Sooooo….tonight’s the night before the first day of classes for the spring semester for international students at Kansai Gaidai. Most Japanese students won’t be around since they just started their spring break between semesters just a couple days ago or so. The only Japanese students who will be around are those who have decided to take afternoon lecture courses with us international students. Kinda sucks…less break, you know?
Anyways, I’m sitting here at the kotatsu in my shack enjoying the warmth of my last school-free moments. I’m a bit anxious, as usual, because I’m excited for school to start, but I’ve been a lazy bum all winter break long. Thus, I’m also anxious because I haven’t studied much at all, and my Japanese is going down the drain, as is what’s prone to happen during any school break. I did make one good productive choice and reviewed 2 out of the 6 lessons of kanji, but that’s about it. No grammar. No vocab. No nothing…. (｡ŏ﹏ŏ)
This semester I will be in level 5 reading/writing (aka kanji class) and level 5 speaking (aka grammar and vocab class). I’ve signed up to take two lecture courses: Monsters, Ghosts, and the Making of Modern Japan, which covers Japanese folktales and creatures of myth, and Intersection of Fantasy & Real Life in Modern Japanese Literature, which is a literature class in which we read the professor’s favorite obscure Japanese books translated into English. Lengthy titles, right? I actually didn’t get into the first class, and instead I’m in Survey of Japanese Art, a class in which an old professor lectures you to sleep while describing all the art since Japan existed. I hope that maybe I can get into the Monsters class before the end of the week….we’ll see. I’m on the waiting list, and I asked the head of the Japanese department back at my home institution to see if she could get me into the class via emailing the staff here at Kansai Gaidai. We’ll see. If not, I’m pretty happy with my class schedule because I’ll be done by no later than 3 pm every weekday. ^__^
Right now, I am getting ready by pretending to review grammar and then picking out my outfit for tomorrow, the first day of school, which is also forecasted to be a cold and gloomy day. Oh yeah~! Heh heh.
I’ll get back to recapping how Tokyo and Seoul went. To tell you the truth, Tokyo was meh. If you want to visit Japan, I really recommend the Osaka/Kyoto/Nara area. It’s so much more cultural here in the Kansai region, and there’s so much more to see, both modern and historical. Tokyo’s cool for like 2 days. Then…it’s pretty much Times Square x50 and too expensive. Thus, my Tokyo post will be kinda meh, and then I will write as much as I can about Seoul! I loved Seoul, the good and the bad…except maybe the pollution, but, yeah, Seoul. Awesome.
Ok, let’s get down to business (insert Mulan sing-a-along).
This is kind of a recap, but not. Only slightly.
Classes and finals were over by the 16th (or maybe a few days earlier). I spent a lot of time with my friends who were only here for a semester, and I also spent a lot of time packing things to go away in storage at the seminar house and packing things to go with me on my trip to Tokyo and the Seoul, KOREA!!! I WAS VERY EXCITED FOR THIS TRIP (mostly just the Korea part), and you can tell by the use of capital letters.
The end of the semester could come no sooner, but then it was really hard to see all my friends leave and help them load their luggage onto the bus right outside Seminar House 4 and watch them go…go away…and go home and away from Japan and me and all of our memories… Alright, that was a bit too dramatic, but it did suck, but we still keep in touch via Facebook and tumblr and reminisce about our adventures and ridiculousness in the land of Osaka, Japan.
Then this weird lull happened as everyone was leaving and packing and leaving. I didn’t leave for Tokyo until the 23rd of December, so I was at Seminar House, at this dorm, a lot just chilling, watching Jarhead and episodes of Rome with some guy friends, dancing with girl friends, and spending A LOT of time on tumblr. I also had my boyfriend over a lot to waste time with on the internet. Then came lots of packing for me, and there was no one to see me off as most people had left. I wasn’t all sad or left wanting for crowds of people to wave me off because I was on my way to Tokyo and was more excited than anything by the time it was my turn to put a suitcase onto the bus.
Getting to Tokyo was a bundle of fun. Andrew, Andrea, and I lugged altogether 5 large suitcases across many train stations, escalators, staircases, and onto a couple of trains much to the dismay of the Japanese people who happened to encounter us. I won’t even begin to explain how much I’ve been over the fact that Japanese people will stare at you if you’re not Japanese and then how much more they will stare if you’re doing things out of the ordinary, like traveling with suitcases. It was really annoying…BUT there was a diamond in the rough.
