Waido Marathon

Two Sundays ago I completed my first footrace, the 21km component of Miyako's annual Waido Marathon. 'Waido' is a Miyako-dialect word that basically means 'ganbare,' or 'try hard/go for it', and that's what participants do for the most part.

Some work harder than others, though. The main event is a 100km loop around the coasts of Miyako and Ikema that takes the fastest runners about 7.5 hours. The next step down is a 50km marathon-plus that, interestingly enough, attracts few participants. The shortest available distance (and my trial run) was the 21km dash from Higashi Hennazaki (Eastern Cape) to the German culture village in Ueno. It is reasonably popular with us locals. There's something for everyone.

My training for the race was half-assed, and I credit this to a depressingly inert combination of ignorance and indolence. That is, the lead up to the race went just as I expected and not as I planned, if you catch my drift. The longest single run I achieved during training was a 10k, and that happened only once. I had a rough cough during the week of the race, but I decided to go for it-- not because I trained, but because I paid money and had received a shirt which would become embarrassingly inapplicable to me if I didn't complete the run.

And so I ran.

I learned a lot during the first 10km: how to run down hills without crying, that I should have started farther in the front of the starting pack, and that my Underarmour shirt was too fucking hot to be wearing that day. I took it off and tied it around my waist, leaving the outer shirt jauntily bunched up around my neck like a wreath. Got to have that airflow.

Kilometers 10 to 17 were pleasant, as far as these things go. I was zen-like as I breezed past the sugar cane on one side and the coast on the other.

The running reverie came to a crashing halt at kilometer 18 when my legs stiffened like curing cement. As a small guy, normal physical activity has never caused my knees to hurt, but this run caused some serious tension at the area immediately below them. I stretched a bit at the drink stations, downing sports drink and water and avoiding the bananas and brown sugar on offer.

Anyway, I eventually made to the end (no sprinting finish) and inhaled a pile of bananas, anpan, and water from the recovery area. My students from Ueno milled around in sporty blue jackets, handing out medals and refreshments to the runners as they finished.

Next up is the Irabu half marathon in February. I'm thinking about getting some Nike Free 5s (I have 7s right now) and developing a different stride. As it is, I run in a fairly conventional manner (landing on the heel after the stride), but lately I've been trying to avoid the heels and stay more bouncy like a barefoot runner. I'll give that style a go and put it to the test at the end of next month, sans Underarmour. Out.

Stuff

Howdy,

I've been here in Miyako for over a year now and the sheer amount of shit my students give each other still staggers me. Today one student approached the blackboard to throw a suction-cup ball at an English vocabulary word (it's part of a game) and the rest of the students in this 17-person class started screaming about how long this kid's legs are (he's comparatively tall).
Two things: (1) That this dude is tall is not new to the class. The composition of this group hasn't significantly changed in over 8 years of schooling. (2) The comments were actually neutral-sounding, but that's the way Japanese people tend to take the piss out of anyone who momentarily stands out. Again, it never fails to fascinate me.

In other news:

I typed up a review of Infinity Ward/Activision's November release, Modern Warfare 2, but it's on my other computer and I haven't posted it yet. In that review I don't go on about how awesome or crappy the game is-- instead I talk about a few of the changes IW made to the MW formula that make the new one more 'casual gamer'-oriented than the last. I'll finalize it and put it up this afternoon when I get back to the big machine.

However, I usually bring a laptop with me to schools (this is where I'm writing from right now). It's a Gateway MTxxxx purchased straight off the shelves of Office Depot in 2007 and is currently running Ubuntu Linux. I've been pretty happy with it as far as word processing and web browsing go. Video isn't really a problem, either, but it won't push anything that involves OpenGL or lightly intensive 3D graphics. Originally the machine had Vista, and it would run Aero without a hitch, but I've since moved Vista to the homebuilt machine and replaced it here with Ubuntu. Again, I use this only for wapuro and browsing, so Ubuntu is ideal. It boots up quickly, drivers haven't been a problem, and-- contrary to the daunting image of Linux-- I haven't had to use the command line terminal once since installation. I also like how each release is aesthetically better than the last. I think it's a pretty good deal.

