We also made a trip to Nagoya one Saturday so that Sarah, too, could experience the amazingness that is spicy miso garlic butter ramen. She was an instant fan, and Jon, now having a better grasp on the ramen scene, appreciated it even more, making the bold claim that it is the best meal he has eaten in his 26 years on this planet. I’d say that’s a pretty rave review. We did some shopping; or rather Jon did, picking up a snazzy new 1 TB external hard drive. We also stopped by the clothing store Zara, where my friend Aki works. She had break time in the middle of the afternoon, so we went across the street and chatted over shakes. My pineapple shake was rather refreshing. Already being in Nagoya, I took the opportunity to head to the Nagoya branch’s capoeira practice (same instructor) in the evening, and let John and Sarah have a nice dinner at Flour (my favorite Italian place in Nagoya). Sadly, I was still sore from practice the previous night and wasn’t really feeling it that night.
At some point, on one of the Wednesdays somewhere in here, we decided to play Boggle. Sarah was talking some smack about her skillz (yes, with a “z”), and I remember doing all right when I played with my mom and sisters, so I talked some game right back…and then got completely shamed. Sarah whooped up on us every round, the gap only closing during rounds where there simply weren’t many words to be seen. Otherwise, we were no match for her sheer speed. I started to step it up at the end, and considered it a win when I at least came close (i.e. withing 10) to writing down as many words as her. And apparently Sarah always lost to her grandma. Damn, granny’s got game.
During this time I also received a request from Erin at the prefectural government office to help out with a training seminar for Japanese people on how to give local area tours in English. This is in preparation for a rather large meeting of the Asia-Pacific Economoic Cooperative(APEC) to be held in Gifu this October. These occurred on Feb. 11th and 19th. The 11th was technically a day off for us, but I really just wanted to do something different for a change, so I signed up. The first day ended up being miserable, not due to anyone’s fault but mother nature’s. It was colder than usual and raining the entire time. It would have been that bad, but the majority of the tour is outside, and it’s rather hard to keep people’s attention while they are huddled underneath umbrellas, cursing the weather. Okay, well maybe they weren’t cursing, but I sure felt like it. There were four groups total, each with two CIRs assigned as leaders. I’m not sure whose brilliant idea it was, but they decided to pair me up with Irish Colin. So yeah, the group’s leaders were Collin and Colin, that’s not confusing at all. We ended up having them call us by our last name. And I was certainly pleased with the pairing as Colin is an all around cool guy (must be something about the name). The dyanamic duo at work:
We headed to our buses, gave a little introduction, and stopped at Gifu Park, where the tour begins. The basic format was: 1) Stop at point of interest 2) Give explanation 3) Answer questions the group has. Colin and I decided to give the explanations of the first two points of interest, to basically give them an example of how it is supposed to go. After that, the idea was to get volunteers to do the explanations for the rest of the tour, while Colin and I play the part of the foreign tourist and ask questions in English. Here's me, coordinating international relations like you wouldn't believe! (Actually, pleading for someone to volunteer)
We had real trouble getting folks to volunteer, but thankfully some older guy just up and started talking (not the dude in the picture above, who was actually cool). The only problem is, he did this for a number of the points and started dominating things. When we got to the museum, Colin and I changed the formula a bit, so that instead of designating a “tour guide” to explain a point, we just started asking questions to random people to give everyone a chance to speak a bit. That seemed to work pretty well and brought a couple of the shy people out of their shell, once they realized we were actually nice and wouldn’t bite their heads off if they made a mistake. We continued on to Kawara-machi, a little district near Nagara River where the cormorant fishing takes place. I had never been there, and it’s a charming area with shops, cafes, restaurants, and old buildings with traditional style architecture. I’d really like to come back when it isn’t pouring cold rain. The people in my group were all quite nice. One older dude gave pointed a place in the district that was a hot spring bathhouse, and he highly suggested it. Duly noted. That will be happening at some point. We had sort of a reference text for the event, and aside from all of the touristy sights, it also just had one line about random, but semi fancy-looking Italian restaurant. That may also get put on the list of things to do. Stopping in front of the bathhouse, though, triggered a debate about onsen. Someone thought this place was better than Gero, and in general she didn’t think Gero was nearly as magnificent as everyone makes it out to be. This apparently rubbed the old dude who volunteered to speak from before the wrong way, and he made a beeline over to her, knocking several people’s umbrellas in the process, to let her know just how mistaken she was. Nobody in the group said anything, but looking at their faces, they were all annoyed with this clown. All right, dude, settle down. It’s cold and rainy and nobody wants to listen to your shit. One of thing of note was that the bathhouse actually had a little spring water hand bath outside. I’d heard of the foot baths before (and experienced their awesomness in Gero), but this was the first hand bath I’d come across. I would’ve given it a shot, but I feared how cold my hands would be once the water started stealing my body heat to evaporate.
