Where do I even start?

It's been so long I don't even know where to start. When life gets difficult, I tend to withdraw from the technology aspect. I don't want to reach out; I don't want to expend the energy to tell my story. My texts to friends are basic, non-committal. It will take me days to return an email, if I even remember, and sometimes texts that ask "how are you doing?" hang out on my phone, unanswered, for so long that it becomes almost rude to respond.

How am I doing? It depends on the day, I guess. I've become good at compartmentalizing, so even when people say, "it must be so stressful!" I kind of shrug and say, "well, not really." And I mean it. I don't stray too close to thoughts about what is actually happening in my life... I shove it away, into a mental corner, always to deal with it "later."

Later never really comes.

I think it is this compartmentalization that makes me hate answering those texts and those emails, and the phone calls. I don't want to answer the questions, I don't want to have any conversations that will force me to face the fact that I have no answers, no plan, no control. I don't want to face the fact that we're supposed to be moving a year after we finally moved "home," or that my husband is so burnt out at his job that I worry for his health, or that he works so many hours and travels so much that I've become a "work widow," or that I left a job that I liked for a job that I hate. I don't want to think about how we're trying to stay put, and everything is coming together in mis-matched pieces so that the timing is all wrong... the job interview the week after we have to sign a lease or else lose the apartment, the move that--if it goes through--takes us away from here just in time to miss some friends passing through, but if we don't move then, we miss friends passing through on the other side.

I wake in the morning to an alarm that I snooze three or four times, until the little white fur balls curled up against me--one on each side--finally stir restlessly and start nosing and nudging for pets and cuddles. On feistier days the pets and cuddles are traded for licks and ear-lobe nibbling, which generally forces me out of bed faster. I have to shoo and shepherd the dogs off the bed or shunt them to the other side so that I can swing my legs off the mattress and trudge to the bathroom. Then I'm dressed, and the dogs race each other down the stairs to get outside. The little one spins in circles in front of the door, the eagerness to get outside and go potty potty potty combining to make a cheerful morning dance.

They trot outside, and while the big one picks his way daintily through the grass to find just the right spot, the little one leaps across the lawn, pauses nearly mid-air to land in his "duty crouch," and then races onto the rock wall bordering the sidewalk, yipping at the world. It only takes him a few yips, and then he stands quiet, a miniature mountain goat perched on the rocks, nose raised to the wind. The breeze ruffles the shaggy hairs on his forehead that I really ought to trim soon, and catches at his tail as his nose quivers, trying to interpret the morning smells. Wet grass. Desert sage. A hint of smoke from a far-away wildfire. The undefinable smell of late summer.

I stand there for a bit, barefoot in the sun, yawning and watching the dogs, savoring the summer air as it slowly, nearly imperceptibly, turns to autumn. A hint of crispness in the air, hay instead of sage, the fuller, rounder scents of plants that have not been scorched by the sun for days on end.

I call the dogs inside with promises of treats and they sprint to me over the lawn, their little bellies barely clearing the grass. I shamble to the kitchen and make my coffee, and the dogs dutifully trot after me to the office, their tiny claws making little snicksnicksnicksnicksnicks across the hardwood. They settle into their beds or onto the floor almost immediately while I smother yawns and boot up my computer.

We spend the days like this, me on the phone talking loudly or listening to conferences on a muted speaker phone, or the radio playing in the background. Occasional breaks outside where the dogs play and sniff and potty while I inspect the zucchinis and the cucumbers, stretch and touch my toes. Then it's back to the office until we meander back outside again. On slow days when I leave work and there's still time before I feel like I have to make dinner, they boys and I will sit outside on the lawn. They'll run laps around me and wrestle until one of them makes a squeak of protest, and then the big one's tail will droop until it sweeps the lawn, and he'll come and sit so close to me that he's nearly on top of me, chastened. Often we'll walk, a strange juxtaposition with the two dogs on separate leashes--one who wants to walk so badly that you can barely get his leash on because he's spinning in excitement, the other who views the leash as a strange sort of torture and has to be quite literally dragged until the feel of grass hits his paws, and suddenly he can walk on his own.

Then there's the call from my husband as he's on his way to get dinner before he goes to the hotel, and we talk for a few minutes before he has to pay for his salad bar from Whole Foods and I have to scrounge something up to eat. It's far too much work to cook for just one.

It's TV, and dishes, and maybe some reading. It's thinking about everything that needs to be done, and then not doing it. Or it's starting a little bit of it, enough to get stressed out by it. Then it's back to TV, or the book, or whatever, because I just. don't. want. to. think. about. it. 

