It's now been two weeks since I moved to my new family, and it's totally different than my first one, but really good. It was hard to move, and weird standing with my old sisters looking at my new sisters, and realizing how comfortable I was with the Takano's. My host grandma surprised me, since I didn't spend that much time with her, by running after the car, since I hadn't said a final goodbye, and seeming almost about to cry as she gave me a book and insisted I read it. I think it's a book of fairy tales, but unfortunately it's full of kanji and I can't read it, but it was really sweet anyway. I missed them a lot the first night, but I knew I had an odori lesson with them in three days. Now I'm glad I switched families, because I'm experiencing a completely different way of living in Japan, which is the whole point. Also they're a lot of fun :) When I did go back for my odori lesson, walking there from school, it was very strange. On the one hand it felt extremely familiar, but on the other hand it wasn't my home anymore. I'd also just had a bad experience at school. I was told that the principal had decided to move me to a different class, one grade lower, the next week, although it had been brought up and I expressed my extreme dislike before winter break. I feel I've been really lucky with my class, and they're one of the reasons my exchange has gone so well. Also, there's already an age gap and I really didn't want to be put in with 15 year olds. So I went and talked/pleaded with the principal, and he said he'd think about it. So I wasn't in the greatest mood that day. In the end he let me stay for this term, but I'll have to move in April to the grade lower. Also instead of English Lounge periods, now I sometimes have periods with different classes, all in the first grade and one with the middle school. But it's kind of fun, and at least I have a few more months with my class.
This family is a different one than I had thought, with 3 girls, 11, 9, and 6, and a 4-year-old boy. I like them a lot, the oldest girls are smart and mature and the little ones are adorable. The boy, Taichi, has quite a personality. I'm good friends with the mom, who's really cool and much younger than my first one, so we both decided it would be weird if I called her "okāsan" (mom), like I did at the Takano's. The dad is super nice, but he comes home late and leaves early, so I don't see him much. He's an important person, possibly CEO, of I think a grocery company? I'm not quite sure. But they're very well off. It was a little intimidating when I first walked in to a gigantic flower display and 5 foot wooden bear statue in the entryway, and other expensive-looking decorations everywhere. There's a full suit of samurai armor. I was about to begin hauling a suitcase up the stairs, when Masako (the mother) is like, "oh, use the elevator." There is an elevator inside the house!! It's three stories, but we don't use the first one. My room is huge, with a random six person dining table in the corner, but it's kind of annoying because it takes time to walk across (ok, not that big a problem I guess). And it has it's own heater!!! The rest of the house is still usually freezing though, but at least I can sleep and change clothes without fear of frost bite. The house is in a complex with two other relatives' houses, and there are two guards that are always there. I think they help with other things too sometimes, and twice one of them has driven us to the train station for school.
That's the one downside, school is much farther than my nice 10 minute bike ride from the Takano's. The two oldest girls go to Kenmei's elementary school so we go together in the morning, but theirs starts half an hour earlier than the high school, making the mornings even earlier. We leave at 6:30, and it takes 20-25 minutes to drive to the train. The train ride's 10-15 minutes, and from there a 10 minute bus ride to pretty near the school. Altogether with transitions it's a bit over an hour, but it doesn't feel too bad. I've been able to read a lot, working my way through Game of Thrones :) And it's kind of peaceful having the classroom to myself for 25 minutes before anyone else comes. The bus fare system is really smart! You enter at the middle door and either swipe a bus pass or take a ticket from the dispenser there. Then at the end, up front there is a ticket reader/money taker machine and another sensor for cards. But with the commute and the driving around to people's various lessons, all the time in the evening somehow disappears, so I feel like all I do at home is prepare/eat dinner, shower, and sleep. I'm helping cook a lot more, which is good because I don't know anything...
