Toilets and Pajamas

Last weekend I went to Tokyo for a work conference. Westgate put me up in nice hotel around the corner from the conference site. My hotel room was about half the size of a standard Holiday Inn room but had some nice amenities. Specifically there were two things that stood out. First there was the most advanced toilet I’ve ever seen. The thing had a heated seat with a remote control next to it. One button was for a bidet. One button was for a “spray” (a butt shower which somehow differed from the biday). And other buttons/dials that controlled the pressure of the spray and bidet Needless to say, I did a lot of reading at the hotel.

The other cool amenity was a giant shirt/pajama thing that was left laid out on my bed.

I don’t usually wear pajamas to sleep but of course I had to try it. Frankly, I looked pretty good in it:

You know you're in Japan when...

...you're at the gym and King Kong is playing on the treadmill TV screens. Unfortunately, it was the Peter Jackson King Kong.

New Friends

(PICTURE: Paula and Katie)

The teaching program I'm in, per my request, placed me in the smallest city with the most nature they had. I'm in Koryama City in Fukushima Prefecture. If you haven't heard of it don't feel bad. I asked two friends who lived in Japan for a few years about it and they both said it didn't ring a bell.

I'm only an hour and a half from Tokyo if you take the bullet train but this area is considered "the country." There's a whole bunch of mountains not too far from where I'm at and loads of rice fields and forests right outside of my city. Frankly, it's not the most exciting place but it's pretty darn close to what I pictured before coming here.

Since I'm in a small city, there isn't a need for many English teachers. In fact, including me, there are only three teachers in this prefecture that are part of our program (there are some other language schools supposedly). Luckily for me though the other two teachers who are part of my program are freaking awesome. Paula and Katie are sort of like twins. Both girls originally came to Japan as part of the famous Jet program. They did three years with Jet and then stuck around after meeting Japanese men that they ended up marrying. Yup, both girls are married to Japanese guys and both girls speak Japanese. Even cooler, both girls are ridiculously nice and don't mind showing me the ropes in Japan despite me asking them a gazillion questions. I gotta say, I got pretty freaking lucky with my new friends and my new city.

Sushi

Two nights before I left Vietnam, I did something very stupid -- I ate sushi. Sushi in Vietnam isn't good. Period. I've had it a couple of times and always been a little bit skeptical of the fish. Well, the kid I tutor's family took Huyen and I out to the Sofitel Plaza for dinner as a going away present. The Sofitel is one of the nicest hotels in Hanoi and the buffet there is supposed to be very good. I've told many people that I personally think the most dangerous food in Vietnam is the stuff served in nice restaurants since not everything is fresh like it is on the street. Well, I should have listened to myself. I ate A LOT of sushi at the Sofitel buffet and then spent next 36 hours fighting food poisoning. I had a temperature, unbelievable cramps and found that with every sip of water I would spend ten minutes on the toilet bowl. It wasn't pretty and I was sure I wouldn't be able to fly to Japan.

Somehow I made a miracle recovery and obviously made it to Japan. On the second day here my new friend Katie and I went to lunch...at a sushi restaurant. Generally I would avoid a food that just got me sick (I haven't had a Napoleon dessert since I got sick from one about 20 years ago) but how can you say no to sushi in Japan! This is my first bowl of sushi...and it was DELICIOUS!

Yo, Tokyo!

This is my first picture in Japan. Do you see those black boxes above the seats? They are the reason I took the picture. Let me set the scene: I had just arrived in Japan an hour before and was riding the Narita Airport Express Train to Tokyo. I had an assigned seat but decided to sit behind it because someones luggage was placed in front of my assigned chair. Both seats were open behind where I was supposed to sit so sat down and began to stare out the window, enjoying my first views of Japan. Well, about two minutes went by before a train worker walked into the train holding a fancy gadget in his hand. The gadget apparently had received a signal that someone was sitting in a reserved seat who shouldn't have been. The worker came to check my ticket and potentially charge me more money for not sitting in the unreserved car. I showed the train worker my ticket and all was okay.

So why am I writing this as my first blog about Japan? Because, well, Japan is soooo much more advanced than Vietnam. I knew this coming in but BAM it struck me right away with everything. In Vietnam, two weeks ago, I snuck into a train compartment we weren't supposed to be in. After getting caught -- by chance since Huyen's sister asked the guy a question! -- we just had to give the guy a couple dollars and he let us stay. Such is clearly not the case in Japan.

This is going to be an interesting three months!

A Bright Shining Lie

Based on LH from KY's recommendation, I recently read A Bright Shining Lie by Neil Sheehan.

The book won the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award for a reason -- it was unbelievable. I use the word unbelievable for two reasons. First, Sheehan's writing is spectacular. Whenever a non-fiction book is a page turner you know the author is a good writer. The book had such a compelling narrative that one could easily mistake it for fiction. The second reason I say the book was unbelievable is because it is mind boggling to read about the absolutely insane policies/rationales/strategies of the US government and military leading up to and during the Vietnam War. As an American, I like to hope that our country knows what it is doing especially when it puts people's lives at risk. This book paints a picture that couldn't be farther from that hope.

Grass Skiing & Grass Sledding

(PICTURE: Grass Sledding)
I'm gonna shock you with something: It doesn't snow much in Vietnam.

You might be saying to yourself, "I didn't think it ever snowed." Well, I thought that too when I first got here but supposedly it has snowed in Sapa. However, that's clearly not the norm.

As a skiier, I wish there was more snow. Luckily though the Vietnamese are quite innovative and don't let the lack of snow stop them from skiing. Recently Huyen and I went to a resort with grass skiing and grass sledding. The "hill" for skiing was about twice the size of a speed bump so we decided just to go sledding. Check out the video of grass skiers and a grass sledder. The music you'll hear was what was pumping out of the stereo systems at the resort: