Monday, October 31, 2011

all you can eat bread and another cash-mergency

My coworkers asked me to join them for a ladies only lunch on Saturday.  Well, ladies and kids I guess.  I was supposed to meet my coworkers at our office at 11:20am on Saturday but ended up getting scooped up during my walk over to the office by one coworker who spotted me walking.  After everyone arrived and we did a little carpool rearranging, we headed to Takatsuki, a city next to Ibaraki where I live.  The restaurant was a kind of European style bakery and we were planning to have a fixed price lunch... basically a few courses of food along with all you can eat BREAD.  Heaven.  If you know me, you know about my love of bread.  So I pretty much loved this place and never wanted to leave as long as the bread kept coming.  


I think the babies had fun, too.  How cute are they??  The little girl in the middle and I especially bonded over our headbands and love of picking up donguri (acorns).  But that came later.


This isn't a great photo but here's the whole group.  Look who's holding the sweet baby!  That would be me.  He let me hold him for about the time it took the photo.  

Can you spot what I was surprised to find on the table?  Silverware.  It hadn't really occurred to me that I've hardly used forks and knives during my time in Japan.  So, a fun surprise.

After a lovely lunch and lots of chatting about what women normally chat about (shopping, husbands, kids, single men in the office, eating too much, boyfriends... you get the idea) we got back in our cars and headed to the "expo park".  Some type of world fair was held in Osaka in 1970 and this park was built for the festivities.  Maybe this guy will look familiar to you...


The Tower of the Sun designed by Taro Okamoto for the world fair.  The park is HUGE and we spent a few hours walking around and playing.  There wasn't a ton of English conversation happening but I had such a nice time with the ladies and getting to know them a bit better.  Of course, kids are the same in every country so also got to play and laugh a lot with them.


Take one...


...two


...three!

I'm still trying to learn all of their names (and pronounce them correctly!) so I can't really tell you who they are but look at these sweet faces!  My coworkers told me that these flowers are called cosmos.  Not sure if that translates or not.  Such a fun day.  So thankful for the ladies in my office and their infinite patience with me.

Saturday was probably the big Halloween party day in Osaka but I was so tired from our day at the park that after I came home and made dinner, I went to bed pretty early.  Not so exciting but my Halloween options were pretty much don't go out or go out and stay out aaaaaall night until the trains start running again at 5am.  I'm sure it could have been so fun but I had already decided that I wanted to try and go to a new church on Sunday morning and didn't think staying out all night would be so helpful.  

I found the church before coming to Japan while Googling "christian church osaka".  There weren't many links that even came up but I found this one, did a little digging in and decided that it might be nice to check out.  It's actually a brand new church and their launch Sunday was this past week.  So that's why I haven't really gone to any other churches here (besides being super busy on the weekends) since I've been waiting for this one to start up.

Maybe you remember my running out of cash saga from a few weeks ago?  Well that basically happened again on Saturday... one of my colleagues had to buy my way into the expo park because of my lack of funds.  It was kind of an accident but I knew that I needed to get to Osaka as soon as I could to get more cash.  So on Sunday before church, I ventured to Osaka and went in search of a Citibank ATM.  I had written down the name of the building and some general directions but still had a hard time finding what I was looking for.  It was also rainy and I was running late for church so in general a bit of a stressed situation.  But I decided that getting cash was my number one priority since I hadn't had breakfast (fridge also empty at this point haha) and was hungry.  Now this cashless situation was a bit different from last time because now I have a fully loaded transit card.  So no chance of getting stranded in a train station or anything.  That made the situation completely stress-less, it was just the fact that I was running late for church that I didn't really like.  Soooo after some searching I found the building, went to the seventh floor like I had written and found the bank to be closed (of course) with no ATMs.  Annoyed that I had rushed and stressed over being late only to find no ATMs, I went back downstairs to the street level.  Sitting right by the entrance that I had just rushed through were two ATMs.  So I got a bit of cash and went back out into the drizzle to try and find my way to the church. 


Here's what cheap, lazy people do when they don't want to draw a map or use data roaming on their phone for Google Maps.  Pull up directions on your computer and then take a photo.  Easy breezy.  Walking to church from the main train station area took me around fifteen minutes and I was happy to spot an American at the entrance to the church venue so that I didn't have to guess as to where it was.  The church has rented a dance club type space through the end of the year so that they're in a central location with easy access to train stations.  

I probably spent around two hours at the church including the service and then lots of talking afterwards.  The church is being planted by an organization that wants to plant churches in a bunch of big cities all over the world.  Very vague, yes.  But I guess just go to their website if you're interested in more detail :)  Everyone was SO nice that I met and it was really refreshing to have easy conversation and to meet people that relocated to Japan from the US and have been living here for a few years.  I'm hoping to go back when I have free Sundays and may also try to hang out with some of the people I met during the week.

