Tako Tomodachi

Left: Gan-Chan teaches Jo how to honor Mai's late Grandmother with a prayer and the burning of incense.

_ _ _

_

_

_

_

_

_

_

_

_

_

_

______

Good morning Tokyo!

First some updates.

Lost In Translation: Top Janglish Quotes:

(1)

The backdrop: All week we had been looking forward to going to Mai's house for a traditional Japanese dinner, sleepover, and breakfast. On Saturday night we receive the following email from Mai:

Tomorrow, I prepare your roomwears! You don't have to bring them. I will take pleasure your visiting very much!! From MAI

I read the email. I thought about it for a moment. I couldn't come up with a translation for roomwears, and I started to wonder. Is there some traditional item or clothing that Japanese have that we don't have in the US ? It sure seemed possible. I called Jo over to take a look at the email. She read it and looked up at me just as perplexed. We laughed a little, and I decided to forward the email to Sawa for an expert translation and some etiquette advice.

Ten minutes later I get a phone call from Sawa. I think there is a little laughter in her voice, but I'm not positive. She tells me, "roomwears means pajamas." I say, "OK, and thanks for your help . "

.

The next day at practice I find out Sawa didn't know what roomwears was either, and that's because Mai and her mom looked up pajamas in the dictionary and the closest thing they could find was," roomwears ". Sawa had to call Mai to ask her what she meant. Then she called me with the answer. That's why she was laughing, and when Mai came over apologizing for using the word "roomwears", we all had a good laugh.

After, Sawa wished Jo and I luck on our Japanese sleepover and told us NOT to call her if we needed any help. Isn't she sweet!

(2)

"Wait, I have dictionary." Almost always accompanied by a hand gesture and some enthusiastic head nodding, this is Gan-Chan's tag line. We hear it many times a day, and thankfully because there are often conversations that can't be finished without a little outside help. Luckily, Gan-Chan always has her dictionary, and it's not just your standard dictionary either. It's actually the "mack-daddy" of all dictionaries.

.

If you just looked at it, you would think it was a mini-computer with a soft carrying case. You can type words in both Japanese-romaji (roman alphabet - very necessary for Japanese beginners like us) and Japanese-characters (for the native speaker). It has audio capability complete with proper pronunciation for words, expressions, and whole sentences. The voice can speak in five different speeds, the slower speeds help with pronunciation, and the faster speeds help the listener get used to how a native speaker actually sounds. Needless to say, this dictionary has saved many conversations, and we love hearing Gan-Chan say, "Wait, I have dictionary."

(3)

What do the Japanese do on a sleepover? The same thing Americans do, of course. Eat dinner, hang out, and watch a movie. It was great (more about dinner and hanging out later). The movie was called Hula Girls, and it was a Japanese original with English subtitles for our benefit. The story was about a young girl growing up in a coal mining village, during a time when coal was becoming obselete. Men were being laid off from the mines. There were no other jobs in town, and everyone was in an uproar over what to do next. The main character skips school and defies her mother's wishes in order to train to be a hula dancer. The rest of the movie is about her struggle to to learn to dance and to bring Hawaii to the cold, coal mining town she grew up in.

.

It was a great story, and the subtitles were awesome. Joanna and I used the subtitles to expand our Japanese vocabulary with some important words and sayings. For instance, Joanna's favorite expression, "Odoritai!" In English, "I want to dance! "When you can't communicate with the people around you, it really helps to have a sense of humor. Joanna often uses this expression at random, miss-timed moments, bringing on a roar of laughter. Another expression," Ikuzo! " , meaning, "Let's go!" Said with an exorbitant amount of enthusiasm, "Ikuzo!", can also bring down the house. A few other expressions we've found particularly useful:

"Inakamono" --- Country bumpkin.

"Iitaikoto ga arunara itteyo!" --- If you have a problem, say it to my face!

"Bakkajoyanaino!" --- Unbelievable!

(4)

Tako Tomodachis: The nickname for our group of four people that together have eight arms just like an octopus. Joanna and I started using the expression, "octopus party" (said with our best impression of a Japanese accent it sounds more like octopus pati) , to describe our time hanging out with Gan-Chan and Mai. They have been so helpful and kind to us, and we have a great time hanging out with them on our days off from soccer. They love practicing their English with us, and we love practicing our Japanese with them. We have a great friendship.

.

This weekend on our sleepover at Mai's house, the expression evolved into, "tako tomodachis", which in Janglish means, "octopus friends". It is an affectionate term, and we use it often to convey that we appreciate them and they are special to us. It is funny all the different ways we have learned to communicate verbal and emotional messages with such a limited vocabulary.

The Sleepover:

Now that I've shared some of the funny moments with you, let me paint a more complete picture of our sleepover at Mai's house. After practice on Sunday (we were at the field for six full hours), the tako tomodachis headed to Mai's house (affectionately called, Mai Chome, same idea as Gan-Chan Chome from the previous blogs). As we entered her house we were given slippers to wear inside. We met Mai's parents in the living room and kitchen area, introducing ourselves in Japanese . We can't say much, but we were excited to be there, and we smiled and nodded a lot to show our enthusiasm.

Mai's mother, Okaasan, which is the Japanese word for mother, had been cooking all day in preparation for our visit. This was our first authentic Japanese dinner, complete with chopsticks, tatami floors, bento boxes, and Asahi (Japanese beer). It was a feast, and you have to excuse me because I don't remember the names of everything we ate. I will try to describe it anyway.

.

We started with udon noodle salad with fresh seared tuna. Then we had fried and breaded shrimp, chicken, and squid; followed by seared eggplant with a distinctly Japanese taste; sesame flavored roots; potato, carrot, noodle, and beef brisket stew; soft tofu soup (impossible to pick up with chopsticks); and delicious sashimi on a bed of cabbage. I'm sure I am forgetting something. There was food everywhere and endless new things to try.

.

Her mother didn't eat with us because she was too busy cooking and preparing the food in the kitchen. She would come into the room with a new dish, and together she, Mai and Gan-Chan would explain what it was. She would stay until we had our first bight. We would look up and say, "oishi", which means delicious, and then she would disappear back into the kitchen to get the next dish together. It was, hands down, the most extravagant and delicious meal we've had in Japan, and the company was incredible as usual.

Because Mai's father was sick he sat in the adjoining room, and only occasionally joined the conversation through Mai and her Mom. He often came to the edge of the room to take pictures, which he later printed for us as a gift to take home. After dinner Mai's Mom opened the presents we had brought from the US, and we all moved cheerily into the living room to eat desert, drink coffee, and watch Hula Girls.

As we relaxed in our "roomwears", watching the Japanese movie, occasionally laughing as we taught each other new Japanese and English expressions, I felt very at home in this foreign country. I am not looking forward to the end of our trip, and I'm becoming more and more aware that our time here is finite.