Nippon (日本) continued

We’re currently driving through the beautiful Nagano mountains, en route back to Tokyo.   It’s been two weeks in Japan, and high school students have come and gone for the summer school.    This Japan trip has been jam-packed with activities, much moreso than China.   Between teaching, talking with high school students, going on planned outings, and participating in the many summer camp activities, I am totally exhausted but happy.  At first, I was a bit overwhelmed by the combination of new living conditions, busyness, and lack of sleep.  Even so, I think that some of that culture shock/adjustment has made me more confident in my ability to travel a bit more adventurously.    Now I know that I can survive without Western-style living conditions.  Japanese futons (the word “futon” actually comes from Japanese), which are basically padded floor cushions, are good enough for me. 

Obuse was a pretty cute place to explore.    I’m glad that I got to spend time in the Japanese countryside as opposed to just staying in Tokyo.   For one thing, the food is much better and more vegetarian-friendly than Tokyo.  Obuse has lots of locally grown vegetables and, as it’s not on the coast, is not as heavy on fish as other parts of Japan.    During the one week that the high school students were here, while the summer school was in session,  I didn’t have that much time to explore, but we did manage to make a few outings to the town center to get Chestnut ice cream!    Besides the amazing vegetables, Obuse is also known for locally grown chestnuts.   You can actually see chestnut trees everywhere – the chestnuts are spiky and green on the outside.    I tried chesnut ice cream, chestnut rice,  chestnut oyaki …you name it and it is chestnut-flavored in Obuse.    The roads are literally paved with chestnuts, because the sidewalk tiles in the town center are made of chestnut tree wood.   Did I mention that it's really beautiful?

We’ve been all over the place in Nagano, actually.   On one memorable night of the summer school, all of the university and high school students did home stays around Obuse.   Mine, along with the other university girls, was at a Zen Buddhist temple.    It turns out that Japanese Zen Buddhist monks are allowed to marry, drink alcohol, and eat meat, much less strict than in other schools of Buddhism.   At the temple, we all woke up at 6 am and practiced “zazen” meditation.   Staying at a temple is an opportunity that I will likely not have again in the near future, and everything about the temple and its grounds felt peaceful.

Yesterday, we visited Shinano junior high school, a neighboring town to Obuse, and we ran a mini Q&A session as a way of giving back to the Shinano community.    (The town funded our stay last night at the beautiful YWCA camp grounds...more on that later.)   It was a fascinating look into education in Japan.    The main thing that I noticed at Shinano JHS was how quiet and reserved the students were, much the opposite of noisy middle schools in the US.  While language was a huge barrier – junior high school students have just started learning English – the students were either afraid or not interested in talking to me.    I found myself talking with the English teacher, an American, in the classroom due to the general atmosphere of silence.  I’ve found it to be difficult to communicate with students here due to the language/culture gap, though the students at the summer school were much easier to talk to than at Shinano JHS.

The Japanese emphasis on politeness and hospitality is lovely, but it also is a little bit frustrating in that I often have no idea what people are actually thinking.  Additionally, the politeness comes with a whole set of social rules – ranging from never ever J-walking, to taking off your shoes everywhere, to being incredibly selfless – that are quite conformist.  While the Chinese government enforces conformity, in Japan the society itself does.

The other fascinating cultural aspect in Japan, for me anyway, has been the collectivist attitude.    Even the way the HLAB summer school runs is based on a solid community of people who work for the good of the summer school because they believe in its mission (which I certainly do!).   I’ve done a lot of “voluntary” cleaning at HLAB, whether it’s helping throw out the trash, put away bedding, or cleaning the bathroom because that’s what everyone does – they help out.    People do nice things for the social good, and so you do as well.   While I like the idea of collectivism on the surface and love the idea of doing good deeds, I’m definitely a more individualistic kind of girl.    I’d rather do good deeds because I feel like it, rather than out of a sense of obligation.    Moreover it often feels that people put their own health and happiness below that of society, rather than on par with it, and feels a bit too self-sacrificing to me.  That being said, my time in Japan has definitely inspired me to be more thoughtful and kind towards others in my daily life.   More on how my teaching went in the next post!