musical again!

Musical performances have begun and so have the after performance revelries. This year we are doing Snow white (who is a male) and the Seven Samurai. It is quite a wacky adaptation but we've had good reviews. Before our performance a few weeks ago I rounded up some people to go skating because I have had this strange urge to go. We had all levels of skater with us but the crappy skates we were provided didn't help anyone. It was like riding a bike though with one flat tire!

That night we celebrated Holly's goodbye because she was leaving Japan. The show must go on though so our director is going to assume her role!

Learned that giving the peace sign upwards is a way of say f you in England so Courtney and I are give the non-profane version!

mid-year seminar and northern lights

Mid-year seminar came around again and the party was a costume (or fancy dress as they say in the UK). Pirates vs Ninjas ... what a random theme anyhow as I am a sucker for dressing up went for the pirate alias.

Naomi and I practicing our gansta pirate pose

Naomi and Courtney two of my best buds this year

Tried some funky colour contacts out but caused my one eye to swell up.

Or I should say it was from the pistol butt in the last pirate fight.

Marshall has become a good bud as well and probably more addicted to snowboarding than I. He is planning on taking a week off to snowboard!

Friday went to Northern Lights with Naomi and the greatest Japanese couple ever Ruu and Futoshi. They are sooooo much fun!


My talent - pregnancy simulation! Never though... it could be a good way to scare off unwanted attention. Naomi claims it is because I have strong stomach muscles?

This apparently is Naomi's frog face, which means she is trying to be sad?

Ruu has the funniest faces and sounds!

random snowboarding

I have spent this winter on the slopes as much as possible. I am addicted to the weather report and check it five times a day praying for snow. All this due to snowboarding! Winter in this country is really frustrating when you want to be snowboarding every weekend. The snow doesn't stay around as it is always melting and snowing, melting and snowing, this does lead to great powder conditions when it snows but on any given day you can't be sure there will be snow. They actually have a special name for snow that doesn't melt all winter and were shocked when I explained that it doesn't snow that much in Canada it just doesn't melt. Anyhow, here I am praying for snow once again but it is like the sun in the summer...comes on the week days when you are at work.

Mt. Hakkai, Minamiuonuma, Niigata

Tainai skijo, Niigata

snowboard can be a good sled as well!everybody likes the curry!

Ikenotaira Onsen, Myoko, Niigata

suicide the honourable way out

I debated about writing on this topic for a while but it has been part of my stay in japan and something I intimately experienced.
At the mid year conference a man had jumped from the third floor in my hotel and my friend and I had found him after exiting the elevator. I am not certain if he died (though I searched the newspapers and watched the news) but the amount of blood and lack of any movement would suggest he did. It shocked me how many of the Japanese people who walked by took a quick look and then hurried along their way as though it was an everyday occurrence and this man's life wasn't noteworthy.

Suicide is view much differently in Japan than in the west. I think this view probably began with the tradition of seppuku or as the west likes to call it harikari.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seppuku
Seppuku (切腹?, "stomach-cutting") is a form of Japanese ritual suicide by disembowelment. Seppuku was originally reserved only for samurai. Part of the samurai honor code, seppuku was used voluntarily by samurai to die with honor rather than fall into the hands of their enemies, as a form of capital punishment for samurai who have committed serious offenses, and for reasons that shamed them. Seppuku is performed by plunging a sword into the abdomen and moving the sword left to right in a slicing motion. The practice of committing seppukuat the death of one's master, known as oibara (追腹 or 追い腹, ) or tsuifuku (追腹, ), follows a similar ritual.

This form of suicide is seen as noble and many of those who committed this act are revered to this day. I admit to admiring the stories of the

Fourty-Seven Ronin
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forty-seven_Ronin
The story tells of a group of samurai who were left leaderless (became ronin) after their daimyo (feudal lord) was forced to commit seppuku for assaulting a court official named Kira Yoshinaka. The ronin avenged their master's honor after patiently waiting and planning for over a year to kill Kira. In turn, the ronin were themselves forced to commit seppuku — as they had known they would be — for committing the crime of murder.

or the Byakkotai
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byakkotai
Twenty of the members of the Byakkotai, cut off from the rest of their unit in the wake of the Battle of Tonoguchihara, retreated to Iimori Hill, which overlooked the castle town. From there, they saw what they thought was the castle on fire, and committed seppuku (with one failed attempt) in desperation, believing their lord and families dead. However these 20 Byakkotai members were mistaken in their assessment of defeat, as the castle defenses had not actually been breached; the castle town surrounding the inner citadel was aflame. As the majority of the town was between Iimori Hill and the castle, the boys saw the rising smoke and assumed that the castle itself had fallen.

Japan has one of the highest suicide rates in the world but the suicides in Japan are not typically committed by people who are depressed and want out of life but people who have cause mistakes or are so stressed they are willing to take their lives before being a disgrace. Many ninth grade students are known to take their lives before or after their high school entrance examinations and as such their classrooms are on the second floor of the school rather than the third. Within a month you will hear of several cases of CEOs or people in positions of power committing suicide because their companies have not performed well, they were caught in scandal, or some sort of mistake was made that had public repercussions.

Though I don't want to get into an anthropological discussion here many scholar say that Japan is known as a shame culture and shame and ostracisim rather than guilt is the process that controls their lives. I haven't done a study into this topic but it does seem to fit with the reasoning for many suicides.

I can't help but wonder for what reason did that man die?

zao

Gomen for the lack of posts. I can't believe it has been over two months! Hopefully I well get my Korea pic up soon!

For now we are going to stay in the present though much has been missed! Iwan organized a trip to Zao which is one of the biggest and most famous ski resorts in Japan. It was only a couple hour drive away, I don't know why I haven't been there before. The powder was suweeeeeet! The lift system is a bit complicated and you often have to take three different lifts to get to the top so it was a bit annoying. The skijo has five different parking lots and on the first day we ended up in the most remote one. Misael and I almost got stuck on the mountain when the lifts for our parking lot closed and we had to maneuver our way to the parking lot making it just in time (ぎりぎり) for our bus! The second day the powder was to die for but the visibility was lacking. Because the wind was crazy strong near the top all the jumps were closed. Was a great time nonetheless!



We stayed at what is known as a pension but would be like a B&B back home. It smelt like old people and there were tons of stink bugs around but the food was good and the place was warm!


Stopping at one of the lodges half way up the mountain for a bite! The food at skijos is usually not very good and the prices are high! This restaurant proved to be the same and Misael grumbled the rest of the day about his beef,

Went izakaya exploring Saturday night and found a dingy one that suited our tastes. Zao is famous for konyaku but the rubbery texture just turns me off. The rest enjoyed their rubbery balls though.