I Love LOVE Hotels

So for the past 3 months i have been trying to convince my mates to sample Love Hotels with me.....(A love hotel, is the cheesy hourly place that business men go to with their lovers, and couples go to get away from their parents...if you go after 11 pm, you can rent the room for the entire night...til 10 AM) So I know it all sounds super sleazy and why would I want to go to one of these places. Well, the answer is simple, I have heard from my sources that Love Hotels are trully some of the most amazing pieces of Japanese culture...full of cheesy theme rooms with heart shaped beds and saunas, Japanese porn, Karoke in bed, disco balls and catwalks. And more importantly, they are the subject of an article i agreed to write.

Friday night, I convinced a couple of people to do a Love Hotel Slumber party. It was totally great. We pull into a spot in the garage, and have to pull a curtain across our car, so that no one will be able to see our license plate and be able to identify us. Then we wander up our own private stairway to our "love shack"...which turned out to be super fabulous. Red Shag carpet, crushed red velvet curtains and bed, a slot machine, tons of free snacks, a condom machine, and a sex toy vending machine. This place was straight out of a cheesy 80s porno. So after karokeing from bed, watching a bit of J-porn (which is actually pretty boring, as not only does it have a clinical feel about it, but everything is censored and blurred out)..playing with the 300 mood music channels (including death metal, gangster rap, and sound effect stations for role playing) we settled nicely on a night of MTV...I doubt we got the "best" possible use out of the room...but I think we can all agree, that the experience was definatly appreciated.

under the kotatsu

When I was in College my girlfriends and I used to crash under the coffee table after a night out on the town. We used to call it the "bomb shelter" because it was the only safe place when the room started to spin. After graduating from college, I never thought that i would find myself crashing under a coffee table ever again...then I moved to Japan. So after a late night of drinking and Karoke (I know this sounds so fraternity boy, but "dude you should have seen the beer bongs at this bar..they were literally 5 feet tall and could fill 15 pints") I found myself at my girlfriend S's house. Attempting to sleep under a Japanese coffee table (the kotatsu) between 2 other people. Now to really understand how necessary and ridiculous it is to sleep under said coffee table, you must understand that S's apartment (like ever other JET's apartment in this country) has no heating. The warmest place in the apartment is under the kotatsu (or heated coffee table....the greatest japanese invention ever.) So there I was, marveling at how crazy the world really is...when I realized I was not just warm and toasty...but BURNING up....It was hotter than hell under that table...In fact I think my skin may have been melting. So for the rest of the night I wandered from icy subzero couch to 110 degree coffee table. I don't think any of my collegiate practice with coffee table bomb shelters could have prepared me for a Japanese Kotatsu.

attempting to collect yen for a good cause

I have spent the last 5 days traveling back and forth to Takamatsu for meetings. Takamatsu is the capital of my prefecture, so it is the "big city" in my current world. The best part about spending so much time in Takamatsu, is that I feel like I have had a brief vacation...I mean every day I have been gorging on mexican, indian, italian, starbucks, and bagels....its like a bizarre version of heaven. I mean, since when would any of those food categories be considered special? Well, I have managed to eat more than my share of amazing...exotic foods...I actually feel like I have a vacation belly...its so great...well, until i remember that tomorrow is back to good old school lunch..YUMMY;)

I spent most of my Saturday afternoon doing charity work...trying to collect money for the tsunami survivors. I guess doing stuff like that is part of my contract...1/3 of my responsibilities for this job include being an ambassador for my home country and making appearance on special occassions...(I am not kidding, its there...although, not worded quite like that)...Anyhow, the govenor of our prefecture called on the foreigners to come out and help collect money....Do you have any idea how hard it is to collect money from people if you don't speak the language? I mean, I stood on a busy-ish street corner for 2 hours with 2 of my fellow foreigners and it was nearly impossible to get people to donate. We had signs written in Japanese, explaining the cause. We had a set line we would yell, asking people to donate money to the victims of this tragedy. I even managed to paste on a genuine-ish looking smile for 2 hours, despite the cold. And still I feel that the end results were almost embarrassing. Well I suppose this is one of those things that should make you feel good despite its short-comings. But I was a bit annoyed. I mean, I have done charity work in the past, collecting donations for any number of things...it has never been this hard. I suppose the language barrier was definatly the most difficult...but i think our tactics also had be examined. I mean, usally I just have smile and bat my eyelashes a little, and i can get most men over the age of 12 to donate a little money. And the smile usually even works on most women...but here in Japan...That tactic absolutely positively 98% of the time does not work. I believe it actually turns people off. In fact, frowning may have been the answer to my problems....

The badass rebel....

