Lantern festival

Due to the large chinese community here the inauguration of the chinese new year is a big event here and to brighten up the city, they have colourful lanterns (especially red ones) just everywhere and especially in Chinatown, chúkakai 中華街 . It lasts from the 29th February through the 12th March with every evening different events. Everyone eats white chinese dumplings and is in a good mood. I have only been during the day but in the evening it should be pretty spectacular.
The only unsettling thing I witnessed was an array of pigheads that were laid out on golden dishes in a litlle shrine (as a present to the gods I imagine). See below........
On the conversation side there is an opportunity that presented itself. Through a Japanese student here at the University, called Mai (studied in Utrecht for a year) I was introduced to an employee here at the planning department called Eguchi Akitaka 江口明孝, 31 years old, who wants to learn more and better english. At first he wanted to pay me (a first for me..!!) but I struck a deal so that we have one hour of English conversation and then one hour of Japanese. We'll meet every friday at 6.00 pm so that should be good.

Once again we have trouble with the exams here. They just put down an arbitrary date (monday the 13th) with 3 exams on the same day (duh..) knowing very well that most people will go on travels somewhere already before since our holiday starts on saturday the 11th February.
They threaten us that the Immigration office will throw us out of the country if we do not participate...???? Like they have the time, let alone the people to do all that. Really stupid. We'll see. It's definitely going to be interesting once again.
Don't you just love this country......!!!

Calligraphy

The last lecture in the Japanese Culture series for this semester was devoted to the art of Calligraphy....as the word indicates..writing in a beautiful manner. In Japanese it is called shodó 書道 (the way of writing) and the two ways of writing are gyósho 行書, semi cursive style and the more artistic sósho 叢書, cursive style , also known as grass writing.
The elementary utensils used are the black mat, shitakiji下記事 to put the paper on, the paperweight, bunchin文鎮 to hold the paper, hanshi 半紙 in place, the brushes, fude筆, the inkstone, suzuri硯 and ofcourse the ink, sumi墨 (comes in a stick normally) but we used ink in a bottle.
At first we practiced the numbers one through ten but after that we could try our hand at more complex charachters.
The end result wasn't that fab so I got my teacher, sensei 先生 to write my own charachters 'Karyuudo' 狩人 and one thing is sure I certainly couldn't have achieved this degree of perfection in a hundred years.

Today we celebrated Wei's birthday, one of the Taiwanese girls here, by going to an italian restaurant with about 25 people and enjoying each other's company. It's quite funny that you speak japanese, German and English with all kinds of different people...but mostly Japanese since that's the language we all have in common. Had pasta with clams and a small beer (unlike me actually..the small beer that is) but did have still some homework to do so couldn't get too tipsy.......

P.S
For those who like to see more of 'Hadogei' videos, check out this website with several episodes.......
http://video.google.com/videosearch?q=razor+ramon

Onsen

One of the relaxing things the Japanese do is take hot baths, called furo 風呂 , and based on the principle of the hotsprings, onsen 温泉 , that are overabundant in this country. And we have a fabulous one right here in Nichi machi (our neighbourhood). It's open till 3 o'clock in the morning and you can have beer and food too. Tonight Mads, Colin and myself went there at around 9 pm and the only thing you need to bring is a towel to dry yourself. I don't have picture of our onsen but you get an idea of what it looks like from this picture taken from the internet.
Apart from the finnish sauna (dry) and the turkish bath (steam) they have these hot tubs inside and outside with various temperatures (from 40 up to 43 and a cold one with just 15 degrees. What you do is first of all scrub yourself down with soap and shampoo and after that you just go and sit in the hot tubs. You can soak in one and then move on to the next one with a slightly higher temperature. They also have jetstream massage and some have coloured water (due to the minerals, I think). You can stay as long as you like and all that for the amazing sum of 500 Yen.
It's going to be a once a week happening I guess...cause I came out two hours later in a total 'Zen' frame of mind and looking like a wrinkled prune.

Webcam

After having thought for a while how utterly non-essential a Webcam is, I now arrived at the point that I wonder why so few people have one..... It's great. You get to see people all over the world during certain stages in the day. You get to wave, smile and send any old mimicry that you want. Bought a pair of small speakers as welll for the laptop..so I'm all set. Normally listen to Heart106.2 , a London based radiostation, Vivace, a classical station from Radio France, the american classical station Beethoven.com and the dutch Arrow Jazz FM and all that via the internet.
Next sunday I have my first meeting with a prospective conversational partner, called Naoko, a 38 year old woman. I wonder what kind of woman she is..since she calls her self "Wienerwald" as an alterego on the internet...see and be amused..!!

