Watching the Super Bowl in Japan

So this Sunday is the Super Bowl, and my beloved Steelers are in the big game. (Again.) This will actually be the third Pittsburgh championship contest since I've been overseas: in 2009, the Steelers won Super Bowl XLIII and  the Penguins pulled out a dramatic game-7 win in the Stanley Cup Finals.

Given the time difference, I was working during both of those games. The Penguins game was on an in-service day at the end of the year, so I did get to watch most of it. The Steelers game, though, was just a regular Monday morning, and let me tell you, trying to teach during that game was no fun at all. I caught a brief glimpse of the fourth quarter before lunch, then had to dash off to a meeting right at the beginning of what would become the Steelers' last-minute, game-winning drive.

Thankfully, I will not have to suffer so ignobly during Super Bowl XLV. Instead, we're throwing a middle-school Super Bowl party. Students have been asked to choose a side and come in team colors (a co-worker has offered to take the unenviable position of rooting against the Steelers). During the game, they'll have a series of English, math, social studies, science, and art activities, plus snacks. 

Thanks to some cheer-leading by the faculty, the students are starting to get excited, and I'm certainly looking forward to sharing the experience with my classes. It'll be a pretty unique way to watch a game, that's for sure--and in the process, maybe I can start a little colony of Steelers Nation here in Japan!

Japanese Saki-Ori (Sakiori) Weaving: an illoominating experience

By blind chance yesterday I stumbled across the ACROS cultural events website. ACROS is a multifarious venue, home to everything from a convention center to shopping floors to fast-food burgers to the Fukuoka Symphony. They feature cultural events in the second floor Takumi Gallery, and the event that's on right now (through tomorrow) is about Sakiori. I knew nothing about Sakiori (in fact, until I got to the exhibit, I mistakenly thought it was Hakata-ori, or Hakata fabric) but I knew it was textile-related, so I wanted to go, because hey, that's what my master's degree is in.

Sakiori, it turns out, is old-tyme Japanese recycling. Weaving means taking threads that go up and down (warp) and filling them in with threads going left and right (weft). In Sakiori, the weft threads are shreds of rags salvaged from other garments: in fact, saki means rag and ori means weaving (as in Hakata-ori, above, or weaving from the city of Hakata). Sakiori was a way for peasants to repurpose old fabric into something useful and warm. The end result is rather tweedy in texture. Most authentic old sakiori (see here and here) are plain because they were meant to be durable work garments, but just like crazy quilts, they could be made fancier if the artist had the time and resources. Modern sakiori is quite organized and beautiful because it commands a nice price as a traditional handicraft.

The ACROS exhibition was part art display, part sale gallery, and part demonstration. Here's the lady demonstrating the sakiori loom:

The sling on her lower back is made from sakiori and holds the end of the fabric you're working on in your lap. I say "your," but really, I eventually mean "my." We learned long ago that Rule #1 of Asian public events is Call On The Foreigner, so it should come as no surprise that shortly thereafter, I found myself being cinched into the loom and put to work. Being the goofy foreigner is like an automatic "Pass go, collect $200" ticket. Not that I object: after all, it got me on the loom and weaving, right?

(To be perfectly fair - we were the only people under the age of 50 at this exhibition. American handicrafts ladies probably would have pulled me out, too.)

My fumbly attempts to weave and understand Japanese directions were evidently a highlight of the morning for the septuagenarian Japanese set. The lady next to Justin had her mobile phone whipped out and filming within about five seconds of me sitting in the chair. I wonder if I'll end up on Youtube.

Here are Justin's videos of the same:

What do you think? More or less awkward than Justin putting on a kilt?

And some still shots, for posterity:

All in all, I'm completely pumped by our ACROS experience. I learned something new and had a great time. I've looked over the calendar of events and the next one I think I want to try is the decorative embroidered ball exhibition the week of Feb 14. Any coworkers, holler if you want to go along!

Hong Kong

I went to Hong Kong last weekend for an International Baccalaureate workshop (more on that later, perhaps)--here are some photos from the trip.

