Today I finally managed to find myself BOOTS, which was significantly cheaper (and significantly easier) than I thought it would be. Even better, they don't have a ridiculous four inch heel* and are waterproof.** They're not technically snow boots, but since the temperature is only supposed to drop below freezing at 2 a.m. or something during the time I'm in Nagano, I think that wearing not-really-snow-boots and wool socks will probably save me from frostbite.
In other news, for some reason the salesman at the shoe store thought that telling me the boots were cute would make me more likely to buy them? Ahahahahaha.
Also, I was in Sakae trying to do Christmas shopping (I failed, for the most part) and there was a magician/juggler performing in Oasis 21. He was probably the weirdest magician/juggler I have ever seen, because he did things like solve Rubik's cubes behind his back (so he couldn't see) in 30 seconds and juggle knives while standing on a piece of wood (like a skateboard without the wheels) on top of four blocks on top of another piece of wood on top of a plastic pipe about a foot in diameter on top of a chest. It was kind of epic. He also told really bad jokes and chugged bottles of water. He also has a website. WHOO. CULTURAL EXPERIENCES.
Anyway, I'll be in the MOUNTAINS tomorrow and Friday, and then Saturday I am planning on celebrating my ability to drink in the US by doing fieldwork and going to see Tin-Tin***, so, uh, there might not be an update from me until Sunday. But we'll see.
Also, TWO WEEKS UNTIL NICK AND MIRANDA ARE IN MY CLUTCHES MWAHAHAHAHAHA. I'm not planning anything evil, I swear.
*Perhaps I am just boring to the extreme, but four inch heels + snow seems like a bad idea to me. Then again, I've seen Anna + high heels + snow. On the other hand, Anna could probably kill bears with her high heels. So I think she probably shouldn't be used as a reasonable example.
**Apparently I can stand in water for up to two hours! YAY!
***Or, in Japanese, Tan-Tan.
Wednesday, December 14, 2011
Monday, December 12, 2011
This post is going to be exceedingly short, but I must spread the amazing news
Ton-chan: Hey, Dana, are you free on the 15th and 16th?
Me: Maybe. Why?
Ton-chan: Well, some friends and I are going to a festival in Nagano, and I thought you might want to come along.
Me: Really? That's awesome.
Ton-chan: Yeah, I've been before for fieldwork*, and it was really cool! Oh, also, have you seen Spirited Away?
Me: Uh, yes? Iloveitsomuch.
Ton-chan: Yeah, well, apparently Hayao Miyazaki based the spirit world off of this festival.
Me: OMGIHAVETOGO.
Ton-chan: It's going to be super cold. Nagano is super cold. It's in the MOUNTAINS.
Me: I've been to Nagano before, but it was in the fall...
Ton-chan: COLDER THAN THAT. It is in the MOUNTAINS. It is more mountain-y than mountains. There are MONKEYS.
Other classmate: It's snowing right now too.
Me: SNOW? YES.
Ton-chan: So you want to come?
Me: YES.
Nagano, HERE I COME.
(Also, our paper has been moved so we don't have to turn it in until the 22nd of December or the 12th of January? Yeah.)
(Also, I submitted four of my five graduate school applications today.)
(ALSO, WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. Another day in the glamorous life of a Fulbrighter!)
SO EXCITED.
*She's an anthropology major.
Me: Maybe. Why?
Ton-chan: Well, some friends and I are going to a festival in Nagano, and I thought you might want to come along.
Me: Really? That's awesome.
Ton-chan: Yeah, I've been before for fieldwork*, and it was really cool! Oh, also, have you seen Spirited Away?
Me: Uh, yes? Iloveitsomuch.
Ton-chan: Yeah, well, apparently Hayao Miyazaki based the spirit world off of this festival.
Me: OMGIHAVETOGO.
Ton-chan: It's going to be super cold. Nagano is super cold. It's in the MOUNTAINS.
Me: I've been to Nagano before, but it was in the fall...
Ton-chan: COLDER THAN THAT. It is in the MOUNTAINS. It is more mountain-y than mountains. There are MONKEYS.
Other classmate: It's snowing right now too.
Me: SNOW? YES.
Ton-chan: So you want to come?
Me: YES.
Nagano, HERE I COME.
(Also, our paper has been moved so we don't have to turn it in until the 22nd of December or the 12th of January? Yeah.)
(Also, I submitted four of my five graduate school applications today.)
(ALSO, WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. Another day in the glamorous life of a Fulbrighter!)
SO EXCITED.
*She's an anthropology major.
Sunday, December 11, 2011
In which I am very distracted
This will be short, because I am exhausted from working on graduate school applications. However, I should probably write something because at some point people will start thinking I am dead.
They are PERTURBINGLY LARGE. "Perturbingly" isn't even a word, but it has to be used to describe how large these parfaits are. The waitress was staggering as she carried it to the table.
