Life in Japan, part 1

wrote in message
ups.com...

//snip//
I did finally find an excellent international book shop in Shibuya. The
seventh floor of Tower records is all "Books in English".
You and I must have met different Japanese people, the once I've met
couldn't speak English worth a damn, with or without beer and
regardless of age.
Actually this is not true, there are some at the Ericsson AB office
that I meet every day and that are very good at English.
Anyway, it isn't a real big problem since the Japanese must be among
the most service minded people I've ever met. All that can happen when
trying to communicate in Japanese is that I make a fool of myself, and
since this is more or less expected of me, being a Gaijin and all, I'm
babbling away.


I didn't think there was a Japanese person under 70 who couldn't speak at
least a few words of English. It's taught aggressively in the schools. I
used to be mobbed by school kids wanting my autograph. I thought it was
because of my movie star looks but my wife disagrees. Says it's because they
were working on school assignments and had to get an autograph from somebody
who speaks English, to prove that they had a conversation with a native
English speaker. But what does she know . . .

There's a fabulous book store called "Kinokuniya". It's probably the best
bookstore in Japan and offers on online service.

You've got a great time ahead of you. Most gaijin who spend several years
there go through three main phases: phase 1, when you're positively
enchanted and fascinated by the place; phase 2, when you're absolutely
disgusted, and finally settling into a more permanent phase in which you
understand what's going on and come to accept and respect the differences.
It really is a fascinating place, especially if you can make some local
friends.

Americans think they have a long history that goes back 400 years, and
Europeans think American's are new arrivals on the scene. But I have
Japanese friends who can trace their ancestry - via written records - back
to around 700 AD. They really do have a different perspective.

Bob


--
Bob Patton
(remove hat to respond)

Wayne,

There's plenty of fishing to be found here, and in spectacular
surroundings, this being evident from the books and web pages that I've
found so far. However, with a huge number of Japanese fishermen comes
rather high prices and it seems some of the trout fishing streams in
the mountains are way beyond my budget. Fishing, I have been told, is
one of the favorite pastimes of the Japanese. I guess that's logical,
they do after all live on islands.
True to the Japanese way of being thorough, some of the flies I found
in that fly fishing shop (tied by Japanese locals) were among the best
I've ever seen. They were expensive though.
I haven't been here all that long yet and still need to find out how to
get out of the city and then how to get to where there's some fishing
to be had. Trout fishing that is, seems there's a lot more of the carp
fishing and sea fishing to be had than the trout fishing.
Also, my father is sending me my fishing gear since it would have been
a bit much to carry on the plane together with all the other things
needed for a 5 month stay, so I guess there's still time to find out
more.

/Roger

vincent p. norris wrote:

[snip]

Each teacher was "adopted" by a local family; we adopted one for about
seven years. It was to enable them to learn more about America, and
practice their English outside the classroom. We enjoyed it, and
learned a lot about Japan. But even when they left, after about two
months, their English was pretty damn bad.

We still get Christmas cards from most of them, and their English is
STILL bad.

That may help explain why their students are reluctant to speak
English to strangers until they've absorbed a few beers.

vince
Who has often wondered if our public-school foreign-language teachers
are equally bad.

Yes.


Chuck Vance

wrote:

Wayne,

There's plenty of fishing to be found here, and in spectacular
surroundings, this being evident from the books and web pages that I've
found so far. However, with a huge number of Japanese fishermen comes
rather high prices and it seems some of the trout fishing streams in
the mountains are way beyond my budget. Fishing, I have been told, is
one of the favorite pastimes of the Japanese. I guess that's logical,
they do after all live on islands.
True to the Japanese way of being thorough, some of the flies I found
in that fly fishing shop (tied by Japanese locals) were among the best
I've ever seen. They were expensive though.

Roger,

I assume you're familiar with this little jewel of a webpage:
http://www.itow.com/amago/b-streams/index2.html

It's got nice descriptions of some of the author's favorite streams,
fish and flies. In particular, I find the pics and descriptions of the
flies fascinating.


