Lockdown

On Tuesday evening Cian arrived home from school with the news that (a) 7 of his classmates had been absent that day with influenza, and as a result (b) his classes for the remainder of the week had been cancelled.
To which I calmly replied, WT good F?!!!
Apparently in a effort to stave off a viral borne apocalypse, the school has decided to keep the kids at home until next Monday. This is standard practice in Japan, but also a reflexive rule carried forward from a previous generation when only fathers worked and mothers stayed at home. This has long since changed but the rule remains; as is often the case here the tradition of 'we-do-it-because-we-have-always-done-it' triumphs any sort of cognizance of practical necessity.
Sanae and myself were hoping to alternate days off to look after Cian but the principal at Sanae's school, in his usual gendered, job-before-family mentality scowled at her when she explained why she wanted time off and growled at her to find someone else to look after Cian. That someone ended up being me as, well, what alternative do we have? We have no relatives living in Muroran to call upon, and as Cian went to a nursery school, the friends of the family we would feel comfortable (or rather, least uncomfortable) in imposing upon are all working parents themselves and so in no position to look after the boy. To catch up with the work I have temporarily frozen for these three days means having to work this weekend so that's our planned return skiing trip to Rusutsu out the window. February is the end of the academic year here which means I am frantically trying to set, administer and correct exams, attend exam board meetings, coordinate repeat exams, review English translations of graduate theses' abstracts, and the all other 'No-it-can't-wait' stuff that marks the last week of February.
So it will be off to work I go on Saturday while Cian continues to bounce off the walls of the house because his teacher (or rather, his unmarried and childless teacher who to the best of my knowledge does not have a formal qualification in medical epidemiology) insisted that the kids could not go outside nor play with their friends inside the house. And apparently such teacher declarations carry more weight and authority than the utterances of his mere luckless parents.
Sometimes, this country drives me up the bleeding wall.

Flicking the on switch

Events over the past month or so have pretty much ensured that 2014 will see the restarting of some of the nuclear power stations in Japan. First up was the victory of Yoichi Masuzoe in Tokyo's recent mayoral election. Ostensibly an 'independent' (the word has little meaning in Japanese politics) he was supported by the ruling Liberal Democratic Party and like them and their leader the prime minster Shinzo Abe, he is very much in favor of getting the currently dormant nuclear reactors up and spinning their atoms again.
The second influence was the record snowfalls Tokyo and surrounding regions received for two weeks in a row. Unlike us winter weary veterans up here in Hokkaido, the effeminate denizens of Japan's Big Smoke basically don't have a clue how to deal with more than a couple centimeters of the white stuff. 19 people died, over 5000 households were cut off by roads being rendered impassable, and a section of highway was closed for three days leaving hundreds of motorists stranded in their vehicles the entire time. All this bad weather meant that heaters were cranked up to 11, there was a surge in power consumption which in turn meant the various electricity utilities had to burn an awful lot of oil, gas and coal. As they have been doing since 2011. Japan doesn't have any oil, gas nor coal so it has to import pretty much everything it burns. And this in turn is costing a colossal amount of yen.
Which brings me to the third factor: Japan's eye-wateringly huge trade deficit. In January (the most recent published figures), the deficit stood at 2.79 trillion yen (27.4 billion US dollars) - January also marked the nineteenth month in a row that saw a deficit. Much of this is a result of Abe's deliberate weakening of the yen to boost the earnings and profits of the major Japanese exporting companies which in turn, it was presumed by the wise heads in the 財務省 (Ministry of Finance) would lead to an overall boost to the Japanese economy. This hasn't happened. And is unlikely to happen as a sales tax in April from 5% to 8% is going to seriously dampen consumer spending for a long while (just ask Sanae).
The obvious and immediate way to reduce the deficit would be to cut back on imports of oil, gas and coal which in turn will require alternative sources of energy production. Which will can only come from, all together now, restarting those expensively mothballed nuclear power stations. You know where you read it first.

