belief is a full-time job

Where the Gods go to gossip

2007-10-22T05:58:00.000+02:00

Moving away from the theme of fish for a while, this is a post I've been wanting to do for months. Only now do I realise that it's quite fitting that I have delayed writing it until October.

This post is about the biggest and oldest shrine in Japan -Izumo Taisha- located in Shimane prefecture. As you start traveling around Japan, the one temple/shrine/castle begins to look like the previous one, and the next one.. But Izumo Taisha is the kind of shrine that will appear in dreams, that people will do pilgrimages to, that can change lives.

The most most significant things about this temple is that it's the official gathering place for the Gods, and a source of love.
Legend goes that, every October, the 8 million Shinto Gods of Japan gather inside this temple to catch up on the year's happenings, and discuss the potential matches of their yet unmarried worshippers. The old Japanese calendar even referred to October as "kannazuki" or "the month with no Gods". This name was used in 46 of the 47 prefectures - but in Shimane prefecture, home to Izumo Taisha - October was known as "kamiarizuki": The month of Gods.

The current Izumo Taisha, the one I visited, has been in exsistence since 1744. About 500 years before that, it looked different, but had the same basic shape as the "modern" temple. Before 1248 though, the temple stood 48 meters into the air, connected to the ground by an enormous flight of stairs, giant logs tied together in clumps of threes serving as pillars, and surely providing breakthtaking views over the forest sunrises and seaside sunsets.

Today, people go to Izumo Taisha to pray for finding love and keeping love. The prayers tied onto the trees repeated messages such as "suteki na hito aitai" - I want to meet a nice guy/girl. I swallowed my pride and clapped my hands together, wishing for the same. A newly wed couple posed for photos - probably the most prosperous location for wedding reception. Love was all around us, in the crunch of the hot, white gravel and in the mossy shade of the forests. There is some magic at Izumo.

Tsuri

2007-10-21T06:47:00.000+02:00

So, the majority of my Japanese friends might share their birthdates with my parents, but they sure know how to take you out for a totally satisfying day. Those kind of days seem few and far between once you start working. As a kid, a Saturday would be.. - rise early, meet your friends, climb trees, spend a few hours splashing in a pool, eat watermelon and hotdogs for lunch, mission around the back streets poking things with sticks, ride around on bikes, and before you know it, the sun is setting and you have to go home, because darkness is your natural curfew. And you return grudingly, but with the full satisfaction of having had A DAY.

Saturday was like that. I woke up after yet again not having slept enough. Hiro picked us up in his big, white, legendary van and we made the 2-hour drive to Yonago with fishing rods in the back, me chattering away with the mindlessness of the sleep-deprived. We stopped in Yonago for an early lunch at a fish market, where I ate a plate of the most amazing raw sea creatures - raw octopus, squid, three kinds of fish, sazae (turban shell) and a vicious-looking soup with half a pregnant crab clawing it's way out. We washed it down with one-cup sake from Kyoto, while being pleasantly harrased by a strange little man with tiny hands and long, yellow nails who was telling us about Jusco stores and Korean massages in toothless, incomprehensible Japanese. And stalked us all the way to the toilet to give us a complimentary bag of tiny mikans (citrus fruit).

A beautiful drive up a typical Japanese mountain road (as wide as one small car and winding madly between bamboo forests and moss-covered trees), and we reached our destination - a tiny seaside town with 20 houses, a deserted pier, and tiny squid fishing boats with names in kanji characters written on the sides. Hiro started setting up the three fishing rods, which I looked at incredulously, but after trying it for myself, I was squealing in delight and talking to the fish I caught, apologising as I ripped the hooks out of their bony mouths.

There was this game we played at birthday parties as a kid, right after vroteier and before pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey. I forget the intricacies of the game, but it involved a makeshift fishing rod with a magnet at the end, and a school of paper fish on the floor with paperclips attached. Fishing for aji (spanish mackerel) was like that - you literally dip your six-hook fishing line with shrimp-bait-bag at the end into the water, and pull it up seconds later with a tiny fish (or two or three or four) hooked and struggling. Hippies, don't fret - as Kurt Cobain said: "it's okay to eat fish, cause they don't have any feelings".

We did this, struggling against a wind that reminded me of Cape Town's fiercest south-east, laughing like children, and packed up as the sun started its descent. We stopped at the peninsula and had coffee at a lighthouse, watching clouds over the grey water (which would influence my dreams later on, as I dreamt an apocalypse where the clouds came crashing down into the ocean).

We arrived in Niimi in the dark, where Hiro sliced our catch into sashimi (raw fish slices) and decapitated and de-gutted the rest, fried it in batter, and served with rice and miso soup (thanks Tara). Nothing quite beats eating something that you caught yourself.

Satisfied in so many ways, I walked down to my apartment, feeling that I had.. A Day.

Bachelor dinner, Japan style

2007-10-18T12:04:00.000+02:00

After wearing a cartoon cloud over my head the entire day, and franctically researching articles about crime in SA the entire day, I decided to give in it a rest. If life in Paranoia Land makes you old before your time, I wil start my own fight by eating all the fish I can in Japan. Even from a can. And so starts a new chapter of arbitrary blog topics. Amen, and itadakimasu.

Dwindling patriotism

2007-10-18T04:23:00.000+02:00

It is only after I moved out of South Africa, that I started having issues with my beautiful disastrous country. It's about getting perspective - you can't see the forest while walking next to the trees. But once you remove yourself from your daily situation, you unconsciously start creating an alternate viewpoint.

Fun Fact about South Africa: Per capita, it has the most rapes, assults and murders with firearms. Crime has become a business, and it's supported by the government.
http://www.nationmaster.com/country/sf-south-africa/cri-crime

This is the most over-discussed topic in the country, I don't want to go off an a tangent about it. I just want to show you this article by David Bullard. I read it somewhere during this week, and was hit by a real depression afterwards. And since, my doubt in SA has been growing by the day. I realise that a country is not it's political system, but do I really want to live somewhere where paranoia and tragedy is so common that it just becomes the norm?

Anyways. Read.

Earlier this year, a few weeks before I was shot, I wrote in this column that the ANC had ‘‘effectively become the largest organised crime syndicate in the country”.

At the time of my shooting I dismissed suggestions that it could have had anything to do with the content of this column over the years. Now I am not so sure.

Thabo Mbeki’s complex web of evil is gradually being exposed by a fearless media, and I now believe anything is possible. Reading respected commentators such as Xolela Mangcu in The Weekender, I cannot avoid the conclusion that if we don’t do something soon, South Africa will self-destruct and go the way of other basket cases.

In the past I have flippantly accused the government of state-sponsored anarchy, but suddenly things are beginning to make sense. Our violent crime figures make us one of the most dangerous places to live in the world, including countries at war. The mere act of daily survival distracts us from the monstrous scale of theft and incompetence that has occurred under Mbeki’s presidency.

It helps explain his affection for Mad Bob Mugabe, and it maybe even gives some credence to a conspiracy theory currently doing the rounds: that the ludicrous level of violent crime is of no real concern to the government because the people dying are regarded as dispensable. A few weeks ago I would have snorted with cynical derision at this. Now I find it believable.

Mangcu wrote last week that “I have never been as depressed by this country’s politics as I am this point. Not even under apartheid was I ever this depressed.”

That’s quite a statement, particularly for one who suffered under apartheid. Fortunately, I don’t feel quite as despondent as Mangcu, but maybe my sunny optimism is misplaced. I believe there is still hope, precisely because of people like Mangcu, Financial Mail editor Barney Mthombothi, The Times columnist Justice Malala, Mail & Guardian editor Ferial Haffajee and this newspaper’s gutsy editorial staff. I’m a white boy who never suffered under apartheid and my criticism can easily be dismissed as post-colonial whining; not so for the aforementioned, who all have genuine struggle credentials and integrity measured by the ton.

I also desperately want to believe that not everyone in the ANC has been sucked into Mbeki’s web of evil. I really hope that there are some senior politicians who are reeling in shock at the daily revelations.

It’s a pity they haven’t the guts to speak out, but the ANC is run along the lines of a charismatic religion, and independence of thought is not encouraged. That doesn’t necessarily make those who remain silent guilty, but it is still disappointing. Several articles have asked rhetorically what Nelson Mandela makes of this sacrifice of the South African dream. Well, why doesn’t somebody ask him — or is he, too, not allowed to break the sacred law of omert€?

Under Mbeki this country has become a quagmire of corruption and vice. The media is often accused by politicians of stooping to offensive racist stereotypes, but when your country is run by offensive stereotypes, what choice do you have? If the allegations against Mbeki are even half true, then the word “impeachment“ should be in common usage before too long.

News at eight

2007-07-13T03:50:00.000+02:00

Since about two weeks ago, I've been getting daily updates on what's happening in the Japanese news. It's rather shocking that I went 10 months in Japan without knowing more than the local weather report, but from living in SA, I know that your quality of life can be higher if you do not keep yourself updated with the news.

The news in Japan is different though -

The sad side is the suicides. Almost every day, there is news of family suicides, teenage suicides, group suicides. It's a popular way out. And in Japanese fashion, they seem to be on a mission to perfect the act. In this week's news, a 47-year old man killed his mother, then himself. Another bulletin featured a JR (Japan Rail) worker who left his suicide note on the platform before jumping in front of a bullet train in Osaka, screwing up the system for about 4 hours. The honorary award for creativity though, goes to a 50-year old man in Nagoya. He tied a rope around a tree, strung it through the back window of his car, tied it around his neck and hit the accelerator. Kinda like pulling a tooth, only bloodier.

That's the creepy side.

In other news, people have been giving away money.
In April, a man trew 57 10,000Yen bills from a bridge, in order to "vent frustration about work" (you get'em, tiger). Three months later, the man who did this strange crime was identified, and the police publicly requested the return of his money. So far, 47 of the 57 bills have been returned. The others probably haven't heard the request yet.

More recently, someone has been wrapping 10,000 Yen bills in white paper, and leaving it in municipal buildings. A few months ago, free money was popping up in cemetaries in Osaka and Hyogo. No one knows who is doing this, or why, but the money carries the message: "Please make use of this as a provision for ascetic practices".
So far, 545 bills have been found. And by that I mean returned to the police.

'Tis a strange country, this.

The 17th Space Children Gathering

2007-07-04T05:04:00.000+02:00

Every golden week, as hordes of omiyage-seeking Japanese families chase their way around Japan in search of the perfect picture and the local delicacies, a small handful of people find their way to Kyushu and go off the beaten track. In a small town called Akamizu-cho, the train line from Kumamoto-shi ends. Only few kilometers from this final train station, a steep windy road snakes through trees, past a golf course and shrines, and opens up to a natural reserve. And that's where you'll find the Niji no misaki matsuri, a just-add-rain community, a small piece of paradise.

After a long, exhausting drive from Okayama-ken, we finally made it to the festival. We paid our entrance fee and chose the gemstones we wanted our entrance necklaces to be made from. Cars and tents created a little village, with teepees, stalls and festival-goers keeping it all together. I could see the stage from afar – a small, intimate stage, with the longest pieces of bamboo I've ever seen tied together at the top to form a roof. Next to it, a koinobori was flapping in the wind, a sign that kodomo no hi was just around the corner.

The van was parked, the beers opened, and the camping chairs broken in. Night was falling though, so grudgingly we put up our tents while the boys tried to get a fire going. With only a lighter and some coal it proved to be tricky, but within a few minutes our new neighbors were huddled around the barbeque, contributing all sorts of flammable materials. And so started a continuous theme through the weekend – without asking for anything in return, random strangers shared their food, their drinks, their ganja, drums, camping equipment, ideas.. they pushed cars out of the mud, looked after each others' kids, provided shelter from the rain, organized lifts for those traveling on luck, passed on their knowledge and skills.. and everyone smiled when you looked at them.

But a festival is not a festival without some good tunes. By the second day, with a light but persistent rain, the area in front of the stage had virtually turned into mud pit. Not that this deterred the party people from stomping hard onto the ground. Some donned gumboots, others just gave up on shoes and let the rich volcanic mud paint their feet black up to the ankles. I remember looking down and thinking: "I haven't been this dirty since I was 6 years old." And just after that, someone gave me free ice cream. It was beautiful.

Music for the festival was provided by an array of diverse artists, including a 7-man "let's-jam" outfit who rocked the stage with 60's sounding beats that led to spontaneous dancing while grinning, a rock trio with a front man who looked more like a front girl, a gaijin hippy lady wearing a patchwork dress crooning with her guitar, beautiful belly dancers who hypnotized the crowd with their liquid hip movements (and then gave a crash course from the stage), ギター　パンダ who later transformed into Elvis, more jembe drums than you could shake a bamboo at and an outfit called "seikatsu circus".

Truthfully, I can say that it was one of the best weekends I've had in Japan, if not in my life. It's a side of Japan that not everyone gets to see, where there are no foreigner/Japanese barriers, where people treat you like an old friend, and where you can join the fundoshi revolution if you are so inclined. With Mount Aso in the background, surrounded by bamboo forests and the smell of food and fire, you can be, just be. Without prejudice, worries or shoes.

The original document

2007-07-04T04:55:00.000+02:00

What will follow is the original story I wrote for the Okayama JET publication, The Fuzzy Peach. Not that it's in any way a literary achievement.. it's like a community newspaper. Hey, it keeps up the illusion that I get mail.

So yesterday while cleaning, I picked up the Fuzzy which featured my memories of Golden Week. I never read my article in the magazine cause, well, I knew what it was about. However, yesterday I read it for the first time, to notice to my horror that the article was mangled beyond recognition, and dumbass spelling mistakes appeared where I never would have left them. Would I ever spell "tent" as "tenet"? I don't think so.

After being silently offended all on my own, I got to school this morning to hear my JTE say: "Oh, I found your evaluation sheet but, Marilu, you made a spelling mistake. Memorisation is spelled with a z."

I'm done with arguing about "MY WAY" vs "The American Way", so, what the hell, let's spell it with a z.

I digress.

Next post to follow will be the article of the last bestest time on earth I had.

peace out.

The big question

2007-06-25T08:23:00.000+02:00

Will I ever update my blog again?

Stay tuned to find out.

Golden Weekend

2007-05-10T03:25:00.000+02:00

Because I just wrote a little blurb on it (which I'll post later) and I had to say "ahh, tanoshikatta" six thousand times, I'm sick of talking about what I did for golden week. So I will let these badly recorded videos do the talking.

Ree Reply.

2007-04-03T06:25:00.000+02:00

Natuurlik onthou ek.

The soul of Seoul

2007-03-26T07:10:00.000+02:00

There is this very nifty law in South Korea that states that every high-rise building has to have a piece of art in front of it. The city being a bit of a concrete jungle, this has led to Seoul being the most extensive outdoor art gallery on earth. Without exaggerating. It actually seems like people have taken this law into their own hands, and it is hard to walk one block without seeing a sculpture of some kind. There is a park in Seoul playing host to 200 bizarre sculptures from all over the world.

Unfortunately, there Just Wasn’t Enough Time to go see it. We also didn’t have time to visit any museums, and I was itching to stop at the Warhol exhibition, the museum of contemporary art, modern art, folk museums..

We did have time to stop at an intersection on the way to The Next Stop, where we played on the sculptures for a while before dragging our sleep-deprived bodies to whoknowswhere. And looked through many gallery windows for artworks that challenged every available media previously used to create something.
(My favourite one was a 2m tall picture of the Alice in Wonderland rabbit, using different shades of 2cm zip units as “pixels”)

Aside from the bazillion sculptures and museums, the theatre and film industry also seems to be pumping with life. Walls are littered with poster upon poster of the latest Korean musical, ballet, film or whatever stage production. And such variety! Seoul alone has 47 universities, a few of them directed at the arts, and I’m sure students creativity is limited only by their imagination.

On our first night, despite honorable intentions to get to bed early (having been awake since 5am that morning, and traveling around quite a bit), we ended up at a Live Jazz Bar after dinner. We saw a three-man-band called J-Story, who played the most irregular jazz I’ve ever seen. At times I was convinced that each of the musicians were just jamming to their own tunes (piano, double bass and drums), but then they’d come together in a perfect off-beat, grin at each other, and rock on.

Luckily, they stopped playing just after midnight, so we caught the subway home to Euljiro-4-ga, exit 4, right turn by the light blue sign, down the alley that smelt of decaying organic matter and into the unmarked side of Traveler’s A guesthouse, where late-night debates in Japanese would be the sound to which I’d fall asleep.

It's a big, big world.

2007-03-26T06:43:00.000+02:00

I have tons to write about: Weekends in Okayama, Fukuyama and my first trip to Hiroshima; graduations, birthday celebrations and getting off at wrong train stations. But I will leave that for now, let it grow hazy, with only blurry photos to remind me of those times. And while it is still fresh in my mind and whispered in the dark circles under my eyes, I will write about Korea.

With no spring holiday to look forward to and no desire to give in to Japan's National Rip-off (golden week 400% increase in plane ticket prices), Vicky and I decided to go on a short holiday to Seoul in South Korea, a mere hour in the air from Hiroshima airport. Now, in this new life of mine, holiday does not equal “a period of rest”. Closer to the truth would be “long days, late nights, sensory overdose and rushing from one spot to the next”. As with my weekends, I return from my holidays even more exhausted than I was at the start. Is this the live fast, die young thing I’ve been reading about? It’s the symptom of the problem that there just isn’t enough time on earth.

