Yesterday, in my infinite wisdom (I looked outside and saw that it was raining), I wore a jacket to work to avoid the misery of being drenched in rainwater from head to toe. When I got to school after the 30-minute bike ride, the rain had only soaked me from waist to toe. From head to waist, I was drenched in sweat. So I wasn't just soaked all over—I also smelled like a seventh grade locker room after P.E. all day. Now, on to what I really want to talk about.
The Japanese language borrows heavily from western languages. Many words can be expressed not only in Japanese, but in pseudo-westernese. Part time job can be referred to as either its Japanese-ized English equivalent, paato taimu, or its German equivalent, arubaito. There's mostly likely a Japanese term for it as well, but I'm too lazy to look it up, and the western terms are more common. Other commonly used English words include basuketto booru (basketball), biiru (beer), pen (pen), and juusu (juice).
Here's a quick guide for Japanese vowel pronunciation to help you understand my romanizations:
Japanese vowels are basically just like Spanish ones.
a = ah, as in the Bostonian “go pahk the cah”
e = eh, as in “eh, you go pahk it yaself”
i = ee, as in “beets beets, sugar beets, beets sugar beets beets beets”
o = oh, as in “oh noh you (Trevor) dohn't”
u = oo, as in “Scooby Doo went scuba dooving”*
*It's actually a little more complicated than that—closer to a French u sound. But that's not really important right now.
Japanese consonants, while close in pronunciation to Spanish consonants, are similar enough to English consonants that we can use English to describe them. Each vowel (a, e, i, o, u) or combination of consonant-plus-vowel (ta, ka, pi, bu, etc) counts as one rhythmic beat, or syllable. Two consecutive vowels are each enunciated, instead of being blended into one syllable like we would in English with the ou in mouth. In paato, the vowel is held out for two syllables instead of just one. So, paato taimu is a six-syllable phrase (pa-a-to ta-i-mu) in Japanese, instead of the two syllable part time that we have in English.
The sixth graders are learning to read words made from roman characters--what we simply know as the alphabet. The teachers are all pretty good at reading English letters, even if they don't always pronounce them correctly. There are many reasons why they should learn how to read the alphabet. Internet addresses, for example, are generally written with roman characters, so it's important that they learn how to read them even if they don't plan on learning English. If they go anywhere outside their country (except probably China), they will most likely have to be able to read roman characters in order to properly understand and navigate their surroundings.
This is a reality the Japanese government understands, so they teach kids the alphabet in grade school. Their whole country is flooded with roman letters, so there are plenty of opportunities for practice. Because of the ubiquitousness of letters, they typically know how to pronounce them with crude Japanese pronunciation. In teaching correct pronunciation of English letters and written words, the problem lies in making them un-learn everything they've acquired while living in a place where most people don't know how to pronounce things correctly.
Today, the sixth graders brought papers with English words that they had seen around them, whether at home, on their clothes, or out in public. They hid the words, uncovering one letter at a time while offering three hints so that the other kids could guess the word. There were two problems with this game. First, most of the English words they chose weren't English at all, but brand names written in roman letters. Second, the kids were asked to give hints in a language using grammar and vocabulary that they hadn't yet learned. It's one thing to ask a Japanese kid to get in front of the whole class to speak a language with which they don't feel confident. It's another thing entirely to expect them to do it with words they haven't yet learned. That said, the kids did really well, in spite of the difficulties.
Some of their words were curious, while others were downright hilarious.
First, the acceptable ones:
Baby Mickey and Friends, Sesame Street, Converse: sure, they're proper names of products, but they generally have some lexical meaning outside of their brand name-ness.
Second, the non-English:
Nintendo, Panasonic, Sony, Toshiba: Japanese brand names of Japanese electronics.
Marlboro, Nescafé, Nike, Adidas: American brands that have no meaning outside of being proper names.
Burcmüller, Zaturn: I have no idea what the first is, but it's most likely a German surname. The second is apparently the name of a roller coaster at the Japanese theme park, Spaceworld.
Next, the misspelled English:
Gorden Retriever, The World of Goldn Eggs, Emepgency: While it's entirely possible that some of these were merely misspelled by the kids who copied them down, it's highly likely that the source material was wrong. Japanese companies don't usually have copy editors to check their English spelling or grammar.
Last, my favorite:
Cannabis World: I kid you not. It wasn't as if the girl who wrote this one had seen it at a store—she actually owned a little kiddie pencil case bearing those words, complete with Jamaican colors, peace signs, and marijuana leaves. She had no idea what it was. How do you explain what marijuana is to kids that are better off not knowing? How in the heck am I supposed to help her come up with three hints for that? I just gave her a new word instead.
The homeroom teacher's example word for the game was the English “word” DVD. The v sound doesn't exist in Japanese, so to distinguish v from b, they say bwii (sounds like bwee) instead of vii. Dii bwii dii. I followed the incorrect pronunciation with the correct one. Here's how the dialogue went:
Teacher: Dii bwii dii!
Class: Dii bwii dii!
Me: D V D!
Class (correctly): D V D!
Teacher: One smore! (Should be once more) Dii bwii dii!
Class: Dii bwii dii!
Me: ...
