How I feel right now... minus the man hands.
I started writing this post while waiting for my flight out of Narita to Seattle last night... or this morning... or another lifetime ago? Fucking jet lag; I don't know how to use relative time terms. Anyway, I ran out of time and now I need to try to finish this post up. In thinking about the past week since the cancellation of IUC and doing battle with the UW administrators, I've become increasingly frustrated with the bureaucracy that surrounds all of the decisions that have led to me sitting here in on Sarah, Brandon and Sean's couch rather than in my apartment in Yokohama. Though I want to emphasize that I am very happy to see all of my friends here in Seattle; it has nothing to do with them - they are the awesome, though I wish Kelly weren't sick!! - but everything to do with labyrinthine bureaucratic channels within IUC itself and UW.
But I promised the second half of the story of what Speed referred to as "Intimate Blue Tree-Kai" on Facebook, huh? It's been a rough couple of weeks for me as I have said repeatedly, and collecting my thoughts on last Wednesday (which feels like it was about 2 years ago) has been really difficult. There's a part of me that is completely in shock that I am in Seattle, and the other feels like I never left at all. That's the weird thing about traveling long distances; even though you're in that metal tube for more than 8 or 9 hours and you have a sense of the passage of time, you don't really get a sense of a passage of distance. You know you're in a different place, and yet you feel like you should be able to go to the same hangouts and places that you could before you took out. I keep wondering when my next nomihoudai is and where I can get another chu-hi, and I also hallucinate I am seeing people from IUC around Seattle (I swear I saw Haitham's doppelganger at Portage Bay Cafe). At any given moment, either my situation in Seattle seems like a waking dream, or the entirety of Japan seems like a dream. I can't straighten my thoughts out.
My point here is that I'm going to do what I can to recall the sequence of events, details, and my impressions, but right now my brain is still so clouded with confusion and emotion that I can only hope I don't overlook something. Rest assured that I will go through this post a couple of times (maybe not immediately after writing it, though) to try and polish it since I have realized a lot of things in the last couple of days, but these thoughts are still very much in their nascent stages and have yet to really develop into something beyond just mentioning. My one succor (I love that this word sounds so much like 救い because they mean essentially the same thing) as of late has been writing, and I think you can tell from my posts as of late that I've been using this open space as a way to try to work some things out in my head and try to make sense of it all. But this isn't what you came for, is it?
My point here is that I'm going to do what I can to recall the sequence of events, details, and my impressions, but right now my brain is still so clouded with confusion and emotion that I can only hope I don't overlook something. Rest assured that I will go through this post a couple of times (maybe not immediately after writing it, though) to try and polish it since I have realized a lot of things in the last couple of days, but these thoughts are still very much in their nascent stages and have yet to really develop into something beyond just mentioning. My one succor (I love that this word sounds so much like 救い because they mean essentially the same thing) as of late has been writing, and I think you can tell from my posts as of late that I've been using this open space as a way to try to work some things out in my head and try to make sense of it all. But this isn't what you came for, is it?
A disclaimer first, however: since the following took place in Japan and the drinking culture dictates that what you say at nomikai remains at the table with your emptied sake glasses. I feel there are plenty of things I can tell you about what Aoki said, but at the same time there are some spots where I will have to suminuri (censor with a big black bar) because to include the details would be terribly inappropriate of me. To be a complete asshole about it: you had to have been there.
さて、after my embarrassing little crying jag in the teacher's room, Aoki, Speed and I proceeded outside. I think Speed needled me a little bit about crying, and I snapped at him to "shut up" as jokingly as possible, but it probably came out a bit harsh. I've already said it, but public crying is NOT something I do, but it's now become kind of standard in the last week. You should've seen me on the bus on the way out Narita, watching Pacifico Yokohama disappear out of sight. Anyway, knowing it was going to be my last day at the Center, I had also brought the last of the umbrellas I had borrowed back (you'd swear I had a small family living in my apartment based on the number I had at any given time during the year) and I'm pretty sure I swore audibly when I saw it was raining rather heavily. There was some discussion about where to go for drinks, and Speed settled on a place called Ichi no Kura, a place we used to frequent for our teishoku lunches on Wednesdays when we had no afternoon class. I may have misheard Aoki (you'll have to confirm with Speed), but I thought he jokingly called the place kind of dangerous or something and thought that he didn't want to go there. I'm not really sure, but we made our way to Sakuragicho; Speed made light talk with Aoki along the way, and I admittedly was pretty tight-lipped on the way out. It's not that I didn't want to talk; I've just been having trouble expressing myself other than through waterworks and was afraid I'd set myself off.
