SUMO STRUT

First the naked man festival, now sumo: a theme for this year seems to be emerging, namely ogling nude men in Japan.  I made my first foray into the sport of sumo wrestling this past weekend, and found it to be surprisingly interesting (compared to the 4 hours I spent at my first kabuki play, which I will never get back).  In Roald Dahl's classic, The BFG, the female protagonist, Sophie, is kidnapped and taken to Giant Country, where she is terrified by the horde of tall, hairy, smelly, man-eating behemoths in loincloths.  In this sense, sumo is a lot like being lost in Giant Country, except instead of eating human beings, wrestlers are fattened up on chanko nabe, an exceptionally fatty kind of soup.  Sumo began some 1500 years ago, and originally was a Shinto ritual beseeching good harvests.  Sumo is fought in a ring called a dohyo, which is about 15 feet in diameter, a raised platform of rice sacks.  Above the dohyo is suspended a roof resembling that of a Shinto shrine.  

This 6 pack is not for the squeamish

Pre-tournament ritual

The bout begins with stretches and the sumo strut.  Facing the audience, wrestlers raise one leg at a time, only to slam it down, hard.  They purify their mouths with water, wipe their bodies with a towel, and throw handfuls of salt into the ring to purify it.  They then enter the ring itself, do more leg slams, and scowl at each other as they squat, butts out.  Each wrestler lays a fist on the ground; first one, and then the other.  When both sets of fists are on the ground, the match can start, unless one wrestler quickly takes his fist from the floor, and goes off for more stretching, water, and salt-throwing.  This is supposed to be part of an elaborate process of psychological warfare.  Really, it's a rather tedious 4 minutes of waiting for the initial clash.  

Stomp

The fights themselves are quick, sometimes just a couple of seconds.  A match is won when a wrestler either touches the floor of the ring with something other than his feet, or moves outside of it.  Balance is perhaps the most important skill, and many victors win simply by using their opponent's weight against him.  As one wrestler rushes at the other, the second man quickly steps back and lets his opponent make a face plant on the floor. There are other popular maneuvers as well, including flipping, pushing, and grabbing hold of an opponent's mawashi (sumo diaper), and yanking on it, creating a giant wedgie.  Some contestants are so strong that they can literally pick their opponent up and place him on his feet outside of the ring.  Kicking in the stomach or chest, punching, hair pulling, eye gouging and choking are not permitted.  Slapping is allowed, however, and some of the lower-ranking matches resembled a slap fight more than a wrestling match.     

Flip

Wedgie

Push

Most surprising? There are a ton of foreign wrestlers who participate in sumo.  One of the poster boys (literally) for the sport is a 6'8" blond haired, blue eyed mammoth Mongolian.  The only foreigner I saw win a match was a Belgian, and the audience's reaction was more fitting for an English cricket party than a stadium affair.  Conversely, when the 8 or so other foreign competitors lost, Japanese fans were up on their feet, cheering and clapping.  

Beginning in 2010, the honor of sumo has been sullied by multiple confirmed charges of match fixing.  A range of people have been implicated, from tournament officials to the wrestlers themselves.  A lot of the match rigging has occurred in connection with the notorious yakuza, who run most of the gambling outfits in Japan.  Since sumo is considered the national pastime, many people, including Prime Minister Naoto Kan, have perceived this skulduggery as an affront against the Japanese people.  Judging by the crowds, however, the scandals haven't deterred the fans.   

GUESS WHO'S COMING TO DINNER

Cross-cultural dating isn't common in Japan, but when you do see it, 98% of the time it's Japanese girls with western guys.  There is apparently a dearth of relationships between foreign girls and Japanese guys.  I've heard more than a few stories of JETs who thought they had a Japanese boyfriend, only to find out that they were being used for English practice.  And although Japanese men love to flirt with western women, few of them seem keen to bring home a foreign girlfriend to introduce to their families, even men who have lived abroad for some period of time.  

Of the foreign male/Japanese female pairings, some of these couples end up getting married and stay in Japan, while others relocate to the groom's home country.** More often than not, the male half of these inter-cultural relationships would not be considered the most eligible of bachelors in their countries of origin, but they manage to do excessively well here (though that luck can run out).  I was introduced to a strange and handsome outgoing ALT when I arrived, who was proud of his Cassanova reputation (and true to form, he hit on me within a few minutes of our first meeting).  However, when he left JET, he was dismayed to find that he did not have as much success with the ladies of his homeland as he did with his Japanese girlfriends.  It seems that the lines that work on Japanese girls don't translate into other cultures.   

Particularly curious are the men of questionable sexual orientation who date and even marry Japanese women.  [I can't actually confirm that these guys are gay, but the very fact they set off my non-existent gaydar is compelling evidence.]  I once read that this was due to the fact that Japanese women's bodies are often fairly androgynous.  However, one of my friends here offered a different theory: "Yeah, gay men marry Japanese women because after they get married and have kids, couples pretty much stop having sex.  The houses are so small that often the kids sleep with the parents, so it's kind of a perfect arrangement for guys who are in the closet."  Mystery solved?    