After church, I spent a few hours in Umeda (main train station area in Osaka) doing some shopping and relaxing.  My only goals for the day were to pick up a few gifts for colleagues and get supplies for Halloween in the office.  So I headed back to Ibaraki to meet up with my coworker and do some Halloween grocery shopping.


My main idea was to make caramel apples.  Pretty much the whole plan hinged on my ability to find meltable caramel so that's the first ingredient that we looked for at the grocery.  I bought a few bags of individually wrapped milk caramels and hoped for the best.  I also got some plain cookies and mini cupcakes for decorating.  As you can see, the caramels melted really well and I was so happy that it worked out.  My coworker told me that candy apples are more common in Japan so maybe the caramel apples were a new experience.



For toppings (toppings?  not sure what to call this) I used peanuts, coconut and these salty, fried ramen noodly things.  The green dots are macha (green tea) chocolate drops.  I also dipped the cupcakes and cookies in caramel since I had plenty leftover from the apples.


I had a lot of fun making all of this... apparently I forgot about my love of crafting and baking since I haven't done it in a few weeks.  Full disclosure- the bulk of the crafting came after dinner when I got back to my apartment but for continuities sake I'm posting out of order.  

I can't remember how it came up but my coworker was in the mood for sushi and really wanted rolling sushi in particular.  I'd heard of this kind of restaurant but hadn't tried it yet in Japan so I was definitely excited to try it out.


We sat at a bar with all the fixings for sushi laid out- green tea powder and hot water, ginger, soy sauces, etc.  Plates prepared with single serving portions of various types of sushi continuously rolled by on a conveyor belt that looped through the dining room past all of the diners and once through the kitchen.  The belt was reloaded with fresh plates as people took their picks off of the moving buffet.  Each plate cost 105 yen (around $1.40) and there were also special dishes with higher prices as marked on a picture menu at our seats.  You could also press a little intercom button and place a special order.  Your order would come out via the conveyor belt on a special plate marked "reserved".  So efficient. 

It was really interesting to see all the different sushi options and try some new things.  The strangest dish that I tried was a cooked shrimp hand roll with a little slice of cheese and squiggle of mayonnaise (I think?).  I can't say that I've ever had cheese on sushi.  Everything I had was good and it was also fun to see what my coworker picked out and tried.  

When we decided that we'd had enough, my coworker called the waitress over and she whipped out this ruler thing to hold beside our stacks of plates and quickly see how many plates we each had.  She marked it down on our ticket and we paid at the door.  Seven for me.  Seventeen for him.  


Rolling sushi will definitely happen again in Japan.  The setting is really fun and I love the delivery method.  It's also nice to have a little bit of lots of things instead of just ordering one type of sushi.  And again, I'm continually amazed at the patience and kindness of my coworkers.  Maybe it's just Japanese good manners, but I appreciate it either way.  

Usually I like to segment posts by the weekend, BUT since I'm already typing I'll go ahead and tell you about today.  I think the caramel apples and other snacks were a success... sometimes I forget that you have to kind of announce things and invite people to eat what I brought.  In my office at home, I usually just put cookies or whatever up at the front and by the end of the day people have figured out that I brought them.  So, not quite the same official announcement and invitation to try.  But still fun.  

It seems like my colleagues and I are getting in the routine of going down to one of the lab break areas for the 10am coffee break, going to play outside after lunch and then going to the downstairs engineering lab for the 3pm break.  This is really fun for me because there's not much English but I still get to laugh when someone translates for me and hang out with colleagues that I don't see on a normal daily basis.  After lunch today, some of us played a kind of croquet/golf game.  But the field was all mushy and wet so maybe tomorrow we'll play a real game.  I'm not sure what my lady coworkers must think of me playing with the boys everyday, but maybe I can convince one or two to join.  It's so nice to take a few minutes outside and enjoy the weather.  Especially considering it's almost dark when we leave the office.

This morning I scouted out a meeting room on the other side of the building from our office that was sunny and empty.  In the afternoon, I camped out for a few hours by myself to work on a few things and spend some time processing all the information I've been absorbing.  I think my brains needs as much time to process and rest as it does to absorb and learn and I haven't really given myself enough time to think through all of the presentations and meetings in the office.  So this week I'm going to be more intentional about spending some time by myself away from the distractions of our office so that I can do a bit of thinking.  I love the group atmosphere of the office because I enjoy being with my colleagues, but at this point I'm not acclimated to the point of really being able to concentrate.  Everything is a distraction to me so if I'm doing anything past checking and replying to emails, it can be difficult for me to focus.

