All the Upcoming Shenanigans

So many things going on! Here's a rundown:

Tomorrow I teachmy normal classes, then run off to Sendai for the last class with one of my private students.

The next day I take Julia and Hana to the park at Tsutsujugaoka to hand out free tea bags and cookies for our E4K-- Random Acts yearly fundraiser (for which I have received only one donation) and
I will not be collecting donations as I have no way of putting the donated money into the crowdrise situation-- no debit card or credit card here, only Paypal and not much in my paypal.

If you would like to contribute to some awesome projects, donate here.

Monday I have one lesson and one skype-date with my mom.

Tuesday I have a full afternoon of classes at a student's house and this will be the first time I have taught these lessons this way. It will be interesting.

Wednesday I actually have a day off and might trek down to Ogawara with Julia to see 1000 sakura trees...maybe not. We'll see.

Thursday we have a class in Sendai in the afternoon.

Friday things go back to normal with my evening class.

Saturday will be Julia's kindergarten entrance ceremony.

That Sunday might be a day off, I have no idea.

That Monday, Julia starts kindergarten and I finally get to clean my house in addition to trying to make costumes and other fun things for Steampunk Hanami: Easter Edition which we will be having on Easter Sunday, April 16th.

Fun times!

Too many things to do....

So here I go, off to do the things!

A Fairly Excellent Day

Today was pretty awesome.

It's Wednesday, which means I have no classes and since Julia hasn't started school yet, it was one of our last chances for a day-long adventure without weekend crowds.

So we got ready and headed out to Sendai. We started with a pizza buffet lunch (at a place I had read about but never been to) which was pretty great actually. The pizzas were small and few offerings that I really enjoyed, but the tomato-moz-basil option and the basic cheese were both totally delectable. After picking up a slice of something green (too excited/hungry to bother reading the Japanese-only description written on a short note near the pizza) that I realized later was zunda (mashed raw soybean with sugar--a Sendai-specific sweet) I decided I had been adventurous enough and went with salad instead. The zunda wasn't bad, just not what I wanted on pizza.
Julia was free, but does not have any affinity for pizza, so I brought her some items from the small salad bar, all of which she rejected. I spied fruit-filled yogurt in the dessert area and brought it along, and she ate it-- or at least the yogurt. She carefully dodged each mango and pineapple chunk, carefully partaking only in the yogurt.
I later brought her more of just the yogurt and finished off her remaining fruit. I would later get her something she actually liked for lunch elsewhere.
There was also a free juice bar, and as I'm still harboring some post-nasal drip, I made the most of my $10/45minute beverage festival.
It was actually pretty great. A lot better than I thought it would be.

Then we walked through the arcade, with me trying desperately to catch the Farfetch'd Pokemon for my mom, and failing again. Again! The little blighter will not show himself.
I charged my phone at 3 different restaurants/coffee shops during the day trying to catch him. Could not make it work.
Oh well.
In the mean time, we went to the Owl Cafe, surprised to find it now the home of a meerkat and several rabbits in addition to the now adolescent miniature pigs and the same owls as before. I got to pet a fluffy owl.
And the meerkat.
And the marmoset.
Julia was freaked out a little because the meerkat was very curious about the smell of her slightly-wet pants. It was awkward, but not traumatic, so yay! They also have a twice-daily flying session, in which they put all the owl-prey away in cages and have three of their best trained owls fly across the room to perch on the gloved hand of an owl-cafe employee, only to have volunteers from the audience join the action afterward for the same interval. The barn owl perched on my left index finger, and I thought of David Bowie, and it was a good day.

Then it had been an hour and Julia was getting tired so we went for a little walk, still chasing and not finding the Pokemon. I found some pokestops that were lured, so I gravitated toward them but still couldn't catch my guy. In the process, I found a new favorite coffee shop, under an AU shop in a building that may have housed Zara back in 2011. I'm not really sure, but it was super convenient, with tablets at the same seating area as the outlets, so I could charge my phone while Julia played with ice and watched a few trial episodes of random innocuous anime.
It was rather excellent.

I kept stopping for lures, but never did find the guy. Instead I spent a little bit at a few places, buying coffee so my phone could charge while my daughter made small talk with every person who would look at her for more than 2 seconds. She is just that way. She stayed close to me today though, with no running off in random directions, so overall it was good.

Now we're home, and about to head out for some last minute groceries (and a last-ditch poke-walk of desperation...)

But the day had actually begun with me telling the Amanda Palmer facebook group that I was happy to be the unofficial Japan-guru but that I could not plan any more trips, and directing people who were interested in coming here to my previous blog post on the subject.
This may seem like me saying the same thing over and over to strangers who don't care, but in that group, anytime Japan is mentioned, someone seems to tag me, and most of the time it is no big deal. Yes, they have crazy chocolates. No, the fixing-broken-things-with-gold thing isn't really common these days and most people throw perfectly good electronics in the garbage when they get new ones. Yes, some people are pervs and the rate of harassment committed upon young women in this country (myself included-- in Nagoya, once) is appallingly high.
Anyway, most of this isn't a problem but as I said in the post before, I can't keep doing the planning craziness, and since I will put myself into that position, it is better if anyone planning a trip like that looks at my blog post and only bugs me if they want to head up this way.

I posted this to a group of 4000 people, only a handful of whom I know online and none have I met in person. I posted this with more than an inkling of trepidation, as I was sure, just like the Engrish discussion, someone would decide I was being an asshole for something that didn't seem asshole-y to me at all.

On the train back to Shiogama, I checked Facebook only to find a number of comments to my post, all positive. Some were people asking if they could meet me for coffee if they did get out to Sendai, to which I replied of course. Some were just celebrating the attempt to do something for my mental health. None were negative or strained or weird.
We'll see if that holds out, but it's nice to not feel like I cannot be understood.