The workshop venue:

 The mountain behind the workshop venue:

 The other end of the mall by my hotel, where I ate most of my meals:

Which concludes our grand tour of everything Justin saw in Hong Kong. Yeah, you can bet the romance of "going to Hong Kong . . . ON BUSINESS(!)" wore off pretty fast. The workshop itself was pretty demanding, and both the venue and my hotel were on the outskirts of the city. Add to that the fact that I still had a full week's worth of lesson planning to do in the evenings, and there just wasn't time to get out.

Oh, well! They certainly aren't paying me to go sightseeing, are they?

The awesomely creative and yet utterly terrifying world of middle school poetry

Student has selected "danger" as a poem topic and is working on symbolism, i.e. "dangerous like a sharp knife." Justin goes over to check on list of "dangerous" analogies.

Student's List:
1. Hockey
2. Poisonous bees
3. Viking robots.

Justin: "Viking robots?"
Student: "Yes, they're like regular robots, but they come and sack your city, like Vikings."
Justin: "I see."
Student (earnestly): "They're very dangerous."

Now I'm going to have nightmares about a giant mechanical version of Stinger from the Columbus Blue Jackets laying waste to swathes of Fukuoka while wearing a double-horned helmet. Thanks a lot, student.

Blast from the Past

A student comes up to me in the hallway today.

"Ms. Massie, I was looking at my University of Edinburgh prospectus last weekend, and I think I saw Mr. Goff..."

Remember this? Well, here it is, back to haunt us!

An intelligent and sociable young man:

They knew better than to put a guy who looks like Justin on the cover of the engineering section.

A vigorous walk up one of Edinburgh's scenic hills:

And wait! Who's that loitering in the background at the law school?


I'd know that backpack anywhere, I would.

My favorite part is imagining that student over the weekend. Here he is, minding his own business, just trying to get into college, and suddenly HUH? there's the Middle School English teacher, right there in the middle of the Edinburgh undergraduate prospectus. It's enough to make a kid paranoid.

Heading to Hong Kong

I'm going to Hong Kong for an IB workshop today--I'll be there through Monday morning. On the one hand, I'm looking forward to the trip (eat some good food, hopefully learn something), but on the other hand, I'm not thrilled about leaving Nana behind.

Anyway, I promise as many pictures as I can manage to take around workshop sessions, and anyone who needs to should be able to reach me by e-mail while I'm gone.

Yes, They Make Wasabi Kit-Kats

A couple years ago, while making our way back to the US from Korea, Nana and I stumbled upon a pack of green tea Kit-Kats during a layover in Tokyo. We promptly bought a few, and while we meant to blog about the experience, it seems we never got around to it. Just another one of those weird little things that, despite all our best efforts, didn't make it into the blog.

Little did we know, however, that we were just scratching the surface of Japan's strange Kit-Kat obsession. (Our friend Rosa over at ZOMG Candy has links to some relevant information, including reviews, here.) It turns out that "Kit-kat" sounds a lot like the Japanese for "good luck," so it's become a thing to give people Kit-Kats before important events, such as (especially) college entrance exams. From there, the Kit-Kat has blossomed into a national obsession, with hundreds of strange flavors available, including regional and limited-edition varieties, some of which are considered collector's items. Yes, you heard me: collector Kit-Kats. There's even a Kit-Kat blog devoted to the phenomenon.

Thus for Christmas, in addition* to bringing home a stash of dark chocolate Kit-Kats (delicious, especially when frozen), Nana and I decided to torture--I mean, treat her family to some of the stranger flavors we could find.

The top is wasabi, the bottom sweet potato.

Each one seemed to be made from a white-chocolate base, with the flavor and color added.

We decided to taste the sweet potato first, on the theory that it was less likely to nuke our tastebuds and/or make us swear off Kit-Kats for the remainder of our natural lives.

Verdict? It actually tasted like Japanese sweet potato (which is a little less sweet and a little less orange than the sweet potatoes you find in the US). Fairly edible, but it had a sickly, buttery kind of taste that means we probably won't be buying any more.

Next: wasabi.

 At first, it didn't taste much like anything--but then it hit.

As you can see from the photo above, the wasabi Kit-Kat actually tastes like wasabi. White chocolate and wasabi. Hm.

*Somehow, I managed to spell this as "edition" in the first draft. Whoops!