I constantly have to fight incorrect pronunciation from the teachers. I feel really bad for them, because they didn't ask to be forced to teach English. They feel much more uncomfortable than I do. Sympathies aside, it would serve them well to try to model their pronunciation after the native-speaking assistant teacher. The kids haven't yet been fully corrupted, so they can often mimic my pronunciation. I like to draw simple diagrams of the mouth and speak in exaggerated tones so that the kids can see how to produce the sounds of English. Most of them pick it up considerably well. The teachers, on the other hand, just can't go against what they've had incorrectly ingrained in their brains for years.
One of the biggest problems I encounter is the prevalence of waseigo, which is the Japanese term for words that have been either altered or mixed from their English roots to take on different meanings or pronunciations. For example, a teacher once asked me something about some other person's charm points. I didn't know what to say. Did this person have a level-34 Charisma in the Dungeons and Dragons of life? I eventually figured out that charm point meant something like positive characteristics.
Other words are chopped off for convenience, like the convenience store, which is rendered in Japanese as konbini. Other include waapuro (word processor goes from waado purosessaa to waa-puro), pasokon (personal computer goes from paasonaru konpyuutaa to paso-kon), and dejikamu (digital camera changes from dejitaru kamera to deji-kamu). It's often difficult to know what people using waseigo are talking about, because we don't know what words they're changing.
Others make sense, but still sound strange, like beebii kaa, (baby car, meaning stroller or baby carriage).
Japanese people often refer to all sorts of companies as meekaa, meaning maker, while in English we might say brand or company. Sure, with cars, we sometimes we'll say make, or possibly even maker. But it's not common to do so for chewing gum companies, clothing, or video games.
This aspect of Japanese can be charming, but not so much when it's being taught to the children as correct English. It's not that words like maker and baby car aren't English words, or that there aren't people that would understand what you were trying to get across—the point is that the majority of people with whom you hope to one day communicate probably won't understand what you're saying. People are much easier to understand when they use the commonly accepted words.
For example, if you're searching for the Converse store (konbaasu) and decide to ask a Japanese person who doesn't know correct pronunciation, you might accidentally get led to a store that sells buses full of corn (koonbasu). Ice cream (aisu-kuriimu) is abbreviated to aisu, so if people ask if you want ice, they're really asking if you want ice cream. This is serious stuff here!
Some words change meaning altogether, like manshon, which came from the English mansion. You might get excited to hear that I live in a mansion, only to find out that it's really an old dilapidated apartment building with multiple stories.
If a word ends with a non-voiced consonant plus i or u, like su, shi, chi or tsu, the last vowel is typically weakened, and sometimes altogether omitted. So, words like shaatsu (shirt) and piinatsu (peanut) actually sound more like English shots and peanuts, respectively. There are many words, like juusu (juice), that get it right. The ending su gets weakened an ends up sounding like an s, so it sounds just like juice. But there are also many words that confuse. The English Note textbook that the kids use is full of examples, like the Donut Shop on the town map. In Japanese, donut is pronounced donatsu (like peanut, which became piinatsu). So, naturally, the non-native speaker preparing the graphics for the book writes Donuts Shop instead. My sister Emily likes an anime called Fruits Basket, which makes absolutely no sense in English. The plural fruits comes from the fact that fruit in Japanese is not just kudamono, but also the borrowed pseudo-English furuutsu (sounds like fruits). You don't need to pluralize fruit for us to know that more than one kind of fruit could fit in the basket. Even if the basket was for effeminate men, the same title of Fruit Basket would suffice.
I guess it was good that they were forced to look for letters and get more familiar with the alphabet. It's good that they're interested in English. I just wonder about the practical application of the words they learned. Who knows-—maybe someday, once the Earth has been evacuated due to “man-caused disasters,” and we're living in space, and the Japanese have taken over the new international government, we will thank the Japanese for their attention to detail. I can see it now:
EMEPGENCY. EMEPGENCY. GORDEN RETRIEVER HAS INVADED ZATURN. LET'S PLEASE LEAVE MANSIONS AND FRUITS BASKETS AND BOARD EMEPGENCY SHUTTLE BOUND FOR THE WORLD OF GOLDN EGGS.
Thursday, June 11, 2009
Saturday, May 30, 2009
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
No, I Don't Know What I'm Doing
Today, I met with one of my JTEs to plan the lesson for a 9th grade class that I teach once or twice per month. First, she explained the rules of today's warm-up activity, with which I was familiar. With the students all standing, the JTE and I take turns asking questions, gradually increasing the difficulty with each question. The student who answers correctly sits down and then chooses either tate or yoko, very loosely translated to column and row, respectively. With tate, those standing in front of or behind the student have to sit down. Yoko causes the people to the left and right to sit. The object of the game is to narrow the field down to one or two people, who are then forced to watch Japanese television answer a question.
After discussing the rules, we came across a slight stumbling block. Here's what happened, more or less:
Me: Is there a list from which we pick the questions?
JTE: No, just ask appropriate questions.
Me: Ok, so what have they learned so far? What's an appropriate question?
JTE: Well, they're third years, so anything that they learned in the first or second year is fair game.
Me: What did they learn in the first or second year?
JTE: The same thing that all first and second year students learn.
Me: What do first and second year students learn?
JTE: [blank stare]
…
Me: Let me clarify. Before working here, I worked at a school with only one junior high student who never came to class. I almost never got to teach him.
JTE: Wait, so you're telling me that you have no previous experience teaching junior high?
Me: Pretty much, yeah.
JTE: [blank stare]
[scene]
This type of interaction is not good for my self–esteem. I swear I'm not a moron.
