Case of the Racist Hatemongers

So I was walking around Tenjin, Fukuoka this sunny February afternoon, spending copious amounts of money on CDs and music equipment, singlehandedly saving the local economy. I walked past a group of fascinating gentlemen -- pictured below -- and out of the corner of my eye I caught the word 外国人 ("foreigner") on their banner. My interest piqued, and I joined their small audience of a two old women and a glassy-eyed junior high school student.


On closer inspection, it turns out they're racist hatemongers. It's easy to tell a racist hatemonger in Japan from any other kind of protester* because, try as you might, they will not make eye contact. They won't even pose for a nice group photo.

* Note: There are always protesters in Tenjin, it seems, and the vast majority of them are pretty cool, so I don't mean to generalize them or Japanese people at large. Last time I was there we were approached by some people protesting the war in Gaza, who were interested in discussion, not shouting scat out of megaphones.

So what makes them racist hatemongers? Well, let's focus on what makes them hatemongers to start. This group is called "在日特権を許さない市民の会", or "Association of citizens who will not allow special rights for zainichi", with "zainichi" (在日 -- properly "Japanese people of Korean descent" but literally "Koreans living in Japan") being a common ethnic slur for Koreans.

To let the matter speak for itself, I'm going to quote their website:

過去の誤った歴史認識に基づき「日帝の被害者」「かわいそうな在日」という妄想がいまだに払拭されていない日本社会では、在日韓国人・朝鮮人を特別に扱う社会的暗黙の了解が存在しているのも事実です。

In a Japanese society where wild ideas based on a bygone mistaken understanding of history such as "victims of the Empire of Japan" or "poor zainichi" have still not been wiped out, it is a fact that an unspoken social agreement to handle Japanese of Korean descent and [mainland] Koreans* still remains.

* Note: A slur for mainland Koreans this time.

If you're unaware of who these "victims of the empire" are, I suggest you head to your local library. I'll give you a hint though: it's about the same number as "victims of the Reich".

On group leader Sakurai Matoko's website, he describes the Japanese colonization of East Asia to be a very good thing for the region, and describes the Chinese (using another slur, of course) and Koreans as "beasts" who hold no value in human life. And one fun little tidbit even accuses Confucius of cannibalism.

Anyway, not to harp on this, because -- like I said -- there are more people in Fukuoka who are protesting for human rights than protesting against them, but I have a personal problem with the way these right wing groups that talk about Koreans. This stems in something I saw at ground zero in Hiroshima last year. In front of a monument dedicated to the 20,000 Korean victims of the atomic bomb, many of which were "forced labourers", there was a black van giving an idiotic racist rant similar to Sakurai's.


This is like skinheads protesting in front of the camp in Dachau. Absolutely jaw-droppingly disgusting.

And the reason I would post any of this here is, I think the vast majority of Japanese people want nothing to do with assholes like Sakurai, but in a general sense, there are a lot of soft-core historical revisionists in Japan, and to make a spectacle of these hate group's ignorance is the best way to fight this dangerous ideology. The best way that doesn't involve balaclavas and baseball bats, that is.

And if you want to send a message to Sakurai personally, you can reach him by e-mail.

Sakurai's screen name, by the way, is "Doronpa", which I believe translates as "scatmuncher".

Peeing in Japan

I was at YouMe Town today ("[shopping] town" being Engrish for "mall", and "youme" being close to the spelling of "yumé", or dream). Yes, I went there again. I'm not proud of it, but there I was.

Anyway, I used to washroom -- the second floor one beside the dentist office and smoking room that's always empty. I tend to have a bit of a predilection toward that one, because the ones on the main floor seem to always have "Part of My World" from the Aladdin soundtrack playing while middle aged women obliviously clean the floors a few metres behind me, while old men hock loogies into the urinals, glance at my gaijin manhood, and then shake just a little too much, all the while swarms of five year olds pee Butters-style.

But, there I was, and I walked up the the urinal, completely alone and as I unzipped my fly, I heard a voice from somewhere say, "cha-ching!" I was absolutely sure I was alone, but I heard this two or three times. It was like an adult trying to imitate a child's voice and ended up sounding eerily like Michael Jackson. I thought I heard "cha-ching!", but it slowly dawned on me that I probably actually heard "chin-chin", which is childish Japanese slang for "penis". Needless to say, I got out of there as soon as possible.

