Big things and little things - Japan series #2

Warning: This post would be a lot more amusing if I could just get my pictures uploaded properly.

So I was calling this post big and small things because I have a picture of my toilet, and it has a big flush and small flush. This knob is a constant source for chuckles. (In case you are wondering, the small flush is useless.)

Big things:

- The language barrier. People are really friendly, but unwilling to attempt to use their ten years of mandatory English lessons. For instance, communicating with our new labmates is virtually impossible. They are too shy to make a mistake, and I am not capable of learning conversational Japansese during my stay. Perhaps next time I should Berlitz it before coming to a different country.

- Sightseeing. I don't think I ever took the time to truly look around Boston, except when I have visitors. The past weekend V and I went to Peace Memorial Park and Peace Memorial Museum. (Imagine pictures of various memorial statues, bells etc..) I, also, have planned a myriad of trips around the country. Even though, I will be here for 2 months, I will not even get to see a tenth of what I want to see.

- The A-bomb. I work in the Research Institute of Radiation Biology and Medicine. All the major tourists sights surround are about the bomb, whether it be the sight of the explosion or the redreation of a castle because it was destroyed. The date August 6, 1945 (8:15am) has now been burned into my memory.

Small things:

- Vending machines. Without exageration, there is a vending machine at every street corner. Most of them have coffee, tea, and soda. Some sell cigarettes. Some sell beer. V and I tried the Sochi lemon highballs (it is like hard lemonade) from a vending machine a week ago, just to say we bought liquor from a vending machine. We also get our morning coffee at the Suntory vending machine next the work gate entrance. Because there are so many vending machines everywhere there is no need to carry water or such with you. Another weird fact about them is that people here do not drink or eat as they walk. There are recycling bins by the machine, and we have noticed many people drinking by the machine.

- Eating out. Of course, there are lots of restaurants in Boston, but it pales in comparison here. Also, many of them are very affordable. Their high-end restaurants are far above our price range. But for the everyday, the options are many and the quality good so that there is no guilt in dining out ... for every meal.

- Sweets. Along those food lines, I have been eating an inordinate amount of sweets here. Cakes, donuts, chocolates are are superior. Most of the time I have no idea what I am eating, having been lured by the attractive packaging. They have all been tasty. (However, do avoid the hard candies.) I am especially partial to the pound cake made in Hokkaido.

More to come....

First Saturday - Japan series #1

I finally arrived. The truth is I arrived almost 5 days ago, but it feels as if I just got here. (Pardon the tone of this entry as it might be a little grumpy. I currently have strep throat and being sick and not at home is unpleasant.)

There about five million cultural differences between the US and Japan that I would love to point out, but I figure most of them will come out in time. For now, I think I will just focus on my weekend.

As mentioned before, I am in Hiroshima. My exact address is still a mystery to me. (I will have to ask H about that today.) My apartment is on the 10th floor of this building. I am in the southeast part of the city, mainly residential neighborhood called, Minamiku. It is close to work, but the drawback is that it is a little far from the city center and the farther away you get from the center the more communication problems arise. I do have a phrase book, which for the past few days has become my bible. The people here seem to be extra friendly (maybe because all the annoying tourists are in the center of town) and are willing to patiently read (after I make a very poor attempt in pronouncing what I want) to words that I point in the book.

Getting lost is very easy here due to the very poor city planning and ultra narrow streets. Luckily, on the first day here, H did show me how to get form the lab to my apartment. My strategy for getting around is to say "Hiroshima Daigaku Byuoin, yuki no basu tei wa doko desu ka?" (Where is the bus to the Hiroshima University Hospital) Then it is just a ten minute walk from the hospital to my apartment.

My other favorite phrase is "Sumimasen, nihongo wa wakarimasen." (Pardon me, I cannot understand Japansese.) With just two phrases, I have been able to survive quite nicely so far.

My friend H and his wife took me out on Saturday. When in Boston, H used to work like a mad man and would never take a weekend off. I told him not to worry about me, and he told me he has a life in Japan so he does not work as hard here. I was kind of taken aback because you always read about the Japanese work ethic. See, stereotypes already being torn down.

H and his wife decided to show me downtown Hiroshima. Y needed to buy a matching pajama set for her friend that is getting married next week. I asked if that was for the bachelorette party, but apparently in faux pas number 302 that I made that day that was their wedding gift. (They do not give kitchenware, and his/her pajama set is over 200 dollars.)

Downtown Hiroshima is one huge mall. There many department stores, small curio shops, electronic shops etc.. The Japanese seem to be enamoured by high-end name brands. Names like Coach, Louis Vitton, Kate Spade, Burberry, etc. are displayed in the windows. Even the iPod is popular here, which I find odd because the alternatives are so superior.

For lunch we went to eat okonami-yaki. It is famous in Hiroshima. It is all cooked on a large griddle. It is two thin flour pancakes stuffed with cabbage, scallions, bacon, octopus, shrimp, sprouts, and anything else you would like. The cooks then flip is over and fry an egg on one side of the pancake. The finishing touches are some parsley and special okonami-yaki sauce. It is delicious and very filling. According to H, it is considered junk food. Oddly enough it is the first sign of a lot of vegetables I had seen in awhile. (More about that in later posts)

After shopping and lunch, we did a little sight seeing. We went by the baseball stadium (Hiroshima Toyo Carp), the A-bomb dome and the Peace memorial. We also decided to play a few rounds of pool.