When we come to Japan, we ALTs get no help, no training, no lesson manuals and no teaching materials. The people who "manage" us go to great lengths to avoid having to deal with us, to the point that their "actions" are surrounded by "scare quotes".
On one hand, it's easy to see where they're coming from--and even sympathize. Most of them don't speak or understand English outside of a smattering of phrases that they most likely learned when they, as kids, were forced to take English classes. Assuming--usually correctly--that we ALTs speak no Japanese, they just want to avoid socially awkward situations in which they are obligated help us, yet have no way of truly communicating. So, rather than helping us have some idea of what's expected of us, they leave us to figure it out alone.
On the other hand, it's their job.
For someone who was thrown into the fray without any explanations or directions, I feel like I do a pretty good job. The kids generally get excited to have me there, and I've figured out ways to make learning enjoyable. I see the kids once or twice a month, have no idea what they've learned up to that point, and have no idea what kids their age are supposed to learn. It'll take some experience reading the textbooks and teaching lessons before I automatically know which questions are appropriate for each grade.
Before class, the teacher gave me a second year textbook so that I could study the grammar patterns. I went through the textbook and familiarized myself with everything, making a list of example questions along the way. Then class started, and the teacher decided to skip the tate-yoko game. Of course.
But it's okay, because in that class I got to chuckle when the kids and teacher all pronounced earthquake as arsequake.
After discussing the rules, we came across a slight stumbling block. Here's what happened, more or less:
Me: Is there a list from which we pick the questions?
JTE: No, just ask appropriate questions.
Me: Ok, so what have they learned so far? What's an appropriate question?
JTE: Well, they're third years, so anything that they learned in the first or second year is fair game.
Me: What did they learn in the first or second year?
JTE: The same thing that all first and second year students learn.
Me: What do first and second year students learn?
JTE: [blank stare]
…
Me: Let me clarify. Before working here, I worked at a school with only one junior high student who never came to class. I almost never got to teach him.
JTE: Wait, so you're telling me that you have no previous experience teaching junior high?
Me: Pretty much, yeah.
JTE: [blank stare]
[scene]
This type of interaction is not good for my self–esteem. I swear I'm not a moron.
When we come to Japan, we ALTs get no help, no training, no lesson manuals and no teaching materials. The people who "manage" us go to great lengths to avoid having to deal with us, to the point that their "actions" are surrounded by "scare quotes".
On one hand, it's easy to see where they're coming from--and even sympathize. Most of them don't speak or understand English outside of a smattering of phrases that they most likely learned when they, as kids, were forced to take English classes. Assuming--usually correctly--that we ALTs speak no Japanese, they just want to avoid socially awkward situations in which they are obligated help us, yet have no way of truly communicating. So, rather than helping us have some idea of what's expected of us, they leave us to figure it out alone.
On the other hand, it's their job.
For someone who was thrown into the fray without any explanations or directions, I feel like I do a pretty good job. The kids generally get excited to have me there, and I've figured out ways to make learning enjoyable. I see the kids once or twice a month, have no idea what they've learned up to that point, and have no idea what kids their age are supposed to learn. It'll take some experience reading the textbooks and teaching lessons before I automatically know which questions are appropriate for each grade.
Before class, the teacher gave me a second year textbook so that I could study the grammar patterns. I went through the textbook and familiarized myself with everything, making a list of example questions along the way. Then class started, and the teacher decided to skip the tate-yoko game. Of course.
But it's okay, because in that class I got to chuckle when the kids and teacher all pronounced earthquake as arsequake.
Monday, May 25, 2009
I'm still hungry
Lunch was pretty good today. It's a shame that my portions were less than half the size of those of kids less than half my size.
Sunday, May 24, 2009
Experience vs. Expectation
It's funny how much our actual experiences can differ from our expectations. When I got to Uoshima, I got to spend two days with Ethan, my predecessor. Between packing and paperwork, Ethan could unfortunately only offer me a couple of hours to pick his brain and establish realistic expectations for my stay on fish island.
In the time we did spend together, I got to walk around with him and meet some of the people that he was leaving behind. Even though he hadn't studied Japanese at all before coming, two years alone on the island with no English speakers really strengthened his Japanese. Given that I came to Japan to study the language, I loved the thought of being fluent after two years. I couldn't have been in a better position.
Ethan was in fantastic shape when he left. I believe he was a runner before coming to Japan, but he spent the copious free time in the afternoons and evenings running up and down the hills of the circular island road, training for a marathon. Having been out of shape since the age of six, I looked forward to simultaneously slimming down and exploring the island. I would even join the baseball club and hone those skills.
Attached to Uoshima by a stacked stone foot bridge is a little island called Kojima (Japanese for "little island"), where Ethan would go in the evening to read. I envisioned myself composing music on the cool, rough rocks with the sun slipping below the horizon. Afterward, I could hop in the sea for a nice evening swim.
Life would be nice and slow. We'd learn to be self-sufficient with a vegetable garden. Kimiko Azuma, one of two people on the island who spoke English, worked out a deal with an old lady to get us a plot of land. I wrote a few months ago:
We brought all sorts of seeds and bought a book about utilizing space in the garden. We were ready to go; we just needed to wait until planting season.
Before Ethan left, he wrote farewell cards to all the people he had gotten to know on the island. When it was time to board the ferry to leave, a bunch of people gathered around to say goodbye. I wrote a little about this:
Obviously, I looked forward to the day when my heart strings would snap, and I'd be reduced to a sobbing and babbling fool. Actually, I just hoped to build the friendships that would make it so difficult to leave.