Then I walked by a group of probably-stoned teenagers pushing eachother over and laughing hysterically -- which, given that drugs are tightly enforced here -- is almost unseen in Japan. Just after this, I walked by a woman who was wearing a tight navy blue t-shirt with the well-known English word "MILK" written across her chest in big white letters. In Japanese, the word for milk and breasts uses the same kanji (乳, for you pervs), so Japanese people should be much more aware that this is a a strange thing for a woman to write on her chest. Maybe this is a very popular shirt these days? Maybe she works on a dairy farm? Or maybe she has no idea what it says... being Saga, none would surprise me.

All in all, a very strange day at YouMe Town.

Indigence

One of my schools is really horribly disorganized right now. Actually, I have no idea if it's actually is disorganized, or if I only get that feeling because no one tells me a thing about what's going on. EVER.

It's a little like that scene in Apocalypse Now where Willard asks the soldier at Dung Lo Bridge, "Who's in command here?" and the guy looks a bit freaked out and says,


Weird thing about being an ALT is, no one - NO ONE - is sure what I'm supposed to do, and for a variety of linguistic and sociological reasons, I'm permanently out of the loop, and no one's sure who's in charge of me anyway, or if I'm in charge of myself, or if the idea of "being in charge" of a gaijin is simply absurd anyway, since we're as inexorable and untameable as 1000 wild stallions.

Top 10 Japanese Words that ALTs Use In Casual Conversation (Part 2)

Part two of my top 10 list of most common Japanese words used by foreigners in Japan. I hope you enjoy!

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Konbini [kon-been-ee]
- noun

Ever wish there was a place where you could buy such things as snacks, stationery, a bottle of French wine, concert tickets, some lunch, DVD movies, clothing, video games, umbrellas, and "love magic", and where you can even pay your bills; all in one convenient store? Try 7-11, Lawson, AM-PM Mini Mart, Family Mart, or one of the many other fine Japanese konbini.

Yes, I know 7-11 exists outside of Japan. In fact, most of the Japanese konbinis started off life as American companies, then were bought by Japanese companies, but in Japan they're unbelievably highly competitive, doing very specialized and localized market research which they call "Dominant" (yes, an English adjective), and end up being something else altogether. So much so, that they go beyond the North American image of a "corner store" and little by little has become... the konbini!

[Origin: Japanese コンビニ, itself from the English convenience store]

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Gaijin [gahy-jin]
- noun, adjective, interjective

I've been in Japan for about a year, and I'm willing to guess that anyone who knows a smattering of Japanese phrases has come across this one already, so I won't go into the details of the nuances or etymology beyond the meaning "foreigner", except that it's a shortened form of gaikokujin, or "person-from-a-foreign-country". And, it's pretty rude. And Japanese people say it all the time. And the Japanese people that use this shortened form of gaikokujin would be horrified if they I used the shortened forms of "Nipponjin" or "Japanese".

And let's not even get into nanban chicken.

All this, of course, does not stop the gaijin community from using "gaijin" in every other sentence. In fact, just the other day I was in Fukuoka with my gaijin friends and spotted some strange, suspicious, possibly criminally-active foreigner-looking gaijins coming our way and I said, "Goddamn, there're a lot of gaijins here!" with a bit of autoxenophobic excitement.

I personally used the word "gaijin" 46 times today. I counted.

See also: Gaijin Smash.

[Origin: Japanese 外人, itself a contraction of 外国人]

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Eki [ey-kee, ek-ee]
- noun

Train station. I don't know why we use this particular Japanese word since Japanese train stations closely resemble their Western equivalent, but maybe because very few of us had lives so intimately connected to a mere train station. Ever wake up at 6:15 AM to be on time for a lonely commuter train? If you have, you feel my pain. Pushing through a noisey, hostile crowd of uniformed students, barely (and sometimes not) avoiding hitting your head on handle bars which are all at a painfully low six-foot level -- pushing through just to get out at your stop...


At the same time as I associate the eki with so many terrible things, it's also the home of plenty of good memories, so what can I say? I love my eki.

[Origin: Japanese 駅]

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Onsen
- noun

Ever feel like sitting in a bit bathtub filled with sulphuric water, ass-naked with a few of your best mates? Well then you'd best to Japan, me son! This is at first the most uncomfortable thing in the world, but after a couple of times, it stops being anything of an issue and becomes one of the most relaxing things to do on a Sunday afternoon. Especially if you're sipping a beer and are outside in the warm water on a cold winter day staring off at the mountains. Said to be quite healthy too.

The first time I went to an onsen was at the very end of operating hours, and as we were leaving, a security guard came to ask my naked self to bend over and pull out the big onsen bath plug to let the water out for the night. Awkward!