Me and the boys head out for one last potty break, them scampering across the lawn in the dark while I put my hands in my pockets and tilt my head back, back, back to look at the stars. Above the horizon are two stars that I think must be planets, because they wink at me with red light, and go in and out of alignment across the summer skies. Some evenings the coyotes are active. When they're across the valley it's not so bad, just eerie. When they're on the hillside behind us, it's pretty creepy and I get antsy, quietly urging the puppy to just gogogo so that we can get the HECK inside before they swoop down off the hillside and snap up my pooches straight off the front walk. An unlikely scenario, I know, but it happened to one of my neighbors in midwinter. When I hear the eerie yips, the story alway comes to mind.

Then I head up to bed, the two pooches sprinting and wrestling ahead of me, their little growls breaking the silence of the bedroom. I crawl into bed and read until I can't stay awake any more and I call Sean, or until he calls me, just now heading to bed in a timezone an hour ahead. I close the book, turn out the light, and roll onto my side. The dogs take their places, the little one curled into a half-moon and tucked right against my belly, the big one curled into his own half-moon and snugged up against my back. All the thoughts I've been avoiding all day come rushing in, even though I read myself bleary-eyed. I look at the sky through the bedroom window, counting stars, and then I roll onto my stomach, careful not to dislodge the little fur balls. Take a deep breath in, hold, exhale, hold, inhale, hold, exhale, hold, hold, hold. Inhale, hold, exhale, hold, until I drift off and it happens all over again.

We're getting to the point now when I can't compartmentalize... I have to do. There's shopping and planning for the wedding cupcakes, the meeting with the moving surveyor, the calls and appointments and schedulings, the cleaning and the sorting and the organizing. My best intentions of not waiting until the last minute will fail, and the last week before the move to Texas I'll be in the same scramble that I'm always in.

Life goes on, though, and in a month things will be over and I'll be free to put it behind me and move on to the next adventure. I'm not merely as morose as this makes me sound, but if you send me a text, or an email, and I don't get back to you for days... well, at least now you know why!

I Was Never That Young

© 2013 Vernon Chan, Flickr | CC-BY | via Wylio

Sean and I just got back from a One Republic concert (also featuring The Script and opened by The American Authors). It was a ton of fun and they're incredibly talented (and multi-talented… who would expect the lead guitarist to bust out a classical acoustic Spanish guitar solo in the middle?), but the concert tonight has led me to one inescapable conclusion:

We are old fogies.

The thing about One Republic is that they have an appeal that crosses generational divides. There were kids younger than 10 there (though I really think there shouldn't have been), as well as a few definitely old enough to be grandma types. In fact, one of the women--who was 74 if she were a day--was lip-syncing and be-bopping along to a couple of their most popular songs while her husband suffered silently in the seat next to her. When I get to 74, I want to be that cool. And in front of us there was a dad with his daughter and her friend, and I just knew he was thinking, "this is SO much better than a Jonas Brothers concert."

Unfortunately, Sean and I found ourselves in front of two incredibly enthusiastic tween girls. I don't know, maybe they were actual teenagers. I would have guestimated them to be around 12-13.

In case you haven't been to a concert lately, let me tell you: they're LOUD. You can feel the bass beat against your sternum, and until you get used to it, you might suspect that you're having heart palpitations.

Trying to talk to anyone involves cupping your hand around the other person's ear and yelling. Or you can just really EMPHASIZE THE MOVEMENT OF YOUR LIPS so that they can try to lip-read while you pantomime whatever it is that you're trying to say. Nothing can drown out the music.

Nothing, that is, but the high-pitched SHRIEK of a tween. A tween so racked with excitement that she cheers when the lights go down. Screams when the Parrot Bay rum advertisement flashes across the screen. Squeals when the roadies set the stage for the set. Shrieks (and shrieks, and shrieks) when the band takes the stage... and after every song... and during every song, and at the beginning of every song. I am nearly positive that some of her shrieks went super-sonic, and somewhere dogs were twitching and chasing their tails in response.

I ended up putting in earplugs not to deal with the loud music, but to deal with the ultra-sonic shrieking behind me. When The Script left the stage and the One Republic roadies were setting up, I leaned over to Sean and said, "I don't think either of us were ever that young." Sean gave me his trademark close-mouthed chuckle and half head-shake.

"I don't know how I'll handle all this excitement!" she exclaimed melodramatically behind us.