We eventually got to the restaurant (fortunately a good part of the way we walked had overhead cover, but don't fuck with my hair! Ugh, not looking forward to Seattle dampness) and when we walked in, Aoki said 久しぶりだね, meaning he hadn't been there in a long time. My understanding of the Center is that back in the halcyon days teachers and students mingled freely in their downtime, and a cheap place like Ichi no Kura fits the bill for a night out of getting your sensei drunk. It doesn't seem this happens any more (as I mentioned in this post), and as far as I know the first Ari/Blue Tree-kai was the only outing of students and senseis this year. There was of course the one planned for the day of the earthquake, but that was never to be. During the course of the evening, Aoki mentioned that there was another bar that they used to frequent a little further away from Sakuragicho station... I guess a place to keep in mind if there's ever an IUC Class of '11 reunion.
We sat down, order some drinks (I started with anzu-shu - apricot sake -, Speed had a beer and Aoki Nihon-shu) and the conversation started off lightly enough about how unfortunate it was that the students would no longer be able to attend class at Pacifico. Speed asked a few questions to try and break the ice, and fortunately alcohol helped to ease conversation so that the topics no longer needed to be forced. We talked about the decision to cancel classes in Japan for the year, and as Aoki had indicated in e-mails to both Speed and I previously, he again restated that this was not something that came out of the offices in Yokohama. Instead, it wholly originated in Stanford under the direction of Dr. Levy, and Aoki himself was completely taken aback at the decision. The staff in Japan was not consulted, and I have to think that they are all a bit resentful of it. Certainly Aoki - who seems to have worked at the Center since at least the early 90s as I think he taught a couple of my professors in those days - would know more than anyone the ins and outs of running a program like IUC, and more than just his expectation of being included in such discussions, would also have a lot to contribute in the planning process. From what someone had mentioned earlier in the year, it seems like the current director of IUC (Baxter) relies on Aoki's guidance in making decisions. The Directors seem to change every few years, and it just seems to me that as soon as they get used to the job, they have to switch. Plus, Aoki's the man.
Aoki, likewise, had questions for us. A part of me thinks that one of the reasons Aoki decided so quickly to come out with us is that - aside from Speed and I obviously being so awesome - is that he's heard from the teachers and admins in Japan, and certainly has gotten an earful from Stanford. Whose opinions he hasn't heard are the students. I mean, no matter what IUC decides, how much they fight amongst themselves, or how they work to try and make the upcoming 4th quarter go as smoothly as possible, the fact remains that the ones who have the least amount of contribution to these discussions are also the ones who have to live with the outcome. I think he wanted to hear our opinions how things have played out, and also get a feel for much we actually understood of what had been going in the last week or more.
The one thing that Speed and I emphasized was how the tone of e-mail traffic come out of IUC differs greatly between depending on whether it is from Japan or from Stanford. The weekend after the earthquake we received a number of updates from Yoshida-san in the admin office, explaining to us some of the after effects of the earthquake, the planned power outages and impact on train schedules, and moreover, make it clear to us there WOULD be class on Monday morning. She had a very calming influence, I think (or at least, I felt better after reading her messages and expected something from her whenever circumstances seemed confusing). The succession of messages we got from Akizawa-sensei about first the cancellation of Monday classes and then classes for the rest of the week still remained very cool and reinforced the idea that we would start up again on 4/4 after spring break. And can I just say, Akizawa has some mad fucking English skills. We got another message from Baxter I believe that Tuesday or Wednesday that was very much in the same vein, and even though the people I was talking to all felt kind of disappointed we weren't in class, we could still live with the decision.
However, on Thursday (3/17) there were messages appearing our inbox from Indra Levy. Honestly, I didn't really know who she was and just assumed she was the chosen mouthpiece of the IUC Executive Committee. Turns out she's the one who holds all the power in the IUC hierarchy. I didn't realize what Stanford decided had so much bearing on IUC itself; I always assumed that because all our paperwork says that Stanford only "administers" IUC that they took care of a lot of the mundane details and got their orders from the tops in Japan. And even within the Japan IUC hierarchy, you have to keep in mind that though Dr. Baxter is the director, IUC itself seems to be very much structured like a Japanese company: there is a figurehead at the top who gets the fancy title, but all the decision-making power lies with the Vice President, which would be Aoki-sensei. When Speed and I mentioned that we didn't know that Dr. Levy had so much authority, Aoki got this amused smile on his face and said, "僕も知らなかった" ("I also didn't know"). I mean, if AOKI had no idea that she was in such a position of power, then how could we? Without getting into details here (you know that suminuri I mentioned earlier? Just imagine a black bar over the details), there's clearly some tension between IUC Japan and Stanford, but I feel like that's also to be expected when you have two groups competing for power. Dr. Levy, as Aoki noted, is new to her position and I think for some like Aoki who has been with the Center for 20+ years, having someone inexperienced newbie stepping on his toes from all the way across the Pacific is something he's unused to.