On the weekends though, there's more time, which is really nice. Also I can run, which I can't during the week because I get home too late. My first day with them, a Sunday, we drove to a temple in Nara, which isn't so far anymore, so the dad could pray for a successful year. Then we went to a park to fly kites, except they were really cheap and never worked, but it was fun anyway. We went to a different shrine in the middle of Osaka for a business god later in the week, and there was a whole festival around it with the same game and food stalls that are at all the festivals. I won a shitajiki, the plastic sheet you put under paper to write on, with pictures of the most popular male idol group on it, and I was pretty excited. Last weekend we went to the zoo, which was decent although cold (I thought about you, Grandma Betty :)). So it's really cool getting to see Japan from a younger perspective, and getting to know the children's TV shows. I also discovered that children's books are really cool because they don't use kanji, and I can actually understand a lot. It's so fun how my Japanese is getting better! I felt completely confident in it for moving families, since I can understand most things relating to daily life. My biggest issue is vocab, which will come more and more I guess, so I still understand barely anything in classes. But now sometimes I forget easy English words, and it's kind of terrifying.
We just came back from the grandparents' house, where all the relatives gathered for a ceremony honoring the ancestors. There were about 40 people packed into a room, all wearing black, and a man chanting at the family shrine. There was a group chant, which was kind of fun, then incense dishes were passed around until everyone was choking. It lasted about 40 minutes. After the ceremony everyone mingled around, and it was fun hanging out with the cousins and talking to other relatives. It's so nice being able to speak Japanese! We ate huge beautiful bentos, and there was so much food. At one point, when people were getting kind of bored, someone was like, "it's time for a konbini date!" and everyone's like, "yay, a konbini date!" and all the cousins and a couple uncles with the wallets walked to the nearest convenient store and loaded up on snacks (like we needed more food). I'm really going to miss konbinis!
Last weekend I went back to the Takano's again and stayed over Saturday night because on Sunday we had a special ceremony at the tea ceremony sensei's house. It was less weird going back the second time. I'm not quite sure what the occasion was, but it was an annual thing. We got up a couple hours early so okāsan could dress my sister Hirona and I in kimonos, which is quite a process. There are so many layers and ties, I don't know how people wore these things regularly. But once in a while it's fun, although uncomfortable by the end of the day. There was the usual group of about 15 ladies, all wearing kimonos. First Hirona performed the tea ceremony, and it was very pretty. Then we had an awesome traditional bento lunch, and it was so hard not to eat everything and take some home. And then it was kind of confusing, two ladies took my little sister Yuzuki and I out to sit in a little traditional-looking bench shelter in the freezing backyard. After a while I'm like, "Soo, what are we doing here?" And they're like, "We sit here. And then we listen." And eventually someone rang a bell or gong or something on the other side of the yard, and we went over to a little connected building there, after putting our seat cushions back just so, and opening the gate just so. There's an exact way to do everything in these traditional things, and every move matters, but I can never remember how. There we had a different kind of tea ceremony that I think was related to the New Year? They were telling me all about the architecture of the little building, but I didn't really understand. After that there was, of course, Bingo, and I had the honor of rolling the thing and calling out the numbers. It's not a party without Bingo. By then we were ready to go home and get the heavy obis off our backs.
Also in the past couple weeks, I had the lovely experience of going to a cat cafe with my exchange student friends. This is literally a cafe full of cats, where you pay by the hour. Oh my god. It was a very chill place, with cat structures everywhere, and didn't actually smell bad. The cats were friendly and mostly big and fluffy.
Another great New Year's tradition I forgot to mention in my last post: otoshidama. Young people get money from their relatives, in pretty little envelopes. I was really surprised when I received money from 5 different relatives, several of whom I'd only just met, so that was really generous.
Sunday, January 19, 2014
Friday, January 3, 2014
New Year's
明けましておめでとうございます！Happy New Year! So here, while Christmas is not a big thing, New Year's is. And that makes sense, they've been celebrating new Year's much longer, Christmas is a relatively new import.
