Thanksgiving

So yesterday was Thanksgiving. I had no idea until I saw all the "Happy Thanksgiving" posts online. Of course, by then it was pretty much too late for me - I'm about a day ahead of the U.S.

Obviously, the Japanese don't celebrate Thanksgiving. The pilgrims and natives didn't quite make it out this far. Occasionally I explain Thanksgiving to students - eat lots of food and watch football. They have a few family gathering and feasting holidays, so that's understandable, but the whole pilgrims/natives thing is way beyond their grasp.

Another obviously, Brits and Aussies don't do Thanksgiving either. But the Canadians do - in October. That threw me for a loop when my students would ask about my Thanksgiving plans a month early. I had a few polite disagreements until another teacher filled me in. I looked at some Thanksgiving history online and it turns out the holiday was only officially established with a specific day this century. Before that, it was pretty much celebrated whenever people felt like it. So it makes sense - Canada just picked a different day.

Anyway, my Thanksgiving was uneventful. I sat around my apartment pretty much all day and went to capoeira class that night. Thanksgiving dinner? Chicken curry.

Minou Park

Fall is in full swing out here, and it's a great time to go wander around Osaka's many parks and temples. It's also great for me since I don't have a job. Every day is a holiday! And the parks are free, which serves my bum self well.

Last weekend, some of my old students (Rika and Yumiko - in the picture) took me up to Minou park in north Osaka. They drove, which is an event in itself. I don't have a car, as public transportation is more than adequate to get me anywhere outside my bike's range. This makes car rides somewhat of an adventure, and I'm like a kid staring out the window the whole time.

Minou is famous for its waterfall, which is really quite nice. The park is pretty much just a big mountain with some river valleys and a few roads through it. Tough walking, but very scenic. It's also well stocked with yatai - food stalls selling snacks, drinks, and gifts. One of my favorite parts of sightseeing is taking in as much yatai food as possible, it's usually pretty cheap and just plain fun to eat.

The other thing about Minou that really got me wanting to check it out is the monkeys. I've been here in Japan over two years now, and I haven't seen any of the notorious wild monkeys. My friends told me the park is full of them; but once we got there and didn't see any, they changed to being a lucky encounter. Leaving the park without seeing any monkeys, I was rather crestfallen. That's when we saw them - right as the sun was setting and we were winding down the mountain road out of the park. They were just sitting on the curb, some were even in the street. We pulled up next to a few to get some pictures, but I was really nervous about rolling the window down. I kept visualizing the monkey freaking out because of the flash, then jumping into the window in a fit of rage. Luckily, I managed to snap off one decent shot with the window down. Enjoy - my wild monkey encounter!

Eat It Raw

When I was a kid, sushi was the most disgusting food I could imagine. Who in their right mind would eat raw fish? As far as I knew, if you didn't cook fish, eating it would be slow death for sure.

Obviously, I was wrong and my tastes have changed greatly. I have since grown to love raw seafood. Before I could stomach sushi, I ate raw oysters with aplomb. Back in the states, I even had occasion to try calamari, uncooked. But I had no idea of the world of bleeding fresh meat awaiting me here in Japan.

The first item on the menu, yuke. This is a Korean dish, found at your average yaki niku Korean barbeque restaurant. Simple recipe: sliced, uncooked beef. The first time I tried it was in a ricebowl/salad dish. That was also the first time I really dug into some raw beef. Once the initial "it didn't kill me" fear was overcome, I was ready to move onto the real deal; straight yuke with a raw egg. As you can see, not so pretty, but very tasty.

Here I am modelling some lovely raw liver. I'm not sure what animal it's from, since they eat just about anything's organs over here, but I would hazard it's cow. It goes well with a little soy sauce, some chopped onion sprouts, and horseraddish. Personally, I'm not a big fan of liver; I don't like the texture - a bit gritty.