You know that character from "Grease", Danny Zukko (aka John Travolta), I think that one of my kids is channeling his spirit...imagine if you will, a really tough JR High School kid...a complete punkass (9th grader)...I walk outside one day and catch this kid throwing rocks up to his friend on the 3rd floor. He wasn't tossing those rocks in a gentle manner (whatever that would be)... he's THROWING them...pitcher style at a kid who is standing 3 stories up, in front of a window. So I (in my most authoritative voice) yell to him, "Hey man, what do you think you are doing?" (and I am so not kidding here) He looks at me, drops the remaining rocks he is holding and starts singing a loud song in Japanese, then follows that by dancing around. Crazy dancing...arms flailing, legs shaking...we are talking Elvis meets a gaggle of mosh pitters....this was nuts. All I could think was how badly, i wished there were subtitles to read, what on earth he was singing at that moment.

fashion faux pas

So this happened before...in fact it happened about 5 times in the first month. There would be a big important (i.e. formal) event at one of my schools. All of the staff would be wearing a suit and I would show up looking like a slob, prepared for a normal day of work. Nobody ever gives me warning about these days. And usually what makes it worse is that I have to give a speech of some sort in front of 500 people. Generally, I am given 15 minutes to prepare what I will say. These are the moments that I am eternally grateful to my highschool speech teacher, Mr. Sassenberg. Of course decent public speaking abilities can't cover the fact that I am wearing a Paul Frank "Julius" t-shirt and army shorts in a room full of suits.

Today, was only different, in that I didn't have to actually speak. Today, I just had to stand in front of the entire Elementary school...all 450 kids, looking like a fool in my pink yoga pants (they are totally warm) and "dressy" sweatshirt (an oxymoron I know...but its what i tell myself in order to get out of bed in the morning.) in and amongst a pool of black suits.

I love communication barriers;)

the light at the end of the tunnel

It's official, as of July 25, 2005 I will have completed my contract and will be able to leave rural Japan behind. I handed in my decision on Friday, and my supervisor was very unhappy. His face turned bright red, and a vein in his forehead started to throb. I of course knew something like this would happen, so I had tried to smooth it over a bit, by bringing in omiyagi (which is basically the mandantory present one gives to EVERYONE, each time they go on a trip.) and saying things like, I am very sorry, but i have decided not to return for a 2nd year. I even tossed in the pathetic breakup line, "It's not you, it's me...I think you are fantastic and please don't take this personally." Strangely, that kind of worked on the throbbing forehead vein...although, he couldn't make eye contact with me as I was leaving my Japanese lesson to go home.

You know, I really wish parts of this whole adventure had worked out differently. I mean, I came here with so much energy and optimism about what the year ahead would be like. I was enthusiatic about learning from a new culture and language and really excited about the challenge of teaching English to a bunch of japanese kids. Unfortunatly, I have been continually disappointed by Japanese society. The very blatant superficial-ness that the majority of the population displays, the passive-agressive energy, and the overwhelming need to conform. I despise the fact that within my town I am often ignored because I am of Asian-American descent, and therefore in their eyes not really a foreigner. Most people here think I should speak fluent Japanese purely because language should be programmed into ones DNA. Because, I don't speak the language, but look like I should I am often treated like a person with "special needs." Of course, its possible that looking like a blond-haired, blue-eyed westerner might actually be even worse. Whenever i go out with my extremely "foreign" looking friends, I experience the E.T. effect. Where everywhere we go, everything we do...we are watched, pointed at, giggled at...strangers come up to us on the street and feel the need to say random english phrases then run off giggling... "how is the weather?" "what time is it?" "how much is a ticket to Chicago?" usually they don't wait for an answer..
Or even wierder, I have actually had strangers come up to me, as ask if they could take a picture with me. I have always obliged, but it is totally strange.

I have nailed down how to look like a japanese person vs a westerner...so when I go out, I can dress as to how I want to be treated...It all comes down to the earrings. It doesn't matter what clothes I wear, how much makeup I apply, or how i wear my hair. If I wear earrings, I am automatically a "gaijin" and therefore free-for-all gossip fodder (usually they don't even whisper when they talk about me, they figure i cannot understand). If I don't wear earrings...I am clearly japanese, and therefore I can blend in with the crowd. I have found myself wearing earrings less and less these days.

After having this brief rant session of some of the negative aspects of my life here. I do have to say that there are a lot of positives; things that make me not regret having come. For instance, I have made some really amazing friends, who inspire me to do things I never would have thought of. There are so many opportunities to travel and see things I could never have seen from my LA home. And my students (at least the little kids) generally make me laugh, and make at least 2 days of my weekly teaching routine seem, worthwhile.

guilt trips

So the superintendent of schools calls me into his office today...its kind of like seeing the principal when you were in primary school....I mean all that was going thru my head was,"what have I done lately that would get me in trouble." Let's face it, no matter how you spin it, being called in to see the superintendent is never a good thing. And today was really no exception.

