we're the aliens we wonder exist

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-8260059923762628848

Things like this and Syriana make me feel as though my own species may be alien to me. Perhaps it is just my lack of experience in being evil, but it shocks my mind.

Just how bad are people capable of being? I guess the limits are those of the imagination, and because the imagination has very few limits... I guess that is very bad.

The film linked above is about the attack on New York's World Trade Center on Tuesday, September 11th, 2001 referred to as '911'. The reason I spell this out like so is that this whole event is still a fully unresolved thing. Questions need to be asked. The same is true with the 2000 and 2004 elections in the USA. Who really won these? What foul play was involved? Sometimes it appears to be the case that America really is getting taken over by tyrants and yet there seems to be no way for people who realize this to do something about it.

I'm hesitant to go to DC at times. I'm estranged by my own people, my own species, it's a strange feeling.

Today I took a holiday since there is nothing to do in the office. I am wandering around Kumamoto City by myself, taking pictures, feeling strange all the while. Maybe I should go eat some hearty food.

ethics, art, and your life

It seems to be a natural state of the world, or at least the human world, that problems exist. There will never be a problem free world unless it is a world with no beings because if there is nothing to experience the problem, then it is probably not much of a problem.

If you want to fight the problems because you want to be good then you have some choices to make. There are many ways that you could get pulled into the storm and spun around this way and that. To simplify things for you, you can either try to clean up and ameliorate the bads or you can do your best to promote the goods of the world (and if you are wonderful you can do both). Fighting against the bad is a respectable thing to do but it can mean that you give up a lot of your own freedoms and happinesses. Fighting for the good is perhaps the more selfish choice; it means that you yourself may get to have fun the whole time because you are immersing yourself in goodness. If you do both, and this is for the MLK Jr. and Ghandi types, you have a crazy, amazing rollercoaster of a life. Or, of course, you could do both but on the smaller level. You may think this is a vast over-simplification. For one, goods and bads cannot exist by themselves. There is always a mixture. What I am really trying to do is justify why I want to go to art school after I am in DC. (Always look for the personal reasons behind any theory someone is trying to make about a broader population or world).

Luckily I can always find good reasons for doing anything that I feel like doing (even while those desires morph and change on a weekly basis). It's nice how reasoning can protect feelings and desires if you let it. For instance I can always seem to say that if someone else were in my shoes then they would make the same decisions (because they would also actually be me if they had always been in my shoes). It's dangerously close to letting everyone off the hook for their choices, but it works fine for us peaceful folk.

Bring out the graduates!

Today was kindergarten graduation. These three and ten more dressed up in little suits and acted like perfect adults, complete with songs and memorized lines. None of them even flinched. They were seamless, united, almost royal in their self-presentation. The ceremony was grueling, long, and unfortunately for the one year olds and Tedo-sensei, boring. I felt like the tone of this graduation was even more serious, in some ways, than the tone of the middle school graduation.

Understandably I would never want my kids to go through this. I am only a temporary member of the family in this town and country and I am honored to be introduced to this experience, but I am not a real member of the society and nor could I ever be one even if I tried from this day forward with all my might.

The kindergarten graduates mimicked the smooth and seamless process that I see throughout Japanese society. It is a kind of clockwork that means that people just work here, the society just works (with its kinks--see last month's posts). Crime is low, obedience is high. But like a clock there is a mechanical element to it; it has been engineered to function in a very careful, precise way. It is inevitable that a society that works like a well-crafted machine (in most ways) will also suffer from the mechanization of its individuals. But as you can see in any of the photos of the people here they are full of life and vinegar. These kids especially, when they are away from school, are much freer spirits. No society or culture could completely cover up the oddities that make up our humanness; but they can do more or less of it. And who is to say which way is better, if it is even a useful question? Even if it were a matter of taste most people don't get the choice. They are born into the society that shapes them. And some societies do more intense shaping than others.

