People watching on the subway November 29, 2006
Posted by Kristen in Japanese Culture, Tokyo Adventures.1 comment so far
I like riding the subway because it gives me a chance to observe people up close. Because we live in an expat neighborhood, I often encounter Americans and other foreigners when I walk around near home; on the subway, I’m quite often the only non-Japanese person.
In some ways, everyone looks alike. They all have black hair, except for the women who have lightened thiers to one of a few shades of dark brown or auburn. They all have “Asian” eyes. I have been thinking about this for some time: what is it that distinguishes the eyes of Asian people? They’re brown; they’re narrower and less round than ours; they have a little fold of skin on the inner corner. It’s hard to characterize, yet we recognize them immediately by their eyes. What do our eyes look like to them? Are they noticeable for being large, round, blue?
Despite the sameness of a few obvious features, they all look completely individual and distinct from one another. When I look at their faces I can pick out many of the same “types” of people I might see on the subway in New York. We tend to describe people by their hair and eye and skin color, as though those are the things that differentiate us from one another. It’s interesting to see that these are really not the things that set us apart after all.
Today I saw a young woman on the subway who was well-dressed, with her hair neatly styled, a perfect manicure, and makeup. And her teeth were crooked. What a surprise! When was the last time you saw a young person with crooked teeth?
Thanksgiving November 29, 2006
Posted by Kristen in Food, Holiday.add a comment
It seemed especially important to me that we keep up American holiday traditions while in this new land. So I decided to cook Thanksgiving dinner. And I didn’t stop at that. Feeling inspired by having met new people in the building and at Isabella’s school, I decided we should have guests. This is not something I’m used to doing. It all came out very nice and we had a good visit, but what an undertaking! I tip my hat to my mother and all the amazing, elaborate meals she has made over the years.
I managed to get all the ingredients for the dinner at National Azabu, the international supermarket that is very close by. Nothing pre-made to be had, however, so I did the whole thing from scratch. Took me about 3 days to prepare and 2 to clean up! Since I couldn’t call my mother with last-minute questions, as I always do, I managed with web searches. The turkey was frozen, of course, so I was glad I bought it on Sunday and found out right away that it would take 3 days to thaw. Besides turkey with stuffing and gravy, we had mashed potatoes, baked yams (purple ones!), mushrooms sauteed with marsala and cream (shiitake and other Japanese varieties) and green beans (because I have a method for blanching them ahead of time). I made pumpkin cheesecake, and then, because we had 4 guests, an apple pie, too. What’s really amazing is that I managed to do a lot ahead of time, I didn’t panic, and everything came out just fine. Be very impressed.
Our guests were Isabella’s friend Eric from school, his mother Miki (born in Japan and moved to the U.S. at 14), Eric’s father and ex-husband of Miki, Johan, who is Swedish, and Miki’s boyfriend, Kevin, who is Irish. A most unusual family grouping! It appears they all get along quite well and often socialize together. Isabella and Eric did well at the formal table, then enjoyed playing together in the den while the grown-ups chatted. Eric was great with Juliet, as well.
It’s awfully nice to have non-Americans as guests for Thanksgiving dinner because they’re so impressed by everything and have no preconceived notions of what the dinner ought to be. Miki was fascinated by the gravy-making process. She had never seen a turkey neck before and was amazed at how we made use of all the extra parts. All of the adult guests chose the apple pie for dessert because they thought that was the most “American.” We topped it all off with espresso from our new DeLonghi espresso maker, which seemed to be the best part of all. They were delighted to have real espresso and complimented us on our cups, the mismatched china demitasse cups we bought in Geneva. A nice international touch to our American holiday.
It was a terriffic dinner and a lovely afternoon. And now I think I’ll take the next 2 weeks or so off from cooking. Good thing I finally figured out how to order Domino’s online!
Branching Out November 21, 2006
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I started this post over a week ago, then got overwhelmed with preparations for Thanksgiving. Here, belatedly, are some of my recent adventures getting around this unusual city.
