Uncle Travelling Matt

Japanese Musings VIII: The Joys of Internationalisation

Series 2

Japanese Musings I: Heads, Shoulders, Knees and Toes

Japanese Musings VIII: The Joys of Internationalisation

The subject for this weeks musings regards the side of my job which they don't really tell you about before you hit the town. I thought that I was coming here as a teacher. This is of course partially true, but not entirely, for it seems that the town ALTs, (the city ALTs are a different matter entirely), also are expected to perform the role of some unofficial ambassador. Now of course where they are ambassador for is not precisely stated, and indeed there seems to be much confusion on this matter, though it seems to roughly translate to being anywhere that speaks English. This is ok and perhaps understandable, though I must confess that I am getting fed up of being mistaken for an American.

"So how is beer in America?" I am asked.

"I wouldn't know," one replies, "since I've never been there, nor do I have any inclination whatsoever to go. But, judging by the stuff they export, I should guess that its pretty crap."

This is met with puzzled looks. "But you speak English?!"

"Yes, indeed I do, that is because I am English, that is the language we speak, in fact that is where that fine tongue originated from. You see, I am a citizen of the European Union, 'Europa' in Japanese, and Europe is not, I'm afraid, America. Ask me about Rotterdam, Edinburgh, Athens or Barcelona, maybe I can help. Ask about sheep farming in the Lake District [we did that one in geography see] and I am your man, but on Thanksgiving celebrations, I am sorry but I must draw a blank. I would even go so far as to say that I know more about energy production in Japan [another geography gem] than the good old US of A."

"Oh!"

On the whole though, it is not so bad and some townsfolk even know about England, though their perceptions seem rather coloured by their experiences of group travel.

"Please Matto-sensei, I make invitation that you can come my house at exactly three pm."

"Why, thank you."

"Because I make Afternoon Tea with scones and I know that every English person eat this at three."

"Right, and from where did you learn that little cultural titbit?"

"Ah yes, we make a vacation to England before three years, and everyday the coach is stop at tearoom and we have Afternoon Tea."

"I see, and did you perchance happen to stop in a place called Broadway, or perhaps Bourton-on-the-Water for the Afternoon Tea, en route to Stratford to see Shakespeare's house?"

"Yes, exactly this was the place. They say is typical English village."

"Right..."

But, I jest. On the whole I really do enjoy my new career as the Official Ambassador of Englishdom. For a start, I get to write a little piece in the town paper every month, talking about my experiences in Osawano. My predecessor warned me about this beforehand. "Don't criticise anything in Japan" were his sage words, "they won't print it!" It seems that one of his articles, discussing discipline within the school, (well to be more exact, the abject lack of discipline within the school), was refused. I read the piece and whilst it was mildly controversial, and indeed may have raised a few eyebrows back home, ("And what right has a bloody foreigner got to criticise our education system?" thunders the local Tory councillor in a strongly-worded letter to the 'Times and Echo'), it wasn't altogether that bad.

But I digress. So staying away from controversial subjects, I then decided to make my little pieces are incredibly cheesy as possible. One extolled the virtues of karaoke, another talked about how marvellous Royal Families are, (though should they ever be got rid of, I suggested Paul McCartney as a good candidate for British President and Katori Shingo (exceptionally cheesy singer) for Japan). I discuss red telephone boxes, the Beatles and of course Afternoon Tea. What's more they love it!! I have lost count of the number of times people have come up to me and complimented me on what are in my opinion, ( and a valid opinion since I wrote them), exceptionally bad articles. This month's topic is cooking and in particular Roast Beef and Yorkshire Puddings. I await the response.

But my Ambassador role does not stop there. Far from it. Two weeks ago I had to show a Malaysian girl around who was on an exchange from the Lions Club International. "You're the first person that I met here that speaks English" commented Ms. Choing Chang.

"Really!" I replied, "that does surprise me!"