**Out of curiosity, I asked someone whether women are considered "tainted" after their relationships end with western men, as it seems unlikely to me that westerners would commit to a celibate relationship the way some Japanese men might. Apparently this isn't much of an issue, as pre-marital sex is not uncommon in Japan.  I was a little curious as to how couples manage this when everyone lives with their parents until marriage, but apparently, this is the #1 purpose of love hotels.  

LIP MY STOCKINGS

Today's post is sure to make my mother squirm, assuming that she's even reading this.  So this week we're going to be examining some of Japan's most bizarre fetishes, which are not for the faint of heart.  Most of the stuff I'm including is pretty tame (I'm too scared to research the hardcore stuff), and I'm not going to provide links to anything that really crosses a line.  Which is A LOT, as it so happens.  Anyone who's seen "Lost in Translation" will probably remember the awkward encounter of Bill Murray and an unknown Japanese woman in his hotel room.  He's mystified as to what she's doing there, and why she keeps telling him to "lip my stockings."  She seems to be trying to seduce him, but any time his hand so much as grazes her person, she collapses in a heap of flailing arms and limbs, shouting "No, Mr. Bob Halis, no!" before trying to pull him closer.  We infer that she believes that some men are attracted to women who flirt and then protest.  That's weird, right?  Turns out it's only the tip of the iceberg.

I was surprised to learn as I was preparing to move here that there are certain goods that expats recommend you bring with you to Japan, because you either can't find them here, or they are not the same strength as products from home.  Toothpaste, deodorant, tampons, and aspirin are all on the list.  However, there are some things that you may really want to have in Japan, but aren't allowed to bring in, including cold medicine, over-the-counter allergy meds, and porn.  Several males were very matter-of-fact: "I mean, they have porn in Japan, but the laws don't allow them to show specific body parts like genitalia, so all of it's kind of blurred.  So, um, yeah.  That's why they won't let you bring in western porn, because they don't blur stuff.  So if you want that kind of stuff, you'll have to have someone send it to you in the mail.  But it could still be confiscated by customs, so be aware of that." Catholic friend MB was dismayed to find a cache of his predecessor's porn contraband as he was cleaning out his apartment.  He told me, "I mean, I don't why the guy couldn't have just thrown it out when he left. Or taken it with him, you know? It's not like it's illegal in his home country." He looked at the pile and shuddered a little.  Not that the embargo on pornography really matters, since you can get real, live sexy times at select locations throughout the country. 

The list of things that Japanese men purportedly find to be a turn on (because who cares what women like) would mystify even Freud.  Last week, I mentioned body pillows and life-sized plastic dolls.  Vending machines selling (used) panties are also a fad in some major cities.  Other usual suspects include school girl uniforms, baby doll dresses, knee-high stockings, and the like. From there, the predilections go off in all sorts of tangents.  Here's a selection of the most memorable: 

1. Diapers.  There are many schools of the diaper fetish.  Some involve the apparent allure of urinating on oneself; others revolve around men wearing a diaper and being babied by women.  In bebigyaru ("baby girl"), women wear the diapers and parade around in front of men.  

They're so slimming
From www.9ghealthfoods.com

2. Face farting.  I trust this is self-explanatory.

From www.dannychoo.com

3. Cat slapping.  Taken from the English term "cat fight," cat slapping celebrates women hitting each other across the face.  It's considered particularly sporting to watch porn actresses walk through the streets slapping unsuspecting women.   

4. Fish/food.  A guy from vice.com (the website pretty much says it all) did an interview with a Japanese pornographer who has been incorporating different "foods" into the making of his films.  To be clear, there is no bestiality involved,** though I'm sure PETA would have a fit (some of the foods are eaten alive during the shoot, others are inserted into various orifices, etc).  The producer argues that there is a niche for watching women covered in worms, insects, fish, and frogs.  The still shots that are shown in the clip are pretty outrageous, but weirdly artistic, as though Tim Burton were chosen to direct a shoot for Playboy.  However, when the interviewer pays the producer the compliment of saying, "These are actually kind of artistic. Is this about art for you?," the producer muses for a moment before replying, "Mmm, some people ask me if this is art.  For me, it is not art.  It is just pornography."  So much for trying to elevate his work. The vice video is prurient enough that I'm not going to link to it.  If you really want to gross yourself out, you can search for "Genki and the Art of Eel Porn."

**That ickiness is reserved for a Japanese phenomenon called "tentacle rape."  Apparently some men, including renowned woodblock print artist Katsushika Hokusai, found the idea of women and octopi or squid getting frisky with one another to be quite appealing.  Hokusai's "The Dream of the Fisherman's Wife" (maybe don't click on this link at work) is a prime example of this progressive relationship. 