Spring is in the air.....

Today I received a symbolic broom called hóki 箒, from Aki. One that will reap in luck and good fortune for the coming year...and god knows I do need it..... You keep them in the house and next year on the 3rd January you bring it to a shrine to be burned and...you've guessed it, get another one.
The sun is shining brightly and I've started out to create my own , be it a little one, garden with herbs (coriander, spearmint and basil) and one actual plant, the Pointsettia left over from the X-mas period. I even got a doghouse with dog ( 可愛いね ) to guard the seedlings from...whatever it needs to be protected from. Lovely isn't it?

Elementary School

Last Tuesday we went for a day to a primary school in a fishing village just outside Nagasaki, called Nagasaki City Black Cape Eastern Primary School 長崎市立黒埼小学校 .
Not unlike the day we had last year at the Junior High School we were met by the kids, who welcomed us in a freezing sports　room which functions as an auditorium as well. One of us, Pim, did the counterspeech.
We made "original Dutch pancakes" with bacon, apple and just plain ones in the kitchen and to some they were a great success and to others not at all.
The fun thing about these little kids is that they are still totally carefree, and not yet embedded in the rigid social structures of Japan. A great day was had by all but somehow I can't stop feeling that I was part of a traveling "Freak Show".

A rather uneventful week passed by with my horrid cold still not completely gone. Did give a present to one of our teachers, the nicest one we have, called Kinoshita 木下 , which means "under the tree", who teaches Japanese conversation. She was pleasantly surpised to get Dutch 'stroopwafels'......I will hear next week if she liked them or not.
Did have a nice walk with Saul through Nagasaki this saturday, showing him the City Historical Museum, The Suwa shrine, Deshima island and finally Starbucks for a great 'Café Latte'.
We should do this more often..it clears your head and you get to see the delightful side of nagasaki as well.
Most importantly the sun is shining again and spring is about to arrive...Yeah..!!!!

Back with the living....

Well the doctor has finally left after about a week and apart from a croaky voice there is not a lot that reminds me of my moribund week.
First lecture today and it will take a bit of adjusting to the regular life again....but I'm sure I'll manage...

In bed with the doctor......

The sun is shining and it's fab 18 degrees and I'm in bed with a severe cold. Started with a sore throat and an inability to speak (to many people's delight) but now I'm sneezing and coughing away like a madman. Poor me! Did get cough drops and things to suck on but no it's not a good feeling.
I think going out with Saul last night for dinner wasn't the right thing to do either. Bundled up we met at the station and had a delightful dinner. Very pleasant guy who at around 65 decided to accept a job here in Nagasaki as a teamleader for the department of tropical and infectious diseases at the University, leaving comfy Washington DC behind for a more austere way of life.
Going to go back to bed now....will keep you posted..

Back in Nagasaki again

After an absolute fabulous two weeks in Amsterdam I safely arrived back in Nagasaki last sunday the 8th January after a long trip. It takes about 22 hours from door to door.
Saw a lot of friends and family and unfortunately I wasn't able to see everybody that I wanted to see. It was tough leaving with Paul taking me to the airport but once in the aircraft it felt OK.
Alex picked me up from Nagasaki Station 長崎駅前 , had coffee and headed back home for a home cooked meal. Realized that I couldn't read a thing anymore (in japanese that is) so it will be tough starting again.
The older you get the worse the jetlag becomes....having a hard time adjusting to my new rythm. Missed already my first lecture at 08.50 this morning.

Going to have dinner tomorrow evening with Saul Helfenbein, a american friend of Tim Mackay, who will be spending a year at Nagasaki University doing research or something at the department of Collaborative Studies (whatever that is). Will find out more tomorrow.
Put some new lights up in my room ( a gift from Paul all the way from Pnom Penh) and viewed 5 new episodes of Stargate Atlantis.
Did send a package with foodstuff from Holland but it hasn't arrived yet...bummer!!

Yesterday was a public holiday, seijin no hi 成人の日 , celebrating the coming of age of boys and girls who turned twenty during the past year from April thru April. The parade through the town in Kimono's and other garb..very festive indeed. Even Penny, taiwanese, took part in the ritual and her friend Claudia decided to go along. It's rather important since as of now they officially can vote but also smoke, drink en get married without their parents consent. In other words they're officially adults.