The student teacher who taught his teacher

In Japan, age is considered to be one of the biggest marks of status. Eldership is not easily underestimated. Some will downright refuse to be taught by someone earlier, especially men, from what I can see. One of my friends who had studied Taikyoken but who had moved away from his teacher from college immediately refused my teaching him anything at all upon my offering my services as a friend, despite the fact he was looking for a teacher. The reason he cited was that he was one month and one week older than me, therefore he is my sempai (a stepladder on the way to being teacher, generally determined first by age, then other factors after that such as experience and ability). Call it stubborn, but the tradition of teacher-pupil relationship here in Japan is as old as the master-apprentice relationship from Europe, maybe even older. It has also changed much slower over it's time than ours have, what with the high status of teachers in general in Japanese society. It is a fairly deeply ingrained system, and one that might not be conscious to many. Luckily, women tend to be a little more liberal in some way, thanks to three waves of feminism and a general desire to change the monotony of being a bored housewife that some carry with them everywhere (and that builds up after a while).

I had an unusual Community Center class this morning, putting me in an odd situation. Firstly, for context, this was Kyoko-sensei's class. She is around 50ish, I have determined, and teaches mostly younger people, as do all teachers in the area. Fortunately for the community, she is probably the best community center teacher in the area. Similar to what I've mentioned before, her pronunciation is better than many Japanese born-and-raised in Seattle or San Fransico. She's also a determined, inquisitive, yet lady-like woman, and is a model Japanese citizen. This is important. Because of all these things, she is a significant role-model to what I would assume comes to a total of many hundreds if not thousands of peoples. Thousands is very likely. Her status is very high, and so although she offers very respectful treatment to her elder students, she is still fair. She is probably, in her own way, the highest status woman in Miki City, despite being of an inferior age to thousands. This allows her to teach many older women than herself, and she is probably the most popular choice for older women learning English. An older woman does NOT go to a 20-something teacher to learn, generally.

The idea of "fair" is not seen as optimal in many cases in Japan. Deference is to your superiors. You shouldn't really have to defer to those below you. It's awkward for them. In fact...it's gotten much more awkward for me now that I have been in a real-life status-inversion (Status inversion is my own term, one which I will use to mean when statuses are reversed because of reasons totally abnormal to Japanese society. They do not normally occur in Japan. I'm sure that they have, but it would be because someone powerful has fallen from their high place and their student has raised to power. But even then much deference would be made to the original teacher, despite the drop).

So this morning, I went to give a presentation at a nice public house that is used for cultural learning in Japan. The house is beautiful, inside and out! The furniture is all top-notch, the screens are in a newer style of bamboo, and there is a nice feeling of "progressive movement" to the whole building, yet it sacrifices nothing from it's values. The building itself is a mark of what many-a Japanese person feel they should aspire to be in modern society.

I gave a presentation that I have given before to another class of Kyoko-sensei's, which was a short summary of culture in the inland northwest, and a general overview of how the cultures many of us have brought with us from other places still exist and in some cases continue within the greater "American" culture. This class was the high-level class, so I knew I didn't need to tone-down my language much. When I walked into the classroom, I was met by Noriko (group leader teacher of the plays we did last month for "Kid's English" last month) as well as Nishi-sensei, who kindly took me to find a bookstore and also Kongoo-ji shrine! Here's where it gets confusing: they were to be in my body of students for the day! As well as a number of older women (all older than me actually!) Because of the age-priority thing, it is probably almost impossible to get into a class that isn't a late night class for Kyoko, and since this was a morning class, it was entirely dominated by 30's-80's in age (weighted more towards the 80's than the 30's). Although I am male, and that counts for more especially among older women, I am still QUITE young to be a teacher of this group. I was invited in as a guest speaker by Kyoko but...I was not expecting this! Kyoko, too, was unaware when she invited me to teach my own Japanese teacher, Nishi-sensei (because she was unaware that she WAS my teacher at all!) part way through the class, on a little break, I approached Michiko Nishi awkwardly. I had to ask her, "what is it I'm supposed to call you in this situation?" I knew she had to call me sensei, that part was a given. However, she is my superior AND she is my own teacher outside of the class. But, I underestimated one factor: the Japanese, when put into a new situation, can completely set aside the past for a cause and assimilate into a brand-new ordering, often with little difficulty. Sure enough, Michiko Nishi told me: "Just call me Michiko." I was almost...shocked. I had treated her with the utmost of respect in my past meeting with her, yet...she wanted me to call her by her first name? Preposterous! Unthinkable!

