I just realized that I can do blog posts from my phone. So I will the start doing microposts!!!
Like the title says, I am enjoying a quiet Sunday in Sendai. For dinner, I am eating at a popular cheap restaurant called Cafe Gusto! The menu for me? Beef steak!
Nothing from me today. Going to get much needed rest.
Good night!
So, unexpected mail arrived from home today. It turns out to be a new bag from mom!!! Thank you mom!!!
This got me thinking about how many bags I have been through in my travels this past year. If my count is correct, I have used over 10 different bags during my travel, and every single one of them made travelling easier.
To keep this short, here is an important tip for all who are planning to travel. "ALWAYS spend the money necessary to have a good bag." It doesn't have to be a $200+ bag, it just has to be a bag that has the workmanship that you know will last through all of the travel you will be doing!!!
So, I was enjoying my lunch today at a local restaurant in my section of Sendai, and I was thinking about all the different types of foods I enjoyed while traveling around the world this year. This gets me thinking about my regular diet in Japan, and how much it differs from what I eat at home and around the world.
The first subject I have to bring up about eating in Japan is that rice is the staple food. I didn't notice when I first came to Japan for about the first month, but food in Japan revolves around rice rather than wheat. Many people will be hard pressed to find a loaf of bread in any food store that is Western in taste or texture. Even the bread here is created with rice rather than wheat. I enjoy this though, as I actually prefer rice to bread on many occasions, and many different types of tasty breads are available at bakeries and cafes all around Japan in reasonable portions and prices. So, I guess I can say that you can find bread in Japan, but be ready to pay a decent amount more than what you were used to paying for bread.
With rice out of the way, I want to mention the lack of "fast food" on the streets of Japan. In its place is the availability of many cheap restaurant chains where you can buy dishes such as curry rice, meat over rice, salads, soups, and many other Japanese style dishes in a diverse selection. While the Japanese see these dishes as "rather unhealthy" compared to the dishes that they enjoy in home cooked meals and high end restaurant meals, they are still leagues healthier than American fast food in many instances and cost just about the same as a fast food meal back home as well. Every meal in Japan, I have always been able to enjoy a salad or vegetable dish that was fresh and refreshing.
Another aspect I have to mention about food in Japan is that the Japanese have a diversified palate in many regards. They will not eat food that lacks flavor, and as such, they have created a restaurant economy where every restaurant serves a delicious meal even in the cheapest dishes. Because all restaurants serve tasty meals, they must compete in other aspects of service. As a result, there are many types of restaurants available in any area, from the traditionally Japanese such as ramen, curry, and sushi, to Italian, French, and even Indian cuisine.
Finally, I would like to get to portion sizes in Japan. Yes, they are smaller than what I know in the United States, but they are quite filling. Portioning in Japan will probably trouble people used to Western diets, as often find yourself not feeling filled or not having the satisfying textures of food you are familiar with at home as a majority of the portion is relatively soft rice. The trade-off of this difference in eating habits is that Japan has one of the healthiest populations in the world. I am not saying that Japanese people live healthy, Japanese have many bad habits that I might touch on later, but Japan's eating habits are one of the healthiest I know of and a culture I think many other's can draw possible solutions to their own eating culture problems.
Bringing this all to conclusion, I have yet to have a bad meal in Japan. Japan is an example of what a culture can do when they simply will not accept poor quality of service of their food, and as a result have created a thriving yet competitive restaurant culture that is able to fill every niche and value point. I do miss sliced bread and fast food from home, but I am equally enjoying the diverse flavors available to me in Japan for a reasonable price.
So..... My goal now is to write every day, so here we go!
One thing that has been on my mind recently is how well Japanese anime melds with Japanese culture as a whole. As a foreigner, this caught me quite off guard, as cartoons and many other fantasy type media have been regarded as childish and immature in my society. But in the case of anime, I feel that this media form has aligned itself with Japan's problems and ideals in ways that allows it to transcend the commonplace idea of childish media.
Now, to get this straight, I am not saying that there is no such thing as a children's anime. There are many such anime in existence such as "Youkai Watch", "Pokémon", and many other anime that I cannot think of. I am implying that there are many anime available to the public that are able to explore relatively important and often mature themes in Japanese culture compared to what is available in other fictional media for other cultures. Exploring themes such as the struggle of faith, implications of technology, and gender recognition underneath an anime simple enough to entertain a relatively young audience gives anime the ability to reach an adult audience. This gives anime a special niche in Japan that I have not quite seen in other cultures in a fictional media - social commentary and insight and possible solution on Japanese values and problems.
The best way for me to describe this phenomenon will be through anecdote. Let me use the most popular anime in Japan (I think, the anime is over 600 episodes long and still releasing new episodes weekly.) - "One Piece" - as a case study. This anime is about a teenage pirate, Luffy, who travels the world with his friends and companions in search of the One Piece treasure. Through these journeys, Luffy makes many friends and explores many different lands and cultures. Through this description of this anime, I will highlight anime’s intimate relationship with Japanese culture.
