Odds, Ends, And More Thoughts on Being Back in Oita

So what else have I been up to during Summer break, you ask? Well, one thing’s for sure: a hell of a lot of driving.

I felt kind of guilty even taking the company car down to Kyushu in the first place, and I told myself once I got down here I was going to limit the amount of miles I put on it. But it’s unavoidable really. I’m staying in Hita with Shoko, and all of my friends live on the other side of the prefecture.

I’ve already gotten quite a nice “trucker’s tan”, from always driving here, there, and everywhere in the heat of the day. My right arm is burned from always being next to the window. My left arm is nice and pale by comparison. (In Japan we drive on the other side of the road). At least I’m making a lot of progress on my books on tape listening.

Things I Didn’t Do
Not everything has gone exactly as planned. Shoko had planned to rent a cottage near the sea for a long weekend, but at the last minute we both decided we didn’t want to do that. I’m a Michigan boy, so I never really got used to the feel of salt water. On a hot day, swimming around in the ocean sounds like the worst thing ever to me. So we went to the waterfall instead, and I swam in the fresh mountain water.

Also, I mentioned to some of you that I was planning on going to Hiroshima on the day of the 60th anniversary of the atomic bombing, and checking out what was going on. That ended up not working out as well. It was primarily money. The anniversary, August 6th, was just a few days before my payday, and funds were a little thin as they always are that time of month. There were other reasons as well. I had a busy couple days leading up to August 6th, and so was a bit tired out. Also, as well as I could tell from my research on the internet, not too much was scheduled to happen anyway. Also, I knew it would be another blistering summer day in Japan. But primarily it was the money.

In fact, as for the whole 60th anniversary of the end of the war going on this month, I really haven’t seen anything special aside from what I read in the papers. So I guess I'm not a good person to ask. Media Mouse has a good post though.

Waterfalls
Considering the heat, I’ve been swimming in the waterfalls whenever possible. A group of us went to the Higashishiya waterfall in Ajimu last week Friday. There are lots of waterfalls in this area, but Higashishiya is very touristy. Because it’s in my old town, I’ve been there loads of times, and, as I explained to the other people, “I don’t think there’s any rule against swimming here. I always go swimming here, and no one has ever told me not to. But none of the Japanese people ever go swimming. So you are a bit on display if you do jump in.”

There was a busload of tourists. We were a bit shy about jumping in with everyone watching. “I’d feel bad about all the photos I’d ruin if I jumped in now,” someone said.

“My experience is we usually create just as many photos as we destroy if we jump in,” I said. Sure enough, when we eventually overcame our shyness and started swimming, we got our pictures taken by several people.

Time with Shoko
Shoko caught a cold last week and has been taking it easy and spending most of her free time in bed. I thought she was babying herself a little bit too much to be honest, but it’s her apartment and if she wants to take it easy she can take it easy.

My problem was that I felt like I was spending too much time in her apartment watching TV anyway. I’d wait for her to come home from work so we could do something, but then she would just want to stay in and watch TV. After a while I thought like I was crawling off the walls. I made an effort to get out and do stuff independent of Shoko, but I did lose my temper a little bit one day when I really was itching to get out of the apartment, and I felt like she was taking too long putting on her make up. She asked why I was upset, I confessed that I was feeling a bit cooped up in the apartment, and she asked me if my trip back to see her again had been enjoyable. I said it wasn’t as fun as I thought it was going to be.

A stupid thing to say of course. And she took it a bit rough of course. But she’s really been making an effort to get out more with me. We went to a Jazz festival in Beppu on Sunday. And we’ve done a bit of light hiking and sight seeing together as well.

Other Stuff
This time of the year is always a lot of good-bye parties. I’ve already said good-bye to a couple friends, and a few more are going to be leaving soon. I hate saying good-bye, but I like the parties.

As mentioned in the previous entry, I’ve also been spending time with Chris, the new ALT in my old position. Yesterday we went down to Oita city together. I helped him get a library card, and then showed him around the places to get English books, and other cool stuff.

I really dig the beautiful scenery in Oita prefecture. I’m starting to remember why I stayed here as long as I did.

On the other hand, I’m also starting to ask myself what I accomplished during my 3 years here. I’ve got a lot of memories, but they seem all lumped together in my brain without any sort of organization. Sometimes it’s hard to believe I was actually here for 3 years. It seems like I only really have one year’s worth of memories. It’s as if my memory was some sort of accordion. During the time I was actually living here, the accordion was stretched out and filled with memories. Now the accordion has closed, and all my memories are squashed into a small space, and it seems like my memories only take up a small amount of time.

I was talking to someone about this earlier. “When you live in one place for a long time,” I said, “sometimes your memories all get mixed together. Of course in University we live in the same place for 4 years. But University is different. You proceed through different levels, so you have different ways of codifying your memories. You can think:
‘Ah, yes, I remember that. That happened when we were Sophmores, and we were still living in the dormitory.’
But when you stay put for 3 years and nothing really changes, all your memories run into each other, and it’s hard to sort out what happened when.”

My friend answered, “Yes, but that’s what real life is like. Since we came to Japan straight from University, we expect real life to resemble University life, but in real life you do stay put in one place for many years, and you don’t always notice yourself progressing from one level to another, and so your memories do all run together. But that’s the way life really is.”