Jim in Japan

2003-09-20T09:34:00.000-07:00

Where am I at and what's the score? "Where am I at?" I ask myself as I wake up, because I am never certain for the first few seconds of consciousness, if I am in Biei or in Sapporo. I imagine that traveling salesmen have the same problem. "What's the score?" is easier, because I just make a mental note of above or below par. Had a couple of so-so games of Park Golf last week; nothing special except that I did see a guy hit a hole-in-one. I am still waiting for my hole-in-one.

2003-09-07T06:57:00.000-07:00

Shot a nine under par last week in Park Golf; a feat I probably will not match any time soon. It was a no mistake game. Now the course is just down the hill from my new apartment in Biei. It would be even more convenient if I had my own club, but I still need to go into town to rent one. I noticed that at about 5 p.m. the course is empty except for the serious lone golfer who usually works at the game by playing two balls on the same holes repeatedly. I think I will try that tactic next time. The courses close at the end of October and I can expect occasional snow in October, so the season is winding down.

My new apartment (new, old apartment) is about 250 square feet, fairly clean, and very quiet.

2003-09-05T09:19:00.000-07:00

blog

2003-08-09T21:18:00.000-07:00

Third game: five under par.

2003-08-08T17:05:00.000-07:00

Park Golf 3: Now I have played park golf twice in Biei on two different courses. It is a lot of fun. It's not exactly golf, however. Each hole is from thirty to a hundred meters, so eighteen holes takes less than an hour. The balls don't fly very much, but mostly roll. The key to the game is the "putting"; getting the sense of the roll of the ball when you are near the hole. I played about four above par the first time and one above par the second time. It is a game obviously designed for seniors, but of course anyone can play. It may not be suitable for my golf course on the mountain, unless I can figure out how to make the balls fly more. Also, with a larger ball you have to deal with the tendency of the ball to roll down any slope and not stay put. Both courses side the Biei river, so it is pleasent simply to walk in the grass and edge a ball along. I rent a club, ball and rubber tee for 100 yen at the community center, and with a bicycle it is pretty easy to get back and forth from the courses. You can expect to see my under par scores soon.

2003-08-03T05:05:00.000-07:00

Youko has expressed in interest in studying the psychology of the Japanese. I know it is a surprise to come back to a culture after some time away from it. Here are my generalizations: First of all begin with the word, "meticulous," and then extend that to all aspects of life. Meticulous about things being clean, of course, although appearance takes priority. For example, they don't use hot water to wash dishes, because they are meticulous about the cost of gas, electricity, etc. Meticulous about safety: Ask any Japanese about Japan, and they will all say it is safer than the rest of the world. Perhaps they are right, perhaps they are obsessed with predictability, or both. Constuction goes on with relative efficiency (meticulously) but with a good number of safety people standing around. It is this trait that makes me think the Japanese should be managing the international space station. Everything will take them longer, perhaps five or ten years longer (because they are meticulous planners), but there would be fewer mishaps. Meticulous about the appearance of food, as we all well know. Meticulous about time schedules. They are group oriented, perhaps because they are meticulous about being organized, but certainly also because they feel safety in numbers. They would hesitate to deviate from a hiking path, a tour, or the company policy. This, along with a long tradition, explains why the society in general is slow to change. Short of shooting cannon balls, to open trade, or having the american army write their constitution for them, drastic change is unlikely to occur. Slow, calculated changes make more sense to them. This environment may be a source of frustration for western foreigners who are brought up to seize the day, and act decisively, but as I have noted, it in most cases brings stability and security to life. Stability can mean stagnation, and decisiveness can mean rushing into a war. I have no doubt that the cultural environment of Japan puts some psychological restraint on radical creative thinking, but in the same repect, there is no doubt that freedom in America has opened up a lot of opportunities for the abuse of that freedom. In America we encourage our children to pursue their dreams and be proud of their talents, while in Japan children are encouraged to study hard, be realistic, humble, get a steady government job and stick with it. Our two countries have a lot to learn from each other.

2003-07-29T10:15:00.000-07:00

Just got off the phone with American Express after a lengthy run-around. Internet banking is still not up to snuf: web site is down, or other problems. I changed my mailing address after much ado. Today I had been working on a job application for a college in Oregon, and came across the Word document form inadequacies. So as I was talking to an American Express guy regardiing his input problems, I said, "You must be working with a Word document form." And of course he was and he laughed. The idea that things must be done such and such a way is an insidious evil. It is rampant in Japan. I am all for orderly behaviour, but specified behaviour is neurotic. Japan needs more radical elements, in my opinion. More clowns, more hippies, more beatniks or hobos. They also serve who sit and wait. What a wonderous society it would be if clowns were funded like the military!