5. Teeth.  Men watch women brush their teeth, floss, undergo dental exams and x-rays, or enjoy a meal (though I can't imagine watching someone eat corn on the cob would be all that appealing, even if you had a fetish for teeth).

THE MEA CULPA AND THE NOT QUITE

A few weeks ago, I mentioned a story from This American Life that covered the conditions of factories in China that happen to make Apple products.  Since then, a number of related stories have followed, including a front page spread in The New York Times.  Petitions have gone up, urging Apple to make an audit of their factories, which they have started.  Then last week, TAL issued a retraction of their original story, saying that the source of their material (a one-man show by a guy named Mike Daisey) had numerous discrepancies. To wit, Daisey had lied about several details in his show, some more egregious than others.  TAL is doing an entire show dedicated to retracting the first podcast, and to separate the lies from the truth.  

I think TAL has acted honorably in their retraction, and they acknowledge that although they fact checked as much as they could have before broadcasting the story initially, there were holes that should have made them shelve it.  Examining what's been written about the whole debacle, it seems most people have come down on the side of TAL, and feel that Daisey should have been more forthcoming about his material and how he secured it.  The sad thing is that there are many objectionable practices going on in factories like Foxconn, things that can be independently verified by watchdog and humanitarian organizations.  Unfortunately, these stories get overshadowed when people (Daisey) embellish their reports.  Some argue that snafus like this can even hinder US-China relations, allowing China to shake a finger at the US media for smearing them with biased stories.   

What I find really galling is Daisey's response to these revelations.  He says he regrets allowing TAL to air his story under the guise of journalism, but that he stands by its accuracy.  He claims that the standards of theatre are not the same as those of journalism, making his embellishments art, not lies.  This seems disingenuous to me, to put out a chronological narrative, to characterize these moments as actual events, and then when caught having fabricated details, say that fictional liberties were taken in the pursuit of raising awareness through art. I'm going to let Mike Daisey have the last word on this, in a quote from his act that turned out to be true: "And she [Cathy, his interpreter in China] says, you will lie to them [the factories]. And I say, yes Cathy, I'm going to lie to lots of people."

"I GUESS YOU ARE AMERICAN"

Japan celebrates the vernal equinox with a national holiday, which this year fell on March 20th　(also my uncle's birthday!  Happy Birthday, Uncle Stu).  Instead of going forth to learn more about Japan, I chose to make the two hour slog to my new Mecca: Costco.  En route, Bearded AL made the comment that he disparages bulk foods outfits like Costco and Sam's Club in the States.  They are, he argues, a symptom of what's wrong with the country: gross consumerism, wastefulness, rant rant rant.  However, 2 minutes into Costco, and all his qualms were forgotten.  Applying for membership was fairly painless, save for having to watch countless carts of Kettle potato chips, sheet cakes, rolls, and other sundries pass by.  The line was predominantly made up of Japanese people, although there was a Peruvian family and another Western couple waiting as well.  We traded knowing smiles with one another, as if to say, "Yes, this is where we belong, isn't it?" When we crossed the threshold with our new cards, I suddenly felt as though I loved everyone in the world.

We made an excellent decision to eat lunch in the Costco cafeteria before shopping.  The cafeteria was mobbed; people were literally squatting on the floor, eating their food.  I took comfort in the American decor: concrete floors, stainless steel relish and onion dispensers, the floor littered with dropped bits of food and spilled liquids.  At first it was hard to decide what to order: pizza or a hot dog? There was also a bulgoki option, but that seemed like sacrilege at Costco.  I opted for a giant slice of New York-style pizza, the kind that you have to fold in half to eat, but only after you let some of the grease drop off and pool on your plate.  One slice of pizza was $3.  The western-sized soda cups (with free refills!) were $1.*** We bought our lunches, walked 3 feet from the register, sat down on the cold Costco floor, and devoured every last morsel.  And then got a refill.  Then there was a quick stop at the toilets.  More joy ensued.  All the toilets were western-style! There was soap at the sinks [not a given in Japan]! The faucets gushed warm water [all water here is cold, to save on heating costs]!!  All of this augured well for the rest of the Costco experience.    

The next hour and a half passed quickly and incomprehensibly.  Things, so many things!, were thrown into the cart for purchase.  There were victories (bagels!) and failures (no pie or baking mixes).  We ran into Brendon, the English-speaking manager, who told us that if we had difficulty finding anything, we should let him know, and he would tell us why they didn't have it.  We debated over how many things we could load ourselves down with and still make the 30 minute walk back to the train station.  We giggled like children over pasta sauce, cereal, and hot cocoa powder.  And finally, we were done.  We grabbed one last refill and hobbled to the station, still high on Costco adrenaline.  But we'll be back.  Next time with a giant roller bag.       

