Where's summer?

I think I might have tempted the weather gods too much with my previous post extolling the sunny June we were enjoying. In response the deities have unleashed some torrential rain upon us for the past week and despite these being the longest days of the year, the gloomy grey rain clouds ensure it is dark by 7:30 in the evening. Adding to our seasonal despair is the fact that although it is July we are still 4 weeks away from the start of the summer holidays.
Yes, 4 weeks away. Sweet mother of educational Jesus.
By rights that should be in fact 6 weeks away for me (and 4 for Cian and Sanae). The end of the first term in the university is the 30th of July, and this is followed by a two week exam period, taking us up to August 14th. And only then, a mere fortnight away from the start of autumn, can the 'summer' holidays commence.
Matters aren't helped by the fact that Cian and Sanae will begin their holidays at the end of the third week of July but are then back in school by August 20th, which gives the Gaynor-Takahashi family a sum total of 6 days of shared holiday time.
Yes, 6 days. Sweet, sweet ripening fruit mother of educational Jesus.
Much is made in the media about Japan's fumbling attempts to 'globalize' its educational system and prepare its children for a cosmopolitan future. Hence, the seemingly annual plethora of initiatives launched by the Ministry of Education with aerily ambitious titles like 'Super Science High Schools', 'Super Global High Schools', and the 'Global 30 Universities'. A select number of schools are, well, selected for such 'super' designations, the principal super part of it all being the dollops of additional public funding they receive (which adds to the increasingly pervasive problem of educational inequality, but that's a post for another day).
A considerably cheaper and more equitable initiative in the country's attempt to become 'global' (whatever that means), would be to change its academic year. At the moment the Japanese academic year runs from April through to March, for all levels of education from primary to tertiary. Not many other countries maintain the same school calendar. This is in turn is a very large disincentive for both Japanese students thinking of studying abroad and for foreign students coming to Japan to study. (It should be noted that this 'start in April' ethos is not just confined to schools; the fiscal year also follows the same schedule).
A couple of years back the University of Tokyo announced that it was going to break with tradition and change its academic year to the global norm of September - June/July. Now, in the hierarchy of Japanese education, the University of Tokyo sits right at the top (and Muroran sits, or rather is squashed, somewhere at the bottom), so when Todai (as it is commonly known) says its going to change then the expectation is that the rest of educational world will hastily follow.
But not this time. Too many vested interests were opposed: corporate Japan and their established January to March milk rounds; civil service exams; various professional exam boards; not to mention the knock on effect this would have on high schools, junior high schools, and elementary schools. So the plan died a despairing death and we continue with our April-March year.
Personally, I am a tad skeptical of this urgent need to 'globalize' (read: adhere to western imposed notions of education), but if it meant that we (Sanae, Cian, and myself) got longer summer holidays then hell yeah, bring on the Coca-Cola capitalism and let's hit the beaches by the end of June.

This is the garden, colors come and go...

It is June, it is summer, and remarkably, it is not raining. At all. This time last year I was complaining about the record breaking 16 successive days of rain. By the end of this month I may well be posting about the driest June I (and perhaps Hokkaido) have ever experienced. I know we are not having the best of summers back home so I don't want to gloat, but, heck, I do want to gloat. We are having a cracking summer; lots of warm sunshine, not too humid, not too hot, but consistently pleasant.
And it shows.

The garden, our thin L-shaped strip of greenery bordering two sides of the house, is thriving. Our strawberries are red and ripe; the juniper berries are coming along nicely, and it looks like we will enjoy a bumper crop of black and red currents this year. My hope is that the good weather continues which might help the blueberries ripen early this year, late July perhaps. Usually it is August and we are in Ireland so the local birds get to feast themselves on the crop, but if the sunshine continues we may just get to enjoy them ourselves. Hell, we might just bring some over with us.

Yes, I know what you are thinking; it is kind of oriental version of Chelsea flower show. But all is not what it seems in the Garden of Eden...
Last Thursday, Cian and myself arrived home to find this handwritten note of terror stuck to the front door.

