David Glekel: Go

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For my CIP, I went to a Go Center in Karasuma. Go is an ancient Japanese strategy game that I’ve been playing for several years in America. Since learning, I had always wanted to be able to play Go in Japan, so I was very excited to finally get the opportunity to do so.

The first time I went into the club, located above a convenience store, I was overwhelmed. The two rooms were filled with older men and a few women hunched over Go boards, and there was hardly any sound but the clack of glass Go stones against the wooden boards. I introduced myself to the woman who was running the club, and she quickly found me an opponent to play. Everyone looked very surprised to see me there; it was clear very few foreigners ever came to the club. Luckily, all the members were welcoming from the beginning, asking where I came from and how long I had been playing.

As time went on I got to know some of the club’s regulars, and could ask them for games without waiting for the hostess to pair us up. Often after playing we would review the game together, but their mumbled kansai-ben often proved challenging to decipher. With time I got used to their idiosyncratic speech, and soon become able to converse more smoothly with some of the members.

The moment that most made me feel like I was accepted occurred a month or two into my stay. While I was waiting for a game, one of the men I often played with came up to me with a book in his hand. He bowed and presented it to me, saying that he thought it would help my studies in Go. It was a book of Go problems, and when I opened it I found a handwritten note from the man. It had been painstakingly written in English, and said “David san, I hope you will be the champion of your country.” After I read it and thanked him, the man self-consciously asked if I could understand his written English. I assured him I could and put the book in my bag. I left the Go center that day knowing that I had found a place where if I pushed myself to reach across the language barrier, I would be met halfway.

Melanie Berry: Volunteering at the Kyoto International Manga Museum

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Volunteering at the Kyoto International Manga Museum has been a fun and interesting but occasionally demanding experience. I have definitely learned a lot there, not only about manga itself but also about tourism in Japan, how the Japanese tend to view their own pop culture and foreigners’ perceptions of it, and the culture of the workplace. Adjusting to such a new environment, though, is not exactly simple. The main two difficulties I’ve encountered while volunteering are switching sets of social cues between the Japanese staff and foreign guests and interacting on a casual basis with the staff.

Overall, I have found that for the most part I can communicate fairly effectively with the staff of the museum, but occasionally I have had trouble switching between Japanese and English when conducting tours and answering questions. Switching between the languages themselves is not necessarily the problem, although that is sometimes difficult. Moreover, the various social cues you utilize while in a setting like a museum seem to differ to a certain extent between Japan and America. Though I’ve volunteered in an American museum before, it was difficult to bring a lot of what I learned there to this experience, as the way one greets customers and generally behaves around them seems to be generally a bit different here. It can also be rather jarring to switch from using formal language in Japanese with our supervisors to using English with the guests. One suddenly feels the instinct to make one’s language more formal toward the guest, although my intuition developed while working in an American museum tends to push me to want to seem friendlier, more welcoming, and therefore a little more informal. This has definitely been more interesting than it has been difficult, though. Figuring out the different ways to interact with both the guests and the staff makes every day fascinating.

In addition, bonding with the staff has been a little difficult, mainly because we are always in a constant work environment. I regularly talk to the two employees who supervise us, Yasui-san and Uramune-san, who are both extremely nice and friendly and also have occasionally been able to speak to some of the other employees, such as the kamishibai artist who performs shows at the museum. However, because our breaks are at different times from the rest of the employees, having time outside of the main areas of the museum to speak casually is rather rare. Because of this, it has admittedly been difficult to get to know people at the museum. Overall, though, I’m glad that I’ve gotten to know the employees I have met at the museum! It has been a great experience.

Hillary Fens: Cooking Class

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This is fun – I am supposed to sum up my experiences with KCJS’ Community Involvement Project, and I’ve only made it up to two of the six required CIP meetings. (April will be busy!) To be fair, I’ve been looking, as have Nakamura-sensei and Maeguchi-sensei. The problem is, I’ve been unwilling to spend more than sen, ni sen en per class.

To back up, my official CIP is cooking class. I can’t cook, and I like food – fairly straightforward reasoning in signing up for cooking classes.