Aside from talking about IUC's cancellation, there was also a discussion around the progression of the year in general. Though certainly the senseis ask for our opinions in our individual evals at the end of every quarter, the atmosphere of an izakaya is much more conducive to an honest answer than a classroom. As I think I've mentioned, Speed and I have had Aoki since the first quarter, and we both agree that he has to be the best Japanese sensei we've ever had. I've certainly had some very good ones (hey, Kato-sensei, I'm looking forward to your party this spring), and some pretty mediocre, ineffective ones (not naming names). But Aoki is always on his game and can pretty much answer any question you throw at him; 20 years of dumb foreigner questions about Japanese will give you that advantage if it doesn't give you a stress headache first. I also imagine Aoki has fantastic English (sadly, still haven't heard it), and can understand exactly where we are getting confused. The mistakes a Japanese person makes in their own language I think must be very different from the ones we make; just think of listening to a non-native speaker using English and the kinds of mistakes they make. If they seem "bizarre," it's probably because it's not anything you've heard someone else slip up on, and it must be the same in Japanese. Aoki, however, can answer most questions right on the spot, whereas other senseis say they need to check into it later to give a satisfactory answer.
But even in saying this, Aoki admitted that he found our 3rd quarter morning grammar class to be the most difficult class he's ever had to handle. Even in the second quarter there were problems and he had solicited us for opinions about how he could make the class better in our interviews, and unfortunately the students that changed between quarters only made the problem worse. One kid never showed up even once, another wouldn't do the work and also wouldn't shut up... and so forth. Aoki said he thought that the individual expectations of him in that class were so different that it was nearly impossible for him to appease everyone or find middle ground. He apologized repeatedly for it, despite our assurances that there was nothing to be sorry about. It wasn't his fault that the chemistry of the class was out of whack, or that the other sensei who came in on Wednesdays didn't do a very good job of reigning in one particular student (I don't want to name names, but I feel like anyone who has ever spoken to me outside of class knows exactly who it is I am talking about), or just leading discussion in general. However, he seemed to take it upon himself that the class hadn't gone as well as he had hoped, and said at least twice that his faults as a teacher were to blame. I just had no idea what to say except for to shake my head and tell him that wasn't it. I explained to him that I had a similar problem with my afternoon modern Japanese history class; that the backgrounds of the students was too different and that discussions were frustrating. He had actually heard about this from my sensei - Akizawa - so it seems that I wasn't incorrect in my assessment (and annoyance) with that class. Anyway, it was rather refreshing to see such candor since with Japanese senseis you know you're almost always getting just their game face; what they think on the inside is a mystery.
Along with these more serious discussions, there were also a lot of very funny, light moments. No one can be serious all the time, you know. Certainly someone with Aoki's sense of humor (he's a riot in class if given a chance) has to crack a joke every once in awhile. I forget why it came up, but he told us this hilarious story about how when he was a kid some old lady (I missed her relationship to him) had served him a plate of yakisoba with a live moth still flapping around in the noodles. He called attention to it and the old lady just smashed it and said "all better! eat!" He of course had no idea what to do, so he turned to his mom for guidance, who made a face and refrained from eating. He also mentioned how some years previous he had taught a class called "offensive Japanese," that taught all of the Japanese you don't normally get in a classroom. You generally have to have Japanese friends or be around oyaji (old men) to get the actual language Japanese people use amongst themselves in casual contexts. He said one student in particular had been so good at it that when he was stumbling drunk down the street from a sensei's party (DAMMIT, WHY WEREN'T WE INVITED INTO YOUR HOMES?!), he bumped into another drunk. This student then let loose some string of crude Japanese (I can't remember exactly what he said) in such fluent Japanese that when another of his senseis followed soon behind, they had a hard time trying to make the excuse that this foreigner just learned this expression and didn't know any better.
Aoki also mentioned that when he would introduce these different expressions, he'd do his best to make it as funny as possible. He wanted them to react to this style of Japanese that we never, EVER use in the classroom; Japanese doesn't have much in the way of swear words, and instead trying to be crude or offensive depends on how you pronounce your sentences. There's a lot of talking out of your nose, stressing syllables and drawing out vowels to show annoyance, frustration, and anger. At the gokon I went to probably a month ago, one of the guys asked what kinds of words in English do we have that don't really translate into Japanese. I immediately launched into a string of four-letter words - because you know, I'm classy like that - to show them how much more effectively you can swear in English. Anyway, Aoki had expected students to laugh at his what was essentially swearing in class, but instead they took immediately to their notebooks to write it all down. Sasuga, grad students. God we suck sometimes; an example like this is exactly why when someone asks me what other grad students are like, I say "socially inept."