Now that I’ve justified that sleeping is waste of time, it’s time to reporto on Korea.

After 8-9 months in Japan, I can finally walk down a street and make out a word or two on posters, banners and advertisements. I can ask basic questions if I get lost, or if I don’t understand. It’s not quite swimming, but it’s definitely treading water.
Then I went to Korea, and I was back to square one.

Wait. Time out. Stop... the boat, Mr. Wonka. I need to retrace my steps. As I was walking down the empty stone roads in the Jongmyo Royal Shrine, I started mentally composing my blog entry. I only just now remembered that stroll of thought. So here goes.. it went something like this:

While I was living in Pretoria, I was completely fascinated with the outside of a certain fruit & veg shop, which soon became my favourite. The green glass panes were covered in strange scribbles which I thought of as alien hieroglyphs. It became my favorite alphabet to look at, and still is. Little did I know that, less that a year later, I’d be walking down the streets of the country that uses that alphabet, assaulted by its lines and circles, drowned in neon miscomprehension.

(Insert photo)

That’s how far I got. But really, the language is even more impenetrable than Japanese. Even if you have a Korean street name or local dish written out in roman letters.. your pronunciation is so far off, you just confuse them even more. Japanese also helped a bit, as we found out just after we booked into the hostel and the Russian owner could not speak a word of English or Korean, but managed alright in broken Japanese. In fact, the Japanese influence is visible everywhere. More than half of the kids in our hostel were from Japan, shopfronts had signs like ようこそいらっしゃいませ！ and taxis boasted 日本語O.K. It did make me feel a little bit more at home. Even with Japan being the major source of tourism and influence, there is still an underlying bitterness towards Japan, stemming from Japan’s annexation of Korea from 1910-1945, and the harsh rule that ensued. In fact, there are many fights still going on today, such as what the name of the sea between Japan and Korea should be, which country owns the Takeshima islands (or Dokdo Islands, according to S.Korea) and Japan refusing to extend warcrime compensation or apologies to the South Korean comfort women that were obviously scarred during the colonial rule. (Even today, they still protest once a week on front of the Japanese Embassy in S.K, but are skillfully ignored).

I’m digressing, but it was really interesting to see another thriving Asian country while having Japan as a reference. If you take fashion as an example, it was a breath of fresh air to not see bags adorned with stuffed animals, keitais without 1kg of dangly pink things, no cartoon characters on everything from trucks to tampons, to see boys dressed like boys (as opposed to the furry jackets and hairclips the Japanese androgenous sport). Who knows why Japan cannot grow up, and even adults are caught up in the “kawaii” (cute) culture. SK seems more mature, sensible and level-headed than Japan.

In fact, if I have to sum up my impression of South Korea (wait, who am I kidding, I don’t know shit about South Korea. Spent 4 days in one city.) Okay, my impression of Seoul is.. an intelligent fusion of art and technology. This is dynamic Korea.

Moenie Huh se nie.

2007-03-06T09:00:00.000+02:00

Ek wens nogsteeds ek kan kappies maak. Maar nie op hierdie keyboards nie.

Anyways. Dis sneeu vandag en dit freak my uit. Wou net vir iemand vertel. Ek het gedog dis as van die fabrieke of 'n moerse trop duiwe wat deur 'n vliegtuig enjin gevlieg het. Maar nee, dis sneeu. En dis warm. Weird.

Dangerous Individual Training

2007-03-06T08:27:00.000+02:00

When the PE teacher changed his purple raincoat and ski-goggles for a black suit jacket, I knew that something was going to happen at school.
Then, Kyoto Sensei turned off al the lights, and told me I could go home at 4:00, because they will be having a meeting.
Half an hour later, all the teachers walked out of the teacher's room, video cameras and long sticks in their hands. My JTE must have noticed my amused looks, because he came over and explained: "These people are here for.. dangerous individual training."

They re-enacted an entire scene. Half an hour ago, I was sniggering and snorting at the articles on watkykjy, and now I had a live re-enactment of dangerous individual threats. A good day.

Someone rang the buzzer. The Kyoto Sensei walked slowly to go open it. As if he didn't know what was waiting for him. Everyone pretended to be busy for 20 seconds, and then.. the whistle blew.
The jacket-clad PE teacher and the short teacher both grabbed their holding sticks (think of a metal halfmoon attached to a long stick - ideal for pinning bad guys onto walls - but still big enough for them to slip out of, haha, didn't think about that now did you!) and ran into the hallway. The JTE ran after, holding the camera.

There were a few sounds of commotion.. and they returned to the staffroom bearing triumphant smiles.

This training was not only exciting, but also practical. Now we are just waiting for a dangerous individual to come to Japan, trek through the mountains, make it to this small town, climb up the long hill to my school, make it past the video cameras outside, get through the video camera'ed front door (maybe disguised as a lady selling apples) and disturb the general peace.
Or maybe one of the townsfolk will go crazy.
We can only hope.

This week I use "de".

2007-02-27T08:15:00.000+02:00

Booty Call

2007-02-21T07:10:00.000+02:00

Time for a new post. Reading about other peoples' "charming students" is like having to listen to someone's dream they had last night, or having to look at pictures of someone's kids. It's only that exciting, so you smile and nod, and make the appropriate sounds at the expected times.
So, to make up for the "oh my kids are so adorable" post, the next one will be about something we all like:

Ass.

The 17th of February brought the Hadaka Matsuri ("naked man festival") to the prefecture of peaches. (Peaches.. naked ass.. uhm..) A bunch of gaijin from prefectures all around met up in Okayama City and got soaked to the bone by the persistent rain (and chilled to the bone by the leftover winter). The running boys left an hour before us, and used their extra time to get nekkid and nappied by some old Japanese men.

(I like this photo, because it reminds me of Church festivals I used to go to as a child. Only difference is: all the old ladies are Japanese. They are selling oden and sake instead of jaffels and pancakes. And there's a freezing foreigner wearing a tiny piece of white cloth instead of his Sunday Best)

So, we met up with the dripping, shivering, semi-naked guys, laughed at them, took photos of their skinny white butts, laughed at them some more, and then made our way to the viewing deck from where we'd have a Class-A view on the men running through the holy pool of spiritual disinfection.

On the bus we were told that umbrellas are unacceptable, and by the time we made it to the viewing deck, it wasn't funny anymore. I was cold, wet, and I would have been miserable, was it not for the energy in the air and the chu-hai in my bag.

After one, two, maybe three dips in the ice cold pool while chanting "Washoi! Washoi!" , the fleshy mass of guys headed to the temple where they waited for the lights to be killed at midnight. Two sticks were dropped, a lot of movement took place, one guy was trampled to death in the madness, many injuries sutained, and in the end the Yakuza (Jap mafia) won the game, as tradition holds it.

We were too far from the temple to really witness the madness - all we saw was a sea of skin-coloured movement, people falling down the stairs like lemmings, and disgruntled participants moving away from the chaos after a while. Some friendly Japanese people gave us their umbrella and made small talk, and we returned when the sticks were (probably) found. We bought chocolate just as an excuse to stand in the shop for a while, and moved on when we realised we are equally wet, indoors or out. Dame'ed by the police, we had to wait for the participants to walk back, giving us a wonderful close-up view as a take-home memory of the festival.
I only returned from Okayama City at 11 or so the next morning, and channel-hopped mindlessly while running a bath.
I was lucky enough to catch the last few minutes of a news bulletin about the Hadaka Matsuri. On it, they showed a fat dude running toward the barrier like mad with the magic stick in his hand. Unfortunately, he made quite a scene of having the stick, and before he made it to the end, he was ruthlessly tackled by a team of 5 guys in black fundoshi (the g-strings). They started beating the crap out of him, got the stick, and that, ladies and gentlemen, is how you win in the Hadaka Matsuri.

Individual Seconds that Make all the Difference

2007-02-14T08:27:00.000+02:00

Although I still question the wisdom of spending another year of my life in Japan, there are definitely moments that make it worthwhile.
I wanted to say "for example, sitting outside a combini between the can bin and the PET bottle bin, drinking combini chu-hai at 8 on a Friday morning, looking like crap but not caring, no idea where your hotel is, watching the school kids walking past in their mini skirts and bags weighed down by stuffed animal kyarakutaasu (read: characters) and sniggering at everything like an idiot cause you haven't slept in two days."

But that's not what this post is about.

I'm doing this koukan nikki a.k.a. diary exchange with some students at my one school, and ALL ichi- and ni-nenseis at my other school. This means that there are now roundabout 25 diaries that I have to write original replies to, think of a reply to "I like green", and draw pictures in. I love it but.. well, I made work for myself.

So, quoting from Misa (the soupy girl)'s diary.. we're in a slo-mo convo about candy.

Hi Maliru!
I maked cookie, chocolate cake and namachoco last weekend.
Cookie umakudekita. (note: I think it means "I'm good at making it"... Nihongophiles confirm?)
chocolate cake... appearance... soso. surface burnt.
But teist is good.
Namachoco is simply rcipe.

And.. then she writes me the recipe for Namachoco (unbaked chocolate)! I'm almost clapping my hands in delight. Takes very little to make my day, these days.

Then, Megu writes:

Because I have not been to a foreign country, I am envious of you. (My selling point for English at this stage is "If you can't speak it, you cannot go outside Japan". It seems to work for some kids)
The country which I want to go is Germany now. The reason is because it studies a dog.
In addition, I want to eat a delicious dish in... Europe. Delicious chocolate wants to eat in France in particular.

Man, I adore this class. I could swoop them up and hug em, but.. I don't.

Then, last week I asked Nana, the 13-year old with the biggest dimples this side of the equator:
In Japan, where is the most beautiful place?
Her answer? It is... sky!

Can't wait for next week's installment...

Osaka I daisuki you

2007-02-13T03:51:00.000+02:00

I fell in love with Japan all over again.

It is a misguided love, that's true. It's falling in love with the biker boy with tattoos and a facial piercing. But while it lasts, it's a true love. I could have cried as I saw the concrete jungle disappear behind me and I once again made my way to the concrete-covered mountains of the countryside.

The weekend started with a Tool concert. Well, we can retrace a bit and say the weekend started in a tiny little tatami room for 1000yen a night, changing into party clothes (2 shirts and 7 pairs of socks for 5 days in the city.. will I never learn to pack properly) and cracking open one-cup sake. Trainrides to Cosmo Square, giggling in anticipation and walking the road to Zepp Osaka with dreary looking people dressed in black. Three tall South Africans reunited, plus some new friends from Hiroshima and Kyuushu.

The Tool concert was bizarre. Tool: Japan style. For a subculture that is based on anger and rebellion, it was mind-boggling to see the fans line up in perfect ques to go inside. By number. Guys with loudspeakers calling seat numbers for standing places, and the Japanese sheep lining up to take their assigned spot on the floor. Weird. My token line from the evening is "I got shusshed at a Tool concert". And when I didn't stop talking, someone flicked me against the ear. Library, dark rock concert, same thing yo.

Long story. Grand evening.

That feels like it happened 3 months ago. Only having limited time in Osaka, we made sure to fill the hours maximally by only sleeping around 2 to 3 hours per day. For 4 days. After that, we were worn-out enough to sit in bed and watch a movie on my Mac to start off our last night in Osaka.

Maybe I'll do a more structured post later. Day by day, or so. What it comes down to is the following:

1) I love Osaka. I might be in love with Osaka. The highest concentration of freaks in Japan. Take me home, Willy Wonka. Walking in the streets around Namba is like walking into a fantasy toystore where dolls have pulse and they speak Japanese and they ignore your foreign existance. I want to collect them: One hip-hop b-boy. One goateed-hottie with guitar on back. One goth chick with smeared black lipstick. One industrial raver. One manga-like waif. One iro-iro no iro multicoloured explosion of psychedelic colour with big hat. One mountain witch eating bananas. One Little Bo Peep. One pimp with funky hair. One psuedo-schoolgirl. One salaryman. And then I want to keep them on a shelf, look at them, and take them out to have tea with, one by one.

2) The art teacher who wears the same navy blue suit Every Single Day wanted to use the broken pc next to me, so I gave him this one. And forgot what my rant was.

Tabun I wanted to say something about.. I spent as much money cruising 5 days in Osaka as I spent 2 weeks in Thailand. So it is probably a good thing that I do not live there. The inaka is my harnass to the real world. ("real world" hahaha.. haha. yeah. hahaha..). But should I lose myself in Japan, I'd like it to be in Osaka.

Kanpai!

2007-02-02T10:09:00.000+02:00

Today was the closing date for the JET re-application papers to be filled in and filed away. Seeing as it's been one of the main topics of discussion in the JET family, I took it to be a big, important, almost national day in the Japanese schooling system. Seems not. I took the papers to my JTE so that he could play translator between me and kocho-sensei. I don't know the Japanese words for "recontracting" and "documents" and "official". Unfortunately, my JTE didn't know the English either. I watched his finger as it moved from word to word and he mouthed out the simple English words. And then retraced his finger to the beginning of the sentence.

After much confusion, the vice-principal phoned the Board of Education to hear what exactly this "recontracting" story is all about. They explained, and.. well, I filled out my half of the form, made two copies of it (one for me, one for the school), and I'm hoping that I'll make it onto the paperwork system that is Japan as "inaka JET selling her soul for another 18 months".

One of the main reasons that I'm taking the plunge for another year in this retirement village, is that I decided from the begining that I was going to do two years. So much for following your heart, hey. Well, that and money. If and when I return to SA, I'll have to work for a bag of peanuts per day again, I won't have a state-subsidised car or trustworthy public transport, and I'll be white and jobless. I need to build a little egg out of yen-notes and spit before I can return to the motherland.

The truth is that I'm bored. But you're in Japan, how can life be boring? This is Japan? Oh, the mountain was blocking my view. Wait, wait. I'm starting to sound like a Japanese person. Next I'll be phoning up the local municipalities, asking them to please cut down all the trees cause it's messing leaves onto my stoep.

Tis a strange place, this homogenous triple-wrapped please stamp here island. And I'm still not sure how I feel about living here. It's a love-hate relationship. But all the most important things in my life has been like that.

18 more months to go.. let's see how many trips I can work into that one.
(Currently thinking Korea or Taiwan end March longweekend. We'll see what happens.)

Koh Tao

2007-01-22T07:02:00.001+02:00

Although the name Koh Tao means Turtle Island, they might as well rename it to "Diving Island". The cheapest place to do your dives (2500 yen a dive as opposed to Japan's 15000 yen), the shore is lined with one diving school after the other. Naturally, the commercialising of the sport here probably makes it a bit more impersonal, but if you want to get your qualification from people who have over 4000 dives under their weight belts, this is the place to go.

I arrived on Koh Tao early in the afternoon, and zombied my way to Crystal Diving resort, where I had a bed to sleep in. Not having slept for 2 days, my general vocabulary dropped to the retarded phase, and I booked myself in saying: "Uhh, I think I'm here for scuba. Or summin'."
The guy at the counter gave me one look and said: "You just came from Koh Pan Gnan, right?"
I didn't have the energy to be funny, so I took my room key and made my way to my home for the next 4 days. Too tired to sleep, I missioned off in search of an internet cafe, and to my surprise I ran into Chris on the beach. I wanted to have with her and the other Okayamans on Koh Tao for dinner, so we set a time to meet, and I slept right through it. What a good sleep though.

Somewhere during my first day on the Turtle Island, I fell in love with it. I lost count of how many times since leaving Koh Tao I said: "I want to go back to Koh Tao". It could be because I met some amazing people there who became instant friends. It could be because it's where I had my first taste of breathing underwater for 40 minutes. It could be because I found myself lazing about on a deserted white beach, shaded from the sun by huge overhanging palm trees (okay, it was only deserted for an hour just because I got there early). Ag, I don't know. I just lost my heart there. And I need to return to pick it up. It's without the raven crowds of Koh Pan Gang. Everyone just leaves you be. Nice and quiet. I would have breakfast in restaurants reading my book and now and again having a bite of food, while looking out at the wooden, hand-painted taxi boats anchored on the shore, or watching a sun-bleached CocaCola umbrella lazily move in the breeze. Koh Tao is my idea of paradise.

Through my diving class of seven people, I met Monika and Diana, two amazing girls from Mexico and Brazil currently on a 4 month journey of the planet. Even though our roads only briefly crossed, I feel that they taught me something (thank you). Then Lee aka Hege, a beautiful Korean girl who grew up in Norway.. Actually, every conversation seemed like the beginning of an international joke: "A Brit, a South African, 2 Danish dudes, some Dutch people, a Norwegian couple, some Australians, a Japanese, an Austrian boy, a Mexican and a Brasilian were sitting on this island one January evening...". I'm serious. That was our dinner group. Now, THAT is what I call internationalisation. Thank you, JET Program, for making moments like that possible with your misdirected financing. So, the kids will never be able to speak English, but one out of three isn't bad.