Something really embarrassing happened to me on this journey from our starting point of Hirakata city, Osaka to Kyoto, where we would catch our 7- or 8-hour day bus to Tokyo. My friends and I lugged our suitcases up and down escalators and stairs and onto elevators. Thus, an accident was pretty much just waiting to happen. At one station, we got off the train and waited until the crowds finally got up the escalators for then us to get up without having time-crunched, grouchy people from the morning rush hour trying to beat us to the escalators since I knew they wouldn’t want to get stuck behind the slow-moving foreign tourists with tons of baggage. I mean, who does?
Anyways, as soon as it was clear, another train started to arrive. I urged my friends to move quickly before the train stopped and let off a new wave of passengers. We got to the escalator just in time for a ginormous crowd amassed at the bottom of the escalator. Andrea went first with her one suitcase and Andrew right after with his two. I came up at the rear, but when I placed one suitcase in front of me on a step and one behind, I didn’t place them each squarely on a step. The one behind me was only half on a step. I realized this and try to pull it closer to me. At the same time, what I didn’t realize was that the suitcase in front of me was in the middle of two steps, so when the flat part of the escalator became stairs, my attention was not on the correct bag to fix first. The top suitcase started to lean towards me and fall on me. I started to fall on top off the suitcase behind me, and then that one fell. It was a ridiculous domino effect. If you know me, then you know that I have absolutely no upper body strength nor significant muscle mass in my arms. I tried to push the suitcase on top of me off of me, but instead propelled myself backwards even more and I actually started to fall over and roll over the suitcase behind me. All of this was happening in a matter of seconds, by the way. And in these few seconds I could see Andrea’s concerned face that was also stifling a laugh and Andrew’s helpless look. I also realized that I was *falling down the up escalator*. Geez. I couldn’t believe it and kind of laughed at myself within the panic of falling and my arms and ankles getting bruised.
Surprisingly, a man who had just gotten off the train was right behind me and realized my predicament as it started to happen. The moment I started to fall over my other suitcase, he reached out to grab the extended handle of the suitcase in front of me to prevent it from falling over me as well. I was really surprised he came out to help me. I actually didn’t expect anyone to do anything but stare at me as I fell down the up escalator.
He really helped me because then I was able to steady myself, pull myself up onto a stair in between the suitcases, grab the higher one above me and put it onto a step. I thanked him and apologized profusely. Then I could pull the one behind me up, and then in a few seconds, I was up and off the escalator rushing to put the whole fiasco behind me. As soon as I had regained composure and stopped blushing, I laughed. Andrea asked me if I was ok, and I reassured that I was. I noticed that she was going to laugh at me earlier and told her so. She felt so bad and expressed that it was really funny, but she knew I was in big trouble there, and she couldn’t do anything since she was way ahead of me. I told her it was okay, and the three of us laughed it off as we went to exit the station and go to our next train transfer.
My goodness. Such a crazy pre-departure journey to Tokyo. And that man who helped me out, which was definitely a behavior out of the ordinary for Japan, he was the diamond in the rough.
The newest single from one of my favorite groups. It’s wintry and conveniently subbed. XD
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It’s been… a long time. Don’t blame me, though–blame finals. XD I’m finally mostly settled into my apartment; I’m only missing having a proper desk and a dresser. ): I didn’t have a dresser when I was at my homestay, but I at least had bins to sort my clothes into… I don’t have that here, and I can’t really hang anything up because they don’t use dryers in Japan so I have to air-dry everything. >: so I have to spend the next four months and change living out of my suitcases, which isn’t very fun. but it’s fine, I guess…I just wish I had places to put all my things instead of having ugly piles of crap everywhere. ]:
Anyway, I’ve already given my general thoughts on the past semester, so I guess I’ll talk more about the various events I took part in since the beginning of November. XD;
柚希礼音 – 夜空に眠るまで (Yuzuki Reon – Yozora ni nemuru made — Yuzuki Reon – Until we sleep in the night sky)
The video is unrelated to the content of the entry. XD But this lovely lady is one of the current top stars in Takarazuka (from the previous entry), and one of my favorite actors. (: She’s also huge for a Japanese woman–nearly 5’8″. XD
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I apologize for the lack of updates, but I’ve been incredibly busy for the past several weeks with nonstop exams and papers, and it’s only gotten worse with the end of the semester just around the corner. I’ve done some things worth mentioning here, but once the semester is done with for good for me, I’ll post something. (: I just don’t have time right now to compile a post like that… lol. Instead, because I’m done with everything in only a few days, I figured I’d do a little end of semester review of how things went at Kansai Gaidai.