2003-07-28T08:21:00.000-07:00

More on Park Golf: I attempted to play a round last friday, but when I went to rent the equipment at the community center, I learned that friday was a day off for that course. The rental fee is a mere $2. and only $1. if I had given them a Biei address. The ball, I had thought, was hard rubber, but in fact it is more like a large billiard ball. So this game is sort of a cross between gateball (japanese croquet) and golf. I will be playing it on a regular basis as soon as I move to Biei. Next week I will be going there prior to a pig roast party the school is hosting. And I will go to city hall to apply for a cheaper apartment near to the free course. The city parks are mostly empty except for shortly after schools end the day, and the city of Biei has a kind of surreal atmosphere to it, because it has few people walking newly created sidewalks. It is what I imagine to be the aftermath of a newtron bomb: clean buildings intact, but no people.

2003-07-19T07:25:00.000-07:00

Park Golf: I have seen my first "Park golf" course, and it is good. It is a ten minute bike ride from my apartment and it is FREE. Park Golf is golf on a smaller scale, and not too much different from the way I played golf on the mountain in Arcata. I am sure I will do quite well at it. I can rent a club (like on my course, you use only one club), the holes are bigger than coffee cans, and par for the holes are obviously set to make you feel good. I watched a man play the first hole, which is maybe fifty yards. Par was 4 and he did it in 3. Looks like my kind of game. There are two other courses in Biei which cost a hundred yen to play (about 83 cents). The free course is very close to my apartment and by the Biei river. Unfortunately I have learned that this part of the river has no fish because of the sulpher from the local hot springs. Still, it is a pretty area, and I can make a small campfire there and cook potatoes. Oh, the simple pleasures of life.

2003-07-19T07:09:00.000-07:00

Syncronicity: I met an older man in the park who sat by me and was eager to talk. This is unusual, because he didn't speak any English, but we talked, and it happens that the Japanese characters for his name were on my water bottle, which he pointed out to me. Considering the number of Japanese characters, this was indeed odd. He was gregarious and sang for me a couple of traditional Japanese songs.

On my last trip to Biei I met an american student who was going to stay in Biei for three days. I pointed out to her where she could rent a bicycle, and where there is free Internet access. Two days latter, as I steped out my apartment door, she came by on bicycle at that very moment and I gave her directions.

2003-07-19T06:58:00.000-07:00

Outdoors: I never realized how important the outdoors was to me until moving to a basically indoors society. I am intent on being outside as much as possible, because it is there that I feel at peace. I am aware that winter will come, sooner than in California, for sure. And I want to take in all the sun that is available. I spend a lot of time in parks, bike ride, and when I am at home I sit on the small veranda. I have never understood how people can work in a box, go home in a box, and spend the evening in a box.

2003-07-06T04:32:00.000-07:00

Paint the town red: Well, that might take me awhile, but I started today by painting my recently assembled junk bicycle bright red. About 99% of all Japanese bicycles are black or grey. Don't ask me why. A decade ago 99% of all Japanese cars were white. And they don't have those funny foam footballs or yarn on their antennas, so how did they find their cars in a big parking lot? Anyhow, I have not yet seen a red bicycle in Japan, so I think it should be easy to pick mine out from the hundred or so that park at the train station. Perhaps bright red is considered too egotistic? Or will I be ostrasized as a communist? No, probably, when they see me on my red bike, they will just think, "there's an american".

2003-06-29T23:49:00.000-07:00

Pigeons climbing steps: It is now raining lightly in Sapporo, but this morning I went to a park to watch the pigeons climb the stone stairs, up and down. I had just watched "Chicken Run," so I was tuned to watching bird feet. Beautiful eyes, pigeons have. Observe, and you will see what you are in the frame of mind to see. It is not common to observe the color of a person's eyes, although it is an assertive engagement for people who want to be assertive. A former caretaker of our place on the moutain was a dyslectic artist who always averted his eyes. Are they really paths to the soul? He was frightened of looking into a mirror.

2003-06-23T22:40:00.000-07:00

Emptying the shed: These last two weeks we have been attempting to clean out the shed; difficult because of the number of large objects to get rid of. You have to pay about $40. to throw away large things you can't simply put out with the garbage anymore, and the older generation resists this with tenacity. The other day I heard a loud crash, and looked out the window to see Youko's father attacking a large old television with a large rock. This morning he persisted, and after a couple of hours managed to reduce it to rubble. At one point he was attacking it with a huge mallet, normally used to pound mochi in a barrel. No point in trying to explain to him that small pieces of a large television are no safer for the environment than one intact large television. At the present rate that small cell phones are being produced and disposed of like bic lighters, it is easy to see that future generations will have to deal with this problem. We often learn the hard way. It was the 60s when in Minomata some company realized that dumping mercury into the local river was not a very good thing. That issue, of thousands of people being poisoned, was resolved about twenty five years later. Some things change with excruiating slowness.