I loved the last part of my holiday (note: not journey but holiday. I was still a tourist. Which is not good enough) so much that I decided to skip meeting J&D in Bangkok, and got a room for one more night with Paula, the English girl, at Mr. J's. Mr. J is a funny man who puts random posters up all over town advertising things like "Hand Made Condoms - Buy 10 get 1 free". He also has graphs of nationalities up all over town, saying what percentage of his guests are from which countries. South Africans were supposedly 4% of the bunch, but not having met any other Saffers, I had my doubts. Each nationality had a one-word description next to them, and SA'cans were labeled as "handsome". Shot, Mr. J! Anyways, Paula kicked ass because she had Christmas lights and big paper stars in her backpack, so the room looked like home.

Our days were spent getting into the finer details of diving (plus 4 getting down to the ocean bottom dives), and the nights were spent kuiering in bars that spilled over onto the beach. Every night, new star systems were created by orange paper lanterns that were floated into the sky to hang in orange constellations that never existed before and will never exist again. People talked about the world under the sea and the differences in languages and compared motorcycle accident wounds. Conversations mingled with misunderstanding due to heavy accents and English not being anyone's mother tongue. We watched toned, tattooed Thai guys play fire as if they were brushing their teeth (perfection, precision, but with no passion), and walked up and down the beach with our feet in warm water.

And, as if KT didn't give me enough by just existing, it also gave me free food the one night.

Some of the crew went to an Italian restaurant, and I missioned off with Paula and the Dutch dude to find Thai food. We got to a cosy restaurant and walked in to check out the menu.
"Oh, everything is free tonight." the girl at the counter replied.
We "but..but.." gulped air like fish on dry land, trying to understand what exactly she meant by that.
One of the waiters saw us fumbling around in confusion, and explained that it was the owner's birthday and to celebrate, he had a massive table filled with creamy oysters, spicy meat, mountains of pasta and big bowls of punch, all on the house. We filled our plates, giggling like kids in a candy store. It was a feast, and to top it all off, a girl came around dishing out pieces of chocolate cake. Indeed, my idea of paradise.

An environmental note

2007-01-22T07:01:00.001+02:00

Having an island to party on does not come without a price. Long before the yearly countdown to midnight began, the beach looked more like a garbage dump than a flyer for paradise. The ocean licked its way through bottles and buckets, and puddles of water were filled with straws and cigarette butts. On the plus side, the beach was cleared up so efficiently the next morning that you could literally see the mess disappearing bit-by-bit like stop-frame photography. It's clear to see that the guys from KP are used to foreigners coming to their beaches to make a horrid mess, bringing money and destruction. It's the perfect situation to prove that tourism is another horseman of the apocalypse. It's a vicious cycle, and it will continue. Just like global warming. So, 10 out of 10 for the guys with the plastic bags the morning after, but
it doesn't end there.

When I did my first dive a few days after, I was trying to establish buoyancy in the fantasy environment of the underwater world. I was completely enamored by the utter alienness of it.. until I spotted a nice, fat green beer bottle 12 meters under the surface. Thank you, human race. No worries- that bottle is sure to disappear in, let's see, about 5000 years or so. No harm done.

Koh Pan Gnan

2007-01-22T06:54:00.000+02:00

Against all odds, at the last minute, and once again after chasing down a bus on a motorbike, I caught the last ferry to Koh Pa Ngan on the 30th of December. I was ecstatic to run into Dimple, Jen, Rich and Faye. A nice Okayama crew on a party boat going to a party island. We swopped sordid stories and titilating tales of our holidays thus far, and docked with a bunch of other young party-seekers around 10 in the evening. We phoned for our "complimentary taxi" to come pick us up, but the ringing phone mysteriously turned into an answering machine and none of the taxi drivers knew where our booked bungalow was. A travel agent lady helped us out, and we sat around for about half an hour, listening to people stressing out because they came to the island without pre-booking a place to sleep, waiting for a taxi. Taxis on Koh Pa Ngan means bush-beating trucks with narrow benches built into the back. We got to our accomodation, skipped dinner because the closest open restaurant was miles away, and promptly passed out.

The next day we had pancakes for breakfast, and headed through to Hat Rin, the main party beach in the early morning. There we hung around, eating, drinking, sunning ourselves in bikinis and swimming in the motionless turquoise ocean until night fell. New Year's eve was a mad mass of people, buckets, milkshakes, dancing, getting lost, getting found, true talks on the beach, playing fire (oh how my fingers itched to play again). Dodgy Thai guys that moved in packs, wading into the ocean with my camera (nice one), Tigerbalm Tommy and the plumber, taking photos of some dude's back with a flag painted on it, the Scottish-Nigerian dude who spilled our bucket (promplty getting a punch from me for that one), an SA dude with a tongue ring sitting on a rock, a zillion dudes pissing into the sea, Jen doing eyeliner for me in a nice bathroom, bumguns and memoryloss. Jen and I spent a great deal of the evening looking for Dimple, who we lost at about ten in the evening. We found her the next day around 11am, sitting under a palm tree with some guy who looked after her for the last part of the evening. It was mad, it was brilliant. The sun was high into the sky, and I was still dancing my heart out on top of a speaker with a mad grin on my face, fueled by Thai Red Bull and a lust for life.

We returned to our bungalow with torn clothes and dirty bodies at 11:30 on the first day of 2007, really looking forward to a good sleep. Upon our arrival, we were informed of the 12:00 checkout time, so we managed to squeeze in a shower, packed in a rushed flurry, and went back to nani-nani port for a breakfast, exhausted but smiling. I caught the next ferry to Koh Tao, and Jen and Dimple waited a few hours more to head to Koh Samui.

Kuala Lumpur

2007-01-22T06:49:00.000+02:00

My mental image of KL is "Islam meets the future". Home of the still-standing Twin Towers, the Petronas Towers. It used to be the tallest building on earth, until Taiwan went and built a higher one. The quest for Babel.

As with Singapore, the thing that fascinated me was the diversity of people. Coming from a completely homogenous Japan, it was a breath of fresh air to see a mix of cultures. And by this I mean local cultures, not the crazy global mix of foreigners that prevailed in Thailand. The major races represented in both Singapore and KL are Malays, Chinese and Indians. It's like South Africa, except that there are no whites, blacks (should I be writing these with capitals?) or coloureds. Same same but different.

From the Lonely Planet, I copied down some addresses of cheap backpackers in Chinatown. After a very uncomfortable 11 hour overnight journey on a train (I'm too cheap to take the sleepers), I walked around drenched in sweat, my discomfort enhanced by the stench of drains and durians. I couldn't find any of the backpackers in my notebook, so booked my exhausted ass into one above a Rasta bar. I took a cold shower in the shared bathrooms, and headed down to the rasta bar for a beer and lunch that I bought from the street. As delicious as the food looked, it also looked like a carrier for food poisoning, but I took my chances and I ended up having 2 huge plates of unidentifiable meatstuffs for next to nothing. The bartender invited himself to my table, showed me videos on his cellphone of all the girls he's slept with (he was without his shirt in all of them) and asked where I'm from. Turns out he lived in both Japan and SA at some time in his life, and then mentioned that he partied in Cape Town with the guys from African Dope, my ichiban favourite record label from the Fairest Cape. He didn't have any African Dope to play over the sound system, but he owned more Lucky Dube (ancient South African reggae) than I knew existed. So there I was in Chinatown of an Islamic Futuristic city, listening to Lucky Dube at a bar which sported the exact same tablecloths as Cool Runnings Cafe in South Africa. How bizarre.

A great part of my time there was spent trying to organise transport to Koh Pan Gnan in time to use the accomodation I'd already payed for. Turns out that, over New Years, there is some huge Muslim festival, and KL being the mosque of a city that it is, all the busses and trains to anywhere were fully booked until after New Years. All the travel agents told me "sorry ne." I was about to give up hope and crawl into a readily-available gutter, when a strange Indian guy with a smudge of Hindu worship paint on his forehead invited me for a drink. We went to a place filled with old men, and sat on plastic chairs by a sticky table, talking about gemstones and drinking Coke. I told him of my dilemma, and he told me where the locals buy their bus tickets. We finished our drinks, and he took me to this incredibly noisy, dirty madhouse of transportation bookings. It's basically a room with one ticket booth after the other, with hundreds of locals pushing and kicking to get to the front. I went from window to window, and at the 14th booth, I found a bus company with an open seat to Hat Yai. I payed for the ticket that would lead me to The Dodgiest Busride Ever, made a breakfast date with my outta-the-blue saviour, and continued ambling my way through the city.

The next morning I met up with my 1-day friend, Murugon. He was sitting on the steps in front of the temple near the backpackers, this time sans the worship paint on his forehead. Instead, he was looking a bit pale for an Indian guy. I enquired about it, and he said that he bought something from the street the night before that didn't agree with his chemical composition. Food poisoning: You win some, you lose some. He didn't feel up to facing food, but still wanted to take me to his friend's restaurant. So we boarded the train and made our way to KL Sentral. With an S.

Throughout the 7 minute journey, he was hanging onto the pole, face pressed against the cold windows like a Japanese School kid that had too much to drink in the city. A mere 20 seconds before the train came to a halt, he started coughing, and then proceeded to paint the carriage floor yellow with last night's dodgy dinner. The doors opened and people flooded out, gasping for fresh air. I guided him to the nearest bin, where he did a few more heaves while I patted him on the back. There, there. Get it all out. He wiped his mouth, and with bits of carrot still clinging to his face he grinned at me and said: "Good, I can eat breakfast now."
Never in my life had I met anyone so nonchalant about public puking. His attitude was both refreshing and disturbing.

In the end, I ditched him after the roti & watermelon juice breakfast (that he payed for) because he wanted to feed me my breakfast. What!? I told him that I knew how to use a fork (you should see me use chopsticks! haha!) and when he sneaked his hand onto my knee, I considered using the fork to skewer more than just my roti. Gochisoooo sama deshita, sayonara!

I walked around the city like a madwoman, trying to see as much as I could in my final hours. At sunset, I went up the KL Tower, Menara Kuala Lumpur (at 421m, it's 4th highest in the world) and watched the city flicker into yet another night with a breathtaking 360 degree view of the surroundings. As I stood there watching a sea of lights, I came to the conclusion that the more you see, the more you realise that you ain't seen nothing yet. One life just is not enough. But we make do with what we have.

My bus left at 23h00 that evening, and I wasn't sure how I'd kill the final 3 hours. With all my belongings on my back, I didn't feel like taking any trains or walking excessive distances. As I walked through the vibrant nightmarket in Chinatown, I heard someone call my name, and there sat yet another random stranger that I had met earlier that day. An Arabic guy named Ebrahim who runs a guesthouse in Langkawi, one of the Malyasian islands, with his Japanese wife. I had met him earlier that day while buying a refreshing coconut beverage from a vendor, and for some arb reason I knew I was going to run into him again. He was having dinner with a Japanese girl who was not his wife, and they asked me to join them. He told me amazing tales from India, though I could only understand 40% of what he was saying (the story of my holiday), while his Japanese uhm friend kept refilling my glass with Tiger beer and putting food in my plate. Just before 23h00 I had to stop him mid-story, and bade them farewell. I made my way to the bus depot, an underground room filled with Thais, Malays, busses and carbon monoxide, and found my bus after being showed to the wrong one about 4 times. I showed my ticket to the busdriver, who looked at me blankly, then to 4 passengers who looked at me blankly. Silently I took an empty seat, hoped for the best, and passed out as soon as the bus started moving.

After the bus nearly popped a tire driving through a pothole/off the road, I woke up to find another hand on my knee that I did not remember putting there. And on the same trip, the bus driver disappeared with my passport somewhere between Malay and Thai No Man's Land, but those are different stories for a different day. All was well and therefore all ended well. Hakuna matata.

Losgatgeid (a moment of dread)

2007-01-22T06:48:00.000+02:00

After a 5 hour journey from who-knows-where to Hat Yai in a tiny minibus, the funny Osaka-jin and I are dropped off at yet another busstop to catch our next connecting vehicles. We wave our 12 Thai fellow passengers goodbye, and my new 5-hour friend heads off to find a better deal at a different bus station. My bus is supposed to arrive in a few minutes, and I desperately need to check my e-mail. I have no idea where I'm going in Singapore; no phone number or address. Just a city. I ask the Thai girl manning the phone where I can find the closest computer. She chases me back to my seat: "No email! You bus come now!"
Fine.
I check my money belt, and find that I only have 20 Baht on me. The rest is all USD and Yen. That'll get you nowhere fast in Thailand inaka. I wait until my bus is 15 minutes late, and then decide to rush over to the bank opposite me to change some money. I run up the stairs. Good, I can see the busstop from the window. At the counter, I open my bag to take out my Black Book Of Very Important Things. And in that moment, I realise that I left everything on the minibus which I waved goodbye 20 minutes ago. With everything I mean:
All my Yen.
All my USD.
My plane tickets back to Japan.
My bus tickets back to Niimi.
Everything.
On a minibus filled with Thai, somewhere.
Wakatta?

I walk back to the busstop taking inventory of my situation: I'm alone in the middle of nowhere in Thailand and all I have is my clothes, my passport, a set of poi, and 20 Baht which is about 70 Yen which is about R3.56. And a busticket to Singapore. Nice one.

Get back to the girl by the telephone who doesn't speak English. "Listen. Very Important. I.. lost.. something. Minibus. Black book. Very Important."
She looks at me and says: "You bus come now!"
"No," I reply, shaking just a little bit. "No bus. First - black book. Minibus. Can you help me?"
She consults a friend, and they phone another friend who speaks broken English, who speaks to them in fluent Thai, and all this is going on in Thai-go around me and I have no clue what's happening. Fianlly, they call over a dude on a motorbike and motions for me to get on. The bus is now 30 minutes late. He tells me it'll be 40 Baht, and I say 20 now, 20 later. I hook my backpack onto my shoulders, get on the motorbike and we zip through the mad traffic of pedestrians and cyclists and tuk-tuks and busses. And he stops at another busstop.

From the start, I decided to just go with whatever the moment brings, so in incomprehension I sit on the corner of a street, looking slightly distressed, not knowing what the hell is happening. The motorcycle guy is happily chatting to his buddies, and I stare at them, hoping to pick up a positive English word. But nai. An old Thai man with a long grey beard breaks away form the group, come over to me and tells me "No worry. You get everything back. Mae pen rai."
Not even 4 minutes into my most distraught diary entry, the motorcycle man calls to me, "This you minibus?"
And it is.
The driver steps out, and in his hands he has the most beautiful black document book I have ever seen in my whole life. Mine. He asks me to check inside, and everything is just as I left it, still warm from the floor where I sat close to the engine. I feel like hugging them, but I have a bus to catch, and we get back onto the motorbike. I'm not even holding on, as I'm using my hands to pray thankyous to the deities that are always saving me from myself.

At the original busstop, the girl is still sitting by her telephone.
"You bus come, you bus leave!" she shouts over the noises of traffic. "No next bus!"
Saying something in Thai, the motorbike guy motions for me to get on again, so I do, and we are back in the street again. He pushes through cars and skips orange lights, until he spots a big bus further on in the street. At the next traffic light, he drives next to the bus and repeatedly smacks it on the side with his palm. The bus stops in the middle of traffic, the driver gets out, words are exchanged and my backpack is loaded into the luggage compartment. I am kwah-pun-kaah'ing in a bow so low the Japanese would have applauded me. I give the guy U$D20, climb the stairs onto the bus, find my seat, and sit down for the next chapter in My Winter Holiday. On my way to Singapore.

And now for something completely different

2007-01-22T06:44:00.000+02:00

I'm typing this at home, my fingers covered in chocolate cake that I was planning to take to school, but I wasuremashita'ed it in my kitchen. Now, all for me.
After having owned this useless laptop for 4 months, I finally hooked it up to someone else's internet and made it useful. This means that, for the first time since August 06, I've been able to access all the music I burned into some obscure format back in SA. Currently, I'm listening to the deep, smooth voice of Laurika Rauch. Ek dink ek het hierdie cd nog van Eric af gebum een aand in Witbank. As jy die lees, thanks dude, dit beteken waar ek nou is vir my soveel. En so ook Koos Kombuis. Lisa se klavier was nog nooit so mooi nie.

I'd just like to quote the following, because it's so damn beautiful. A song about a girl in Cape Town that plays the piano so beautifully that people just stop in the streets at night to listen to the sounds floating down from her window:

haar vingers ken die pad
opgesluit in wit en swart
die klavier se grootste vreugde, hartseer en verlange
verstaan die hart se diepste smart

(her fingers know the way
locked up in black and white
the piano's greatest joy, sadness and longing
understands the deepest pain of the heart)

(not that much lost in translation)

Kao San Road

2007-01-22T04:30:00.000+02:00

This part could have been titled "Bangkok", but it all honesty, we didn't see much of the city. There are a lot of tourist things to do, buddhas to be seen, boats in which you can ride, but for 3 days we became stuck in the magical tourist carnival that is Kao San Road. In a Lonely Planet somewhere, there is a mention that KS Rd gained fame/notoriety after the release of The Beach, but only having read the book (twice, years ago) I cannot recall any mention of this road in literature. We just went there because it was a definite that we would find accomodation without booking beforehand.

Three beds we found, for less than the price of a beer in Japan. It was our first introduction to the hand-held cold-water showers that would become the norm for the rest of the trip. The rest of the time was spent people-watching, getting our hair dreaded and braided, indulging in pancakes and food that set your lips on fire, buying crap we didn't need, sampling the local beers, meeting random travelers, getting ripped off by TAT (a travel company that gave our individual trips instant structure, but at a price), going for manic drives in wheelying tuk-tuks, a Muay-Thai boxing match, getting familiar with the yellow backgrounds of the King's face, more food, more beer, more backpackers, night markets, day markets, the sound of wooden frog curios and "kwah pun kaah's" echoing through the streets.