I have no idea how I'll handle your excitement either, young teeny bopper. I surely don't.

Gaijin Chronicles Issue 10: Of Toast and Telephones

Rice paddies near our neighborhood.

(Originally published September 18, 2007)

I set two pieces of toast on fire today.  Really.  I didn’t just burn them.  There were actual flames.  Twice. 

Before I left the states, I told many of you that we’d be living like college students.  We weren’t shipping any furniture, I ditched my cat at my sister’s house, and we were taking only what would fit in two carry-on bags and five suit cases of various sizes.  This means, however, in some aspects we are worse off than college students. 

We don’t have air conditioning.  In the winter, we don’t have heat.  We do have two fans and some space heaters.  We have a coffee table.  We have four cushions for the floor in nicely coordinated shades of sage green and brown.  We have two of those adjustable “banana chairs” that sit flat on the floor and have a back.  In the States, we didn’t have a “real” bed.  We had a king-sized Aerobed with a heated mattress pad and a featherbed on top.  Western beds here are very expensive, and for the average westerner, futons (not at all like the ones in the States) are uncomfortable.  So Sean lugged our air bed across the Pacific Ocean in his baggage.  What we didn’t lug across was our featherbed, considering it costs more than the rest of our bedroom furniture put together.  So, we have a bed.  Not as comfortable as it could be, but cheap and big. 

The garbage days here are complicated.  Recyclables go out only twice a month.  Garbage can go into the dumpsters any day.  But… garbage here is incinerated, so only the burnable garbage can go out whenever.  There is a separate once- or twice-monthly day for “unburnable” garbage.  Then there’s a once-a-month day for “big” garbage.  And it stinks (no pun intended), because you place your recyclables, unburnables, big garbage, etc, in a big fenced cage.  However, the cage is locked except for garbage days.  This means, of course, that everything accumulates all over the apartment until garbage day.  Sometimes this isn’t a bad thing.  On one of the big garbage days, Sean and I were walking past the unlocked cage and saw some bookshelves and other furniture.  We looked at each other, got an evil gleam in our collective eye, and went dumpster diving. 

Did we feel foolish?  Heck yes.  Were we ashamed?  Heck no.  So, in addition to our coffee table, bed, and two floor chairs, we also have a skinny and a wide bookshelf.  No books yet, but we have the shelves.  One is in the kitchen, holding our Costco supplies of black beans, chicken broth, tomatoes, and cereal.  The other one is a table for our phone and a landing place for our junk. 

In the kitchen, we have a decent set of dishes that we got from the “Hyaku Yen” (read: Dollar Store), a pan, and a pot.  A microwave, a mini-fridge, and a rice maker complete our additions.  We have a mini two-burner gas stove, but no oven.  And no toaster. 

To make toast, we use the mini-broiler in our mini-stove in our mini-kitchen.  The problem with this is that you have to be REALLY attentive.  The other problem is that wheat bread is rare, and it’s expensive.  So my timing, for white bread at least, is nearly perfect.  For some scientific reason, wheat bread toasts FAR faster than white bread.  Don’t believe me?  Try it at home.  Use the same toaster setting for white bread and wheat bread, and see which one comes out toastier. 

So today, I go to make myself some toast (wheat…it was on sale) for a snack before I start writing.  I put it in the broiler, walk into our “living room” to pull up my document, and then I smell smoke.  I dash the three steps into the kitchen, pull out the broiler, and once the smoke clears (we don’t have any smoke alarms, either), I have to blow out my toast.  Yes, I had to blow it out like a marshmallow that “accidentally” catches fire during the s’more roast. 

I looked sadly at my poor slice of wheat bread.  Normally, I would get the knife and scrape off the charred parts in the sink and figure it was good enough.  This poor bread, however, was unsalvageable.  Still smoking.  Charred a quarter of an inch deep.  The purest black.  So, with a sigh, I place it in the sink to cool down before I throw it away so that I don’t set the garbage on fire.  I get another slice of bread, put it in the broiler, turn around and throw the other bread away, turn back around, and the other piece is on fire!!

Again, I pull out toast, blow it out, and survey the damage.  This one isn’t as bad.  I whip out my knife, scrape it off in the sink, and flip the bread over to toast the other side.  This time I crouch down on my knees and watch it the whole time through the little window.  Yup.  Sure enough, it’s done in about 5.4 seconds.  When Sean asks why we went through bread so fast, I’ll tell him I made a sandwich. 

