WORSHIPPING THE PORCELAIN GOD

Last week I walked into the granny circle to find that their chosen topic for the evening was toilets.   In the hour and a half that followed, we discussed our best and worst public toilet experiences, debated over how often foreign tour companies should allow for toilet breaks in their itineraries (the group had strong opinions on this point), pondered why sanitation varies across countries, and compared different styles of toilets internationally.  Somewhat predictably, the Japanese-designed Western toilet won out in the international competition, having gained high marks in the categories of sanitation, promotion of personal hygiene (the bidet is crucial, the grannies argue), and overall comfort.   Most of these accolades are warranted; the standardization of heated toilet seats alone ranks as one of the greatest inventions of all time.  However, the bidet still skeezes me out.  

The top panel

6 buttons, one toilet

The Japanese-designed Western toilet is like a rocket ship with varying functions and amenities. During a recent visit from my parents, my mother became enamored of the toilets in their various hotel rooms.  As they moved from city to city and hotel to hotel, she provided for me a rundown of each facility: "So this one has a lot of buttons and that toilet seat warmer,  but I really prefer the one at the Granvia."  By "the one at the Granvia," she meant to throne she dragged me in to see one day when I went to collect them for a day of sightseeing.  "Look!" she exclaimed, "You stand there by the sink, and then walk over to the toilet and then a motion sensor raises the toilet lid!"  She demonstrated this for me before continuing, "And then you sit on the seat and do your business, and when you stand up, the toilet flushes, and after a few minutes, the toilet lid goes down again!"  Lest you think that I am poking fun at my mother for this performance, I will admit that I was also impressed, to a point where I made a video.

The one catch of the premier Japanese toilets is that they rarely come with English labels on the buttons.  As such, I have experienced various traumas whilst in the loo.  First, I emerged wet from my shoulders to my knees at a restaurant after I mistakenly hit the bidet button instead of the flush toggle, and was sprayed for several seconds as I scrambled to find the "stop" button with increased futility.  Then there was the incident at the Kobe port, where I accidentally hit the emergency button in the handicapped toilet (again in lieu of the flush- these toilets are tricky!), and a Japanese woman standing outside with two children tried to break in to help me.  Once she realized I was all right, she easily turned off the alarm; however, the siren could be heard throughout the terminal, and a security guard raced through the building to give me assistance.  Embarrassed doesn't do justice to the moment.


One question the grannies had was whether or not Americans have a toilet god.  A toilet god? I repeated.  Oh yes, they said.  In a long tradition spanning back generations, grandmothers had admonished their granddaughters to keep the toilet clean, telling them that if they did, they would grow up to be beautiful and find good husbands.  One young woman recently became a national sensation when she composed a song on the subject, "Toire no kamisama," or "The God of the Toilet"  Here's the song, in all its 10 minute glory:

One final note: Toilets, it turns out, can even be a tourist attraction, such as this public toilet in Ichihara City.  

DID I DO THAT?

In my pre-Japan research, a friend put me in touch with a former JET who lived in Kyoto.  We met up for lunch one day, and I encouraged her to share with me some of her most memorable moments.  For her, one such memory was the compulsory annual chest x-ray.  She was sent to a doctor's office by herself, and was told that all she would have to do was go in, have the x-ray taken, and leave.  No muss, no fuss, no removal of clothing.  So in she goes, and the first thing the doctor says is for her to take off her shirt, which she does.  Then he tells her she needs to take off something else, so she stripped off her bra, and walks back into the room, to the clearly shocked face of the elderly physician.  He takes the x-ray, and she goes back to school and says to a teacher, "I thought you said I didn't have to remove my shirt, but the doctor made me!"  The teacher, thinking this was funny business on the part of the doctor, called his office for an explanation.  "I told her to take off her necklace!" he said, "And she walked in half naked!"


Thanks to this friend, I was determined to be more savvy during my own x-ray.  Instead, I ended up writing her the following email:


I walked into school this morning and was informed that I needed to go have a chest x-ray taken.  They're doing the x-rays in the back of a camper van out by the school gym.  Very classy.  I had been told by a teacher that I didn't need to take anything off except my sweater and any jewelry, so in I went.  Once I was sitting in the "privacy area"- an upholstered bench seat behind some short curtains, the technicians told me that I needed to unzip my dress and take off my bra.  So I did.  And of course when the lady technician comes back, I'm sitting there bra-less, with the top of my dress folded down over my waist.  This seems to freak her out, so she grabs my sweater and drapes it hastily over me before ushering me into the x-ray room to where the male technician is standing.  Then I inadvertently flash him as he's situating me near the machine.

Basically, it was a good morning.

A COMPENDIUM OF CONVERSATIONS

Billy Cosby wasn't fooling when he said, "Kids say the darndest things." However, he never tapped into a vast reservoir of humor: kids trying to communicate in a foreign language. Since starting the new school year, I've noticed that students are far more eager to talk to me outside of class. I love this for so many reasons, not least of which because they are often so entertaining. I've started making notes of the conversational gems I've encountered, as well as some of the strange situations. Enjoy.