The really interesting part was to go to Thailand from Japan. To go from a place where politeness is taken to the point of indifference, and where people would do a 180 degree turn to avoid you, in fear of being greeted in English. A mere 6 hour flight, and suddenly people were making eye contact (what a novelty!) and smiling when they greet you. Also, I felt much more at home in Bangkok because it was so much more like Africa. More real. Dirty, smelly streets, messy hawkers with stalls and garbage that spills over into the streets. Homeless, toothless people sleeping on the streets. Poverty. Need. Desperation. And yet, they smile.

On the second or third night, we touristed our way over to Patpong with our new Thai friend, the dude who sold me my money belt. That red money belt became so much part of my attire that I wore it into the ocean on New Year's and killed my camera, but that's another story. Patpong had been a name in my head since I read about it in Tom Robbins novels, where he proclaimed it to be the one place on earth that you can find any type of sex that you can imagine. We didn't wander that deep into it's seedy alleyways, but stopped short at the first Ping-Pong bar we found, briefly looking at the program. It was like the scene it "From Dusk Till Dawn" where the guy stands outside the Titty Twister bar, rambling off the pussy menu for the night. The shows ran at 15 minute intervals, and all had delightful names such as: "Pussy open water bottle" / "Pussy play ping-pong" / "Pussy shoot darts". We payed our 200 baht, and made our way up the narrow stairs, anticipating the worst but propelled onwards by morbid curiosity.

Now, you can go your whole life without seeing a Ping-Pong show. You might actually be better off not seeing one. But if you should ever find yourself in Bangkok, just go ahead and do it so that you, in turn, can tell others that it's not worth it. It's not that the shows are hardcore or perverse. What I saw in Amsterdam made the Ping Pong show look like a chugakko English class. And that's the main reason why you leave there feeling a bit gritty. They're so.. disinterested. Removed from what they are doing. The girls dancing on poles in skimpy clothes are barely moving their asses. They keep checking their hair in the mirrors behind them. When we walked inside, there was a naked girl squatted over a piece of paper, with a marking pen stuffed up her twat. No, I won't use flowery euphemisms. She removed the pen, picked up the paper, and walked around, chewing gum in a good imitation of a cow "Welcome To Ping Pong Show" it said on the paper. We felt everything but.

They all just go through the motions. Remove top. Remove panties. Chew that hangnail on your middle finger while you flex those cervical muscles. It's sad because it's nothing. We left after our complimentary beers and headed to a club called "Lucifer" to dance their dead eyes out of our minds.

And so we just mucked about for a few days in a tiny percentage of the city. It was good though. There were moments where I felt myself change, where I felt more alive than I had in weeks. Two nights ended and turned into mornings with me sitting around a dented old stainless steel bowl in the middle of a street, getting a smoky fire going with dry bamboo and matches, trading stories and viewpoints with people who survive only from day to day. No, I don't know what it feels like to sit in school with a war going on outside. I don't know what it feels like to not know where my food will come from tomorrow. I don't know what it feels like to not know my brothers,, not know whether they are alive or dead. I can seek experience in other countries. I don't have to seek solace. I am lucky, my life has been so easy and I have been so blessed. And those dudes - Kpebane, Chai and Adam - they reminded me of that.

Kao San road ended for me while struggling my way through the spiciest salad in Bangkok. Someone was supposed to come pick me up from the guesthouse, to take me to the bus headed for Singapore. A shifty-looking boy came inside, and asked where we were going. I said Singapore. He motioned for me to follow him. I took my backpack, hugged Jen and Dimple goodbye (who, at that stage, had no idea whether or not they were going to see me again, ever) and followed him. We headed through restaurants and boxing rings with primary school boys lifting weights, through dodgy alleys and past sleeping dogs. And finally, a busstop. Which is the point from where I sojourned, until I met up with Hernes 42 hours and 2 countries later.

Fuyu Yasumi (finally..)

2007-01-22T04:28:00.000+02:00

It's been just over a week since I left the jungles and beaches of South East Asia and returned to the brown mountains of inaka Japan. It's been over a week since I sadly left the summer sun for a mediocre winter where the snow just isn't getting around to falling. On the day of my inevitable return, the winds in Osaka was blowing with such force that the trains had to be cancelled, and the rest of the trip was done in all too familiar bus seats. Of my 15 day holiday, approximately 4 days was spent in transit. Three nights I slept on busses. One night on a train. Despite the slight discomfort of 55 degree reclining seats, nightbusses suited me fine, as it meant one less night I had to pay for accomodation. So much happened in such a short time that it would take an entire day's worth of blogging to type everything down, so I decided to divide the posts into convenient bite-sized portions. These will be arranged according to topic. The things I want to remember. The things that I feel is worth sharing. The things that the Niimi crew have heard seven thousand times already. Enjoy, kudasai.

In all fairness

2007-01-10T09:09:00.000+02:00

Today had all the makings of a very bad day. I had to re-set my alarm three times because I just couldn't muster up the enthusiasm to face the cold. In the end, I opted to not bath, and crawled from electric blanket to kerosene heater to school. But my fears were unsupported: Today turned out to be a pretty kickass day.

Here are two highlights:

1) I bought some durian candy in Kuala Lumpur. Now, for those unfamiliar with the natural charms of Durian, it is said to smell like a good dose of vagina, and any respectable train, bus or hotel in Southern SE Asia will have a sign like this one:

Yah. It stinks.

So, rubbing my sweaty palms together in grinning glee, I bought three packs of durian candy and lugged it around for 2 weeks, all for the simple pleasure of seeing my school kids vomit in class.

I was not disappointed.

When I cracked open the bag in the san-nensei class, they ran to open the windows. Half of them dared to eat it, and started gag-reflexes while desperately clawing the air. My team-teaching partner wanted to fold over laughing, but he was too busy trying to get his vision back after taking his first bite of chewy durian. It was like the atom bomb had been dropped again. Only this time it smelled like gasoline (they said) and tasted like green onions. And they call it a fruit.

PS - my team-teacher refrained from eating any more candy during the next 2 classes, and said he wished he had a camera with which to capture the other classes' obvious pain when they too were introduced to Durian.

2) I was trying to explain "New Years Resolutions" to 2 other teachers, failing horribly because I could not remember the English ("voornemens".. what the hell.. English.. uhh..). Trying to corss-reference from a Japanese word that they gave me (houfu), I flipped through my pocket dictionary and

there I spotted my memory card

The memory card that I thought I had crumpled up and threwn into Koh Tao's garbage

The memory card from the dead camera that I fed to the sea on New Years

The memory card that contains all my memory reminders up to 23h39 on the 31st of December 2006.

My trip to Thailand/Malaysia/Singapore has been resurrected. Brilliant.

(photos might possibly follow)

Almost in transit

2006-12-23T22:40:00.000+02:00

Tomorrow I say goodbye to Bangkok, to Koh San road which I know I'm misspelling, goodbye to Jen and Dimple, and goodbye to paying things in Baht. I'll be exchanging my currency into Dollars of the Singaporean kind, and take the longest busride of my life through Malaysia to Singapore. Almost two days on the road. Even though I'm dreading the sleeping on the bus bit, I'm really keen on going for a plethora of reasons.

Today's impressions:
Stalls with everything my material heart desires. A man on a motorcycle wearing goggles, with a black dog in front of him, wearing goggles. A woman carrying as cage filled with tiny rabbits. A very old blind, toothless woman singing over a microphone while being led by the hand by a guy. Ping-pong.. and all the rest. Made friends with the guy who sells the bags down that other road, and he took us around Patpong. I've wanted to visit this seedy side of this seedy city every since reading about Patpong repeatedly in Tom Robbins novels. Tuk-tuks and people from all over. Sat for over 3 hours getting my hair dreaded while watching a kaldeidoscope of people walk by. Food. Oh, the food.. Always hungry. Fantasy world. Freshly squeezed juice from tiny oranges. Ran into a South African girl I met on Sado Island way back when. You can't get away from the small world syndrome. Absolute randomness.

I've seen so much that I wished desperately I would remember, but it's impossible. I changed within two days of being here. No, actually when I walked out of the airport, I knew I would not be the same after this holiday. And the Thai alphabet is definitely my favourite thus far.

It's 3.51AM, and tomorrow we want to go see the Grand Palace, on which the temple in Bronkhorstspruit is based. So off to bed.

m.

2006-12-23T22:39:00.000+02:00

Life on earth was the best thing that could have happened to me

Thailand, baby.

2006-12-22T19:24:00.000+02:00

A short report from the ghettos of Koh San road. Spelling is for the birds. I keep thanking people in Japanese, and I don't understand the English.

Bangkok is a big, bubbling pot of colours, smells and people. With the King's face plastered on roads all over and food from heaven and crazy tukl-tuk drivers popping wheelies to our delight. Night markets and muay thai boxing with beer from plastic cups. My travels have been booked, and with it rooms in Koh Tao and Koh Phagnan. Seeing Hernes in 3 days time in Singapore. Would love to stop i Kuala Lum,pur, because I saw a picture of it, and it looks beautiful.

Through the amazement, Bangkok has a sadness under the surface. The people struggle, the roads are dirty, dogs covered in ticks sleep in forgotten corners. But I love it. It reminds me of Africa. The people are real. Their shoes are worn out and scuffed. In Japan, everyone's shoes look like they just took it from the box. It probably smells like store. I love the realness of Bangkok. I love feeling the sun on my face. I love it that people look me in the eyes and smile. Such a contrast from that other Island I now call my home.

Still on the to-do list; floating markets on the river, seedy sex shows in Patpong, superficial faith at the grand palace, a bus tour through Malaysia, a new city, a scuba course.

Gotta go.

xxx

Praat Afrikaans of hou jou bek.

2006-12-13T05:16:00.000+02:00

After the orphanage, we stepped into the shi to do a bit of shopping. I wanted to pick up a backpack for Thailand (now Thailand/Singapore) and a book on Japanese verbs (as verbs are the foundations of conversations. The rest are just bricks and mortar, with the onomatope being paintings from afar.)

In Maruzen, the "English section" bookshop where all the literature junkies go for their next hit, I cruised the aisles in search of my next escape from reality. They had a big sale on DIY language books that looked like someone found it in the back of the storeroom, forgotten after the 1986 sale, before Swahili was fashionable. I was about to turn away from the reminder that there are just too many languages and not enough time on earth, when I saw it. In garish, shiny orange, the koeksisters filled the cover in an almost perverse fashion. And there it was:

I flipped out. In the middle of this strange, foreign country where no one knows what I mean when I say "mos" or "sommer". I bought the book for the price of 2 vending machine green teas, and proceeded to to force-feed some of my friends tit-bits of Afrikaans information. (Tit-bits?)

Who else was going to buy it? I can't imagine some young Jap student going "Hey, let me spend hours on learning a language that is one of 11 in a country that no one knows of, and with this book I'll be able to not even pronounce it correctly!"

So, after this weekend, a series of random people will be all over the world in a few years, carrying with them knowledge of the bastard child of Dutch, the youngest language on earth, thick with history and memories. The language that grew up too fast.

Freakin' foreigners.

2006-12-12T08:43:00.001+02:00

F.Y.Intertainment

2006-12-05T05:10:00.000+02:00

Feedback on the test. Let's get it over with.

It might not have been the best idea to drink the night before. But it was a reunion of sorts, a visit to the dude with whom I missioned around in Tokyo, way back during orientation days. Vincent Vertue. With a name like that, a life of mediocrity is impossible. To my shock, I realised that he stays an hour by car away from me. In inaka terms, he is practically my neighbour. The English is this paragraph feels really bad, but I'm gonna trudge on. Voorwaarts mars!

So, got to his town of 2000 people somewhere in the afternoon, broke open the Jack & lime, went for dinner at this stunning little sushi bar which seemed like it was run from the owners' house. We sat at the bar calling out whatever fish names we could remember. The old man behind the bar lopped a chunk off whatever sea animal we chose an stuck it on a ball of rice, tinged green with wasabi. This was washed down with namabiiru and topped off with sake. Damn, `twas good.

FFWD to the next morning, Fukuyama station, too early.
I realised how futile me taking this test is, when I tried to asked a Japanese girl at the counter what the fastest way to Saijo is. Through my dehydrated mouth, I stupidly fumbled around, saying "uuhh.. kono densha wa.. uhh.. ano densha.. uhm.. ichiban hayai" and straining my nervous system while trying to hear what the price is. Nisenkyuhyakurokujuen sounds like "yoroshiku onegaishimasu" that time of the morning. Crap.

And then I went to write that damned test.

The second realisation of the futility, no, stupidity of the test kicked in when I entered the exam hall, and everyone was speaking Japanese. Sho-sho, `twas a Japanese test, but it was the lowest one, for crying out loud. Where was my question saying "This is a pen"? The instructions were in Japanese. The do's and don'ts were in Japanese. The freaking test questions were in Japanese! I felt like crying. No, actually I felt like having some onigiri and Myprodols. But alas.

The kanji and vocab part I rocked. But then came the listening. I was hoping for sentences like "Mary is a teacher. She is 30 years old. She is an American." You know, beginner level shit.
Instead, it went something like this (translated in English for your convenience):

A: So, Hiroshitakahiro, when are you going on holiday?
B: Oh, I'm going the day after the one that came before last week's yesterday a week from now.
A: So, you mean Thursday the 22nd?
B: No, the 22nd is a public holiday, so I'm adding that to e = mc square and then I do the hokey-pokey and I turn around.
A: Ahh, I understand! You are leaving the week before the day after yesterday's tomorrow which is not a Monday but a public holiday.
B: No, that is correct.

Yah, I almost burst a vein listening to that.

That was followed by intense grammar, where I did not know what to answer cause I couldn't understand the questions! Haha. Was a grand day out in Hiroshima ken. 40 minutes away from the peace park.

Aside from the test, it was rocking. Chatted to a Hiroshima NOVA dude with beautiful eyes and a cool hat, saw some Okayamans (what's up!), caught a train back to Fukuyama with wonderful earthlings, walked around with Kevin for a bit, met up with Vincent again, had korean barbeque, made my way home..

..which is the part where I decide to take a new route back home, in the dark, in the deepest inaka, in the lightly falling snow, just me, very tired, super paranoid, scared of the trees, and end up getting lost for 2 hours. There were no lights. No double-lane roads. No signboards. No houses. Just trees and concrete blocks and mountains and darkness and scary roadworks next to dangerous cliffs.

But that's another post altogether.

Countdown to wonderland

2006-12-05T02:51:00.000+02:00

For the first time in this round of my existence, I saw snow.

The way I imagined it would be, this first sighting of something I've only ever seen in pictures, was stupid picture-book material. In my head, I would have been standing by a window, seeing flakes fall from the sky. I would have opened a door to run outside, giddy, and catch flakes on my tongue. Maybe Christmas music would have started playing in the background, or a sled pulled by flying deer would have silhouetted past the full moon.

That was the expectation. This is the realisation:

Sunday morning, Vincent and I had our alarms set for 5:45am. I woke up in disbelief, Jack Daniels and sake still coursing through my blood. It was still dark outside, and bitterly cold. He came downstairs, we brushed our teeth, and ventured outside to take the road to Fukuyama, from where I'd be catching an early-morning Shinkansen to make it to Saijo in time to write a test in a language I don't understand.
While I was putting on my yellow Crocs, he came back inside, saying the car's windows were frosted over. Wow, pretty damn thick frost, I said later, drawing spirals in the white layer on my car's windscreen.

Just as we were about to leave, the car's headlights illuminated that.. things.. were falling from the sky. Like rain, only.. not. I noticed that in all the turns and corners, nooks and crannies, were coloured in in sparkly white. The further we drove, the more convinced we because that it's actually snow. Intelligent comments like "do you think.. yah dude.. I really think this is snow.. weird.. this is.. kinda.. shit man.. snow.." prevailed. I was both amazed and freaked out. It was like a harsh reality kicking in. The reality that I'm gonna be freezing my ass off. The reality that I won't be able to drive my car recklessly. The reality that summer is still a long way from here.

It wasn't quite jingle bells and snow angels, dashing through the snow on a one-horse open sleigh. It was miserable, dark, and I was sick and hung over, not even kipper enough to use the English function in my brain. But I was with another South African who was also cold and sick and hung over, and that made the experience more perfect than I could ever have imagined it.

To all the beautiful people

2006-12-05T02:47:00.000+02:00

I came to a wonderful realisation that I've grown to love some of my new friends in Japan.

And, to all the amazing humans that left comments on my page, and noticed that it never showed ("no show!", just like boobs in Japan.. harhar)
That's cause I switched over to another version of Blogger.
And I saw this one section saying
"you have 5 unmoderated comments
you have 19 unmoderated comments
you have..."

And today, while typing up Action Plans for my JTE's, I happened to click on it.
Thanks, you dudes rock.

2006-12-01T05:17:00.001+02:00

This study session has been made possible by

Morinaga Miruku Kokoa and 139yen milk.

And I still can't speak it.

