First day of work after summer vacation conversations in Canada:

8:30 am – leaving the house:
Girlfriend: "Don’t work too hard today, OK? You don’t need to get through everything all at once."
You: "OK. Thanks. You too, all right? Take it easy."

9:00 am – at work:
Boss: "How was vacation?"
You: "Pretty nice. We had perfect camping weather."
Boss: "Oh? Where’d you go?"
You: “Down to Diefenbaker.”
Boss: "Beautiful lake, isn't it? We visited our daughter in Victoria. She's lucky to be out there, let me tell you."

5:00 pm – leaving work:
Friend: "You leaving? Take it easy. We’ll see you tomorrow."
You: "Thanks. See you tomorrow."

Same conversations in Japan (keeping in mind vacation was one day long – not a Monday or a Friday, either, but a Wednesday):

6:30 am – leaving the house:
Girlfriend: "Try your best today. Don’t leave until you finish."
You: "You too. Try your best."

8:00 am – at work:
Boss: "How was vacation?"
You: "Very hard and difficult. Thankfully it is over."
Boss: "Where did you go?"
You: "To the carwash and then I went gambling."
Boss: "I see. Are those papers ready?"
You: "Yes."

8:30 pm – leaving work:
Friend: "You leaving? Thank you for your hard work."
You: "Thanks. Sorry for leaving early."

I asked around and that was the biggest typhoon in 25 years. I don’t how many, if any, people died, but is there ever a lot of damage. Driving to work I saw three massive cedars, maybe 150 years old, snapped in half. The tin club house beside our house ended up in the driveway. The solar panels blew off my supervisor’s roof. Mastushita-sensei said the waves were crashing right over the concrete retaining wall, which makes them at least ten meters high.

I spent the morning helping out around one of my schools. Some windows were broken in the gym, and the floor was partially flooded. The roof collapsed in one spot and some sheet metal was torn off the side. Of course there were leaves and branches everywhere.

I’m glad I got to go home early yesterday. The road would have been super kowai. As for Nancy, her supervisor gave her this excellent advice as she was leaving at 5:15, when the typhoon was at its worst: “Be careful on your bike.”

yep. the typhoon is definitely here. it is pretty scary too. huge winds and massive amounts of rain. don't worry everyone, we will be fine! i just don't understand why my boss won't send me home. i am not doing anything and the typhoon is going to keep getting worse for hours to come. at this rate, i will have to sleep at my board of education...

The rain is coming down in great buckets now, the wind scattering the walls of water into blinding spray. The rivers are overflowing, the streets are flooded, the mountains are falling into great soggy heaps on the road and roof tiles litter the streets. The farmers are at home praying for the gods to spare their crop and not even the stick-wavers are working. Its typhoon time here in Kochi and the only thing on TV is people chasing umbrellas.

This is the big one and we've been waiting for three days. The first we heard it was supposed to arrive Friday night, then Saturday morning, then early Sunday. Finally its here.

Every town in Kochi cancelled its fall festival. No fireworks this year I'm afraid. Yesterday we drove down to the ocean to watch the surfers carving the hell out of five meter waves. It was impressive and dangerous. I watched one surfer walk into the ocean only to be spit out five minutes later, exhausted as a rat in a rainbarrel. Luckily she got out in one piece.

My work was going to send me home early, but for some reason here I am, watching the bamboo buckle in the breeze. I hope the little road home is OK. I might have to go around, through Tosa and up Ino way back to Sakawa. Better safe than sorry, right?

It was sunny when I left the office after lunch. But then it started pouring rain and I was stuck at a supermarket waiting for it to finish. Some lady came up to me and started a conversation in perfect English, then it almost stopped raining, so I went back to the office. Its been simultaneously raining and sun shining all afternoon.

Maybe me and Nancy could do Kochi to Vancouver when we're finished here. Anyone want to get started on the sponsorships?

Bagdhad, before and after.

"Kore wa English dake. Japanese nashi" (this is English only. without Japanese) some random guy wandering through my office remarked as he watched me write an email.

Ok. So he knew a total of 2 English words - English and Japanese. As a side note, all Japanese people know the word "Japanese". That way they can say "Japanese (insert word here)". It works for everything. Summer. School. Life. Culture. Carrot. Why was he so surprised to see me typing in English? I am sure he didn't expect me to be typing away in Japanese. Maybe he would have been really shocked then.

Actually, maybe I wowed him with my ability to use all of my fingers to type on the keyboard really fast. Typing in Japanese is definitely a slower process. You must first break the symbols into romaji. For example, やま would be typed as yama. (I realize that if you don't have the Japanese language thingy installed onto your computer then you can't see these symbols but just work with me and pretend like you can see them) Then, if it is actually supposed to be in kanji, you need to highlight the letters to change and then hit the space bar creating 山. Lastly, hit the enter key and you are finished typing mountain. It's complicated.

This weekend, Jon and I are going to meet some of the new people in our area. I am pretty excited. We are also going to meet up with a few of our friends from last year who we haven't seen in a month. Or, in Vineeth's case, 2 months. The plan is to meet at our house for a chat, some snacks and a drink or two before we head out on the town to hit the local bar/restaurant. Should be fun!