On top of learning how to make simple Japanese recipes and, of course, eating what we make, cooking class provides great language instruction without the day-in day-out feel of a classroom. The cooking classes are all in Japanese, technical cooking terms and all. But because you watch the instructors go through whatever step they’re explaining, new kotoba are easy to soak up! Learn new words while you learn how to cook – it’s great for someone in a lower language level.

The specific group I committed to for the semester is Kyoto Cooking Circle, KCC. They meet once a month at Kyoto Wings (super convenient! near Daimaru on Shijo), and the price is subsidized for foreigners only, at 1000. Most importantly, the class really caters to non-native Japanese speakers – I’ve always been made to feel included.

The instructor spoke at a normal pace, but would repeat herself if she felt we did not understand; many times, we would punch whatever unknown word into a denshi jisho then repeat the word in English, and she would confirm or deny it. I’ve never taken a cooking class in America, but I can’t imagine it being too different in terms of teaching style or use of language.

Thinking about American and Japanese cooking classes, my speculation is that the structure and attitude of classes of this type differs. In my time with KCC, I was always in a group, and it was in groups that we later went around to introduce ourselves. Everyone was engaged in the self-introduction period of class. After class, no one tried to shirk housekeeping duties like washing dishes, cleaning, etc. No one leaves right after the cooking portion is over. The social atmosphere fosters a sense of pride in the group. I’m not just in KCC to learn how to cook, I’m also there to form connections with other group members.

Lindsay Kosasa: Ankoku Butoh (Dance of Darkness)

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After spending a couple of semesters researching Butoh, I have finally translated my research into a physical praxis. Because this workshop is more or less open to anyone, our focus is on body awareness via various breathing and visualization exercises. Some people see dance as a universal language-and falling head first into this workshop with little knowledge of “dance” terminology in Japanese confirmed this notion. The first two workshops were simply watch and copy, but by the third workshop I could focus less on the physical and more on the mental part of the exercises. In Butoh, one’s thought process is equally, if not more, important than the physical aesthetics, and that it itself is difficult to grasp for most people.

Movement, whether we are conscious of it or not, initiates with a breath.  The aim for many of the warm up exercises involves becoming aware of our breath and channeling such energy to various parts of the body. Each movement initiates from an inhale, is held, and returns with an exhale. Finding your body’s center after each breath is essential for gaining complete awareness and control.

The metaphors and imagery we translate into our bodies creates a sensation for us as movers, and alters the space we occupy. Through this mutual change in time and space, we become attune to our individual bodies in space.  For example, in one exercise, we had an image for various body parts, and being aware of all at once, we walked through space:

1. A waterfall is flowing from the crown of your head down your back to the floor. 2. Your favorite flower is at your chest, and your nose takes notice and smells. 3. A 1000 year old forest is on both shoulders. 4. There is a lake in front of your stomach and a man lives at the shore. 5. There are rock formations and mountains in front of your knees. 6. A young family with a new born baby lives behind your knees.

I continuously question the meaning of conceptual body practices, and in performance, how much of the movement is still strictly personal and therefore goes unnoticed by the audience? After seeing my Butoh teacher perform, and considering society’s expectation of “performance”, how much does she, as a performer, sacrifice to satisfy those expectations? I have found it wonderful that the Japanese movement artists/visual artists who I’ve met or researched don’t give two cents about what society expects from them as artists. They have their own reasons for doing what they do, and they don’t owe an explanation to anyone.

Joomi Kim: NicoNicoTomato Volunteer

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My CIP project at NicoNicoTomato isn’t the first volunteer experience I’ve had at a hospital. It’s also not the first volunteer position I’ve had with children or in a foreign language I’m not comfortable in. Throughout all my different experiences in America however, my time at NicoNicoToma has been strangely unique and similar to them all.

In a very basic sense, NicoNicoTomato is very….Japanese. As obvious as that is, the famous “customer service”, attention to detail, and efficiency I found and expected everywhere in Japan came to life in a new form within the hospital setting. My previous encounters with volunteering, medical-related experiences, and kids in general were never very organized or based on anything further than the pure essentials of the job. Flowers, snacks, and games were always secondary or a means of killing time. Without me who would wipe the tables down, wheel the patients, or run through basic vocabulary? These tasks, however menial, made me feel like an integral part of the system I participated in, and although I knew NicoNicoToma would be fundamentally different from everything else I had been through, I was caught off-guard once I realized how exposed and inexperienced I was in this new form of contributing.

