So I guess I'm not that great at updating blogs frequently. Scratch that, I'm not great at updating THIS blog. Sorry. Anywho, I'm up in Iwate-ken, Miyako-shi (岩手県宮古市) and have been for the past 2.5 weeks. I started teaching on the 16th, so I'm almost done with my second "full" week of school (Japan has SO many national holidays, and this week was no different so that I had Monday off). Its been real good so far, though of course minor mistakes have been made, but who didn't see that coming?
I'm working at 3 different highschools: Miyako Koukou (koukou means highschool), Miyako Kita Koukou, and Miyako Kawai Koukou. I teach at Miyako Monday-Wednesday, Kita on Thursday, and Kawai on Friday, and these schools couldn't be any more different: Miyako is, for the area, a very academically-minded kind of school, with most if not all of the kids trying to get into decent universities. As a result, their English ability is, while obviously not great, pretty damn good for their age. The past 2 weeks have been the semester-end testing period, so this week I was grading tests. That proved to be an interesting task, considering I'm pretty sure that a few, though not many, questions were grammatically incorrect, and also considering that a number of questions had multiple, grammatically distinct, possible answers but only one was right. In the end, I was a bit confused about the whole process only because I felt like I had been shorthanding some of the students due to the strict nature of Japanese grading syllabi.
Then there's Kita. I'm not sure if they take tests. Kita's basically the punk's school, and I don't mean that in the Ramones/Sex Pistols sense, but rather they don't give a shit about what they learn, and I wonder if even one of them has post-high school plans in the realm of education. Its also a bit smaller than Miyako (which is, as far as I can guess, probably around 800-1000 students), at around 500-800 students. Pardon the french, but its a fuck ton of fun - while actually adhering to a proper lesson plan there is next to impossible, if you can ride the wave its actually possible to get information across to these kids where a more rigid teacher would be stuck. What does that mean? I can talk about the Steelers and Pens a lot more than I normally wold be able to, as well as music; basically pop culture is the key to success there. Plus they like my beard.
Finally comes Kawai, which is closing at the end of this year. As such, despite its already being a small school, the only students left there are seniors. This means I have a grand total of 40 students to interact with at that school. The kids are interested in learning, though, unlike Kita, and so while the classes are small they are also much more focused. I don't have much of an impression yet, however, because the only time I've been there was last Friday which happened to be a testing day, so I literally went there, having already prepared my introductory lesson plan, and sat around all day doing nothing. It wasn't much fun. And kind of hot. Plus its 800 yen and 45 minutes away, so I more or less felt like I wasted my time.
But what about my life outside of school? Its not bad, though weekdays are mostly devoted to prepping for the next day. Its a nice, small town, full of restaurants with that-day-fresh seafood (I'm about a 20 minute walk from the ocean), and surrounded with ski resorts, beaches, onsen (those Japanese hot springs that I'm sure yr all familiar with), and apparently a real cool cave about 2 hours north of here... so basically its the exact opposite of Tokyo. Its different, yeah, but that' not to say I don't enjoy it - hell, I love Hikone, where I studied abroad, and while that's closer to a big city (Kyoto/Osaka) by a long shot, its way more rural than here. Or at least as rural. If there's one reason I'm bummed about being all the way up here (I'm about 5 hours north of Tokyo), aside from the fact that most of my friends live in Tokyo, its that while I was down in the big city I was doing a pretty decent job of getting myself connected with promoters and bands. Hell, I had an opportunity to try out for my absolute favorite band, Church of Misery, but then I got placed and couldn't go to the audition. Lame. Ultra lame. Ultra fucking lame. But you know what? I'm young, 23 to be exact. I took this job as a way of getting myself over here, and I figure that I can spend some of that time out here in the sticks. I'll be back in Tokyo at some point kind of soon (sorry to all you folks who thought I'd be over here for only a little/thought I'd be coming back to visit the states regularly), and I'm gonna enjoy the ride before, during, and after that time. Here's to me finally getting what I wanted, living in Japan. Cheers.
