This week we've had Steve (sorry, Stephen!) visiting from NZ. That sums things up in a way - an intense week of touristing to show a visitor everything we can about our region. Last weekend was spent in Kyoto, where we got soaked with heavy heavy rain and were totally overwhelmed with the number of 'must see sights'. We managed to hit a temple with 100 small (Buddhist?) god statues surrounding one huge gold-plated one (would give you the name but I don't remember it. It's long and Japanese...), the Nijo-jo castle (it may be Nijijo. Or Noji-jo. Or Jo-nono. You get the gist. I failed to wrap my head round the names. End of story) which had awesome 'nightengale floors' that make bird-like noises when stepped on so intruders can't creep in undetected. Must be the only place in the world where a crowd of tourists tramping around sounds like native birds cheeping in the forest! We finished up the afternoon at a food market, trying different things and buying sake... mmm. Yuzu (type of citrus fruit) sake... I love you.
The Sunday was rather drier so we went to the something-mizu-something shrine (I only know that much because mizu is water), where we wandered round taking pictures of the changing leaf colour and made a wish on the turning stone in the PITCHBLACK depths of a side temple. We then hit what was probably the highlight of our weekend - Kinkakuji (I think that's at least 3/4 accurate. At least, if I say it quickly no-one laughs at me, so it's fairly correct...). It's a three story building on the edge of a man-made lake and is completely painted in gold - $6 million worth. We were lucky enough to have sunshine while we viewed it, so we got the full effect. It was built as an ostentatious display of power and, hundreds of years on, it still works! We had a particularly good time there because Jeff was approached by three uni students wearing homemade 'Guide' badges. They explained they study languages and are in some kind of English club, so they like to get practice by volunteering as tourist guides at some of the big attractions in Kyoto. There were three guides and three of us, so we had fun chatting to locals as we went around. I'm not sure how successful Steve and his super-cute little Japanese girl were; he's not used to Japanese English and she's not used to superspeedNZEnglish. But all three of our guides were very friendly and we got a picture with the group before waving them goodbye.
This week I've been working while Jeff showed Steve round the more local sights (I'm having issues choosing between sites and sights... most sentences I'm using they are interchangeable, despite the totally different meanings!). However, Wednesday was a holiday, so J&S headed down to Hiroshima on Tuesday morning and I took the train down to join them after work. That was quite a mission - I had to drive back from Tode High School (about 40 mins), get changed and made-up for town (always odd before 5pm! Was hoping I wouldn't meet students!), walk up to the train station with my luggage and take a train down to Hiroshima (about an hour and a half), before tramming from Hiroshima Station to our hotel. It was a long journey but fairly simple. The only hairy bit was when I had to change trains. Mentally rehersing the Japanese in my head, I turned to the woman next to me and pointed out the window at a train on another track. 'Excuse me,' I asked in my best Japanese, 'is that the bicycle to Hiroshima?' She did one of those bite-your-cheeks-to-hold-in-the-smile things and answered in perfect English that no, it wasn't. She pulled our her timetable and told me I had to wait 17 minutes on track 2. 'Oh, thanks.' I answered. Silence for a moment. 'I said bicycle, didn't I? Man, I'm lucky I'm sitting next to you!'
That night we took Steve out to an all you can eat, all you can drink restaurant before hitting karaoke (Steve's big request). My big achievement for the night was not falling asleep (it was touch and go at the restaurant after two drinks and a big feed. Jeff started making me weak Coke-based drinks to try to keep me awake!), while Jeff's was joining in and... dare I say enjoying it?? Beforehand I had been talking about doing an hour, but they had a deal on where for the price of two hours you could stay as long as you liked between 11pm and 6am. I was sceptical, but we did it. Initially we figured we'd drunk enough at the restaurant, but Jeff soon declared he needed lots more beer to sing, so we topped up our deal to all you can drink karaoke. Four hours later I had sung myself hoarse and told the others we were leaving. Steve was encouraging us to stay longer, even as we protested four hours was quite enough. As we paid up, Steve asked the time. "3:30am" I told him. "Oh, damn, really?" he asked. "You mean, we actually have been here four hours?" "Ah, yeah, yeah we have!" Someone was clearly smiling on us because we were even able to talk the next day and the guys (who had taken on board plenty of booze) weren't looking too seedy - or no worse than you expect on not a lot of sleep.
