Fountain/Sculpture in the Courtyard of the Kobe Bay Sheraton, Rokko Island -- Site of FLEAT IV! Click for enlarged view...
All photographs copyright of John H. Stewart.
This document is a supplement for IALL members to the very good documentation provided by the FLEAT IV conference hosts at http://www.hll.kutc.kansai-u.ac.jp:8000/fleat4.html. I will try to give useful information in a direct manner; in doing so, I acknowledge that there will be generalizations made, by which I mean no offense or insensitivity. One cannot make "true" statements about all individuals in a culture or country, and even these general statements are my interpretation based on my experiences and study, and are additionally subject to the interpretation of the reader. Generalizations can be useful tools for understanding and adapting to another culture, so long as they are recognized as such. I believe that all such information is subjective by definition, however, I have striven to make this information as objective and devoid of judgement as possible. I have also aimed my comments to fit my interpretation of the "average"(obviously another faulty term) IALL attendee. Some information will be superfluous as many Japanese attendees of the conference, as well as many residents of Kobe are already well versed in their exposure to foreigners. Any references to the U.S. are not to imply that I don't acknowledge the existence of other countries, but rather that I am an American, and will therefore not presume to speak for countries/cultures that I don't know well. This is also written from the eyes of a foreigner who lived in Japan rather than a Japanese person's perspective (although I did have Japanese peers read it to make sure I didn't say anything too stupid). I have also taken the vulgar liberty of being very frank about such subjects as what Americans refer to as "Bathrooms" or "Restrooms." Once again, I believe that conveying this information takes priority over the risk of offending readers. I therefore apologize for any offense or distastefulness in the entire document. I also tried to make it a bit fun. Any faults in the content are purely my own. (Isn't it great to live in a legalistic society?) Lastly, I have tried to provide the kind of information that would have been helpful to me before my first trip. Alas, the books I read and the people I talked to could not prepare me for everything (what fun would that have been?), nor can I you.
Oh yeah!!! I seem to have forgotten
the far more important thing than being able to dry your hands!
One should bring tissues along to these public bathrooms as well!
So where and what kind? Well, you are welcome to carry a role
of TP with you if you want, but what most Japanese do is carry
a little packet of "facial tissues." You'll notice
that most of theirs weren't purchased through a store, but rather
were advertisements. These are often handed out on the streets
of large cities. But how do they decide to whom to hand these?
Many are for businesses like "phone clubs" where (let
me be blunt) dirty ol' men go to "rent" a telephone.
The tissue packets are handed out to women (usually younger and
not traveling as half of a couple), and have the telephone numbers
of these businesses. The women are paid for calling and talking
to the "renters." It has become common that the women
will make outside dates with these men to bilk them out of money,
etc. ("I just wanted to know where to get a packet of tissues,"
you're saying?) There are more advertisers than just this, but
you should be able to buy tissues in any convenience store rather
than trying your luck at getting free tissues...
Here's
a site http://www.asahi-net.or.jp/~AD8Y-HYS/movie.htm
that (un)covers the "usage," aspect in (I think I can
safely say) gruesome detail, and I will warn, contains links
that also go quite a bit beyond beyond...
If you are traveling in less cosmopolitan
areas, don't be shocked to see men heeding the first (I've never
seen the second being openly heeded) call of nature. How openly?
Say, by the side of the road, on the side of a building, and
so on. This is considered perhaps only slightly more "uncouth"
than spitting on the sidewalk. Okay, enough with the "colorful"
stuff and back on to the decent!
This, in my experience, was entirely different than the differences in buying power. In fact, I would describe that difference as potentially mind-numbing. This is how I think of the money*:
*This is not because I'm rich. You could, for example, easily drop ¥5,000 on lunch. If you are doing a mental conversion, it might well be shocking; if, on the other hand, you are thinking of it as $10, it's not so bad at all. This isn't to say that every lunch will cost you $50, but you should be prepared for some to cost that. It can be awkward to back out of a meal (or eat nothing while those around you eat plenty) because you refuse to spend that much on principle. The way I came to think of it (to console both my cheap and social sides) was that this is the cost of having this wonderful experience in Japan. Other experiences (going to the movies, for example) cost a lot as well; do I want to cheapen my experience here (and constantly be doing conversion math) by constantly fretting about money? Well, I can't always say that, but warm up your credit cards...