Ms. Choing Chang checking out the Osawano Statue Park

The best part however is dealing with the Osawano International Circle.

The Osawano International Circle is run by a Mr Sugibaiashi who is retired. In fact all of it's members are retired, except one who is a housewife. It is in essence a group who likes to practice their English and talk to foreigners, and it is also one of the nicest groups of people whom one could expect to meet. I say practice their English, but that is not entirely true, since they don't have a lot of English to practice with, but they try hard, I try to speak some Japanese and together we communicate.

Osawano Cooking Class (Mr. Sugibaiashi is second from the left)

Earlier in the month they held a Cooking Class where two Russian girls and a Chinese lady cooked dishes from their home countries. I was the guest of honour, and we all had a real good laugh. "Thank you for inviting me" I told our hostess.

"No problem," replieth she with a twinkle in her eye, "because next time you is teacher. We make scones!"

"But I can't cook!" I protested.

"Of course you can," retorted she, "I know because I read Osawano Town Paper. You write 'I cook scones every day to eat with my Afternoon Tea'!"

Talk about digging your own grave! I'm off to the library now for a recipe book....

Next musing: Meri Kurisumasu!

Technorati Tags: uncle travelling matt,travel,blog,japanese musings,japan,osawano,toyama-ken,osawano international circle,sugibaiashi,lions club,choing chang,afternoon tea,ireland,bru na boinne,dublin,newgrange,clonmacnoise,achill island,croagh patrick,hill of tara,lenin

Friday, 1 August 2014

Japanese Musings VII: Time, time, time…

Greetings!

Today’s post combines two of my favourite activities: reading and travel. I read a lot as a child but then stopped at high school. I’ve always blamed GCSE and A-Level Literature for that; the books we read were inaccessible and totally unsuited to the world of the teenager. Thankfully, when I moved to Japan I began to read again, vociferously, and I am still doing it today. Not quite to the same degree perhaps – I don’t have the same amount of free time now as I did then – but still with passion and verve.

And over the years I’ve found that travel and reading are natural bedfellows. One can inform the other and vice versa. On this site I review some of the travel writing that I’ve read, but what I’m talking about goes beyond that. If you’re going to the Philippines, then read a Filipino novel, (I recommend the stuff by F. Sionil Jose), or if you are headed to Turkey, why not a brief history of the country or an aspect of it that you are particularly interested in (nothing better than John Julius Norwich’s ‘Byzantium’)? Indeed, both can be love affairs to last a lifetime, partners that can change as you do, (although a brief return fling with Enid Blyton is always fun). Reading a book on a long train journey as the scenery of an exotic place rolls by – what pleasure in life is finer?

Which brings me to the present because tomorrow I head off on my travels again, week’s trip to Ireland to see two friends of mine. And on that trip there’ll be two juicy train trips from the east coast to the west. What shall I pack to keep me entertained? ‘Around Ireland with a Fridge’ by Tony Hawks, an Emerald Isle classic by Joyce; ‘Under Milk Wood’ to help inspire me to write up my Welsh expeditions or something completely off the wall… ‘Anna Karenina’, ‘Ten Days that Shook the World’ or perhaps yet another re-read of ‘1984’. Choosing, that is always the hardest part…

Keep travelling!

Uncle Travelling Matt

Links to all the Japanese Musings:

Series 1

Japanese Musings VIII: The Joys of Internationalisation

Series 2

Next musing: The Joys of Internationalisation

Japanese Musings VII: Time, time, time...

Today I am quite agitated. The thing that is bothering me is whether Prince Andrew will marry Natasha. I certainly hope that he does, since he is a nice bloke and she is a sweet girl. Of course I appreciate that the age difference could cause problems and all, but they do love each other so. Of course where that leaves Pierre is another matter. His marriage to Helene is nothing more than a sham, and whilst she may be beautiful she does strike me as a bit of a bitch at times. Yep, I feel sorry sorry for Pierre in a big way. Ok, so he's a bit strange and he took being in the Freemasons a wee bit too seriously, especially the mystical side of it all, but his heart is in the right place, isn't it?

