Leaves, Lasagne, and Lessons Learned

Hello everyone..

I know. Once again I have missed my self-imposed weekend blogging deadline. I'm not sure if I have any good excuses. I'm not even sure if I have any good reasons, except that by the time I found myself sitting in front of my computer last night (Sunday), it was 10pm, I couldn't remember where the weekend had gone, and I was too tired to sound even semi-coherent.

And even though I'm not entirely convinced I won't sound semi-coherent even now, I'll do my best to chronicle my past week.

Thanksgiving Re-Cap

I talked with my mom this past week. She said to me "Your last blog was great, but I want to hear about your Thanksgiving!". Fair enough.

As you may recall, on Saturday (11/19) we invited over a lovely bunch of Bob's fellow professors and co-workers from Ritsumeikan, with the aim to share some early Thanksgiving cheer.

I started cooking at 9am on Saturday. I tore bread for stuffing, peeled and soaked potatoes for mashing and yamming, diced onions, cleaned and marinated chicken for grilling. By 1pm we had brought down Patrick's desk to serve as a table extension, and both the regular table and the desk were set and ready to go. By 2pm the stuffing was being rotated into our newly purchased oven (purchased the night before--just in time to make stuffing properly, not in time to order a turkey). By 3pm the chicken was grilling and the potatoes were mashing. By 4pm people were arriving.

In addition to my grilled chicken, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, stuffing, apple cobbler, sodas, juice and rolls, people brought salad, chirashi sushi, stew, a variety of bottles of sake and wine, pumpkin pastries, ice cream and cheesecake. Clearly, no one went away hungry.

It turned out to be a wonderful and relaxing time. People gradually made themselves at home, easing into serving themselves seconds and pouring themselves drinks. One of Bob's co-workers had brought her 9 year old granddaughter who spoke no English. Not to worry however! Our 3 cats were uncharacteristically social and charming as they let her pet them, chase them, throw balls for them and take endless digital pictures of them on her cell phone camera.

By the time the last people left around 9pm, the refrigerator was full of leftovers, the dishes were done and my feet were toast.

**On the REAL Thanksgiving, we did a Facetime video call with Bob's family, who were just sitting down to eat. The next day we talked to my mom on Skype. While we didn't manage to have turkey, we did manage to visit with family--which beats turkey any day.

The Colors of Autumn

The leaves are finally changing color in Kyoto. Interspersed with the longer-lasting green leafed trees and evergreens are trees that seem to be burning with bright reds, brilliant oranges and eye-watering yellows. Every time I live in Japan I am astounded that leaves can change to these unbelievable colors.

This last Saturday Bob and I met a group of Ritusmeikan Students, and took a tram (called the "Randen Train") to Arashiyama, a city about a 30 minute train ride from our area of Kyoto. Arashiyama is one of the many sought after fall leaf viewing areas here, so there were, predictably, thousands of people enjoying the sights along with us.

Some of Bob's students seemed to be having trouble equating him as professor with him as married guy, but no matter. The mood was festive and relaxed (indeed, sometimes too relaxed for Bob's comfort, as the students kept stopping, and stopping and stopping to take pictures or eat snacks).

Arashiyama was gorgeous. We walked through temple gardens where the trees seemed to be jostling each other to show off their colors. Dark red maples, bright yellow ginkos (watch out for the smelly fermenting dropped ginko fruits beneath your feet!). Some maples had leaves so dark red they were purple. Other trees were flaming orange. It was like an extremely slow-moving fireworks display.

Towards the end we walked through a dim tunnel made up of tall densely grown bamboo. The sensation was eerie and peaceful at the same time, the chilly fall air around us as the silent bamboo towered overhead, leaving just a strip of blue sky visible.

Soon after that Bob and I bid our goodbyes to the students, and ducked into a small udon shop to warm up. Bob had a bowl of rice donburi while I had a bowl of udon. Then it was the crowded tram ride back to the tiny station near Ryoanji, and a long, chilly bike ride home.

