April 19, 2005
Addicted to raisins
I liked Ian Jack’s article here on the media as a “dictatorship of grief”, reflecting on response to the deaths of Diana and the Pope. I really want to read Chernobyl Strawberries by Vesna Goldsworthy. I’ve been reading up on America lately, first from The Star: How to succeed in Bush’s White House. It seems it’s not about success at all but suckiness. Isn’t that John Bolton terrible? Speaking of terrible, why is anyone opposed to the emergency contraceptive pill? And while we’re on about the zealots of piety and the bullshit crusade, how about this little expose on Washington’s most devout citizens? (On the disgustingly-wretched-by-any-moral-standard Mr. DeLay: I’ll never understand born-again Christians, who mess up royally before they find God, and then believe themselves to be more righteous than those of us who were smart enough by our own accord never to make their mistakes in the first place.)
This weekend we are off to Miyajima to stay here! This mini-break has been a long time coming and we’re really excited. I am also addicted to raisins.
April 18, 2005
Six Mats & One Year
Six Mats & One Year is a beautiful book by Canadian poet Alison Smith, about the time she spent in Japan. In three weeks today, we are leaving Japan to fly to England and let the future begin. The feeling of coming to love a place so well we may never see again is awfully tragic. I have cried more than once lately while looking at the mountains from the train, and I can’t quite believe we’re actually going. It’s strange to be frantically counting down and cherishing every second at the same time.
I really love this poem.
Under-Country
by Alison Smith
I have pushed off and landed far away
but you travel with me as under-country
always close enough to pull here,
a blanket lost in sleep.
Small details have caught under heart
like hair under a painting on a wall:
in the dark they rupture the familiar.
If I were to return
the cities would seem smaller.
Everyday your volcanic reality
shrinks into columns of print
while dream, in dimension of depth
and meaning, continues its expansion.
Words that follow-
When I was in Japan-
will soon outsize you.
I left as we do our childhoods:
rushing to escape, without souvenirs.
I collected no sake cups
no tsukemono plates.
All this time
a core of miso grew.
(You can read my review of her book at my ne’er updated book review website, Now Reading. I bought my copy online from Northwest Passages– Canadian Literature Online)
April 17, 2005
The art of everyday life
The baby I’ve been waiting for was born yesterday, unlike the rest of us. My dear friend Paul is now an uncle! The baby is going to be amazingly loved, lucky him.
In technology news, we are getting Ipod Minis. Stuart is getting a grey one and I am getting a pink one. In six months, when I am complaining about having no money, don’t remind me of this decision. I still might get an Ipod shuffle instead. We only bought our Mini Disc players a year ago, and I feel a bit guilty shelling out for something new so soon. Though it is a mini-disc.
The papers have been a bit boring this weekend. No kawaii elephant poo. Because I don’t believe I’ll be one of them, on ubiquitous and poor first-novelists who seem to have forgotten about the art of everyday life. Though this article does reek of something bitter. The poet, Julia Darling, died of cancer this week. She did the January exercise for the Guardian Poetry Workshop and I really enjoyed her stuff. An interesting story on Andrea Dworkin.
We’re going to a hanami party tonight at the castle. The blossom life is nearly exhausted, so we’ll catch it while we can.
April 15, 2005
Forbidden!
I am the worst post office customer ever. Not only am I unable to communicate beyond wild gestures, but I am functionally illiterate. I am the post office chimpanzee. Further, I never require anything easy. One letter first class stamp? Oh no, not I. I have never made a request of the post-office staff that wasn’t bizarre in some construct. I send multiple packages to various continents, I sent 60+ cards and parcels at Christmas, I’ve been sending enormous boxes of our random stuff home monthly since January, there were about 50 wedding invitations mailed two weeks ago, registered mail. Ecetera. Today we sent two boxes containing, among other things, our winter coats, my porcelain Hello Kitty, a few books, knitting needles, my Miffy mugs, hats and scarves. A third box consisted of my entire CD collection, all 5 kilograms of it. This is the end of our stuff, and I was thrilled about that. So thrilled that I decided to explain as much to the Post Office staff member who has to help us every time. “Finished” I said to her in Japanese, pointing to our stuff. She looked confused. I repeated myself a few times, pointing, with a large smile hoping she would understand. Then I realised Stuart was also looking at me rather strangely. “What are you doing?” he asked. I realised I wasn’t actually saying “Dekita!”, which means “finished”. I was saying “Dammait!” which is a very strong way to say “Forbidden!”, and you would yell it at someone who was groping you on the train. I stopped yelling “Forbidden” in the post office, at that realisation. The staff member, who no doubt already thinks I am crazy, didn’t really bat an eye. We ended up spending $150.00, which has become quite normal for us. It beats paying excess luggage fees at the airport. We must be the post office’s best customers. In Japan, it is common for stores to give “gifts” to customers who spend large amounts of money. Today, in spite of me shouting “Forbidden, Forbidden!” at the Post Office staff, we were given the gift of a brand new sponge.
