2007-06-15 - 5:50 p.m.
Two Weeks in Nagoya
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Late May throught early July in apartment 2B near Hongo station. I did this two years ago, and now I will do it again.
I appreciate the odd opportunity that my former, and now current employer, has given me, to experience again the bizarre dynamic of a group of, mostly new-to-this-side-of-the-Pacific, foreign trainees two years wiser than my Former Self, who's done this already.
Immediately upon arrival I notice that the lazy cat sleeping outside the tea shop next door is still around, which pleases me greatly. Cats are unreliable pets, in that they seem to go missing a whole lot more often than others do. It made me happy to see that this one was still OK.
The urban bats that do tricks beneath the subway line (above ground in this neighborhood) have obviously had a good time of things since I saw them last. There are many more of them than I'd remembered. No one else in my group seemed to notice that they were bats, and not birds, and I didn't tell them. Keeping this a secret, for no real reason at all, is strangely satisfying to me even now.
My roommate makes me feel as though I must have won some roommmate-who-you-didn't-get-to-choose lottery. She is originally from Ghana, is married, has two kids, and has lived here for almost eight years. She is a Muslim who takes her religion seriously enough to pray several times a day and refrain from eating pork and drinking alcohol, but not quite seriously enough to wake up and do the first prayer of the day at 4 AM, which strikes me as a very good balance of religousity. She has a gold tooth which, I learn, means that she has been to Mecca. (I didn't know that!) She also makes for us recipes from Ghana like shitto (I spell phonetically and, therefore, quite possibly incorrectly) which, despite the name, was delicious.
Getting-to-know-you chit chat with the rest of group was tedious. I haven't needed to get-to-know-anyone like this in quite a while, and wondered if it was obvious to anyone else that I was out of practise. I found myself imagining us all as prospective members of some demented country club in an effort to stifle my impression that getting-to-know-you information such as where I grew up and what my husband's job is has no purpose at all except as the basis to form lame assumptions that will, at best, be only half true. The demented coutry club approach may actually have been a good one. By the third day I hardly even needed it at all.
I saw a frazzled-looking woman carrying a baby, a large bag, and an opened package of diapers into a cab and wondered about her story. I saw forests and mountains and gardens and wondered about the sort of stories that had happened in these places. I like this about myself. I like that I wonder about stories.
I missed Shuhei, and he said that he missed me too. There's a lot to be said for being missed, it feels pretty good.
Training itself felt like summer camp for adults and adolescents mascarading as adults. I had a hard time taking it seriously, but did my best not to let that show. The word 'confident' came up again and again in the feedback I received from demos and guest appearances that I had to perform. And it's true, I do feel more confident than I once was. I was unaware that this was emanating from me, but if it is, what can I say? I don't mind at all.
In conclusion, three cheers for Yano Jicho, the president of this whole thing, and a name that's fun to say.
Three cheers for Shuhei, who said that if I wanted to have my old job back I should just wait for it to become availible, and that there was no rush at all for me to get a job.
And three cheers for the rash that Shuhei got earlier this week, the care for which makes me feel as though I'm a good wife, and not the sort of A-wad wife who got tipsy at kareoke in Nagoya on her husband's birthday while he was at home watching a zombie movie alone.
