I've been feeling very Japanesey lately. It's calling to me, I swear.
My friend has been in town this weekend. She was the Japanese English teacher in one of the schools I worked in and I haven't seen her for a few years. She decided to take a year sabbatical from teaching and come to Canada to observe in elementary schools, so has been living in Vernon since mid-March. We've been touristing and it's pretty exhausting.
One thing that I both love and hate about Japan is that, whenever you see someone you haven't seen for a while or are just meeting for the first time, you have to give a present, or omiyage. Because I live here I didn't have to give anything, but Tamaki brought me a gift for showing her around Vancouver. And it is one of the raddest gifts I've ever gotten, behind the Jon Cryer-signed "Pretty in Pink" soundtrack on vinyl. She gave me four sets of chopsticks with little bunnies on them, a cotton headscarf thing (you know the ones... it's a piece of cotton with some group's insignia on it and you have to fold it and tie it around your head for communal konnyaku-making day or sports day. I can't remember what it's called), a box of Meiji Almond, and...... a sumo mouse pad!
I love sumo. I mean, I LOVE sumo. Now it's much harder to keep up with it because it's all stats, but still. While living in Japan I went to four or five tournaments (basho) and Akebono's retirement ceremony. (Akebono was the first foreign yokozuna, or grand champion, and was enormous by the time he retired: 6'5" and over 500 pounds. This is a very uncommon size for rikishi; most wrestlers are surprisingly football-playerish and agile. The retirement ceremony seems a little degrading: all the rikishi line up and cut a strand of his hair until the last person, usually one of the high ranking sumo officials, does the final cut and removes the sumo ponytail. It takes hours for everyone to get in on the action.) I was also a somewhat frequent visitor to the sumo hotel in my village for parties and the owner (a very active and high-ranking member of one of the sumo stables [a stable is almost like a sports team, only the athletes all live and work in the stable, working their way up to a higher rank in the sumo hierarchy]) took a shine to me, so constantly sent over sumo-related gifts to my workplace and helped me get sweet seats for the Osaka basho (tournament) the spring my parents and aunt came to Japan. It is extremely hard to get really good seats at basho and Osaka is the hardest one to get into because Osaka is so traditional about sumo. This owner also let me and my parents/aunt stay at the hotel one night with the biggest spread of food I've ever seen for four people, including a tonne of sushi and sashimi, which finally got my parents to eat raw fish after saying they wouldn't touch it the previous two weeks. And the onsen there is one of the best; they have flowers floating in the bath, the bath shaped like a sumo dojo! (If you happen to be in central Japan, I can give you directions to my village, one of the best onsen areas in Japan.)
This wasn't really supposed to be about sumo. I just can't stop talking about it. It's a completely rad sport.
Just this last thing... The reason I loved paying up to $400 for the sweet seats is, in that seating, I got to sit closer in a box on cushions and get a full all-day meal with loads of beer and some sort of keepsake, like handmade ceramics or laquerware, which are completely awesome because so few people get them. And when there's an upset at the end of the day's events (which almost always happens), you get to throw your cushion at the ring and yell really, really loud. The closer you sit to the front, the more likely it is you're going to get wave of ass cushions to the head because people misjudge their cushion throwing skills and few make it into the ring.
See what sumo does to me? I initially meant to write about my day yesterday and why I was so tired, but it seems anticlimatic now. Everything pales in comparison to sumo. And I have loads of sumo stories. But I'll get to yesterday's recap maybe tomorrow or soon. We're going for dim sum and Round #2 of the touristy bus tour today.
Can I say that I am SO COMPLETELY JEALOUS of my friend Scott. Not only is he going to Japan for 9 days, but he's starting off his trip in Chicago, one of my favourite places ever. Some guys have all the luck. Or are far better planners than I.
Currently listening :
Shingo Mama No Oha Rock
By Shingo Katori
Release date: 15 January, 2001
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