 
We ran screaming into the house. No, we didn't. Cian remarked on Mammy's lack of cursive script whilst pointing out the omission of a definite article and issues with her word order. Then we ran screaming into the house.
The good weather has also brought with it an infestation of 毒蛾 (dokuga), literally 'poisonous moth', (though apparently it hides behind the more unassuming name of 'Oriental Tussock Moth').

 Along the south east coast of Hokkaido there has been an explosion of these venom tipped monsters and the tussocky feckers are everywhere. Beaches and parks have been closed because of them and poor Mammy got, well not exactly stung but more like 'grazed' by one of them. The caterpillar's poison is contained in the hairy bristles (or urticating hairs for all you Lepidoptera fans out there) covering their brown and orange bodies. These hairs are shed by the caterpillar when it senses danger and lets face it, there's nothing much more dangerous than an enraged Mammy finding insects munching on her strawberries. So, she got covered in these hairs, broke out in a terrible, itchy rash, and is now using the sort of steroid-based analgesic cream beloved of 1980's bearded, deep-voiced, female Bulgarian weightlifters.
Apparently we can expect another couple of weeks or so of caterpillar horror before they metamorphosize into winged moths and bring poisonous terror from the night skies!

A Red Team Whitewash

For the past two years in the undokai Cian has been a stalwart member of the White team, and for the past two years White team have been beaten by the Red team.
So, after intense negotiations and an undisclosed sum (but let us just say, it was a big sum; a big three figure sum. Oh yeah), Cian was transferred to the Red team for this year's competition. And yesterday the Red team were then utterly annihilated by the White team. It was in many ways reminiscent of the Dublin v. Galway match down in Tullamore. After the first three events of the morning White team had succumbed to the undokai equivalent of shipping three quick goals: they were beaten in the 50m, 80m, and 100m sprints. And that was before the horror show that was the tug of war. And don't get Cian started on the relay race...
The day had started so full of promise. Well, actually, it had started what sounded like a sustained salvo from the 16 inch guns on the battleship USS Iowa as the fireworks went off at 5:30 announcing that the undokai was 'good to go'. Which in turn meant a very bleary eyed Daddy had to hustle his still bed-warmed ass up to the school ground in order to secure a prime patch of sand from which to view the games. Given how things turned out I should really have stayed in bed. Somehow, ahem, I managed to miss the opening speeches but did get there for the "You will know us by our righteous fury" orations from the team leaders. Or rather blood curling whistles. As the video shows it was a bit like the trailer for the new Star Wars but without an old aged pensioner masquerading as Han Solo.

The events are divided up according to class grades which in turn are cleverly scattered over the course of the day so that people don't get up and leave once their kid's events are over. As I was only interested in 3rd class this meant I tuned out of much of the rest of the proceedings, though the human pyramid always has that 'will they fall and break bones?!' aspect to hold the viewer's interest.

For Cian first up was the 80m dash. The boy is a bit like the great Maurice Fitzgerald: you can't train nor tell him what to do; you just let him be and he'll perform for you on the day. And so it proved.

And yes, he was easing up with about 20 metres to go.
The tug of war followed. From the Red Team's point of view it should really have been called the 'tug of shame'. The event was staged twice and they lost both of them.

 We then had a musical interlude. A dancing musical interlude. It seems to be one of the prerequisites of Japanese primary school education that students learn how to move to the groove, even if the groove isn't particularly groovy. Looking back over Cian's school history to date it is striking how many instances there are of tripping the light fantastic. I mean, you'd never see that sort of behaviour in a scoil náisiúnta.
You can watch it, sorry, get your groove on here.

Onto the 'Hurricane'.
Initially, I thought this would be a revelatory tribute to the great Rubin Carter with perhaps a hair-raising acapella vocal rendition of Dylan's scintillating song (with a knowing look thrown towards the school principal when Cian snarls out the words "All of Rubin's cards were marked in advance, the relay trial was a pig circus he never had a chance"). But no. It was in fact a competition involving a long pole, running, jumping, and no, it wasn't a miniature version of the pole vault. It was something very ... Japanese, though its connection to a meteorological phenomenon and/or a terrible miscarriage of racial injustice remains unknown me. Suggestions, dear readers?

 
Then we had lunch.