Sadly enough, that’s about as much excitement as my average day holds.  I have, for all intents and purposes, become a housewife.  Not a very good one, at that!  My days are quite dull and unadventurous.  Every other day or so, I’ll do laundry. We do have a laundry machine, but we don’t have a dryer.  For that matter, hardly anyone in Japan has a dryer.  Everyone, regardless of wealth, generally hangs their clothes out to dry.  In the closet, we don’t have a closet rod, so Sean went and bought a tension rod when he first got here.  However, the rod—no matter how much or how little we put on it, no matter how much strain we exert to tighten it beyond average human strength—won’t stay up. 

Therefore, when I hang the laundry, I take great pains to snap it out, shake it out, smooth it out, and hang it with as much care and consideration as I can so that it doesn’t wrinkle, pucker, or stretch…especially because I DON’T want to iron it!  However, the last time the tension rod fell down, we didn’t bother to put it back up.  Which means that whenever I take down the laundry, Sean takes all my carefully hung, lovingly caressed laundry and throws it in the closet.  He does take some care to lay it flat.  But more importantly, now I can appreciate my mom’s frustration when I did basically the same thing to her as a teenager.  Sorry, Mom.  I get it now. 

I usually shower and get dressed in the afternoon sometime before Sean gets home, so that he doesn’t think that I’ve been hanging around all day in my pajamas, which I usually have been.  I might do the dishes, or I might not.  I almost always make dinner and have it nearly ready by the time Sean’s home.  In the beginning, I would spend hours looking for and applying to jobs.  Not so much anymore.  About every four to seven days, I’ll make a batch of tortillas to last the week.  Every once in a while I’ll pick up or clean, but not often enough.  Plus, I feel like sometimes it’s a losing battle, and we don’t even have kids.  I might go to the store, or I might not. 

The other day, I decided to tackle cleaning our “living room” because it was getting a little bit disgusting.  We do all of our day-to-day living in this room and in the kitchen, so it gets the most abuse.  I had been avoiding trying to clean the floor, because I wasn’t quite sure how.

The actual rooms are all floored with tatami mats.  Tatami mats are tightly woven reed mats with black cloth borders—the quintessential Asian floor.  But how the HECK do you take care of them?  They have little swiffer-like pads, but those are for wet use.  I haven’t tried them, yet.  I think you can vacuum the mats, but like so much else in life, we don’t have a vacuum.  So I got out our mini-broom, and I started sweeping.  First, I went with the grain, then against the grain, then with the grain, then against the grain… and the whole time I was thinking, “Man, I shed a lot!”  I felt like for every forward sweep, the fanning motion of the broom would encourage the little hairballs and other debris to retreat half-a-sweep.  Forward one, back one-half.  The tatami mats are not laid out with the weave all in the same direction.  Nor are they all precisely the same size.  Thus, for this room which is not more than about eight feet by seven feet, I used nearly fifteen minutes just to sweep it.  I leave wet mopping for some other day. 

In midst of my domestic mundaneness, two days ago my life was turned briefly upside down.

The phone rang. 

It took me two rings to realize what was happening.  It took me one and a half rings to make it out of bed and to the phone.  It was taking me one and a half rings to decide to answer it or not, and then the machine picked up.  I stood there, heart beating fast, listening to our very polite and pre-recorded lady give our “we’re not home” message, my hand poised over the receiver, ready to snap it up should it prove necessary.

Alas… as the gentleman started speaking, it was, of course, all in Japanese.  I caught lots of the “-mashite” conjugations, and a series of numbers at the end.  But that’s all.  Disappointed, I shrugged and went back to bed until my alarm went off.  Sean has listened to the message.  He doesn’t know what it says, either, but at least he understands all the numbers. 

I make no secret of the fact that culture shock hit me quite hard, but I’m also not sure how much of it is “Japanese” culture shock and how much of it is just a giant change from my old life.  At home I had a job that—whether I liked it or not—kept me commonly occupied for 12 hours a day with an hour commute, total.  I had a cat to keep me company before I got married, and then later whenever Sean was out of town.  I had a car that I could use to jet off for errands or whatever.

All of that, of course, has changed.  We live in a beautiful area over the mountain from downtown, but it’s considered the boondocks, and thus there’s nothing here.  I can walk to a veggie stand or a miniature grocery store that is over-priced.  There is a French Boulangerie ten minutes away, but it is a pointless destination because I never buy anything.  It’s the same story with the optician, the dentist, and the liquor store.  We went to the ramen shop once.  I can walk 20 minutes to Tanigami station to a bigger, but still small, grocery store, or McDonald’s, if I really want it...and usually I don’t.  But I did use my broken Japanese, some sign-language, and lots of funny faces to order some french fries for the first time last week. 

