和太鼓/ Taiko

Because I’m white, I get a column in a slick, citywide publication that is delivered to everyone’s mailbox every month.

The other English teachers and I rotate this column every few months. My next deadline is this Monday, so I’m preparing an article for that, but I thought I would post my debut article, published last June.

That’s me in one of my hand-knits! On the left is what I wrote and on the right is the Japanese translation from a woman in the city office.

The Spirit of Taiko

Before coming to Japan to teach English, I had experience as a teacher, but rather as a teacher of music. My degree is in Double Bass music performance, and after 4 years of studying classical western music, I became very inspired by Japanese music and dance. One of the performance forms I am interested in is taiko drumming.

I first saw the internationally reknowned “Kodo” 3 years ago as a student at the University of Michigan. The strength and spirit of the performers coupled with the drums’ powerful sound left me awestruck. I wanted to play taiko so badly after that performance, but according to the performance notes Kodo lives and practices on a mysterious, secluded island on the other side of the world, so while I was left with this striking impression of taiko drumming, I had to put my dream of becoming a participant to rest.

Since coming to Niigata, not only do I live right next door to that mysterious, secluded island, Sado, but I could join my town’s group, Bunsui Taiko. The spirit of taiko and of music is so strong in their hearts, that I feel continuous refreshing inspiration as a musician. I feel lucky to live in Niigata, and honored to be a member of Bunsui Taiko.

FIN

I joined this group of crazy, rowdy, old and young men and women a year ago and have since played in three festivals and gone to several drinking parties with them. Here are some pictures from our outings.

Me in full festival regalia, a little bit softer (pre-Shangri-La Diet).

This drum is bigger than it looks; it’s made from an old whiskey barrel. I’ve never actually performed on it. This picture was taken minutes after the completion of the rack it is suspended on.

Believe it or not, the picture below was taken at 7 a.m. To say they like drinking would be an understatement; I like to say it’s not a taiko party if I’m not being scraped off the floor by the end of it.

This was taken on a rented bus on the way to an overnight hot spring trip. In Japan, edamame is for beer, not for hippies.

While buckets of chicken wings, french fries, and heart attacks are the usual accomaniment to alcohol in the States, over here it’s fish, shellfish, and vegetables.

This food was SO GOOD!! >_<

And tomorrow, I’m preparing to be scraped off the floor by my fellow taiko players yet again, this time at an old house near a shrine! W00T!!

FIN?

Sado Island

Last weekend I went to Sado Island to see the taiko drumming group Kodo, at their Earth Celebration concert.

Sado has some of the world’s most interesting underwater creatures living deep in the waters that touch this incredible coastline.

I went snorkelling for the first time at this unusually calm cove:

I was scared because it was probably my fourth time ever swimming in the ocean. There were lots of baby pufferfish in the water and they were adorable, speckled black on yellow. The seaweed was a succulent green and blue and danced in the water surrounding it.

It really is like another world under there. I want to go again very much.

High quality photos at flickr here.

GooooooYA!

Goya, also known as bitter melon in English, is currently in season in Japan. This makes me very happy because I get to eat it! This beautiful vegi, savored in Eastern and Middle Eastern cultures, is reputed to be very good for the immune system and has been used for many years in traditional medicines; but I especially like it because it tastes great!

I decided to give a traditional Okinawan dish I’ve had in restaurants many times, Goya Chanpuru, a go using this recipe here. Mine turned out considerably different but was insanely tasty, so I decided to post the recipe. If you can find bitter melon, you should definitely try it!

(Pearl’s) Goya Chanpuru

Ingredients:

1 medium bitter melon
3 eggs, beaten
6 oz. extra soft tofu
small can water-packed tuna
2 oz. shredded cheddar cheese
1/2 tps dried dashi stock (see pic below)
1 Tbs soy sauce
2 Tbs oil
1 Tbs salt

Remove ends of bitter melon, slice in half lengthwise, remove pith and seeds, and cut crosswise into thin slices. Place melon in dish of water with 1 Tbs of salt for 15 mins.

Heat oil to high and fry tofu for 3 minutes, breaking into pieces. Add drained bitter melon, dashi, and soy sauce and fry for 1 minute. Add beaten eggs.

