A Long Day

Konbanwa students,

It is Oct. 12th, but this entry will look like it is published tomorrow because it is already after 11:00 p.m. here in San Francisco.

I'm finally ending my day of departure for San Francisco after having left Louisville International Airport this morning on a 6:00am flight. Of course, I had to be at the airport at 4:30a.m.. After leaving Louisville, the flight arrived in Chicago and I disembarked(look this word up if you don't know what it means!) to make my connecting flight to San Francisco leaving at 7:58 a.m. I arrivied in San Francisco at 10:30. The shuttle took us to the Sheraton Gateway Hotel, which is the picture on your left. It is here that we had a buffet lunch, and had meetings from 2:00p.m. until 5:30. During the meetings we learned what not to do to enable us to have good manners while we are the guests of Japan and the Japanese people. Now, you know that teachers do have rules, and even have homework too. I've already told you that we will be having a Festival of Japanese culture in the Spring, and to be thinking about what your class will want to do for its booth. My learning about Japanese culture first-hand is going to help all of us do that together. This kind of homework can and will be fun! After our meetings, we were the guests of the Consul General of Japan. He is one of one diplomats sent by the Japanese government as its representative in the United States.
His house is the picture on the right. Behind it you can see San Francisco Bay. On the other side of the house we could see the Golden Gate Bridge. This is where we had our evening meal. Now my assignment for you is to get out your map of the United States, or go to www.worldatlas.com, and show your parents the route from Louisville to Chicago to San Francisco. We did this in class so it shouldn't be too hard.

Tomorrow I will leave for Tokyo at 8:00 a.m., but my flight won't leave until 11:30.That will be 7:30 Greensburg time. Right now, it has been a very long day, and I am going to bed. I will write to you again when I'm in Japan!

Sayonara(Good bye)

The Art of Origami

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Konnichiwa students,

I am almost packed, but I wanted to honor my commitment to talk about another Japanese art, the Art of Origami, before I became involved in the actual experience of traveling there.

Origami is a combination of two words ori folding, and gami paper.
Origami arrived in Japan around the 6Th century, brought there by Buddhist monks who were sent as missionaries from China. We learned in the Reading Rainbow episode, The Paper Crane that paper was invented in China by pounding strips of bark into what would eventually become paper. Paper was expensive and was not used as a form of recreation. But the Japanese being a practical, and not wasteful people, as I mentioned yesterday, used their paper well. Samurai(remember Ota Dokan? He was one, belonging to a class of warriors who also exulted in the practice of the arts) would give and receive gifts of dried fish and meat which were cleverly folded in paper and tied artfully with cord. These were called noshi and were regarded as tokens of good luck. Wealthy people would wrap glasses of rice wine in butterfly shapes for weddings to represent the bride and groom.

Origami was passed down through the generations by one person showing another how it was done. It wasn't until 1791 that a book was published titled How to fold 1000 Cranes made many Japanese interested in pursuing this art. Translated from the original Japanese, the title read The Secret of the 1000 Cranes; the secret, or belief, is that if a person can fold 1000 cranes he, or she, will be granted one wish. However, origami did not become a popular pasttime until the appearance, in 1819, of a woodblock print called The Magician Turns Sheets of Birds.In the legend, a magician folds a flapping bird so realistic that it takes flight. This woodblock print created a renewed interest in origami among many people.

Cranes are considered sacred birds in Japan, representing long life and peace. This association with peace is believed to have been established when in 11Th century Japan, a warrior named Kakamura tied prayer strips to the legs of cranes representing all who had died in battle and then set the cranes free to fly.
But, the origami crane did not become a global symbol of peace until after the publication of Eleanor Coerr's Sadako and One Thousand Cranes. In the story, Sadako is stricken with radiation sickness due to the atomic bomb being dropped on Japan. She folds 1000 cranes in order to have her wish for health granted( Of course, I'm not going to tell you what happens, you will have to read that book for yourself---it is not long). In our day, the International Peace Movement was initiated and set a goal of receiving 1,000,000,000 cranes by the year 2000. By the close of 1999, 400 people from 18 different countries had folded 1.2 million cranes for peace. You can find more information by doing a web search for 1000 Cranes Peace Network.

