My 10 Yen on Japanese Culture Part ll

 Disclaimer: The viewpoint I am about to respond to is my mishmash interpretation of what I think is a common misconception of Japanese culture that is prevalent in NZ and other western countries. I am not claiming that any particular people hold all or any of these beliefs but various comments that people have made over the years lead to me to believe that these ideas are common enough for it to be worthwhile for me to attempt to refute them. Comments, agreeing or disagreeing, are welcome but not of a personal or insulting nature.

It seems to be that there is a common belief in NZ and other Western countries that the Japanese ideal woman is subservient to men. There is a kind of stereotyped idea that some westerners have that Japanese men want their women to be subordinate, meek and submissive. I was horrified on more than one occasion when westerners I met in Japan not only believed in that ideal of Japanese women but were specifically looking for that subservient ideal Japanese girlfriend for themselves. Some indicated that scoring with this Japanese ideal was their primary reason for coming to Japan (I'm hoping that this was at least in part male boasting at work and not genuinely their main reason for travelling to a country). I'll paraphrase the comments and try to get the gist across without the offensive swearing and sexist terminology, but essentially what they hoped to get from their Japanese woman was along these lines: she was beautiful, acquiesced to all their sexual demands (both in terms of the frequency of sex as well as performing certain acts) without expecting any sexual pleasure herself, and then did all the housework for them afterwards.

I was pretty disturbed by this attitude. Was it really a fantasy that existed in men at all? Western or Japanese? Would anyone really want this in this day and age? I was quite shocked. Even in my most cynical moments about the modern male, I had really only thought that some of them were maybe guilty of being unfaithful or shallow and wanting beauty before anything else. It hadn't really occurred to me that some men would actively seek a women without any sexual desires of her own or who would suppress them all meekly. Did they really just want a gorgeous woman who would lie back/bend over and think of the motherland? Was going off to do the dishes really the most desirable post-coital activity?

This was not long after we had arrived in Japan. I found it hard to reconcile this disturbing new insight into the psyche of some men with the fact that Matt and my male friends did not seem to fit the mould of disturbingly sexist-and-uncomfortable-with-their-own-masculinity-to-the-point-where-they-only-want-a-robotic-sex-and-domestic-slave-for-a-girlfriend. Without consciously realising it, I assumed that this ideal Japanese woman was something that Japanese men desired even though it was a British guy and an American that I had heard having the conversation. I guess subconsciously it was easier to project the views expressed onto Japanese men because of the cultural/language difference. I actually found it too scary to consider that apparently normal men that were friendly and polite, and were from cultural backgrounds similar to my own, would actually want this level of subservience from a partner. Besides - Salary-men on the trains had the appearance of dodginess. They were always reading pornographic manga and staring creepily at Japanese school girls adjusting their gigantic socks and short skirts. There are some aspects of Japanese mentality that seem odd when you are a foreigner, for example the panty fetish, so it becomes easy to assume that bad or strange stereotypes about Japanese men are accurate.

However, after I had been in Japan for several months, my opinions began to change. Firstly, the Japanese men I met were always polite and respectful. None of them had problems being taught by women and would happily defer to other female students in lessons. Many of Japanese women I met were well educated, confidently intellectual and whilst they were polite, they never struck me as meek or submissive.

After I had been working at Nova for a while I got transferred to a smaller branch for one day a week. At this branch, there were several women with very good English who came every week around lunchtime. This meant I got at least one lesson a week with them and got to know them very well. Their English was quite advanced and they really only needed to practice their conversation so teaching them was always fun. We had lots of interesting conversations about the differences and similarities between Western, specifically NZ, and Japanese cultures. They were an interesting mix of women.

One of them was a shufu (Japanese housewife), approximately aged around 50, who had a degree in Literature. She hadn't worked since she was married about 20-30 years ago but raised three children and had a broad range of hobbies. She spent most of her days rushing between tennis, English lessons, ikebana, golf and painting classes.

Another was an architect who had recently stopped working as she was pregnant with her first child. She was pretty stoic about the whole pregnancy thing. She came in every week right up to the birth, missed one week and then came back the next week.

The other was a recent university graduate. She held pretty strong feminist views and was forthright about her beliefs.

It is really these women I credit with destroying the stereotyped beliefs I had started to form. The first one was that Japanese women give up their careers when they are married. It seemed to me that many Japanese women were housewives. Of course as a group my students were a slightly disproportionate representation as people with time to take English lessons (during the week) are likely not be working full-time. I assumed that this meant that they were less empowered to work than western women and society forced them to be stay-at-home mothers.