Lasagne? Yes I can!

I've been hungry for Lasagne for a few weeks now. I began trying to satisfy this urge by first seeking out lasagne noodles. Once I located these, putting together the tomato sauce, shredded cheese, ground beef and spices was easy as pie.

Ricotta cheese, however, was a bigger problem. Ricotta cheese is not a common staple here. The ricotta I DID manage to find was so expensive that I actually started to feel a little less hungry for lasagne.

However, I did find cottage cheese, which is a good substitute for Ricotta in a pinch (and I would call this a pinch, wouldn't you?). For my purposes it was perfect, since the consistency of this cottage cheese was more like ricotta than the wee little curdy cottage cheese at home.

And with some mixing and gooping and smearing, and with the miraculous new oven on my side, we ended up eating Lasagne for dinner tonight. Aya declared it 'delicious'. Patrick, never a big casserole eater, opted for rice and mini burger patties. Bob didn't say much, but he did have 3 helpings, which, in my book, speaks for itself.

So, the tally so far is: tortillas, empanadas, taco spices, semi-effective approximation of ranch dressing, salsa and now lasagne. Next up: Mac and cheese. Have oven, will bake.

Occupying my mind...still

You know, it is really all too easy to fall back into our little complacent way of life after something disturbing happens. Disturbing things disturb us, and I think a part of us yearns for things to simplify again, even if the way things were wasn't especially good for us.

It is especially easy for this to happen when one is living, say, thousands of miles away from home in, say, Japan.

However, all this week I have been keeping up on the situation at UC Davis. I have read the descriptions of the meetings. I have watched the Youtube videos. I have read the articles that lay the blame at the feet of the chancellor/the regents/the police department/DHS/congress and the president. And these articles, for the most part, were thoughtfully and intelligently written, and gave me much food for thought.

But in the end, living here in Japan, I can't really tell where the truth is. I'm pretty sure few people back at home can really say where to lay the blame. Upon whose head to heap the guilt and punishment.

Here is what I do know.

Things back at home are not working well.

Something has broken in the big machine and with each turning gear everything breaks just a little more.

And there are two kinds of people with this machine.

There are the people who stick their hands inside the machine every day, trying to work with it and fix it. Most of the time they aren't all that successful.

Then there are the people who sit on top of the machine. They have lots of power and money, and never have to stick their hands into those gears, never have to work on the machine themselves. They never have to get their hands dirty, seldom have to sacrifice to keep the machine running.

Sadly enough, they can't even hear the gears grinding, much less the yelling of the people who are being ground up inside it.

And this is what all the protests are about: people inside the machine, yelling for help. And, the people sitting on top of the machine, either unable, or unwilling, to hear them.

I, for one, don't have the answers. I don't have any answers.

But I think we have to ask ourselves this: what will happen if the people inside the machine stop yelling?

Is silence really the answer?

Or, in a version of the immortal words of Fernando, "Is it better to look good or to feel good?"

Until next time...

Giving Thanks vs Giving Hope

Hello all...

I usually start thinking about what to blog around Thursday or Friday, and then pour my blithering and meandering mental wanderings into a blog on Saturday or Sunday.

So when I anticipated this week's blog, I was thinking of heart warming subjects--describing our Thanksgiving get together (which was yesterday--Saturday), pouring out shiny adjectives to describe our new oven, gathering together head scratching confusion over Patrick and Aya's antics.

I woke up Saturday morning with these lovely subjects still percolating around my head, as I tore bread for stuffing, peeled potatoes for mashed potatoes and cleaned chicken.

Bob came downstairs, iphone in hand and said "Watch this."

I took his iphone and watched the video that has now gone viral--footage of the Occupy Davis protest that occurred sometime Friday afternoon. In a surreal time warp, we were watching it minutes after it happened, even though in Japan it was Saturday morning.

My jaw dropped open. I saw a long line of students, sitting on the sidewalk, arms linked in the classic pose of peaceful protest.

