Seoul searching

Wherever our travels may take us, the journey itself is a quest for authenticity. That truly Italian cup of espresso you sip as you sit in a sidewalk cafe. That untrodden road leading to a local's only beach. The handcrafted jewelry you bought after a successful barter. In experiencing a place, we want to feel this unique sense of culture, as if we truly know what it is like for those who live it daily. We are prideful of those sacred moments with natives or those seemingly unspotted places in the city that remain untouched by a foreign glance. We hope we are the first to find a place and knight it with a shining glow of authenticity.

But, sometimes there are those trips you take and you aren't really searching for anything. The journey finds you because it knows where you sleep. Hostels are a way to enliven any travel experience mainly because of who you meet. It's a motley crew hailing from every corner of the world. The Spanish girls who arrived at 3 am, the Brits who camp out on the couch, the Israeli squatter who lives in the makeshift closet off the living room, the traveling Brazilian singers and the Swedish professor. Although the accommodations are usually small, modest and shared, what you do pay for isn't reflected in the furnishings, but in the companions. The hostel-goers are the ones who have at least some inkling of adventure in them to veer off the common course of hotels and packaged tours to make their own road less traveled.

Hostels exist all over the world, and were popularized in Europe for their affordability and acclaim among young twenty-something backpackers. But, after staying for a whirlwind visit of Seoul, Asia has proved a heavy contender for the quality of hostel experience.

Note to self: don't travel to Korea in the fall or winter. It is cold. So cold. And with a bite of wind. The majority of sightseeing activities and places of note in the city were outdoors. The markets, Seoul Tower, temples I have had enough of in Japan--all were understood in the pocket sized guidebook I read on the bus on our way to the airport back home. But, the memories of what actually did happen were better than trying to mimic the suggested sightseeing route from the book. It was authentic without trying and unable to duplicate--a completely spontaneous weekend wholly shaped by Bong's House, the hostel we chose simply by judging the book by it's cover. In this situation, it served in our favor.

Bong's House was homey and in a central part of the college town in Seoul. It had remnants of Boston with it's university-lined cobblestone streets and red brick buildings. Choosing a hostel is arguably the most important part of the trip because it is home base in a foreign city. It orients you with your surroundings, and in a way, acts as the center of the city. You will learn how to go everywhere on the basis of finding your way back to your hostel.

When searching hostel sites, a big, virtual security blanket is the ratings. Hostels are designed in a "by the people, for the people" mindset, so those of us traveling have a certain trust in the opinions of fellow travelers for no other reason other than we have nothing else to base our reason. We travelers anchor mixed memories of a certain hostel environment and those of us planning ahead, try and find the reviews that are most unanimously positive.

Kahlil Gibran wrote in his novel, The Prophet, "We wanderers, ever seeking the lonelier way, begin no day where we have ended another day; and no sunrise finds us where sunset left us."

The journey is always the inspiration that leads us to another place. Authenticity cannot be defined by a text and taught in a class where the light bulb blinks once something in finally understood. Authenticity shoots random beams of light through the cracks in the floor--it is that mysterious light that has crept itself around the corner, egging you follow it. In our travels, we find ourselves, which the most authentic belonging we can possess. With each new stop, each random encounter, each fleeting moment is still an impressionable memory that changes us permanently like a scar--we will never forget how it marked us and we carry it even if we've lost our belongings and permanence in life.

Gibran says, "the lust for comfort murders the passions of the soul, and then walks grinning in the funeral." Travelers who find the hostel aren't seeking comfort, they're hoping for adventure and an experience they remember regardless of where they were. We often forget that the homes we make may not always be permanent or well-known. They are a shelter from the cold, a home away from home, and an inspiration to move again.

I guess it's Thanksgiving

Turkey Day has come and gone in this far away land of lackluster American holidays. Of course, Japanese don't question the arbitrary tendency to celebrate Christmas, a holiday with absolutely no religious or cultural significance and in fact is more similar to Valentines Day. Surely the Japanese have heard of the brutal sabotage of the Native Americans and how Pilgrims single-handedly destroyed any sense of their heritage other than the reservations they deign to live on. But, I guess today is a day where our bellies are too full to realize how bringing up the white man's burden created a whole new sense of American history.

It would be nice to have some turkey, though. Alas, there is not a single oven in this country that could fit a full-bodied bird. We expats resort to the comforts of rice balls salted with tears and Korean BBQ drinking parties. The memory of sweet potatoes and corn bread is almost as distant as Native American culture in the U.S., sparse and sedated with alcohol.

