A Hopeful Story

This story, shared by one of my online English students at work, made me happy. :)

So this one lady logged onto the class as usual to practice chatting English, and she was so excited because her husband had given her flowers for their anniversary. Moreover, it was a surprise because he had been unusually busy with work recently and she hadn't expected him to make such an effort. She also speculated fondly of how he must have carried the large bouquet on a crowded train!

We all took turns sharing about thoughtful gifts we had received, and each lady (it's mostly housewives who have time to do eikaiwa during the afternoon) remembered some gift from her spouse. One said she had never received flowers, but that's because her husband knew she liked chocolate more! (Hana yori dango -- sweets over flowers.)

Talking about kind gifts, even if a lot of them were simple, made me happy because recently I read an article on JapanTimes about the increase in loveless marriages and people too busy for relationships. Now, JapanTimes often isn't that reliable. This particular article had a rather patronizing tone of "Oh, you silly Japanese. You should take after Americans to learn what a successful relationship looks like." (Isn't there some saying about taking care of the plank in your own eye before going after the speck in your neighbor's? But I digress...)

The article might have been ridiculous, but I do feel like there are couples in Japan who act more like roommates. In general, Japanese people (especially guys) are less comfortable talking about romantic things. I would like to read an article about how an American person can encourage her Japanese friends in their relationships...That would actually be more helpful than another article complaining about Japan.

That's why I felt encouraged today, hearing ordinary, unromantic housewives who have been married 20 or 30 + years--and are usually more concerned with the mundanities of cooking dinner for busy husbands--reminisce about thoughtful actions their spouses had done for them.

Romance is not dead! Not in America and not in Japan!

Oktoberfest

Apparently there's an Oktoberfest in Hiroshima. But it ends in the middle of September. Someone was interested in German cars... Noticed it's still a right-hand drive, though. Souichirou was too embarrassed to ask permission to take a photo with the car, so I did. Or maybe this was a ploy to get me to speak up more...

It was raining that day, so we saw a lot of umbrellas. But I think a rainy day was the way to go because it wasn't too crowded.

The German beers were really big! Also the two guys next to me were speaking German. It must be weird for them to see the Oktoberfest in Hiroshima. Not to mention a band of Japanese performers wearing dirndl/lederhosen singing in German with a Japanese accent.

Anyway it was worth going for the beer!

Guide to Learning Vocabulary

This method is not based on what you find in textbooks. This is real life. It's based heavily on experience, and on logic, not at all.

(Sorry for sentences in romaji. My computer makes typing in non-english letters very complicated.)

Step 1. "My vocabulary sucks. I need to learn new words. I know the weekdays, how about seasons?"

Step 2. "Natsu means summer. Natsu. Natsu. Natsu."

Step 3. "I learned a new word today. Um....Dangit!!!!"

Step 4. My friend: "Kotoshi, natsu-yasumi ga arimasu-ka?"
            Me: "Um...?"

Step 5. "I want to write about summer starting in my diary...I think it starts with Na???"

Step 6. "That kanji looks interesting. I wonder what it means...Oh. I was supposed to know this."

Step 7. "I have no tiiiiiiime to study! Forget it!"

Step 8. "Those cards look seasonal. I'll bet that kanji/katakana means 'Summer Cards.'"

Step 9. "Oh, that clothing store is having natsu no se-ru. I should check it out."

Step 10. My friend: "Nihon no natsu wa atsui desu-ne."
               Me: "Um...hai! Saikin wa totemo atsukatta!"

Step 10. "My vocabulary sucks! I only know words that I've known forever, like the seasons! Haru, natsu, aki, and fuyu."

Do this, while simultaneously learning various other vocabulary and grammar points, while also trying to manage a full time job and a social life, and you will be following  the Stephanie method of learning new vocabulary. It is a fool-proof system, because it was proved by real fools.

Autumn Rain

Fall is definitely here in Hiroshima. For the past two weeks or so we've had sprints of heavy rain lasting up to five days at a time. Which probably is about  normal for this season, but for a California girl it's very trying. After a few days without the sun I start going, "Is this world even worth living in anymore????"