Rusutsu

I first learned to ski when I came to Japan. Prior to that I had never even considered it. Coming from Ireland the only exposure we got to skiing was either (a) chancing across Ski Sunday on BBC 2 when rain had cancelled that afternoon's GAA match I was supposed to play; or (b) driving by the artificial ski slope in Kiltiernan on the way down to Wexford (usually to watch a GAA match) and wondering who had more money than sense to be arsing around on a strip of plastic half way up a mountain.
So I came to the, eh, 'sport' a complete novice, sans experience and skis. This all changed during my first winter in Shibestu. Like many schools across Hokkaido (including Cian's), in winter PE classes are often spent on the slopes. So, I could either remain in the school with the old, overweight, chain smoking math's teacher (in those days of complete tobacco freedom, you could still smoke in the school staff room), or I could go out and engage in winter sports. No choice really.
First though, I had to acquire a set of skis. Fifteen years ago the considered wisdom when buying beginner's skis was to get your height plus 15 to 20 cms. In the lands of men this may not have been a problem, but here amongst the halflings you were lucky to come across skis longer than 170cms. I did finally find a set of skis - 205 centimetres long. Yes, over 2 metres of slick plastic on each leg which meant I had the turning radius of a small oil tanker (though with less finesse). That though wasn't the biggest problem. The biggest, most blinding problem was the colour of the skis: they were of a special hue which I can only describe as 'iridescent radioactive pink". Apparently you could see my skis from space. Before heading out for a day on the powder I would have to clear my itinerary with the local air traffic control so I didn't blind any jets making their final approach at Nakashibetsu airport.
I stuck at the skiing for the first couple of years, more out of camaderie than any great love of the sport - most of my friends back then were hearty "swoosh! swoosh!" types and it was either the slopes or sitting home alone sipping hot cocoa growing fat, lonely and probably unhinged.
I pretty much gave up when I moved to Muroran - replaced by definitely unhinged new found desire to catch some waves, even when those waves have ice floes in them.
This in turn has given way to (a) age; (b) a modicum of sense - continue winter surfing and crippling rheumatism beckons before I am 50; and (c) Cian's burgeoning ability on skis.
The boy, born in the deep heartland of a Hokkaido winter, is oblivious to the cold and passionate about his skiing. Some body has to take him skiing and that responsibility falls to me. Which is why I, adapting the adage of if you can't beat it out of the boy then you might as well join him, bought a new set of skis and boots last December. I figure they are going to get some use until such time as Cian learns to drive (his mother's car; no way he moves the Mazda. No way).
Last weekend we ended up in Rusutsu, a ski resort about a hour's drive away. Here the slopes are longer, wider and more fun than the short, shallow ski run here in Muroran. And the boy loved it, as can be witnessed from the videos which you can watch here and here (they were too big and too spectacular to embed directly into this blog post).

The Winter Olympics

Last Friday was Hoppo Yonto day yet despite my new year's day temple marathon, the four islands are still in hoc to the Russian rouble.
Yolked and bridled too, apparently.
It was for this very reason that Cian decided to boycott the Winter Olympics in Sochi. Instead we hosted our own inaugural Muroran Olympiad at the Tenjin-cho Saka. First up was the "Freestyle falling down" event, a performance based competition where maximum points were awarded for technique, style, and making an arse of yourself.

Next up was the pair bobsleigh on a particularly hazardous course.

Followed by the pair luge with the Irish half of the combined team utilizing a highly unorthodox breaking method.

Finally we finished with a spectacular display of virtuoso 'super sliding' with records (and self respect) being shattered across the board.

節分

Yesterday was Setsubun here in Japan. According to Wikipedia this refers to the day before the beginning of Spring but up here in it's-winter-all-the-way-through-to-April Hokkaido we reckon their just taking the piss. Plus, as anybody who actually lives here can tell you, Setsubun really refers to "The Day of the Devil".
EEEUuuuuurrrggeeekkkkkkkk, or however you render the written equivalent of ominous screeching violins.
Yes, the Day of the Devil.
!!!!!
Apparently on this day throughout Japan households do battle with the dark forces of Satan. All that stands between them and unvanquishable darkness (and yes, I know, 'unvanquishable' is not a word. But it should be) are some peanuts.
Now, I could be misconstruing some of the finer details but basically the only way you are going to stop a full on attack by the Army of Darkness (!!!!!) is by throwing peanuts at them. Okay, that's not entirely true. You don't actually throw the peanuts at the Army, but rather you preempt their attack by flinging peanuts into those parts of the house where Satan's soldiers could be lurking. Like the kitchen, the bedrooms, the bathroom, the toilet, pretty much everywhere in fact. And during all of this indiscriminate peanut carpet bombing, you have to recite the mantra "鬼は外！福は内！", "Devils out, Luck in".
No, seriously.
This is Cian doing it round our house last night.

