Picnic

My spring break is turning out to be much more busy than I had planned.

Today was Day Three of my Art Tour.
Mayo took me to a restored Machiya (old Japanese style house) with displays of Hinamatsuri dolls. What I really like about the old houses is the kitchens. They are built in a way that makes them seem outside the house and inside the house at the same time. This one was particularly large and had the wonderful old stone stove with large built in pots for cooking rice. It is said that rice cooked in these old stoves tastes better than rice-cooker rice. I would think that the fire has something to do with this.
After that we went to see a smaller exhibition by Ota Saburo, the man who had done the BirdNet project at the Art Center. It was amazing how much they were charging for his stuff. I mean, I can understand that artists don't make a lot of money, but you aren' t going to make money chargin $40 for some string and a stamp that no one will buy.

Ah, the sakura are blooming! We had a picnic in the Old Palace grounds, and I saw my first cherry tree blossoms of the season. They should be starting any day now, according to Yahoo Sakura Predictions. I love how the Japanese try to predict everything. Except for tomorrow's temperature. They only like to say that it's gonna be sunny or rainy. Not helpful.

Art and Moving Pictures

Day Two of artistic endeavors. I went with Mayo and her friend Mariko down near Osaka to learn a new/old way of dying paper. It was based on the old art of dying cloth with designs using wax, but this artist uses washi, Japanese style paper, instead. The process involved drawing a design with hot wax and dying the paper, leaving the wax covered areas undyed. This is repeated numerous times reapplying wax to areas of color you want to keep. It sounds easy, but it is difficult to think what colors you want to keep and what will change. I made two coasters with random designs.

Then I went to see an independent film over in Otsu on the shore of Lake Biwa. It is called The Motorcycle Diaries, and I suggest that everyone goes to see it. Well, go to rent it, anyway. It's probably out of the theatres by now in the US.
Anyway, the only problem with going to see a foreign film in Japan is that the subtitles are not in English. They are in Japanese. In general, I didn't have too much of problem in understanding - I was very proud of myself for that. The difficulty was not the words, it was how fast they came up and left the screen. In Japanese grammer, the verb is at the end of the sentence. I would be three-quarters through when it would disappear, leaving me with no idea what the action that this person at that time had done. I mean, I could guess quite a lot, but it was still annoying.

Caught in the Net

I am trying to get in touch with my volunteer side again. My friend, Mayo, volunteers at the Kyoto Art Center, and sometimes I join her for projects. Today I helped take down the latest exhibition, a project of postage stamps and bird netting. It took us nine hours to separate the little pieces from the big pieces and pack everything away. In the meantime, I seem to have been sucked into the world that is the Art Center - I often eat at the Cafe, I've gone to some workshops, I was on TV for them, and I have recently put my name down as a gallery guide/guard. I think I'm hoping for a place like Marsh Chapel was for me at BU, a place where I can just drop in to hang out or help out, whichever I prefer. At any rate, it's a good place to meet all sorts of people, from people with an interest in art to famous Japanese artists.

Bunny Day

My friend's parents are visiting from the States, and they wanted to go to an Easter service yesterday. So I took them to this church I sometimes go to that has simultaneous English translation. I never use it, but my friend(who speaks Japanese) did. She commented afterwards on how much longer the Japanese is than the English. Usually when I think about the length of the language it is because I'm trying to translate a three kanji word, which usually requires a sentence in English. I think of Japanese as being compact. But that's before you put honorifics and humblers in. And believe me, when you're talking to or about God, you add them like crazy. The Lord's Prayer practically doubles in length. I wonder about this language usage. There are some in the US that feel talking to God should be more like talking to a friend. I wonder if the Japanese could ever get around to saying their equivalent of "What's up God?" Somehow, I doubt it.

Too Many Babies

I was clicking through my list of bookmarks this morning and stumbled across my uncle's website again. The page is untitled, but I would like to submit a suggestion: "Too Many Babies." Why? Because it is a webpage of pictures of the recent births of his grandchildren, my cousins' children. It is apparently my only connection to what is happening in that side of the family, because if I hadn't had looked at it two minutes ago, I wouldn't have known that my oldest cousin just had another baby. Congratulations Jen! That makes the fourth grandchild for my aunt and uncle in about two years, if I am counting correctly. I would imagine their house has been turned into babysitting central.

I can't imagine being married and having kids anytime soon. I can't believe that all of my cousins older than me are married, and most of them have kids. Indeed, I have found a very good way to avoid all of this, and that is living in Japan. The chances of me finding a boyfriend, let alone a husband, are practically zero. I'm sorry mother, you're going to have to wait a long while for grandchildren.