That said, the people you will be dining with aren't made of money either -- this is a special occasion for them too. Perhaps plan to have some more expensive meals and then have fun looking for some of the less expensive meals -- Kobe has very good takoyaki (doughballs with octopus inside -- for example).
Budget:
As was pointed out to me via a nice e-mail message, I still haven't
given budget information. So how much shoud you plan on bringing
with you? Here is an excerpt from my response with some additions:
Your question is a somewhat difficult one. My wife, who is Japanese, can't
really give a reasonable estimate, because she is unfortunately very
literate in Japanese; she can inquire about, find, and understand how/what
to order in order to stay on a strict budget. This is where my experience
as a (former?) complete illiterate comes in handy...First of all, try to hook up with someone who knows their way in Japan (and
of course, it doesn't have to be the same person for each meal!). That
person can help you find reasonable meals for around 1000 yen ($10) for
lunch and 2000 ($20) for dinner. These are quite modest (in terms of "haut
cuisine"), but quite adequate. The hotels listed on the FLEAT page do
include breakfast, so that leaves us at about $30/day. Transportation
(primarily between your hotel and the conference center) will probably be
around 1000 yen/day ($10), which brings us to about $40/day.This is a very modest budget, and will probably require some work to
maintain, as you will have to find places that serve less expensive meals
and figure out how to order there... as opposed to going into the first
restaurant you find; again, natives will be happy to help, as should
foreigners who have lived there (as they have no doubt been through this
themselves...)Some key (cheap) "food groups" to look for:
- Ramen (Noodle soup -- MUCH better and more substantial than what is sold at
grocery stores here...)- Soba (another kind of noodles, usually (mercifully) served cold in the
summer)- Takoyaki (octopus in batter balls -- a Kobe specialty and very good!)
- Okonomiyaki (lamely called "Japanese Pizza" -- cabbage, sprouts and other
supplimental veggies fried in a egg/flour batter with a kind of BBQ sauce
on top -- very delicious, and another Kobe specialty)- Another decidedly less romantic but nonetheless cheap and surprisingly good
resource is just about any convenience store (7-Eleven, Lawson, Circle K,
Family Mart, etc.), which have "bento", or lunchboxes (which you can of
course eat at any time). The larger train stations also often have bento,
which are probably a step up from the convenience stores'.If you can bring more money rather than less, you'll hate-but-thank yourself afterwards!
http://www.metropla.net/as/kobe.htm is a map of Kobe subways. You should be able to
get them when you arrive, but this is in the meanwhile...
http://www.jnto.go.jp/db/traffic/
A quite extensive site with lots of train information. If
you are the type of person who likes to read details of this
sort of thing, this page is for you.
So your flight arrives, and you rush to get off the airplane. You see the Japanese passengers breezing through immigration and think, "This isn't so bad." But in fact, that's not your line. Look for the slower non-resident line.
After you've made it through, you pick up your luggage and head for customs, and upon exiting customs, you might consider the following:
Kobe is a very "international-friendly" city; most important signs will be in roman characters and/or English, and probably other languages as well. English is compulsory in Japanese schools in junior and senior high school, and though this far from guarantees fluency, many people will happily make the attempt to meet you halfway.
All of Japanese is made up of syllables rather than an alphabet of consonants and vowels -- once you learn the system of syllables, you should be (reasonably) able to pronounce just about any word in Japanese. The syllables are made up of the 5 individual vowel sounds or a consonant plus one of the 5 vowel sounds. There is one terminal consonant, "n" as well as contractions. These syllables are usually taught in a grid chart, shown below.
