How unusual!

Mezurashii!

Wow, 2 posts in a single month!

My brother took us to a soba (buckwheat noodle) restaurant in Bandai.

Buckwheat will grow in places other crops will not. This is why good soba is often found in places where other culinary choices are limited. Pumpkin Prefecture has fairly good soba (and pasta in general). Central Shizuoka, where I lived for a year, does not. They had wonderful seafood (including but not limited to sushi and fresh prawn), but the soba left a bit to be desired. Actually, pretty much every kind of pasta in Shizuoka left quite a bit to be desired. The sushi lover in me misses Shizuoka. The pasta lover in me does not.

This was the dinner the grownups got (the youngsters got soba and the option of stealing things from their parents' plates). Clockwise from top right: assorted tempura, the tempura sauce, the soba sauce (with scallions), pickles, an empty rice bowl with paddle, bamboo steamer, and a covered ramekin containing chawan-mushi (savory steamed custard containing seafood and vegetables).

This is what was in the bamboo steamer: rice cooked in a soy based broth with assorted vegetables.

There was also this. The picture is quite blurry. There are thin cuts of fine meat (look at that marbling!), a slice of scallion, and shimeji mushrooms cooking in a soy based sauce.

Oh yes, and there was soba.

After the meal, the Pumpkin Daddy was attacked by the youngsters.

Of course, there is always the man who marches to a different drummer.

Tsuki ichi

Once a month

Seems to be the frequency of my blogging these days...

Here in Japan, the days before and after the first weekend in April are known as Golden Week. There's a string of national holidays starting with Showa Day (April 29th, the previous Emperor's birthday) and ending with Children's Day (May 5th). If you work in manufacturing and the factory stops production (like the Pumpkin Daddy), or if you tack on a couple vacation days in between, you end up with a holiday of a week or more.

We went to visit my brother in Aizu. Which means we had to check out at least one Byakkotai (White Tiger Unit) related site. We picked Iimoriyama, the hill overlooking the city where the young men took their own lives.



The dads are holding their babies. The Pumpkin Princess is holding hands with her cousin, who is her Prince du jour.

(Short version of the story for people who are 1) not residents of Japan and therefore do not see the TV movies on the topic, aired every New Year's eve starring the cute teenage stars of the moment 2) too busy to check out the Wikipedia link above: Byakkotai, or the "White Tiger Corps" were a unit of young men, about 16 or 17 years old, who fought in the Japanese civil war in 1868. Part of the unit was isolated during battle. They were young and inexperienced and idealistic, and when they saw the town they were defending in flames, they assumed their castle had been taken and their lord killed. Their samurai education dictated that if their master died, they were obliged to join him. So they did.)

Iimoriyama was the typical tourist attraction with stores full of souvenir swords, commemorative T-shirts and junk food. Young women dressed in contemporary male attire gave guided tours. For 500 yen, you could use the escalator instead of climbing the hill the old fashioned way.

At the point where the city could be seen, there were monuments sent from Germany and Italy. Actually, they were replicas of the originals sent in the 1930s. The concept of monuments from Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy celebrating boy soldiers committing ritual suicide did not go over well with Douglas MacArthur, and he had them destroyed.



According to the plaque beside it, the original inscription read "from a German soldier to the young soldiers of Aizu". My extremely limited German tells me the current inscription does not.



This monument is a replica of the one from the city of Rome. The original was destroyed by the occupying forces shortly after WWII.

The Byakkotai is sad, but not particularly so. They were boys by modern standards, but by contemporary Japanese standards, if you'd had your Coming of Age ceremony, you were a man. These young men did what was expected of them, and in the eyes of their own society, they'd died the death of heroes. What I think they would find annoying was how their image was used to the advantage of the power of the moment. First their corpses were left rotting in the hills, their families not permitted to give them proper funerals because the new Meiji Restoration government (the forces they were fighting) found it necessary to make a show of what would happen to those who opposed the Emperor. Then, when Japan became more and more militaristic, they were depicted as the ideal warriors for their fierce loyalty to their master (keep in mind, this is essentially the same government that forbid their families to give them proper funerals). After that, Japan lost the war and the occupying American forces decided that glorification of ritual suicide was a bad idea and destroyed the monuments dedicated to them.

I think, though, the worst thing that has happened to them is the commercialism. I mean, Byakkotai butter cookies?



I kind of missed out on the cherry blossoms, so the trip north gave me a second chance.

Spring is here.

Haru ga kita.

In Japan, the school year begins in April. The Pumpkin Prince and Princess have new teachers and new classmates at day care. And I have new co-workers. I have gained more co-workers than I have lost. One of my biggest gains is a senior level type back from maternity and child care leave. There's more work, but since there's more workers, I'm not feeling it. Yet.

A couple weeks ago, we went to Yokohama. I had work stuff to do, and the Pumpkin Princess and Daddy went to the Anpanman Museum. I'd always thought Anpanman was less commercial than Disney (they certainly are less strict about copyright) but this museum proves me wrong.



Please note very cute but extremely inferior quality headband on the Pumpkin Princess's head (1500 yen= $16 or thereabouts) and also very cute helium balloon (1000 yen=$11 or thereabouts).