So, I obviously had some grandiose visions of life on Uoshima. But what really happened?
First off, most of my long-term expectations became moot the moment I moved to Imabari. But right from the start, my expectations were off. Coming to the island, I was excited to meet the members of my new community. Here's what I wrote:
As for the language, Uoshima forced me to study Japanese enough to communicate, and I had plenty of free time at work. The teachers on Uoshima were amiable, but they rarely spoke to me in Japanese. Even though I had made it clear that I came to Japan to study the language, they instead tried to practice their English. I didn't really grow until Mia came in the middle of the night.
Dealing with the doctors at the hospital in Japanese forced me to learn how to communicate better. I'm not fluent yet, but I also haven't even reached the 10-month mark. My vocabulary is exploding and each day I get a little better at conversing. I understand almost everything I hear (except TV comedy shows--I'm often clueless to the slang). In Imabari, all my schools have at least one person with whom I can converse. Now I have less time to study, but more opportunities to practice Japanese. I can't draw any conclusions yet, but so far I feel that being in Uoshima was necessary at first, but being in Imabari is better for my Japanese in the long run.
Fitness was also a bit of a disappointment. I dropped from 245 pounds to 220 pounds, thanks mostly to the exercise festival and not having a wife at home for two months. While I lost a good chunk of weight, I'm still not happy with my physique. I never got to play real baseball on Uoshima. The weather was much too cold for me to run around the island. So, yeah, my once-tight pants are now baggy. But I never got to explore the island, and I still need to lose a few.
I went out to the little island a couple times, but never with the intent to compose. I figured I'd always have a chance later. Nope. I only went swimming three or four times, but looked forward to next year's summer, when we'd surely go swimming as a family every few days. False. We'd never get the chance.
Though life actually was slow like I'd hoped, we never got the chance to cultivate the garden. We're glad that we didn't, since we would've had to leave it all behind. Here in Imabari, Stef has some planters full of fruits and vegetables that are in various states of health. The first strawberries are almost ready. The cucumbers (or is it the eggplant?) are dead. Stef's having fun, and it's much less work to maintain planters than a whole forty-by-eighty foot garden. While it's not quite what we expected, things are good on the garden front.
I don't believe I've blogged about my teary departure from Uoshima. That's because it never happened.
I spent most of the last day filling out forms at the town hall office. They told me that the boat would leave at about 9:50, and so I should load my stuff onto the boat at 9:30 or so. At 9:10, they told me that I had to load my luggage. I threw my stuff on the boat, and the other teachers, who had been saying good bye to the townsfolk for the previous fifteen minutes, all got on. They handed us each a ribbon or two and the crowd of people held on to the other end of the ribbons. The boat was off at 9:12. I didn't even get to say a personal good bye to the people I got to know. Typically, ALTs on Uoshima get their own send off. But since I was leaving with other teachers, I was just one of many who were leaving. There was no time for tears.
The boat pulled away, tightening my ribbon until it snapped, severing my ties with the island. I guess it doesn't really matter that I never got to say good bye, because I never got to know anyone on the island (outside of the doctor, the band members, and Azuma-san). Imabari is a great place to live, but I'll always look back with fondness at my time on Uoshima. The saddest part about leaving fish island is losing the memories of experiences I never got to have.
In the time we did spend together, I got to walk around with him and meet some of the people that he was leaving behind. Even though he hadn't studied Japanese at all before coming, two years alone on the island with no English speakers really strengthened his Japanese. Given that I came to Japan to study the language, I loved the thought of being fluent after two years. I couldn't have been in a better position.
Ethan was in fantastic shape when he left. I believe he was a runner before coming to Japan, but he spent the copious free time in the afternoons and evenings running up and down the hills of the circular island road, training for a marathon. Having been out of shape since the age of six, I looked forward to simultaneously slimming down and exploring the island. I would even join the baseball club and hone those skills.
Attached to Uoshima by a stacked stone foot bridge is a little island called Kojima (Japanese for "little island"), where Ethan would go in the evening to read. I envisioned myself composing music on the cool, rough rocks with the sun slipping below the horizon. Afterward, I could hop in the sea for a nice evening swim.
Life would be nice and slow. We'd learn to be self-sufficient with a vegetable garden. Kimiko Azuma, one of two people on the island who spoke English, worked out a deal with an old lady to get us a plot of land. I wrote a few months ago:
We have a plot of land that's been set aside as our garden. It's actually already a garden, but the owner of the land is hurt and won't be able to cultivate it any longer. It's right by the new house, so that's another factor to consider. It's a pretty big plot, about 40 feet by 80 feet.
We brought all sorts of seeds and bought a book about utilizing space in the garden. We were ready to go; we just needed to wait until planting season.
Before Ethan left, he wrote farewell cards to all the people he had gotten to know on the island. When it was time to board the ferry to leave, a bunch of people gathered around to say goodbye. I wrote a little about this:
His send off was touching. Dozens of villagers met him and the docks to see him off. They all held streamers that were on a spool, giving the ends to Ethan and Sarah (his girlfriend) to hold on to as the boat drove away. They remained "connected" to him even as he rode away on the boat (or at least until the streamers broke). It was hard to watch. I hope that I have as big a connection with these people by the time I leave.
Obviously, I looked forward to the day when my heart strings would snap, and I'd be reduced to a sobbing and babbling fool. Actually, I just hoped to build the friendships that would make it so difficult to leave.
