Sparklers

The sparking fizz of the blazing stick in my hand made my heart leap for a moment, but with delight, not fear. Mari had purchased a variety pack of sparklers on the way to the park where our small group of friends met for a sunset picnic, and though a bloodthirsty swarm of mosquitoes drove us from our tarp within minutes of arriving, the party continued at Romain's cluttered apartment, where we devoured our combini banquet with Korean Sake and French lounge music. The sake was drained swiftly, as we lounged back on the tatami and chatted in English, Japanese, and French, and eventually the pack of sparklers began to call to us like an overripe fruit begging to be plucked. Towing along a broken hula-hoop and a bucket of water (entertainment and safety, respectively), we stumbled through the heavy night air to the parking lot opposite Romain's place, and eagerly ripped at the thin plastic encasing our treasure. When Mari had phoned me earlier that evening to invite me to the petite fete, she had asked me to bring a lighter, and now I stood with the bright plastic torch in my hand, the master of ceremonies. I flipped the flint; a column of yellow flame leapt up, and as I tipped the cluster of thin spindles into the fire, a burst of white sparks erupted like a font of light. I quickly passed the fizzling sparklers around, each small torch illuminating the childish delight spreading like fire on everyone's faces. We jumped and spun about on the parking lot asphalt, still hot from the sunny afternoon, twirling like lunatics in the joy of feeling ten years old once again. The sparklers flamed for fifteen seconds, then spattered out. Eager to continue our revelry, we quickly passed around another set of new sparklers, then another, until all that was left in the pack were a set of "dropping ball" fireworks. These very special firecrackers are used by Japanese children in competitions: everyone lights his sparkler at the same time, igniting a thin string that flares up into a tiny glowing sphere of light. As the sparkler burns, the glowing sphere grows as it descends down the string, eventually falling under its own weight and extinguishing on the ground. The last one with a glowing sphere intact is the winner. We all crouched down close together, hushed and concentrated on coordinating the ignition. Each of our spheres flared in a miniature show of lights, slowly dropping down the string in delicate beauty. A moment before we were jumping about and shouting like madmen, but now we crouched and spoke in near-whispers, afraid to disturb the exquisite orbs of light. One by one, the spheres dropped from the strings, falling into grey ash on the pavement, until there was only one left, and then it too fell and left us all in darkness.

Riding home that night, while musing at the fun of hula-hoops and sake, I thought how so much in life is like the sparklers we wrote our names with in the night. Flaring for a moment of ecstasy, blinding us with bursting light, then extinguishing just as quickly, leaving only the cloudy white tracks burned on our retinas. I suppose the trick of it is to nurture our joy, like small dropping balls of light, being careful not to shake the root. Or perhaps, after the white glow has burned its last, we should turn our faces upward, settling into the millions of tiny sparklers which wink and glow overhead, unshakable in their rapture.

*photo by Gareth Coker

The Green Chapel

My small backpack was stocked with two bottles of green tea, three bundles of rice and nori, one packet of matcha-flavored "American Soft" chocolate chip cookies, five maps of Nikko and my camera; I was prepared. All of last week I promised to reward my hard work at school with a weekend day trip to Nikko, a historic town located in western Tochigi. I kept a map of Nikko stuck between two English textbooks in the bookshelf above my desk, for the purpose of stealing peeks throughout the workday at the hiking routes that wind up into the mountains. And though on Sunday morning lounging on my futon until noon sounded quite nice, I forced myself to get up and cruise my bike down to JR Station to catch the 9:38 Nikko train.
It's not a long train ride up to Nikko, maybe 45 minutes of rocking through the verdant rice fields, the air growing milkier with mist the closer Nikko becomes. From the train station, it wasn't difficult to follow the other tourists meandering up to the shrine district, which is world-famous and the main draw for nearly all visitors to Nikko. After pausing to admire the ancient red foot bridge that marks the unofficial gateway to the shrines, I walked past all the fanny-packed Europeans and found my way (after becoming lost several times) to a trailhead. I'm sure the shrines are magnificent, and I intend to visit them at some point, but my mission on Sunday was to enjoy a nice walk in the woods. I followed the trail as it wound gently up into Nikko National Park, passing through a forest thick with ancient trees and lichen-painted stone Buddas. There were several other tourists on the path, but the further away from the Shrine District I climbed, the fewer voices joined the undying pulse of cicadas, until eventually the edges of the path became swallowed by tall grass, and I found myself quite alone with the trees.
For a moment I was lost, the path having disappeared behind me, and then I came upon it: a still and velvety cove of moss. The shoulder-high grass I had been pushing through fell back to reveal an arboreal sanctuary within the forest, a clustering of stones and fallen trees, all blanketed in a gentle mantle of moss. Awed by the beauty of it, I let out a vocal sigh, and startled myself at the sound of my own voice, which was quickly swallowed up in the mossy acoustics. I feared at first treading upon the delicate little plants, though quickly overcame my hesitation and stepped into the perfect scene as if entering a storybook illustration. And like a character in a book, I settled down on a moist and fuzzy boulder and sat admiring the life about me until I though I might burst from the joy of it.
Finding my way back wasn't difficult; after pulling myself away from the mystical spectacle, I found the main road quite easily, and followed it to the shrines. I made my route back to the train station skirting along the edge of the popular grouping of buildings, and noted the elegant eaves of red lacquer and gold, the elaborate carvings, the painted statues.
The famous shrines and temples of Nikko are, indeed, quite lovely. But there is another temple in Nikko, not so far from the edge of town. There are no golden eaves or statues, no walls or scrolls to speak of. Only a thick and inviting carpet, renewing each day a celebration of the subtler beauty which surrounds us.

