teaching is far and away the easiest way to pay for a life in Japan. I don’t actually know any foreigners who do anything else. Usually you have to sign a contract for at least a year, but it’s not too hard to get a couple gigs without signing up. I’m on the JET program which rocks, cause I get loads of money and perks (free house) but I don’t really have to work that hard. I work as an English teacher in a Japanese public jr. high. JET is defiantly the way to go, as we are by far the most respected foreigners besides the company expats. Unfortunately you have to apply in November and it's kinda tough to get into.

So your options are basically two. You can work for one of the big 4 English schools GEOS, NOVA, and two others I can’t remember. On the plus side the money is enough, they will fly you out and back for free. The also will take care of the visa situation. Rumor has it that you can also get discount Japanese lessons, but I don’t know about that. On the flipside you have to sign a contract usually for about a year, and you basically have to teach straight out of a rather boring book, but you get to teach adults. Because I’m a JET elitist and I don’t live in a town with one of the big ekaiwas I’m don’t know anyone who personally works for the big companies. If you want to teach in Japan this is the easiest and most reliable way to go.

You can also go the private route. Checkout http://www.eslcafe.com/ there is a good jobs site there. This is really tricky cause you can either totally luck out or you’ll be a slave…and you don’t want to be a Japanese slave. Total crap shoot. I used to work for a small private company when I taught in Thailand and it was the most fun place I’d ever worked. These can be especially cool if nihongo o hanasshita koto ga dekimasu. My advise here is to be in good contact with the school before you go. Ask for the email address of someone who works there, and ask them how they like it. Also talk to the person in charge on the phone. If they can speak English well, that’s a really good sign. In my town none of my superiors speak English at all, but there are teachers at my school that lived in Singapore for a while so they totally help me out. Alright now I’m ramblin’ but lemme know if there was anything specific I can help you out with.

It’s also crazy expensive here, but that’s not to say that it’s impossible. In most big cities there are some really nice hostels that aren’t too expensive at all about $40 a night. Food is about the same as in the US. Sushi might be a little cheaper. Beer is expensive though. If you want to stay long-term rent is about SF prices. I’m pretty lucky cause I have a huge free house. Which sounds like it’s cool, but it’s not because its super cold.

Japanese language is pretty wild. There are 3 types or writing: kanji (Chinese words) hiragana (for Japanese words) and katakana (foreign words). All are a little tricky, but pronunciation is really easy. The grammar is really strange, but you get the hang of it. Lots of verb suffixes and stuff like that. The word order is the same as Yoda's (not a coincidence) so if you can sort out what you want to say into Yoda speak your half way there. Personally I like the sound of it, especially in cartoons. Japanese cartoon culture is fantastically rich…so if you’re a nerd like that…. Actually, if you’re any kind of nerd, you should come to Japan.

so lets very enjoy Japan.

Birth of a Blog

Ok, so I've been blogging on myspace.com for a bit and, well, I just don't like blogging there, I feel like Uncle Murdock is watching me and selling me stuff. Plus I don't like the banners and whistles and bells and stuff on there, especially at work. It's just not cool. Not that blogging, bloggers, or blog readers are all that cool either. But hey, I'm bored, and sometimes your bored too.

So please enjoy...

Hearing Jesus or Max`s Thanksgiving Tale

It`s been said that Americans can make an epic novel over a trip to the pharmacy. It is in this spirit that I write a pointlessly long slightly boring blog entry on going to the pharmacy....and hearing Jesus.

So for the past 3 weeks or so my hearing was getting worse and worse. When i was late to work because I didn`t hear my alarm ringing right next to my head I knew I had to do something about it. For those you who know me well you know that I`m not the most proactive person regarding health issues, and I like creative solutions. Case in point Aaron`s successful living room minor surgery. So after the lack of hearing had become intolerable I decided to fix the damn thing.

First Attempt: Pharmacy.

