Nasty Children

"That is a place for nasty children."

"Nasty children?!" I looked in surprise at the innocuous low-rise building. Could there really be a detention centre for young offenders on the corner of Hokkaido University campus?

"Yes. They are very small."

Well, it wasn't that I didn't agree with the sentiment. Small children were indeed often downright obnoxious. Still, it seemed a surprising comment to come from someone who I knew had a son.

"Do you say 'kindergarten'?" One of the students had noticed my confusion. "No, that's German."

"It is German but we sometimes use that for a school for young...." I made the connection. "Nursery children."

"Ahh, nursery children."

I think I should have left that uncorrected at 'nasty'. Far more accurate.

The hand that rocks the cradle

It had to be asked.

We had covered teaching duties, computer resources, research grants, the hiring of students and language requirements. It was quite likely this final point would never be an issue, but for completeness it really ought to be queried when discussing a permanent position.

"How do maternity benefits work in Japan?"

"Matern....?"

The person I was discussing the job details with was a senior male professor. His English was good, but not fluent and this was probably a topic that didn't come up too often in places where he would use the language. Like at conferences on galaxy formation.

"If I were to have a baby....?" I made a hand gesture of show a swollen stomach. Either I would be understood, or it would be assumed I was concerned about sudden and chronic obesity from over indulgence in sushi. The latter was possibly a risk, so finding the solution to that too would be no bad thing.

"Ahh, so you...?"

"No! Not now!" I hastened to clarify my current state of being. "But possibly in the future. Maybe." I stretched my arms out to indicate vast amounts of time passing. I received a gratifying nod of understanding.

"My wife was a graduate student when she had our son. She had six weeks off."

Six weeks?! Did she drop the baby, rock the baby and declare it ready for school? The Japanese education system is notoriously hard core, so this was almost plausible.

"But that was twenty years ago. Now, the Japanese Government wants more women employed, so it may have changed."

Hmm. Note to self: look into getting birth control in Japan. I smiled, "Well, this will probably never be an issue."

However, this produced quick reassurance that such a move would be a positive thing:

"Please, do find husband and have babies."

Well... let's not contract that in quite yet.


--
[As a side-note, this professor very kindly went to find what the current maternity leave protocol was and told me this afternoon that is was 8 weeks (I think...) full pay and up to one year on reduced pay.]

Ace serve

There are some situations that are just going to be awkward. Finding yourself opposite a dozen wide-eyes students who are all clearly anxious about having to speak English to this prospective British faculty member is bound to be one of them. I nodded, smiled encouragingly and wished I could help out by discussing my research in Japanese but ... well, I couldn't.

"What does your favourite character in Harry Potter teach?"

The question wasn't put to me but to a master's student who gulped audibly. The idea was a great one; start a conversation about an incredibly popular British-based franchise to kick off the conversation. The problem was that the professor who poised the question hadn't read the books himself and didn't realise that the answer was unlikely to be in a list of common English vocabulary:

'Apple... chair... book... school... transfiguration...' No, I couldn't see it.

Fortunately, this was an idea I could use but with a small twist.

"I like Japanese anime," I volunteered.

"Ah! Which ones?" came back an enthusiastic question.

"Prince of tennis?" I paused. "Tenisu no Oujisama?"

"Tenisu no Oujisama! Mada mada dane!" The response rang down the table from every student.

Problem solved. Ore-sama no bigi ni yoi na.,

--
("Mada mada dane" is the catch phrase of the anime series' progenitor, Echizen Ryoma. It obnoxiously means "You still have a long way to go". "Ore-sama no bigi ni yoi na" is said by one of the rival team members, translating to "Be awed at the sight of my prowess".)

Please don't flush your sanitary thing down the toilet

My first night back in Tokyo, I slept in a coffin.

Capsule hotels are Japan's answer to cheap accommodation for business men who just want somewhere to sleep. Stacked together in the same room, the enclosed beds have just enough space for you to stretch out lengthways and --in the luxurious versions-- enough height for you to sit up. The pictures I had seen resembled coffins in a morgue but with doors that could be opened from the inside and an internal TV in case the afterlife got boring. Due to the close proximity of the guests, capsule hotels are usually male-only, so I had to hunt around to try out this quintessential modern Japanese experience.

With the help of a couple of friends, I found the Ace Inn; a capsule hotel in Shinjuku, one of the major districts in downtown Tokyo. This place had both mixed and separate floors for men and women with shared bathroom facilities in the basement. Frankly, after being promised a claustrophobic night, buried alive with zombie-fied neighbours, it was disappointingly nice. The capsules resembled enclosed wooden bunk-beds with curtains over an opening in the side. Everyone had a locker for their belongings, but it was a narrow affair which was fine for my valuables, but wouldn't have taken a suitcase. The downstairs showers required a 100 Yen (~$1) coin to operate, apparently to limit the time and ensure everyone has a fighting chance to get clean in the morning. Clearly, some people must have been extremely smelly since I showered and finished before my 100 Yen had run out.

Despite it being 'Hanami' in Tokyo, the traditional weekend to view the cherry blossoms, the capsule hotel was nearly empty. There was a sign pinned up inside the elevator in English thanking visitors for coming to Tokyo during this difficult time and asking them to pass on the message that Tokyo was safe to visit. There is evident concern that the drop in tourism may succeed where the tsunami has not, and drive smaller businesses into bankruptcy.