I will say first and foremost that this anime is seen as an anime for children, new episodes are shown every Sunday morning and the story and dialog is kept simple and entertaining for a young audience. While this anime is easily accessible for the younger viewers, it also presents ideas and themes that attract the adult audience. The main catch of this anime will be the relatability of the setting to Japan. Just by looking at a map of Japan, you can see that every point in Japan is less than about 50 kilometers (30 miles) away from the ocean. Combine this with the extremely mountainous landscape of Japan as a whole, and you can easily understand that the Japanese people feel both close to the ocean, and secluded to their section of the country being surrounded by mountains and water. “One Piece” along with many other anime attract a large scale audience by giving the audience a chance to explore the waters and land beyond. This also gives the Japanese a place to explore when living in a city packed with building for many tens of kilometres. The best way to describe these feelings would be to compare it to the feelings one might have watching a travel documentary on television, it gives the viewers an escape to another land without the effort and resources needed to plan such a trip.
Another important aspect of anime in Japanese culture is the accessibility of friendship to the main characters while travelling. Due to the “keep problems to yourself” construct in Japan, I would say Japan is a hard place to make friends and even acquaintances apart from the workplace and your closest friend’s social circle. It is normal in Japanese animation to see the protagonist making new friends or having a large group of friends on a regular basis. This speaks to the relative loneliness that many people in Japan experience on a daily basis. Since people cannot find friends on the streets, anime gives the viewers a friend that they can keep with little effort. While this sounds like escapism, I see this rather as a possible solution in Japanese society to reduce insomnia by reducing the perception of loneliness in society. I feel that the majority of people in Japan do have a sizeable amount of acquaintances, but cannot perceive it as such due to the lack of interactions they have with these acquaintances on a regular basis.
A final theme I want to highlight in anime that is extremely important to its symbiosis with Japanese culture is the freedom of the characters. To be more precise, the ability of the characters to pursue their personal dreams and goals with little hindrance, and sometimes even support, from society as a whole. That being said, that does not mean there are not antagonists in anime. There would not be a story without an antagonist. I would describe this as almost an exact opposite of Japanese society as a whole. While individuals are free to choose their life’s path, they are often lead to choose certain paths due to societal pressures. These pressures take multiple forms, whether it be the will of the family to take over the family business, create a stable and successful family, or simply maintaining a public face. From what I have experienced so far in Japan, these pressure often leave individuals with little choice in their careers and even where they live as there is often social implications if they make choices that possibly disrupts the public’s order, whether it be from something as extreme as breaking up a family to something as trivial as inconveniencing an individual. The fear of causing someone else problems cause many Japanese people to make “safe” choices, even if that means not reaching their dreams or full potential.
To conclude, anime gives the Japanese people something which they do not have; a world where they can explore their dreams and passions without the need to worry about the Japanese social construct. While this has caused several problems for Japanese society as a whole, I would also say that Japan’s interesting set of societal problems has created a media form that could only form and thrive in Japanese culture, and it has also resonated with people with similar problems all around the world.
I have to say that I am starting to lose interest in many anime recently as I am finding myself with the power to do what I could previously only dream of through anime. I have become the hero of my own story, where I am on an adventure to travel the world to fight monsters (solve problems I wish to solve) and create a world which I dream of (affect the world around me). This is a very powerful position I am in, and I am grateful to media like anime and the people around me who gave me the courage to seek out such power to make myself happy. The only thing I can wish for now is for those who are lost to anime and other forms of media to search for their power which they can use to create their own adventure, away from the beautiful, but fictional world of anime or whatever created medium. Realized dreams are the result of adventure in whatever form or fashion, whether or not these adventures are seen as successful in the eyes of the dreamer or their peers.
Okay! Time to write something!!!!! Oh goodness that has terrible connotation!
Oh well.... Nothing I can do about the connotation, I just have to write something meaningful now to compensate!
So, December has arrived, 十二月 (jyu ni getsu) in Japanese (and Chinese). This also marks the time when I get rather festive and think about the year that is going to end soon. These thoughts have brought me to many old and new ideas alike, and I think I have an idea which I really have to talk about.
What I really want to talk about is the state of my generation through my experiences in Hong Kong, Japan, Australia, and back home in America over the past year. It is cheesy to say, but this past year has truly have been eye-opening for me in many ways. I have come to understand myself and the world better, and the individual abilities I have in this world which I can apply to my own and others' success. That being said, I have to say that I feel that this state of self-understanding and realization has changed a lot from my parent's to my generation.
Regardless of the cause, whether it be the economy or other social or political factors, many people I have met around the world my own age is what I will call "unrealized". I guess another way I can describe this sensation is that people in my generation are "not growing up" and "inexperienced". On many occasions, this has left me butt-hurt in conversations as I realize that the level of understanding I am trying to communicate at is leaving my peers either confused or confounded. To be straight about this statement, I am not trying to say that I know more or am better than any of my peers, that is far from what I am trying to say, but I am trying to say that my peers are lacking experience that I and I expect my parents' generation would expect people around my age to have.
