Emails from Kirsten & Naoto
May 2003

Date: Fri, 9 May 2003 04:35:08 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: The Cult of Mizuta Continues and 10 reasons why international marriages are not for the faint hearted

Dear Friends and Family;

Hi there. Long time no see. (I just taught that phrase in class today.)

Things have been super busy at the Lincoln/Suzuki house recently. We've got Naoto running off to traffic school, the anniversary of his high school friend's death gathering, unexpected parent-in-law visits, my finals for my online class, and Mia dentist appointments.

Just your average Gumyo week. Although I think we must have said something to make the wind god angry, he's been rattling our windows and blowing my bicycle down a lot recently.

We got a few interesting responses from people about my "fighting in English/Japanese" and Naoto's reply. I love getting those kind of responses. It is nice to know that we're not alone. (it's also nice to know people actually read this.)

In Mia news, she has become this totally fastidious person, except for the milk squeezing. In the morning, I must carefully lay her blankie over her legs before we can read books together. We went to the beach and she wouldn't get off the blanket because her feet would get sandy. If we're eating hijiki (black stringy seaweed) for dinner, if some gets on her hand she'll point and whine until we clean it off.

But she loves to squeeze her milk box and make milk jet all over the room (and her clothes and my clothes and the carpet.) Go figure.

The Cult of Mizuta Continues

Some of you may remember that Mizuta is the name of the family that established, runs, and completely controls the university where I work.

Well, we got a message in our boxes about five days ago that a special "faculty development" meeting was planned for today (friday afternoon.) Lucky me, I had a class, so I didn't think twice about it. My office partner, Kristie, was less than thrilled because she has planned to use friday afternoon to plan this Japanese association of language teachers conference (awfully close to actual faculty development, if you ask me).

Then, two days ago, I got word that I was to cancel my class so I could participate in this meeting. Well now, that's all good, but the meeting was scheduled from 1:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. Oh yes, and it WAS ALL IN JAPANESE!

We sat for 2 and a half hours in a crowded, hot room, and got lectured to my various higher ups about such timely and innovative topics as:

-you should teach your courses (um, excuse me?)
-you should impress your students (okay, that's important)
-you shouldn't lecture for two hours at a time (um, been to an English class recently, don't do much lecturing actually)
-we are a new college so we need to change with the times (okay, I can stand behind that, don't know what it means, really, but it sounds good.)
-13 years in the future, there will be so few 18 year olds that basically anyone who wants will be accepted to college. (scary, but I don't plan to be here in 13 years, so yawn.)
-education is now more about "doing" than "knowing" (yep, not much silent knowing of English in my classes)

Then we broke up into smaller groups. They were billed as "discussion" groups. I chose "student satisfaction and class evaluation." I wish I could tell you more about this topic, but the first guy to speak kind of ticked me off. He was apparently told to speak at this small group last night. He said it didn't give him enough time to prepare, but he certainly took his time saying it anyway. It turns out our key speaker, so to speak, was a banker turned professor last year. He lectured us a little about how it's important to deliver what the customer wants. (I know his hair is greyer than mine, but doesn't 8 years experience teaching count for anything?)

Anyway, can you tell I wasn't too thrilled with the whole thing. It makes me sad, actually. This could have been really a good thing. There are a lot of interesting people in this faculty. However, it was so top/down and amorphous that even the Japanese professors in the back rows were openly sleeping.

It also struck me as ironic that I was told to cancel my class because I had to attend a meeting where people told me to impress my students, deliver what they wanted, and take a more active interest in them.

10 reasons international marriage is not for the faint hearted

10. You've got to fly frequently. Usually over vast bodies of water.

9. You have to get used to eating strange foods regularly (raw fish, strange sea creatures, slimy potato-like things, fish-shaped pancakes with red bean paste, etc. etc.)

8. divorce usually means you have to leave the country, too.

7. phone bills are a nightmare

6. all your vacations are spent with family in the other country

5. spelling your last name to sales clerks and over the phone is a nightmare

4. having to remember foriegn holidays so you don't forget to send presents to in-laws

3. the emotional and mental strain of simultaneously hosting relatives from both sides of the family (just the translating alone will kill you, not to mention the worrying about food, bedding, timing, grandchild-holding, etc.)

2. wondering whether its a cultural thing, or if your spouse just has a mental problem

1. forgetting for a moment which language is the "safe" language to fight in so the people around you can't understand you when you're in public

love and light,
Kirsten

p.s. Mia and Naoto watching evening teletubbies. Also, a picture of Mia in front of the huge koinobori (giant carp flags) set up for children's day here in Japan.