Bow all means!

Pipe down, conservative wackjobs. When I read that there was actually controversy of President Obama's bow to Japanese Emperor Akihito, I imagined Dick Cheney sitting on his toilet taking a dump, almost herniating over the news.

Since Obama's inauguration, conservatives have been in a delicate mourning of Democratic victory. They, of course, scrutinize every move Obama makes, which certainly is expected of any government official. Even still, respecting the custom of the country you're visiting could hardly be considered "groveling", as some reported.

Obama has recently been made an honorary citizen of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, in order to make amends with a historically crass relationship with Japan and deem America's status against nuclear warfare. His bow, to a son of a former Emperor during the atomic bombings of World War II, seemed only an appropriate gesture of appreciation for said citizenship.

In Japan, bowing is a customary greeting. When bowing to someone of higher status, it usually entails a longer, deeper bow to indicate respect. It is also common to express thanks, request for a favor or to apologize. It certainly isn't a sign of weakness to bow instead of giving a firm handshake--but the two together?

Perhaps the handshake alone is far too right-winged; a symbolic screw you and your customs. And the 90-degree bow is culturally appropriate and dignified, but with that hand shake gumming up the real significance of it's meaning, it just looks awkward and can't please either party. Nonetheless, conservatives wouldn't be satisfied unless Obama wore a mask portraying him as a white republican, so chances are he'll be online fodder for weeks regardless.

Brutal Polka

We take our time getting dressed. Put on some music to loosen up a little while we scrutinize every blemish on our face. We have a blank slate and a full plate that we hope is first class and paid for. Dating is exciting. It's a chance to meet new people and feel like the possibilities are endless.

Dates can be daunting as well. You might go blindly into it, set up by your friend who's friend of a friend is also single. You might find yourself sitting sadly while you wait for a not-so-charming prince to arrive as you belly up to the bar for a second margarita salted with tears. You might sit passively, nodding to your drone of a date while your inner self is devising a stealthy escape through the bathroom window.

Whether you're reveling in dessert that's as decadent as the man across from you, or swearing off the opposite sex all together because you just can't seem to find the right one, there's always one thing you can count on: the rules of the game.

The dating game is different in every country and with it comes a set of prescribed steps to take before strapping into the roller coaster we call a relationship. In Japan, they call this roller coaster a jet coaster, which refers to the same mechanism, but in just a slight change of the word, the ride can be completely different.

Japanese dating can best be described as a brutal polka. The traditionally Czech dance is a series of small half-steps with a partner. The Japanese method to this "dance" is in a start-stop rhythm. They move toward each other, but then awkwardly pull back--and this back and forth continues until it looks like a convoluted seizure.

Men and women play a spying game on each others minds. Men side step softly, making only a subtle cameo in the corner of the woman's mind, and then retreat back to their denizens of the deep, cerebral unknown. In Japanese culture, the burden is on the listener to understand what the speaker is saying. Therefore, the man treads lightly with his pitter-patter half steps until he is certain that the woman shares mutual feelings. He does so in order to not make the other person feel awkward or uncomfortable in case she doesn't want to join in for couple's dance.

For foreign women attempting to date in Japan, we are otherwise unaccustomed to this brutal polka. And because we don't understand, we assume the worst, because as women, we internalize everything. Most of us don't fit into Japanese clothing, so we must be too big for the men as well. We haven't mastered the reflexive giggle and aren't able to maintain an inherent submissiveness, so we're about as appealing as animals. But, in truth, the men are feeling the pressure to relate. If only we knew that is was just shyness that was keeping them at bay, not our large, American asses.

Once the initial steps are taken, the accordion pumps, the tuba blows and the polka is in full swing. In order to get to this step, there is what I call "the naming." Japanese people must label themselves as a couple before proceeding to do relationship things, like even kissing. The sanction of this naming is important because it honors the relationship between the two. In this respect, Americans could benefit from trying this method before they jump into the horizontal polka. Japanese don't have any moral hangups about premarital sex because there isn't religious attachment to the right way to lay. Perhaps honoring every woman in a one night stand as "you're my girlfriend...for the next 2 hours" might assuage any guilt she has on her walk of shame the morning after.

It seems like the polka is done in quick bursts of short movement. But, the brutal polka encompasses these fast twitches into months and months of dress rehearsal. It wears on your feet and your mind, leaving you confused, but at the same time hopeful. Foreign females beware. You are no longer preyed upon by the same men you met back in the states. They don't come after you, dick in hand, requesting some sort of sexual favor. They half-step forward and half-step back, leaving you dizzier than when you began. We American women are used to the two second, free-falling drop of a roller coaster; these jet coasters are sometimes too slow to ride.