2003-06-20T10:28:00.000-07:00

Rush to the back of the bus: I am not one to hurry, so I make it a point to leave very early for my bus to Asahikawa. As in any big city, one sees many people in a rush. How women can run in high heels is a mystery to me. It should be an olympic event. People do have schedules, but I have become accustomed to what we call in Humboldt county, "Humboldt Time". If someone is an hour late, you say they are on "humboldt time". Punctuality is important sometimes, BUT EVEN AN AMBULANCE SHOULD NOT GO TOO FAST

2003-06-16T02:00:00.000-07:00

Sapporo observer: simply observing is mostly what I do in the parks. Watching childeren play can be fun, fun, fun. In Japan we wear shoes that are a half a size too big, so they can come off easily when we enter a room. So watching kids shoes go flying while they are on the swing or kicking a ball is amusing. Shoes become squished down in the rear because of so much on/off, on/off activity throughout the day. They get to be like flat tires. I had my shoes stolen once from the apartment building foyer when I first lived in Sapporo. Later I saw outside the flat tire shoes which were the reason for the theft. Three things are fair game for theft in Japan: umbrellas, bicycles, and shoes. Off limits are cars: unless you have a russian fishing boat at hand, there are few places to take it without being found out in quick order.

2003-06-14T19:14:00.000-07:00

Bicycles, Bicycles: we found a couple more abandoned bicycles, one in perfect condition (just ugly) and another nearly new with a bad tube in the rear. It took a couple of hours for me and Youko's dad to fix the rear tire on that one, but it rides beautifully. Every spring the Japan Railroad collects the thousands of abandoned bicycles left at train stations, repairs the repairable, and sends them to Africa. More of a gesture than anything else. It would probably be better if they set up a bicycle factory somewhere in Africa and just sent the broken bikes. I think in another life, I would like to come back as a bicycle shop owner. He does no harm to the environment and simply helps people get around.

2003-06-10T05:31:00.000-07:00

Doing the impossible. Today I found out the tire on my "found" bike was bad in the rear. The cultural attitude is such that it is believed that only a bicycle shop can possibly repace a bad rear tire. The bicycle shop will charge quite a lot, thus the great number of abandoned bicycles. Michio, Youko's dad explained that it reqires a special tool (for spreading the forks), and that tool is not sold. Only bicycle shop owners have this special tool. So he says it's impossible, impossible, impossible. It took quite awhile, but of course it was not impossible. I wonder what other things are not impossible in Japan.

2003-06-09T07:01:00.000-07:00

Flat tires and other things. Haven't fixed the flat tire yet; the tube is fixed, but the tire is bad, and replacing rear tires on these type of bikes is quite a job. No easy way to do it. Mostly bicycles are used in Japan for street transportation. You will occasionally see a mountain bike, but rarely a racing bike. My goal, when riding a bike, is to ride it as slowly as possible, with back straight, and see as much as possible. I have no interest in going fast and far.

I made kites with some students and we flew them in the park near the school. One flew well and high (made by a couple of girls), others not so well, and the kite of the aggressive boys in a hurry crashed and crashed and crashed.

2003-06-08T16:55:00.000-07:00

Easy come; easy go. I had a bicycle stolen from me a couple of days ago. I stoped by a phone booth to make a call, and within thirty seconds it was gone. I hadn't even gotten my change out yet. So yesterday I set out to find a good bike in the garbage (abandoned bike). In a pile of abandoned bikes I found a good functional bike with no seat and a flat tire. Took a seat off of another one, and will fix the flat tire today. Also, in a different pile of garbage, I found a small refrigerator, gas range, and a small vaccum cleaner. This stuff was from some shop that had gone out of business (also found a small "open/closed" sign.) I will try to collect a few more things before I arrange for a ride to Biei to move them. Then I will be open for business!

2003-06-03T06:31:00.000-07:00

Well, its back to Biei city by bicycle, bus and train tomorrow. I will stay an extra day to use the public bath and try to find the recycle center (used store). Used stores in Japan lack the religious influence like a Saint Vincent's or Salvation Army. Perhaps a little shinto shrine would give them more style. My favorite used store in the area is a place called, "Second Street," and they are always playing black rap music. You can count about twenty seconds between each "mother fucker" and "smoke pot". It's hard to not burst out laughing, because all of the customers are completely unaware of the words, and just listening to the beat.