A couple of weeks ago, I went in search of an electronics store to buy a webcam and headset for my computer. I decided to go to one called Bic Camera, because I’d been to the store before and I have a “pointo cardo” (they’re really into point cards here). I set out for Shibuya, thinking that was the location of the store I’d been to before. It turned out this was a different store, and I wasn’t sure where to find it. I wandered around for awhile and tried to just enjoy exploring without worrying too much about finding anything. This worked for some time, but then I began to get annoyed because I really wanted the webcam and headset. I found a map near the subway station and located the store on the map. I set off in what I thought was the right direction, but couldn’t find the store. So I checked the map again, and found another location for the store in another direction. I walked up that street and looked, still to no avail. I walked many blocks, knowing it was too far. This is when I stumbled upon Colonel Sanders as Santa Claus. Finally, I found a policeman and asked him. He pointed me back in the direction I had come and added helpfully “right-hand side”. By this time I was determined to find it, so after walking back several blocks, I began walking slowly and looking for electronics. I listened closely. At last, I heard it: “bic-a bic-a bic-a bic camera!”, that inane little jingle that they always play outside the store. I looked up, and sure enough, there it was: The sign. Plain as day. Written in katakana.
It had never occurred to me that the sign would not be in English.
(Okay, in my defense, most big stores have signs in English–even those wtih Japanese names like Takashimaya.)
Another day, I decided to walk to the American Club. I had been told by a couple of different people in my building that it takes about 25 minutes to walk. I had never tried before, and thought it was time. Why had I never walked this relatively short distance in the 2 months I’ve been here? Well, because it’s nearly impossible to find things in this city. Why?
There are not street names in Tokyo.
Okay, to be fair, there are some major avenues that have names. Think University Avenue, Franklin Avenue, the West Side Highway, Broadway. But most streets are tiny little windy roads that are barely wide enough for 2 cars to pass and usually have no sidewalks. And they have no names. So you can look at a map, but you can’t actually find any of the streets unless you have really good spacial reasoning, which I apparently don’t. I took my map with me on this walk and I still got lost several times. But I persevered. I even asked directions from a Japanese person, a friendly-looking woman with young children. Later, lost again, I asked a policeman who spoke very good English. He directed me in a very roundabout way that didn’t seem to make sense according to my map. I asked if I couldn’t go a more direct way, and he said no, that wasn’t the way people go. So of course, being the stubborn, independent American I am, I had to try it my way anyway. And he was right: the “direct” way got me to the service entrance of the club with no way around to the front door. I had to walk around several blocks and up a hill with the stroller to finally get to the front entrance.
After an hour and 5 minutes, I finally made it to the entrance to the club. At this point, I hardly needed the workout–but would you have skipped it after all that effort? I went to the gym anyway.
I think I finally have to accept the fact that in order to learn my way around here, I have to be willing to get lost. Many times. This will be a challenge for me because I am very uncomfortable when I’m lost. And can’t read a map. And can’t ask for directions. It will be a good exercise in letting go, I think. It’s time to branch out a little more.
I’ve met some new people in our building during the past few weeks. Two women who live on the floor below decided to host a coffee for all the stay-at-home moms in the building and I got to meet and talk to several of the women I have seen in the elevator and the halls. It was a great relief to talk to new people and make new connections. And of course, several of them have children close in age to Isabella and Juliet. I was especially glad to meet our new neighbor down the hall, who had just moved from New Jersey with two girls, ages 4 and 6, who are also going to the New International School. To top it off, the older girl is named Isabella! The girls met soon after, and have been running down the hall to visit each other almost every day. Even better for my Isabella was getting to meet Rachel, 10, and Hana, 8, who live just downstairs. They grew up in Tokyo with a Japanese mother and an English father and go to an international school nearby. Isabella likes to hang out with the older girls and get help with her Japanese homework. It makes a big difference for us both to add more people to our social circles. And I think it’s great for Isabella to have friends she can visit completely independently. Finally, she can say “Bye, Mom, I’m going to Rachel and Hana’s. See you later!”
Now, if I can just figure out how to get her to come home on time . . . .
A Tasty Snack ? November 20, 2006
Posted by Kristen in Food, Kids.1 comment so far
It is clear that Juliet will have a different childhood from most American children. Today I took her to Gymboree for open play time and struck up a conversation with a Japanese woman I had met in her music class. When we sat down in the snack area afterwards, she gave her child a snack of tiny dried fish. Juliet seemed interested in them, so the other mother offered her one. Juliet loved them so much, she gave us the whole package and she happily munched them all the way home! (The other mom pointed out to me that they are slightly sweet, for children.)
A City Scene November 15, 2006
Posted by Kristen in Food, Japanese Culture, Tokyo Adventures.2 comments
I stumbled across this yesterday when I was out shopping. I thought it was just too silly for words, so I had to share it. It seems they think St. Nick is a Kentucky Colonel!
A Day Out at the Science Museum November 13, 2006
Posted by Kristen in Kids, Tokyo Adventures.1 comment so far
Most exhibits were labelled in English at least somewhat, and when they weren’t, we just had more opportunities to experiment. We practiced our katakana, too.