I am not dead. I am just applying to graduate school. It's hard to tell the difference sometimes, I know.
Anyway.
Friday night I went with a group from my dorm to a cafe that sells the largest parfaits you have ever seen in your life.
They are PERTURBINGLY LARGE. "Perturbingly" isn't even a word, but it has to be used to describe how large these parfaits are. The waitress was staggering as she carried it to the table.
Also, all the (absurdly long) spoons have bells on the end. I DUNNO.
Anyway, one of those enormous parfaits was supposed to serve 5-8 people, but we ordered 2 for our group of 20 and didn't finish them. Yeah. Apparently some people in the dorm have not learned the age old lesson, There Is Such a Thing as Too Much Ice Cream, and its brother, Actually, If You Eat That Much Ice Cream You Will Make Yourself Physically Ill. One of the guys was trying SO HARD to finish it that he started crying. Yeah... He then tried to convince the girl sitting next to me that if she didn't help him finish it she was declaring him the victor of the duel to finish the parfait, to which she responded, "Okay. You win." (It later turned out that he might not have been crying at all in the first place, because he had eye drops which he was later using to convince someone else to finish the parfait.)
It was another Exciting Glimpse into the College Student Mind!
Saturday I went over to the Takigawa Elementary School Parent-Child Connectedness Festa, which was kind of like a cross between a craft fair, a flea market, and a county fair combined. There were a bunch of booths set up by various organizations like the police department, the fire department, the local hospital, and the SDF.* There were also some craft stations and fair games and a couple of people selling random used clothes. There was also a sort-the-garbage game, which I played and got all but one thing right.** Basically, you were given a basket full of random objects and you had to place them on the placard with the name of the type of garbage they were. I messed up on the aerosol can, 'cause I thought it was a can and then I thought it was unburnable garbage, but it turned out to be SUPER DUPER DANGEROUS GARBAGE.*** Of course, I didn't know this, since we don't have SUPER DUPER DANGEROUS GARBAGE in our dorm. Anyway, the people running the game were exceedingly impressed that I got any of them right. And I did better than the boy in front of me, who looked to be about five. I can put this on my resume: Better at Sorting Garbage Than a Japanese Five Year Old.
On a somewhat random note, the exceedingly unfortunate thing about being distracted by graduate school applications is that when I am distracted I am INCREDIBLY DISTRACTED. That would be why today I managed to drop a plate of curry on the floor. The plate broke and the curry spattered, so I then got to clean up shards of broken ceramic and curry...on carpeting. It was great. And by great I mean horrible. Then I realized that there was some weird, reddish substance on my keyboard. After some investigation, I discovered it was blood; I had managed to gash my finger open while cleaning up the broken plate. (I didn't actually notice, probably because I was distracted by the curry and also because I have high pain tolerance.) So then I realized that I didn't have any band-aids (I'm sure I packed some, but I don't remember where they went), so I just wrapped a tissue around it until it stopped gushing all over the place. Then, somehow, I managed to forget my glasses when I went to the 100 yen store to buy a new plate, and instead of turning around to get them, I figured that it wouldn't be that bad walking to the store and back with no glasses. That was kind of a mistake, since I forgot how bad the vision in my right eye is getting, which means that after about five minutes I started getting a splitting headache, and every time I tried to look at anything in the distance, it was like looking through heat waves or something. Also, my depth perception was shot. So, being the brilliant person I am, I figured I'd just close my right eye (since my vision is perfect in my left eye) and walk around like that. It worked, but everybody probably thought I was insane. Plus then my depth perception was super shot. WHOO. I'm thinking that maybe I should just glue my glasses to my face, 'cause then I can't forget them.
And then, when I was going down to the dorm meeting this evening, I put my shoes on the wrong feet.
SUCH A PRO.
On a final note, last night I decided to take a sanity break and translate "Rolling Girl," which is one of the few Hatsune Miku songs that I prefer the Vocaloid**** version to the human version.***** If you feel like listening to a song that may or may not be about committing suicide or, alternatively, if you want to see how bad I am at translating songs, my translation is here.
Okay, time to sleep so I don't go insane. G'night!
*The SDF (Self-Defense Force) is the Japanese equivalent of the army. Which they're not supposed to have, according to their constitution. It's all very confusing, and actually one of the other Fulbrighters is working on exactly this topic.
It was really weird to see a military-type booth at an elementary school fair. Would that even be allowed in the States?
**Sorting garbage in Japan is a SERIOUS BUSINESS. No matter how strict your garbage disposal laws are, JAPAN'S ARE MORE INTENSE. They even have GARBAGE POLICE. No, I am not making this up.
***Not the real name, but close enough.
****For those of you not in the know, Vocaloids are computer generated singers. They are INSANELY POPULAR in Japan. Hatsune Miku is the first and most popular of them.