Thursday, November 26, 2009
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
When Shit Hits The Fan, Nothing is Safe
Ugh, so I've had my first bout of... everything-bad-that-could-happen-happeneditis. From last Friday until today (Wednesday), I have had 0 contact with anyone via technology. Last Wednesday I took my computer in to the Apple Store in Ginza to try and get it to stop crashing, and while my computer is now fixed (or at least so it seems thus far) it took them exactly 1 week to accomplish that. Something about my logicboard being totally fucked. So that by itself isn't so bad, but paired with my phone falling out of my pocket at a concert, it gets much much worse. Then, pair that with trying to get a new phone but having softbank (phone company) finally realize that I have ~$750 of debt owed them from my last stint in Japan, and that unless I pay that I can't GET a new phone, it gets even worse.
But hey, I'm still alive and getting by, so lets talk about good things, right?
The concert I lost my phone at was for a band called Corrupted. You probably don't know them. If you do know them, though, I can't imagine how jealous you are of me having seen them live. And they played for 90 freaking minutes, starting off with El Mundo-fucking-Frio. The show was at a pretty hip joint out in Kumagaya, and that was a bit of a problem in itself. See, on the train maps, a lot of stops are written only in Kanji (chinese characters), and that's no problem by me - I can read most of the stops. Buuuuut, there is a place that is called Kumagawa (熊川), as opposed to Kumagaya (熊谷). Kumagawa is kind of south-westerly of Tokyo and to get there from where I live in Chiba you have to transfer.... 4? 5? times. Kumagaya, on the other hand, is north-north-westerly of Tokyo, and from where I live in Chiba I can take 2 trains to get there. So when I was looking for the map, obviously I was looking for the character 熊 (kuma), but unfortunately I went with the first place that started with 熊 that I saw, which was Kumagawa and not Kumagaya. I realized this only when I was about to arrive at Kumagawa, which is about an hour and then some outside of Tokyo. So, long story short, instead of spending maybe an hour in transit, I ended up arriving at the concert at about 730 PM where I had left at ~3 PM. Ridiculous.
But back to the show. There were a few alright opening acts, none particularly memorable but sufficiently down-tuned and bass-heavy, but this night was more or less given to Corrupted, as it should be wherever they play. A lot of people have misconceptions about metal, mostly centered around the fact that without any knowledge of the various different subgenres contained within, you can't really begin analyzing the numerous aspects of that most unholy of monikers (METALLLLLL). There's thrash, death, sludge, fantasy, prog, heavy, and many more, but the most affecting of them all, in my opinion, is the one known as doom metal, and this is due partially to its black-sheepish-ness. A lot of metal IS played fast, this is no lie. Doom metal, for the most part, lies outside of that realm. Where Napalm Death said "we can be mind-boggilingly technical and STILL be all kinds of bad ass", Doom opted to pursue the almighty riff that bands like Sabbath and Zeppelin put to use (mostly leaning towards the former), so instead of executing you with a flurry of searing solos and yelped/grunted vocals, Doom seeks to crush yr will to live by dragging you down to the deepest, darkest depths of an ocean of tar. What that all means is, Doom tends to be much slower than all other kinds of metal, and delivers its brutality through detuned guitars, sunn amps cranked to 11, and the patience to meditate on a riff or even single note instead of working the fretboard; it is the definition of "heavy".
