Supplemental Ascension
Week 10
Well, I'm back online again. Pardon the lack of a post for last week and the likely tardiness of week #11. I've had some japanese illiteracy related problems that I allege were surely the responsibility of the "flat" renters to mitigate, caused me to lose my net connection for the last week. Hopefully I'll be able to remember two weekends ago, but if not, my apologies.
As I recall the week was unremarkable, with the exception of the last class of the week, as per usual and with the noted exception of Friday night. More about these two in a second.
Teaching is still really enjoyable for me, but due to an unlucky convergence of student's vacation times, I'm teaching an inordinately high number of private lessons, so it's been quite busy and I'm a little bit stressed. Fortunately, as of writing this, my worst week in the foreseeable future is done and I should have an easier time of things in weeks to come.
Friday night was unusual because it was the quasi-start of my weekend. As soon as class ended I hopped into some casual clothes and rode the train out to a fairly remote section of Tokyo in order to attend a small going away party for one Gareth (see weeks 3, 4 and 5). He left Japan for greener (and colder) pastures having headed back, not to the rain-soaked moors of England but to the snow choked wastes of Canada.
The bar was pretty small and very friendly. Gareth knew the bar owners quite well as he had frequented the bar regularly during his time in Japan. The first band took the stage shortly after I arrived and jumped into very solid rendition of Jumpin' Jack Flash. They followed this with Like a Rolling Stone, I Shot the Sheriff and, for an encore, Wonderwall, which was sung by two of Gareth's coworkers. I thought the band was pretty damn awesome, and had a ton of fun. It was also an odd coincidence that one of the Wonderwall singers was in fact a former GEOS teacher who used to teach in my school and in fact lived in the same apartment as I do. This was about 2 years ago though.
I had to call it an early night though, and headed for home at around 11:30 after saying good bye to Gareth. Everything went fine and I was up and ready for teaching with plenty of time the next morning.
Saturday was, as always, busy at first but finished with a fun series of classes. One of my students is leaving for Sean's class in 3 weeks, which is too bad, cause it really is a ton of fun teaching her.
The last class of the week though, the Newsweek article, is turning out to have a memorable moment every time. This time the article we were debating was focused on the Environmental Performance Index. We happened to be talking about American energy policy and one of my students had been quiet for quite some time. I turned to him and said (name changed):
"What do you think Hitaro?"
"I think the Americans should eat less so they don't need such large cars to carry themselves around in."
As I recall the week was unremarkable, with the exception of the last class of the week, as per usual and with the noted exception of Friday night. More about these two in a second.
Teaching is still really enjoyable for me, but due to an unlucky convergence of student's vacation times, I'm teaching an inordinately high number of private lessons, so it's been quite busy and I'm a little bit stressed. Fortunately, as of writing this, my worst week in the foreseeable future is done and I should have an easier time of things in weeks to come.
Friday night was unusual because it was the quasi-start of my weekend. As soon as class ended I hopped into some casual clothes and rode the train out to a fairly remote section of Tokyo in order to attend a small going away party for one Gareth (see weeks 3, 4 and 5). He left Japan for greener (and colder) pastures having headed back, not to the rain-soaked moors of England but to the snow choked wastes of Canada.
The bar was pretty small and very friendly. Gareth knew the bar owners quite well as he had frequented the bar regularly during his time in Japan. The first band took the stage shortly after I arrived and jumped into very solid rendition of Jumpin' Jack Flash. They followed this with Like a Rolling Stone, I Shot the Sheriff and, for an encore, Wonderwall, which was sung by two of Gareth's coworkers. I thought the band was pretty damn awesome, and had a ton of fun. It was also an odd coincidence that one of the Wonderwall singers was in fact a former GEOS teacher who used to teach in my school and in fact lived in the same apartment as I do. This was about 2 years ago though.
I had to call it an early night though, and headed for home at around 11:30 after saying good bye to Gareth. Everything went fine and I was up and ready for teaching with plenty of time the next morning.
Saturday was, as always, busy at first but finished with a fun series of classes. One of my students is leaving for Sean's class in 3 weeks, which is too bad, cause it really is a ton of fun teaching her.