However, I didn't really think about it until my students started questioning me about my marriage and continuing to work. I said that it was common for married women to keep working and many mothers continue to work.

They said that that was true in Japan too. Then they started to question me about if I would stop working when I had children, or did I want to have children and when.

I replied that I wasn't sure about it and I didn't know whether I thought it was better to keep working or be a stay at home mother for the first few years. They were really surprised that I didn't know. I think it seemed to show weakness or a lack of organisation on my part. To them it seemed almost humorous that a woman in her 20s would be married and not know when she wanted to start a family and when she wanted to return to work.

They continued to question me about why I didn't know and I replied that I thought it might be best for the children to have a parent around for the first few years.

They nodded but then Yuki asked me, "but what is best for you? That is most important."

The others agreed. Yes, you must know what is best for you and that is what you do.

This was quite a revelation for me. For them, the decision about working and not working, and motherhood weren't necessarily about what is best for your children or your career, but what is best for you. The woman and the mother. It seemed so much more empowered that such choices were made by and for the mother rather than other factors.

Since then I have spoken to other women in NZ on various occasions about the issue of when to have children and when to go back to work. The answers that frequently come up have to do with justifying it in terms of money, career or children's well-being, and seldom in terms of what is best for the mother as a person.

It was not only the fact that Japanese women made these choices for themselves but also their interpretation of what the role of the housewife is in Japan that destroyed the myth of the submissive Japanese women for me.

I think it is fair to say that in NZ and other western countries we hugely undervalue housework and domestic labour. It is made economically undesirable to be a housewife or househusband in NZ, whereas in Japan larger salaries, lower tax rates and further tax benefits for one-income families make having one partner at home a far more appealing option.

Traditionally in the west, the housewife is not a role that is given a great deal of respect or financial power within the relationship. In Japan the housewife controls the finances. The husband's salary goes into a bank account that she controls and then she gives him an allowance to buy his lunch, pay for his transport and maybe, if she is generous, enough for him to go out drinking with his colleagues. I often heard Japanese salary men joke that their sons were given more allowance from their wives than they were.

As one female student explained to me, "If my husband is boss at work or gets promotion, I'm happy for him. But I'm boss at home."

Apart from a couple of disgruntled salary-men who would like more money to buy drink with from their wives, they generally seem happy enough with this arrangement. The men just have to work - they don't worry about paying bills and maintenance stuff, they are happy to have their wives deal with those hassles.

They do not seem to find being given an allowance an affront to their masculinity as I suspect many western men would at being given pocket money.

I venture out into speculation here but I suspect it comes from the Japanese ideal of womanhood being the Mother.

Motherhood and idealised maternal qualities seemed to be commonly presented as attractive in Japanese media. It was pretty common in commercials in Japan to see a beautiful woman promoting various products as mothers, that is playing with or cuddling some small child. It was a stereotype known as, amongst several western colleagues of mine, the 'yummy mummy'. A woman enjoying motherhood and looking radiant and happy as she has fun with her kids. I think that this image is not-so-common in Western commercials. Sure sometimes they have the 'mother' character advertising the product but it is often undercut with a slightly negative context which makes motherhood seem less attractive option than the carefree, presumably single lifestyles of the super-models who surf and play tennis in the tampon, toothpaste and moisturiser ads. There is often a slightly negative undercurrent - "As a busy mother I need a washing powder that gets out my children's hard-to-clean stains" or "this cleanser-and-toner-in-one product allows me to look good in spite of my lifestyle."

The idealised, glamorised mother image could in some ways be interpreted as a subversive pressure on Japanese women to have kids or at least to behave maternally towards men. There appeared to be a tendency for Japanese women to be indulgent and nurturing towards men, almost as a form of flirting. I often observed even amongst children that the girls would kind of look after the boys - they adopted a half-bossy but half-praising/fawning attitude towards males that left me confused.

That's about 5 yen worth - there's still another 5 yen to come!

My 10 yen on Japanese culture and Anime - Part 1 Anime

 The fairly recent discussion on Talula's LiveJournal has made me ponder a few things about prejudice against Anime and also against the Japanese culture. I'm not claiming to be commenting on any particular person's viewpoint or opinion. I'm not stating that certain people are prejudiced in these matters but rather that some aspects of some of the comments reminded of some conversations or statements I have heard over the years on the subjects of Anime and Japanese culture. I feel I would like to respond to the general impression I have gathered that some, if not many, people hold some slightly prejudiced views on these topics.

