…Yeah. Now that I just said that little bit of patheticness out loud, I'm thinking that I don't mind at all that it's been compartmentalized in some far corner of my mind.
Jobhunt
I’ve come to the
conclusion that job hunts stink in any language. Many of you might be wondering, “But Jill,
you’re in a new country, plenty of things to see!” And, of course, you wonderers would be
right. However, Sean is back at work, I
still don’t speak the language, and you don’t get a job teaching English by
literally wandering the streets. So, I
hit the net, make some calls, send some emails, and cross my fingers. And to break up the tedium, I write. Or I pretend to study Japanese. And I think about cleaning. Thinking is about as far as I get. On a happy note, the cicadas are finally
dying off.
So, with that in mind, today you get two for the price of one! No photos this time, but I’ll make up for it next time! Without further ado, here is today’s “Chronicle”.
Unfashionable Gaijin
The climate
here—for a girl that’s northern mountain born and raised—is torture. There is no such thing as dry.
At home it would take me ten to fifteen minutes before I got
sweaty-sticky in the summer heat. Here,
it’s about ten to fifteen seconds. Such
a climate leads to lush and beautiful flora as well as spotless
complexions. It also leads to very
grumpy attitudes (mainly mine).
I got a haircut before I left the states. With my hair so much shorter, it naturally gets curlier. So now I enter the world where the word “humid” was born, and all of a sudden I look like the Shirley Temple no one ever knew. Hair curlier than fries at the county fair. Hair that could give a slinky a run for its money. I have always been a bit vain about my hair, and I find that I don’t really mind this change. It’s one thing I’ve got that these skinny-minnie, high-heel wearing, itty-bitty waisted girls don’t have. Jealous of them? I think not.
It is interesting, though. There have only been a few occasions when I have truly felt like a Gaijin here. For those who are unfamiliar with the term, Gaijin is a Japanese word that’s a shortened version of “person from a different country”, or simply “foreigner”. Depending on who says it and how, it can be an insult. Generally speaking, it’s not. Most of the time when I’m made aware of how different I am, it’s usually by a small child. They are the ones who have not been sufficiently socially groomed to stare at you without seeming to stare at you.
The first day I was in Kobe City, Sean dragged me out and about. One of the places we visited was a major shopping center, and I took the opportunity to use the facilities—regardless of how afraid I was that I might find nothing but Japanese-style toilets (a porcelain hole in the floor). As I exited the stall of my happily western-style toilet, I nearly bumped into a little girl exiting hers. As I washed my hands, I watched her in the mirror watching me. When she couldn’t reach the faucet to turn the tap, I smiled and reached over to turn it on for her. She looked at me with these wide, terrified eyes and ran back to her mother, who was just exiting her stall. A bit bemused and a tiny bit hurt, I left the bathroom to meet back up with Sean.
Other than that, I have merely been the victim of stares, and there has thus far only ever been one girl who, when I caught her staring, smiled and gave me a greeting. Sometimes I think I might make some of the stares up, mostly because I have never felt so unfashionable in my entire life.
Not only do I not wear high heels, but also none of my clothes are truly the right cut. I’m not the right weight and thus not the right body type to wear what a lot of the Japanese women do. And I won’t deny it. These women know what looks good. Never anything but impeccably feminine, every outfit is flawlessly accessorized and—unlike many American girls—fits well. Kobe is home to a University of Fashion and a Fashion Museum, and many of the trends that end up big in Tokyo get started as fringe movements here. Against that, I have nothing.
I did have a single, irreplaceable moment of camaraderie today, however. When Sean dragged me out again today to visit downtown, we were wandering through one of the major shopping districts and I passed another gaijin. But not just any gaijin. This one had hair curlier than rotini pasta. So do I. She was wearing a cheap plastic headband. So was I. Her shirt was the wrong style. So was mine. Her pants were the wrong cut. So were mine. And on her feet? Hiking sandals. Me, too! I’m sure that if we had stopped to exchange anything more than a commiserating smile and a hello, we would have been grand friends.
Engrish
The Japanese seem to have a fascination with all cultures western. Until Sean took me into the heart of downtown, I didn’t even truly feel like I was in Asia. Our neighborhood—for that matter, most all of Kobe except downtown—feels much like Seattle. When I first emerged from the entrance to the subway, however, I got a slap in the face—and it felt like Asia.
Huge ads were everywhere, many of
them featuring Caucasian women like Heather Locklear for Nescafe, or Cameron
Diaz for cell phones. One public mural
featured three blond women enjoying themselves at a café—all of them dressed in
clothing best left in 1989. That’s the
problem with permanent art, I suppose.
Pachinko parlors belched smoke, loud music, and electronic boops. Neon lights and signs were above nightclubs and bars closed for the day.
Music from every third store was being pumped into the street. A five-story variety store crammed with
hodge-podge goods ranging from Diesel Jeans to TVs to socks, batteries, and
shampoo lured shoppers in with an over-stimulating array of fluorescent signs,
loud music, and lights.
Go into one of
the major shopping districts, however, and you could be shopping anywhere in
Europe. There is a French Boulangerie et
Patisserie (bakery) on every corner.
Stores with names like “Rue de B” and “Mediteranesse” and
Caucasian mannequins display kimonos in one of the few truly Japanese
stores. “Banana” and
“Comme ça le mode” and “Regalo”, or other versions of almost-right English,
French, and Spanish line the walkways.
Like the names of some of the
stores suggest, many of the Japanese don’t care or don’t know if a phrase or
translation is right as much as they care about the illusion of
“western-ness”. A mild example was a
fashionable young lady attired in a kelly-green sports jacked with gold
embroidered lettering that said, “Mysterious” on one line and “Inconvenient” on
the next. I’m sure that “inconvenient”
isn’t what they had in mind. Or, a worse
example is a shirt for a young boy (or girl, I suppose) that says (and I
quote), “Sweet Little Rock the Happiest of Emotions”. Now, explain to me what THAT means! Or, a shirt for a toddler that says, “Strain
Joy Baby Doll”. Baby Doll is, I think, a
brand, but that’s only a guess. Either
that, or people really like wandering around with “baby doll” written on their
clothing. 
In the end, however, I suppose it’s
really no different than so many Americans wearing clothing or getting tattoos
with kanji, the Japanese pictographic symbols.
How often are any of us really sure of what such things say? Sean’s wedding ring has the kanji for “Love,
Loyalty, Happiness” on it, but I was meticulous in having it researched first
and then approved by a native Japanese teacher.
Therefore, I’m fairly confident that it really does say “Love, Loyalty, Happiness”. If it doesn’t, I suppose I could be in no
better place to find out!
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