The last two days I've had peace and quiet having my Fukuyama apartment to myself while J&S explore Jinseki (much of the time the three of us have been sharing one tatami 'bedroom' so we have been living out of each other's pockets!). Tonight I will go up and join the guys in going out for ramen for dinner. Tomorrow we will do Matsue (awesome castle and moat. The coolest castle we've found in Japan so far) and Stoehroagobgoehroeh (small town famous for its street lined with manga characters. And one day I will remember the name...). It will be a huge day for Jeff, who will be driving; it's three hours drive each way and a bit of a drive inbetween. But it saves paying for accomodation and we have to get Steve to the Okayama airport bus on Sunday morning, so it's a good way to pack it all in! Our American friend Emma will be coming to Matsue too, so it will be cool to catch up with her. I'm a little nervous for my poor little car - this will be a hell of an ask for it. Four big adults (no Japanese sized people in our group!), with a little 500-600 cc motor! I hope I don't kill it one of these days - I'm really attached to my tiny, cheap little thing!
With regards to Jeff being approached by the guides at Kinkakuji, he was also approached in one of the underground malls that weekend. We were surprised because usually Jeff never gets approached - if someone Japanese is going to approach one of us, it's always me. But he had a gaggle of tiny 17 yr olds (I teach high school and these girls looked even younger than usual) come up and ask him some questions for a school project. He had to take a note the girl had written and write one in return, then get a photo with her. The top of her head reached his elbow. We had a few different theories as to why Jeff was getting approached that weekend, but I think the best suggestion is just that they are more used to foreigners up that way, so people aren't intimidated. Down here, unless the kids have a tall, broad bloke for an English teacher, they have no exposure to people Jeff's size.
Then in Kyoto we had another... err... interesting discovery. Turns out my favourite food, famous in Hiroshima, that we have taken all our visitors to try, well I've been saying it wrong the whole time. Turns out if you say something quickly with confidence, no-one notices your mistake! It wasn't until I broke it down for Steve that Jeff noticed I was saying 'oKInomiyaki', instead of 'oKOnomiyaki'. Not a huge difference, but bad when it's my fave Japanese food and I use the word regularly! Ooops!
After all this negativity about my Japanese ability, there is one positive. I have noticed that when we have visitors Jeff and I speak a lot more Japanese to each other. Nothing major - we can't have heartfelt discussions or even chat each other up (Jeff might be able to manage 'your head looks nice', but I don't think he knows 'hair' or 'outfit'. And I wouldn't understand him anyway). We are pretty much limited to stuff like 'Let's go', 'ok', 'it's cold', 'yes it is', 'are you alright?' 'yes I am', 'it's delicious', 'yet it is'... I think you notice a pattern. I'm the reply. Anyway, we do it much more when we have visitors. On one hand I feel rude talking in front of people in a language I know they don't understand, but on the other hand I always need the practice and it's kinda fun to show our visitors that we do know some Japanese! But mainly... mainly I think we do it as a kind of support for each other thing. Like other couples use personal nicknames or something. Ironically, when we have visitors we can use Japanese - a language spoken by 130 million other people in the country, to convey a sense of intimacy when it would be inappropriate to hug or anything. I don't know, maybe I'm reading too much into this, but I have just noticed it's a pattern. Maybe I just notice it a lot more in front of visitors. But I'm pretty sure that's because we do it more when they're here.
Now I better stop procrastinating and get back to my Japanese study. With the free correspondance course provided by the JET Program you get books that have four pages to do each day. I was doing really well until the extreme exhaustion of this week, so I'm currently four and a half days behind. Today I'm supposed to finish the book and do the test, but I'll have to do that next week. I have until the 9th to get the test in, so I have a little time up my sleeve, but I don't want to leave it to the last minute. I'm going to need that free time for when we go away on our Christmas holidays.
Until next time,
Charly
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