Also, while in America we do most celebrating the night of the 31st, here the 1st itself is the most important day (again I think that makes sense). On the 31st, we spent most of the day cooking, preparing for the next day's osechi, traditional New Year's food. These are like large bentos, big boxes filled with many different dishes. I think we had 14 different foods in ours. This went smoothly, except when my little sister and I were supposed to prepare the shrimp, but when she poked the package they started thrashing around. We left that one for my host mom. For dinner, we ate soba, which is traditional, and watched TV. There was a long end of the year program with all the best artists and actors of the year, which almost everyone watches.
Then at about 11:40, we went over to the temple and shrines near our house. There were a lot of people, and I think it's actually a well known temple that people travel to and we just happen to live near. At each shrine and temple, we waited in line to make our offerings, giving a small amount of money then ringing some sort of bell or gong. At a couple of the shrines, afterward they gave us free food or drink. At the first one, there was a thick sweet rice drink that I think usually is alcoholic but wasn't this year, and it was really good. At another one, there were actually low tables set up and we were served the sweet red bean soup with mochi and green tea. At the main temple, there were many good luck things and special offerings to buy. It was sad though, while waiting in one of the lines I asked, "What time is it?" "12:04." So I completely missed the countdown! :( So I guess that's not very important here.
On New Year's itself, at lunch we opened the bentos together. We all had our names written on our chopstick sleeves. We also had sashimi and soup with mochi. We kept refilling the bentos as we went, so everyone ate a lot. It's well known that everyone becomes fatter at New Year's, just sitting under the kotatsu eating. When we were finally done, some relatives came but it was really awkward so Mayuko and I took the train to a different big temple. It was soo crowded but everyone is patient here and doesn't push and shove so it's not bad, just takes a long time to move. Because it was so crowded, there were mats in front of the shrines so people could just throw their money when they got close. There were more luck things to buy, and I got my fortune for the year, but apparently it was a bad one =/ Nearby there were many stalls with food and games, and even though we had just had the osechi, it smelled soo good so we had to get some. So when we got home I took a run, and there were definitely more people than usual out running, I guess staving off the New Year's fat like me or fulfilling newly made resolutions. At dinner, we brought out the bentos again, and ate more. Then we played Wii sports, telling ourselves that moving our one arm is definitely a workout.
On the second, we went over to different relatives' house. It was very relative-y. I realized it was only the second Japanese house I've been in, and I think my house is on the more traditional side, with lots of tatami mats and sliding doors. I move in an hour though, so I'll see what the new place is like! Eek. My life is once again packed into two large suitcases. My sisters made a slideshow of my time with them, and it was really sweet. They have been an awesome family and I feel really comfortable here. But I will see them again soon, since we still have our odori performance, and we're trying to plan a trip to Tokyo. It will probably be a good thing to shake things up a bit. Wish me luck!
Also, while in America we do most celebrating the night of the 31st, here the 1st itself is the most important day (again I think that makes sense). On the 31st, we spent most of the day cooking, preparing for the next day's osechi, traditional New Year's food. These are like large bentos, big boxes filled with many different dishes. I think we had 14 different foods in ours. This went smoothly, except when my little sister and I were supposed to prepare the shrimp, but when she poked the package they started thrashing around. We left that one for my host mom. For dinner, we ate soba, which is traditional, and watched TV. There was a long end of the year program with all the best artists and actors of the year, which almost everyone watches.
Then at about 11:40, we went over to the temple and shrines near our house. There were a lot of people, and I think it's actually a well known temple that people travel to and we just happen to live near. At each shrine and temple, we waited in line to make our offerings, giving a small amount of money then ringing some sort of bell or gong. At a couple of the shrines, afterward they gave us free food or drink. At the first one, there was a thick sweet rice drink that I think usually is alcoholic but wasn't this year, and it was really good. At another one, there were actually low tables set up and we were served the sweet red bean soup with mochi and green tea. At the main temple, there were many good luck things and special offerings to buy. It was sad though, while waiting in one of the lines I asked, "What time is it?" "12:04." So I completely missed the countdown! :( So I guess that's not very important here.