I had better get tougher before winter comes.

However, I did manage to buy actual rain boots before the heavy rain started in earnest. I've had a lot of fun wearing them around. After my black boots finally expired last spring (a bit of gravel worked through the sole without me noticing and since then the water seeps in), it's been good to have waterproof shoes again.

Is Learning a Second Language Like Learning Math?

Recently I've been thinking that the skills necessary for learning a new language are similar to the skills needed for math. Not to make anyone panic who happens to love language and hate math...

Not that Japanese has a one-to-one correlation with English. Of course not. That's as weird as saying algebra has a one-to-one correspondence to English. I guess in your own language you don't have to worry so much about the rules, but in a different one you're always conscious of the rules.

I made the connection after I started writing cards to help me remember grammar. And they sort of ended up looking like equations.

plain verb + you ni + suru (This sentence means you're trying to do something.)

Actually in both math and language you have to learn some new terms and how to change simple concepts into more difficult ones. When you add all these different terms together in the right order you can get some important information as a result. In math it's some number. In language it's a sentence you need in everyday life.

The tricky part is when everything begins affecting everything else--when it's not just one operation going on but a series of operations all going on at the same time, and you have to balance them. And in both math and language, forgetting even one step can change the result!

When I learned something new in math I usually had to start by memorizing a formula. And just doing it lots of times until the steps stuck in my head. And then once I had it, I could start playing around and seeing its nuances. It's the same with new grammar. First, I just have to remember the rules and the general meaning. But after I'm used to it, I can see interesting things and unusual ways to use it.

What's also similar is "If you don't use it you lose it."  So practice is important!

Shimane

So I didn't go anywhere very exotic for my summer vacation this year, but I did make it to the Shimane prefecture and saw the Japan sea for the first time, something I've wanted to do for a while. The water is really clear, and you can look out straight to the horizon without having your view blocked by islands, which is unusual for Japan.

I don't really know what the clock tower was for, but it looked really cool.

Beyond Selfish and Unselfish?

One thing I have trouble with is thinking of relationships as a zero-sum game. (Maybe it's being too much a fan of Adam Smith and leaning too far towards capitalism in general, I dunno...) I.E. a zero-sum game being: "Somebody has to be the loser. Either it's good for me or good for you. Never both."

Of course I read enough C.S. Lewis in high school to know that this sounds a bit like the philosophy of hell from the Screwtape Letters.

I think a lot of people get around the zero-sum game by turning it on its head, and trying to be less selfish instead of more. While selfish people would say, "Our interests are in conflict so I have to do what's best for me first," an unselfish person would say, "I will always put you first." So the best person is the one enduring the most unpleasantness to make others happy.

Now, "unselfishness" is obviously a loaded word, especially after bringing up C.S. Lewis. It's easy to remember some critiques he made in Mere Christianity and The Four Loves. Essentially, that it can turn into a game of one-up-manship that leaves everybody miserable.

So even though it's common to say "die to yourself" and so on, sometimes I don't really agree with that. One of the strangest stories in the Bible to me is the one about "Unless a seed falleth into the ground and die.." Because it seems that the only result of the seed's death is to produce....more seeds. Who will go on to produce more seeds and so on into infinity. It's definitely a sustainable pattern, but singularly pointless. Why do we want more seeds? Do the seeds ever do anything with their lives besides reproduce mindlessly?

Essentially, it's the story that tells us the group is worth everything and the individual nothing. Did you think you had personal value? Think again! You're just a tool to produce more exactly like you!

Sometimes I want to be a little Nietzsche-ish. Why not go beyond selfishness and unselfishness? Not just lions over lambs or lambs over lions.

Why do we assume that the joy of self and the joy of others are mutually exclusive? Is it possible that showing kindness can produce sincere, lasting, happiness? Without us having to double-think ourselves into it?

Maybe personal suffering is only a side-effect of virtue and not it's true measure. I think a truly kind person can be measured by joy.