Kyoto is a city with so many temples that at this time of year the whole city smells like a mix of wood fires and incense. It feels like a truly timeless city. I'm amazed by how everything in Japan seems to escape the plastic stamp of tourism-- the only junkie souvenirs are trinkets to protect wearers against traffic incidents and bad grades, and all barriers between people and the exhibits they look at are natural and blend in with the surroundings. This is particularly true in Kyoto, where most sites are shrines that are still actively in use. The streets are full of young women in Kyoto, and they aren't there for tourists to photograph. Some are contemporary geisha, others are maiko (geisha in training), but most are Japanese college students putting on their kimonos for a trip to the old capital.
I regretfully slept through most of the shinkansen (bullet train) to Kyoto, but Rachel woke me up at one point to point out Mount Fuji. We were very close to the base (although apparently there's a special magnifying effect at the time of year that makes it appear closer than it is), and it loomed crisp and snow-covered above the surrounding villages. I'm still not used to the sight of volcanic mountains as opposed to the ones formed by plates colliding-- it's strange to see a mountain standing all by itself, scraping the clouds, without being surrounded by other mountains.
After putting our bags in a locker in the train station, Rachel and I walked through the Gion district of old Kyoto. Gion developed in order to meet the needs of visitors to the Yasaka shrine, which was built in the the century, and historically has been the entertainment district.
It consisted of a series of winding, narrow, hilly streets full of visitors and merchants. Although some merchants sold novelty t-shirts with Japanese characters, others sold fans, kimono, kitchen sets, and I could imagine similar storefronts back in medieval times when Gion first developed. Several vendors sold sweet bean paste sweets wrapped in green tea-flavored mochi dough. Sweet bean paste is better than chocolate, and I've missed it since being home. In my excitement, I mistook a carefully sliced wax copy for a sample. Luckily I didn't damage it too much when I bit into it. Still an embarrassment to myself.
We then rode a series of old-fashioned trains outside of the city to see the Golden Temple. I apologize for the constant comparisions, but from time to time, I'm surprised by how much parts of Japan look like Arusha. I think it's just the low-lying buildings, a contrast in up-keep but probably built during the same post-war period set against the mountains and the occasional smell of wood smoke. If I knew more about plants, I might say the plants were similar too. Of course, there are major differences. I felt much less safe in Arusha than in Dar es Salaam, whereas Rachel and I didn't hesitate to walk two miles to the Golden Temple at dusk.
My Japanese friends have told me that the best time to view the Golden Temple is at dawn, but given the fact Japan is in sort of an artificial time zone, I expect that would mean waking up painfully early and probably before the trains were even running. We arrived at the Golden Temple just as the sun was setting over it, and the rays lit up the gold, brightening the temple's reflection in the surrounding pond. The pavilion was built as as a shogun villa in the 13th century and was later converted into a temple. In general, I think gold structures are usually a bad idea (see: gold palm trees in Dubai airport), but given the pavilion's well-forested setting, its gold leaf exterior was striking and entirely avoided Dubai-airportitis.
After that, we headed to a ryokan outside of the city for the night. We ordered sake to go with our dinner and the host asked Rachel if we'd prefer one "go" or two "gos." Rachel assumed a "go" was a drink and ordered two. We should have known this was a problem when the host looked shocked. For future reference: a "go" is one of the metal tea kettle containers sake comes in and one "go" is just fine for two or three people, post honors exam celebrations aside.
Kyoto adventures will continue tomorrow, along with other stuff. Have a very happy New Year!
Friday, December 21, 2007
Thursday, December 20, 2007
Home Sweet Home
I just arrived in Burlington a few hours ago and can happily report I survived my trip. My computer is mysteriously working again. I'm not terribly optimistic this trend will continue, although I can envision a scenario that looks something like this: My computer gets terribly homesick and, like a small child, doesn't have a way to tell me this. Instead of engaging in productive dialogue about how it misses English-speaking computers, it instead throws a fit and ignores all commands from me. Now we are home, it is behaving better.
During the trip home, I slept pretty much whenever the plane was in motion. I even slept through meals, which is a first. Plane food is rarely good, but once I got this delicious masala-and-mini-chapati dish on an Emirates flight that was actually spicy. As a result of this experience, I'm eternally hopeful. I also like looking at how it's all packaged, although that seems less ingenious post-Japan then it did before.
The hardest part of the trip was the UAE layover, which was around 17 hours. It was much too long to wait in the airport, but I had huge bags and there were no lockers in sight. This September, I'd rarely thought of the UAE as a beautiful place, but the cab ride from Dubai to Abu Dhabi proved to me just how beautiful it was at the time of year. It even looked as though it had rained recently and there were tons of flowers along the edge of the highway. I read three books while waiting in the Abu Dhabi airport and got rounds of Turkish coffee with a succession of Lebanese guys going home for Christmas.
When I finally landed in Vermont, there was snow all over the runway, which was lit up by low-lying indigo lights, Tokyo club style. There must be almost a foot of snow all over the ground. It feels really good to be home and see my parents. It's time for some horizontal sleeping now (the best kind), but I plan to write about Kyoto and Osaka tomorrowish.
During the trip home, I slept pretty much whenever the plane was in motion. I even slept through meals, which is a first. Plane food is rarely good, but once I got this delicious masala-and-mini-chapati dish on an Emirates flight that was actually spicy. As a result of this experience, I'm eternally hopeful. I also like looking at how it's all packaged, although that seems less ingenious post-Japan then it did before.
The hardest part of the trip was the UAE layover, which was around 17 hours. It was much too long to wait in the airport, but I had huge bags and there were no lockers in sight. This September, I'd rarely thought of the UAE as a beautiful place, but the cab ride from Dubai to Abu Dhabi proved to me just how beautiful it was at the time of year. It even looked as though it had rained recently and there were tons of flowers along the edge of the highway. I read three books while waiting in the Abu Dhabi airport and got rounds of Turkish coffee with a succession of Lebanese guys going home for Christmas.
When I finally landed in Vermont, there was snow all over the runway, which was lit up by low-lying indigo lights, Tokyo club style. There must be almost a foot of snow all over the ground. It feels really good to be home and see my parents. It's time for some horizontal sleeping now (the best kind), but I plan to write about Kyoto and Osaka tomorrowish.
The Remains of the Would-Be Novelist
I read “The Remains of the Day” by Kazuo Ishiguro during part of my layover in the UAE and loved it. For those who haven't read it, it's the story of a British butler who was employed by a British lord accused of having Nazi sympathies during the interwar period. The frame for the story is the butler's road trip across England, during which he reflects back on his past.
I went through a stage where I tried to write short stories about anti-heroes. An anti-hero is very different from a villain. The anti-hero is a good person who wants deeply to do the right thing but attaches himself to a futile, worthless or sinister cause without realizing it and lives his life in vain.
The literary hero can also take wrong actions, but there is a process of struggle and realization present in the hero that can only come to the anti-hero at the end. The conflict undergirdding the classic hero narrative is the hero’s struggle with his wrong choices; whereas the conflict framing the plot of the antiheroic tale is the anti-hero’s struggle to perform his unheroic actions and win his unepic battles. In this sense, Ian McEwan’s novel “ The Innocent” is not an unheroic tale, but instead a story about a hero who commits great evil and who the reader must sympathize with anyway and feel we could do no other were we in his shoes.
In general, I only like stories where the writer accords her characters with a certain amount of respect; I find Nicholas Hornby addictive but it took me a little while to get over his shabby (but hysterical) treatment of his protagonists. I think Ishiguro is particularly masterful in “Remains of the Day” because he treats his main character with so much respect, and forces readers to feel concern for the daily drama of the butler.
I went through a stage where I tried to write short stories about anti-heroes. An anti-hero is very different from a villain. The anti-hero is a good person who wants deeply to do the right thing but attaches himself to a futile, worthless or sinister cause without realizing it and lives his life in vain.
The literary hero can also take wrong actions, but there is a process of struggle and realization present in the hero that can only come to the anti-hero at the end. The conflict undergirdding the classic hero narrative is the hero’s struggle with his wrong choices; whereas the conflict framing the plot of the antiheroic tale is the anti-hero’s struggle to perform his unheroic actions and win his unepic battles. In this sense, Ian McEwan’s novel “ The Innocent” is not an unheroic tale, but instead a story about a hero who commits great evil and who the reader must sympathize with anyway and feel we could do no other were we in his shoes.
In general, I only like stories where the writer accords her characters with a certain amount of respect; I find Nicholas Hornby addictive but it took me a little while to get over his shabby (but hysterical) treatment of his protagonists. I think Ishiguro is particularly masterful in “Remains of the Day” because he treats his main character with so much respect, and forces readers to feel concern for the daily drama of the butler.
Saturday, December 15, 2007
My Life as An Airline Food Reviewer
I mentioned earlier that there's a reasonable way to fly home from Japan and an unreasonable one. Due to complications ensuing from the fact that my return ticket was purchased back when we thought we'd be in the UAE for the year, I believe my itinerary blazes new trails into the absurd. One of my friends joked that it sounded like my sister was just showing off how many cities she knew.
Tomorrow morning, I head to Kyoto with Rachel by shinkansen (bullet train). After spending two days there, I'm going to Osaka, then flying from Osaka to Dubai. I have a nineteen hour layover in the UAE, during which I have to take a cab from Dubai to Abu Dhabi. I fly from Abu Dhabi to Frankfurt where I have a six hour layover, Frankfurt to DC, and DC to VT. The odyssey spans three days and three airlines.
It's basically an accelerated version of the last four months of my life in reverse, and it would be nice to think this literary symmetry would be reflective and filled with deep thoughts about space and time. I suspect all I will be thinking about is how much I want to change out of my clothes and lie down all the way.
I'm extremely excited to go home, but am also getting a bit sad to be leaving Japan. I've gotten pretty close to Brett and Rachel and I'll miss living with them and their exuberant golden retriever, Abby. I have a bad track record with recent departures: I cried when I left Swat, I cried when I left DC and I cried when I left Vermont. I have a feeling the trend will continue.
I doubt I'll post while in transit, but I'm planning to post about Kyoto, Osaka, the trip and what I think of the term 'global citizen' when I get home. I also have some ongoing thoughts about civil society and participatory/popular democracy I've been meaning to write about for a while as soon as I can organize my thinking better. Maybe I'll be inspired to write transit survival advice.
Tomorrow morning, I head to Kyoto with Rachel by shinkansen (bullet train). After spending two days there, I'm going to Osaka, then flying from Osaka to Dubai. I have a nineteen hour layover in the UAE, during which I have to take a cab from Dubai to Abu Dhabi. I fly from Abu Dhabi to Frankfurt where I have a six hour layover, Frankfurt to DC, and DC to VT. The odyssey spans three days and three airlines.
It's basically an accelerated version of the last four months of my life in reverse, and it would be nice to think this literary symmetry would be reflective and filled with deep thoughts about space and time. I suspect all I will be thinking about is how much I want to change out of my clothes and lie down all the way.
I'm extremely excited to go home, but am also getting a bit sad to be leaving Japan. I've gotten pretty close to Brett and Rachel and I'll miss living with them and their exuberant golden retriever, Abby. I have a bad track record with recent departures: I cried when I left Swat, I cried when I left DC and I cried when I left Vermont. I have a feeling the trend will continue.
I doubt I'll post while in transit, but I'm planning to post about Kyoto, Osaka, the trip and what I think of the term 'global citizen' when I get home. I also have some ongoing thoughts about civil society and participatory/popular democracy I've been meaning to write about for a while as soon as I can organize my thinking better. Maybe I'll be inspired to write transit survival advice.
The Kindness of Strangers
This evening, I went to a party in Tokyo with some people from Brett's work and others I'd met at the party last week. In general, people don't have the space in their apartments to host large gatherings, so people rent out rooms for these events. The room was dimly lit by purple and blue lights close to the floor and there were couches along all the walls with banquet tables of food in the middle.
I asked one young woman about her job, and she said she was a "socialist." I was a little confused and asked if she worked for the socialist party. She was confused in turn and pulled up her phone dictionary (yet another feature of the amazing Japanese cell phone) and reported back that she worked on "personal affairs." Mysteries I may never solve.
One thing that struck me throughout all the conversations was how hard the average young Japanese professional (yjpie) works. Many of the people I talked to reported waking up at six am and getting home from work at ten. A couple said they rarely got home before one or two. I'd dismiss this as hyperbole, but everytime I ride the train, I see people falling asleep while standing up. I've wondered why Japan isn't higher on quality of life indexes (The Economist puts it at 17, behind the United States, Italy, and Singapore among others). The hours worked must be part of the answer. A lot of the people my age I talked to were interested in improving their English so as to get jobs with foreign companies, which offer comparatively flexible hours.
I was really touched by the inclusiveness and kindness of the people at the party. There was a moment when I didn't have anyone to talk to, and a girl named Hiromi came over and grabbed me by the wrist and led me across the room to a table with her friends. She then rearranged the table so I was sitting between the two English speakers while pouring everyone a round of drinks. I'd met Hiromi for the first time that night, and we'd had a conversation in which we revealed that the extent of our ability to understand each other was to say we didn't understand and laugh about it. Despite this, she broke Japanese taboos against boldness and physical contact to help an outsider feel less alone.
I used to intern at the refugee relocation center in Vermont, and the volunteer coordinator, Judy Scott, always said she had felt drawn towards helping new Vermonters because her own children traveled so much and were so dependent on the kindness of strangers. For me, the draw was that these were people who'd repeatedly lost everything through no fault of their own.
After spending more time abroad, I can appreciate the reciprocal framework too. I'm a grateful beneficary of the kindness of strangers. Sometimes this is bittersweet, like when the people in a dusty Sukuma village south of Lake Victoria wouldn't let us leave until they'd filled the trunk of our car with sweet potatoes, even though it was clear they had nothing else to eat. Other times, it's just plain sweet, like all the people who have made me feel a more like a friend than a stranger.
I asked one young woman about her job, and she said she was a "socialist." I was a little confused and asked if she worked for the socialist party. She was confused in turn and pulled up her phone dictionary (yet another feature of the amazing Japanese cell phone) and reported back that she worked on "personal affairs." Mysteries I may never solve.
One thing that struck me throughout all the conversations was how hard the average young Japanese professional (yjpie) works. Many of the people I talked to reported waking up at six am and getting home from work at ten. A couple said they rarely got home before one or two. I'd dismiss this as hyperbole, but everytime I ride the train, I see people falling asleep while standing up. I've wondered why Japan isn't higher on quality of life indexes (The Economist puts it at 17, behind the United States, Italy, and Singapore among others). The hours worked must be part of the answer. A lot of the people my age I talked to were interested in improving their English so as to get jobs with foreign companies, which offer comparatively flexible hours.
I was really touched by the inclusiveness and kindness of the people at the party. There was a moment when I didn't have anyone to talk to, and a girl named Hiromi came over and grabbed me by the wrist and led me across the room to a table with her friends. She then rearranged the table so I was sitting between the two English speakers while pouring everyone a round of drinks. I'd met Hiromi for the first time that night, and we'd had a conversation in which we revealed that the extent of our ability to understand each other was to say we didn't understand and laugh about it. Despite this, she broke Japanese taboos against boldness and physical contact to help an outsider feel less alone.
I used to intern at the refugee relocation center in Vermont, and the volunteer coordinator, Judy Scott, always said she had felt drawn towards helping new Vermonters because her own children traveled so much and were so dependent on the kindness of strangers. For me, the draw was that these were people who'd repeatedly lost everything through no fault of their own.
After spending more time abroad, I can appreciate the reciprocal framework too. I'm a grateful beneficary of the kindness of strangers. Sometimes this is bittersweet, like when the people in a dusty Sukuma village south of Lake Victoria wouldn't let us leave until they'd filled the trunk of our car with sweet potatoes, even though it was clear they had nothing else to eat. Other times, it's just plain sweet, like all the people who have made me feel a more like a friend than a stranger.
Friday, December 14, 2007
The Kanagawa Wrap Up
I have one day left in Yokohama, and then will be headed out to spend two days in Kyoto and a day in Osaka before flying back to the states. (I'll post more about my crazy trip home soon, but let's put it this way: There is a reasonable way to return home from Japan. It invovles a flight across the Pacific and a brief stopover on the West Coast. This is not the way I'm going home-- I'm going the unreasonable way.)I took Rachel and Brett out to the Korean bbq today to thank them for their hospitality, and was once again bowed over by the deliciousness. Meat aside, I'd eat grilled onions all by themsleves.
Just when I think I've got Japan better figured out, I made two mistakes today. I took the train the wrong direction from Yokohama-- a trip I make almost four or five times a week-- towards Mitomirai instead of Kikuna. It was luckily easily fixed, but I am still an embarassment to myself. The Korean bbq place we go to is called Xzcaca (I'm sure it's spelled differently, sorry) but I asked Rachel, "How long does it take to get to Yukata?" Hi boss, how long does it take to disrobe?
Tomorrow will probably be absorbed by packing and cleaning, and then an office party in Tokyo. I found out most of Brett's office thinks I'm pretty cute, which is flattering. Another perk of being exotic.
Japan is my second full-on experience with being in a racial minority, and I don't think I've found the experience as striking or as illuminating as I would have expected. It hasn't really helped me to understand what it's like to be a racial minority in America at all. When in Tanzania, our whiteness and racial difference really stood out to one of my friends, but I felt like we stood out due to our privilege before our race. (In a poor country, I don't think money is any harder to read than skin color.)I was never as conscious of my paleness as I was of the money in my belt. I don't think we should assume race is an inherently meaningful distinction but it assumes meaning in relation to the symbols and history associated with it.
