September is nearly over but the sweltering Japanese summer persists.
Even the locals are befuddled when I contradict them saying, "it is still summer, why else are we sweating like this?" But tonight I have been blessed with a sweet rain.
Not the downpour that some passing typhoon has spawned but a nice summer shower that is lasting well into the night. Japan gets a lions share of rain. Typhoon Number 17 just went by two days ago fortunately only bringing a day of thundercloud activity with it.
I wonder if they ever tried to name them or just started numbering them in each year because they know they will have so many that there aren't enough names to go around . Kind of helps reduce the anxiety toward them I guess. It's not Lucy or Debbie or Brian bearing down on the country, just another one of those, nearly countless, pesky typhoon things.
Regardless of the inevitable rain and periodic ravaging of carefree typhoons the winter must be on the way as the autumn equinox has just passed us by and I find it hard to imagine that winter will fail to come when the earth stops tanning this hemisphere under the sun's rays.
[More:]
And winter here is no picnic either, heh. I got the tail end of it when I arrived, sheesh, six months ago and it had just stopped snowing. I lived out the bitter cold that remained for some 2-3 months [March to May]. So weather, schmether.
Did I mention, in the last, that I was moving into a new house? Well it's done. I had the one day off from work to do it all and wouldn't ya know it, I catch the flu. Felt like a piece of dung. I think I've already made mention of the fact that Japan seems to be a very dusty place and this detail is very obvious when you have to clean down one accom' on the way out and then find you have to do the same when you move into the other.
The house I moved into is large, by Japanese standards, not to mention cheap. Two highly motivating reasons that I moved in here as well as the tenant of my previous lodgings imminent return to Japan. In fact he turned up the day after I moved, with no notice to either me or his partner from what I could ascertain, so the timing was gorgeous.
Except I didn't exactly leave his pad in *fine* form. Hey I was sick! .. of cleaning! Then to the new house. Lived in by a family of three, Ma Pah and the twelve month old fledgling human plus two dogs. One of which has enough hair for three! Take a guess what the house smells like and how that felt to someone with a sinus situation!
A gaijin friend here calls such phlegm and colds "the Mung" and I can *feel* & *taste* the essence of the word. In fact I can even put it on a slide if you like..? OK .. maybe not. So the house is nicely sized. Firstly a tatami, the standard "carpeting" of a floor in a Nihon home comes in a rectangle shape at a 2:1 ratio. There are a few different sizes and the ones in this place seem to actually be bigger than the last ones I lived over. About 1.7m long and half that [duh .85m] wide.
The last bungalow had a bedroom of 6 jo [tatami being called 'joe' over here, as well as tatami ] but a couple of these were taken up by the cupboard. Then the lounge room of 6 jo. The kitchen, not actually tatami'ed, a tad bigger. Between 7-8 jo. With small WC and bathroom tacked on. My washing machine out on the two foot deep verandah [patio to you yanks or whomever else speaks 'patio']
The new pad [read "pit"] has a 6 jo kitchen area with a largish, step down, bathroom area. This has my washing machine in it and a bathtub, no shower. The bath has to be filled to cover the outlet/inlet holes that let water circulate to the Kerosene heater on the other side of the wall, outside. This is my *only* source of hot water via plumbing, and yes I know I am using the term loosely. For I then have to bucket the water from the tub to wherever I choose to use it.
Of course the kitchen has the gas stove so small volumes are easy enough to pan heat. To the other side of the kitchen area is the first of two doors that separates my from the pit toilet. And no "pit" is not being used here as a college dorm adjective. Thankfully the times I've spent over such "dunnies" has me coping with the contraption [yes "hole"] fine. And squatting really is a good, forced, morning stretch that I was lacking. To be honest. Bugger honest do I hear you say? Get back on those nice smelling tatami..