To follow up on Nancy's lazy-bones entry, here's an entry from a page called Kind Of Crap, put up by an ex-JET:

It has recently come to my attention that I may in fact not be the least productive member of my board of education, or at least not by much. Why do I say this? Because, as I type this, the old guy who works at the desk across from me is SLEEPING. Before that, he was reading the newspaper. For an HOUR. And when he eventually wakes up, he will probably read it for another hour. I guess I never had the time or the presence of mind to notice before but, having been in the office for about two weeks straight now, I've finally noticed that this is indeed about all he does. I can't believe I never realized this before. I've gotten used to just naturally assuming that I'm the least productive person in the immediate area, no matter where I go. I could walk into a graveyard and just to show me up there'd still be at least one really motivated corpse actively directing those worms on how to eat his body as efficiently as possible. But now, all of a sudden, I am met with this surprising new source of kinship, one that I find both validating, and threatening. On the one hand, this means I don't have to feel quite so bad when I choose to spend my work day filling my mouth with jam and then loudly playing the harmonica while everyone else is slaving away with real work. On the other, well, I just kind of assumed being the Office Slack-Off was MY predetermined role. This must be what it feels like when doves cry; but, painfully, there can only be one.

Now, whenever i look up from my desk at him, it feels like I'm staring at my own future. I try reading a Japanese novel in the office to appear industrious, and he reads Japanese novels in the office because...uh, well because he wants to, I guess. I use a computer so coworkers can at least imagine I'm doing work when they look at me and sigh; he uses a computer for what only I assume is work, until I glance the screen and see he is playing computerized game of Go. He does everything I do, except older.

Yesterday I taught a Canadian cooking class for the teachers at Minami junior high school. When they first asked me to do the class, I was at a bit of loss. What is Canadian food anyway? Turkey dinner? Chicken balls? Perogies? For better or worse, our culturally mixed heritage defies gastronomic categorization.

The Japanese have a hard time with there not being a distinct Canadian cuisine. Sushi dates back to the 8th or 9th century; it was a way to preserve rice. Sake and miso are as ancient as red wine and butter, sashimi as culturally loaded as lamb. Unfortunately I couldn't pass the buck off on multiculturalism (is that Trudeau I hear quaking in his boots?). I would need to cook something Canadian.

My googles turned up bannock, which is pretty rare in most parts of Canada, and poutine, which is pretty gross, especially when its been left on the counter for a couple days like my old roommates used to do. I wanted to do perogies, but didn't have the eight hours needed to create them. I thought of Saskatchewan wild rice, but didn't want to dip into my own precious supply.

After much brainstorming, I decided on shishliki, one of Grandma Sookocheff's recipes - lamb or pork marinated for three or four days in salt, pepper, garlic and onion (thanks for the spice dad!). On the side would be potatoes, onions and carrots grilled in foil, devilled eggs, Rice Krispie cake and cherry Nibs. It would be a BBQ, Canada style.

I started marinating the shishliki shortly after returning to Japan. I left it out on the counter for about eight hours, then threw it in the fridge for three days. On the fourth day it started to smell a little funny, so I put it in the freezer. Thawed the next day, it didn't smell much better; the Japanese looked worried and truthfully, so was I. The minute it was cooked, a sneaked a taste test: delicious!

In fact, the entire meal turned out fine. They couldn't believe you could melt marshmallows, took second helpings of the shishliki and potatoes, didn't care for the devilled eggs and couldn't stand Nibs (one woman spit hers into a napkin). I think they enjoyed their Canadian cooking day. I know I did.

Another day at work....

Today there are only about 4 people including me in my office. No one said a word to anyone except to say "soandso, you are wanted on line 1. It's whatshisface from suchandsuch school". One would assume that they are busy. This would be a good reason for not talking to your coworkers. Maybe they ran out of things to say. "It's hot" got boring. Plus, we have airconditioning so it wouldn't really apply. Perhaps they don't really like each other. No, I don't think that's possible. I have never seen anyone even look a little ticked off let alone raise their voice.

They must be busy. However, if this is the case, I don't know what they are doing. Take T-san for instance. He has been leaned back in his chair staring at his black computer screen for the last 30 minutes with no signs of wanting to snap out of it. The manager has been reading a book and taking smoke breaks. S-san has been leafing through books on his desk and photocopying various documents. Yamamoto-san has been busy making tea and coffee and preparing the afternoon snack. Today's snack is nashi - the pears that I hand-picked from the orchard 3 days ago. I guess Yamamoto-san has been busy. Slightly. And I,...I have been surfing the net and studying Japanese for the last 6.5 hours. Oh, I also cut out some pictures of Canada and Saskatchewan to put up on display on my English board. I am trying to think of some more display possibilities. Any ideas?

Story time...

In the beginning, there was a slimy blob, which contained good, evil, and germs, good and evil understood as yin and yang, the ancient Chinese philosophy of opposites.