*****The only other Vocaloid song where I prefer the Vocaloid version to the human version is 「人柱アリス」("Human Sacrifice Alice"), an UTTERLY UNNERVING SONG you probably should not listen to if you are alone in a dark room. The human version is less unnerving.
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
SO MUCH GYOZA
First things first.
I got these three carrots for 98 yen. 98 YEN! THEY ARE HUGE.
This is directly outside of my dorm. MOMIJI ARE OFFICIALLY THE PRETTIEST FLOWERS. AND BY "FLOWERS" I MEAN "LEAVES."
Also, since Julia asked so nicely, this is the reason my classmates steal my notebook:
Yeah.
(Part of the reason I draw so much on my notes is that if I'm not writing SOMETHING I tend to stop paying attention to the lecture, which is not a good thing to do. Plus, I tend to remember notes when there are pictures on the page better than when there aren't.)
Also, it's time for Super Awkward Cautionary Tales!
About a week ago, as I was leaving penmanship class, one of the women gave me this little heating pad thing, because it was really cold. It looks a lot like a cloth bag full of poppy seeds...? Apparently they're very popular in Japan, because you can put them in your pockets and they are WARM THINGS. Yes. They are super nice and I was super grateful.
Anyway, the next morning I stumbled out of bed half asleep and the warm thing WASN'T WARM ANY MORE. So, being half asleep, I thought, "Hrrrm, maybe it's like those things in the US where you put them in the microwave and that's how you warm them up?"
Long story short, if you microwave them they, uh, explodeandburstintoflames. Yeah.
Sae stared at me a while and then got one of her little heating pad things and made me read the instructions.
Anyway!
Yesterday I had penmanship class, and I worked on this:
(Bottom character on the right makes me wince.)
For the record, the right radical in 部 is SO MUCH FUN TO WRITE with a brush.
Also, Nakano-san says I'm doing really well, and then she does this to my paper:
RIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIGHT.
Also, I have had the stroke order of 女 wrong for ALMOST FIVE YEARS. I die of shame.
...yeah, still needs more work.
Also, after class Nakano-san decided to cook lunch for Shigehara-san (the only other class attendant that day) and I, and DANG, it was delicious. Also, both of them made fun of me endlessly for not slurping my noodles. MY SHAME IS UNBEARABLE. Even when I try really, really hard, I can't get my noodles to make reasonable slurpy noises.
ANYWAY, last night JoJo-san invited all of us from Japanese class over to her house for an INSANELY INTENSE dinner party. Seriously, she made SO MUCH FOOD. SO MUCH REALLY GOOD FOOD.*
Om nom nom.
Our lovely hostess.
Our sensei making gyoza.
MORE FOOD.
Finished gyoza!
EVEN MORE FOOD.
Me: You look like you're going to fight someone.
O-san: I'm going to punch someone.
With a gyoza.
It's dangerous.
It then turned into a gyoza-making party.
I NOW KNOW HOW TO MAKE GYOZA.
Also, I dunno what was going on here.
The best part of a gyoza-making party is EATING GYOZA.
Did I mention there were a lot of gyoza?
This was delicious, whatever it was.
So everyone ate themselves into a stupor and sort of lay on the floor and talked about Reality and Marriage and Boyfriends and Why You Can Speak Kansai-ben Without Being from Kansai and Why People in Kyoto Are Friendlier Than People in Nagoya. Also, JoJo-san said we could come over to eat any time and Ton-chan immediately asked, "What about tomorrow?"
Anyway, we have decided to have another dinner party, but this time the rest of us will cook Japanese food for JoJo-san. (Well, originally it was going to be the Japanese students cooking Japanese food and me cooking American food, but then I pointed out that I'm better at Japanese food than American food...)
And now I am going to go work on essays. Good night!
OH WAIT. I forgot to mention. I got my friendship essay back (the one where I wrote about Shannon and Mary and Josh**) and there were only THREE CORRECTIONS. It was epic. THE END.
*And then she apologized for how much it cost. It was 900 yen a person. NINE HUNDRED YEN. We rounded up and made it 1,000 yen apiece, 'cause DANG.
**Oh, yeah, Josh, I wrote an essay partially about you. Ahahahahahaha.
I got these three carrots for 98 yen. 98 YEN! THEY ARE HUGE.
This is directly outside of my dorm. MOMIJI ARE OFFICIALLY THE PRETTIEST FLOWERS. AND BY "FLOWERS" I MEAN "LEAVES."
Also, since Julia asked so nicely, this is the reason my classmates steal my notebook:
Yeah.
(Part of the reason I draw so much on my notes is that if I'm not writing SOMETHING I tend to stop paying attention to the lecture, which is not a good thing to do. Plus, I tend to remember notes when there are pictures on the page better than when there aren't.)