Confusingly and mysteriously I get to be like a big brother to these kids, helping to socialize them in a very Japanese way. My quirks are certainly exposing them to other ways of thinking but my job requires that I obey and respect the rites and the ways those rites are carried out. There is really no other way for me as I must also conform while I am here and while I am a part of the community. It is an interesting study in sociology and anthropology, that is for sure.

on being an illiterate

So what's it like to not be able to understand, to speak, to read the language that is used all around you? What's it like to be an employee in an office where everyone speaks a language you don't understand, all the time?

It's like being an infant again, except without the blessing of not always being aware of your own shortcomings, your own lack of complete humanity. It's frustrating, aggravating, non-sensical. Why would anyone hire someone who is completely illiterate and then expect them to be able to stand the same intensely close-quarters of the Japanese teacher's room (a room like in any corporate office, but smaller and stuffier) in which the normal, literate teachers work? Also there is the fact that they give me very little in terms of teaching responsibilities, but that is a well known downside of the JET program (for many, but not all ALTs).

It, of course, helps that I love just about all the individuals in this room. But all together, spending hours in this room where I have little power to contribute to, or even comprehend, most of the numerous conversations and outbursts is not unlike some strange form of torture.

My wires are crossed and I must hold on for four more months without 1) going crazy, 2) making some strange, primal outburst of frustration in the office, 3) deciding not to shave/wash/wear clothes in the office out of laziness and frustration, 4) going AWOL, and 5) all of the above.

Now I understand a little more about how so many immigrants must feel.

mountain home life moving along

Today I was chatting online with my friend Michael and all of a sudden the whole school building starts shaking like hell and doesn't stop for about ten seconds. My first thoughts were along the lines of "don't come a knockin if the boat's a-rocking" (not really though) and then I thought that it might be the end. Haha, I am glad that these concrete buildings get along well with earthquakes. It turned out to be a 5.3 with the epicenter being dangerously close to my small mountain village. Probably the most shaking I have felt this year.

I keep thinking about how I can come back and try to make a difference in my old country. Perhaps I can get a job with moveon.org and drive around key states in some cool, gas-efficient used car that I find on the internet for under $2000. That would be a good way to explore parts of America I have never been to. Then again I just want to live on the east coast for a while, see some of you friends I've been missing. Enjoy life while it lasts with those who matter most. See the fam, you know.

Wherever you are, I send my best to you like a squirrel saving precious nuts for the winter. Still exhausted, but won't give up.

P.S. right now is spring break here which means that teachers come to work just about as much as usual and students come everyday for sports. I played some baseball with the kids today, which was fun.

beautiful exhaustion

my last post was written in what can only be called a beautiful exhaustion. So is what I am writing now. I had an active day and there were many things that I thought to say but I would end up being prevented today. And still while my mind's at bay I can make a play, of words, because I guess it's easy ro rhyme when you're exhausted.

Imagine always being exhausted. Life becomes more like a dream. You have no energy for reflection. It is both good and bad. Exhaustion simplifies and caresses you through a light version of the experience of life.

The blossoms are here and with it comes the intense Japanese tradition of watching them. Sakura-mi so to speak. To eye the sakura blossoms. It may be a commodified tradition, but it must also be praised for its roots in a deep respect for nature and the beauty it offers. It may not be that much better, though, than admiring a conventionaly beautiful woman, complete with makeup and the newest, most fashionable clothes. But at least it does not involve the objectification of a human for that is far more damaging (although I guess I am trying to say that it's related and relatable).

But I am exhausted so I must rest my attention on simpler tasks. Please forgive my foolishness and simpleton nature. I only have the best intentions, and yet they are human.

One more crazy thought to share. May I ask you if you believe in aliens, kind sir/madame? "No," you reply. "But of course." Did it ever occur to you that we are already basically the same thing as these so-called aliens? We are intelligent life on a planet in the universe. I think that should be enough to shock those seekers of the new and bizarre. If only most people weren't too exhausted to notice that our existence is strange enough. And if we exist then of course other crazy animals like us could very well exist somewhere else in the universe.