OK. Now we move to the first lounge room / entry area. What use to be the front room for the house after god knows what killed the yet to be mentioned other two rooms. This one is 10 jo. About 3.4m x 5.1m. A good space, with two desks and chairs ready to go. Then the next room. This and the next room having been resurrected from some past fire and damaged rat lair situation to be lined and fitted with tatami to make them livable.
The bedroom, again large, this one being 8 jo and filled with an Enormous bed. I gotta sow sheets together to fit this thing but it is nice to get of the floor when sleeping. This place is too dusty and the floor is where gravity sends the dust.
Then we move on to the last room, which I used call the second lounge room but I now call the aquarium. Yes it has a large fishtank. The others were large, this ones a squash court [nearly]. at 14 jo. A room to actually invite friends and not have to ask the first ones who arrived to leave and make room for the second ones at the door. This really pleases me.
Along with the joy of being able to walk around the place while the heavens drop yet another load of water on this island. Helps with the cabin fever you know? Really... truly. I even stop disassembling my assault rifle just to take a walk to the back porch for a breather, and a sighting... gotta make sure the sights are true[d].
So a big shed basically but with shoes of and tatami pretty naf. Not hot water on tap or a 5 star hotel toilet and two dogs that come with it but it seems to fit well. Now where was I .. oh yeah. Nihon! It hasn't changed to my eye since I've been here. Least I don't think I am affecting it overtly or it me inadvertently.
Other than these self obsessive rants that I spam to everyone who wishes hadn't given me their email address 7 months ago . I am slowly getting more of a glance under the blanket of "normal" life that makes most places seem like another when it comes to daily stuff. They eat, sleep and work then rush off on holidays like many other first world populations but they are quite the chivalrous folk about it.
The Japanese way is one which really does allow many people to live as *close* together, and I do mean *close*, as possible. In fact I had a letter from a friend who kind of stuck me with a "just what is it with them folk?" kind a question so the response to that is gonna make up the next [half?] of this letter.
[Quote]
From the vast spaces of Oz and the comparative freedom that we enjoy it is hard to relate to the industrial ideals of the Japanese- their absurd group holidays and the camera fetish they seem to share. Their fixation for appearance: Vogue products,Chanel,Dior,Louise Vuitton. Their mercenary greed and insensitivity to environmental concerns, whether it be whaling,forestry,fishing or mining are hard to relate to.
[End quote]
Sure hard to relate maybe but some retrospect puts it in place.
The Japanese are a country transformed in the briefest of time spans. Forced to no less. Their culture a combination of Zen tranquility, rigid caste hierarchy and now, thanks to the Occupation of the Americans and the necessity of so large a population on so small a land mass, modern consumerism, and international trade.
The [North] American Dream has been supplanted here, for better or [probably] worse, and the Japanese are, in my eyes, struggling along as best they can. This in many ways is a defining trait of the Japanese people and one for which as you ask..
[Quote] I suppose I am asking ,"Do you (as it seems) find them an admirable people?"
.. is why. Just as John Howard has introduced a GST into Australia saying he has a "mandate" from the masses, which I personally do not see and expect most Australians also feel the same, many countries [their governments] around the world do things which are heinous and reproachable and not appreciated nor asked for by the citizenry.
I do not find the average Japanese person to be keen to kill a whale or see a forest chopped down. These things are kept consistent with their cultural habits. If whale meat is available [at whatever price in a fancy restaurant] then it will be purchased and consumed. If it is not they will not riot. They may lament but who doesn't save the Nirvana-approaching-sage.
Perhaps the merchants will [riot] or the whaling fleets but these are the adages of any business that sees its death looming. Australian truck drivers will bemoan the cost of fuel yet any environmentalist will advise the use of rail to trucking which puts lives at stake and the environment lower on the list of items to be considered.
Yet those truckies will claim their livelihood is being taken from them. That to take it is to put them in the dole queue. We know the same about loggers. More and more they are losing their jobs not because the greenies cost them but because the rationalising timber companies put larger and nastier machinery to work to do the same processes.