Gone, but not forgotten

 ***A few things to put into perspective: first, a Japanese medium size drink is the equivalent of a western small.  A small, personal-sized pizza is typically $15.  A can of coke from a vending machine is $2.  

BESAME MUCHO

The plum blossoms are here!

This title for this week's post goes out to the third year student who asked me to kiss him.  Apparently becoming a high school senior makes you both cocky and delusional.  A few days later I was treated to the attentions of a different student, who gave me his business card.  Never having owned business cards of my own, I felt a little out-classed by this 17 year-old.  Not to mention the fact that the last time a male gave me his card under an amorous pretext, he was about 26, and the card featured a clipart cartoon of Homer Simpson kicking a soccer ball.  

YOU'VE GOT A FRIEND IN ME

The BBC's website recently featured an interesting article on the ways in which people in Japan pay money for companionship and connection with another (not necessarily living) being.  The rented friends run a gamut, from playing with cats or dogs at a cafe, to single mothers who pay men to act as surrogate fathers.  These dads-for-hire help children with homework, take them on outings, mediate disputes with neighbors, and even pose with the moms as a happy couple for school interviews.  To me, this has all trappings of a potential Hollywood romcom: unemployed male meets hardworking single mom and falls in love with her and her offspring.  It's only time before Harvey Weinstein picks this one up and starts production.

Then there are the more salacious encounters, not all of which are sexual.  Some men employ women as hostesses at dinner, to provide conversation, flattery, and an empathetic ear.  Prostitution and escort services do of course exist, but flesh and blood partners are not a requisite for sexual gratification.  In fact, some popular Japanese fetishes include life-like plastic dolls, and even body pillows (as seen on a great episode of 30 Rock, featuring James Franco as a celebrity with a secret passion for his body pillow girlfriend, Komiko).  Stay tuned for a future post on other Japanese fetishes, which can be anything from creepy to hilarious to flat-out disgusting.

Despite ample opportunities for human interaction, particularly in urban areas, many people here still feel isolated and alone.  This may be a result of overwork limiting the amount of time people have to socialize, or an intrinsic shyness that pervades society.  A finger can also be pointed at technology, where cell phones, video games, online chatting, and anime (Japanese cartoons) take the place of face-to-face conversation, and cause people to become withdrawn, awkward, and in extreme cases can even lead to death.  Regardless of the causes, the fact that some people are so lonely that they have to pay in order to pretend they have a pet breaks my hardened heart.  Even The Grinch had Max!  

I'm pretty sure that heaven is redolent with the smell of plum blossoms

WE'RE REDNECKS, WE'RE REDNECKS...

When I first got to Japan, I received an invitation to a prefectural event.  Under "location" was written, "We'll meet at the yanki Lawson's and walk over from there."  Apparently there are two Lawson's stores in this small town, one of which is a major meeting place for the yankis.  Lawson's is a popular convenience store chain, like 7-11, but I had no idea what a yanki Lawson's was.  Yanki is a word based on the English word "yankee," and refers to a certain kind of Japanese subculture that's fairly common in my prefecture.  As the grannies in my adult English conversation group put it,  "They have their hair dyed, pierced ears.  They wear glittery things.  They look very flashy. They are also very young."  Another granny piped up, "Like hooligans!" An American equivalent would be the cast of "Jersey Shore," if they all rode motorcycles and hung out at convenience stores. 

At graduation this year, I had an opportunity to observe grown up yankis.  The father was dressed very nattily in a tightly tailored three piece suit.  He looked like a stockbroker, until you looked closer and saw his triple pierced ears and the heavy steel wallet chain that snaked down the side of his pants.  Then there was the mother, who had dyed her hair auburn, caked her face in makeup, and could barely see out of her thick, fake caterpillar-like eyelashes.  She sat for most of the ceremony trying to navigate her iPhone to take pictures, a process made difficult by her horrifically long nails, which had been filed into claws.  (I saw a woman with a similar manicure on the train the other day, and lived in fear of the moment that she might skewer the sweet and perfect baby who was strapped to her front.)  However, in some ways it's true that people are the same the world over, and when this couple's daughter walked by in the graduation procession, Yanki Papa leaped up with the camera and started taking photos, while mom waved proudly.  

 

ONE YEAR LATER

March 11, 2012 marks the one year anniversary of the giant earthquake and tsunami that devastated the Tohoku region of Japan.  Twelve months later, the situation is still pretty grim.  Over the past year, thousands of volunteers have come to help clear out the area and take the first steps in restoring homes, businesses and infrastructure.   Though a great deal of progress has been made in rehabilitating the area, recovery has proved elusive.  The local economy has stagnated as most of the working population, particularly those in their 20s-40s, have moved elsewhere in order to find jobs.  This made for a particularly difficult winter for the elderly population, who have been forced to fend for themselves, not just in putting their homes to right, but also in dealing with the snow and foul weather.  

