Another English Encounter
Ok, so we all remember my amazement at being approached by the two Japanese girls at the festivle on Sunday, well it happened again. Well, not with two Japanese girls, but this time with an elderly man. Ok, so Sunday I was invited by Claire and a Japanese family whom she tutors thier son in English to come to thier house and have dinner. Claire and I get off the train and are walking down this set of steps, and just talking about the randomness of the previous day when she turns to me and says something along the lines of, "I am really going to miss this", and before she can clarify, a Japanese man walking by lets out a loud belch. Yep, gonna miss it all. After we stop laughing (belching is something aparently most Japanese men aren't afraid to do out in public or anywhere, no matter how close to your face they may be!) ANyway, we are walking along the street heading towards the familie's house, when we hear a man behind us say excuse me (in English). We both turned surprised, not exactly knowing what to expect, and there is this elderly man, who starts speaking pretty decent English to us. He asks where we came from, and when i told him I was from the US, he asked which state, because aparently he lived in Ohio some 15 years back. He talks with us a little longer, and remarks to Claire how sorry he was about the terrorism in London (being that she said she was from England), and that he still "hates 9/11". We soon parted ways, but it was nice and strange. Lately, I've been having alot of encounters with Japanese people - well random Japanese people anyway.
So we went and had dinner with the family, mom, dad, and 12 year old boy (very tall, very shy). It was a really nice dinner - we had curry rice, tofu and shrimp, greenbeans, cherries, and whine. Oh, I will miss all the good food, I figure I better learn how to cook soon (or I will starve back at UNCC)
Ok, so I have been wanting to write this piece for a few days now. THis is half exgatteration, half truth, and of course my take on the situation.
-------THoughts and reactions of the Japanese --------
1) So me and a few other RJ students are ridding the elevator up, when it stops on one of the floors. The doors open up to revel one Japanese student.
Japanese girl " Oh shit! oh shit! Gaijin (foreigner), a whole elevator of gaijin! Ohohoh! What do I do!?" (she looks paniced from side to side, looking for an escape excuse or another Japanese person, but oh, there is none, so she recutlently gets on, stands so close to the doors she can smell the paint on the doors) "I don't exist , I don't exist, I don't exist, I don't exist...." Thinks the poor, lonely, surrounded Japanese girl.
2) Morning train, Naruse station, doors are about to shut, suddenly there is this large blurry white object running up the stairs. "Oh God, what the hell is that? Is it a cloud? No, is it an animal? No, is it a demon? Oh no! Oh it's worse! Its a gaijin! Ohhhhhhhhhhhhh!", Gaijin, manages to run up the stairs just intime to slip inbetween the shutting train doors. "Fuck, now I have to spent the entire train ride stairing at her, but keep my distance, because she JUST may eat my babies" thinks the entire car full of Japanese people.
3) McDonalds, Monday lunch time. Normal day, kinda busy now during lunch rush, and suddenly, to every cashier's horror, in comes the gaijin crowd. Damn! WHo would have thought - gaijin eating at McDonalds!? You know they won't understand you, you know they can't really speak Japanese - I mean, even though they come in here almost everyday, and yesterday they DID understand Japanese, and could speak it, you are sure that today, why today, they won't udnerstand anything! That's why you have the trusty picture menu on the counter. picture menu = gaijin handicap. Oh yeah.
Just in general, at times, there seems to be a sence that Claire has deemed, " WHy, you better avoid me because I will eat your babies" treatment about us. Yep. But Japan really is wonderful, especially if you get to live here and interact with people in thier daily lives. I have never forgotten that I am foreign, it is impossiable here. And you could live here for 20 years, and people would still complement you on how amazing your Japanese is and how well you can use chopsticks. You never "fit in" in Japan, you will always be a foreigner, but that doesn't mean that everyone will treat you meanly or wrongly. But it does happen at times. I suppose the best way to describe Japan is just plain strange. Your experiences here are strange, and so many times have I thought "Only in Japan", because so much od daily life here could only be accepted as the norm in Japan. Clarie and I determined that the best phrase to use in Japan is this -
"What the hell is that?" or a varried, "What the hell are they doing?", or "What the hell do they want me to do?".