Costing those men a livelihood that is quite a fine life. Being out in the forest is a lovely place to be. They [simply?] need to switch to farmed or properly [eco]managed wood/timbers instead of virgin and habitat-essential environs and it would be fine. Or at least a damn sight better than it globally is now. I read mention recently of the last nomadic tribes in the amazon[s]. The logging companies give them alcohol so that the tribes will lead them to the largest [oldest & most valuable to the environment] trees in the forest.
You know how nice the forest is, a shame it is filling up with machines doing the work [raping] instead of men who could be taught to care for it and nurture it as they [earn their] harvest from it. How many jobs can we put on the list that should be either ceased or seriously re managed to allow the environment to survive *with* us.
Yet the number of jobs, and therefore votes, that these vocations represent, and the pathetic will and/or foresight that's displayed by the government in general, maintain the status quo of reap or be reaped. 'Tis true, and sad, that they [the Japanese] are so hung on such Gucci items but as we know they are not the only ones buying these things.
The consumerism they have been stuck with is a fairly global phenomenon and in light of their inability to do many things, work commitments and the ritualistic ways of raising family, then that only leaves meditation or shopping. If not just to get out of a house which is only two steps wide in every room and housing three generations of family.
Which also explains why most Japanese seem to do many things though. Sports, music lessons [girls mostly] and such. So much so they end up sleeping on trains to make up for lost time elsewhere. Their culture has traveled a long road. One that saw them [after a long stretch of bloodshed between rivaling Shoguns] settle into a snug island existence.
They opened their doors to trade but saw bad ideas entering their lands so they closed the doors. They were forced back into international trade at canon point. From this they powered on. Needing to feed a population that lives on such mountainous country they simply cannot grow enough food they had to get into the international trade wars.
Whatever racial ancestry or hangovers they carried misguided them into trying on the world and in this they were seriously pounded down. Not just one bomb but TWO. The word here is "gaman". You feel sick but you work on. You feel tired but you work on. The weather is horrid but you stay and work on. The country needs you too or else we all starve. If a wheel in the system breaks down we all go down together.
[Quote] Perhaps it is neat prejudice but I find that the "best" Japanese are those that reject the way their industrial culture force feeds them into the crowded trains to do safe salariman jobs and take the allotted weeks annual holiday in air conditioned greyhounds. The heroes are those cycling through our deserts or struggling to become surfers or freeform dancers.
[End quote]
Of course they are the heroes. How many people in our own cultures our doing things you, we, us, find reprehensible? Just because the Japanese make the headlines does not mean the housewife on the street wanted the act in question performed. I see a lot of Japanese people stuck on an island they can't leave.
We know the passport/visa situation of many countries doesn't exactly encourage a move to another place to make a life. We have borders now and they are greedily monitored. Many people having to work illegally because they have no way to obtain a work visa. How ridiculous. Obviously their skills are utilitarian enough that they have found gainful employ but that is not enough . They must jump the hoops/hurdles that they stipulate as requirements to be here.
The average Japanese is keen to go elsewhere [one in five has gone abroad] but what other way than in an annual holiday to do so. One needs a job, the system says you work at the job long hours unless you do [very] basic pay part time jobs like convenience store clerks, and this keeps them trapped. Yay to have a passport to another country and/or to see the way to move there.
To see a place for yourself in another culture and know you will be safe and loved and be able to raise a family. Legally. A lot of these people are tired of the system but the world has many such systems that are ingrained. That are slow to change.
Our own country, like the majority, makes laws easily and changes them uneasily. The populace lives with this. Shrugs its shoulders and plods along. This legal lethargy is detrimental to the growth of a society, IMHO [in my humble opinion], because although it might help prevent dangerous change it also means that the laws do not really keep times with the people.
Australia's laws and blind obedience to the USA regarding hemp prohibition is an example. How can so many agricultural nations of the world, beaten down in the trade wars through the use of cheap labor or genetically modified crops, not be allowed to grow a product which could provide so many essential materials for sale and export.
