Japanese Cities - We Can Make This Relationship Work

Well it’s finally Golden Week. This weekend I go to Osaka. Next weekend I go to Tokyo. Maybe these trips show a lack of imagination but I’m really looking forward to getting to know these cities better. Tokyo still feels uncomfortably alienating for me. I just don’t know it well enough to feel at home there. It has that London feeling where there’s so much to do and see that it’s actually overwhelming. In many ways, Tokyo was the reason I came to Japan. Before coming, I had a very child-like view of the Japanese nation. My desire to come originated in being 11 years old and really into video games. At that time, Tokyo just seemed like a giant video games playground. The neon and the electronics were so attractive to my 11 year old self. I remember watching an episode of Bad Influence where Violet visited Tokyo. More than anything else, that episode probably instilled my desire to come here.

Now my view of Japan has changed considerably. I still love Tokyo for all the Bad Influence reasons. There are also grown up reasons for enjoying the big city experience. But I never realized what a beautiful country Japan is. The countryside here is amazing. The most striking thing in Okayama is how green everything is. The hills with mist rising off them, the rice paddies, the amazing range of birds and wildlife that I see every day. Tokyo aside, I perhaps haven’t warmed to Japanese cities as much as I thought I would. If it’s night-time and raining they look beautiful, but they’re generally pretty ugly. Okayama City is great but most cities in Japan feel very similar. Tokyo, on the other hand is still exotic and different enough to make me misty eyed and super-excited at the prospect of a visit. Hurrah.

Osaka, on the other hand. Oh-we don’t get on. We have issues, Osaka and I. I want to resolve this. I want to work it out. I want to get my first ever proper night’s sleep there and think of a sightseeing activity that isn’t just going to the aquarium.  I believe it can happen. I have to believe that. I do love the aquarium though.

I will never wear a puffa (puffer?) jacket. Ever.

No. No. No.

I never thought I would find myself being grateful for Uniqlo. It’s not a brand that I like. The designs are dull. They tend to be a boxy fit, which isn’t good when you’re a tall, slim bloke. And I can’t really get over the way that they have the same item in 50 different colours, even if that item is itself rubbish. 50 different colour puffa jackets are still well, puffa jackets.

 Anyway, in Japan they are my best friend. That’s because most shops don’t sell clothes which will fit me. It’s very frustrating. I’ve been really impressed by the dress sense of guys in Okayama and there are a range of men’s clothing shops which sell some beautiful clothing, expensive though it is. But they don’t cater for anyone over six foot. That means I have to do most of my shopping at international chains, super size stores or online.

 Having to shop in this way really limits your choice. At the moment, I feel like I’m having to wear really dull clothes, just because they’re the only ones available. Today I sported the sports-casual look of Nicky Wire circa-1998. This is not really something to be proud of. It would have been good if I was going to a dance class though.

I had a calm weekend, filled merely with shopping, coffee and windy bike rides. That’s because the next few weeks are going to be rammed with activity and I needed to save money. Golden Week is coming up fast and we’ll be making our second post-orientation trip to Tokyo. I still feel like there’s so much there I haven’t done yet. And our last attempt at a wild night out there was foiled by chemicals and long distance taxi rides. This time it will be different and I’m not leaving Tokyo until I’ve at least danced to two songs in a row that don’t make me want to self-harm. I’d also like to find a karaoke place that has a Belle and Sebastian repertoire large than Funny Little Frog and Little Lou, Ugly Jack. Hell, I know doing B and S at karaoke is a terrible idea, but I’d at least like the option.

I've started calling football "soccer". I know.

Yesterday, I swallowed my pride and re-joined the school’s soccer club. When I first arrived, I would go to soccer practice once a week. My intentions were to get some exercise, score brownie points and bond with the older male students who would rather do pretty much anything other than speak to me. 

It was okay at first. I can be pretty flexible on the one hand, but also slightly lazy on the other. I enjoyed hanging out with the students outside lessons. It was an opportunity to spend time with a teacher at the school who had made an initial effort to be open and friendly towards me, even though he spoke almost no English.

But I dropped out. Here’s why-and it’s a cautionary tale for JETs and other ALTs who try to get involved in extra curricular activities. I should precede this tale by adding that I blame only myself for my failure to stick with the soccer-I’m not trying to shift blame elsewhere. But there are also a range of challenges which, bit by bit, wear down one’s initial enthusiasm. So here goes. 

It started reasonably well. The students made an effort. The students with whom I was working were also students I taught and were pretty much the least enthusiastic English students you could ever find. That was okay. But they didn’t want to stand around chatting in English. Again, that was okay-I felt it was enough just to be there, spending normal time with them. I didn’t feel like I needed to make every session an English class. 

