May 19, 05

Back in May, just before Thor left on his long cruise, we invited Sejimo-san--our "house agent" --and his wife over for dinner (yes -- that is our kitchen -- the biggest room in our house). It all went off just great, despite--or perhaps because of--the fact that while serving salad, I offered our guests garbage (gomi) instead of sesame (goma) dressing!

Thor....on crack at Chichibu Tama Kai National Park. This was our first time climbing granite and at first I was convinced that crack sucked. I've sinced learned to just love it! 

At this point, I began to wonder what the hell I was doing...I nonetheless went on to complete the climb... 

May 21, 05 (Chichibu Tama Kai National Park)

Thor and I went on a climbing/camping trip to Chichibu Tama Kai National Park back in May...It was a wonderful trip -- beautiful park, challenging climbs. They even had an indoor onsen (hot spring) though despite the fact that there were male and female baths, only the women on the climbing trip actually decided to avail ourselves; I guess men just like being stinky (?)

Immediately upon our return from that climbing trip, Thor left, and in his absence, I often found myself alone in the house, playing obsessively with our newly purchased rock climbing ropes. I spent many an hour learning how to tie the "figure eight" knot, the "bowline knot," the "clove hitch," and the "alpine" and "double alpine butterfly" knots (I just love the internet! Such helpful animated graphics for spatially challenged individuals like me -- why you can even learn how to tie one of several variations on the hangman's noose!) .

Sometimes, I'd even take a short length of rope with me while riding the train (passing time absentmindly tying my perfect climbing knots). After a while, I realized--based on the freaked out looks of fellow passengers--that I had begun executing with clinical precision the perfect "hangman's noose." Needless to say, I soon stopped tying knots (climbing or otherwise) at home or anywhere else for that matter.

On the hike into Takatoriyama (Mt. Takatori), one of the rock climbing "hot spots" in Yokosuka, you can pass by (and climb) this majestic Buddha.

Most trains have designated women only cars as a way to provide some protection from "chikan" -- gropers -- a group of deviants apparently reaching near epidemic proportions over here. Unfortunately, if you don't want to risk being groped (at least by a man) you must ride the train in the early morning hours...seems to go against logic since it is at night (after a few beers and sake) that men are most likely to transform from respectable "salary men" into groping and slobbering morons.... 

Squeaky at home (unaware of the surveillance camera I've recently had installed in the bedroom). 

Teaching, Learning, Sweating, etc.

Well, it's been just ages since I updated "the blog." So much so that I hardly know where to begin!

I'm doing well -- sweating out the humid rainy season and navigating my way through the junior high school to which I've been assigned as an assistant English language teacher. My school is one of the more run-down ones in Yokosuka with a significant number of unruly students...It's been "interesting" if a little boring at times, since I find that I am often confined to the role of human tape recorder in the classroom!

One of my co-teachers just loves to start out each class by having students sing -a-long to an American pop tune, for example, "We are the World" and more recently "Ob la Di, Ob la Da." It's actually pretty funny (now that I've gotten over the mixture of humiliation and cheesed out horror I initially felt when I realized that no one but the Japanese teacher and myself ever actually sang the words out loud). I've begun to clown around during the songs in the hopes of receiving a special award from the Actors' Guild in the category "Most Convincing Performance in a Farcical and Completely Misguided Language Teaching Exercise."

In other news, Thor has been gone for a month and returns at the beginning of September. We communicate regularly via email and he assures me that life on the boat is indeed just the sort of adventure that all those ads enticing you to join the Navy suggest (if of course, listening to your neighbour beat off in his bunk and watching desperate sailors jump overboard can count as some sort of adventure!).

(Ooh! I just got distracted by Condi's (Rice) appearance on CNN. I've no idea what she said since whether I set the t.v. audio to English or Japanese, inevitably all I actually hear is "blah, blah, blah.")

Anyway, Thor's absence has freed up Squeaky (my favourite stuffed animal) to hog as much of the bed as she wishes. No matter how demurely I place her on top of the pillow every morning, by the time I'm ready to tumble into bed, she is spread eagled in its centre and drooling on both pillows...I guess she's trying to stand in for my hubby!

Yes, I do hallucinate sometimes.

When not engaged in an imaginary struggle for covers with my stuffed rabbit, I've been spending time gardening, reading, writing (and then burning my writing outdoors while dancing around whooping and wearing war paint and skimpy clothes -- just because I know how the Japanese (with their wooden homes) will really love this sort of performance), and bug proofing our home. I've also had a few very enjoyable outings with students and plan several more over the next few weeks.

Lately, it seems that scatological and/or sexual slang just keeps cropping up in my private lessons -- no matter how seemingly inocuous the topic under discussion. In a recent lesson concerning body part and verbs (wiggle your fingers, wiggle your toes, bend your elbow, etc.) one of my student somehow made a connection between wiggly fingers and subway gropers. Vewwy vewwy mysterious....And just last week, while talking about food, the subject of cock somehow managed to rear its ugly head -- predicatably brought up by the only male in the group. I patiently explained that while cock was the male term for a chicken, one does not respond to a waiter's question as to what you would like for dinner by saying, "I'd like cock, please." Nor does one go into a steak house to enquire if they "have any cock." It was a fun lesson; I've noticed that whenever we stray into the lewd and/or forbidden, everyone just seems to perk up. Unfortunately, it's not a strategy I see myself employing with much success at the junior high school....

I've been making slow but steady progress with Japanese...It really is a complex language and it's funny how just by omitting one or two syllables you can completely change the meaning of a sentence. For example, while showing my Japanese friend Yuki the result of my labours at translation she was kind enough to point out that my attempt to say: "You may not drive the car after it snows," actually came out as "You may not take a shit after it snows." (Unten shitay wa ikay masen means you may not drive, but unshitay wa ikay masen means you may not shit). Who knew?!!! Oh well, at least now I know how to tell someone not to "Number 2 in the car!"

More later....