And, finally, Akira Yoshizawa, considered to be the father of modern origami, created a set of symbols to represent the various folds need to create standard origami pieces, like the crane. Some of these folds are: mountain fold, valley fold,and squash fold. Some years ago I was really into origami, and enjoyed showing others(all children) how to create some of the figures. Origami can be very simple, like the directions for making a cup, or it can become as difficult as you would like to make it. I have seen examples of intricate origami creatures created by Japanese Masters that are no larger than my thumb nail. I, however, am not that good.

Preparations

Moshi, Moshi, students,

I am very busy getting ready for my trip to Japan. I depart this Sunday, and I still have much to do. Luckily, I did not wait until the last minute!

Are you wondering about the picture for this entry? Those are the gifts that I am going to take with me to give to the Japanese host family I will be staying with while I am in Minamisoma, Fukushima. One of he gifts I chose to bring is a book called Simply Beautiful by John Adams. It is a pictorial essay of our gorgeous scenery and people(of course, what else would a librarian bring!). The other is a tasteful product of Kentucky's cultural heritage. What I wanted you to notice was the beautiful wrapping---I did not do this! I do know that the Japanese appreciate a nicely wrapped and presented gift, so I asked a friend of mine, you know her as Miss Sarah, to do the job for me. She did a beautiful job--tasteful and elegant,also reflecting the current season, very appropriate for any Japanese person. I am confident my host family will admire and appreciate the coverings of my gifts. I will be sure to relate to you how they enjoyed them. The bundle of twigs in the lower left hand-corner Miss Sarah made for me on Tuesday. It is for a gift I have yet to purchase (okay, I did wait till the last minute on some stuff). I recently was told that the family I will be staying with includes a musuko san who likes to watch horse racing. I have ordered a t-shirt from the Kentucky Derby museum for him and will fold it in some copper-colored Shantung material I have. The twigs with red berries will decorate this last package.

The Japanese call wrapping in cloth, furoshiki. It has become an art form,( their culture likes to take skills and perfect them into an art), but it had humble beginnings too. Historians believe that furoshiki began around the 700-1100's, but it took hold during the Edoperiod. Remember, I mentioned Edo as the village that became a city, and then evolved into what we now call Tokyo. It was during the Edo period that people going to the public baths,sento, would bundle up the clothes they were carrying. From this time cloth was used to wrap a variety of things, mostly because the Japanese are not a wasteful people, finding a use for what scraps of cloth they saved. In more recent times, furoshiki has fallen out of use due to the convenience of plastic bags. But, on March 6, 2006, the Japanese Minister of the Environment, Yuriko Koike, created a furoshiki cloth to promote its use in this modern day.
Since Miss Sarah used paper to wrap the presents shown, and had to fold it, I'd also like to talk about the art of origami, but I'll save that for a future posting.

i yoru (good night)

Wakarimasen and other useful Japanese words

Konnichiwa, students,

As you can tell from the tile, this is another entry on the Japanese language.
There are certain words in all languages that convey a whole sentence in just one word. Wakarimasen and Sumimasen are two such words I think I will probably make good use of during my stay in Japan. Wakarimasen means "I don't understand", and Sumimasen means "Excuse me, or "Sorry". Since the Japanese people are very polite, they use "sumimasen" regularly.

In the picture of me posted on this blog, I am reading 15-minute Japanese . It has been a helpful guide to learning phrases that I can use in different situations. I have learned that I can make a sentence into a question by add "ka" to the end of the sentence. O genki desuka, for example, means "How are you?"

I have also learned that Japanese has been greatly influenced by the other countries it has traded with in its past, such as Portugal, the Netherlands, and the United States. Many words are "borrowed" and then Japanized. Here are some: Pants are pantsu, however, the word pants in Japanese means underwear; the color pink is pinku,the Internet is intahnetto. So, I have found I can remember many words once I know their meaning.

In other situations there are different words for the same thing. This became evident to me when I began learning how to tell the Japanese I meet about my family. Otohsan is the word for father, but if I were talking about my father, Steve, I would call him ChiChi. In some instances, I like the familiar word for "my" relative better than the formal one. Whereas Okhsan is mother, when you're talking about your mother, she is HaHa. Musume san is daughter, musume for my daughter, Sarah. I would use musuko san for son when asking someone about their son, and musuko for my son, Aaron when talking about him.


