In Which a Normally Quiet and Reserved Person Becomes “Vocal”

I was interviewed by a reporter at the Japan Times. You can read the article here.

Death of a Farmer

This morning there was a funeral at the compound next door. We heard a few days ago that the grandfather had died. I didn’t even know there was a grandfather. Apparently he has been in the hospital the whole time we’ve lived here.  Three or four generations live in the house next to ours, but I’d only ever seen one man over there, and when I first moved in, I was introduced to my mother-in-law’s cohort and no one else. My mother-in-law handled neighborhood relations, receiving grannies and their offerings in her entryway, o rmaking the rounds with the cookies I brought back from America herself. The younger generations around here don’t mingle much. And though I’ve greeted the younger neighbors when they’ve gone past with their dog or small child, they’ve never stopped to chat about the weather or anything else. I don’t even know their given names.

In spite of this, I feel a certain intimacy with them. I can hear their doorbell ring as I sit at my computer. I hear the child’s squeaky slippers as he runs around the compound. And they probably know quite a bit about our lives as well. (The grannies do talk!)

I must confess, I don’t really know how to behave at times like this. I’m sure that there is a phrase like “I’m sorry for your loss,” but I don’t know what it is in Japanese.” And although I feel that I should have helped out, I think I would have gotten in the way. I feel that my presence would have been conspicuous. In the past, my mother-in-law would have been the family rep at a neighborhood wake and funeral, but this time it was my husband. I went over with the neighborhood women (the ones my mother-in-law’s age) the day after the death. I asked my mother-in-law’s closest neighborhood friend what I should say. “Don’t say anything,” she said. “Just bow your head.”  And that’s what I did.

Slumdog Millionaire author at Japan Writer’s Conference – October 17-18

I loved the movie “Slumdog Millionaire,” so imagine my delight when I found out a couple days ago that Vikras Swarup, the author of Q & A,  the book on which the film is based is now living in Osaka where he works as a diplomat. Not only that, but he will be presenting at the third annual Japan Writer’s Conference (an event originally cooked up by my friend poet Jane Joritz-Nakagawa, who will also be presenting) to be held October 17-18 at the Imadegawa campus of Doshisha Women’s College in Kyoto. Swarup will talk about how his novel became an Academy award-winning movie.You can bet your britches that I’ll be there.

This conference is shaping up to be perhaps the best ever. Not only will participants be able to enjoy the dazzling fall colors, but also they’ll have a chance to listen to the likes of Judy Halebsky, who just won the prestigious 2009 New Issues Poetry Prize for her forthcoming collection Sky=Empty; renowned translator Juliet Winters Carpenter; Holly Thompson, author of the novel Ash and the recent picture book The Wakame Gatherers; rabblerouser and Japan Times columnist Arudou Debito; and poet/translator Taylor Mignon, plus a host of others. Should be a good time – and guess what – it’s free and open to the public!

Mixed Chicks Chat with Me

I’m looking forward to being a guest on the Mixed Chicks Chat podcast tomorrow morning at 6:00 (2PM Pacific Time on Wednesday in the U.S.). I hope the alarm clock goes off!!

6 Things I Love About School in Japan

I realize that I have devoted quite a few posts to things that irk me about my children’s schools, so to prove I’m a glass-is-half-full type, here is a brief list of things I love about my children’s schools.

1. Morning Poetry

Every morning my son recites traditional Japanese poetry at school. He and his classmates are going to give a public recitation later next month. Being a lover of poetry and literature in general, I think this is great.

2. Ballet Workshop

At my daughter’s school, outside experts are often brought in to teach the kids things like indigo-dyeing and, now, ballet. My daughter gets to participate in a ballet workshop at school with a professional dancer tomorrow, and next month will be onstage in the chorus during a performance of “Swan Lake.” The boys don’t get to participate in the actual dance, but since I’m the mother of a girl, this doesn’t bother me.

3. Gardening

I love it that the kids at both schools grow and harvest vegetables. My kids will never wonder where a tomato comes from.

4. Sign Language

There are some deaf schools in Japan, still, I believe, where sign language is not used. At my daughter’s school, however, everyone uses it. I also appreciate that kids in other schools learn at least one song in sign language.

5. School Lunch

In Japan, kids at school get healthy meals made with local ingredients. I also love that the kids help to serve the food and clean up afterward.

6. Music Class

When I was kid, we gathered around a piano, a songsheet clutched in our hands, and sang once in awhile. Maybe there was a tambourine or a triangle or two. But my kids get to play on real instruments. I also love the traiditional taiko drumming at the deaf school – and so does my daughter.

