Sept 12-14, 2008 ..We are now taking Japanese classes

...WARNING WARNING...Slick-san's "Japlish" is coming soon....:-)

It has been a slow last few days here in Japan as we resettle after our trip to China. CJ had a late night dinner meeting on Thursday..so late that I thought he might have missed the last train and stayed overnight in a capsule hotel bed. He ended up taking a taxi home and showed up right as I was calling his cell phone to see where he was, before I myself headed to bed. I grocery shopped one day and then hung around the house and did chores while waiting for the furniture delivery guy on Friday. It is nice to have the TV up off the floor and at eye level for better viewing. I am finding CJ is enjoying sitting in front of the TV while I prefer chatting and writing to all of you on my computer:-)
On Friday night I met CJ and Carolyn the controller from Graco in MN for a Shabu Shabu meal. For those of you who do not know what that is, let me explain. You have a gas burner in the middle of your table and they put a cast iron pot of water on it. Then they give you a plate of veggies...we had little long stem brown mushrooms, white longer stemmed mushrooms, a few thin slices of squash, a few carrot slices, bok choy cut up, chinese cabbage squares, cellophane noodles,rectangle cubes of tofu, and a plate of very thinly sliced marbelized beef.
Then you put some of the veggies in the bowling hot water to cook. Once the veggies are close to done, you add the beef which cooks very fast and then you spoon out some meat and veggies to each person. You eat it all by dipping it in your 2 different sauces. One sauce is like soy suace with scallions and sesame seeds floating on top and the other is an orangish colored creamy and spicier sauce. I have no idea what is in it , but it reminded me of the sauce at Bennihanis if anyone has ever been there, back in the states?
After our veggies and meat were all gone. The guy brought out a plate of wide noodles. He first skimmed some of the fat off the top of the water which was now getting rather thick from all the veggies and meat cooking in it. Once he had the fat removed he added the noodles and let them cook for a bit. Now this was our soup. It looked a bit like dirty dish water to me, and it tasted quite bland to me as well, so I poured in my left over sauces and then it was just right and quite tasty if I say so myself.
When we were done with our noodle soup, they brought out a little bowl of sherbet for each of us. The meal was actually better than I expected and it filled me up more than I thought it would when they first brought it out. We then took Carolyn on the subway to see our house and for some dessert. All the pastry shops were closed in Motomachi by the time we got there and so we stopped at the Union Foods store and got some raspberry, lemon and strawberry sorbet cups and coconut "cocona" macaroons. We all enjoyed our very little taste of sherbet at the restaurant and guess we were craving some more. We gave Carolyn a tour of the house and then sat and talked a bit over our treats before walking her back to the train station and her subway ride back to the hotel. It was a nice relaxing night and beautiful weather.
Saturday we hung out at the house all morning and talked with Kalen and my dad and mom on the phone, did some book work, computer Emails and watched some TV over taco salad. At 3 pm we went to search out our first Japanese language class. It was held at the local Catholic church and they charged 100yen for a 2 hour class. It was very nice and the teachers were very helpful and friendly. The schedule through Christmas shows they will have a few parties, a bazar and so that should be fun.
That is CJ getting his slippers on when we entered the church hall before going up stairs to the classroom and then us with the teachers after class. They by the way, were very excited to hear I wanted to put their photo on my blog. :-) We missed the first class of Session Two which was last week when we were in China. They went over the Hiragana letter chart. Those are the written symbols for Japanese native words and so they were reviewing them this week with flash cards. I recognized a few from books I had checked out and read over way back in June before we moved here. Then she gave us a katakana alphabet chart and we went over that. Katakana are the foreign words that the Japanese have now made part of their language. It was a bit confusing when she wrote a phrase with both types of lettering in one sentence. Yikes...that is when the headache started.
There was about 10 or 12 other folks there, but they had name tags out for about 20. It is a drop in type of class I think and so people come and go I think. We met two women after class one from New Zealand and another from New York. They both work for the same company having something to do with trees. "Tree huggers", I said and the younger one said, "Yes kind of, but we cut them down too". We did not have much time to talk as there was another class from 7-9 at a different location that we wanted to check out as well.
So off we were to find that building. We walked down many steps and past Ishakowicho station and over the canal to the hostel area of town. We had a bit of a scavenger hunt trying to find the place with the map. Once we found the right building and went up to the 7th floor we ended up in a balcony hallway overlooking rooftops below us. We figured it was going to be in a person's apartment and we were 1/2 hour early (got there quicker than we thought) so we were deciding what to do when a lady came out of the #701 door. She was on the phone and we asked her about the class and she said something to the person on the phone and then handed me the phone.