It was really nice to get out and do something fun as visitors in this city. We hope to make lots more visits like this in the future.
Saipan November 11, 2006
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Last weekend we took our first family vacation from Tokyo. We thought it would be nice after the busy summer and difficult move to have a few days on the beach, so we flew to the island of Saipan. I don’t think I had even heard of this island before, and certainly had no idea where it was. It turns out it’s about 3 hours away from Tokyo by airplane, about 1400 miles. It is a U.S. Territory in the same chain of islands as Guam, but politically unrelated to Guam. If you’re interested in learning about its chequered history and current state of political corruption, not to mention appalling lack of labor laws and abuse of immigrant workers, check out this website.
I found it to be a strange little island. It looks American in some respects, with standard U.S. street signs and some familiar stores. But most of the visitors were Japanese and all the signs in the hotel were in Japanese as well as English. Amid the palm trees and tropical flowers, there are immediate reminders of its sad history: places with names like Invasion Beach, Tank Beach and Suicide Point. There is a rusted-out Japanese tank on a platform next to the road as you drive along the beach. I was hoping to find a drugstore to buy a few America toiletries that I had been missing, but there didn’t seem to be such a thing. There is one stretch of upscale stores, along with a Hard Rock Cafe, that seems to cater to the Japanese tourists. But off that clean strip the shopping areas seemed to be little more than poker joints, pawn shops and run-down markets. I walked 40 minutes from the hotel in search of diapers and found it very depressing. When I finally found a market that had them, however, they were very friendly and helped me get a cab back to the hotel.
We missed out on beach time on our first day because our flight was delayed, but enjoyed 3-1/2 days of sun and sand. Our hotel was on the leeward side of the island and the water was very calm; the coral reef created an extremely shallow lagoon that was great for the kids to play in (view some photos of the hotel here). Juliet enjoyed the sand—both digging in it and eating it. We made holes in the sand for her to sit in and splash when they filled with water. (“Juliet soup”) We also spent plenty of time at the pool, where Juliet bobbed in her baby float and Isabella found other kids to play with.
The highlight of the trip was a snorkeling outing to the tiny island of Managaha a 5-minute boat ride away. We left Juliet with a babysitter, borrowed gear, and set out for the day. When you arrive at the island, you have to pay a $20 admission fee; the island closes at 4:00 (who ever heard of an island closing?) There is a gift shop and a restaurant that serves both cheeseburgers and Japanese food. You can lock your gear in a locker and walk down to the beach. The
3 of us donned our flippers and walked into the water. Within just a few yards of the 
shore, we were swimming with parrot fish, surgeon fish, trumpet fish, and our favorite, the humuhumunukunukuapua’a. There was iridescent blue-purple coral and a school of tiny yellow fish that vanished into a web of coral as we approached. And most of the time, we were within 50 yards of the shore and in 5-6 feet of water. It was really spectacular. Here is a picture of Isabella on the beach; the coral reef is right behind her.
Back on Saipan, we enjoyed several good meals together. Isabella joined us for tw
o: one very good Italian, and the other a delicious and entertaining Japanese tepanyaki restaurant. This is the cook-at-your table dinner-as-theater that you might be familiar with from the American chain Benihana. You place your order, then the chef brings out all the ingredients and cooks it in front of you. Isabella ordered sauteed escargots with shiitake mushrooms; we also had asparagus, oysters with shiitake and beef tenderloin. The highlight of the meal was the shrimp fried rice: the chef placed each egg on the griddle, cracking the base to hold it steady. Then he flipped them up one by one into his hat, bent over to drop it into his hand, and cracked it onto the hot griddle. He scrambled the eggs on the griddle and stirred them into the rice. It was a lot of fun, and all the food was delicious.
Isabella made some friends at the pool and had a lot of fun splashing around. One of the girls she met lives close by in Tokyo and we hope to get them together for a playdate now that we’re back. She also loved visiting the resident tropical birds, a beautiful blue macaw and a cockatoo named Freddie. Freddie was very friendly, and if you walked over to his cage and called him, he would move to a part of the cage where there was a little opening in the mesh and let you reach in and stroke his feathers. Isabella was very sad to leave him!
As much as we all enjoyed the sun and sand, we all found ourselves feeling somewhat uneasy throughout the trip. It was hard to settle down and relax and we all found ourselves losing our tempers from time to time. I’m sure part of it was the difficulty of travelling with 2 children and working around a baby’s schedule. But I think there was more to it. There was something about going on vacation from Japan that made it feel more foreign, made us feel displaced and unsettled. And where did we fit in within the mishmash of Japanese and American culture? Should we be eating sushi or cheeseburgers? Should we try to speak Japanese, to practice and be polite, or English, to be comfortable?