2006-12-01T05:06:00.000+02:00

Four months ago I wouln't have been able to read my own handwriting. Ahh, how we grow.
I've been saving a bunchload of money staying in and studying until my eyes burn and my back hurts. That being the result of studying on the floor (kotatsufied.) in bad light.

Only one more sleep to go till Hiroshima, and two more till that darned test.

Tis gonna be a good weekend.

2010 - Love to be there

2006-11-29T07:57:00.000+02:00

About 40% of adult deaths that occurred in the age group 15-49 years in 2000 were due to HIV/AIDS. About 20% of all adult deaths are due to AIDS. When combined with the excess deaths in childhood, AIDS accounts for 25% of all deaths in the year 2000 and has become the single biggest cause of death in South Africa. And if nothing is done to treat AIDS, the number of AIDS deaths is expected to grow further to more than double the number of deaths due to all other causes, resulting in 5 to 7 million cumulative AIDS deaths in South Africa by 2010.

There's this media campaign for AIDS awareness in South Africa called Love Life. I always thought their approach to the topic was a bit off-colour, rather promoting promiscuity than steering the youth away from it. The main slogan for the campaign (see title) was to inspire the youth to stay alive till 2010- it being the year of soccer world cup, SA's first attempt at proper public transport, and, well it's just such a smooth number. Even though I found the message slightly morbid the slogan stuck, and wherever my road leads me, in 2010, I'd love to be on home grounds.

With SA recently passing a bill legalising gay marriages (see http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15714036/ ) and religious fanatics kicking up a storm over this, I've been wondering where the line is between human rights and overseeing immorality. Just to clarify myself - the passing of the bill is shaap-shaap in my books. A liberal decision, but it is almost 2005, y'all. SA is a pioneering, leading country in so many ways, and in just as many, it's stuck in the corrupt political mud.

The line gets thinner with the following:
A mail from my mother, a teacher, told of the following developments in SA's education.
The government wants to implement maternity leave for school children, because so many pupils are out of school with pregnancies. The even want to bring creches to school, so that the children and their children can be close together. The kids keep having kids because the government gives grants to underaged mothers (the more kids your have, the more money you get, without lifting more than your knees). And so continues a destructive cycle.
The path to hell being paved with good intentions and all that.

That was my daily dose of cynicism.

On a happier note - I had whale for school lunch. Itadakimashita!

Hyaku bottles of beer on the wall, hyaku bottles of beer..

2006-11-21T09:04:00.000+02:00

The vice-principal just offered me coffee, even though I've been parked on the net for almost an hour now. Maybe they do like me.
See, this is where paranoia comes in. You sit at your desk, secretly typing mail messages about Mexian nights and Second-hand shopping into your keitai under the table. You could be making worksheets or re-developing the teaching structure or thinking up games for class, but really, there'd be no point.

My team-teacher partner (snigger. haha. yeah. whatever) has called in sick for the second day in a row. Yesterday he had a very, very high fever. Today he cannot move his head. Ladies and Gentlemen, English has been cancelled. Ja, these kids' English future has been cancelled. At least they have Japanese, which'll take them another 6 or so years to figure out in any case.

Wait, the paranoia bit:
So, you're sitting at your desknot working, which in essence goes against my work-ethic grain, but I have my own admin to do and verbs to study, and no classes to teach. Shite man, the kyoto-sensei even asked me to please enjoy studying today.
But still.
Underlying paranoia combined with just enough knowledge of the language to know that you don't understand, creates a dangerous combination. In my hiragana-muddled mind, any and every conversation could be about me, and how I'm not working. It's all the product of knowing that I could be doing more than I am at the moment. Eish.
That's the thing with paranoia. It's very self-centered. And that's exactly the reason why I never hang onto it for very long.

And in other news, I don't have school the next two days.

Join the JET program! All we ask of you is nothing!

Always knew I was unique

2006-11-15T08:07:00.000+02:00

HowManyOfMe.com

There are:
0
people with my name
in the U.S.A.

How many have your name?

2006-11-10T13:16:00.000+02:00

Ever wonder what it'd look like if you had to make out with yourself?

Oh.. no? So it's just me?

okay..

2006-11-10T13:14:00.000+02:00

We waste, therefore we are

2006-11-10T12:44:00.000+02:00

After reading a post on Wessel's blog concerning whaling, I've been having arb conversations with fellow teachers about why Japan keeps killing whales, even though their numbers are going down. Feeding thousands of schoolkids on tomato-soaked whale meat for school lunch, and till having enough left over for dogfood..

To see the entry, direct your cursors to

http://thesausageonmylap.blogspot.com/2006/11/here-today-gone-tomorrow.html#links

The fact is, it all comes down to supply and demand. The demand for tons of cheap meat is high in a country of 128,085,000 hungry people. And, as the saying goes, "There is nothing to throw away from a whale except its voice". Money talks, and it keeps the spears sharp.

To end this unfocussed post about waste (because I've had many rants about it in the past 3 months, plus Vicky just gave me a bowl of chicken curry and rice, so itadakimasho), I'd like to quote something by my new favourite author, Haruki Murakami.

Waste is the highest virtue one can achieve in advanced capitalist society. If you put an end to waste, mass panic would ensue and the global economy would go haywire. Waste is the fuel of contradiction, and contradiction activates the economy, and an active economy creates more waste.

Trying Hard to Be a Girl (part 2)

2006-11-10T12:38:00.000+02:00

Halloooo Kitty!

In an honourable attempt to subscribe to Japanese stereotypes, I pimped up my keitai. Cellphone. Texting device.

Once again, I had a total of one class at school today, and spent a good 4 minutes raiding the sticker collection I found in my desk drawer and turned my phone into a fruit salad. Cherries and strawberries, that's what girls are made of. And here, boys too.

For the kids back at home, here's a little poem:

waarvan is meisies gemaak?
van koekies en soentjies en soet soet lemoentjies
daarvan is meisies gemaak

waarvan is seuntjies gemaak?
van paddas en slakke en rondloper brakke
daarvan is seuntjies gemaak

Trying Hard to Be a Girl (part 1)

2006-11-10T12:31:00.000+02:00

Okay, so, how cool are these boots.

No, really. On a scale from 9 to 10, how cool are they?

Sure, they are one number too small, I lose all feeling in my toes after wearing em for more than 5 minutes, and they make my feel feel like it's being ground up for minced beef. But that's hardly the point, ne.

That's what happens when you buy footwear at a Japanese toystore.

Quote Unquote Japan

2006-11-08T07:23:00.000+02:00

Thursday Evening - Slurry conversations with young, drunken boys.
Him: "So, are you an uma?"
(uma is Japanese for horse)
Me: Uma? What? Am I a horse?
Him: No no.. an uuuuma. Is your sex an uma?
Me: Do I.. What? Are we talking beastiality here?
Him: Nooo. Not Uma... Uma! Like. Not a man, a uma.
Me: Oh.. Woman.. You want to know if I'm a woman. Nice.

Saturday - Driving to Mt. Daisen.
"Have you ever made out with an ape?"

Saturday - Driving back
"Oh look, there's the salaryclam!"
--The what?
"It's a clam wearing a suit and tie. A salaryclam."

Putting the 'exclude' in 'exclusivity'

2006-11-01T11:44:00.000+02:00

Drie maande het verbygegaan. Die Honeymoon is verby. Met die dalende temperatuur kom die harde realiteit dat jy heavy ver weg van die huis is. Daar is nerens om jou wonde te gaan lek nie. Niks is bekend nie - nie die kos, die mentaliteit, die taal, die tv programme, die mode, niks herhinner jou aan wat jy ken nie. Winter voel groot en koud, en wag om die draai soos 'n Hatfield mugger.

Snaaks genoeg kan ek twee definitiewe oomblikke onthou in die afgelope 24 uur wat alles grys gekleur het.
1) Ek het met 'n skok besef dat niemand ooit vir my sal kom kuier nie. Nie sonder 'n kar nie. Bitter min mense gaan ooit Niimi toe, want hier's niks nie. En van Niimi af vat dit 30 minute met 'n fiets om by my uit te kom. Hierdie is seclusion soos jy nie kan imagine nie.
2) Ek het wakker geword uit 'n Suid Afrika droom, waar ek omring was met mense wat baie vir my beteken. Ek het met my oe toe gele en na 'n kriek buite geluister, en was convinced dat ek op my bed in Sasolburg was, onder die quilt wat my ma gemaak het. Totdat ek besef het ek le in Japan. Om halfpad om die wereld te travel in 0.4 sekondes is bliksems vinnig. En die landing is nogal seer.

So, vasgevang in bad habits en pointless existence het 'n week van introspeksie stadig in my kop in gesyfer. Bastian Balthazar Bux se kamer met 'n duisend deure en 'n goeie dose Dandy Warhols het dit verder gevat. En so het ek in 'n dromerige niksheid rondgeloop met vraagtekens om my gesig vir te lank. Tot 5de periode.

Shouji. Skoonmaaktyd. Almal gryp besems en lappe, en vee vloere en was tafels. Daar's nie iets soos faktotums in Japanese skole nie. Ek en die secretary doen ons eie dinge in stilte, totdat ek vir haar in Japanees vra waar ek 'n vuilgoedsak kan kry. 'n Stadige conversation ensue, oor my heritage, Hollands en Engels, maar my oe is seer van kanji oefen, en my kop is seer van Japanees luister.

Sy vat my na my tafel toe, en bring 'n klein boekie na my toe. Die titel is iets soos "Some days are blue". Elke bladsy het 'n standaar cute animal foto in swart en wit, met 'n sinnetjie in hiragana/katakana/kanji geskryf, en 'n Engelse translation onder dit. Sy lees die Japanees. Ek lees die Engels. En ek is oortuig dat die sekretaresse 'n engel is.

Hierdie simpel boekie cruise bladsy vir bladsy deur elke ding wat my gepla het. Partykeer voel dit asof jou lewe geen doel het nie. Partykeer voel jy oorweldig. Partykeer voel jy klein en insignificant. Partykeer weet jy nie waarom jy doen wat jy doen nie. Maar moenie moed verloor nie. Onthou wie jy is. Aanvaar elke uitdaging, en aanvaar verantwoordelikheid vir jou besluite. Niks is te groot nie. Niks is onmoontlik nie.

Na die tyd wil ek vir haar se "jy verstaan nie hoeveel hierdie vandag vir my beteken het nie, in alle eenvoudigheid", maar ek het nie die woordeskat om dit te doen nie. So ek arigatou, ek domo arigato, en sy smile, knik haar kop, en se vir my ek kan huistoe gaan. En oppad terug notice ek alles wat ek begin mis het - die sonlig op die water, die rooi shrine hek in die bosse weggesteek, die maan wat in die daglig soveel groter as in SA is..

Maybe is hemel op die platteland. Maybe is daar engele.

To Re-Direct your Attention

2006-10-31T07:17:00.000+02:00

Hi there.

I suck at blogging laterly. Lately. After analysing the situation, I have come to the following conclusion.

The reason for this atrocious style of blogging is due to bits and bats of the following:
1) I have no internet connection (always a good excuse)
2) Typing extensive paragraphs in the teacher's room leads to paranoia, and it's not like I'm in need of any more.
3) So much happens every day that it's nearly impossible to pick out one single event and write a paragraph about it
4) I couldn't really be bothered. Thank you to the apathy-inducing junior high schooling system.

So, for your convenience, I now boast a range of links to other people around the ken. Prefecture. The area in which I reside.
To kill some time at work, and find out what I've been up to.. just fool around in their links.

One day, one day...

marilu.

Double-dose Despondency

2006-10-27T06:32:00.000+02:00

What was I thinking?

Seeing as my job does not actually involve working, I have been spending my hours at school making flashcards for myself, and getting the grip on 2 new alphabets.
The reason for this illustrious behaviour is not self-improvement or over-enthusiasm.. no sirree, I am studying for an exam. A very expensive exam. Just like kids at school.

Today I read up a bit on JLPT level 4 (the lowest you can go), and someone was quoted as saying "Level 4 is a joke is you have 1 year of University Japanese behind you, or 6 months of diligent study once in Japan". Needless to say, I'm not finding it very funny.

I just started, which leaves me with less than six weeks to memorise 800 Japanese words and 80 kanji. And not go mad in the process.
Gambarimasu. Me and my clever ideas.

(on the plus side, I should be able to hold my own in conversation with the 5 year old by sometime next year)

Kwaidan : Stories and studies of strange things

2006-10-13T08:18:00.000+02:00

Today has been absolutely grand.
The students were all on some sport trip, so I studied a few Japanese verbs and then proceeded to research Obakemono; ghosts and spirits of the Japanese past and present. Ghost stories are everywhere, and I have taken a fasciantion to both that and Japanese children's stories.

The secretary and the vice-principal were very excited about me getting into the mysterious underground of their nation's tales. She proceeded to tell me a local ghost story called Yuurei taki (Ghost waterfall) in extremely broken English. Her extended pauses just added to the suspense, as I had to wait for her translation to find out what happened next. After she painstakingly related the story, she re-typed it into Yahoo Instranslator, and this is what it mangled out:

There was young mother named "Yasumoto Masaru" in old days in Kurosaka-mura in a prefectural border of Tottori and Okayama.
The friends who worked overtime in the sewing factory which she commits at the night of a certain summer had a chat, but will say that I "contribute money together if I return to here with an offertory box of 瀧山神社 and will give a reward to the person at suggestion of a woman of そのなかの seniority.
When she who was a bride of a poor farming family wants to let my child eat a delicious thing, I come forward and will go to a test of a courage. I ran in a dark road at night hard and was going to return in delight when she who arrived at an offertory box "was successful".
When go by 瀧 on the way; from the back "leave" it!　 I felt like having heard a mysterious terrible voice of ", but I covered my ears desperately and returned on the run to a factory.
When I finally opened a door of a factory, one of the women who waited screamed.
Her back was bloody.　
It was assumed by her, and the neck of the baby who should have slept peacefully disappeared as picked off by someone.

Disclaimer : 'tis a pity that you didn't get to hear the real story, cause it's actually very good. But bad computerised English always makes for easy humour.

Long weekend, indeed.

2006-10-11T07:18:00.000+02:00

Friday
A car locked in the parking lot of a bank I don't even use.
Cycling in the rain.
A cellphone with a flickering screen that reminds of disco lights or Outer Limits.
(they are watching)
Beer at Tara's and more than a slight annoyance with myself.
Good, good, good food and two Takahashi girls.
Clam factory.
And the last proper night's sleep in three days.

Saturday
7 am arrival in Niimi armed with backpack (contents: toothbrush, Zambian cloth, firepoi, camera, socks, dictionary, tshirt and wallet) and tent.
7:30 Bus to Shin-Osaka.
The Japanese dude that had to sit next to me looked petrified as he checked, re-checked and double checked his seat number. It took him les than 5 minutes to fall asleep (it's a special gift they have), and was soon leaning most of his body on mine as he dreamt about a world without white people.
10:30-something. Arrival in Shin-Osaka.
A slow walk through a fleamarket, and a lesson in Osaka-ben. "oo-kii-ni" means "thank you". A phonecall to Cisco Osaka while in the playpark, attention distracted by a tiny dog and two damn cute Japanese kids. The phonecall led us to the underground subway, the red Midosuji line, to the wonderfully seedy Shinsaibashi.
Arrival in Shinsaibashi
Loud music; rock and trance blaring from shop fronts. Everyone looks as if they fell from the circus bus. Strange kids. Second hand shops like you won't believe. Beer and sushi in the rain surrounded by Japanese misfits and the odd bum. Also a geeky-looking dude with a Lonely Planet, Japan. A kid with weird shoe fashion chases doves around the plain. Unsuccessful sunglass shopping in a shop with trolls. Ice cream in a strange shop where the man behind the counter wore a garage attendant outfit, and the decor was American enough to make me lose my direction.
Change to Daikoku-naninani
Mistake. The suburb features a drab-looking dude with a newspaper, and a gaijin that almost rode into a wall when Tara asks him "how ya doing". Consult Lonely Planet. We go back underground.
Change to Namba
Slightly better. Namba has a beautiful park, beautiful buildings. I'm hit by the realisation that I know of three people in Osaka, but forgot about them. Too late to contact them, as my phone has ceased to be. If it wasn't made from plastic it'd been pushing up the daisies. 100 yen shops and asking a construction worker for directions. The sun has set. We walk back to Shinsaibashi, where we've left part of our souls.
The directions are vague, the language barrier existant, and the map nonexistant. We end up in the part of town with the huge crab on the wall that I have seen in so many travel brochures. We gawk and gape and ask for directions.
I crave takoyaki, because the smell hangs around between raindrops and clouds of cigarette smoke. We're still lost. We find our way to where we were before. Looking for a nomihodai (drink all you can) place that starts with "pa". The word 'nomihodai' catches my attention between strings of Japanese words advertised by voice. We are led to floor 8 of a closeby building for 888 yen nomihodai. Two hours passes quickly. We stuff ourselves with food and cocktails, while thoroughly entertained by the clapping girl on the next door table. I get my takoyaki.

Only after this, the madness really started. Random Jap dudes with purple hair and facial piercings. Pickups on street corners cause foreign girls are easy. I meet a Sotho guy from SA, and greet him with a Sawubona. He appreciates my Nkomazi shirt. We stay much longer than indended. We stay in Osaka much longer than intended, but I fell in love with it's colourful undergroundedness. Where this post is at the moment, the night is still young, but I have lost interest in my writing.