Ughhhhh….It’s finals time. This week starts the hellish time of test-taking, oral interviews, and handing in papers I procrastinated for too long. In actuality, the week after next is the official finals week, but every professor thought, “Oh if I make my paper due/have the students take the test/etc. the week before finals, it’ll give them a break so they can focus on the rest of their finals afterwards.” WELL, now it’s more like TWO hellish weeks of finals coming up! *sigh*
I have been writing a 13-page research paper that was due today and memorizing a presentation speech for Monday. Now, I’m typing here to give myself a breather and have uploaded a video to my youtube account. I know I don’t post regularly, but I can assure I won’t be posting these next two weeks due to these finals. I apologize.
I will keep posting videos though, and I hope to start some kind of online photo account soon so I can share pictures from all the things I’ve done this semester.
On this day I met my host family. It was this day I was scheduled to meet them (and then, go to their home with them…that is not ever explicitly stated during orientation week, by the way―SURPRISE!! ) Anyways…that morning I had to move out of my temporary dorm, set all my luggage downstairs in the lobby, and then walk over to the CIE (the Center for International Education a.k.a. gaijin building) to wait FOREVER and in so much anxious anticipation for this Japanese family who was willing to let a foreign stranger live in their home with their children.
While I was waiting, I looked over my paper that told me information about the family. There was a mom, a dad, a niece who was my age, and two small children (a girl of about 3 and a 1 year-old boy). I was very excited because there would be adorable children and someone my age who can teach me how people of this generation actually speak! Yes! Luckily, some friends from my university waited with me in the waiting room (nothing fancy, just a small classroom next to other classrooms we would meet our future host families in). I started to get the jitters while waiting, and I think it’s because a certain realization was dawning on me.
Eventually, I was called to meet my family. One of the CIE staff greeted me and asked me what I liked to be called. I heard other staff ask other students the same question because some people had names that would be hard for Japanese people to pronounce. LoL, my boyfriend, Andrew, was asked if his family could call him “Andy,” and he said no. Andrew does not like that nickname at all. In my case, I pronounced my name as “Sandara” and also said that “Dara” would be fine (how funny that that name would become a very much used nickname during my time here in Japan). Then we went to go see the family in the next classroom over.
We met the family in the hallway as we looked for the classroom. I was a bit unsettled because there was a mom, a dad, two small children, and another girl? She looked to be in grade school and definitely not my age. I wondered if she was another daughter or someone else who lived in the house, and I wondered what the niece was like then. I also wondered if we’d all fit in their car with all my humungous luggage. The staff member who was to play the intermediary role and interpreter for us seemed to also be concerned, and once we had settled down at a table, he asked about the other child. The mom replied that she was a neighbor friend who often visited so she had accompanied them to this meeting.
The meeting then commenced, and we went over the contract that the family filled out with preferences and house rules. As we did this, the baby peed on himself and on the floor, one of the children knocked over the tea served to the family, and the interpreter and other staff tried to help clean up, all the while being very embarrassed. (I should have known craziness would ensue once I live with this family. Jay kay. Jay kay. I really did think it was funny and cute. I mean, they’re kids. What are you going to do? Press the pause button on them?)
As far as the meeting itself, a lot of the rules about there being an order to who showers and goes into the bath at night, dinnertime, curfew, etc. were all written out quite strictly on the contract itself, but then as each rule was brought up for clarification and discussion, the mother would actually contradict her own writing and say things like, “oh no there’s not really an order” and “dinnertime is between these two hours but we can save you the food if you come home late” and “there’s not really a curfew; just please let us know when you’ll be home” and so on. Some things that were required were that I clean my own room at least once a week, I hang and pick up and fold my own laundry after the mom washes it, and that I help clean the dishes up at night. The mom said she’d show me everything when we got to their house. That dawning realization became stronger as I realized I was really going home with them and going to sleep in their house.