-----
Visiting sensei sitting across from me is wearing leather pants and a cravat. 

-----
Just got hugged by my favorite JTE. Twice. Was this uncomfortable because a) living in Japan for 8 months has made me unused to human contact, b) because the hugs lasted about a minute in total, or c) both?
-----
Just watched as one of the teachers woke up from the nap he was taking at his desk (at 9am), and then realized with panic that he was late for a faculty meeting. Drool dribbling down the side of his mouth, he leaped up, tripped over a trashcan, and then the cord to the space heater, sending things flying. Not bothering to set anything to rights, he raced out of the room.

-----
[Shortly after Whitney Houston died:]

Very macho baseball coach is absent-mindedly humming, "And I Will Always Love You."

-----
Second years are working on a commercial or advertisement for a product of their choosing. "Madam Donut" features a collection of leopard print, tofu, and collagen donuts. Thinking this was a mistranslation by an electronic dictionary, I asked what they thought "collagen" meant. "You know, it makes you young and beautiful." When I argued that collagen can't be ingested, they blinked and replied, "It's a magic donut."

-----
Realized today that I can get my students to do pretty much 
whatever I want if I pretend to cry.  One of my students has come to class unprepared two weeks in a row for a presentation he has to give.  Finally, I told him that I wouldn't give him any more time.  He had to do it that day.  He told me, "No."  Instead of being overly positive and encouraging him or yelling at him, I put on an incredibly hammish crying face and told him he was making me so sad, would he PLEASE do his presentation.  And then I waited, looking at him with the sad face.  As the minutes passed, the whole class became very uncomfortable, until finally, one of the other male students said, "Hey, she's being so cute. Do the presentation."  The peer pressure worked, and he gave his speech without further ado.  I tried a similar tack with a class that had forgotten to do their homework. Last year, I'd ask students to give me their work the next day, and I'd be lucky if they gave me the assignment by the end of term.  This time, the students lined up at lunch the next day to give me their worksheets.  GUILTING VICTORY.
-----
While playing the Game of Life board game in ESS club, we had a small crisis. [If you've never played this game, it's a bit like a Candy Land and Monopoly mashup. Each player has a game token of a car, into which they can insert an androgynous plastic person that is either blue or pink. If you get married or have children during the game, you can add other figures to the car as well.]

The club, made up of all girls, literally screamed when one team landed on the "get married" space, and a girl accidentally handed me a pink person to join another pink person in the car. I took this as an opportunity to ask them their feelings about gay marriage, thinking it could be a great segue into a conversation with them. However, the question could not have made them more palpably uncomfortable. They stood there, glancing at each other nervously, shifting from foot to foot and doing a nonverbal hot potato of "You say something." Finally, the club captain spoke up and said, "I think love is the most important thing." We ended up leaving it at that.
-----
My third years were doing a project this week where they had to pretend they were cartoon characters who had been wrecked on a Pacific island, and there was only enough food for some of them to live. The group had to decide who would live and who would die based on information I gave each of them, and then explain their decision. Overheard in one group of girls:

“Anpanman, you will die. And then we’ll eat your face.”

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My kids enjoy asking me how old I am, and are always surprised by my answer. Yesterday they sat there, shaking their heads.

"What's the matter?" I asked.
"So sad. You are almost misoji [thirty]."

Thanks, guys. I can feel the pall of death on me already.

------
In a conversation with one of my [female] students:

‎"Eri-sensei, you are so melty."
"What does that mean?"
"You are so cute, you are melty. Like Melty Kiss!"

CAMBODIA, PART II: PHNOM PENH, WINNER*

*Of the award for the worst place I have ever been.

THE INFERNO

Phnom Penh is no laughing matter

I flatter myself to think I've been to several of what could be considered the armpits of the world: Mexico City, Delhi, Beijing, Detroit.  Poverty, sanitation, pollution, crime, poor infrastructure, lack of potable water- these are all factors that plague these areas.  And yet, with the exception of Detroit, each city has its own redeeming virtue or virtues- architecture, food, history, the people, etc.  Not so with Phnom Penh.   Whatever charm the city might have had during the days of French colonialism or before has long since passed.  Heaps of rotting trash, questionable feces, leaking batteries, broken furniture, and other unmentionables lay everywhere.  I watched one Cambodian squat in a garbage pile in front of his (her? I couldn't tell) friends, defecate, and then pick up a rag from the surrounding pile and wipe himself. The stench and the fumes of the city overpower everything, though the noxious haze is occasionally cut by the sweet scent of the frangipani trees.  After one night, we were ready to leave.  


