Nothing But Words

View at Picasa The ceremony06-Aug-2011 17:30, Canon Canon PowerShot SD780 IS, 3.2, 5.9mm, 0.002 sec, ISO 80

We just got back from my younger sister’s Nicole wedding. She and Keith were married on 1st Beach in Newport. The ceremony and the reception were great. The party is still going on, but we needed to get the boys to bed. My nephew Robbie almost stole the show in the ceremony as the ringbearer, coming down the aisle on his skateboard to deliver the rings. The wedding party arrived on a school bus since Nicole is a teacher (and they needed a bus since they had a a flotilla of 10 bridesmaids and 10 groomsmen). After the ceremony they had their photos taken on a firetruck since he’s a fireman.

The only person obsessed with the “Toppa” name more than me is Nicole (I have toppa.com, but she has the TOPPA license plate). She’s giving up her name for him, so she must be in love. Congratulations Keith and Nicole!

Maria, before the ceremony View at Picasa Maria, before the ceremony06-Aug-2011 17:00, Canon Canon PowerShot SD780 IS, 3.2, 5.9mm, 0.002 sec, ISO 125	The ceremony View at Picasa The ceremony06-Aug-2011 17:21, Canon Canon PowerShot SD780 IS, 4.0, 8.736mm, 0.002 sec, ISO 80	My nieces Taylor and Haley – 2 of a flotilla of 10 bridesmaids View at Picasa My nieces Taylor and Haley – 2 of a flotilla of 10 bridesmaids06-Aug-2011 17:24, Canon Canon PowerShot SD780 IS, 5.0, 14.777mm, 0.005 sec, ISO 125
Matthew, Kai, and Eidan View at Picasa Matthew, Kai, and Eidan06-Aug-2011 17:42, Canon Canon PowerShot SD780 IS, 3.2, 5.9mm, 0.003 sec, ISO 125	The boys with me and my dad View at Picasa The boys with me and my dad06-Aug-2011 18:08, Canon Canon PowerShot SD780 IS, 4.0, 8.736mm, 0.004 sec, ISO 100	My sister E’loise and Maria View at Picasa My sister E'loise and Maria06-Aug-2011 20:30, Canon Canon PowerShot SD780 IS, 3.2, 5.9mm, 0.017 sec, ISO 640

The first Japanese proverb I posted was from a book published 56 years ago. Today’s is from a more recent book, 101 Japanese Idioms, published in 1993. So if you make this very insulting comment about someone, it’s probably less likely to sound quaint:

Sashimi no tsuma
Garnish for raw fish

However attractive, the garnish that accompanies a serving of sashimi is of no significance. Some people may not even notice its presence. Such is the degree of dismissal sashimi no tsuma carries when used in discounting the importance of a person’s attendance at a meeting or gathering.

A note on pronunciation: when I tell people unfamiliar with Japanese about my experiences learning it so far, they are always surprised when I tell them it has very few sounds that don’t exist in English. A native English speaker won’t have much trouble pronouncing most Japanese words reasonably well (after you get used to all the vowels being monophthongs). One of few divergent syllables is the “tsu” (つ) in tsuma. Americans will recognize it from tsunami, but we tend to drop the “t” sound at the beginning. You can make the correct sound by trying to make an “s” and a “t” sound at the same time. What works for me is trying to make a “su” sound, while holding the front of my tongue at the front of the roof of my mouth. And like anything else, if you practice enough, it comes to feel natural.

2011 – NewportJul 1, 2011Photos: 27

2011 – HonoluluMar 30, 2011Photos: 28

The boys and I came back from a trip to Newport on Thursday, and Maria came back from Tokyo on Friday. She got stuck in Detroit for 6 hours, and had been awake and traveling for over 30 hours by the time she got home. It was a short (and successful) research trip for her. She spent most of her time there in one appointment after another. Before going, she had identified some problems in the data about Japan in the data sets compiled by AidData, so part of her trip was to determine what had happened with the Japanese government’s coding of the data. She was also there to further her general research on Japanese development aid, which has become an important part of her work in recent years.

View at Picasa My sister E'loise modeling in the Doris Duke charity fashion show http://www.golocalprov.com/beauty/8608/

The boys had a good time visiting their cousins in Newport. We’ll go back again in August for my sister Nicole’s wedding. This is a photo of E’loise (one my other sisters), who was in the Doris Duke charity clothing auction.

