Names

So, the coolest thing about Japanese people is there names. Names like Haneda, Suzuki, Nakayama, Tanaka. What's so cool about these names? Well like most names in cultures (I would assume) the names have meaning behind them. And in Japanese, the way you decipher these meanings is by simply looking at the kanzi characters (basically pictures) that make up the persons name.

So let's look at Tanaka. In Japanese, it is written 田中。 The first symbol means field or rice patty, and the second symbol means in the middle of. Thus, if your name is Tanaka, it means you are in the middle of a field...lol. Nakayama, 中山, means in the middle of a mountain. And Nakamura, 中村, means in the middle of the village. So it's pretty cool to see the meaning of the person's name just by looking at how they write it. You can't really make the connection that Wald means forest just by looking at the letters w,a,l, and d very easily...

So this same logic applies to places as well. 東京, Tokyo, actually means eastern lantern, and 京都　means lantern city, or something of the sort. I think Sapporo, 札幌 means frozen river or something like that, I learned it when I first got here but forgot...oops.

So, the meaning of a Japanese name is derived from the symbols used to write it. Now this story is a little old, but we were talking about Japanese names in my Kanji class last semester, and my kanji teacher told us a pretty funny story. Her mother, was born on 3/7, and (according to my kanji teacher) her parents were lazy, so they named her mina. Mi means 3, and na means 7 in Japanese, so her name was literally 37 (three seven). She didn't show us what characters were used to write it, but I have to admit I thought it was pretty funny.

Now I'm going to be even more shallow, and talk about the names of some of the students in my class. Now I realize making fun of someones name isn't the nicest thing to do, but come on, it's just for giggles. The class with the best names last semester was by far my Japanese writing class.

So lets start things off with a guy whose name sounded like imdaunkyou. Or, when you slow it down a little bit, I'ma dunk you lol. Every time the professor called for attendance at the beginning of class and said his name, I just got this mental image of 2 kids in a pool and one of them yelling that. Always brought a smile to my face...

Next up is probably my favorite, tincock. Well you already know where this is going, the latter half of his name means penis in English. What you might not know however, is that tin, also means penis in Japanese. So this poor fellow's name means penis in 2 languages...I can't help but laugh a little when I think about what kanzi characters are used to write his name....

So there were some other funny names in the class but those two are all I remember, and all I care to write about right now. Now if my name means something funny in another language, I would most certainly find it funny. It's just coincidence that language overlap sometimes, and if you don't stop to enjoy it for a minute, I think your missing out on some of the fun of studying foreign languages.

So I guess Monday in Japanese, getuyoubi, is super close to a Russian cuss word. Tuesday is as well, but whenever someone says Monday you can usually see the Russians in the room smirking a little bit. Sougei, pronounced basically soo gay, means to see someone off, and meet them when they return. Keiseiki is super close to basically the worst swear word in the Korean language. It's really amazing how often these language overlap, despite being completely different from one another...

Who cleans this joint?

So I've been getting rather fed up with the soccer team, not because of practice or what not, but because of where we practice. There are 2 gyms on the north side of campus, and I don't think they've been cleaned in years.

The first gym has 2 floors, one is the court, and the 2nd has seating for those who want to watch whatever is going on on the court. This second floor is where we change and stretch and get ready for practice basically before we can enter the gym floor, and it is so incredibly dirty. Theres hair, dust, trash, junk, you name it, all just lying around, on the same ground we stretch on. It's positively disgusting.

Now I'm not saying that I'm the cleanest person in the world. After all I am a Wald...But my allergies just go insane in this place. During and after practice I am constantly hacking and sniveling and such and it's really really annoying. The bathroom is also a complete mess. I don't think it has been touched in several years.

Every once in awhile I see this little building manager running around and stuff, but I don't think he ever cleans...at all.

As for some of the other classrooms and such, it really depends on the faculty, or so I've heard. The international student center is usually...relatively...kind of clean, and I've seen a little cleaning crew run around before, but the classrooms in the ISC are still pretty dirty. The econ building I've been in is usually kept pretty clean actually which is nice, same thing with the Slavic research center, however this other building (insert name here because I don't actually know it) was pretty dirty.


Man I guess I am just a spoiled moron American...