Morning Appointment

I woke this morning to the soft pattering sound of raindrops tapping on the eaves, and knew before opening my eyes what the coolness of the air meant. Our heat wave was finally broken, if but for a moment, by a rainstorm sneaking in during the night. Inspired by the relief provided by the cold front, I rose early and took a long bath before dressing for work and heading out on my bicycle.
As I was tossing my work bag into my bike basket, I nearly didn’t notice the small green twig with legs who clung fiercely to the weave of the basket. Using a rock I found laying nearby on the ground, I carefully pried the walking stick from his perch and placed him on the ground, after which he scooted away in a lateral fashion.

Determined not to be deterred by the fine mist which fell from the slate-gray morning sky, I made an indirect route to school, cycling to a nearby park and stopping at the grocer on the way to pick up a few items for breakfast. Visiting the park for a breakfast picnic in the drizzle seemed an odd combination of decadence and misfortune, and I delighted in the morning chorus of crickets, cicadas, crows, and bullfrogs which sang to me as I nibbled on my red bean bun. Despite the rain, the park was busy with tottering grandpas practicing their morning exercises and young mothers pushing baby carriages; I received more than a few curious glances as my kitten heels clicked against the damp cobblestone path, echoing in the invisible chamber of precipitation hanging in the bowers.
My morning appointment in the park has suggested to me the value of small pleasures. Its calmness has stuck with me all day, much like the bits of moss I found tucked in the treads of my shoes. I am reminded of how important it is to be gentle with ourselves. We must depend on ourselves for this care, as we are the keepers of our own happiness.

Cobwebs and Kami

Determined to break my streak of isolation, I met a friend for coffee at Starbucks today after work, and (being in a mindset of experimentation) felt an obligation to order the most unusual item on the menu: The Matcha Frappuccino. As an earnest fan of matcha (Japanese green tea made from powdered crushed tea leaves), I had nothing but positive expectations for my Jappuccino, and was not wholly disappointed. The concoction tasted much like a matcha-flavored milkshake, and was even topped with a generous mountain of whipped cream. Oh tamai matchafrappuccinoai itashimasu!

My venture downtown for a coffee date extended into the evening after I ran into Romain and Mari, two other JETs, who were on their way to the Utsunomiya Shrine in the middle of downtown. As dusk fell on the city and we mounted the steep stone steps leading to the shrine, Romain, a French Coordinator of International Relations who has lived in Utsunomiya for a year now, explained to us the significance of the buildings. After purifying ourselves at the mizusashi just inside the large gateway, we wandered around the compound, pausing beneath the giant Ginkgo trees and bathing in the buzz of cicadas. Coming to a smaller building to the left of the main shrine, we paused as Romain explained the stone statues of foxes lining the path to the shrine’s doorway. As he stepped over the threshold into the darkening chamber, Mari gave me a worried look.
“Hadn’t you better not...?” her voice hesitated in the question mark.
I turned to her and asked, “Are people not supposed to go in there?”
We peered into the darkened room where Romain had disappeared, seeing only the slivery reflection of the polished mirror on the alter. “It’s not that so much, it’s just there is a belief that the spirits come out at dusk, and Japanese people think it’s a bad idea to enter a shrine at this time; you may run into a ghost.” Her words hung in the thick air of the doorway, falling into the darkened space where Romain lingered unseen.
The delicate stylet of a mosquito pricked my dampened neck.
“Hey Romain, let’s go. Can you even see anything in there?” I called into the shadows. His lanky form stepped into the dusky light.
“Oh, not much. Just a bunch of cobwebs. It’s getting pretty dark, no?” As we followed the stepping stones back to the main gate and Romain brushed the dust from his shirtsleeves, I turned back for one last glimpse of the small shine behind us. A shimmer of silvery light flickered from the gloaming and for a moment, my pulse quickened at the sighting. But then I remembered the crude polished mirror adorning the alter. It had only been the reflection of the eventide sky playing back at me.