Then I saw a police man in full riot gear (The disconnected words "riot gear" and "Davis" floated through my brain), face the seated protesters, hold up a large can of pepper spray, and drench them in a thick reddish mist of the stuff.

The crowd of observing students and by standers began chanting "Shame on You!" as the policeman continued spraying, yanking out those protesters in too much pain to keep connected to the line, and kneeling on their backs in order to handcuff them. The crowd got louder, their noise no doubt bringing others out of offices and buildings, drawing in passers by.

I think there are huge numbers of people across the United States and throughout the world, watching these videos and mumbling to themselves in disbelief "Here? This is happening here?" And even though we are so far away in Japan, suddenly the "occupy" movement was sitting in our backyard, so to speak. And we are now the ones mumbling to ourselves in disbelief "There? This is happening THERE?".

I'm not talking about feeling disbelief over the protesters. Peaceful protest--whether it be loud chanting, silent-but-poignant costuming, or thoughtful speech making, in numbers of a few dozen to a few thousand--has become woven into the fabric of our lives and is, indeed, a powerful tool for change and communication. (emphasis on the words "peaceful protest" folks, not "out of control crazy ranting property damaging lunacy". And no, I do not consider tents part of "out of control crazy ranting property damaging lunacy". A possible sanitation issue? Yes, considering the logistics of providing toilet and water facilities to huge numbers of people, but property damaging lunacy, no. )

I'm talking about the police--their actions, their decisions, the decisions of their superiors, and of the UC Davis Chancellor. I watched the video again. I saw agitated students, I heard loud chanting. I saw people sitting. For the life of me I couldn't spy any protesters touching the police officers, throwing things at them or threatening them in any way, aside from chanting in their faces. If any of that were going on, then the story would be different. I still would not approve of the use of pepper spray, but there would be some sort of logic involved (from the officer's point of view) in the use of it. And let's face it--I'm a pretty tame, kindergarten teacher, law abidin', fairly boring sort of person. I usually attach the word "good" with the words "police officer", so I'm not out to do any bashing.

I am out to do some questioning. It's all about critical thinking. If a situation feels really wrong to me, I'm going to think about it and ask about it.

So what happened in Davis? Or Berkeley? Or New York? Or London? Pick your city, pick your people, pick your video....

That protest was what we teachers call "a teachable moment". Yes, the protesters weren't really children any more. They were adults, for the most part. But many if not most of them were students still, which made that a 'teachable moment'. A moment for professors (one of whom suggested this very idea in a letter to the Chancellor), university leaders and city leaders to explore what was happening, why it was happening in Davis and work together to find a way to begin addressing the root causes of this massive movement.

It certainly became a 'teachable moment' for Aya.

She came downstairs Saturday morning as Bob and I were watching and discussing the video. She listened to us for a minute, then got out her ipod and watched the video for herself, and kept asking "This is happening in DAVIS?!".

Later that evening, after our Thanksgiving guests left and with the video still on her mind, Aya got on Bob's computer and began researching the issues around the "Occupy movement" and what exactly was meant by "the 99%". As Bob and I lay in bed, exhausted, Aya sat in Bob's desk chair across the room, venting and ranting about the injustice of it all, and wondering aloud what Obama was doing to change things.

"We should donate money." She said.

"We could. But how long would that money last to bring about change?" I asked her back.

She thought for a moment.

"I guess not very long".

"Okay," I said "So what else could you do to bring about change?"

She was silent.

I said "Think of it this way: what do I do to bring about change?"

"You teach little kids"

I said "That's right. I don't teach them about things like this. I start small."

She nodded "You teach them about accepting other people"

I nodded. "Among other things. And what does your Dad do to bring about change?"

"He teaches college students"

I nodded again. "So do we necessarily need to donate money to make change happen?"

She shook her head.

"You think about that, and think about how you, even as a 12 year old, could make change happen. Maybe in a small way."

She nodded.

And she went to bed.