It is no secret that contemporary Japan is barely the shadow of the cultural richness of Japan's past. Even that shadow, from the perspective my time here has granted, seems to be losing itself in the overwhelming process of the new culture. There may have been a well constructed, well traveled dirt path, but that path bas been almost completely covered by a brand new pavement road. Cracks in the road let you peer through the surface and into the past but soon they are re-paved to again hide the old-fashioned past and to show the shiny new present.

The Japanese city, if lucky, has a generous amount of its ancient heritage still standing for you to see (Kyoto, Nagasaki, Kumamoto). If unlucky, (and this includes places like Hiroshima City, Sendai, and Tokyo) then the old parts have been almost completely built over with what can be said to be just about the most steriized, sterilizing modern architecture that exists. What is left has, like the paved over dirt path, just a fragment of the richness that once was. And as people tend to become the things they do, people also become their environment. The rich cultural past is easily shed from most peoples' backs and replaced by a shiny and new, shallow one. Like the buildings that all look alike, people too tend to fashion themselves with similar styles (and this happens all over the world) and, because of the political and educational system in place here many people share similar behaviors and opinions (also like many parts of the world, let's admit). Fortunately the behaviors and characterisitics people tend to share here in Japan are mostly incredibly pleasant and nice.

Here in the coutryside I have the good fortune of seeing less of the paved-over Japan and more of the old dirt path underneath. Still, there is much that has been lost here as well.

The explanations for all of these occurences here appear as complex as Japan's cultural heritage. I won't begin to pretend that I could properly discuss them. What I can note is that when America forced Japan's unconditional surrender, and thus made the Japanese governement vulnerable to America's cultural influence, this country was given some of the tools that would help make it the second biggest economy in the world. Those tools would also contribute to the rebuilding of Japan after the war and thus the restructuring of the culture and government (education in particular).
The tradeoffs for achieving economic competeitiveness were huge. The electronic revolution has its side-affects as well. Let's just say they don't exactly help reinforfce, or even remember, the cultural ancestry of Japan. Just watch any TV channel in Japan and you'll see what I am talking about. Consumption, and the commodification thereof, are central aspects of most of the shows you'll see. Along the lines of obsession over subtle gourmet dishes tasted by the rich and famous as their faces are projected, close-up, to millions as their make their careful judgments of the foods. At least we can say that it is tantalizingly amusing how people can be so enthralled by this stuff. It is also mostly harmless. Harm is done though.

so much to say...

Today I experienced at times my favorite part of photography, the sunset rush. It can be as quiet as ever but the sun still makes it way down towards the horizon and you know the heat is on (and time is running out). You must chase to every spot you wish to photograph before it's too late, before the ideal light is gone (and the ideal light is usually only there for a very short time). But while in the process of this you often lose track of the time, new light seems to live beyond the estimated time of darkness and you lose the rush. You relax and in that relaxation you find your freedom. No one can stop the sun's everyday disappearance, but you can at least be grateful for how it reminds you how fast life can seem to run away from you and then also how forgiving life can be if you're lucky...

And in those moments you also realize that when you turn to examine one aspect of the environment around you you inevitably are missing infinite many more. For every place you focus you attention there are many more you are not. It is a tragic reality of life. And if you try to take too much gold out of the cave, you may wind up getting none, or worse, dying. Luckily I was able to take over 200 pictures today during this sunset rush.

regeneration renewal regrowth rebirth

I have a shirt that I got at one of the sweat-shop clothes selling clothes shops in the town down the mountain from me that has many "re-" words on it.

One of my favorite co-workers said today that "humans are the cancer of the earth" after I told her that sea levels may rise 20 feet in the next 100 years. It's funny how bad news like that can be both depressing and unusually amusing, funny, freeing. It's sometimes good to remember that one's life can be seen as very insignificant in the vastness of things even it it remains true that your own life dominates your perceptions and experience of life in general.

I am thinking about going to DC this year (August or September) and fighting the good fight. If there are any objections to that, or recommendations, please let me know.