Only in Japan do people dress up in huge Pokemon costumes and take pictures in small photoboths, only in Japan is there porn sold right next to Disney toys, only in Japan can you find over 15 different kinds of seaweed at a small groshery store, only in Japan do the train and subway ticket selling machines have an animated cashier bow to you as you purchase your ticket, only in Japan do they eat anything raw, only in Japan do they have a 2 hour set price of all you can drink (alchol or juice for the kids), and only in Japan can you find temples, shrines, amusement parks, imperal palaces, weed covered old buildings next to super game stores, 8 story anime shops next to octopus on a stick vendors all together in just one small downtown city.
My time in Japan is close to being over, and today marks my 100th day here. I have really enjoyed all my experiences here (well most of em anyway). I hope ya'll have enjoyed reading about them. When Jon arrives, 9 days from now, I won't really be writing on LJ, because I won't have everyday access to a computer, but when I get home I can tell ya'll all about Japan!
So we went and had dinner with the family, mom, dad, and 12 year old boy (very tall, very shy). It was a really nice dinner - we had curry rice, tofu and shrimp, greenbeans, cherries, and whine. Oh, I will miss all the good food, I figure I better learn how to cook soon (or I will starve back at UNCC)
Ok, so I have been wanting to write this piece for a few days now. THis is half exgatteration, half truth, and of course my take on the situation.
-------THoughts and reactions of the Japanese --------
1) So me and a few other RJ students are ridding the elevator up, when it stops on one of the floors. The doors open up to revel one Japanese student.
Japanese girl " Oh shit! oh shit! Gaijin (foreigner), a whole elevator of gaijin! Ohohoh! What do I do!?" (she looks paniced from side to side, looking for an escape excuse or another Japanese person, but oh, there is none, so she recutlently gets on, stands so close to the doors she can smell the paint on the doors) "I don't exist , I don't exist, I don't exist, I don't exist...." Thinks the poor, lonely, surrounded Japanese girl.
2) Morning train, Naruse station, doors are about to shut, suddenly there is this large blurry white object running up the stairs. "Oh God, what the hell is that? Is it a cloud? No, is it an animal? No, is it a demon? Oh no! Oh it's worse! Its a gaijin! Ohhhhhhhhhhhhh!", Gaijin, manages to run up the stairs just intime to slip inbetween the shutting train doors. "Fuck, now I have to spent the entire train ride stairing at her, but keep my distance, because she JUST may eat my babies" thinks the entire car full of Japanese people.
3) McDonalds, Monday lunch time. Normal day, kinda busy now during lunch rush, and suddenly, to every cashier's horror, in comes the gaijin crowd. Damn! WHo would have thought - gaijin eating at McDonalds!? You know they won't understand you, you know they can't really speak Japanese - I mean, even though they come in here almost everyday, and yesterday they DID understand Japanese, and could speak it, you are sure that today, why today, they won't udnerstand anything! That's why you have the trusty picture menu on the counter. picture menu = gaijin handicap. Oh yeah.
Just in general, at times, there seems to be a sence that Claire has deemed, " WHy, you better avoid me because I will eat your babies" treatment about us. Yep. But Japan really is wonderful, especially if you get to live here and interact with people in thier daily lives. I have never forgotten that I am foreign, it is impossiable here. And you could live here for 20 years, and people would still complement you on how amazing your Japanese is and how well you can use chopsticks. You never "fit in" in Japan, you will always be a foreigner, but that doesn't mean that everyone will treat you meanly or wrongly. But it does happen at times. I suppose the best way to describe Japan is just plain strange. Your experiences here are strange, and so many times have I thought "Only in Japan", because so much od daily life here could only be accepted as the norm in Japan. Clarie and I determined that the best phrase to use in Japan is this -
"What the hell is that?" or a varried, "What the hell are they doing?", or "What the hell do they want me to do?".
Only in Japan do people dress up in huge Pokemon costumes and take pictures in small photoboths, only in Japan is there porn sold right next to Disney toys, only in Japan can you find over 15 different kinds of seaweed at a small groshery store, only in Japan do the train and subway ticket selling machines have an animated cashier bow to you as you purchase your ticket, only in Japan do they eat anything raw, only in Japan do they have a 2 hour set price of all you can drink (alchol or juice for the kids), and only in Japan can you find temples, shrines, amusement parks, imperal palaces, weed covered old buildings next to super game stores, 8 story anime shops next to octopus on a stick vendors all together in just one small downtown city.
My time in Japan is close to being over, and today marks my 100th day here. I have really enjoyed all my experiences here (well most of em anyway). I hope ya'll have enjoyed reading about them. When Jon arrives, 9 days from now, I won't really be writing on LJ, because I won't have everyday access to a computer, but when I get home I can tell ya'll all about Japan!