So two days ago, our group visited the Edo-Tokyo Museum, which is a museum specializing, as the name says, in cultural objects from the Edo Period all the way up to modern times in Japan. Since our trip is about "Japanese Cool", one of the very cool things about Japan is the manga. Manga is EVERYWHERE here! Their are gigantic stores dedicated to it anyway you go in Tokyo; at every train stop, on every store corner, anywhere you could imagine. But how are these two periods related?
So even before the Edo Period, printing artworks with a woodblock was a popular medium for an artist to work in. The lines on these works stylized the Japanese figure to have an elongated face, beautiful curves, and all set in a beautifully decorative landscape. This is seen in the first picture I have posted. In the second picture we see the modern day evolution of this print. Although, the second picture of the woman with the sword is much more complex and colorful, the stylization is still the same, still very Japanese in style. Her curves are accentuated, her face is long and beautiful, and the setting she is placed in is absolutely gorgeous. Woodblocks may have introduced Japanese artwork to the world, but it is modern day manga that keeps it alive!
The Great Buddha statue in Kamakura is one of those iconic images that for the whole world says "Japan," or even more than that, the exotic, the inscrutable Orient, the Other. To see it, you have to go through a gate and come around a corner, at which point for me a big gong goes off in my head like it's some airline commercial. But to Japanese, Kamakura is much more than an ad campaign. It was the site of the first shogun's government in 1192 (which Japanese remember with a little mnemonic device in which the numbers 1192 sound like the Japanese for "good country": イ・イ・ク・ニを作ろう、鎌倉幕府). The Kamakura Era only lasted about 150 years and by the time the shoguns set up their tent ("tents" referring to their militaristic origin, as if on a constant campaign) in Edo (the old name for Tokyo), Kamakura was a neglected backwater town. But the temples and shrines built in its heyday were kept up and those are pretty much what Kamakura is known for today. It's also just an hour's train ride from Tokyo, which facilitates a constant flow of tourists and their yen to preserve the old landmarks.
Here we are chumming with the Great Buddha, who was once inside a temple that blew down in a typhoon, so they built another temple, which blew down in another typhoon, so they built yet another temple, which washed away in a tsunami, at which point they said to themselves maybe this statue was meant to be outdoors. So, since 1498, he's been outdoors.
Here's a great mystery to me. This rather ordinary grave off the tourist circuit in Kamakura is that of Minamoto no Yoritomo, the first shogun of Japan. If you don't ask and you're not good with directions, you probably won't find it. I took this picture with past and future students of John Van Sant's Japanese history course at UAB. (Dr. Van Sant, does this give students extra credit?) Compare this to the gilded mausoleums of the Tokugawa shoguns at Nikko like this:
which we did not go to (image from Wikipedia), and it makes you wonder where the Kamakura shoguns went wrong, although Nikko is hardly fitting for guys that fancied themselves living in tents (which they did not). And this is just the entrance.
Those of you who remember Mikiko Kohno, our Fulbright Japanese Teaching Assistant at UAB in 2008 and 2009, will be pleased to know that she is now a high school English teacher in Komae, on the outskirts of Tokyo. Visiting a Japanese high school always brings back memories for me as a former JET teacher teaching in many different schools. For the UAB students, however, high school is the site of countless anime and manga. In a way, it was like walking into a real live anime. The architecture, the layout of classrooms, the uniforms, the after-school activities, it was all there.
Here's the English class of Mikiko, er, Kohno-sensei, with UAB students interspersed throughout the classroom. Just as we like to do when we have Japanese visitors to our Japanese classes, she had the class talk part of the time in English for her students' benefit and part in Japanese for our students. There's Tyler speaking Japanese.
Here's John in another after-school class for kids who are going to visit their sister school in Australia. There's Mikiko's happy face mugging for the camera. Those lucky students!
Japanese high school teachers have a lot tighter schedule than their American counterparts, but from the school, Mikiko took us to a Vietnamese restaurant just down the street near the station.
