I know it seems nigh on impossible to think that I am still writing about September when I already have 30 blogs in the can, but I’m on a blog roll (a joke any Brits might appreciate). Anyhow, a lot happened in those first two months – exciting and new, and it will help paint a better picture of what I was up to, and who I was up to it with.
It happened a month after settling into my new digs in Ohtawara – September 1990. Matthew, who was a frequent visitor to my apartment bringing food and beer, asked Ashley and myself whether or not we'd like to come to a meeting of the Ohtawara International Friendship Association (Ohtawara Kokusai Kouryuu Kai)—henceforth called OIFA, which doesn’t sound enough like a real word to make it a true acronym.
From what I could tell, the core focus of the OIFA was to meet foreigners, learn about foreign culture and hopefully pick up a few words.
“C’mon. It’ll be good to come out and meet the townsfolk,” said Matthew. Okay, I can’t remember if that’s exactly what he said as it was a while back and apparently getting older can affect one’s memory. I’m unsure if I knew that, but I know that now. I think.
I have to admit that I wasn’t that keen on going. Living in Japan had already been quite the fish bowl experience for me – it was only five weeks in the country and a week after teaching at Dai Chu (Ohtawara Junior High). Pretty much everyone in town knew who I was thanks to the local newspaper media featuring a story or four telling everybody that I was coming to Japan, had arrived in Tokyo, had arrived in Ohtawara and had begun teaching at Dai-chu.
Despite the advance notoriety I had achieved, and the fact that I was a reporter for one of Canada’s top newspapers (Toronto Star) before arriving, I still considered myself to be shy (other people probably considered me to be an egomaniacal loudmouth, but pa-tay-toe – poh-ta-toe).
I believe Ashley and I did make it out to the first meeting - it started at 7PM and went until 9PM, and factoring in the goodbye's and a half-hour bike ride for Ashley (and thus also me) to her town of Nishinasuno, it meant that she might not get home till sometime after 10 or 10:30PM (and me sometime after 11PM – but that was no big deal as I usually stayed up until 1AM). Ashley, though currently 21 to my 24, got tired easier and claimed to need to be asleep by 10PM, at least on the weekdays, if she was to function. Matthew and I? We not only burned the biggest candle in Ohtawara at both ends, we burned the middle of the candle, too.
Our first meeting with OIFA was on a Tuesday, and to be fair, not only Ashley, but myself as well, were less than thrilled with being stuck coming out to meet a bunch of old farts in their 30s, 40's and up. (You can see my conundrum now, as I write this all at the relatively young age of 44).
That first meeting had about 50 people there, and we divided up into groups of 15+ for myself, Ashley and that skunk, Matthew. What the heck had he gotten us into? Why were they dividing us up?
In a classroom, we arranged the desks in a square circle and I talked to my class of eager adults about who I am. I did it in English, as I really had very limited Japanese-speaking ability (and three years later, I wasn't much better).
Luckily, I had two Japanese folks watching the class. A short, pensive, 20-something woman named Naoko Kimijima (she's in the bottom right corner wearing blue in the photo above), and a tall, handsome, always smiling, late 30's man, I simply knew as Mr. Suzuki. This is not the same Suzuki-san as Matthew's boss. This Suzuki-san was a farmer who I believe grew rice and standard veggies like tomatoes, green peppers, daikon radishes, etc.
Anyhow, these two translated my ramblings into coherent Japanese, and then turned the students questions into coherent English for me. It wasn't the best professional translation job, but these folks have nothing to be ashamed of. Really awesome.
As an aside, the surname Suzuki, translates into "bell/suzu and tree/ki", and is as common in Japan as Smith and Jones are for North America and the UK. Actually, I'm only assuming the UK is included.
Naoko... her name has a "ko" at the end... while not exclusive, the majority of female names utilize it: Keiko, Naoko, Takako... the equivalent is adding an "a" to the end of a Western name: Andrea. Figures. I try to make a point on the spur of the moment and can only come up with Andrea.
While the focus of the OIFA seems to have been completely altruistic... no, that's not the word... man, English am difficult even for native speakers like I. .. okay, I have no idea what their focus was, but all I know is that these folk went out of their way to make all of the foreigners living in their town—and there were quite a few of us—feel welcome.