There are a number of words bandied about in connection with the tsunami.  Denizens of Tohoku were praised for their gaman (forbearance), as they stoically went about putting their lives back together.  The disaster also created a national sense of kizuna, or bond.  Several people have told me that the quake reaffirmed for the country the importance of family and solidarity.  The most prevalent word, however, has been "Gambatte!" Gambatte is a bit difficult to translate.  The Japanese think of it as "Do your best," though I think there's an undercurrent of "Good luck!" as well.  Precise definitions aside, this is the word that most irks people in Tohoku, many of whom are sick of words and are looking for action, like assistance with practical tasks such as disposing of debris, reconstruction, etc.  

Perhaps the most prominent Japan-related story in the news has been the nuclear power plant at Fukushima. The plant continues to grapple with unstable reactors, sinister radiation levels, and the question of what could happen in the case of another earthquake or tsunami. However, the greatest danger may be TEPCO, a utility company that controls electric power in the greater Tokyo area, and owns and administrates the Fukushima Daiichi plant. Jake Adelstein, an American journalist who has gained great notoriety in Japan and elsewhere for his coverage of the yakuza (Japanese mob), writes that there has been a push within the government to nationalize Fukushima Daiichi and wrest it from the control of TEPCO. Their concern lies not in a fear of an imminent meltdown, but rather TEPCO's cozy ties with the yakuza. It seems that a number of yakuza associates are currently employed at the plant, and as one senator of the Diet said, "TEPCO's involvement with anti-social forces and their inability to filter them out of the work-place is a national security issue. It is one reason that increasingly in the Diet we are talking de facto nationalization of the company. Nuclear energy shouldn't be in the hands of the yakuza. They're gamblers and an intelligent person doesn't want them to have atomic dice to play with." There don't seem to be any immediate plans to nationalize Fukushima Daiichi, but we'll see what the next year brings.     

HOW TO MAKE TOFU

March is a month-long hiatus from classes, although teachers are still required to come to work as usual.  This week some of the staff decided to kick off the break by making tofu from scratch.  Wildest spring break ever.  I was conscripted into service for several hours; making tofu is time-consuming, but remarkably easy.  You leave dried soy beans to soak overnight, and then the next day, stick them in a blender with some water, and juice them until you have soy milk.  You boil the milk, and then place the fluid in a cotton bag (like a pillow case, for example).  Squeeze the milk from the bag, leaving a hefty amount of soy sediment behind.  "I've never milked a cow before, but this is what I imagine it would be like," said one of the teachers.  Put the milk back on the stove and bring it to a boil again.  Then turn off the heat, and take a slotted spoon and sift through the milk to find the soy curd.  This is your tofu.  Put the curds inside a cloth in a square wooden box, and allow this to sit in cold water for several hours and solidify.  Then, presto: tofu!

The remarkable thing about this process was that nothing was let go to waste.  The soy sediment is used in soups, and the last dregs of the soy milk were drunk in large mugs.  The Japanese make the Native Americans look wasteful.

Soy milk

Ladle into bags

Tofu!

APROPOS OF NOTHING

For all my fellow word nerds, the OED has an article on the Japanese words that are becoming mainstream in English. The biggest surprise? Tycoon!

CONGRATS, CLASS OF 2012

Today marked the official end of the school year, and the graduation ceremony for our third year class. The event was quite a do; the gym was decorated with flowers, golden screens, and a red carpet.  All the teachers were turned out in their nicest suits.  The principal even wore a morning suit.  I had a number of questions about the affair, which I later posed to my adult English conversation group, affectionately dubbed "the grannies."  The conversation that followed was an interesting discussion on nationalism in Japan, Japanese rednecks, and square dancing.

It started with an observation I made about the Japanese national anthem, which I had never heard before.  The song is very short, and sung slowly and in a low octave, so that it sounds more like a dirge than a jingoistic jingle.  Called "Kimigayo," it is essentially an ode to the emperor.  Translated, it says:

May the reign of the Emperor
continue for a thousand, nay, eight thousand generations
and for the eternity that it takes
for small pebbles to grow into a great rock
and become covered with moss.