Here are some of us with Mikiko in the Vietnamese restaurant. We were just fortunate that day that Mikiko could join us. A Japanese high school teacher's job usually includes guiding some after-school club activity, with "after school" usually including Saturdays and Sundays. Mikiko is the coach of the girls' basketball club, which took a day off the day we visited so she could do stuff like go with us to the Vietnamese restaurant. Before we left the school, she showed us other club activities. Judging by how single-mindedly each club was engaged in their respective activities, I figured it was a big sacrifice for girls' basketball to take a day off. Sorry, Komae HS girls' basketball. Thanks for loaning us your coach for dinner.
This time of year, any neighborhood of consequence in Japan has a festival at their local Shinto shrine. The neighborhood where Mako grew up in south Tokyo usually has their annual festival the first weekend in June, when we were still in Hitachi. But for some reason, it was switched to the second weekend.
Here are Tyler and Callie in front of the shrine gate. Leading up to the shrine are all sort of fun stalls selling food, toys, goldfish, cotton candy -- sort of like Japan's version of a county fair, but without the rides.
During a festival, neighborhood people take the local kami (god, spirit, deity -- translations always fail) from the shrine on this portable shrine and carry it through the neighborhood. When we saw the shrine carriers resting, we went up to the shrine to look at it and take pictures, at which point they cheered and asked us to help them carry it. There's Ashley, Callie, Josh, and Corey in there bearing their share of the weight, which was considerable. This still picture doesn't convey how boisterous the heaving and hoeing was, as if the kami were a jolly good fellow. This whole affair was more like a carnival than a religious event. I'm sure Japan has its share of pious folks, but they seem to lay low during a festival.
Yesterday we went to Odaiba and in front of the shopping mall, Divers City, they had a huge replica of a Gundam. It was so cool even though it was kind of raining on us but that did not stop us from standing and getting pictures with it!!
The place we're staying, Sakura Hostel, is filled with mostly foreign
students for some reason I don't understand. Foreigners stay here
because it's cheap compared to other places one could stay in Tokyo. It's so popular with foreigners that it was even featured on
a morning news show. Mako, John, Jordan, and
Callie were even interviewed for it. The show is all in Japanese, but
even if you don't understand it, it's still pretty cool to see us on TV:
Sakura Hostel isn't that cheap (e.g., approximately US$40 per night), but for Tokyo, it's considered near rock-bottom. What I don't get is that Japanese students aren't rich either, so why don't more of them stay here? It would make it more interesting for the foreigners and it would be a great place to practice English, which actually one group of Japanese guests did do.
Here's
the main floor. That's the front desk in the back, a kitchen for guests
on the right, and 6 computers with Internet on the left. Guests can
bring food and eat it on the tables in the middle. Mako and I use a
group of tables for our classroom.
Here I am teaching the class on manga and anime.
As you might expect for a place that's called a "hostel," Sakura Hostel is rather spartan, meaning small rooms with bunk beds and
communal showers and toilets down the hall.
Here's a room with six bunk beds. We reserved this for the girls because there were six of them. We got a room with four bunk beds for the guys' because there were four of them.
And here's the double room for Mako and me. Pretty much just four walls, two beds, and that amount of floor space between the beds.
This was the view from our room. I should have taken this on a clear day, but during the rainy season, there are far more cloudy days than clear ones. See that pagoda on the right? That's the same as...
...this pagoda on the left. I was walking through here by myself and realized it wasn't cloudy, and also realized I had my camera in my pocket, so I snapped this shot. We're in the Asakusa area of Tokyo here, and this is Senso-ji, the big Buddhist temple with the iconic Kaminari-mon, or Thunder Gate.
Here's Kaminari-mon in the evening, with a passing group of junior high school students on a school trip to Tokyo.
Through the gate is this long row of shops. This car-free street is called Nakamise. That's Kaminari-mon there at the end.
And if you turn the other way, you see this inner gate (that's our students there in the middle) with the actual temple there in the back. All the back streets around here are mini-adventures into every kind of imaginable store, noodle shop, sushi joint, bathhouse, little shrine that pops out of nowhere, and a little amusement park (which you can see from Mako's and my room above). We're getting pretty used to all this enchantment because we have to walk through it to get to a subway station to go anywhere else in Tokyo. Like ordinary Japanese folks, we end up walking a lot, to get to the bank or the post office or the grocery store or places to eat or the subway. And the subway is how we get to anywhere else. I myself much prefer this kind of workout a gym because we're putting exercise to a practical use, i.e., getting somewhere, as opposed to a piece of gym equipment—the ultimate reduction wheel in my mind.