I'm not sure what Japanese grad students are like, but American ones are a very... special bunch. I am honestly not sad at all to be losing this title soon because for someone who tries hard not to be a social doofus, it's insulting to be lumped in with a group of people which on the whole lacks even a fleeting grasp on self-awareness. I just do not understand it sometimes. DO YOU NOT HEAR YOURSELF SPEAKING? At one point, we were talking about the temperaments of this year's crop of students, and contrary to what I thought, apparently the students from years previous had been much more arrogant and harder to teach. I had reasoned that perhaps because the Center has been letting in more and more students recently that the percentage of asshole went up commensurately (not exactly the words I used... it also must be noted here that my spoken Japanese spotty that night and I had difficulty expressing myself. You can ask Speed; he didn't pull any punches in his assessment of my performance later on in the night), but not so. Aoki said that in fact our group had been rather amiable and willing to go along with whatever the senseis gave us; in contrast, previous classes had been rather stubborn and thought they knew it all already. I told Speed later that I assume these students came as a result of Japan's bubble economy in the late 80s; Japan studies was hot for some years into the 90s (it took awhile before people realized Japan was really slipping and the bubble burst wasn't just a small hiccup), and presumably the students in those years had bigger egos than grad students do now. Japanese speakers were in high demand back then, and they therefore weren't exactly looking for someone to tell them what they were doing wrong: just how fucking awesome they were.
The night wore on and we all worked through our second drinks; I wanted something stronger and though Japanese whiskey is typically awful, I ordered a double on the rocks. I think I have mentioned before that Speed consistently wrote sample sentences for class about how much I drink (which is funny considering he drinks more than I do ::cough::), and though it's hard to say how seriously Aoki took these (I mean, it's Paul Speed we're talking about), he certainly remembered them. In my individual eval for the second quarter, Aoki asked me if I was "Ok" because Speed had written some sample sentence about how I drink 5 beers every night (WRONG! I don't drink beer, thank you), and though now I think now he was (mostly) kidding, at the time I was horrified. I told Aoki Speed was displacing his bad habits onto me (let's also not forget Speed's giant man crush on Aoki), and afterward messaged Speed to tell him he needed to clear this up. There was also another instance where a sample sentence in our book was related to someone drinking too much at a bonenkai, and Aoki cheekily called on me to read it. I was so flustered when I realized it I had trouble getting the sentence out. Dammit. Anyway, Aoki looks at me and asks if it isn't rare that people drink whiskey these days. As Speed pointed out at the time, it seems rare that a woman would drink whiskey, though I still know a couple who do. No big moral to this story; you could say that I should keep myself in check around my senseis, but Japanese people don't really judge you too harshly about what you drink. Certainly not the way that Americans do. The other thing I can add here is that apparently my sensei from last year had commented to Brian at the winter party he holds for everyone who has ever taken his class that "that Mariko from last year sure could handle her alcohol ("酒が強い" meaning I'm strong with sake), huh?" Probably better things I could be remembered for...
We sat talking for probably close to 3 hours (I think we left the Center at 5:30 and I remember checking watch some time after 8 and we hadn't left at that point), and it came time to leave. Aoki does have a family, after all. Aoki grabbed the check and went up to the cashier (you don't pay at the table in Japan, and you don't pay TIP. UGH, I am having such a hard time adjusting to this stupid tipping system in America). Once Speed and I had caught up to him, he waved us off and insisted on paying. I stood kind of slack-jawed and unable to respond, while Speed tried to insist we pay. He wouldn't let us, and I can now say for the first time in my life I've actually been treated by a sensei. Couldn't have come from a nicer guy.