Miyako Victory Lap

Guess who's back to terrorize the highways.

Final Answer?

Remember the manzai lunch?

Here the shougakkou 4th graders perform an impromptu game-show style quiz for everyone's post-lunch entertainment.

Sega Outrun: Miyako

Video game box art?

Sure, the island is small, but it looks like this. No complaints from this guy.

The beginning of April is a big time in for civil employees in Japan. We ALTs got a new supervisor at the board of education, the other office workers got shuffled around, and many teachers at all of the schools were switched around all over the place. And our board of education itself was relocated out of its convenient, reasonable placement at the center of the city to a distant building on the other side of the island. Makes for a nice motorcycle ride, though.

Anyway, the respective office ladies of a few of my schools changed. Introducing myself to one of them one day, I thought it interesting to compare my katakana name (ザック, ZAKKU) to the semi-onomatopoeic Japanese expression for crunchy food texture, さくさく (SAKUSAKU).

You don't need to tell me how ill advised that was. The comparison fails to make sense. I know; let's continue.

So I basically explained to the office lady that my name is funny because it resembles a snack food expression and that that expression translates to 'crispy' in English. Not amused yet? Yeah. I don't think she was either; she listened too intently, and without the mirth I had hoped for. She now calls me "Crispy" every time I see her. Fun story.

New Shirts

We continue down the slippery slope:

I recently bought a few T-shirts here in Miyako that feature some mean Engrish. Shirts that feature Engrish are a dime-a-dozen in Asia, but I think the ones I found stand out as being extremely poetic or extremely relevant. To me. Thus, the contents of these shirts:

(1) PAINT FAME

Can you hear - footsteps of the future.

Listen for paradise.

Sound evolves one step further.

Sound is life.

I hear nostalgic sounds.

Graphic T's in the States are simple affairs with a setup and a punchline. In Japan we wear cinquains.

(2) A NEW TYPE GOOD TASTE

Man, can't even argue with that one.

Finally, my favorite:

(3) LEARNING IS WORK

THERE ARE SOME THINGS WE MUST KNOW IS THERE ANYONE WHO DOESN'T KNOW THAT?

I WANT TO KNOW EVERYTHING

A shirt after my own heart, I suppose.

Summer may be Here.

Maehama beach. Preferred venue for v-ball.

The mystery beverage option on a vending machine. Yeah.

Doing work.

Announcing at Miyako Strongman Triathlon.

Ah...WORTHLESS

I guess this is what happens to most blogs. The writer starts out strong enough, but slowly and surely the time between each post lengthens until all activity has utterly fled the page.

I think this can be avoided. Here's my offer:

If you'll tolerate my posts not being in chronological order at all, then I'll do my best-- nay-- guarantee that this thing will go on until it is one year old.

Anyway

I usually teach junior high school, but recently I've been deployed to an elementary school. I go there once a week and, unlike junior high school where I work with JTEs, I pretty much run the show. I decide what the kids learn (things that amuse me) and how they learn it (rowdy games, no writing).

It's a fun time. It's also more work.

Anyway, I like my students, and most of them like me well enough, but the fourth grade class at this school is the "ZT IS RAD TO THE POWER OF SICK" club. They think I'm the shit-- fucking awesome-- the tightest MF-er on the planet-- the bee's knees.

I did something right with these kids when I first met them. I don't remember what that was, but I do know that it has led us to a point where they turn cartwheels when I show up.

Hey, who doesn't enjoy being liked?

I try to return the favor by being a good sport. I amuse them by making dumb faces my father taught me, doing the old broken arm illusion (I was going to embed a link to explain, but I can't find an example of it on the internet), and letting them leap on to my back from higher perches.

Ninja children.

Anyway, I got to eat lunch with my crew today. Little did I know that we were in for a manzai lunch.

Manzai, as I understand it, is a form of Japanese stand up comedy. It frequently appears on the TV variety shows. It usually consists of two comedians, one of whom is the 'straight man' while the other is the goofier one. Hilarity ensues as the straight man berates the goofy one and is ultimately embarassed or otherwise comically defeated by the latter.