In case you are unfamiliar: yang represents maleness, the sun, creation, heat, light, Heaven and dominance; yin represents femaleness, the moon, completion, cold, darkness, material forms and submission; each produces the other, cyclically and constantly, forever and ever, amen; creation occurs under yang, the completion of the created thing occurs under yin; the moon gives birth to the sun, from darkness comes light; on occassion, yin dominates yang, or vice versa, resulting in the temporary experience of health and sickness, wealth and poverty, power and submission; but nothing is forever, except, of course, diamonds.

Eventually the blob began to separate, as blobs do: imagine a chicken's egg stretching out toward infinity. The less germ-ridden part, the white, if you will, rose up and formed the heavens while the more germ-ridden element, the yolk, sunk down and formed the earth. Heaven, having few impurities, formed easily and perfectly; earth, being impure, experienced considerable setbacks; heaven came first and earth followed.

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That's my take on the creation of heaven earth according to Shinto.

A conversation I just had with Kana, who works in the child welfare department of the board of education and who enjoys English very much:

Kana: "Hello?"
Me: "Hi, how are you?"
Kana: "Fine, thank you. And you? Are you back from Canada?"
Me: "Yes. Here, have some Canadian gum. How was your summer?"
Kana: "Oh, not so good. It was very hot."
Me: "You like to stay cool?"
Kana: "Yes, iced coffee, iced tea and iced curry. Everything in ice."
Me: "Iced curry? That sounds awful."
Kana: "It's delicious."

On an unrelated note, I found this Bushism during my googles today:

"Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we."
—George W. Bush, August 5, 2004

"Nancy-chan, here is your green tea. Be careful, it's very hot." Yamamoto-san warned as she delivered the afternoon coffee. In the morning and at lunch we get cold tea but at about 3:00 everyone prefers warm coffee. However, I always get tea because I don't drink coffee.

"Crack!" It had been pouring rain all day. Supposedly there was going to be a typhoon on Thursday. These were the warning signs. The rain and wind started today and would continue on until Saturday gathering force on Wednesday night and tapering off again on Friday. The thunder had started about 20 minutes ago. "Boom!"

"In Japan thunder is thought to be blab blab blab. Yadda yadda yadda." S-san rambled off in speed Japanese. I should have paid more attention. Whoops. From what I understood he said that thunder is the sound of the taiko drums being sticken by the horned people. Maybe that's correct. Maybe not. "How about in Canada?" Uh oh. My turn and yes or no will not suffice.

"I think it is supposed to be God speaking. Maybe." Or is it God being angry? I can't remember. Plus, I don't know how to say someone is feeling something like God feeling angry. I don't know how to say angry for that matter. O.K. God speaking it is. "Yah, it's God speaking."

"Countries are different, hey?" S-san chuckled.

"Yep." I smiled and went back to drinking my tea.

Before Christine left for Washington, she gave Nancy and I a cookbook outlining the history, ingredients and tools required for the preparation Japanese cuisine. It's a beautiful book; glossy pages highlight the weathered ancient prints and luscious photography in its pages.

I can't remember the name of what we cooked last night, so lets call it eggplant in miso sauce. First we had to cut the eggplant into bite-sized chunks and soak in salted water for thirty minutes. Meanwhile we mixed together three tablespoons of dark red miso paste, three tablespoons of Miriam, three tablespoons of water and two tablespoons of sugar. When the eggplant's bitter juices had been absorbed, we heated vegetable oil to smoking and stir-fried the eggplant. Eight minutes later we added the miso mixture, stir fried until the sauce was thickened, and viola, down home Japanese cooking.

It was fast, easy and delicious; with rice and cucumber salad we had a nice, light dinner. Next time, we're going to make either clay-pot udon in ginger broth or spinach with sesame seeds and soy sauce. Mmm.

"Nancy, would you like to come with me and see a pear (nashi) farm?" the division manager asked me at 10:00 a.m. today.

"Sure", I replied. Afterall I had nothing to do for the next two weeks.

At 10:30 we were off to Komi-san's farm to look at the pears. I was a little anxious about the drive. The division manager, Kacho-san, had never really spoken directly to me other than to say thank you when I gave him a present from some trip I had taken. However, he talked to me like a normal person. "Komi-san and I are friends. He grows pears and chestnuts. Your Japanese has become very good. You can understand what I say and only after 1 year. Good job." I couldn't believe he had noticed that I can understand Japanese without ever talking to me. I guess he listens in when I talk to the other workers in the office.

When we arrived at the farm, Komi-san told me to follow him. He took me into one of the pear patches where he had already hung 2 large baskets.

"Watch me. Like this. You pull off this wire part and twist the pear upwards to break it off of the stem. Then you put the wire into this basket and the pear into that basket. Now you try."

I picked an entire basket full - maybe 20 pears with the encouragement of Komi-san and his wife. "Pick more. Fill up the whole basket."

45 minutes later it was time to go. Komi-san put the pears into a plastic bag and handed them to me. "Thank you very much" I replied, surprised. At the farmer's market pears cost $2 a pop. Komi-san was very generous. As Kacho-san said on the drive home, "His face looks scary but he has a kind heart".

We're back in Japan.....