2003-06-01T06:09:00.000-07:00

OK, this may seem a bit esoteric, but my Yoga Nidra meditation has been taking me into some interesting dreams, or as my text tells me, archetypal images. After living for a few decades I can't say for sure that all the images I see are not simply recollections of things in my past, or imaginative creations of my subconscious mind, but I am becoming more inclined to believe that indeed I am seeing images that are imprinted in each human mind. Now I don't even need a relaxation tape to enter this trance state, but can simply lie down with an eye bag over my eyes. There are still undoubtedly more bumps in the road up ahead, but I seem to be able to control the energies better. The time passes so quickly now, and while I think I have been meditating for perhaps fourty minutes, more than two hours have passed.

2003-05-31T06:23:00.000-07:00

Yoga Nidra revisited: I'm still trying to get balanced with this technique. Like Pranayama (yogic breathing) it can cause energies to emerge that one may not know how to handle. One day you feel as if you are Bruce Lee, with powerful intensity, and the next day you simply view the passing scene with a calm mind. Of course it is hightly recommended that one finds a teacher, but that is very unlikely unless I make a plan to go to India. I will just have to go it alone and hope there are not too many bumps on the road.

2003-05-27T04:43:00.000-07:00

Rear Window. As I have mentioned before, People use the small parks in Japan to park their cars by and take a break. Otherwise they are mostly used by children, and adults who walk their small dogs. Often, but not always, there is one unofficial observer of the park, who will pick up the trash in the spring, turn the water faucet off when kids leave it on, and probably report all suspicious behaviour to the police. So you get the feeling you are in the movie, "Rear Window". The Jimmy Stewart character is not bed-ridden, and there are likely no body parts in the flower beds, but you definately get the feeling you are being watched. It is tempting to make trips to the park in the evenings with a large suitcase, but I doubt that the local authorities would have much of a sense of humor about such antics.

2003-05-25T21:32:00.000-07:00

Yoga Nidra: I would boasting to say I have mastered it, but have gotten pretty good at it. What is Yoga Nidra? It is basically the art of relaxing flat on your back. If you search on the Internet for the term you will find a book by that title and a short explanation. Strangely enough it is one of the few books I took to Japan, and strangely enough, I became able to do it well just a few weeks after coming to Japan. I can now, at will, lay down and go into a light sleep within one minute. That is to say, I go into Alpha and Theta states. It is deeply restful, but not true sleep. I am still aware of the world around me, but with no worries or concerns. I became interested in this because I can't do such vigorous physical yoga anymore, or at least am more careful about my back. There are a few tricks to this, like resting your hands on your belly, and being aware of the tip of your tongue touching the roof of your mouth. Also, some meditation tapes are helpful. It is a lot like floating in a floatation tank, but without the salt water. It is also like using a sound and light machine to relax, but with Yoga Nidra you can relax almost instantly, and stay relaxed as long as you like. What a great skill to have!

2003-05-25T02:04:00.000-07:00

Today much discussion about home beer brewing, which is a new thing in Japan, although I did it illegally in Aomori eight years ago. Still, the law wants you to keep the alcohol content below one percent or else technically they can hit you with a $5,000. fine. I can see this bust in my mind: the police come knocking at your door and insist on drinking your beer. Then they take out some device for measuring the alcohol content and inform you that you are over the limit. You are then instructed to report to the local police station to pay the fine. You will incur six or eight bows in this process, and I expect your last two bows at the police station will need to be especially low. Pay the fine, and back to normal business.

2003-05-24T04:37:00.000-07:00

Bell bottom blues....

Bell bottoms are strangely coming back into fashion. As well as 60s type tight skirts. I am developing a foot fetish, because Japanese women pay so much attention to their appearance with their high heel shoes. I suppose this is innocent enough, although, like Jimmy Carter I might have to confess that I have lusted in my mind. It is a fun hobby to look at feet, and of course, if you are looking down toward the floor, no one has any idea.

Generally speaking, no one has any idea of what is on your mind. And, generally speaking, no one notices what you are personally concerned about.

It is nice to be clean-shaven and wear a neck-tie, but beyond that, unless you stink, you are an invisable man. This may be more true in Japan, because people will mentally seclude themselves to create a mental distance because they have no physical distance from you.

There is what I call the "UPS" behavior in Japan: many workers park their cars near a park to get some zzzs, or read a newspaper before going home or to check out at work.

There is a very apparent desire to escape, and few ways to do it.

2003-05-23T22:09:00.000-07:00

A windy day in Sapporo. Yesterday returned from the town of Biei by bus and train, beautiful scenery and many rice fields with the sprouts just coming up.