And Corrupted is the king of Doom. Though they are Japanese, they choose to sing mostly in Spanish (don't ask me why), and have looooooong segments of quiet accented with the pluck of a string here and there. Time ceases to exist with these guys, and they'll lull you into a false calm for great lengths of time, and then kaBAM, they stomp on their pedals, and with pick in hand stroke, one, two or maybe even three of the most dissonant, soul-crushingly heavy progressions, and all the while they have become loud enough to skin a goat. Their vocalist has an impressively deep voice for this kind of music, and while the long passages of him uttering incomprehensible bubbling-oil-speak are interesting by themselves, they serve merely to accent they sheer monolith of sonic doom that this band creates. Theirs is a music that goes beyond words, that describes something of the human condition so deep and dark that language ceases to suffice and all we are left with through their music is an impression that evil exists, and that something is very, very wrong. Its quite moving, and totally metal.
So then Halloween was the next day, and I spent most of the night at a bar in Shinjuku called Current. When bands tour in Tokyo, they tend to end up at Current, so a lot people there are in the know and are relatively connected. I went there with a Norwegian friend, Chris, who's in a band called Zombie Blasphemy. Not too much to tell, met some new people, danced with some ladies, drank beer, put lots of fake blood on my face and arms, you know the routine. All in all a real fun night.
But hey, I'm still alive and getting by, so lets talk about good things, right?
The concert I lost my phone at was for a band called Corrupted. You probably don't know them. If you do know them, though, I can't imagine how jealous you are of me having seen them live. And they played for 90 freaking minutes, starting off with El Mundo-fucking-Frio. The show was at a pretty hip joint out in Kumagaya, and that was a bit of a problem in itself. See, on the train maps, a lot of stops are written only in Kanji (chinese characters), and that's no problem by me - I can read most of the stops. Buuuuut, there is a place that is called Kumagawa (熊川), as opposed to Kumagaya (熊谷). Kumagawa is kind of south-westerly of Tokyo and to get there from where I live in Chiba you have to transfer.... 4? 5? times. Kumagaya, on the other hand, is north-north-westerly of Tokyo, and from where I live in Chiba I can take 2 trains to get there. So when I was looking for the map, obviously I was looking for the character 熊 (kuma), but unfortunately I went with the first place that started with 熊 that I saw, which was Kumagawa and not Kumagaya. I realized this only when I was about to arrive at Kumagawa, which is about an hour and then some outside of Tokyo. So, long story short, instead of spending maybe an hour in transit, I ended up arriving at the concert at about 730 PM where I had left at ~3 PM. Ridiculous.
But back to the show. There were a few alright opening acts, none particularly memorable but sufficiently down-tuned and bass-heavy, but this night was more or less given to Corrupted, as it should be wherever they play. A lot of people have misconceptions about metal, mostly centered around the fact that without any knowledge of the various different subgenres contained within, you can't really begin analyzing the numerous aspects of that most unholy of monikers (METALLLLLL). There's thrash, death, sludge, fantasy, prog, heavy, and many more, but the most affecting of them all, in my opinion, is the one known as doom metal, and this is due partially to its black-sheepish-ness. A lot of metal IS played fast, this is no lie. Doom metal, for the most part, lies outside of that realm. Where Napalm Death said "we can be mind-boggilingly technical and STILL be all kinds of bad ass", Doom opted to pursue the almighty riff that bands like Sabbath and Zeppelin put to use (mostly leaning towards the former), so instead of executing you with a flurry of searing solos and yelped/grunted vocals, Doom seeks to crush yr will to live by dragging you down to the deepest, darkest depths of an ocean of tar. What that all means is, Doom tends to be much slower than all other kinds of metal, and delivers its brutality through detuned guitars, sunn amps cranked to 11, and the patience to meditate on a riff or even single note instead of working the fretboard; it is the definition of "heavy".
