Fall weather in Japan changes like a woman's feelings

... according to my physical therapist. Funny man.

It's October now and it's definitely fall, and apparently the weather varies quite a bit. But we get a lot of beautiful clear days (which are referred to in Japanese as akibare 秋晴れ, my principle taught me).

So, last month the season changed to autumn quite suddenly. The summer was hell, absolute humid hell - typical Japan weather that Hokkaido is supposed to be the exception to, but instead we probably got about 2 weeks of perfect, comfortably warm summer weather before fall came in and the temperatures dropped to sweater/jacket weather. Sigh.

Speaking of sudden changes, I leave my base school (once I had gotten used to it and all that :/) and start visiting other schools. So from Monday I'll be at another middle school near home for 2 months, followed by a 2-month visit at another middle school that's like an hour commute to Jouzankei, a little onsen resort town up in the mountains (unlike my other schools, it's insanely small - something to the tune of 20 students and 20 staff). And then after that, it's back to my base school for a few months. Until then, it's going to just be me struggling to remember 500 students names and faces, and then just when I get the hang of some students I'll have to switch schools. Haha.

Last night I went out to Sapporo's nightlife district Susukino with my co-workers to celebrate the end of the school festival, my coming to the school (ironically on my last day there for 4 months), etc. Two-hour nomihodai (all-you-can-drink) and food, followed by a nijikai (second party) resulted in having to pay like 6,000 yen, which is probably almost 70 USD with the current bad exchange rate. Nope, wait, according to google it's 77 USD. Holy crap.

But it was worth it, since it's important that I spend time with my Japanese co-workers (and Japanese people in general) and being forced to speak Japanese for an evening is NEVER a bad idea. But two girl friends got birthday parties tonight which probably involves another nomihodai and karaoke. Partying Japanese style is more fun and extravagant than how Americans do it (and karaoke in Japan is superior to waiting to sing one song in front of a bunch of people in a bar). But PAYDAY COULD SURE COME SOONER.

Oh, and as of the October 1st I've been in Japan for 2 months. And Sapporo is still awesome and amazing!! I still love it here. I'm starting to miss home a little, but living here has been way easier than my first time in Japan. Living in my hometown's sister city must be why? The quality of life here just feels quite comparable to Portland.

All text and no photo or anything. I want to make all my posts have a visual because I think it's a more appealing format to blog in, but alas I failed. Sorry, next time.

Teacher Life. (or a small sample, anyway)

I haven't really talked much about work, but you're probably curious (whoever the hell may be reading this). So I'll indulge you, but just a little bit... because I don't know, the idea of talking about work just seems kinda lame/boring. I mean, just look at these photos of the teachers' office here on the right, along withmy desk. The only thing that doesn't look like monotone barf is my hello kitty bottle - which has gotten compliments from middle school girls (for whatever that's worth to a 23 year old) - THANK YOOUU MOM!

To be honest, the rest of the school doesn't look any more inspiring and um, not dull. But there's paintings and such here and there, which really brighten the halls. And this Ghibli-themed one is my favorite (OF COURSE).

And for English class, a bunch of the kids made Halloween-themed paper skulls (although they're like a month early and these sort of paper-folding crafts are totally a Japanese thing people in other countries probably wouldn't do). But I gotta say the Minnie Mouse skull is my absolute favorite. It's totally creepy and weird, but not all that surprising as Minnie Mouse is adored by Japanese girls age 0 to 35 (well, something like that - it's totally normal for young ladies to love Minnie Mouse and lots of cute things that would be considered by Americans to be kind of childish for adults). Pretty ironic how Disney and Disney characters are hardly a big deal in America like they are in Japan.

And here's some of the kiddies getting ready for the school festival coming up on October 1st, which I'll report on later.

Drag queens, ramen and beer

Yes, the header indicates that it was a quintessentially Sapporo weekend (last weekend, that is).

I went to the Rainbow March, Sapporo's gay pride parade, which is also the longest running in Japan and is notable for being one in which the city mayor addresses the rally - something that is quite rare for government officials to do at these sort of events due to the taboo view and hush-hush attitude generally held toward homosexuality in Japan.

However, it seems the island of Hokkaido (where Sapporo is) is a little more open about those kind of things, being a place that Japanese people didn't come to until quite later in Japan's history. So Hokkaido's a newer place (thus more oldschool western style brick buildings and Sapporo's unique grid layout) with people who wanted to get away from the main island, and thus the folks here a little more open-minded - which totally reminds me of Portland!!

Speaking of (as seen in second photo), the lovely host read a message from Sam Adams, the mayor of Portland (who is gay).

I ran into some friends there, one who is also from Portland (REPRAZENT) and we hit up the famous Ramen Yokocho, and area in Sapporo which has tons of ramen shops. After a bit of looking around, we picked a place and I got their specialty ramen, butter corn miso.