Below, the rare specimen "Professional Collin"
Finally we got back onto the bus and headed back to the International Center to close the training session. I forgot to mention that this training session was organized with help from the volunteer tourism promotion group. We had a couple of their members in our group, and the leader of the GGG (the group's unfortunate acronym) led the opening and closing sections of the session. I will henceforth refer to her as Diva, as she was wearing one of the most ridiculous flamboyant outfits I’ve seen in awhile. And you know she thought she looked like a million bucks. Anyway, Diva wanted us all to go up and say a couple things about the day. Then Erin prompted us to “say something about the day that was good and something that was difficult.” Okay, I can do that. And so I did. “I learned a lot from everyone, but we didn’t have enough time.” I elaborated a little more than that, but didn’t get into too much detail, and kept it all warm and fuzzy. The next couple CIRs also kept it short and sweet, but there were a couple at the end who ended up giving over 5 minutes worth of advice/criticism. Granted, the stuff they were saying was for the most part valid, it was the way in which they said it (as if they are professional interpreters themselves) and the audience they were saying it to (this was volunteer training). Also, we weren’t told to give a long, drawn-out, self-important speech picking apart every little thing they could improve on. After this finished, Diva gave us some money to hit up a café on our way back. Now, Diva is apparently a somewhat infamous person in the international event circle within Gifu. I had been warned about her by my friend Naomi from capoeira. She is always calling up the International Affairs Division of city hall and asking them for favors, etc. Diva apparently also asks Irish Colin to volunteer for different events all the time, and Naomi advised me that it would be best to keep my distance lest I end up getting badgered to give up my weekends for events all the time. Always looking out for me, thanks Naomi!
We all headed out and stopped at a café near Gifu station. I looked at the menus and there was some sort of cocoa-esque drink that looked really thick, essentially drinking chocolate, or at least that’s what I had built it up to be in my head. I thought it had to be special given that the size of the cup was tiny and it still cost $4.50. Nope, I was wrong. The viscosity was all together disappointing, as it was as pourable as regular hot cocoa. For hot chocolate, it was pretty good- nice, rich and semisweet. I was expecting more than hot chocolate, though, whereas what I got didn’t really surpass what I could get at Starbucks, or hell, even College Library back at UW-Madison (where, for a little over a buck, you got one hell of a sugar boost for studying…tasty and a great value).
The females in the group were heading to a ladies’ night gathering, which left Irish Colin and I to fend for ourselves. Colin wanted to head to this Mexican restaurant, but after making the walk we found it to be closed, seeing as it was technically a holiday that day. We grabbed dinner at Erich’s Curry instead, followed by dessert at Mister Donut.
That Saturday I pretty much lazed around and then hung out with Jon for some solid gaming. It had been quite awhile, so long, in fact, that my skills were suffering severely, but it was good to bust out the fighting games again. Sarah was out of town, so Jon and I gave her a hard time by insinuating we were at a snack bar via texts. For the uninitiated, a “snack bar” is another way to refer to a “hostess club,” basically a place where you go to horrendously overpay for alcohol while talking to pretty women in nice dresses who are paid to pour your drink, light your cigarette, and laugh at your shitty jokes. Basically, you get your ego stroked…and if you head to a really sketchy looking one, maybe something else, too. It is a business model that would never really fly in the States, especially given that nothing sexual goes on at the vast majority of them. In reality, Jon and I were sending these texts from his apartment, in between bouts of Tekken 6, but we really just wanted to give Sarah some crap.