The city didn't improve upon closer exploration.  Our first full day was spent walking around the grounds of the royal palace and the National Museum, on a day where the temperature was well into the triple digits.  The former had no shade, and the latter no air conditioning, and by 1pm we were forced to retreat, drenched and exhausted, to our hotel.  Remarkable, considering that we managed to spend entire days hiking and climbing in the sweltering heat of Angkor with little more than a quick lunch and a bathroom break.  To make matters worse, we were continually thwarted by the arbitrary opening and closing times of various establishments in Phnom Penh, such as being unceremoniously ushered out of the royal complex when they decided to shut down (presumably for lunch) at 11AM.  

Royal Throne Room

City folk were also a disappointment.  People were brusque to the point of being rude; there was none of the graciousness or warmth of the people of Siem Reap.  The few friendly overtures made to us were by people vying to sell us things or offer their services.  We managed to get by speaking English the whole trip, because Cambodians seem to speak every language under the sun: English, Chinese, Korean, Japanese, German, French.  I heard one guide speaking impeccably accented Castillian Spanish.  Linguistic abilities are far better in Siem Reap than Phnom Penh, perhaps because SR is more reliant on tourism as a source of income.  I asked a few people how they had learned the different languages they speak.  Books seemed to be the main tutor, though some listen to the radio or watch foreign television programs.  No one mentioned having taken language classes in school.


It takes a while, but at some point you suddenly realize how young the population of Cambodia is.  The middle-aged and the elderly are almost non-existent demographics.  Given the history of the country, you have to wonder at the stories of the older people you do see.  LAL remarked that the elderly deserved a badge of honor for having survived, but I wonder if for some of them, it's a burden to have lived through the things they have.  


A common sight is older male expats with young Cambodian women.  The inverse correlation at work is troubling: the older the man, the younger the woman.  Yet it appeared as though these women were more than just an escort for the evening; in most cases, the couples seemed to be running errands, eating a simple meal, going for a walk, etc.  This barely lessened the ick factor, which none of us could seem to shake.  We stayed at a guest house situated above a popular bar, "The Lone Star Saloon."  Every night we'd return to find a slew of foreign men in their 30s-50s sitting at the bar, buying drinks for heavily made up Cambodian girls who were probably a few years shy of the legal drinking age in the States.  These girls would start hanging out in front of the doors starting around 4 or 5, waiting to meet up with someone.  

Our one solace was the food.  We ate fairly well (and cheaply) everywhere, but particularly in Phnom Penh.  Though Cambodias are not the best at preparing meat or fish, they more than make up for their protein shortcomings with delicious fruit drinks.  We even managed to sample a variety of Khmer delicacies, some more palatable than others.  I ordered crispy tarantulas one night, and then about jumped out of my skin when my plate arrived.  It turns out that they look remarkably similar in death as in life.  This impression did not diminish when the waiter brought a live specimen to our table to show us.  I managed to get it together enough to eat a leg, thanks to LAL's support.  It turns out tarantulas are incredibly delicious, and soon I had eaten all the legs, and was left to conjure up the willpower to eat the rest of the bodies...reluctantly.

THE 9TH CIRCLE


In 1975, the French-sponsored government of Indochine was overthrown by Communist forces led by Pol Pot.  These revolutionaries called themselves the Khmer Rouge- Khmer from the largest ethnic group in Cambodia, rouge ("red") from the color most associated with Communism.  Pol Pot's vision was for a pure Communist state, where the people would work and live off the land.  There would be no need for doctors, lawyers, or teachers.  In fact, these learned individuals were viewed as the enemy, along with capitalists, the CIA, and the KGB (by this time, the Soviet Communists were at odds with their Chinese brethren, with whose tenets the Khmer Rouge identified).  One of the great inconsistencies of this policy was that Pol Pot and all the top leaders of the Khmer Rouge were highly educated individuals, many of whom had even obtained degrees while studying in Paris.


Pol Pot's first act was to expel people from the major urban areas into the countryside.  In Phnom Penh, people were settled in different quarters of the city under the French (the French and other diplomats in one quarter, the Chinese in another, the Vietnamese in a third, and Cambodians in a fourth). Soldiers took over different quarters, and marshaled people out, irrespective of whether those people lived in that quarter, or simply worked there or were passing through on there way to someplace else.  As a result, many families were separated in the forced exodus, and there are some who are still unsure as to what happened to their loved ones.  


Farms were commandeered and collectivized, and people forced to work the land- men, women and children.  The crops grown (mainly rice) were then sold to China for arms and munitions, even though the workers themselves were starving.  Pol Pot expected to triple rice production through these measure- an impossible feat.  As the paranoia of the regime increased, various detention centers were set up for interrogation to ferret out the disloyal- those not working hard enough, those working for the CIA, the KGB.  One such center was S-21, or Tuol Sleng. Formerly a primary and secondary school, it was transformed into a holding area used for torture and questioning.  At one point, rooms in the prison were remodeled so as to insulate the sounds of the screams coming from inside.  When the Vietnamese liberated Phnom Penh in 1978, they found only 7 survivors, all of whose lives had been spared due to their utility as artists, engineers, etc.  Liberators also found the remains of 14 people, including 1 woman, who were unidentifiable due to decomposition.  These bodies are buried on the grounds in front of the building in which they were discovered.  