I imagine that you probably haven't got the faintest idea what I'm going on about, and to be honest I'm not surprised. You see the thing that I'm talking about is the thing that has taken over my life completely for the last four or five days; the latest book that I'm reading. The book is called "War and Peace" and its bloody brilliant. To be fair, most people have heard of this text, but how many have actually read it? Not many I would imagine for the simple reason that it is ridiculously big. It is not big in the usual "hmm this is a big book" sense, but piss-takingly huge. I am reading it in a serious way, I have been doing such for four or five days, and I aren't near the half way mark yet. It is THAT big, way too large and long and thick. Too big really.

War and Peace: long

Mr Tolstoy, I imagine must have had a lot of time on his hands, and indeed the theme of this weeks mail is just that, people with rather too much time on their hands, in other words, ALTs or JETs, (whichever abbreviation rolls off your tongue most easily). Having conversed with many of my colleagues on the matter I have come to the conclusion that all ALTs spend large portions of their working day doing absolutely sod all. In fact all those that I spoke to have this problem, bar one and thus I conclude that she is either lying or should demand a transfer to somewhere easier immediately.

To be fair, we are only being like the Japanese themselves, who must spend on average about ten hours every weekday at the office, doing the same amount of work which Europeans do in seven. But it is ok for them, they can sit and chat to their mates or indeed they can drop off to sleep at the drop of a hat.

That is quite interesting really but it seems to me that most Japanese are trained from birth to be able to sleep anywhere and then wake up only five minutes later. As soon as they get on a train, and they all doze off, but did you ever see one sleep through his or her stop. Not bloody likely, nope, they wake up just in time and walk off looking as fresh as if they'd just stepped out of the shower.

Sleeping Salarymen

It's the same at work, they doze off at their desk, yet always wake up ready for the next lesson. Some, I suspect fall asleep at the wheel, yet still drive the same, at a steady 50km per hour, just slow enough to annoy you and prevent you from getting anywhere on time.

But gaijin can't do that, or at least Matto-sensei can't. He dozes off, and stays asleep, and misses important things. Alternatively he doesn't doze off and gets bored. Thus he, like most of his gaijin comrades must find other diversions.

Perhaps the most popular of these is learning Japanese. This is educational and indeed incredibly useful. Unfortunately, it is also rather difficult and if, (like I), thou art a wee bit lazy, 'tis not a good road to travel upon. It takes a lot off effort and let's be honest, if I'd wanted to do things that require a lot of effort, I'd have set up my own business or gone to work for a bank or something. No, too much like hard work for me is that one. Other solutions include, writing pointless Japanese Musings, surfing the net, writing letters, etc, etc. There are however some more unorthodox ways of filling in time.

For starters, there's the humble cup of tea, (or coffee for those from less advanced civilisations. Interesting tea and coffee games can be thought of. Why not compare the different powdered milk brands in your tea. I find Marim to be the least creamy, whilst Creap (Creamy Powder), the creamiest. This is ok in coffee, but for tea, too much. I plumped, (after much deliberation), for Nestle Brite, the happy medium.

Am I feeling brite or creapy this morning…?

How about inventing your own kanji? Kanji are the 'picture' characters for words or concepts, (which fail to look remotely like what they represent despite what some people try and tell you). Why not invent kanji for concepts such as "bad hair day" or "Dutch courage"?

Another good option is of course e-mail. E-mail can waste a lot of valuable time as we all know, but what happens when we run out of people to correspond to? That is when people like my friend Lee come in.

Lee is my e-mail friend. I have never met him and don't know a lot about him, except that he lives in Osaka and is probably the only other Stoke fan east of Istanbul. However, this doesn't stop him sending me several e-mails per day with the magic prefix "Fwd" in their title. Waste good time by reading those sexist jokes and witty anti-French digs; laugh at the interactive jokes and then forward them on to your friends.