Otaku, Ojisan and Gaijin: a triumvirate of awkwardness

As featured on the ever-popular, now coffee table bestseller Stuff White People Like, Japan is hands down a crowd pleaser among the Western folk.

Americans tend to glamorize the unknowns, especially those of a foreign, far east creed. The island nation exudes this alien aura of a beautiful unknown. Many of us cannot fathom an ancient society that for so long, kept it's culture and people locked within.

Be that as it may, Japan has now become popularized as being this nucleus where tradition and unparalleled technology fuse and form a mutated creature of a culture all its own.

From the outside looking in, Japan's mystery is alluring and radiates this delicate, exotic beauty. From the inside looking further in, Japan is full of a strangeness that is often exemplified by the men who live in it.

As a patriarchal male society, women are often left as an afterthought to the real inner workings of the country. There is this seeping awkwardness that transpires from the pores of most men in this country and they can be categorized into three major groups:

Otaku. Otaku are the anime-loving, manga-masterbating freaks who adore anything without a pulse. It has been stenciled into their brains that the most sexually stimulating and emotionally fulfilling beings on the planet are in fact characters from their favorite comic or video game. Their minds are addled by steady streams of technology and their aspirations in life are to actually become 2D like their favorite characters, so they can battle in victory together or finally have cybersex with their true anime amor. As a term similar to Trekkie or fanboy, these joystick riding geeks would be the subject of constant ridicule in American high schools across the nation. However, this island of Nihon has come to love and respect them as a sub-culture that adds yet another layer to the fetish for big-breasted cartoons and entire districts of Tokyo existing as a gamer's playground.

Ojisan. Ojisan literally means uncle in Japanese. But, that uncle. The estranged one that dropped out of life to do acid in his mid-40's and join a jazz quartet, touring parts of upstate New York and New Hampshire. The one that occasionally comes to family dinners and plays footsie with you under the table and then blames it on the cat after he steals all the dinner rolls and anything else he can fit into his man purse. Ojisans are creepy, older men who often come in numbers. They enjoy social drinking with fellow ojisan, plopping their overworked bald heads between the bosom of snack shop girls, licking the syphilis from their lips before heading home to their neglected wives, but not before groping the sweet, young short-skirted girls on the train ride there.

Gaijin. Finally the foreign icing on the awkwardly sliced shortcake. Gaijin are scalded like Hester Prynn with that scarlet letter "A" emblazoned all over their white, western faces. Gaijin who stay in Japan do so most likely to teach English or geek it up with their otaku neighbor. They could potentially be outcasted members of another society and seek solace in the strange, cold walls of a Japan unknown. Perhaps they have a hard time assimilating to their own culture so they strive for one so far removed from their own that they might actually fit in. 9 out 10 times it works.

As a friend once said, every foreigner who comes to Japan and stays is crazy. The society of men who breed more and more awkward stock into the livelihood of the country are unknown to the innocent white people who read blogs about how wonderful Japan is and want some sort of bragging rights for knowing which sashimi is best. If they were to come to Japan and live (which they probably wouldn't because they're not crazy), they would see that this triad of otaku, ojisan and gaijin permeate the culture and create a foreign world not even the most pretentious white people would know. It's a scary world of cultural discomfort, even for those born and raised. But, of course, how can I judge because I am just as nuts as the next.

The Running Kind

I was born the running kind

with leaving always on my mind

home was never home to me

at any time

every front door found me hoping

I would find the back door open

there just had to be an exit

for the running kind

within me there's a prison

surrounding me alone

as real as any dungeon

with its walls of stone

I know running's not the answer

though running's been my nature

and the thing in me

that keeps me moving on

I was born the running kind

with leaving always on my mind

South Park vs. Japan: a battle of ethnic sarcasm

Simply by existing on this glorious green earth, one is subject to scrutiny. There is fodder that surrounds us all, and those with wit have the advantage of capitalizing on the opportunity to make fun of others.

Humor is not easy to come by. Some of us are born with impeccable comedic timing and others wallow in a shallow grave of stale gags and mediocre one liners they picked up from a guy funnier than they.

Recently, the shock value of a joke is at a price too high for riches. All the cock talk, dick and fart jokes, and the grotesque animation to date dominates the comedic spectrum and almost drowns out classical stand up gigs and variety shows.