In English, please

I receive my grant from the graciousness of former Japanese Fulbright grantees and other Japanese companies. None of the money comes from the US government. Zero. Tell me, then, why is all of it taxable in the United States? Why are students "enrolled in degree granting programs" entitled to tax-free money, while those of us doing independent research and promoting "cultural exchange" have to pay ridiculous sums to Uncle Sam?

I have been reading and rereading the tax forms and tax instructions and explanations of the tax instructions for the past three hours trying to figure out exactly where my grant falls into this mess of a system. I particularly love the section in Publication 520, Scholarships and Fellowships, under the heading Studying or Teaching Under Fulbright Grants, that says,

If you are a lecturer, teacher, research scholar, or student who receives a grant...under the Fulbright-Hays Act, you will probably encounter tax situations different from those discussed earlier in this publication.

Contrary to what you might expect, it does not go on to explain what I should do with my different tax situations. It says I MAY be eligable for some stuff, and I MIGHT be able to do some other stuff, but really, it doesn't say anything at all. I would like to take it to be a secret code that really means, "We don't actually understand what's going on here either, so do whatever you feel like and we promise not to hunt you down for not paying your taxes correctly." However, I'm not particularly talented at reading between the lines, so I will probably not risk it. Instead, I will tell them everything, and consequently will pay more taxes than my mother, who has a real job.

p.s. If you, or someone you know, understands this tax mumbo jumbo, please, oh please, help me!

Dream Cup 2005 

Dreaming of American Ultimate

Game 1: us 6, them 5
It is said that on the days you can see Mt.Fuji the wind will be strong, and it almost blew me over today. We only won this game because of surprisingly good defense and some lucky catches.

Game 2: them a lot, us 1
We can't play zone offense, and our man offense doesn't work in the wind.

Overall, it was a decent tourney. We went 3-3, and were 22nd out of 50 teams. I got a few good layouts on the dead grass, and I tried to bring some spirit to japanese ultimate by wearing my purple frisbee skirt. The whole affair was way too expensive, but at least I got a sweatshirt and some Wieder-in power jelly out of it.

No disc, no life. -Club Jr.

Can you hear me now?

Apparently there was a pretty big earthquake in northern Kyushu yesterday morning while we were winning our first game. I didn't learn about it until my American friend's mom called him and said she saw it on TV in California. It didn't effect me at all, since I am up north near Fuji, but my captain is from there. She was worried about her family since her calls wouldn't go through. This is a bad side effect of the increase in cell phones; when too many people try to use them at the same time, they don't work. There was a tv show that explained how to survive an earthquake. One of the suggestions was to have a 10yen coin in your safety bag. Why? For when your cell phone call won't go through. The problem is that they have taken out most of the public phones because everyone has a cell phone.

Best Friend and Worst Enemy

Basically every new car in Japan has a nifty GPS navigation device, or "nabi". This includes our rental cars. We enter the phone number of our hotel, and it tells us how to get there from the fields. At least theoretically. It worked in the car I rode in yesterday, there were diferent directions in this morning's car, and it didn't exist tonight. This is the problem - everyone watches the screen and trusts the little voice, so no one remembers landmarks or gets a map. We wandered around for 20 minutes today trying to find our way home while Nabi instructed us to drive in circles. The situation is only made worse by a driver who is afraid of turning.

Dream Day 2

Game 1: us 12, them 2
It was a beautiful day for playing ultimate, and somehow things worked out.

Game 2: them 10, us 2
The wind picked up, and despite the fact that I could pull out the endzone, there was no one else who could get the disc halfway down the field even in the downwind.

-A guy on the mens' team had to go to the hospital after being kicked in the chest during a dive. The team had to forfeit due to too many injuries. My team is building their injuries list too.

Dream Cup

Game 1: us 12, them 3
I learned a very interesting thing. The first six people in the stack do not plan on subbing out. "These six people come to practice and know how they fit in these positions," I am told. The remaining five people are to rotate through one spot-that's 10min each per game. These people are 3rd year students who are too busy to come to practice, and me. I come to practice. I am not happy.

Game 2: them 13, us 2
They played zone. We can't break a zone. They told me to play more cause I was at practice this week for those two times we went over zone. I refused to go out. I feel kinda bad not letting the others play, but dangit I went to 6hr practices and paid 400dollars for this tourney, I'm gonna play zone until they kick me out for man.

On a happier note, Mt. Fuji was completely visible all morning.

Exit!

I'm on the way to a frisbee tournament in Shizuoka. I'm in a car. I've been in this car for 6 hours. In the past 3 hours we have not advanceded by one exit. If we don't start moving soon, I'm gonna get out, walk over and hijack a dumptruck.