Lee is not my only e-mail friend however. I have another one called Lucy_Pike. Now Lucy_Pike is one of the JETs here, or at least that is what I thought. Therefore, I was happily sending all my forwards and musings to Lucy_Pike, and indeed I even got a short reply once, saying, "Thanks for the forward. Very funny." However, one day whilst out in Toyama, I spoke to Lucy Pike, an ALT in that fair city and also a friend of mine, who proceeded to chastise me for not sending her my musings or forwards. "But I do" one protested.

"Well, I'm not receiving any" retorted she.

It then transpired that we were both telling the gospel truth and that whilst Lucy_Pike had been enjoying my witticisms, Pike_Lucy (whom dwells in Toyama), was not. Oh well...

My number one time waster however is a good book. Unfortunately, we have so much spare time that you begin to read faster, and faster, and faster, until, wow, you start finishing a book in two days, on a regular basis. Reading becomes more expensive than drinking due to the books that you get through and the lack of public libraries. And thus, here Mr Tolstoy comes to help. I have a theory that perhaps in nineteenth century Russia there was a glut of RETs (Russian English Teachers), who had sod all to do all day. Old Tolstoy-san identified this "gap in the market", wrote books of a stupid length and thus he made his fortune. Aah, a clever man indeed.

Anyway, I must depart for Prince Andrew Bolkonski has a ball to attend at the Rostov household, and young Natasha Rostova will of course be there. Will he promise her his hand? We shall see...

War-and-Peace-war-and-peace-1956-30904830-670-492

Written 27^th November, 2000, Osawano-machi, Japan

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Friday, 25 July 2014

Japanese Musings VI – A Bad Day

Greetings!

We’re still in Japan and this week I talk about a very bad day and a few of the contradictions of the Japan I lived in. To me the one about technology is the biggest. As well as the washing machine one, the one that always got me was that concerning household heating. In a country with hi-tech cars and phones yet houses had no heating beyond simple petrol-based heaters that emitted harmful and headache-inducing fumes and cut off after several hours, causing you to wake up in the middle of the night freezing to death! Remember, this is a country where the winters are harsh and there’s no double-glazing and lots of paper-thin walls. Interesting. I wonder what an outsider might think to be such a weird contradiction about our society. Perhaps the steadfast refusal of FIFA to use video evidence despite the fact that referees are both fallible and, at times, corrupt. In the 19th century they represented the best way of ensuring justice in a football game. Now they surely do not… if that is, justice is what the aim is, for cold hard evidence also leaves little room for corruption. Something which does not apply to the Japanese washing machines and heaters which were (are?) instead, merely crap.

Keep travelling!

Uncle Travelling Matt

Links to all the Japanese Musings:

Series 1

Japanese Musings I: Heads, Shoulders, Knees and Toes

Japanese Musings VIII: The Joys of Internationalisation

Series 2

Next musing: Time, time, time…

Japanese Musings VI – A Bad Day

Yesterday was a bad day. To be honest it was a bad end to a bad week. Or at least I hope it was the end. But then again, it may not be.

Normally I am not one to moan; in fact barring garden centres, Manchester United, vegetarianism, Margaret Thatcher and Robbie Williams, there are very few things on this earth that can put me in a bad mood, but yesterday I was not happy, and I hadn't even seen a garden centre.

It started pretty awfully when I awoke at ten to nine. Now of course, compared with the previous few years, this is still an exceptionally early time to wake. But here it is not early enough, for my first lesson started at quarter to nine, and I had no excuse whatsoever for being late. Therefore, I had to pretend that I was ill, and indeed that perhaps the school was lucky that I had managed to drag myself in at all, since most ALTs would hardly be able to move in my sickened state.

To be fair, I wasn't on top of the world anyway, (and before you ask, no, I had not been drinking the previous night), but I wasn't THAT ill. So without a shower I rushed to put my clothes on, that I had washed the previous day in preparation. Except that I then noticed they weren't clean.