Also, my city-cost blog post about lolita/punk/vk fashion in Sendai (with 2 pictures of your truly) has been posted.
See it here.
So...things went well. Yay!

So You're Coming to Japan...

I'm prefacing this by acknowledging the mucus content of my sinuses is screwing with my intellectual capabilities.

But my feelings keep getting hurt for no real reason and I'm going to put a stop to this.

So let's assume you're seeing the post as a response to the following situation:
"Oh  my god. I'm coming to Japan at some unknown point in the future and know nothing of where/when/how to go/do anything, HALP!"

This has come up too many times with friends and acquaintances and people I don't even know who somehow get referred to me for this solution. Being me, I then put hours into trying to help these people plan their adventure, providing lots of details and recommendations, offering frequently to personally guide people around Tohoku completely for free.

And then the same damn thing happens every time. They think about it and make the same damn decision that everyone else does. They see Tokyo, Kyoto, maybe Osaka, occassionally Nagoya. They will go and see the same things everyone else goes and sees and since no one goes to Tohoku, no one ever will.

Then I get to find out this information months later, if ever, and I always feel slightly trampled. I know they weren't solid plans, but I keep fucking offering my heart and soul to people who really just want to have the DisneyLand-Japan experience. Not Tokyo Disney, which is an actual theme park, but the theme-park style tourist experiences that EVERY TOURIST seems to have, because having your own authentic experience in this "exotic" country is verboten. Your experiences are only worthwhile if they are exactly the same as the ones everyone else has.

You went to Japan, huh? Did you see Sky Tree? Tokyo Tower? This one thing I saw in Tokyo? Did you go only to the places that I also went? Awesome.

And there are tons of people out there willing to provide their experiences that corroborate this trend. A friend (who did actually come up here for a couple of days in addition to seeing Tokyo and other places) posted on facebook that she was headed this way and several of her friends had places to recommend....all in Tokyo. "Oh, I've been there-- all the way from Akihabara to Asakusa..."

And I'm out here thinking, "Yeah, that's ALL JUST in Tokyo. Hmm. Kinda like there's not a country out here...Guess I don't live in Japan after all...Since I don't live in Tokyo..."

So, if you're asking me for advice, here's my advice. 

1.   Get a Japan Rail Pass (you have to arrange it and pay for it before you get here, but it's totally worth it for the days when you're travelling a lot)

2. Check Trip Advisor, Japan guide, or just freaking google whatever cities you are actually interested in. You could even check City-Cost, where I sometimes blog about Tohoku, for information from other foreign residence and reviews of places nearby.

3. If you actually really want to come to Tohoku and have worked that into your finalized plans, hit me up. I'm still happy to show people around and be a free guide, but only when that's not getting my hopes up before someone says, "Oh, well we decided we'd just go wherever everyone goes after all. Screw Sendai."


So good luck guys, and enjoy your vacation wherever it takes you, but leave me out of it unless you actually give a crap about seeing me or Tohoku.

Thanks.

Happy Hina Matsuri Day!

So it is girls' day here in Japan and we had lunch with my in-laws to celebrate. They wanted to set up the dolls at our house but we didn't ever have time (or space) so they set up the top tier (emperor and empress only, plus flowers and lanterns) at their home atop the piano.

What we didn't count on was Grandpa Nakamura, who we love very much, being there in the house as well. Of course no one minds spending time with Grandpa Nakamura-- my mother-in-law's father-- as he's always happy to greet everyone with a warm smile and even uses a few words of English now and again. This time, we found him sitting at the dining table, shying away from our glances and speaking so softly as to barely be heard. He tried to be polite, but was a little scared and a little shy.

I've always liked Grandpa Nakamura partially because he is where my husband gets the ability to smile with his whole face (an uncommon trait in this country) and because he tends to speak plainly, but with a warm tone, so I can usually get the gist of what he's saying.

Grandpa celebrated his 90th birthday a few weeks ago and we all went out and had a great dinner where Julia actually ate something and only spent half of the evening rolling on the floor. That's an improvement, sadly enough.

Well, today we found out that Grandpa has been having memory issues, and is now living with his daughter and her husband so they can help take care of him.

My mother-in-law whispered the new sad stories of his current progress to my husband while we waited to wash our hands at the sink by the shower room before eating. I caught 50%, I'd like to say, but not a useful 50. Tomo had to clarify.
Then he tried to walk away.

I know they're good  at the whole face-hiding thing and I am bad at that, even for an American. There are people I know from my home country (hell, from my hometown) who can lie to your face and make you believe it while they hold every emotion back, showing you only an almost Vulcan face of emotionlessness.

And I can't do that. At all. I started crying and made him come back and hold me. I thought I would get it together after that but couldn't make it work for a few minutes.

On the upside, I could let the tears roll silently, which I couldn't do 10 years ago. I couldn't stop, though. And Tomo and his mom were perfectly together, and I admire their strength so much. 5 years ago, I would have felt stupid and angry at myself for not being able to hold it together better while my mother-in-law is oscillating between happy and normal on the outside.

I guess I don't really have an outside. I have me. This molten core of burbling emotion, that's me.

On the upside, my husband and in-laws don't have to worry about who I am inside. They see me. They can't not. I'm right there, heart exposed, every second of every day.
Like an idiot.
An almost brave but also terrified idiot.

I did finally stop the tears from falling. It kind of helped that my father in law also had to wipe his face and blow his nose after I came out and couldn't stop wiping the tears from my face.

After a few minutes, Tomo and his parents began talking about silly things that were happening and Julia was wandering around talking to everyone. Grandpa Nakamura laughed, and for a few minutes he really was his old self again.

This is the beginning of a long and very depressing road.
But at least we're on it together.