Cultural classes

So this past week the university was nice enough to provide us some opportunities to engage in really traditional Japanese activities.

First up on Monday was Koto, or a type of Japanese harp. This was actually my favorite. The harps themselves are rather large, not very wide, but very long, and you sit perpendicular to them.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koto_%28musical_instrument%29

So we had 2 hours, with 6 little Japanese ladies trying to help 30 of us play this Japanese song. It was actually a lot of fun. There are 13 strings, and you have 3 picks on your right hand, one on your thumb, and the other 2 on your first two fingers. You can also push down the strings to get sharp notes.

The song we were attempting to play was called sakura, which is a super traditional song, which is about Japanese cherry trees...I think. Sakura means Japanese cherry tree, in Japanese of course...but I couldn't really get the lyrics from the song, and was more focused on playing the instrument than signing the song. It was a lot of fun, even though my fingers hurt pretty bad by the end.

On Tuesday we were doing Kado, or Ikebana, or flower arranging. There's actually a ton of different ways to go about arranging flowers, and they all have their own unique styles and beauty. So I was given a couple of branches from a cherry tree, some twigs, grassy things, and 2 flowers. I began chopping and sticking and moving and removing my flowers and twigs and such, and finally ended up with an arrangement that I was satisfied with. I raised my hand to tell the sensei that I was done and she made her way over to me. She stood, examining my...arrangement...for a couple of seconds, and then sort of sighed in a disappointed manner. I was heart broken.

She then basically took everything out, and put it back in, creating an entirely different set up than I had. I was sort of insulted, but I guess that's the way of the Japanese. Maybe that's why they have so many problems with creative thinking...whenever someone creates something outside the box, they throw it away and force them back into the box....

On Wednesday, we headed to a temple, where we practiced some Soto-zen, or zahzen. Apparently this particular sect had been brought to Japan in the 6th century, and is 1 of the only 2 that are practiced in Japan. The other kind, Rinzai, has temples that are more famous, such as toudaizi (largest wooded building in the world in Nara), but Soto has more followers in Japan.

I wanted to hum...but much to my dismay this sect doesn't really do that :(. We learned a couple of hand positions and breathing techniques, and how to sit correctly, and then we bowed, sat down, and began to meditate. Normally you meditate in a special super quiet hall, and everyone faces the wall. This temple was freezing however, and so the monk turned on the heater, which roared to life, breaking the much needed silence lol. My legs were also hurting a ton, so I think I only got really into the mood for maybe 5 of the 30 minutes we were supposed to be meditating. You also have to keep your eyes open, and your posture is super important, so I wasn't exactly comfortable. Also, if the monk thinks you are getting sleepy, they can wack you with this wooden stick, so the 2 monks that were there were constantly prowling behind us while we were trying to concentrate, which was rather unnerving, especially when every once in awhile you heard the crack of someone else getting hit.

So it was fun, but meditating and such really isn't for me. I'll just go take a nice nap.

On Thursday, I went to the Sapporo snow (or ice) festival that is super popular in Japan these days. There were tons of people, and tons of foreigners. There were 3 sites, one had snow sculptures, another had ice sculptures and the last just had things for kids to do, like snow slides and such. So I only went to the 2 that had the sculptures and stuff.

We (me and a couple Japanese friends) headed to the snow place first, it was super cold and crowded, but a lot of the sculptures were really cool. Some of them were the size of a small house, others were 20 meters tall. My favorite was a sculpture of a famous church in Dresden. Also, funny little fact, all the snow sculptures were made by the Japanese Self Defense Force. Apparently they have nothing better to do that play with snow, while the people in Haiti could use all the help they can get.

Anyway, as the evening wore on, we made our way towards a tower that is at the end of Odoori Park. We went up to the top of it (by stairs btw) and were able to get some great photos. This one is my favorite. The colors are so vibrant and you can see the city and park stretch away before your eyes. I wish it was clear enough to see the mountains in the background, but I am still happy with the shot.

After the snow sculptures, we headed over to the ice ones, and I was pretty disappointed. I guess we ended up going on the last day, so most of the ice has melted somewhat, leaving some of the sculptures in a rather sad state. But it was still fun.

On Friday then I got my hands dirty with Japanese shodou, or calligraphy. I hate Japanese calligraphy...