Japan is known for being a relatively closed society, and there are many policies which can apparently make life hard for foreigners. Landlords sometimes refuse to rent to them on the grounds that they won't understand how to properly sort the trash (to be fair, it's a complicated system). Sometimes, their parents have to vouch for them before they can participate in programs, and people often need Japanese sponsors before they can rent apartments. In Okinawa, there are bars where foreigners aren't allowed because of drunken incidents near the bases.
I haven't experienced any of degree of this (and am also not trying to rent an apartment). Every time I consider going clothes shopping, I'm somewhat bitterly reminded of real physical differences, and babies tend to stare at me on trains (this is definitely another perk of being exotic because the babies are so cute). In general, though, I feel like the degree to which I "stand out" in Japan is more complimentary than alienating. I think it's akin to the pretty exchange student from the former Soviet bloc who doesn't speak English treatment.
Language can be a huge alienating factor though. The other day, while we were making our bookings for the Kyoto trip, all the travel agents were mysteriously on the phone when our number was called. The manager bustled over, and when Rachel demonstrated that she could speak Japanese, agents were instantly free. I don't think this is xenophobia; people are just afraid of making a mistake and doing their job badly.
In addition to friends and family, cheese, gym workouts, and my red coat, I'm really looking forward to being able to understand all the conversations and read all the signs at home. Information overload has its own appeal.
Just when I think I've got Japan better figured out, I made two mistakes today. I took the train the wrong direction from Yokohama-- a trip I make almost four or five times a week-- towards Mitomirai instead of Kikuna. It was luckily easily fixed, but I am still an embarassment to myself. The Korean bbq place we go to is called Xzcaca (I'm sure it's spelled differently, sorry) but I asked Rachel, "How long does it take to get to Yukata?" Hi boss, how long does it take to disrobe?
Tomorrow will probably be absorbed by packing and cleaning, and then an office party in Tokyo. I found out most of Brett's office thinks I'm pretty cute, which is flattering. Another perk of being exotic.
Japan is my second full-on experience with being in a racial minority, and I don't think I've found the experience as striking or as illuminating as I would have expected. It hasn't really helped me to understand what it's like to be a racial minority in America at all. When in Tanzania, our whiteness and racial difference really stood out to one of my friends, but I felt like we stood out due to our privilege before our race. (In a poor country, I don't think money is any harder to read than skin color.)I was never as conscious of my paleness as I was of the money in my belt. I don't think we should assume race is an inherently meaningful distinction but it assumes meaning in relation to the symbols and history associated with it.
Japan is known for being a relatively closed society, and there are many policies which can apparently make life hard for foreigners. Landlords sometimes refuse to rent to them on the grounds that they won't understand how to properly sort the trash (to be fair, it's a complicated system). Sometimes, their parents have to vouch for them before they can participate in programs, and people often need Japanese sponsors before they can rent apartments. In Okinawa, there are bars where foreigners aren't allowed because of drunken incidents near the bases.
I haven't experienced any of degree of this (and am also not trying to rent an apartment). Every time I consider going clothes shopping, I'm somewhat bitterly reminded of real physical differences, and babies tend to stare at me on trains (this is definitely another perk of being exotic because the babies are so cute). In general, though, I feel like the degree to which I "stand out" in Japan is more complimentary than alienating. I think it's akin to the pretty exchange student from the former Soviet bloc who doesn't speak English treatment.
Language can be a huge alienating factor though. The other day, while we were making our bookings for the Kyoto trip, all the travel agents were mysteriously on the phone when our number was called. The manager bustled over, and when Rachel demonstrated that she could speak Japanese, agents were instantly free. I don't think this is xenophobia; people are just afraid of making a mistake and doing their job badly.
In addition to friends and family, cheese, gym workouts, and my red coat, I'm really looking forward to being able to understand all the conversations and read all the signs at home. Information overload has its own appeal.
All Gone to Look for America
Instead of packing today, I made a playlist for my trip, which is almost the same as packing.
Going Home Mix
1) Closer to Me (Dar Williams)
2) Carmen Sandiago (Rockapella-- completely breaks the tone of the mix, but oh well)
3) Leaving on a Jet Plane (John Denver--ok, Chantal Kreviazuk)
4) Unwritten (Natasha Bedingfield)
5) All That I Want (The Weepies)
6) The Blessings (Dar Williams)
7) Hotel Song (Regina Spektor)
8) America (Simon and Garfunkel)
9) California (Joni Mitchell)
10) Iowa (Dar Williams)
11) Omaha (Counting Crows-- strong opinion: someone needs to write a Vermont song but I have a sustained ten year love for this song)
12) So Close to My Heart (Dar Williams)
13) Happiness (The Weepies)
14) Heaven When We're Home (The Wailing Jennies)
The Daily Gazette ran an article about my friend Jon and other swatties serving in the military. I think the article slightly misrepresents Jon's interest in the military--I think he sees economic diversity within the armed services as as critical a goal as political diversity-- but it's an interesting topic.
Going Home Mix
1) Closer to Me (Dar Williams)
2) Carmen Sandiago (Rockapella-- completely breaks the tone of the mix, but oh well)
3) Leaving on a Jet Plane (John Denver--ok, Chantal Kreviazuk)
4) Unwritten (Natasha Bedingfield)
5) All That I Want (The Weepies)
6) The Blessings (Dar Williams)
7) Hotel Song (Regina Spektor)
8) America (Simon and Garfunkel)
9) California (Joni Mitchell)
10) Iowa (Dar Williams)
11) Omaha (Counting Crows-- strong opinion: someone needs to write a Vermont song but I have a sustained ten year love for this song)
12) So Close to My Heart (Dar Williams)
13) Happiness (The Weepies)
14) Heaven When We're Home (The Wailing Jennies)
The Daily Gazette ran an article about my friend Jon and other swatties serving in the military. I think the article slightly misrepresents Jon's interest in the military--I think he sees economic diversity within the armed services as as critical a goal as political diversity-- but it's an interesting topic.
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
The Idiot Reader
When I was a freshman, I took a creative writing workshop with Gregory Frost in which we coined the term "idiot reader." For every story shared in a workshop of twevle, there is always someone who just can't gain purchase on your style or material. I love minimalist prose and understated endings, but will reject a story without a second chance if the author doesn't let me get inside the character, or deliberately creates an unsympathetic character even though I understand this can be a stylistic choice.
Announcing "I think I'm the idiot reader" is a way to explain you were unable to connect with a story without directly criticizing the author's stylistic choices or content. If a writer has several idiot readers, they then may want to reassess.
I'm sometimes the idiot reader outside my fiction workshop. Cars are sexy? I'm the idiot reader. Umbrellas are useful? Idiot reader (and a stubborn one). Diamonds are pretty? Idiot reader.
I discovered today I'm also the idiot reader when it comes to the importance of tracing Alexander the Great's family tree. Let me backtrack. I was fantasizing about trips I could take the summer before grad school, and started looking for Silk Road backpacking trips. This led me to look up the Kalash, an ethnic group living in Chitral, Pakistan, near China.
There's a lot of contraversy over whether the Kalash are the descendents of Alexander the Great, a claim they themselves make. Some visitors have found similarities between them and ancient Greeks, and as always, there's the Western fascination with a fair complexioned group where it isn't expected.
I am in no position to assess the acccuracy of this claim, although it sounds plausible given a lack of contact with other groups (mountaineous region). I'd sort of doubt cultural similarities would last that long in isolation, but the Kalash have such a distinct religion that makes me wonder.
The wikipedia talk page on the Kalash takes me head on into the first Alexander the Great contraversy I can't understand (I'm only the idiot reader as to the importance of this connection-- I can understand why it's interesting), the Macedonia/FYROM controversy. Sure enough, whenever the Kalash are discussed, the Macedonians and Greeks go at it in the forums.
I've never really understood the search for the lost tribes of Israel-- but I can also understand how if you're Pashtun or Ethiopian, having your family discovered and aided by a wealthy country is a plus. Therefore, I can understand part of why it's a powerful and contested identity struggle.
I like speculating about the waves of early human migration in a Kon-tiki kind of way, but I get nervous when origins are traced back to shadowy legendary events, like the Hamitic Myth in Rwanda. 19th century explorer John Speke postulated that the Tutsi were a superior invading class not-native to Rwanda descended from Noah's son Ham. This myth informed the entrenchment of an ethnic division under colonial rule. I also wonder if the poor treatment the Hazara in Afghanistan recieved under the Taliban was in part justified by the legend that they were descended from remnants of Gengis Khan's army, installed in Afghanistan through brutality.
But the birthplace and descendants of Alexander the Great? I'm struggling to understand even sinister or commercial explanations for why this is so contested. I'm the idiot reader.
Edit: Maybe it's about proving early "civilizedness," sort of like Afrocentrism and the split over Egypt? Gotta love conquering as a yardstick of advancement.
Announcing "I think I'm the idiot reader" is a way to explain you were unable to connect with a story without directly criticizing the author's stylistic choices or content. If a writer has several idiot readers, they then may want to reassess.
I'm sometimes the idiot reader outside my fiction workshop. Cars are sexy? I'm the idiot reader. Umbrellas are useful? Idiot reader (and a stubborn one). Diamonds are pretty? Idiot reader.
I discovered today I'm also the idiot reader when it comes to the importance of tracing Alexander the Great's family tree. Let me backtrack. I was fantasizing about trips I could take the summer before grad school, and started looking for Silk Road backpacking trips. This led me to look up the Kalash, an ethnic group living in Chitral, Pakistan, near China.
There's a lot of contraversy over whether the Kalash are the descendents of Alexander the Great, a claim they themselves make. Some visitors have found similarities between them and ancient Greeks, and as always, there's the Western fascination with a fair complexioned group where it isn't expected.
I am in no position to assess the acccuracy of this claim, although it sounds plausible given a lack of contact with other groups (mountaineous region). I'd sort of doubt cultural similarities would last that long in isolation, but the Kalash have such a distinct religion that makes me wonder.
The wikipedia talk page on the Kalash takes me head on into the first Alexander the Great contraversy I can't understand (I'm only the idiot reader as to the importance of this connection-- I can understand why it's interesting), the Macedonia/FYROM controversy. Sure enough, whenever the Kalash are discussed, the Macedonians and Greeks go at it in the forums.
I've never really understood the search for the lost tribes of Israel-- but I can also understand how if you're Pashtun or Ethiopian, having your family discovered and aided by a wealthy country is a plus. Therefore, I can understand part of why it's a powerful and contested identity struggle.
I like speculating about the waves of early human migration in a Kon-tiki kind of way, but I get nervous when origins are traced back to shadowy legendary events, like the Hamitic Myth in Rwanda. 19th century explorer John Speke postulated that the Tutsi were a superior invading class not-native to Rwanda descended from Noah's son Ham. This myth informed the entrenchment of an ethnic division under colonial rule. I also wonder if the poor treatment the Hazara in Afghanistan recieved under the Taliban was in part justified by the legend that they were descended from remnants of Gengis Khan's army, installed in Afghanistan through brutality.
But the birthplace and descendants of Alexander the Great? I'm struggling to understand even sinister or commercial explanations for why this is so contested. I'm the idiot reader.
Edit: Maybe it's about proving early "civilizedness," sort of like Afrocentrism and the split over Egypt? Gotta love conquering as a yardstick of advancement.
Hakone, Ryokans and Onsens
This past Monday and Tuesday, I went up to Hakone, a mountaneous area south of Yokohama that is famous for its hot springs. To get there, we had to go on two local trains, and then a little red switchback train through the mountains.
Fall seems to come a bit later in Japan (apparently it also takes longer to get warm in the spring) and like everywhere else, Japan's been experiencing unusua climate patterns lately. Even though it was early December, it felt like early-October-in-Vermont in Hakone. All the trees were turning orange and red and the air had that crisp mountain feel. As we went into the mountains, I could almost pretend I was back home, except volcanic mountains (which I don't think I'd ever seen before) are shaped really differently from VT mountains. Volcanic mountains are much more dramatically shaped and less sloping. I still think northwestern Tanzania looks more like Vermont than anywhere else I've been. As we got further into the mountains, we could see steam pouring off some of the slopes, a sign of volcanic activity.
We got off the train at Gora, the last stop before the monorail. It seems Hakone revovles around the hot springs (onsens) and the domestic--and few foreign tourists--who come to use them. There was also a large local handicraft industry fueled by the onsen traffic. We walked by a huge open air sculpture museum that had pieces by Rodin (my favorite), Calder and Picasso. It looked pretty cool in the dramatic setting-- there was even a cool midair walkway over a cliff--but it seemed a little odd to put a museum so far from urban centers where most people could access it. We also saw what may be my all-time favorite cafe concept--it centered around a foot hot bath that people sat around while they enjoyed food and drinks.
As it was getting dark, we checked into our ryokan. A ryokan is a traditional Japanese inn with tatami mat floors where everyone sleeps on futons on the floor. It's very elegant and customer service oriented. Every room is assigned a maid, and when you check in, you tell the front desk what time you would like dinner and breakfast served at. The maid brings in your courses at the appointed times, and then clears the table and lays out your futons (which are stored in a closet) while you are in the onsen. (The experience also reminded me how weird it feels not to tip here, but it's very taboo.)
Our ryokan was located in the valley below the nearest train station. We checked in at the top of the train station, and rode this little cable car down through the forest for five or six minutes to get to the ryokan. It was located right on the hot springs, a spread-out clump of pale buildings with red trim just on the edge of the cliff.
After drinking tea in our room, we put on our yukata (a yukata is roughly the same shape as a kimono, but it is made out of thin cotton. It's a bit like a thin, long bathrobe with kimono sleeves. It's important to cross the left side over the right side-- the reverse cross is only done on the dead) and our hopi (kimono sleeved bed jackets that tie at the waist) and headed down to the onsen. I struggled a little to put on my split toe socks, but by the end of the visit, I mastered it. Our maid scolded us if we left our room without our hopi for fear we'd catch cold.
In contemporary Japan, onsen for men and women are almost always seperated, but my understanding is that before the occupation, unisex public baths were common. The onsen itself is procedure heavy, and there were lots of signs explaining the process in English, Japanese, and naked-person-cartoon (I guess it doesn't quite count as a manga). First, after undressing, everyone squats on wooden stools about 9 inches off the ground in front of a series of faucets (this is probably among the most unflattering positions ever, but were I more properly focused on thoroughly cleaning my toenails--a Herculean task for sure-- I wouldn't have noticed). After a very through scrub and rinse, one enters the onsen. A critical point of etiquette as highlighted by the signs is "let's not dunk our towels into the onsen." I was a little mystified as to why this was even a concern, but I guess it's more of a problem on the men's side where "vanity towels" are common during the scrubbing. The towel then is positioned on the head while in the onsen.
There are indoor pools which are VERY hot and outdoor polls that are quite hot. I prefered the outdoor pools because as it got darker, I could look up and see the stars, and I liked the contrast of the very cold air and the hot water on my skin. There was also a great view of the springs from the bath itself. Although I went to a Turkish bath once to clean up after an all night bus ride, this was my first time seeing a hot springs, and I really enjoyed it. We went in before and after dinner and breakfast the next day. My skin still feels very soft.
Meals were both very good and kind of terrifying. It's considered very rude to not finish all the food, and can result in not being invited back. However, Rachel and Brett are both allergic to shellfish, so we plastic-bagged and flushed a lot of food. We felt a little guilty about this because it's all very fresh, gourmet Japanese food, but it's also very intimidating. Dinner consisted of assorted sashimi (including really good tuna), tofu with a silver of beef decorated with pine nuts, an abalone with mushrooms and peppers that cooked on a burner at each place, mini ramen, a dumpling in a soup, tempura crab, plum wine and many other things I forget. One 'goal' of the ryokan is to never show you the same serving/eating dish twice, and the dishes everything came on were equally beautiful. My favorite was shaped like a boat.
I haven't really adapted to the Japanese attitude towards rice. I'm alright with rice as a vehicle, but in general, I stop eating my rice when I run out of curry to soak it in, and I believe the optimal curry to rice ratio is very high. I can taste the difference between good rice and horrible rice, but I'm blurry on the whole spectrum. In Japan, rice is the most important part of the meal and is often served after the rest of the food, intended to be eaten all by itself or with pickled vegetables. I was entirely too full to eat my rice (bad Japanese person!) and considered the plastic bag approach before Brett voluntered (good Japanese person!).
Breakfast was pretty difficult. I'd bragged to Julie I had no qualms about a tuna onigiri in the morning, but a steaming tofu-fish pudding was another story and Brett and Rachel took pity on me. Please don't take my non-picky eater card away. I'll do better next time, and I did enjoy a broth-with-clams, a mini omelet dumpling in broth, and even a small fish with its head and tail. (Come on, everyone, you know that's really scary. It's almost a live fish. Even though it doesn't smell fishy, there's the knowledge it COULD smell fishy. I could have eaten some part not intended to be eaten. I couldn't tell the nama gomi from the delicious. Also, fish look kind of like monsters when they are dead.) It was actually very good.
Almost everyone staying at our onsen--except us and an Iranian man named Jimmy who was married to a Canadian Japanese woman-- was Japanese, so it was cool to get the traditional Japanese ryokan experience. I debated whether going to an onsen was a good choice given the limited amount of time I had, but Brett and Rachel were enthusiastic and it was a really good trip.
After a final dip, Brett had to head into Tokyo for a business meeting and Rachel and I took the train up to Gora, and then took a monorail/funnicula/cable car higher up the mountain. It was much colder up there, and even though the sky was perfectly clear, there were drops of rain. I've tried to look this up online to no avail, but my best guess is that it is volcanic steam condensing. After exploring and enjoying the view, we hiked down to Gora and then did some shopping before heading home.