Afterward, we made our way down to the subway with Aoki - though awkwardly because Speed and I hadn't quite decided what to do yet. Speed and I settled on going out for a couple more drinks out in Yokohama, while Aoki takes the city subway to and from work every day. Standing on the platform waiting for the train, Speed said he needed to show Aoki something and started fumbling for his phone. I don't know how I knew, but I felt a dull stab of panic hit the back of my throat. You have to understand, Paul Speed knows no shame. If he wants to do it, he'll do it. So he goes scrolling through the photos saved on his iphone and pulls up this:
さて、after my embarrassing little crying jag in the teacher's room, Aoki, Speed and I proceeded outside. I think Speed needled me a little bit about crying, and I snapped at him to "shut up" as jokingly as possible, but it probably came out a bit harsh. I've already said it, but public crying is NOT something I do, but it's now become kind of standard in the last week. You should've seen me on the bus on the way out Narita, watching Pacifico Yokohama disappear out of sight. Anyway, knowing it was going to be my last day at the Center, I had also brought the last of the umbrellas I had borrowed back (you'd swear I had a small family living in my apartment based on the number I had at any given time during the year) and I'm pretty sure I swore audibly when I saw it was raining rather heavily. There was some discussion about where to go for drinks, and Speed settled on a place called Ichi no Kura, a place we used to frequent for our teishoku lunches on Wednesdays when we had no afternoon class. I may have misheard Aoki (you'll have to confirm with Speed), but I thought he jokingly called the place kind of dangerous or something and thought that he didn't want to go there. I'm not really sure, but we made our way to Sakuragicho; Speed made light talk with Aoki along the way, and I admittedly was pretty tight-lipped on the way out. It's not that I didn't want to talk; I've just been having trouble expressing myself other than through waterworks and was afraid I'd set myself off.
We eventually got to the restaurant (fortunately a good part of the way we walked had overhead cover, but don't fuck with my hair! Ugh, not looking forward to Seattle dampness) and when we walked in, Aoki said 久しぶりだね, meaning he hadn't been there in a long time. My understanding of the Center is that back in the halcyon days teachers and students mingled freely in their downtime, and a cheap place like Ichi no Kura fits the bill for a night out of getting your sensei drunk. It doesn't seem this happens any more (as I mentioned in this post), and as far as I know the first Ari/Blue Tree-kai was the only outing of students and senseis this year. There was of course the one planned for the day of the earthquake, but that was never to be. During the course of the evening, Aoki mentioned that there was another bar that they used to frequent a little further away from Sakuragicho station... I guess a place to keep in mind if there's ever an IUC Class of '11 reunion.
We sat down, order some drinks (I started with anzu-shu - apricot sake -, Speed had a beer and Aoki Nihon-shu) and the conversation started off lightly enough about how unfortunate it was that the students would no longer be able to attend class at Pacifico. Speed asked a few questions to try and break the ice, and fortunately alcohol helped to ease conversation so that the topics no longer needed to be forced. We talked about the decision to cancel classes in Japan for the year, and as Aoki had indicated in e-mails to both Speed and I previously, he again restated that this was not something that came out of the offices in Yokohama. Instead, it wholly originated in Stanford under the direction of Dr. Levy, and Aoki himself was completely taken aback at the decision. The staff in Japan was not consulted, and I have to think that they are all a bit resentful of it. Certainly Aoki - who seems to have worked at the Center since at least the early 90s as I think he taught a couple of my professors in those days - would know more than anyone the ins and outs of running a program like IUC, and more than just his expectation of being included in such discussions, would also have a lot to contribute in the planning process. From what someone had mentioned earlier in the year, it seems like the current director of IUC (Baxter) relies on Aoki's guidance in making decisions. The Directors seem to change every few years, and it just seems to me that as soon as they get used to the job, they have to switch. Plus, Aoki's the man.
Aoki, likewise, had questions for us. A part of me thinks that one of the reasons Aoki decided so quickly to come out with us is that - aside from Speed and I obviously being so awesome - is that he's heard from the teachers and admins in Japan, and certainly has gotten an earful from Stanford. Whose opinions he hasn't heard are the students. I mean, no matter what IUC decides, how much they fight amongst themselves, or how they work to try and make the upcoming 4th quarter go as smoothly as possible, the fact remains that the ones who have the least amount of contribution to these discussions are also the ones who have to live with the outcome. I think he wanted to hear our opinions how things have played out, and also get a feel for much we actually understood of what had been going in the last week or more.
The one thing that Speed and I emphasized was how the tone of e-mail traffic come out of IUC differs greatly between depending on whether it is from Japan or from Stanford. The weekend after the earthquake we received a number of updates from Yoshida-san in the admin office, explaining to us some of the after effects of the earthquake, the planned power outages and impact on train schedules, and moreover, make it clear to us there WOULD be class on Monday morning. She had a very calming influence, I think (or at least, I felt better after reading her messages and expected something from her whenever circumstances seemed confusing). The succession of messages we got from Akizawa-sensei about first the cancellation of Monday classes and then classes for the rest of the week still remained very cool and reinforced the idea that we would start up again on 4/4 after spring break. And can I just say, Akizawa has some mad fucking English skills. We got another message from Baxter I believe that Tuesday or Wednesday that was very much in the same vein, and even though the people I was talking to all felt kind of disappointed we weren't in class, we could still live with the decision.