For the kanji lovers

My friend made a kanji(chinese character) joke:

kt: What's that first kanji in "tanbabashi"?
d: Looks like your mom.

Pollen problems

The Japanese word for sneeze is kushami. It sounds so perfectly like the action it describes, doesn't it? I decided to try to study Japanese more, so I've be reading some newspaper articles. The one I read yesterday was about kafunsho, pollen allergies. Since who knows how long ago, the Japanese have been replacing logged forests with symmetrically placed ceder trees. While they look and smell nice, they have also caused a nationwide problem of epidemic propertions in allergies. Starting around now and continuting until fall, people will check the pollen report on the news and wear a mask, or not leave their house, accordingly. This year the pollen count is predicted to be three times higher than last year, the highest ever. I sincerely hope that I do not spontaneously develop an allergy, as I have heard happens. Please oh please, I want to be able to breathe.

Flowers For Everyone

In honor of the spring tourist season in Kyoto, the traditional downtown area is putting on a light-up called "Hana Dori" (Flower Road). While technically I think this is supposed to mean they will light up the blooming plum and cherry blossoms, it also includes displays of all sorts of ikebana, flower arranging. My friends and I went the other night and wandered the candle-lit parks, winding through the traditional shops of Gion toward Kiyomizudera. On the way we passed several of these ikebana arrangements. Note the drastic difference between "traditional" and "modern" ikebana art.

Ikebana gone wild

Traditional ikebana 

A Friendly Face

I went running this morning to explore my side of the mountain. As I was jogging along one of the many winding roads in the area, I noticed a foreign woman coming toward me on her bicycle. Usually when foreigners meet on the road in Japan one of two things happen; slight eye contact and a little head nod to acknowledge the unspoken "foreigners' club," or complete avoidance of eye contact or any recognition of any kind. I don't have a reason for the second one, we just do it. However, this morning this woman stopped and said, "Do you go to Boston University?" I thought, do I know her somehow? Then she says, "I'm from Boston and I saw your sweatshirt..." Right, I forgot I was wearing BU gear. She says her husband is doing research here and she just came over, so she's still in the "glad to see a familar foreign face" mode. That's about that, and we continue on our way. This evening I was riding down along the river for an evening of dinner and karaoke and a special city "light up" when I see the same woman riding toward me. We exchange surprised "hey!"'s. What are the chances that I would see this woman again, and in the same day? It's a small world, especially in Kyoto, and even more especially if you aren't Japanese.

Thanks, but no thanks?

The Fed-Ex man came today. He told me what I already knew:
I am not good enough for a PhD program.
However, if you pass my application down to the Master's people, I am apparently good enough for Columbia. They accepted me into their Master's program for East Asian Languages and Cultures. I am not particularly excited about this offer.
I like lists, so let's list why:

1. PhD students get six years of free education. MA students get a $60,000 bill.
2. NYC: big, expensive, noisy, city
3. I just looked at the course listings. 80% of their Japan-related classes are not being offered in 2005-2006. This is a two year program; when I am I supposed to learn stuff?

So the question is: Do I accept this gracious offer, despite the massive debt, because it is someplace to go and something to do? Or do I refuse it and wander aimlessly for another year while applying to other Master's and fellowship programs?

I have until June 1st to decide.

And you thought Hallmark created all the cheesy holidays

Today is March 14th. It is White Day. What, you may ask, is White Day? It is a Hallmark holiday above all Hallmark holidays. But it wasn't created by the famous card company, it was created by the Japanese chocolate companies. March 14th is exactly one month after February 14th, the infamous day when all the women in Japan give chocolate to any male remotely associated with them, be it boyfriend, boss, or random office worker. To spur on reciprocation, the chocolate companies created White Day, a day set aside for men to give the women they love white chocolate, jewelry, Louis Vuitton bags, and fancy lingerie. The department stores had their displays set up even before the Valentine's chocolate had gone 25% off. I'm sure if I were to venture downtown this evening I wouldn't fail to see a number of couples strolling down the street, the women holding white roses. Isn't consumerism great?

Runner's envy

I was standing on the side of the road yelling "Gambare!" when I realized that I am weak and lazy. Three of my fellow ultimate frisbee teammates ran passed, well on their way to finishing under the two hour mark of the Kyoto City Half Marathon. I was supposed to be running too. I signed up, they sent my number in the mail, and I got my free towel, but for these following reasons, I decided not to run. Let me consider these:
Excuse #1. I haven't run more than five miles at a time in three months.
- For the first half marathon I ran, I hadn't run more than two miles at a time in three months, and I finished in a little over two hours. I have become weak.
Excuse #2. I have a huge important frisbee tournament next weekend. I don't want to be sore.
- I was only sore for three days after the Boston Marathon. Albeit, I had been training for months. I have become afraid of pain.
Excuse #3. Bad knees.
- This is the excuse I use anytime I don't want to do physical activity. If I would just do my stretches and physical therapy, I wouldn't have this excuse anymore.
Excuse #4. I have a cold/fever.
- This one is perhaps legitimate. I did go to frisbee practice yesterday, but my team is so ridiculous that we don't do more than five minutes of running altogether. In a five hour practice, I didn't break a sweat. But I think I would find breathing difficult during a two hour thirteen mile run.