When mixture begins to thicken, add drained can tuna and cheese. Lower heat to med-low and cover with pan, stirring occasionally for 1 minute. Do not overcook, melon should be crisp. Done!

Note: This is one type of dried dashi stock, it imparts a good flavor but it could probably be omitted if you can’t find it.

Also interesting to note is that the eggs I purchased way out here in the country were cheap, and from chickens fed sesame seeds, giving all sorts of vitamins to my body. The yolks were bright, dark orange. Like all eggs in Japan, they were stored at room temperature in the super market.

Sex, Anyone?

Equality between women and men is a frequent topic of interest for Westerns when generalizing about Eastern cultures, and Japan’s is definitely no exception. It is pretty widely accepted that Japan is more male-dominated than a country like the US, although I think that the ways in which it is can be confusing to many people who do not live here.

My impression of it is an understanding of roles and balance between the sexes. For example, a female double bass player happily unmarried at 24 and gallivanting around a foreign country, like I am, would not be very accepted in the Japanese social strata because, like everyone else her age, she should be swinging children from her bosom while her over-worked salaryman husband slaves at the office until 11 or 12 PM every night.

The role-playing which puts women at the domestic end of things is slowly changing, but examples of it are often bemusedly noted by one unfamiliar to them. For example I was once asked by the women of a family to help prepare dinner while the rest of the males were left alone to relax and play with the children. If a woman is present, she will make the tea when office guests arrive, and likewise pour the beer at the party.

Looking at gender roles and jobs in the country can be very interesting. Recently the students photocopied the pages of some publication about careers featuring “day in the life” stories and posted them on the walls at school. Let’s take a look at who does what.

Women:
stewardess
beautician
bus guide
dolphin trainer
photographer
manga artist
pharmacist
translator
voice actress
imports shop employee
detective

Men:
farmer
club DJ
fire fighter
sushi chef
cellphone store manager
doctor
baker
tour conductor
commercial director
Buddhist monk
pilot
shoe cobbler
lawyer
prep school lecturer
social welfare practitioner
credit union banker
pension manager
kindergarten teacher
government official
government secretary

I was hardly surprised that most of the jobs of the women in the features were fairly “soft”, not time consuming or laden with responsibility, and was a little surprised to see pharmacist and detective there as well. No female bassists on the list, alas.

The female list is probably shorter than the male list because many women quit working when they get married. A famous example would be Crown Princess Masako who gave up her career in diplomacy when she married the Crown Prince. Maybe that’s why so many women these days are choosing a tiny dog stuffed into a Vuitton handbag over a ring and children.

However rigid, there is a harmony to the gender roles in Japan which seem to continue well on their merry way with few obvious snags. At least it can be said that Japanese men are not often openly chauvinistic or brutish towards women, even desiring to pay for dinner, opening doors, offering their coat, and using various other genteel gestures.

Some of the more peon varieties even hold their girlfriend’s dog-stuffed Vuitton handbags for them when the girls have too many shopping bags to carry. (Wait…is this Japan’s answer to feminism?)

お弁当/ Obento

On days like today where I feel tired and sick, I often have a craving for obento [お弁当/boxed lunch]. Obento (or simply “bento” in a casual context, removing the honorific “o”) is a boxed lunch that can be easily purchased like fast food from privately run shops or larger chains, or simply made at home, that is designed to be taken with you and eaten at lunchtime.

This one is from my favorite bento place, which happens to be literally right next door. It is the higawari [日替わり/changing daily] bento for 500yen ($4.50).

As you can see, all of the foods are clearly divided to avoid mixing, done with the general tray design, foil cups, and green plastic dividers. Clockwise from the bottom left, the contents are rice topped with black sesame and pickled plum, crispy fried skin-on chicken thigh, sausage, egg omelet, breaded and fried octopus and potato croquette with sauce, boiled potato topped with cream sauce, braised eggplant, eggplant and radish pickles, and rice noodle and cucumber vinegared salad. I am not sure of the caloric content, but the bentos purchasable at the 7-11 convenience chain generally have around 800-900 calories. The most typical accompaniment to bento is a bottle of unsweetened green tea.

I’m not really sure what it is about お弁当 that makes me feel very satisfied and happy, but it is addictive.