And thanks to the young exorcist's peanut flinging dexterity we are happily demon free here in the Teach Takahashi-Gaynor.
But for how long...

How did we get the teaching of Irish so wrong?

was the title of an interesting article in the Irish Times last Wednesday (you can read the full article here). The gist of the piece is that the teaching of Irish is doing a disservice to the language and ultimately behind the ongoing decline in standards as gaeilge. Dr. Muiris O'Laoire of IT Tralee makes a very valid point about the lack of clarity surrounding the purpose of learning Irish: is it to communicate or is it for cultural reasons? If it is the former, then the current curriculum clearly falls short of that goal, whereas if it is the latter then if we continue teaching as we have been we are going to end up with the linguistic equivalent of the National Museum.
Equally interesting was the range of readers comments appended to the piece, 104 at the time of writing. Many of them criticized learning Irish from what I would term an utilitarian market perspective. The time and money spent on learning Irish was contrasted with the economical gains to be had from learning a modern foreign language instead (a famous dead French philosopher by the name of Bordeau termed this 'linguistic capital'. If you want to advance at all in the field of applied linguistics you need to invoke Bourdieu and 'linguistic capital' at every chance you get. Like this one). Certainly, from a rational, economic based, cost-performance assessment, the Irish language doesn't stand a chance. Though if you were to be rigorous in your application of such market criteria and follow through on the quashing of Irish education, you would also be compelled to advocate for the compulsory learning of Chinese instead. And if we are going to run the capitalist rule over language, then why not over all other endeavors as well? Professional team sports for instance. Why is it that so many support soccer teams where no real economic or social benefit is achieved besides the huge reallocation of financial resources from fans and media to a select few athletes who earn vastly disproportionate amounts of money for kicking a ball around a rectangle of grass for 90 minutes a week? Every day nurses save countless lives but they don't get paid 300,000 pounds a week the way Wayne Rooney does.
There are other, more subtler counter arguments to be made too against the abrogation of Irish. One is the cognitive benefits that come from learning two (or more) languages. A famous research paper published in 2010 examined the effects of language learning and use amongst Alzheimer patients. Those who were bilingual reported the delayed onset of symptoms some 5.1 years later than monolingual patients (for those so academically inclined, you can read it here). Developmental gains have also been found in cognitive awareness in young bilingual children as compared to their monolingual peers.
Ahh yes, you may reply, but why Irish? Why not French or German? Back to the economic argument: in terms of resources and access to areas where the language is actually used, Irish is the obvious choice. And really, where would you prefer to spend three weeks of summer at a language school - Sherkin Island or Berlin? Only one of these places is renowned for its sessions and lock-ins.
The final argument I would make in favor of learning Irish at school is very much colored by my emigrant's perspective. The Irish language is an integral part of what I take to be my Irish identity. As a English teacher in Japan the 14 years of compulsory Irish I had at school has had no bearing whatsoever on my current career, yet as the years go by I increasingly regret that I didn't retain more than the cúpla focal. Language contains within it the DNA of a culture; the words we use and the way we use them are more than mere transmitters of linguistic meaning. They speak of traditions, ways of thinking, approaches to the world and an understanding of our place in it. And they give voice to the inchoate memories of those who came before us but have been rendered silent by time.
Last summer I stood, as I have countless times before, to sing Amhrán na bhFiann at the start of the All Ireland Hurling semi-final between Clare and Limerick. Cian stood beside me and beside him stood his grandfather. It was Cian's first time in Croke Park and as 70,000 people around him began to sing the national anthem, he looked increasingly bewildered and more than just a little bit scared. When we reached the crescendo of faoi lámhach na bpiléar and the supporters' roars erupted, Cian's hand gripped mine fiercely.
"Daddy, what are you singing?"
I wasn't sure how to explain the concept of a national anthem to a 6 year old boy, so I simply replied, "It's an Irish song".
"And why are you singing it?"
"Because this is Ireland and we're Irish".
Seemingly content with that explanation, he let go of my hand and settled back in his seat. His Grandfather leaned across to him.
"And we support Clare".