I ask, using hand language and sound effects asked for some sort of non-prescription ear drops (headtilted horizontaly and BLOOP BLOOP BLOOP effects) or something to ear-enema myself with (head tilted woooooosh effects). No dice. Bowing and appology furry ensue. result: FAIL

Second Attempt: 100 yen stor

I decided that I don`t need fancy medicines and such; I`ll solve my problem with a little creative thinking a turkey baster (99cents), a small bottle of rubbing alcohol (99cents), wine vineger (99 cents), and my stove. So I mix up the alchohol and viniger, heat it up pretty hot, and blast (baste?) my ears with it. It makes things much worse. Now my ears smell like a drunkerd, are slightly burned, and even more clogged than before. I admit defeat and set the morning alarm to vibrate. Result FAIL

Third Attempt: Hearing Jesus.

After my backyard surgery fix was unsuccessful, I decided to go to the hospital. The hospital system in Japan rules, but that not the point. So, I meet Hearing Jesus. He looks at my magnified ear, "naka ni berry berry hahto deshita ne? Takusan mimikuso arimasu." (Translation: It was very very hot inside wasn`t it. There is a lot of ear shit). The nurse slams (yes, slams) my head into the chair, "No move". Then Hearing Jesus sticks a funnel in my ear milimeters from my brain and turns on his Jesus-class ear shit removal vacumn to 11. I can hear (because it`s in the core of my ear) wax being pulled out after he painfully wiggles the buisness end of this thing around for a while. Then sticks in another cone. Using this one to seperate my ear canal...ouch he starts pulling wax out chopstick style. Sure enough there was "taksun mimikuso arimasu" and my hearing was so improved that I can hear the desperate cries of the flies complainig how cold it is. Lets enjoying hearing with hearing Jesus! Result: SUCCESS!!.

So this Thanksgiving I`m thankful to Hearing Jesus

Zen Bones and Tokyo Mad Kick

Hey guys hope your all recovering from Christmas New Years etc.

Yeah its new years here in Japan and I had a real strange goof that I’d like to write about. If you don’t want to read about it that’s cool too, nothing of consequence happens, just a bunch of stupid bullshit actually. But I’ll try to make it readable. I apologize in advance for the length (and over reliance on parenthesis).