Kyo's(today's)picture is from a Japanese Anime movie, one which won the 2002 Academy Award for animation. We can't always stay focused on "school" subjects, now can we? I have seen my share of Pokemon cards when musuko, Aaron collected them. Although he doesn't trade them anymore, he is keeping them as an "investment", and memories of his younger years. And, I chose this picture because it gives another example of Japanese hiragana (Japanese characters representing syllables).

Mr., Mrs., and Three

Ohayo gozaimasu students,

Did the title of this entry catch your attention? Any fourth grader in my school who is working on his writing portfolio entries should know about "hooks". If the title intrigued you enough to want to read on, then it did its job of hooking you.

Since I've been practicing my Japanese more, today I will share a little of what I've learned. Perhaps many of you already know the meaning of the word "san". In one of my blogs I used the Japanese word "san" to refer to Mt. Fuji, but I didn't receive any comments as to why I called Mt. Fuji, Fuji-san, or Mr. Fuji. That is, in fact, what the Japanese call this mountain.

The word "san" in Japanese can mean Mr., or Mrs., when following a name, or it can mean the number three. The Kanji symbol for san is shown above. It is composed of three lines, the last longer than the other two.

I've learned that Japanese is one of the most difficult languages to write because it uses 3 different scripts to convey meaning. One is Kanji; these are modified Chinese characters. Hiragana and Katahana are characters based on the syllabic sounds of Japanese words, and are to the right in the above picture. The third, which allows Westerners to read Japanese and to pronounce the words is romanji, the Roman letters we use for our writing. This enables me to read Japanese, although I still don't understand the meaning of many of the passages. Here are few of the phrases and sentences I have learned: dohzo yoroshiku = pleased to meet you, ichi(e-chi) ji(gee) han dewa = thank you very much, and kehki o onegai shimasu = may I have some cake please,( this I thought was an important sentence for me to learn, since I really have a sweet tooth and like any kind of cake).

I'll be leaving a week from today, and I'm getting nervous about being able to communicate with the host family I will be staying with. But at the same time, I'm becoming excited about using the new words, phrases and sentences that I've been learning.

Dewa Mata (see you soon)

Tokyo's humble beginnings

Konnichiwa students!

Did you find that the capital of Japan is Tokyo, just like the prefecture name. However,the correct name of the prefecture is "Metropolitan Prefecture of Tokyo", and it includes smaller cities called "wards" that are under the administration of the prefecture. Tokyo is not only the capital and seat of government, but is also home to the Imperial family, and is where the the Imperial Palace is located. But as I mentioned the other day, it hasn't always been so.
Once named Edo, it was a small and simple village whose inhabitants caught fish for their livelihood. In the year 1457, Edo began to change. A samurai, Ota Dokan, a warrior-poet, built Edo castle,(a current picture of which is above). In 1590, the great military general, Tokugawa Ieyasu, made Edo his military headquarters when he became Shogun, or military high commander of Japan, in 1603. Then, because of its importance in the governing of Japan, the Emperor moved to Edo; Edo castle became the Imperial Palace.
Throughout the years the population grew, and it became Japan's political and cultural center. So it remains today.
Over 12 million people live in the Metropolitan Prefecture of Tokyo where I will be spending the first five days of my visit to Japan. I'm very excited because I will be staying in the New Otani Hotel which now owns the 10 acre garden that once belonged to Edo Castle. I can't wait to see it! In just a few days (Oct. 1) Tokyo will celebrate its anniversary in memory of Ota Dokan. The following is a poem written by him that describes the castle that he built and mentions a famous landmark of Japan that I have already noted in a previous blog.

The abode of mine
Adjoins a pine grove
Sitting on the blue sea
And from its humble eaves
Commands a view of soaring Fuji

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A political map part 2----Cities of Japan

Kombanwa students,
One aspects of Japan's political divisions we should view before we leave the topic of maps, for now, are the cities. Look at this map. Where are the cities located? if you said "along the coastal areas", you are right.
With what you have already learned about Japan's topography, why do you think they located their cities on their coastline? Can you find the capital city of Japan? It is located in Tokyo prefecture, and its beginning letter is a capital "T". But it wasn't always called this; long ago it was know as Edo.
I will stay in the capital for about 5-6 days, but most of the time will be spent in my host city of Minamisoma. It was hard for me to find on a map...it is not a coastal city, but it is close to the Pacific Ocean, and south of Soma. It is not a large city, and is not on this map.