As always, I hope you are taking care of yourselves and gathering hugs from loved ones. There is a picture above of the trees that are always green in my town to give you peace at heart.

deaths and births

Today things are converging and chaos is seeping into this foreigner of a town foreign to him. Today is the day that all the teachers of Kumamoto are told whether they will continue or move on. Yes, they are given almost no notice as the new school year starts in April; they do not know until the entire year here is finished--they may be sent to any other school in the prefecture. Also today there was the graduation at Yamaga and Hokubu elementary schools. I went to the bigger one (at Yamaga).

Spring is also well on its way here. The weather is much warmer now; it's even sunny.

The thing about graduations here is that they are more like funerals than weddings. The tone is very sad, very formal, and yet hopeful. Students, parents, and teachers often cry. Sometimes it is extremely cold in the gyms that lack proper heating, but this perhaps only contributes to the profundity of the event. Every person in the school was involved in today's ceremony. Younger students stood up at designated times and praised individual students. They had memorized their lines and their time to stand and it was seemless. Even second and first graders were fully involved. Then the fifth graders all formed an orchestra at the end to see the sixth graders out the door. The whole school of kids sang for the graduates as they walked through student-held arches with colored tissue paper wrapped around them. They were wearing suits and presenters would bow a total of eight times (four as they approach the stage and four as they depart it).

You may think that these ceremonies are ridiculous and overdone. They certainly seem so at first. But after being here for a while and becoming part of this town I have come to appreciate these events, even in their tedium. I think that they are one of the few, rare ways to show people that their lives are taken seriously: that they are so important that a whole school, including all of the administrators, will take an hour or two in all seriousness to show their respect. Even if it is a required, annual event it still seems to get the good message across. All too often in America people are only shown this kind of respect once they are already unable to hear and see it, once they have already died. Perhaps it is good to give respect while one can still benefit from it.

I've noticed a few times that culture here sometimes mimics the processes of nature. The students who leave every year are like the falling leaves that then become replenished. Like the leaves the teachers have no choice when or where they will fall. So in about 40 minutes the teachers in my office will know if they have fallen off the tree or if they have remained attached for another year.

And here is a poem sent to me by a former student of my mom. It was sent to her by chance and she noticed that I too like to relate things to leaves and trees and stuff so she sent it to me. (thanks Beth).

The Trees

The trees are coming into leaf
Like something almost being said;
The recent buds relax and spread,
Their greenness is a kind of grief.

Is it that they are born again
And we grow old? No, they die too,
Their yearly trick of looking new
Is written down in rings of grain.

Yet still the unresting castles thresh
In fullgrown thickness every May.
Last year is dead, they seem to say,
Begin afresh, afresh, afresh.

Philip Larkin

Life begins in darkness.

While working at the nursery school this morning I thought about the fact that when you are born the world is almost completely imperceivable and then becomes increasingly perceivable as the months and years go by. I realized that it's like a sort of hypnosis because as your ability to percieve the world increases, the numbness to and normality of the world around you also increases. You become more and more used to your human life. So once you are all grown up you may have your full capabilities of perception, but your full abilities of wonder, awe, and amazement at the absurdity of life have been decreased substantially throughout your development (supposedly). I always wondered how it is that adults can be more blind than children so much of the time.

If this all seems a bit crazy than it's probably because I too am a bit numb to the world. But alas, I am aware of it, so perhaps I can fight it off with some vitamins and vinegar!

Many movies and books suggest that life is like a dream. While I tend to think that they are pushing it a little I can also see how a very numb person's experience of the world could be very much like a dream. Things are fuzzy and simple. Time passes almost imperceivably. Years, decades go by with the blink of an eye.

...

I'm tired today, and drowsy. I watched Vanilla Sky last night and I think that it was enough to give me a number of unpleasant dreams. In one dream I watched a friend jump off of a balcony to her death. That was pretty awful. But that film ended with the main character jumping off a skyscraper, so it is understandable.

Yesterday I happened to be in the Sendai airport in the afternoon. People were huddled around one of the high-definition flatscreens in the departures lobby watching Japan play Cuba at baseball. People clapped together when Japan scored. It was pretty clever. I will continue to be amazed by this place.

