Will Miss #45 - New Year's Trinkets (reflection)

Shortly before the new year, my husband and I met a Japanese acquaintance at a Starbucks. We talked about a variety of things, including what it was like to go to shrines during the biggest holiday of the year in Japan. She thought it might be fun to go to a shrine in America on New Year's day. However, despite the fact that there is a large community of Japanese people in the area, there were no shrines offering services of any sort on the day, and only one make-shift church doing so on January 3rd. We were all disappointed by this fact, though not necessarily surprised.

While it is impossible to go to shrines where I'm living now, it is actually within the realm of possibility to buy the trinkets that are sold each year in accord with the Chinese horoscope (pictured above). They are sold, somewhat expensively, in souvenir shops in Japan town in San Jose as well as in a few places in other cities that are not too far from where we're living. That being said, stripped of the time and the place in which they held significance and stronger symbolism, they are reduced to feeling like mere knicknacks.

I can say that I don't necessarily miss the physical objects, but I very much miss the memories they would carry for me when I bought one at a shrine in Tokyo. 

Will Miss #532 - lack of New Year's resolutions

No resolutions, but plenty of bananas for New Year's day consumption. No, I don't know why, but there are always chocolate-covered bananas around the shrines. 

Most years, after returning from the holidays, I asked my students whether or not they made any New Year's resolutions. Each time I asked this question, I got a quizzical look. They didn't understand the word "resolution" and that was a part of their confusion, but even after I explained it, the concept appeared fairly alien to them. In my experience, the Japanese are not in the habit of making such resolutions and, to my mind, that is all for the best.

I've read that most people fail at their resolutions within three months - five months on the outside. The key to lasting change and accomplishing ones goals is not to indulge in excess for a month and then do a 180-degree turn-around on a given date, but to make gradual progress toward a goal and to exercise moderation. I miss the fact that people aren't talking about New Year's resolutions at the end of the old year and the beginning of the new one.

Will Miss #531 - card delivery on holidays

This year, I had some expectations that I'd receive some real Christmas cards. No, I did not expect to receive them from Americans. I expected to get them from Japanese friends and I did receive a few (and they were gorgeous). When Christmas day arrived and I'd only gotten four cards, I had a strange sense of anticipation about possibly getting just one more on the holiday itself. Of course, in the U.S., there is no mail on national holidays. In Japan, I simply got spoiled by the fact that they deliver cards on the biggest holiday of the year - New Year's.

There was a culture in which New Year's cards played a huge role in the celebration of the holiday which created circumstances in which the post office delivered on that day. I miss having this to look forward to. 

Happy New Year to my kind readers

This year will be the year of the horse. The fact that I pay attention to that is one of the lasting effects - one among many - of my time in Japan. It may seem a mere bit of trivia or an aspect of culture meant to add color and interesting fiction to the changing of the year. To me, it is more than that. It is a reflection of the  the way in which the shape of time passing is framed differently in various cultures. We see it mainly as numbers. They see it as rather different types of numbers or as something affiliated with an animal or different characteristics for those born in that year.

The important thing to me is to keep the understanding of varying perspective in mind. I see "2014", someone else sees it as Heisei 26, and others may see it as the year of the horse. Perspective is affected by numerous things such as this. For example, if you see the year as Heisei 26, then you're framing time through the number of years that someone has been emperor. Culture and the characters shaped within a particular one are built by such things. When you understand that, you start to appreciate and digest the complexity that makes up all of we humans.

I hope 2014 brings all of my readers a world full of the richness, personal growth and enlightenment that such complexity can bring.

Will Miss #19 - New Year's being a real holiday (reflection)

One of the things my students used to tell me was that they were interested in how I viewed parts of their lives as remarkable. We don't know what may look weird or unique to others until we experience another perspective. This was absolutely one of the best things about living in Japan. It made me feel more alive every day to be so aware of my surroundings.

Of course, as time goes by, you notice less and less because what was once novel is now mundane. This process is so slow and unconscious that you don't notice it until you go back to America after 23 years and realize that you grew so acclimated to the ebb and flow of life in Japan that you are more synchronized with their life than life at "home". Such is the case with holidays.

I grew used to the rhythm of time off and holidays in Japan and I've found that I not only miss the New Year's break, but all of the holidays they have that we don't. The American holidays take me by surprise, and I find it hard to get into the spirit of them. I absolutely miss the holiday schedule and how it shaped my life in Japan.