April 13, 2005
English is also bustin out all over
Must draw attention to this article from This Magazine, which takes issue with “linguistic imperialism” and the ethical problem that has been my daily life for the past year. English has become a hot commodity and people are desperate to get it, paying massive fees and going into debt to do so. I think of one of my students, who works night shifts in a toothpaste factory and is usually far too nervous to speak in her English classes, another who had mental problems to begin with (and this is more common than you’d think among our clientele) and now has been admitted to hospital for the next three months. She has lost all the points she bought for English lessons as they’ll expire by the time she’s out. The number of students who feel utterly diminished by their lack of English skills, regardless of what other accomplishments they’ve managed in their lives, and so exalt people such as myself and my co-workers to a near-Godlike status for something we’ve put in no effort to achieve. The people who are desperate to learn idioms and slang, to sound “natural”, like a native speaker- and no one ever does. They want to sound and act Westernized, and at the expense of what? Their parents can’t help but be proud of them though. The article’s missionary metaphor is a successful one- blatantly as some teachers are eager to share their religious faith with students, and others (I am definitely not innocent here) try to share their ideals, which go against cultural grain. We challenge students to defy their parents, to stand up for themselves, to express themselves, to be individuals, on a daily basis.
It’s not all bad. I think there are many teachers who allow themselves to come away with a broadened perspective as a result of their international experience. In a country like Japan, exposing people to the rare foreigner does them a remarkable amount of worldly good. I think the idea of an international communication tool is a positive thing, even if I have to bear the guilt that it’s the language I was born with. Learning a second language is a worthy occupation. The problem is the business, which exploits its customers, preying on their inferiority complexes to make them open their wallets wide, all the while delivering a product that isn’t so entirely good. The problem is this insistence on “nativeness” that allows students to chase an unachievable-for-most goal, and gives companies an excuse to hire teachers (such as myself) with the bare minimum of qualifications.
I’ve had an incredible year like you can’t imagine and I wouldn’t want to take that away from anyone else. But I think it’s important that teachers maintain a realistic perspective on what it is we’re doing here, and so an article like this is a good thing.
April 13, 2005
Britney's bustin out all over
In the midst of financial freak-outs, because I am not a resident of Ontario and therefore may not qualify for govmt loans. Anyway, I think this may be big news, though only time will tell. I am currently finishing the novel I’ve been writing for a year and a half, and very pleased with the results. I’m thinking ahead to my next project, which will probably turn into my graduate thesis. I’m excited. I know the characters already. It’s going to be a little bit of 1980s Whitby suburbia, Cold War Mania, expatriate family life in the Middle East, the Revolution in Iran. It’s going to involve a ton of research and I think I am going to make something really incredible.
We said good bye to Julie tonight. Her bag weighs an absolute ton, and watching her pack was a scary glimpse into our immediate future. We must send another couple of boxed home tomorrow. How does the stuff gather? It’s our weekend again, and in view of our imminent poverty, we’ve elected to stay in town this weekend. The usual karaoke, lunch out, hang about routine. We might go to the garden at Himeji Castle, which we haven’t seen yet.
And on with the big news, though I sure you know by now. Britney is pregnant! Has Kevin Federline not heard of birth control? That man has been impregnating women at a crazy rate of late. In less idiotic news, Alice Munro is one of Time’s Most influential people. There is a Northrop Frye Lit Festival in Moncton this month. The man who is regrettingly behind the famous necropheliac duck, on being Donald, which is the name of Charles Kennedy’s baby son. Ee-na!- a summer music festival guide. A very short excerpt from my beloved Douglas Coupland’s new book on Terry Fox. And a sensible perspective on the Japanese textbook debate.
April 12, 2005
They say our love won't pay the rent
Realizing just how poor we’re going to be, as I enter Graduate School and my husband waits for his landed immigrant status. What a way to start our marriage. It’s going to be an incredibly crazy couple of years. And beyond that too, I’m sure.
Andrea Dworkin has died. “In a world where teenage girls believe that breast implants will make them happy and where rape convictions are down to a record low of 5.6% of reported rapes; in a public culture which has been relentlessly pornographised, in an academic environment which has allowed postmodernism to remove all politics from feminism, we will miss Andrea Dworkin”- from The Guardian. Her ideas are not easy to stomach, but they get important dialogues started, no matter where they lead. In other feminist news, an attack on Title IX.