So, I obviously had some grandiose visions of life on Uoshima. But what really happened?
First off, most of my long-term expectations became moot the moment I moved to Imabari. But right from the start, my expectations were off. Coming to the island, I was excited to meet the members of my new community. Here's what I wrote:
The ferry ride was beautiful. I was a little motion sick from all the travel, but it was neat to ride on the top of the little ferry and look down at the thousands of harmless jellyfish in the sea. Ethan said that I should be expecting a big welcome when I got home, but that didn't really happen. Ethan's girlfriend and one lady were running up to the docks when we got there with a sign that said "Welcome Mr. Stout to Uoshima!" Ethan seemed miffed that they didn't have more people there...
As for the language, Uoshima forced me to study Japanese enough to communicate, and I had plenty of free time at work. The teachers on Uoshima were amiable, but they rarely spoke to me in Japanese. Even though I had made it clear that I came to Japan to study the language, they instead tried to practice their English. I didn't really grow until Mia came in the middle of the night.
Dealing with the doctors at the hospital in Japanese forced me to learn how to communicate better. I'm not fluent yet, but I also haven't even reached the 10-month mark. My vocabulary is exploding and each day I get a little better at conversing. I understand almost everything I hear (except TV comedy shows--I'm often clueless to the slang). In Imabari, all my schools have at least one person with whom I can converse. Now I have less time to study, but more opportunities to practice Japanese. I can't draw any conclusions yet, but so far I feel that being in Uoshima was necessary at first, but being in Imabari is better for my Japanese in the long run.
Fitness was also a bit of a disappointment. I dropped from 245 pounds to 220 pounds, thanks mostly to the exercise festival and not having a wife at home for two months. While I lost a good chunk of weight, I'm still not happy with my physique. I never got to play real baseball on Uoshima. The weather was much too cold for me to run around the island. So, yeah, my once-tight pants are now baggy. But I never got to explore the island, and I still need to lose a few.
I went out to the little island a couple times, but never with the intent to compose. I figured I'd always have a chance later. Nope. I only went swimming three or four times, but looked forward to next year's summer, when we'd surely go swimming as a family every few days. False. We'd never get the chance.
Though life actually was slow like I'd hoped, we never got the chance to cultivate the garden. We're glad that we didn't, since we would've had to leave it all behind. Here in Imabari, Stef has some planters full of fruits and vegetables that are in various states of health. The first strawberries are almost ready. The cucumbers (or is it the eggplant?) are dead. Stef's having fun, and it's much less work to maintain planters than a whole forty-by-eighty foot garden. While it's not quite what we expected, things are good on the garden front.
I don't believe I've blogged about my teary departure from Uoshima. That's because it never happened.
I spent most of the last day filling out forms at the town hall office. They told me that the boat would leave at about 9:50, and so I should load my stuff onto the boat at 9:30 or so. At 9:10, they told me that I had to load my luggage. I threw my stuff on the boat, and the other teachers, who had been saying good bye to the townsfolk for the previous fifteen minutes, all got on. They handed us each a ribbon or two and the crowd of people held on to the other end of the ribbons. The boat was off at 9:12. I didn't even get to say a personal good bye to the people I got to know. Typically, ALTs on Uoshima get their own send off. But since I was leaving with other teachers, I was just one of many who were leaving. There was no time for tears.
The boat pulled away, tightening my ribbon until it snapped, severing my ties with the island. I guess it doesn't really matter that I never got to say good bye, because I never got to know anyone on the island (outside of the doctor, the band members, and Azuma-san). Imabari is a great place to live, but I'll always look back with fondness at my time on Uoshima. The saddest part about leaving fish island is losing the memories of experiences I never got to have.
Friday, May 1, 2009
Next Time Won’t You Not Desecrate the Classics
Why can’t people just leave the classics alone? Today in class, we sang the alphabet song. You know, “Ah, vous dirai-je, maman”, the one that shares the same melody as “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star”, “Baa, Baa, Black Sheep”, and probably dozens of other children’s songs. We all know it as something pretty close to the following:
A-B-C-D-E-F-Gee (rest)
H-I-J-K-LMNOPee (rest)
Q-R-esS (eh sound) (rest)
T-U-Vee (rest)
W-eX (eh sound) (rest)
Y and Zee. (rest)
Now I know my ABCs. (rest)
Next time, won’t you sing/play with me? (end)
The Canadian version is the same, except for the ending:
…
Y and Zed (rest)
Now I know my As to Zeds-- (rest)
Let’s all go and wet our beds. (wet bed)
Crazy Canucks aside, we can all pretty much agree on the structure of the song. Well, apparently not all of us. Whoever put this horrific Eigo Nooto (English Notebook) program together 1) doesn’t speak English natively and 2) decided that it was too hard for the kids in Japan to learn how to say “LMNOPee.” So, here’s the new version of the song:
A-B-C-D-E-F-Gee (rest)
H-I-J-K-L-M-eN (rest)
O-P-Q-R-S-T-yU (rest)
V-W and X-Y-Zee (rest)
Happy, happy. I’m ha-PPY. (rest)
I can sing my ABC. (shoot self)
Since there’s almost no communication between team-teachers about lessons, I was ill-prepared for this travesty come class time. The teacher hit “play” on the CD player and asked me to direct the singing. I loathingly shook my head when the vocalist strayed from the normal, accepted, canonized version of the ABC song. It's one thing to change a word or two, but another to change the entire structure of a song.