Also, it's time for Super Awkward Cautionary Tales!
About a week ago, as I was leaving penmanship class, one of the women gave me this little heating pad thing, because it was really cold. It looks a lot like a cloth bag full of poppy seeds...? Apparently they're very popular in Japan, because you can put them in your pockets and they are WARM THINGS. Yes. They are super nice and I was super grateful.
Anyway, the next morning I stumbled out of bed half asleep and the warm thing WASN'T WARM ANY MORE. So, being half asleep, I thought, "Hrrrm, maybe it's like those things in the US where you put them in the microwave and that's how you warm them up?"
Long story short, if you microwave them they, uh, explodeandburstintoflames. Yeah.
Sae stared at me a while and then got one of her little heating pad things and made me read the instructions.
Anyway!
Yesterday I had penmanship class, and I worked on this:
(Bottom character on the right makes me wince.)
For the record, the right radical in 部 is SO MUCH FUN TO WRITE with a brush.
Also, Nakano-san says I'm doing really well, and then she does this to my paper:
RIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIGHT.
Also, I have had the stroke order of 女 wrong for ALMOST FIVE YEARS. I die of shame.
...yeah, still needs more work.
Also, after class Nakano-san decided to cook lunch for Shigehara-san (the only other class attendant that day) and I, and DANG, it was delicious. Also, both of them made fun of me endlessly for not slurping my noodles. MY SHAME IS UNBEARABLE. Even when I try really, really hard, I can't get my noodles to make reasonable slurpy noises.
ANYWAY, last night JoJo-san invited all of us from Japanese class over to her house for an INSANELY INTENSE dinner party. Seriously, she made SO MUCH FOOD. SO MUCH REALLY GOOD FOOD.*
Om nom nom.
Our lovely hostess.
Our sensei making gyoza.
MORE FOOD.
Finished gyoza!
EVEN MORE FOOD.
Me: You look like you're going to fight someone.
O-san: I'm going to punch someone.
With a gyoza.
It's dangerous.
It then turned into a gyoza-making party.
I NOW KNOW HOW TO MAKE GYOZA.
Also, I dunno what was going on here.
The best part of a gyoza-making party is EATING GYOZA.
Did I mention there were a lot of gyoza?
This was delicious, whatever it was.
So everyone ate themselves into a stupor and sort of lay on the floor and talked about Reality and Marriage and Boyfriends and Why You Can Speak Kansai-ben Without Being from Kansai and Why People in Kyoto Are Friendlier Than People in Nagoya. Also, JoJo-san said we could come over to eat any time and Ton-chan immediately asked, "What about tomorrow?"
Anyway, we have decided to have another dinner party, but this time the rest of us will cook Japanese food for JoJo-san. (Well, originally it was going to be the Japanese students cooking Japanese food and me cooking American food, but then I pointed out that I'm better at Japanese food than American food...)
And now I am going to go work on essays. Good night!
OH WAIT. I forgot to mention. I got my friendship essay back (the one where I wrote about Shannon and Mary and Josh**) and there were only THREE CORRECTIONS. It was epic. THE END.
*And then she apologized for how much it cost. It was 900 yen a person. NINE HUNDRED YEN. We rounded up and made it 1,000 yen apiece, 'cause DANG.
**Oh, yeah, Josh, I wrote an essay partially about you. Ahahahahahaha.
Monday, December 5, 2011
In which I 迷惑 big time
So last night Itou-san called me up and said, "Hey, do you want to see a funeral tomorrow?" which is perhaps the strangest invitation I have ever received.
While normally I am not a particularly big fan of funerals, since there are virtually no Shinto funerals performed ever,* this was an amazing research opportunity. As it turned out, the funeral was for the guji of Masumida Shrine, who passed away at the end of November. Because he was a Shinto priest, he was having a Shinto funeral (performed by the other priests from the shrine), and Itou-san said I could attend without it being awkward and weird.
...there was then a moment of panic when I realized that I didn't have a black top (I mean, seriously, I did not expect to be attending any funerals in Japan), but Itou-san said that I could just wear something dark colored with my black coat on top. Okay, phew.
So this morning we hopped on a train together to Ichinomiya and then walked to the funeral parlor, where I discovered that in Japan funerals are public functions, which is to say anyone can come. Seriously, anyone.** And it seemed like half the town had shown up. And then Itou-san said there weren't very many people there because it was the middle of the work day???? Yeah.
Anyway, we checked in, which basically meant that we handed over business cards so that the family could keep track of who had come. There were so many people there that the reception had been divided into areas like "people associated with shrines," "relatives," "people from rotary," "people from the town," and "other people." (We got to go in the "people associated with shrines" line.) We were also given gift bags with tea in them? According to Itou-san, it used to be that guests to funerals would pay a sum (like 5,000 yen) to the family, but then the family would have to return a portion of the sum (like 3,000 yen) in the form of a gift. But now people have decided that that's too ridiculously complicated and just give people little gift bags at the start of the funeral.
