There are a number of school refusers in my current school. A school refuser is one who, for whatever reason, refuses to come to school.
We started the school year with 1. Now we have 5.
We did have one boy who refused to come to school during sports festival and associated practices, but is back now.
I wonder if my other school has many now? I remember we had only one as well last time I was there.
Friday, September 18
Thursday, September 10
I think I'll pass.
Tokyo is known for its ridiculously high rent prices for small spaces.
I found this article about a new retail business, closet-sized ...apartments? crawlspaces? addresses for hire? way to slowly drive oneself mad by depriving oneself of the comforts of life?
"Cheaper than a regular gaijin (foreigner) house and more comfortable than the couch at an Internet cafe, oshiire (closet) houses provide 1 1/2-tatami-mat-size (2.5-sq. meter), often windowless "rooms" — picture a capsule hotel pod as your home."
Click here for the rest of 'Half a room, without a view'
I found this article about a new retail business, closet-sized ...apartments? crawlspaces? addresses for hire? way to slowly drive oneself mad by depriving oneself of the comforts of life?
"Cheaper than a regular gaijin (foreigner) house and more comfortable than the couch at an Internet cafe, oshiire (closet) houses provide 1 1/2-tatami-mat-size (2.5-sq. meter), often windowless "rooms" — picture a capsule hotel pod as your home."
Click here for the rest of 'Half a room, without a view'
Wednesday, September 9
Kyuushoku Best Ten and Worst Ten
In no particular order, things that pop up and make an impression on my palate or senses.
BEST (Lunch makes me happy!)
1. Grilled fish with a miso sauce. Mmm mmm mmm. Minus points if I have to pick through bones though.
2. Curry. Always good, whether they go for a traditional Japanese curry or mix it up with some dry curry or more Indian style.
3. Salads with Sesame (goma) dressing. I have such a love affair going on with Goma Dressing.
4. Niku-jaga and its relatives. Beef stew and it always has the right flavors and I don't have to deal with anything strange popping up.
5. Anything that claims to be sushi. This includes Temakizushi (you are given the rice, the seaweed, and the fillings, and you do a 'make your own' sushi wrap) or Chirashizushi (stuff thrown on top of sushi rice) I like the way the rice tastes, and the toppings/fillings are usually good. One time the rice was just normal rice though. Other teachers complained loudly, voicing my thoughts for me.
6. Spinach salads. Mom must have done something to me when I was young because I love the taste of spinach. (Also love - mustard greens (小松菜), garlic chives (ニラ), and Mizuna)
7. Fried (anything). Notably delicious are Shrimp and Pumpkin Croquettes.
8. Fruit, when easy to eat. I also tolerate fresh oranges even though they make my hands all sticky.
9. Tofu anything. Especially in a nicely flavored soup with greens and pork.
10. Desert! Today we had Sudachi (kinda like a lime) flavored Jello.
WORST (Lunch makes me CRY)
1. Noodle dishes. The noodles are invariable overdone and mushy. We did have a semi-decent spaghetti once though.
2. Whole Fishes, ESPECIALLY Shishamo (AKA tiny river fish ready to lay some eggs in your stomach). Even if I am not expected to consume it whole, the process of working around the fish bones with my chopsticks is time consuming and annoying.
3. Natto. Mother of all painful lunches. Worst when someone decided it went ok with mayonnaise. I can handle it though...somehow.
4. Bread. The exception is Pineapple Bread, which has enough moisture from the pineapple to be quite tasty, but usually the bread I get is dry and unappetizing.
5. Rubbery, what are they smoking today? salads. Usually tasteless and boring. Eaten quickly so as to use the better parts of the meal to help one forget about their depressing existence. Honorable mention - that potato salad with apples in it.