But let’s look at the real problem behind this version of the song: it sucks. No attempt whatsoever was made to preserve the meter of the original. The final sounds of stanzas are nowhere close to being related. And the virtual/hermaphrodite/wrenched stress/weakened/anisobaric rhyme of ha-PPY would have been bad enough if it wasn’t paired with the ungrammatical, highly Japanese-sounding “I can sing my ABC.”
I made a point of enunciating the nonexistent “s” each of the twelve times I was forced to sing this disgraceful rubbish, but I don’t know if they noticed. The lyrics are written (just as sung) in the textbooks. When a teacher asked me for clarification on the pronunciation of this horrible song, I did my best to explain that this was not the normal version.
What will happen when these Japanese kids sing their “ABC” out in the English-speaking real world? Oh, the ignominy! The shame! The Ministry of Education is sending these poor children on a collision course with awkward embarrassment. I know it’s a difficult task, but I will voluntarily bear the massive burden of cleansing their English. Hey, somebody’s got to do it.
A-B-C-D-E-F-Gee (rest)
H-I-J-K-LMNOPee (rest)
Q-R-esS (eh sound) (rest)
T-U-Vee (rest)
W-eX (eh sound) (rest)
Y and Zee. (rest)
Now I know my ABCs. (rest)
Next time, won’t you sing/play with me? (end)
The Canadian version is the same, except for the ending:
…
Y and Zed (rest)
Now I know my As to Zeds-- (rest)
Let’s all go and wet our beds. (wet bed)
Crazy Canucks aside, we can all pretty much agree on the structure of the song. Well, apparently not all of us. Whoever put this horrific Eigo Nooto (English Notebook) program together 1) doesn’t speak English natively and 2) decided that it was too hard for the kids in Japan to learn how to say “LMNOPee.” So, here’s the new version of the song:
A-B-C-D-E-F-Gee (rest)
H-I-J-K-L-M-eN (rest)
O-P-Q-R-S-T-yU (rest)
V-W and X-Y-Zee (rest)
Happy, happy. I’m ha-PPY. (rest)
I can sing my ABC. (shoot self)
Since there’s almost no communication between team-teachers about lessons, I was ill-prepared for this travesty come class time. The teacher hit “play” on the CD player and asked me to direct the singing. I loathingly shook my head when the vocalist strayed from the normal, accepted, canonized version of the ABC song. It's one thing to change a word or two, but another to change the entire structure of a song.
But let’s look at the real problem behind this version of the song: it sucks. No attempt whatsoever was made to preserve the meter of the original. The final sounds of stanzas are nowhere close to being related. And the virtual/hermaphrodite/wrenched stress/weakened/anisobaric rhyme of ha-PPY would have been bad enough if it wasn’t paired with the ungrammatical, highly Japanese-sounding “I can sing my ABC.”
I made a point of enunciating the nonexistent “s” each of the twelve times I was forced to sing this disgraceful rubbish, but I don’t know if they noticed. The lyrics are written (just as sung) in the textbooks. When a teacher asked me for clarification on the pronunciation of this horrible song, I did my best to explain that this was not the normal version.
What will happen when these Japanese kids sing their “ABC” out in the English-speaking real world? Oh, the ignominy! The shame! The Ministry of Education is sending these poor children on a collision course with awkward embarrassment. I know it’s a difficult task, but I will voluntarily bear the massive burden of cleansing their English. Hey, somebody’s got to do it.
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
The Time We Went Out for All-You-Can-Eat Yakiniku
So, today I bid adieu to greatness as I usher in the era of my physical decline.
Bill James, a baseball statistics guru, found that most baseball players experienced peak performance between the ages of 26 and 28, after which time they began a slippery-slope-style decline.
Rather than dwell on the bleakness of my future, I choose to live out my unfulfilled sports glory through my children, and reminisce of the past. Today, it is in this spirit of nostalgia that I write about an experience that I had when my mom came to visit us in Japan while Mia was in the hospital in Matsuyama.
One day in late January or early February, Mom and I dropped by the Ehime Prefectural Information Center (EPIC) in Matsuyama to renew the agreement on my rental bike. While we were there, a very helpful woman named Noriko Omori gave us some advice on places to visit, as well as some simple maps of surrounding Matsuyama. Stef and I wanted to treat Mom to a nice dinner, so we inquired about all-you-can-eat yakiniku restaurants, and she pointed to the unfamiliar side of the map and explained that there was a good one right by the movie theater on the far edge of town. She suggested that we first peruse the fine fabrics of the textile museum, after which we could enjoy the tantalizing taste of thinly shaved meat, meticulously marinated in a savory sauce and grilled right before our eyes at our table--perhaps after a soothing soak in the luxurious hot spring.
"Who talks like that?" I asked.
"Someone who's employed by the chamber of commerce," Mom quipped.
We decided we’d at least give the meat place a shot.
At night, when it was already slightly past our usual dinner time, we jaunted over to the train station to catch a city train to the unfamiliar neighborhood with the meat joint. We forgot to bring the stroller with us, and Kelsey stopped cooperating before we even got to the train station. On the train, the only way to keep her from shrieking was to hold her up so that she could hang like an Olympian on the hand rings until we got to our stop. I listened intently for the name of the stop that I thought we were supposed to take, and got off when I thought I recognized it.