However, on Thursday (3/17) there were messages appearing our inbox from Indra Levy. Honestly, I didn't really know who she was and just assumed she was the chosen mouthpiece of the IUC Executive Committee. Turns out she's the one who holds all the power in the IUC hierarchy. I didn't realize what Stanford decided had so much bearing on IUC itself; I always assumed that because all our paperwork says that Stanford only "administers" IUC that they took care of a lot of the mundane details and got their orders from the tops in Japan. And even within the Japan IUC hierarchy, you have to keep in mind that though Dr. Baxter is the director, IUC itself seems to be very much structured like a Japanese company: there is a figurehead at the top who gets the fancy title, but all the decision-making power lies with the Vice President, which would be Aoki-sensei. When Speed and I mentioned that we didn't know that Dr. Levy had so much authority, Aoki got this amused smile on his face and said, "僕も知らなかった" ("I also didn't know"). I mean, if AOKI had no idea that she was in such a position of power, then how could we? Without getting into details here (you know that suminuri I mentioned earlier? Just imagine a black bar over the details), there's clearly some tension between IUC Japan and Stanford, but I feel like that's also to be expected when you have two groups competing for power. Dr. Levy, as Aoki noted, is new to her position and I think for some like Aoki who has been with the Center for 20+ years, having someone inexperienced newbie stepping on his toes from all the way across the Pacific is something he's unused to.
Aside from talking about IUC's cancellation, there was also a discussion around the progression of the year in general. Though certainly the senseis ask for our opinions in our individual evals at the end of every quarter, the atmosphere of an izakaya is much more conducive to an honest answer than a classroom. As I think I've mentioned, Speed and I have had Aoki since the first quarter, and we both agree that he has to be the best Japanese sensei we've ever had. I've certainly had some very good ones (hey, Kato-sensei, I'm looking forward to your party this spring), and some pretty mediocre, ineffective ones (not naming names). But Aoki is always on his game and can pretty much answer any question you throw at him; 20 years of dumb foreigner questions about Japanese will give you that advantage if it doesn't give you a stress headache first. I also imagine Aoki has fantastic English (sadly, still haven't heard it), and can understand exactly where we are getting confused. The mistakes a Japanese person makes in their own language I think must be very different from the ones we make; just think of listening to a non-native speaker using English and the kinds of mistakes they make. If they seem "bizarre," it's probably because it's not anything you've heard someone else slip up on, and it must be the same in Japanese. Aoki, however, can answer most questions right on the spot, whereas other senseis say they need to check into it later to give a satisfactory answer.
But even in saying this, Aoki admitted that he found our 3rd quarter morning grammar class to be the most difficult class he's ever had to handle. Even in the second quarter there were problems and he had solicited us for opinions about how he could make the class better in our interviews, and unfortunately the students that changed between quarters only made the problem worse. One kid never showed up even once, another wouldn't do the work and also wouldn't shut up... and so forth. Aoki said he thought that the individual expectations of him in that class were so different that it was nearly impossible for him to appease everyone or find middle ground. He apologized repeatedly for it, despite our assurances that there was nothing to be sorry about. It wasn't his fault that the chemistry of the class was out of whack, or that the other sensei who came in on Wednesdays didn't do a very good job of reigning in one particular student (I don't want to name names, but I feel like anyone who has ever spoken to me outside of class knows exactly who it is I am talking about), or just leading discussion in general. However, he seemed to take it upon himself that the class hadn't gone as well as he had hoped, and said at least twice that his faults as a teacher were to blame. I just had no idea what to say except for to shake my head and tell him that wasn't it. I explained to him that I had a similar problem with my afternoon modern Japanese history class; that the backgrounds of the students was too different and that discussions were frustrating. He had actually heard about this from my sensei - Akizawa - so it seems that I wasn't incorrect in my assessment (and annoyance) with that class. Anyway, it was rather refreshing to see such candor since with Japanese senseis you know you're almost always getting just their game face; what they think on the inside is a mystery.