Even without my favorite phrase of "I do not understand japanese," I am pretty sure people know I am a foreigner. 1) I dress differently. Despite the fact that I am dressed slightly more neatly than normal, I am still way underdressed for a japanese woman. 2) I do not wear makeup or have a hairdo. 3) I play pool not well but decently enough to show that I had spent some time playing when I was younger. The only other two women in the pool hall, Y and some other girl at the table closest to the window, were giggling a lot, definate beginners.

After all of that, we went for a sushi dinner at Hiroshima Port. You could see a bunch of small islands from the docks. They were all green and partially covered in the fog. It was beautiful, but too dark to take any good pictures. It was a very good day.

Of course, I have tons more to say, but I trying to pace myself a little. So for now, sayanora.

Leaving on a jet plane

Dear Readers,

For those of you who do not know, I will be in Japan for the next two months.

Hiroshima is now called the city of peace, although I am pretty sure that being blown to bits had a lot to do with that name. It is home of the Hiroshima-yaki, an especially delicious japanese savory pancake. The baseball team the Toyo Carp are super fantastic, and even made it to the Japan Series three times. It is the center of Mitsubishi manufacturing. And soon the host for two american visiting scientists.

In an effort to foster closer ties and collaborations withe scientists around the world, V and I will be working at Hiroshima U for the summer. I am of course full of intrepidation as I don't want to single handedly reinforce every bad image of the loud american woman. But some things cannot be avoided. Wouldn't it be weird working in a place in which no one spoke your language...wait that is the one thing of which I have plenty of experience.

There are other things that are frightening too. like the earthquake that just hit the south. Nothing happened but I thought I left all that stuff when I moved to the East Coast.

I say a lot of things in jest, but the truth is that I hope in the coming weeks I have some interesting adventures and stories to report. Maybe it will be like "Lost in Translation," "Shogun, " or "The Seven Samurai." Or more likely my experiences are not likely found in any movie. There will be very mundane lab work mixed in with some quality touristy things.

Wish me luck on my 11 hour flight to Tokyo, followed by my foray into mastering the Japanese rail system. Hopefully, late Thursday night I will be in Hiroshima. Guess you will have to wait and see.

Sincerely,
Evil Twin #1

Staying "On Point" and speaking aloud

Call it nature or nurture, but I have inherited an odd pasttime from my father. If you ever read the op-ed page of a newspaper and wondered who bothers to take the time to write a letter, I have an answer: Evil Twin #1 and her father. I remember being 7 or 8 years of age and writing letters to Reagan (on my father's behalf) about the rigeurs of having such a large national debt.

On Thursday, I was in the tissue culture room and NPR was blaring in the background. It was a show called "On Point with Tom Ashbrook." The topic of discussion that day was a Newsweek article saying the prospects of women marrying over the age of forty are not as dire as once thought. While I had heard about this story all week, the inane callers made me so angry that I too had call into the show. (I also had a small presentation to finish so my desire to procrastinate, may have been a contributing factor.)

What had made me angry was there was a woman on the phone talking about how women can have it all. She was a little over forty and recently just got married. She is now a stay at home mom, taking care of her new born and she could not be happier. Now I do not want to begrudge her happiness, but it is wrong to espouse fact on anecdotal evidence. This caller was fortunate that she did not have five miscarriages, need to go through multiple rounds of IVF, and have a child with developmental problems. But biologically speaking having children so late is not always wise. There are like to be complications at birth and if it is your first child and you are over the age of 35 you risk for breast and ovarian cancer goes up remarkedly. Telling the world there are no risks in waiting late is dangerous.

Here were the points I wanted to make.

1. Why is this story such a big deal? The average of age of women getting married is 25 years old, which implies that the number of women this issue effects are in the minority. Most likely, the forty never married population (men and women) are probably overeducated career driven individuals who have the resources to make the story a big deal. The news coverage on this story is a remenant of the fifties, implying there is an inherent desire of all women to be married. (To have a little booty and companionship, yes. A husband or wife (I do live in MA) may not necessarily)
2. The forty something year-old woman from Jamaica Plain is an idiot.
3. To point out the health risks involved in having children later in life. If you are willing to take the risks fine, and the media must never cover those risks up. Sometimes in life you just have to make hard choices, but the public needs to know the info behind those choice.

So I called in and said all these things. The moderator was perhaps less than enthused that I implied he and the caller were morons, but at least the experts agreed with me.

It was rather thrilling calling into NPR. I am normally a letter writer. For example, last week I e-mailed President Bush, Dunkin' Donuts, and Michael Kinsley. With the call in I actually got some feedback unlike my letters which I guarantee fall on blind eyes. E-mail replies normally look like this:

On behalf of President Bush, thank you for your correspondence. We appreciate hearing your views and welcome your suggestions. Due to the large volume of e-mail received, the White House is unable to respond to every message, and therefore this response is an autoreply.
Thank you again for taking the time to write.

Now if only talk shows had more than just pundits on them, I would call in more often....