| a | i | u | e | o |
| ka | ki | ku | ke | ko |
| sa | shi | su | se | so |
| ta | chi | tsu | te | to |
| na | ni | nu | ne | no |
| ha | hi | fu | he | ho |
| ma | mi | mu | me | mo |
| ya | yu | yo | ||
| ra | ri | ru | re | ro |
| wa | wo | |||
| n | ||||
| ga | gi | gu | ge | go |
| za | ji | zu | ze | zo |
| da | ji | zu | de | do |
| ba | bi | bu | be | bo |
| pa | pi | pu | pe | po |
| kya | kyu | kyo | ||
| sha | shu | sho | ||
| cha | chu | cho | ||
| nya | nyu | nyo | ||
| hya | hyu | hyo | ||
| mya | myu | myo | ||
| rya | ryu | ryo | ||
| gya | gyu | gyo | ||
| ja | ju | jo | ||
| bya | byu | byo | ||
| pya | pyu | pyo |
Vowel pronunciation
"a" is like the "o" in "hot"
"e" is like the "a" in "say"
"i" is like the "ea" in "seat"
"o" is like the "oa" in "toad"
"u" is like the "oo" in "food"
For an online audio guide to pronunciation, please see
http://www.japanese-online.com/language/katakana.htm
or
http://www.umich.edu/~yomoto/Katakanapro/index.html
Now you can muster that:
shin is pronounced as the English word "sheen," not like the painful-when-wacked bone between your knee and ankle, and ichi man is 10,000, not a guy with poison ivy. So from here on in, no more "carry-oakie" or "sah-kay"! (Karaoke and sake)
kudasai -- please (in the context of someone doing something for you)
arigato -- thank you
domo arigato gozaimasu -- thank you very much
sumimasen -- excuse me, thank you (for going to the trouble), I'm sorry.
hai -- yes
ie -- no
ohayo gozaimasu -- Good morning
konnichiwa -- Good afternoon/day
konbanwa -- Good evening
oyasumi nasai -- Good night
hajimemashite -- pleased to meet you
sayonara -- goodbye
Many restaurants will have models of the food that they serve; you'll only have to point at it and say, "kore o kudasai" ("This, please").
"Itadakimasu" -- what is said before eating. Often translated (butchered, really) as, "Let's eat!," this is really a phrase that acknowledges the many factors and efforts that brought the food to the table, from the elements like the sun, rain, and soil, to the farmers, merchants, cooks and servers. "Let's eat" indeed!
taberu -- eat
nomu -- drink
sushi -- rice with vinegar, actually; most commonly thought of as molded rice with a slab of (usually) raw fish on top
sashimi -- thin slices of raw fish
soba -- buckwheat noodles
ramen -- you know, ramen noodles!
somen -- thin white noodles
ocha -- tea; cocha is English style tea, Nihoncha is Japanese style tea
kohi -- coffee; since it will be hot, ice coffee will be being served often as well, usually with syrup (not maple) for sweetening (this is a much better solution than granulated sugar in cold drinks...). Also, you'll notice canned coffee in vending machines everywhere...
yooshoku -- western-style food
washoku -- Japanese-style food
migi -- right
hidari -- left
masugu -- straight
tomatte kudasai -- please stop
kore -- this
sore -- that
are -- that way (over there)
koko -- here
soko -- there
asoko -- way over there
Smithsan -- Mister/Ms. Smith. San is usually translated as "Mister," which leaves out some interesting information: san is also used for women, and like mister does not signify marital status. While formal, san is also relatively informal. Co-workers, where we would use given names, will use san; in this usage, it is not more formal, it's just the norm. Also, when referring to oneself, one does NOT use san. It conveys the feeling of being self-important. By the way, the name order in Japan is family name first, given name last.
kanji -- Chinese-origin characters
kana (hirigana/katakana) -- phonetic syllabary characters. Hirigana is used for many words, with kanji for verb endings, particles, and so on. Katakana is associated with "borrowed" words ("konpyutaa" or computer), and foreigner's names, but is also used for signs and so on.
gaijin -- foreigner; this a common term, and though a bit unrefined, should not be taken as offensive, though it is not as "PC" as
gaikokujin -- foreign country person
nihon/nippon -- Japan
nihonjin -- Japanese person
Interested in more? There is a very practical guide to Japanese called, appropriately enough, The Quick and Dirty Guide to Japanese http://users.ccnet.com/~jvasquez/quick-dirty.japanese.html If you want more than this, I'd start looking at full-fledged textbooks!
Electricity in Japan is 100 Volts AC, 50 Hz. Most notebook computer power adapters are designed to operate at this current, but you should double-check. Peripherals likely will not work at these settings (well, they *might* work - kind of - but they may never work the same afterwards...), including wall-wart-style transformers; you can buy international versions of wall-warts for many portable peripherals, such as zip drives.
Outlets in Japan are just like the U.S. with the following exceptions: 1) they only have two blade holes -- they are lacking the third-prong ground hole, so you may need a ground-lifting adapter, commonly sold in hardware stores and places that sell electrical supplies; and 2) they aren't polarized -- so overtly polarized plugs may not fit in every outlet. This also can be remedied with a ground-lifting adapter -- just file down the nubs that stick up on the plug.