It was about a five or ten minute walk from the station to the complex with the movie theater. Kelsey didn’t want to be held, but she wouldn’t hold our hands while she walked. She still hasn’t figured out that holding her own hand is not a solution. I walked alongside her like a sheepdog, making sure she didn’t stray into the street. Eventually it got to be too difficult, and I just picked her up and plopped her on my shoulders--much to her dismay. We walked around the back of a restaurant and through a parking lot toward the movie theater, keeping our eyes peeled for anything that looked like a meat place. One restaurant appeared to serve meat in some capacity, but most of the myriad restaurants in the complex offered some other specialty dish.
Omori-san hadn’t given us a name, since she didn’t know what the place was called. All we had to go on was the Japanese word for “all-you-can-eat”, or “tabehoudai”. I popped my head into a pachinko parlor to ask one of the peppy attendants if they knew where the restaurant was, and her pleasant demeanor turned serious. She called one of the other attendants over on her radio headset and they intently discussed the location of our mysterious restaurant. The girl wasn’t positive, but the guy she consulted was sure that we should head across the parking lot over to the place that had appeared to serve some kind of meat. We thanked the attendants and gave it a shot.
The restaurant appeared to be pretty classy, or, in other words, expensive. The menu outside the front door displayed a feast of a meal for the equivalent of about 30 or 40 dollars. Omori-san had pegged the tabehoudai price at about 12-15 dollars a person, and I probably could have eaten the 40-dollar feast by myself. I went in and asked the guy at the front desk if they offered tabehoudai, and he sadly replied that they didn’t. I asked if, by chance, he knew of one in the neighborhood. I was set on Mom getting to try yakiniku and on me getting my money’s worth.
The man, obviously impressed with my flawless Japanese, fired off the directions to the meat place. Just around some building, some nonsense words past the doohickey, a stoplight or two up the street, a left (or was it a right?), then kitty-corner (or past it--they sound the same) from a place. It was right there. I convinced myself that I understood his directions and set out with my increasingly impatient and hungry family in search for the mythical restaurant. I followed (what I understood of) his directions to the best of my ability, until we got to where I thought he had intended to send us. We realized that there was no way we would find it and decided to ask a third person for directions.
It was now nearly two hours after our normal dinner time, and we were all starving. I was walking the thin line between hunger and murder, and Kelsey was beyond unbearable. My final stop in the search for the meat shack was a restaurant-slash-coffee shop. Leaving the girls outside, I went in and asked the waitress if she knew of any yakiniku tabehoudai places in the neighborhood, and she said that she did, but that it was a bit of a walk. She hurried over to her boss, took off her apron and beckoned me to follow her. I expected her to just point us in the direction of the restaurant, but she was taking us there. An employee of a restaurant leaving her job to show us how to get to another restaurant. Would that ever happen anywhere else? Would the TGIFridays people walk you to the nearest Outback? Somehow, I doubt it.
We followed her back in the direction that we came from. We crossed the street, went around a few small buildings, walked through a parking lot, and jogged around one big building, until the restaurant was in sight. There it was, across the parking lot: the Holy Grail of Restaurants. The Big Cheese. The Hallowed House of Bounteous Beef. The same exact restaurant that sent me toward the coffee shop.
We thanked the lady for her help, and I burst into an uncontrollable fit of rage and tears. Or not. But at this point, I was ready to wither and crumble into nonexistence. Kelsey needed to eat. I needed to eat. We all needed to eat. We resigned ourselves to an okonomiyaki shop, which was a bit disappointing considering that the three or four places in which we had theretofore eaten were okonomiyaki shops. But it no longer mattered what we ate. I had failed in my quest to find the meat place.
We sat down at the restaurant and ordered our food, and they quickly brought out the ingredients for our okonomiyaki. Kelsey got a toy boat full of finger foods and noodles. When nobody came back to help cook our food, we realized that it was up to us to prepare it. While we had seen others make it, it was our first chance to cook okonomiyaki. And to burn okonomiyaki.
Burnt or not, it was extremely delicious. As miserable as we all were before we got there, we now felt pretty good about our dinner that night. We even indulged with some soft serve ice cream.
Exhausted, we carried Kelsey back to the train and went home for the night.
I have a whole life of physical decline ahead of me. It's time to focus on the areas that won't decline until I'm at least 30. Like wisdom. I discovered quite a few pearls that night:
Bill James, a baseball statistics guru, found that most baseball players experienced peak performance between the ages of 26 and 28, after which time they began a slippery-slope-style decline.
Rather than dwell on the bleakness of my future, I choose to live out my unfulfilled sports glory through my children, and reminisce of the past. Today, it is in this spirit of nostalgia that I write about an experience that I had when my mom came to visit us in Japan while Mia was in the hospital in Matsuyama.
One day in late January or early February, Mom and I dropped by the Ehime Prefectural Information Center (EPIC) in Matsuyama to renew the agreement on my rental bike. While we were there, a very helpful woman named Noriko Omori gave us some advice on places to visit, as well as some simple maps of surrounding Matsuyama. Stef and I wanted to treat Mom to a nice dinner, so we inquired about all-you-can-eat yakiniku restaurants, and she pointed to the unfamiliar side of the map and explained that there was a good one right by the movie theater on the far edge of town. She suggested that we first peruse the fine fabrics of the textile museum, after which we could enjoy the tantalizing taste of thinly shaved meat, meticulously marinated in a savory sauce and grilled right before our eyes at our table--perhaps after a soothing soak in the luxurious hot spring.