The subject of the emperor made me segue to another question concerning a trivia game a fellow ALT had made up for one of her classes.  One of the answers was the name of the emperor.  Her teacher told her later that they were not allowed to mention or discuss the emperor in class, that it was "too nationalistic."  When I asked the grannies why this was the case, they launched into a long explanation involving the end of WWII and the rise of communism.  Like many countries, Japan has a trinity of national symbols: a leader (traditionally, the emperor), an anthem (Kimigayo, an ode to the emperor), and a flag (hinomaru).  The red dot of the Japanese flag symbolizes the sun, but that also is associated with the emperor, who is considered the descendant of the god, and the Japanese are the chosen people of god.  With me so far? However, for many people, this trifecta is not a benevolent one, particularly following WWII, when the Japanese brutally invaded parts of eastern Asia (mainly China and Korea), and left some lasting scars.  As Beatles granny put it: "Japan's flag, and the anthem, and the emperor are symbolic figures of imperialism." This led to some dark associations for many Chinese and Koreans, but for some Japanese as well.  In Okinawa, for example, the flag is a reminder of WWII and the subsequent establishment of the US military on the island (which Okinawans despise).  Some people, including many within the teachers union in Japan, are communists who object to the emperor on political grounds, and therefore refuse to honor the national flag or sing the country's anthem. Thus, these symbols have become a major source of contention at schools and within Japanese society as a whole, to a point where it is unusual to see the Japanese flag flown in places other than government buildings.  When I told the grannies that one of my neighbors flies two flags during national holidays, they were taken aback, and told me this was very unusual.  One granny told me that 25 years ago, there was a scuffle in her town when a communist teacher lowered the flag at school. Riot police had to be called out, and the children were forced to stay home for several days until tensions cooled.   

At one point, we veered off into talking about school dances, and they wanted to know what kinds of steps people are taught in the United States.  We talked a little about ballroom dancing, but I acknowledged that most people don't really know how to ballroom dance.  "There is something called square dancing, though," I said, "Which is mainly done in the South, but it's a fun way for lots of people to dance together to the same steps."  Some of my grannies started reminiscing about their elementary school days, when they were taught how to folk dance.  I asked them what folk dancing in Japan looks like, and High Tech Granny started to perform a search on her iPad.  "Do you know the Oklahoma song?" another asked.  "Like the musical Oklahoma?" I responded.  "Mmm...it goes [starts humming 'Turkey in the Hay']."  High Tech Granny then pulled up the following video, which left me speechless for several seconds:

Finally, all I could get out was, "But...that's...they're SQUARE DANCING!" It was a perfect moment of cultural exchange and minds blown.  How square dancing became a fad in Japan, we may never know.  But it's a beautiful thing.  

SPRING FEVER

If reports around school are any indicator, a heinous plague is about to befall the entirety of Japan.  DL was wrestling with a cold in early February, which prompted Yosh sensei to gleefully speculate that he might be suffering from kafunsho.  "What's that?" asked DL.  "It's an illness that you get in the spring," replied Yosh.  "Oh, you mean like allergies?"  "No.  This is much worse than allergies. This is a sickness where you get a headache, and your eyes itch, and your ears itch, and your nose is always wet."  Ah, I see.

Kafunsho, or hay fever, is triggered mainly by pollen from the hectares of cedar trees that were planted throughout Japan in the 1950s.  The wood was intended for rebuilding efforts following WWII; however, when it became clear that it was cheaper to import foreign lumber, the trees were left to proliferate, along with an allergy-stricken population.  On the bright side, hay fever has spawned a booming industry of antihistamines, inhalers, herbal teas, eye drops, nasal sprays, protective goggles, face masks, online pollen monitoring systems, etc. These remedies are but one slice of the pie of what I term the seasonal products of Japan.  In summer, there are racks of sweat towels, big hats, umbrellas, and sunscreen.  Starting in the fall and extending through winter, these goods are then replaced by hot patches for every conceivable part of the body, hot water bottles, electric blankets, kerosene stoves, layers of thermal underwear, protective face masks, and tissues.  (Just don't blow your nose in public, which can strike terror into those around you.)  However, it seems to me that at least two of the three sources discomfort (heat and cold) could be easily circumvented with...insulation!  Instead, the government is reportedly bent on tackling the harbinger of the third cause of seasonal discomfiture, pollen.  

Back in 2006, the Japanese Forestry Agency started formulating various strategies to deal with the growing pollen count.  One article I read from 2008 stated that the agency was looking to cull the cedar trees in certain areas and plant strains that produce less pollen.  A more recent piece states that trees are being logged in other areas, but new ones are not being planted, in the hopes that other arboreal types that produce less pollen will be given a chance to spread.  Still, these efforts are isolated and limited, leaving most of the country in a constant swirl of spores.  Oh, contraband Zyrtec, don't fail me now.

**Since posting this, another friend has warned me about Asian Dust, a phenomenon in which sand, pollutants and bacteria are blown over from Central Asia. Mon Dieu.  I'm thinking about being fitted for a Hazmat suit.  That Fukushima look is really in right now.  

BILL BAILEY, WON'T YOU PLEASE [GO] HOME?

About a month ago, The Economist audaciously published an account by a Canadian freelance journalist who had been detained at a Tokyo airport, and was then deported back to Canada against his will (he had previously lived in Tokyo for many years with his partner).  What made the story so remarkable was 1) that The Economist admitted flat-out that it could not verify his story, but were publishing it anyway, and 2) if even part of what he wrote was true, the effect was quite chilling. I won't go into the details here, but basically the journalist in question, Christopher Johnson, claims that he was abused and taken advantage of by the Japanese immigration system and an Asian airline, Asiana.     While he says he was never given an official reason for being stopped and sent back to Canada, he suspects it has to do with work he's done criticizing the Japanese government.  Having only been here 7 months, I can't really speak to the claims he makes about immigration.  However, there are several elements to the story that make me (and others more knowledgeable of Japanese culture than I) a bit skeptical, a sense that was exacerbated when Johnson started getting cagey about questions pertaining to his visa status.  From what I've read, it appears he allowed his visa to expire and wasn't as quick as he should have been to get it renewed.