Right now she is still asleep. I am pretty sure she didn't fall right to sleep last night.

I bet she was up for awhile, eyes open in the dark...thinking.

I'm pretty sure I'm in for an earful of ideas today when she does wake up.

And you know what I call that?

A real reason to give thanks, and to keep up hope.

Until next time....

Have Kotatsu, will hibernate

Hello everyone...

I have managed to make it back within the weekend. While you might assume this means I have mastered all my bizarre writing projects and have finally gotten firm control of my life, I am sorry to say you and your assumptions would be wrong. How wrong? So wrong...

Nanowrimo Story Achieves Its Own Consciousness

I am fairly on target with my Nanowrimo project, sitting comfortably at just under 20,000 words. However, odd things are happening in my story that deviate alarmingly from the nice, neat outline I had constructed 2 weeks ago when I began this insanity. I am actually a little afraid of writing too much about it here in my blog, as I am afraid the story will seek revenge and only dream up more weird and unexpected plot twists. Suffice it to say that the story is gradually taking over my life. Good thing it has not yet gained corporeal form. Or opposable thumbs.

Chicken Vs Turkey

Next Saturday (11/19) our house will be filled with the pitter patter of many feet as we open our house to a Thanksgiving potluck for Bob's fellow Ritsumeikan work buddies. So far we are in good shape. Everyone has signed up to bring lovely foods and drinks. Our big kotatsu is set up complete with a fuzzy new kotatsu futon. We even got a smaller kotatsu futon to put on our small kotatsu, so everyone will be toasty and have table space upon which to rest their edibles. I have purchased many plastic cups and disposable chopsticks (waribashi). Tomorrow I shall go forth and seek out forks and knives, sturdy plates and napkins. Then, as the time draws closer to the bloated event, I will gather in my loaves of bread for stuffing, my chicken broth, my sage, my celery, my many bags of potatoes to cook and mash, my yams and brown sugar. I shall hopefully find gravy in one form or another.

The only deviation from norm will be that we will be having grilled chicken instead of turkey. Grilled chicken has several benefits over turkey at this time.

1. It is flat and thus able to fit on a grill or in a pan, unlike turkey.

2. It looks a lot like turkey.

3. It tastes rather like turkey.

4. It tastes good with stuffing, mashed potatoes and gravy.

5. It is readily available...unlike turkey

Then I started thinking "well, what are the main differences between chickens and turkeys, really?" Of course, once I thought this, I had to find out.

1. Chickens are, in comparison, smaller than turkeys. (average chicken weight: 5 to 7 pounds. Average turkey weight: 12 to 20 pounds.)

2. Chickens can only fly short distances (when, that is, humans aren't stuffing them silly to make them huge and fat) . Turkeys can fly quite well and, in the wild, roost in trees. (when, that is, humans aren't stuffing them silly to make them huge and fat).

3. The word 'chicken' came originally from the word 'chicks'. They are also called, depending on the place, "yardbirds", "fowl" or "chook".

4. The word 'turkey' came from these birds mistakenly being called "guinea fowl", synonymous with 'turkey fowl'. Weirdly enough, the scientific name for turkeys--meleagris--comes from the greek word for guinea fowl, even though turkeys are not guinea fowl! However, the name 'turkey' stuck because turkeys have been present in North America for thousands and thousands of years. And North America, as we all know from our elementary lessons, was at one time considered at first to be part of Asia (courtesy of Mr. Columbus and no doubt others), and the name 'turkey' brought to mind exotic places in Asia, and stuck. I love language.

5. Folks I know tend to eat turkey only in November for the confusing holiday of Thanksgiving. Folks I know tend to eat chicken all the time.

I probably could have learned more about chickens and turkeys, but scouring the web for enticing poultry tidbits is exhausting and I had laundry to hang out on the clothesline.

