I think I'm all set for the 4th of July.

Perpatrator: One Cindi Textor
Time: The 18th year of Emporer Heisei, June 29th, 18:37 JST
Location: Family Mart Convenience Store, Kanazawa, Japan
Items Purchased:

• One (1) can of Asahi Super Dry (500 mL)
• One bag of cheap Chinese fireworks (1 crapload)

Cost: 1560 yen (app. $14.50 American)

Comments:

Yeah. I think I'll blow that crap up on Tuesday when I get back from Tokyo and Nagoya. And we're not talking sparklers here. Fireworks. The kind that rocket up into the sky and explode in a colorful display of light and sound. For $15. At a convenience store. I love this country.

See how the posts are gradually getting farther and farther apart?

I have an excuse this time. I've actually been working at work instead of surfing the web and updating my blog. Right now they have me putting some crap in a spread sheet, which probably takes me ten times as long to do than anyone else in the office, since I have to look up kanji and stuff that I can't read, but hell, it keeps me busy. So much for Japanese efficiency.

But anyway...updates...let's see...

Friday was my give a lecture about America day. It was supposed to take up an hour, and I managed to fill up half of that, and was shocked at the competency I displayed in answering the half hour's worth of questions that followed. They mostly wanted to know why we don't use the metric system. Actually, I kind of want to know why we don't use the metric system.

Anyway, that evening I went out to karaoke and other festivities with the other interns. Somebody brought a PII friend from Harvard, and as can be expected, he was a total jackass. Luckily, he left early, and after karaoke we went to this really fun bar, a tiny little place with some fun Japanese ska playing in the background, to which the cute little bartender was dancing around to while he washed out glasses and refilled beers and spoke half Japanese and half poor English. The best part? The special that night was Apple Pizza Toast, which I ordered for reasons beyond my comprehension, and it was delicious. I don't know why Apple Pizza Toast is delicious, but it is, and that bar was awesome.

Saturday, I went out for dumplings with Yoshida Sensei, one of the teachers at the center, and her two sons, one a high school senior and one a college freshman, both very funny and cute. Also, the dumplings were the best I've ever had. I've been inspired to quit school and apprentice myself to this gyoza chef and spend my life making delicious dumplings. I could be Iron Chef Gyoza, which is pretty much the same thing as Iron Chef Chinese, since that guys always like screwing up his dish, wrapping it in gyoza wrappers, and it turns out delicious. Yep. That's going to be me.

Sunday was also cool, in a fairly weird sort of way. I think, though I can't be 100% certain, that I attended a Japanese Hippie piano concert. Here's my evidence:

• One of the performers played a jazzed up version of Over the Rainbow. Rainbow=trippy.
• One of the pieces was a reading about a girl who doesn't want to get married or something (I could only sort of follow it) accompanied by piano. Japanese beatnik. Wow.
• They handed us flowers on our way out the door.

Of course, they were also playing some insane Chopin walzes and stuff, but I mean, it's Japan. I think the hippies here dig Chopin.

So that took me back to Monday. Nothing much of interest happening at work. One of my coworkers wanted me to teach him some English slang. I almost fell on the floor laughing when he asked me what "burushitto" means. That's pretty much been the highlight of my week so far.

Anyway, better go. They'll catch me not entering useless crap into that spreadsheet.

THAT'S how smart I am.

This week was pretty cool. I did some exciting stuff at the office, or at least exciting compared to fun with staplers and envelopes. First, I got to visit one of the local high schools and attend some of the 10th grade English classes. I even got to assist the teachers a little bit. I was surprised at how different the Japanese classroom was. Perhaps it's because it was a foreign language class and students are a little nervous about speaking in English, but it seemed like Japanese high school students are very unwilling to participate in class. They're very well suited to huge lectures where all you do is take notes, or if you're me, sleep through it, or don't attend. Having talked to a few of the JETs who work in Ishikawa, it sounds like most English classes are even worse than the ones I attended, having visited one of the best high schools in Japan. It's odd that the kids are so afraid(?) to speak up in class, ask a question, give an answer when they know it, but then I suppose it's not so surprising in an education system that revolves strictly around passing exams, and not around actual learning.

Also, later in the week, I attended a couple of seminars for elementary school teachers, one on science lab safety, and one on gym class. As far as the science goes, elementary schoolers in Japan are doing way more lab stuff than we do in the states. We're talking lighting bunsen burners, mixing harsh chemicals, the kind of stuff I technically wasn't allowed to do until 8th or 9th grade. But then, I suppose 6th grade isn't so much earlier than that, but it feels like a big difference. And then the gym seminar was hilarious. It was mostly like a normal gym class, except with a lot more bowing, clapping, grinning, and general Japanese ridiculousness. Like before we would play a game, we would bow to the other team and say, "Onegaishimasu!" which could be translated as "I am humbly requesting," or more simply, "Please." And then afterward, of course, another bow and a nice, hearty "Arigatoo gozaimashita!" It was weird, politeness in gym class, but then, I suppose I shouldn't be surprised. It is Japan, after all.

This job is great. I'm getting paid to just learn stuff about Japan. I have to pay for that at Princeton. But then, I guess Princeton's going to give me a "diploma" which is "important." Knock on wood.

Cow shit?

I had this dream last night that the band started having cow shit fights, like throwing a bunch of cow shit at each other, so I had to quit band because wherever I went, people were like, "You smell like cow shit." It's probably allegorical, but I don't think I'm going to quit. I rather enjoy smelling of metaphorical cow shit, and plus, it's fun to throw it at other bandies.

