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The busy life of a kaishain is not only made of meetings and reports, in fact there is also a little time for harvest. For those of you who missed the first episode of tamanegi crop, they can catch up with the potatoes crop. Right, we as researchers like to dig deep subjects that matter and sometimes output weird ideas. So like last time, we went to the small field next to the research center and joyfully dig to take out potatoes from the earth. It is sure a lot of fun, especially when everyone is there to get their potatoes, even the big boss.
The big discussion after the crops is “what are we going to do with them?” The most common answer is obviously curry rice (pronounced kare raisu), after 2 months in Japan, it is probably one of the most common and appreciated dish here. And of course my answer is the same as my Japanese colleagues but just mentioning I will do it in the betonamu style.
Back to work, each of us carrying 1,2 or more kilos of potatoes, you get a strange feeling entering our open space as you see many bags of potatoes next to each researcher but hey ! that how it is, the fruits of our hard work. Speaking of hard work, it was not really that yesterday. Everybody was excited for sure but because we were going to watch the fireflies after work (you bet we or they left the office at least 3 hours earlier than they usually do). We all met at the station to get to Nara and except that they were no one around Todaiji, we really looked like a school excursion… taking pictures of the deers and playing with them.
Once we got to the little water and forest place, perfect setting to see fireflies, we waited for a couple of minute, gazing in the dark to be sure we do not miss the first one. Unfortunately we did not see many of them or were I expecting too much, I don’t know. What’s the point in watching fireflies? Well, it is part of Japanese culture, it is relaxing outside the city and you remember your mother telling you that story of fireflies close to a small river and a forest just like that one. Or maybe because it is the boss’ idea and that we are going for drinks after that…
You said drinking, but are we not eating first? Well there will be some food… Like the welcome party one month ago, we went to a Japanese style “restaurant” or izakaya. Food is of course delicious but so are the drinks! And you cannot read the drinks name, you let your colleague choose for you and hopefully till the end of the night, you will have taste enough of them to remember some names for next time…
Anyway, those social parties are really made to make abstract of the hierarchical relationship you have during the day, more or less, and freely chat and joke on any matter. This is during those nights that you discover how fun are your colleagues but don’t get me wrong, tomorrow, you will be at work and forget about what I said tonight.
People think that Japanese cannot stand alcohol very well, the thing is that alcoholic drinks tend to be cheaper or slightly more expensive that the dishes they served in izakaya, so let’s drink! The corollary is that you may get drunk easily then. An interesting point is that those izakaya usually take the last order at 10pm so customers can recover, just enough if needed, to catch the last train. Social analysis of the last train population is something to experience.
I do not know if Japanese like to play “Hide and seek” but lately some people have come ringing at my door. I am not sure but I guess Japanese use to shout “はい” as they are going to open to their guest. Neither am I shouting the word nor am I prepared to answer as I am not waiting for anyone at night. Anyway, back to the hide & seek game; I know some kids like to ring at doors and then run away before someone can see and catch them but I do not think children in Japan are doing so, still whenever I open my door to see who’s ringing, guess what? Nobody there! Actually, not quite true… the person is not waiting in front of the door so I can see him as I open my door, instead he stays right behind it to be sure I cannot see him?! So once I open it and seeing no one outside a head pops out from the back of the door and begin to apologize for troubling me (in Japanese). Why can’t they wait on the opposite side so I can see (and not being frightened every time I open my door? They know how the door will open, don’t they?
Maybe next time I should try to open it suddenly and violently to knock out my guest… One can never know the true motivation of unexpected guest. If I am right, the next person will be the money collector from NHK… Ok, just joking.
One last thing… my neighbour (I hope he really was my neighbour) came last night at my door to apologize for troubling me (in Japanese) during 5 minutes (just exagerating a little bit, but only a little bit). To what I just replied it was too fast and I did not understand anything except he was living next door. Puzzled for 2 minutes, he explained he forgot his key in Kyoto and was asking if it was possible to get to his balcony from mine. It sounded strange for me as I did not understand why it would be easier to get in from the window or from the door if he did not have his key. Well let me tell you that Japanese usually do not close their windows and sometimes their doors so he was able to get into his room from the window. He came back to get his shoes and apologize again and then thank me and bow a dozen of time before going back next door.