How can our gaols be filled with people who have done nothing more than abuse ONLY themselves with a drug that grows from the ground like the tobacco which puts millions into the health system and the grave.. Yet a rapist may get a sentence of a shorter duration, for committing a [heinous] physical crime against a person. Such crimes are rare here. I find that admirable. Is it not a crime of humanity that women are not safe to walk home at night in many places?
Those places are far fewer here. Is it not nice to have your wallet mailed to you the day after you lost it, or to be lead [nearly by hand] to the train platform you have been unsuccessfully looking for. Mutual consideration are words which may sum it up and while Japan does not seem so to the outside world that is a result, perhaps, of governments handling such things.
I was embarrassed to be Australian when John Howard became PM but how much did I / we [the people really affected and who think & care about *social* values] have to do with that? I didn't vote for him? But the system allowed him to remain. The propaganda, the preferential voting system that is, I think, unethical and NON democratic.
If I want to vote for one man and no other why can I not? But we don't have "one man one vote". Preferences are sold from one political party to another for whatever favours they are after. That and the pandering to seats filled with [well off] suburbs of people who DO profit from John's longevity. Was the Australian public asked if it wanted a GST? If I recall correctly he actually said previously that he *wouldn't* enact such legislation.
And when the Australian public was asked about the Republic was it a simple YES or NO. Were the commercials on TV informative? Most I spoke to did not find them so. Ambiguous crap that told them as little as the info on the GST does.
A lot of money spent to keep the public in the dark because that is where they are best controlled. Information IS power nowadays, even politicians are becoming [more] bewildered and losing control because of it. They will struggle to retain it, at all costs, although it will be to no avail.
The Japanese have one of, if not the highest, literacy rate in the world, but what they are given to read is the question. Just as Americans are bombarded with domestic news and see little informative telecast about the rest of the world so too the Japanese are kept busy with *internal* dogma. Life goes from one Flower festival to another. Those short sweet holidays are filled with jammed roads and trains as people run to see distant family or places in the space of a long weekend.
The world needs change from such structures not just Japan. How many people die on Aussie roads in Easter because of the same work life arrangements. Even though most Japanese are not religious they visit the grave side of family members once every season except [I think it is] winter. I think this an interesting and charming trait. The Japanese are considerate to the dead. They take a moment from their selfishness, which is a rarity anyway being so group oriented, and think of someone else, someone gone who doesn't need them anymore.
The main bent in Japan is Buddhism. I saw recently that it's not so much defined as a religion but as a philosophy. And that is something the Japanese definitely do have. And it can be seen in the way they live together. They have a philosophy. Mostly it works. At least it allows so many to coexist so well whilst meanwhile Los Angeles murders itself.
Heh, now I am raving. Sorry.
[Quote] Are not gaijin rather despised for their big sweaty bodies and un-Japanese behavior. I suppose I am asking ,"Do you (as it seems) find them an admirable people?"
[End quote]
Yeah, often. A few places will not accept foreigners because they don't want to risk trouble [lots of drinking in Japan and it's the foreigners who lash out the most] or just the difficulty of the language customs differences. The Japanese have many traits which are admirable, even as simple as letting one in during peak hour traffic. Something I saw little of during my driving history in Australia. I am sure I would have found even less in New York.
Every culture, like every person, has its goods and bads. Japan is full of goods, as much as its leaders are prey to corruption like any other country's leaders, maybe some more or some less, hard for a man on the street to really know.
But the people are nice. The food is healthy [a shame truly that the rivers are dying but again, is it the local man or the giant company that wreaks such chaos] the language and [therefore] culture very interesting. What's more it's very easy to just *be* in Japan. Isn't that what most of us desire.
No matter what they think of you they don't shove it in your face because their culture says:
"Don't be rude, it's just not polite."
Woooooooooo
Love ya's all
nomaD
[end of transmission]
This place is beautiful to say the least. Just got this blog goin, gotta run to work, pics soon.