This last one was a killer, about $15 for 6 or 7 slices of super-premium beef. Served with some wasabi and soy sauce, this is basically cow sashimi. It's so soft it melts in your mouth. You can also get this in horse meat; usually eaten with thin sliced onions, lemon, and horseraddish. Either way, it's awesome and worth the money, at least once.

The thing I like most about eating all the uncooked food is that it's so un-American. Like I said, I grew up under the impression that raw food meant certain death, everything has to be cooked or you'll catch some terrible disease. Bullshit. As long as the food is properly prepared and stored, there's no problem. Raw fish, beef, chicken, pork, eggs - they eat it all out here. And there's even more....I'm still looking for a restaurant that serves live octopi. I've seen it on video!

I'm 25

Just wrapped up my birthday weekend, but I'll probably be getting more presents and such in the coming weeks anyway. The Japanese are excessively generous that way.

Last night I went out to one of the local hip-hop clubs with some friends from the gym. It was fun, even though I didn't get drunk and pick up any girls - the supposed birthday tradition. Just had a few drinks, danced a little, and chatted up a few Japanese chicks. A fine time by my very sedate standards.

Saturday I went out to dinner with a freind. She treated me, and boy, do I feel like an ass for it. We went to a yaki niku restaurant, and a pretty nice one at that. The bill ended up near $100. I offered to take it, but she insisted. I'm thinking I'd better jump the country before her birthday comes around, lord knows I can't foot that much.

Friday was capoeira class. The tradition is to have a birthday roda, where the birthday celebrant has to play everyone. It's really hard, especially since the instructors usually play last and beat you up a bit. I was cut some slack, as there were two other people having their birthday rodas with me (that's them in the picture). So I only had to play a third of the time and could take a break when I was tired. But I felt pretty good in there, I played aggressively and maybe at my highest speed.

My first birthday party this year came last Sunday, when some of my old students took me out to a Korean place in Namba. Really nice restaurant, cool interior design. They gave me some nice gifts too, although it was a little tricky carrying it all home on my bike.

So I'm 25 now. This is my 3rd birthday in Japan, and I would say the best. The first one I had out here was kinda quiet, I didn't really know many people. I can't remember the second one, so it probably wasn't very eventful. And this one, being rather low-key, has been just the way I like to celebrate.

Phalluses Everywhere

When I was a freshman back at UF, I took a class on Japanese culture. The teacher was probably the smartest person I've ever met, the guy was exceptionally insightful and observant. One thing he mentioned when discussing architecture and monuments is that they are often phallic, and how it was odd that the alligator statue near Turlington is decidedly not. From that brief aside, I've always been one to notice when something is discreetly or indisceetly penis-shaped.

Behold the PL tower. It's the central hub of the Perfect Liberty cult, located in pissant Tondabayashi. I worked right down the street from this thing, so I saw it every day, for hours at a time. This little religious group is rather shady to me, but the Japanese have no complaints. Their schools are top-notch, their golf club is big business, and they put on what might be the world's largest fireworks show every August. They also have a fucking giant penis tower. The funny thing is, the locals think nothing of it. When I ask them what the popular sight-seeing spots in town would be for foreigners, no one ever says the huge freaky dick building. I've always wanted to go inside, I think there are like offices in there or something, but you have to be in the cult.

I also get a kick out of this one. This is Kujira Koen or "whale park" in the Namba Walk underground mall. It's a bunch of stone whales that look like they're jumpng out of the ground. I'm willing to bet that the artist who designed them had no idea he or she was making such obviously phallic statues. And again, the Japanese seem to take no notice. But there they are: giant penises.

Batizado in Shiga

Today was a new experience for me - I went to another group's batizado. I've been playing capoeira for about six years now, and I've had 5 batizados. Besides those, I've been to two others, but they were still Capoeira Brasil. So today was the first time I saw a batizado that I wasn't directly involved with. How was it? Not very good.