Aaaanyway.  Here are some photos that I took when I left the office today.  It wasn't that late, maybe 5:30 or 5:45 but it's getting dark earlier and earlier.  




I think our office looks so  nice in the evening- warmly lit windows with the barely lit sky and a few palm trees just for fun.  I guess it looks pretty industrial but the building is pretty interesting.  I'll have to take some more photos during the day so you can see the strange architecture.  It was designed by an American.  With asbestos.  So my choice of the word strange is not a reflection on Japanese design.  Ha.

Another busy week ahead.  Time is going by entirely too fast.  There's a national holiday on Thursday and I'm imagining some fun activities like a pedicure or massage.  Or maybe just napping and reading.  Whatever it is, it will be relaxing!  Tomorrow, I have to go to the grocery store.  I cooked my last onion, can of tuna and bag of noodles in a curry sauce for dinner tonight.  All I have really have left is peanut butter, jam, instant miso soup and coffee.  But for me coffee isn't worth it without milk so that won't be happening for breakfast tomorrow.  I actually texted my coworker tonight to ask what time the grocery store opens in the morning in case I had time to go before work (and before it gets so crowded so I can peruse every aisle at my favorite leisurely pace).  But she translated my question as a request to be taken shopping so I spent some time trying to sort that out before figuring out that the store doesn't open until 10am.  So.  Looks like I'll be going shopping after work tomorrow.  On my bicycle.  In the dark.  Since it's getting dark at like, 5:30pm now.  Wish me luck.


New words: oishi- tastes good.  After talking to the preacher's wife at church, she suggested that I learn one of the Japanese alphabets called Katakana.  This could be completely wrong but I think it's an alphabet of characters that represent sounds so that you can make words in Japanese based on foreign (imported) words.  There are forty something characters in the basic Katakana alphabet and she said that once I memorize these, I should be able to read some things at the grocery store, signs of stores, etc.  That would be really nice so today I started working on learning them.  I may or may not have used some of my alone time today in the office as Katakana study hall.

Other exciting things:  my coworker told me about a Japanese music group called Spitz.  So I'm going to Google them at some point.  I'd Spotify but after they found out that I was streaming from Japan they blocked my account and are holding my playlists hostage until I either upgrade or go back home.  So sad.

I can't think of anything else and unfortunately I took very few notes in my little red  notebook over the weekend.  Only directions to the ATM and church.  

Friday, October 28, 2011

the scary thing

First up, a little English lesson during the 10am coffee break.  We learned about the difference between dating, being engaged and being married.  It was interesting to hear about the traditional process of engagement in Japan which I'm pretty sure includes the guy asking her parents' permission.  Tough.


I explained that in the US, if the guy has a big salary he buys a big diamond.  Small salary = small diamond.  Pronounced DI-ah-mond in Japan.  Sounds much more grand.


Mid-week trip to Iwakuni!  A lovely city in Southern-ish Japan.  This was my second time visiting Iwakuni and my first time visiting its famous Kintai-kyo!  A beautiful, old bridge that was built in 1673 and has been rebuilt and restored many times over.  I learned this from my guidebook, not the signs nearby written in Japanese.  Okay maybe they were written in English too but I didn't slow down long enough to look.  My colleague was nice enough to plan the quick sightseeing stop on our way from the train station to our office location in Iwakuni.


Au naturale.  Being bossy, probably.


Toooourissssst.  Love.


With my patient and super funny coworker.  He endured a combined four hours of English conversation and "lessons" on the train to and from Iwakuni.  At least now he knows the difference between a question and a Christian.


After a few meetings and presentations, our hosts had a nice dinner and "drinking party" planned for the evening.


This was only part of the meal but I thought the "flat fish" deserved a photo.  We also had sashimi, mizudake (maybe, meat cooked with water??), lots of other things.


So good.  I asked if the "flat fish" had both eyes on one side of its body.  The answer was yes, so I'm guessing that this was a flounder.  


Family photo.  We all crouched and then the photographer did, too.  So precious.  The guy above me spent some time in Atlanta with me earlier this year and each time I see him, his English seems to be improved.  Really impressive.  With as much trouble as I've had with Japanese (real life example coming up), people who are learning and succeeding with new languages are so amazing to me.  He takes lessons from a military wife at the US base in Iwakuni.  He said his favorite restaurant that we (and another colleague) went to in Atlanta was Six Feet Under for the Southern style seafood and awesome rooftop patio atmosphere.  