Along with these more serious discussions, there were also a lot of very funny, light moments. No one can be serious all the time, you know. Certainly someone with Aoki's sense of humor (he's a riot in class if given a chance) has to crack a joke every once in awhile. I forget why it came up, but he told us this hilarious story about how when he was a kid some old lady (I missed her relationship to him) had served him a plate of yakisoba with a live moth still flapping around in the noodles. He called attention to it and the old lady just smashed it and said "all better! eat!" He of course had no idea what to do, so he turned to his mom for guidance, who made a face and refrained from eating. He also mentioned how some years previous he had taught a class called "offensive Japanese," that taught all of the Japanese you don't normally get in a classroom. You generally have to have Japanese friends or be around oyaji (old men) to get the actual language Japanese people use amongst themselves in casual contexts. He said one student in particular had been so good at it that when he was stumbling drunk down the street from a sensei's party (DAMMIT, WHY WEREN'T WE INVITED INTO YOUR HOMES?!), he bumped into another drunk. This student then let loose some string of crude Japanese (I can't remember exactly what he said) in such fluent Japanese that when another of his senseis followed soon behind, they had a hard time trying to make the excuse that this foreigner just learned this expression and didn't know any better.
Aoki also mentioned that when he would introduce these different expressions, he'd do his best to make it as funny as possible. He wanted them to react to this style of Japanese that we never, EVER use in the classroom; Japanese doesn't have much in the way of swear words, and instead trying to be crude or offensive depends on how you pronounce your sentences. There's a lot of talking out of your nose, stressing syllables and drawing out vowels to show annoyance, frustration, and anger. At the gokon I went to probably a month ago, one of the guys asked what kinds of words in English do we have that don't really translate into Japanese. I immediately launched into a string of four-letter words - because you know, I'm classy like that - to show them how much more effectively you can swear in English. Anyway, Aoki had expected students to laugh at his what was essentially swearing in class, but instead they took immediately to their notebooks to write it all down. Sasuga, grad students. God we suck sometimes; an example like this is exactly why when someone asks me what other grad students are like, I say "socially inept."
I'm not sure what Japanese grad students are like, but American ones are a very... special bunch. I am honestly not sad at all to be losing this title soon because for someone who tries hard not to be a social doofus, it's insulting to be lumped in with a group of people which on the whole lacks even a fleeting grasp on self-awareness. I just do not understand it sometimes. DO YOU NOT HEAR YOURSELF SPEAKING? At one point, we were talking about the temperaments of this year's crop of students, and contrary to what I thought, apparently the students from years previous had been much more arrogant and harder to teach. I had reasoned that perhaps because the Center has been letting in more and more students recently that the percentage of asshole went up commensurately (not exactly the words I used... it also must be noted here that my spoken Japanese spotty that night and I had difficulty expressing myself. You can ask Speed; he didn't pull any punches in his assessment of my performance later on in the night), but not so. Aoki said that in fact our group had been rather amiable and willing to go along with whatever the senseis gave us; in contrast, previous classes had been rather stubborn and thought they knew it all already. I told Speed later that I assume these students came as a result of Japan's bubble economy in the late 80s; Japan studies was hot for some years into the 90s (it took awhile before people realized Japan was really slipping and the bubble burst wasn't just a small hiccup), and presumably the students in those years had bigger egos than grad students do now. Japanese speakers were in high demand back then, and they therefore weren't exactly looking for someone to tell them what they were doing wrong: just how fucking awesome they were.
The night wore on and we all worked through our second drinks; I wanted something stronger and though Japanese whiskey is typically awful, I ordered a double on the rocks. I think I have mentioned before that Speed consistently wrote sample sentences for class about how much I drink (which is funny considering he drinks more than I do ::cough::), and though it's hard to say how seriously Aoki took these (I mean, it's Paul Speed we're talking about), he certainly remembered them. In my individual eval for the second quarter, Aoki asked me if I was "Ok" because Speed had written some sample sentence about how I drink 5 beers every night (WRONG! I don't drink beer, thank you), and though now I think now he was (mostly) kidding, at the time I was horrified. I told Aoki Speed was displacing his bad habits onto me (let's also not forget Speed's giant man crush on Aoki), and afterward messaged Speed to tell him he needed to clear this up. There was also another instance where a sample sentence in our book was related to someone drinking too much at a bonenkai, and Aoki cheekily called on me to read it. I was so flustered when I realized it I had trouble getting the sentence out. Dammit. Anyway, Aoki looks at me and asks if it isn't rare that people drink whiskey these days. As Speed pointed out at the time, it seems rare that a woman would drink whiskey, though I still know a couple who do. No big moral to this story; you could say that I should keep myself in check around my senseis, but Japanese people don't really judge you too harshly about what you drink. Certainly not the way that Americans do. The other thing I can add here is that apparently my sensei from last year had commented to Brian at the winter party he holds for everyone who has ever taken his class that "that Mariko from last year sure could handle her alcohol ("酒が強い" meaning I'm strong with sake), huh?" Probably better things I could be remembered for...