Happy New Year 2013

If only snakes were really made of gold!

Happy New Year to all of my readers! Thank you for continuing to follow my blog(s), and for taking part in comments now that they have been enabled. It is a common custom at the start of the new year to reflect back upon the old one, and I must say that the past year has been a very rough one for me indeed.

Before I left Japan, I spent a great deal of mental energy attempting to prepare myself for the changes to come. After 23 years there, and only visiting home once during that entire time and that visit coming very early in my stay, I knew that it was going to be a bumpy ride. Boy howdy, I was right.

There is an experience that many Japanese people have after they have lived abroad for an extended time in which they have been fundamentally changed such that they cannot fully integrate with their own culture upon return. These "returnees" sometimes find the restrictions of their culture stifling and hard to bear. Their cohorts find them weird and harder to live with. I always felt that this was something that easily happened to the Japanese because they lived in a straight jacket and once released, they found it hard to climb back into those confines again.

Well, I'm here to say that it doesn't only happen to "them". It absolutely happened to me, too. I have been fundamentally changed from my time in Japan and find adapting to life here very hard. There are numerous things which have been difficult to adjust to and it has been emotionally overwhelming at times. I don't want to make an exhaustive list, but just one of the many things I've found hard to deal with is the arbitrary nature of social life in the U.S.

In particular, the unchecked and intentional aggressiveness of people and the arbitrary nature of social behavior have disturbed me. There are no rules, save personal ones, and when they are unintentionally transgressed, you will be handled in an overtly unkind manner. People will go out of their way to confront you angrily just as easily as they will go out of their way to be kind to you by holding open a door or offering to carry your bag. The chaotic nature of both acts of kindness and hostility is something I have had problems finding equanimity with. This is but a tiny portion of the reverse culture shock I've been attempting to deal with, but it has been a pretty significant one.

I don't know if this was the America I lived in 23 years ago, but I don't recall it having been so. Of course, when you are a part of the river and moving along with the flow, you don't really notice that it is doing anything special. When you are rock standing still and watching it wash all around you at breakneck speed, you see every ripple and current, every twig and branch being torn apart by it's furious movement.

This blog continues to act as a filtering and organizing tool for my transition from Japan to America as well as a way of noting my memories. I can't express enough how valuable writing is as a process and would encourage any reader who finds himself thinking too much to consider using public writing as a way of coming to understand oneself and the world. If you want to make a positive change in the coming year, using a blog as a productive tool for self-knowledge and growth could certainly be a good resolution.

My best wishes for health, peace, and happiness to all in the coming year.

Will Miss #419 - 108 bell chimes

At or around midnight on New Year's Eve, temples in Japan ring a bell 108 times to rid themselves of their desires and "sins" from the previous year. It's symbolizes a sort of spiritual cleansing so people go into the next year purged of negativity. I think most Japanese people don't know what it means and few think deeply about the meaning. As a custom and a mindset, I like the idea that you leave behind your negative thoughts and feelings and can start with a clean slate the next year. Even if many Japanese folks aren't deeply internationalizing this feeling as they hear the bell ring, I do. The atmosphere that is created by the slow ringing of the bell so many times adds to the sense of ceremony and special nature of the holiday.

I will miss hearing the bells ring 108 times on New Years Eve for what it represents as well as how it brings a sense of peace and good ambience.

Won't Miss #275 - New Year's postcards

Every year, my students, foreign and Japanese acquaintances, and blog buddies complain about having to write New Year's postcards... well, "write" isn't really correct. Most of them just print a sheaf of them en masse from their color printers. I have never met one person who likes sending them out, and few who care much about even receiving them. It's a tradition which is even worse than sending Christmas cards because the messages are shorter and hollower than the boring, mass produced yearly holiday letters that people cram in them. They're really just something people do out of obligation or for business purposes. The tradition seems to exist mainly so that people can get the equivalent of an entry into the postal lottery which comes along with certain types of cards and stamps. Most people don't win anything (or at best, win some stamps), but it is pretty much the only reason they care about getting the cards since the messages are so brief and perfunctory.

I won't miss getting these cards knowing that they're sent out of obligation and I won't miss feeling guilty that I don't send any myself in return out of similar obligation.