This was a really fun (and long!) trip with my colleagues.  I left my apartment at around 8:15am and got back maybe around 11pm.  I'm really impressed with the Japanese train system... considering we left our homes in the morning, traveled around 500 miles roundtrip, had a few hours of meetings, a few minutes of sightseeing, another few hours of dinner and then still got home by bedtime.  Really, really amazing.

So since you guys are well versed in the dangerous thing already, next up is the scary thing.  Since I've been in Japan, I've told you all about the fun foods that I've eaten and awesome dining out experiences with coworkers.  But when I'm by myself for meals, I usually cook at home or just pick up some kind of take-out from the grocery or a convenience store.  The ease and anonymity of being able to go into the grocery store and spend as long as I want sorting through things and perusing the aisles is really comforting to me.  I don't really have to be able to communicate effectively or actually talk to anyone at all.

Quick side story- the last comment just reminded me of it.  This has nothing to do with the other story that I'm about to tell so don't think that I'm trying to dramatically lead up to something exciting.  I'm not.  So I was at a new-to-me grocery store this week and I had already checked out and was at the little table where you go to bag your groceries.  I haven't mentioned this before but in Japan, you buy your groceries and they're put back into your basket while you're handed a few plastic bags.  You then take your bags and basketful of groceries to a little side table area and bag them yourselves.  Very efficient.  Very nice system.  Also, no one has overflowing grocery carts here.  Just a small cart with room for two baskets to sit.  I have to take a photo of this because that is not a good description.  ANYWAY.  I was bagging my groceries and this little old lady next to me turned to me and said somethingsomethinginjapanesesomethingAMERICAsomething.  I nodded and said, "yes, America!"  And she laughed and started talking again and then started naming off US cities.  WashingTON, New York Cityyyy, Las VEgas, SeATtle, etc.  I tried to tell her "Atlanta" but ended up just saying yes to WashingTON.  She kept talking to me and I kept apologizing for not being able to understand.  Eventually she said goodbye and walked out.  I finished bagging up my groceries and headed to the door and of course since she was traveling at old lady speed, I passed her on the way out.  As I was walking up behind her, I could hear her mumbling "Americaaa" and laughing to herself.  So sweet.  Pointless story.  But it made me happy.  Because strangers rarely talk to me in public.  When they do, it makes me very happy.  Especially little old ladies.

Okay, back to the scary thing.  Sorry about the sidetrack.  So picking up dinner from grocery and convenience stores is appealing to me in the same way that traveling by train is.  You can step on, realize that you're going in the wrong direction, step off to board another train, and no ones knows the difference.  Speaking from lots of experience.  So after being in Japan just over three weeks, I decided that tonight was the night to venture out to dinner.  By myself.  Alone.  With no Japanese speaking help. So naturally I pulled up Google Maps for my neighborhood and typed in "restaurants".  I live in a very residential area so there aren't so many restaurants nearby.  I found an area that I pass by a few times a week on the bus that seemed to have a few in close proximity.  I figured I could walk by them and scout one out from outside.  There was also a convenience store conveniently located in the same area so I could always drop in and pick up dinner there if I got scared.

The first few I walked by appeared to be really well lit from inside and looked too intimidating.  I wanted somewhere dark and private where I wouldn't have a lot of attention for my inevitably awkward ordering experience.  So I passed by about three options and knew that I only had one left.  So it was this one or the convenience store.  I decided to suck it up and just walk in. 


Also, please bear in mind that I don't read Japanese either so I had no idea what kind of restaurant this was from the outside.  Honestly, I wasn't even sure that it was a restaurant.  But I took my chances and said a little prayer that the door would be locked so that I could turn around and go home.  But unfortunately (or fortunately) it slid open and I was greeted with a small room of six tables, one lone gentleman smoking and watching a tv in the corner and the cook sitting at another table also watching the tv.  I took a seat at the table and quickly noticed a grill installed in the center- Korean BBQ.  On one hand, I love Korean BBQ and could probably happily eat it everyday.  On the other, I think it's a little strange for one person to be sitting at a table with six chairs having Korean BBQ, alone.  So. 

The waitress came over and brought me water, a bowl of sauce and a bowl of cabbage leaves.  I had no idea what to do next because the only writing I saw on the walls and on the menu was in Japanese and I haven't really learned any restaurant vocab at this point.  Probably should have thought that one through a little bit more.  I spent a few pointless minutes flipping through my vocab book and working up a sweat and eventually motioned the waitress over to try and talk to her.  I'm literally laughing outloud as I write this because it was such a ridiculous conversation.  I had no idea what to say.  So I just started naming off some types of meat and saying things like, "I like everything", "I'll eat anything", "do you have a house specialty".  Ha!  She called the cook over and neither of them spoke any English.  It was great.  So sweaty.  It wasn't really that I was embarrassed, because I know I can't speak Japanese and I walked willingly into this situation.  It was just kind of helpless and probably I looked really pitiful.  Or dumb.  I'm not sure.  