Until later,
M.

Program 3 Lesson 2

2006-10-06T09:03:00.000+02:00

"I have accepted the fact that there is no God in Japan" - South African, Nagasaki.

So, Hello Kitty and black bobby socks with golden shoes are big in Japan. So are stupid hairclips on boys, easily accessible alcohol, stuffed animals dangling from cellphones, keepin' up with what's hot this week, oven mitts as bicycle gloves, not using couches, and pokemon characters that get in the way of the weather report on TV. The list goes on forever.

With so many things being big in Japan, they kinda missed out on the Sunday as a rest day. Maybe it's a Western thing. God knows (..or does He..?), organised religion is NOT big in Japan.

I'm going to have to work my third Sunday, soon. Trouble with the previous two was that I didn't sleep for many, many consecutive hours, and then tried to stay awake during 45 minute long plays in Japanese, soaked in bad acting. It was an exercise in futility.

Today, I was presented with the following deal:
You work at the open day on 22 October. It's a Sunday, of course.
You get the Monday off.
The possibility exists that you can go home at 13h00 on Sunday
BUT
If you go home at 13h00.. you are not allowed to leave your house until 16h15.

Now, I can try to be funny and say (to myself).. "Haha.. what, is Big Brother going to see me?"
but I know the answer to that question. And it's not a comforting one.

Program 3 Lesson 1

2006-10-06T05:22:00.000+02:00

I don't want to make this a blog about school. At all. You want stories about how absolutely ridiculous the teaching time in a JET's life is, surf the net. There's loads of personal sites there that range from the absolutely hysterical to the eye-gougingly drab. So, for the first and hopefully last time, I will share with you two moments from my day so far. It's not even lunchtime yet.

Scenario 1 - First, yes first team-teaching lesson with my elusive Japanese Teacher of English (JTE)
He's rambling on in Japanese, and I'm having a grand time daydreaming about.. whatever. It's harder to pin down daydreams that it is to remember night dreams. I hear my name. It's my que! I jump to service. Shall I pronounce something for you? Perhaps I can pass a pen to you?
Oh no.
He says: "Mariru sensei... please explain to students.. the difference in intonation and pronounce.. for different English speakers.. from these countries."

Immediately I think: "Huh?".

I look at the board, where there's three points scribbled in katakana. Crap. I take a moment to decypher the question.
The writing on the wall says:
1) I-gi-ri-su
2) A-me-ri-ka
3) Oo-su-to-ra-ri-a

He must have noted the blank expression on my face, for he elaborated on the question. He added on the blackboard the words: "How are you?"
Then he asked me to explain the different ways that speakers from the above countries pronounced the phrase "How are you?"

I stared at him in disbelief, the whole class waiting for my answer.

"Well.. " I replied. "It's all about the local way that words are used. For example, Australians would not say 'Good morning', but would say 'Gday mate!'"

I felt enveloped by stupidity.

But they went for it. He translated my stupid little speech (including how South Africans say "Howzit" instead of..) into Japanese for the class, and I was free to go.

Disclaimer
I sincerely apologise to all Australians for stereotyping in order to save my ass. But the kids won't remember anything. I have come to believe that all English knowledge is extraced from their minds during monthly brainwashing sessions.

Koh Koh Bango

2006-10-02T06:50:00.000+02:00

With the amazing assistance of Miss Silverman and her understandable Japanese skills, my ticket to Thailand has been booked. I realise that we're kinda jumping the gun here, as the plane only departs 21st December, but as they say in ZuluLand: Walala Wasala.

I am eagerly anticipating this trip. But first.. there are three more months of Japan madness to get through.

We survived.

2006-09-19T10:39:00.000+02:00

According to Patricia Schultz's book, 1000 places to see before you die, seeing the sun rise from the top of Mount Fuji is regarded as one of the most moving natural experiences you can have on our ball of clay.

She forgot to mention that you will also be stiff as a plank, your eyes will be bloodshot from volcanic dust that had been sandblasting your retinas for the past few hours, you'll lose basic speech ability, you will be shaking like a reed from the cold, even with 5 jackets layered over each other, and the wind will cut into your lips so much that it'll still be peeling two days later.

Even with the physical discomforts, the garaikou (sunrise) was an awe-inspiring sight. I felt on top of the world, looking down at creation. The sunrise started as a neon pink smear across the horison. It grew and progressed to become orange, yellow, golden. It touched the clouds, forming spaceships and alternate universes across the expansive horison.

I was surprised to see how many people had come to climb through the darkest night for eight or nine hours, just to see the sun rise. Earlier, we looked down during water breaks to see caterpillars of lights ascend the mountain. Strings of Japanese climbers, each equipped with a different coloured light, walked in long, snaking rows with the bells on their walking sticks echoing through the night. People from all over the world sat on top of the symmetrical emblem of Japan, huddled together for some warmth, waiting quietly for the skies to change colour.
PS, I went all the way there and back, and I did not take one photo of Fuji-san. I took photos of the thousands of bells hanging from the shrine at the top. I took photos of bleary-eyed fellow travellers. But not one of Fuji. Well, I suppose I can just google image it if I really want to.

PPS The above photo was taken with my keitai. I had reception on the top of Fuji! Hurrah for Docomo! Alas, there was no one that I wanted to phone.

PPPS Ta to Isabel who sent me the photos I sent her. Let's picture tennis! One day when I own a laptop, I promise to add some photos of bells, found only on top of the mountain.

Fuji Food

2006-09-19T04:53:00.000+02:00

I have been inacpacitated for 2 days now. My legs are so sore that I had to take the car to school today, and I have to slide down the 4 steps from my 'loft' to my 'living room' on my bum, cause climbing stairs is too painful. I am a victim of Fuji-san. My chapped lips and sunburnt face is the price I payed to see one of the great wonders of the natural world - a sunrise from Mount Fuji. And it was worth it.

Before I elaborate on the volcanic rocks and the lights in the night, I want to introduce to my mostly South African readers another amazing Japanese snackfood - The Onigiri.

Onigiri is basically a triangular steamed rice ball with a convenient blanket of seaweed wrapped around it. Inside this plain but tasty snack, you can find anything from Ikura (fish eggs) to tuna & mayo, Umeboshi (extremely salty pickled plums) or salmon. The combinis (convenience stores.. but they are, like REALLY convenient) stock a host of flavours, shapes and sizes, and it has become one of my favourite on-the-go things to eat.

Onigiri was also the reason why I made it all the way up Mount Fuji. To be technical, Jen's onigiri (thank you!) and a few Snickers bars (which made me think of you, Wessel) is what got me to the top. I finished all my food before we were even 100m up the mountain, and was forced to snack on the rest of the night climb crew's food: nuts and apricots, dried peas and energy bars, chicken-shits and dried banana. You guys rock. Volcanically.

Wessel.

2006-09-14T11:15:00.000+02:00

お誕生日おめでとう

Geluk met jou verjaarsdag, ne.

(ek try all in touch met die Ooste wees hier)

Seeing as ek hierdie een nie saam met jou kan vier nie, maybe maybe New Years?

after all these years..

2006-09-13T11:52:00.000+02:00

Tonight is the night.

I've been wanting to see this movie ever since Hernes and Riette told me how they saw this in Germany, and held hands crying, and I sniggered and called them wusses. That was aaaages ago, and I've unsuccessfully been half-heartedly looking for this film. I did manage to catch 5 seconds of it while channel-hopping when I was still dating that other dude. Rephrase - ages ago when I still used to date.

Then, last night I found it while raiding Vicky's video collection. It was like an emerald in the hay, a needle on the camels's back, a shiny thing presented to a depraved crow. I can't wait.

Man, screw this blogging thing, I'm going home.

Living for Living on Weekends

2006-09-13T11:35:00.000+02:00

Time seems to be sped up in this country (slash Island slash Alternate Universe). Every time I get a second to catch my breath, the week is almost riding away in the sunset, taking with it silly self-introductions and Tuesday Night dinners in Niimi. I seem to live from weekend to weekend, and the options with which I can fill my days off just never ends.

On the weekend of 22-24 September (which also features my bro's birthday), I have my mind stubbornly set on going to this place

for one of these

(just with more green than that pic.)

Well, I think that it is in a place called Ryokusuiko. I can only read four things on the whole flyer, and that is the name of the party, the date, the price (per day or for the weekend..? pfft, I dunno) and the URL.. which leads to a site where I can only understand.. three things.

First things first though. This Friday, 44 of us are off on a little trip to.. more North, Japan, to go climb this mountain (looks so tiny on the picture.. Little Fuji-san)

Get it while it's hot.

What's In A Name?

2006-09-13T11:02:00.000+02:00

In South Africa, my name was Marilu Snyders.

I miss that name. I miss the roll of the r, the normality of the spelling, and the pitch in the right places (never figured out how you're actually supposed to pronounce it though.)

In English conversation, my name is Marylou Snaiders.

In Japan, they just raped it into a complete different alphabet. You got an 'l' in your name? Hey, we don't do l's... no more for you!

In Japan, I am Mariru Sunaideesu.

The bizarre bit is that, within my first week here, I started introducing myself as Mariru. Sneaking in the alien 'l' caused too much confusion.

Today, my name unexpectedly levelled up.
One of the teachers walked up to me, and stuck a sticker of a blue mouse on my textbook.
"Do you know?", she asks me. The mouse looks vaguely familiar, uhm, yeah some cartoon or maybe.. "It is pocketmonster"
Oh yeah! Pokemon! It's a blue pokemon!
"This Pokemon is also called... Mariru. Same as you."
And damn, it sure is. Ladies and gentlemen.. Meet Mariru.

Nothin' to Learn from Dwarfs

2006-09-10T07:26:00.000+02:00

Today, for the second time in a week, I was politely asked to not whistle while I work.

Strangely enough, the only other time I was asked to suck up my whistle, was also in Japan. It was for more valid reason though, as the person who asked me to do so was a girl with a crazy fear of snakes, and she had heard that whistling at night attracts snakes. I have no idea where that belief is from, but it was valid enough for me to adhere to her request.

But why no whistling on school property? Who knows. What I do know is that I've memorised the words to "Girl, you'll be a woman soon" so that I can sing it in the teacher's room, Uma dance and all.

A Cow Goes Moo

2006-08-31T10:28:00.000+02:00

As I'm gathered around the dinner table with my neighbours all around, the food just keeps comin'. I'm in heaven. I keep making notes. Translating fish names. The next plate arrives, pinkish meat with veggies.
"Douzo.. please, have some," the guy next to me says.
"Ooh, what is it?" I asked, chopsticks poised to grab a bite.
He smiles. He leans forward. All the other people around the table lean in as well.
"No no.. Just have some. Tell us.. if you like."
By this time I was just hoping that it wasn't something that used to be human. I pop it in my mouth. Chew. And chew. And chew chew chew. Salty. Chewy. Tasty. Oishiii desu!
The rest of the table was intently watching my every chew. They lean back, and remember to breathe.
"Ahh. You like? It is pig stomach. Hahaha!"
Oh, really? I ask, and pop another piece into my mouth.

Yup. I'll eat anything. Bring it on.

O-no-ma-to-pe

2006-08-31T05:49:00.000+02:00

As an avider reader of dictionaries, and a speaker of Afrikaans, it was inevitable that I stumble upon the Japanese idea of onomatopoeia within my first month.

Afrikaans is choc-full of onamatopoeia, but in a sense that the words mimic the sounds of the action. Words like "plons" and "klap" and "hop" are fun to say, and are extremely descriptive. You could paint a mental picture with verbs.

Japanese has a wealth of double-glance words. In the end, they don't mean anything to me because they are all just repetitions, but they are still fun to say, although they do not paint any mental pictures in my bilingual (soon to be semi-tri-lingual) mind.

Some of the words are:
tabi-tabi (often, many times, frequently)
waza-waza (especially, on purpose)
zoku-zoku (in succession)
pera-pera (fluently)
pin-pin (lively)
suya-suya (quietly, gently)
don-don (one after another, bang, beat, rapidly, on and on)

Last night at the short-notice dinner party (which turned out to be a party worth writing home about), the first dish was a small bowl of juicy looking snails (called baigai). Imagine my delight when I asked them how to eat it, and my neighbour took a toothpick and said "kuru-kuru".. and I knew that she meant "turn it round and round". Small joys everywhere.

oh! bento

2006-08-30T09:40:00.000+02:00

This is one of my favourite things about Japan so far.

It gives new meaning to the concept 'lunchbox'. I especially like the ones that has pink lotus root in it.

I just received a call from my one school's secretary, saying they are ordering bentos tomorrow for lunch, would I like one?

Oh, and would I..

The introductory speech I have to give in front of the whole school tomorrow, in Japanese, seems trivial because.. I'll have bento for lunch.

Another Day In The Life Of

2006-08-30T09:29:00.000+02:00

I left early today from Ikura Chugakko, as they had nothing for me to do. The kocho sensei interviewed me for the monthly school paper, and I confused the shit out of them by listing "fire poi" as my only hobby. A dictionary consulting session followed, and "poi" was found to be a small Chinese potato. No, no, the other poi. Google images came to my resque (but what will the students think when they read it in the paper? Will they expect fried potato omiyage from me?)

Ikura Chugakko is on top of a hill, so getting there requires a drive up quite a steep incline. I'm sure all the kids in the school have beautiful calves. During my time at the school, three teachers asked me, with pride shining in their eyes: "So, what do you think of our slope? Steep, isn't it?"

After driving my car down the steep driveway, I stopped at a Lawsons for a tuna mayo onigiri, which I've recently become addicted to, and drove back to my tiny apato in Tetta-cho. I'm becoming more and more comfortable with breaking the 40 km/h speed limit, and I really am enjoying taking corners at the crazy speed of 60 km/h. It's almost an adrenaline rush.

As I get to my apartment, I decide to set back my plans of cycling to Niimi in favour of cleaning up the mess. I'm worse than a bachelor. A month down the line I still have papers from Tokyo orientation all over the show. I just started the systematic cleanup, when my doorbell rang. I picked up with a "moshi-moshi!", and a kid's voice replied something unintelligible. I opened the door in any case, and let Mizuki-kun in. He's a six-year old boy that seems to enjoy chilling with me while rambling away in Japanese, while I sit and clip my toenails and ask "nani? nani? nani?" the whole time.

Mizuki brought his Dragonball Z PS2 game. He had it there yesterday as well, and Nihongoed me though all the character profiles. Today he was convinced that my cd player was in actual fact a playstation, and tried repeatedly to get the disk to work. I looked up the word for "music", and kept repeating "ongaku, ongaku" while pointing at the cd player, but he was determined to transform it into something more.

Then the doorbell rang again.

"Moshi-moshi!" (I love saying that...) Reply is.. something in Japanese.. uhm.. so I open the door. There's an old Japanese man whom I've never seen before. He smiles and makes cutting motions in his hair with his hands. Uhh, no, I did not cut my hair.. Who are you? Maybe he was mistaking me for the previous ALT, who had long blonde hair and looked in no way the same as me. I introduce myself. He keeps rambling in Japanese. "Ahh, gomen nasai.. Only.. sukoshi Nihongo.." I utter.
He understands, and proceeds to include at least one english word per sentence.
"We have.. party for you? Yes? When?" Most of my evenings end in a beer drinking session with local gaijin, so it's not like I have a schedule or anything. We swop numbers and agree on next Monday. He says he'll phone me to confirm.

Back inside, Mizuki-kun is still trying the game on my cd player, stopping only to try on all my jewelery. He raids the fridge, and I give him chocolate. He colours in the pictures in my 100 yen katakana practise book. I have no idea what he is saying, but he doesn't stop talking. Eventually he just says "goodbye!" and runs out.

I make use of the opportunity to get on my mama chari (old-skool bicycle with a basket, but no gears), and cycle the 20 minutes or so to Niimi, where I can make use of free internet. While I'm replying to some mails from fellow South Africans, my phone rings. It's.. the dude from earlier. I can't remember Japanese names, as they all seem to be made up of different combinations of "yo", "ya", "ma", "no", "to" and "ri". It's all the same to me.

I moshi-moshi again, but this time with some apprehension. Ahh, they decided to move the party to tonight. I lack the language skills to fight, so I say that it sounds wonderful. Nan-ji? "roku-ji-han", he replies, which translates as 6:30. "So that's eight-sirty", he says. I can't muster up the enthusiasm to correct him, or attempt to figure out which of the times is correct, so I say my goodbyes, and decide to be home by 6.30.. and then wait. Who knows what the evening hold.

Nippon? Ahh.. sugooooi..

It's the little things that kill

2006-08-11T06:56:00.000+02:00

I am painfully aware of the fact that my blog is being spammed.
So, I visit it every now and again to delete the stupid "here are some interesting links" comments, in a futile attempt to keep my comment space clean and clinical.

So, why not just add the squiggly letter fucntion? I hear myself ask.

See, I'd love to add comment verification protection spam-prevention.. but.. In Japan, die whole damn blogger site is in Japanese. I don't even know where the "English" button is, if there is one. There's no chance that I'll be able to do anything more complicated that post a message, and hopefully, one day, add a picture or two. Yup, I am now more illiterate than I was at age 4. So, this must be what braindamage feels like...