And...sure enough, I have already become Japanese enough that I found myself unable to call her by her first name. So I simply avoided having to use that particular method of calling on her the rest of the class time. Funny, I am now Japanese enough to have adapted to the heirarchy, and I have established that in any normal situation, that the respect of position is carried with you everywhere in live even as it evolves with your age, experience, and through public observation of your performance. However, I am not Japanese enough yet to be able to change instantaneously my feelings of position in the heirarchy as essentially everyone in the class seemed to be able to do with me. But that is something we don't have in America, and If I've said it once, I'll be saying it again: What people do outside of their work in their private lives is not to and generally does not in any way interfere with your work. A person can get completely liquored up and insult his entire body of coworkers one night, and the next day no one even seems to remember from all outward appearances. Correct me if I'm wrong, but to me it seems this would obviously not be the case in the US, or perhaps anywhere else in teh West. But here, these things just are not allowed to interfere. So whereas Michiko Nishi was able to adjust, I was slower to do so. When I see someone get up and make a fool of themselves, in or out of work, I remember it. It goes into my equation, in one way or another, whether I like it or not, of what I think of the person. And I will certainly incorporate my assessment of the person into how I will react to them in the future.

We all do it in the US, some more than others. We might try to treat folks equally, but there is a point which almost any of us will finally decide they aren't so sure if they want to treat certain people exactly the same as others. Fairness is a nice goal to aspire to, and treating all humans as perfect equals is a nice goal, but more than sin itself, it may be all but unavoidable. Few are immune to the things that make us human, so I think we can come very close to this goal, but that it is impossible to be perfect at it. Someone once said to me, "One of the differences between the Westerners and the Japanese is that we try to hide it when statuses are unequal. We call our professors by their first names, even though we really know better that we are not equals in status. The Japanese not only make clear distinctions of status, more importantly, they WANT to make those distinctions clear." The honorifics of -san, -sensei, -chan, -kun, etc. Are one of the many ways that this is done. At first, when I was in America and I heard that, there was a part of me that immediately protested. Now that I'm here, I see that the statement had more truth than I wanted to admit. Everything became deferential to me in the classroom, minus when Kyoko-sensei took over the class. Truly astonishing.

I can more easily see now how it is that in Japanese manga and anime old enemies can set aside their differences with apparent ease to take on the greater forces that oppose them! Before I thought it was just lazy writing style or fan-service, but now I see that the people of Japan (where it is all written) really CAN do stuff like that! Once they go to work, they by-gones-be-by-gones much easier that anything I've ever observed! It's really comforting in a way. At the same time, it makes me want to aspire to be able to do the same thing. My American nature, however, is telling me I still want to keep the choice of not being forced to treat jerks nicely when I don't feel like it though, haha.

Observations on the Japanese Government & what the US looks like from the outside

I haven't really talked to anyone about the structure of Japanese government since I arrived here. I've kinda wanted to get a feel for how it works before I got into knowing any details on how things are performed. Because if we just look at the theory of government, how it should work, and what seems to make sense, it is almost always wrong in application. I like learning new things, especially about the order in places and I find law fascinating, but this is a discision I have made, nonetheless. This post is my reactions to the system as I have seen it at work around Kansai.

First of all, I have spent somewhere around $1300 in startup costs, 2 months rent, phonebill, food and to be 100% medically insured. This is very reasonable for moving to a new place with almost nothing and living here roughly 7 weeks, especially what with having to buy a bicycle and other basic things for living and getting around in the area. Considering that I have invested this much, you would expect that since I am in a country that provides cheap health care (full insurance for me is about $15/month). Total taxation: about $10. No sales tax on anything I have purchased. Only some paperwork fees to the government. That's it.

The roads are worked on every day. No potholes, ever. They patch roads, and even more often replace the entire thing. People are generally healthy, happy-looking, and unfortuately obsessed with being thin (blame the French and US media for that). So other than the fact that conformity is sometimes dangerous here, it is generally for the best. No-smoking laws in public? Nah, public concensus. Now they smoke outside. Cost to the government, $0! How's that for law?