So sadly, I had to stand at the side of the road and cheer masses of runners on. It wasn't bad. I knew exactly what many of them were feeling as they passed, as I had been in a similar position before. I knew how wonderful it is to have someone cheer you on.
I cheered for everyone, but especially:
-People in costume. Superman, a cheerleader, a man with a crown, and a guy in one of those t-shirts that looks like he's wearing a bikini (Coincidentally, I believe that was the owner of one of the bars I frequent. He often wears that shirt...)
-The blind runner paired with a sighted runner. I admire both of these people; the blind person because it's gotta be hard to run without seeing where you're going, and the sighted person, who trains for the race not for himself, but for someone else. The partner doesn't even get a number.
-People I know. No one told me that three guys (or more, I might not have seen them) from my frisbee team were running. Unfortunately, as they are older guys, I didn't know their names, so I could only yell a little louder for them.
-People over 50. I hope that I can still run a half marathon when I turn 40, let alone over 50. There was a woman who looked 65 running, and she was in the elite group!

Congratulations to all the finishers, and good try to all of those that got cut short by the time limits and were herded onto buses to the finish line.

Post-travel laziness

I knew it was supposed to rain, which is why I planned to do so many outdoor errands. But the post-travel laziness has set in quite completely, and I feel no desire whatsoever to leave my semi-warm room and venture into the wetness. Yes, I know I need to withdrawl money from the bank before it closes for the weekend, and I know I don't have any food in the house, but these things seem so trivial when you consider that it is raining. To make up for my lack of outside errands, I have managed to clean my room, return several emails, download a few songs, and stare at the pile of presents I must package and send. I have pondered the reasons why my housemate has left his laundry to soak in the washing machine for two days. And I have debated the best way to reattach the fusuma paper on my japanese style window to its frame. I am not bothered by this innactive day, however, I am worried about the consequences of not doing my "To Do" list. But alas, until the pitterpatter on my neighbor's roof subsides, I will not waste my energy trying to ride my bike holding an umbrella down a hill without getting drenched.

Journeys and Journals

I've been trying to put together a webpage chronicling my journey through China, but I am finding it extremely difficult to do so. It's not that I have forgotten things; uncharacteristically, I kept a journal. I think it is that the immediacy and excitement of the trip has dimmed. I remember reading a "re-entry to the US" guide before I ended my year abroad a couple years ago, and one of the things it said is, "People won't really want to hear about your experience." I have fully realized this now. Two, three days after the fact, people care very little. Heck, even I don't look at my pictures that much after the initial postings. But despite having said all of this, it is my intention to set up a website anyway, even if it takes me the rest of my vacation (only another month) to do so. In fact, I am debating buying my own domain name and space. Any suggestions for the name? This development has just become easier since I bought a wireless router today, and with the help of a friend, set it up. I now have wireless internet in my room!! So look for me to be online more than I have been for the previous five months.

Good things aside, I am the latest victim of the head cold that is going around the country. And I got my rejection letter from Harvard in the mail. I am preparing myself for the reality of not having any plans for my future after September 14th. Yay!

Hokkaido

My friends posted our Hokkaido pictures on furuburaito.com. Take a look!

Rejection

I will not be going to UC Berkeley.
I will not be going to Princeton.

Re-Entry

The China extravaganza is over. Three weeks in the People's Republic of China, the Middle Kingdom. I have lots to tell and over three hundred pictures to share. But I must leave for Tokyo in two hours, so let it suffice for now to say that I had a great time, but I am glad to be back.

The Four Best Things About China:
1. Sunrise from Lotus Peak at Huangshan (Yellow Mountain)
2. Buddhist cave carvings from 1500 years ago, many still with colors
3. Thousands of terracotta warriors standing as they were placed 2500 years ago
4. Incredibly cheap living: trains, food, DVDs, hotels...

The Four Worst Things About China:
1. Maybe I'm used to overly-polite Japanese people, but Chinese people are downright rude
2. Dirty, dirty, smoggy, trash everywhere
3. Can't drink the water
4. The incredible difference in lifestyle between Shanghai and the rural areas