One thing that many Japanese people are curious about when it comes to me is my ability to speak English. Japanese people who are really confident with their English skills will speak English to me no matter whether I respond in English or Japanese, but those people are few in number. Most people use English as a conversation starter and from their proceed to ask where I'm from and what I'm doing in Japan. Many people also tell me it's considered "cool" in Japan if one can speak English. Then again, most of the people who are telling me this are young people. People who are older than I am, working-age people, don't tend to want to practice English with me, but they like to share with me their past experiences with studying English. My host mom tells me how she despised studying English as a child, but now she enjoys it despite how difficult it is, and she wishes she had studied English more when she was young. And tonight, she requested that I practice some English with her in the form of reading Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, which I thought was a fun experience. Her accent isn't perfect, and it makes me giggle at times, but she can understand much of what she's reading, which is especially impressive with a book such any of those from the Harry Potter series due to the made-up works and unusual names that often pop up.

One thing that I am curious about when it comes to Japanese people is the choice of school uniforms. Elementary school boys seem to always be wearing shorts, no matter the time of year. Most girls from elementary school through high school wear skirts, and sometimes they wear knee socks, not tights, which leaves their legs exposed to the cold. I feel that this is bad for the children's health, but it's the decided uniform, and there is no way to change it. Still, I feel cold myself just looking at the school children walking around with bare skin on January days when the temperature sometimes stays below forty degrees Fahrenheit!

Okaasan's Birthday

Tonight was Okaasan's birthday, and she spent the day in Kyoto sight-seeing with Otousan. For dinner, she ordered Domino's pizza, which surprised me. For my birthday and Otousan's birthday, she prepared scrumptious Japanese meals. But I guess Okaasan wanted to go light on the food preparation for her own birthday, and I don't blame her. Besides, no one else in the household cooks, so if Okaasan doesn't cook, we can't eat food prepared at home in that given evening. Therefore tonight we ate Domino's pizza.

The Domino's pizza here does not have as much sauce as its counterpart in the U.S. However, there are rather unusual toppings on the pizza here, including corn and shrimp. There was even a small section of a mixed-topping pizza that had cream cheese and blueberries on top of it! I wasn't feeling that adventurous, so Otousan and Yoko sampled it, and sure enough, they both confirmed that that sort of topping is not meant to be on a pizza.

For dessert tonight, instead of the usual cake and whipped topping with strawberries that Okaasan prepares, she served maccha, Japanese green tea, with traditional Japanese sweets bought in Kyoto earlier that day.

I think Okaasan likes the opal necklace I gave her. One of my friends definitely said she would buy the necklace from me if Okaasan didn't like it, so judging from the all-around good reception to this necklace, I think I made a nice choice.

Second Semester Has Begun

Due to my infrequent posting of new blog entries, it is probably easy to tell that I am quite busy right now. This is due to the start of my spring semester here in Japan. Everyone keeps telling the foreign exchange students how quickly the year is going by and how much we need to savor every moment of it, but I'm well aware of this and I'm doing my best. However, it's difficult now that Japanese classes are in full swing. It's the same weekly schedule (two hour classes every Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday, three hour classes every Wednesday and Friday), but I'm trying to be extra diligent this semester and really stay on top of all my class work. I went out and bought an electronic dictionary today that I can use when studying kanji. This means I don't need to ask a Japanese person for the proper kanji reading every time I encounter a new kanji. However, the machine is designed for use by a Japanese person, so all the labels, directions, and explanations are in Japanese. I'm going to need some serious help figuring out how to work my new toy.

I'm also enrolled in a Japanese literature class, which begins this coming Wednesday, and a class called Japanese Society and Law, which has already met three times. So far we've been assigned parts of the Japanese Constitution to read (in English) for homework, and we've discussed the role the Emperor has played and does play in ruling Japan. We also did a little comparison between how the legislative branches of government function in Japan versus our home countries (we have students from France, Germany, the U.S., Canada, and England in our class).

Japanese Puppet Theatre

There are no pictures to accompany this entry, but I had a really exciting cultural experience at the National Bunraku Theatre of Japan this past Saturday. My host mother had asked me a month or two ago if I wanted to see a bunraku, or puppet theatre, performance in Osaka, and of course I said yes.

Since the new year was celebrated quite recently, the inside of the theatre was decorated with small, delicate pink and white balls hanging from the ceiling. Many women came in kimono, and I even saw a few men in the male version (I do not know the Japanese word). The theatre was absolutely packed, but it seemed rather small for a "national theatre," it had only one floor. Hanging from the ceiling above the edge of the stage were two large, red fish, faces pointing toward each other. Below the fish there was a screen for supertitles, which were presented in Japanese.

To the right of the stage, a しゃみせん (shamisen - traditional Japanese instrument) player sat and strummed the three-stringed instrument. In between the shamisen player and the stage is the narrator. There maybe anywhere from one to eight narrators, depending on how the performance was written. The narrators sing in a chant-like way, and the plays were all written hundreds of years ago, so the narrators sing old-fashioned Japanese.

A single puppet, which is probably one and half to two feet in length, is operated by three men. When the puppets come out on to the stage, they are held on the right side by one man in hakama (wide-legged, loose clothing for the lower body that resembles pants) and a happi, a shirt that is folded left side over right side like a kimono. The puppets are operated from the center rear and on the left side by two men who are clothed completely in black with their faces covered, called kuroko, black children. The faces of the kuroko are hidden so that those puppeteers' facial expressions do not distract the audience from watching the puppets' movements. The men without covered faces who operate the puppets show almost no expression on their faces.