Japan is the most technologically advanced nation on earth, I can state that without a doubt, just look at the especially cool mobile phones, disc players and other assorted electrical appliances. This being the case, why the hell have they not managed to invent a washing machine that can actually clean clothes? The reason why they don't clean them is simple, they don't use hot water. Now in my mind, even an idiot can work out that maybe heating the water up helps in the cleaning process, but no, Messers Fuji, Suzuki, Toyota, Yamamoto, Tanaka et al who can invent a mobile phone the size of a rice crispie, cannot work out that maybe hot water is a good idea for washing machine. Thus, the clothes had to go back in the washer and I had to wear the minging clothes from last week.

A Japanese top-loading washing machine (cold water only)

Upon arrival at school I then found that it was my only busy day of the year at Osawano Junior High, so I had no time to sort myself out properly. I hadn't managed to have a cup of tea at home, so feeling decidedly in need of caffeine, I rushed back from lesson number one for a nice mug of tea.

Except that they ran out of tea. And milk. So, instead I had to lower myself to drinking coffee which may be perfectly fine for people from the south of England and mainland Europe, but does not suffice for those from higher civilisations. But there was no alternative, so I drank coffee, with powdered milk.

Yum!!

The day progressed slowly, until dinnertime, (lunch to those of you from down south), an event which I, (like most fat people), always look forward to with considerable relish. I sat down with my delightful third year students in the dining hall and surveyed the fayre on offer; rice, and vegetables, some sort of soup, and a chunk of meat. Well, at least it wasn't vegetarian. By the rice was a small packet of what I call "sprinkly stuff". Every so often they give us packets of bits of dried fish, meat or veg to sprinkle on our rice, thus making this staple food moderately interesting. 'Good' thought I, and I proceeded to open the packet and sprinkle it upon my rice.

A Japanese school dinner

"Aah!" I heard a shriek and looked up. There were several of my third years shrieking and pointing. The rest were giggling. "Matto-sensei, this no rice, no!" I was puzzled. What were they on about, and come on, couldn't they speak any English that made sense.

Just about to chastise them I then remembered who was responsible for their bad English and decided to keep quiet. The student opposite was still pointing at my dinner. "Matto-sensei, this no rice, milk!" he exclaimed. I looked down at the packet which I was sprinkling on my rice and noticed a huge grinning cow on the front. It was not not sprinkly stuff for rice at all, but chocolate powder for the milk.

Thus, I had to endure chocolatey rice and the fact that all my third years reckon I am pretty stupid. And there was still no tea to wash it down with.

And some student nicked my bike.

Written Oswano-machi, Japan, 14th November, 2000

Technorati Tags: uncle travelling matt,matt pointon,travel,blog,japan,japanese musings,toyama-ken,osawano,osawano chugakko,osawano junior high school,technology,washing machine,rice,school dinner,coffee,tea,powdered milk

Friday, 18 July 2014

Japanese Musings V: The Sporting Life

Greetings!

This week’s offering is actually one of the original set of Japanese Musings, writing whilst I was in Japan all those years ago. They were written as emails, one a week, to friends and family and that comes through in the style which is quite different to the stuff I produce these days. It’s up to you to decide whether I’ve improved or regressed as a writer.

This week’s topic is also quite fitting, the World of Sport just after the World Cup has ended, I watched the Tour de France fly past in Yorkshire and only a few weeks before I head up to Manchester to watch England v India in the 4th Test Match. Sport is a greaat bringer together of people from disparate cultures around the world, it’s a language that we speak in common that does not involve politics or religion. One of my first experiences of interacting with foreign cultures came when I was in Sixth Form, just 18 years old and the Euro 96 football tournament was hosted in the UK. In the pub I drank at some Danes came in and we befriended them, took one for a night out on the town and let him stop at my house, much to my parents’ ire. It was a great experience and one that inspired me to more and more foreign interaction. Incidentally, that tournament was won by the Germans and, as was proven last weekend in Rio, some things don’t change. Still, this time, as then, they deserved it.