Which induced a soporific stupor in pretty much everyone present. Matters weren't helped by the scheduling of a series of bizarre 'It's a Knockout!' (remember that?) style events in the afternoon. Note the distinct lack of enthusiasm amongst competitors and spectators both in the clip below.

And that marked the end of Cian's participation in the undokai. There were some other events but Daddy had brought a copy of the Economist with him and to be honest, the article on India's public-sector banks proved more enthralling.
At least the weather was good. Unlike the forecast for this weekend when Sanae's school is due to hold their undokai.

The countdown begins

Well, if it's June it must be undokai (sports day) season. First up this Saturday is Cian's followed a week later by Mammy's extravaganza. However, overshadowing both events (and the inane goings on at FIFA) is the shock news of the omission of Cian 'The Tenjin-cho Bolt' from the third class relay team. For the previous two years he has been the go to guy when things get speedy but this year he didn't even make the reserve team. And this despite winning his heat.
The fix, ladies and gentlemen, is very much 'in'.
I don't know what kind of bribes, kickbacks, or payoffs were made, but they were made. And the world of sport is a lesser place for it. I am not pointing any fingers but that is a suspiciously shiny new Nissan Fuga the headmaster is driving. With the leather seats. And the touch screen navigation system.
Cian has taken it all in his stride (a stride which is among the quickest in all of third class, but that doesn't matter in the relay selection as, apparently, other things rather than speed are more important. Like having a father who owns the local Nissan car dealership). Instead, he is concentrating on all his energy and athleticism on the yosokai soran dance, a 'modern interpretation' of a traditional Japanese summer dance.
I know, I know, still your beating hearts. But you will just have to wait until Saturday evening when I put a clip up on youtube.
Unlike last year (and our record breaking 16 consecutive days of rain), the weather forecast is looking good for this Saturday, so it will be up with the fireworks at 5:30 and off to fight for the prime patch of dirt around the running track.
And guess who has to do that?
As a sort of postscript, if we are talking on skype this weekend to any of you good readers, the 'relay' word is not to be mentioned. At all. If I even here the phoneme 're', the connection will be immediately dropped and not resumed. Ever.

A river runs through it

I have yet to read Norman Macclean's classic account of growing up in the mid-west (shamefully, it sits on the shelf gathering dust like so many other novels; I now reckon my remaining lifespan in terms of unread books. By my rough reckoning I have about 300 books I have yet to read sitting on shelves in the house and my office. Even in my most wildly optimistic scenario of reading two books a month and a couple more during the holidays [and refraining from buying any new ones in the meantime - an utterly fantastic notion I know, but indulge me], it would take me 10 years to get through the backlog. And don't get me started on all the back issues of the Dublin Review and the New York Review of Books that are piled up under, around, and occasionally, on top of the bed).
But I digress. To repeat, I have yet to read Mr. Macclean's short story (I will, I promise), but even unread I reckon there were more fish caught in it than what me and Cian managed last Saturday.
Our house is too small and family lifestyle too busy to justify having a dog or cat, so what we have instead for pets are various types of fish. At the moment we have one goldfish, one crayfish, nine loach, and an exceedingly large school (swarm? brood? host? gathering? team? collective? posse?) of tadpoles. However, all this aquatic richness wasn't enough for Cian Costeau, who wanted to add to his collection. So last Saturday we ventured into the woods beyond the University in search of fish. My colleague Mike had regaled us with tales of all the fish he and his son used to catch up there when he was younger. So, suitably inspired we grabbed our nets and headed up the trail.
Only to be nearly eaten by a grizzly bear!



 

Well, maybe not a grizzly bear, or even a bear really. Sanae, after looking at the photographs, says it was a Japanese racoon, and a small one and that too. But she wasn't there. It was a bear damnit, and if it wasn't for our Forest Kozan acquired consummate wilderness skills ("throw something at it! Stones, sticks, anything! Just make it go away!"), we would surely have been devoured.
Thankfully, we got to the river without any other excitement (though Daddy did have to extract a tic from his leg that was feasting on his rich, type O blood. Obviously, a geographically savvy tic who had no problem with taking Irish blood, unlike a certain scarlet shaded hospital. I still squashed the fecker anyway). Unfortunately, there were no fish to be had, no matter how many rocks we poked under, which led us to conclude that either (a) it is too early in the season for the fish to be out and about (still very cold, snowmelt water flowing down from the mountain); or (b) Mike is a lying sack of s*** (Cian's words). We vowed to return next month and if we still can't find any fish, then we are going to feed Mike to the racoon, sorry, bear.

