It’s been a whirlwind week for me; traveling from California to Tokyo and then on to Kanazawa, meeting my host family and settling in, and beginning my classes have all been mentally and physically exhausting processes, and I’m relieved that the weekend has come around quickly.
I am delighted to report that I absolutely love my host family. I had really been hoping for a family with children, and Ha-chan, Re-chan and I get along famously. Even though we’ve known each other for only a few days, the boys will sit on my lap while watching T.V. and share jokes with me. Ai-san is also very sweet, and I’m really looking forward to getting to know her better in these two months. Since Ai-san is young, fashionable, and up-to-date on current trends and events, I don’t feel apprehensive about engaging her in conversation. I feel like we have a lot in common, which was not really the case with my host mother during my semester abroad in Spain. This morning while we were eating breakfast, which consisted of the most adorable onigiri (rice balls wrapped in seaweed) I’ve ever seen, Ha-chan was quick to occupy his mother’s vacant seat next to me when Ai-san got up to pour coffee. She laughed and asked him, “You want to sit next to Karin while you eat your yogurt?” He replied, “Yeah, I love Karin!” These kind of occurrences make me really look forward to coming home in the afternoons after school so that I can play with the kids and forget about how stressful my classes are.
Speaking of which, classes definitely threaten to be the biggest obstacle in my pursuit of happiness in Kanazawa. As I discussed in the previous post, I continue to feel far behind my classmates in my knowledge of kanji and vocabulary, which I have chosen to attribute in part to a variance in textbook use at Whitman versus at other colleges. Since it seems that most of the students in my class have used the textbook series Tobira throughout their Japanese language education, they are naturally more prepared for the kanji and vocabulary we encounter in our current textbook, also in the Tobira series.
During class on Friday, dismayed by my lack of comprehension and struggles in reading from the textbook, I approached one of my professors, Makino sensei, for advice. Makino sensei, a septuagenarian originally from Tokyo who always wears clothes that appear at least one size too big for him, is a very kind man, and obviously extremely intelligent. (Our syllabus for the class included a list of recommended dictionaries, and he had co-written both of them. The guy wrote the dictionary.) I really want to make a good impression on him as an individual and as a representative of Whitman, but listening to him talk is like reading one of those censored letters from the World War II era in which most of the letter’s content has been blacked out. When I brought up my difficulties with Makino sensei, I almost hoped that he would suggest that I move down a level to the second-year class, where I would probably be more comfortable. Makino sensei seemed hesitant to to this, however, regardless of the fact that he had obviously noticed me struggling. He recommended that I ask my host family to speak more quickly rather than slowing their speech for my benefit, and he also told me to raise my hand in class whenever I felt that I didn’t understand. I was a little disappointed by this counsel, as speed is definitely not the point at issue in my situation–I can usually understand what people are saying regardless of speed, provided they use words I understand. Furthermore, if I were to raise my hand every time I didn’t understand Makino sensei‘s words in class, my hand would be more or less constantly in the air.
The situation is compounded considerably by the fact that I’m not entirely sure whether my classmates understand as much as they appear to. I was bewildered by an exchange with a Harvard student sitting next to me when I asked for clarification on an assignment. He admitted that although he had nodded in response to Makino sensei‘s query “Everyone understand?” he actually hadn’t understood what the professor had said. He added that he would “figure out” the assignment later. At this point, I was pretty frustrated with the whole class situation, so I called him out on this feigned comprehension. “Why didn’t you say anything?” I asked, irritated. “I’m sitting here shaking my head, ‘No, no I don’t understand,” while all of you are going, ‘Hai, hai wakarimashita.’ You’ll ‘figure it out?’ I don’t learn that way.” Indeed, I am typically the only person who admits lack of understanding throughout the class.
I talked this over with my parents over Skype later that afternoon, and my dad suggested that since most of these kids attend pretty competitive Ivy League colleges, they might not be as comfortable admitting their shortcomings or misunderstandings in class as someone from an intimate, cooperative learning environment like Whitman. I can only speak to my Whitman experience, as I have never attended Harvard, Princeton, or Columbia, but I have never felt vulnerable or victimized as a result of asking for clarification. Indeed, I usually feel a heck of a lot better when I ask for help or explication of an assignment, but it could be that professors at other colleges are not as accessible or willing to help as they are at Whitman. If it is indeed the case that my fellow students are merely pretending to understand in order to “save face,” I think their actions are totally irrational and will ultimately get them nowhere.
