Did you know they have been working on replacing all of the sidewalks on the main street in town since April? There wasn't anything wrong with the sidewalk before. Every day about 50 government wage receivers gather at the site of the former supermarket parking lot around 7:30AM to get their assignments.
80% of these people stand around with red and green flags, helping old ladies and pedestrians cross the street. The fat guys always get a job holding the red and green flags. Where they come up with fat guys in Japan is a mystery to me. But all of them get a job holding red and green flags at bogus construction sites. There's a fat Japanese guy hanging around at each corner of the construction area. This is good for the restaurant business.
Another 10% are just standing around, smoking, or they are sweeping or watering the street. That's not a typo, they spray water on the street to get the dirt off. And they sweep up the dirt using old fashioned brooms made with sticks and straw. No kidding, one of the klutztier guys dropped his broom on the gaijin (me) as I was walking by.
The remaining 10% are actually working on digging a hole or tearing out the old perfectly good sidewalk and installing the new one.
The town's main street runs about 3 Miles from end to end, counting both side of the street that makes six miles of pavement for the sidewalk. They've been on this job for 6 months and arn't finished yet. Not even close. Are they using chopsticks to do the work? No, it just seems that way. They actually have heavy equipment, like steam rollers and backhoes.
This is what they call "stimulus" in Japan. Does anyone in their right mind think that wasting money on this will help the economy? The economy here has been in recession for about 30 years. Betcha the construction companies working on projects like this make a lot of contributions to the politicians in power.
Friday, October 29, 2010
Saturday, October 9, 2010
Kouyou
In spite of global warming, autumn leaf changing season in the northern hemisphere has arrived. The Japanese people have a special word for the leaf changing season, Kouyou. The leaf colors around here are magnificent and despite the beauty, remind me that another year is passing. In another 3 short weeks the mountain roads where I ride bike and where elderly people forage for wild mushrooms will be closed until late next spring. My thermal underwear is ready to wear, having been located at the back of the closet where it had remained comfortably hidden underneath our camping gear, behind a suitcase we haven't used in 8 years.
This year has been a wonderful success for me. My repertoire of Japanese kanji symbols has increased by 50%, from 4 to 6. Even better, I can almost understand what the neighbor's 3 year old is saying to me. (Do you want to eat some of this? Child holds out a piece of slimy looking cheese in his dirt encrusted fingers)
Can an adult be comfortable operating at this level, living in a child like state, mostly unable to communicate, as if I was an alien that just landed on earth? Say, did you ever notice that TV and movie aliens always know how to speak English? Just once it would be fun to see what would happen if they only spoke French, or Japanese. What would Captain Kirk do?
More than a year after having arrived here I can report that I am comfortable living in Japan, despite the language difficulties. For once, my hesitation to form interpersonal relationships is actually a benefit. I have formed no relationships and don't mind it. My neighbors, mostly elderly women who hang out and gossip all day long, keep a close eye on me. How do you say "what's that crazy, lazy, non working, bike riding, foreigner doing today?" in Japanese?
My wife and daughter also like it here in an isolated part of rural Japan. Guess we'll stay. It's a great place to hide!
This year has been a wonderful success for me. My repertoire of Japanese kanji symbols has increased by 50%, from 4 to 6. Even better, I can almost understand what the neighbor's 3 year old is saying to me. (Do you want to eat some of this? Child holds out a piece of slimy looking cheese in his dirt encrusted fingers)
Can an adult be comfortable operating at this level, living in a child like state, mostly unable to communicate, as if I was an alien that just landed on earth? Say, did you ever notice that TV and movie aliens always know how to speak English? Just once it would be fun to see what would happen if they only spoke French, or Japanese. What would Captain Kirk do?
More than a year after having arrived here I can report that I am comfortable living in Japan, despite the language difficulties. For once, my hesitation to form interpersonal relationships is actually a benefit. I have formed no relationships and don't mind it. My neighbors, mostly elderly women who hang out and gossip all day long, keep a close eye on me. How do you say "what's that crazy, lazy, non working, bike riding, foreigner doing today?" in Japanese?