The plan was to eat lunch and then send a few students to the front of the class to act like fools for everyone's dining enjoyment. But as soon as I finished my Harajuku Banana Chocolate Dog (it's like an eclair) I was yanked to the front and ordered to dance.

I was going to embark upon a lengthy socio-policial protest against being cast as a English-teaching gaijin clown, but my ears were greeted by the pleasant sounds of an Okinawan folk song (reworked for school children) pouring out of the intercom system.

I really wanted to dance.

I glanced at my backup dancers waiting behind me and, without warning, attempted everything that white men not named Justin Timberlake should never try.

Of course, the class loved it. But I could have done anything. I was glad I did something.

Anyway, it was a pretty rocking time even though the manzai turned out to be a 'Get ZT to Dance - Noontime Special.' Man, these kids are WIN. Hell, I just added yet another aspect to the ongoing 'ZT IS AWESOME TO FOURTH GRADERS BECAUSE...' list:

1. He is super-strong-- he can lift a 9 year old with each arm and retain mobility with four attached to his back.

2. He is a great musician because he can play the guitar and the benjo (toilet). What's a banjo?

3. He is the best soccer player in Miyako and fast as lightning because he raced Taiga and Taiga's the fastest boy in Miyako and he won when they raced even when they raced four times and Zakku-sensei was tired and we gave everyone a 30m head start but not Zakku-sensei.

4. His monkey and fish faces are hilarious, and the swinging arm trick is endlessly amusing.

5. We get to scream like chimpanzees during English class.

And now...

6. He can dance really well, like Justin Timberlake.

O-HISASHIBURI

I've been pretty lame at updating lately.  Here's what's news (new's):

We've been going at diving pretty hard recently, which is great.  So have the sea snakes.  two Sundays ago my buddy and I counted 12 snakes over the course of a short 30 minute dive.  As I read when I was researching them, these Colubrine sea kraits are indeed quite docile.  New Caledonian children play with them and they are unaggressive toward divers.  They are a curious sort that are fun to observe swimming around and surfacing for air.

And their venom is 15 times more potent than that of the king cobra.  Cheers.

The previous Friday I spotted a reef shark of some sort.  Couldn't tell what it was exactly.   Not too large, however-- perhaps only 1.5 m or so.  Didn't hang around.

I've taken up spearfishing as well.  Like most things new to me here on Miyako, I experience painful disappointment with this activity because of my inability to do things well.  But on this past outing I managed to jump a nice-sized parrotfish that was preoccupied with eating something on the reef.  I landed what appeared to be an ideal hit-- straight into the gill area-- and pinned the fish to the rocks.  It was a tough catch with a pole spear because of the depth of the water, and I was very pleased with myself.  As images of tempura danced through my head, the parrotfish thrashed about and managed to tear its own body apart off of the spear and dash into a hole.  I was pissed.  I think fishing is great, but, like most people, I don't particularly enjoy killing or causing animals grief unless I am going to eat them; I'm not there just to ruin some fish's day.  Damn.

On that same dive I reached a depth of 11.9 m.  That's a new high score. 

Miyako in NYTimes

The article is a year old, but it is cool to see it anyway.

Diluvian Tales: Snakes in Miyako

There aren't any. While other Ryukyu islands (Ishigaki, Iriomote, Okinawa, etc.) do have snakes, Miyako doesn't. Sources say that relative sea levels were higher in previous eras and much area of the islands was previously underwater. Miyako, being the geographical oddity that it is (it is extremely flat), was likely entirely submerged while the higher elevations of other islands remained above the water. Snakes (and presumably other animals) found refuge from the sea there, but no such purchase was to be found in Miyako.

However, we still have sea snakes. And they sure are curious about humans in the water.

EDIT: Apparently there are land snakes on the island. And a few sea snakes pursued us in the water today (13 MAR).

The other day,

someone asked me when I was going to leave this place.

Heh.

A Whale-like Voice

So, they (members of the local board of education, my employer) thought it would be super kokusaiteki, or an otherwise good idea, to have me play banjo (very exotic) during the intermission at this term's junior high school English storytelling contest. 

Here's the thing: they wanted a complete show featuring me, a set of songs, and singing.  