Despite being poorly curated, the museum of Tuol Sleng is powerful.  Little has been done to renovate the place, which has certain benefits.  The oppressive heat in the close rooms, coupled with the dirty, stained ceramic floors, immediately cause you to feel the proximity of death.  The rooms are barren, save for a few displays- a rusty bed, shackles, black-and-white photos of decomposing bodies.  Then there are the series of photographs mounted on larger boards.  Some are of guards, young men and women in their early 20s.  Then there are the rows of inmates.  Men, women, children, and some foreigners- there are hundreds of them.  The perverse thing is that some of them are smiling, as though posing for a portrait.  Others look out hollow-eyed, as though they can see into their future.  They are all wearing numbers, and all I can think is that these episodes in history always seem to involve numbers.  Detailed records of names, ages, family histories, etc., are reduced to a combination of digits, and I hate them almost as much as I hate the looks on these faces.  To become a face on these walls was remarkably easy- someone simply had to report some kind of suspicion of you, and away you went.  Not even members of the Khmer Rouge were safe.  As the years went on, the suspicions turned inward, and revolutionaries became inmates themselves.  Eventually, those who survived questioning were transported to a "new home."


About 30 minutes from Tuol Sleng is Choeung Ek, or "The Killing Fields."  People were sent here by the truckloads to be executed.  Since bullets were expensive, people were usually lined up on the sides of pits and then beaten or hacked to death.  Some infants were clubbed against trees in front of their mothers.  Unlike the Nazis with their crematoriums, the dead or dying bodies were covered in DDT to conceal the smell and left there.  After Pol Pot was toppled, locals went onto the grounds looking for food to forage.  What they found were tracts of ground bubbling up from the gases of the decaying bodies below.

When the rains are heavy, the soil is washed away to reveal what is left of those who died at the Killing Fields.  It is truly horrifying to walk along the dirt paths of the area today, watching for a stray root or stone that might trip you, only to realize that you are stepping on bones.  Or the remnants of someone's clothes.  Or their teeth, which are still all in a line.  Every few months, these artifacts are collected and deposited with all the rest that have been found.  The memorial stupa at the center of the grounds holds 17 stories of different bones.


From 1975-1978, Pol Pot killed 3 million people, out of a population of 8 million. 

Human teeth and cloth, the Killing Fields

Small sample from the 17 story stupa

CAMBODIA PART I: SIEM REAP

The most glorious week of the year in Japan is undoubtedly the aptly named Golden Week.  Every May, the country celebrates a string of successive national holidays, so that everyone has almost a full week off from work and school.  I spent my inaugural Golden Week in Cambodia.


When I announced my intended destination to Japanese friends and colleagues, their shock was palpable.  It should be noted that many people don't travel around Japan, much less pack up and travel abroad.  I'm still surprised every time I tell someone, "I'm going to Place X this weekend.  Have you visited there?," and their response is no.  When discussing bucket lists with my adult eikaiwa group, we talked a lot about places we want to travel, and Mr. M asked me why I wasn't more interested in going to Europe.  His attitude seemed to be, "Why would you want to go to Asia or someplace like Egypt, when you could go to France or Italy instead?"  


"NO THANKS, YOU BUY"


We prepped for our Cambodian adventure by buying large amounts of sunscreen, researching local foods, reading some books, starting a malaria prophylaxis regimen, and watching Tomb Raider.  We also received a lot of advice from friends and family, who all gave glowing accounts of their time in Cambodia...save one.  "It was grand," said Paul, "But there's quite a lot of people trying to take advantage of you, so you have to be cold and hard sometimes.  Elizabeth shouldn't have a problem with that, but the rest of you should toughen up."  He was right about one thing- we were inundated by requests for money; however, I think BAL and I tied for being most hardened to the pleas.  What's interesting is the tack people take in Cambodia, beggars and professionals alike.


Our cab driver from the Siem Reap airport (which is super swank, by the way) was very friendly, until he started trying to pigeonhole us into hiring him as our driver during our stay.  Since we hadn't definitively decided where we would go first the next day or what time we would start, we told him that we'd be happy to call him after we'd discussed our plans.  Would he give us his phone number?  He told us that he couldn't give us his number, that he doesn't get mobile service in his home, but that he could still come meet us the next day.  This went on for some time, back and forth, while he dropped other bits of information, like, "There are over 200 cab drivers in Siem Reap and this is the low season.  If I'm lucky, maybe I will get one job a week.  So I can come by your hotel at whatever time tomorrow you want."  Finally, we told him that we couldn't commit at that moment, and unless he gave us a way to contact him, that was all we could say.  We sat in near silence for the rest of the drive, and as we got close to the hotel, we thanked him for his help.  "Don't thank me, give me a job!" he exploded.  The next day, a young girl selling postcards by Angkor Wat said something similar to me.  She was trying to get me to buy her wares, and I told her, "No, thank you.  I'm OK."  Without missing a beat, she said authoritatively, "You OK, but I not OK! No [say] thanks, I want you to buy!"  