Once I started inserting toy after toy into plastic bags, taking time to match the most suitable ribbon color with the content inside, I slowly began to realize that the goal of NicoNicoTomato picks up after all the basic work I had done in my other jobs and volunteering attempts. Perfectly gluing a paper bear’s paws to make it hug a heart seemed like a colossal waste of time at first, especially since I sucked at it. I was used to brushing over the details to get the job done, despite rough edges, and I was proud of it; but the other volunteers brought me down to their pace. NicoNicoToma volunteers are kind, seasoned, and deliberate. I began to see how the program pushed itself not to babysit the children or educate them, but to provide a childhood and memories. The painstakingly simple details mattered. The quality and care mattered. They were constantly changing the decorations and photographs in the children’s ward, creating an atmosphere of progress and relationships that I doubt many other long-term patients in the hospitals throughout Japan and the rest of the world are able to have. They appreciate the little sparks in daily life, and the constant waves of hard work NicoNicoToma puts into its little patients and events is one of the coolest personal accounts I have of watching and experiencing some very positive aspects of Japanese values first-hand. I am still really shy and embarrassed when speaking with Japanese people, but I am glad that I have these small, steady revelations in NicoNicoTomato that provide a new way for me to experience Japanese society and giving in general.

Rebecca Gabriel : English Teaching Assistant

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Starting in September, I have been volunteering as an English teaching assistant at a middle school for my CIP.  As I have mentioned in the previous blog entry, I had to change schools this semester because of schedule conflicts.  Though I missed my old school a bit, it was interesting to be able to help at two different schools.  Both of the schools were actually very similar, but the activities I did were very different.

In the first school, I went to class and played English work games or read off vocabulary lists or readings or I went around helping out with worksheets.  At the second school, I did that sort of thing the first time, but after that I started coming after class and practicing English conversations with the kids.  We talked about a lot of things. Where we want to go on vacation, kpop sings that we like, which club they were in, and so on and so forth.  They were really very cute, but it was a bit unfortunate that they were shy about speaking in English.  Most of the time, they would go off in Japanese tangents about whatever we were talking about at the time.  I sometimes think that I didn’t really do much to help with their English education, but I am still glad that I could meet them all.

The last time I went to speak with the 7th graders, there happened to be a girl in a wheelchair there as well.  I was actually touched by how they all included her.  Rather than making her sit in the wheelchair, one of the girls carried her over to a regular chair.  After we talked, she tried to help her to the wheelchair again, but they both fell.  They burst out laughing.  The girl who helped her didn’t seem troubled or put upon at all.  Although I am not well informed on the subject, I often hear about criticism for the Japanese view on and treatment of handicapped persons.  As such, I was really proud of all of the girls who so naturally helped out and included their friend.  Wednesday was the opening ceremony for the school, so I hope I can go at least one more time!  It’s been a really interesting experience teaching here, and I won’t soon forget it.

Erica Neville: Manga Workshop

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To be sure, my insight into private drawing classes hasn’t changed much from last quarter. I’ve learned how to understand critique in Japanese, and how to follow both drawn and spoken suggestions despite limited relevant vocabulary. This quarter I’ve managed to communicate a lot more with my teacher, and a lot of last quarter’s frustration regarding being given assignments I found boring has been alleviated and, perhaps helpfully, replaced with frustration in struggling through more challenging structural and organic perspective assignments. Huzzah!

I have learned that, in practice, in small classrooms the kinds of respectful language we Japanese language students have learned and are told to use are often dropped in favor of a mix of casual and polite language. Especially in the drawing classroom, the emphasis is on effective communication. This might be because some of the students are younger, ranging from elementary to high school age, although I’ve heard other adults speaking much the same way. Greetings and small-talk are typically polite or, less often, respectful, but when it comes to the meat of the conversation we often use casual or です•ます style alone.

Moreover, in this setting, critique is more straightforward than it might otherwise be when there isn’t a definite student-teacher relationship. My teacher will often employ softer grammar to phrase things more as a suggestion, but he still makes his point clear and will continue suggesting improvements every time he comes by if a piece of the drawing is still not dark enough, for instance.