Somehow, they got the idea that I didn't really care what was for dinner and the waitress must have texted a friend or used a translation service on her phone to show me the message "how much do you want to spend?"  So smart!  I didn't even think of that.  So I told them 2000 yen, hoping that was enough to get a good dinner at this place.  That's around $25 maybe.  So they both nodded and went back to the kitchen.  In a few minutes I had a plate of raw beef, rice, kimchee and soup sitting in front of me.  They showed me how to grease the grill with what looked like a hunk of lard and I got to cooking.  

When I was finished, I had a good amount of food left so the waitress brought me a sheet of paper where she had written, "do you want take-out?", so I nodded.  Then she came back again with the paper and had written "do you want raw meat or cocking meat?".  Cocking, please.  She brought my (cooked) leftovers all nicely wrapped up and ready to go.  So nice.


Overall the experience went really well and wasn't as scary as I'd imagined.  The waitress was really patient and the translations were the star of the night.  Only after I left did I remember that the electronic translator that my supervisor had given me was in my bag.  Oopsies.  

So, do I want to go to a restaurant by myself again?  Not really.  Will I be working on my restaurant vocabulary?  Yes.  Absolutely, yes.


Exciting happenings:  Skyping with my aunt!  It was so nice to see a face from home (well... Florida) and catch up.  If you want to set up a Skype date, just let me know! :)  Talking about baseball and the Atlanta Braves during today's coffee break.  Sports = universal language.  Learned the word for crazy sports fan but I don't remember it anymore.  Apparently we have a few in our office.  

New words: McDonald's is pronounced something like "mac-a-don-aldos".  Interesting.  Watashiwa eh eggo dake, Nihongo hanaseimasen- I only speak English, no Japanese please.  Or something like that.  Sometimes I get confused when my coworkers translate to English.  Dozo- please; mizu- water; daki- boil; izakaya- type of restaurant where they serve a variety of foods (specific, I know). Cappa- described to me as some kind of imaginary animal (but not monster) that has something to do with a story about the Chinese "silk road" and the birth of "Gandal" music??  This story was told to me by my coworker on our train ride home.  I don't remember what the point was.  There may or may not have been a little bit of beer involved.  

Wednesday, October 26, 2011

how could I forget krispy kreme

The first two photos are ones that I forgot to put in the weekend post...


Krispy Kreme!  In Osaka!  So strange.  I obviously had to take a photo.  We didn't go but I asked my coworker if he had been and he hasn't.  So I told him that we have to go sometime since these doughnuts are unlike any in the world.  But knowing Japan, I'm sure they've changed them just slightly.  We'll see.  Maybe next time.


Here are the octopus nuggets.  Takoyaki... I think.  Tako means octopus, yaki is cooked or grilled.  So hot.  So drippy.  So delicious.

From here on out is the past three days.  Look how good I'm staying up to date!!!  Let's see how long this lasts.  


My coworker brought these treats into the office this week.  In general, sweets like this are either called mochi (which I've mentioned before) or dango.  I think both are made from grains, ground into a pulp and maybe cooked until this paste/gelatin like state occurs.  I'm not an expert, just piecing together information from coworkers.  So this is called kibedango and is specifically made from millet.  It's special to the Okayama area of Japan and was brought back by a colleague during a business trip.  The texture is mushy and kind of jelly-like, tastes just slightly sweet and I think really good.  So I had a few alongside my miso soup.


Here's the part where I tell you about what I'm doing all day at the office.  Or show you.  I spend my time in labs with flames and other hot things and watching things burn and smoke.  I get to wear these super cool polarized glasses and pose for photos with my awesome colleagues.  Love it.

The next few photos are from my favorite experience of the past three days.  Last week, my supervisor mentioned that we have an office softball team.  I thought that sounded really fun and asked when the games were.  Everyone loves a good church league softball game, right??  Well by the end of the day (and at my welcome party), it was pretty much understood by my entire office that I actually wanted to play softball and practice with the team.  I was introduced to the captain of the team and told that practice was after lunch at the softball field (aka, the safe place).  

After asking more questions and learning more about this team, it turns out that it's not just like any old church league.  These guys are pretty much the equivalent of Japanese minor league players and have won national championships in the past.  Maybe this is why everyone was laughing so much at my welcome party when I said I wanted to play with them??  Could be.