The plays reminded me of European operas that I have seen performed at the Lyric Opera House in Chicago. One play was about a foiled plot to assassinate a young successor to a family clan, and another was about a young couple, deeply in love, who had to sneak around behind their parents' backs and overcome various obstacles such as arranged marriage propositions in order to finally live happily ever after. I am not surprised that this art has flourished so much in Japan, a country that seems to show appreciation for the subtle nuances in life. Truly, bunraku, which involves intricate plots told in artful ways, also relies on the audience's attention to the detail in the puppet movements to appreciate the dedication it takes to master this art form.

Ringing in 2010 in Nagano

My host family was kind enough to take me with them as they drove up to Nagano prefecture to celebrate the new year this winter break. My host father's mother lives alone in a big house in the countryside in Nagano. The house is huge and incredibly beautiful. Almost all the rooms in the house, except for the bathroom and kitchen, have tatami (bamboo) mat floors and sliding wooden doors with white paper or drawings on them. My host grandmother was incredibly friendly and kind, just like the rest of my host family. I also met my host uncle, his wife, and their two children, who are Eri (17) and Yuuka (15).

We went sightseeing at Matsumoto Castle, one of the oldest castles in Japan, on our first day up north. The castle is also known as the Crow's Castle because of its black hue. We saw the oldest elementary school in Japan, too, which was located within walking distance from the castle.

The following day we went shopping for some special foods needed for the new year celebration, including black koi fish (not commonly eaten), mochi (sticky, soft rice cakes), and various types of fish, noodles, and vegetables. At home my host mother and host aunt seemed to always be in the kitchen cooking, and my host cousins, host siblings, and I would hang out in this one warm room with a large, heated table. We sat on the floor cushions and stuck our legs under the table to keep them warm, and did homework around the table. I was never bored for a second in the countryside because I spent the entire time talking with my host family. I felt like I belonged with them, and I really enjoyed their company.

On the thirty-first, the ten of us at grandmother's house at a huge evening meal, and at 10:30 p.m. we gathered around the dinner table once more and ate soba, or buckwheat noodles, a Japanese new year tradition. Half the adults were asleep before midnight, and my host cousins, host siblings, and I sat around the dinner table and watched on TV as 2009 left and 2010 came in. I then went to sleep shortly after midnight. We ate leftovers from the night before on the following morning, and we also at a traditional soup with vegetables and mochi in it, called ozouni. I was really happy that my host family included me in their new year celebrations, and I had a really wonderful time with them in Nagano.

Visit to Nara

Thanks to my friend Junko, I was able to take my first trip to Nara, the ancient capital of Japan, shortly before the end of 2009. In Nara there exists the 大仏 (daibutsu, or great Buddha). It is made out of bronze, and is about fifteen meters tall. There are other smaller statues in the Todaiji Temple, in which the daibutsu is located, which are gold-plated. After walking around the temple, Junko and I came upon a column surrounded by a crowd of people. I asked what all the commotion was about, and as I did, I saw a hole in the bottom of the column. Junko explained that the hole is the same diameter as the daibutsu's nostrils, so if someone can fit through the hole in the bottom of the column, they can also fit through the daibutsu's nostril holes. Of course I had to try this, and I successfully wriggled through the hole.

Junko and I also walked alongside Nara Park, a huge expanse of grass and trees in the middle of the city, and we chatted as we walked. I hadn't seen Junko since the summer, so we had a lot to catch up on. There were many deer in Nara, both in the park and near the temple area, and Nara is apparently famous for these deer. The deer are so used to having people come up to them and feed them that they are not at all afraid of people, and we were even able to pet the deer.

I have heard that Nara is also a great place to view the cherry blossoms in April, so I will have to return there someday.

Omochi Tsuki

Shortly before the new year rolls around, a traditional activity in Japan is omochi tsuki, or making mochi, Japanese rice balls. Mochi are round, and the dough is sticky and gooey, so one must take small bites and chew carefully, lest the mochi lodge itself into your throat, creating a choking hazard! Mochi are delicious, and eating mochi is a traditional way to celebrate the new year.

To make mochi, one must buy rice that is used especially for mochi and then boil the rice. After the rice is boiled, it is poured into a hollowed out, large wooden container that may in fact be a tree stump. Then, you take a large mallet that looks like a wooden hammer. First, you use the hammer to mash the rice until the grains have lost their shape and stick together. Then, you use the mallet as a hammer and pound the rice to turn it into one soft, huge mass of rice. But you have to be careful to not pound the rice too much, or else the rice will become too soft, and the mochi will fall apart when you place them into soup broth. After being pounded out, the huge mass of rice dough is removed from the wooden container and placed on a table covered in flour. The flour prevents the dough from sticking to people's hands. Small sections are torn from the rice dough and manipulated with the hands to form small balls. The balls are set on the table, which slightly flattens the bottom of the rice ball, and the mochi is ready to eat.

I went to my friend Yuya's house for this event, and we all ate the mochi by putting it in a fish broth with vegetables. We also inserted sweet red bean paste into some of the mochi for dessert.