Farewell, Sheila

Two of my favorite cookbooks are Sheila Lukins’ U.S.A. Cookbook and All Around The World Cookbook. Sometimes I leaf through them just for fun. Although Lukins’ lists of ingredients are typically very  long, the results are always yummy. Thanks to Sheila, my family has enjoyed Mu Shu Chicken Burritos, Berta’s Carrot Cake Caribe (truly fabulous), Tiny Potato Croquettes with Orange-Rosemary Mayonnaise (standard Christmas Eve fare chez moi), Spiced Carrot Pie and Grilled Fish with Mango Maui Barbecue Sauce. Not only were her recipes challenging and enticing, but her marginal notes (anecdotes about local fairs, international customs, and travel adventures, etc.) made for entertaining reading.

There will be no more cookbooks, but the meals will live on.

From Publisher’s Weekly:

“Sheila Lukins, co-author of The Silver Palate Cookbook and The New Basics Cookbook, and author Celebrate!, Ten and other cookbooks, died yesterday. The cause was brain cancer, diagnosed three months ago. Lukins was 66.”

Idea Bank

Every summer, as part of her homework, my daughter is required to make a bank. She’s supposed to come up with an original design, and the result is entered in an Idea Bank Contest.  Of course, as the head teacher reminded us parents, the kids need help.

At the beginning of summer, I was thinking along the lines of a papier mache rabbit, or a head with yarn for hair. Or some kind of house constructed from all of the popsicle sticks we’ve accumulated over the past couple of months. But now, with only a few days left to go, I’m casting about for something quick and easy that we haven’t done before.We stopped by the bookstore yesterday so that I could look for a craft book. At the beginning of summer, there are oodles of such books on display – books intended to give parents and kids inspiration for how to while the August days away. Those books are gone. In Japan, everything has its season.

I wonder why my daughter has to make the same thing, year after year? What are we supposed to do with all of those banks? Is some sort of lesson in money management embedded in the task?

My son’s school doesn’t have the same requirement. The kids made banks in year one (many of them used ready-made kits). This summer, my son is supposed to paint a picture on the theme of “freedom.” I was thinking doves, people of many colors holding hands, etc., but he needs to come up with the idea on his own.  I tried to help him out a bit. “What do you think of when you hear the word ‘freedom’?” I asked. My son said, “Getting out of jail.”

Polite Lies by Kyoko Mori

I’ve been doing a lot of reading this summer, and trying not to spend so much time at the computer. I used to spend lots of time reading, but now I waste lots of time surfing the net, which makes me a little bit sad.

Anyway, I’m currently reading Polite Lies by Kyoko Mori, a Japanese woman who lived for a long time in the Midwest, which is the reverse of me – a Midwesterner living in Japan. This book was published ten years ago, and many things in Japan have changed since then. For example, I know of many adult women who don’t want to marry, and I know of middle-aged women who have gone back to college. But a lot of things ring true even now, and I find myself wanting to call up my friends and read passages out loud. In lieu of that, I’ll post a bit. Here’s what Ms. Mori wrote about school:

“No matter what the subject, our teachers never gave us very clear advice about how to do better. When I couldn’t understand long division or fractions and decimals in math, I felt bad at first. On the timed tests we had every day, I could finish only half the problems before the teacher’s stopwatch beeped, telling us to put down our pencils. The results were put up on the wall, and my name was always near the bottom. I was told to ‘try harder,’ but none of my teachers spent extra time with me to go over what I was doing wrong. Since I wasn’t given a real chance to improve, I decided after a while that I didn’t really care how I did.”

Reading this has made me feel better about my son’s recent math scores. He’s not doomed (as my husband thinks) after all!  Kyoko Mori is now teaching at Harvard.

Koshien!

So yesterday morning we set out for Koshien Stadium in Osaka, which is home to the Hanshin Tigers, but also (and more importantly) where the annual national high school baseball tournament is played. It was a hot day, about 34 degrees. The TV cameras were covered with bamboo mats, and vendors went up and down the aisles selling crushed ice and cold drinks. The kids and I got to sit in a shady, cordoned-off box behind home plate – the wheelchair area. We had a great view. My husband was off being interviewed by the media, so he didn’t sit with us.

The stadium was pretty much full. In Tokushima, maybe a few hundred people show up for high school games, but there were nearly 57,000 spectators (plus, all those people across the nation watching on TV). Nevertheless, I felt our boys from Kita High School showed considerable poise. When the fourth batter, Saito, stepped up to the plate, my son said, “That’s the guy who’s lending me his Little League uniform.” I thought it was kind of cool that he had a personal connection to our local heroes (beyond his dad, of course).

Kita High School was matched up with a team from the big city, which had to make it through about 200 other teams to get to the national tournament. That ’s about four times as many teams as in Tokushima. Everyone expected Kita High School to lose, and maybe to lose badly. Well, they did lose, due to a couple of costly errors, but only by two runs. They did good.

After the game, they scooped up dirt from the sacred grounds of Koshien and put it into a special bag to take home.

And then we got in our car and drove back to Tokushima.

Call Me Okaasan in The Japan Times!

Thanks to Katrina Grigg-Saito for her very kind review of Call Me Okaasan!