The last class of the week though, the Newsweek article, is turning out to have a memorable moment every time. This time the article we were debating was focused on the Environmental Performance Index. We happened to be talking about American energy policy and one of my students had been quiet for quite some time. I turned to him and said (name changed):
"What do you think Hitaro?"
"I think the Americans should eat less so they don't need such large cars to carry themselves around in."
I cracked up, needless to say.
Anyways, I bid a temporary farewell to the GEOS offices and hopped a train out to Toyoda with Kayoko in order to attend ANOTHER farewell party, this time for the manager at Sean's school. Her name is Erika or "The Gaffer" to Sean (see week #4). She is also headed to the frozen wastes of Canada, perhaps. Anyways, it was a huge party at an Izakaya. An Izakaya, by the way, is roughly equivalent to a Pub, in that it offers pretty substantial food, a lot of drink, and facilities for relatively large groups of people. I had my welcome party at a similar establishment, although my description at the time was a little off-base (see week #3).
This party was much larger then my welcome party. I think the total attendance was somewhere in the ballpark of 60 students, teachers and managers. It was pretty cool, I snacked on yakitori and had about five beers. There was a short section for speeches during which every teacher that was attending was asked to speak, including Kayoko who knows the students et all about as well as I did, which is to say barely. Unfortunately when I stood up to give my speech I knocked a beer over with my wallet as I was moving between two tables and doused the pants of Pat (see weeks 3, 4 and 5) who was also attending the festivities. The speech I gave ran something like "Erika, I've only met you a couple of times and I'm sorry that we're losing you so soon. Good luck!" Pat and I had had a long discussion afterwards about the merits of Japanese powder and I'm now determined to make it up to Sapporo for skiing at some point, most likely in the winter.
Unfortunately, I couldn't attend the karaoke that occurred after the dinner/drinking and had to head home in order to be up in time to meet Zoey, Rowena and Winny the next day in Yokohama!
Yokohama is renowned as a multicultural city in what is a very culturally uniform country. The became important shortly after 1854 when Commdore Matthew Perry (not the Friends actor) arrived and demanded that Japan open ports for commerce. Yokohama, which was a fishing village at the time, became one of those places. As such, it developed quite rapidly into something much more then its humble beginnings. It's fairly ethincally diverse and has a lot of interesting locations, including the foreigner graver yard, which I did see, but have heard is pretty neat.
The next day dawned with me on my way down to the aforementioned city. I arrived about 1/2 hour late and then got totally turned around because my train dropped me off on a different platform than normal. After wandering around a bit I found Rowena, then Winny soon afterwards. We meandered down to Chinatown past a rather upper class (I thought) shopping district.
The Chinatown in Yokohama is in essence the Chinatown for all of Tokyo and as such is pretty massive. We saw all kinds of really cool temples, shops and restaurants. Pandas were a central feature of many of the tourist shop one object for sale being a Hello Kitty doll wearing a panda costume. Kawaii, as they say.
We stopped for lunch at, gasp of surprise, a Chinese restaurant. The food here was much different than what I would call Chinese food back in Canada. It was pretty good, but just different. Not as sweet I guess? If we eat Americanized Chinese food, this was Japanized Chinese food. Also had a Chinese beer which is surprisingly similar to a soft drink. Not bad, and refreshing on a hot day.
Oh yeah, have I mentioned that it's like a sauna over here? I didn't believe Sean when he told me that some days you'd walk out the door of your house, turn to lock your door and by the time you took the first step on the way to work you'd be drenched in sweat.
This party was much larger then my welcome party. I think the total attendance was somewhere in the ballpark of 60 students, teachers and managers. It was pretty cool, I snacked on yakitori and had about five beers. There was a short section for speeches during which every teacher that was attending was asked to speak, including Kayoko who knows the students et all about as well as I did, which is to say barely. Unfortunately when I stood up to give my speech I knocked a beer over with my wallet as I was moving between two tables and doused the pants of Pat (see weeks 3, 4 and 5) who was also attending the festivities. The speech I gave ran something like "Erika, I've only met you a couple of times and I'm sorry that we're losing you so soon. Good luck!" Pat and I had had a long discussion afterwards about the merits of Japanese powder and I'm now determined to make it up to Sapporo for skiing at some point, most likely in the winter.