I've been to a lot of poor countries, and I've seen a lot of people begging for money.  Some are trying to sell things, as they do in Cambodia ("We don't want money! We want a job!" says one sign in Phnom Penh), while others are flat-out looking for charity.  But I've never been anyplace (China, India, Central and South America, Europe, etc.) where people were trying to guilt you into handing over your cash.  Their reasoning is that because you have money and are in their country, you should be giving it to them.  It is true that these people live unimaginably hard lives, and yes, it would be great if my $1 for a bunch of postcards helped that girl's family.  But where the children are concerned, at least, they don't keep any of the money they are given.  LAL would buy something from small children, and as we walked away, a man who had been lurking behind a tree or in the shadows would walk out, hand outstretched, and take the money from the child.  Then the kid would go back to work.  At first I was discouraged by these scenarios, and then eventually became outright irritated.  Wherever you go, there is someone hovering over you, trying to get you to buy something, or to pay them to do something for you, and they will keep pressing you until you walk away, and they will make you feel bad about it if you say no.  


Money turned out to be a major recurring theme of our trip.  The Cambodian currency is officially the riel, but everyone accepts US dollars.  It's rather disconcerting to pay for something in American currency, and to receive in change a mix of dollars and riel (the riel substitutes for US coins).  We jokingly dubbed riel "Monopoly money," because $0.50 in change often resulted in a wad of riel bills being passed our way.  Interestingly, dollars are very common in Siem Reap, but riel are more frequently used in the capital, Phnom Penh.  


Money is a constant concern and topic of conversation in Cambodia.  Our tuk tuk driver told us several times (enviously, it seemed) about a friend of his who was moving to Korea for 4 years to work in a factory.  "He will earn $1,000 a year!" he said, shaking his head in wonder.  There are very few fixed prices (other than restaurants, hotels, etc.), so often you find yourself haggling for the price of a taxi, or goods at a market, and having to figure out what the fair price should be.  The LAs, generous as they are, were more willing to pay the inflated prices than I (I'm too German for that), which means we probably got ripped off most of the time we were in Cambodia.  When we bought souvenirs or gifts for people, our tuk tuk driver and others would ask us how much we had paid for the goods.  It's an awkward conversation to tell someone that you just paid 2/3 of the cost for hiring a driver for the day on local spices for your friends. 


HEAVEN ON EARTH


The site known as Angkor Wat the world's largest religious building and is actually one in a series of temples built in what is today known as the Angkor Archaeological Park.  Angkor is supposed to be an earthly representation of Mt. Meru, which Hindus regard as the home of the gods.  Indeed, most of the temples were originally built for Hindu gods, and the art is very Indian as a result.  Statues dedicated to Vishnu, Ganesha, and Shiva are everywhere.  However, at some point, Jayavaraman VII, one of the latest and greatest devarajas (god-kings) converted to Buddhism, so the later structures are filled with Buddhas.  

The temples of Angkor Archaeological Park range in size, style and state of preservation.  Some, like Ta Prohm (infamously captured in the film "Tomb Raider"), have been swallowed by the jungle.  Others are more exquisitely preserved thanks to efforts by India, Germany, Japan, the United Kingdom, and others.  Whether intact or in ruins, the entire site is a dream come true for anyone who, like me, dreamed as a child of discovering a lost city or being the next Indiana Jones or Howard Carter.  We spent 4 days exploring the various structures, and there are too many places and experiences to name.  Here are a few highlights:

Ta Prohm

Inside Angkor Wat

• At Preah Khan, one of the temple guardians led me through a maze of caved-in passage ways that seemed to shrink the farther in we went.  I was a bit trepidatious at first, as the LAs had fallen behind and it was just me and this stranger.  Soon we walked into a small alcove, where there was a brightly decorated shrine dedicated to the smiling ancient stone carving of a woman.  This was Jayavaraman VII's first wife, the guide explained.  He lit some incense from the shrine and handed some to me.  Then, on our knees, we bowed and prayed several times.  It was like being in another world.
• Also at Preah Khan, I was jokingly posing for a friend's photo between some apsaras (half-naked, supernatural women), when a Frenchman walked by and said, "You know, if you want to make that authentic, you should take off your top."

Apsaras

• Bayon, built by Jayavaraman VII, has over 216 stone faces peeking out from every direction.  

Bayon

• I made friends with a couple of novice Buddhist monks, who had a lot of questions for me (in English!), including, "Do you have boyfriend?" and then giggled like school children when I responded.  When we parted, one of them kept repeating, very earnestly, "I wish you good fortune, always."