Of course, at the top of this heap of vulgarity and sarcasm notoriously lies South Park. Creators Matt Parker and Trey Stone have crafted the basest farce known to air on syndicated television. The humor is ribald and offensive; an abomination of what the notion of cartoons used to stand for as a wholesome, friendly way to send a message. A modern-day Aesop's fable, if you will. South Park attacks nearly every ethnic group known to man and does it shamelessly and with cutting truth. Lest we forget, their biggest targets are themselves.

As an American expatriate, living in Japan has enlivened a sarcastic spirit. In the last few seasons of South Park, my interest was waning and I believed it had lost any sense of real poignancy in it's humor and creativity to do so.

However, my mind is no longer addled by the senselessness of American culture, politics and people, so I therefore seek truth in that which I can bemuse myself. That, or Japanese have no sense of humor I can understand, so I resort to the extreme and inundate myself with potty talk and the patronizing defamation of any living soul.

The one thing South Park doesn't discriminate on is it's fair and equal castration of ethnic groups alike. The Mexicans, Mormons, Peruvian flutists and gays--they get it all the same, and they get it good. Nonetheless, the Japanese more so than other defamed featured foreigners seem to have captured the attention of South Park's creators for several seasons.

Starting in Season 3, the episode Chinpokomon aired. "Chinpokomon", in Japanese means "little penis", which is a reference I would have never picked up on had I not recapped the episode in the break room with my American co-worker within an earshot of my Japanese manager who laughed hysterically and proceeded to explain it's meaning.

The episode features knock-off Pokemon dolls who brainwash the children into conspiring with the Japanese to take over America. In the end, the toys ultimately became uncool and the plan to re-bomb Pearl Harbor is aborted.

Season 7's Japancentric episode, Good Times with Weapons was a rattling spoof on anime and ninja play fighting. The boys' imaginations take them to an anime world where all sense of reality is lost--much like Japan in the sense that people can become so obsessed with the anime otaku culture.
In both episodes, Parker and Stone clearly identify Japanese fads that became mainstream in America. Yet, in the most recent Japan episode from Season 13, "Whale Whores", South Park has seemed to step up it's social commentary game and tried to stir the pot, targeting both the issue of whaling and dolphin killing in Japan as well as the craptastic Discovery Channel show Whale Wars.

This episode, like many others, uses a little reverse psychology. They aren't making fun of the Japanese, rather the people who are complaining about the Japanese killing whales and dolphins and believe the Japanese to be a barbaric country full of men dressed in robes who run around spearing things. It only proves American ignorance to foreign cultures such as Japan and exposes such stereotypes through mockery.

It was well-played, and these Japan episodes definitely have a native player on the inside. Word is Trey Parker's wife is Japanese and he can speak the language well. In that case, I'm sure his understanding for the culture is much greater than the average American's. Even if not, he at least made his point that sometimes the funniest ethnic put downs are more elaborate than just exaggerated racial profiling. It is an attack on our own ignorance and maybe those of us too dimwitted to realize have the last laugh.

A fad for fall plaid

It's not just the youngsters, err should I say hipsters, that are making this pattern famous across Japan. When a fashion trend reaches it's moment in the sun, everyone wants a few of it's rays.

With the cool, crisp air blowing and the foliage that excites us to many a-Kodak moment, plaid is the fashion for fall and it is on every hanger, thrift store and Japanese person in sight.

I often associate plaid with a few fellow Americans. One being the lumberjack. A burly type that cuts raw lamb's meat on a wooden chopping block inside his log cabin on a cold winter night. The fire crackles, his beard itches and the flannel plaid is warming his muscles with each checkered square.

Another plaid partisan you would find more in the eccentric pockets of urban cities. The hipsters don plaid for every occasion, whether it's riding their fixed gears to the art show or behind the counter of a dilettante cafe. Their unwashed, greasy hair lines with a film their unkempt stubble, an assortment of tattoos and piercings, thick rimmed glasses all the way down to their skinny jeans and beat up skate shoes. Plaid to the hipster is a way of saying f u to those who care about fashion. But, then again, if the hipsters have created their own group in an attempt to be group-less, then what is anything they do other than trendy?

For Japanese, plaid is less of a peg for a particular kind of person. It knows no boundaries aside from it's inscribed patchwork. Plaid is ageless and sexless. It is cool to wear popular fashions in Japan, so everyone jumps on this quilted bandwagon. If you were to compliment a Japanese person for their choice in plaid, chances are they will have never heard of the word.