Unfortunately, I couldn't attend the karaoke that occurred after the dinner/drinking and had to head home in order to be up in time to meet Zoey, Rowena and Winny the next day in Yokohama!
Yokohama is renowned as a multicultural city in what is a very culturally uniform country. The became important shortly after 1854 when Commdore Matthew Perry (not the Friends actor) arrived and demanded that Japan open ports for commerce. Yokohama, which was a fishing village at the time, became one of those places. As such, it developed quite rapidly into something much more then its humble beginnings. It's fairly ethincally diverse and has a lot of interesting locations, including the foreigner graver yard, which I did see, but have heard is pretty neat.
The next day dawned with me on my way down to the aforementioned city. I arrived about 1/2 hour late and then got totally turned around because my train dropped me off on a different platform than normal. After wandering around a bit I found Rowena, then Winny soon afterwards. We meandered down to Chinatown past a rather upper class (I thought) shopping district.
The Chinatown in Yokohama is in essence the Chinatown for all of Tokyo and as such is pretty massive. We saw all kinds of really cool temples, shops and restaurants. Pandas were a central feature of many of the tourist shop one object for sale being a Hello Kitty doll wearing a panda costume. Kawaii, as they say.
We stopped for lunch at, gasp of surprise, a Chinese restaurant. The food here was much different than what I would call Chinese food back in Canada. It was pretty good, but just different. Not as sweet I guess? If we eat Americanized Chinese food, this was Japanized Chinese food. Also had a Chinese beer which is surprisingly similar to a soft drink. Not bad, and refreshing on a hot day.
Oh yeah, have I mentioned that it's like a sauna over here? I didn't believe Sean when he told me that some days you'd walk out the door of your house, turn to lock your door and by the time you took the first step on the way to work you'd be drenched in sweat.
Well, Sean is a spectacularly truthful fellow.
I've had days that have worked out exactly like that. It's been 33+ degrees every day for the last two weeks with mid to high humidity along with it. I've taken to jogging at night only, which is nice because it's a little cooler. Unfortunately, it also means that I usually end up bedecked in spider webs and have to dodge the odd bat. Oh, I've also been hit in the chest a few times by beetles/cockroaches and once in the tooth. That last one was definitely not cool.
Speaking of beetles, you know those National Geographic docs where they explore rain forests and whatnot? You notice how they always have that crazy insect buzzing noise going on in the background? Yeah, that's what it's like jogging in the park at night. I have noise canceling ear buds on my iPod and I can still clearly hear the sound the beetles make. Pretty crazy.
Anyways, forget about that, it's Chinatown. After lunch we walked at a leisurely pace towards Landmark Tower, which happens to be the tallest building in Japan, as well as containing the world's second fastest elevator.
We got a nice view of the city from the 69th floor before heading back down to a nearby shopping mall to pick out Yukata. For those who do not know, what we call a kimono in Canada is called a yukata in Japan, whether it is a men's yukata, or a woman's. They are most commonly worn by couples at summer festivals and in the spring during sakura (cherry blossom) viewing season. We figured it was appropriate for the occasion, so we all bought one, including Zoey, who had met up with us a few hours earlier. I refrained from putting mine on, due to the fact that I only had a pair of shoes to wear and there were no wooden sandals of the appropriate style available at the store.
So, appropriately yukata'd up we all headed out to the waterfront area (which was packed) for the primary reason that we came down to Yokohama for: the Port Opening fireworks display!
The fireworks were pretty cool...I guess. We didn't have the best vantage point and it was a LONG show. It started at 7:30 (I think) and lasted until 8:15. Apparently there was somewhere in the area of 6000 fireworks detonated, but I actually think I prefer the shorter, 20 minute or so displays. I found the latter half of the display to be kind of boring, and the finale to be underwhelming. At least it was pretty cool watching the massive crowds. Plus, we got a police officer to take a picture of us!