But to go anywhere or to do anything like going into the Cultural Center to read the Spanish or American newspapers, or maybe to eventually get a free tutor, I walk a long distance and then pay $5 one way.  Because we live on the other side of the mountain, the train tunnel is fairly new, and thus fare is expensive until the tunnel is paid down.  With me not working regularly, it doesn’t make much financial sense for me to spend $10 (or more, if I want to come in to the station that’s close to our apartment) to go into downtown for a lark.  As a result, I lump my trips together, and normally I go with Sean on the weekends.  I did brave everything on my own to get my Visa adjusted to work part-time, and to my chagrin that necessitated two different trips.  So I hit the grocery store downtown while I was there, and traveled all the way into Shin-Osaka for a job interview that has so far yielded me no private students like they promised. 

I do, however, teach a few classes to children ranging in age from three to nine years old, and with varying degrees of English from none to basically fluent.  I teach these classes in a private school in Mondo-yakujin, which is a part of Nishinomiya, which means by the time I walk to the station on one end and the school on another, it takes me nearly an hour and a half to get there.  It also costs me nearly $15 U.S. for round-trip transportation.   On top of that, it’s basically exactly the hours that I didn’t want to work.  Eventually I will work some of Wednesday evening, and then work from 3:00-8:00 pm on Fridays.  Right now I work a couple of Saturday mornings a week, but once my Friday gets extended to 8:00 pm, I probably won’t work Saturday.  Normally, the proprietor only pays 600¥ in transportation… which doesn’t even cover half.  So… the whole thing is up in the air, but for now I enjoy teaching the kids. 

In the meantime, I’m shamelessly hawking myself.  If any of you know of any decent free-lance writing gigs that I might be qualified for (or can MAKE myself qualified for), keep me in mind! 

This last weekend, we did break down and buy some speakers for our iPods, which means that now, at least, I can have music during the day.  As a result, I’m in a slightly better mood by the time Sean gets home at night.  I can boogie down all I want in private during the day.

Today, I hope to pump out a lot of writing.  We have done and seen much since I have been here that I haven’t written about… but perhaps today is the day.  For now, though, it’s nearly three o’clock, which is generally my cue to rush about and be domestic so that Sean thinks I might have actually been moderately productive.  Plus, the kitchen has aired out now, so I can comfortably do dishes without inhaling toast-smoke.