So when Monday lunch rolled around, I decided that I wasn't quite ready to practice with the team and chickened out.  By Tuesday, I had made up my mind that it was good to do scary things and decided that I would venture out to the field after lunch.  Of course I recruited a few colleagues for backup.  As it turns out, the team was just having a meeting on Tuesday (whew) so I just ended up playing catch with my colleagues.  Still really fun and a good first experience at practice.  On Wednesday, I had been told that we would be practicing batting.  So as I walked to the field Wednesday after lunch (still with my colleagues in tow), my heart started beating harder and harder as I imagined stepping up to bat for the first time in probably over ten years.  I told my coworker about how nervous I was so he volunteered to go first.


Yep, that's me being terrified in the background.  My coworker played baseball in high school so was actually really good at batting.  Unfortunately for me, his successor, he made it look way too easy.


Here's the pitcher.  Also the captain (I think?) and "ace" of the team.  


The first pitch absolutely made me jump back from its speed.  He pitched SO fast.  I don't ever remember pitches being that fast when I was younger.  But maybe I was just a lot braver back then.  Basically put, after a few (or maybe more than a few...) swings and misses and instances of me yelling "too fast!!", they decided that maybe I needed something a little easier.  


So my sweet and patient colleague (the former baseball player) stood fifteen feet in front of me and gently tossed me the softball.  FINALLY I managed to make some good hits and hopefully redeem myself.  But please, please note the entire team watching my progress from the sidelines.  This all went down in around fifteen minutes and mysteriously, no one else did any batting practice that day.  So I'm not sure how much real practice actually takes place during the lunch hour, but I'll definitely keep coming back even if it's just to play catch with a random coworker.  Hopefully the team doesn't mind wasting some of their practice time on me... I know that I enjoyed every minute.  Even with the stress of super fast pitches, a laughing audience of (semi-pro) softball players and a bunch of swings and misses.  


I'm checking on the schedule of their games so that I can hopefully catch one or two and at least be a good cheerleader.  This is just another example of the patience, laughter and hospitality that I've experienced in Japan.  They even let the kids that really stink play!


New words: gobi- garbage, mido- hello (Osaka specific), osaki shitsurei shimasu- goodbye (when leaving the office), moukarimakka?- hello/how much money do you make (Osaka specific, when a woman greets a man), mican- orange, ringo- apple, megane- glasses, hijiki- branchy brown seaweed that I had for lunch today.

Exciting things: Rode my bike to the office today after a weeklong break from biking, the security guard gave me a bag of okaki (rice crackers) and a mican (orange).  So, so sweet.  The guard, not the snacks.

What I need help with:  Halloween!!  I'm in charge of "teaching" my colleaugues Halloween next week and I need ideas on what to take, do, etc.  Any and all ideas are welcome!

Tuesday, October 25, 2011

octopus nuggets and the japanese waffle house

I've tried to avoid really long, drawn out posts.  But inevitably that's what you get when you put off writing for a week at a time.  So please stick with me as we travel through the past week of the Japan adventure.

First up is a few photos from my office.  Of course, I took these while all of my colleagues were out at a monthly meeting.  It was held in Japanese only so there wasn't much point in me joining.  Plus it's kind of fun to have the office to myself for a few quiet minutes :)


My desk is at the table on the left, on the aisle side.  The space with the big navy pocket book sitting on top.  Everyone has their own kind of space with a some drawers and outlets.  Normally all of my stuff expands to take up well over my share of space and outlets, or at least that's how it feels.  Everyday I look at all of my desk's contents and wonder how in the world I managed to bring so much office stuff with me.  Granted I have two laptops, one issued to me by my Japanese office and one that I brought with me.  All the cords, mice (???) and wifi devices that go along with those is enough to fill my little space.  It's definitely different than my office back at home, but honestly it's kind of nice to work side by side with other people.  It's really difficult to actually get anything done since there are constant interruptions... but I think every office setup has its good and bad.


You may remember this main character from my safety training story.  I've still not forgiven it for the embarrassing squeak.  But honestly, I love that my colleagues issued me my own special hard hat.


Here's the board where we post our comings and goings.


In case you didn't notice the only non-Japanese word on the board, here's a closeup.


One night last week I took a trip to a nearby mall and stopped in the Gap store to check out the sale rack.  Interesting fact applicable to the ladies only: when you enter the dressing room of a Japanese clothing store, you will be handed a small, tissue-like bag about the size of a normal plastic grocery sack.  Most likely, you will look down at the bag in your hand and then back to the smiling face of the sales woman and in the most polite sign language possible, you will question the purpose of the bag.  She will then take a second bag from her stash and place it over her head while making a motion that suggests the action of trying on a shirt.  You will then smile and nod while immediately remembering the extreme amount of makeup worn by many fashionable Japanese women.  Bag mystery solved.  