On a less despondent note, I am trying my best to figure out how to travel about 700 kms North into the country to get to a party on the 18th, seeing as I have an insane amount of free time, which I'm getting payed for. The challenging bit is that I have no idea how this public transport system works..

Gotta find out some time though, and there's no better reason for learning to swim than throwing yourself into the deep side of the pool.

PS Until I find out how to englishify die blogger site, does anyone want my password to add the protection for me?

Say whaaaat?

2006-08-07T07:33:00.000+02:00

There's no point in visiting my blog at the moment.

No, really. I'm in the process of adjusting and decompressing in Japan, and for that I need a gaijin card. Wait, let me try structure my thoughts. I have very little internet time on my hands, as those who have not been receiving mails from me will be able to say. Today I had my first day of school, which ended at 12h00 (what a bonus..), so afterwards I changed my clothes, repacked my bags, and got onto my hard-on-those-hills purple bicycle and tried to keep my eyes on the narrow road for the 5 kilometres it took to get me to Niimi central.

In Niimi I got sunblock (why did I not listen to my mother when she offered me a whole bottle, free of charge?) because my exposed parts are turning a rural shade of Japanese already. White legs, brown arms, maybe I should invest in a pair of weird gloves and a bonnet hat.

My point with the gaijin card was the following: Before I can enter into communication mode again, I need this aforementioned card to apply for landline connections, keitai accounts and yes, I'll have a fax machine as well. So I'll keep you posted. This all should happen in the next few weeks. Next two weeks.

Now to figure out which button will let me post this message...

Ja mata ne

whatamess

2006-07-27T19:33:00.000+02:00

...at least everything is in heap-like heaps. It's a start.

Who's prepared?

2006-07-27T19:08:00.000+02:00

Instead of ripping the last 15 cds, I'm going to go visit Gert, who wants to make me a skirt with the most beautiful material on earth. This guy is great, and I've known him since childhood days. My first memory of him is seeing him walk with my brother in the garden, while I was chilling on the roof.. Or maybe I'm thinking of someone else. Nevermind.
There's often an occasion where we're all broke and hungry, and Gert would say "do you have eggs and some cacao", and 20 minutes later we'd have brownies. No recipe book. Nothing to wear tonight? No worries, he'll just make a jacket to cover his shoulders. Car troubles? Fixed if Gert is in the neighbourhood. He's like a McGyver of sorts. I really wish he came in a travel-sized pack so I could take him with.

I am a sum total of the phases I go through

2006-07-19T20:55:00.000+02:00

The past week was spent in a petrol-consuming daze of red wine and pasta, couch-hopping from one friend's house/flat to the other. I was spoilt enough to make me not want to go home (?), but I had other people in other towns/cities to see, so I filled up my tank with unleaded and moved on.
Also, I was in dire need of some fresh clothes, and was itching to check my mails. My packing skills have always let me down, and I spent a week in Pretoria with 3 pairs of pants, 2 shirts, and 8 pairs of socks.

Friday evening we decided to go against the grain, and payed a visit to the local alternative club in Pretoria central. Zeplins is located right next to the biggest Adult World that the city has to offer, giving it a slightly more dodgy feel than it perfectly well managed to exude on its own. We spotted a dog unit police car in front of the club, but our mild paranoia never realised, and we figured that they were probably busting the porn shop, or perhaps stocking up on handcuffs. (Or selling theirs, you never know.)
A long time ago, in a previous life, I used to frequent clubs that were even more alternative and more dodgy than the aforementioned Zeplins. Clubs where the only lighting was fluorescent, and people danced as if they were just resurrected from a miserable death. My mother always left me to go through my many phases, so when I told her the one day that I wanted a full-lenght body-hugging halter-neck black pvc dress, she said:

"Let's go buy material"

and she made one for me.

On Friday I donned it for the last time, danced for hours, inhaled yellow smoke from smoke machines, smelled my retinas burn in the persistence of the fluorescent tubes, and realised that I'll never wear it again.
It is being passed on to my dearest Tish. Use it well.

Gallerie d'Prinsloo 70

2006-07-18T21:13:00.001+02:00

(Closed Recently)

Some of the images that have travelled with me for years. The Pinkish siamese twin poster, I fished out of a garbage bin in front of the Uni radio station (blocked on wood and everything), and the brown little girl faces are years older than I am. Projects and presents..

Every object has a history
every picture tells a story

Petroleum Powered

2006-07-18T20:57:00.000+02:00

Sasolburg was established in the early 1950’s as a town to house a host of Engineers, specialists, mechanics, fitters and turners, the people who were responsible for making SASOL work. SASOL is the main company responsible for petroleum manufacture in SA, and Sasolburg was filled with great minds who worked long hours and built a giant energy corporation. It used to be a town with culture, where the trophy wives kept themselves busy with raising kids with high morals, and drinking tea at quilting clubs. My most frequently repeated quote about Sasolburg is “It’s the perfect place to raise kids. It’s not big enough to be a city, and it’s too big to be a small town. It’s a well-balanced town with well-balanced people.”

I spent the biggest part of my life in this town. Walking through the streets brought back memories from being in primary school and riding my bike, nearly being hit by a lightning bolt once and speeding back home, white as a sheet. Or the eye-to-eye I had with some insect, causing me to crash my bike into a fence and cutting open three of my toes as I never wore shoes in those days.

There’s this wonderful thing called groenstroke (green strips) in Sasolburg. This is basically a network of cement roads for bicyclists and pedestrians that snakes through the neighborhoods like a network of veins, keeping kids out of the streets and getting people to walk down tree-lined backroads. After 5 o’ clock, you found families on bicycles, families walking their dogs, old people walking hand in hand. Maybe I just had a beautifully disillusioned childhood.

Now, walking through town is like walking through a faded snapshot. Everything is still there, but neglect is spray-painted on the walls and overgrowing the pathways. Corrupt municipalities and apathetic government systems has led to the downfall of the town. Faded wrappers and empty cooldrink cans decorate the unkempt bushes. Plants grow through in cracks in walls and slowly creep over the man-made structures. What I like about it though, is that it almost seems like nature is reclaiming the land. With no budget to trim the hedges and cut the grass, plants are given free reign once again to grow over and around the structures put in their way, back when Sasolburg was still in it’s prime.

2006-07-18T20:44:00.000+02:00

Expectation vs Realisation

2006-07-12T08:11:00.000+02:00

With just over 2 weeks before I hop the ocean, you'd think that I'd be frantically organising those little things that requires organisation.. tying up loose ends, working out budgets, making lists of things to do.. being productive, is what it comes down to. So to recap:

What I was planning to do during my stay in Sasolburg:
- Unpack and repack my room full of boxes (to figure our what the hell is going on there)
- Go shopping for clothes that I can teach in, i.e. that weren't bought at the Salvation Army for 5 bucks and a piece of gum. In 1997.
- Study some Japanese that goes past 'konnichiwa' and 'arigato'.
- Brush up on hiragana and attempt katakana
- Figure out my finances
- Sort out my photos and make beautiful, cheesy photo collages for my blog.
- Mail a thousand friends
- Fill in my tax return forms

What I actually did during my stay in Sasolburg
- Walked around the town of my youth with a friend from my youth (who's still a good friend)
- Did hours and hours of reminiscing in nostalgia mode.
- Went for mid-morning walks in gardens with carel after which he gave me a crapload of movies and anime, and showed me a beautiful, silver flute.
- Watched countless episodes of Robot Chicken and Simpsons, and experienced braincell death because of that.
- Channelhopped (quite a novelty for someone who hasn't had a tv in years)
- Drove around town, in forgotten areas, past forgotten streets
- Sat on the back of a bakkie drinking beer, watching the sun go down and seeing two dudes play around with a bulldozer, breaking up logs for firewood.
- Chatted on MSN
- None of the planned things

For those with a short attention span, here's a picture of a rose.
(to be added later)

Ukulimala koyedwa ukulimala kwethu sonke

2006-07-04T12:09:00.000+02:00

The end of the financial year means tons of paperwork for some, day-long stock-takes for others, and for the plebian slave-workers of this factory, it means the legal fight for wage increases.

Led by COSATU, driven by fear and swept away by the crazy sense of community that black people have and white people will never understand (whites being driven by the fight for the individual), the first tendrils of an upcoming strike are already creeping into daily production.

As I started typing this, the veggie department (just around the corner) started singing, chanting: “Gerela yo.. Gerela, a nyamazane”

Loosely translated, this means something to the like of We will hunt until we find our animal.

Interpretively translated, this means We will not back down from our 20% increase demand, we will take your factory down, we will toi-toi in the streets and watch as you lose millions of rands per day because we won’t stand around like human machines for measly pay that is less than the legal minimum wage.

Personally, I’m rooting for the underprivileged, unschooled, underpaid, uneducated staff.

Something from the archives

2006-06-28T09:04:00.000+02:00

31 october 2005 - halloween (but in reality, just another monday evening)

My history with blogs stretches more than seven years back. I was still in high school, and already addicted to the internet. I was a regular in the imusic chatroom during the evenings, and, during the day I was living a strange double life inside my head where my thoughts revolved around the people behind the nicknames - people I've never met and never will. I haven't got the slightest idea what happened to them. They are somewhere on this planet, either dead or alive. i have no idea.

During this same time, I stumbled across my first blog. I had no idea that there was a name for writing of this kind, I just happened upon a site called tummyache.com (don't bother going there, it's now a medical site dealing with, well, tummyaches and the likes). I cannot remember the name of the girl who was the author of the site, but I soon became addicted to her online diary, reading my way through her life, her dreams, her obsession and disappointments. she worked in a book store somewhere in the USA, had a secret crush on her boss (or fellow colleague), she had a dog that she loved, and a stuffed lobster called Jesus. She also had an obsession with food, a hate for her desire of it, a hate for her bulemic tendencies, a hate for the significant role it played in her life. One story from her blog still lingers in my head today: After preparing a midnight snack of tapioca that she was voraciously anticipating, she tripped over stairs, fell down and so did the steaming bowl of tapioca. She ended this tragic story by saying: "and now I am certain that your God does not exist."

During my possibly pointless research into japan and everything that comes with the island, I started surfing the blogs of some JET kids, people who are in Japan thanks to the program I'm planning to join. Unfortunately, most of it made for terribly boring reading. basically their writing sucked, it was all "and then I went here, and then I saw these JETs, and then I got onto a train, and then". If I sound like a snob, it's because I am. There's nothing more torturous than scrolling through pages and pages of badly-written boo-ha. actually there is, and it's sitting through half an hour of makeup advertisements and previews about war movies when you really just want to watch the subtitled artsy film that you payed to see.

My second real blog addiction only started a month or so ago, something I came across while searching for JET blogs. Very well written, thoroughly entertaining (I keep thinking - damn this is better than reality tv), and frequently updated (as in 4 to 5 times a day, sometimes even more).. all the ingredients required to produce a blog that hooks. I'm not going to get into detail about this femme's blog, i'll put it up as a link one day one day when i actually have my own blog.

then what is this?

This is me, so enamoured with the idea of blogging (that comment alone should warn that i'm a geek at heart) that I'm writing my first post without a connection to the www, and without an existing blog. I've got this crap but trusty pentium 233 that always has notepad open and some essay in the making. Most of them I send off as emails to a hand-picked selection of cyber friends. The rest sit in my "arb crap" folder. when I die, I'd like all my words to be printed and cremated with me. But for the time being, it's relatively safe on my outdated harddrive, and it keeps me busy during the evenings.

I do have a social life, but i need to drive to get there. Currently, I'm staying in Bronkhorstspruit (try typing that really fast), South Africa. Just me and my cat and my notepad. Next year this time, I'm hoping to be in rural village, japan. I thought that a blog would be a convenient way for my friends to get a taste of what i'm up to, a million miles away.

this is how I know I have way too much free time on my hands - Applications for the JET programme has not even opened yet, and I'm already posting in my blog that doesn't exist to keep people updated with the life that I do not even lead. I've already decided which books I'll take with to Japan, because I'd feel lost without some reading material. i've limited myself to five, and according to today's reasoning, these five books are:

1) Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance (Robert M. Pirzig *note - confirm later) - because I only read the first forty pages before giving up, and I think it's an essential read. Must get own copy first.

2) The tao of health, sex & longevity by Daniel Reid - because this book will go wherever I go. It's a user manual to the human body, and my bible. It's wonderful for referencing. You say your kidneys hurt? Wait, lemme see, hmm yes you need to drink some cucumber and beet smoothies, off you go. Next!

3) Atlas shrugged, We the living, and Fountainhead by Anne Ryand - The fact that's it is three books is a technicality. If i count them seperately, I won't have space for

4) An Afrikaans book - If i'm gonna be stuck on a little island where I don't even know whether I'm in the male of female toilets, i'd like to have some reading in my mother tongue. It's a beautiful language, a bit rough around the edges, but jam-packed with onomatopoeia, which makes for delicious reading (and even better writing).

5) Application for position still open.

as a disclaimer - I chose to write in English because it is the language of the world, and the Net that binds it together. I prefer Afrikaans, but in case there's some wool-headed girl out there trying to blogspot some JET writings, I'd like to make this understandable, world-wide. The thought that I'm a vernacular traitor is made redundant by the fact that there a few blogs that I desperately wanted to read, but couldn't, because they were in freaking french or ali baba language. So yes, for your reading convenience this blog is dubbed into the language of microsoft and google, the language that is supposed to unite the world, the language i'm planning to use as my excuse to go chill in the East.

No News Is No News

2006-06-24T12:06:00.000+02:00

When my landlady knocked on my window to check if I was still alive, I realised that I really am not home all that often.

When the check-out girl at the supermarket said, “You really like red wine, hey?”, I realised that I might be overdoing the glassss-a-night thing.

When my daily friends kept asking why I haven’t posted anything on my blog recently, I realised that I’ve been neglecting my blogging.

I haven’t been neglecting my writing, as I spend many an evening in front of my pc with my cat on the monitor, a heater at my back, and a glass of wine in my hand. Another evening in Dronkwordspruit. It’s just that I’ve been pouring my arbitrary analysis and petty pet hates into personal emails. But I’m still writing. It’s my biggest addiction.

With two weeks, one day and 5 hours left of life as a food tech green-cap, I have been stuck on a mental analysis of my current situation. Just to kinda get a grip on what exactly it is that I’ll be leaving behind. And I’ve realised that I’m living a pretty damn comfortable life. I’m financially independent. I’ve got amazing friends. I’ve got a promising career ahead of me. I really dig my job. I love South Africa. I love the people. Even with many things missing from my life, I’m happier than some people will ever be.

So this is the perfect time to give everything up. It’s the clever way, like walking out of the casino when you’ve won your bucks. Thanks, much appreciated, check you later. Leaving a pseudo-perfect life behind means that my move is out of choice, not out of circumstance. I’m not running away from anything. I’m not leaving in fear of my future. I’m not seeking greener pastures. The grass I’m feeding on is pretty damn green. But I’ve never grazed on Japanese grass, which is more than enough reason to do it.

We’ve only got one planet. Go explore it.

I Don't Dream

2006-06-10T18:00:00.000+02:00

This picture has been floating around in my head the past few days. It was the first Dali I ever saw, in a book about dreams or psychology, something of the subconscious.
Can't remember, I was very young..

Speak Softly

2006-06-08T15:58:00.000+02:00

I've been so manically busy at work the past few weeks, that I haven't checked out my friends' blogs in quite a while. I don't see them half as often as I'd like, so The Blog plays a convenient, yet sterile role in me knowing what's going on in their lives. Make do with what you have.

I gave up on cleaning schedules and micro reports, and decided to wander down their mind lanes for a while. It left me feeling the way that I feel after witnessing any great work of art - both inspired and despondent. But for different reasons, this time around.

Be kind to people you meet for the first time - every person is fighting their own personal battle.

Experiencing A Slight Change In Pressure

2006-05-29T01:03:00.000+02:00

My options are limited:

1) Take an aimless walk around the factory

2) Phone a friend

3) De-scale the kettle

I've already done 1 and 2, and option 3 will have to wait a while, as I'm letting the water cool down for my umpteenth super-sized cup of green tea. No one should have to be at work at 4 o' clock on a Sunday afternoon. I'd rather be sitting outside with the sun on my face, reading the Sunday newspaper. But eh, you can't always do what you want. If you could have, free will would have lost it's novelty years ago.

All the white men who work nightshift here look like pedophiles with hidden collections of kitty and kiddy porn in their basements. And toy trains. I greet them with a friendly smile, but from afar, in fear that they might smell me. There's a younger nightshift guy who looks like a really scary Wolverine. Imagine Wolverine on meth for 6 days straight, lost in an industrial area. Wearing dark blue overalls. Scary people.

Yesterday, I took a manic drive from work to home to Pretoria, making my way to a non-compulsory JET Q&A session at the Embassy. Initially, I decided to go to check out my fellow jets, but in the end the gathering proved to be informative. Fortunately or unfortunately (I've yet to make up my mind), I've been researching Japan/JET like a crazylady for almost a year now. My brain is super-saturated with island info. Please, I'm looking for a distraction. Tell me a story, or invite me to something.

Time to de-scale that kettle, I think.