On New Year's itself, at lunch we opened the bentos together. We all had our names written on our chopstick sleeves. We also had sashimi and soup with mochi. We kept refilling the bentos as we went, so everyone ate a lot. It's well known that everyone becomes fatter at New Year's, just sitting under the kotatsu eating. When we were finally done, some relatives came but it was really awkward so Mayuko and I took the train to a different big temple. It was soo crowded but everyone is patient here and doesn't push and shove so it's not bad, just takes a long time to move. Because it was so crowded, there were mats in front of the shrines so people could just throw their money when they got close. There were more luck things to buy, and I got my fortune for the year, but apparently it was a bad one =/ Nearby there were many stalls with food and games, and even though we had just had the osechi, it smelled soo good so we had to get some. So when we got home I took a run, and there were definitely more people than usual out running, I guess staving off the New Year's fat like me or fulfilling newly made resolutions. At dinner, we brought out the bentos again, and ate more. Then we played Wii sports, telling ourselves that moving our one arm is definitely a workout.
On the second, we went over to different relatives' house. It was very relative-y. I realized it was only the second Japanese house I've been in, and I think my house is on the more traditional side, with lots of tatami mats and sliding doors. I move in an hour though, so I'll see what the new place is like! Eek. My life is once again packed into two large suitcases. My sisters made a slideshow of my time with them, and it was really sweet. They have been an awesome family and I feel really comfortable here. But I will see them again soon, since we still have our odori performance, and we're trying to plan a trip to Tokyo. It will probably be a good thing to shake things up a bit. Wish me luck!
Wednesday, January 1, 2014
Christmas Festivities
Happy Holidays!! So far they have indeed been happy over here, and there's still New Year's and all it's festivities, which I'm looking forward to.
The Friday before Christmas, my school had a "Chorus Concours," in which each middle school and high school class sang a song they'd been working on for weeks. With over 20 songs, and then songs for each grade, it got a bit long but was better than I expected. The worst part was the large awfully decorated Christmas tree on the end of the stage. There were three feather boas, white and pale pink, hanging vertically from random places. It hurt my eyes. But it was cute how nervous my classmates were, and fun seeing their excitement afterwards as they all shared how shaky their legs had been. With the whole second grade I sang "Joy to the World" in Japanese, after my friend had patiently taught me the words over and over the day before. It was a fun day, with everyone in good spirits, especially since it snowed for the first time during the morning. Everyone immediately opened the windows, as Hannah said her class did too, which just seems so Japanese. They do this sometimes when it's storming or really windy too, so they can feel the weather. In America, when it snows or storms, people might run to the windows, but not OPEN them. Here nature is just not shut out as much as in America, which is kind of cool but means inside it's really cold in the winter and hot in the summer, with bugs.
But on the cold note, they have a great thing called a kotatsu to deal with this. It's a low wooden table frame with a futon or thick blanket draped over it, then a table top over the blanket. Usually there is a heater in the table itself, or as in my house where just the carpet is heated, but the heat still gets trapped under the table. It's amazingly warm and comfortable, and brings people together because it's too cold elsewhere.