Keep travelling!

Uncle Travelling Matt

Links to all the Japanese Musings:

Series 1

Japanese Musings I: Heads, Shoulders, Knees and Toes

Japanese Musings VIII: The Joys of Internationalisation

Series 2

Japanese Musings I: Heads, Shoulders, Knees and Toes

Japanese Musings V: The Sporting Life

Ok, so this week's musings concerns the extremely important subject of Sport. Why am I am writing about this today, well I shall explain in due course.

Firstly, I must state that Sport in Japan is completely different to the UK. Although this may be disturbing to some readers, it grieves me to inform you that the gospel of Football has not fully reached the Japanese populace. Even more heart-rending is the sad state of affairs that exists here where people are ignorant of the Gospel of Cricket. Yes, it's sad, but sadder still, it is true.

That is not to say however, that these isles are without sport. Quite the opposite in fact, the Japanese are actually extremely sporty people indeed. Football, whilst having a minute following and passion attached to it in comparison with Europe, still is practised and supported and there are other games too, including a strange sport named baseball, . No, it is strange but the Japanese really are quite passionate about sport and this shocked me due to their pretty pathetic showing in more or less anything they partake in, except Judo or Sumo of course, but there again any country can invent a sport and then win at it constantly… except England.

No, what surprises me is what they actually get excited about. The Olympics certainly affected these people, especially the Olympic Football Tournament. Now, excuse me, I am a football fan and what's more I know many more in various countries but never in my life before did I meet someone who cared about Olympic Football. The World Cup, aye tis a different matter, the European Championships too, and even maybe the CONCAFA Cup, (or whatever it's called). But the Olympics, no. The Auto-Windscreens Trophy generally attracts more interest, (though to be fair, considering who the present holders are, that is far from surprising). But this is not what I am here to talk about. The Olympics are over, and good riddance. No I am here to talk about Japan's 55^th National Sports Tournament.

Every year, (presumably since WWII), Japan holds the Kokutai, its own National 'Olympics'. Each year it is held in a different ken, (county), and this year the Annual Kokutai is in Toyama-ken. Needless to say, the whole ken has been getting more than a little excited about this. And Osawano in particular has been going sincerely over the top. The reasoning is simple. Osawano is a town of 22,000 people, not big at all, but by chance many of the regions sporting facilities happen to be within her borders. On top of that, the town itself seems to produce an excess of sporting talent, which no doubt is some compensation for the lack of academic talent which is all too obvious at Osawano Junior High. Indeed, one of Japan's Olympic Swimmers came from the town and a few weeks ago, the whole school had to watch the guy race. He came 6^th, but hey, it's the taking part that counts.

So, the whole ken has been going games crazy and everywhere you go, the ubiquitous mascots can be seen. To be honest, the mascots are more than a little strange. They are two strange figures, one of whom is brown, he (? - I assume it's a he), carries a torch and has no eyes, instead just a banner around his head with 2000 on it. I think that maybe two of the zeros are meant to be his eyes, but it is not too successful if they are. His mate is white, has a beak, and eyes two, but also arms and legs. Except that one arm is more like a bat or something. Now it may be meant to be a Snow Grouse, the prefectural bird, and all I can say is that if it is, it is no wonder that that particular creature is virtually extinct. No, they are pretty poor mascots, no doubt at all, though of course I had to buy the key-ring which now hangs from my car mirror. Just getting into the local culture, I'm sure you understand.¹

Toki and Kazae

Anyway, today, the whole school went to watch a softball match, and I went with them.