Forests, Trees, Invisibilities

When you focus on the details you often lose sight of the forest. When you focus on the forest you may often lose sight of the trees. But some things you still have not seen. There is the earth on which the forest is only just a small lining over portions of the landmass. Then, on the smaller level, there are the microorganisms that nurture and sustain the tree. My point is not to show the obvious limitations of a popular metaphor, but rather to suggest that even when you try to keep the bigger and smaller pictures of your world active in your mind you are still missing the bulk of it. Just as much slides past the notice of your eyes, ears, nose, and tastebuds, much also slides past the notice of your mind (and then there are things that are simply imperceivable).

I think that maybe it’s the things that an individual cannot see for her-/his-self that often control/define/betray that person the most. Likewise, it is the stuff that thinkers do not see that often leads them astray into focusing too much on trees or becoming too infatuated with the forest to notice the inner workings of the trees.

I have been trying to understand my life recently and it’s not an easy task. I sometimes wonder why it seems that I have never done any hard work and that I may never have to (even though I have done certain kinds of hard work if you call thinking hard work (and a few months of shoveling cow shit early in the morning). Maybe it’s that I have learned how to prevent most stress from infiltrating my life. Somehow I know how to avoid living in hell, so to speak (and I am, at times, pretty good at finding heaven, or at least a kind of Eden). But maybe it’s also due to the fact a lot of the work in our society nowadays seems predominantly mind-work, paperwork, and softer-labor such as serving in restaurants or working as a Subway Sandwich Artist (a job I wasn’t bad at).

When I have a lot of free time I tend to labor myself with a lot of a certain kind of mild stress: the mild stress of trying to plan a future that cannot yet be planned. It is a future of almost complete unknowns. The only known, if it is one, is myself and who I am. But somehow I cannot keep a complete picture of myself in mind. It always darkens in one place as light is shed on another. And perhaps it’s true that even with someone else’s perception engaged, a clear image of myself is impossible as of now (and maybe always will be). So I am fighting a losing battle in trying to visualize myself, but that won’t stop me from trying. There is always the fear of finding something I don’t like the sight of (perhaps that’s what keeps me from seeing my whole self).

You may wonder why I write all this here. It’s because I have no one else to talk to in my house and I think that maybe you out there are the best people I know to communicate with. Maybe someday we can talk together about these things for surely I am not the only one with these kinds of concerns. I also have this funny idea that trying to understand peoples’ basic limitations may help me figure out what I would like to do with my life after I leave Japan (probably in August).

Until next time.
p.s. of course it's not just what we are and are not aware of that makes us who we are, but how we respond to those things (emotions, sympathy, empathy, lightly, heavily, carelessly, caringly) - and there is no one best way to be, of course.

Mortal In Ubuyama

The days here have increasingly reminded me of my own mortality and the evanescence of the world around me. The teachers in my office are dear friends that will all be moving around schools eventually as it is custom to switch every three years or so and I will be leaving come August. The winter lingers in the form of a day long snow storm, but even that melted away almost completely by evening. Then there are the third graders that have seemingly become adults as they have crossed the line between student and peer in the office. Even though they came back the day after still wearing their school uniforms, there was a different energy they now held. They had worked very hard for three years and now they will move on, some of them to schools that are two hours away from their homes and families and they will stay there during the week.

These pictures I took on the day of graduation really get to me. I think in many years tears will come to my eyes as I look at them. I have spent so many hours in a small office with these people. No matter how annoying it sometimes has been, how oxygen-less because of the kerosene heater in the room, I cannot help but feel endlessly attached to these individuals. The principal and vice-principal with their desks together set up so they can always see their inferiors. Every person's face is within me now.

Being here for only one year has made everything that much more intense. No longer have I the emotional luxury of just feeling like I am tired of my job. As much as it has not been perfect for me here I have become irrevocably attached to the people here and I think I always will be, as long as I have my memory. And it's not like this happens to me every year, no no. No, I think this one's special so I will have to be sure to tell them this in my farewell speeches. Maybe I will even be on the local tv.

Today was graduation. It snowed and was very cold inside the large, virtually unheated gym. But for over an hour we showed our passion and celebrated the students' victory. These are two of the fifteen students that graduated. Above is Yurina and next is Ayumi. They are all really nice kids.