6. Tasteless Soup. Please add seasoning.
7. Getting the mushy part of the rice. It's like ...eating mushy rice.
8. Most squid. I only like squid two ways -- dried or fried. Keep your grilled, boiled, whatevered squid out of my life.
9. Salt Salmon. Hey what does salmon taste like if you grill it with a ton of salt until it's the consistency of canned salmon? ...mostly just like salt.
10. Frozen Mandarin Oranges. A crime against nature.
Some things I hated a year ago are gone from the 'worst' list. Prime example is 'purple rice'...I've grown to like the taste of the pickled purple...things which give it its flavor. Hooray for assimilation!
BEST (Lunch makes me happy!)
1. Grilled fish with a miso sauce. Mmm mmm mmm. Minus points if I have to pick through bones though.
2. Curry. Always good, whether they go for a traditional Japanese curry or mix it up with some dry curry or more Indian style.
3. Salads with Sesame (goma) dressing. I have such a love affair going on with Goma Dressing.
4. Niku-jaga and its relatives. Beef stew and it always has the right flavors and I don't have to deal with anything strange popping up.
5. Anything that claims to be sushi. This includes Temakizushi (you are given the rice, the seaweed, and the fillings, and you do a 'make your own' sushi wrap) or Chirashizushi (stuff thrown on top of sushi rice) I like the way the rice tastes, and the toppings/fillings are usually good. One time the rice was just normal rice though. Other teachers complained loudly, voicing my thoughts for me.
6. Spinach salads. Mom must have done something to me when I was young because I love the taste of spinach. (Also love - mustard greens (小松菜), garlic chives (ニラ), and Mizuna)
7. Fried (anything). Notably delicious are Shrimp and Pumpkin Croquettes.
8. Fruit, when easy to eat. I also tolerate fresh oranges even though they make my hands all sticky.
9. Tofu anything. Especially in a nicely flavored soup with greens and pork.
10. Desert! Today we had Sudachi (kinda like a lime) flavored Jello.
WORST (Lunch makes me CRY)
1. Noodle dishes. The noodles are invariable overdone and mushy. We did have a semi-decent spaghetti once though.
2. Whole Fishes, ESPECIALLY Shishamo (AKA tiny river fish ready to lay some eggs in your stomach). Even if I am not expected to consume it whole, the process of working around the fish bones with my chopsticks is time consuming and annoying.
3. Natto. Mother of all painful lunches. Worst when someone decided it went ok with mayonnaise. I can handle it though...somehow.
4. Bread. The exception is Pineapple Bread, which has enough moisture from the pineapple to be quite tasty, but usually the bread I get is dry and unappetizing.
5. Rubbery, what are they smoking today? salads. Usually tasteless and boring. Eaten quickly so as to use the better parts of the meal to help one forget about their depressing existence. Honorable mention - that potato salad with apples in it.
6. Tasteless Soup. Please add seasoning.
7. Getting the mushy part of the rice. It's like ...eating mushy rice.
8. Most squid. I only like squid two ways -- dried or fried. Keep your grilled, boiled, whatevered squid out of my life.
9. Salt Salmon. Hey what does salmon taste like if you grill it with a ton of salt until it's the consistency of canned salmon? ...mostly just like salt.
10. Frozen Mandarin Oranges. A crime against nature.
Some things I hated a year ago are gone from the 'worst' list. Prime example is 'purple rice'...I've grown to like the taste of the pickled purple...things which give it its flavor. Hooray for assimilation!
Tuesday, September 8
Tuesday, September 1
空気を読めるように Learning to 'read the air'
I was reading this column, Cultural Conundrums: Can you guess when to guess?, and it made me think of an incident that happened, oh, yesterday.
The column covers the idea of omoiyari, something akin to empathy, which in Japan means you guess or assert knowledge over what another person is thinking, and act according to that assumption. The column further states that this is seen in Japan as 'good' but in the US and many other places would be considered 'arrogant.'