Failing to adhere to rules and regulations (especially as a gaijin) is tantamount to shooting yourself in the foot in Japan, and there is little patience and understanding for people who don't comply.  One of the first things I was told to settle upon coming here was my re-entry visa.  Even if you have secured a visa from the Japanese government, you are expected to get a second permit that allows you to leave and then return to the country.  If you go abroad without the approved visa and then try to come back, the authorities will deny you entrance. So even if there was a family emergency in your home country, and you left suddenly and then came back, if you didn't have the appropriate papers, you'd be told to leave again.  Re-entry can be worked out, but it takes a lot of time and expense.  

The Japanese immigration system is difficult to maneuver, and few people are successful in garnering a long-term visa.  The website for the Immigration Bureau of Japan is less than encouraging.  Their mission statement (emphasis added) reads:

By connecting Japan and the world through proper immigration control services under the motto "Internationalization in compliance with the rules," making efforts for smoother cross-border human mobility, and deporting undesirable aliens for Japan, the Immigration Bureau, the Ministry of Justice makes contributions to sound development of the Japanese society.

Teachers contracted through organizations like mine have to jump through all sorts of hoops (fingerprinting, background checks, etc.), and receive a 5-year visa.  After the 5-year visa expires, we are expected to return to our home countries, though a few people do stay on and find other work in Japan.  Their new employer then negotiates another visa for them.  For those who don't have jobs and therefore can't get a work visa, staying in Japan is trickier.  Many boyfriends and girlfriends of fellow English teachers have come to live with their significant others in Japan under a 90-day tourist visa.  When that expires, they then make a quick trip to a nearby country (usually South Korea), before returning and restarting the clock on a new 90 days.  If you want to stay for the really long term, you have to pass a test, in Japanese, that is more an examination of a linguistic proficiency than civic understanding.  Very few (and sometimes no) people pass the test.  

It's therefore not surprising that there are so few foreigners here outside of tourists.  Indeed, the most welcoming period of "immigration" was at the beginning of the previous century, when the Japanese brought Koreans (and some Chinese) into the country to perform manual labor.  Today, Korea and China have the greatest number of emigrants residing in Japan, though numbers from the Philippines are rising as well (mostly nurses and healthcare workers, a boon for Japan's aging population).  Most immigrants take on positions involving the 3 ks: kitanai, kitsui and kiten (dirty, heavy and dangerous).  Japan is also having trouble navigating issues relating to the nikkei, or people of Japanese descent living abroad.  This applies in particular to Brazilians and Peruvians with Japanese blood, whose Japanese forebears moved to South America in search of work following the collapse of feudalism in the late 18th, early 19th century.  The Meiji government encouraged emigration to the Americas; however, they were less keen when descendants of these adventurers sought to return to Japan during the country's economic boom in the 1980s.  Though the nikkei have Japanese blood, they are not considered Japanese, and there is considerable debate over whether or not they have a claim to immigration status in Japan.

It will be interesting in the coming years to see how this struggle plays out.  As reluctant as the Japanese are to allow an influx of foreigners, they need to open their doors in order to grow their numbers, which are rapidly declining thanks to the aging population and the decreased birth rate.  Still, change is not an easy concept for this proud country, and if it comes, it will not be quick.    

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And now for something a little lighter...

In one of the last meetings of the English club for the term, we decided to have an "all English day." No speaking Japanese!  We dusted off the Scrabble boards and broke up into teams.  As the game went on, the vowels became fewer, and the creation of words more difficult.  One of my students, U-chan, was struggling.  She rummaged through the little velvet bag, pulled out a "z," looked at it, and said, "Shit!"  

I was so proud.  

NAKED MAN FESTIVAL: WASSHOI, WASSHOI!

I love Japan.  I love it.  Despite its occasional frustrations, Japan is unparalleled in terms of adventure, challenges, and overall weirdness. And as in any good relationship, Japan is forever surprising me with new and strangely wonderful memories, few of which could be stranger than Hadaka Matsuri.  

Hadaka Matsuri (literally, "Naked Man Festival") takes place in select locations around Japan in January or February every year.  The gist of the event is this: thousands of men strip down to loincloths (fundoshi) and tabi (socks) and run around a Shinto shrine, trying to catch a couple of smelly sticks (shingi- they smell of incense) that are thrown by priests at the stroke of midnight.  Whoever catches the sticks will have good luck for a year.  In some cases the winners are given a lot of money, which is probably then invested in sutures and plastic surgery, as the winner is inevitably cut, bruised, crushed and trampled in the chaotic rush for the sticks.