On Sunday the 22, I had my Rotary District Christmas party, where it was really nice to see everyone again. In the beginning, we all had to sing our national anthems, which I had missed last time. But fortunately, it turns out the other girl from America sings opera, so the American boy and I just let her take all the high parts. Then we all had to give two minute speeches in Japanese, without notes. I had written mine with the help of friends in school and memorized it the day before, and it actually went really smoothly. Then students going out next year did their best to give speeches in English, and there's a girl going to Illinois! After the speeches the "party" part started, and we played a card game, gestures, and bingo, which seems to be popular here. We had all brought $5 presents, which we got to pick from after getting a bingo. There must have been one left over so I got it for having the best speech, and it was a fluffy blanket so I was really happy :)
And finally Christmas itself! I had honestly not been looking forward to it, but it actually turned out to be a really nice day. The day before, a little fake tree had been put up, although we hadn't decorated it yet. So when I woke up before anyone else out of school habit, since I had school through the 24th, I decided to put everyone's presents under the tree. I was less stealthy than I'd hoped, first half running into my little sister on the way to the bathroom, then knocking over a ladder and making a huge crash, but it was ok! Everyone really enjoyed it when they woke up, like "Look! Santa-san came!" and set a cheery mood for the day, which everyone picked up. I spent most of the day cooking and baking with my sister, making beef stew and a Yule log cake, and we played Christmas music and it was very pleasant. Then I was like, "it would look much better if we decorated the tree before opening presents," so we finally did. We had a nice dinner and opened presents, and they really enjoyed the chocolate I got from home, especially pretzel m&m's. So overall I felt I successfully brought Christmas spirit to what would probably have been an ordinary day, so I was happy :)
A few days later, unrelated to Christmas, we had a mochi-tsuki party, literally "mochi making," an annual event held before the New Year. The process of making the mochi was very simple. Special sticky rice was soaked in water overnight, then steamed over a wood-burning stove in our small outdoor courtyard, where all of this was done. Then the rice was put in a big bowl and pounded with a large heavy mallet until it was a solid sticky lump, mochi. This was surprisingly difficult because the mallet was so heavy. The large lump was then rolled with cornstarch into smaller balls, and it was done! We dipped them in soy sauce and roasted them over a little fire, had them dusted with kinako (roasted soy flour), or ate them in a hot sweet red bean soup. The soup was my favorite, the mochi became melty and it was soo good. But now there is constantly mochi because we made so much.
I also ventured to get a haircut for the first time here, with Hannah. One of the American teachers at school had recommended a place that's near an international school and gets a lot of foreigners, but the directions were unclear. So we found a place, but I'm not sure if it was the same one. It was pretty amusing, we struggled along with the language barrier as best as we could. Hannah has really curly hair so her poor guy had quite a challenge. The stylists were almost all male, which my sister said is normal, while in America they seem to be mostly female. But in the end it was a success, and even though it was a nice looking place, much cheaper than I expected for Japan, about $28.
Also, I went bowling with some friends from school and there was an automatic shoe dispenser! So smart. At random times there was a "Moon Light Strike Game," when the lights were turned down and people came out with tambourines. If whoever was up got a strike if they were male or at least 9 if they were female (really??) or elementary students, they got to wear a lei for a while until someone came to take a picture of them holding a "Moon Light Strike Game" sign. I bowled unbelievably terribly all day, except for when it was my turn during one of these games, and I happened to get my only strike! Yay.
Andd now it's past New Years (Happy New Year!!) but that will be a new post soon.
The Friday before Christmas, my school had a "Chorus Concours," in which each middle school and high school class sang a song they'd been working on for weeks. With over 20 songs, and then songs for each grade, it got a bit long but was better than I expected. The worst part was the large awfully decorated Christmas tree on the end of the stage. There were three feather boas, white and pale pink, hanging vertically from random places. It hurt my eyes. But it was cute how nervous my classmates were, and fun seeing their excitement afterwards as they all shared how shaky their legs had been. With the whole second grade I sang "Joy to the World" in Japanese, after my friend had patiently taught me the words over and over the day before. It was a fun day, with everyone in good spirits, especially since it snowed for the first time during the morning. Everyone immediately opened the windows, as Hannah said her class did too, which just seems so Japanese. They do this sometimes when it's storming or really windy too, so they can feel the weather. In America, when it snows or storms, people might run to the windows, but not OPEN them. Here nature is just not shut out as much as in America, which is kind of cool but means inside it's really cold in the winter and hot in the summer, with bugs.