When it came time to pack up, I didn’t feel the letdown I often feel about returning from a trip. It felt very different, knowing I was not going back to New York. I don’t know if that was because it is always hard to return to New York (I always think there should be a sign at JFK Airport saying “Welcome to America. F*** You.” It would prepare you for the attitude you’re about to encounter!), or because it didn’t really feel like we were going home.
Once we got back to Tokyo, I think something clicked for all of us: this is not a vacation; this is home. I think we’ve all been sailing along feeling as if this was some sort of extended holiday. The reality has begun to sink in this week, and it was a bit of a shock for all of us. Isabella suddenly felt very homesick and began to say for the first time “I want to go home.” I went to the drugstore on Tuesday to look once again for moisturizer and had another panic. What are all these stupid bottles with funny lines on them? Just give me my Oil of Olay and leave me alone! And why can’t I find Cheerios for Juliet?! It didn’t help that Mark flew off to Hong Kong the morning after our return or that Isabella came down with a bad cold and a fever on Thursday night.
But now it is Saturday. Isabella is recovering after staying home one day from school. Mark has returned from Hong Kong, bringing me both Oil of Olay and Bailey’s Irish Creme. Mark and I are planning to go out to dinner tonight, and Isabella has a call planned for tomorrow morning with her best friend Sophia in New York. Hopefully, next week will be easier. And if it’s not, I made some really good chocolate sauce for ice cream last night and there’s lots left over in the refrigerator . . . .
Juliet’s first Japanese Word November 10, 2006
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Yesterday morning at Gymboree music class, Juliet handed her blankie to the teacher (see the picture below) and said “dozo.” This means “here you go” in Japanese. Yippee!
Her words in English so far include “baby,” “ball,” “no,” “okay,” and “oh-oh.”
Lunch Box Woes November 9, 2006
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I would never make it as a Japanese mother. During my Japanese lesson this morning, as lunch time approached, I mentioned I was getting hungry. My teacher said that she was hungry too, as she gets up at 5:30 every morning to make her daughter’s lunch for school. I asked what she made today. Here’s what she described:
pork, cooked with onions and spices;
broccoli;
weiners and beans.
I asked her, did she make all of this fresh today, from scratch? Yes, she said. Do you do this every morning, I asked? Yes.
Wow. I’m a failure at lunchboxes.
After a few weeks of packing sandwiches in Isabella’s old lunchbox, we got her a kid’s bento box lunch set. Hers is a Hello Kitty set that has two stacking plastic boxes, one with a divider. I used to pack her a whole piece of fruit; now, she tells me I’m supposed to cut it up into small pieces and give her a little pick to eat it with. Today I gave her a hard-boiled egg, so I peeled it and cut it into quarters. When I told this to Noriko, she said “oh, you can cut it in a zigzag pattern so that it looks like a tulip.” Good grief! Now I’m supposed to be making decorative hors-d’oevres for my 8-year-old daughter’s lunch.
The lunch-box section in department stores is huge: besides the boxes, there are little bags to carry them in, chopstick sets, forks and spoons, and all kinds of cute little containers and dividers for putting cute little things into the boxes. Part of me feels woefully inadequate; but another part of me says, “Give me a break! Don’t they have anything better to do with their time?” There are even magazines devoted to creative bento box ideas.
For the record, tomorrow’s lunch is leftover gnocchi from tonight’s dinner, broccoli, mixed vegetables, and an orange (peeled and divided into sections). Okay, so I just put the vegetables into the box frozen and let them thaw in the refrigerator overnight. A lazy American has to take shortcuts somewhere.
Bullies and Witches November 7, 2006
Posted by Kristen in Holiday, Kids, School.add a comment
It is such a challenge to keep up with this journal, and always difficult to decide what to write about. Sometimes when big things happen, I am so tired out by dealing with the event itself that I have no energy left to write about it. How do real writers do this?
Just when things start to get settled in part of my life here, it seems I can free up space to deal with the other parts that I have pushed aside. And then I can get knocked for a loop all over again.
I had not been involved in Isabella’s school at all, and knew very little about what was going on in her class. So when they had a Field Day recently, I decided to go and check it out.