I have over 500 photos from the evening, all of mostly naked men.  Let's just say that it's nice that Asian men are mostly hairless.

The Nara delegation for Naked Man put forward 8 intrepid competitors, though that number would have been higher were women allowed to participate.  As spectators and members of the entourage, the rest of us pitched in by giving moral support and prepping our team for the grueling night ahead of them: having your nether regions wrapped in a loincloth by a stranger, running around in the cold, and being doused in freezing water as part of a purification ritual.  Our prep mainly consisted of passing around a bottle of Jameson to keep our champions comfortably buzzed (for warmth), and finding ingenious ways to conceal the large tattoos of two of our party.  Tattoos are a big no-no in Japan because they are associated with the yakuza (Japanese mob).  In an effort to exclude yakuza from public spaces and events, people with tattoos are prohibited from going to onsen, having massages...or taking part in Naked Man.  Of course, the yakuza find a way around this ban by covering up their tattoos with bandages and surgical tape.  You can spot them at Naked Man because of their black fundoshi (most everyone else is wearing white).  The loudspeakers declare that drinking is strictly prohibited, but that rule, like that of no tattoos, is quietly overlooked by most officials.  However, in order to minimize the number of injuries that arise from (or in part from) intoxication, the shrine changed the time they would drop the sticks from midnight to 10pm. 

Outside a wrapping tent

On the run, being sprayed with water

Runners and spectators arrive separately, as the runners need extra time to get wrapped up in their fundoshi by local volunteers, which apparently involves a cinching action that sounds quite painful.  We the spectators got to the shrine at around 7:30pm, and found that the party was already in full swing.  Legions of diapered men, old, young and middle-aged, were jogging around the streets to keep warm, through water-filled ponds that had been dug on the grounds, and up the steps of the shrine, shouting, "Wasshoi, wasshoi!"  After making the rounds a few times, I went to snag a spot in the spectators area that was appropriate for someone vertically challenged.  I was not disappointed, as I had a prime view of the main "stage" of the shrine, above which the priests throw out the shingi.  Standing on the stage with 10 Japanese men were 4 of our party, whose strategy was clearly the same as mine: get a good spot early.  

Running up the temple stairs

At 8:30pm, I checked the temperature.  It was -3 degrees Celsius (that's 27 degrees Fahrenheit).  By 9pm, the shrine was filling up quickly. The "stage" and its surrounding stairs were soon so crowded with jostling bodies that every 5-10 minutes you'd see whole sections of men tumbling down the stairs like dominoes.  You could hear the thumps from where we were standing, about 150m away.  After a few seconds, the dazed men would straggle up the stairs again, and try to push their way deeper into the crowd.  Fights and pushing are not uncommon, and are considered a part of strategy.  One of our runners told me incredulously afterwards, "There was this pervert standing next to me!  The dude kept pinching my butt and then reaching around and plucking my pubes! I tried to elbow him, but he just kept at it until [another ALT] reached around me and put his hand between the guy's hip and his, you know, front.  That finally stopped the guy, but it was SO WEIRD!"  Another ALT turned around and found a middle-aged Japanese man giving him a death stare.  The man then proceeded to start punching the ALT, which he made no move to fend off so as not to escalate the situation, until other Japanese runners quickly came over and dragged the pugilist away.  At one point, the police had to intervene and push their way through the crowds to rescue a man who had been injured in the scrum, a process that took about 10 minutes to complete.

Start the countdown

By 9:45pm, the crowds were so dense that you could see steam rising up from the bodies, as though it were a scene from Dante's Inferno.  The atmosphere became more and more frenzied until 10pm, when the sticks were dropped and the lights went out.  When they came back on a few moments later, the mass appeared to be boiling- steam was coming from everywhere as cold water was thrown down to keep the bodies from sticking together.  People were pushed and tackled, and some were trying to hurry off.  As one ALT said to me, "Once I realized I hadn't caught one of the sticks, I realized it was time to just put my hands in the air, and calmly try to walk away.  If you stuck around at that point, you were just looking for a fight."  Checking the temperature again, it was now -5 degrees Celsius (25 degrees Fahrenheit).  

Shrine exodus

The end was anticlimactic, like a poorly executed magic trick that gets built up and built up, but the illusion is so quick that you miss it.  Thankfully, there were no deaths this year, and other than a few bruises and abrasions, none of our lads were hurt in the scuffle.  They even made the paper the next day!  Still, as we made our way back to the buses, I couldn't help but think that the runners looked a little deflated and unwilling to let go of the evening, despite its trials.  They meandered their way down the street slightly hunched, no longer chanting or carousing, their still-bare butts peeking sadly from underneath their snugly zipped down jackets.  Naked Man was officially concluded.  Goodnight, moon.