Or perhaps it was the kami stirring from the boughs overhead.

I’m content with either possibility.

“Now is the time of night
when the graves, all open wide,
send the ghosts that haunt the night.
And we spirits to run
from the presence of the sun,
following darkness like a dream.
And I am sent with broom before
to sweep the dust behind the door.”
- Puck, A Midsummer Night’s Dream

Breakfast Companion

The early light flitering through the rice papers of my bedroom window this morning pulled me into wakefulness, and for a moment I thought I was in Boulder again, nestled in the foothills of the Rockies and not my futon cacoon on the hard tatami of my Utsunomiya flat. Again, too much sleep drugged my conciousness today; I slept for nearly 12 hours last night, worrying me for strange African illnesses I may have brought with me as unwanted omiyage. As comfort and breakfast companion, I wrote postcards home as I sipped madagascar vanilla red rooibos tea (a popular African tea left behind, unopened, by my predecessor), getting up every now and then to stir the sauteeing green beans and egg on my small gas range. All of yesterday I went without speaking, and broke the stretch only for a moment this morning when greeting the only other teacher who came to my school today. The school, like my still and quiet apartment, was empty all day long, and I was left to sit at my desk and look busy for the offchance that someone might actually walk through the sliding doors to the teachers' office and notice me.
My time at work today allowed me to be productive in overviewing my predecessors' teaching materials and lesson plans, which was interesting and gave me a good perspective of what I can expect to be doing in the coming year.
I also took some time in the morning to slip away from my desk and do some exploring. As I mentioned, the school was nearly empty, but after a bit of searching I did come across a few other individuals.

Two girls giggle and throw erasers at eachother in the chemistry lab, postponing the study they have met to conduct.

A small man with heavy glasses shuffles along the shadowy third-floor cooridor, busy reading from a stack of papers he carries with him.

A lone girl sits in the back row of an empty classroom, her headphones on and her nose in a textbook. On the board someone has written in English "Why postpone for tomorrow what can be done today?"

I sneak back to my desk and hold the images like a secret, opening my books and pretending I have been working hard all morning.

And so, like this, all day I sat at my desk and tried not to look at the big schoolroom clock hanging on the wall above the exit. Four o'clock came, and with it, the end of my first full day at Utsunomiya Girls Senior High. One down. A few hundred to go. I think I can manage. The silence of the empty hallways makes a most wonderful work companion.

English Focus Week

When I first received notice that I would be participating in English Focus Week 2006, I was still in the States. The "invitation" came in the form of an email from my prefectures supervisor stating something like, "you have been invited to participate in EFW 2006, and we are looking forward to your involvement." I just got back from the camp yesterday, and I won't try and say that it was all hard work. In fact, my participation involved as little work as possible, as my duty was simply to sit in the back of the room and observe the contracted professional English teachers from the UK do their magic. This magic, which on day one of the camp promised a room full of 30 nervous teenagers improvement in English speaking skills, was perhaps rusty or rendered ineffective by the high altitude of the retreat center where the camp took place. (I'm trying to be generous, here.) In short, the three UK instructors were more than a bit displeased by just about every aspect of the camp's facilitation: from the communication with the prefectural Board of Education, to the presence of myself and other JETs in the classroom, to the English ability of the students. These teachers did not try, in any way, to conceal their strong feelings of contempt from anyone (even the students), and let the JETs and Japanese teachers know from day one that they were angered by our presence.

Let me say that it has been a challenging week.

While my first reaction was to meet their ill feelings with anger, I soon realized that I had no desire to spend the week being bored and pissed off, so instead tried to focus my energies on interacting with the kids as much as possible (allowed during meals and break periods only). This proved, I believe, the best approach to dealing with the ugliness of it all, and I got to have some fun with the kids.

