My ten-year-old fantasy come true...

Did I ever mention that I once dressed up as a ninja for Halloween? I got my mom to draw scars on my face, and make it look like I had a black eye and everything. I was super-bad-ass.

So a few months ago, I visited Ueno, which a major location where ninjas came from back in feudal Japan. The area is now a tourist trap, while also serving as a monument to the crazy spy/assassins off days long past.

It took us what seemed like over an hour in the car to get there, along winding, mountainy roads. That, and having the kids shove corn snacks into my face was just too much to handle. Fortunately, I was able to steady my stomach until we got to the entrance of the parking lot for Ueno, where I hurled into the gutter. Don't worry, it was all liquid, and not gross at all. Not having the required Japanese proficiency to explain to my host family, I just gestured to the car made a swaying motion, and then looked sick. Hopefully they didn't think I was insulting their driving.

Anyhow, after that, we had a great time. Yuka (the mom) made us a delicious lunch (which is hard to come by in this not-understanding-that-bacon-is-considered-meat-to-vegetarains culture, which helped settle my stomach [on a side note, all ninjas were apparently vegetarian, because eating meat can give you body odour, which might give you away when you're trying to sneak up on someone]). Hightlights included seeing the spy house (where the ninjas kept all their secrets, such as how to make gunpowder and such), and the fighting-ninja demonstration. Afterwards (for a nominal fee) spectators could throw shuriken against a wooden board. One of mine stuck into the board, and I'm pretty sure I threw the rest all wrong as I couldn't understand the directions.

On our way home (after being questioned as to whether or not I would hurl again by my host family), Hidehito (the older kid) started crying as we were getting close to Lisa's appartment. Apparently, he was quite sad because it was getting dark out, and that meant that we didn't have time to play baseball. We told them we would play baseball again some time, and that seemed to make things a little better.

So, lessons learned: ninjas are super-smart (there was a whole museum-type building full of various inventions designed to increase the efficiency of their trade), foreigners throwing up in the street is apparently not that uncommon (I get more weird looks just walking down the street than I did from puking in the gutter), and home-made lunches by moms are always the best. Oh yeah, and the stairs in castles are steep. Super steep. Hidehito was almost in tears (he's afraid of heights) while Kosuke was content practically dangling from the 3rd story window.

Me exhausted on the floor, after being "killed" (you can dress up like ninjas, play around and get your picture taken). Note the little bugger punching me in the crotch. Young children here like to hit you in the no-no spot, or run up from behind you and try to stick their two index fingers up your ass (it's called "koncho"). And people wonder why I'm jumpy after my days at elementary school.

If this doesn't say "men against violence against women" then I don't know what does.

Best picture I got of one of the "features" of the ninja house. This is where you can hide a sword. Other features included hidden revolving doors, hidden second floor (plus stairwell to it), and a secret entrances.

This is the moat that surrounds the castle. Surprisingly, moats aren't really a deterrent for ninjas, who just swim across it at night.

This is the Ueno castle. Inside is a museum-type set-up where you can see crazy samurai armor and such.

Why I should be fired...

So today was the last day of a long series of speeches for my san-nenseis (9th graders). Here is one speech that I'd like to share with you (they were all show-and-tell speeches, though many students opted to just tell). Please note that the first and last lines were given to the students as part of their "template":

Hello everyone, I am going to talk about something that I like.
This is a toy red.
This toy is sent from a friend and is a thing.
This was the toy which wanted me.
There will be sound, if it pushes.
Thank you for listening.

This student recieved a B.
Her squeezing the toy to make a squeaky noise was the best part of that class (aside from me performing the usual entertainment monkey routine, of course).

Hope you are all well,

Whoever can think of the funniest caption for this picture gets a prize. Enter your submission by clicking on "comment" below (then "post anonymously", but include your name in the message if you actually want the prize).

Tough Crowd

I walked into a barber shop today to get a haircut (which cost friggin' 3300 yen, or about $40 CDN [my haircuts usually cost around $15], by the way) and this little girl takes one look at me, and I can see the horror in her eyes as her faces changes from a happy disposition to one of complete panic. She starts bawling (and I don't mean crying, I mean BAWLING) after about 2 seconds of looking at me. The barber had to send her off to another room (I think it's a barber-shop-room-in-a-house-type-set-up). I guess she's never seen a foreigner before, and she thought I was going to eat her or something (either that, or my looks have deteriorated significantly). Later, her mom carried her back into the barber shop, I guess to show that I wasn't that scary, but as soon as the kid took another look at me, she buried her face in her mom's shoulder and started crying again. I tried to smile, and tell her (in Japanese) that I wasn't really scary, but she would have none of it.
What really killed me is when her older brother came in, he took one look at me, and did a half-jump backwards, as if he expected me to punch him in the face or something. This is in a house that is both a stone's throw away from my apartment, and that I litterally pass next to every time I leave my apartment. I'm sure I've seen them outside of their house before; I guess they must have figured that gaikokujin (non-japanese) just don't need haircuts. Crazy.