And this adorable box of cute breads...did not taste as good as those from the bakery 3 minutes away from hour house, and cost three times as much.

One evening about a week later, we saw this.



Those of us in, say, the American Midwest will probably shrug and wonder why I am making a fuss. However, in Pumpkin City, snow is in and of itself a very big deal. Snow in mid-April has not happened in 14 years.

Fortunately for almost everyone, including the Pumpkin Daddy, who changed his winter tires a couple weeks prior, but not the Pumpkin Princes, who was excited about getting to build the first snowman of this year, it started raining about an hour after the photo was taken, and the snow was completely gone by morning.

I'm home!

Tadaima!

OK, back from Vienna...much accomplished in terms of both work and play, thanks in no small part to the excellent company (boss and two junior co-workers).



This is the seat belt on an Austrian Air economy class seat. I would have thought it was Wonder Woman if 1) I were flying on an American airline 2) the wings were not there.



Johann Strauss. In gold.



St. Stephan's Cathedral was being restored. How cool are those drapes that accurately show what they are covering?

We rode the elevator to the belfry and saw this.



"Ich fergebe Dir" is painted on a roof. This would translate into "I forgive thee" were it not grammatically incorrect. Not that I would have known if the sign hadn't told me...Anne?



No Starbucks for us, not that I'd complain.

Sorry, no work pictures. I don't write about the technical aspects of work here, unless I need to do so when one of my co-workers is living out an episode of General Hospital.

While I was away, the Pumpkin Prince and Princess stayed with my parents during the workweek, and the Pumpkin Daddy took them to his mom's house on Friday evening. While there, the Pumpkin Prince chose that time to develop a very high fever. This involved a febrile seizure and an emergency trip to the local duty pediatrician (I am slightly disturbed that these did not happen in that order, but at this point, only slightly, since he is obviously fine now). What has happened with the Pumpkin Prince (again, he's fine now, I'm talking about what he and my parents and the Pumpkin Daddy went through while I was gone) makes it hard for me to go on another trip like this, but I do hope that other people at work will be able to, because there is so much to be gained.

It's OK!

Daijoubu!

I've pretty much been absent from my online world since around Christmas. I took advantage of a sleepless night to do taxes and make a very quick entry.

Nothing bad has happened, on the contrary, everything is fine, if hectic. The Pumpkin Prince and Princess have so far managed to avoid full-force infections of the bug du jour after the Pumpkin Princess's swine flu episode. I am constantly impressed and grateful at how healthy they both are. New Year's had my brother and his family over, a fun time was had by the Pumpkin Princess and her cousin, but I think the Pumpkin Granny found it rather stressful.

Work is busier than ever, but there is not that much I can do about it except to pace myself to produce as much as possible, And when I say this, I mean total work output for my entire career, not the short term. For example, sometimes maximizing productivity involves putting off work that should be done but does not have to be done right now, in favor of dinner and bedtime at a reasonable hour, and opting not to put in extra hours and spending time with the Pumpkin Daddy and Prince and Princess instead.

It saddens me that there are people who have not figured out how to pace themselves, and they become burned out and depressed, and end up staying away from work for extended periods. To a certain extent, it also angers me, because when they are not at work, their work becomes my work.

And I should probably eat my own words, because in just a couple more weeks, I'm headed for my first work related overseas trip since I gave birth to the Pumpkin Princess. To Austria, no less. I've been listening to German language instruction CDs during my commute, but I expect most of the people I encounter will have some command of English.

There's only one thing you can do.

Dekiru koto ha hitotsu shika nai.

Picture a group of 30 or so boys, five or six years old, on the stage of the local civic hall. The hall is packed, with parents elbowing each other for prime video recording positions. The boys are wearing white shirts, black pants, and black neckties. They are also wearing sequined gloves on only one hand, and black fedoras on which fake jheri curls have been attached. They dance enthusiastically and skillfully to a medley of Michael Jackson music.

There is a time for everything. There is a time for pondering and discussing the irony in 30 adorable 5 and 6 year olds dancing to "Billie Jean" and "Human Nature" and "PYT." There is a time for pondering and discussing what Michael Jackson would have felt if he saw the adorable boys shaking their arms to "Thriller". There is a time to remember when you pinned the photo cards of beautiful children your internet friends had sent you on your bulletin board, and called it your Michael Jackson collection.

However, this would not be the time.

The only thing you can do when faced with a stageful of day care pumpkins trying to Moonwalk is cheer and applaud wildly.

One after another

Tsugi kara tsugi he

This time, when my 20something co-worker came into work with her pink and blue patterned hose, I recognized them as such, and felt all up-to-date and informed.

My job for the morning was to teach a group of four university undergrads. One of them stumbled on an answer when I was quizzing him. The correct answer was "ADC" but he stammered "A...C...D...um, C..."

I couldn't resist. "No, not AC/ DC. In this particular instance, Heavy Metal would be a bad idea."

I got four blank looks.

"Have any of you heard of AC/ DC? The band?"

Again, four blank looks.

"Do any of you know what Heavy Metal music is?"

Yet another quartet of blank looks.

That's it, I'm going to wear granny shoes to work every day from now on.

That or feathered bangs, 80's style.