Today we had the dreaded speech contest- memorizing a four minute speech wasn't bad at all (but I guess I memorized so many 8-10 speeches in my debate days that something of that length is a snap). The general consensus among my class is that we wouldn't be caught dead delivering the same speech in English; the limited length of the speech, paired with the necessity of polite (read: long) forms means there's very little of insight we can actually say. I couldn't succinctly sum up the Japanese culture in a speech of that length in English, or even a summer's worth of blogs. So as we revised our drafts amid Sensei's constant questioning of "What's the message?", I finally had to resort to the earth-shattering Pearl of Wisdom "it's not that one culture is better than the other, it's just that I think they're different".
An interesting development in the language swapping: Sunday I went out running to clear my head, deep into the rice fields and far enough that Hakodate Yama, the cow-shaped mountain that looms over every activity of every day, disappeared altogether. Apparently a lone gaijin walking the side of the road attracted enough attention that one car of two japanese ladies drove past me, stopped, turned around and asked me why I was so far from anywhere else. They asked me friendly questions, and I responded in Japanese- it wasn't until halfway through our conversation that I consciously realized they were asking questions in English. Whoa.
Of course, the process of training myself to speak something else comes with its own screw-ups. A few of my favorite recent examples of WORD FAIL:
"この手紙を送りたいから、何時まで教科書があいてる？"
("Since I want to mail this letter, until what time is the textbook open?" Host mom gave me some funny looks. Probably meant Post Office. The words aren't even close.)
When I went to actually mail the letter, the post office lady did the transaction then invited me to seal the envelope. I immediately put the flap to my mouth... and she handed me a stick of glue. The entire post office laughed. Apparently they do these things differently. Maybe something to do with the general germophobia here? I didn't know the verb "to lick" to explain how we usually do it in the states, so I figured it'd be best to cut my losses and leave early. (Although I guess I could have explained it with something like "封筒に舌をすると、のりになる！” "If you do a tongue to the envelope, it becomes glue!")
I tried to tell my host mom that I learned how to make ちょうちん (paper lanterns) after class, but instead told her I brought home a ちんちょう．My dictionary won't tell me, but I'm pretty sure I told her something about a penis.
I was invited to go to ドン・キホーテ (English: Don-kihoute, or as I eventually figured out, Don Quixote.) I thought we were going to a play based off the book, but it's actually a store. Like the general store but exploded with glitter. I bought engrish apparel, including Rilokumma bear underwear that says in roman characters "kyou to ashita mo minna goro goro shimasu" ("Today and also tomorrow everyone's just kinda loafing around") It is the most fabulous piece of clothing I've ever worn.
The big deal of today was 七夕 (Tanabata). On the 7th day of the 7th month, there's some lore about the daughter of a god and a normal person who were lovers make a bridge to meet on that one day. This holiday isn't a big deal in most of Japan, except here in Hokkaido, it's a close approximation to Trick-Or-Treating. All the obscenely adorable children dress up in obscenely adorable yukatas and go door to door, singing the Tanabata Song (in a similar fashion to the phrase "trick-or-treat", some regions' songs threaten bodily harm if they don't get candy). The original tradition and the song's word ask for candles as mementos, but everyone gives out candy or toys (I got a balloon dog!) and the few old people who actually give out candles are immediately blacklisted from the neighborhood.
Nozomi (pink), Hikari (blue), and me (tall American dude) pose with the decorated sasa tree outside the house. It's covered with little origamis, chains of paper, and small prayers written out on cards. I decorated the tree myself!I went around to a couple houses with my host sisters, adamantly insisting I was too old and I didn't need the candy, but everytime my host sisters insisted even more adamantly I needed it, and then took the candy for me and held it at me / threw it at me until I finally accepted it. Probably the best part of Tanabata is that our friend and neighbor Shibuya-san gave me beer in exchange for singing the Tanabata song.
As Amanda-san and I caught up with the itty bitty host sisters to go out Tana-Bata'ing, I explained that even though we were too old Amanda and I wanted to experience it together. Actually said we wanted to get married together. Oops.
Awww, children are adorbs. This is moments before they ran shrieking to the next house. This happened between every house, as if all the sweets would be gone if they didn't hurry.
Lots more interesting things to report/ponder, but its late and the semester final exam is fast approaching. For now, the tanabata song, which requires only two notes and will be stuck in my head forever after the number of times I heard children singing it tonight.
竹に短冊七夕祭り
大い祝おうローッソク 一本
ちょうだいナア！
Who decided it would be a good idea to give them THAT MUCH sugar? Crap.
No comments:
Post a Comment