"Who talks like that?" I asked.
"Someone who's employed by the chamber of commerce," Mom quipped.
We decided we’d at least give the meat place a shot.
At night, when it was already slightly past our usual dinner time, we jaunted over to the train station to catch a city train to the unfamiliar neighborhood with the meat joint. We forgot to bring the stroller with us, and Kelsey stopped cooperating before we even got to the train station. On the train, the only way to keep her from shrieking was to hold her up so that she could hang like an Olympian on the hand rings until we got to our stop. I listened intently for the name of the stop that I thought we were supposed to take, and got off when I thought I recognized it.
It was about a five or ten minute walk from the station to the complex with the movie theater. Kelsey didn’t want to be held, but she wouldn’t hold our hands while she walked. She still hasn’t figured out that holding her own hand is not a solution. I walked alongside her like a sheepdog, making sure she didn’t stray into the street. Eventually it got to be too difficult, and I just picked her up and plopped her on my shoulders--much to her dismay. We walked around the back of a restaurant and through a parking lot toward the movie theater, keeping our eyes peeled for anything that looked like a meat place. One restaurant appeared to serve meat in some capacity, but most of the myriad restaurants in the complex offered some other specialty dish.
Omori-san hadn’t given us a name, since she didn’t know what the place was called. All we had to go on was the Japanese word for “all-you-can-eat”, or “tabehoudai”. I popped my head into a pachinko parlor to ask one of the peppy attendants if they knew where the restaurant was, and her pleasant demeanor turned serious. She called one of the other attendants over on her radio headset and they intently discussed the location of our mysterious restaurant. The girl wasn’t positive, but the guy she consulted was sure that we should head across the parking lot over to the place that had appeared to serve some kind of meat. We thanked the attendants and gave it a shot.
The restaurant appeared to be pretty classy, or, in other words, expensive. The menu outside the front door displayed a feast of a meal for the equivalent of about 30 or 40 dollars. Omori-san had pegged the tabehoudai price at about 12-15 dollars a person, and I probably could have eaten the 40-dollar feast by myself. I went in and asked the guy at the front desk if they offered tabehoudai, and he sadly replied that they didn’t. I asked if, by chance, he knew of one in the neighborhood. I was set on Mom getting to try yakiniku and on me getting my money’s worth.
The man, obviously impressed with my flawless Japanese, fired off the directions to the meat place. Just around some building, some nonsense words past the doohickey, a stoplight or two up the street, a left (or was it a right?), then kitty-corner (or past it--they sound the same) from a place. It was right there. I convinced myself that I understood his directions and set out with my increasingly impatient and hungry family in search for the mythical restaurant. I followed (what I understood of) his directions to the best of my ability, until we got to where I thought he had intended to send us. We realized that there was no way we would find it and decided to ask a third person for directions.
It was now nearly two hours after our normal dinner time, and we were all starving. I was walking the thin line between hunger and murder, and Kelsey was beyond unbearable. My final stop in the search for the meat shack was a restaurant-slash-coffee shop. Leaving the girls outside, I went in and asked the waitress if she knew of any yakiniku tabehoudai places in the neighborhood, and she said that she did, but that it was a bit of a walk. She hurried over to her boss, took off her apron and beckoned me to follow her. I expected her to just point us in the direction of the restaurant, but she was taking us there. An employee of a restaurant leaving her job to show us how to get to another restaurant. Would that ever happen anywhere else? Would the TGIFridays people walk you to the nearest Outback? Somehow, I doubt it.
We followed her back in the direction that we came from. We crossed the street, went around a few small buildings, walked through a parking lot, and jogged around one big building, until the restaurant was in sight. There it was, across the parking lot: the Holy Grail of Restaurants. The Big Cheese. The Hallowed House of Bounteous Beef. The same exact restaurant that sent me toward the coffee shop.
We thanked the lady for her help, and I burst into an uncontrollable fit of rage and tears. Or not. But at this point, I was ready to wither and crumble into nonexistence. Kelsey needed to eat. I needed to eat. We all needed to eat. We resigned ourselves to an okonomiyaki shop, which was a bit disappointing considering that the three or four places in which we had theretofore eaten were okonomiyaki shops. But it no longer mattered what we ate. I had failed in my quest to find the meat place.
We sat down at the restaurant and ordered our food, and they quickly brought out the ingredients for our okonomiyaki. Kelsey got a toy boat full of finger foods and noodles. When nobody came back to help cook our food, we realized that it was up to us to prepare it. While we had seen others make it, it was our first chance to cook okonomiyaki. And to burn okonomiyaki.
Burnt or not, it was extremely delicious. As miserable as we all were before we got there, we now felt pretty good about our dinner that night. We even indulged with some soft serve ice cream.
Exhausted, we carried Kelsey back to the train and went home for the night.
I have a whole life of physical decline ahead of me. It's time to focus on the areas that won't decline until I'm at least 30. Like wisdom. I discovered quite a few pearls that night:
- The Holy Grail of Restaurants, no matter where you are, doesn’t exist. Don’t be stubborn. You will not find it.
- Don't ask for directions in Japan. It doesn’t matter how little Japanese people actually know about something: they’ll go totally out of their way to help you, even if it actually ends up being more of a hindrance than a help.
- Dang it, even in my nostalgic, partially-confabulated peak season, I was still a jerk.
- You can never go wrong with okonomiyaki.
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