Fall seems to come a bit later in Japan (apparently it also takes longer to get warm in the spring) and like everywhere else, Japan's been experiencing unusua climate patterns lately. Even though it was early December, it felt like early-October-in-Vermont in Hakone. All the trees were turning orange and red and the air had that crisp mountain feel. As we went into the mountains, I could almost pretend I was back home, except volcanic mountains (which I don't think I'd ever seen before) are shaped really differently from VT mountains. Volcanic mountains are much more dramatically shaped and less sloping. I still think northwestern Tanzania looks more like Vermont than anywhere else I've been. As we got further into the mountains, we could see steam pouring off some of the slopes, a sign of volcanic activity.
We got off the train at Gora, the last stop before the monorail. It seems Hakone revovles around the hot springs (onsens) and the domestic--and few foreign tourists--who come to use them. There was also a large local handicraft industry fueled by the onsen traffic. We walked by a huge open air sculpture museum that had pieces by Rodin (my favorite), Calder and Picasso. It looked pretty cool in the dramatic setting-- there was even a cool midair walkway over a cliff--but it seemed a little odd to put a museum so far from urban centers where most people could access it. We also saw what may be my all-time favorite cafe concept--it centered around a foot hot bath that people sat around while they enjoyed food and drinks.
As it was getting dark, we checked into our ryokan. A ryokan is a traditional Japanese inn with tatami mat floors where everyone sleeps on futons on the floor. It's very elegant and customer service oriented. Every room is assigned a maid, and when you check in, you tell the front desk what time you would like dinner and breakfast served at. The maid brings in your courses at the appointed times, and then clears the table and lays out your futons (which are stored in a closet) while you are in the onsen. (The experience also reminded me how weird it feels not to tip here, but it's very taboo.)
Our ryokan was located in the valley below the nearest train station. We checked in at the top of the train station, and rode this little cable car down through the forest for five or six minutes to get to the ryokan. It was located right on the hot springs, a spread-out clump of pale buildings with red trim just on the edge of the cliff.
After drinking tea in our room, we put on our yukata (a yukata is roughly the same shape as a kimono, but it is made out of thin cotton. It's a bit like a thin, long bathrobe with kimono sleeves. It's important to cross the left side over the right side-- the reverse cross is only done on the dead) and our hopi (kimono sleeved bed jackets that tie at the waist) and headed down to the onsen. I struggled a little to put on my split toe socks, but by the end of the visit, I mastered it. Our maid scolded us if we left our room without our hopi for fear we'd catch cold.
In contemporary Japan, onsen for men and women are almost always seperated, but my understanding is that before the occupation, unisex public baths were common. The onsen itself is procedure heavy, and there were lots of signs explaining the process in English, Japanese, and naked-person-cartoon (I guess it doesn't quite count as a manga). First, after undressing, everyone squats on wooden stools about 9 inches off the ground in front of a series of faucets (this is probably among the most unflattering positions ever, but were I more properly focused on thoroughly cleaning my toenails--a Herculean task for sure-- I wouldn't have noticed). After a very through scrub and rinse, one enters the onsen. A critical point of etiquette as highlighted by the signs is "let's not dunk our towels into the onsen." I was a little mystified as to why this was even a concern, but I guess it's more of a problem on the men's side where "vanity towels" are common during the scrubbing. The towel then is positioned on the head while in the onsen.
There are indoor pools which are VERY hot and outdoor polls that are quite hot. I prefered the outdoor pools because as it got darker, I could look up and see the stars, and I liked the contrast of the very cold air and the hot water on my skin. There was also a great view of the springs from the bath itself. Although I went to a Turkish bath once to clean up after an all night bus ride, this was my first time seeing a hot springs, and I really enjoyed it. We went in before and after dinner and breakfast the next day. My skin still feels very soft.
Meals were both very good and kind of terrifying. It's considered very rude to not finish all the food, and can result in not being invited back. However, Rachel and Brett are both allergic to shellfish, so we plastic-bagged and flushed a lot of food. We felt a little guilty about this because it's all very fresh, gourmet Japanese food, but it's also very intimidating. Dinner consisted of assorted sashimi (including really good tuna), tofu with a silver of beef decorated with pine nuts, an abalone with mushrooms and peppers that cooked on a burner at each place, mini ramen, a dumpling in a soup, tempura crab, plum wine and many other things I forget. One 'goal' of the ryokan is to never show you the same serving/eating dish twice, and the dishes everything came on were equally beautiful. My favorite was shaped like a boat.
I haven't really adapted to the Japanese attitude towards rice. I'm alright with rice as a vehicle, but in general, I stop eating my rice when I run out of curry to soak it in, and I believe the optimal curry to rice ratio is very high. I can taste the difference between good rice and horrible rice, but I'm blurry on the whole spectrum. In Japan, rice is the most important part of the meal and is often served after the rest of the food, intended to be eaten all by itself or with pickled vegetables. I was entirely too full to eat my rice (bad Japanese person!) and considered the plastic bag approach before Brett voluntered (good Japanese person!).
Breakfast was pretty difficult. I'd bragged to Julie I had no qualms about a tuna onigiri in the morning, but a steaming tofu-fish pudding was another story and Brett and Rachel took pity on me. Please don't take my non-picky eater card away. I'll do better next time, and I did enjoy a broth-with-clams, a mini omelet dumpling in broth, and even a small fish with its head and tail. (Come on, everyone, you know that's really scary. It's almost a live fish. Even though it doesn't smell fishy, there's the knowledge it COULD smell fishy. I could have eaten some part not intended to be eaten. I couldn't tell the nama gomi from the delicious. Also, fish look kind of like monsters when they are dead.) It was actually very good.
Almost everyone staying at our onsen--except us and an Iranian man named Jimmy who was married to a Canadian Japanese woman-- was Japanese, so it was cool to get the traditional Japanese ryokan experience. I debated whether going to an onsen was a good choice given the limited amount of time I had, but Brett and Rachel were enthusiastic and it was a really good trip.
After a final dip, Brett had to head into Tokyo for a business meeting and Rachel and I took the train up to Gora, and then took a monorail/funnicula/cable car higher up the mountain. It was much colder up there, and even though the sky was perfectly clear, there were drops of rain. I've tried to look this up online to no avail, but my best guess is that it is volcanic steam condensing. After exploring and enjoying the view, we hiked down to Gora and then did some shopping before heading home.
Sunday, December 9, 2007
We Will Rock You
Today I went into Tokyo to meet up with Julie, a fellow Truman, who’s from Wisconsin and who has just embarked on a post-graduate trip around the world with two friends. They are starting out in Tokyo, then going to South Korea, Australia, New Zealand, India, Nepal, Thailand, South Africa, Kenya, Uganda, and Rwanda. I got a East Africa craving just thinking about it. It was really nice to see Julie.
We spent the afternoon wandering around a park between Harajuku and Shinjuku. The park had a major pedestrian thoroughfare which was lined by bands playing and people performing. The bands typically played for exposure, not money, although some were also selling CDs. Crowds gathered around better bands, sitting down or standing in a circle around silently clapping (at first we clapped too loudly and everyone stared at us). Male bands were almost exclusively watched by females, and vice versa. I'm struggling to capture the degree of interesting chaos, so I'll revert to a list. Particularly noteworthy were:
-a group of people dressed in jeans and plaid (think Sixteen Feet) doing heavily choreographed “footloose” style dancing while filmed.
-Two people doing karoke to Queen’s “We Will Rock You” alongside the street.
-Five particularly pretty Japanese boys in dark jeans and leather jackets danced and played invisible instruments to a string of hit songs. Mysterically, the instruments disasppeared—and the song continued—whenever the chorus came on and they danced to it.
-Several tiny dogs on a bench wearing sunglasses and matching sweaters.
-A bunch of Amnesty volunteers wearing bright orange jackets urged us to “get in bed for Darfur.” They had a huge make-shift bed and they were talking pictures of people in it holding up signs calling for intervention in Darfur. They would then send all the pictures to the UN. I’ve seen college groups adopt the same picture taking strategy with pledge signs, but this was definitely one step further. Julie and I happily got in the bed (how could you not) and held up the signs. Make love, not war. I think this was the first CSO I’ve seen in Japan, which was interesting in itself. I wished we had more language in common, because I’m curious what their base of support is like, how much coverage Darfur gets in the Japanese news, and what the position of the Japanese government is. I guess I can look the latter up online.
-Men dressed as frogs, cartoon characters, and horses with reindeer antlers.
-While listening to the bands, the Japanese girls danced by making small jumps from side to side. I might be able to do that! I have a feeling I’d wind up coming down on someone’s foot though.
--Julie’s friends who live in Japan have a comedy routine, and had a sign with them that said “Hugs—500 Yen.” They used it to bargain at the flea market and to get in a ‘fight’ with a Japanese improve group.
It was a colder day than I was prepared for, so on my way home I got in touch with my inner Japanese schoolgirl and bought a pair of knee socks.
On Friday night, I went to a “young person’s party” in Tokyo which very similar to every other good house party I’ve been to. I met a Japanese guy who, lo and behold, had attended Springhurst elementary, my alma mater, a couple years before I had. I also met two Japanese girls who’d just graduated from American colleges. One of them attended Hofstra University and had a thick Jersey accent—something I never expected to hear in Japan.
I want to post more, but I have to get up early to go to Hakonei tomorrow. I'm not taking a laptop with me, but will be back by Tuesday night, Japan time.
We spent the afternoon wandering around a park between Harajuku and Shinjuku. The park had a major pedestrian thoroughfare which was lined by bands playing and people performing. The bands typically played for exposure, not money, although some were also selling CDs. Crowds gathered around better bands, sitting down or standing in a circle around silently clapping (at first we clapped too loudly and everyone stared at us). Male bands were almost exclusively watched by females, and vice versa. I'm struggling to capture the degree of interesting chaos, so I'll revert to a list. Particularly noteworthy were:
-a group of people dressed in jeans and plaid (think Sixteen Feet) doing heavily choreographed “footloose” style dancing while filmed.
-Two people doing karoke to Queen’s “We Will Rock You” alongside the street.
-Five particularly pretty Japanese boys in dark jeans and leather jackets danced and played invisible instruments to a string of hit songs. Mysterically, the instruments disasppeared—and the song continued—whenever the chorus came on and they danced to it.
-Several tiny dogs on a bench wearing sunglasses and matching sweaters.
-A bunch of Amnesty volunteers wearing bright orange jackets urged us to “get in bed for Darfur.” They had a huge make-shift bed and they were talking pictures of people in it holding up signs calling for intervention in Darfur. They would then send all the pictures to the UN. I’ve seen college groups adopt the same picture taking strategy with pledge signs, but this was definitely one step further. Julie and I happily got in the bed (how could you not) and held up the signs. Make love, not war. I think this was the first CSO I’ve seen in Japan, which was interesting in itself. I wished we had more language in common, because I’m curious what their base of support is like, how much coverage Darfur gets in the Japanese news, and what the position of the Japanese government is. I guess I can look the latter up online.
-Men dressed as frogs, cartoon characters, and horses with reindeer antlers.
-While listening to the bands, the Japanese girls danced by making small jumps from side to side. I might be able to do that! I have a feeling I’d wind up coming down on someone’s foot though.
--Julie’s friends who live in Japan have a comedy routine, and had a sign with them that said “Hugs—500 Yen.” They used it to bargain at the flea market and to get in a ‘fight’ with a Japanese improve group.
It was a colder day than I was prepared for, so on my way home I got in touch with my inner Japanese schoolgirl and bought a pair of knee socks.
On Friday night, I went to a “young person’s party” in Tokyo which very similar to every other good house party I’ve been to. I met a Japanese guy who, lo and behold, had attended Springhurst elementary, my alma mater, a couple years before I had. I also met two Japanese girls who’d just graduated from American colleges. One of them attended Hofstra University and had a thick Jersey accent—something I never expected to hear in Japan.
I want to post more, but I have to get up early to go to Hakonei tomorrow. I'm not taking a laptop with me, but will be back by Tuesday night, Japan time.
Diffusion on the Tokyu Line
I’m on a Milan Kundera kick, so on the train into Shibuya I sat reading “Of Laughter and Forgetting” while wearing Turkish earrings and drinking ostensibly Kenyan coffee. Our lives are full of these moments, but every now and then it hits me again how recent this all is. I think we underestimate the “first wave” of globalization and the long-standing trade network across Asia through the silkroad and the amount of trade across the Indian ocean, but I don’t think so many things were ever this casually integrated before.
I used to rhapsodize about this in high school. I thought cultural diffusion and globalization boiled down to New York City girls in Chinese embroidered flats and Indian bracelets eating Mexican food (like many, I left Africa out of my global daydream at the time), a fusion that was sure to spread ever outwards. (Giuliani assures me NYC is a microcosm the world—or at least the country.) Intellectually, all I can stick with from this is I think we too often characterize cultural globalization as the spread of Western products and images, when in fact there’s more multi-dimensional integration.
Also, of course, looking at the integration of consumer products as the hallmark of globalization is cheap. Trade exists without equal power relations, and an exchange of goods doesn’t necessarily lead to an exchange of ideas. (Theory: if there’s trade between two relatively equal countries, there has to be an exchange of ideas. Case in point: corporate reorganization and assessment in the US and Japan. Maybe the difference lies in competing corporations in two counties versus trade through a multinational corporation.)
At any rate, even if we shouldn’t draw too many conculsions about the state of the world from one American girl’s reading material and jewelry and coffee on the Tokyo subway, it is a fairly new and growing snapshot. It also makes me so happy to be living in this era.
I used to rhapsodize about this in high school. I thought cultural diffusion and globalization boiled down to New York City girls in Chinese embroidered flats and Indian bracelets eating Mexican food (like many, I left Africa out of my global daydream at the time), a fusion that was sure to spread ever outwards. (Giuliani assures me NYC is a microcosm the world—or at least the country.) Intellectually, all I can stick with from this is I think we too often characterize cultural globalization as the spread of Western products and images, when in fact there’s more multi-dimensional integration.
Also, of course, looking at the integration of consumer products as the hallmark of globalization is cheap. Trade exists without equal power relations, and an exchange of goods doesn’t necessarily lead to an exchange of ideas. (Theory: if there’s trade between two relatively equal countries, there has to be an exchange of ideas. Case in point: corporate reorganization and assessment in the US and Japan. Maybe the difference lies in competing corporations in two counties versus trade through a multinational corporation.)
At any rate, even if we shouldn’t draw too many conculsions about the state of the world from one American girl’s reading material and jewelry and coffee on the Tokyo subway, it is a fairly new and growing snapshot. It also makes me so happy to be living in this era.
In a Bright and Distant Town
This has been my favorite week in Japan in some ways. I’ve gotten to feel really comfortable with Rachel and Brett and I’m not always an embarrassment to myself in public. I loved Kamakura and enjoyed the party and meeting up with friends this weekend. I also am beginning to be able to conceptualize a fulfilling social life for myself here (this is guaranteed to happen right before one leaves a place. Guaranteed).
It’s also been a hard week though. My grandmother recently had surgery and had to return to the hospital due to complications. I hear that she’s doing better now but it’s hard to be so far away from home and I wish I could be with my family.
I’m also realizing I committed an error in putting a friendship before a friend. One thing that frustrates me is how much of the last six to eight years I’ve spent thinking about relationships and how little I’ve spent thinking about how to be a good friend or a good daughter. I think this is worth posting about (and sorry if this sounds preachy) because I think this is pretty common among people my age. I don’t know that the solution is spending more time doing comprehensive social analysis (yeah, mock me for this sentence), but it seems like there was a lot of waste somewhere.
It’s also been a hard week though. My grandmother recently had surgery and had to return to the hospital due to complications. I hear that she’s doing better now but it’s hard to be so far away from home and I wish I could be with my family.
I’m also realizing I committed an error in putting a friendship before a friend. One thing that frustrates me is how much of the last six to eight years I’ve spent thinking about relationships and how little I’ve spent thinking about how to be a good friend or a good daughter. I think this is worth posting about (and sorry if this sounds preachy) because I think this is pretty common among people my age. I don’t know that the solution is spending more time doing comprehensive social analysis (yeah, mock me for this sentence), but it seems like there was a lot of waste somewhere.
Saturday, December 8, 2007
Sumimasen
There's quite a few things I'd planned to post about tonight--including friendship, a round two on comparative civil society, the consequences of demographic shifts in Japan and a 'college party' in Tokyo, but it's been a really exhausting week and I think I'm too tired to write anything readable right now. I definitely plan on major postage tomorrow. I'm meeting a friend in a part of Tokyo I've never been to, so I may have something to say about that too.
Thursday, December 6, 2007
Balancing Better in the Land of Pedestrians
If I was actually probably learning Japanese, I'd write "Daily Life" in Japanese, and then you could all be impressed/have no clue what I was writing. Unfortunately, I'm stuck at the word-of-the-day level. I can describe all objects as lively, pretty, cute, dangerous, tasty, green or purple. I request your kindness. It's my fault. There is no need to say thank you.
On the bright side, I'm doing much better with my hashi than I was at first. The score for tonight: no noodles on lap/floor, only one noodle down shirt. This means my hashi skills roughly approximate my silverware abilities. My next goal is to learn to properly cut meat in the US without having to lean into it.
Some of my long-standing foibles are par for the course in Japan. R often comments on the degree of "consensus culture" and the degree of consulting that goes into social planning. People will typically call each other five or six times over the course of an evening to develop mutually acceptable social plans. I don't think I'd notice this if it weren't pointed out to me-- after all, what is gchat for?
I also have a tendency to be overly diffident and diplomatic when making small scale plans: "Oh, I really don't have a preference. Whatever you decide sounds good to me." I think I take this far enough so that it may become annoying rather than polite at home, but it definitely is the acceptable way to make decisions here.
I really like the strong pedestrian orientation of everything. Not only is space an issue, but drivers' licenses cost around 5,000 dollars, so cars are much less common than in the states. All the streets are very narrow and there are a lot of very hilly neighborhoods through which only one car could drive through at a time. There are neighborhoods not accessible by car at all, and stairs that connect lower and higher neighborhoods.