That's not to say it was bad, though. Instrutor Kenji is awesome, he's got an amazing game and treats everyone with the utmost respect. The guests were also great; they were pretty much the same the people that came to our batizado last month. And I did find it interesting to see how they give out new cords, grade students, and generally run things.

What got me was the timing of it all. I'm used to a little more game time from the participants; they just blew through all the gradings, one game per student. The whole batizado was over in like an hour. It just felt really rushed.

After the batizado came the real killer - a workshop. Our group always holds workshops and lectures the week before the batizado, and the day of is left to focus on the event. An extra class just didn't sit with me, especially since I was already exhausted and had just come to watch and maybe play a game or two. I ended up wasting 1000 yen to sit through most of a lecture I didn't understand and walk out to join a free angola roda.

My instructor was ready to go as soon as the batizado was over - I should have listened to him. We ended up leaving a little early, but he was right about getting home as soon as possible. I seem to forget that he's been to a lot of these things, and knows a hell of a lot more about how to handle them.

In all, it was an enlightening experience and I certainly appreciate our group's batizados more now. It also got me thinking more about going home in May to see my old school's batizado and trying to bring some of the people here with me. I'm already getting psyched about it.

Breakfast

I've recently turned over a new stone in my life - a healthy diet. Well, it may not be entirely healthy, I can't quite read the nutritional information on the packaging here, but I think it's pretty much balanced, fresh, and not loaded with the bad stuff I read about online. And no where does my new-found focus on smart eating present itself better than in my breakfast.

I like to start with a nice bowl of miso soup with some tofu and wakame. Wakame is a kind of seaweed; I get the dried variety because it keeps longer and I love watching it change from these little crispy flakes into big green chunks of seaweed. Tofu is also a big plus in the miso. Back in the states, I remember getting little pieces of fried tofu, but now I use big, soft, fresh cubes. Throw a little Chinese pepper into the mix and you've practically got a meal right there.

After the soup, natto. Very few people outside Japan know what natto is, and for good reason - it's the worst food you'll ever have. The basic description is fermented soy beans, but that leaves out the full sensory experience of this decidely Japanese food. It stinks, it's sticky, it's brown, it's soft. When you eat it, these long strings of goo attach to everything; imagine caramel but thinner and longer. No one likes natto, unless you're Japanese, or you really make yourself like it. I took the second option, resisting the gag reflex and eating the stuff everyday until - gasp - I came to like it. Now, the Japanese will go on and on singing the praises of natto; claiming it fights diseases like cancer and AIDS; it's the best fertilizer in the world; it keeps you young and healthy. The truth to most of these claims is dubious, but I'm sure it's certainly not bad for you. It's also pretty cheap and easy to prepare, which fits well into my menu.

Western foods are also on my breakfast table, but with a little Japanese twist. I can't get away from toast and jelly, and I've never had better than the stuff I eat here. The Japanese love thick-sliced bread, which is perfect for toasting, and have some rather tasty blueberry jelly on the cheap. My piece de resistance is the bowl of chocolate cornflakes, yogurt, and chopped banana. Yogurt is a very popular ingredient here, especially in drinks, so tubs of plain are a good buy. And you can't go wrong with bananas and cornflakes, even the chocolate kind. Finally, being a Florida boy, I have to have my daily fix of orange juice, no question.

Lately, I've been gorging on kaki - persimmons in English. The Japanese diet is very seasonal, and kaki is an autumn food. I wolf down around 3 a day, and since they're in season, that's only like a dollar. The goal is to cut back on my sugar, switch over to more natural foods and snacks. The Japanese do not throw pounds of sugar into everything they eat, so just being here has already made me cut down. Back home, I was never one to jump all over a bag of Oreos, I never really had a sweet tooth. My, how that's changed. I'm a total chocoholic, I love anything remotely sweet now. The ice cream case at the grocer's my as well be full of crack. The upshot is that I actually really like food now, it's not just stuff to stop my stomach from grumbling. In the end, eating and cooking have become a great pleasure for me.