And Corrupted is the king of Doom. Though they are Japanese, they choose to sing mostly in Spanish (don't ask me why), and have looooooong segments of quiet accented with the pluck of a string here and there. Time ceases to exist with these guys, and they'll lull you into a false calm for great lengths of time, and then kaBAM, they stomp on their pedals, and with pick in hand stroke, one, two or maybe even three of the most dissonant, soul-crushingly heavy progressions, and all the while they have become loud enough to skin a goat. Their vocalist has an impressively deep voice for this kind of music, and while the long passages of him uttering incomprehensible bubbling-oil-speak are interesting by themselves, they serve merely to accent they sheer monolith of sonic doom that this band creates. Theirs is a music that goes beyond words, that describes something of the human condition so deep and dark that language ceases to suffice and all we are left with through their music is an impression that evil exists, and that something is very, very wrong. Its quite moving, and totally metal.
So then Halloween was the next day, and I spent most of the night at a bar in Shinjuku called Current. When bands tour in Tokyo, they tend to end up at Current, so a lot people there are in the know and are relatively connected. I went there with a Norwegian friend, Chris, who's in a band called Zombie Blasphemy. Not too much to tell, met some new people, danced with some ladies, drank beer, put lots of fake blood on my face and arms, you know the routine. All in all a real fun night.
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Sick!
I'm pretty sure I'm sick. I can't be sure,probably because I haven't been legitimately sick in god-knows how long, but I know I my nose is congested, I'm coughing and sneezing a lot, and my head hurts. Good thing I'm not placed otherwise I'd be tempted to take a work day off (ししし). But other than that things are going super rad over here. Since I'm trying to find a real job aside from this McJob of Asia that is "teaching english", I've been doing a bit of mixing business and pleasure and have started connecting with some bands and some promoters during and outside of concerts, and they've been introducing me to other's in that scene. There's one guy especially, puts together a lot of shows in Shinokubo's Earthdom, that really knows his stuff and he's been quit forthcoming with the probably-juvenile questions I have about getting shows put together/asking bands to come over from abroad. Its going slow, but I'm learning a bit and, at least, meeting a whole slew of different people so I figure its a pretty good thing I've got going (plus being guest-listed drastically reduces entrance fees).
But for the most part I'm still bumming around Kashiwa, bidding my time in the company of locals and co-workers while I continue to wait to be placed. Its not bad at all, and I decided, at least for now, to stay up here rather than move down to Tokyo proper - why? I figure even though I'd be spending a good deal less on housing, I'd be spending a lot more on everything else, and its also kind of a pain in the ass because I'd have to re-register myself at the post-office/bank, and with the local authorities. This is made doubly painful by the fact that its probably at most only for a few weeks, and I'd prefer it if things didn't get lost in the mail etc.
But for the most part I'm still bumming around Kashiwa, bidding my time in the company of locals and co-workers while I continue to wait to be placed. Its not bad at all, and I decided, at least for now, to stay up here rather than move down to Tokyo proper - why? I figure even though I'd be spending a good deal less on housing, I'd be spending a lot more on everything else, and its also kind of a pain in the ass because I'd have to re-register myself at the post-office/bank, and with the local authorities. This is made doubly painful by the fact that its probably at most only for a few weeks, and I'd prefer it if things didn't get lost in the mail etc.
Sunday, October 11, 2009
Escapades
Recap of recent events: a coworker got fired, I sat next to Sumo on a train, I saw a really drunk Japanese guy get ultra-manhandled by the cops, someone rolled in vomit, I ate Whale, and I'm still not placed. Crazy times over here, fortunately nothing at all bad has happened to me. I haven't yet moved, but am going in to talk to the guy who is subletting the house tomorrow at about 10 AM. Its in Denenchoufu, which is actually a pretty wealthy area, and also houses a number of politicians, PM Hatoyama included.
I got some new cans today, so now I can boil 3x as much water. This is a very good thing, considering I also decided that instead of eating instant noodles all day everyday, I should be eating more fresh vegetables and fish. So Now I get boiled vegetables and fish. Simple? Yeah, but hey it gets me by, especially considering that after 8 PM most of the fish in the supermarket is marked of half price. For example, I got about a half pound of norwegian Mackerel for about 2 dollars. And there are always wicked cheap vegetables to be had at the end of the day.