• A terrifying 2 hour trip to Beng Malea in a tuk tuk (auto-rickshaw), followed by exploration of the grounds.  Beng Malea has not been restored at all, and has been torn apart by the jungle, bombs, and land mines.  We toured the site by climbing through narrow passageways held up by thick wooden supports, over large heaps of rubble and fallen stone, and sliding down giant vines- it was an archaeological jungle gym.
• On the way to Beng Malea, traveling along back roads through the countryside.  People, mainly children, started spontaneously waving at us, as though we were neighbors passing by.  Some of the kids got so excited, they'd jump up and down or run after the tuk tuk. I started counting, and in the span of 2 hours, 54 people had waved at us.  

ADIEU, ANGKOR


On the 5th day, we left Siem Reap by bus for Phnom Penh.  Our promised 5 hour ride on an air conditioned bus with a bathroom turned out to be a 7 hour ride in 90 degree heat, with a bucket downstairs in the cargo area.  We made frequent stops along the way to load passengers, 2 motorbikes, a large wooden yoke used for oxen, and a bag of rotting matter that joined us for the final hour and a half of the journey.  I can only assume that this noxious sack was someone's compost heap, from which they were loath to part.  Traveling overland on the Oregon Trail would have been preferable.


We arrived in Phnom Penh stinky, dusty, dehydrated, disgruntled, and with our kidneys aching.  In this frame of mind, we made our first foray into the city.  Details to follow in the next post!

KONPAI EXTRAVAGANZA

Two weeks before the start of the Japanese school year in April, each teacher receives a phone call from the local school board informing them of whether they'll be allowed to remain at their current school, or transferred somewhere else.  Apparently this rotation occurs so that teachers and parents don't become too chummy.  The fear is that parents may flatter teachers with gifts, favors, etc., in exchange for information about tests.  The change is abrupt, and can be a little like Russian roulette if a faculty member you really like is replaced by someone awful.  In honor of the incoming and outgoing teachers, each school holds an enkai (office party) to welcome and say farewell, respectively.

The enkai for my school was a swanky affair held at a local hotel, with an open bar (beer, wine and sake) and a multiple course meal.  The office lady seated next to me told me proudly that the cost was ichi-man ($100) per person!  On my other side was Chinese Dragon-sensei, who was loudly trying to quiz me on the names of all the faculty members (many of which I don't actually know, to be honest).  To divert him from his game, I asked him why his face was so pink under the eyes.  "Are you sunburned?" I inquired.  "Oh, Eri-san," interjected the office lady, "He's been drinking sake since the end of school with Nice-sensei, Panda-sensei, and Department Head-sensei."  I looked at Department Head-sensei for confirmation, who was already glowing red.  He leaned back in his chair, arms folded across his chest, and smirked and nodded.  I added "pregame" to a list of words I should teach him sometime as the head of the English department.  Multiple rounds of speeches began, and Chinese Dragon-sensei became impatient after an hour, brandishing his watch in front of my face, saying, "Hungry! So hungry!" Finally, the first set of speeches came to an end, and we were promptly served the first course, along with about 5 large bottles of beer per table, each the size of a champagne magnum.  At this point, the party turned into a free-for-all.

In Japan, etiquette dictates that you should serve others first, and then wait for someone else to serve you. To accept a drink as it is being poured, you should hold out the glass using both your hands.  During the Edo Period (1603-1868) there was a civil war, and at the conclusion, the fighters started having banquets to promote reconciliation.  The custom developed that they would serve drinks to one another as a sign of good will, on the condition that the recipient hold out both of his hands with his cup, so as to prove he was not concealing a weapon.  It is considered a compliment (and an ice breaker) to have someone offer to fill your glass.  If your glass is full, but you don't want to spurn the attention, you can take a hasty glug, and then hold out your glass again.  The pour-swapping is not limited to the people at your table; in fact, I was shocked when people leaped up as though a whistle had gone off, and started moving to other tables to top up their friends, coworkers, and supervisors.  The $100 per person meal was clearly a secondary consideration, and most people seemed to pick at the various courses; however, this could have also been because the food was pretty strange, even by Japanese standards, and not all that flavorful.  

As the drinks flowed, so did the conversation.  Teachers who had never spoken to me before were emboldened to approach and start speaking in limited English.  One topic that is particularly popular among the male teachers is the the "dangerous man" list.  These are all male teachers of whom I'm supposed to be wary because they are dangerous, or at times "super dangerous."  The list is usually the same every time, consisting of 3-4 names.  When I first started playing along, I would feign surprise and ask why these teachers are such a threat.  "Yosh-sensei is aikido master, Nice-sensei is judo master, and Chinese Dragon-sensei is bad man," came the response.  However, now the answer is more direct: "SEX-SHU-AL men!" crows Panda-sensei.**  The list has been recited to me so many times that now a teacher can turn to me and say, "Eri-san, who are most dangerous men?" and I can tick them off in order of magnitude of danger.  This never fails to delight the teacher to whom I'm speaking, even though it is clear to me that he is probably more deserving of a place on the list than the others (except for Chinese Dragon-sensei, he really is a "bad man"- in the nicest way possible).  