The funeral parlor had been set up so that the ceremony would be performed on the third floor with television screens on the first and second floors so that not everybody had to cram into a single room. We went up to the second floor to discover that all the seats had been taken, so we joined a quickly growing crowd of standing people. They also had photo albums set up of all the things the guji had accomplished in his lifetime, and WOW. He seems like he was an amazing guy. He reached the highest rank of the priesthood (which apparently has to be given for services rendered; you can't test into it), he was active in the Japanese rotary club, he arranged some amazingly elaborate festivals (literally people in happi FLOODING the streets of Ichinomiya), and he was apparently an all-around really nice guy. (Itou-san had met him once when he had visited Kawahara Shrine, so apparently she didn't know him very well.)
Anyway, then the ceremony started. There was a quick purification (most of which I couldn't hear because the microphone on the third floor was having issues) and then one of the priests went to the front of the room to read a special norito which had been composed for the occasion. Itou-san told me in advance to pay close attention to the norito, because at funerals the norito basically tells the story of the person's life...all in incredibly archaic Japanese.
About three lines into the norito, I suddenly started feeling...really weird. Within about fifteen seconds I went from concentrating really intensely on understanding as much as I could to "uh oh, I don't feel so good" to "oh frig, I think I'm going to pass out." Of course, I decided that I was NOT going to pass out, because passing out in the middle of a funeral is approximately the SECOND WORST place you could possibly pass out.*** Fortunately, I didn't pass out, but my legs gave out from under me and I collapsed in approximately the most graceful way I could manage. I have to say, everyone reacted surprisingly calmly. If I were at a funeral and some random gaijin suddenly collapsed all over the floor, I would be freaking out everywhere, but Itou-san and some of the funeral parlor staff just scooped me up and dragged me out of the crowd and got me a glass of water and waited patiently for me to be able to form coherent words. Apparently collapsing does not do good things to my Japanese! Also, I realized that I don't know the Japanese word for fainting. WHY DID YOU NEVER TEACH ME THIS, JAPANESE CLASS? Anyway, one of the funeral parlor employees wanted to call an ambulance (because apparently I had turned completely white), but I was very adamant that I would be okay and I did not need an ambulance, because seriously, the last time I passed out and wound up in an ambulance, they just spent the whole time asking me if I was pregnant. AUGH.
Anyway, they took me off to a sitting room on the side and I apologized about a million times and they told me to SIT THERE until I felt entirely better and NOT GET UP. And Itou-san came with me and I apologized about a million times again, and she said it was pretty understandable because the room had about a million people in it and I had probably collapsed from the heat. Except, you know, I was the youngest person in the room, and I had eaten breakfast and wasn't dehydrated and am actually pretty healthy, so my legs have no excuse for going all noodly under me.
So I wound up sitting there for about an hour (during which time I apologized profusely and Itou-san said that it was fine and then asked me to teach her how to say a bunch of stuff for weddings in English, because apparently she has a lot of foreigners come to the shrine to get married and they don't speak Japanese?) and missing the entire funeral. GAH. I feel really bad about being a 迷惑 to everyone. Fortunately my 迷惑ing was reduced by the funeral parlor staff and Itou-san, to whom I am super grateful.
Moral of the story: UH, DON'T OVERHEAT WHILE DOING FIELDWORK?
skjglashjtoehagoishgoa
I APOLOGIZE TO THE UNIVERSE.
So, after that adventure, I went to eat lunch with Itou-san and then hopped on the train back to Nagoya and she offered to drive me home but I said I was okay and I was sorryyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy. And then I went home and sat and then went to Japanese class where we learned how to count on our fingers in a whole bunch of languages and my sensei and my classmates stole my notebook to look at my doodles. Oh dear.
In any case, I've decided that it's probably a good idea to go to sleep early today so that I don't go around collapsing everywhere tomorrow, so with that I shall sign off.
I'm so sorryyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy. ;_;
*Almost all funerals in Japan are Buddhist. Part of it has to do with Shinto taboos about death, and part of it has to do with Shinto funerals apparently being incredibly depressing.
**This would explain why it was okay for me to randomly show up. There were people coming who had never even met the man or his family, but only knew of his reputation.
***The absolute worst being the hallway of the fourth floor of Metcalf, aka the dorm of the living dead.
While normally I am not a particularly big fan of funerals, since there are virtually no Shinto funerals performed ever,* this was an amazing research opportunity. As it turned out, the funeral was for the guji of Masumida Shrine, who passed away at the end of November. Because he was a Shinto priest, he was having a Shinto funeral (performed by the other priests from the shrine), and Itou-san said I could attend without it being awkward and weird.