Then after we all went and had a dinner party. They made me sing some stupid songs in front of everyone but I managed to stay alive and not drink too much.

The details were glorious but I cannot share them here and now since it is late and cold.

Hope you are well, Ted

Amazing, Deceptively Complex Japan

Today coming back from the city after spending a full weekend there enjoying the castle, time with friends, and the sometimes bizarre nightlife, I saw some things that reminded me of what I often forget during the weekdays in my tiny village.

These things I saw were details. Like the k-truck that had been fitted with neon lights (k-trucks are 3-cylinder trucks that are about 2/3 the size of small pickups in the USA). I also saw this oldman with wispy facial hair sitting by the road by the aqueduct who looked stoic and rugged while smoking his cigarette except that he had a perfectly groomed lap dog decorated with ribbons sitting inside his jacket. I said "konnichiwa" to him, he said "konnichiwa" back and then whispered to his dog, after I had passed him, something along the lines of "who don't you say 'konnichiwa' as well?" in a cute, loving voice. I turned around then, smiled, and nodded and he said "konnichiwa" yet again. If I had had a camera with me the man and his dog would have been the most memorable subjects I could ever capture here in Japan. Instead I have my memory and words.

And last night I was at a crazy little Japanese restaurant where my new friend Wada-san, a 35 year old dude who works in the gym I workout at, ordered a couple hundred dollars worth of the most wacked out seafood you could imagine. Fish guts, sea slug, whale, and plenty of octopus (which by now I have gotten absolutely used to eating). Oh yeah, and don't forget the lower intestines of horse. I unfortunately tried all of the above meats. I truly wish that I had known the whale was whale before eating it so I could've avoided eating it. (In case you're curious, it tastes like chicken.)

Why deceptive? Because the schools and mass media feed the people so much propaganda that seems to make everyone the same but there is actually a whole lot of different kinds of diversity here (and I am part of it). But the culture of homogenization here is incredibly powerful. It makes you and many Japanese people think that Japanese people really all are the same. When people start reinforcing the stereotypes you see on the tele then you start to think that the steretypes are representative of reality. They are not. But they sure have a way of making you think they aren't just stereotypes.

There are some things that seem pretty universal here. I have a first-hand view into the most powerful cultural mover in Japan--the education system. I can tell you that it at least seems to be true that kids are, from a very young age, taught to conform to strict rules and behaviors and to not challenge the system either by rebellion or by asking questions. So critical thinking is not promoted. Actually it is stunted very forcefully; though that doesn't mean that some people don't break the mold. They are very heroic people and they often seem to suffer for their digressions. I am very impressed with those few and I encourage it as much as I can, yet I still have a lot of respect for the ways things are done here. They do do wonders.

Education. Health. Security.

Why can't this be the DNC's new slogan?

It's another cold one. We just had a pre-graduation celebration for the JHS third years in the cold gym. Many speeches, even I did a little one.

I've heard from smart sources that the key to happiness is doing work that you're good at doing and having people who you love around. That's not quite as simple as "love and work," but it's still a simplification.

I look forward to seeing you all again. I can't wait to get out there and live a more exciting, involved life but I can still enjoy my simple, quiet life here a little longer. As the days get warmer I will surely spend more time outside. And April will be full of traveling and seeing great people, so I am excited.

Later, Teo

(not so) random acts of kindness

Today two random acts of kindness reminded me that I am a part of the Ubuyama family. At lunch time the strangest thing happened. As usual two students and two teachers had rationed out the teachers' lunches in their bowls on their trays but Tedo-sensei had been forgotten :( But then a miracle happened. One teacher started a "Help Tedo-sensei" benefit drive and immediately there gathered around three or four teachers who reportioned their lunch trays to give Tedo-sensei a lunch. The Udon noodles were good too. Then, later, my suibokuga (india ink/monochrome painting) teacher stopped by after a class (that I had missed) to give me my very own bag with a stand and a bamboo paintbrush supporter. What kindness--I do have fam here.