**Panda-sensei is one to talk, since the last time I hung out with him and some other teachers after school, he pulled out his phone to show me pictures of his dog...several of which featured the dog nestled on top of P-sensei's naked butt crack, and another that featured him shirtless and mugging for the camera.  Later in the conversation, we were talking about his girlfriend, and I asked what she was like.  "A little fat," he said after some consideration, "But she has C-cup," he went on, proudly holding his hands out in front of his chest.  His English vocabulary may not extend to things like "lawyer" or "elephant," but he's clearly got some priorities.

EMAIL FROM MY SUPERVISOR

Dear Elizabeth-sensei,


I am sorry I am so absent-minded.  I forgot to give you these forms. Please fill out and return them to me immediately.


m(      )m


-M

Top marks for the use of the word "absent-minded" and an emoticon to denote embarrassment.

POWER OF THE PURSE

Last week Mr. M was on holiday in Italy, which meant that the grannies and I were left to our own devices for our English conversation group. I joked about his absence, saying that we were having a girls' night out (substitute green tea for cocktails). In turn, they taught me a Japanese saying, "genki de teshu rusugai,"or, "happy when the husband is away." While it's often difficult for women whose husbands work far away from home, they grow used to it, to a point where it's almost more disruptive having their husbands home than not. This tension comes to a head when the husband retires and returns home full-time.  Take Mr. M, for instance.

Part of what's so endearing about Mr. M is how he has adjusted to retirement.  Among the many hobbies he's taken up, he's started learning how to cook, since his wife informed him that just because he was going to be home for lunch didn't mean she was going to make it for him.  In fact, to hear him tell it, he is on his own a lot.  His wife is very busy with friends and various volunteer positions, leaving him with a lot of free time on his hands.  Instead of resenting his wife, or twiddling his thumbs at home, Mr. M seems fairly exhilarated by his freedom.  Conversely, many women who hope to spend more time with their husbands after they retire find themselves to be forsaken for various hobbies.  There are apparently a lot of "golf widows" or "softball widows."  Beyond how much time couples spend together post-retirement, the task of running a household can be a source of contention as well.  Sometimes this involves simple tasks like washing up- "My husband drinks tea all day.  I told him that he had to start washing his own dishes, because I did not like him putting dirty things in the sink AFTER I had finished washing all the things!" said a particularly irate granny.  But there are other issues as well, such as who has control over family finances.  

As far as typical household management goes in Japan, families employ different means of accounting.  Some men have no say over the finances.  They deposit their salaries into a bank account, and then their wives make withdrawals, and report back on what they've spent.  Mr. M freely admits that he doesn't even have a bank card, so he has to rely on his wife to withdraw money for him.  One woman told me that she can authorize payment for sums up to 100,000 yen ($1,000).  If it's over 500,000 yen, she consults with her husband.  In other families, women receive a monthly allowance, to do with as they choose.  Often, these women set aside hezokuri, or money saved from allowances to spend at will.  Often "at will" means doing something nice for someone else in the family, like buying their husband a new pair of pants, or saving for a birthday present for one of their kids.  There is a relatively recent law that states that after a man retires and receives his pension, his wife is allowed to divorce him and take half of his money. This raised a lot of eyebrows among the older generations in particular.  Measures like these are some of small steps towards female empowerment going on in Japan.  Even the imperial family is not immune from liberalization efforts.

Recently there's been discussion of the constitutionality of the "female lines" of the imperial family.  Specifically, whether imperial women who marry commoners are allowed to retain imperial status and set up their own branches of the family, wherein any children resulting from those marriages would have imperial authority handed down to them.  The concern is that if the tradition of the male lineage is left intact, the line will die out.  Today, the emperor has only one male heir, Prince Hisahito, who has two daughters.  Conservatives who are against changing the constitution cite history as their main support, although they also argue that since the commoner husbands of the imperial women could never have exalted status, it would be unfair to make the children of these marriages eligible for certain honors and privileges, but not one of their parents.  I highly doubt a change will be made.  Those in favor of allowing female lines don't care enough about the imperial family to push for it, while the people who are die hard loyalists are mostly too conservative to divert from tradition.  Sorry, ladies.  Might as well go out and buy yourself something pretty.

JAPAN AND KOREA, SITTIN' IN A TREE

Japan is in love with Korea. South Korea, that is.  This is probably due to the fact that the modern culture of South Korea is synonymous with that of modern day Japan.  Meanwhile, North Koreans are mainly known as a bunch of drug dealer thugs.  So when the North Korean rocket launch failed earlier this week, the Japanese had some choice words for the people of the Powerful and Prosperous Nation.  One JET wrote on Facebook:  

Word of the day: ZAMAMIRO. It's Japanese slang for "serves you right". And this was how one of our teachers reacted to the North Korean failed rocket launch today. 

