Kanji: logic and magic

     I have already mentioned Japanese Kanji in some previous posts. Once again, kanji are charachters used in Japanese language, they were borrowed from Chinese. 

      As once a week I have a Kanji class, all the time I discover something new. Until this moment I was always attempting to find logic that would help me memorize characters better. Sometimes it works, but often doesn't. For example this kanji means "alcohol"

this means a "person"

this means "fire"

 this means "oil"

 this means "sea"

  Graphics of those kanji relate to the meaning behind them. 

     However more complex kanji comprising of other smaller kanji exists, making it more difficult to memorize. For example this kanji  means "week": 

     The last category that I have uncovered is kanji that to me make no sense at all (to this moment). For example this one means "big" 

and this one means "dog"

 Is there a logical connection? The connection I am looking for is not there. However logic is still there: dog is a relatively new word in Japanese and when creating a character for dog they had to readjust some other character. This is how our kanji teacher explained relation of those two. But everything has a meaning and its purpose, we just need to search better to find it! 

THE FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL

TRAINING ROOM

     Beautiful sunny day in Tokyo. Today I woke up early as we were to meet Philipp to go to the training room together. Training room is a place on campus with different machines and weights, it is cheaper than a gym (300 yen per entry). 

     I had to wake up my buddy next door (Ondrej-san), otherwise he would sleep in our training. We left the dorm at 9:15 and at 9:30 were at the meeting point. Philipp didn't turn up for a while. But neither one of us yet had a phone and we didn't know where the training room was... So we had to return to the dorm and then go back out. 

     As it turned out, there is no way to get to the campus from the side of the street that we live in, you have to make a loop and go through the main entrance. This didn't stop us from climbing the fence and making our shortcut. 

Training room (in Japanese "tureiningu rumu") was found on the first floor of student union building. From the inside the building was full with posters. People were playing musical instruments in the hall and everything looked really fun. In a while we found the magic training room. We entered to ask some questions. The lady there spoke really good English and explained to us the conditions. However she said the training room will open in 7 minutes and we had to wait outside... That is exactly what happened! In 7 minutes she took of the sign "closed" and invited us to go in. We paid our 300 jpy entry fee and enjoyed a great workout. By the way, most of the visitors of the training room that morning were foreigners. 

SUPERMARKET OPENING

     Under Motosumiyoshi dorm building on the first floor there is a supermarket. To be more precise, there in from today a supermarket: it just opened. The opening day was something special. Many Japanese people gathered in front of the store, most of them dressed up in suited. Lots of habitants of local neighborhood came with their bikes for the store opening. Apparently, this occasion is promoted very well in Japan and many people gather to get the good discounts on the opening day. 

WELCOME CEREMONY

     1st of April for us is fool's day, in Japan it is the first day of University in spring-summer semester. Today many Japanese students gathered for the welcome ceremony. Some of them came with parents. 

     Interestingly, all male students wear suits with ties. 99% of the suits are black. I can hardly remember anyone wearing jeans or something else than a suit. This is definitely different from the countries I have lived in. Going through a crowd of Japanese students in black suites was quite funny, reminded me Matrix somehow. =)

JAPANESE CLASS

     There are plenty of Japanese classes available for exchange students. There are 2 groups of exchange students in Keio: Japanese Language Students and pert-time exchange students. The first group studies mostly  Japanese Japanese-related subjects, while other group studies subjects in English but is allowed to participate in up to 2 Japanese language courses.

     The timetables of available Japanese classless really bad... Many classes overlap with our regular CEMS classes, those which don't overlap, are simply held in another campus far away. 

     After deciding for a long time, I wanted to try Basic Japanese Conversation class. It seems, that my level is something in between 1 and 2: 1 seems too easy while 2 seems to hard... 

     We went to the class together with other CEMS students. The teacher (sensej) is a very nice lady with great sense of humor. The class was full of international people that never studied Japanese before (most of them) and many of the things seemed new to them. We discussed things like "my name is, I am from etc." It was pretty nice, but pretty basic... Now I am doubting event more, which class to choose. 

GREETINGS

      During the class the teacher we have rehearsed traditional Japanese greetings. Interestingly, for close friends and family there is a special word you use in the morning (short version of good morning), but during the day or afternoon you don't greet each other (family members and close friends). 

      This seemed quite strange to me, how can a husband in Europe come back from work and say nothing to his wife, and hear nothing back from her. Larry, our CEMS student from Taiwan and kanji-master, has explained, that in Taiwan it was the same. Once he said hello to his girlfriend and she got really upset, because she felt he had treated her as a stranger by greeting her. That's a WOW!