On Friday October 27, I packed up Juliet and a picnic lunch and went to Isabella’s school for Field Day. The children spent almost the whole day at a nearby elementary school (which seems to be no longer in use as a school) that has outdoor space with a tr
ack. They were put into groups mixed by age and competed in lots of different activities. Some seemed more fun than others, but the ended with a tug-of-war tournament that everyone seemed to enjoy. Up until this point, I had only been to school twice: on Isabella’s first day to drop her off, and for her birthday to serve cupcakes. It was nice to spend the day there and meet some of the other parents. They were dismissed early and several of us went to a nearby park. I had a chance to visit with several other mothers and Isabella had fun playing with other kids, something she has had very little opportunity to do because of the long school day and long bus ride. Juliet fared well even though she missed both naps, enjoying the company of all the big kids, and crawling in the dirt.
It was fortunate that I met and spoke to the other moms on Friday, because on Saturday morning I got a call from one of them. She asked if I had been aware that one of the girls in Isabella’s class had put her shirt in the toilet on Thursday afternoon. It seems that several of the girls had been called back to school on Friday afternoon after Field Day and questioned by the teachers. Somehow, however, nobody thought to let me in on it, even though I had been there all day. Needless to say, it was all pretty upsetting and I was pretty angry with the teachers. I was also upset because Isabella had been telling me things that had happened in school, and I realized that I hadn’t been paying close enough attention. Her first few days, everyone wanted to be her friend and they used to argue about who got to sit next to her. But then, quite suddenly, it stopped. It seems that this one girl was jealous of her and decided that she would make the others stop paying attention to her. She started some sort of negative campaign against Isabella which included stealing things and telling others Isabella had done it, and probably even threatening the girls if they tried to be friendly to her. The shirt in the toilet was the last straw. I finally understood what had been going on and I hit the roof. Then I had to spend the rest of the weekend recovering and decompressing, waiting until I could talk to someone at school on Monday.
I was pleasantly surprised when I spoke to the principal (who is American ) on Monday and found that he understood that there was real bullying going on and agreed that it was very serious. I arranged to go in on Tuesday and meet with both of Isabella’s teachers and then with the teachers and principal together. It is a tricky problem, including language and cultural differences as well as plain old-fashioned bullying. Still, the meeting went well. The teachers apologized for not talking to me sooner and said they were making some immediate and obvious changes, such as only letting one child go to the bathroom at a time. The principal has had real experience with bullying when he taught in public school in Glasgow and seemed to have good, sensible ideas about what to do and what not to do. In addition, he seems kind and approachable and I think the kids feel comfortable talking to him. I was really impressed with how he handled the situation. The next day (or was it later that day?), two of the girls apologized to Isabella in front of the class. She is content that it’s all over and done with, but I’m still wary. I still don’t trust the girl who has been the ringleader and it’s hard to know which of the other girls will tend to be fearful followers and which will be true friends.
Although it was exhausting, in the end I was glad that this whole shirt incident took place. It was so outrageous that it made everyone stand up and take notice, and got everyone involved. Now, hopefully, it will get better. And I will make an effort to spend more time at school and make sure Isabella has more time to play with her friends outside of school, out of the reach of the bully.
This led us right into Halloween. Although Noriko told me that Japanese children don’t go trick-or-treating, we saw several groups of them wandering through our neighborhood in full costume. Maybe they’ve discovered this is the place to come, with all the Americans here? Isabella was invited to go with her friend Eric in his apartment building nearby. It is a huge building with lots of Americans and Eric’s mom promised lots of loot. I tried to get a picture of the two of them together, but Juliet was afraid of Eric’s Space Alien mask and he had to hide it until they left! I stayed in the apartment with Juliet and Eric’s mom while Isabella and Eric went in search of treats. They had a lot of fun going around the building and came back heavily laden with candy, both familiar treats and some strange new ones.
On Wednesday afternoon Isabella had a playdate with a girl from another class at school who lives nearby. Her mother had sent a note home to me asking if she could pick the girls up after school and take them to the park. I met them later and they seemed to have had a very nice time together. They are Japanese and speak English pretty well. The mother seems like a lovely person. She told me that several of the mothers were planning a trip in December to a new theme park and wanted to know if they could take Isabella. I thought it was so nice of them to think of her and ask to include her. It sounds like a fun outing and I’m sure she’ll have a great time.
Tomorrow is Wednesday, the “early” day at school when they get out at 2:50. I’ve decided to go and pick Isabella up from school and take her to the nearby park to play, as I’ve learned that several of her classmates go there every Wednesday afternoon. I plan to make this a regular event, and hope that I can help her get more settled and avoid more major dramas in the future.