Yeah, that's it.

Little to report.

I may do a presentation next week about America. I'm glad they kept the topic narrow so I knew what they wanted me to talk about. And I'm glad it's only a few minutes long and it's in my native language. Oh crap. It's actually 40 minutes long and it's in Japanese. Whatever. I'm looking on the bright side and viewing it as a wonderful opportunity for learning. Woooo!

And besides, I'm more than willing to make long presentations in Japanese if it means I get to go out with my coworkers on the weekends and watch them get plastered and try to sing karaoke songs in English. I'm pretty sure that's the reason I study Japanese. People say that the Japanese get drunk really fast, which I suppose is true in part, by Western standards, but after this weekend, I must beg to differ. To be sure, they acted totally bombed after half a beer, but I daresay that a tolerance that bad is impossible. I think it's more like the consumption of any amount of alcohol at all gives them permission to act how they would like, instead of by the strict code of etiquette to which they are restrained in their day to day work. For example, all of my coworkers, when speaking to the supervisor of our department, use a very polite, honorific way of speaking. But after a single beer, they stop using such language when they talk to him, and treat him more as an equal. That, I think, is not the work of the alcohol, but of the culture.

And now you've had your daily Japanese anthropology lesson.

Workin' hard, or hardly workin'?

The last couple days of work have been more fun, in that they finally found some stuff for me to do. Perhaps the keyword here is "stuff," however, and not "work." They have me going to some of the seminars and lectures that some of the senseis who work at the Education Center give to other teachers who come to the center to receive training and whatnot. It's been crazy interesting, as a native English speaker learning Japanese, to attend classes for native Japanese speaking teachers of English. I get a look at foreign language education from a twofold different perspective: that of the teacher, rather than the student, and that of the Japanese speaker, rather than that of the English speaker. Also, I get to listen to Japanese people try to speak English, which is always hilarious. One teacher said she "eats her right hand," but I think she meant that she eats with her right hand. That must be how I sound to them.

Also, the other interns and I met the governor of Ishikawa prefecture yesterday. He has one of the most ridiculous combovers I have ever seen. One of the interns said that his host-father calls the governor "Barcode-san" (Mr. Barcode), since when he bows, it looks like there's a big ol' barcode on his head. Anyway, the governor gave us our money for the summer. We don't get paid biweekly or anything normal like that, but instead received the entire summer's payment in one huge chunk, which for someone as flaky as me is quite a scary thing indeed. Someone who would her head if it weren't attached to her neck should not be carrying around $2000, so I was pretty anxious to get that ass home and locked up in a desk or something. But first, I went to a sweet restaurant with the other interns and blew $25 of it on steak and beer. Incidentally, I ordered the last steak the restaurant had (and quite possibly the last steak Japan had), so when Tom, one of the other interns, tried to order one, he got pwn3d.

Then I'm the cock of the walk...

Blog's on the what now?

It seems it's been a while since I updated this ass. That happens. It turns out that happenings as fun and interesting as a close relative failing physical education are few and far between...unless of course you're in Japan.

(Keith graduated, by the way. We're all very proud of him.)

At any rate, here I am, back in Kanazawa, but this time instead of stealing wireless from the neighbors to blog while I should be doing stupid homework, I'll be blogging from my desk at work when I'm not busy doing important intern things like...stapling.

I got in to Tokyo on Thursday. It was rainy, just like last time. Except this time I didn't walk around lost for an hour before finding my hotel, which is nice. Overall, I'm feeling way more competent with the whole speaking Japanese thing and the whole not screwing up everything I try to do thing, so that's cool.

On Friday, I had some free time before my night bus to Kanazawa, so I took in a ball game: the Yokohama Baystars vs. the Orix Buffaloes. My seat was good, probably about 20th row, looking right at first base, and just a few seats over from a group of pretty young Japanese people who appeared to be there blowing off steam after a hard week of work. I knew they must be awesome when they had a Jan-Ken-Pon (rock paper scissors) tournament to determine the order in which they would be buying rounds. By the fifth inning, the home team Baystars were down 5-0, and my neighbors were drunk enough to ask me to come sit with them. Cool! New friends (and a chance to get my brain back in Japanese mode before I got to Kanazawa)! They, like most Japanese people I've met, were super nice (especially after a few drinks), and a couple innings later, the Baystars still hadn't scored, and they were tanked enough to start buying me all kinds of Baystars crap and just maybe a couple of beers. In the eighth inning, Yokohama scored five runs to tie it up, and the game went into extra innings, so I'm like "Holy crap! Free stuff, free beer, and now free baseball!" It was pretty much the best day of my life. Unfortunately for me, I had to leave in the middle of the 10th to catch that pesky bus, but checked the score later to find out that Yokohama won, 7-5.

So I rode said bus, got to Kanazawa, etc, etc. I met the host family on Sunday (a 75 year old woman who lives alone). She's about 4'6", and if you've ever played the GameCube Zelda, she looks just like Link's grandma. And then on Monday I started "work." They started out by introducing me to everyone in the office, set me up with a desk and a laptop, and then basically told me that my job was to sit at said desk and in front of said laptop and look sort of busy. Oh, and sometimes I get to staple things.

That's pretty much it for now. Japan's still beautiful, the US still sucks at soccer, and your mom is still a loose woman.