Firstly, anime. I personally am no expert on the matter since I have really only started watching Anime for the last couple of years and I'm very aware that there is a wide range of Anime out there that I haven't seen and as such cannot make a comment on.

I think it is fair to say that a common perception of anime is that it is Hentai and/or strange and/or graphically violent or sexual. To a certain extent I held that belief several years ago. The only Anime I had seen parts of was Urotsukidoji - Legend of the Overfiend which is disturbing and Hentai in my opinion and despite the fact that I only saw about 5 minutes of it, it was enough to put me off watching any other anime for a while. Bad.

The next Anime I saw was Akira, which is considered by many to be an 'important' Anime. At the time I could appreciate the artwork and aspects of the story but I really just didn't get it. Large parts of the movie (especially the ending) eluded me and I left the film feeling a bit like I had just seen a cartoon made by Aliens who were trying to make a film for Earthlings, but it really defied Earth logic and conventions of storytelling. I re-watched Akira last year, and actually enjoyed it. It made sense to me. I'm not sure if it is because I had become more fluent in the language of anime and thus got more of the subtle nuances or because it had a better translation on the subtitles/dubbing.

When I was living in Brooklyn with Matt and his brother, we watched some Anime occasionally. The Ghost in the Shell was the first anime the really impressed me. It was visually stunning, intelligently crafted and had an excellent SF story that wasn't over-simplified or patronisingly explained. Since watching a lot more Anime I find I often prefer their approach to SF and fantasy stories. I think they are far more inclined to just tell and story and let the background and ideas unfold themselves in their own time. I sometimes find it a little annoying the way Hollywood SF and Fantasy movies can assume their viewers are too stupid to work things out for themselves. Many often hammer the background/main idea with cheesy plot exposition or, worse yet, having some characters have the "But why is this happening and what's going on?" conversation.*

My fandom of Anime was cemented when I saw Miyazaki's films such as Princess Mononoke, Spirited Away, The Cat Returns etc. They are all cute, charming, beautiful with magical/fantasy aspects but also the characters, stories and themes are complex. A lot of the stories or ideas are based in fairytale but they are layered with far more interesting characters than any Disney film and some, particularly Princess Mononoke, are thought-provoking.

Since then I have come to appreciate many different kinds of Anime. Anime can be any genre or fusion of genre, and the stories often appeal to all ages. The distinction between children's and adults' movies and shows is often unclear and frankly, doesn't matter. I would easily list various Anime amongst my favourite TV shows and movies.

Anime is hard to generalise about because the range of Anime out there is so broad. Some of it is slow, others are fast-paced. Some Anime is humourous and has you laughing until your sides hurt, some Anime is poignant, touching and can break your heart - more than one Anime has reduced me to a crying mess. Some of it is OTT fantasy or SF and some is cemented in reality and 'real issues'. Sure some Anime is graphically violent or Hentai but an awful lot of it isn't!!!

I don't necessarily like all Anime but that is kind of the point.

My main point is that people really shouldn't generalise about Anime because really it such a broad and diverse artform that any generalisations are bound to be incorrect for some Anime.

I understand that it's easy to gain a bad first impression of Anime - I know I did. I would encourage people to have an open-mind and give Anime a go. There is probably something out there you'd appreciate. If not, then try to be sensitive and not make hugely negative generalisations about Anime. Some Anime is very important to me and other fans; any book, film or work of art that has touched or moved us becomes special and holds a sacred place in our hearts. To insult Anime offends fans because some Anime has become very special to us.

Personally, Fruits Basket alone got me through some very stressful and nasty times in my first year of teaching.

I love my favourite Anime and beware any who slight it. You might as well say all novels written in the English language since 1960 are post-modern trash.

Disliking a particular book, or film, is a matter of personal opinion and taste; disliking an entire artform is unfair and bigoted and best done in the privacy of one's own home.

Tune in next Blog for: My 10 yen on Japanese Culture and Anime Part II

* Hollywood remakes of Japanese horror films are also guilty of this crime against intelligent audience members. Case in point: The Ring - Japanese version: the video is a creepy series of uncomfortable images. Some have physical links to Sadako's death, others are more to do with the emotional discomfort. The Ring - Hollywood version: The video had some disturbing images, and some others which were blindingly obvious 'clues'. The code of the clues are usually pretty simple so that even Bush-voters can work them out. For example, image of 'a ladder going up to a loft in a barn' is important because Samara's room was 'a barn loft with a ladder going up to it'. To further clarify when the heroine arrives at the aforementioned barn, there is a flashback to the shot of the 'ladder going up to the loft' and then she turns around to see the 'ladder going up to the loft'. Amazingly enough she works out to climb up the ladder and seize the next cryptic clue.