I also find it interesting that even the younger kids receive the same level of critique. Many of the students in the classroom are there preparing to apply to art school, of course, but it seems that even at a younger age this kind of instruction is valued as a serious study, whereas in America there is a tendency towards leniency with children and treating private classes primarily as a fun pastime rather than actual skill-building.

Although I had the option to choose another CIP, perhaps the manga circle on campus, and in the process would have saved a good chunk of money, I can definitely say I am glad I stayed with this private classroom. The interaction can be more limited than some given that we mostly work independently, but the one-on-one instruction from the teacher and listening to him interacting with other students is very informative and gratifying.

Mary Ross: Volunteer English Teacher's Assistant

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My CIP for this semester was working as an English teacher’s assistant at a nearby middle school, Kamigyō Chūgakkō. Before my CIP began, I had visions of myself (through my profound and awe-inspiring teaching abilities) stirring a love of the English language in my students. My real experience was something quite different: thought quite enjoyable, it was definitely not what I expected.

For one thing, before volunteering at the school, I imagined Japanese schools to run like a well-oiled machine, populated by polite and serious students. Maybe this middle school is an exception to that rule, but it all felt a little chaotic. Still, the students were thrilled to see me every time I came and always made me feel welcome. As well, the teachers were quite kind and were passionate about teaching.

Another unexpected aspect of this experience was the manner in which I was employed. I helped out in the classroom about two or three times and the rest of the times I went, I simply talked with a group of the students for an hour or two. These kaiwa sessions were successful to various degrees: one time it was a large group of both boys and girls and so the conversation flowed quite well; another time it was just three shy girls and I almost had to drag the conversation out of them. Contrary to my visions of greatness, while there were a few students who did love English (for which I sadly cannot take credit), the vast majority seemed simply to be suffering through the class.

Kamigyō Chūgakkō

Moreover, I was a little disappointed that I couldn’t work in the classroom more often or in a more academic manner with the students. While conversational skills are important, the conversations sometimes devolved into me making small-talk and the students answering just “yes” or “no,” which doesn’t do much for their language abilities. I think using the volunteers in a more structured and academic manner (such as short individual sessions to address a particular student’s concerns or weaknesses) would be a better use of everyone’s time. However, the conversations (when they extended beyond me making small-talk) were a lot of fun and taught me some fun Japanese slang when the students wanted something translated into English.

If a KCJS student’s goal for their CIP was to interact deeply with Japanese people, I would probably not recommend a volunteer English assistant position to them. I did learn a lot about Japanese schools and youth, but I felt more like an outsider looking in than a part of the society itself. As well, since you are teaching English (and I was asked to stick to only English when talking to the students), there aren’t many chance to practice Japanese. To better integrate and become a member of Japanese society, I think it is important to speak the language and develop deeper relationships with Japanese people which is, unfortunately, difficult to do when you are interacting solely in English and with people who are much younger than you.

However, I did feel that I was able to get a glimpse into Japanese society and I think that by interacting with the Japanese students and allowing them to interact with a non-Japanese person, I was able to make a small impact on Japanese society. No matter what country it is, I think interacting with people from other countries not only gives you a wider, more global perspective, but also enriches that nation’s culture.

All in all, I really enjoyed this experience. To better integrate in Japanese society, I would advise supplementing volunteering as an English assistant teacher with activities that have to do with Japanese culture and language (KIX is a good option for this!). However, I found this CIP very fulfilling; it felt nice to know that I may have furthered someone’s interest in English or at least offered them a new experience. It was definitely a new experience for me, so I guess they taught me something too!

Rachelle Chouinard: Volunteering at a Children’s Hospital

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For my CIP, I have been volunteering at a program called Nico Toma (which aptly stands for “smiling tomato”), a program which runs a playroom and other fun events for the children staying in the Children’s Ward at the Kyoto University hospital. Once a week since September I have been going to Nico Toma and mostly helping out with decorations or other craft and organizational tasks. On days that there are special events, like the spring and Christmas cafes and fundraising bazaar, I get to have more contact with the children as I am usually assigned a task where I get to help them pick out which basket of candies they want or help them put cookies on their plate. Increasingly as I have acquired more experience with the program I have noticed an increase in the responsibility of the tasks I am assigned, which is a relief because although I like doing arts and crafts always doing simplistic tasks is boring.