My wife and daughter also like it here in an isolated part of rural Japan. Guess we'll stay. It's a great place to hide!
Monday, September 20, 2010
Respect
Today is respect for the elderly day in Japan. It's a national holiday. To celebrate, my daughter made pudding for her grandma. Old people love soft foods, ya know.
The real celebration was when we loaded the family into the Japo mini car, picked up grandma at her house, and drove up the hill to her favorite public hot bath. Actually, its a nice place. Everything is clean and the water is from real volcanic mountain springs, so it feels and smells good, if you like sulfer.
After bathing (don't worry, men bathe in a different room than women) we all went out to lucnh at the best restaurant in town. In truth, where this hot bath place is, there's only one restaurant. Located right across the street from the hot bath place you find the restaurant. They serve traditional Japanese lunch fare, mainly gigantic bowls of soup with noodles.
The place was crowded and everyone was "drinking" soup, as the Japanese say. In reality, they slurp the soup and they slurp it loudly. It was like a symphony of slurping coming from every table in the restaurant. We shared a table with one fellow because there wasn't an empty table available for us. My ears are still ringing from his slurping, approximately 9.7 on the slurp Richter scale.
My mother in law loved the place, loved the soup, loved the slurping. For $30 of US currency all 4 of us got a bowl of tasteless broth, some cabbage, a hand full of noodles, a few pieces of onion, 2 pieces of tofu, and a small amount of greasy meat. Out of respect for the elderly, I didn't complain. At least not when she was in close proximity.
The real celebration was when we loaded the family into the Japo mini car, picked up grandma at her house, and drove up the hill to her favorite public hot bath. Actually, its a nice place. Everything is clean and the water is from real volcanic mountain springs, so it feels and smells good, if you like sulfer.
After bathing (don't worry, men bathe in a different room than women) we all went out to lucnh at the best restaurant in town. In truth, where this hot bath place is, there's only one restaurant. Located right across the street from the hot bath place you find the restaurant. They serve traditional Japanese lunch fare, mainly gigantic bowls of soup with noodles.
The place was crowded and everyone was "drinking" soup, as the Japanese say. In reality, they slurp the soup and they slurp it loudly. It was like a symphony of slurping coming from every table in the restaurant. We shared a table with one fellow because there wasn't an empty table available for us. My ears are still ringing from his slurping, approximately 9.7 on the slurp Richter scale.
My mother in law loved the place, loved the soup, loved the slurping. For $30 of US currency all 4 of us got a bowl of tasteless broth, some cabbage, a hand full of noodles, a few pieces of onion, 2 pieces of tofu, and a small amount of greasy meat. Out of respect for the elderly, I didn't complain. At least not when she was in close proximity.
Thursday, August 12, 2010
That Slater Flight Attendant
Why in the world would anyone make a hero out of this Slater fellow who cursed out a planeload of paying customers and then stormed away like a 5 year old who didn't get a cookie he wanted? In Japan, I guarantee, this behavior would be seen as exceedingly shameful, as so it should. Certainly his union cohorts will support him, but that doesn't mean that he is in the right.
I suppose we can accept his claim that the passenger was rude, cursing, and had hit him with a suitcase causing a cut. Being hit with the bag could easily have been accidental and even Slater does not claim it was intentional. Walk up behind someone taking a heavy item out of the bin and you are asking to get smacked in the head as they struggle to pull it down. People don't have eyes in the backs of their heads.
However, we do not know whether or not anything Slater claims is the truth, as none of the passengers has corroborated his story about the rude passenger.
Even if the passenger was rude and even if many passengers are rude, can you blame people for getting upset? What other business model, other than an airline, has paying customers 1) show up 2-3 hours in advance to wait in a check in line, 2) requires customers to wait in another security check line in order to have their personal possessions searched through, 3) provides the choice of being frisked like a criminal or electronically strip searched, 4) routinely offers severe delays or service cancellations, and 5) offers uncomfortable seating and bad food after requiring that food and drink are confiscated at the so called security check point?