The first thing that annoyed me was the format of the sessions. Every week, all they did was drills. They would never play a match, except on weekends. So every day of the week would start with hugely elaborate warm up exercises. These would last about 20 minutes. They would then spend about 15 minutes practicing keepy uppy type exercises-header, volley, catch etc. This would sometimes be hard to join in if there were even numbers so I would sometimes take a supervisory role rather than an involved one. 

The next 30 minutes would usually involve drilling some kind of move. For example, 3 players would be in a line and would have to pass the ball 3 times in a very specific way, before shooting. This was pretty dull, but I could see there was some benefit. One thing which always amused me was that the goalkeeper would almost always let me score. It’s a bit like letting your boss beat you at squash. I’ve seen this kind of thing before-it’s part of the cultural custom of bigging people up. Anyway, it’s strange to play a sport where you know that people are helping you to look good as far as is possible. 

But there was never a match. Or anything properly competitive. The drill would maybe be followed by twenty minutes practicing pull ups before a long warm down and raking of the pitch. I remember reading somewhere that English footballers dislike training in some European mainland countries because of the strong emphasis on technical improvement and lack of actual playing time. This has been used as a criticism of the English training methods and is one of the possible explanations for the lack of technically gifted youngsters in the UK. 

But it’s a bit dull. Especially if you’re no good at the technical stuff.  A few other things happened. After the initial novelty of my presence wore off, I didn’t feel like the students were getting much out of me being there. We weren’t using much English and we weren’t bonding especially, though they were a good bunch. In addition, I had a couple of misunderstandings with the team coach which made things a little awkward between us. These were entirely caused by the language difference. Then the schedules changed and sessions began to be intermittently cancelled. I would bring my kit in and find that there was no training that day. No one would warn me. Thankfully I never got changed until I knew for sure. This was really irritating though. Finally, the weather turned and sessions became primarily about fitness and cross country runs because the pitch had frozen. There’s no way I could have embarrassed myself in front of them by attempting a long distance run, so that froze me out slightly. In the end, I missed a few sessions, resolved to be more reliable but then eventually dropped out.

A couple of months passed. A new wave of students joined the school. Then, a few days ago, the soccer coach asked me out of the blue if I wanted to come to soccer this week. I saw this mainly as a goodwill gesture on his part. He had gone out of his way to try and make me feel welcome again. I was very grateful for this and said yes immediately. So yesterday, I again joined the team and I’m going to try and be committed until I leave Japan in August. 

That August deadline is looming. Less than seven days after leaving Japan I will be back in the job I was doing just over a year ago. It’s gonna be tricky.

Cherry Blossom. Go.

What a week it’s been. Having returned from a stressful UK trip and simultaneously having had to consider an early break of contract and return home, it was reassuring to find that I can still have great times in Japan. Despite all the bad things going on back in England at the moment, it’s possible to go out and forget it all.

Making my own Joanna Newsom/Florence album cover. Maybe that's not a good thing.

In the space of two weeks, the climate, appearance and atmosphere of Okayama City have changed beyond recognition. The yellow fields have gone. The lush green shoots are rising and the landscape is returning to the beauty that was so overwhelming when we arrived back in August. I am convinced that I will never live somewhere as gorgeous as this ever again.

It’s comfortably warm too. This kind of comfortable short-sleeves weather has been pretty rare during our time in Japan. Meanwhile, the cherry blossoms are out. We are now at the end of a 10 day period during which the Okayama landscape turns pink. Traditionally, you are supposed to sit outside under the cherry blossoms and act with wild abandon. I was happy to do that.

It began with night time drinking. Aided and abetted by a Britfriend, we set up camp at sunset by the river. Elderly Japanese people kept walking past and each time I expected a glance of disapproval at the booze and fags. But instead, people seemed really happy that we were enjoying the blossom in the traditional way. No-one seemed censorious about the level of noise or anything like that. It was, and this is rare for Japan, relaxed.

It was great to spend a whole weekend together after some time apart whilst I was in the UK.

K and I hadn’t seen much of each other for the past couple of weeks as I’d been a)Out of the country and then b)Busy with odd bits and bobs. So we made time this weekend to spend some “quality” time in and around Okayama City. It was fun to spend lazy mornings together and to wander in the sunshine. We also went to see The Artist, which I like as much as you’d expect, knowing how pretentious I am. It was actually my second time seeing it and I enjoyed it just as much as the first time. Again, there’s a period of 15 minutes in the middle where it drags slightly but otherwise, it’s a treat and as light as chiffon cake. It was interesting to observe the Japanese audience as some of the cultural references are quite obscure to Japanese culture and it helps if you can lip-read English. But it seemed to go down really well and there were lots of laughs, especially at anything involving the dog. I love the scene where he comes across the pile of his auctioned-off possessions and whips the sheets off in a dramatic Dorian Gray-like fury.

