Hiroshima, etc.

OK so I am really bad at updating this thing. Last weekend I spent a couple days in Hiroshima with a good friend and went to Miyajima island, which is famous for–as you know by now–this:

Also, for these (that apparently love to eat paper, including hotel reservations):

aaaand these:

That’s right, lazy monkeys that eat things off each other all day long. The deer and monkeys actually have a somewhat parasitic relationship here: The monkeys pick things off the deer to eat, and the deer eat the monkeys’ droppings (this is actually true). After carefully taking pictures of a monkey to make him appear dead, we took a ropeway and hiked here:

Looking out, you can see a lot of the surrounding islands, and looking back, we could see Hiroshima city, which is basically a thin strip that stretches between the mountains and the ocean. Above is the location we started the hike from. On a good day you are supposed to be able to see the island of Shikoku from this location, but it was cloudy when we were there.

Other interesting attractions on Miyajima: the wise-looking bald guy, and the creepy-looking baby things.

After Miyajima, we went back to Hiroshima and the next day had a great time going to several art museums and a nice Japanese garden. The art museums were fantastic and I recommend looking up Masuo Ikeda. His exhibit was showing at one of them and he is pretty incredible across a range of mediums – redone Hiroshiges in watercolor, ceramics made to look like metal twisted and bubbled from the bomb blast, sketches, installations, etc. However, outside one of the museums there was some kind of mooning pigeon. Pretty frightening. The garden was also fun and had these little red crabs running around, and turtles, and a cool camouflagey-looking beetle. Then we went to eat Okonomiyaki, which Hiroshima is known for. Hiroshima-yaki has soba noodles and bacon in it and is super delicious.

We skipped the bomb stuff because we had seen it before and after going to the Nagasaki bomb stuff again, we decided it was unnecessary. It was great to see a whole new side of Hiroshima. It’s a great city, has a million nice little islands right next to it, and has three incredible art museums. There was even a Salvador Dali at one of them! A lot else happened I’m sure, but it’s late and I’m tired. Everything else is going very well. This weekend I will attend my welcome party, and next weekend will be a pirate-themed cruise around beautiful islands at sunset (details to come). I’ll end with my view of Hiroshima castle after exiting the station, and some pictures I took of a reflection that I thought turned out pretty well. Comments on photo technique are most welcome.

The Kids

I know, another post about politics.  But seriously, you can’t script this:

Biden

I achieved Destination Hiroshima this weekend and had a wonderful time, returning last night at a reasonable 11:30 pm, thanks to the magic of the bullet train (turns out the return night bus was full). I will post more about the weekend–which was awesome, and included deer, monkeys, and an art museum that had a Salvador Dali painting–and some pictures soon. In the meantime, some short commentary on Barack Obama’s choice of Joe Biden for the VP slot.

After initial concern and sleeping on it, I think Biden is a very strong choice. Over the years I have tended to like him more than most. And in addition to the obvious foreign policy credentials, he comes with several advantages that are not visible initially: He is the poorest senator and rides the train back to Delaware every night from work – this will allow him to connect to working-class voters and help Obama from being branded an elitist. Biden got to work on this task immediately at their first joint appearance, coming out strong with a line that had me in stitches:

In a sign to Mr. McCain that friendship only goes so deep in politics, Mr. Biden went so far as to mock the Arizona senator for owning at least seven houses, as he talked about the kitchen-table conversations struggling Americans were having today. “That’s not a worry John McCain has to worry about,” he said. “It’s a pretty hard experience: He’ll have to figure out which of the seven kitchen tables to sit at.”

He is also from Scranton, PA, a place where Hillary Clinton also has roots and where she crushed Obama in the primary. He is Catholic, a voting bloc that Obama has struggled with. And maybe most importantly, he loves to campaign. He can be very funny, and he drew some of the most coverage at the earlier Democratic debates for his one-liners. Anyone remember his one-word answer in response to a question about his verbosity? Or how he crushed Rudy Guilani here, and oh yes, also here? These clips should reassure anyone concerned about his campaigning skills.