If you can read Japanese, here's some pictures and descriptions from Ikeda-sensei, the Japanese language teacher who helped to make UAB and Ibaraki University sister universities: "UAB students' visit to Ibaraki University." Thanks, Ikeda-sensei. It's our privilege to be associated with you.
Here are some more pictures from our visit to Ibaraki University on May 31. Taken by Daiki, who is an assistant to English instructor Joyce Cunningham.
Lunch with Joyce's students.
Long-time friends meeting for the first time.
Fujiwara-sensei's Japanese language class.
Mako talking to students from Japan, the U.S. and Indonesia in Kanamoto-sensei's ESL class turned bilingual for our benefit.
Kanamoto-sensei comparing daily schedules of Japan, the U.S. and Indonesia.
After class with Kanamoto-sensei. Many thanks, Kanamoto-sensei, Fujiwara-sensei, and Joyce-sensei, for accommodating all of us in your classes. And thanks to Daiki-kun for taking the pictures.
Here are some pictures taken by Ibaraki Christian University student, Yuhei Ishikawa.
IC students Wataru and Yuhei hanging out with UAB students Tyler, Josh, and Corey, in the student center where we stayed.
IC student Maki with UAB students John, Corey, Josh, and Tyler, on the "Walk of the Shogun" to get food for the cookout.
Shopping in a Hitachi supermarket.
In the parking lot with Maki-san.
Monday, June 4, 2012
From our reception in Hitachi, you would think these people thought we were related to them, as if "sister cities" referred to real family members. It was that way for our three nights at Ibaraki Christian University and it continued on Saturday at the welcome party in the Hitachi Civic Center, where the UAB students met their Hitachi homestay families. The affair was akin to a big wedding reception, with food that stretched down a long row of tables.
That's Corey Fall there at the end. It just so happened to be his 20th birthday that day and a birthday cake just materialized from I don't know where, much to everyone's surprise, especially his.
Here at the party was a getting-to-know-you game that involved rounds of rock-paper-scissors. So much for the notion that Japanese are always serious. Hah.
Also at the welcome party was this delightful group of high school students whom Birmingham hosted two years ago when they were junior high school students. Their group leader then, Matsumoto-sensei, was with them, as was Moriyama-sensei, the group leader that came with them from the municipal board of education, but Moriyama-sensei was taking the picture. Patrick Stephens and several of his students who were such gracious hosts to us at Ibaraki Christian were also there, as if to pass us from one set of family members to another.
We all returned to the Civic Center yesterday for the Hitachi-Birmingham Sister Cities 30th Anniversary Celebration, which they held in the planetarium. We couldn't take pictures inside, which was too bad because you wouldn't otherwise believe what a spectacular event that was. I knew it was going to be big when I saw the mayor arrive, whose face I recognized from the picture he took with Sam Eto when he arrived from Alabama. It was a pretty big planetarium, packed with people for whom their sister city was apparently reason enough to come out on a Sunday afternoon. After a young people's swing band played some numbers, the planetarium showed the configuration of the stars that evening in Birmingham, then followed that with photos of the 30 years of history between our two cities. Hitachi Mayor Akira Yoshinari greeted everyone and then we watched Birmingham Mayor William Bell blown up on the big screen giving his greetings for the occasion. Next it was our turn. I led the UAB group to the stage and we demonstrated American shape notes by singing Angel Band in unaccompanied four-part harmony. I guess we were pretty good (although I could hear our mistakes). Then we sang a nostalgic old Japanese song in four-part harmony, and I swear, I heard at least one person wipe away some sniffles and tears. It looked to me like it was the Mayor, but maybe not. Then I was asked to represent Mayor Bell as Mayor Yoshinari presented me a beautiful Japanese painting. Mayor Bell, it's in the mail. That was followed by a 10-question quiz about Birmingham. I'm ashamed to say I got a D. I'm saying they were trick questions. Only one person got all the questions right, not one of us from Birmingham, but one of the 2010 Hitachi students to visit Birmingham.