If you follow me on Twitter you’ll know we took a trip to Honolulu back in early April, but I haven’t had a chance to mention it on my blog. Maria went for the ICAS AAS conference. Her ticket was paid for, and we had enough frequent flyer miles to cover two more, so we only had to pay for one ticket. The past year has been crazy for me with work, so I really enjoyed this trip.

Maria spent the first few days at the conference, and the boys and I explored the Waikiki area on foot. For our last few days, we rented a car and visited Diamond Head, Pearl Harbor, Hanauma Bay, the Foster Botanical Garden, the Polynesian Cultural Center, and a few other places. We had visited most of these places before on our last trip (the AAS conference regularly returns to Honolulu every 6 years), but the Polynesian Cultural Center was new for us. It was very well done, but a little too much like a Disney version of Polynesia. We chatted with some of the workers and performers, and they were all students at Brigham Young University Hawaii, which created the center. They work there to defray the cost of their education.

When it was time to fly back home, I really did not want to get on the plane. Part of me was thinking, hey, I’ve got credit cards, I can make this last for a while, but I reluctantly decided to not give in to the temptation.

Last week I tweeted this excellent Economist article about Japan’s recovery from the triple disasters of earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear accident. Especially worth highlighting is this infographic that illustrates the size of the Japanese economy:

View at Picasa Infographic from economist.com, illustrating the size of Japan's economy

Earlier this year Japan slipped to having the third largest economy in the world (it was displaced from the number two spot by China). Considering that the entire country is about the size of California (with almost 70% of the land covered in forest), has a population less than half that of the US, and has endured two “lost decades” in a row of sputtering economic growth, I have always been amazed at the resilience and size of Japan’s economy.

Tucked away in a corner of a bookshelf in Maria’s office at Villanova I found a small green book, about 4 inches by 8 inches, printed in 1955: “Japanese Proverbs – Tourist Library Vol. 20.” Reading through it has been a lot of fun. This is the first of at least a few blog entries where I’ll share some of my favorites. Be cautious if you’re thinking of using one though – the book is 56 years old, so it’s likely many of these are now quaint.

This first entry concerns a few proverbs related to tatami, gossip, and differing perspectives on the best age for wives.

Atarashii tatami demo tatakeba gomi ga deru
Even new tatami, when thoroughly beaten, will give out dust

If you pry into the private affairs of other people, you are likely to find that they are not free from shortcomings. The floors of most rooms of a Japanese house are covered with thick mats called tatami. Though shoes are not worn inside a Japanese house, the tatami easily gather dust, as may be expected. Since a vacuum cleaner is of little use for tatami, it is the custom with the Japanese to take them outside, at the time of spring cleaning, and dust them by beating them with a stick. Hence, this proverb. Another tatami proverb goes, “Nyobo to tatami wa atarashii hodo yoi” which means “Wives and tatami are better when new and fresh.” (Cf. New brooms sweep clean.) The grossness of this insult to one’s better half is tempered with the reasonableness of another humorous proverb, Nyobo to nabe-kama wa furui hodo yoi (Both wife and pot get better with age).

Maria is reading Tokyo from Edo to Showa 1867-1989: The Emergence of the World’s Greatest City and there’s a wonderful passage about the popularity of operetta and revue in Asakusa in the 1910s. This gave rise to warring gangs of peragoro – which means “opera thugs” – two words I never would have imagined being used together:

Asakusa opera was astonishingly popular, especially among the young… Pretty legs were kicking in every direction… The fanatical devotees known as peragoro were young and often penniless… Everyone agrees that the first two syllables are the last two of “opera”… [most believe the last two] are from gorotsuki, an old word for “thug” or “vagrant”… The peragoro were the disorderly elements that hung around the park. They went to the theaters night after night, provided unpaid claques for favorite singers, and formed gangs, whose rivalries were not limited to vehement support for singers. There were violent incidents… Peragoro gangs would gather in the park, each having plighted its allegiance to a popular singer, one gang under the statue of Danjuro, another under the wisteria bower by the lake. Two marches upon the theaters would occur each night, one for the more affluent at opening time, one for the more straitened when the signals sounded that half-fare had come… Their lady friends, often from the dubious little houses below the Twelve Storys, were sometimes called peragorina.