That particular notice was written in almost perfect English, but elsewhere in the hotel the signs were more entertaining. My personal favourite was the note in the women's toilet stalls saying "Please don't flush your sanitary thing down the toilet". Although, I must say the prospect promised by "If you want to have fun, go to Roppongi or Shibuya!! You can have a hot night there." made me wonder if I should reconsider going to see the cherry blossoms.

There was an earthquake during my brief stay. A 4.3 magnitude shortly after I arrived at the hotel that vibrated the building. Earthquakes are never rare in Japan and the infrastructure has little problem coping with the vast majority of them. There is no doubt though, that the ringing of Japan's main island is a reminder of the all too recent tragedy. As night fell, the usually dazzling lights of one of the world's largest cities appeared at half-mast, both due to the saving of power in the wake of Fukushima's reactor problems and out of sympathy for the huge numbers of Japanese who had lost their homes further north.

In practical terms, the power shortage caused few inconveniences. The express train service running from the airport wasn't operating during the afternoons, but there was a direct bus that took the same amount of time, so it was a non-issue. Even the lack of lights at night was only dark by Tokyo standards; the city still shone with activity. I therefore echo my hotel's sentiments: if you are planning a trip to Tokyo, go. Take a camera. It's going to be great.

A difficult situation

In addition to evil old biddies who think my idea of a fun evening is to have my car breakdown on the sidewalk, there is another lady who frequently passes by my house. She is short with thin greying hair that is cropped to chin level. Her clothes are usually baggy and slightly ill-assorted and she speaks in a pre-occupied manner. She looks to be in her forties and despite seeing her regularly in the same place, I have often wondered if she has somewhere to live.

Regardless of her situation, she is always friendly and treated my stuck car debacal with a great deal more sympathy than the afore mentioned evil biddy. Once she told me she owned a yellow car too. I strongly suspected this was an equally friendly bare-faced lie.

This evening on the way back from work, I saw her not on my road, but near the highway. Crossing the road to head home, I greeted her and asked how she did. I recieved the usual vague answer of "fine, fine", followed by:

"I suppose I can walk back home with you."

I replied that of course she could, took my headphones from my ears and fell into step with her. I noted she was shivering, despite a large sweater and I asked if she was cold, adding that at least the weather had become warmer the last few days. She agreed and started talking to herself in a low tone with words I couldn't make out. We had not gone many steps when her pace slowed and she stopped.

"I think I'm going to walk the other way now."

I should emphasise that this road was near absolutely nothing. Walk twenty minutes and you would reach the cluster of houses and shops belonging to Westdale village, the other side of which the University was situated. Twenty minutes in the opposite direction would see you in downtown Hamilton. An incredibly slow pace alternating directions would see you nowhere, unless you had a particularly favourite patch of highway concrete.

"Are you all right?" I stopped and looked down at her. For the first time, I felt as if I loomed above her stooping figure. "Are you sure?"

She insisted that all was well and started shuffling off along the sidewalk again. Reluctantly, I headed for home.

Technically, I had done my duty, yet there was no doubt that it was within my power to offer more. The problem, of course, is that more personal interventions --for example an offer of money or an invitation to my home-- come with an associated risk. If I gave her cash, it might set a precedent for a continual donation of funds which would deplete my own resources and, if she really was homeless, would not ultimately help the problem. If I let her into my apartment, I left myself open to robbery or worse. Undoubtedly, there are social services who could be contacted, but I'm not at all sure what I could tell them if I called. I should make it clear that never once has this lady asked me for anything, yet self-preservation makes me keep my distance.

It's not that I feel my behaviour is wrong or even unnecessary. It's just damn unfortunate.

Snowpocalypse in spring-time

Hello March. I didn't see you there under ALL THAT SNOW.

It wasn't really the sheer quantity of white stuff that had me gawking out of my window on Wednesday morning. I mean, I live in Canada. I know that has consequences. Perhaps I was daft, but I thought that 20CM OF SNOW would be preceded by, you know, cold weather.

It wasn't even that we'd just had a brief warmer day. It hadn't snowed for weeks and on the weekend, I had finally dragged the bag of de-icing grit for the sidewalks back down to my basement. I had picked up my snow boots from their spot by the door and stowed them in my closet and laid aside my full length coat in favour of a fleece. I had even switched my violently coloured knee-length socks to violently coloured ankle socks. Seriously, spring was coming!

I noted my actions on Facebook and received the prompt reply that I'd jinxed everything and now it was going to snow on Wednesday....

.... I'm still hoping a weather forecast was involved somewhere in that.

Having completed a serious 20 minutes worth of slack-jawed gawking on Wednesday morning, I shovelled my drive and staggered into work. Notably, only the few most major roads had been cleared; something that was true even when I returned home in the evening. In Ontario, much of the snow clearing comes from residents with plough-attachments on their pick-up trucks. They get paid by the province for the work they do, but apparently I wasn't the only one who had packed up for the season.

Upon arriving in my office, I found my Facebook wall had become a site of blame:

"Cause and effect -> didn't you put your salt/grit back in the basement? Doomed..."

Sad but true. Evidently, the clearing of my drive had also been a repulsive act to Mother Nature and she worked steadily all day to cover up any evidence of my labour. It was extremely successful.

I returned home and wrote my message to the world in my car's rear windscreen.

Typical homecoming

Upon walking up my driveway towards the door of my apartment:

Neighbour's dog: Ruff! Ruff ruff ruff! Ruff ruff!

Me: Ruff ruff ruff ruff. Ruff!

Upon pushing open the door and entering the kitchen:

Cat: Meow! Meow meow meow meeeeooooow!

Me: Meow meow! Meow!

I'd feel better about all this if I felt anything I said during the preceding day had made more sense.