Something I have noticed as I have worked with the same volunteers is a gradual transformation of speaking styles when speaking with the other volunteers, not just the style of speaking becoming less formal, but also the content of the questions slowly becoming more personal and more complex. In the beginning, we spoke of mostly simplistic things such as likes and dislikes, basic facts of our lives, etc. Now we tackle much more complex topics, such as the differences between Americans and Japanese, politics, and other much more esoteric topics. I also find it interesting how in Japanese, much more clearly than in English, you can tell your closeness to a person by their use of particular language. Perhaps this clear language distinction reflects a Japanese preoccupation with distinctions between social gradients.

As I have spent a little more time this semester out in the Children’s Ward changing the decorations, I have also had more of an opportunity to witness the reactions of parents and the hospital staff to us as volunteers in the hospital. The reactions of the different types of people in the hospital to us are usually very different. Doctors and nurses usually seem pleased to see us, and really seem to appreciate the decorations. The children are always pleased and curious, although the younger ones can look a little intimidated. To the younger kids we are almost as interesting as the new decorations; they stare unabashedly at us the whole time we are working. It’s the parents who have the most diverse reactions. Some are very enthusiastic about seeing us there, others are ambivalent, and some people even seem annoyed or confused about why we are there. Because volunteering in hospitals is so uncommon in Japan, at least according to the other volunteers, perhaps it is just that these parents see communicating with a foreigner another added burden in an already stressful situation. Overall, I have enjoyed my time volunteering with Nico Toma and the opportunity to interact with so many different kinds of people that I would not have had contact with otherwise. Plus, the kids are always so adorable!

 

カーヴァー・ルーシャ：日本のLGBTに関する調査

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　今学期のCIP活動は私の卒業論文の研究の一環として、「参与観察」という方法論を用い、京都・大阪地域のレズビアン・ゲイコミュニティーのイベントに参加し、同性愛者として日本での生活について調査することである。高校四年生のとき以来、日本に住む日系ブラジル人の状況を初めて聞いたことがきっかけとなり、移民・部落・LGBTの人などの日本の社会的マイノリティに深い興味を持っている。去年、東アジア研究学部の学生のための個別指導クラスを受け、マスコミが与える日本人による外国人犯罪に対する恐怖心への影響力についての期末レポートを書いた。そして、今年、KCJSの春学期に自分で決めるテーマに基づいて独学ができることおよび日本に住んでいる状況を機会として生かし、来年の卒業論文に先んじて、実地調査を行おうと決めた。日本に住むLGBTである人に関しての研究は非常に少なく、さらに大半の研究はゲイ男性に関するものが多いので、若い女性としてはこれまであまり研究されていない日本のレズビアンコミュニティーを調査し、学界に意味ある貢献をするチャンスだと思い、日本の女性同性愛者の性的同一性の形成というテーマを選んだ。

まず気付いたことは、アメリカと比べ、日本に家族・職場・友達、つまりLGBTコミュニティー以外の知り合いにカミングアウトする人は非常に少ないのである。日本人のレズビアンに「あなたはいつかカミングアウトするつもりですか？」と聞いたら、「いや、絶対カミングアウトしない」とよく言われる。それはなぜなら、日本でLGBTである人の存在がよく認められていないとともに、やはり社会的な期待、とくに家族からの結婚することに対するプレッシャーが原因で、カミングアウトするのはなかなか難しいことである。しかし、カミングアウトしていないからこそ、一般的な日本人には自分の周りにLGBTである人がいないように見えるなので、結果として「日本にLGBTである人は存在していない」という考え方や社会に定着している既成概念が疑われることなく、結局、先述したカミングアウトしていない状況の原因になる社会的な期待が続き、いわゆる悪循環が繰り返される。


アメリカのLGBTのように、比較的にオープンに暮らせるが、同時によく憎悪犯罪の犠牲となるという両極端な状況より、日本に隠れているLGBTである人に対しての暴力事件の発生率が低いということを考えれば、日本の現在状況の方が安全に見えるかもしれないけど、自分のアイデンティティーの大事な一部を愛する人から隠すのはたしかにつらいと思う。今までの調査結果では、アメリカと日本との状況の格差が明らかに見えるのが一番面白い。調査を続け、色々な新しい経験をし、これから日本に住むLGBTコミュニティーについてもっと学ぶことを楽しみにしている。