...there was then a moment of panic when I realized that I didn't have a black top (I mean, seriously, I did not expect to be attending any funerals in Japan), but Itou-san said that I could just wear something dark colored with my black coat on top. Okay, phew.
So this morning we hopped on a train together to Ichinomiya and then walked to the funeral parlor, where I discovered that in Japan funerals are public functions, which is to say anyone can come. Seriously, anyone.** And it seemed like half the town had shown up. And then Itou-san said there weren't very many people there because it was the middle of the work day???? Yeah.
Anyway, we checked in, which basically meant that we handed over business cards so that the family could keep track of who had come. There were so many people there that the reception had been divided into areas like "people associated with shrines," "relatives," "people from rotary," "people from the town," and "other people." (We got to go in the "people associated with shrines" line.) We were also given gift bags with tea in them? According to Itou-san, it used to be that guests to funerals would pay a sum (like 5,000 yen) to the family, but then the family would have to return a portion of the sum (like 3,000 yen) in the form of a gift. But now people have decided that that's too ridiculously complicated and just give people little gift bags at the start of the funeral.
The funeral parlor had been set up so that the ceremony would be performed on the third floor with television screens on the first and second floors so that not everybody had to cram into a single room. We went up to the second floor to discover that all the seats had been taken, so we joined a quickly growing crowd of standing people. They also had photo albums set up of all the things the guji had accomplished in his lifetime, and WOW. He seems like he was an amazing guy. He reached the highest rank of the priesthood (which apparently has to be given for services rendered; you can't test into it), he was active in the Japanese rotary club, he arranged some amazingly elaborate festivals (literally people in happi FLOODING the streets of Ichinomiya), and he was apparently an all-around really nice guy. (Itou-san had met him once when he had visited Kawahara Shrine, so apparently she didn't know him very well.)
Anyway, then the ceremony started. There was a quick purification (most of which I couldn't hear because the microphone on the third floor was having issues) and then one of the priests went to the front of the room to read a special norito which had been composed for the occasion. Itou-san told me in advance to pay close attention to the norito, because at funerals the norito basically tells the story of the person's life...all in incredibly archaic Japanese.
About three lines into the norito, I suddenly started feeling...really weird. Within about fifteen seconds I went from concentrating really intensely on understanding as much as I could to "uh oh, I don't feel so good" to "oh frig, I think I'm going to pass out." Of course, I decided that I was NOT going to pass out, because passing out in the middle of a funeral is approximately the SECOND WORST place you could possibly pass out.*** Fortunately, I didn't pass out, but my legs gave out from under me and I collapsed in approximately the most graceful way I could manage. I have to say, everyone reacted surprisingly calmly. If I were at a funeral and some random gaijin suddenly collapsed all over the floor, I would be freaking out everywhere, but Itou-san and some of the funeral parlor staff just scooped me up and dragged me out of the crowd and got me a glass of water and waited patiently for me to be able to form coherent words. Apparently collapsing does not do good things to my Japanese! Also, I realized that I don't know the Japanese word for fainting. WHY DID YOU NEVER TEACH ME THIS, JAPANESE CLASS? Anyway, one of the funeral parlor employees wanted to call an ambulance (because apparently I had turned completely white), but I was very adamant that I would be okay and I did not need an ambulance, because seriously, the last time I passed out and wound up in an ambulance, they just spent the whole time asking me if I was pregnant. AUGH.
Anyway, they took me off to a sitting room on the side and I apologized about a million times and they told me to SIT THERE until I felt entirely better and NOT GET UP. And Itou-san came with me and I apologized about a million times again, and she said it was pretty understandable because the room had about a million people in it and I had probably collapsed from the heat. Except, you know, I was the youngest person in the room, and I had eaten breakfast and wasn't dehydrated and am actually pretty healthy, so my legs have no excuse for going all noodly under me.
So I wound up sitting there for about an hour (during which time I apologized profusely and Itou-san said that it was fine and then asked me to teach her how to say a bunch of stuff for weddings in English, because apparently she has a lot of foreigners come to the shrine to get married and they don't speak Japanese?) and missing the entire funeral. GAH. I feel really bad about being a 迷惑 to everyone. Fortunately my 迷惑ing was reduced by the funeral parlor staff and Itou-san, to whom I am super grateful.
Moral of the story: UH, DON'T OVERHEAT WHILE DOING FIELDWORK?
skjglashjtoehagoishgoa
I APOLOGIZE TO THE UNIVERSE.
So, after that adventure, I went to eat lunch with Itou-san and then hopped on the train back to Nagoya and she offered to drive me home but I said I was okay and I was sorryyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy. And then I went home and sat and then went to Japanese class where we learned how to count on our fingers in a whole bunch of languages and my sensei and my classmates stole my notebook to look at my doodles. Oh dear.