Chuck Vance

Yep,

That's one of the best pages so far. Found it while still in Sweden and
figured that I'd do some fishing in Japan. Now, if I can only find my
way out of this, to say the least, enourmous city ;-(

/Roger

On 9/20/05 8:01 AM, in article , "Conan The
Librarian" wrote:

wrote:

Wayne,

There's plenty of fishing to be found here, and in spectacular
surroundings, this being evident from the books and web pages that I've
found so far. However, with a huge number of Japanese fishermen comes
rather high prices and it seems some of the trout fishing streams in
the mountains are way beyond my budget. Fishing, I have been told, is
one of the favorite pastimes of the Japanese. I guess that's logical,
they do after all live on islands.
True to the Japanese way of being thorough, some of the flies I found
in that fly fishing shop (tied by Japanese locals) were among the best
I've ever seen. They were expensive though.

Roger,

I assume you're familiar with this little jewel of a webpage:
http://www.itow.com/amago/b-streams/index2.html

It's got nice descriptions of some of the author's favorite streams,
fish and flies. In particular, I find the pics and descriptions of the
flies fascinating.

That's a very cool page, and has been in my bookmarks file for quite some
time. Last winter I "built" several of his folded-paper trout models. Fun!
I've got 'em in my office, they make good conversation pieces!

Bill

On 19 Sep 2005 16:54:09 -0700, wrote:

Charlie,

I did finally find an excellent international book shop in Shibuya. The
seventh floor of Tower records is all "Books in English".

I had forgotten that one. My most useful book there, though, was "Tokyo City
Atlas, a Bilingual Guide". I had that and a program on my Palm III that you
could input two train stations and it would give you the route - quickest,
fewest train changes, etc. The biggest problem was that it didn't take into
account how many levels apart the platforms were in the stations.

You and I must have met different Japanese people, the once I've met
couldn't speak English worth a damn, with or without beer and
regardless of age.

I probably should have said 'know' instead of 'speak'. They don't get a chance
to speak much and enjoyed practicing in relaxed settings, but for business it
was all done through translators.

All that can happen when
trying to communicate in Japanese is that I make a fool of myself, and
since this is more or less expected of me, being a Gaijin and all, I'm
babbling away.

I was told that if a gaijin speaks Japanese too well they are suspicious since
some of the more subtle usage, like the proper personal pronouns in the proper
context, are very difficult to master unless you were raised Japanese. I never
gave them any reason to be suspicious of me in that regard. g
--
Charlie...
http://www.chocphoto.com

Roger,

I assume you're familiar with this little jewel of a webpage:
http://www.itow.com/amago/b-streams/index2.html

That's a very cool page, and has been in my bookmarks file for quite some
time. Last winter I "built" several of his folded-paper trout models.
Fun!
I've got 'em in my office, they make good conversation pieces!

Bill

Very cool. I'm going to build a couple tonight.
http://www.itow.com/amago/papercraft/papercraft2.html

--
Frank Reid
Euthanize to respond

William Claspy wrote:

[http://www.itow.com/amago/b-streams/index2.html]

That's a very cool page, and has been in my bookmarks file for quite some
time. Last winter I "built" several of his folded-paper trout models. Fun!
I've got 'em in my office, they make good conversation pieces!

I'm guessing that I got the url from you in the first place, my
brother of bookish breath. But I'm not shy about claiming something
once it's in my own bookmarks file. :-)

I'll check out the folded-paper trouts. I seem to have missed that
altogether.


Chuck Vance

On 9/20/05 9:58 AM, in article , "Conan The
Librarian" wrote:

William Claspy wrote:

[http://www.itow.com/amago/b-streams/index2.html]

That's a very cool page, and has been in my bookmarks file for quite some
time. Last winter I "built" several of his folded-paper trout models. Fun!
I've got 'em in my office, they make good conversation pieces!

I'm guessing that I got the url from you in the first place, my
brother of bookish breath. But I'm not shy about claiming something
once it's in my own bookmarks file. :-)

I'll check out the folded-paper trouts. I seem to have missed that
altogether.

Frankie-baby posted the direct URL to them, or if you back up to his home
page, you'll find them there.

This guy did some really nice work. You print them out on heavy-ish paper
stock, in color. You'll have to tell your printer to reduce-to-fit as they
seem to have been made to print on slightly larger paper size. I've used
both liquid glue and glue sticks, both seem to work, though you have to keep
something handy to keep your fingers clean if you use glue stick.

Much fun for us "build stuff" kind of guys.

And for Chuck and me, we can even fiddle with scary-sharpening our x-acto
knives :-)

Bill