First stage: Zen Bones

For whatever reason I’ve found myself in the Zen gobbly-gook brain bender for a couple of years now, and finally I had a chance to go to a real zendo http://tekishin.org/ and practice sitting and breathing. When I entered the temple (through the side door to show humility), I met a bald gaijin (foreigner) dressed in modest indigo robes. He introduced himself in English as Gentoku, the head Zen foreign student of the temple. His last name was Zurbriggen and he was Swiss-German. As I’d soon find out a Swiss German Zen Master is a very precise person indeed.
Soon after I arrived it was time for sutra reading. Sutras are sort of like Christian prayers except they are in Pali, the ancient language that the Buddha spoke-and are read at mach II. I was given a 25 page-deteriorating booklet with random syllables on it. Next thing I know everyone is standing yelling, “zabutsugonijishabutsuofzenji” (not kidding) and shit and I’ve already lost my place and just start mumbling. I am not alone; some of the people know pages and pages of his incomprehensible blabber by heart and recite it with great gusto while the rest of us just sound like self-conscious bees. Each sutra goes on for about 4 pages. One guy is banging on a drum and ringing a bell to keep time. When he rings it twice it means the sutra is almost over. Everyone slows down to a comprehensible speed for the last couple lines and I join in like I’d been following the whole time feeling clever and a little guilty. Suddenly everyone hits the deck forehead to the ground hands up. Then stands up again and again. Thankfully a young Japanese girl named Hamada san (indeterminable age, overbite) is sitting next to me (bless her heart) shows me three fingers, I realize that we will do this three times. I was right. Then we sat.
Sitting and breathing. So I sat in the half lotus position (Indian sty…errrr cross-legged with left foot on right thigh) and breathed (breathed?) for a couple hours at 30 min intervals everyday starring blurrily—no glasses-- at a raked sand and stone garden in front of me. Unlike other forms of meditation, including my favored Vappassanna style, Zen mediation (zazen) has no focus. Just sit and breathe. This seems to be very easy. It is not. The sitting position is very uncomfortable. Buddha’s seated position is like Jesus’ Cross, it represents peaceful living in the midst of immeasurable suffering. Anyways. We sit and suffer trying not to think. Just breath. All the sudden an old Japanese guy breaks out of his seated position and the (Swiss) Zen dude goes completely ape shit (without moving) and starts yelling at him in impolite Japanese something to the tune of “Don’t fucking move”. Whatever he said, it scared the hell out of me enough to not move during zazen regardless of the intense pain. Most of the time I hung in there, but when it gets bad I feel like I’m in the pit of hell screaming for that son of bitch to ring the damn bell and end it all.
This sort of stuff goes on for days. Eventually I start to get the hang of it and it’s not so bad mentally. Physically is another story. My right hip hurts like crazy, but my mind is becoming more like Mt Fuji, who doesn’t give a crap about anything and never scratches his nose or move his legs or leaks snot cause he doesn’t have that stuff. Just loads of dirt. Fuji-san is a very respectable Buddha.
Zen meals are pretty mental. The vegetarian food is grown on the temple grounds and is really tasty though sparse, mostly daikon (radish) carrots, and sweet potatoes. There is no talking. Movements are to be exact and silent. To get a sense of it here are some things the master said: “don’t use your hands”, “pick up the bowl”,” don’t pick up the bowl”, “use your right hand”,” use your left hand” etc. At each second of the meal there is a precise action to be done. Buddhist monks in many countries have done each precise action identically for the last 2500 years and it’s comforting to remember that they all fucked up in the beginning. What else…. Oh yeah the guesthouse.
The guesthouse is where the male students stay. It’s about 15 minutes away from the temple in a quiet area of respectable families and snow covered rice fields. The building is a 400-year-old maze of a building with UNESCO class woodwork carefully cleaned by the newest monks everyday (me and a talkative Swede who pronounces “th” as an “f’). It was as cold as it was beautiful. The outer wall is paned glass then there is a wooden walkway with rice paper walls that separate each room. Semi-transparent rice and glass are shitty insulators, but my Marmot-synthetic-down-John-Muir-and-Jeremy’s –living-room-floor-tested sleeping bag and a mound of thick futons did the trick. I slept like a baby and snored like a Romanian dragon as did my other three Japanese, Swedish, and English roommates. Meditation gives you fantastic vivid dreams. One morning I woke up thinking-talking “Stupid Flanders and his chocolate boats---- HOLY SHIT NUCLEAR ATTACK!!” (At 4:50am lights go on). Strange. But I guess anything is strange when you’re awoken by a high-pitched bell and blinding light at that hour.
Christmas was pretty uneventful. We ate a Christmas cake that one of the new guys brought with him and had some green tea. The two Siberian Russian guys who were like brothers (one quiet, one loud), the Swede, the Germans and I sang a few Christmas songs, but that was about it. Christmas dinner was a far cry from my mom and dad’s delicious cooking. We had left over rice soup with no vegetables. It was ok though


After going to the zendo (zen temple) outside Kyoto to some pretty extreme pain in my right hip) I caught the night bus to Tokyo to visit Devin. Little did I know how integrated into his host family he is. His host sister Kiwako is almost his sister. It’s funny to watch them together. Anyways, I was worried about not being able to sleep on the night bus so before it left I drank two bottles of gut rot chardonnay in the bus station and slept like a tranquilized bear. Unfortunately I’m fairly sure i snored like one too because when I woke up the Japanese guy next to me gave me a dirty look. Anyways when I got to Tokyo, Devin was there to meet me at the station, which was really cool. He has very good karma and has helped me out more often than I care to say. We ended up walking around some of the hip areas of Tokyo alternating between coffee and beer. It was pretty sweet. Then we met up with my jet buddy Jake and hung out a bit. In Shabuya we went to a cool Punk bar and Devin met a cute and very interesting girl named Mariko that seemed pretty into him. I think she’s already emailed him so that’s good too. Later Devin`s friend Yuuka (two Us I think) drove her 740i BMW to an exclusive club in God knows where Tokyo. It was a pretty posh place and we had a good time dancing. Unfortunately we forgot to take off our layers of keepwarm clothes and overheated quckly. Lots of very cute rich Japanese girls with swimming pools, rich looking Japanese guys with haircuts and even a few Sumo wrestlers who, I might add, are surprisingly agile on the dance floor. We stayed out late and came home drunk and thirsty having accidentally given our US$3 bottle of Pocari Sweat to a gay dude (who wasn’t really gay I guess) who kept putting his hands down Devin and my back pockets. I fell asleep in the car home and started snoring. Again.