For you boys out there, the bag over your face protects the new clothing from makeup smears and stains.  Just in case you were still wondering.  

I had also set out on this little shopping adventure to try and find some tops to wear under my suit.  The next day, I was leaving for a business trip to visit customers on the West coast of Japan.  I was really fortunate to find a few nice tops that would look great with my suit the next day.  Unfortunately, my suit somehow didn't make it into my suitcase while I was packing.  So instead of a new shirt with my suit, our customers got to see my new top with jeans and flats.  Very classy.


Headed to Yonago City in Western Japan.  This area of the country has some really nice mountains and rivers.  I could see a bunch of tiny towns as our local train wound through the countryside.  


Big girl bed in my Yonago City hotel room.  


And a nice sunset view of the town.


The lady who checked us in at the front desk also gave me a stack of complimentary toiletries.  I still haven't really figured out what any of it actually is.  Maybe you can help me...


I hope you can read this.  Because it's really, really beautiful Engrish.

Also, I'm afraid to use anything that calls itself Red Heat Hot pepper SHAPE UP GEL.


More beautiful countryside.  I wish we had more time to sightsee or go hiking.  I might try to see how difficult it would be to come back here for a weekend or day trip.


Backseat sightseeing.  Two hour drive.


At a restaurant slash reststop with my colleague and customer.  We're standing in front of (literally, we're blocking it from your view) Mt. Daisen.  1700 meters of mountain.


Lunch!  Rice bowl with chicken, soft boiled egg and seaweed strips.  Also miso soup, some noodly things and pickled daikon.


Tourists.

The mid-week trip to Yonago was so nice and I really enjoyed seeing some new parts of Japan.  However, the same day that we traveled back to Ibaraki (last Thursday) I had dinner with some colleagues planned which led to an extremely long day.  So, so fun but I was so tired!


This is called "turban shell" according to my colleague's electronic translator.  Delicious.


We had a ton of food but I only took photos of the new and interesting things :)  The dish above is tuna sashimi with natto, which is fermented soybeans and apparently considered to be a Japanese super healthy food.  Kind of different, also delicious.  Good enough that I bought some at the grocery store for this week.

The next night, Friday, was my official welcome party with my office colleagues.  Myself and two other colleagues had joined the office in the past month or so, so we had a big dinner to celebrate.


The traditional Japanese welcome party is a pretty interesting process.  I can't remember the timeline exactly, but it starts with randomly assigned seats (typical style, apparently to encourage colleagues to talk to new people), always has a "leader" who does introductions and kind of acts as the emcee of the evening, includes lots of kampais (cheers, drink!), requires the guests of honor to say something in front of the group, and consists of a two hour period of all you can eat and drink followed by a group photo and exit.  The only reason I know this is a sort of typical process is because I had a similar experience when I visited Japan for the first time.  It's actually a really nice setup and idea.  

We had shabu shabu for dinner which means we were brought out a bunch of thinly sliced raw meat and raw vegetables and cooked everything ourselves in a pot of simmering water.  I think the name shabu shabu comes from the sound or motion of swishing the mean through the water to cook it.  Or something like that.  Overall, really great food and a really fun evening.  It turned out to be one of my favorite Japan memories so far.


Throwing up the peace sign at every chance I get.  The woman at the table is in my department, the guy across the table from me sits next to me in the office and speaks great English so I constantly bother him with questions and the guy next to me works with our department in the physical testing lab.  They obviously love the peace sign, too.


Group photo.  I love this so much.  SUCH a fun evening.

Basically my "speech" consisted of an acknowledgment of everyones kindness and hospitality towards me and an invitation to sit at my lunch table.

Halfway through my speech I became suspicious of my translator's, how can I say, accuracy of translation since everyone was laughing more than I thought appropriate considering what I had said.  So I nominated a new translator and of course everyone laughed even more.  So even if my colleagues can't actually understand me, at least they think I'm funny.  Or crazy.


NORTH CAROLINA!!!!!!


This is another great example of beautiful, beautiful Engrish.  The opening of a port?  In Charlotte?  Really??

What happened next that night doesn't even need a lead-in.


K-A-R-A-O-K-E


I'm not sure why I just spelled it out with all caps, but it just felt right.  There were a few pages of songs in English that were hits.  There was also a little electronic tablet where you could search for your favorite songs.  But do you want to guess what happens when you're about to do karaoke for the first time and you're put on the spot to sing a song?  Absolutely ZERO songs come to mind.  Not so helpful when all of your Japanese colleagues are already zooming through their mental list of karaoke favorites.