And then the next day I went to go meet a friend from my time on study abroad in Akita Prefecture, who came to visit with a bunch of the new study abroad students. We met at the Sapporo beer factory museum and enjoyed deliciouuuussssss Ebisu!!!

Taiko no Tatsujin / Taiko Drum Master Happy Meal Toys

Even if I haven't played this music game forever and don't really care to pump to 200 yen (2+ USD) into one at a game center (and everyone and their mom loves this game and lines up to pay what's usually twice the price of a BEMANI game), I do want one of these Happy Meal toys from McDonald's.

Today, I inquired as to whether I could purchase one without having to give up my dignity by buying a happy meal, but apparently this is not possible.

NOW HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO GET A TAIKO DRUM MASCOT THAT LOOKS LIKE A CAKE OR SERVES ME MCDONALDS?! (or looks like a creepy panda with bamboo growing out of its head)

Who knew?!

From http://kanjipictographix.com/2009/04/english-words-born-in-japan/:

Honcho: A person in charge of some group or of some function, usually a male person. A Japanese word, often mistakenly thought to be of Spanish origin. In Japanese it’s a term for a small-time yakuza gangster in charge of just a few underlings, but the underworld flavor has mostly been lost as the word has been adopted into English.

And I found it in Japanese...
班長 はんちょう (hanchou)
(n) squad leader; honcho; team leader; group leader

Now you know!!

And hopefully some real content soon. I haven't been taking pictures or thinking of anything interesting from my daily life to toss in here. Sorry. :(

Japan gives anti-whaling activists suspended sentences

I'll admit I was pretty amused reading this since I just had just tried whale recently (it was on that big sashimi boat in a prior entry, so it wasn't like it was purely intentional! I was just enjoying random sashimi that my friends picked alright?!). Makes me think about how Japan is supposedly putting tuna at risk of becoming endangered (and man do I love tuna).

Yeah, Japan loves their seafood, and SO DO I. Guilty as charged.

Sweet Sapporo People

What to talk about? I feel I have nothing interesting to write about. Well, what would be better than the nice people? First off, the people at my school are super nice. Upon entering at the beginning of the term, the English club made me some nice welcome messages, in the pics you see above. The English teachers I work with are awesome and really look after me, and the kyoto sensei (head teacher) and other teachers are great. It's just a matter of getting more familiar with students (who are pretty dang shy with me), as well as teachers, who are a little shy with me too. It kind of comes down to me needing to stop being tired and speak Japanese with people more.

The other ALTs (as well as some non-ALTs) I've met are really nice, seasoned and new. Of course, my friends who came to UO on exchange, Tatsuya and Nozomi, and my friend Amber (with whom I became friends with through some sort of weaboo-livejournal-parapara connection). I'm lucky I already have people I know here. Last but not least, my friend Sho is from Sapporo but still in the US so I met his family, who took me out and showed me around and were way too generous and kind like Japanese people will be (paid for everything, including a nice dinner, and bought me omiyage - welcome gifts...! Aaaaa). And they took me to the Okurayama ski jump where the Winter Olympics were hosted in the 70s. Check it out (and a Hokkaido melon, one of the many gifts I got).



For what its worth, I would just like to acknowledge everyone's kindness so far and give them recognition here. Even the random owner of the genghis khan shop in my neighborhood - he was ridiculously nice. People in Sapporo are great!!! Thanks ya'll.

Just a day in the life in Japan.

Ya know, this kinda stuff.

Post with substance? (well not really)

I don't think I can possibly sum up the past month in Japan... I might post of a video of an update on all that. But! Tonight I met some friends, a couple who studied at my school on exchange, and we ate sashimi (raw fish) and drank beer. A dinner completely of raw fish...

I especially wanted to mention this just to say I got to try crazy stuff like shark's head (mmm cartilage), whale, crab eggs, umi no budou (lit. "sea grapes") and tentacles (or were they...?). Also had this little squid before the big sashimi boat came out... it was a whole squid, head and all. So in eating it, I had to remove the head with my chopsticks. :(

They had crazy decor at the place.

The inspiration for this blog's name

Sapp Time, by Bob Sapp. It is ridiculous, funny and so politically incorrect. So at he same time you can see how non-Japanese people can be portrayed in the media in Japan (especially black folks). Maybe this is why a guy said "kowai" (lit. "scary") right to my face while passing me on the street (jerk)...

According to the Japan wikipedia article, the population is as follows: 98.5% Japanese, 0.5% Korean, 0.4% Chinese, 0.6% "other".

So being a white person who's a part of that 0.6% percent, I'm going to accumulate probably, like, thousands of instances where the locals will stare, assume I am a tourist who doesn't actually live here or know Japanese language or culture, etc. Sigh. (But I got myself into this whole deal being pretty aware of this, so I suppose it's alright?)

So in a way, this video can also encompass the (non-asian?) foreigner's struggle living in Japan, haha...