New Years morning I woke up very late (1:00) at the host family’s large house. I wasn’t hungry but it was time to eat. I wasn't interesting in being awake or appearing to be awake. I sorta stumbled downstairs into the dining room and to my surprise a very long table is FILLED with food. The centerpiece being a spider crab at least a foot in diameter. It was like going into a Japanese restaurant and ordering one of everything. Around the table are Devin’s host mother, father, sister and woman of indeterminable age possibly aunt. Yeah aunt I think. Thankfully everyone else was up late drinking Korean wine and didn’t feel the need to dress up. Also I guess New Years is a big holiday to be spent with family, kinda like Thanksgiving. There is a lot of etiquette involved in eating in Japan, especially so if one is a guest in someone’s house. So I did my best not to screw up and I think I did fairly well. Althewhile everyone was asking me lots of questions and I was trying MOST unsuccessfully to answer in Japanese. Thankfully Devin and his host sister Kiwako were able to help me out a lot. After lunch/dinner we watched a hilarious Japanese TV show called "paper driver" in which Japanese people who have drivers licenses and never used them are given their boss’s cars and forced to perform difficult driving tasks around Japan. Then they are told to drive assorted equipment at high speed around a course. It`s amazingly funny.

The Sake Sumo Sutra

Well I'm back at "work" in quotations because I hardy do anything. I just talk to kids all day. I just having a blast. Last Thursday I signed my papers to recontract for another year. It's just too much fun. Here's why:

Winter is pretty miserable it snow/rains all day everyday. It's just awful. A couple days ago i was walking down the street with my umbrella up and an obasan (old lady) laughed an old lady laugh and said, "ume shiimasen" (It's not raining). I go outside, I put up the umbrella. Reflex. BUT: Yesterday I went snowboarding with friends. It was the first time I'd ever snowboarded and I was pathetic for about 10 minutes. I got it wired almost immediately and by the end of the day I was flying across the mountain with the best of 'em. It's a lot like the easy parts of surfing. I don't think I've ever been that good at anything that fast. I was a great feeling. I can't wait for next weekend 'cause we're going to Nagano (winter Olympics '92?) on a snowboarding trip, should be awesome.

I was tempted to going to the slops again today, but had to get a bunch of odds and ends taken care of. Got a haircut, paid bills, got new tatami mats, and I got a track suit-- which I'm wearing now. For some (Japanese) reason at school I can wear a sport coat and necktie or a track suit. While track suits are totally ridiculous, they're more comfortable than business clothes. When I Rome and all that.

Today was Nabe (winter soup) day in a nearby town. As you can see it's cooked in big pots. It's really good stuff. The directions to get there are pretty funny:

Exit the train station, go straight past the castle. You'll see a blue and red Pachinko parlor that says'"Alpha vs. Pluto" on it. Turn right. go straight til you see a huge Buddha. The pots are in front of it. Lastly, I got home-- full of soup wearing a tracksuit with a bag full of sushi and sake (;;;;;drinking now;;;;;)-- to watch my two favorite shows on TV. The first is sumo which is great, there..'s a Bulgarian that..'s climbing the ranks. Very exciting. Second is a show pronounced /paypah du-rai-ba/ (paper driver) which features Japanese people with drivers licenses but never drive being forced to navigate their boss..'s cars around difficult areas in Tokyo. It..'s AMAZING. Whatta great week I..'m ready for 52 more much love, may yeah I almost forgot (stupid sake) I..'m coming home at the end of July/early August for my friend John Higgins wedding. I..'ll be in California for a couple weeks. WHhoo hhoo

Lastly, I got home-- full of soup wearing a tracksuit with a bag full of sushi and sake (;;;;;drinking now;;;;;)-- to watch my two favorite shows on TV. The first is sumo which is great, there's a Bulgarian that's climbing the ranks. Very exciting. Second is a show pronounced /paypah du-rai-ba/ (paper driver) which features Japanese people with driver's licenses but never drive being forced to navigate their boss's cars around difficult areas in Tokyo. It's AMAZING.