From my experiences so far, I concluded that the majority of the "childishness" I feel is being perpetuated in my generation is a product of this inexperience. I am in many ways worried that my generation will not be able to improve upon what my parent's generation created simply from the lack of drive I see in my generation since they have not found what truly brings them happiness and self-actualization. I also understand at the same point that I set an extremely high standard for myself and the world I create around myself, so my worries might be misplaced. With both of these judgments though, I feel that I have to call out my generation to push to improve upon itself.
That being said, I am also hopeful in many ways as there are so many ideas that is available to us right now that our generation has access to. I have discovered so many ideas in my travels that I am simply bursting to realize these ideas when I finally settle back down from my travels.
I guess what I truly want to say at the end of all of this text is a call out to my generation that is either still in college, graduation college, or starting to work in the workforce to start to dream big again. It doesn't matter what it is, or if it is even possible at this time, just have a big dream to work towards so that our generation can create a better world than what our parents have given us, and hopefully a world upon which our children will have to try even harder to improve! Like Steve Jobs said (who I know many of you worship), "Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish". Realized dreams is a product of this.
Good night all! I am going to bed!
So..... Let's see.......
Good morning from just a rather normal Tuesday in Japan. I have just recovered from a trip to Matsushima, a beautiful coast town just northeast of Sendai city with many beautiful islands and quite tasty oysters. Not going to say when I might be able to post photos, I keep on finding myself doing something new that keeps me from having the time to finish all the photos. I guess that is a good thing though!!!!
Well, American Thanksgiving is coming this Thursday, and I was just thinking about the year I have been having. Yesterday was Japan's Labor Thanksgiving Day, a name which to me is quite obscure. Is this day the equivalent of Labor Day back home, or Thanksgiving back home. Either ways, Thanksgiving is in the name, so I guess we should be thankful for something!
I guess I should be writing this to my fellow classmates back home at Drexel. Despite all of the problems Drexel can appear to give us every term without fail, Drexel has one of the best Study Abroad systems I know of. Among all of the universities of the classmates I have and am studying with while abroad, Drexel is one of only a few universities that allows you to be flexible with class scheduling until the scheduling deadline of the university I have studied at. And despite a seemingly illogical school calendar with four quarter terms that start and end at drastically different times than our friends at other universities, this schedule allows us to be better timed with the exchange timing of other universities abroad.
I guess what I am saying is that Drexel's pamplets telling us to "Go Away" and "Find Your Destination" is probably the most accurate description of the Study Abroad program I can think of. If you have the chance to travel, and want to travel, you absolutely have to apply to study abroad as a student of Drexel University. Despite all of the stress I might have incurred doing so, I have been able to visit three different countries in one year, and am so much better for it. I have been able to meet family I have not met in over 15 years and learn about 3 great cultures that have allowed me to get a better understanding of the world I live in.
So, TL;DR, I implore everyone to travel abroad while in college. Globalization and westernization is happening at a rate unmatched in history, and from my travels, I understand that we are not individual countries anymore. We interact with different cultures every day without knowing it, whether it is with what we eat, buy, or use, everything we have around us nowadays is a product of many different cultures and many different ideas, and the only way to understand this is to travel. So GO!
Sorry for the lack of posts over the past two weeks all, I have been having an interesting time at the very least. Have been having a hard time getting truly settled here, along with enjoying a lot of what Fall time Sendai can offer me. Good thing is that I finally feel that I am comfortable in Sendai now and as a result, I am back to writing.
So, one of the great aspects of living in Japan that the majority of foreign people I meet here always mention is how comfortable it is. This comes from a multitude of things. First off, dining in Japan is an experience that I would experience only in nicer restaurants back home. When you are in any restaurant in Japan, the waiters all take care of you. I think this is a product that there is no such thing as tipping in Japan. The price you pay for your meal pays for all of your service at a restaurant, including the waiters' salaries, which I see as a positive in the cultural perspective of Japan.
Secondly, shopping in Japan is just like a dream. I understand why Japanese housewives are so well known for being great shoppers. Shopping in Japan is quite literally a pleasure. All prices in Japan include tax, so what you see is what you pay, and all the staff are there for any requests and information you might require. Also, I found many prices for items to be quite reasonable given the level of quality and service for every product you buy here in Japan.
Finally, Japan is mostly safe. There has been many times when I have forgotten to lock my bike, and it has never been stolen. There is also close to no fear of public violence whenever you are out and about due to the fact there are extremely stringent weapon laws in Japan. As far as I can tell, even the police does not have firearms. This has allowed me to spend many days until late nights down in downtown Sendai without worrying about my safety.
All of these seemingly positives in Japan comes at a cost though. Many of these societal norms in Japan appear to come from the Japanese extreme following of tradition and what I will call "that is what it has always been" syndrome. As a an overcasting statement of the majority, the majority of people just follow the standard, quite different from other societies I have been in. And this is why I will not be living in Japan in the near future, it will be hard for me to sell new ideas in Japan as Japanese people are very hard to shift in mindset overall.
I have enjoyed everyday I have live in Japan, I do not want to neglect that, but for me, the while the culture might be great, I am looking for a place that is more open to changes in ideas with my young age.