I noticed the different layout--and the uber efficient train system-- much earlier, but have only recently noticed some of the other effects of the scarcity of cars. At the grocery story, the only carts are sort of half-sized double decker carts that are used to tote a heavy basket, and most customers carry baskets. No point in buying a cart full of groceries you will then be unable to carry home, probably over several hills. Anything larger than groceries can be delivered.
I'm in Japan until the 18th, and then will be back in the states for the holidays and at least some of the winter. I'm going to Hakonei, a mountain town with lots of onsen, this weekend, and will go to Kyoto and Osaka shortly before leaving.
On the bright side, I'm doing much better with my hashi than I was at first. The score for tonight: no noodles on lap/floor, only one noodle down shirt. This means my hashi skills roughly approximate my silverware abilities. My next goal is to learn to properly cut meat in the US without having to lean into it.
Some of my long-standing foibles are par for the course in Japan. R often comments on the degree of "consensus culture" and the degree of consulting that goes into social planning. People will typically call each other five or six times over the course of an evening to develop mutually acceptable social plans. I don't think I'd notice this if it weren't pointed out to me-- after all, what is gchat for?
I also have a tendency to be overly diffident and diplomatic when making small scale plans: "Oh, I really don't have a preference. Whatever you decide sounds good to me." I think I take this far enough so that it may become annoying rather than polite at home, but it definitely is the acceptable way to make decisions here.
I really like the strong pedestrian orientation of everything. Not only is space an issue, but drivers' licenses cost around 5,000 dollars, so cars are much less common than in the states. All the streets are very narrow and there are a lot of very hilly neighborhoods through which only one car could drive through at a time. There are neighborhoods not accessible by car at all, and stairs that connect lower and higher neighborhoods.
I noticed the different layout--and the uber efficient train system-- much earlier, but have only recently noticed some of the other effects of the scarcity of cars. At the grocery story, the only carts are sort of half-sized double decker carts that are used to tote a heavy basket, and most customers carry baskets. No point in buying a cart full of groceries you will then be unable to carry home, probably over several hills. Anything larger than groceries can be delivered.
I'm in Japan until the 18th, and then will be back in the states for the holidays and at least some of the winter. I'm going to Hakonei, a mountain town with lots of onsen, this weekend, and will go to Kyoto and Osaka shortly before leaving.
Monday, December 3, 2007
Not About Doves
In Little Women (or at least the 1994 film version), there's a scene where Jo gets into an argument with a man who believes women should have the right to vote because they would be a good moral influence. The timelessly kickass Jo March responds: "I find it poor logic to say that women should vote because they are good. Men do not vote because they are good; they vote because they are male, and women should vote, not because we are angels and men are animals, but because we are human beings and citizens of this country."
I spent today working on notes for a R is giving on women and international security and came up with an almost parallel theme. Throughout most of the 20th century, the desire to invovle women in foreign policy or security decisions stemmed from the fact that people believed that women would be a force for peace. It's a fairly archetypal story, stemming back at least to the sex strike against the Peloponnesian War in the Greek play Lysistrata. There was Jeanette Rankin, the only member of Congress to vote against World War II who commented that commented that “As a woman, I can’t go to war, and I refuse to send anyone else.”Most of the feminist IR theory I read in college claimed that war (and particularly the military industrial complex) was a singularly masculine construction and the male-dominated nature of the defense establishment contributed to an unhealthy separation between conflict and emotion.
I think a couple of factors have changed this argument in the last fifteen years. First, as more women have held high positions within security-oriented institutions, the idea that women are inclined towards pacifism has been challenged in practice. Within the United States, Albright advocated for US military commitment in Kosovo. Rice has been active in the execution of the War on Terror. Hillary Clinton strongly supported the 2003 Iraq War. One explanation is that there are few inherent psychological differences between men and women, and women are as disposed to conflict as men. Another theory is that in order to gain power and respect, women must present themselves as men present themselves, taking care not to seem “weak on security.”I can buy either, and they could both work if we argue that women are socialized to be more uncomfortable with confrontation, but the women who gain power are the ones less affected by this.
I also think that the painful prevalence of gender based violence (the slaughter of thousands of men in Srebrenica, the mass rape of Bosnian Muslim victims, the propaganda about Tutsi women and the ensuing sexual violence) in ethnic cleansing campaigns in the 1990s forced organizations like the UN to reevaluate their predominantly male peace-keeping structure for different reasons. Because gender can play a huge role in the execution of conflict and the affected populations are both male and female, it seems short-sighted to have security decisions made and executed by men alone. I think this is the rationale the UN was moving towards with resolution 1325, and it's a way to argue that gender integration is essential without being, err, essentializing.
I spent today working on notes for a R is giving on women and international security and came up with an almost parallel theme. Throughout most of the 20th century, the desire to invovle women in foreign policy or security decisions stemmed from the fact that people believed that women would be a force for peace. It's a fairly archetypal story, stemming back at least to the sex strike against the Peloponnesian War in the Greek play Lysistrata. There was Jeanette Rankin, the only member of Congress to vote against World War II who commented that commented that “As a woman, I can’t go to war, and I refuse to send anyone else.”Most of the feminist IR theory I read in college claimed that war (and particularly the military industrial complex) was a singularly masculine construction and the male-dominated nature of the defense establishment contributed to an unhealthy separation between conflict and emotion.
I think a couple of factors have changed this argument in the last fifteen years. First, as more women have held high positions within security-oriented institutions, the idea that women are inclined towards pacifism has been challenged in practice. Within the United States, Albright advocated for US military commitment in Kosovo. Rice has been active in the execution of the War on Terror. Hillary Clinton strongly supported the 2003 Iraq War. One explanation is that there are few inherent psychological differences between men and women, and women are as disposed to conflict as men. Another theory is that in order to gain power and respect, women must present themselves as men present themselves, taking care not to seem “weak on security.”I can buy either, and they could both work if we argue that women are socialized to be more uncomfortable with confrontation, but the women who gain power are the ones less affected by this.
I also think that the painful prevalence of gender based violence (the slaughter of thousands of men in Srebrenica, the mass rape of Bosnian Muslim victims, the propaganda about Tutsi women and the ensuing sexual violence) in ethnic cleansing campaigns in the 1990s forced organizations like the UN to reevaluate their predominantly male peace-keeping structure for different reasons. Because gender can play a huge role in the execution of conflict and the affected populations are both male and female, it seems short-sighted to have security decisions made and executed by men alone. I think this is the rationale the UN was moving towards with resolution 1325, and it's a way to argue that gender integration is essential without being, err, essentializing.
Royalty and Remakes
Ok, I give up,I officially hate primary season. Can I be cool now? I wanted to be a marine biologist when I was in kindergarten. A little fishy.
I've always thought it was a good thing that American didn't have royalty, but today while we were watching coverage of the Guiliani NYC scandal, R made an interesting point. She argued that while Guiliani clearly used city resources inappropriately, the coverage of his sex life was over the top, although it was a long shot from the attention paid to Clinton's scandals. In contrast, in Europe, monarchs can be the moral face of a population so the public is less concerned with the morality of politicians and more concerned with their policies. (Or maybe whether they'd done business with people who harbor al Qaeda operatives.) I'd always thought Europe was just less puritanical, but maybe it is helpful for a country to have non-elected dignitaries who can be morally accountable celebrity representatives.
Also, this story sounds kind of like high school students decided to remake the War of 1812 in the style of a Wishbone episode for their final, setting it in the present day. They swapped out press ganging for extradition and got confused about who was doing the kidnapping. Aren't there treaties with our allies for that?
I've always thought it was a good thing that American didn't have royalty, but today while we were watching coverage of the Guiliani NYC scandal, R made an interesting point. She argued that while Guiliani clearly used city resources inappropriately, the coverage of his sex life was over the top, although it was a long shot from the attention paid to Clinton's scandals. In contrast, in Europe, monarchs can be the moral face of a population so the public is less concerned with the morality of politicians and more concerned with their policies. (Or maybe whether they'd done business with people who harbor al Qaeda operatives.) I'd always thought Europe was just less puritanical, but maybe it is helpful for a country to have non-elected dignitaries who can be morally accountable celebrity representatives.
Also, this story sounds kind of like high school students decided to remake the War of 1812 in the style of a Wishbone episode for their final, setting it in the present day. They swapped out press ganging for extradition and got confused about who was doing the kidnapping. Aren't there treaties with our allies for that?
Sunday, December 2, 2007
Kamakura
Today I went to Kamakura, which is a seaside town south of Yokohama. It was briefly the capital of Japan during the 13th century. (I just looked up Kamakura on wikipedia to check the date, and learned something really interesting: People think it was the fourth largest city in the world back in the 12th century. It's built in an ideal location for an old city-surrounded by mountains on three sides and the ocean on the fourth.)
Kamakura is famous for its giant bronze Buddha, or daibutsu, which was built around 1252 and is almost 14 meters high. On our way into see the daibutsu, we were stopped by three young men and a woman who asked if they could talk to us for a moment. I thought they were probably trying to sell something, but we stopped anyway. They explained they were students at a nearby universities who volunteered to give tours in order to improve their English. They were members of a cross-cultural club, and they took turns doing this each weekend. This was a little bit of an only-in-Japan moment for me. A sign one is in an economically secure country: volunteer tour guides don't try to charge you.
Before we went to see the Buddha, there was a well of water with several tin dippers placed across it. Our guides instructed us to first wash our left hand, then our right, then our mouth. We then saw the Buddha. One of my favorite moments was when one of our guides described his third eye as a laser. It's completely hollow, so we got to go inside the belly of the Buddha. Looking up, I could see the indentation of each knot of his hair inside the casting of his head. To one side of the Buddha were giant straw sandals that must have been about six feet long. There were several bronze statues of the lotus flower on either side, each with blooms ranging from fully closed to part way open to in full flower. Our guides explained that this symbolized the past, present, and future.
(I think there was a time I knew a lot more about Buddhism. I think when I was 15, I knew more about existentialism, the Indian Subcontinent, the Russian and French revolutions and post colonial literature than I know now. When I was three, I knew a lot of things about dinosaurs I have long since forgetten. Information about marine mammals, the Salem Witch trials, and human evolution has also been left along the wayside somewhere in favor of backbending labor supply curves and learning to apply eyeliner, things I expect to forget in the next ten years. It's a little sad to think about losing knowledge. I guess it's relearnable.)
Our guides were great. They were freshman and sophomores who were studying economics and cross cultural relations. Throughout the tour, they strived to find their own themes for transcedent conversations. Did I like music? What "man type" did I like? What kinds of Japanese food had I tried?
After the daibutsu, we went to Hase temple, which is famous for its giant wooden statue of Kannon, the goddess of mercy. There was also a golden buddha statue with offerings like sake and oranges around its base. People tossed coins into the offering box in front of the statues and made wishes. There was a beautiful writing room with rows of low-lying tables and cushions and large windows. Each table was stocked with elegant writing paper and ink, and people sat on the cushions and wrote wishes, which they later tied onto wooden frames. I was worried I'd make a mess with the ink, so I stuck to the more familar coin wishing approach.
What made the Hase temple unnerving and eery were the small stone statues in rows and rows everywhere. As I understand, women purchase the statues to "give peace to unborn children." Amid the rows of identical statues was occasionally a flash of color-- one statue was wearing a red knit cap. Another wore a pink sweater. Another had crackers left at its base. There were small childrens' toys everywhere. It was a little bit chilling, but I guess if it allows women to make peace with themselves while still acknowledging their abortion or miscarriage, it's certainly a powerful idea. It reminded me a little of the tomb of the unknown solidier somehow. Graveyards commemorate people who have been known, whereas this temple commemorated the idea of a person.
But, then, I'm not sure if this is the goal of the temple grounds at all. Perhaps memorialize and commemorate are entirely inappropriate words to use. Perhaps by putting a statue there, one is protecting oneself against a ghost. The truth is lost in the vagueries of my pamplet for english-speaking tourists.
At the base of the temple was a cave filled with more stone statues, and other, large sculptures. The cave itself was carved out of the rock and was very old. We had to crouch-walk thought most of it. After emerging from the cave, we climbed up the hillside to an overlook where we could see the ocean and the town of Kamakura below us. Through the climb, there were lots of signs urging people to be quiet because it was a meditative place. Even though the site was packed, almost everyone was silent. (I was also impressed by the number of people making the trip in heels; the woman in front of me didn't falter in boots with four inch silettos. A meditation on balance, I guess. )
The top really highlighted what a protected bay it was. We could see the mountains on three sides of us, then straight across the bay and out to sea. Back when Kamakura was the capital and there was an ongoing threat of Mongol invasion, I could imagine a lookout scanning the horizon line for ships. It reminded me a little of Rumeli Kavagi, an old fortress at the north of the strait of Bosphorus in Turkey-- or the view from the acropolis in Greece.
Kamakura is a beach town as well as home to major Buddhist sites, and we wound up on the beach. It's been an unseasonably warm December, and I have a hard time seeing ocean without going in, so I rolled up my jeans and did some wading. A lot of people were braver then me-- there were tons of surfers and windsurfers bracing themselves against the cold in wetsuits. I was jealous.
We ended up at the "Seedless California Beach Bar" (I guess the seedy one is down the round) where I discovered that my thumb is not big enough to fill to cover the top of a Corona bottle when trying to mix in the lime. Oops. I probably could have looked at my hand and figured this out, but at least my already salty jeans were the only victim of my experiential learning style.
Kamakura is famous for its giant bronze Buddha, or daibutsu, which was built around 1252 and is almost 14 meters high. On our way into see the daibutsu, we were stopped by three young men and a woman who asked if they could talk to us for a moment. I thought they were probably trying to sell something, but we stopped anyway. They explained they were students at a nearby universities who volunteered to give tours in order to improve their English. They were members of a cross-cultural club, and they took turns doing this each weekend. This was a little bit of an only-in-Japan moment for me. A sign one is in an economically secure country: volunteer tour guides don't try to charge you.
Before we went to see the Buddha, there was a well of water with several tin dippers placed across it. Our guides instructed us to first wash our left hand, then our right, then our mouth. We then saw the Buddha. One of my favorite moments was when one of our guides described his third eye as a laser. It's completely hollow, so we got to go inside the belly of the Buddha. Looking up, I could see the indentation of each knot of his hair inside the casting of his head. To one side of the Buddha were giant straw sandals that must have been about six feet long. There were several bronze statues of the lotus flower on either side, each with blooms ranging from fully closed to part way open to in full flower. Our guides explained that this symbolized the past, present, and future.
(I think there was a time I knew a lot more about Buddhism. I think when I was 15, I knew more about existentialism, the Indian Subcontinent, the Russian and French revolutions and post colonial literature than I know now. When I was three, I knew a lot of things about dinosaurs I have long since forgetten. Information about marine mammals, the Salem Witch trials, and human evolution has also been left along the wayside somewhere in favor of backbending labor supply curves and learning to apply eyeliner, things I expect to forget in the next ten years. It's a little sad to think about losing knowledge. I guess it's relearnable.)
Our guides were great. They were freshman and sophomores who were studying economics and cross cultural relations. Throughout the tour, they strived to find their own themes for transcedent conversations. Did I like music? What "man type" did I like? What kinds of Japanese food had I tried?
After the daibutsu, we went to Hase temple, which is famous for its giant wooden statue of Kannon, the goddess of mercy. There was also a golden buddha statue with offerings like sake and oranges around its base. People tossed coins into the offering box in front of the statues and made wishes. There was a beautiful writing room with rows of low-lying tables and cushions and large windows. Each table was stocked with elegant writing paper and ink, and people sat on the cushions and wrote wishes, which they later tied onto wooden frames. I was worried I'd make a mess with the ink, so I stuck to the more familar coin wishing approach.
What made the Hase temple unnerving and eery were the small stone statues in rows and rows everywhere. As I understand, women purchase the statues to "give peace to unborn children." Amid the rows of identical statues was occasionally a flash of color-- one statue was wearing a red knit cap. Another wore a pink sweater. Another had crackers left at its base. There were small childrens' toys everywhere. It was a little bit chilling, but I guess if it allows women to make peace with themselves while still acknowledging their abortion or miscarriage, it's certainly a powerful idea. It reminded me a little of the tomb of the unknown solidier somehow. Graveyards commemorate people who have been known, whereas this temple commemorated the idea of a person.
But, then, I'm not sure if this is the goal of the temple grounds at all. Perhaps memorialize and commemorate are entirely inappropriate words to use. Perhaps by putting a statue there, one is protecting oneself against a ghost. The truth is lost in the vagueries of my pamplet for english-speaking tourists.
At the base of the temple was a cave filled with more stone statues, and other, large sculptures. The cave itself was carved out of the rock and was very old. We had to crouch-walk thought most of it. After emerging from the cave, we climbed up the hillside to an overlook where we could see the ocean and the town of Kamakura below us. Through the climb, there were lots of signs urging people to be quiet because it was a meditative place. Even though the site was packed, almost everyone was silent. (I was also impressed by the number of people making the trip in heels; the woman in front of me didn't falter in boots with four inch silettos. A meditation on balance, I guess. )
The top really highlighted what a protected bay it was. We could see the mountains on three sides of us, then straight across the bay and out to sea. Back when Kamakura was the capital and there was an ongoing threat of Mongol invasion, I could imagine a lookout scanning the horizon line for ships. It reminded me a little of Rumeli Kavagi, an old fortress at the north of the strait of Bosphorus in Turkey-- or the view from the acropolis in Greece.
Kamakura is a beach town as well as home to major Buddhist sites, and we wound up on the beach. It's been an unseasonably warm December, and I have a hard time seeing ocean without going in, so I rolled up my jeans and did some wading. A lot of people were braver then me-- there were tons of surfers and windsurfers bracing themselves against the cold in wetsuits. I was jealous.