I'm getting really bad with this not posting pictures thing.
Oh, and in about 2 months my friend's having a boy (holy shit I have friends who are pregnant and married??) and that boy will be dressed in the best steelers-baby-clothes that money at Kohl's can buy. Go Pittsburgh.
I got some new cans today, so now I can boil 3x as much water. This is a very good thing, considering I also decided that instead of eating instant noodles all day everyday, I should be eating more fresh vegetables and fish. So Now I get boiled vegetables and fish. Simple? Yeah, but hey it gets me by, especially considering that after 8 PM most of the fish in the supermarket is marked of half price. For example, I got about a half pound of norwegian Mackerel for about 2 dollars. And there are always wicked cheap vegetables to be had at the end of the day.
I'm getting really bad with this not posting pictures thing.
Oh, and in about 2 months my friend's having a boy (holy shit I have friends who are pregnant and married??) and that boy will be dressed in the best steelers-baby-clothes that money at Kohl's can buy. Go Pittsburgh.
Thursday, October 1, 2009
It's been a while
Sorry about that. Was I busy? Was I working? was I out too often? Was I sitting in my room? I can't really tell you - its been going by pretty fast up until now. I was placed as a sub for this week (last day is tomorrow) in a middle school in Otsu, near Kyoto. Ridiculous part is, not only did a girl I was friends with at training get placed in the same city, but I also studied abroad right near there for a semester, so I'm very comfortable here. And so far, I've been having a great time - all the kids are realllllly excited over me, and the general way things work is that a horde of little girls will come up to me, giggle for a bit, and then say "Ku-ru" or "kakkoi" (yr cool), and then ask me a bunch of questions and get excited about my answers (you should've seen their faces when I said I lived about 2.5 hours away from Lake Erie - totally, and 100% over-the-top hyper-excitment. I thought they'd break glass with the shrieks they let out), and the boys generally ask me 2 questions, one always followed by the other: Do you like X? Do you LOVE X??? They pay attention though, and are mostly pretty good students (though a few will be not-asleep, but catatonic in their decisiveness to remain silent and non-participating).
The teachers I'm with are all wonderful, though there is one who makes me... uneasy. She's not mean or anything, but there's just something about her teaching style and overall demeanor that throws me off.
So on to the interesting things in the classroom during my week in Otsu. There are 2 that are worth mentioning, and I'll do so in chronological order. The 2nd day I was here, I learned just how inept I am at drawing, especially on a chalk board. During an introduction to the kids, I mentioned that I like playing guitar, and then went on to try to draw one on the board. What resulted went beyond innuendo, or even being suggestive, and was really just offensive. It took me a minute to realize what exactly I had done, and upon doing so quickly erased it and moved on, but there were a few kids chuckling to themselves, wondering if I actually had just drawn what they thought I had just drawn. Fortunately, nothing came of this.
Number two was way less funny and almost tear-jerkingly sad/awkward. Today (thursday), I had to teach a class that had as part of their schedule a test on how they had done memorizing a short story. It was called "A Mother's Lullaby," and was about a dying little girl sitting under a tree holding a smaller, dying-er (later dead) boy looking at all of the charred bodies shortly after the bomb had dropped on Hiroshima. What made it worse is that this class must have had a lot of kids with allergies or something, so AS I'M BASICALLY YELLING AT THEM (you have to speak loud to be understood) ABOUT HOW THE U.S. NUKED THE SHIT OUT OF THEIR GRANDPARENTS THERE ARE A BUNCH OF KIDS WITH THEIR HEADS DOWN (reading) AND SNIFFLING. I'm not sure exactly what the word is to describe how that felt (or the ensuing test, which was student after student coming up to me and reciting one of 4 passages from this story), but it was weird, and it was very bad.
I guess its also kind of ironic that just before I came to this middle school, I found and started to really enjoy a band called 中学生棺桶, or Middle Schooler's Coffin/s. I get to see them live soon!
