Settling, eating and exploring

Greetings from rainy Tokyo!  I keep hoping that the rain will usher in Fall weather, but so far no such luck.  The other morning, I was lying in bed, listening to the rain and wondering what shoes I could wear for the walk to work, when it occurred to me that maybe it was time to buy rain boots.  So my first pair of rain boots in probably 30 years is now zooming across the ocean to me.

Besides the occasional rain, the last few weeks have involved settling, eating and exploring. 

Settling: I moved into my permanent housing last weekend!  I’m very happy to be here.  It’s a good space, and I am looking forward to decorating it.  Slipcovers for the sofa, chair and ottoman have been ordered (to protect them from the kitty and because they are not attractive).  Shower curtains for both bathrooms are also on the way.  I’ve already put much of the welcome kit down in my storage unit and dragged furniture all over the apartment.  I receive my stuff on Wednesday afternoon (WOOHOO!), at which point settling in will begin in earnest.

Eating: We’ve been doing a bunch of lunches, receptions and dinners so that my boss and I (who both arrived last month) can meet contacts.  And then there are the regular work receptions.  In one month, I’ve been to more receptions than I think I went to during my entire tour in Brazil.  Since I don’t have most of my kitchen stuff yet, it’s kind of nice to not have to cook hardly at all, and I appreciate the opportunity to visit a bunch of restaurants.  However, I’ll be lucky to not gain 20 pounds by the end of this!  Thankfully (for my weight and my feet), I hear that October will be a slow month before all of the pre-New Year’s and New Year’s receptions start.  The goal is to start exercising again and eat healthy for the month of October.  I should probably also invest in some salts for soaking my feet… 

Takahata Fudo temple

Takahata Fudo temple

Exploring: Last weekend I went with some colleagues and their families to a shrine sale (aka: flea market) at Takahata Fudo temple, which is about an hour away.  Because it was raining off and on, there weren’t a ton of vendors, but I still managed to buy an obi and a scroll for my office (which is in serious need of decorating) and take a lot of pictures of the lovely grounds. 

Takahata Fudo temple

An hour after returning home, I heard the drum from the festival at the shrine next door and quickly forgot about aching feet, grabbed my camera, and headed back out the door.  It was my first Japanese festival (of which I hear there are a ton).  It was a lot of fun.  There was food and drinks and games for the kids and people in their kimonos dancing around the drum (like Japanese line dancing). 

I was going to do some more exploring this weekend, but then I saw that it was going to rain – which cuts down on my picture-taking – so I decided to putter around the house.  My goal is to get everything put away before the majority of my worldly belongings arrive this week.

Happy Fall!

First impressions

I have a plan to take at least one day each weekend to play tourist. So far, I’ve been to the major Shinto shrine in Tokyo (Meiji Jingu) and the major Buddhist temple in Tokyo (Senso-Ji), as well as a few other places of interest. I also had a work trip that involved my first Shinkansen (high-speed train) trip. We spent an afternoon in Nagoya, and then spent the night and the next day in Osaka. Osaka is quite different from Tokyo, but I’ll need to spend a bit more time there (and here) before I can write something about the differences. One amusing part of the trip was when we were waiting for the train and some young Japanese men tried to take a picture of us foreigners without our knowledge. (One guy just happened to pose for a picture where we were the only thing in the background.) I don’t know if it was because my boss is 6’5”, or because we were not Asian, but they seemed rather proud of themselves for having “discreetly” taken the picture.

Gate to Senso-Ji temple

First impressions of the weather: Hot and humid! My hair is constantly curly. My clothes feel damp when I put them on. Because of energy conservation efforts since shutting down the nuclear power plants, it is hot and humid everywhere. The embassy is following “cool biz” (light on the air conditioning, so people don’t have to wear a suit and tie all the time), which means that the embassy has been at about 77F with 55ish percent humidity since I arrived. On the positive side, I’m not constantly freezing in the office due to high a/c, so yeah!

Unfortunate weather observation: My body reacts to August in Tokyo the same way it does to the rainy season in Brazil. Lots of migraines. After three in my first week, I went to the med unit, and the doctor prescribed the same medication that worked for me in Brazil. That should take care of that.