Got the end of year 'sleepies'

 It is getting really close to the end of year so I should be feeling pretty excited and full of pre-Xmas holiday perkiness. However, I seem to be in a constant state of unmotivated tiredness. I now think that exhaustion is an over-simplified state of being. Sure, many of us often complain about being tired or stressed but we are seldom encouraged to explore the nuances and subtle differences in types of 'tiredness'. With so much tiredness going on at this time of year, let us all take some time to reflect on the variety and range of the 'sleepies'.

Readers: feel free to add to the list or comment on your favourite kind of exhaustion and recommended cures.

1. The post-exercise exhaustion - one of the more pleasant types of sleepies. You have just exerted your body and parts of it ache in a good 'Hey, wow! I have muscles in that place' way. Often accompanied with deep breathing, sweating and the thirsties. Recommended treatment: a big glass of cold water, refreshing shower and relaxing stretching.

2. Stinging eyes exhaustion - You're tired from a long day and your eyes feel like they have had lemon juice squirted in them and then have been sandpapered dry. Often occurs at the end of a day at work in front of the computer or in harsh lighting. Recommended treatment: Optrex eye drops or a cold tea bag on the eyes, accompanied with some serious lying down.

3. Mysterious aches and pains exhaustion - You're so tired that your body starts to hurt for no apparent reason. Frequently achey body parts include back, feet , arms and legs. Recommended cure: long, hot bath with bubbles and/or nice smelling bath product, wine, quiet evening spent reading followed by an early night, milky or chocolatey drinks.

4. Headache exhaustion - You are so tired and that your head is throbbing. Often happens after a long or hard day of work, especially when you have not had enough lunchables or caffeine to sustain you throughout the day. Sometimes accompanied with cravings for junk food or chocolate. Recommended treatment: lots of delicious food, nurofen or similar, rest and relaxation.

5. Stressed exhaustion - You are tired and have been working hard but you have had to come home knowing that some unpleasant problem or mountain of work is still lurking back at work waiting to ambush you the following morning. It is hard to relax when you are aware of something unpleasant looming ahead. Recommended treatment: exercise/elaborate cocktail/bath your way to temporarily forgetting your troubles. Stroking a friendly feline or doing something fun to take your mind off things. If all else fails repeat the Debz Mantra of work stress avoidance. "It doesn't matter. Work is silly. If I get fired, I can stay at home and not go to work anymore."

6. Seething, bitter anger exhaustion - You have one of those days. Someone you work with, generally a management type*, has done something to really annoy you. They simply don't understand or appreciate the fact that you are tired from working hard and the last thing you need is some obnoxious blighter making your life harder than it needs to be. Recommended treatment: complaining to a sympathetic colleague (although this can turn into a drawnout 'slagging off the boss' conversation - fun but time-consuming), relaxing fun, punching bags and a nice walk in the sunny fresh air.

* For teachers, it can also be the students. Mangement and teenagers have the following aspects in common: 1) they often make unpractical and irrational decisions, 2) they are snide and rude, 3) you are not allowed to tell them they are smegheads who should die horribly.

Countdown to Holidays!

 The Weekend was fun, relaxing and full of food as all good weekends should be. However, I’m now finding that enjoyable weekends do not leave me feeling refreshed and rejuvenated for the following working week so much as they make me insanely impatient for the Summer holidays.

I have not only started the ‘days to go’ countdown* but also an ‘individual lessons left to go with each class’ countdown. I only have 7 more lessons with my bratty Year 10 class! Yay! They have activities day and Work Experience days knocking out a fair few lessons! Oh joy, oh rapture! I’m considering writing a countdown on my whiteboard but maybe it’ll induce too much excitement** at the prospect of it nearly being over.

I’m glad the weekend was summery as well as fun. It made the two days feel like a preview of what summer will be like especially as I didn’t have any planning or marking to do. I must remember to thank ‘last-week Debbie’ for doing all the work in advance so that ‘weekend Debbie’*** could be slothful.