Softball is a game that I never encountered before, so I was quite looking forward to this dose of alternative sporting culture. I settled down in the stand next to a bloke with a weird glass eye. Now here it seems, I had performed my masterstroke, for this bloke turned out to be THE man to be sat next to. His strange stare apart, I was most glad to be sat next to him for from the word go he started plying me with beer. Now of course, initially I thought about refusing, since I was actually at work an all, but then I considered that it may be rude to do so, and thus, in the name of International Relations, (and for this reason alone I must stress), I accepted.

Many times.

On top of this, Glasseye-san also turned out to be the life and soul of the Osawano Softball Fraternity. From the word go, he got up and sang and clapped with the enthusiasm of a Pentecostal Pastor. Aye, he was a good bloke to sit next to and thus I watched my first ever game of softball.

Getting ready for the game (Glasseye-san is in the foreground)

Now Softball is a sport rather similar to Rounders or Baseball, in the respect that it has a bat and a ball and they run round several bases. For some reason though, it has seven innings, each of which does not last too long. This particular game was Toyama-ken versus Fukuoka-ken. It ended two-nil to Toyama, (yeah!!!), though it must be stated that I would imagine that Fukuoka's nickname is not "The Softball Ken". They didn't even get close to scoring. Toyama on the other hand were unlucky not to get a lot more, but there again they did have two players from Osawano, (according to Glasseye-san), so this is hardly surprising.

The victorious Toyama team

All in all, whilst not a bad game, I cannot imagine me ever becoming a softball fan. The essential problem is the length of the game, less than two hours. Now, as far as I am concerned, there are two types of game. One that is exciting, full of adrenalin rushes and does not last very long. Football and Rugby are prime examples. The second is more relaxed. Instead of excitement, you get a whole day (or five) to watch the match at your leisure, fully appreciate the skills being displayed, and of course, the beverages on offer. Yes, this is the category that cricket occupies. Instead, softball threatens to be like cricket, yet as soon as you are settled down, the innings ends and the other team gets in. On the other hand, it has little of the excitement of football, and by dint of the fact that there is a bat and ball, and no kicking, it really doesn't fall happily into that category either.

Well, whatever, it was a nice change from "Hello, how are you? Today we will learn about how to greet each other" and so I ain't complaining.

And remember, its only two years to go until the next World Cup!

Getting close to the big stars

Written Osawano-machi, 20^th October, 2000

1They are Toki and Kaze respectively, taken from the 55^th Annual Kokutai slogan which is “Ai-no kaze, Yume-nosete” (On the wind of love, with dreams). 'Kaze' means 'wind'; not sure about 'Toki'. The prefectural bird is called the 'raichou' in Japanese and in English is sometimes referred to as the 'Thunderbird', hence the local express trains being a picture of the bird on the front and being called Thunderbird also.

Next musing: A Bad Day

Technorati Tags: uncle travelling matt,travel,blog,japanese musings,japan,osawano,toyama-ken,kokutai,softball,sport,toki,kaze,raichou,snow grouse

Saturday, 12 July 2014

Japanese Musings 2.3: Riding the Kamioka-sen

Greetings!

I had a seminal moment this week. Chatting with someone about the linguist roots of Romanian, (as you do), they came out with a very informed opinion which was not dissimilar to my own and when this was mentioned, it transpired that they’d got it off this blog. Is that what fame is like; when people quote your theories back at you? Nice to know someone’s reading all this stuff anyway.

This week’s post is a bit weird. After posting Japanese Musings 2.1 last week, the first half of my account of arriving in Japan, one might have expected 2.2 this week but instead we’re jumping onto 2.3 inexplicably. Why? Well, the unfortunate truth is that in my recent computer crash crisis, I lost 2.2 so it’s going to have to be rewritten. And so, until I get round to doing just that, here’s the next one in the series, my musings on one of my favourite railway lines of all time, the idiosyncratic Kamioka-sen.

Keep travelling!

Uncle Travelling Matt

Links to all the Japanese Musings:

Series 1

Japanese Musings VIII: The Joys of Internationalisation

Series 2