Tuesday night Satoshi and I went to the symphony. Ok, so it wasn’t a real full on orchestral performance, but it still rocked. The event in question was the Japan Russia Goodwill Concert series, which as it traveled around Japan was stopping over in Beppu and playing the convention center for one night only. Tickets were free, via the university, and having little better to do, we went.
The Most Important Thing You’ll Ever Read
Sometimes in a man’s life, when things are going ok, nothing explicitly exciting is happening, and he has nothing to complain about… well, he has to get creative with his journal postings…
So without further introduction, I present to you the first part of a one part series on the most critical of all culture lessons:
How to Poop in Japan!
Graduate School Beginnings – The Week in Review
Well I’ve been a bit delinquent in posting, but not because I don’t love you. I find it very hard to have any semblance of a schedule around here. Granted my classes always start and end at definitive times, but once I head back towards the AP Houses things just tend to get whack. In any case, here goes:
I awoke Wednesday morning to this:
Continue reading Graduate School Beginnings – The Week in Review
Graduate School – The Breakdown
Monday was my first official day of class as a graduate student here at APU. I had two classes, Introduction to the Asia Pacific Region II, and The Environment and Natural Resources in Monsoon Asia.
A Hot Day in the City of Hells
Posted in an obscure corner of my dorm’s bulletin board I found an interesting announcement yesterday. It read, simply, “All air-conditioners will be turned off as of October 1st. Heat will be activated as of November 1st.” Here in the AP Houses we have both hall aircons (as they’re known in Japan) and room aircons. I naturally assumed that the halls were about to get a little warmer, and thought nothing more about it.
Certain Deviations & Yakuza News
No news is good news I suppose. I registered for my classes without incident on Tuesday morning. Since then I’ve sat through a number of orientations which usually sound promising at first and then quickly devolve into mind-numbing paperwork lectures, or end up applying primarily to undergraduates.
I received the results of my medical tests today. In typical Japanese fashion I scored within acceptable limits for an adult male on every single test, and on many tests was in the optimum area, and yet my final rating was still A2(with A1 being best). My A2 rating came with the following explanation – “Certain deviations were found, but there is no need for concern.” Ooooook…
Chopsticks, Tuberculosis, and Sumo
Yesterday I promised Sumo, and today I shall deliver, but you’ve gotta hear about some other stuff first. So, this morning all new students had to report to a health center down in Beppu to take a battery of medical tests. In order to accommodate us all in an orderly fashion, they staggered our arrival times to the pick-up point based upon Student ID number. Last night I was under the impression that the graduate students would be headed down last, but upon checking the schedule just before bed at 1am or so, I discovered that I was completely wrong. It seems that whichever wiseguy came up with said schedule decided that us older graduate students should all be crammed onto the 8am bus to be the first load of the day. From the moment I read this on the paper I had just under 6hrs of sleep left if I was going to rise, shower, and catch that bus. Thanks, ass.
The following morning, this morning, came much much too quickly and I stumbled into the shower half-blind until the soothing hot water pried my eyes open. As promised, I busted out the hair goop for the first time. Time constraints as they were, I couldn’t get overly creative, but if you force me to wake up at 7am you’d better be prepared for my mean face.
Odds and Ends
Lots of odds and ends to tell you about today, try and keep up. First off, yesterday I finally broke down and bought a rice cooker. Scoff if you want, but in Japan it’s not as simple as waddling down to the local Walmart and grabbing a $20 box off the shelf. Here, it’s more akin to buying a car. One must first decide what features one wants in said cooker. For me, I’m simple, all I want is something into which I can put water and dry rice, and out of which comes tasty sticky rice. As I found out, there is not a single rice cooker in Japan that *just* cooks rice. At the local Yamada Denki, which is basically a Best Buy with more home appliances, they carry over 30 different models of rice cooker. In fact, if you’re so inclined, they’ll even let you pay upwards of $550 for one. I don’t know what else a $550 rice cooker does besides cook rice, and frankly I don’t want to know, because for that price it better be something naughty or else you’re getting ripped off!
My Second Dinner
6pm found my stomach demanding food, so I did what any self-reliant, fiercely independent young man would do – I cooked myself some dinner. For reasons of national security I cannot divulge my recipe, but I can say that there were vegetables involved, some chicken, even the odd spice or two. Ok so I completely made it up, but there was also a noticeable absence of smoke and/or fire, which have traditionally served to notify everyone in the vicinity that I’m using the kitchen. In fact, things were going so well that I inspired my dear friend Satoshi to make some gyoza.
Yakisoba
In my 22 years of life I have consistently managed to avoid all opportunities to learn how to cook. Now, finding myself in Japan in a culture where so many people cook that the campus Cafe is only open for breakfast and lunch, well, my body weight is in jeopardy.
However, I am not too proud to ask for help, and by now my inability to manufacture culinary items is a well-known fact among my building’s RAs. To this end they have decided to help me learn to sustain myself on groceries, to become my cooking support group if you will. At this point I recognize the handicap that is not knowing one’s way around a kitchen, and I am eager to learn.