This is me in the middle of my first song.  Thank goodness for a seven second pause to take a photo.  Stand By Me.  Also, thank goodness this came from the list of English "hits" and thank goodness that my colleagues understood my laughter to be that of the nervous kind so they were willing and able to help me sing.  Whew.


Chu-hei, a mixed drink of Japanese gin or shochu and fizzy fruit juice.  This one was lime-y.


Name that Bon Jovi hit.

So overall, karaoke wasn't nearly as terrifying as I'd imagined and I'm glad that I was able to go with my colleagues.  They are honestly SO fun and I'm really enjoying our time together.  Hopefully there will be some repeats of this night.  Well, minus the awkward first song and plus some pre-chosen songs on my part. 

The next day was spent mostly sleeping, doing laundry, napping and then going into Osaka to do some shopping.  My colleague and probably BFF of the office (BFFOTO from here on out, ha!) came with me to Osaka so that was really nice.  I'm pretty sure he just likes to practice his English but it's nice to have a friend along for my kind of aimless shopping.  Over the course of the evening, he introduced me to TWO new foods- one that I'll call octopus nuggets and the other was an infamous "ramen shop" that I've been hearing about since I got to Japan.  Apparently these ramen shops are open late and serve exactly what you're thinking- all ramen all the time!  Of course this ramen is a little more sophisticated than what we eat by the bowlfuls in college.  So good.  Will definitely be visiting a ramen shop again.  Apparently it has the same kind of allure as Waffle House... great for super late night eating when you've had a lot to drink and nothing else is open.


On Sunday, my supervisor had invited me to Kyoto to have lunch with him and his family.  The Kyoto train station was filled with tourists because of a big festival happening in Kyoto that day.  I had been hoping to avoid the festival traffic but it had actually been postponed from Saturday due to rainy weather.  The Kyoto train station is pretty huge and I spotted Cafe du Monde on the upper level.  No beignets, but I had a great cafe au lait while I people-watched and waited for my colleague to meet me.

We took another local train and then walked to his house.  It was so nice to spend a relaxed afternoon eating great, homemade Japanese food and sitting around talking.  My colleague kept apologizing for making me come because I seemed so tired (ha, not so great at disguising this I guess) but it was honestly such a lovely day.  I loved seeing a typical Japanese home getting to know my colleague and his family a bit better.  His daughter and wife both speak English and I had fun watching them all try Pop Rocks (from the US) for the first time.  


Homemade tempura vegetables and shrimp, edamame, sashimi, a kind of cooked egg roll, tuna salad, dried sheets of seaweed and rice.  All the fixings for make-your-own rolls!  This was really fun and I want to try and recreate this kind of meal at my apartment.  Not the tempura, because I'd probably burn the place down.  But I loved the little customized sushi roll idea.


Just before being rolled up and devoured.


At the Ibaraki train station on my way back home.  I've been meaning to take a photo of this shop every time I pass it.  Beard Papa.  Love it.  And fresh'n natural cream puffs??  How is that even possible?

Overall this week and weekend were really, really great.  I feel like my relationships with my colleagues keeps getting better as we all get more comfortable with each other and spend more time together.  


New words: chikuwa- a processed fish meat that I had in the cafeteria one day.  Doh itashimashite, you're welcome.  Mido- hello!  Kansai area specific.  Chu-hei (choo-hey), Japanese mixed drink.  Tokoyaki- grilled batter nugget (?) with octopus inside.  Yum.  I took a photo but guess it's on my other camera or something so it didn't make this post.

Other exciting things:  I have a Japanese cellphone!  Over the course of a week (yes, a week) I've learned to send a text message, check my voicemail and delete voicemails.  I think I've sent maybe four texts and made one call in the week that I've had it but it's still exciting to have a local number.

Exciting things learned about the office: at three o'clock everyday, music plays over the intercom but I never knew why.  Now I know that it signals a COFFEE BREAK.  So from here on out, I'm taking a walk around the campus or going downstairs to get a coconut juice from the machine and enjoying my afternoon break.  My supervisor also told me that we have a softball team that's actually pretty good.  I'm planning to try and go to a game if I can... they're usually held on Sundays, a few times a month.

Stranger interactions:  a guy talked to me on the bus (a first!  hardly anyone talks on the bus) and showed me a book he was reading in English.  He recommended that I read it to learn about Japanese culture.  So I ended up buying it during my trip to Osaka last weekend at the biggest bookstore I've ever seen!  Bushido: The Soul of Japan, by Inazo Nitobe.  Also bought a Japanese cookbook (in English).