Dreams

I just awoke from the strangest dream.

I was a teacher at a high school in Japan (how do I think of this stuff?!?!), and there was a scandal involving a girl on the dance team wearing a low-cut tank top. It wasn't even that bad, but I think her bra-strap was showing during a dance number, and eyebrows were raised. In the dream, I had nothing to do with the dance team at all, but the girl came to me for help after being accosted by parents, teachers, and the Japanese media. She was looking for solace from a foreigner I suppose, someone who would understand that a little bra-strap sighting wasn't the end of the world. Well, the parents and teachers found out she came to me, and the blame was turned. It turned into this crazy Japan vs. America thing, complete with a visit to my school office from two Japanese military officials in full uniform. One of them ate my lunch (it was a seemingly delicious mushroom pasta, warm, ready to be eaten on my desk).

I was informed that some wanted me dead. Clearly, I had polluted the young mind of a dancer and subsequently a nation... that kind of thing just doesn't fly. My fate would be decided in a few days... by a DODGEBALL game. No kidding. The weird thing (as if there was only one weird thing) was that it wasn't quite dodgeball. First, the giant ball was pitched like a baseball to the hitter, who then caught it and whacked it as far as he could. Come to think of it, it was more like kickball. Anyway, a whole crew of Americans and other random foreigners rallied for my cause and came to play on my team. There was one especially enthusiastic Brunette who insisted on playing with his shirt off, and tried to lead the foreign crowd in chants like, "Don't buy Japanese cars! Don't buy Japanese cars!" None of them very catchy or successful.

The other strange thing about the whole feeling of the dream was my apathy. Here I was, being potentially sentenced to death by the results of a dodgeball (kickball?) game for corrupting Japan, and I wasn't even fighting back. For some reason, I sympathized slightly with the Japanese government, and I could see that they were attacking me not out of hate or justice, but out of panic for a country that was sliding into a moral-less pit of sex and drugs and a splintering family structure. I was remarkably calm throughout the game, and I couldn't tell you who won.

At some point Julie and I hopped in her car and headed out on the road. We ended up in Nara, in the village where Rob lives, and I realized we were just a few single-lane inaka roads away from his house. We should go. She sort of thought I was kidding but kept driving anyway. The roads were flooding, but we continued through, nearly falling off a cliff and one point but eventually pulling into his house (which looked nothing like his actual house). At that moment, I remembered that his entire family was visiting from America - grandparents, aunts, uncles, the whole crew. Saying hello would be crazy, creepy... Why were we at his house again? But then I spotted him, his hair much too short and his skin kind of greasy - or was that my skin? It's not clear- and he approached to exchange a brief hug. He didn't even seem shocked that we were there. But for some reason I was being blocked by one of his relatives; I could barely see over some guy's huge head, and Julie was standing a ways to my right, so he went to hug her instead. I think we left after that. Rob and I never actually exchanged any words or hugs, just went on our ways - me back into Julie's car and Rob back to his hoards of awaiting family.

Weird, right?

A Change of Pace

For some reason, I've put a mental boundary on my blogging recently. I'm always thinking I should keep it to the surface, only write about travels, weird experiences, novelty stories that the kids back home might have a laugh at. But in the meantime, I've effectively forgotten the joy of blogging for me, for my sanity, for my own self-reflection. I'm gonna give it a go again.

Yesterday was Travis's 26th birthday, so the gang, including Jules, Hessen, Jody, and Jason met up for dinner at a needle-in-a-haystack French restaurant on Hondori. The others had already been to this place once or twice, and had nothing but good things to say, including ridiculous stories of free whiskey and red pepper creme brule. So despite having just 4000 yen in my wallet, I settled on spending 3150 of it on a lovely birthday dinner. As expected, no complaints could be made about the food. The chef who owns the restaurant lived and studied culinary arts in Europe for four years some time ago, so he speaks a bit of English and a little French. The menu is always a set course, which changes monthly with the seasonal foods. Last night our first course was fried clams in a blue cheese sauce, with cucumbers and crispy green beans on the side. Next came a lightly baked white fish in a mushroom cream sauce, then the most amazing wild rice I have ever tasted topped with foie gras. Then he surprised us with steamed whole shrimp (complete with head and shell), and finally, we thought, a delicate chocolate mousse for dessert. Everything was lovely.

We're chatting about the discrepancy is quality between the book and movie of The Beach and Fear and Loathing, having a good time, and soon all the Japanese customers have gone home. Yoshi (the chef) then emerges with a bottle of chianti for the table.
"Now all the Japanese are gone! Let's drink!" he proclaims. Cheers from the foreigners.
2 minutes later, he gets up and returns with a second bottle, accompanied by the largest hunk of blue cheese I have ever seen, which he plops on a plate with 6 spoons.
"Sorry, no crackers," he says. That's okay! More cheers from the foreigners (drool from Hessen).
Perhaps you can't quite appreciate the value of a large block of stinky cheese naked on a plate in the middle of a table until you've lived in Japan, where the only cheese anyone recognizes is Camembert or processed cheese. It's a strange cheese-deprived world here.
Anyway, minutes later, another bottle of wine is brought out. And then a fourth. I am in disbelief. I realize this man is a genuine alcoholic. Travis says he sees the chef a few times a week on the way home from work, usually drunk by 4 or 5 pm, getting ready for the dinner crowd. I believe it. At this point, all efforts to use English have stopped, and the chef is slurring Japanese at Jody and I, as we are the closest to him, occasionally shaking Jason's hand, who is seated next to him, and asking if he'd like to marry his 18-year-old daughter, who is set to return in November from a 4-year high school study abroad in New Zealand. He also asks Julie and I to meet her and test her English.
In the midst of the slurring Japanese, the chef mentions something to me about his kanojo. For some reason I can't quite process that when he says "girlfriend," he isn't referring to his wife. He keeps saying how he misses her so much, that he hasn't seen her in almost a month. I don't understand. He slurs something about how his relationship with his wife has nothing to do with love, and I finally see it. So as he sits there wasted and complaining to me about how much he misses his mistress, I want to leave. I can't offer sympathy; it's absurd. I can't even believe he's telling me this crap. Anyway, soon the group realizes we should go before another bottle of wine is opened, so we do. Strange night. I'm sure we'll go back.

Today I started a new lesson with my kids. It's a blindfolded taste test deal... they have to eat stuff and describe it in English. It's great. All sorts of faces and laughing and a few teary eyes. One of the foods I gave them today was 99% cocoa chocolate. Disgusting. I had no idea when I bought it just how serious it was. Who eats that stuff? Baffling. Try it.

Okay, I'm out of steam. Time for gluttonous relaxation with the AC on.