In any case, I've decided that it's probably a good idea to go to sleep early today so that I don't go around collapsing everywhere tomorrow, so with that I shall sign off.
I'm so sorryyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy. ;_;
*Almost all funerals in Japan are Buddhist. Part of it has to do with Shinto taboos about death, and part of it has to do with Shinto funerals apparently being incredibly depressing.
**This would explain why it was okay for me to randomly show up. There were people coming who had never even met the man or his family, but only knew of his reputation.
***The absolute worst being the hallway of the fourth floor of Metcalf, aka the dorm of the living dead.
Saturday, December 3, 2011
Inari
So people have been asking me why there are Inari shrines everywhere I go, which is a pretty valid question. I gave some of them kind of lame and spastic answers, but now I have decided to...
Academic Post #7
Inari, or Seriously Why Are There So Many of These Shrines
Let's start with the basics. Inari is a kami of rice. There's a fair amount of dispute over whether Inari is a man, a woman, a fox, a man who can turn into a fox, a woman who can turn into a fox, a man who rides a fox, a woman who rides a fox, a man with a fox familiar, a woman with a fox familiar, etc. What basically everyone can agree on is that Inari is probably associated with foxes. So far so good.
Inari worship is centered around Fushimi Inari on Inari Mountain in Kyoto
One of the really interesting things about Inari is that he/she/it can undergo a process called kanjō (勧請) in which a portion of the kami's spirit is separated from the main shrine and enshrined in a new location for a specific benefit.* This little piece of the kami's spirit is sometimes called the bunrei (分霊) or "divided spirit" of the kami. Priests often compare the process “to lighting a new candle from a burning one: the light of the first is in no way diminished as it becomes two” (Smyers 156).
"But what does this meeeeeeeean, Dana?" you cry. Well, let me illustrate with a mildly dorky (okay, really dorky) example.
So I'm mildly obsessed** with a nerdy card game called Dominion. All you really need to know for this hypothetical example is that I'm currently involved in the 2011 Dominionstrategy.com Championships. I'm a pretty okay player, but in the next round I have to go up against the second best player in the entire tournament.
So maybe I decide that I need some divine intervention, so I head over to Fushimi Inari and ask for a divided spirit of Inari to enshrine in my room. And let's say I get the divided spirit, name it Dominion Inari***, and decide that it grants success in Dominion. And then let's say that, somehow, I win the Dominion tournament. Suddenly, everyone's saying, "Dang, how the heck did she win? She always underestimates Fool's Gold!" And then they realize that it's because I prayed to Dominion Inari, so they start to visit Dominion Inari as well, to pray for success in Dominion because, hey, if it worked for me, maybe it'll work for them. Next thing you know, word of Dominion Inari's success has been transmitted back to Fushimi Inari, where "success in Dominion" is added to the list of benefits that Inari offers.
This probably seems overwhelmingly ridiculous to you, but that's basically how the re-enshrinement process works. The re-enshrined spirit is worshiped for a specific benefit, and if it's successful, that benefit is associated with the Inari back on Fushimi Inari. That's why Inari is associated with benefits such as:
- agricultural prosperity
- victory in sumo wrestling (and you thought my Dominion example was silly!)
- faithful husbands
- wealthy patrons for geisha
- protection from small pox
- business prosperity
- cures for colds
- cures for coughs
- protection of mulberry and silk worms
Inari is also the patron of:
- blacksmiths
- prostitutes
- rice farmers
- the fishing industry
Keep in mind that Fushimi Inari is in Kyoto , which is in central Japan
Also, as technology changes, some benefits become more important while others fade into the background. For example, granting business prosperity has overshadowed Inari’s original role as a rice deity, and protection of mulberry and silk worms, which are no longer associated with major industries in Japan
Okay, so this is all very cool, but, as many of my professors would write in bright red pen across the top of the paper, “SO WHAT?”
So what does this tell us about the Japanese concept of deity?
Well, for one thing, kami aren’t static. Just because Inari was originally a rice deity doesn’t mean he/she/it can’t also be the patron of prostitutes or start granting success in sumo or faithful husbands. Inari’s power is shaped by the needs of the worshipers.
Also, efficacy (or perceived efficacy) shapes kami. Let's say I enshrine Dominion Inari and then lose the tournament spectacularly. Will anyone worship Dominion Inari? No, because it's not efficacious. Here's a big difference between Western and Eastern religion. In general, in Western religion you worship god(s) because it/they are higher than you and more powerful. The relationship is vertical. In Eastern religion, in general, the relationship may be slightly vertical, but it's a mutual relationship. If Dominion Inari doesn't help you win at Dominion, most people won't worship Dominion Inari, and those that do come pray at Dominion Inari will probably not be expecting success in Dominion. (See my post about genze riyaku for other reasons they could be visiting.) Plus, if Dominion Inari isn't successful, the benefit won't be transmitted back to Fushimi Inari's Inari, and Dominion Inari will fade into obscurity forever...
