I spent my month-long summer vacation traveling around Wisconsin, between Platteville, Eau Claire, and Milwaukee…and summertime Wisconsin, totemo subarashi desu: miles of so much green and so few buildings, sunsets radiating over rolling horizons, rivers full and cold, evening air that leaves the slightest welcome prickle…sensory overload at times. 30 days packed with family and friends, river boat rides, Joynt and Badger Bar evenings, ridiculous amounts of food, car drives and golf drives, a wedding, and a funeral.
Not to mention a few job interviews: three jobs, good work, teaching and tutoring writing. But for how much I have missed home, working in Japan is a far better deal. Government-subsidized housing. National health care. And two of the three jobs I was offered in the U.S. provided no health insurance to start. I could purchase my own insurance covering major medical, leaving me to pay out-of-pocket should I ever want a check-up…you know, to possibly catch any issues from the start, not when they are full-blown. I am lucky to be a healthy person, but these fears still exist. And something is very wrong with a country that cannot provide basic (and preventative) health care to all its citizens. But I know we’ve already heard a lot about this lately.
II.Sometimes I can’t believe I’m getting paid for this. I work for a company that contracts with Boards of Education in cities and towns throughout Japan to provide their schools with foreign language teachers to assist the schools’ regular English teachers. The company has its ridiculous paperwork and such, but they are generally hands-off, and the only contact I have with my official supervisor is via monthly emails.
As for the work itself, it’s incredibly fun. We read stories, perform skits, sing Beatles songs, play Bingo, Battleship, Memory, Telephone, Jeopardy, Hot Potato, Scrabble, Pictionary, and countless other games. I team-teach lessons; there’s always a Japanese teacher of English alongside me to translate, or discipline the students if necessary. Homework is usually checked in class, and the Japanese teacher is in charge of holding exams, while I can spend my time kicking around a soccer ball at recess and answering students’ pressing questions such as, “Who is your favorite Disney character?”, “Do you like green tea?”, and “What shampoo do you use?” Fantastic. And that concludes the bragging portion of this post.
III.My great-aunt was Aunt Jane to everyone. She kept track of small snippets and souvenirs so carefully…the objects in physical form and events in her mind. She recalled vivid details remarkably well: a letter of thanks my dad wrote as a kid, a job working in New York City as a dressmaker—creating model garments for the covers of pattern books, travels around the world with her husband, and then others—being charged with steering a catamaran and accidentally pulling onto a nude beach…
When I saw her in December, right before I left for Japan, I was afraid it would be the last. By June, she’d taken enough medication. She seemed ready to go, the last surviving sibling. She had often talked about getting all of us together: my family and the families of her siblings’ children. And in late August, we all finally gathered in her own house, to celebrate her.
I know the tiniest fraction of her life’s stories…but what pieces I have assemble an inspiration. Someone present and loving to her family. A best friend in a sister. A Columbia graduate who engaged and encouraged her high school students. A woman who married later in life than the status quo, then experienced loss. An international traveler. I don’t know her flaws…not a one. And while I don’t seek flawlessness, I would so hope to be seen one day as someone very much like her. Part of me would like to move back to my hometown…but I think she’d be glad I am still out on an adventure.
I had said my goodbyes to Shizuoka: my favorite sights, restaurants, pals. Had been leaning toward not coming back. So this is just to say, summer vacation was fantastic, but I am back in Japan until December. Time is flying.
After sunset, naturally, temps slowly lowered to tolerable, and Shizuoka’s rooftop bars especially bustled with business. July was also prime summer festival time, and before I left for vacation, I was able to take in a few seasonal traditions, including a lantern float, a temple festival, and a fireworks display.
At the Tomoe River in Shimizu, participants bought floating lanterns, personalized them with wishes and drawings, and sent them downstream through the city.
Right behind my apartment is Kiyomizusan Park, which includes the small Kiyomizu Temple, and on an early July evening, vendors lined the streets leading up to the park, and people packed the area to visit the temple, eat food on a stick, and view the sporadic fireworks being launched over the nearby playground.
Many men and women wear traditional yukata (summer-weight kimono) to festivals...
Droves boarded busses in downtown Shizuoka, headed for the Nihondaira fireworks, despite cloudy weather. The Nihondaira is a huge, forested hill between Shizuoka and Shimizu, and the fireworks were to be set off over a grassy clearing near the top of the hill. As our hour-long bus ride took us up the winding, switchbacked road, we realized a thick cloud had stationed itself atop the Nihondaira. Davin, Joyce, Tatyana, and I were left off and proceeded to claim a spot on the crowded field, covered in fog. 
As showtime neared, people who had arrived early to claim prime blanket space began to pack up. A few test shots were fired, and the darkened sky lit up in solid color, as if we were watching a giant movie screen that briefly flashed plain green, then red.
Nevertheless, an announcement was made that the show would go on, and the entirety of the display proceeded just as the test—a solid wall of color flashing before us—no individual sparks or distinguishable fireworks to be seen, until the end when they lit off a few ground displays (including a Mt. Fuji). Everyone who stayed was laughing at the ridiculousness of it all. Definitely a most memorable fireworks experience.