Whatta great week I'm ready for 52 more

much love,

max

I'm a feverish, illiterate, slob and your friends with me (a story-rant)

Sorry I just gotta bitch, Im spotting so I think my period is coming on. You can read it or not. Your definantly better off not reading this, it will have no effect on your life. Go brush your teeth or call your grandma instead. She'd like that.

Ok that said. Its story time.
'Goo moaning Makusu sensei. You dough look so good today'. Fujita always says this, some times he doesn't even look at me. He just lets it fly. In actuality I dont look very well on account of the fact that that morning my water pipes were frozen, and I just had to walk 20 min in the snow to work. I slipped on the ice twice. 'Do you have any play pretend phones yet?'
'Uhhh, phones?'
'for skit?'
'skit?'
'Yes first grade students next next (not a typo) Thursday have make phone skit.' Why I'm expected to have fake phones for an event in the semi-distant future that Im not aware of is beyond me. So miraculously the 100-yen store has some fake phones that ring and are totallly sweet. Mission Accomplished. Hurdle jumped. Everyday has it's mission, little did I know that things were going to take a turn for the worse.

'Goo moaning Makusu sensei, you dough look so good today, too.' Fuck you. I actually feel like shit, sore throat etc. By nightfall Ive got a full-blown fever and I feel horrible. Its like all the bad parts of being stoned.

Days pass. Still sick. Phone call. Unknown number. I risk it.

'Mushi Mushi Max desu', I answer delusionally.
'Max sensei, this is Rumiko,' Ahhh, thank God. I really love this woman, she pronounces my name correctly and saves my ass. We teach English together and she gets it. Unfortunately she gets it a little too much and sometimes I think shes suicidal. Pleasantries are exchanged I find out that she got in a car crash on a bridge.
'Are you ready for next Wednesday?' uhh oohh thats the preface for something bad.
'Wednesday?' Grown. Cough. Fever high and sympathy needed.
'The speech.'

Squiggily doo Squigggily doo Squiggily doo

Flashback about 3 months; lets sayuh September ish.

Everyday a shit load of totally irrelevant papers cross my desk, I scan them for two things, my name in Japanese, and the kanji for English. A lone sheet of paper waiting on my desk has red official looking stamps all over it and a date 2/15. This is potentially very bad. I like surprises, but not red stamp official surprises. Maybe I'm being deported. 'Rumiko sensei, whats this?'

'Hummm,' she reads the paper, 'Are you free February 15th next year?' a totally random Wednesday calendar pages away.
'Uh, I guess so why?' I couldnt say I was busy; it was deep in the future.
'You have to give a speech for 30 minutes for the Rotary Club just a minute.' She starts speaking frantic Japanese with principal, and Im thinking: alright speech, not a problem, Ill just charm em and talk about bullsh....
'...in Japanese.' The other shoe has dropped.

Flash forward to sick on couch.

'Oh yeah, the speech.'
'Are you ready?'
'No, I havent even thou...' door bell rings, just a minute, someones at the door

'Goo moaning Makusu sensei, you dough look so good.' Ahh well look who it is! Just who I wanted to see. Fujita actually came to my house to tell me in his shitty broken ass English that I didnt look so good. WOW, NO SHIT, Ive been in this Goddamn sleeping bag unshaven sweating out a gnarly fever for days taking nonfunctioning Japanese medicine, prescribed by a doctor I didn't understand, from a hospital that I had to walk to in the snow.
'Your house not so clean, you need girlfriend clean up for you.' Unbelievable, he managed to insult my hygiene, my lack of sex life, and my language in a mere eleven words.

I started feeling better and decided I was well enough to go to my Japanese lesson. My teacher lookeed upset.

'Konban wa, sensei.' Good evening teacher.
'Ah Max san, You dont have any Japanese friends do you? Because I can tell you Japanese isn't improving.' (in English)

So here I am post-sick and 7 pounds lighter with a messy room and a crummy beard desperately writing a 30-minute speech to give in a language I barely speak.

These last couple weeks havent been bad. They've been scathing.