We ended up at the "Seedless California Beach Bar" (I guess the seedy one is down the round) where I discovered that my thumb is not big enough to fill to cover the top of a Corona bottle when trying to mix in the lime. Oops. I probably could have looked at my hand and figured this out, but at least my already salty jeans were the only victim of my experiential learning style.
Thursday, November 29, 2007
Litmus Tests and Pancakes
Rachel and I convinced ourselves we would be Bad Americans if we didn't watch the Republican YouTube debate this morning. We tried to convince Brett this was a valid reason to go to work late, but he decided to be a Bad American/Good Japanese Worker instead. It was weird to watch a debate first thing in the morning, but I made pancakes and we watched in our pajamas, which was fun.
(I really try to avoid posting domestic political commentary because I know I don't have anything fresh to bring to the table and lots of people can do it so well, whereas only I can unveil horrors of nama gomi and the complexity of my bathroom. However, sometimes I can't help myself.)
This was the first time in my political consciousness there's been a Republican presidental primary. I had one happy moment at the very begining of the debate where I thought "ooh, a variety of smart Republicans, new." This rapidly changed to "eeeww, xenophobia." I think I tend to be overly emotional in my support for amnesty policies, and I can understand the side, but I thought a lot of the tenor of the debate was anti-all-immigration rather than anti-illegal immigration. And fences? Assimilation? What ever happened to open borders and salad bowls? In Tancredo's own words, they were all trying to out-Tancredo Tancredo. It made me upset when Guiliani and Huckabee had to defend strategically sound, humane policies. Who does it serve to deny access to the children of illegal immigrants?
It was interesting what a strong domestic focus the debate had. While it was refreshing it wasn't all Iraq and terrorism all the time (not a lot of "verb noun 9/11"ing), I think it speaks to the fact that we are lacking strong mass foreign policy constituencies.
I thought Huckabee did the best. I disagreed with nearly everything he said ("fairtax?") but it seemed as though he really believed it and wanted to stand by the policies he thought were best rather than trying to win over voters. I was glad Ron Paul was there to be a voice for withdrawing the troops.
Two of my friends and I once had an extended conversation on the elliptical machines that became a running joke about litmus test questions we could ask on first dates that would ensure we didn't date people who's political views were reprehensible to us. (The conversation started because one friend wanted to be sure not to date anyone who would disown a transgendered child. Long story.) My litmus test boiled down to "do you believe in progressive taxation?" but I could never come up with the appropriate first date lead-in. Watching the Republican debate reminded me to add "So, do you believe in torture?" to the list. An asterik, "waterboarding counts" is also clearly warranted.
(I really try to avoid posting domestic political commentary because I know I don't have anything fresh to bring to the table and lots of people can do it so well, whereas only I can unveil horrors of nama gomi and the complexity of my bathroom. However, sometimes I can't help myself.)
This was the first time in my political consciousness there's been a Republican presidental primary. I had one happy moment at the very begining of the debate where I thought "ooh, a variety of smart Republicans, new." This rapidly changed to "eeeww, xenophobia." I think I tend to be overly emotional in my support for amnesty policies, and I can understand the side, but I thought a lot of the tenor of the debate was anti-all-immigration rather than anti-illegal immigration. And fences? Assimilation? What ever happened to open borders and salad bowls? In Tancredo's own words, they were all trying to out-Tancredo Tancredo. It made me upset when Guiliani and Huckabee had to defend strategically sound, humane policies. Who does it serve to deny access to the children of illegal immigrants?
It was interesting what a strong domestic focus the debate had. While it was refreshing it wasn't all Iraq and terrorism all the time (not a lot of "verb noun 9/11"ing), I think it speaks to the fact that we are lacking strong mass foreign policy constituencies.
I thought Huckabee did the best. I disagreed with nearly everything he said ("fairtax?") but it seemed as though he really believed it and wanted to stand by the policies he thought were best rather than trying to win over voters. I was glad Ron Paul was there to be a voice for withdrawing the troops.
Two of my friends and I once had an extended conversation on the elliptical machines that became a running joke about litmus test questions we could ask on first dates that would ensure we didn't date people who's political views were reprehensible to us. (The conversation started because one friend wanted to be sure not to date anyone who would disown a transgendered child. Long story.) My litmus test boiled down to "do you believe in progressive taxation?" but I could never come up with the appropriate first date lead-in. Watching the Republican debate reminded me to add "So, do you believe in torture?" to the list. An asterik, "waterboarding counts" is also clearly warranted.
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
Tribalism, Anarchy, and All Sorts of Commitment
This could also be titled: Interesting things I read today.
-Bush and Maliki have been negotiating plans for a permanent US presence in Iraq. When the tunnel fills with water, keep digging and plug the door? Rachel-my-boss pointed out this could make Iraq an effective non-issue in the 2008 campaign by hamstringing the candidates.
-This article appeared in Atlantic Monthly in 1957. It was written by a Smith grad about the dating challenges faced by the modern co-ed. What I find so surprising about it is how cold and calculating the relationships she describes seem. It feels like some contemporary ideas (romantic love, not dating around) are more "traditional" (word choice) than the fifties relationships she describes. I guess there's room for more complicated stories once women are not something to be gotten or won.
-I've been trying to learn about the Afghan-Pakistan border and I came across this article by Robert Kaplan. (A similar, older piece by him was more helpful.)I've had to do battle against "The Coming Anarchy" five or six times by now in political science classes, and these essays have a very similar theme: "globalization is allowing tribes to mess with national borders. Doom!" I sort of like reading Kaplan, because I think he's a very good writer, but I disagree with the way he builds his arguments and his conculsions make me furious. He counts on certain key phrases (backward, primate, tribal, mideavil) to do all the work in indicating the "harm" he describes rather than explaining the problems with tribalism or what "backwards" means. (A Uzbek translator who slurps his soup is crude, but I wonder if the decidedly untribal Japanese would get the same treatment.)
His take-home conculsion from this piece is that democratization efforts should take into account the social structure on the ground rather than try to impose one from the top down. Great. So far, so good. I get a little irritated when he describes Iraq as "among the most backward parts of the Ottoman empire." Because it was backward, it was tribal, apparently. He goes on to explain that the Durand line is a very tribal area and while there are nice things about tribes, they are very mideavil and anti-democratic and therefore we should be prepared to bribe them and accept second best solutions to build peace.
I don't want to sugarcoat the situation-- and I don't know enough to put a very accurate glaze on it anyway-- but my understanding is that Pashtun political customs like the Loya Jirga are based on representative decision-making through consensus. (Because of the emphasis on agreement, meetings can last for days, and there's no nuclear option for you, Senator Lott.) I think if we go around looking for elections as the hallmark of democracy in largely illiterate societies, we're going to be disappointed (many of the electorate in the 2005 parliamentary elections in Afghanistan didn't know who they were voting for). We have to stop behaving as though Western style democracy, anarchy and authoritarianism are the only options. His conculsion reads like: "because they are tribal over there, we can't expect them to get our democracy and therefore, let's settle for something less." I think a more flexible idea of what a democratic institution looks like would result in a more successful, less imperalist approach.
-Bush and Maliki have been negotiating plans for a permanent US presence in Iraq. When the tunnel fills with water, keep digging and plug the door? Rachel-my-boss pointed out this could make Iraq an effective non-issue in the 2008 campaign by hamstringing the candidates.
-This article appeared in Atlantic Monthly in 1957. It was written by a Smith grad about the dating challenges faced by the modern co-ed. What I find so surprising about it is how cold and calculating the relationships she describes seem. It feels like some contemporary ideas (romantic love, not dating around) are more "traditional" (word choice) than the fifties relationships she describes. I guess there's room for more complicated stories once women are not something to be gotten or won.
-I've been trying to learn about the Afghan-Pakistan border and I came across this article by Robert Kaplan. (A similar, older piece by him was more helpful.)I've had to do battle against "The Coming Anarchy" five or six times by now in political science classes, and these essays have a very similar theme: "globalization is allowing tribes to mess with national borders. Doom!" I sort of like reading Kaplan, because I think he's a very good writer, but I disagree with the way he builds his arguments and his conculsions make me furious. He counts on certain key phrases (backward, primate, tribal, mideavil) to do all the work in indicating the "harm" he describes rather than explaining the problems with tribalism or what "backwards" means. (A Uzbek translator who slurps his soup is crude, but I wonder if the decidedly untribal Japanese would get the same treatment.)
His take-home conculsion from this piece is that democratization efforts should take into account the social structure on the ground rather than try to impose one from the top down. Great. So far, so good. I get a little irritated when he describes Iraq as "among the most backward parts of the Ottoman empire." Because it was backward, it was tribal, apparently. He goes on to explain that the Durand line is a very tribal area and while there are nice things about tribes, they are very mideavil and anti-democratic and therefore we should be prepared to bribe them and accept second best solutions to build peace.
I don't want to sugarcoat the situation-- and I don't know enough to put a very accurate glaze on it anyway-- but my understanding is that Pashtun political customs like the Loya Jirga are based on representative decision-making through consensus. (Because of the emphasis on agreement, meetings can last for days, and there's no nuclear option for you, Senator Lott.) I think if we go around looking for elections as the hallmark of democracy in largely illiterate societies, we're going to be disappointed (many of the electorate in the 2005 parliamentary elections in Afghanistan didn't know who they were voting for). We have to stop behaving as though Western style democracy, anarchy and authoritarianism are the only options. His conculsion reads like: "because they are tribal over there, we can't expect them to get our democracy and therefore, let's settle for something less." I think a more flexible idea of what a democratic institution looks like would result in a more successful, less imperalist approach.
There's Always a Future in Plastics
Around this time last year, my friends and I spent a lo of time talking about what it meant to "sell out." Was selling out entering the private sector or was it about settling for a job you weren't passionate about? At the time, we were still in the bright eyed stage of sending out resumes and we didn't realize just how long we would have to wait to hear so little. I liked this column by my classmates, but my friends and I typically took a less forgiving stance. To me, "selling out" was also taking a job that was "safe" rather than one that pushed me in some way.
That conversation seems very far away now, and it's hard for me to recapture why it felt so important to discuss at the time. What remains relevant is a conversation I had a few months prior to that conversation while in Tanzania about the choice between direct service, policy making and advocacy.
My friend Rachel always speaks about "activist division of labor." In its original incarnation, this meant that it was ok I'm not interested in spending my life working on saving the enviroment and it's fine she doesn't want to spend hers shaping policy towards the developing world. I think the division of labor argument can also apply to all the different roles people can play in developing and enacting the same policy. Academics and journalists get to shape and extend the conversation about the problems the world faces and the scope of the solutions. Legislators, lobbyists and advocacy groups develop a policy, and a third group of people carry out the policy.
I'm really unclear what group I'd like to be in. I think I've felt the most fulfilled when directly helping someone, and there's a slightly immature part of me that feels like I'll always be selling out a little bit unless I wind up handing out food in an IDP camp in the northern DRC. On the other hand, the "problematic" bells started sounding in my head as soon as I typed that. I think part of what is appealing about that is the level of deprivation invovled which makes it feel like a more heroic act even though my comfort level doesn't impact my efficacy. Then I remember everything I've read about the aid machine being self-perpetuated, etc. Farewell, Constant Gardener style fantasy. Stop raining on my daydream, Swarthmore College.
I also think I tend to get very frustrated with imperfect systems (this works just great in college but is a potentially unattractive and arrogant trait in a 22 year old, so I bit my tongue).They are neither as bad nor as avoidable as nama gomi. After volunteering for a campaign, my friend Jon and I would spend thirty minutes privately debriefing on their poor volunteer stewardship or inefficient allocation of flashlights. He'll make a good marine officer. Our friends got sick of our endless treatise on loopholes in the RA selection process. It was painful.
I credit some of this to my mother. I think my mother ran my third birthday party better than most government agencies are run. Therefore, I'm always left asking whether a thing would go better if my mother was running it. The answer is almost always yes.
Personal neuroses aside, I think people who spend their lives in direct service have to be very good emotional boundary setters. They have to be able to accept that they only have resources for a limited number of people, and can only do a limited amount for those people. I think I'd really struggle as, say, an English teacher in Tanzania. You can't teach everyone, and you can't give everyone shoes, and you can't feed everyone, and yet every day the barefoot and hungry would come into your classroom. Clearly, there are limits on resources no matter what, but I don't think I have the type of emotional strength required to set those limits every day without going insane and reinventing the facts.
My current job is a great opportunity and I'm glad to be able to learn so much! I think learning is the most valuable thing right now. In the long run, though, I want a job more interactive and direct than the one I have now. I think in general, I'm most effective and happiest one-one-one or with small groups.
I've been thinking about law school for a while. I enjoyed the tort and contract law parts of my law and econ class, which I'd been told was the "bad part" of law school. I happily ate, slept and breathed con law for the second semester of my senior year, so I think I'd enjoy law school. I also have this hope that law could be a good fit for me because a good lawyer can directly help their clients but they can also create precedents that shape legal policy in other cases. At best, it could be a way to help individuals while simaltaneously reshaping the framework that societies operate within, bridging the direct/indirect gap.
On the other hand, I don't know much about what international case law looks like, and professors give me the "it doesn't really exist" vibe. Maybe I'm just being naive, but I do believe we're going to see the development of a stronger international legal infastructure in the next decades and I'd like to do some of the building.
Sometimes I get the feeling all this ambition and life angst is sort of silly, a post college version of my seventeen year old self carefully examing my body in a mirror. I think maturity comes less from knowing who you are and what you want, and more about not feeling like those are the important questions. On the other hand, I do have to make big decisions about my future and graduate school in the next year, so it's impossible to entirely avoid.
That conversation seems very far away now, and it's hard for me to recapture why it felt so important to discuss at the time. What remains relevant is a conversation I had a few months prior to that conversation while in Tanzania about the choice between direct service, policy making and advocacy.
My friend Rachel always speaks about "activist division of labor." In its original incarnation, this meant that it was ok I'm not interested in spending my life working on saving the enviroment and it's fine she doesn't want to spend hers shaping policy towards the developing world. I think the division of labor argument can also apply to all the different roles people can play in developing and enacting the same policy. Academics and journalists get to shape and extend the conversation about the problems the world faces and the scope of the solutions. Legislators, lobbyists and advocacy groups develop a policy, and a third group of people carry out the policy.
I'm really unclear what group I'd like to be in. I think I've felt the most fulfilled when directly helping someone, and there's a slightly immature part of me that feels like I'll always be selling out a little bit unless I wind up handing out food in an IDP camp in the northern DRC. On the other hand, the "problematic" bells started sounding in my head as soon as I typed that. I think part of what is appealing about that is the level of deprivation invovled which makes it feel like a more heroic act even though my comfort level doesn't impact my efficacy. Then I remember everything I've read about the aid machine being self-perpetuated, etc. Farewell, Constant Gardener style fantasy. Stop raining on my daydream, Swarthmore College.
I also think I tend to get very frustrated with imperfect systems (this works just great in college but is a potentially unattractive and arrogant trait in a 22 year old, so I bit my tongue).They are neither as bad nor as avoidable as nama gomi. After volunteering for a campaign, my friend Jon and I would spend thirty minutes privately debriefing on their poor volunteer stewardship or inefficient allocation of flashlights. He'll make a good marine officer. Our friends got sick of our endless treatise on loopholes in the RA selection process. It was painful.
I credit some of this to my mother. I think my mother ran my third birthday party better than most government agencies are run. Therefore, I'm always left asking whether a thing would go better if my mother was running it. The answer is almost always yes.
Personal neuroses aside, I think people who spend their lives in direct service have to be very good emotional boundary setters. They have to be able to accept that they only have resources for a limited number of people, and can only do a limited amount for those people. I think I'd really struggle as, say, an English teacher in Tanzania. You can't teach everyone, and you can't give everyone shoes, and you can't feed everyone, and yet every day the barefoot and hungry would come into your classroom. Clearly, there are limits on resources no matter what, but I don't think I have the type of emotional strength required to set those limits every day without going insane and reinventing the facts.
My current job is a great opportunity and I'm glad to be able to learn so much! I think learning is the most valuable thing right now. In the long run, though, I want a job more interactive and direct than the one I have now. I think in general, I'm most effective and happiest one-one-one or with small groups.
I've been thinking about law school for a while. I enjoyed the tort and contract law parts of my law and econ class, which I'd been told was the "bad part" of law school. I happily ate, slept and breathed con law for the second semester of my senior year, so I think I'd enjoy law school. I also have this hope that law could be a good fit for me because a good lawyer can directly help their clients but they can also create precedents that shape legal policy in other cases. At best, it could be a way to help individuals while simaltaneously reshaping the framework that societies operate within, bridging the direct/indirect gap.
On the other hand, I don't know much about what international case law looks like, and professors give me the "it doesn't really exist" vibe. Maybe I'm just being naive, but I do believe we're going to see the development of a stronger international legal infastructure in the next decades and I'd like to do some of the building.
Sometimes I get the feeling all this ambition and life angst is sort of silly, a post college version of my seventeen year old self carefully examing my body in a mirror. I think maturity comes less from knowing who you are and what you want, and more about not feeling like those are the important questions. On the other hand, I do have to make big decisions about my future and graduate school in the next year, so it's impossible to entirely avoid.
Sunday, November 25, 2007
Thanksgiving in Japan
This weekend was essentially absorbed into procurring, preparing, cooking and cleaning for our Thanksgiving feast. The food shopping started in earnest Friday, when Rachel and I went shopping for American equipment essentially like rolling pins (beer bottles don’t quite do the job), a masher (mashing thirty potatoes with a dining fork seemed like a recipe for disaster) and a peeler. Miraculously, after spending a few hours wandering around Tokyo Hands (which has nothing on Target) we found everything. It might have gone faster, but I got really distracted by the “robo mop,” kind of a donut-shaped swiffer pad with a battery-operated ball in the middle that pushed the “mop” around. It was way too much fun to play with.