Monday is my first lesson in about 6 weeks. There, in a nutshell, is the main problem with the JET programme in Okayama. But I am really looking forward to it. I love the teaching here. When it goes well it’s so satisfying and I get a warm feeling from watching my students improve. There are a million irritations to being an ALT. That’s for another post. But I get to be a teacher and that’s really something.

It's always better on holiday.

The Japanese school year starts in April and last week we received a new batch of junior and senior high students. They were rather nervous at the welcome ceremony and I felt a little sorry for them as they were paraded in front of their peers and teachers. My school is quite prestigious and just to have gained entry is a significant achievement for the students. Their parents have probably invested a fortune just to get their students to this point and will likely invest a lot more before their time is up.

The life of an academic student in Japan is tough. Most of my students have private lessons in addition to their schoolwork, often on a daily basis. Many will not get home til late when they will then have to do their homework. There are no school holidays in the English sense of the word, because the students will be expected to do a full day’s work each day in order to keep up. Also, many students will continue to come in during the holidays for “boost” classes and club activities. It’s not like in the UK where everyone downs tools when the final bell goes and heads for the nearest mall/theme park/multiplex. The parents may well both be working so they won’t necessarily both be around to do stuff with their kids if that is the particular setup. That’s especially true since many people won’t take more than 7-10 days “leave” per year and that will often include sick leave which gets included in the Japanese equivalent of annual leave.

I could never work as hard as people here seem to. What’s frustrating sometimes is that it can feel so inefficient. Whatever the benefits of the Japanese work ethic, I can’t see how the amount of time put in to work could ever be worth it. The gains from an eighteen hour working day, 6.5 days a week can’t possibly outweigh the drawbacks. Work isn’t fun. It never could be and, as Franz Ferdinand say, it’s always better on holiday.

There is a flip side to this argument though, which you experience in the UK any time you queue at a supermarket, wait an hour for a late train or get irritated by poor customer service in restaurants. People work hard in Japan to get the above things right and it does take time and effort. But I’m too lazy to think it could ever be worth it.

As a follow up to yesterday’s Pulp video, here’s a bit of Allo Darlin’. I’ve been obsessed by this song for a while now. I know it’s painfully twee but I’m afraid I can’t help myself. I have a bit of a crush on the singer but I hate myself for it as her image is so obviously calculated to appeal to me that I feel I ought to react badly. I believe the technical term for this feeling is Josielong-itis.

But then that's why I came here in the first place...

It’s been a funny month. I haven’t updated for a while. That’s because I had to fly back to the UK at short notice and they weren’t the kind of circumstances where I could post an offbeat observation on Japanese crisps or other equally fascinating topics.

London felt different. Being away for such a long time really made me appreciate its good points. Japanese cities tend to be beautiful at night but less appealing in the daytime. For once, I really appreciated what a pretty city London is. There is a sense of history that you don’t feel in many Japanese cities where the buildings often feel transient-like they will all be knocked down and rebuilt in 20 years time.

British people look really unhealthy. I’m not sure why I haven’t noticed that until now. In Japan I’ve been surrounded by super-skinny people and many of my older colleagues are surprisingly fit for their age. My vice principle, who’s in his fifties, outpaced both me and Kelly when we went hiking with him. But on touchdown at Heathrow, it was noticeable just how unwell people looked. In saying that, I think Brits look unhealthy compared to almost all other nationalities, not just the Japanese.

I realised that I’d really been missing pretentious art scene stuff. So I did a whirlwind tour of the Mondrian-Nicholson exhibition at the Courtald and the Picasso in Britain exhibition at the Tate. Both were great, but especially the former which gave me a whole new range of pretentious things to say in conversation about Nicholson. Not that I’d do that, right?

I’m back in Japan now. Outside of my school, I have barely seen any cherry blossom yet. That needs to be rectified. K Chan and I are thinking about visiting Kyoto at the weekend, but so is everyone else in Japan so we’ll see if that actually comes together. I’ve actually got it into my head that too much is made out of the cherry blossom and that I don’t especially like it-but I have no basis on which to think this. It could just be that my brain is just wanting to be automatically contrary. I need to get down to Kyoto/Korakuen and decide for myself.

Apropos of nothing, here's a link to my favourite live Pulp-clip. This song always makes me want to be a house-husband.