Also, citizens demand more of themselves in making their society better, everything from superfluous stuff like keeping their garden nice to recycling and road-clean up. Unfortunately, by concensus bicycle helmet are not used by non-jr. highers. So they are not sold. Motorcyclists use helmets by concensus, but they all wear them hanging loosely on the back of their heads. They don't actually do anything. But all in all, a very peaceful, low-tax and high-prosperity nation. Like the US, they drive speeds that would never be safe in any automobile in any conditions, so they have a high rate of traffic accidents, but as far as intent goes, no one seems more benign. Whatever the government has been doing, asides from the Ministry of Education, seems to be working just fine. They strive for collectively coming to agreement on everything. And they aren't so stubborn as Americans to never move. Sure it moves slowly when it is a touchy issue, but generally there is agreement on most social rule within any area of Japan.

All-in-all, it's working better than the US! Maybe if we weren't so focused on having a gigantic military, giving children an education to think in a participatory democracy, and having social programs to support those in need instead of just oestracizing them, we might have less problems. More people in Japan are coming around to the idea that parenting shouldn't have to be primarily at the hands of the school either, which is a relief. I'm seeing it in the (English) papers even! It's funny, but in Spokane, there seems to be a big overlap between people who want to do good for others (the Welfare system is the most efficient system for redistributing money in the world of its kind, $ in for $ out) and yet very few of these people donate much of what they make to charity either and those that want to reduce our social programs, unlike almost every last one of our global competitors that are gaining lifespan and economic prosperity somewhat proportionately to the growth of their programs. Low tax, low benefit to those in need, smaller middle-class, basically, almost no government. Not even that to help others, the idea that many think happens naturally when we have less government. Well, we do have less social benefits than Canada, Sweden, Japan, and a host of others who are doing well, but gues what! We also donate less money to those in need in our own country or to other countries than almost any 1st or 2nd world country. So that theory seems to be moot.

It seems strange to me that Protestantism so frequently is accompanied by lack of interest in social benefits to the needy in America. You don't see that kind of thing in Japan. Those that are religiously inclined to help their fellow just go out and do it. And the government does it too. Don't get me wrong: I think that there are alot of Catholics out there that are the same way in the US. But I've seen a little more out of individuals of my own religion than by Protestants too, so I can't say it looks very good for any that preach help and don't give it and try to supress social welfare programs.

I don't see really poor people here. I'm sure there are some. But no one looks like the people living in the streets in Spokane. I've seen 3 people that I have suspected might be homeless since I've gotten here out of tens of thousands. They were together. But they might have been guys just sitting in the park for all I know. They were clean and looked well-fed. They might have just been guys on a lunch break.

So, while I started thinking that it was something the government was doing right here, now I'm not so sure! It seems to be as much a marriage between the people and the government going with the flow. It seems to work. Certainly there are protests when people are being misrepresented, and in the end the politican is forced to retire every time something like this happens, from all that I have read. In America we protect GW Bush from impeachment and try to impeach a man for lying about his sex life, and to those here in Japan and elsewhere, this makes us look all the worse. It is no wonder people are surprised when I exhibit any level of intelligence while I am here. From the outside the US makes me even more ashamed as a society as when I was there. I can't see the many exceptions any more from the outside though, so that is probably part of it.

Still, the US makes no efforts to keep up apperances, besides military ones. Al Queda recently announced they are going after France now since the US seems "difficult to access" and attack now. American $ at work. The borders are no more secure than they have ever been, but the terrorists think so. You can still walk across almost anywhere from Mexico or Canada almost any time, or take a small boat to our coasts. Ironically, one of our biggest UN opponents to the war in Iraq are now being targeted as our allies, since, theoretically, our governments are allied in principle of government (liberty, freedom, etc.) The ammo that soldiers have found in Iraq (I asked the only military journalist for the Iraqi war about it) is primarily, interestingly enough, French, Russian, and American. As you can recall Russia opposed our going to war with Iraq too. So we're selling "the enemy" weapons and ammo, and fighting them with more of our own ammo, while paying soldiers alot so they won't quit wars that have little personal meaning to most. To people abroad, like in Japan, this is just confusing. We always manage to put profits before people.

And that is the biggest difference I've found between Japan and the US governments. People here are always first. The environment is close behind. Then business.