** Probably in me rather than the students but it could be a close race as to who wants the holidays more.

*** In Japan, Matt and I had the habit of thanking or cursing past and future Matt and Debbie. For example, if you forgot to put the laundry on the day before it was the fault of those sneaky ‘past Matt and Debbie’ people. Matt drew an inspirational cartoon family portrait of ‘future Matt and Debbie’ who lived in a big house with grass outside, owned a cat and slept in a bed (not a futon). Whenever I got sick of our crammed apartment and less-than-comfy futons, I could envy ‘future Debbie’ and plot how I would soon make her comfy bed my own.

Of course, now I am ‘future Debbie’ so I can smugly gloat at ‘past Debbie’. Heh heh.

I imagine that ‘Summer holiday future Debbie’ will be the smuggest gloater of all Debbies.

Debbie does gratitude (badly)

 Today in staff briefing someone made the Oprah-esque suggestion of people sharing motivational comments/thoughts on what they are grateful for. This didn't go down too well. Apparently people like to complain and keep their happy thoughts to themselves. In the interest of spreading joy and sharing my own delight in my job, I'd thought start my 'grateful' list here.

I'm grateful that...

1. Today is the last day with seniors and they go on exam leave tomorrow. I'm really grateful that it is our responsibility to keep them in class for the one extra day and to chase the multitude of truant seniors up when they invariably skip classes.

2. The prize-giving ceremony is on tonight starting at 7.30pm. Large pools of gratitude are flowing from my heart that school is starting at the same as usual time tomorrow so we don't let the predicted late night and lack of sleep cheat us out of any joyful teaching junior classes.

3. I now have an extra week in the term where I don't have to write Senior reports because they moved the Deadline forward a week. Bonus - the reports will have that whole rushed feel as I desperately try to get them finished this week.

4. I have to run the junior referral room two classes a week. I'll get the joy of getting to know all the bad children, not just the ones in my class, as they congregate in one room for 'silent'* time-out.

5. I probably won't have to run the referral room by next week when some accident (see *) forces management to realise that I'm not capable of controlling 30 junior criminal types.

6. My pointing out that having year 10 activity days being separated by gender and being stereotyped activities (girls make cookies and learn how to wrap presents prettily**, boys go to orchard and do physical/problem solving activities) has been interpreted as volunteering for designing and running less sexist activities. More work, hurrah! If they insist on separating boys and girls, they'll regret it. Doily making for the lads and paintball or fencing for the girls.

* As silent as the hysterical laughter in my brain at the thought of me trying to keep 30 of the worst-behaved juniors in school quiet. I'm guessing they will have burnt down the class or killed someone by the end first period. (See 5. on gratitude list)

** I never realised that they actually teach girls to wrap presents. Clearly I missed out on this along with 'ironing your husband's shirts' and 'advanced vacuum cleaning' lessons which is why my Christmas presents look like a three year old has done the wrapping. I can make cookies though.

Things that make you go "awww"

 Well, today had a surprisingly nice end to it. After a fairly depressing week of much work stress, Bush actually being elected President and the unfortunate loss (and subsequent sore muscles) of the staff netball team (I was WD first half and GD second half), today ended really nicely.

It was my last English lesson with the sixth formers before they leave for their exams. A bit sad but also a bit of a relief, as I will never teach that particular class again.

I had told them that we would quickly review their study homework and then play games seeing as it was the last lesson on a Friday. I brought in some lollipops thinking it would be a nice treat to the kiddies as most of them have worked pretty hard this year.

At the beginning of the lesson I was a bit concerned as four of the naughtier boys* were hanging around in the corridor. I feared some sort of miscreant behaviour involving fireworks might be afoot. I went over to drag them into class threatening detention when they slowly wandered in and gave me a big wrapped-up present. I was a little nervous as these chaps had played a few pranks on me throughout the year** but when I unwrapped it, it was a 3D puzzle of Minas Tirith. Yay! Cool and geeky. So thoughtful and sweet. Then the students all played our various card games. It was cool because they all really liked them and got into the humour. They seemed to appreciate the 80's cop shows references. I played one game with them but lost in a big way as they all repeatedly slapped 'Drug habits' on me (I had four at the end!). I gave them a copy of COP to share.

After class another group of students came up and gave me a card. It was SO GOOD! These students knew about my Cosplaying and regularly write Buffy quotes on the whiteboad. Very cool. The card had a personalised Teen Girl Squad cartoon for me, some cool Pratchett pictures and English related Buffy quotes. Awesome! Here are a couple of the panels of the TGS page:

* A couple of them have recently taken to calling me 'Miss Dungeon-master' since they discovered I was a roleplayer.

** Pranks ranged from the thought-out and cleverly executed to the lame and obscene (putting a drawing of a penis on the OHP).