I am pretty sure none of the neighbours lock their doors and windows though we have been told to do so. Japanese are really too much confident that no one would intend to do something wrong here.
Il m’aura fallu deux mois pour devenir un “alien” ou résident étranger au Japon. Evidemment je n’ai pas entamé les démarches administratives dès mon arrivée, il est marqué qu’il faut juste le faire dans les 3 mois qui suivent l’entrée dans le pays. Et puis, quand on est laissé à soi-même, ce n’est pas chose aisée de savoir où s’adresser pour faire cette demande de carte de résident étranger. Heureusement, on peut encore se débrouiller avec les rares sites en anglais ou alors se déboîter les côtes à la lecture des traductions de Google translate ou Babelfish… Un autre point, c’est que je ne voulais pas prendre congé pour aller trouver la “mairie” donc j’ai attendu la Golden Week… Je me suis rendu à la mairie d’Osaka il y a donc un mois (40 minutes de train quand même), pour qu’on me dise : “Ah, mais vous devez allez à la mairie de Higashiosaka (Osaka Est). Je suis vraiment désolé.” (grand sourire de la réceptioniste) Je tente tant bien que mal de lui soutirer l’adresse de la-dite mairie et après le feuilletage de 2 recueils que je ne saurai identifier, elle me tend un papier avec l’adresse. Merci beaucoup et bonne journée… ah ?! mais c’est en kanji !!! Les Japonais sont aimables et patients, il faut juste savoir leur demander ce que l’on veut. Donc après quelques gesticulations et mots en anglais je sors (sous la pluie) avec l’adresse et une petite carte du lieu. Ah ? mais c’est à 10 minutes de chez moi ça en fait ! *grumble*
Après 30 minutes de train dans l’autre sens, je trouve enfin le bâtiment que je cherchais ! Il ne me reste plus qu’à trouver à qui m’adresser pour faire ma demande de résident étranger au Japon. Ah chouette des formulaires en japonais exclusivement ! Bon bah je vais attendre mon tour et donner mon passeport avec un grand sourire à la gentille personne qui s’occupera de moi… Pour finir je n’échappe pas au formulaire à remplir en japonais avec les aimables conseils de l’employée qui ne parle pas anglais mais qui sourit. Pfiou 2 heures pour qu’on me remette un papier qui m’invite à revenir un mois plus tard pour obtenir ma carte. Anecdote en passant, la demoiselle qui me remet ce papier a un joli livre avec toutes les phrases nécessaires à la communication avec des étrangers, il lui suffit de pointer sur la phrase et moi de lire la traduction en anglais, généralement cachée par son doigt puisqu’elle pointe la version japonaise.
Pouruoi se donner tout ce mal, me demanderez-vous ? Et bien pour pouvoir m’acheter un keitai ou téléphone portable pardi ! Les email ont leur utilité mais donner rendez-vous à quelqu’un dans un grande ville sans téléphone, relève de la grande coordination. Je vous épargne les démarches pour acheter un téléphone, c’est très similaire (sauf qu’avec de la chance on tombe sur un vendeur qui comprend l’anglais) Evidemment comme tout téléphone qui se respecte ici, il faut lui mettre un strap, seulement je n’en ai pas encore trouvé un qui me plaisit vraiment alors à défaut, j’ai opté pour mon porte-clé et un Totoro. Il y a probablement beaucoup de fonctionalités que je découvrirai au hasard d’une combinaison de touches improbables car le manuel est bien évidemment en japonais avec toutefois une version anglaise abrégée (mais vraiment abrégée, à la hache quoi !) Il a tout de même un appareil photo et peut envoyer et recevoir des emails. Bon je vous laisse avec 2 photos prises avec mon natel… keitai1 keitai2
Oui je suis un alien ici parce que les gens ne me comprenennt pas quand je parle… ou alors est-ce l’inverse et c’est moi qui ne les comprend pas ?! Enfin, un grand sourire débloque parfois la situation et ce n’est pas comme si j’avais zéro connaissance en japonais, donc en route pour l’immersion !