The teachers I'm with are all wonderful, though there is one who makes me... uneasy. She's not mean or anything, but there's just something about her teaching style and overall demeanor that throws me off.
So on to the interesting things in the classroom during my week in Otsu. There are 2 that are worth mentioning, and I'll do so in chronological order. The 2nd day I was here, I learned just how inept I am at drawing, especially on a chalk board. During an introduction to the kids, I mentioned that I like playing guitar, and then went on to try to draw one on the board. What resulted went beyond innuendo, or even being suggestive, and was really just offensive. It took me a minute to realize what exactly I had done, and upon doing so quickly erased it and moved on, but there were a few kids chuckling to themselves, wondering if I actually had just drawn what they thought I had just drawn. Fortunately, nothing came of this.
Number two was way less funny and almost tear-jerkingly sad/awkward. Today (thursday), I had to teach a class that had as part of their schedule a test on how they had done memorizing a short story. It was called "A Mother's Lullaby," and was about a dying little girl sitting under a tree holding a smaller, dying-er (later dead) boy looking at all of the charred bodies shortly after the bomb had dropped on Hiroshima. What made it worse is that this class must have had a lot of kids with allergies or something, so AS I'M BASICALLY YELLING AT THEM (you have to speak loud to be understood) ABOUT HOW THE U.S. NUKED THE SHIT OUT OF THEIR GRANDPARENTS THERE ARE A BUNCH OF KIDS WITH THEIR HEADS DOWN (reading) AND SNIFFLING. I'm not sure exactly what the word is to describe how that felt (or the ensuing test, which was student after student coming up to me and reciting one of 4 passages from this story), but it was weird, and it was very bad.
I guess its also kind of ironic that just before I came to this middle school, I found and started to really enjoy a band called 中学生棺桶, or Middle Schooler's Coffin/s. I get to see them live soon!
Thursday, September 24, 2009
Ramen
I figure I shouldn't buy anything substantial in the way of home furnishing/decorating/usefulness, so until I'm placed I'll be eating 100 yen ramen with water I've boiled in a used soup can.
Monday, September 21, 2009
Moved In (Kind of)
So now I'm in Chiba. A small town called Sakasai, to be exact. Not a bad spot, pretty residential though. The only problem is that Interac is kind of taking us for a ride on this one - our station is about a 50 minute ride outside of Tokyo, and we're here because of the living costs of the big city. Right now, on a pro-rated quasi-lease, we're paying 81000 Yen/month, which is OK for the Tokyo area but ridiculous for the family-friendly suburban area we're holing up in. And I'm probably going to be here for 2 months or so (granted, at that point it'll be more or less Interac paying for me to live here without me doing any work). It's a big chunk of change out of my pocket, and I'm a bit put off by it, so me and a few other co-"workers" are scoping out some other options.
Oh,, but the real kicker for this week is the holiday: Including the weekend, its 5 days long, and only because in Japanese law (so I hear) if there are 2 separate holidays with one day in between them, that middle day must also be taken off. Normally, this wouldn't suck (again, in Tokyo everything would be more or less OK), but out here every bank and post-office (aka bank) is closed until Thursday, so I can't exchange bills, cash travelers checks, or even charge my credit account for a withdrawl. So at the moment, for the next 2 days, I have about 4K Yen in my pocket. Doable, but annoying.
Oh,, but the real kicker for this week is the holiday: Including the weekend, its 5 days long, and only because in Japanese law (so I hear) if there are 2 separate holidays with one day in between them, that middle day must also be taken off. Normally, this wouldn't suck (again, in Tokyo everything would be more or less OK), but out here every bank and post-office (aka bank) is closed until Thursday, so I can't exchange bills, cash travelers checks, or even charge my credit account for a withdrawl. So at the moment, for the next 2 days, I have about 4K Yen in my pocket. Doable, but annoying.
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