Culturefest!

Violinist wearing a gas mask.

That's what I woke up to this morning. I sleepily turned on the TV and there was a music video with a violinist wearing a gas mask. There were a few of them, actually. J-pop can be pretty good, but it's still Japanese and therefore strange.

Today, it also rained very, very, hard. This is the view from my balcony. Can you see the sheet of water falling off the side of the roof?

Anyway, there's a whole lot that's happened since I posted last. I've been in sort of a blogging slump for the past couple days...but I figure if I don't write something then I'll forget all the juicy details. (Calm down, Dad, I haven't met a guy or anything.)

Hmm...on Friday my group threw a "Welcome to Japan, gaijin" party for me. Well, it was techinically a "Welcome to the Ishikawa group" party, but it kinda turned into a lesson in Japanese food, language, and culture. Here's what the spread looked like:

From left to right, Yabashi Makina, Yoshihito Tanaka, Akiko Kubo (r0x0rz), Tomoyuki Kirimura, Noriko Hashino, Akinori Kishida, Kazuhiko Tahara, Yoshinori Nishino, Tetsuya Ishikawa, Yukio Takahashi, Lebekka Saitcheru.

We had some catered food (very Japanese), pizza to make sure there was something American that I would like (too bad this was also very Japanese...apparently common toppings are bacon and eggplant, or tomatos and tuna fish...I had to explain what pepperoni was...I also explained about Ian's, a pizza place in Madison that puts anything on a pizza, like macaroni and cheese, so I think I'm completely confused them now), some mixed rice that included gobou (explaining what this was took about half an hour and a lot of confusion, so to make it short for you, it's burdock root), and the beer and wine that I brought from Madison (Spotted Cow, for those of you in the know.)

I gotta calm down (with the parenthetical comments.)

So, we ate. We also talked about what everything is, how Tahara-san is going to be able to teach me Japanese seishin if he can't even make a paper crane (even with supersized paper),
how Dr. Ishikawa can make an incredibly tiny paper crane (the tiny bottle of soy sauce is for scale), and how squid intestines and sake are a favorite combination among middle-aged men. It turns out Dr. Ishikawa has a very very good command of the English language even if he speaks slowly. He made a very good translator. After translating 'stubborn' for us, he pointed out that it's not quite the same in English, so we needed a demonstration. Tanaka-san turns out to be an excellent actor. I guess the Japanese version of being strong-willed means that you drink a lot of sake, yell, and then throw the table across the room. Apparently this attitude was very popular until recently....

I also played a game of Go with Tahara-san. He's very good and I only barely remember playing with Dad, so I got my butt kicked. The score was very close, but that was really just an accident. Kirimura-san told me that if I'm going to learn seishin, "Please beat Tahara-san before you go."

On Saturday, I met Yoko Terashita (one of the bazillion women that Koumura-san has introduced me to...he seems awfully popular... =p ) at Himeji station. This was a small adventure in and of itself. I'd never taken JR trains before, so I didn't know how to buy a ticket or what the kanji for Himeji was or even which train to take. Turned out ok, though...there was a table of fares next to the ticket machine that was in English, so I put in enough money and it spat out a ticket. The rest was self explanatory.

Since it was raining, Yoko-san and I decided not to go to Himeji castle. Instead, she took me to a traditional Japanese restaurant about an hour away that specialized in soba, omochi (not the ice cream, the wierd rice paste that has a bubble-gun type consistency), and rice crackers. With lunch, came the most amazing plum wine I've ever had. The restaurant looks like this. We sat at the central table and the paper door/windows were open so it was cool and you could see the rain and hear the nearby stream.

This was my first real Japanese experience. Not like being confused by the wierdness or watching the tea ceremony or something. Just sitting there in the restaurant on a rainy day, listening to the rainwater, and watching a windchime flutter in the breeze. I'd seen this exact scene in many animes, and thought they were just trying to be artsy and pretentious, but that's definitely not the case. It's a very peaceful, quiet feeling...very Japanese.

Also, the cold soba noodles were the best I've ever had in my entire life. Kinda like the difference between fresh pasta and dried.

After that, we went to a museum in Himeji that had an exhibit of (mostly) traditional Japanese paintings. My favorite by far was a painting of an owl that had just been woken up. I think it was about to kill the artist as soon as it could be bothered to move. It looks exactly like my dad's cat Piggus.

My current dilemma is whether to make the effort and whip out an apple pie for July 4th for my labmates or not. I'm not sure there's an oven, apples are expensive, and I don't have a pie pan. But it's July 4th, and they just threw a nice party for me. What's going to happen is that I'll procrastinate the decision until July 3rd and can't go out shopping. Ooh...that's tomorrow.

The other thing that's tomorrow is my presentation. I have to talk about my work in Madison. This'll be the first time I've given a talk to people outside my group, but the only thing I'm really worried about is if I'll finish the slides. This is completely retarded, becuase Dr. Ishikawa is very smart and these are all x-ray people and I don't know what I'm talking about. Hurrah for false confidence!!


PS. Sarah sent me the awesomest email.

I just wanted to say hello and to say that Iove your blog like I love dog races on a warm summers day in Montana with a pich of la la la. Or in english, you blog = (being at the beach)^3 + a month of vacation.

I just though you could use some American weirdness to go with all the Japanese!

PS.
Once again, Sarah is being featured in my blog. The rest of you people need to catch up... I want your submissions on my desk by 5:00 pm Friday afternoon.