The meeting went pretty smoothly overall, and things looked good. There was only one thing that irked me though. At one point we went over my allergies and foods I disliked. I’m allergic to apples, and I really don’t like onions. I really don’t like onions (especially raw or big cooked slices of mleh). HOWEVER, I will tolerate it if I have to. Anyhoo, when we got to this part, the translator asked me if I was for reals (not in those words, but yeah), and I said, yeah, but that I’ll eat it if it’s not in big chunks or raw. I said that it just was at the bottom of my eatables. She then turns to the host mom and says something along the lines of, “how childlike” (in Japanese kodomoppoi [子供っぽい]). This upset me. Disliking ONE vegetable does not make me childlike. Urrrrgggghhh!! Anyways, later on I cleared it up with my host mom about my onion situation and ate miso soup almost every night at my homestay with onions all up in it!! Take that!
After the meeting, we got into a minivan, and my new host mom chatted me up on the way to the parking lot. She seemed really nice and chillax. The minivan belonged to her mom since they could not all fit in their normal car, much less with me and my suitcases. This was my biggest worry coming up. Can my suitcases fit?
I got into the car, and I kind of just sat quietly the whole time unless they asked me questions. I was really nervous. When we got to the seminar house, I saw Andrew just packing up and about to leave with his host family. That made me feel better. I smiled at him as I nervously helped my host parents get my suitcases. OMG, my poor host dad. They were so heavy. I saw the pain lol. Back in the car, the same continued of just being asked questions and me trying not to be too nervous. By the way, kids do NOT buckle up in Japan and jump around and all about the inside of the vehicle. The mom also sat carrying her BABY in the FRONT SEAT. This madness….I don’t even know what to say. I talked about this with my other homestay friends, and they noticed the same thing and were just as appalled as I was. The thing is, as much as we want to say something, it’s definitely not our place. :/
The house was about 20 to 30 minutes away by car. When we arrived, I was a little disappointed that the house wasn’t more traditional-looking, but who am I to judge? The house was very cute and narrow, regardless, and it was what I expected to see. When we entered (omg, my poor host dad, again), he brought in my suitcases and lugged them upstairs—UPSTAIRS—to my new room. I kept saying sorry for how heavy my suitcases were, and the parents kept saying that it was ok. My room was super cute, and I noticed a lot of IKEA décor and furniture pieces. My bed was a futon on the floor, and I also had a desk and shelving unit. There’s not too much to describe about my room, but if you watch my video tour, you’ll get to see what it looked like. My parents then left me to unpack and relax.
As I unpacked and put my things in their new place, I noticed that there was quite a bit of dust on…well, everything. I think my host family cleaned my room at one point, but not recently enough because then I became really uncomfortable and had the urge to clean everything. There were some hairs and dust balls in the drawers of things and on the floor and on the bed and on the pillow and yeah… I’m not a neat freak, but I really don’t like letting dust build up or particles in bed, which there also were. BUT, everything else was really nice regardless. (I cleaned up that room really well the following weekend since school started the next day.)
They called me down for dinner, and I ate with the children. The host mom and dad don’t really eat dinner, they told me. They’re both on diets? The host niece wasn’t there that day. I would meet her later. I helped clean up and wash dishes, and then we talked some more and got to know each other a little better. We went over my schedule and how to use the bath. I took my first night shower in Japan, but I didn’t use the Japanese bath, or o-furo. I wasn’t ready to do that yet. I said good night and went to my room. I got ready for my first day of classes, cleaned up the bed as best as I could, turned on the fan, turned off the lights, and laid myself to sleep. Then, at that very moment, it hit me. It really hit me at last. I’m in Japan.
Today I am going to talk about the Takarazuka Revue! It’s an all-female musical company comprised of five different troupes (Flower, Moon, Snow, Star, and Cosmos), and it was founded nearly a hundred years ago by the owner of the Hankyuu Railway as a means for enticing people to ride his train to end of its line in the city of Takarazuka. XD A kind of funny reason to start up a singing and dancing company to me, but I guess it’s effective!