The most amazing article I found about Biden, however, was published the day before his selection by David Brooks, someone whose writing I feel is very up and down, but who is no doubt very smart. In it, Brooks, who is often critical of Obama, openly hoped that Obama would choose Biden, and gave a laundry list of reasons why that is the best defense of the Biden pick I have seen so far.

Of course, Biden has obvious risks as well, and was not the safest choice. That would probably have been Evan Bayh. I do not think his years in Washington will hurt Obama as many have suggested. Rather, it is that he has a history of saying very stupid things at inopportune moments. He quit his first campaign for president after plagiarizing comments from a British politician, and made comments about Obama the day he announced for president that were meant with respect, but came out as racially insensitive, and frankly, boneheaded. As far as campaigning goes, when Biden is good, he is great, and is often best when unscripted. But he is also a documented gaffe machine. If he stays on message he will be a strong asset to the ticket; but if he says something stupid again, it could be disastrous. If Obama-Biden wins, I don’t think there is any stronger pick for the actual work of vice-president, aside from maybe Bill Richardson.

Finally, I have to include one article on the state of the election because it is just so damn good. The NYT has been on a roll recently, but this article by Frank Rich is the best description of the state of the election at present and of what Obama needs to do to win. It even includes a reference to Hiroshima!

…pictures of Hiroshima coming soon.

Travel Update

I found a night bus that’s pretty cheap from Fukuoka to Hiroshima, so after all it looks like I WILL be going here:

Travel Is Hard

So, another 3-day weekend.  Here is where I want to go, to meet a friend:

Or, from another angle:

Sadly, here is the cost of a train ticket each way from Isahaya to Hiroshima:

１０７６０ ¥

In other words, approximately this much:

$100

Hmm…

If any of you American family or friends come to Japan, you can do what I did 3 years ago and buy a 3 week unlimited bullet train pass for about $500.  Pretty amazing deal.  With a Visa, can’t do it anymore.  無理！Needless to say I will be spending a lot of time searching out cheap buses, night trains, etc. for upcoming travels.  I won’t have extended vacations for a little while, but I will have lots of 3-day weekends during Japanese holidays.  With the right mode of transportation, that’s enough to enjoy a couple days anywhere in western Japan.  There is a lot to see here…

This Is Where I Live Now

In your wildest imaginations, here:

More broadly, here.

More specifically, here. On the island of Kyushu, Inside the bounds of Nagasaki prefecture (the black Nagasaki), in a city slightly to the northeast of Nagasaki city (the red Nagasaki).

Even more specifically, here:

Isahaya At Dusk

Nagasaki prefecture is famous for its international history of trade with the Dutch and Chinese during the period when Japan was otherwise closed to foreign contact. As such, it is the most Christianized prefecture in Japan. It is also famous obviously for the bomb, and for Champon, an amazing noodle soup that looks as if some Japanese-Chinese mixed family just pulled all the random things out of their fridge and threw them into a bowl.

Isahaya in particular is known for being a central trading area for the surrounding farming communities (i.e. rice fields). This means all the trains go through Isahaya, which is very good for me.

I will be teaching English at six different junior high and elementary schools in the surrounding countryside. Later I will post more about my “job”, but right now I will leave you with what is most important in life: my Japanese cell phone:

This is my phone, except mine is gunmetal and therefore better.

Needless to say much time has been spent appropriating numbers and emails through the magic of infrared. And yes, it says WIN on it, and yes, that is pretty great.

Welcoming To Japan!

Welcome to my Japan blog! I am a first-year ALT on the JET Program in Nagasaki-ken, Isahaya-shi, or　長崎県、諫早市。 This blog will not be a journal, nor will it be a chronological catalog of everything that happens to me during my English-teaching and other adventures in Japan. Rather it will most likely evolve into a smattering of the most insane things I witness as a 外人 in this wonderful land, random observations about the country that will attempt (and probably fail) to stay away from the stereotypical, the blanket, and the ridiculous. All of this will mix with a little bit of the personal, i.e. the blog is not about Japan persay but my life here, and will most likely be very sarcastic from time to time (I can’t help it, I watch too much South Park). Also, I make no apologies for my obsession with hyperlinking.  If you’re still interested, welcome, and please bookmark and comment! If not, go back to Korea! (jokes!)