Amusing weather observation: Some Chinese government people came to Tokyo for a multilateral meeting and were surprised by Tokyo’s blue sky. Remind me not to bid on Beijing in the future.

First impression of nature: Cicadas. Great big, noisy cicadas like I haven’t seen since Brazil. Have I mentioned that they’re big?

First impression of Japanese society: Order. When they’re told to stand behind the line (for shopping or protests or whatever), they stand behind the line. They form lines *everywhere*. Giant crowd of people waiting to get on an escalator? They wait in a long line. 

Second impression of Japanese society: Timeliness. A seminar is scheduled to start at 2pm? Everybody is in their seats and quiet at 1:58, and the seminar starts at 2:00. I suspect that the organizers would be humbly apologizing and offering gifts in recompense if the seminar started at 2:05. The average arrival time for the shinkansen: thirty-four seconds late. Average. Thirty-four seconds. WMATA should take lessons!

Shinkansen

Third impression of Japanese society: Perfectionism. Food/drinks are carefully packaged so that you may enjoy them in their original, perfect state when you reach your destination. You can find the best cream puffs EVER in Shibuya. They don’t put the cream in the puff until you place your order, and the cream is so light and delicious!! Shaved ice outside Senso-Ji temple is truly shaved, so it just melts in your mouth. No crunching. I haven’t tried the macarons in Midtown yet, but they look amazing.

More food: When I was in Brazil, I loved Schweppes Citrus, but we don’t have it in the States. However, in Japan they have Schweppes British Lemon Tonic, which seems to be the same thing. I’m so happy!

I’ve already discovered that, while there are plenty of challenges (e.g. I can't read a thing!), in many ways, it is very easy to live here. The 100 Yen stores (dollar stores) are amazing and full of tons of useful stuff. There are vending machines with drinks (water, tea, coffee (hot or cold), soda, etc) EVERYWHERE – on the streets or in the subway. I’ve counted four Starbucks and two Tully’s within a ten-minute walk of the housing compound. There’s also a Frijoles, which is remarkably similar to Chipotles, and if I walk just a bit farther, there’s a Cold Stone Creamery (where they sang a little song while mixing my ice cream, which naturally makes it taste MUCH better), Outback Steakhouse, TGI Friday’s, etc. And those are just the American restaurants.  There are tons and tons of other restaurants. There is an excellent pho place not far away. In the opposite direction, there's a Wendy’s, where - only in Japan! - you can spend $20 on a Foie Gras Burger. I’ll let you try it and tell me how it tastes. 

Takeshita Street in Harajuku - All things girly and a huge dollar store

There are many more things, but I’ll save them for another day. Next Monday is a holiday (Respect for the Aged Day), and I’ll finally have access to my permanent housing, so that’ll be nice. I’m sure the cat will be THRILLED to move again.  

GO GO SWALLOWS (pt 2)

This is Japan, so of course there are already videos of the cheers on YouTube!  

Here is the Yakult Swallows song for when they score.

And here is most of the Chunichi Dragons cheer that I like, but after the point where they start to speed up and then go into the actual song.  You can also hear the banging together of the bats that I was talking about (although you see a little of it with the Swallows video).  If I find a better video, I'll repost.

Happy Labor Day!

GO GO SWALLOWS!

Last night, some friends and I went to a baseball game at the famous Meiji Jingu Stadium.  Apparently, it’s the second oldest baseball stadium in Japan and one of the few remaining stadiums in the world that Babe Ruth has played in.  It was so much fun! 

The game was the Yakult Swallows (home team) vs the Chunichi Dragons.  The Dragons’ mascot is a koala.  I don’t understand.  The English version of Wikipedia didn’t tell me anything.  One friend hypothesized that it’s because koalas are cute and cuddly, and dragons are not.  If anybody knows the true reason, please share!

Mascots watching the fireworks

In the middle of the game, they stopped for some fireworks.  I love fireworks!  A few minutes after the fireworks, the fastest moving DOWNPOUR I’ve ever seen came sweeping over the big screen and across the stadium.  Ten minutes later, the rain was gone, and we were back to baseball.  Final result: Swallows won, 6-2!