Anyway, moving on from this depressing topic, the weekend started out pretty well with a dinner party on Friday night at the Suzuki house. One of Ai-san‘s good friends came over with her three children and her two nieces, so there were seven children in the house. The kids, especially the youngest ones who were probably about three and two years old, kept staring at me. Once we broke the ice, though, they were giggling and climbing all over me. One little girl in particular who was probably about Re-chan‘s age was holding my hand and hugging me by the end of the night. We ate soba and soumen, two different types of Japanese noodles, and had delicious fruitcake for dessert.
Since we stayed up so late the night before, this morning (Saturday) I slept in until 7:00 AM, which by all rights should not be considered sleeping in. This time change has really messed with my internal clock, but I’m going to try to take advantage of this opportunity and trick my body into getting on an early-riser schedule. We ate breakfast (the aforementioned cute onigiri, in the shape of pandas), then Ai-san and I dropped the boys off at their dad’s house for the weekend. This was a kind of awkward excursion, as Ai-san just pulled up in front of the house, let the boys out, and drove away after giving only the briefest wave of acknowledgement to her ex-husband. It made me wonder whether or not they had a friendly relationship, but I didn’t want to ask Ai-san something so personal.
After returning to the house, I studied for a few hours (I have my first test on Monday), then Ai-san drove me to the Kanazawa International Lounge for a cultural activity: wearing kimono! The International Lounge is a cultural education center constructed and maintained for the benefit of foreigners living in Kanazawa. They host all kinds of events and workshops for foreigners, everything from counseling for culture shock to assistance in acquiring a Japanese driver’s license to lessons in traditional dance. The ten students signed up for today’s activity were helped into kimono by a squad of middle-aged Japanese ladies, who worked tirelessly at the complicated task. A kimono has several layers, starting with a cotton under-robe and ending with a variety of ties and stays around the waist area. The most difficult part of wearing kimono is tying the obi, or heavy sash. Today, the Kimono Squad tied the obi in a shape meant to resemble a sparrow in flight, and tying this knot was easily the lengthiest and most involved step in the process. I have worn kimono several times for chanoyu (tea ceremony) demonstrations at Whitman, but the one I donned today was significantly flashier than the chanoyu kimono I wear, with super-long sleeves and a bright and showy pattern. After the PII students and Kimono Squad had taken about a hundred pictures (I have a feeling they’ll be blowing up everyone’s Facebook feeds over the next few days), we took off the kimono, which is a significantly more straightforward process than putting them on.
I walked with a group of students from the International Lounge to the 21st Century Art Museum to look at a modern ikebana (flower-arrangement) exhibit. Some of the arrangements were beautiful, and some were downright bizarre (it’s a modern art museum, after all). Whereas traditional ikebana is pretty consistently minimalistic and usually tries to imitate nature as closely as possible, some of the arrangements we saw today included garishly painted branches, giant gourds, and plastic tubing. Unfortunately, we couldn’t take pictures in the exhibit, otherwise I would share some of the stranger pieces with you all. By the way, the 21st Century Art Museum is the home of the “Swimming Pool” piece of recent Internet fame; however, since it was raining and there is an additional entrance fee for this particular exhibit, we were unable to check it out as thoroughly as we would have liked.
After exploring the museum, we walked around downtown Kanazawa looking for a bakery, as my former ANA Crowne Plaza roommate Emily had a hankering for cake. We finally found a cafe redolent of secondhand smoke but nevertheless offering delicious kinako roll cake (kinako is a sweet powder made from soybeans). Over coffee and cake, we discussed our classes, and it turns out that these students also have trouble understanding Makino sensei, which comes as a relief. I also learned from a Princeton student that typically not even students at her school are expected to deal with the kind of pressure present in the PII classes, which was something of a surprise. Clearly, although PII is a highly reputed and popular program, there are some flaws in the system. I sincerely hope that I’m not the only one who feels like the class dunce, but I may never find out, given my classmate’s apparent reluctance to admit that they don’t understand. Hopefully this issue is just a first-week fluke and things will get easier from here, but I’m still feeling pretty insecure starting out. Wish me luck, everyone!