We filed out of the waterfront among thousands of other spectators to a nearby Izakaya and had some more very good food. Soon thereafter I was on a train home, exhausted but ready for one more day of sightseeing.
Monday started off with me heading straight for downtown Tokyo again. I bought a pair of sandals on the way out so that I could wear shorts without feeling like I look stupid. This was, in retrospect, a foolish idea as I ended up with some truly awesome blisters.
I made it there eventually after getting lost about three times, including one point where I had to transfer from a train to a Subway.
I was on my way to Asakusa, one of the oldest areas of Tokyo. It seriously felt that way too. There was a tangible difference in the atmosphere around this ward. It felt much older, although also fairly tourist trap-y what with all the various tchochke shops that were in residence around the place. I did buy a fan from one of those stalls. We also had this awesome dessert at one shop. It was a giant ball of shaved ice, covered in matcha syrup with a serving of soft serve vanilla ice cream, a few mochi balls (pulverized rice sweets) and, to top it all off, red beans. Very interesting, and actually pretty good!
The temples were pretty impressive in Asakusa although I'm already getting a little bit burnt out on temples. I've seen A TON since I got here already. I guess the temple capstone will be Kyoto and Nikko, whenever I get around to going there. What was somewhat less impressive was the Asahi Super Dry Building which has to sport what is possibly the world's biggest eyesore. (Edit: Upon closer inspection, it looks kind of like a giant glass of beer with a cup of miso soup beside it. The gold stuff is steam or something? I still don't get it.) See picture above. Asahi is a kind of beer in Japan, perhaps the most famous. Apparently that giant gold spermatozoa is supposed to represent the spirit of the beer or something. I don't really think so.
After that Winny and I pealed off from the others and headed to the drum museum, which was closed (I'll be back, mark my words! I feel I powerful urge to tap out the drum line from Maps on a massive Japanese drum). Sorry in advance for anyone who actually follows that link. Maps has an awful video.
After that we went somewhere that WAS open: the Imperial Palace! Well, partially open. You can't actually go inside, just look at the castle walls. There's only two days of the year when the Emperor and his wife make an appearance and they're both in January (one is for his birthday, I forget what the other is). Winny and I wondered around the grounds, which were quite surreal, if a little bit over engineered. The whole place had a bizarre feeling of artificiality to it. It didn't help that the whole place was covered in fairly uniformly placed pine trees that were almost all exactly the same height. Didn't look all that natural. Looking at the castle walls and the few structures that peaked over the top of the wall was very interesting though. This palace is, after all, the residence of the oldest continuous dynasty still in existence.
The gardens were also closed at the palace, so I'll have to drop by again some Sunday. Winny and I headed down to Shibuya and walked around a bit more before wearily heading to Shinjuku and parting ways. I was totally exhausted by the end of this weekend.
There we go! Another week in the history books. I may put a few more philosophical observations down in a separate post later in the week or next week. For now though I remain, as always...
Ian "Mello Yello" Cantello
Speaking of beetles, you know those National Geographic docs where they explore rain forests and whatnot? You notice how they always have that crazy insect buzzing noise going on in the background? Yeah, that's what it's like jogging in the park at night. I have noise canceling ear buds on my iPod and I can still clearly hear the sound the beetles make. Pretty crazy.
Anyways, forget about that, it's Chinatown. After lunch we walked at a leisurely pace towards Landmark Tower, which happens to be the tallest building in Japan, as well as containing the world's second fastest elevator.
We got a nice view of the city from the 69th floor before heading back down to a nearby shopping mall to pick out Yukata. For those who do not know, what we call a kimono in Canada is called a yukata in Japan, whether it is a men's yukata, or a woman's. They are most commonly worn by couples at summer festivals and in the spring during sakura (cherry blossom) viewing season. We figured it was appropriate for the occasion, so we all bought one, including Zoey, who had met up with us a few hours earlier. I refrained from putting mine on, due to the fact that I only had a pair of shoes to wear and there were no wooden sandals of the appropriate style available at the store.
So, appropriately yukata'd up we all headed out to the waterfront area (which was packed) for the primary reason that we came down to Yokohama for: the Port Opening fireworks display!