Click on pictures to enlarge

Date: Sun, 18 May 2003 04:13:06 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: Medatsu, Mia's TV, and Soulmates

Dear Friends and Family

Hey there. Naoto is now finished with all his traffic ticket stuff. (yeah) After I get paid on the 20th, I am not allowed to use the ticket as blackmail anymore.

Darn.

Mia is moving on to two word phrases. Unfortunately, they are all in Japanese. Her favorites right now are "chichai wan wan" (small dog- but she uses it indiscriminately for all animals) and "shoku pan man" (a superhero shaped like wonderbread with a face. [don't ask me, I just live here])

Mia's TV

Mia watches three programs in the morning (each about 15 minutes long)on NHK, the educational channel here (like PBS but more repressed and dictatorial.)

The first program is "Let's play in English." I like the fact that they characters switch back and forth between English and Japanese alot. (kind of like our home life.) Naoto recently discovered that the guy in the big, green bird suit (a character called JB) was born in Minnesota and went to North Dakota State University. Now he loves JB!

The second program is "Let's play in Japanese." I've talked about this before, but I must reiterate how much I love this show. I am learning all these Japanese literature, traditional arts, and children's songs along with Mia. Mia loves the show. Her favorite part right now is the "ya ya koshi ya" part. Based on Kyogen (http://www.iijnet.or.jp/NOH-KYOGEN/english/english.html) a bunch of guys dressed eerily similiar to Buffy the Vampire Slayer minions of the week (hooded monk robes with demon masks) jump around clapping and stomping while chanting this humorous song. Really, you have to see it to appreciate the full significance.

The third show is "Peek-a-boo." (japanese version is "inai inai ba") This show features a person dressed up in a dog suit. It is aimed at very young children. I like it because the dog character gets crazy sometimes. For instance, near the end of the program one time, the dog character was leading a game of "make believe you're a...". He started with a butterfly, went on to another appropriate animal, and then all of a sudden busted out with "Michael Jackson" and started moonwalking during the credits. How can I explain the feeling evoked in me when I see a Japanese children's character dog moon-walking to peppy music?

Medatsu

Naoto remarked to me the other day that it is sometimes inconvenient to be out and about with Mia. Why? because he is "medatsu" (stands out) People tend to remember the shaved-head father in casual clothes out with a cute, biracial daughter.

He says people come up to him all the time and say things like "how's Mia?" and "Haven't seen you at play group lately" and he has no idea who they are. I said to him, "welcome to the world of being a foriegner in Japan." That's exactly how it feels. People see you all the time and remember you. However, you can't remember everybody else!

Multiply that by being a teacher (meaning you have over a 100 students each semester- all who remember you, but whose names you must replace with the new batch of 100 students each semester) and you see why I can barely remember the names of my immediate family.

Soulmates

Have I said recently how much living in Japan makes me appreciate Naoto?

I am not the romantic sort (just ask anyone. If I were a character on Star Trek, based on emotion, I would be Spock.) I also don't believe that there is one person out there who is my perfect soulmate.

However, if there is anyone out there, I am pretty sure it's Naoto. Despite our growing up in opposite hemispheres, time zones, cultures, languages, etc. We manage to be quite similiar when it comes to big, fundamental life things.

We both love food. We both think family is important so much that we are willing to transcend traditional gender roles from both our cultures.

We don't disagree that much about how to raise Mia (Naoto, I said "that much" not "at all", okay?) Even though our native languages are different, we often find ourselves saying the same thing at the same time in the same language. (scary, let me tell you.) Both of us have problems with the current administration in Japan and the U.S.

How can that be? I mean, the first time I met Naoto he was wearing a condom in a clear plastic pocket on his t-shirt with the logo "in emergency break glass." (okay, his english wasn't so hot back then, but still)

Yet I have never felt so comfortable with anyone else in my life.

I interact with Japanese men of all ages here all the time. I am amazed I ever found him. There isn't anybody else like that here. Lucky me. :)

love and light,
Kirsten

p.s. Mia, in the soon-to-be jungle behind our house. She took a big tumble right after this picture.

Click on picture to make the grass grow and see Mia bigger.

From: Naoto Suzuki
Subject: RE: Medatsu, Mia's TV, and Soulmates
Date: Sun, 18 May 2003 23:12:47 +0900

There were big earthquakes two nights in a law. Mia has been pretty good girl for a while. Lakers lost (yeah!). Kirsten wrote good things about me. Is the end of the world coming pretty soon?