And thus ends me quick introduction to Inari and general obsession over Dominion.
Disclaimer: Re-enshrining Inari is a serious business and should not be done lightly, no matter how desperate you are to win at Dominion. Please consult a priest before attempting to re-enshrine a divided spirit of Inari.
On a completely unrelated note, if you already know of a Dominion Inari shrine, please tell me where it is, so I can go. You know, for research.
Further Reading
The Fox and the Jewel by Karen Smyers
Pretty much THE book on Inari.
Dominion Strategy Blog by theory
Because everyone should know how to play a silk roads strategy.
*Technically other kami can undergo this process, but it most commonly occurs with Inari. If you want an example of kami being re-enshrined for "worship from afar" in the Meiji period, check out Helen Hardacre's Shinto and the State, 1868-1988.
**It's not an addiction; I can stop whenever I want!
***Divided spirits are often renamed. Some names for re-enshrined Inari include "White Jewel Inari," "Toyomitsu Inari," and "White Beard Inari." So Dominion Inari is actually a pretty reasonable name
Friday, December 2, 2011
In which Geoff's hair is alarming and mystifying
So on Wednesday, Geoff and I went to visit Ise Shrine, since he wanted to go and I am all for visiting Ise as many times as possible. After some drama involving not realizing that you need a high speed ticket AND a normal ticket to ride the high speed line, we finally made it to Ise in pretty much one piece.
OH HEY, I WAS HERE LAST MONTH.
While it was less crowded than last time, there were a lot of tourist and pilgrimage groups visiting the shrine.
This is officially the coolest tree. And, yes, those two pictures are of the same tree. IS IT COMPLETELY HOLLOW? I DON'T KNOW. MAYBE IT'S FILLED WITH AWESOMENESS. CAPITAL LETTERS.
So when we finished at the outer shrine, we decided to walk to the inner shrine, because it's only about a 3.8 kilometer walk, and the bus costs 460 yen or something ridiculous like that.
And on the way we found a tiny Inari shrine.
And GORGEOUS momiji.*
So many fox statues!
I assume that the combination of the rock and the trees was sacred, but I'm not entirely sure, 'cause I've never seen a rope tied like that...
On the way to the inner shrine, we passed by a construction worker who was so impressed with Geoff's hair** that he radioed his colleague to tell her about it. DANG.
So then we grabbed lunch, where there was an amusing incident in which our waitress remarked to me how good Geoff's Japanese was (I guess I look the less foreign of the two of us?) and I said he was my kouhai. When she came with the bill, she gave it to me, since I was the senpai. SUCCESS. I have NEVER been given the bill while eating with other people before. Geoff was not amused. (Especially since, as he never fails to point out, he is older than me.***)
So then we headed over to the shrine:
Since Ise has to be rebuilt every twenty years, there's always a lot of construction going on there.
Here's one of the side shrines I didn't get to see while on the field trip.
TREE.
BOSS KOI FOREVER.
CHICKENS.
(I bet you are incredibly impressed by this commentary. Honestly, I don't have that much more to say about Ise this time, except that going to Ise with an art major is pretty epic. You get to hear all sorts of interesting facts about architecture.)
Anyway, after that we walked back to the train station and took the train back to Nagoya, where we visited an onsen. If you've never been to an onsen before, imagine the hottest bathtub in the world and then multiply it by 1.3. There are people who have passed out from dehydration in onsen. Also, because it's communal (although gender segregated), it means NUDITY EVERYWHERE. If you have any modesty at all, an onsen is not a place for you.
But it was really nice! I hadn't been to an onsen in so long, and they're about 150% better when it's not summer, so the air outside is actually colder than the water.
...and then we ate dinner at 11 p.m. because we are ADULTS.
Thursday morning I mostly caught up on work I hadn't been doing because I was out ADVENTURING, but then Thursday afternoon Geoff and I met up with Itou-san for...tea? It was a meal at 3 p.m., which I think would be tea. Except there was no actual tea involved. In any case, we had a nice chat. (Although, when we stopped by Kawahara Shrine to meet her, the women in the shrine office saw Geoff's hair and were stunned into silence for a few moments. He leaves one heck of an impression.)
In other news, I finished reading To Dream of Dreams, which Professor Dorman recommended. It's about constitutional politics and post-war religious freedom in Japan. I already knew a lot of the material, but it was still a pretty interesting read.
...on a final note, Geoff has spent today texting me about how awesome Kyoto is. Excuse me while I make disgruntled faces.
>:I
*Maple leaves, especially in fall when they're turning all sorts of pretty colors. They are pretty much my favorite leaves.
**Geoff has an incredibly impressive afro. It inspires stares of awe. It also makes small children burst into tears.
***By a whopping three months.
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