The man on the other end of the line said in English that they had changed the location of the class about a year ago and he thought perhaps they were not having class tonight as it is a 3 day holiday weekend. Tomorrow Sept 15th Monday is Respect for the Aged Day. I asked her if she was the teacher and she said, "NO" and shook her head and kind of giggled. I asked her if he was the teacher and she didn't answer me. Then she and I passed the phone back and forth while she told him something and then he told me. I asked him if she could tell us where the new location was or mark it on the map I had and he told me she was too lazy to try and tell me, so she would walk us there.
So we bid him farewell and we were off down the elevator, down the street and around the corner with her. She walked very fast and seemed a bit nervous. She did not talk at all. When we got to the building which was about 5 blocks down we went into the building and up to the 2nd floor. There was a sign on the door that said "Kalabaw no Kai"..whatever that means? Anyhow, it was in another apartment building and we now at least knew where to come next week if we want to attend the class. I think I want to go back just to see how little the apartments are. It was a very small elevator and a narrow balcony right up against other buildings. These classes are advertised at 200yen for a 2 hour class. So we will see what I think next week. It is held from 7-9pm.
We were kind of thankful there was no class, as CJ and I were both a bit tired and trying to soak up what was just thrown at us in the other class. Oh Boy, do we ever have alot to learn?!
Some of the words we learned at our first classs were window "mado", stamp "kite", map "chizu", japanese "nihongo", english "eigo", school "gakko", eye glasses "megane", church "kyokai", hospital "byoin", hair cut store "biyouin", bicycle "jitensha", today "kyou", next week "raishuu", library "toshokan", carboard box "danborubako",break time "kyukei", wine "wain", Beer "biru", bed "beddo", shirt "shatsu", Cheese "chizu", pool "puru", chocolate "chokoreto", toilet "toire",bus "basu", soccer "sakka", personal computer "pasokon", air conditioner "eakon", bath "ofuro", I then learned that toilet used to be "benjo", but that is now considered a "dirty" word. :-(
Some phrases we learned were: See you next week "mata raishu". Mata=again and raishu=next week. What does it mean? "Imi wanan desuka?" imi=mean What is that? "Are wa nan desuka"? What is your name? "Onamae wa nan desuka"? Where is the toilet? "toire wa doko desuka"
The subject comes first in sentences and these are how you say the words but they are written in the different characters as well, but I do not know how to do that on the computer. So we have many steps to learn? YIKES! It was fun though and very intriguing to me. I'm excited!!
We made our way back home in the very thick and humid air and under the brightly shining full moon, before the clouds covered it over. This is the weekend the Chinese celebrate with moon cakes as well and go to parks to watch the FULL Harvest moon and pray for good crops and share cakes with friends which represent unity, trust, respect and love. It is a BIG holiday over in CHINA and people wait in long lines to get their box of cakes. They even had an article in the paper about ticket scalpers being thrown in jail for hawking overpriced Mooncake lottery tickets. I guess we should have bought one to try if they are that important..they must be good?
So today we tentatively planned to go to Tokyo and possibly try to see some SUMO, but when we woke to a very overcast and humid day we both felt like just hanging out at home and relaxing while catching up with bookwork, Emails, this blog, expense reports, language lessons, TV...It probably is beginning to sound like all we do is book work, but we get an envelope from my dad every week and so we are trying to keep up with stuff here in Japan ,as well as, back in MN.
We enjoyed phone chats with both our kids and they continue to keep busy...
Kalen is awaiting Michael's return to Chicago this weekend after his stint with Montana Shakespeare is over. She may have found them a new and bigger apartment come October? She is busy with work and school, while apartment hunting and checking out possible job opportunites for after graduation and their trip here to Japan in December. Michael will now look for a job of some kind as well in either or both theater and whatever ?, so to make ends meet in between acting jobs.
Graham is busy with work,school,rugby,rugby and more rugby. He is now playing on the UMD Penguins club team and loving it. They have a tournament next week in Elk River I guess. He too, plays some intramural volleyball, ultimate frisbee and enjoys weight lifting as well.
Well I had better get some breakfast or now brunch I guess, as it it 10:02am on Sunday. The sun looks like it is trying to peak out of the clouds which left a few drizzles earlier as I sat here writing... so who knows maybe we will venture somewhere later today?
Have a great weekend everyone.
Karla and CJ
I wish I could write some of the Japanese words in the characters to really impress you :-)haha