FEW RANDOM PICTURES

Office at metro station 

 Little screen showcasing a product

Keio University cookies set

RAMEN
Traditionally after school we headed to eat at some new place. Our master of Kanji has taken us to a very famous ramen place. As usually, at the entrance there is a machine which takes your cash and allows you to choose ramen and drinks you want.
The staff of the place was very hospitable in Japanese way, they even tried to speak English with us. We all ordered a bowl of ramen and rice as a side dish (for free). The plates were huge and full of food. Unintentionally I have ordered quite a spicy one so I had to swap with Larry, who felt it was absolutely normal.
If you would come to this restaurant for the first time, you would think that those Japanese people are crazy. When you enter they all start screaming at you (in reality they are just welcoming a guest). The same is when you leave, all the restaurant staff starts screaming "goodbye" which for a person from the outside would seem really strange. 

Photos by Larry Du

KANJI

     Today we had a talk wit our Kanji-master, Larry. He is from Taiwan and he started studying kanji from elementary school. Now he knows around 8000 symbols. This right away puts him on advanced level of understanding Japanese writing as Japanese kanji are completely the same as Chinese ones. 

     However knowing kanji doesn't allow Larry to read things in Japanese properly. However I heard it takes much shorter to learn Japanese for people with Chinese or Taiwanese origin as they don't need to learn kanji at all, only their pronunciation. 

     Another interesting fact I learned, is that learning Japanese is easier for Taiwanese that for mainland Chinese people, as there are many similar words used in Taiwan (similar to Japanese). 

Day 11: Shimoda Party

NIHONGO

     The morning I decided to start with Japanese language. I went downstairs hoping to see some Japanese people with whom I could practice some Nihongo (Japanese language). Luckily, Masa was there, and he was happy as usually to help me out. 

      I taught him Russian alphabet. Japanese language doesn't have as many sounds as Russian does. But Japanese people are really good in writing, as they have to memorize thousands of Kanji (signs). They actually have to memorize not only kanji itself, but also stroke order in kanji. For some European student I had writing Russian alphabet was not that easy, but Masa easily copied all the letters that I wrote. He was only writing it in a little strange way, but the letters looked perfect. 

     In our dorm many devices talk to residents. For example water heater tells you something, elevator tells you something. I couldn't understand what they say, thus I asked Masa to translate it for me. Turned out, that the elevator was saying something "Please be careful, doors are closing(opening). Thank you" and floor numbers. The water heater in the bathroom was telling me not to forget to plug the bath before I turn on the water so that I don't lose water. Really funny stuff. 

Shimoda party

    Shimoda students village was having a party for exchage students today. So we went there of course... Hehe. For 500 JPY (4 euro) you got a name tag, snacks and unlimited alcohol. Unlimited alcohol was quite a fun one: 5 liter plastic bottles of whiskey, some Japanese beer with fruit flavors and 3% alcohol, juices, tequila and vodka. Mostly international students were there, however few Japanese also joined. In a while some of the students-organizers from Japanese side were out sleeping on the chairs. 

      We went quite strong with many "bottom-ups". The party started at 7 and at 9:30 organizers started to kick us out. It took around half an hour but they managed it. It was really fun but short party with magic whiskey that hits straight to head.

KAROKE

        Some students headed to the center of Tokyo to a club. We decided to stay around Hiyoshi and a Japanese student purposed to take us to Karaoke. Japanese Karaoke!!! Yeahhhh

     The Karaoke place was open till 5 in the morning and we arrived there around 12. We were split into groups (6-7 people per group). We stayed in our awesome CEMS group. The deal was: 10 Euro per person for 2 hours unlimited singing and one non-alcoholic drink included. There were many songs in English. On top of English words you could see Katakana (Japanese characters used for words taken from English). The remote control for choosing songs was complex as it's menu was completely in Japanese (mostly in Kanji) and we didn't have our master of Kanji (Larry) with us... 

       Somehow we managed to figure it out and had lot's of fun, especially singing Gangnam Style and some other songs, we have never heard before. 

      When we were leaving, the place still seemed busy. Many rooms were still occupied by Japanese singers. Seemed like there was only one guy there working, doing all sorts of activities from bringing drinks to cash desk. 

RAMEN 

      Hiyoushi station is famous for its Ramen restaurants. Ramen is a soup with with noodles and often with meat or seafood. We were considering visiting Mc'Donalds, but our Japanese guide suggested to visit a ramen restaurant. 

      Imagine, 15 foreigners coming in a small ramen restaurant in the middle of the night (also drunk). To get ramen, you had to pay at a special machine at the entrance and then take a seat at a bar. The bar is built around the kitchen, so while sitting at the bar you can watch how everything is cooked. The workers seemed really friendly and happy to see us. For 600 JPY (5 Euro) we each received a huge plate of delicious Ramee soup and a bowl of rice to it. Few guys who didn't order anything also got some food for free. What a great place and great hospitality! The soup was really delicious and filling, exactly what we all needed after a drunken night. 