Another JET reported that they had turned on the TV in the staff room to watch the news, but when they learned that the launch had been unsuccessful, they switched to another channel.  The next program was a morning talk show whose topic for the day was analyzing the different janken (rock, paper, scissors) styles of celebrities.*

*Janken is more than just a children's game here.  It's used as a tie-breaker and decision-maker on almost a daily basis.  I have personally seen grown professionals janken over the best way to reorganize a seating chart for the staff room.  

WHAT THE JAPANESE THINK OF AMERICAN CONSERVATISM

Hold on to your hats, folks.  There may be a new kind of tea party coming to Japan.  The Atlantic recently featured an article about members of various Japanese conservative parties who are attending GOP meetings and conventions in order to get some tips on how the Tea Party has been so successful.  According to the visiting politicians interviewed for this piece, the Japanese find politics "boring," and so they are looking for ways to jolt people out of their apathy  There are several gems throughout the article, including what the Japanese think of the GOP candidates, their affinity for Herman Cain, and the one delegation member who reported that the leader of his party is actually the reincarnation of the Buddha.  Still, this is by far the best punchline:

But the Tokyo Tea Party does not embrace all aspects of America’s conservative legacy. Watase told me that he is less than inspired by the example of the original Boston Tea Party: “They threw away the tea, which is very valuable,” he said disapprovingly. “Japanese people value tea. We would never throw it out; we would save it.”

He thought for a moment longer. “Also,” he said, “it would be green tea.”

SPRING FORWARD

After a long winter of wearing to bed socks, two pairs of pants, two shirts, a fleece, and a ski cap, I'm now down to just pants and a long-sleeved shirt.  Glory!  Accompanying this warming weather is an even more welcome development: sakura season!  Sakura (cherry blossom) season is perhaps the most hyped in Japan.  There are websites dedicated to tracking when the trees will bloom in certain areas, and the local news provides an update every day.  Out comes the cherry blossom memorabilia: ceramics, stationery, textiles, and sakura-flavored foods. There's even a national pastime, called hanami, where people break out their tarps and picnic baskets and awake at dawn to secure a lounging spot for themselves under the trees.  The drinking starts early, and the day is spent eating, imbibing, and napping in a manner more reminiscent of the excesses of imperial Rome than present-day Japan.   

Philosopher's Path, Kyoto

The reverence for the sakura approaches a religious fervor.  Before he left for spring break, my supervisor said to me, "While I'm gone, I've asked Kabuki sensei to teach you about cherry blossoms."  This was no botany talk.  What he meant was that it is important to understand the meaning of the cherry blossoms.  The trees are associated with impermanence, as the blooms are so short-lived that they come and go over a matter of days.  To the Japanese, this is a metaphor for life: fleeting.  There's a sentiment here that you can't truly appreciate or enjoy something unless you understand the philosophy or the mindset behind it.  The only problem is that this understanding seems to hinge entirely on whether or not you are a Japanese national.  Don't get me wrong, the Japanese want foreigners to enjoy the cherry blossoms.  They just want to make sure that we give credit where it is due.  When I mentioned that Washington, DC is renowned for the trees that bloom there, someone told me, "Ah, yes. We gave you those trees one hundred years ago.  They are near the Po-to-mac River, yes?"  The Japanese embassy even has a map of sakura locations in the United States.   It seems cherry blossoms are to Japan what pandas are to China.

Old Gion, Kyoto

JESUS LIVES

Lady AL (LAL) is responsible for writing a monthly newsletter for her place of work, which often contains a number of pieces on Western culture and traditions.  For the month of April, LAL decided to cover two topics, April Fools Day and Easter.  After reading through LAL's definition of the word "pranks," and perusing the history behind Easter, one of her supervisors came up to her, the newsletter in hand.  "Ah, AL-san," he said, "I enjoyed this month's newsletter.  But I have one question. This part [he points to a passage]- this is prank?"  It turns out that the paragraph he was indicating had to do with the tale of Jesus's death and resurrection.  As LAL put it, "I mean, I could kind of see where he was coming from.  Some guy convinces all his friends that he's dead and then 3 days later shows up and says, 'Surprise! Got ya!'"  She then felt bad as she explained that this was actually a miracle, not a prank- and that perhaps her supervisor should not refer to it as a joke to any Christians he might meet. 

Jesus (or Christo, in Japanese) is virtually unknown here, like a character actor whose face you know, but you wouldn't recognize their name.  I was recently talking to the 14 year-old daughter of one of my co-teachers, who has just taken up the guitar and was proudly showing off her new equipment.  She pulled up a photo of her many guitar picks, each of which had a different image or color theme, and one of which looked really familiar to me from my days at Catholic school.  "Why do you have one of Jesus?" I asked.  "Who?" she responded.  "Christo." A few beats.  "WHAAAAAT?"  She looked closer at the bearded man with the radiant halo and shook her head.  "I did not know." I asked her why she bought it; she said, "It is cute!"