The Japanese Red Cross

Last Friday morning I was sitting in my office doing various academic things like, ahem, checking the wave report on Tenki.jp, when there was a knock on my door. Being the convivial Irishman that I am, I said hai, (Japanese for 'yes'). A man I didn't know entered my room, explained he was from the Japanese Red Cross and they were looking for blood donations. They had a mobile unit parked in front of the main building and they were eager for both students and faculty to donate. He inquired as to my blood type and when I told him O, his eyes lit up and he strongly urged me to come along and give 800ml of the finest Irish blood this side of Howth. As Tenki.jp had shown zero wave action forecast for the day, I figured, sure, why not. Seems I would get a free pack of cup noodles for my selflessness.
So, I went down to the temporary reception area they had set up just outside the mobile unit. There I had to fill in a form asking all sorts of personal questions, such as 'Have you ever had risky sex', to which I replied, 'Only in my car whilst driving'.
Us Irish, red-blooded and funny.
Anyway, I was ticking all the 'No' boxes ('No, I haven't been to West Africa lately'), when I came to the following question: 'Since 1980, have you ever lived in another country for more than 12 months?'. To which my obvious answer was 'yes, Ireland, where I grew up. Greatest country in the world'.
This though, seemed to trouble the man at reception. 'Ireland?' he said, in the sort of voice he would have probably used if my answer had been 'North Korea'. He reached behind him and pulled out a large ring folder, blew the dust off it, and began to flip through it. 'Please wait a moment' he muttered. He got to the end of the folder and obviously having not found what he was looking for, started again from the front.
No luck either the second time, so again he said 'Ireland?', followed by 'ummm' and another 'please wait a moment'. Then he got up and went in to the mobile unit.
A few moments passed. I waited.
He reappeared with the classic Japanese head-partially-bowed-bashful-look on his face which clearly signals that an embarrassing apology is imminent.
'Ahh, I am very sorry but, eh, we have no information about Ireland'.
'What?!'
'We have no information about Ireland so, we, ehh, can't accept your blood. I am very sorry'.
I stumbled away shocked. No information about Ireland?! The Japanese Red Cross have no information about the Irish and their blood! How? Why? Who?
Are we so remote from the Orient that news has yet to filter through of modern Ireland's dynamic society where we have such things as running water, electricity, and gay marriage? Does the Irish Embassy in Tokyo know of this state of affairs? Is an affirmative promotional campaign necessary? - 'Irish blood is good. Accept donations now'.
And no cup noodles either.

Deforestation, the Gobi Desert and Me

My Mazda, just back from it's tour of duty.

For the past week Hokkaido has been buffeted by strong westerly winds which have brought with them vast amounts of airborne sand. This phenomenon is known as 黄砂 (kousa), literally 'yellow sand'. It originates in northern China and Mongolia where the sand is picked up by a passing low pressure system which then travels east over Korea and Japan coating everything in its path a golden yellow. Repeated tree and plant degradation (which is a polite way of saying the feckin Chinese chopped down or uprooted everything green) means there is nothing to stop the topsoil being, as Bono would put it, 'blown by the wind'. Unfortunately, the resulting dust cloud doesn't 'disappear without a trace', but ends up falling on my car.
This is bloody annoying as I then have to wash my car.
I don't particularly like washing my car as (a) it's boring; and (b) it just gets dirty again the next time the wind shifts around and starts blowing from the west again. Rain only makes things worse as it leaves big splattery splotches of mustard colored sand over everything. My poor Mazda looks like it has belatedly returned from active duty in 'Operation Desert Storm'.
To try and do our bit and prevent this from happening every spring, myself and Cian went down to our local garden centre, got some grass seed, put it in an envelope and sent it off to the Chinese Embassy along with a helpful note asking them to spread over the land pretty much anywhere west of Beijing.
We have yet to hear back from them.

Somewhere out there beyond the yellow haze is the Pacific Ocean.