Last week, the school nurse passed out some papers for ordering lunch for the coming sports day this Saturday. She also had some pictures of the food that was being offered. I looked at all of this, decided it was not for me. She brought it up briefly every morning in the meeting, I listened quietly and reaffirmed internally that I would bring my own lunch and save money and eat healthier.
Fast-forward to Monday. I had elementary classes all day, but stopped by the junior high to print something out from my computer for my teacher. As I was leaving, I saw the school nurse in the hall. She greeted me, and I greeted her back. Then she brought up the lunch thing. Uh-oh. I actually had this happen last year at my other school's sports day (in which I was subjected to the eating of two cold hamburgers with cheese on them) and could tell I had made an error this year as well. She told me that since I hadn't ordered anything, and she was worried I wouldn't have any food, she had ordered me a hamburger.
Augh! Frustration hit me (self-directed, at my failure to behave appropriately to avoid this misunderstanding), since the last thing I wanted was another cold hamburger. I quickly stated that I had planned to bring my own lunch, but if there was nothing that could be done about it... The nurse cut me short, praising my ability to prepare my own lunch and apologizing for ordering something for me, and then telling me not to worry about it and to bring my own lunch as I had planned.
All this said, it's just one of those situations where yet again false assumptions were made about me. I suppose sometimes I feel integrated to the point where I expect to be treated like those around me, but people ascribe much different thinking to me on account of my otherness, or their perceived barriers to communication with me. Now, honestly, I like the school nurse. And given this article, I think she only responded how culture conditioned her to. Additionally, if I had stated to her that I planned to bring my own lunch, instead of merely tossing out my order form without comment, she would have been spared the situation of making an incorrect judgement call.
I'd like to think both of us learned something from this exchange however. She may have learned to reevaluate her assumptions of foreigners in general and me in particular, and I remembered that I need to be sensitive to the cultural norms which differ in the US and Japan and respond accordingly.
The column covers the idea of omoiyari, something akin to empathy, which in Japan means you guess or assert knowledge over what another person is thinking, and act according to that assumption. The column further states that this is seen in Japan as 'good' but in the US and many other places would be considered 'arrogant.'
Last week, the school nurse passed out some papers for ordering lunch for the coming sports day this Saturday. She also had some pictures of the food that was being offered. I looked at all of this, decided it was not for me. She brought it up briefly every morning in the meeting, I listened quietly and reaffirmed internally that I would bring my own lunch and save money and eat healthier.
Fast-forward to Monday. I had elementary classes all day, but stopped by the junior high to print something out from my computer for my teacher. As I was leaving, I saw the school nurse in the hall. She greeted me, and I greeted her back. Then she brought up the lunch thing. Uh-oh. I actually had this happen last year at my other school's sports day (in which I was subjected to the eating of two cold hamburgers with cheese on them) and could tell I had made an error this year as well. She told me that since I hadn't ordered anything, and she was worried I wouldn't have any food, she had ordered me a hamburger.
Augh! Frustration hit me (self-directed, at my failure to behave appropriately to avoid this misunderstanding), since the last thing I wanted was another cold hamburger. I quickly stated that I had planned to bring my own lunch, but if there was nothing that could be done about it... The nurse cut me short, praising my ability to prepare my own lunch and apologizing for ordering something for me, and then telling me not to worry about it and to bring my own lunch as I had planned.
All this said, it's just one of those situations where yet again false assumptions were made about me. I suppose sometimes I feel integrated to the point where I expect to be treated like those around me, but people ascribe much different thinking to me on account of my otherness, or their perceived barriers to communication with me. Now, honestly, I like the school nurse. And given this article, I think she only responded how culture conditioned her to. Additionally, if I had stated to her that I planned to bring my own lunch, instead of merely tossing out my order form without comment, she would have been spared the situation of making an incorrect judgement call.
I'd like to think both of us learned something from this exchange however. She may have learned to reevaluate her assumptions of foreigners in general and me in particular, and I remembered that I need to be sensitive to the cultural norms which differ in the US and Japan and respond accordingly.
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