The deadline for my decision of whether or not to recontract is on February 4th. Although, I have been asked to stay on for another year, I think we all know that is just stupid. But in knowing that my relationship (whatever that may be) with the schools and the town will change as soon as I decline the offer, I have been holding off giving them an answer until the deadline (which is totally fair, that's why there is a deadline). But the superintendent doesn't quite see it that way...and I admit his reasoning is also fair...he needs to turn in the yearly budget and needs to know how much money to put aside for my program. I tell him, I'll give him my answer on Friday. He said, "great, but keep in mind that if you decide not to come back, it will be really difficult for the next person, as they may want to stay for a long time, and we won't be able to offer them more than a year....because our school system is changing." I said, "okay...I'll give you an answer on Friday." And he's like, "and you should know, that it would be best if you stay for another year...you will get more out of Japan." Okay.... And then he went on and on and on about why I should stay....(by the way, all of it being clearly for budgetary reasons on their part, and none of it because I was an awesome teacher or an outstanding citzen, or even a person they thought was great and wanted to keep me around....it was all about money) I finally looked at him and said, "I'll give you an answer on Friday, but you should know that this guilt trip isn't going to work on me....I've had far more powerful men try to guilt trip me before, and it won't work." His response to this was utter speechlessness...I mean literally, his mouth just hung open and he couldn't say a thing...he just stared ahead. I realized that maybe in this world, that was a rude response on my part...but truthfully, a girl's gotta be able to put her foot down when people are bugging....I mean really, in my past life, I never would have thought twice about telling someone no, or where to stick it....Maybe Japan has managed to soften me a bit.

When I got home the first thing I did was fill out the recontracting form with a big NO...I'll hand it in on Friday.

Thailand and Singapore: a list

I don't really want to bore you with a whole long travelogue of everything I did. Let's just say that the entire trip was amazing...the food, the people, the places we stayed, the shopping, the fresh fruit...oh man I wish I were still on vacation...Here are the highlights:

Chiang Mai:
My favorite things - the resort that we stayed at Baan Nam Ping (check out their website at www.baannamping.com) was so incredibly beautiful. There were only 9 cabins, so the place wasn't very crowded. Every morning the staff prepared a feast of Traditional Thai foods, Japanese foods, and Western style breakfast foods for us...it was so oiishi!!
-The Elephant ride: which was on a 45 year old elephant named Billy, who took my mom and I on an hour long jaunt thru a river and into the jungle.
-Visiting with the Long-neck people...(check out this site for pictures of them...http://www.thailandlife.com/longneck_02.html)
-hour long massages for $6 (that included the tip)
-Fresh Fruit drinks for 30 cents...

Bangkok:
-Wat Pho (the reclining Buddah) which is AWESOME...(in that "it left me speechless way" not the 80s slang way)
-The Imperial Palace which was so beautiful, with all of its intricate jeweled and mosaiced walls...i could have stared for hours.
-Joe Louis Puppet theatre, which is like no other show I have seen before.
-Taking a speed boat thru the backwater canals to the floating market...where ladies in boats hawk fruit and other souvenirs

Singapore (aka my most favorite city in the WORLD)
-The night safari (which is like nothing I have ever seen before)
-the shopping (they have stores from all over the world.....including a Borders (which wouldn't be so cool if not for the fact that I have been so far from civilization for so long)
-The overall mixture of cultures and art just makes this place so cool
-The Botero exhibit at the Singapore Art Museum was outstanding
-the Chinatown Heritage Museum (you would have to see it to understand how cool it is).

Addressing the tsunami disaster

Okay so here I am back in Japan....where my refrigerator is actually warmer than my apartment....of course saying that seems pretty silly in light of all that has happened in the past week. I am grateful, to say the least, that on December 26th my family and I were headed from Chiang Mai Thailand to Bangkok. Where we completely missed the devastation of the tsunamis and earthquake. Where we were fortunate as to not have had to see any of its effects. I am also so happy to say that ALL of my friends that were in Southern Thailand at the time have been accounted for. Safe and sound.

Of course having been in Thailand during this time, we did feel the effects of the disaster. My own family had been in Southern Thailand only a few days before, but had moved to Northern Thailand to meet up with me. They couldn't stop talking about how amazing the beaches and water were off the islands...or how nice all of the people were who helped them out. And from their pictures it appears to be an absolute paradise....I don't think any of them can really believe that the world they only recently left behind no longer exists.

When I first heard about all of the missing people, I kept thinking first of my friends and then about all the people that I had watched get on a plane to Phuket a few days before. As I waited for my flight to Chiang Mai, I remember thinking about how lucky they were to get a few days rest on the beaches down there and how I wondered if I had made a mistake in heading north, purely because I wanted to see Elephants. (I think I have a new respect for Dumbo). I want every one of those strangers to be okay...but I kind of know that not all of them are.

And then when we got to our hotel in Singapore we met a bunch of kids who worked for Club Med...they were some of the survivors who had lost everything and had been evacuated to Singapore before heading home. All of them were so excited to see each other...to know that their friends had made it out.

To see all the relief and aid that is coming from so many sources around the world it trully is amazing. Because it wasn't really a "happy" new year and I really didn't feel like celebrating this year...but in seeing and hearing about all of the people who have donated time and money and supplies to the cause, it kind of makes me think that maybe this year will be different. Maybe this year will be less about fighting and hating and stupid politicians...maybe this year will be about people helping each other out and fixing problems instead of making them worse....

And on that note, I think its time for me to go to bed...the cynical me will return tomorrow with tales from my trip to Thailand and Singapore.