The biggest challenge was finding a big pot for making the soup and potatoes in. With the exception of drinks and ramen, almost everything in Japan is very small. I’m not a particularly big eater, but I wind up going through half a Japanese-family-sized yogurt container for breakfast. Serving size? I laugh at serving size. What we thought was “a very big pot” in the store wound up being pretty small once we removed it from its home environment. It could no longer benefit from being scaled against the other tiny equipment.
Our next challenge came in the form of telling the chicken butcher that we needed approximately two liters of chicken fat for the gravy and the stuffing (I don’t even want to think about this). Japanese people eat a lot less fat and grease than Americans in general, and he looked at us in horror as though we had asked him “So, along with the turkey, could we have two pounds of its feathers please?” His response was apparently something along the lines of “I don’t see why that wouldn’t be possible, but I don’t understand why you would want it.” He went home that night and researching gravy recipes and came back with an alternate solution. He offered us both what looked basically like liposunctioned chicken fat (eewwwww) and a very concentrated chicken stock (success!). Next, we were the talk of the town at the local grocery store when we bought five bags of potatoes and twenty-two apples. My backpack was essential.
My primary responsibilities were apple butternut squash soup, which I’ve made for large groups several times before, mashed potatoes, which are pretty idiot-proof, and apple pie. I was quite nervous about the pie because I haven’t baked much and sort of see recipes as suggestions. I don’t think I’m a terrible cook, I think my instincts are ok, but I’ve definitely had some unpleasant ventures into creativity/complete abandonment of common sense. The worst of these happened in 7th grade when I tried to turn lemonade pink through the use of red vinegar. I also once tried to bake three hundred cookies for my dorm holiday party after midnight (such is the stuff of the true all-nighter). I then realized I didn’t have a bowl large enough for all the ingredients—this was about halfway into the mixing process and all the way into the “I am covered in flour and don’t understand what I’m doing!” process. I had to be rescued by a friend who studied chemistry. I added the last bit so I can pretend I was making very complicated and high level mistakes.
I fully intended to stick to the recipe when making the pies, but then I got bored and thought they’d taste better with more egg and brown sugar. I understand baking isn’t the time for improv. Oops. Anyway, the pies were delicious and my lattice looked good, so I wasn’t an embarrassment to myself.
We also had the roast chickens we ordered, potato bread, stuffing, gravy, green beans, and cranberries. It was a very through Thanksgiving. Rachel can’t cook (once, she tried to make brownies and when it said, “flour the pan” she used the two cups of flour the recipe called for to coat the pan, then threw the rest away) so she made a beautiful “craft corner” of activities for the Motoguchi kids, so I have an array of hand turkeys with katakana script hanging from my walls now.
We wanted to tell them the story of Thanksgiving. I had an interesting conversation with my friend Sarah yesterday about how one can tell the Thanksgiving story. Like so many holidays, it’s hard to boil it down a tale that is both intellectually honest and morally satisfying. It seems hollow to describe the first Thanksgiving to people who have little knowledge of American history without mentioning the many things that happened to the Indians after they shared their food. On the other hand, describing the Trail of Tears and the Battle of Wounded Knee makes it very difficult to conclude the story with a celebration. Unlike Columbus Day, which I think is just a bad holiday, there’s something valuable about reflecting upon what we are thankful for with people we care about. I once went to a humanist seder that told the story of Passover as though it was an allegory for the liberation of all people from all oppression. I think a similar universalizing of Thanksgiving could be appropriate, and be a way to offer the Motoguchis thanks for their hospitality.
Rachel had to tell the Thanksgiving story in Japanese, which was a challenge because the idea of being “grateful” without being grateful TO someone was difficult to convey, and she wanted to avoid religious overtones. I think we wound up with a harvest story, which worked out well.
The Motoguchis brought over speakers for us to use. Each speaker was cubed shaped and about 2 inches square. I admired them because I thought they’d be an excellent fit for my nomadic life, and asked Tauru where they bought them. He promptly told me they were a present for me and I couldn’t refuse. They’re excellent speakers and so light that I’ll be able to take them anywhere, but I have to be more careful what I compliment and I definitely need to get them a nice goodbye present. Rachel and Brett advise I wait till I’m on my way to the airport to avoid a return gift. They are such a sweet family and their kids are adorable. Leon, who is ten, fell asleep on the couch immediately after eating, while Sue-chan wanted to be pushed around in the captain's chair.
Our other guests were Peter, who is from England, and James, from New Zealand. They’ve both been over here in Japan for about four or five years, teaching English. They worked for a program called NOVA, which employed over eight thousand English speakers teaching English throughout Japan. The program recently went bankrupt because it overextended itself, and my gmail-generated ad kept saying: “Job opportunities for NOVA teachers in China!” I guess its scanner picked up that I was a young English speaker living in Japan and went for it. Peter intends to stay on in the hopes that NOVA is able to right itself, and James has a job teaching business English for the next six months, then he plans to go back home.
All in all, Thanksgiving-in-Japan was a success and as a result, my apartment has Christmas lights (with eight different settings) and tons of leftovers. I’m excited about these last few weeks. This Thursday, Rachel and I are watching the Republican youtube debate with pancakes (it’s 9 am our time), Saturday is a neighborhood Buddhist festival, and Sunday I’m going to Kamakura.
The biggest challenge was finding a big pot for making the soup and potatoes in. With the exception of drinks and ramen, almost everything in Japan is very small. I’m not a particularly big eater, but I wind up going through half a Japanese-family-sized yogurt container for breakfast. Serving size? I laugh at serving size. What we thought was “a very big pot” in the store wound up being pretty small once we removed it from its home environment. It could no longer benefit from being scaled against the other tiny equipment.
Our next challenge came in the form of telling the chicken butcher that we needed approximately two liters of chicken fat for the gravy and the stuffing (I don’t even want to think about this). Japanese people eat a lot less fat and grease than Americans in general, and he looked at us in horror as though we had asked him “So, along with the turkey, could we have two pounds of its feathers please?” His response was apparently something along the lines of “I don’t see why that wouldn’t be possible, but I don’t understand why you would want it.” He went home that night and researching gravy recipes and came back with an alternate solution. He offered us both what looked basically like liposunctioned chicken fat (eewwwww) and a very concentrated chicken stock (success!). Next, we were the talk of the town at the local grocery store when we bought five bags of potatoes and twenty-two apples. My backpack was essential.
My primary responsibilities were apple butternut squash soup, which I’ve made for large groups several times before, mashed potatoes, which are pretty idiot-proof, and apple pie. I was quite nervous about the pie because I haven’t baked much and sort of see recipes as suggestions. I don’t think I’m a terrible cook, I think my instincts are ok, but I’ve definitely had some unpleasant ventures into creativity/complete abandonment of common sense. The worst of these happened in 7th grade when I tried to turn lemonade pink through the use of red vinegar. I also once tried to bake three hundred cookies for my dorm holiday party after midnight (such is the stuff of the true all-nighter). I then realized I didn’t have a bowl large enough for all the ingredients—this was about halfway into the mixing process and all the way into the “I am covered in flour and don’t understand what I’m doing!” process. I had to be rescued by a friend who studied chemistry. I added the last bit so I can pretend I was making very complicated and high level mistakes.
I fully intended to stick to the recipe when making the pies, but then I got bored and thought they’d taste better with more egg and brown sugar. I understand baking isn’t the time for improv. Oops. Anyway, the pies were delicious and my lattice looked good, so I wasn’t an embarrassment to myself.
We also had the roast chickens we ordered, potato bread, stuffing, gravy, green beans, and cranberries. It was a very through Thanksgiving. Rachel can’t cook (once, she tried to make brownies and when it said, “flour the pan” she used the two cups of flour the recipe called for to coat the pan, then threw the rest away) so she made a beautiful “craft corner” of activities for the Motoguchi kids, so I have an array of hand turkeys with katakana script hanging from my walls now.
We wanted to tell them the story of Thanksgiving. I had an interesting conversation with my friend Sarah yesterday about how one can tell the Thanksgiving story. Like so many holidays, it’s hard to boil it down a tale that is both intellectually honest and morally satisfying. It seems hollow to describe the first Thanksgiving to people who have little knowledge of American history without mentioning the many things that happened to the Indians after they shared their food. On the other hand, describing the Trail of Tears and the Battle of Wounded Knee makes it very difficult to conclude the story with a celebration. Unlike Columbus Day, which I think is just a bad holiday, there’s something valuable about reflecting upon what we are thankful for with people we care about. I once went to a humanist seder that told the story of Passover as though it was an allegory for the liberation of all people from all oppression. I think a similar universalizing of Thanksgiving could be appropriate, and be a way to offer the Motoguchis thanks for their hospitality.
Rachel had to tell the Thanksgiving story in Japanese, which was a challenge because the idea of being “grateful” without being grateful TO someone was difficult to convey, and she wanted to avoid religious overtones. I think we wound up with a harvest story, which worked out well.
The Motoguchis brought over speakers for us to use. Each speaker was cubed shaped and about 2 inches square. I admired them because I thought they’d be an excellent fit for my nomadic life, and asked Tauru where they bought them. He promptly told me they were a present for me and I couldn’t refuse. They’re excellent speakers and so light that I’ll be able to take them anywhere, but I have to be more careful what I compliment and I definitely need to get them a nice goodbye present. Rachel and Brett advise I wait till I’m on my way to the airport to avoid a return gift. They are such a sweet family and their kids are adorable. Leon, who is ten, fell asleep on the couch immediately after eating, while Sue-chan wanted to be pushed around in the captain's chair.
Our other guests were Peter, who is from England, and James, from New Zealand. They’ve both been over here in Japan for about four or five years, teaching English. They worked for a program called NOVA, which employed over eight thousand English speakers teaching English throughout Japan. The program recently went bankrupt because it overextended itself, and my gmail-generated ad kept saying: “Job opportunities for NOVA teachers in China!” I guess its scanner picked up that I was a young English speaker living in Japan and went for it. Peter intends to stay on in the hopes that NOVA is able to right itself, and James has a job teaching business English for the next six months, then he plans to go back home.
All in all, Thanksgiving-in-Japan was a success and as a result, my apartment has Christmas lights (with eight different settings) and tons of leftovers. I’m excited about these last few weeks. This Thursday, Rachel and I are watching the Republican youtube debate with pancakes (it’s 9 am our time), Saturday is a neighborhood Buddhist festival, and Sunday I’m going to Kamakura.
Nama Gomi
Lest you think less of me, let me start this off by emphasizing that in general, I’m not a squeamish person. I don’t have an issue with spiders or snakes or blood. I’ve been called on to perform emergency evacuations of cockroaches and bats. In college, when the light was out and my roommates complained they could hear mice, I’d usually sleepily roll over and ask what they wanted me to do about it.
There is one thing I’m terribly squeamish about, however. In Japanese, there’s a word for it: nama gomi. Nama gomi (lit: fresh or live trash) is the food that winds up at the bottom of your sink drain. The food no one wants to eat. Think about it: all the potato peels and chicken skin and green bean ends and yogurt curds becoming slimy together and intermixing with soapy water. Now, this would be all very well and good if the nama gomi was mixing in a trash bag or a compost heap. But no. The problem with nama gomi is that you have to reach in and pull the slimy out of the sink drain with your bare hand and then dump it into a bag.
It’s somehow somewhat acceptable for a woman to ask a man to kill a spider, or for someone to pale at the sight of blood. However, asking someone to take care of the nama gomi comes across as just plain spoiled. I also know it’s a silly fear—I’ve met people who’d probably be thankful for my nama gomi, who’d rinse it off and recook it and make it into something approaching delicious. This isn’t anywhere near as gross as the fact that we waste enough food for it to be someone else’s meal.
I still can’t get over my gag reflex though, so prevention is the best defense. I try very hard not to let nama gomi wind up in my sink and usually scrape plates and peel potatoes into my trash. The only good nama gomi is no nama gomi. However, when preparing a feast with several other cooks, there’s no legitimate way of saying “I’m sorry, I’m afraid of potato peels in the sink. Can you peel into this full-to-bursting and inconveniently located trash bag instead?”
We decided to put yesterday’s cleanup off till today, and I went to bed with a sinking feeling, envisioning the nama gomi that awaited my hand in the sink drain. Whole pieces of chicken carcass, plastered with apple seeds! Lurking orange pulp mixed in with squash peel! I was nominally tempted to open one of the bottles of wine our guests had brought over before approaching the beast, an occasional strategy for cleaning up other people’s vomit, but then Brett pulled out handfuls of nama gomi when he was filling up the sink and bagged it before I had to touch it. Now it’s safely outside of my apartment! One day, I'll grow up, but till then, back to prevention. I'm happy there's a word for it.
There is one thing I’m terribly squeamish about, however. In Japanese, there’s a word for it: nama gomi. Nama gomi (lit: fresh or live trash) is the food that winds up at the bottom of your sink drain. The food no one wants to eat. Think about it: all the potato peels and chicken skin and green bean ends and yogurt curds becoming slimy together and intermixing with soapy water. Now, this would be all very well and good if the nama gomi was mixing in a trash bag or a compost heap. But no. The problem with nama gomi is that you have to reach in and pull the slimy out of the sink drain with your bare hand and then dump it into a bag.
It’s somehow somewhat acceptable for a woman to ask a man to kill a spider, or for someone to pale at the sight of blood. However, asking someone to take care of the nama gomi comes across as just plain spoiled. I also know it’s a silly fear—I’ve met people who’d probably be thankful for my nama gomi, who’d rinse it off and recook it and make it into something approaching delicious. This isn’t anywhere near as gross as the fact that we waste enough food for it to be someone else’s meal.
I still can’t get over my gag reflex though, so prevention is the best defense. I try very hard not to let nama gomi wind up in my sink and usually scrape plates and peel potatoes into my trash. The only good nama gomi is no nama gomi. However, when preparing a feast with several other cooks, there’s no legitimate way of saying “I’m sorry, I’m afraid of potato peels in the sink. Can you peel into this full-to-bursting and inconveniently located trash bag instead?”
We decided to put yesterday’s cleanup off till today, and I went to bed with a sinking feeling, envisioning the nama gomi that awaited my hand in the sink drain. Whole pieces of chicken carcass, plastered with apple seeds! Lurking orange pulp mixed in with squash peel! I was nominally tempted to open one of the bottles of wine our guests had brought over before approaching the beast, an occasional strategy for cleaning up other people’s vomit, but then Brett pulled out handfuls of nama gomi when he was filling up the sink and bagged it before I had to touch it. Now it’s safely outside of my apartment! One day, I'll grow up, but till then, back to prevention. I'm happy there's a word for it.
Thursday, November 22, 2007
What Our Friends Say About Their Neighbors
I was in the UAE when Iranian President Ahmadinejah spoke at Columbia, so I watched coverage of the event on Al Jazeera, and got to talk about Iran a lot with others in the UAE. The emirati I talked to-- mainly fairly religious young people-- were positive about Ahmadinejah. They respected his populist vibe (although I understand he is criticized by many in Iran for failing to fulfill domestic campaign promises and instead focusing on the United States) and pointed out how his relatively austere, restrained lifestyle was in keeping with his politics.
A criticism of their own government may have been implicit in their remarks, or maybe I just heard what I wanted. In either case, there is a major difference in the governing structure of a state that has flawed elections in which case people elect a leader who tells them they deserve more as citizens and a state in which the non-elected royalty reward their population with non-obligatory largesse as they see fit.
I have to take political opinions in the UAE with a grain of salt because there is so much censorship and propaganda. In general, I'm finding it hard to get information I trust about Iran. I'm confident Ahmadinejah has made choices I would consider reprehensible. However, he has support for a reason, and I think it's important for the US to move beyond demonizing him to examine whether he is popular because of his criticism of America, or because of his efforts to combat inequality.
In a way, the way I feel about China is similar to the way I feel about Iran. Understanding both better is crucial to shaping our policy, but I can't get a handle on how much we should worry-- and in what ways. In Japan, there seems to be a lot of below-the-surface fear about China, but I haven't gotten to really discuss it with Japanese people yet.
I'd read about China's military and economic rise, and the arguments critiquing its strength, and at first to me it read a little like a play for attention by old school political scientists who hadn't been able to escape the Cold War mindset. It reminded me of John Mearshiemer's argument that Germany would rise again and rue the day! There were also concerns that Japan was going to eat us alive during the tail end of its financial boom.
Then I went to Dar es Salaam. Almost every businessman I saw in Tanzania was Chinese. Every single major construction project was built by a Chinese company. Brand new roads stretched across Northern Tanzania, courtesy of China. Yes, the point of the roads was often to get ore from the Mwanza area to seaside ports faster, but people also used them to get their goods to market, go to secondary school and see distant relatives.
One of my traveling buddies was half Chinese and half Caucasian, and she fielded a lot of questions about whether she spoke Chinese and whether she had ever been to China. Rumor had it that wealthy Tanzanians wanted Chinese nannies for their children so that they would grow up speaking Chinese. Even in more rural parts of the country, people were fascinated by China. They saw it as the "developing country that could."
For most of the twentieth century, even when people disliked the policy of the American government, I think they liked or admired things about "Americanness." We were the land of plenty, of possibility, of dreams. We were internally conscious of this. There's a body of literature that claims the Supreme Court was heavily influenced by the way segregation lend itself to effective anti-American Soviet propaganda. I'm nervous to make this claim-- I sort of feel like anyone born after 1980 has to struggle to get a handle on the Cold War-- but I do believe we won the Cold War because of the strength of our system of government, not the strength of our military or economy. (That was a set up for an argument about hard power versus soft power, but I'm skeptical of the dichotomy and will save it for another ramble.)