Thanks to all of you for your words of encouragement regarding my journals… and remember, if you call, leave a message.  I’m probably standing there in my pajamas, holding a flaming piece of toast, trying to figure out whether I should answer the phone or not!

~~~~~~~

This post was one of my sister's favorites. She said she could just imagine me in my pajamas, leaning intently toward the phone while I waited to see if it was worth answering. 

We very seldom got phone calls, and we also very seldom got any visitors. Normally if a knock came on our door, it was a delivery we were expecting… no super Japanese skills required. However, one day much later than this post, a knock came to the door that I wasn't expecting. Normally I would just hide and ignore it, because what could I do? But instead I answered.

Standing on the stoop were two Japanese men, one probably in his mid-30s and one much older. Their eyes widened a bit when they saw a Gaijin answering the door, and they shared a quick glance before saying something to me. Of course I didn't understand a thing. 

"Sumimasen. Nihongo o hanasemasen!" (I'm so sorry! I don't speak Japanese!"

The younger man lifted his eyebrows quizzically and gestured towards me. "Eigo?" 

"Yes," I said. "English."

He lifted up a brochure, and said--very slowly and deliberately--"We… are… Jehovasu Witnessu."  

"Ah, so!" I said. "Jehovasu Witnessu waskarimashita. Eigo o hanasemasuka?" (Ah, so! Jehovah's Witness, I understand. Do you speak English?)

He took half a step back and shook his head somewhat wistfully. "Ie." Reaching into the pile of pamphlets he was carrying under his arm, he took one out and handed it to me.

"Dozo," he said. "For you." It was a Japanese-language edition of the Watchtower Magazine. 

Then, with short bows and slight smiles, the young man and the silent gray-haired man made their way up the stairs to knock on more doors. 

I shook my head. Across the vast Pacific Ocean, I never once imagined that I'd open my door to a pair of Jehovah's Witnesses. Smiling wryly, I told myself that I'd have quite a story to share with Sean when he got home. I went back inside, putting the copy of the Watchtower on the bookshelf…right next to the phone.

Gaijin Chronicles Issue 9: Laughter in Any Language (Part 2)

Train leaving Tanigami station

Once more, my recollections follow this original post.

(Originally published September 5, 2007)

I followed Dian into the house, made a quick stop at the “powder room”, and then joined her and her sons in the living room.

Dian’s newest son, Shan, was on her hip.  Her oldest son, Jay, was on her couch.  She plopped me down at the table, and in the way that only moms have, she managed to get a tray, two glasses full of iced tea, and two coasters over the kiddie-gate with Shan still on her hip and nothing hitting the floor.  Jay, who is about seven years old, wandered around behind us in the bored way that means summer vacation is almost over. 

             Dian speaks English in the house, and her husband uses about half and half.  As a result, Jay understands English quite well, speaks well enough, but now that he’s in school, prefers Japanese.  He played shy for awhile, picking up one game only to put it down, answering my questions with nods or shrugs.  Shan, on the other hand, was ready for a nap, so Dian pulled together two cushions on the floor and plop! Shan was asleep. 

                  After Shan started snoozing, Dian went into the kitchen to make lunch (she invites me to her house AND makes me lunch?  This woman is amazing!), and Jay made himself comfortable at the table.  His socks were just peeking out under his pants.

                  “Is that a cartoon on your socks, Jay?” I asked.  He smiled and nodded.

                  “Pokemon,” he said.

                  “Pokemon?  Like Pikachu?  Doesn’t Pikachu mean ‘lightning mouse’ in Japanese?”  He grinned and nodded, then got up to bring me his giant, stuffed, bright-yellow Pikachu. 

                  “Who’s your favorite character?”  He got up again and got an encyclopedia-sized book of Pokemon reference.  He flipped through it for so long I almost thought he forgot my question, but then he laid the book flat and said, “This one.” 

                  I had no idea what the little animal was supposed to be, but I nodded appreciatively with some “mm-hmms! and ohs!” and then started flipping though the book on my own.  Jeffrey (my nephew of roughly the same age) has become interested in Pokemon, and the last time he saw me he made the effort to show me every one of his Pokemon collector cards, complete with painstaking explanations.  I saw a character that I vaguely remembered from Jeffrey’s instruction and I said, “Here, this one is my nephew’s—my sister’s son—favorite character.”

                  Jay giggled as I continued, “And when my husband and I play video games, he chooses Pikachu and he always beats me!”  After he heard this, Jay dropped the book and ran off to find his Nintendo DS.  He played a Pokemon game while I watched over his shoulder and laughed when he laughed, pretending like I knew what was going on.  Dian gave me a commiserating smile over the kitchen counter.

                  After lunch, we chatted about how to find jobs (she offered to put me in touch with her HR manager), talked about import food stores, life in Japan, the geography of the Kansai area, and loads of other stuff that’s just good to talk about—especially when one is in the throes of culture shock.  Shan woke up and ate some lunch of his own, and when I offered to hold him so that Dian could eat her own lunch, she said, “No, that’s all right.  He’s a little shy, anyway.”

                 The doorbell rang, startling me, and Dian ran off to the front door.  Jay and I stared at each other across Pokemon.  Dian came back, removing Shan from her hip and putting him on the floor.

                  “The recycle-man is here,” she explained quickly.  “I called him to come pick up some things—I need to get it all together.  I’ll be about ten minutes.  Will you be okay?  Shan should be fine with Jay, anyway.”  I nodded, and she dashed back out the door. 

                  I looked at Jay.  He looked at me.  I looked at Shan.  He ignored me.  Jay started hanging off of the table and doing backflips.  I called him a little monkey.  And then it happened.  We bonded.  Suddenly, after the accusation that Jay was acting like a small primate, we were laughing and giggling together like old friends. 

                  I grabbed Shan and tossed him in the air while he giggled and kicked; Jay methodically laid out his Pokemon cards to display to me.  Shan inspected my necklace, then decided to try and strangle me with it; Jay grabbed his toys and ran around like he was shooting at me, at the wall, at the T.V., at anything that presented a target.  When Dian came back in, I tried to put Shan down, but he pulled himself up against my leg and made little demanding sounds until I picked him up again, and Jay was tugging on my arm to ask me to play Jenga with him. 

                  Dian looked at Shan, looked at me, and said, “Huh!  You’ve made a new friend!”  And then she pulled up a chair to play Jenga.

                  As I was riding the train home (again without mishap) staring straight ahead of me like any good Japanese citizen, I was thinking about how similar those two boys are to my nephews.  I made Jay laugh hysterically when I addressed him jokingly as “Jay-san,” a title of respect.  Shan giggled any time I tossed him in the air and waved goodbye to me, safely perched once more on his mother’s hip. 

                 Definitely different cultures, I thought—but laughter is the same in any language.  