We sat talking for probably close to 3 hours (I think we left the Center at 5:30 and I remember checking watch some time after 8 and we hadn't left at that point), and it came time to leave. Aoki does have a family, after all. Aoki grabbed the check and went up to the cashier (you don't pay at the table in Japan, and you don't pay TIP. UGH, I am having such a hard time adjusting to this stupid tipping system in America). Once Speed and I had caught up to him, he waved us off and insisted on paying. I stood kind of slack-jawed and unable to respond, while Speed tried to insist we pay. He wouldn't let us, and I can now say for the first time in my life I've actually been treated by a sensei. Couldn't have come from a nicer guy.
Afterward, we made our way down to the subway with Aoki - though awkwardly because Speed and I hadn't quite decided what to do yet. Speed and I settled on going out for a couple more drinks out in Yokohama, while Aoki takes the city subway to and from work every day. Standing on the platform waiting for the train, Speed said he needed to show Aoki something and started fumbling for his phone. I don't know how I knew, but I felt a dull stab of panic hit the back of my throat. You have to understand, Paul Speed knows no shame. If he wants to do it, he'll do it. So he goes scrolling through the photos saved on his iphone and pulls up this:
Shit. When I realized I was right in my instincts, I tried to hit him and tell him to stop, but there was no stopping him. I'm sorry to tell you this, Carly, if you're reading, but Speed explained THE WHOLE thing about how you took the photo, faux signed it for him, and had it at your Christmas party. Then he told about how it was passed between lockers in the 3rd quarter, and how there were concerns about where it had wound up after the Center had been canceled. He put the final nail in the coffin when he said that someone does have the pictures now and that person is => pointing at me. Oh I could've killed him. Just to make sure I hadn't a leg to stand on, Speed logged onto Facebook while we were on the train. I remember it was Takashima-cho because he couldn't get internet access while the car was in motion, but once we stopped he was able to pull up this picture from my profile:
MORTIFYING. I knew I was turning bright red and tried to hide my face, though morbidly I wanted to know Aoki's reaction. His face was hard to read and I don't think he quite knew what to think. For the love of God, Speed.
After Takashima-cho Yokohama is the next stop, and fortunately I was tipsy enough not to be getting depressed about time running short. It was bad enough having him see me cry once earlier in the day; twice on top of the damn thing about the picture would have been too much. Since Speed had his phone out he was able to take a couple of pictures of us with him before we had to go:
Speed also had to be awkward and asked Aoki what that "L" meant, and said something about how instead of "loser" like it would mean in English, maybe it meant "love." I swear to God, if anyone has a right to take Speed out of this world, it's me. But the voice over the loudspeaker announced that Yokohama was the next stop, and either Aoki was able to put this behind him or he just couldn't process it. Speed mentioned that he planned on going back to the Center any number of times since he wasn't leaving Japan, and Aoki turned to me to ask again if I was coming in tomorrow. I said I couldn't, he nodded in acknowledgment, and shook my hand. It was time for us to go after that, so it was definitely a better way to depart than him thinking I'm some idiot schoolgirl with a high school crush.
Though there are a lot of things I want to say about this, I really have to get moving. It's almost time to move me into my new apartment in Cap Hill!! But the one thing I will say is that in looking over this post, I realize it reads as a love letter to Aoki, and that really isn't my intention. I know I've made a lot of jokes about crushing on him all year, but after our nomikai I have nothing but infinite respect for the man. I can't even imagine the amount of pressure he must be under, and this is why I think Speed and I are so quick to defend IUC against criticism. They really are doing all they can, and it's hard to get a sense of that unless you've actually spoken to people at the Center. He's good at every single role he fills at IUC and he very clearly cares what happens to all of us. If I can be personal for a second (though really, when I have ever asked for permission about that on my blog before), for someone like me who has always struggled to find a good male role model, meeting someone like Aoki has been unprecedented. I won't go into my complaints about some of the idiots that I know, but Aoki trumps them all not only as a professional but just genuinely being a concerned human being. I hope you all can see that everything that happens at the Center affects him greatly, and that he's doing everything in his power to help us. Unfortunately, his hands are even more tied by red tape than mine.
If I can find the time and the will, there are a few other points that I didn't get to talk about that I want to elaborate on later. My last note here is that though there are still some other stories about my last couple of days in Japan to tell, from where I sit now that adventure has for all intents and purpose come to an abrupt and rather unceremonious end. As such, I feel like the title of my blog needs a change. I have a couple of ideas, and I'll probably put a poll up in the next couple of days to get some help in deciding which one to use.
And that's all she wrote.
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