But on the cold note, they have a great thing called a kotatsu to deal with this. It's a low wooden table frame with a futon or thick blanket draped over it, then a table top over the blanket. Usually there is a heater in the table itself, or as in my house where just the carpet is heated, but the heat still gets trapped under the table. It's amazingly warm and comfortable, and brings people together because it's too cold elsewhere.
On Sunday the 22, I had my Rotary District Christmas party, where it was really nice to see everyone again. In the beginning, we all had to sing our national anthems, which I had missed last time. But fortunately, it turns out the other girl from America sings opera, so the American boy and I just let her take all the high parts. Then we all had to give two minute speeches in Japanese, without notes. I had written mine with the help of friends in school and memorized it the day before, and it actually went really smoothly. Then students going out next year did their best to give speeches in English, and there's a girl going to Illinois! After the speeches the "party" part started, and we played a card game, gestures, and bingo, which seems to be popular here. We had all brought $5 presents, which we got to pick from after getting a bingo. There must have been one left over so I got it for having the best speech, and it was a fluffy blanket so I was really happy :)
And finally Christmas itself! I had honestly not been looking forward to it, but it actually turned out to be a really nice day. The day before, a little fake tree had been put up, although we hadn't decorated it yet. So when I woke up before anyone else out of school habit, since I had school through the 24th, I decided to put everyone's presents under the tree. I was less stealthy than I'd hoped, first half running into my little sister on the way to the bathroom, then knocking over a ladder and making a huge crash, but it was ok! Everyone really enjoyed it when they woke up, like "Look! Santa-san came!" and set a cheery mood for the day, which everyone picked up. I spent most of the day cooking and baking with my sister, making beef stew and a Yule log cake, and we played Christmas music and it was very pleasant. Then I was like, "it would look much better if we decorated the tree before opening presents," so we finally did. We had a nice dinner and opened presents, and they really enjoyed the chocolate I got from home, especially pretzel m&m's. So overall I felt I successfully brought Christmas spirit to what would probably have been an ordinary day, so I was happy :)
A few days later, unrelated to Christmas, we had a mochi-tsuki party, literally "mochi making," an annual event held before the New Year. The process of making the mochi was very simple. Special sticky rice was soaked in water overnight, then steamed over a wood-burning stove in our small outdoor courtyard, where all of this was done. Then the rice was put in a big bowl and pounded with a large heavy mallet until it was a solid sticky lump, mochi. This was surprisingly difficult because the mallet was so heavy. The large lump was then rolled with cornstarch into smaller balls, and it was done! We dipped them in soy sauce and roasted them over a little fire, had them dusted with kinako (roasted soy flour), or ate them in a hot sweet red bean soup. The soup was my favorite, the mochi became melty and it was soo good. But now there is constantly mochi because we made so much.
I also ventured to get a haircut for the first time here, with Hannah. One of the American teachers at school had recommended a place that's near an international school and gets a lot of foreigners, but the directions were unclear. So we found a place, but I'm not sure if it was the same one. It was pretty amusing, we struggled along with the language barrier as best as we could. Hannah has really curly hair so her poor guy had quite a challenge. The stylists were almost all male, which my sister said is normal, while in America they seem to be mostly female. But in the end it was a success, and even though it was a nice looking place, much cheaper than I expected for Japan, about $28.
Also, I went bowling with some friends from school and there was an automatic shoe dispenser! So smart. At random times there was a "Moon Light Strike Game," when the lights were turned down and people came out with tambourines. If whoever was up got a strike if they were male or at least 9 if they were female (really??) or elementary students, they got to wear a lei for a while until someone came to take a picture of them holding a "Moon Light Strike Game" sign. I bowled unbelievably terribly all day, except for when it was my turn during one of these games, and I happened to get my only strike! Yay.
Andd now it's past New Years (Happy New Year!!) but that will be a new post soon.
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