(my thanks to the internet and wikipedia for feeding my ever-ravenous trivia hunger)

Autumn in All its Glory

Japan has 4 (or perhaps 5) seasons. There is the summer, which is so humid and hot that I can't even bring myself to describe it right now. There is the rainy season in June, which is a lot like someone constantly upending a big bucket of water over your head. There is the spring, with beautiful weather and the lovely, ethereal cherry blossoms blooming everywhere, which, in the period of one week in April or so, drift from the trees like lovely flowery snow. There is the winter, which in our part of Japan is cold enough to freeze your clothing on the clothesline and make you want to just live under the kotatsu forever, sucking down mikan until your fingers and eyes turn orange.

And then there is autumn.

There are things I love about all the Japanese seasons, truth be told. Summer, for all its heat, has the delights of matsuri (festivals) and constantly available kakigori (shaved ice). In the rainy season, there is a thrill and poetic delight in seeing such vast quantities of water falling endlessly from the sky (provided, of course, I am in the house, warm and dry). In the winter there is the beauty of frost and snow (a novelty for this California/Kwaj kid) and the pleasures of nabe stews, going to winter festivals to eat hot steamed potatoes slathered in butter, or to chow down on grilled yakimo (sweet potatoes), or to get hot cans of cocoa, tea or coffee out of vending machines that you can first put into your pockets to warm your legs and fingers.

Spring, obviously, is gorgeous here in Japan whatever you decide to do.

But Autumn is special. Perhaps it is just me. Coming from a part of California festooned with evergreens, seeing entire hillsides change from green to crimson and orange is like seeing a very slow fireworks display. Temples and shrines take pains to set up lights to illuminate the trees at night. Last night, for example, we went to Kodaiji Temple to wander through its gardens. lit up from below with floodlights. While the trees have not yet truly begun to change color here in Kyoto, some had already begun. However even without red and orange leaves, the lights created wonderful displays of shadows and texture.

At one point, we stumbled with the press of the crowd upon a smallish garden pool by the side of one of the larger temple buildings. The edges of the pool had angled spotlights set up so that they pointed at the trees above, creating the most incredible mirror. At first glance it looked like we were staring into a sudden and deep chasm in the earth that was filled with trees and branches. It took the work of several minutes to recognize that we were actually seeing a perfect and crystal clear reflection of the trees in the water. Aya actually refused to believe me at first until she spent her own few minutes, staring at the sight. At which point she got a bit grumpy, realizing I had been right (nothing grumps up a teen like realizing the parent is right.)

Sigh.

And so, with the images of reflective pools and surly teens dancing in your heads, I'll leave you for now. With 1,700 words to write on my belligerent story today and Japanese homework screaming at me from the kitchen table, I wish you all a lovely week.

And remember--if it's flying, it's a turkey.

Until next time...

Crazed writing and Overheard Conversations

Hello everyone..

Yes, I missed my weekly writing deadline, and for this I am truly sorry. But I have an excellent excuse. In fact, I have a heap of excellent excuses, distractions and justifications which I am sure you'll find scintillating. So here goes..

Knock Knock. Who's There? Nano

A few years ago a beloved friend said to me (I am paraphrasing because I can't remember what happened yesterday, much less specifics from 2009) "If you really love to write, you should sign up for Nanowrimo." After a bit of prodding for details and an internet search, I discovered that Nanowrimo is a yearly month-long pit of insanity where people sign up to write a 50,000 word novel in one month. In the month of November. It comes out to around 1500-1600 words per day. (www.nanowrimo.org)

Well, in 2009 I was busy teaching. And again in 2010 I was busy teaching. But now it is 2011, and I find myself with strange pockets of time that I previously did not have. So I joined Nanowrimo.

The idea behind all this mad writing is to learn how to just let the words flow--to let go of sentence structure and spelling and grammar and just let the novel FALL OUT, raw and untamed. After the 50,000 word limit is reached, then the time for editing comes. I am now nearly to the 10,000 word mark, and I am discovering that letting words FALL OUT is a lot harder than it seems. I never realized my real writing process involved endless retracing of my steps, editing as I go. For example, late last night I discovered that the REAL starting point of my novel actually occurred after I had already written almost 7500 words, meaning that most of what I had written will likely need to be tossed aside. But hey, the last 2500 words I wrote are simply fabulous.