Kuju-san revisited

Climbed Kuju yesterday. It's the tallest peak on Kyushu at around 1900 meters, believe it or not. There was still a lot of snow and tons of mud on the trail. But the spring wind was a-blowing as I finished the hike.

I met some other hikers. One of them, wearing mostly blue, talked a blue streak for about three hours in some strong dialect. It didn't matter that I could not really understand a full sentence he spoke, he just went on. It was like George Steinbrenner from Seinfeld (Kastanza's boss). Talk talk talk so now I'll walk out of the office backwards, close the door behind myself. Except I got treated to dinner first and "conversed" about world business and other random things. It's really interesting what a foreigner like myself gets exposed to here. Only really attractive girls get treated this way in the US. All I have to be here is white. Ha! That's pretty good.

To clear things up about Saturday: the ice crystals had formed under the glass and they were really cool. There is even a name for them here. Also, one of my predecessors actually worked with the fire brigade here so I may not be the first to light the hills here, but I was told I was. It doesn't really matter, it was awesome anyway.

What else? I am tired today and it's raining outside. I guess spring is here. I finished Seinfeld Season 6 and the first season of Ali G. What else, what else? Hmm maybe I'll think of something later.

to burn hills in Japan

Today I lit fires across the countryside of my town. My supervisor advised it. We hopped over small bumps in the grassy hills where special crystal-like ice had formed and lit fires with a tiny liter in order to ready the hills for new spring grass. Then, with many more townsfolk, we all burned some bigger portions and I got to use this cool water pack. I am honored as the first ALT of Ubuyama to do this (sorry, predecessors). There were flames 10 meters high. After we had a big enkai at the onsen in my town. There I practiced my impeccable Japanese where everyone said how good I was. Damn I must be good.

I'll post some pictures soon.

At the end of the night my supervisor and favorite Ubyaman, Yuusuke, asked me to have a second party at his house but instead I opted out and decided to be driven home by the driver. On the whole way back I felt guilt and regret. I thought about turning the taxi around. I never want to excuse an invitiation like that again. I guess it made me think of the fact that I have to leave this town after becoming part of a family here. So I feel bad now. Perhaps it is the drinks combined with that that makes me feel thus.

But today was awesome to say the least. I've never been able to burn hills like this before. It was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

Perhaps my supervisor feels the same way as I do tonight. Perhaps there will be more chances to have second enkais. Now it is back to my loneliness in my house and some detox.

simplicity

I just had dinner at Mieko and Tomatsu's beautiful wooden home. They served me good, healthy, hearty food. I now feel warm and full.

To eat with them reminded me of a way of living that I forget when living all by myself. A way of enjoying little things and not getting your head mixed up in the unnecessary complications that all too often seem to surround us in the world today.


Not to say that the natural world is not fully complicated, rather, to point out that human life can be less complicated if we only try.

Being 22 years of age, soon to be 23, I've found that there are many ways to imagine my life. There is the one that is anxious to get a move on and become what I am bound to be. Then there is another that says life is not something to be rushed through. Life is not a thing that exists so that we can get it over with, so to speak. It should be something that exists so we can actually experience it and not rush through it.

Life has its way of picking you up and not dropping you; you lose almost all control for many months at a time. You even start to wonder if you are living your life at all or if you are just a ghost in the machine that is your body (and a ghost that has little control of that machine). Creating simplicity seems to be the step that can make you be a little more active in actually living your life. But because of that it can be difficult. Many people around you will also resist your desire for simplicity, especially in the form of peer pressure (both direct and indirect).

I, of course, am no specialist in simplicity, nor am I a specialist in really anything except maybe moving around the world and being a good friend whenever I can. A lot of time though is spent worrying about how and when my focus in life will ensue. Perhaps I should just focus on living a pure and simple life. That seems to be a pretty challenging and worthy quest in this day and age when everyone seems to be racing to reach the next step. It sounds like the same old "live in the now" argument doesn't it? Perhaps I am trying to take it to a new level in suggesting that it is a verifiable and challenging quest simply not to race through life, especially youth.