And so now I'm (finally) back home in Utsunomiya, though I've in total spent more time at camp than I have at my house. I've been feeling in a daze since I got back into town yesterday, sleeping far too much last night, then falling into a nap again this afternoon. Tomorrow I go back to my school and spend the day sitting at my desk daydreaming about what I might have for dinner at the Brazilian cafe I'm meeting friends at tomorrow night. I wonder if the Brazilians serve their cuisine on a stick, too...

Miya Matsuri

Even though the procession of the shrines was four blocks away, I could feel the deep rumbling of the Tyco drums through the thin soles of my summer sandals. My feet were already tired from marching up and down the pavement alongside ODori all day long, but my excitement for seeing the procession made me forget any weariness; my determination was fueled by curiosity, street food, and cheap beer.
The timing of my arrival in Utsunomiya couldn’t have been better. The city’s largest festival, one that brings in over 500,000 people from all over Tochigi, transformed downtown Utsunomiya this weekend into a wonderland of giant crepe flowers, paper lanterns, little girls in kimono, and mobs of fit young men wearing nothing but a bit of cotton over their manly parts. I never quite got the full story on the purpose of the party, but gathered that it had something to do with carrying all the neighborhood shrines from all over the city to the base of the giant shrine in the middle of downtown. The shrines are carried on giant beams of wood, held up by strapping lads (and some ladies) who, while sweating turrets and grimacing in pain and ecstasy, chant out rhythmically to the lead of the young women who straddle the beams above them. The girls lash at the crowd with paper fans and elated cheers. These shrines (not to mention the wooden beams and ladies atop) are neither small nor lightweight; a crowd of dozens is needed to haul the whole fete a pied, and dozens more march behind and jump in as alternates as needed. Even after sunset, the concrete jungle of the city pulses with wet heat; the minimal dress of the processioners is necessary for coping.
My appreciation lies with this summertime fashion, as it does with several other elements of the festival:

1. Drinking beer in the street (though I’m told this is legal in Japan year-round; doing it at the festival with everyone else makes me feel like less of a lush, though...)
2. Costume in public (kimono and similar)
3. Sheer volume of people in festival disposition
4. Japanese street food

This last point is perhaps my favorite,and deserves its own sub-list:
a. fried squid balls
b. fried mochi potato cakes
c. fried cheese balls
d. fried chicken
e. fried fish cake
f. soba omelet
g. candied apple
h. yake soba
i. fried red-bean mochi cake
j. more fried squid balls
*please note that with the exception of (f), (h), and (i), everything listed above was served on a stick, making it all the more delicious.

After two days at the festival, I feel as though I may have used up my caloric allowance for the month of August, but have no plans on honoring it. Instead, I’ve pledged to cool it for awhile on the squid balls (and most other things which come in spherical form, fried, and on a stick).


Tomorrow I head North to Nasu Shiobara, where I’ll be participating in a children’s “English Focus Week” camp. I’m not sure of the 30 children participating in the five-day overnight camp have volunteered themselves or are serving penance for misbehavior. I’ll find out by the degree to which we gaijin are clowns or jail keepers.

Genisis

Lake Naivasha
Originally uploaded by oncemore.

The air above the lake is heavy and wet, still as though it has hovered over the water all day with no visitors to disturb it. And yet there is something sweet and refreshing about its weight, a welcome change from the claustrophobic squeeze of the matatu which brought me here from Nairobi. I have escaped the city and now must only worry for the hippos, who lurk undetectable below the rippled surface under my feet. It is nearly dusk here, the sky turning blue to purple to pink, reflecting on the lake's surface in a deeper, mudded grey. But to a stranger walking into this moment, it could be mistaken for dawn. The potential of the empty lake before me suggests something on the threshold of birth.
Picking my way carefully out onto the worn and precarious dock, the smooth wooden planks below my feet clank together and make the sound of dry bones clapping.
The dark form of a bird slices through the sky overhead, and I am reminded I'm not alone.
The lake is my companion. Open, calm, waiting.
It is with this feeling of threshold that I stand at the beginning of my new life here in Japan. I have brought with me two suitcases and the love of all who are dear to me. Behind me lays the dusty eternal summer of Africa. Before me stretches a most beautiful question mark of potential. In between, my bare feet brush the smooth planks of anticipation, memory, nostalgia, and excitement, pushed together above the surface and warmed by the rising sun.