Just some random observations:

* On my way to the gate where I could buy last-minute tickets, I passed by what I think is the Swallows’ clubhouse.  A Swallows player who appears to be African American came strolling into the stadium.  What was funny about this was seeing all of the little old Japanese ladies who were frantically trying to snap a picture of him with their cell phones.  I was very close to being elbowed out of the way.  Those little old ladies are not only genki; they’re also tech-savvy!

* There was a wide variety of food, with prices not really any more expensive than you would see outside the stadium.  You can also bring in food and beverages, which means that the 5-minute walk from the subway is lined with people/restaurants selling drinks and food. 

* In Japan, not only do you have people carrying around beer, soda and ice cream to sell, you also have beer on tap – i.e. girls walk around with a small tank (backpack-sized) of beer on their back.

* We sat in the outfield, which is cheaper and has no assigned seats.  By the time we arrived, seat availability and chance had us sitting with the Dragons, but either side would be fun.  Both sides had a few trumpet players, a guy who swings a giant flag, and a guy on a ladder leading the whole section in cheers and songs for their team.  Everybody was singing/cheering and banging these small plastic baseball bats together in rhythm (like drumsticks).  My favorite Dragons cheer was the one that started out with everybody singing long tones – rather 3^rd Encounters-esque.

Dragons fans

* Whenever the Swallows score (and again at the end when they won) the fans all sing a song while waving small plastic umbrellas.  It’s very fun looking.  Next time, I’ll try to get to the game really early so that I can sit on that side and get a video of it.

Swallows fans celebrating their win

The beginninzzzzzz…

Greetings from Tokyo! Believe it or not, after a year and a half of planning, I’m finally here!

First impression: Jet lag. So much jet lag. Thirteen hour time differences are brutal. I consider it a major coup that I lasted the entire day at the office yesterday and didn’t wake up until 6 am today (Saturday). Even the cat is jet-lagged, which is kind of hilarious to watch (except when she’s driving me nuts).

Everything went smoothly on the flight over. I successfully checked both suitcases right at the 50lb weight limit and got myself and the cat through security without mishap. During boarding, I got called up to the counter and handed a new plane ticket – for business class. Woohoo! I LOVE business class – especially for a 13 ½ hour flight! So that was a great blessing. About two hours before the end of the flight, the kitty decided that she was sick of the whole thing and started meowing, but thankfully, she was not loud and didn’t continue for too long. Heck, by that point, I was also done with the whole thing. My colleague, Ben, met us at the gate (Yay for diplomats!) and, thanks to my extreme type A tendencies that had me following every single rule down to the letter, the kitty flew through animal inspection, and customs was a breeze.

On the drive into Tokyo, I saw Mt. Fuji at sunset. It was lovely, and by all reports, a rare sight during the hot/humid summer months. I also saw the Tokyo Sky Tree, which is quite impressive.

Remember when I said that I am very type A? Remember how I had all of the cat’s paperwork meticulously prepared and organized? Remember this when I tell you that, upon arriving at my temporary apartment on the Embassy housing compound, I discovered that I had lost the case with my passports, government id, a credit card, and the key to the suitcase with important stuff like shampoo. ARGH. I blame relief from extreme worry about getting the cat into Japan. Or jet lag. That works too. But here is where we get Cultural Experience #1: Japanese people actually turn in highly valuable lost items! Thanks to my sponsor’s awesome Japanese skills, we learned that Narita Airport’s lost & found had my case. My wonderful colleague Jennifer used her mad hammering skills to break into my suitcase, and Ben kindly got up early the next morning to go out to the airport and pick up my case. Situation resolved!

So, I’ve seen Mt. Fuji, had my property restored to me, and survived an entire jet-lagged day at the embassy (complete with getting internet set up). We’re off to a great start!

Getting ready

I’m writing this post from the site of an epic battle. Good vs Evil. Predator vs Prey. The Cat vs The Fuzzy Mouse.