This morning we went deep into the mountains to Nakasato Elementary School and Junior High School, where Birmingham exchange English teacher, Brian Stoney, teaches along side Japanese colleagues. After we left, I told some of our students that they now know what motivated me to become a teacher. I used to have Brian's job (assistant language teacher) in western Japan 30 years ago, in places just like this school. It was my first job out of college and it changed the whole trajectory of my life.
We were then taken to the Civic Center again where they had this kitchen for cooking classes and a sushi master, Monma-san, showed us how to make sushi rolls, the fancy kind.
The U.S. flag flew over City Hall today just in our honor. That was our last stop today, in order to pay an official visit to the Mayor.
Once inside, we took a picture with him, in front of another American flag on prominent display. While we were in his reception room talking to him, the picture was being developed and printed on a greeting card for each person in our group.
Tomorrow we head for Tokyo, where we'll go back to being just regular folks again, but not before being escorted in another municipal bus all the way there. The next time a Hitachi group comes to Birmingham, I'm trying to think how we could possibly even come close to the welcome that Hitachi has given us. Nothing's coming to mind. Get ready, Birmingham, because they'll be sending another junior high group next summer.
Saturday, June 2, 2012
A year of Skyping, Facebooking, and emailing with our sister university and our sister city blossomed into three amazing days with Ibaraki University and Ibaraki Christian University. When we finally met them in person, it was so much like meeting family that it was readily obvious why they use the word "sister" in such relationships. As for myself, these kinds of encounters are why I teach Japanese.
UAB sister Ibaraki University sent a university bus to pick us up in Hitachi and take us the 45 minutes to their campus in Mito where we spent the whole day as late as we could and still catch a late-night train back to Hitachi. After meeting university vice president Dr. Tashiro, Japanese language instructor Sugiura-sensei gave us a presentation that made everyone seriously question why they're not attending Ibaraki University to learn Japanese. Hint, UAB students: They're very friendly and you'll really like it there. Joyce-sensei and her students had us join them for lunch in their classroom, then served as tour guides, dividing us up into small groups and taking different routes to show us their campus. We then joined Fujiwara-sensei's Japanese class and Kanemoto-sensei's English class, where, in both cases, the UAB students were warmly welcomed in lively classroom activities. From the university, we went to famed Kairakuen garden in Mito, then met up with students and Joyce-sensei for dinner, then moved on over to a karaoke place where we all could pretend to be famous singers. Here we are on the steps of the karaoke place.
If you think you recognize UAB graduate Sam Eto in that picture (bottom row, far right), yeah, that's him, coming from Hitachi where he's one of two Birmingham exchange English teachers.
Our visit with Ibaraki Christian University was no less wonderful. UAB has no official relationship with this school, but they let us all stay in Japanese-style rooms on their campus for three nights just for the cost of changing the linen, simply because of the fact that we're from their sister city. And then they wouldn't even collect the linen fee from us after all. After classroom activities in English and Japanese, and lunch in Room 5100, the English students' hangout room, IC students led UAB students on the "Walk of the Shogun" to buy food for a cookout on their campus grounds late yesterday afternoon.
Here we are at the cookout with IC students and teachers. Such a delightful way to just hang out with people and speak English or Japanese or whatever.
That evening, yours truly had the special opportunity to conduct the first American shape-note singing school in Japanese history (that's my story, anyway) in a room that looked like it was built for this kind of activity, in the oldest building on campus. People from the campus, from the city, from the surrounding communities, and even all the way from Ibaraki University came to make a cappella harmony. Shape notes are an early American invention to aid in teaching people to sight-sing music, but having taught these kinds of lessons before, I was astounded by how quickly and apparently easily the Japanese just picked this up. They surprised me and I think I surprised them by how they could make four-part glory. Afterwards, the IC students and their instructor, Patrick-sensei joined us for fun and games where we were staying and they stayed the whole night with us. Even the English Dept chair, Rory Baskin, joined in the fun until late in the evening. You would think he was running a summer camp, which shows how enlightened they are in their teaching of English. Here we all are the next morning, which was this morning:
The city of Hitachi sent a bus to pick us up and everyone came out and waited with us for the bus and stayed until we got on the bus and the bus drove until they couldn't see it anymore. Japanese have a weakness long good-byes. They hate to see you go. And we hated to go too, but it was all followed by a whole 'nother wonderful story of meeting homestay families. That story will have to wait for now. Update w/pics soon.