-naoto

Date: Fri, 23 May 2003 20:26:16 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: The Baby with the Bathwater

Dear Friends and Family

Well, rain season draws ever nearer so we are now into the too-warm-for-long-sleeves but not warm-enough-for-short-sleeves weather. I have nothing in my professional wardrobe that matches this weather. I end up being too cold or too hot every day.

Our jungle is turning into wheat grass, orange-pink poppies, and kudzu vines. Naoto and I watch the first tendrils peak out of the wheatgrass with trepidation, last time the kudzu all but choked the life out of the beautiful flowering bushes next door. The vines would creep over to our tomato and daikon patch. Seeing a kudzu vine evokes the similiar unreasoning hate cockroaches inspire in me. It's as if somewhere in our prehistoric (the Kudzu's and mine) past, our ancestors had some meat/plant war or something.

I am convinced in the event of a nuclear holocaust, all that will survive are cockroaches and kudzu.

Mia is starting to put two or three words together at a time now. She will say "chichai mommy" or "chichai chocho" (small mommy, small butterfly). I think that's an important step because she is learning to apply words to new situations. Today naoto said she correctly identified two out of her 5 colored pencils.

At night, she still whispers words to herself for comfort. This poem from mothering.com expresses my feeling well;

sweet little girl talk
on the edge of sleep
words
and not-quite-words
meditations
incantations
sleep

By Donna P. Harris

Unfortunately, Mia got bitten/stung by some unknown bug. Her hand and eye swelled up suddenly in the middle of the night and we had to rush her to the hospital. Of course she was fine, but she didn't enjoy having a bandage over the blisters on her hand, and she was scared by not being able to open one eye.

She's doing much better today. However, the picture attached is taken from the day after she was bitten/stung. (Shades of elephant man, anyone?)

My office-mate Kristie says that she thinks bugs are bigger and scarier here than anywhere else. I tend to agree. I am looking at our living room window right now, there's been these giant, winged cross-between-a-mosquito-and-a-daddy-long-legs spider mating on the window for the past week. Mia doesn't like them. She looks at them and says "no, no, no."

I understand completely.

The Baby with the Bathwater

The cult of Mizuta faculty development continued last Friday. Luckily, they didn't tell me to cancel my class to participate, so I was exempted. I overheard some teachers talking about it, however. It seems that one main point discussed in the "Class evaluation and student satisfaction" panel was the lack of manners in college students. It seems there was discussion about how teachers should teach students manners.

I have many conflicting ideas regarding that. On one hand, I feel like, "am I teaching in a kindergarten?". On the other hand, having taught at L.E.N. Institute where ESL and computers was just the tip of the iceberg of what we were supposed to teach (we were teaching "office culture" including expectations of behavior, dress, and hygiene), I agree.

Or let me qualify that by saying we shouldn't be teaching "manners" per se, but we should be teaching how to learn, how to make ESL (in my case) a positive reinforcement of self-image and interest. We should be modeling all sorts of positive ways of interacting, working in groups, responsibility in a partnership, etc. etc.

I read this website:

http://www.disciplinehelp.com/
which has 117 behaviors listed and recommendations for positive ways to handle those behaviors. (for instance, the disruptor, the "I don't know", the instigator, etc.)

I agreed with all the advice. The main problem was that all the advice they gave involved a lot of one-on-one conferencing, checking in during classes, and constant observation. Sigh. Who has energy for that? I have over a 100 students this semester, about half of whom could benefit from this kind of attention.

One one side I feel the pull to actually try and make a difference. On the other side I have the simple fact that I would rather be home with Mia and Naoto.

Am I a bad teacher? A bad person?

I don't know. Maybe I can try to make a difference in just a few students' lives. But then how do I justify giving this student a break, and not the other one?

Last year, I tried to make a difference in the life of one of my baseball boys. He ended up fading out of the class. He's back again in one of my classes this year, startin the same vicious cycle of absences, lack of homework, and frustration in class he exhibited last year.

I don't know whether I want to address it this time or not.

Well, this email is ending on a kind of down note. Don't worry, though, I am not that sad. I am sure I will find some kind of workable solution for myself.

On the other hand, I want to (belatedly) congratulate my Monterey friend, Toni on the birth of her new baby, and to congratulate my Earlham friend Sarah (cadbury nee parnham) on the double blessing of her father's recovering process and her pregnancy.

love and light,
Kirsten

Click on Mia for a closer look.

More emails from Kirsten & Naoto