I'm a terrible singer.  My Most Excellent Friend Eli describes my voice as 'cetaceous.'  Yes, I pulled a fast one on someone in the JET Programme selection process: I don't have "excellent intonation, rhythm, pronunciation, and volume", or whatever is called for.  I sound like a whale, and though whales sing in their way, it is a style that is fairly inaccessible.  Like enka.*

Perhaps it is best described as not being entirely unlike the sound of a shitty practice amp whose bass knob is cranked up as the remaining tonal knobs are turned extremely off.  That is, it can sound loud and deep, yet it is  somehow inherently muffled.  It's been a blessing and a curse since my youth.  No, I take that back-- it's given me an unbelievable amount of shit.  Mostly in the form of my dad yelling at me for mumbling all the time.  And I can't sing.

So,

Clearly they had no idea what they were getting into.  Sure, sure, I can play a few crappy songs on my crappy banjo with my crappy technique, but asking this guy to sing is agressively reckless.  One could really sour the mood of the event by doing this sort of thing.  And it's a day for the children, you know.

Still I reluctantly accepted the task because, well, I had already done this sort of thing for one of my schools.  They had a schoolwide musical presentation in which I was called up to play "Country Roads."

Little did you know, all Japanese people are familiar with "Country Roads"; that is, KANTORII ROUDO(ZU).  It was a safe choice.

Anyway, I did it.  It was fine because the audience simply consisted of my students (who already know how cool I fail to be) and grandparents of said students.  I could have gone on stage and hula-hooped for 3 minutes and been met with applause.  It wasn't fine because someone surreptitiously shot a video and committed it to Digital Versatile Disc (DVD).  Not that anyone has or will ever watch it-- it's probably sitting in a cabinet at the school.  I'm still uneasy.

The board of education was aware of this whole affair.  I decided it would be socially costly, if not rude, to decline their request for me to play, regardless of how much of an ass I anticipated making of myself.

With the actual contest weeks away, I had ample time to practice up and prepare a set list.  So I waited until the day before the show to do all of that.

I decided to break out the guitar for one of the songs, Old Crow Medicine Show's "Big Time in the Jungle."  No demanding singing there, and I like the song.  On the banjo front, I readied "Rocky Top" (feebly reppin' for TN) and KANTORII ROUDO (why waste time learning a new song?). 

Despite the changes and my newfound, cleaving decisiveness about what to play, I became extremely nervous as the performance approached.  Really nervous.  I made it a point to express my unease to every person I encountered regardless of whether the conversational context suited it.  I felt like hadn't prepared well enough.  Which I hadn't.

When I finished teaching that day, I decided to do what little practice I could manage.  Half-panicking, I went outside and proceeded to go through the material.

It didn't take long for students to start gathering around me to listen.  They emerged gradually, two or so at a time.  This was fantastic because it helped me get used to the idea of performing in front of lots of people.  Eventually the resident third year (our 9th grade) rockabilly guitar dude came up.  I gave him the guitar and asked him whether he knew KANTORII ROUDO.

As if there were any question about the matter. 

We jammed on that shit for 10 minutes.  Everyone joined in and sang Engrish on the chorus, and I held the verses together while turning out some decent banjo rolls.

Rocking out with the students really turned my world around.  I felt all genki and like myself again.  This isn't meant to imply that I thought I could play the songs better-- it was just that I cared less about whether I sounded good and cared more about rocking.  So, lots of positive energy was received at that moment, and it got me psyched up for the performance.  As for the performance itself, I don't know how good it sounded, but at least I didn't forget any lyrics.  One of my teachers stepped up and played guitar on KANTORII ROUDO (because everyone knows...) as I did my thing.  I even did an extra song when the intermission ended up running longer than expected.  Anyway, I'm not sure that I could have done it without kicking it with the students first.  

Thanks.

* ZING, JAPAN!  Or not.

Potentially unsatisfying

But really I can only take one prune at a time, regardless of whether it is individually wrapped.

Onion-salt rice with pork and coconut chicken curry

This plus salads and drinks for less than 2000 yen.

Laid Back Cafe

Cafe near my place

I like the style ofthis place.

A principal gets the students jazzed up for an ekiden.