I promise you, if I actually hit the 50,000 word mark, I'll let you all know.

Gobble Gobble

Yet another thing that has come up that is distracting me away from blogging is Thanksgiving. When we've lived in Japan in the past, we've hosted a few Thanksgiving get-togethers for various friends and colleagues, whether they be fellow Americans, from various far flung parts of the world, or from right here in Japan.

This year we have somehow managed to invite 12 people over for a pot luck. Lovely. I enjoy entertaining. However, my challenge is...TURKEY. To be more specific, the challenge is the absence of an oven. In previous years the price of the turkey was more prohibitive. This year, the 4000+ yen price tag isn't freaking us out as much as trying to figure out a way to cook the thing.

We currently do not have an oven (however, thanks to our Chicago-bound buddy Sue, this may not be the state of things for long. Updates later). Without an oven, cooking a turkey is a huge challenge. I could deep fry it (a suggestion made by one of my ultra fit, Iron-man competing friends), however I am terrified of setting myself and the whole house on fire. Another friend suggested barbecuing it, but barbecues in Japan are very, very small.

So we settled on grilled chicken. I figured that grilled chicken is rather like turkey. It tastes good with stuffing and mashed potatoes, and is easy to get.

Now if we can only figure out how to fit 16 people into our house.......

Overheard Conversations

This morning I got on the subway for the 15 minute ride to Kyoto Station, on my way to my Japanese class (where, by the way, I serve as comedic relief as I perpetually botch the use of prepositions. At least I make everyone else feel good).

There were ample seats available, so I sat down on a seat, just down from 2 children, a boy and a girl who were perhaps 5 and 7 years old. They were wriggling around on the seat muttering to each other and giggling. I ignored them at first. As they became more energetic and loud, I glanced at a fairly expressionless, very tired looking woman who I could only assume was their mother. She stared straight ahead, the picture of pained endurance.

It didn't take long for the two kids to become animated enough that I could overhear them. It was all I could do not to laugh out loud as I inwardly marveled how kids the world over find the same things hilarious.

(Please note: The following conversation involves the words poop and butt. Just so you know)

Girl: Unchi kochi. ("There's poop here"--which she says while pointing energetically at the seat next to her)

Boy: Unchi kochi ("There's poop here"--pointing with equal fervor)

Girl: Unchi kochi to kochi to kochi ("There's poop here and here and here"--lots of pointing)

Boy: Unchi, unchi, unchi ("Poop, poop, poop"--arms waving wildly around, voice rising)

Girl: Minna unchi. Minna no oshiri unchi ("Everyones poop. Everyones butt poop"--no pointing this time)

Boy: Hai, unchi, unchi, unchi. ("yes, poop, poop, poop" --he kept pointing at the people all around him, including at me).

During this conversation several older Japanese people came to sit next to the boy and girl, only to get up and move away to a new seat fairly rapidly after discovering their close proximity to the animated unchi conversation. Soon enough, the girl and boy crossed the aisle and sat on the seat opposite me, their feet banging loudly on the metal plate near the base of the seats. They repeated the previous conversation nearly word for word, laughing madly every time they said "unchi".

Throughout this enlightening conversation, the mother sat quietly, face calm, every once and a while a sigh escaping her. I totally empathized. I remembered all too well when Patrick and Aya were the same ages as her son and daughter when we came back to Japan, and I recalled conversations they had with each other which weren't much more intellectual than the one I had just overheard. And while I had had the benefit of my children babbling in English (and therefore not clearly understood by everyone around us), it made it no less insane for me as a mom.

Eventually the kids calmed down, just before the mother stood up to lead them off the train. The kids followed her, bouncy and chatting, moving on from their poop conversation to discussing foods they thought were gross.

Like I said, kids are kids, no matter where you go.

Until next time....