This is the decade when the world is falling quite out of love with America. We can engage other countries more in diplomacy, overhaul economic policy in an effort to save the dollar or pull out of Iraq, but I think a shift in attitudes towards Americanness (rather than America or the American government) is alarming because you can't prescribe a solid fix for a shift in attitudes.
A large part of this shift is undoubtedly due to the Iraq War and our Middle East policies. There's a story told that leaders like Ahmadinejah dislike America because of its secularism, but I think this is usually a way to escape critically examining our policy decisions. Some of it may be due to the rise of alternate powers like the EU and China (gotta love the fairy tale potential of the developing country that could). I think it's plausible, though, that part of it is due to increasing inequality within the US. We look more and more like the land of inequality and less like the land of plenty.
I once read that while Communist states during the Cold War could profess to offer equality of outcome, the United States could promise more equality of opportunity. I imagine any story about racial profiling gets substantial global media playing time (it definitely did on Al Jazeera) and this pokes holes in the idea of the American dream. So does our ever increasing Gini index and the fact that the children of rich people tend to stay rich and vice versa.
Of course, there are many reasons to be concerned about inequality in America other than the fact that it may reduce our global capital, and there are many reasons we have less global capital besides domestic inequality. I just think the potential links is interesting.
A criticism of their own government may have been implicit in their remarks, or maybe I just heard what I wanted. In either case, there is a major difference in the governing structure of a state that has flawed elections in which case people elect a leader who tells them they deserve more as citizens and a state in which the non-elected royalty reward their population with non-obligatory largesse as they see fit.
I have to take political opinions in the UAE with a grain of salt because there is so much censorship and propaganda. In general, I'm finding it hard to get information I trust about Iran. I'm confident Ahmadinejah has made choices I would consider reprehensible. However, he has support for a reason, and I think it's important for the US to move beyond demonizing him to examine whether he is popular because of his criticism of America, or because of his efforts to combat inequality.
In a way, the way I feel about China is similar to the way I feel about Iran. Understanding both better is crucial to shaping our policy, but I can't get a handle on how much we should worry-- and in what ways. In Japan, there seems to be a lot of below-the-surface fear about China, but I haven't gotten to really discuss it with Japanese people yet.
I'd read about China's military and economic rise, and the arguments critiquing its strength, and at first to me it read a little like a play for attention by old school political scientists who hadn't been able to escape the Cold War mindset. It reminded me of John Mearshiemer's argument that Germany would rise again and rue the day! There were also concerns that Japan was going to eat us alive during the tail end of its financial boom.
Then I went to Dar es Salaam. Almost every businessman I saw in Tanzania was Chinese. Every single major construction project was built by a Chinese company. Brand new roads stretched across Northern Tanzania, courtesy of China. Yes, the point of the roads was often to get ore from the Mwanza area to seaside ports faster, but people also used them to get their goods to market, go to secondary school and see distant relatives.
One of my traveling buddies was half Chinese and half Caucasian, and she fielded a lot of questions about whether she spoke Chinese and whether she had ever been to China. Rumor had it that wealthy Tanzanians wanted Chinese nannies for their children so that they would grow up speaking Chinese. Even in more rural parts of the country, people were fascinated by China. They saw it as the "developing country that could."
For most of the twentieth century, even when people disliked the policy of the American government, I think they liked or admired things about "Americanness." We were the land of plenty, of possibility, of dreams. We were internally conscious of this. There's a body of literature that claims the Supreme Court was heavily influenced by the way segregation lend itself to effective anti-American Soviet propaganda. I'm nervous to make this claim-- I sort of feel like anyone born after 1980 has to struggle to get a handle on the Cold War-- but I do believe we won the Cold War because of the strength of our system of government, not the strength of our military or economy. (That was a set up for an argument about hard power versus soft power, but I'm skeptical of the dichotomy and will save it for another ramble.)
This is the decade when the world is falling quite out of love with America. We can engage other countries more in diplomacy, overhaul economic policy in an effort to save the dollar or pull out of Iraq, but I think a shift in attitudes towards Americanness (rather than America or the American government) is alarming because you can't prescribe a solid fix for a shift in attitudes.
A large part of this shift is undoubtedly due to the Iraq War and our Middle East policies. There's a story told that leaders like Ahmadinejah dislike America because of its secularism, but I think this is usually a way to escape critically examining our policy decisions. Some of it may be due to the rise of alternate powers like the EU and China (gotta love the fairy tale potential of the developing country that could). I think it's plausible, though, that part of it is due to increasing inequality within the US. We look more and more like the land of inequality and less like the land of plenty.
I once read that while Communist states during the Cold War could profess to offer equality of outcome, the United States could promise more equality of opportunity. I imagine any story about racial profiling gets substantial global media playing time (it definitely did on Al Jazeera) and this pokes holes in the idea of the American dream. So does our ever increasing Gini index and the fact that the children of rich people tend to stay rich and vice versa.
Of course, there are many reasons to be concerned about inequality in America other than the fact that it may reduce our global capital, and there are many reasons we have less global capital besides domestic inequality. I just think the potential links is interesting.
Thankful
We aren't really celebrating Thanksgiving here until Saturday, but I figured since it was Thanksgiving back in the states, I'd take a moment to write about the things I am thankful for. (If the 'corny post' warning wasn't clear from all that, you haven't had your first cup of coffee or tea or shower or whatever does it for you.)
I'm thankful for the first amendment. I'm thankful for four years at Swarthmore, RAing two fantastic halls, great professors and unending Sharples meals. I'm thankful for liking myself enough to laugh at myself. I'm grateful for getting to see so much of the world, and the new friends who have tried to make me feel at home on several continents. I'm grateful for dogs, fall days, long books, good infastructure, cuddling, curry, and green apples.
A boy in my Truman class, Andrew Hammond, recently won a Rhodes Scholarship and he closed his response to the slew of congratulatory emails with "Stay in touch when you can and when you can't, know that there are others slogging through public
service all over the world, and there are many more who do not have the luxury to choose service." I am grateful to have had enough security and joy in my life to want to spend it making the world better. That's obviously a nearly impossible choice to make if you are struggling to survive, but I think it's also a much more difficult choice if one had a financially insecure childhood in the US, etc. Public service is a luxury choice or a very brave one.
I'm also grateful that all the sacrifices I've had to make are small ones. It's sometimes difficult to be away from my family and friends but in the long run, I haven't had to give anything up to do what I want to do. Part of me thinks you aren't really an adult until you learn that you can't have everything, but I'm very thankful for a life without painful choices so far.
I'm thankful for the opportunities I have had. Over the last two years, several different people or organizations have been willing to invest money so that I could have various opportunities-- working on a project with refugee children in Vermont, going to Tanzania, traveling to remote Northwestern Tanzania, getting the Truman, this job. I'm very grateful for this and sometimes in order to justify it, I take a determinist approach: I must be given this opportunities for a reason, because I am intended to do something. Ultimately, though, I don't believe that the events in our life ever deliberately guide us to any final destiny. Therefore, it's my job to make the most of everything that happens to me and to justify it through what I take away from it.
Most of all, I'm thankful for the incredible wealth of people in my life. I'm grateful I have friends who inspire me, who can understand the things I'm not ready to say, and who believe in me even as they laugh at me. I'm grateful for parents who I know will always love me and who always ask the right questions, a sister who teaches me to be more honest with myself on a daily basis, and an extended family that shows me just how many ways there are to lead a meaningful life.
The theme of our graduation speech was about leaping into the proverbial net while also being the net. This sounds like a cliche, but when one is just about to venture out into the wide, wide world and one hasn't slept in a week, it can really get you. I've thought about it a lot since, especially since taking this job. I'm thankful to be loved enough and feel safe enough to believe in endless possibility and not be afraid of risk.
I'm thankful for the first amendment. I'm thankful for four years at Swarthmore, RAing two fantastic halls, great professors and unending Sharples meals. I'm thankful for liking myself enough to laugh at myself. I'm grateful for getting to see so much of the world, and the new friends who have tried to make me feel at home on several continents. I'm grateful for dogs, fall days, long books, good infastructure, cuddling, curry, and green apples.
A boy in my Truman class, Andrew Hammond, recently won a Rhodes Scholarship and he closed his response to the slew of congratulatory emails with "Stay in touch when you can and when you can't, know that there are others slogging through public
service all over the world, and there are many more who do not have the luxury to choose service." I am grateful to have had enough security and joy in my life to want to spend it making the world better. That's obviously a nearly impossible choice to make if you are struggling to survive, but I think it's also a much more difficult choice if one had a financially insecure childhood in the US, etc. Public service is a luxury choice or a very brave one.
I'm also grateful that all the sacrifices I've had to make are small ones. It's sometimes difficult to be away from my family and friends but in the long run, I haven't had to give anything up to do what I want to do. Part of me thinks you aren't really an adult until you learn that you can't have everything, but I'm very thankful for a life without painful choices so far.
I'm thankful for the opportunities I have had. Over the last two years, several different people or organizations have been willing to invest money so that I could have various opportunities-- working on a project with refugee children in Vermont, going to Tanzania, traveling to remote Northwestern Tanzania, getting the Truman, this job. I'm very grateful for this and sometimes in order to justify it, I take a determinist approach: I must be given this opportunities for a reason, because I am intended to do something. Ultimately, though, I don't believe that the events in our life ever deliberately guide us to any final destiny. Therefore, it's my job to make the most of everything that happens to me and to justify it through what I take away from it.
Most of all, I'm thankful for the incredible wealth of people in my life. I'm grateful I have friends who inspire me, who can understand the things I'm not ready to say, and who believe in me even as they laugh at me. I'm grateful for parents who I know will always love me and who always ask the right questions, a sister who teaches me to be more honest with myself on a daily basis, and an extended family that shows me just how many ways there are to lead a meaningful life.
The theme of our graduation speech was about leaping into the proverbial net while also being the net. This sounds like a cliche, but when one is just about to venture out into the wide, wide world and one hasn't slept in a week, it can really get you. I've thought about it a lot since, especially since taking this job. I'm thankful to be loved enough and feel safe enough to believe in endless possibility and not be afraid of risk.
Achilles' Lament
I got through college without a running injury (that is, if you don't count the death of several toenails) without stretching, so I thought my legs were especially ergonomically suited for running. This fall has called that theory into question. So far, I've already had two: a pulled hip muscle in Greece and now Achilles' tendonitious. I'm blaming it on the pavement and the hills.
I keep getting "old person" injuries-- a pulled hip, tight tendons-- instead of normal runner injuries like shin splints or knee joint inflamation. I think it's a sign I need to start actually stretching instead of pulling my ankle back and pretending I'm stretching. I already have an "aren't you flexible" pose-- sitting down on the floor with bent knees open on either side of me and then leaning back all the way until my head is on the floor-- but showing off aside, hyperflexible hips apparently don't make for an injury free runner. Darn. Life's too short for stretching.
I love endomorphins so I go a bit nuts when I can't run, especially when I don't have gym access. I keep taking a day off, deciding I've 'rested' and then running the next day. I'm going to try to take the rest of the week off and do a better of icing in the meantime. I wish there were more injuries you had to apply heat to instead of ice. I considered icing my ankle with a Chu-hi in a hot bath, but then I decided that was probably counterproductive.
I keep getting "old person" injuries-- a pulled hip, tight tendons-- instead of normal runner injuries like shin splints or knee joint inflamation. I think it's a sign I need to start actually stretching instead of pulling my ankle back and pretending I'm stretching. I already have an "aren't you flexible" pose-- sitting down on the floor with bent knees open on either side of me and then leaning back all the way until my head is on the floor-- but showing off aside, hyperflexible hips apparently don't make for an injury free runner. Darn. Life's too short for stretching.
I love endomorphins so I go a bit nuts when I can't run, especially when I don't have gym access. I keep taking a day off, deciding I've 'rested' and then running the next day. I'm going to try to take the rest of the week off and do a better of icing in the meantime. I wish there were more injuries you had to apply heat to instead of ice. I considered icing my ankle with a Chu-hi in a hot bath, but then I decided that was probably counterproductive.
Wednesday, November 21, 2007
Pink Cheeks and Ripped Up Jeans
Every few days, I'll have a moment that reminds me just how little of what's going on I understand. On one of my first days here, I could hear someone broadcasting something on a microphone outside and saw a ton of helicopters overhead. I assumed the most dramatic: missing person, axe murderer on the loose, major earthquake. Later, I found out that the outdoor broadcast is a drive-by advertising strategy and the helicopters were just a coincidence.
The other day, I was on a walk and two very sweet-seeming older women stopped me. They pointed to my cheeks-- which were probably pink from the cold-- and discussed them at length, and then commented on the bottoms of my jeans, which are pretty ripped up. I stuck to my canon of polite incomprehension phrases for about five minutes, and then we said good bye. The conversation could have gone something like this:
"You have such lovely rosy cheeks! Are you cold?"
"I'm sorry, I don't understand."
"We're worried you're going to trip over your jeans. They look ripped up. You should be careful."
"I request your kindness."
Or it could have looked more like this:
"Your cheeks are a very unnatural color! You must either have roscea or wear too much blush."
"Thank you."
"It is very disgraceful to go out in such tattered jeans. Look how elegantly and respectfully Japanese people dress!"
"I would like to speak Japanese."
Given the 'if you don't have something nice to say...' mindset of most Japanese people and the kindness I have recieved, I think the first is much more likely, but they could have been talking about something else entirely unrelated and I could have misunderstood their gestures. I should just stick to pointing to my nose.
Rachel and I went on a turkey search today ("ho-luh tuh-keh" if you ever need to get one in Japan) and were surprised that people knew what we meant. Apparently, turkey's caught on as a Christmas food, but Thanksgiving has yet to follow Halloween in jumping the Pacific (the lack of blue laws is a testament the pilgrims never made it this far) so no turkeys are available yet. We decided roast chicken would be an adequate substitute, but the oven in the apartment is too small for roasting a bird, so we had to order one. While we were consulting with a man at the grocery store, a young women who spoke excellent English offered to help us, and explained the seasonal turkey dilemma. She directed us to another store, where the butcher on the first floor led us up several floors to where we finally ordered chicken. People are so helpful! Tomorrow's goal is finding cornmeal.
The other day, I was on a walk and two very sweet-seeming older women stopped me. They pointed to my cheeks-- which were probably pink from the cold-- and discussed them at length, and then commented on the bottoms of my jeans, which are pretty ripped up. I stuck to my canon of polite incomprehension phrases for about five minutes, and then we said good bye. The conversation could have gone something like this:
"You have such lovely rosy cheeks! Are you cold?"
"I'm sorry, I don't understand."
"We're worried you're going to trip over your jeans. They look ripped up. You should be careful."
"I request your kindness."
Or it could have looked more like this:
"Your cheeks are a very unnatural color! You must either have roscea or wear too much blush."
"Thank you."
"It is very disgraceful to go out in such tattered jeans. Look how elegantly and respectfully Japanese people dress!"
"I would like to speak Japanese."
Given the 'if you don't have something nice to say...' mindset of most Japanese people and the kindness I have recieved, I think the first is much more likely, but they could have been talking about something else entirely unrelated and I could have misunderstood their gestures. I should just stick to pointing to my nose.
Rachel and I went on a turkey search today ("ho-luh tuh-keh" if you ever need to get one in Japan) and were surprised that people knew what we meant. Apparently, turkey's caught on as a Christmas food, but Thanksgiving has yet to follow Halloween in jumping the Pacific (the lack of blue laws is a testament the pilgrims never made it this far) so no turkeys are available yet. We decided roast chicken would be an adequate substitute, but the oven in the apartment is too small for roasting a bird, so we had to order one. While we were consulting with a man at the grocery store, a young women who spoke excellent English offered to help us, and explained the seasonal turkey dilemma. She directed us to another store, where the butcher on the first floor led us up several floors to where we finally ordered chicken. People are so helpful! Tomorrow's goal is finding cornmeal.
Maybe you should drink a lot less coffee
My computer saga has continued, and I don't think I'll have my own functional computer back until I return to the states. Rachel has kindly given me her backup to use as a sub, and although it relies on a Japanese operating system (maybe I'll leave knowing the kanji for "save as" and "this program needs to shut down!"), it works very well. However, the sound isn't as good as on my computer, which has resulted in a few changes in my post-work internet diversions.
In the evening, I used to read the news and legit political blogs for a while, and then switch over to America's Next Top Model Re-runs on Youtube or free Heros downloads. Now, rather than watch ANTM without sound and miss the crucial in-fighting, I've had to do some revamping. I usually start out with legit news-- which devolves into reading about countries I don't know anything about on wikipedia (Tajikistan looks beautiful)-- to obsessively googling primary polls. I'd say this is a step up, but I'm a little alarmed by how easily I can sub out reality TV for primary coverage.
In November of 2006, I had an argument with one of my favorite Political Science professors. He was teaching a class that met once a week from 7 pm to 10 pm (read: midnight) on Tuesday. Several students in his class wanted to reschedule the class on Election Day so they could watch the results come in. He thought this was a superficial element of participation, watching the results come in like a sporting event. He was disparaging of the trend of staying up all night in order to get instant information, pointing out that the result would be the same in the morning regardless of how many people had slept.
I was indignant and argued that a lot of the students had been working on the election for months, and it was difficult to not have a level of emotional investment after that degree of involvement. Even if their watching would not change results, to wait until the morning would be akin to putting your college admission letter on a shelf and not opening it for a week. Even if you found out you were waitlisted (“too close to call”), better to sleep knowing that than nothing at all. He then asked the class if we believed the election results really made a difference, and people answered enthusiastically.
I also pointed out that if he didn’t let his class watch, people were likely to be distracted and text their friends for results or take advantage of the wireless zone on their laptops-obsteniably-brought-for-note-taking. Sometimes I really like technology.