Sunrise in Bronkhorstspruit, Moonrise in Delta Park

2006-05-25T17:32:00.000+02:00

Afrikaners is Plesierig

2006-05-21T08:05:00.000+02:00

What I do when I visit my parents:
1) Eat as much candy as I can
2) Catch up on all my internet time (because work days does not allow for tea, lunch or casual surfing)

I've also been catching up on reading alternative Afrikaans online articles. Die boys (and the occasional skurwe girl) from the watkykjy team had me sniggering in front of the pc like an idiot. Moerse funny artikels. Dis my tipe people - born and bred in die Vaal Driehoek, 'n tersiêre geskiedenis in Pretoria, en 'n bitter siniese uitkyk met 'n tikkie galg humor. Love it.

Verontskuldiging
Alle pics in hierdie post is ge-rightclick, gesave en gesteel van watkykjy.co.za af. Dankie, ek waardeer dit. Spaar my die moeite.

Manzini Memories

2006-05-21T07:45:00.000+02:00

Should you ever find yourself in Swaziland, be sure to drive past Mbabane, onwards to Manzini and stop at House on Fire. It's worth every lush grassy hill.

This is also my 100th blog entry, so let's open that bottle of champagne...

Lost Pixellation

2006-05-20T12:04:00.000+02:00

Kid's colours. Bright red and turquoise are kid's colours.
It whispers to the brain to move into nostalgia mode. It begs for memories to be recalled.

Orange, on the other hand, is the colour of winter and tigers and citrus and institutionalised crazies, and monks, walking through mountains, holding umbrellas. It's a jacket zipped up to hide 'Easily Distracted'. Not many people wear orange. I'm very greatful for that.

On the subject of colour (a recurring theme), I wanted to comment on the spectacular clouds that were featured in the post below.

All four pics were taken while driving from my current home to my childhood home. It's a two hour drive (if traffic has not completely tapered out) on a long, farmstyle road that eventually curves past the airport. Before you actually hit traffic, you drive through this amazing landscape with a full, 360 degree view of the surroundings.

What I love about that road, is that you can look in four different directions, and see four different skies. 1 o' clock presented a grey sky with darkened smudges of rain, connecting the earth and the clouds. 4 -5 o' clock had a rain of a different kind: every shade of yellow, orange and gold pouring down from the sun, discolouring the clouds at such a sneaky tempo that every time I glanced, it was a completely different scene, each more breathtaking than the previous. My rear-view mirror displayed an innocent baby-blue sky with little white cartoon clouds. Looking over my left shoulder, I could see two rainbows drawn next to each other. A horison filled with colours.

The point is:
I was struggling to keep my eyes on the road. So many other things to look at. And I thought that I could not remember such amazing skies. Then I realised - Approximately a year ago, I was driving to my parents' place, on the very same road, struggling just as hard to keep my eyes on the road, when I was pulled over by cops. Speeding and swerving. I did get a fine, but talked it down, telling him the truth: My eyes were not on my speedometer, but on the clouds.

2006-05-20T00:14:00.000+02:00

Because I'm Practical

2006-05-19T22:35:00.000+02:00

I really do dig my hair. The supposed Winona Ryder style (huh, Ree?). So I shaved it again tonight. To be more specific, my brother shaved it for me, between snips and giggles. I just realised I wore the same freaking shirt the first day I shaved my head (scalp-skeer). Got the shirt from on of my weirdass female flatmates from my Pretoria days. The girl whose boyfriend worked at a butchery, and was addicted to Grandpas. The headache powder; not inverted peadophilia.

The point of the post (not all that comfortable splashing my face over my blog - especially not in a "before and after!" mediocre make-over setup.)
The point of the post was the following: I like having a mess of hair. So, to be really practical, I timed my hairgrowth that it would be of a messable lenght by the time I get to Nippon. No cutting, styling, brushing or serious washing in my future! Never thought I'd be blogging about my hair. Wonder if I'm slowly turning into a real girl. Best I stop while I'm a-head...

Autumn in BHS

2006-05-19T22:15:00.000+02:00

I remember when I moved into Bronkhorstspruit, I saw the letters 'BHS' everywhere; on rubbish bins, on electricity boxes, on streetlamps and manhole covers.
"Wow," I thought, "The local High school must be very active in the community service thing," misreading the HS as "high school". It was, in fact, "horstspruit" (what a cool combination of letters).

I love my little house, I love my sample garden and the missing tree and the fact that I can get onto my roof in 9 seconds and I love autumn and the colours of the dorp and I'll miss it but I shall remember it.

Future Rewards

2006-05-18T08:56:00.000+02:00

The sheer goodness of my moodness lately is due to a combination of things. Part of it is the country-hopping expedition that is one day closer every day. I knew that I’d be going to Japan in July, but hearing the name of my future home-away-from-home just added to the reality of it all. In a little over two months (damn, still so far away) my new address will end with Niimi, Okayama prefecture, Japan. I’m as excited as a kid waiting for Christmas, and my current reality is suffering because my head is already on the island. No, my current reality is enhanced; it’s just my work that has regressed from being arbitrary to now being ridiculous. I do try to focus, I just forget to do so sometimes.

They say that you don’t realise how much something means to you until you lose it. So what happens when you know that you’re going to lose something in the near future? You appreciate it more than ever before, while you still have it. A future that involves leaving is a wonderful filter through which to perceive your world. I breathe in every morning and every night. I feel the stable earth of Africa under my feet, and sit hypnotised under the African skies. Autumn has transformed my town into a kaleidoscope of colours. Once again, I love this place. Every visit with my friends and family is a chance to absorb their presences while I still can. In my mind, I’m collecting images and moments. In my head, I’m saying goodbye to everything that means something to me. Every day is lived as if it’s the last – because the last day of this phase is just around the corner.

2006-05-18T08:50:00.000+02:00

I should have taken my camera with. But, this having been my second funeral ever, I was a bit uncertain as to the correct funeral etiquette. Is it rude to take photos? Do you say ‘cry!’ instead of ‘smile!’ when pushing the button? In the end, I left it at home, and regretted it within the first 20 minutes of driving:

The road to Nigel is long and straight. It runs in between farms and small dorpies. The red soil has discoloured the tarmac into a pink-brown strip that carries on forever, over flat hills. I drove past a guy on a donkey-cart who waved as I moved to the other lane to pass him. A little bit further on, there was a black guy in a blue overall next to the road, clutching a white, awkward-looking chicken in each of his hands. Harvest-debris rolled up into huge balls of animal feed, so big that you mistake them for cows from afar. Black cows on a pale brown land. Brown. Winter is brown; all shades of brown. Luckily the sunsets are a picturesque pink and blue.

What Does One Wear To A Funeral?

2006-05-18T07:46:00.000+02:00

The previous post was about life. This one is going to be about death. The two sides of the existence coin.

My uncle died last Friday. He’d been fighting cancer for a while, but the disease had a good start, and won the battle in the end. My perception of death has been on my mind a lot the past week, and I realised that I’m so calm about it that it borders on being blasé. I doubt that I’m ever going to feel sad about his passing. I even really enjoyed the funeral. Like stepping into an 80’s movie, I watched friends and family hold hands, exchange long hugs, an look at each other with half-smiles, not saying anything. The unspoken languages. I love it.

I suppose I just enjoyed watching people swell with emotion, confusion, relief; death and life intertwined into every moment. People from the past. So many people whose paths crossed with his – I could trace my memories of their family just by glancing around and spotting the familiar faces of people I met years ago. People that I’ll never know. Maybe I just enjoy seeing humans being human.

Funeral moods:

I think the funeral to aspire to, is the one at the end of Big Fish. A big party in the memory of the deceased, and everyone is laughing through their tears. Today’s funeral reminded me of that, just more.. Afrikaans. Subdued. Relief and love: That was the mood. What would the mood be like at the funeral of a teen suicide? Or a car accident victim? Sudden deaths. Disbelief? Heart-wrenching sobs that haunt you years after?

Here’s to happy funerals.

Star Struck

2006-05-03T07:12:00.000+02:00

...I'm kinda...

...hypnotised...

I kinda... lost..
..my..

structure of thought

...along the way...

people can be

very addictive
....people...
can feel like home...

From Pretoria with Love

2006-05-01T13:48:00.000+02:00

I've been missing this dude a bit. Especially over the weekend, driving down roads that used to lead to his house. Especially after just reading his blog update.

He's in Sicily at the moment, soaking up sun and eating pasta, and it sounds like he's well, which makes me miss him a little bit less and even more.

Cheers dude, I'll see you in 2007. Oh, I changed our destination to one island east from Koh Samui. Check out Koh Panang when you get the chance. We'll have the party of our lives.

The High Cost of Living

2006-04-24T08:04:00.000+02:00

To confirm my acceptance into the JET program, I had get myself checked out by a doctor. Even after having been a salarygirl for 1.5 years, I still scrape the bottom of the barrel, come end of the month. So when I found out that all the local rip-off doctors were going to require a few hundred rands from me for tests and x-rays, I decided to phone a friend.

Eric has been one of my friends for years now. We even went to our high school matric farewell together. Our paths split during uni years, and after tertiary education, we ended up living half an hour’s drive away from each other. He’s a doctor-in-training in a government hospital, and he totally agreed to play doctor in order for my JET form to be completed. I drove through after work, arrive, eat a chocolate Easter bunny’s head, and mission off to the hospital.

First, I have to open a file. Eric hands me a slip of paper which says ‘CASUALTY’. Cool.

“Go to the counter. Tell them that you drank a lot of pills. You need to be admitted. Remember: You’re overdosing on pills.”

I hadn’t planned on playing sick. Pills? What a siff way to try and kill yourself. Stomach pumping and all that. I take my place in the queue of three people and try imagine why I’d drink too many pills. I decide that I’d been visiting some dodgy friends, who dared me to swallow a handful of pills, which I did, because I am dodgy. And I wait. I hold my stomach. And I wait. I run my hands through my hair, repeatedly (all the better to shape an afro, my child). And I wait. I rock back a forth. And I wait 25 minutes before the guy at the counter finished flirting with his dying patient, and I get to open my file.

I shuffle over to the counter (pills. I drank pills), take my seat, and groan a “Sawubona” to the chick behind the glass panel. She doesn’t return my greeting. She just stares at me with crazy eyes. Finally, she speaks:

“Don’t take this the wrong way but.. are you a man or a lady?”

Her comment shatters my suicide facade, and I burst out laughing. So much for dying, eh? As a fan of androgyny, she unwittingly gave me the biggest compliment. I quit pretending to be dying, and she happily fills out my form. I become an official patient of the inadequate South African Governmental hospital system.

Next step: x-rays of my lungs, to check for da TB. My suicide becomes stupidity:

“Just tell them that you swallowed a pin, and you experienced shortness of breath afterwards, and you need to get an x-ray of your lungs”

Another 25 minutes wasted on cheap plastic seats. I walk around, reading leaflets on breast feeding and poems about death. I get my x-rays and have it analysed. Even with a history of smoking, my lungs are in prime condition (I thank Taoist breathing exercises). My clavicle has healed (I have the best collarbone x-rays, defined by screws and plates). My piss is pure. My blood pressure is textbook. My eyes are 20/20 all the way. My heart beats 80 times per minute. I am sane. I am free.

Slavery Is Not Job Creation

2006-04-17T15:16:00.000+02:00

If I were a vegetarian, I’d probably be a mellow fanatic. I wouldn’t wear leather shoes, I wouldn’t eat jelly babies that contains gelatine form mammalian sources, my catfood would be dolphin friendly. When there’s a mindset that I disagree with, I refuse to be part of anything that supports that mindset. And this leads me back to my job.

Obviously, the aim of any major company is to make money. Minimum expenditures for maximum profits. But when is the price you pay too high? The company I work for is situated conveniently close to an informal settlement. This means that they (I refuse to say “we”) can dip their greedy hands into the struggling community and provide them with jobs. Some job creation is better than no job creation, but after hearing some behind-the-scenes info, I cannot imagine how the company’s owners sleep at night.

a) Some big bosses came to visit the factory, and noticed that we were using raw materials that had expired more than a month before. They made a big hoo-ha, the managers made a big hoo-ha, and everyone passed the buck until it landed on the poor sod who issues the products from the fridges. They opened a disciplinary action against him, humiliated him in a few shouting matches, and finally suspended him from his bottom-of-the-barrel fridge-packer job. Once the big bosses left the building, our managers recalled all the rejected raw materials and insisted that the factory continue using them. Because it still smells alright, and is worth a lot of money. They are rolling around in double standards and new cars, and the fridge guy now has no way to support his family.

b) Yesterday I found out that some people get payed not per hour, but per weight of raw material/product they prepare. This is grand, because the harder you work, the more you earn. Incentive? Not here. The line of ladies who spend every day on their feet, from 6 am to 3 pm, cutting raw meat into 1x5 cm strips are paid by the bucket. R6.00 per bucket filled. It takes them a goof few hours to fill a bucket. The ladies who cut spinach have it even worse: They are paid 50 cents per kilogram of spinach prepared. Spinach is feather-light, especially when cut. It takes them an average of four hours to cut a kilo of spinach. That’s 12.5 cents per hour. South African cents. That translates to $0.01 per hour, working with sharp knives and standing on your feet for 9 hours.

This company is grating against my moral grain.

Vanilla

2006-04-17T08:11:00.000+02:00

Very tired. I've been almost falling asleep all over the show. Today, the rest of the country is sleeping in and having breakfast in bed in the name of Family Day. The bakery manager asked me what the date is. "It's the 17th today," I replied. "It's supposed to be family day." I haven't seen my family in months. I also haven't even seen an easter egg, and Easter is basically over. After having spent my Easter at work, the bakery man crushes the last little wakefulness I had by replying: "Oh, but this is where you should be today. This company is your family now."
Three months and counting. I'm resigning on the 14th of June.

The past week or so has brought forth a series of extremely ironic events. So many absurd interactions with semi-strangers that I'm not quite sure what to make of it yet. I suppose I'll have to let it sink in first, do some mental filing, sexual admin. But first, I need to get through the day. QC sessions and cleaning training awaits in a company that go against the grain of human rights. They are slave drivers. Im referring to the poor black people they use as the cogs & wheels for profit. This is me, digressing. Back to the point:
I do believe that, as humans, we rock individually and connect invisibly. But I forgot that we do. Until recently I've been picking up small connections between me and the semi-strangers. Picking up the phone just seconds before I get an sms from samesame - six times in a row. Or dreaming the burn's blog address - and being out with two letters. It's always the little things that kill, the little things that thrill.
And the main act in this lip-synch circus has yet to make his entrance..

I Am Near

2006-04-13T15:50:00.000+02:00

In three months' time, you'll find me on a different corner. I'll be here. Where? Somewhere. I don't know yet. I'll know by mid-May, and I'll steal another map from Google and add it into a post. All I know at this moment is that I still have to get arond to a doctor so that he can analyse my piss and observe my cough.

And tell the friendly JET people that 'm lesharpa to cross the ocean. That I'm free of TB and HIV and MSG and LSD.

The other thing that I do know, is that I'll be taking ground in Tokyo on 31/07. Damnit, we're only in 04 now. So close, but yet so far.. I love saying it. "I'll be landing inTokyo...." The words sound alien, coming from my mouth. But I can get used to it. Let me say that again.. I'll be landing in Tokyo...

I Am Here

2006-04-13T14:44:00.000+02:00

This is where I am currently geographically situated. If you follow the red arrows, circling around a specific spot like patient vultures, you will more or less get an idea of where I stay.

Ag shite, no arrows. Well, this is the town where I stay. I live in the "Bester" area, which consists of the main square in the map. "Erasmus" is to the left, comprising a grand total of 15 streets, most of which have animal names. Elephant Street. Lion Street. Zebra Street. I don't know or care much about the "Masada" area, but I suspect that alcoholism and wife-beating is a national sport on that side of the dorp.

Drive straight North across the bean-shaped province, the province that is neither Orange, nor Free, nor a a State. Cross the border into the former Transvaal, now remaned to a more politically soothing "Gauteng Province", GP, gangster's paradise. Drive on and on like a halycon, until you reach the Other Mother City. Ons sal lewe ons sal sterwe, ons vir jou Pretoria. Five years of my life spent there. Five years that changed me so much I have no idea to return to what I used to be, and no desire to do it either. Pretoria swallowed me whole, chewed me up, spat me out, played with me and wiped off the film of drool. I'm still clammy and slightly dented, but I've been to places I cannot describe with words.

When you get to Pretoria (also identifiable by the name "Tswane") turn right and drive for 30 minutes. I'll be waiting on the corner. I'll be the chick with the frazzled grey-and-white beanie tripping over my words, spare toothbrush in my pocket. Because you never know.

Map of the World

2006-04-05T06:46:00.000+02:00

So I've been accepted into the JET program.
I have three months left in the country with the most beautiful sunrises
(rumour has it)
only three months left in the job that I lost all passion for
I'm too sleepy to type now.
Maybe later.

For Every Action...

2006-03-30T16:28:00.000+02:00

..there's an equal, but opposite reaction.

So I spent most of my morning typing up a list of all the things I'm required to shove down my throat on a daily basis. The zillion components part is a new thing. So I drew up beatiful tables and so forth, printed out the list (four pages), and plopped it down on my manager's table.

"Hi, here's a list of everything you expect me to QC every single day of the week. I'd appreciate it if you could join me for these QC sessions, so I just want to kow what time will be convenient for you. How does after lunch suit you?"

My component QC list dropped from 131 products to 11. I feel lighter already.