James and Kai View at Picasa James and Kai25-Dec-2010 16:52, Canon Canon PowerShot SD780 IS, 3.2, 5.9mm, 0.002 sec, ISO 125

Yesterday was a full day of skiing and skateboarding. It was the first time I’ve skied since I was here 5 years ago, and it was the best conditions I’ve ever experienced – plenty of snow, but warm, sunny, and no wind. It was a lot more fun than the snowstorm and frigid temperatures back at home in Philly! We went to Keystone – Yoko and I skied while Maria took the boys for inner tube rides. Kai was ready for more after we got back, so James took him to the Denver skate park so he could start learning to ride his new skateboard. Today we drove to Colorado Springs to visit a friend of Maria’s, and then to Manitou Springs to see the Anasazi Cliff Dwellings. It was ok but I wouldn’t recommend it. It was overpriced and commercialized – the gift shop was about 4 times bigger than the museum.

View at Picasa Kai and Maria singing karaoke25-Dec-2010 21:07, Canon Canon PowerShot SD780 IS, 3.5, 7.173mm, 0.067 sec, ISO 500	View at Picasa Kai on an inner tube at Keystone26-Dec-2010 14:32, Canon Canon PowerShot SD780 IS, 9.0, 5.9mm, 0.003 sec, ISO 80	View at Picasa Eidan on the inner tube ride at Keystone26-Dec-2010 14:43, Canon Canon PowerShot SD780 IS, 9.0, 5.9mm, 0.003 sec, ISO 250
View at Picasa Eidan trying to figure out the inner tube26-Dec-2010 14:42, Canon Canon PowerShot SD780 IS, 9.0, 5.9mm, 0.003 sec, ISO 125	View at Picasa View from the Keystone chair lift26-Dec-2010 11:56, SONY DSC-S750, 5.6, 5.8mm, 0.001 sec, ISO 100	View at Picasa Mike on one of the peaks at Keystone26-Dec-2010 12:13, SONY DSC-S750, 7.0, 10.44mm, 0.001 sec, ISO 125
View at Picasa Kai at Eidan at the Keystone snow castle26-Dec-2010 12:41, SONY DSC-S750, 6.0, 8.12mm, 0.002 sec, ISO 100	View at Picasa Kai at the Denver skate park, learning to ride26-Dec-2010 16:14, SAMSUNG SGH-T959, 2.6386719, 3.79mm, 0.008 sec, ISO 50	View at Picasa The Manitou Cliff Dwellings27-Dec-2010 17:01, Canon Canon PowerShot SD780 IS, 3.2, 5.9mm, 0.001 sec, ISO 100
View at Picasa The Manitou Cliff Dwellings27-Dec-2010 16:59, Canon Canon PowerShot SD780 IS, 9.0, 5.9mm, 0.003 sec, ISO 80	View at Picasa View from inside the Manitou Cliff Dwellings27-Dec-2010 16:58, Canon Canon PowerShot SD780 IS, 3.2, 5.9mm, 0.003 sec, ISO 100

We arrived in Denver Tuesday night, to spend Christmas with Maria’s mother (Michiko) and sister (Yoko). So far we’re mostly hanging out, which is actually perfect. We had a nice dinner last night at Marco’s Pizzeria (they cook the pizza at 1000 degrees, so you get it just a few minutes after ordering). Today Maria had a brief visit with her friend Andrea, the boys spent some time at the Denver Aquarium (which has 4 tigers in addition to the fish, which is odd), and tonight we’re indulging the boys with a trip to Dave and Busters. We’ll spend Christmas Eve and Christmas Day with friends of Yoko and James (her husband). After that we’re planning to get in a day of skiing before coming back to Philly. I haven’t been skiing since we were here 5 years ago, so I’m looking forward to it.

View at Picasa Kai outside of REI in Denver22-Dec-2010 14:02, SONY DSC-S750, 5.6, 5.8mm, 0.002 sec, ISO 100	View at Picasa Eidan, Kai, and Maria outside of REI in Denver22-Dec-2010 14:08, SONY DSC-S750, 4.2, 12.76mm, 0.002 sec, ISO 125
View at Picasa Michael, Eidan, Kai, and James22-Dec-2010 19:31, SONY DSC-S750, 3.3, 9.28mm, 0.025 sec, ISO 320	View at Picasa Michiko with the boys at the Denver aquarium23-Dec-2010 15:22, SONY DSC-S750, 2.9, 6.96mm, 0.004 sec, ISO 100