I think he ultimately bought my argument. The next day, he let us take 20 minutes at the begining of (the six hour) class to watch Rumsfeld's resignation speech. To be honest, every minute of that class was solid gold, and retrospectively I wish I had discussed Nicaragua for twenty minutes more instead. At the time, though, the exilheration was worth it.
Still, I left the conversation wondering to what extent closely following polls and fundraising totals is like watching a sporting event, just good competitive entertainment rather than bona fide engagement. I don’t mean pulling up Clinton’s healthcare policy and contrasting it to Edwards', or watching the youtube debate —the things you do to be an informed voter or volunteer. I'll never say politics is just a game. I’m more calling myself out on my obsessive tendency to check polls in primary states on a daily basis, information that doesn’t affect my decisions and that I can’t affect from Kikuna, Japan.
Political commentators who I respect a lot, like Atrios, seem very frustrated by the primary. I suspect that if I were cooler, I'd also be bored by the primary and have a minimalist facebook profile and listen to bands before they sold out. While I could make a case for the primary-- candidates can articulate a much broader scope of policy options than would be acceptable in general debate-- I don't think this is necessarily what happens.
In 2004, I was so into Dean--and so frustrated with the other candidate' attacks on him--that it took me a long time to be geuninely excited about Kerry. While it's important not to rally around a candidate before the primaries even start, the months of un-electable-mongering and dubious matchup polls and campaign gossip and hypothesizing and criticizing and attacking from supporters, media and candidates alike aren't productive. I was so planning to not get hooked on this primary season and hold off until the general election, but it's too late.
I can't blame it all on the lack of sound on my computer. I did the same thing the last two times around. I also have this bad habit of needing to announce my findings to whoever is in earshot. Rachel, my sophomore roommate, pretended that this was useful and she misses it now. Rachel, my boss and current victim, agreed, but I think they are both just nice people.
I guess as addictions go, it's cheap and harmless and more useful than most. Youtube debate next week?
In the evening, I used to read the news and legit political blogs for a while, and then switch over to America's Next Top Model Re-runs on Youtube or free Heros downloads. Now, rather than watch ANTM without sound and miss the crucial in-fighting, I've had to do some revamping. I usually start out with legit news-- which devolves into reading about countries I don't know anything about on wikipedia (Tajikistan looks beautiful)-- to obsessively googling primary polls. I'd say this is a step up, but I'm a little alarmed by how easily I can sub out reality TV for primary coverage.
In November of 2006, I had an argument with one of my favorite Political Science professors. He was teaching a class that met once a week from 7 pm to 10 pm (read: midnight) on Tuesday. Several students in his class wanted to reschedule the class on Election Day so they could watch the results come in. He thought this was a superficial element of participation, watching the results come in like a sporting event. He was disparaging of the trend of staying up all night in order to get instant information, pointing out that the result would be the same in the morning regardless of how many people had slept.
I was indignant and argued that a lot of the students had been working on the election for months, and it was difficult to not have a level of emotional investment after that degree of involvement. Even if their watching would not change results, to wait until the morning would be akin to putting your college admission letter on a shelf and not opening it for a week. Even if you found out you were waitlisted (“too close to call”), better to sleep knowing that than nothing at all. He then asked the class if we believed the election results really made a difference, and people answered enthusiastically.
I also pointed out that if he didn’t let his class watch, people were likely to be distracted and text their friends for results or take advantage of the wireless zone on their laptops-obsteniably-brought-for-note-taking. Sometimes I really like technology.
I think he ultimately bought my argument. The next day, he let us take 20 minutes at the begining of (the six hour) class to watch Rumsfeld's resignation speech. To be honest, every minute of that class was solid gold, and retrospectively I wish I had discussed Nicaragua for twenty minutes more instead. At the time, though, the exilheration was worth it.
Still, I left the conversation wondering to what extent closely following polls and fundraising totals is like watching a sporting event, just good competitive entertainment rather than bona fide engagement. I don’t mean pulling up Clinton’s healthcare policy and contrasting it to Edwards', or watching the youtube debate —the things you do to be an informed voter or volunteer. I'll never say politics is just a game. I’m more calling myself out on my obsessive tendency to check polls in primary states on a daily basis, information that doesn’t affect my decisions and that I can’t affect from Kikuna, Japan.
Political commentators who I respect a lot, like Atrios, seem very frustrated by the primary. I suspect that if I were cooler, I'd also be bored by the primary and have a minimalist facebook profile and listen to bands before they sold out. While I could make a case for the primary-- candidates can articulate a much broader scope of policy options than would be acceptable in general debate-- I don't think this is necessarily what happens.
In 2004, I was so into Dean--and so frustrated with the other candidate' attacks on him--that it took me a long time to be geuninely excited about Kerry. While it's important not to rally around a candidate before the primaries even start, the months of un-electable-mongering and dubious matchup polls and campaign gossip and hypothesizing and criticizing and attacking from supporters, media and candidates alike aren't productive. I was so planning to not get hooked on this primary season and hold off until the general election, but it's too late.
I can't blame it all on the lack of sound on my computer. I did the same thing the last two times around. I also have this bad habit of needing to announce my findings to whoever is in earshot. Rachel, my sophomore roommate, pretended that this was useful and she misses it now. Rachel, my boss and current victim, agreed, but I think they are both just nice people.
I guess as addictions go, it's cheap and harmless and more useful than most. Youtube debate next week?
Monday, November 19, 2007
Among the best smells ever
Wood fires you can smell in people's houses when you walk by on cold days.
Among the best inventions ever: kotatsu tables. People drape a blanket over a table with an electric heater under it and then sit with their legs and feet under the table. The blanket keeps in the heat. It's right up there with my bathtub and clothes steamers.
Among the best inventions ever: kotatsu tables. People drape a blanket over a table with an electric heater under it and then sit with their legs and feet under the table. The blanket keeps in the heat. It's right up there with my bathtub and clothes steamers.
Sankeien Garden and Back to the Future
On Saturday, I went to Sankeien Garden, a park a little south of Yokohama that houses the oldest pagoda in the region and has period houses from throughout Japanese history. It was located in a part of town that housed all the foreigners in the second half of the 19th century, and there was still a large ganjin presence. Poor Rachel had work to do, so Brett was kind enough to take me.
The park had a lake in the middle, an inner garden and an outer garden. Arched bridges over the lake connected the two to each other. Towards the far side of the inner garden, there was a tall hill with the pagoda at the very top. The colors have changed slowly this year in Japan, so the whole hill was light green with pops of orange where there were particularly precious trees. When I used to fly home for fall break in October, landing in Manchester was almost like descending into a fiery ocean because all the trees would be so bright. I bet the park would be even prettier in a few weeks once the colors change, but it was neat to see the begining of that.
I wanted to cross all the bridges. My favorite two were a bright red bridge that arched over the lake and a massive flat stone that perfectly fit across a stream. We went up the hill to look off the observation deck-- from where we could see the Pacific ocean and Yokohama's many lovely factories. I had some oxygenated water. Oxygen is delicious but I think I prefer lemon flavor.
On another peak of the hill was the pagoda. Around its base, people had made hundreds and hundreds of stacks of small, flat rocks, stacking three or four rocks on top of each other as though paralleling the style of the pagoda. I'm still trying to figure out what this was online. Maybe it was an offering. Maybe one day some parents wanted to take a lot of pictures of the pagoda and their kids got bored so they told them to make a mini-pagoda out of rocks and then lots of other kids thought it was a good idea and then it became the customary thing for kids to do while their parents took pictures of the pagoda.
The houses were all absolutely beautiful. When I go into stores in Japan, I'm overwhelmed by the clutter and the information overload coming from all decorations, but I think when something is intended to be beautiful in Japan, it is elegantly minimalist. If I ever designed my own house, I think I'd want to incorporate a lot of Japanese elements. I love the mats on the floor, the rice paper panel walls, and the tables which stand a foot or two below the floor.
We were allowed to go inside an Edo period house that had belonged to a wealthy samurai family in the Hida region. I was struck by how much social space there was- a huge central audience room for town meetings, a fancy reception room for important visitors, and an entry room about the size of my kitchen and living room combined. In Yokohama nowadays, houses are so small that people rarely entertain guests at home. Population growth, I guess.
We decided to walk back to Minoto Mirai, the "port of the future" about 45 minutes away. It was fun to walk towards, because we could see its lights all the way there. Behind the central park, there's a tall building that Brett calls "the apple wedge" that reminds me of the ship hotel in Dubai. The architects designed Minoto Mirai to look like "the future," and it looks almost eeriely like the UAE from far away.
I've been to Minoto Mirai a couple of times, but don't think I've ever really done it justice here. It's a hard place to describe. It's a futuristic ocean-side shopping mall complex/park/fairground/museum. Its train station is on the bottom floor of one of the malls and the train goes straight through the mall. It's home to one of Japan's biggest "clocks"--giant ferris wheels with huge digital clocks in the center. (I rode it with Saori a few weeks back.) In the daytime, it feels campy and at night, just plain exciting, but it's well enough executed to escape tacky entirely. At this time of year, all its plazas and stairs were covered in perriwinkle lights which were reflected in the fountains.
Somehow, Japan has gotten me in a holiday mood already. I'm blaming it on all the lights. This weekend, we're having a modified-Thanksgiving-in-Japan with the Motoguchis (who gave me my hashi)and some friends from England and New Zealand. I'm attempting to make an apple pie from scratch as well as mashed potatoes. Advice is very much appreciated
The park had a lake in the middle, an inner garden and an outer garden. Arched bridges over the lake connected the two to each other. Towards the far side of the inner garden, there was a tall hill with the pagoda at the very top. The colors have changed slowly this year in Japan, so the whole hill was light green with pops of orange where there were particularly precious trees. When I used to fly home for fall break in October, landing in Manchester was almost like descending into a fiery ocean because all the trees would be so bright. I bet the park would be even prettier in a few weeks once the colors change, but it was neat to see the begining of that.
I wanted to cross all the bridges. My favorite two were a bright red bridge that arched over the lake and a massive flat stone that perfectly fit across a stream. We went up the hill to look off the observation deck-- from where we could see the Pacific ocean and Yokohama's many lovely factories. I had some oxygenated water. Oxygen is delicious but I think I prefer lemon flavor.
On another peak of the hill was the pagoda. Around its base, people had made hundreds and hundreds of stacks of small, flat rocks, stacking three or four rocks on top of each other as though paralleling the style of the pagoda. I'm still trying to figure out what this was online. Maybe it was an offering. Maybe one day some parents wanted to take a lot of pictures of the pagoda and their kids got bored so they told them to make a mini-pagoda out of rocks and then lots of other kids thought it was a good idea and then it became the customary thing for kids to do while their parents took pictures of the pagoda.
The houses were all absolutely beautiful. When I go into stores in Japan, I'm overwhelmed by the clutter and the information overload coming from all decorations, but I think when something is intended to be beautiful in Japan, it is elegantly minimalist. If I ever designed my own house, I think I'd want to incorporate a lot of Japanese elements. I love the mats on the floor, the rice paper panel walls, and the tables which stand a foot or two below the floor.
We were allowed to go inside an Edo period house that had belonged to a wealthy samurai family in the Hida region. I was struck by how much social space there was- a huge central audience room for town meetings, a fancy reception room for important visitors, and an entry room about the size of my kitchen and living room combined. In Yokohama nowadays, houses are so small that people rarely entertain guests at home. Population growth, I guess.
We decided to walk back to Minoto Mirai, the "port of the future" about 45 minutes away. It was fun to walk towards, because we could see its lights all the way there. Behind the central park, there's a tall building that Brett calls "the apple wedge" that reminds me of the ship hotel in Dubai. The architects designed Minoto Mirai to look like "the future," and it looks almost eeriely like the UAE from far away.
I've been to Minoto Mirai a couple of times, but don't think I've ever really done it justice here. It's a hard place to describe. It's a futuristic ocean-side shopping mall complex/park/fairground/museum. Its train station is on the bottom floor of one of the malls and the train goes straight through the mall. It's home to one of Japan's biggest "clocks"--giant ferris wheels with huge digital clocks in the center. (I rode it with Saori a few weeks back.) In the daytime, it feels campy and at night, just plain exciting, but it's well enough executed to escape tacky entirely. At this time of year, all its plazas and stairs were covered in perriwinkle lights which were reflected in the fountains.
Somehow, Japan has gotten me in a holiday mood already. I'm blaming it on all the lights. This weekend, we're having a modified-Thanksgiving-in-Japan with the Motoguchis (who gave me my hashi)and some friends from England and New Zealand. I'm attempting to make an apple pie from scratch as well as mashed potatoes. Advice is very much appreciated
Saturday, November 17, 2007
Still Abroad in Yokohama's Chinatown
This week, I've explored three very different places in the Yokohama area. Wednesday night, I met my friend Saori in Yokohama's Chinatown. Saori and I were friends back in ninth grade, when her family was living in the states for a few years. I thought I'd never see her again, so it's fun to be just a few trainstops away after eight years. She's in her last year of vet school, the exact job she wanted when she was fifteen.
When the Yokohama seaport opened for international trade in the mid-19th century, there were special designated areas in which foreigners could live. Although those laws have long since been abolished, there are still high concentrations of foreigners in these zones, such as Yokohama's Chinatown and Motomachi, which I'll write about later. Yokohama has the largest Chinatown in Asia and one of the largest in the world. It had several wide pedestrian streets with gates arching over each entrance, and then a plethora of winding side alleys. I think of Chinatown as having red gate-arches, like the Chinatowns in Philadelphia and New York, but Yokohama's Chinatown had arches in silvery green and purple as well as the traditional red.
I was surprised by how somehow very Japanese Yokohama's Chinatown felt. I don't think I could have purchased bootleg DVDs there or a small turtle that might give me samonella. I am sure I couldn't have found a slightly sketchy but very efficient bus service that could take me to Kyoto for under a thousand yen. The food reflected this difference too-- Chinese food in Japan seems to contain less spice, sauce, and grease and more seafood than American Chinese food. There are foods I thought of as "things available in Chinatown"-- ie mochi with red bean paste--that are available everywhere but Chinatown in Japan. My Japanese friend told me that Chinatown in New York frightened her because you could see plucked chickens hanging to be cooked.
My experience in American Chinatowns has been limited to semesterly trips on the Chinatown bus and dim sum for the most part, and I never had the illusion that I was anywhere but a cool part of New York/Philly/DC. But going to Chinatown in Yokohama brought home the perhaps obvious point that Chinatown in every city reflects back its setting, both because of market demands in the city, and because of the adaption and diffusion of culture. (There's probably an interesting book on how each Chinatown has been shaped based on which era and part of China most of its inhabitants came from, too.) I guess on some level, I expected a universal "Chinatownness" and instead found an interesting hybrid of what the Japanese would like in a Chinatown and what Chinatown's inhabitants have adopted from Japan.
I'm going to stretch this a little into a somewhat related thought on hybridization and authenticity. When I think of Indian food, I think of chicken tikka massala, although I learned earlier this fall that that dish is in fact a hybrid invented because the British balked at the spiciness of Indian food. Now it's one of the most popular dish in Britian. While this makes me feel kind of dumb for thinking of it as Indian food, I think labeling it as "inauthentic" food makes Indian and British culture static and ignores the possibility of Indo-British culture.
I'm going to go to bed, but tomorrow I'll write about seeing a historic village and garden and Minoto Mirai.
When the Yokohama seaport opened for international trade in the mid-19th century, there were special designated areas in which foreigners could live. Although those laws have long since been abolished, there are still high concentrations of foreigners in these zones, such as Yokohama's Chinatown and Motomachi, which I'll write about later. Yokohama has the largest Chinatown in Asia and one of the largest in the world. It had several wide pedestrian streets with gates arching over each entrance, and then a plethora of winding side alleys. I think of Chinatown as having red gate-arches, like the Chinatowns in Philadelphia and New York, but Yokohama's Chinatown had arches in silvery green and purple as well as the traditional red.
I was surprised by how somehow very Japanese Yokohama's Chinatown felt. I don't think I could have purchased bootleg DVDs there or a small turtle that might give me samonella. I am sure I couldn't have found a slightly sketchy but very efficient bus service that could take me to Kyoto for under a thousand yen. The food reflected this difference too-- Chinese food in Japan seems to contain less spice, sauce, and grease and more seafood than American Chinese food. There are foods I thought of as "things available in Chinatown"-- ie mochi with red bean paste--that are available everywhere but Chinatown in Japan. My Japanese friend told me that Chinatown in New York frightened her because you could see plucked chickens hanging to be cooked.
My experience in American Chinatowns has been limited to semesterly trips on the Chinatown bus and dim sum for the most part, and I never had the illusion that I was anywhere but a cool part of New York/Philly/DC. But going to Chinatown in Yokohama brought home the perhaps obvious point that Chinatown in every city reflects back its setting, both because of market demands in the city, and because of the adaption and diffusion of culture. (There's probably an interesting book on how each Chinatown has been shaped based on which era and part of China most of its inhabitants came from, too.) I guess on some level, I expected a universal "Chinatownness" and instead found an interesting hybrid of what the Japanese would like in a Chinatown and what Chinatown's inhabitants have adopted from Japan.
I'm going to stretch this a little into a somewhat related thought on hybridization and authenticity. When I think of Indian food, I think of chicken tikka massala, although I learned earlier this fall that that dish is in fact a hybrid invented because the British balked at the spiciness of Indian food. Now it's one of the most popular dish in Britian. While this makes me feel kind of dumb for thinking of it as Indian food, I think labeling it as "inauthentic" food makes Indian and British culture static and ignores the possibility of Indo-British culture.
I'm going to go to bed, but tomorrow I'll write about seeing a historic village and garden and Minoto Mirai.
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