What about travel transformers? Certainly an option, but bare in mind that it's a lot of weight to haul around with you, and a bit difficult to track down. Remember that the travel adapter sets that are sold are almost always just the plug adapters, NOT transformers -- so they won't protect your electricals from inappropriate current.
In homes and hotel rooms, phones and phone plugs (RJ-11) work the same way in Japan as the U.S.; I've never heard of a U.S. modem not working in Japan, though I suppose it's possible (let's face it, it's possible here in the U.S.!). Pay phones in business areas often have RJ-11 jacks for both analog and digital connetions.
Telephone cards -- the preferred way to pay for phone calls from a pay phone. First of all, you need to purchase a phone card, which come out of vending machines in some booths, and are commonly sold in convenience stores in denominations such as 5,000 Yen and 10,000 Yen. Then go to a (usually) green payphone (if you want to make an international call, it should have a gold faceplate), and stick the phone card in the slot. A digital readout will tell you how many units you have left. If it gets down to one or two, it will start to beep, and you should have your next card ready to avoid being cut off.
Cell phones -- Don't bother bringing one, even though you may feel like the odd-person out (the number of cell phones sold in Japan is greater than the total population!) The Japanese cell phone system is different than the U.S. and Europe, so if you need a cell phone in Japan, rent one.
Are you going to be an e-mail junkie? With your own notebook, you'll probably be able to connect to the phone in your hotel room. Check with your school to see what arrangements need to be made to connect abroad: your school may subscribe to an international Internet Service Provider, and may make that service available to you.
For the uninitiated: Good ol' telnet: This is probably the easiest way to connect to your own school's e-mail server (if it's a UNIX server running PINE). All you need is access to a computer with an internet connection and a telnet client. Simply type your school's telnet address into the <host> field, and login just as if you were at home! A potential drawback is that telnet clients don't necessarily encrypt passwords or the body text.
I haven't looked at guidebooks to Japan in a long time, and so would simply suggest that you find one that has the kind of information that you wonder about. As far as books/movies that give a reasonable picture of what Japan is like, I can recommend the following (unfortunately, Tokyo Style and From Bonsai to Levis appear to be out of print, so perhaps there is a copy at your library...):
I've left "reasonable" and merely "good" sources out of this list. It is short and with (in my opinion) superlative items only, with a mind towards actually being able to finish them by the time the conference roles around.
Womens'
Items:Another conspicuously missing topic pointed out to me by colleagues!
A good place to start is the Japan National Tourist Organization
(JNTO): http://www.jnto.go.jp/
These are suggestions based on what is close to Kobe, and therefore more economical/feasible. But please don't think that you'll be missing out on Japan if you don't see these sights. The everyday aspects of Japan aren't romanticized like the "classics" below, but I think they are just as interesting. If you don't have much time outside of the conference, take a walk through Kobe, into the little neighborhoods. I guarantee you'll enjoy yourself. Remember that this city was devastated just a few short years ago, but you'd be hard pressed to identify any remaining sign of it (there are still displaced people, but you'd have to know where and what to look for...) Spend an evening out with people, experiencing the food (invariably what Japanese outside of Japan seem to miss the most!)
http://www.direct.to/tokyo/
QTVR of all over Tokyo
http://202.23.150.181/users/kkitao/pictures/ikaruga/horyuji/
Horyuji ? the oldest wooden building in the world, and my favorite
temple complex
http://www.dancy.com/vr/ QTVR
views of day-to-day Tokyo
http://www.metropla.net/as/kobe.htm A map of the Kobe subway lines
http://www.asahi-net.or.jp/~AD8Y-HYS/movie.htm How to use a Japanese style toilet!
http://www.asahi-net.or.jp/~AD8Y-HYS/index_e.htm Pictures of Japanese style toilets along with a map/rating of Tokyo subway station bathrooms
http://www.tokyometro.go.jp/metnet/3600e.html If you'll be spending any time in Tokyo, this is a nice set of maps ? of course you'll want to pick up your own to carry with you, but in the meanwhile, this will whet your appetite for going
http://www.jnto.go.jp/db/traffic/ A quite extensive site with lots of train information. If you are the type of person who likes to read details of this sort of thing, this page is for you.
In case you needed a non-linguistic nudge to help you decide to go...
Last updated March 13, 2000