~~~~~~

When I first re-read these two posts, I didn't have any particular memories of this whole incident. Thinking back on my year in Japan, I don't know that I would have remembered this and shared any of the anecdotes unless something in particular jogged my memory. That's why I'm so glad that I wrote it… reading it again made me recall it vividly, right down to Shan's navy blue onesie and the necklace that he was trying to strangle me with--a lime green "pineapple-ish" stone my niece picked out for my sister to give me for my birthday before I left the states. Photos are definitely a good way of keeping memories of a person or place, but they don't capture it all, do they? And you don't think to take photos when stopping in to meet someone for lunch at their house… and if you do, that just seems borderline rude, no? If anything, I'm disappointed in those small details that I never thought to record, because they were so mundane. Hopefully this exercise in re-posting can help me fill some of those gaps!

Gaijin Chronicles Issue 8: Laughter in Any Language (Part 1)

This duo of posts was one of my favorites. It meant a lot to me at the time, not just because I had found a friend… but also because it was the first major outing I had taken and proved to myself that I could do it. 

Further notes can be found at the bottom!

(Originally published September 4, 2007)

Just a day after my train-station mishaps on my way to the birthday dinner, destiny poked me in the rear and made me try again. 

“Destiny” is perhaps too heavy of a word.  “Fate” doesn’t really work, either.  “Circumstance” and “fortune” imply that none of it was planned.  Regardless, some prompting finger of the universe prodded me forward, and I found myself back in Tanigami Station the next morning, snapping my fan open and shut. 

Flashback:

As part of the training for the JET Program, Sean had a small seminar in Spokane and a larger one in Seattle preceding his departure.  Being his devoted and beloved spouse, I accompanied him to the Spokane session.  Hosted in a house off of Freya, the gathering was small and casual. 

Our hostesses were two native Japanese women who had married American men and made their lives in Spokane.  The house belonged to Misako-san, who had kept Japan close to heart when choosing her tasteful decorations for the home.  At one point, training broke for a little bit so that Misako could teach us what the buttons meant on the super-duper-Japanese flushers (don’t laugh!  You’ve read my bathroom entry—they are complex technological marvels!).  Misako-san had the super-flushers put in all the bathrooms of her home, and she spent some time with each of us discussing the different buttons and their functions. 

With Sean and me, however, she took a little extra time and showed us many pictures of her daughter Dian, who currently lives in Japan with her young family.  “You must get in touch with Dian!” she exclaimed.   “She will help you.  I used to mail her all sorts of things from the states, like cake mixes—but I don’t need to now, because there’s a Costco!  Yes, you have to go to Costco!  Call Dian, she’ll take you!  Meat, eggs, bread, whatever you need, it’s at Costco.  And Dian, she’s been to Spain lots of times; she loves Spanish food.”

At this point, Sean mentioned that I had lived in Spain, and perhaps we could make something for Dian.  “Oh, yes! Yes!” she gushed.  “You must teach her, too.  Teach her how to make the Spanish food!”

Well, anxious for a friendly contact in the country, I emailed Dian before we left the states, and she was quite friendly.  Of course, her mother had already talked to her regarding us, so she was expecting the email.  And when I mentioned a common link between us—Spanish food—her response was something like this:  “Actually, I think my mom gets Spain and Mexico mixed up.  I’ve never been to Spain, but I love Mexico and its food.”  Turns out that it still works okay, because I make some mean Mexican food, too.

Well, once I arrived in Kobe, I again made contact with Dian.  She (surprisingly, to me) invited me over to her house in Nishinomiya, which is a distance perhaps similar to that of Coeur d’Alene to downtown Spokane…or maybe Cheney.  Not really sure.  I’m not a pro at translating “train-time” into distance yet.

Nishinomiya, incidentally, is sister-city to Spokane, and Kobe is sister-city to Seattle.  That’s how Dian originally ended up in Nishinomiya.  About fifteen years ago or so, she came to Japan on a sister-city teaching exchange.  She stayed for a couple years, then got a job with a sake company and moved to San Francisco and began marketing the rice wine to different Japanese stores and eateries in the US.  Somewhere along the line she met her husband, moved back to Nishinomiya, and started a family.