     I worked in a restaurant before in Russia and I know that employees and cooks are never happy, when a group of people comes in the middle of the night and orders something. I know that Japanese culture is absolutely different and based on mutual respect. Japanese workers of Ramen restaurant showed great hospitality, but I am still wondering, if it was on the outside only. What were they thinking? "Stupid foreigners came here, why!!!" or they didn't think this way... Hope that by the end of this Japanese journey I will be able to understand people here a lot better. 

DAY 5: First Sunday in Japan

     In Japanese sunday means a day of sun (like in English). This day of sun was actually the first day in Tokyo so far without sun is´itself. But the e´weather was still very warm and nice. 

     Today the first time I slept in and woke up at 7 and not at five, probably bacause lack of sleep last night. After taking a bowl of rice and a coffee, I woke Ondrej up and we decided to go for a run in an hour or so.

SUNDAY IN JAPAN

     This was our first day of sun in Japan. But there is a big difference with Vienna, where nothing is open on Sunday. A convenience store around the corner is 24-7, so the morning coffee for 150 yen ( 1,2 Euro) I bought there. 

      Kotani San and his family were up quite early and greeted us with sadomasochism's (good morning). Additionally, the people were still moving in to the dorm, even on Sunday. As I have noticed, parents were helping most of the students to move in. Few of them had some tables and chairs with them, so I guess the rooms of Japanese students will be even more equipped than mine. 

     Today we took another running route. To be more precise, I rook a running route and Ondrej a roller-blading route, as he is roller-blading while I am running. We went in the direction of Motosumiyoshi metro station. The area is very nice, people are nice and friendly. Some stare at us as if we were Gaijins (foreigners). LOL

     We found a great small stream with beautiful sakura on the  sides. It took us to a large sports ground with a couple football fields and baseball diamond. There very many Japanese there, many were practicing sports, while elderly people were looking at youngsters competing. THat is a great way to spend Sunday morning. Now I started thinking, that Japanese sports culture is stronger, than I thought. 

SHIMODA STUDENTS DORMITORY

     Before we went there, Ondrej and I decided to visit another dorm (Shimoda). It is an international students dorm mostly, thus the rules there are not as strict as in our dorm. We entered easily by accompanying a random guy that we met in front of the entrance. Than without knowing, in which rooms our friends were, we easily managed to find it, as each room had a name of the student in front of it. There are 4 floors in the building, each floor has a shared kitchen. We arrived at the place around 7 in the evening, but there was no one eating, quite a quiet place. 

      Borislav had a little bottle of rice wine and was kind enough to share it with us. Larry, our colleague from Taiwan, has mentioned that in rice wine you have to look at percentage on the label. This percentage indicates how much rice was washed of at the preparation process. The wines with percentage under 50 are of superior quality' have a different name and cost starting from 10000 JPY. We had a little bottle with 70%, quite a new taste for me. 

RUNNING SUSHI

     This evening we decided to attend a traditional Japanese running sushi restaurant. The place was quite small with a relatively strong fish smell. We all took a seat around a sushi bar. It was a time to do all preparations before the meal. First we had to take a box with powdered green tea and put two scoops in a cup, than added hot water to it. I should call the taste very specific. At the next step we added soya sauce mixed with wasabi to  special plate and opened hashi (chopsticks). Now we were finally set and ready. 

     The sushi were passing by. You would only have to grab a plate of sushi that you liked. Each plate had 2 sushi on it, however the golden plate had one piece of sushi (those were tuna sushi for example). After you are done the staff simply counts your plates and you pay 105 JPY per plate (a little less than 1 Euro). Great experience! I'll come again after I learn all the names of the fish and other ingredients they put on sushi :)

BIKING CULTURE

     Japanese have a very strong biking culture. Many people have bikes, however to see a nice mountain bike or professional bike is rare. Japanese people usually do not lock their bikes. Bikes for Japanese are used as a means of transportation from home to closest metro station or to a groceries store. The distances in Tokyo are really long, thus traveling by bike is not really possible. By the way, buying a car is only permitted if you have a confirmed spot on a parking lot. 

     So everyone has one of those classical bikes looking like this. (Photo). The interesting thing about this, as bicycles are really cheap here, many people leave them unattended, because utilizing them is expensive. So there are many bikes on the streets of Tokyo that belong to no one. Police goes around bikes' parking lots and marks the bikes that have to be removed by their owners (if they are left unattended for long time). If the bike that was marked remains there for a long time and will be removed. As I understand, the bikes can be resold or demolished after. There are few places when it is possible to buy a removed bike. From what I heard, it is possible to get a bike in a great condition for up to 6000 Yen, which is really cheap in Austrian standards, however very expensive by Holland's standards (at least that is what Borislav said). 

About this blog

I will write about things related to Japan and Tokyo in particular: stories from exchange semester in Tokyo at Keio university (CEMS program), about learning Japanese language and integrating with the culture and locals.