The next day was Valentine’s Day, and to celebrate I did absolutely nothing related to VD (wow, that’s an unfortunate abbreviation). Instead I had plans to participate in an English speaking event partially put on by Naomi’s office, and a long time ago she had asked if I could volunteer as a native speaker. So I headed over to Gifu where the event was going to be taking place. There were five or so tables, with two native speakers assigned to a table. We talked with the Japanese participants about any old thing, although we had topic cards (music, sports, etc.) in case the conversation stilted. After 30 minutes, the Japanese folks picked a card that told them which table to move to. Most of the participants were rather old, in their 50s or above, and it seems a number of them took up English conversation as something to do in their retirement. Some of them were too nervous to speak up much, but I was definitely surprised at the proficiency of some of the older folks. One older lady mentioned in her introduction that she does tea ceremony and is looking to learn how to teach/explain it in English. I’ve long been interested in taking tea ceremony lessons, so this seemed like the perfect opportunity. The other native speaker at the table was also interested, so we exchanged info with her and set up a date for the next week. This is why I tell myself I need to continue volunteering for these sorts of events and whatnot. Every once in awhile providence steps in and you meet someone with a mutual interest. One of the other native speakers was from Australia and owned a bar called Tree House, and the plan was to head over there for food and drink afterward. The guy was really “in your face” about everything and just rubbed me the wrong way, but Naomi and another guy from capoeira, Tomohiro, were going, so I headed over with them and we grabbed our own little section. Once in awhile I joined, or rather was addressed and pulled into, conversations with other people at the bar, but being me I’d much rather stick to talking to people who I know aren’t going to annoy me, and quickly returned to my own table’s conversation. I was soon vindicated in my decision when a Japanese lady, probably in her mid-upper 40s, commented on how I looked like Harry Potter (fair enough, I get that a lot over here), but then also proceeded to say that I should get naked and dance. All I could do was hope and pray that she was referring to Daniel Radcliffe’s role on stage where he had to appear naked, and thus thought that might be a semi-appropriate thing to say. In reality, though, I doubt that was an attempt on her part to make an obscure reference, and the only other obvious motivation for that comment creeped me the fuck out, so I made sure to not even come close to facing her direction the rest of the time. I turned back to Naomi, who was getting out some chocolate-marshmallow-nut dessert she had made since it was Valentine’s Day. It was really tasty. Again, I can’t stress this enough, but Naomi=awesomeness. Then a couple of random foreigners came in and sat at the bar directly across from our table, so we ended up talking with them a bit. This also ended up being rather awkward. The one guy, Jacob, kept taking to me about whatever rap artist was being played in the background, so I pretended to know/care what he was talking about. He was also apparently looking for some dude named Marcel. When this guy showed up, Jacob jumped out of his chair, ran over, and then turns back to me and says “I’m gonna fight this guy. He’s gonna beat the crap out of me.” WTF?! Jacob did already have some bruising around his one eye, so maybe the dude rocks it Fight Club style, who knows? But still, I just met you, why are you telling me this? I gave him the thumbs up with really fake smile. Jacob soon left to hang with Marcel and attempting to get his friend Michael to go along, but Michael decided to stay at the bar, and I certainly understood his desire to do so. Given this decision, I thought maybe Michael was of sound mind and maybe someone I could get along with. Apparently, though, Michael is completely socially incompetent…that or just really boring. I found out he is from Minnesota, and tried to use the Midwest as a bit of a conversation starter…nope, nothing. I found out he lives in Ogaki, too. Seeing as there are only so many foreigners in the area I thought hey, someone new to potentially hang out with. So I asked what he does in his spare time, he replied with “running.” Fair enough, but more than a one word answer would be nice. Even when I asked if he liked video games…or even just movies, he they were “hit or miss.” At this point, I gave up.
Eventually the three of us from capoeira left to go grab some ramen, since the chicken roll w. fries I had at the bar was underwhelming to say the least. Naomi knows I like ramen a lot, and had a couple of places she wanted to show me in Gifu, so we stopped at one of her recommended ramen joints on the way back to the station. And as per usual, she knows what she’s talking about. I had some black sesame ramen, and it was scrumptious. The broth itself was jet black, which just looks badass, and then it tasted amazing to boot. I’d put it in my top three, I think. For sure in the top five. Then again, I also just love black sesame flavor, so I might be biased.
At H-Mart the other day I found a black sesame drink that comes in a juice box. It was kind of ridiculous.
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