[Origin: Japanese 温泉]

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Keitai
- noun

Keitais! Teacher, mother, secret lover. While you Westerner types are spending X amount of dough on Blackberries per month ($100+?), my little keitai -- the Japanese word for "cell phone" -- was the smallest of the small and cheapest of the cheap, and it combines an ordinary phone with a dedicated e-mail client, web browser, mp3 player, video player, digital camera, digital video camera, dictionary, calculator, etc. Behold(!):


Much like Golem from Lord of the Rings, I love and hate my keitai. I love it because it's fairly useful for communication, but really because it's an endless source of entertainment. Get bored? Send an innane e-mail to all my friends. I hate it because, aside from brain tumors, and for that matter a tumor on my thigh where my pocket is, it's annoying! First of all, I use it as an alarm clock, with it's handy mp3 player playing Kid Koala's "Like Irregular Chickens" (starting at the one minute point) and so I associate it with waking up at 6:15 for crowded commuter trains, but also, it's like a computer in every way, but much less convenient. I don't LIKE typing e-mails with my thumbs, damn it! Lastly, I got that ultra-slim model. The purple one on the top right, actually, because I thought it was dark brown in the muted lighting of the store, and I think dark brown electronics will eventually replace the white lacquer look that Apple's been pushing, so might as well get behind this one now. But I got the smallest phone they had, because my goal was a phone the size and shape of a credit card, and the only drawback, or at least the principal drawback is, I have to endure all manner of folk telling me "It's cute that such a big man has such a small keitai." Pff! Whatever. At least I'm not overcompensating for anything.

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I know this is a "top 10" list, but I didn't number them, let alone choose a favourite. Have a favourite? Post a comment and tell me which! Also, I put two movie and two TV references in this post: figure out which, and I'll buy you a beer.

Top 10 Japanese Words that ALTs Use In Casual Conversation (Part 1)

I've heard the Japanese in Vancouver is rather "slangy". The English in Montreal's soaked up Francicisms enough to be considered a distinct dialect, and Acadian French contains such witticisms as "ridez le truck". Minority languages tend to work this way-- slowly creolizing, de-creolizing, and then eventually disappearing.

I used to be one of them Montreal English, and now I'm a foreigner living in Japan. There aren't too many of us, and if there's one thing that unites us, it's how we fracture the Japanese language at the expensive of our own. Here's the first half of my top 10 list:

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Haro! [hah-roh]
- interjection

English, sort of. Think of this as English fried and then refried. If you've ever been within 50 metres of a group of 10-year-old Japanese boys, you've heard this. If you've been in Japan long enough, you've probably said it.

Today's kids are getting savvy to the fact that... not every white person is a English speaking American citizen, and they occasionally throw out the buenos días and namashites. One time when I got a "haro!" from somewhere behind me, I threw back a nice, crisp "bonjour!". You know, to internationalize. I assume it's the first time he ever heard this, 'cause I faintly heart a sad and confused "bon... jour?"

[Origin: Japanese school children ハロー!, var. of hello, itself var. of hallo, itself var. of hollo, itself var. of earlier holla]

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Genki [gen-kee]
- adjective
Genki isn't in any English dictionaries I know of, but make no mistake: we gaijins have bastardised and Anglicised the sucker until it's Sino-Japanese etymology is just a painful memory. But what does it mean? Genkiness is a mix of exitement, happiness and healthiness, or in other words... "exuberance"?

A quick Google image search yeilds a genki carrot:


Notice the glassy look of excitement on his face and the gung-ho attitute. After spending even days in Japan, everyone's genki or not-genki. There are no other emotions.

[Origin: Japanese 元気]
-Related forms
Genkiness, genkize, genkify, genkerific

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Nomihodai [noh-mee-hoh-dahy]
- noun, verb

All you can drink for two hours for about $15-20. Way to give'r to your liver, eh? Sometimes you get free food and it often it involves making an ass of oneself with coworkers singing terrible songs in karaoke.

I did this last night, in fact, and now I'm feeling not-so-genki.


Note: nomihodais may lead to liver failure.

[Origin: Japanese 飲み放題]

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Tabehodai [tah-bey-hoh-dahy]
- noun, verb

All you can eat for about $10. Sometimes it's à la carte, and sometimes buffet. Either way, prepare to eat a lot of meat, fish, squid and pizza or indeterminable quality.


Sometimes, you can get "nomi-tabehodais", which combines the two into a swirling vortex of fatty meat, a cynical single vegetable serving consisting of some raw cabbage and an endless amount of watery booze. Highly recommended.

[Origin: Japanese 飲み放題]