The fireworks were pretty cool...I guess. We didn't have the best vantage point and it was a LONG show. It started at 7:30 (I think) and lasted until 8:15. Apparently there was somewhere in the area of 6000 fireworks detonated, but I actually think I prefer the shorter, 20 minute or so displays. I found the latter half of the display to be kind of boring, and the finale to be underwhelming. At least it was pretty cool watching the massive crowds. Plus, we got a police officer to take a picture of us!
We filed out of the waterfront among thousands of other spectators to a nearby Izakaya and had some more very good food. Soon thereafter I was on a train home, exhausted but ready for one more day of sightseeing.
Monday started off with me heading straight for downtown Tokyo again. I bought a pair of sandals on the way out so that I could wear shorts without feeling like I look stupid. This was, in retrospect, a foolish idea as I ended up with some truly awesome blisters.
I made it there eventually after getting lost about three times, including one point where I had to transfer from a train to a Subway.
I was on my way to Asakusa, one of the oldest areas of Tokyo. It seriously felt that way too. There was a tangible difference in the atmosphere around this ward. It felt much older, although also fairly tourist trap-y what with all the various tchochke shops that were in residence around the place. I did buy a fan from one of those stalls. We also had this awesome dessert at one shop. It was a giant ball of shaved ice, covered in matcha syrup with a serving of soft serve vanilla ice cream, a few mochi balls (pulverized rice sweets) and, to top it all off, red beans. Very interesting, and actually pretty good!
The temples were pretty impressive in Asakusa although I'm already getting a little bit burnt out on temples. I've seen A TON since I got here already. I guess the temple capstone will be Kyoto and Nikko, whenever I get around to going there. What was somewhat less impressive was the Asahi Super Dry Building which has to sport what is possibly the world's biggest eyesore. (Edit: Upon closer inspection, it looks kind of like a giant glass of beer with a cup of miso soup beside it. The gold stuff is steam or something? I still don't get it.) See picture above. Asahi is a kind of beer in Japan, perhaps the most famous. Apparently that giant gold spermatozoa is supposed to represent the spirit of the beer or something. I don't really think so.
After that Winny and I pealed off from the others and headed to the drum museum, which was closed (I'll be back, mark my words! I feel I powerful urge to tap out the drum line from Maps on a massive Japanese drum). Sorry in advance for anyone who actually follows that link. Maps has an awful video.
After that we went somewhere that WAS open: the Imperial Palace! Well, partially open. You can't actually go inside, just look at the castle walls. There's only two days of the year when the Emperor and his wife make an appearance and they're both in January (one is for his birthday, I forget what the other is). Winny and I wondered around the grounds, which were quite surreal, if a little bit over engineered. The whole place had a bizarre feeling of artificiality to it. It didn't help that the whole place was covered in fairly uniformly placed pine trees that were almost all exactly the same height. Didn't look all that natural. Looking at the castle walls and the few structures that peaked over the top of the wall was very interesting though. This palace is, after all, the residence of the oldest continuous dynasty still in existence.
The gardens were also closed at the palace, so I'll have to drop by again some Sunday. Winny and I headed down to Shibuya and walked around a bit more before wearily heading to Shinjuku and parting ways. I was totally exhausted by the end of this weekend.
There we go! Another week in the history books. I may put a few more philosophical observations down in a separate post later in the week or next week. For now though I remain, as always...
Ian "Mello Yello" Cantello
3 comments:
Hey Ian,
I'm glad to see you back on-line -I have been a faithful (but silent) reader of your weekly missives. I may even have to sign up to Facebook to view more of your photos.
We miss you, most especially around dinner on Saturday night, so keep writing and I'll keep reading.
Love, Leslie
Wow, looks like I missed out on a lot of fun. Stupid gimpy foot.
Kev
Sorry it took so long for me to get back to this Leslie, but yeah, I miss the Saturday night dinners too. I've been trying to get my mom to set up a webcam for some night when you guys are down there, but I tend not to be awake early on Saturday mornings. Also, your lot tends to be off at the cottage. Maybe in September or October. I should be sending emails out to everyone soon, talk to you soon Les!
Love, Ian.
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