People are also cooped up and tired and nervous about missing connections. Did Slater notice these sorts of things? Does he care or understand the pressure of being a passenger? Oh, and we pay through the nose for all of this abuse. Flying is really not so cheap most of the time. People get badly treated and they are rightfully upset at times. Flight attendants need to understand this and learn to deal with it.
Slater's focus was on himself. Someone DARED not obey his command to keep seated. You know, we are all supposed to obey like trained animals when directed to pretend that it is somehow dangerous to grab something out of the overhead bin in the 60 seconds prior to arriving at the gate, when taxi-ing at 1-2 miles an hour.
I can just picture an enraged flight attendant charging down the aisle to confront the disobedient passenger about accessing the overhead bin. I'll bet Slater used his best command voice, you know the one that people usually only use on a dog, prior to being told off by the passenger. And if he did speak rudely to a paying customer about an obviously meaningless government imposed rule, then he deserved to get cussed out. Good for the passenger.
Sounds like Slater left the cut on his head stay open and bleeding throughout the entire flight, even when serving food and beverages. One report said he is HIV positive, and if it's true, he is criminally reckless for leaving the cut open. Even if not HIV positive, he left the cut open to get attention. Similarly, based on his prior web postings, his X rated tirade and other actions seem to be pre-planned in order to maximize attention on himself. Such a self centered person! It's all very childish behavior and nothing he did is to be admired.
I suppose we can accept his claim that the passenger was rude, cursing, and had hit him with a suitcase causing a cut. Being hit with the bag could easily have been accidental and even Slater does not claim it was intentional. Walk up behind someone taking a heavy item out of the bin and you are asking to get smacked in the head as they struggle to pull it down. People don't have eyes in the backs of their heads.
However, we do not know whether or not anything Slater claims is the truth, as none of the passengers has corroborated his story about the rude passenger.
Even if the passenger was rude and even if many passengers are rude, can you blame people for getting upset? What other business model, other than an airline, has paying customers 1) show up 2-3 hours in advance to wait in a check in line, 2) requires customers to wait in another security check line in order to have their personal possessions searched through, 3) provides the choice of being frisked like a criminal or electronically strip searched, 4) routinely offers severe delays or service cancellations, and 5) offers uncomfortable seating and bad food after requiring that food and drink are confiscated at the so called security check point?
People are also cooped up and tired and nervous about missing connections. Did Slater notice these sorts of things? Does he care or understand the pressure of being a passenger? Oh, and we pay through the nose for all of this abuse. Flying is really not so cheap most of the time. People get badly treated and they are rightfully upset at times. Flight attendants need to understand this and learn to deal with it.
Slater's focus was on himself. Someone DARED not obey his command to keep seated. You know, we are all supposed to obey like trained animals when directed to pretend that it is somehow dangerous to grab something out of the overhead bin in the 60 seconds prior to arriving at the gate, when taxi-ing at 1-2 miles an hour.
I can just picture an enraged flight attendant charging down the aisle to confront the disobedient passenger about accessing the overhead bin. I'll bet Slater used his best command voice, you know the one that people usually only use on a dog, prior to being told off by the passenger. And if he did speak rudely to a paying customer about an obviously meaningless government imposed rule, then he deserved to get cussed out. Good for the passenger.
Sounds like Slater left the cut on his head stay open and bleeding throughout the entire flight, even when serving food and beverages. One report said he is HIV positive, and if it's true, he is criminally reckless for leaving the cut open. Even if not HIV positive, he left the cut open to get attention. Similarly, based on his prior web postings, his X rated tirade and other actions seem to be pre-planned in order to maximize attention on himself. Such a self centered person! It's all very childish behavior and nothing he did is to be admired.
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