Okay, I apologize for not having posted on Monday as some of you wrote me early this week. (s’trop la carotte…). I have been busy with work (really busy this time) and could not get the moods to write something interesting. Now you get served, so far I did not write anything about food and it’s a shame because there is so many things to try and taste here. So many that I do not know what I will begin with… as Sebastien wrote on sushi, I will go on with it. Bon appétit !
One can think that sushi is quite expensive, at least in Europe, and it is even in Japan. BUT there is no comparison in taste. I would say that the sushi I am getting from the supermarket here are equivalent to the ones I had in some restaurants back in Switzerland and in the United States. Now you can get two different types of restaurant here; belt type were sushi are moving along a belt and you pick the one you like – pretty cheap like 100-200 yens the pair, or you get the counter type, slightly more expensive, where you order directly the cook in front of you and he will prepare them in a jiffy. おいしいね ! Right so delicious (even though I am not so sure of which one I tried…), taste is not the only particularity in Japan, you have to count on diversity and as gaijin, we tried everything, more or less. The fun part is to report what we ate to our Japanese colleagues, though we can remember some sushi English name, it has barely a meaning for them as they use Japanese names obviously. Still by describing some of the sushi they could tell us that we ate kazunoko, I am not able to transcribe the taste but the texture was interesting, it was a little hard like plastic but you can bite it easily. And of course we had twice of my favourite one, unagi. I am just totally mad of it, on a side note; we also had unadon this week for lunch. Oh and at the end, they servedus chawanmushi though we did not order it, but as curious as one can be, we taste it for you. Yummy !
You probably guys are getting hungry so we go on! Something funnier, everyday we have lunch at the NEC Kansai Lab cafeteria, which is serving good food. You choose between set A or B; both include miso soup, rice, some vegetables or side dish and the main dish. The latter one can go from tonkatsu to hamburger, salmon to tempura. Not to say that it is really cheap either 520 or 630 yens, but recently I have been eating curry rice and ramen or udon more than I can eat in a row. Those sets described earlier come in a limited number and I do not know whether my colleagues have so much work that they go to lunch late or if it did not ring their mind that they are going to eat curry rice for the third time in a row within one week… still I cannot stand this situation anymore. Hopefully, 2 of our colleagues (freshmen) probably felt the same and start the move to go to lunch a couple of minutes earlier, nicely done.
Oh yeah, by the way, Japanese eat very fast! Some of my earliest reader may remember an article entitled “Eat fast and get lost”, the same situation apply here and I would transcribed it as “ittadakimasu, ike, gochisosama deshita”. They literally eat the set in two bites within 10 to 15 minutes and then back to the workspace. It is not like we were in a hurry and anyway as they will be goofing around for 1 hour or so, waiting for coffee to be done (by one of the two people knowing how to handle the coffee machine) and then sit and talk about anything.
Still caring for some more food? Then let’s try takoyaki and okonomiyaki! The first one is a typical dish from Osaka, which consists of small balls of some kind of dough with octopus in it, usually served with mayonaise, very thinly sliced dried fish and a famous unknow sauce (that sauce goes with everything apparently as I can smell it everywhere). The other dish can be translated as Japanese pancake and depending where you eat it, filling is different. Osaka is know for its okonomiyaki with spaghetti but it also have cabbage, meat, shrimp, octopus, mayonaise, very thinly sliced dried fish and… the unknown sauce!
Though you can buy takoyaki and okonomiyaki almost everywhere on the streets (especially in Dotombori area), it is sometimes interesting to sit at a table and have cooks doing it just in front of you. At least you know what you eat or you try to guess which one is yours…
One more thing, sometimes you are lucky enough and get an English menu or the Japanese one has lots of pictures and you can just point at those to order. But sometimes you are damned hungry and get into some small lovely izakaya… there no English menu, even worse no one understand you (or put in the other way, we do not understand them…) . Well now I know that those izakaya are mainly here for drinking, preferably alcohol and the food they serve is only here to accompany the drinks. Itis pretty expensive and you do not get much to eat before you are drunk. The good thing with Japanese people being drunk, is that they socialize more easily and sometimes turn out to know a little of English to order their favorite dishes…
I hope you enjoyed the meal so just say “gochisosama deshita”
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