It all started with me getting my home organized for the pack-out. For me, getting ready for pack-out involves inventorying all of my household goods (mainly to help me get a handle on everything) and deciding what can get thrown/sent to Goodwill, what goes into storage, what goes on the boat, what goes in the air shipment, and what goes in my luggage. To add to the excitement, everything has to be staged – e.g. all of the stuff for the air shipment needs to be all together – because when the movers come to pack you out, they come in like that big thunder storm we had a week ago, and everything in their path gets swooped up and put into boxes (including garbage, if you’ve been silly enough to leave any in your house). So I’m going through all of my stuff. The other day, I pulled down a small box that I haven’t touched since I got back from Brazil. Inside were the electronic doodads that I expected, but also inside was my extra stash of fuzzy mice for the kitty. (No sense in giving the cat more mice when she still had the others!) I didn’t think much of it, but tonight I put the box on the floor, and a few minutes later, the cat is digging into the box trying to pull out a mouse. I gave it to her, and this cat, who hasn’t cared much about her mice for the past year, spent the next half hour (or more – she’s still going) throwing that mouse all over the apartment.

There isn’t much point to that story, except maybe that packing out CAN be fun!

So yes, I’m getting ready to move to Tokyo. The move is imminent now, so procrastination has largely come to an end, although my huge to-do list is not showing any progress. I was intending to write blog posts prior to this – about seeing the Hokusai exhibit at the Smithsonian, the Jakuchu exhibit at the National Gallery of Art, and some of the ancient Japanese books in the Library of Congress. I went to see the cherry blossoms down at the Tidal Basin. (This year was the 100^th anniversary of Japan’s gift of cherry trees to the United States.) I saw the final flight of the Space Shuttle Discovery on its way to its resting place in the Smithsonian’s Air & Space Museum. And I took my mother to England for her birthday, and we drove around the Cotswolds and Cornwall.  (Tea at the Savoy is AMAZING, and I adored Blenheim Palace and the town of Bath. There were lots of other things I loved, but those were my favorites. I highly recommend them!!)

But now I’m about to move to Japan, and this blog will begin to fulfill the part of its intended function that is describing my impressions and experiences in Japan. It’s always a bittersweet thing to move. I am sad to leave friends and family here. But I am also excited to see so many of the amazing/impressive/crazy things I’ve heard about over the past year, and writing this blog will certainly help me process some of it. I hope you enjoy reading about my adventures!

I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!

Since my last blog post, my life has settled into a fairly dull routine. I am always either studying Japanese or feeling (somewhat) guilty for not studying Japanese. They tested my Japanese in late December and declared me to be where I should be given how long I’ve been studying. So at least there is progress! 

Studying a language full-time for a year can feel rather isolating – similar to being in graduate school, except without all of the classmates. It’s too easy for an introvert like me to turn inward and live on my own little island. Now that it’s late February, there are a number of things that I need to start doing in preparation for moving to Tokyo: updating my household effects inventory, updating my will, filling out the housing questionnaire from the embassy, working through the bureaucratic joy of requesting other training that I need to get done, etc. Not to mention spending time with friends while I still can! But prior to now, I have had too much solitary introspective time, which can sometimes lead to self-absorption and/or self-pity.

The other day, I heard a sermon on Abram and Sarai and God’s promise of a son despite their advanced age. The pastor discussed the tension between God’s promise and our perception of “reality”. Abram and Sarai knew they had God’s promise, but they didn’t see how it could be done. So they took matters into their own hands, and Hagar gave birth to Ishmael. But in God’s good timing, Sarah gave birth to Isaac, and from Isaac a nation was born.

When I was younger, lots of friends would seek to assure me that I would get married someday. (Those assurances stopped around age 35, but now that I’m heading to Japan where many women frequently wait until nearly 40 before getting married, there has been a resurgence in the hopeful comments.) Lovely, well-meaning Christian friends would tell me that I would get married and that I needed to trust that God would fulfill his promises to me. My response was simply (and not very graciously) that nowhere in the Bible does God promise me a husband. It was a conversation killer, but there you go.

But as I once again listened to the story of Abram and Sarai, it occurred to me that maybe while I'm noting what promise is NOT in the Bible, I am essentially ignoring the promise that IS in the Bible: “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” (Jer 29:11). The question becomes, do I trust what God says? Do I believe that He has a good and perfect plan for my life – whether in singleness or in marriage, with children or without children, whether in the U.S. or in Japan or in Brazil? I ask myself these questions and I find that I am like the father who sought Jesus’ healing for his son: “I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!”

“Hallelujah! He has found me; Whom my soul so has craved; 

Jesus satisfies all my longings; through His blood I now am saved.” 

(All My Life Long)