Despite my original misgivings about speaking to OIFA, I kept on going out whenever asked. Farmer Suzuki would often invite us out to his farm where the OIFA members would bring food, and we gaijin would arrive, talk about whatever they wanted to talk about, and eat and drink ourselves full. They never asked for anything in return except for our friendship. I miss them all terribly because I’m really hungry and want a beer right now.
Besides Naoko and Farmer Suzuki, some of the OIFA members include: Narita-san, a late 30’s, loud, funny and attractive lady whom we would probably call a cougar nowadays (though very flirty, she kept the boundaries with us all - she's wearing the red outfit in the bottom right corner of the photo above); Maniwa-san, a 50-something, chubby, lascivious man who ran a local pharmacy (he tried to grab Ashley’s boobs a couple of times); Muneo-kun, a guy as old us who ran a barber shop (and the focus of at least two future blogs), plus he was one of the nicest, most soft-spoken guys on the planet; Soma Kenzo-san (who later became a City Councilman); Endo-san; Takase Tsuneo-san; Yoshiko Nakamura, Masashimura-san (owned a flower shop) and his wife; Hashimoto-san; another Suzuki-san, this one is an older woman who always seemed impressed whenever a gaijin was able to use chopsticks (hashi); and Yukitomo Kurita whose claim to fame is that he is Matthew’s father-in-law (am I giving away too much, here?). Okay, Kurita-san was also an Ohtawara City Councilman during our time in the city, and will also be part of a blog coming up very shortly.
Scary that I have this whole blog thing planned out, isn’t it?Photos of some of the OIFA are HERE.
I mentioned that I wasn't alone in Japan, as far as English-speakers go (see Matthew & my girlfriend, Ashley). Various Japanese big businesses would occasionally have a foreign worker as part of an exchange program come and work here. Plus, along with a New Zealander or two working in the near-to-my-heart, liver and apartment-bar scene (more on them later!), there was also a school in north Ohtawara that taught Japanese farming techniques to folks from Africa, Indonesia and India. Heck, I wasn't even the only Brown guy in the city!
While we didn't get to see every foreigner every time, Farmer Suzuki made it his duty to at least try and get as many of us foreign folk out to his farm to chat with the OIFA.
Sometimes it was a pain in the butt trying to juggle parties with OIFA with all of my other responsibili... sorry, even now I have difficulty saying I had responsibilities. Let's just say that if left solely up to Farmer Suzuki, he'd have had Matthew and myself over at his farm every night just to hang out and talk… but then, when would I have had time to rent all of those movies, do laundry and rack up incredibly high long distance phone bills talking to pretty women like Kristine Minami who lived hundreds of kilometres away in Shiga-ken?
Ahhh… that long-distance feeling. Yes, I still had a girlfriend, but she was asleep by 10AM. I’m not making excuses. I’m just telling you what I was doing. Okay, since this is a retrospective blog, I can mention that I had become rather popular with a lot of the women on the JET Programme. I’m pretty sure that the majority of the gaijin guys (like Matthew) were chasing Japanese women. That meant that the gaijin women had very few options left as the sexist attitudes of the majority of Japanese men was not a turn on. And that’s where I came in. While it was well-known that Ashley was my girlfriend, it was also well-known that there usually seemed to be friction between us. For those that cared, I became someone that other AET women could talk to without feeling they were stepping on anyone’s toes. Me? I was looking to keep my options open. And now, back to our regularly scheduled blog.
Anyhow, I guess the three of us must have impressed the OIFA enough for them to ask us to teach a weekly English class—though Ashley decided sleep was more important—Matthew and I decided the equivalent of about $100 for two hours of teaching/talking was worth it. Besides, they always brought us drinks and food. This was important, as I still couldn’t cook (future blog).
I'm unsure if my beginner's class ever learned anything from me, but I know I enjoyed trying. Heck, I almost felt guilty for taking their money. Almost.
Somewhere talking with my mouth full,
An-do-ryu-sensei. Almost.
Title is by The Coasters