Understanding of the bento addiction is a Vietnamese woman named Ngoc who has an excellent blog here called “Cooking Cute” that features her obsession with making absolutely adorable boxed lunches for her family. It also has loads of great recipes for making authentic and easy Asian food with ingredients in American super markets.

Within Japan, bento is also taken to a specialized level with the eki-ben [駅弁/train station bento], usually a series of boxed lunches which feature speciality foods from a train station’s particular prefecture or region and are sold across the country. There are even aficionados who form “ekiben clubs” and sections of the news which have reviews of the seasonal, constantly changing ekiben.

This Japanese website here is easy to navigate without any English and shows pictures of the ekibens from every station in Japan.

Because I was enabled to do so by the Shangri-la Diet, I ate 2/3 of this bento at 11 am, had melon and orange juice at 1 pm, extra light olive oil at 4 pm between my flavorless window, and finished off the day with a few prunes, an asian pear, and copious amounts of green tea. I’ve had virtually no hunger since taking the oil this afternoon.

I Want My Money

There are many reasons why I like this video, despite it featuring a swearing baby.

The overwhelming one will be quite obvious however…

The Monk on Kugami Mountain

I recently found my camera’s USB chord, and can finally download this year’s-worth of pictures stored on my camera. The next few days may or may not feature these pictures.

This man is a Buddhist monk who has been living most of his life in a shrine on a mountain called Kugami-yama [国上山], the second tallest of three large mountains near my home.

This is his living room:

This is his chandelier:

This is where he worships everyday:

These are several of his drawings. He has worked on these hand-drawn pictures of various dieties for many years:

He was actually very fun to talk with. He said it had taken him a long time to complete some dozen sheets of artwork, as well as complete the calligraphy on his walls. He laughed alot when he spoke and came across as odd but very endearing.

It was one of my favorite memories of this year.

View high quality versions of these photos at flickr here.

和/”Wa”

Ok, I’ll let you try and guess what this is. Nope, you guessed wrong, try again.

Wait, did you guess that it was a microphone with a built-in silencer created so that you can practice karaoke as loud as you like without your neighbors hearing you? If you did, you’re smarter than I was when I first laid eyes on this contraption sold for about $80 in a catalog on the bullet train. I thought it was some kind of air filter. Please forgive me for doubting you.

Karaoke (kah-rah-oh-keh, not karyokey) was invented in Japan and bears little resemblance to its U.S. doppelganger; it is enjoyed in small private booths which often feature “all you can drink” and are rented by the hour.

It is also one of the most popular forms of entertainment for all ages, creating the unfortunately common “home karaoke system,” for which the above product is designed. It is supposed to prevent disturbing the neighbors and breaking the “Wa” [和/harmony] that Japanese try so hard to preserve.

I personally love the fact that I have to look no further than a random catalog or the local clothing retailer to find bizarre things which completely offend my Western sensibilities.

Yes folks, that poo is screaming “Help!” These are socks. The bottom of the soles on the yellow pair says something to the effect of “Oh my god! I’ve become a pig!”

和-t the hell?? (Ok, I know, I’m sorry…)

A Pictorial Ode to Shangri-La Diet

Featuring Asahi Super Dry:

I don’t need you giant beer!! Not anymore!!

Shoji Repair

I had an accident a while back where I tripped and fell into my shoji window, breaking a hole in the paper. Shoji windows are frames covered with very thin, translucent paper that act as a window shade. When this type of accident happens, one must remove the frame and repair it. Repairing it is very easy.

This is a shot of my room, showing the removed window. The window is resting on a set of sliding doors which are also easily removable.

An aside about the room; above the set of doors there is a wide frame. This frame has space between it and the wall at the top, so I can hang small hooks over it and hang anything I like from them, such as laundry or my coat. It’s extremely useful. The ceiling lamp, like all ceiling light fixtures, has high-medium-low brightness settings which are adjusted by pulling the chord.

Fixing the hole in the paper can be done by replacing the entire sheet of paper, or by covering it with flower-shaped paper seals. I picked mine up at the local 100yen store (like the $1 store in the US) and covered the hole without intentionally trying to make anything nice-looking. This is how it looks now:

It’s actually quite cute from a distance. It’s things like this that make me recall the lamenting I heard from a U.S. design student after a trip to Japan, wondering how they could justify spending years hitting the bar so low at the university, when there are people setting it so high elsewhere in the world.