In any case, Takarazuka had two peaks: the 70s and the 90s, and even though it hasn’t been as popular lately, it still has an extremely devoted fanbase made up almost entirely of women. This doesn’t really surprise me because–as a scholar of popular culture in Japan–the reasons that the safe, androgynous men of Johnny’s Jimusho are so popular among Japanese women are the same reasons that the safe, androgynous women of Takarazuka are also popular. In the productions the women perform in, because the Revue is all-female, the male roles are also taken on by women, and it is these women–the male players, or otokoyaku (男役)–who have the most fans.
In each troupe, there is a male player who is what is known as the “top star,” so I’m sure you can imagine what that means. :b She is the most popular and always gets the lead role in whichever production she participates in. There is also a “top musumeyaku” (female player (娘役)), who is the most popular female player. She would get the leading female role. There is also an obvious nibante (二番手, lit. “second player”), who is the second most popular in the troupe, gets the second highest supporting role, and usually becomes the next top star after the top star retires, though it’s not certain. There may also even be a sanbante (三番手, lit. “third player”), who would then go on to be nibante and eventually top star, though that too may change due to being moved to a different troupe or something similar. The ni/sanbante are always male players though. There is obviously a second most popular female player, but because female players are less popular on the whole than the male players, they aren’t recognized in the same way outside of the top musumeyaku.
But I’m not here to bore you to death with my academic thoughts on gender and pop culture in Japan, lol.
Oh my goodness. I have no excuse for why I have not written in over a month except that I’ve been having too much fun. Though the truth includes lack of access to internet for a bit, inability to edit videos, etc….still, no excuse for my absence from the internets. I can remember the Monday of orientation week pretty well, but the rest is blur. Here is my summary of orientation. Also, I have finally uploaded edited videos of the seminar houses/dorms so here are the goodies to make up for it:
LINKS!!
Kansai Gaidai Seminar House 4 Tour
Kansai Gaidai Dorm Tour
Monday – August 29
Took a campus tour that consisted of way too much walking. The tour guide lady made us walk up all the way to the 3rd floor of the library, and when we got to the 3rd floor, all she had to say was, “This is the 3rd floor. We have more books here.” Then she had us walk back down ALL THOSE STAIRS. Now, you may think I’m complaining about walking too much, but that 3rd floor tour was completely unnecessary, and you have to remember that I’ve been living in Florida for the past five years or so where walking is at the bottom of the transportation totem pole. Floridians mostly drive everywhere or take escalators. Yeah…I know…I’m a lazy butt now. That will change in Japan though.
That afternoon I also took my placement test. OMG, don’t even get me started on that mess.
Tuesday – August 30 to Friday – September 2
The rest of orientation week was full of more official things to do like opening a bank account, paying for my housing arrangements (homestay fees and a deposit), liability fees, tours of where everything we need is, safety workshops, and just asking questions about things I thought up randomly. Liiiiiiiiike, “How do I join a club?” “Can my parents mail me boxes to my mailbox on campus?” “If a creeper guy touches me on the street, can I punch him in self-defense?” and so on.
I can expand on the answers to these questions and the processes mentioned above in later posts if peeps are interested. Just message me.
AAaaaaanyways….
I went karaoking during orientation week, and it was so awesome!! We went to this place called Jankara, and it was kinda pricey, but the atmosphere was really nice. We went with an old friend from our university who had done the JET programme and continued to live in Japan with her boyfriend afterwards. Jankara is located on the fourth floor of a building near Hirakata city’s train station. You take a sketchy, tiny elevator up, and then you’re brought into a bright and boldly colored room with drink dispensers and a front desk. You pay for whatever karaoke package you want (how many hours, alcoholic drinks or not, etc.), and then you get assigned a room, which could range from a small room the size of a small public restroom with a table and two couches that line the walls on two sides to a super big room with couches that line most of the walls and one to two tables. Most asian karaoke place in America (from my experiences karaoking in New York and Florida) usually use a typical family home-style karaoke machine in which you enter codes for what songs you want to sing, and the codes are usually in large phonebook-like tomes. However, the nicer karaoke places in Japan like Jankara just have a touch screen device that you can type in the artist name or song. The thing will search for what it thinks you want, and then you can enter it into a queue. I highly recommend doing karaoke, either in Japan or asian karaoke places in America. It’s a great stress reliever, super fun, and just a great bonding experience with your friends.
From now on, posts will either be RECAP EPISODES since so much has happened that I have not written about yet, or they will just be normally titled posts for more recent events. There you go~!
Heh heh.
