きれい金沢 (Beautiful Kanazawa)

            Hello everyone! I return to you now with another update. Again, a lot has happened since my last post so I will try to summarize as best as I can. Life in Japan continues to be fantastic and I am still filled with euphoria about living here despite the language barrier and various cultural disparities that inevitably happen everyday. I have started going to the assorted junior highs and elementary schools I will be teaching at and am doing my best to learn the names of my co-workers but, alas, I have quite a few of them and it is proving to be an arduous task (time to make a seating chart it seems). As classes won’t commence until early September, most of my time at the office has thus far been spent studying Japanese and preparing my English self-introduction that I will give to all my schools (fun fact many of you who are reading this post will be featured).

            In terms of non-work related events, my last two weekends have been filled with all sorts of interesting experiences. Two Saturdays ago, I was invited to a puppet show performed by the students of Kanazawa University for the local children in one of my nearby villages. The show was a good opportunity to meet some of the local kids, and I was rather glad the show was for children because I could actually understand most of the simple Japanese vocab and grammar being employed (I was able understand stuff made for 1^st graders Woot! Woot!) From what I gathered, the puppet show was about a group of children who encounter a Kappa (a Japanese mythical creature that is like a turtle-monkey combination) and the shenanigans that follow.

Kappa Play

        The next day, my Japanese Board of Education supervisor, Muroishi-san, generously invited my co-worker, Jillian, and myself over to his house for dinner. I had a splendid time meeting his family and eating myself silly with all of the delicious food his wife made. We concluded the evening by setting off some fireworks and listening to Muroishi-san talk about Japanese constellations (of which he apparently knows everything according to his wife).

Delicious

            This last weekend, from Thursday to Sunday, I had the privilege to visit the capital of Ishikawa prefecture, the beautiful city of Kanazawa for the new Ishikawa JETs’ orientation. As Kanazawa was one of the few major Japanese cities to be spared the horrors of being firebombed during World War II, the city has preserved much of its traditional architectural heritage, making it very similar to Kyoto. Unfortunately, my trip did not begin on a high note as when I took the bus to Kanazawa, I missed the stop I was supposed to get off at and had to walk a good 30 minutes in the stifling heat (in a suit no less) to the prefectural office where orientation was being held. Despite this bump in the road, orientation was a lot of fun and it was great getting to meet all of colleagues in the Ishikawa prefecture. That night, several other JETs and I went to a cool restaurant in downtown Kanazawa where I had some very delicious raw tuna.

Kanazawa Station

            One thing that really caught my eye in Kanazawa the first night was the number of young people. The reason that this caught my attention can be traced to Japan’s demographic situation, and some would say, woes. Japan, especially in rural areas (aka my town) is currently suffering from a gross population imbalance where the old significantly outnumber the young. Indeed, rural areas in Japan suffer from this trend even more as virtually all of the young people flee to the cities after graduating from high school. I have certainly seen this demographic trend in Noto-Cho as everyone between the ages of 18 to about 30 is virtually absent.

            Anyway, I digress, the next day in Kanazawa was more orientation stuff followed by a bar crawl at the end of the day. The first bar we went to was owned by a fellow American and the people who went had great fun imitating each others accents (fun fact ask someone from New Zealand to say Moscow Mule with an American accent hilarious results will follow, kind of sounds like Yosemite Sam). Next we went to a St. Louis themed bar where the bartenders juggle booze for peoples birthdays and suffice to say it was a lot of fun watching them.

The average American according to New Zealand

On Saturday, I had the chance to do some sightseeing of the city and saw some really cool things. The first site I visited was Kanazawa Castle. The castle grounds were enormous and took me a good 40 minutes to explore in its entirety.

Kanazawa Castle

The only bad note at the castle was an absolutely terrifying encounter with the dreaded Osuzumebachi. Indeed, even the Japanese couples that were walking next to me absolutely started booking it when they saw this evil spawn of nature.

Watch out for the Suzumebachi

After this encounter with Satan-bee, I visited the nationally renowned Kenrokuen garden. I vow to return to this gorgeous place during Sakura season when the cherry blossoms are in full bloom. 

Scenes from Kenroku-en Garden

round noon, I headed over to a picnic by the Saigawa River that was being held by several older JETs and had a good time conversing with many old and new JETs.

Picnic at the river

            The next day, the Noto JETs and I headed back up to the depths of Noto and stopped by the city of Wajima on the way, which has a thriving market every Sunday. One of the highlights was going into an antique store that was actually selling Samurai armor, and medieval era katanas, spears and muskets. According to one of the older JETs, these old artifacts are evidently rather cheaper than one would expect in Japan as long as they weren’t owned by anyone famous. However, it is also quite illegal to take these artifacts out of the country so don’t expect any Samurai armor souvenirs. 

Samurai armor for sale!

I did, however make a fine purchase of grilled cuttlefish, which despite its rather intimidating looking appearance was quite tasty.

Grilled Cuttlefish

            That’s all for now folks, I expect something else amusing will happen this upcoming week. Randomly, I have been asked to read the English translation of “The Raven” by Edgar Allen Poe for the local international society. Having never done anything to do with poetry or dramatic reading ever this should prove quite interesting (half of me wants to say the lyrics to Barney the Dinosaur darkly and see if anyone can actually understand me). Also coming up this weekend is a local Matsuri (festival) in Wajima that is supposed to be a good time.