Monday, July 7, 2008

Summer Stories

Usually I like to wrap these updates around a single charming story, but recent times have produced no such grandiose occasions. To tell the truth, life has been running pretty smoothly. This email, therefore, is more a handful of short goings-on and the-other-days than anything else.

About a week ago I bought an illustrated textbook full of Japanese onomatopoeia and mimetic words. In my on-going efforts to shore up the weaker aspects of my Japanese knowledge, this part of the language actually represents a significant portion of what don’t know. There are literally hundreds if not thousands of these words that are available, though practical use could probably be limited to a couple hundred. Still, no small task.

You might be more aware of Japanese onomatopoeia than you think. Take these two examples: pikapika and chuchu. Pikapika (mimetic, actually) used to describe something bright or glaring, as in a star. In fact, this mimetic is used, among other things, in translating “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” and in a famous children’s book describing the atomic blast in Hiroshima. Chuchu is onomatopoeia for a puckering sound, most often used as a kissy noise. Put these two together and you have Pikachu, the cute lightning based mascot for the ever popular Pokeman franchise.

New to me, however, is goron, used specifically to describe a “heavy rolling thud”. Yes, these words get to that level of specificity and that’s why they’re such a headache to study. Fortunately the depths of my dorkdom know no bounds, and in the course of writing this I have realized that goron is none other than the name of the famed mountain tribe creatures in The Legend of Zelda series. They are big and heavy and they roll. It makes perfect sense.

Since around April I’ve been working Mondays at a small private English school in Wakayama. It’s a couple extra hundred a month to help me sort out plane tickets and other necessities without hitting up the ATM. It’s run by this great local couple who can only be described as “far out”. Their place is a joint shop/classroom/cafĂ©/restaurant that, as you can imagine, always has something going on. The guy’s name is Nishida and his wife I only know as “Mama”. Mama is, in fact, a very motherly figure and therefore, after some initial hesitation, I have no trouble addressing her as such. Together they have to be the most chilled out couple I’ve met in Japan.

Typically I’ve found that Japanese spouses live very compartmentalized existences, crossing paths only at breakfast and when bills need paying. I won’t digress into the often sad lives of the sarariman (salary man) or hausuwaifu (you get it), but when you spend too much time here you start to forget how cute old couples are supposed to be. I’m always happy to go to Nishida’s school because the congenial nature of the hosts is palpable and infectious.

The students here are a fun mix as well. From the frustrating knucklehead toddlers to crazy war veterans, there’s always at least one surprise in store per week. Take one old guy I was teaching recently. Kasamatsu-san is a great old guy. Always happy, always arriving with his obscure grammatical questions that don’t really matter too much but eat up plenty of time, and of course he can talk forever about his special interests like gardening and walking. Ask him the right question and you’d be set for a good long while. One time, however, he surprised when he started talking at great length about Green Peace. Now I do my best not to judge students, especially since I’m taking their money, but I just couldn’t resolve the image of this 71-year-old guy and an extreme environmental organization. Furthermore, he wasn’t making much sense. Whenever I attempted to be polite and ask him questions about his Green Peace involvement or stance on various issues he looked at me like I was a crazy person. I thought I was offending him by not being hip enough to his worldly concerns – of course he was concerned about polar ice caps, what a ridiculous thing to ask. So on and so forth. Well this went on for about 45 minutes when he finally decided he could best explain his involvement with pictures. Pictures! Great, I would like photographic evidence of this. He whipped out his keitai, shuffled through it for a bit and then proudly passed it over to me. I couldn’t make anything out and there was definitely no world-saving in the picture, so I gave it back with shrugged shoulders. “What is it, then?” I offered. “Green Peace, Green Peace, my garden!” he retorted with no small amount of exasperation and, I bet, disbelief at the overwhelming stupidity of your humble narrator.

His garden? What the hell does that have to do with Green Peace? Nothing, it turns out, because he’d been talking to me about green peas for 45 minutes and I hadn’t a clue. If that misunderstanding wasn’t bad enough, his green peas weren’t even green peas, they were green beans, or string beans. I tried to explain the difference and then lectured him at great length about the need for correct intonation. All in good fun, of course. He’s a cheerful old guy. I don’t think he’s ever heard of Green Peace and he probably enjoys the occasional whale bacon.

Lastly, a belated “Happy Fourth of July” to all the Americans out there. You’ll be proud to know that even way out here in Japan the expats are celebrating in proper form. On Friday my coworker, John the Michiganian, came over and we got drunk on Budweiser, the King of Beers. Then we shot bottle rockets off the roof of my building, that is until one veered wildly off course and exploded next to my neighbor’s window, at which point we high-tailed it back to my apartment to finish the beers.

The next night we doubled up and had a large BBQ with some more expats and Japanese friends. More beer and fireworks in American-like abundance and at the pinnacle of the celebrations there was an impromptu amateur karaoke to Don Mclean’s American Pie. We dutifully downed bourbon with each refrain. Then some things happened and I’m shaky on the details but it was fun.

Today was a day of recovery – American style, of course. That meant sitting around in my underwear with the curtains drawn, the AC cranked, drinking lots of fluids and playing GTA IV for several hours. USA, all the way.