Now, back to the train station (feel free to imagine some rippling heat-wave/psychedelic effects here to complete the flash-back sequence).  This time, instead of going to the nearer train station and having to transfer almost right away—which was where I had made my first mistake just the day before—I decided to walk the extra fifteen minutes or so to Tanigami Station and thus eliminate one possible opportunity for error.  Plus, I saved ¥170 in doing so.  That’s a whole Diet Coke for Sean right there! 

The night before, Sean helpfully dragged me to the train-fair maps in the station, and we mapped out my route and fare for the next day.  As a result, when I arrived in Sannomiya without any mishaps from Tanigami, I bought my fare, boarded the train, transferred at the right stop, and made it all the way into Nishinomiya BY MYSELF.  It was a jubilant moment.  I didn’t feel comfortable doing a little boogie on the train platform though, so instead I exited the turnstiles as gracefully as I knew how… 

And then I had to navigate Nishinomiya.

Dian sent me some detailed directions which I had copied out and brought with me.  She had also included her phone number and told me that she didn’t mind meeting me.  But you see, this was my first test.  If I couldn’t manage THIS, how was I going to manage anything???  So I pulled out my note pad and looked at her first set of directions.  “Take the East Exit from the station.”  So far, so good.  “Take the shopping street (shotengai).”  Uh oh.  Two streets met in a Y in front of the station.  Both had signs above them, but neither had any English.  I squinted at them, wishing I remembered more of the hiragana alphabet and kicking myself for not studying harder.  On one of them I thought I recognized the symbol for “sho”, so I gave a mental shrug and picked the left path. 

Turns out I was wrong.  Halfway down, they had signs saying that I was walking on “Suzuran” street.  So, I pulled a quick right, linked up with the other street, and prayed that it was Shotengai.  A quick note:  Japanese addresses do not go by street names.  If a street has a name, it’s because usually it is a “shopping” street, or a shopping district.  The addresses go by a number code, so it’s really hard to find anything just based on address alone.  Therefore, I didn’t have the benefit of “going south on 1^st Street” or “turning left on Jefferson”. 

Since that is the case, I say God bless Dian!  She gave what the delivery drivers at work used to call “women’s directions”.  Using landmarks and left-and-right directions (and completely avoiding street names and cardinal directions), she guided me to her house.  After I turned left at the auto shop, and right two blocks down, I was looking for the third house on the left between an apartment building and an empty lot.  Apartment building: check.  Empty lot?  Um… no.  So I went down two more houses (which obviously made it the fifth house on the right), and stopped at the gate, because there was an empty lot next door.  Not knowing what to do now, I stared at the gate.  Do I hit the little speaker button?  Or do I go through the gate (which was unlocked), and knock on the door?  I began to break out in a sweat.  Actually, I’ve been sweating horribly this whole time, but this was a nervous sweat.  Then, thank heavens, I had wits enough to notice the plaque on the garden wall.  “Abe”, it proudly stated.  Not “Nakahara”. 

Sighing to myself, I pulled out my cell phone.  “Dian?” I asked.  “Do you have a silver almost-SUV in your driveway?”

“No,” she said, “but I live right down the street from that.  I’m coming out my front door right now.”  So I turn around, and you know where she was?  Standing on the porch of the third house on the right.  “Sorry,” she said.  “The empty lot is actually behind the house.  I suppose you can’t see it from the street.  I’m surprised you’re here, though.  I was expecting to have to pick you up!”

When I explained that I felt like it was a personal test, she seemed to know what I meant.  “Well, you made it,” she said.  “Why don’t you come inside where it’s cool?” 

God bless Dian!

To be continued…

~~~~~

When we were at the training in Spokane, I remember Misako-san pulling us into the kitchen to show us how she made the steamed pork buns we were eating. Her secret ingredient? Pilsbury biscuit dough. Cooked in her stove-top bamboo steamer, they were surprisingly delicious and I never would have guessed it was biscuit dough from a tube. 

I also remember expressing some anxiety about not knowing the language or any social norms. "Oh, don't worry!" they said, flapping their hands at me. "Just find a man and look at him with those big round eyes of yours, and they'll do anything!" I was a bit flabbergasted by that, but they cracked themselves up. Sean just looked at me and shrugged. 

To the best of my knowledge, my big round eyes never got me anything special in Japan… but maybe I just wasn't trying that hard!