[This was written in the first week of April. It doesn't match the date of the posting and I wouldn't want anyone thinking the cherry blossoms came out in May or June.}

As you can see from the photos here and on the previous posting, the cherry blossoms - sakura- are out. One day, nothing and the next, there they are. They get pretty intense for a few days - seemed like less than a week - and then start to fall. If the wind is blowing, it looks like a snowstorm. My physics professor friend from the university said it's actually called a 'snow storm' of blossoms in Japanese. The ground is covered in pink petals. Then they get swept away and the trees come out green and they're gone until next year, when I have it on good authority that they'll be back. Samurai poets used to consider the short cycle of the cherry blossoms as a metaphor for life and it's easy to see why. Well, I think it's easy. Go ahead and take a poetic view and see what you come up with.

The weather here is not a surprise to me, of course, because I've been through the seasons before, but actually after living in California again for the last ten years, I had forgotten all the problems that come with the weather in Japan. I remembered some of them today because I got caught without my umbrella. This was especially annoying because I have a collapsible one that fits in my backpack and I had made the conscious decision to leave it at home this morning, apparently momentarily forgetting just where I was.

I only had to walk a short distance - far enough to get as wet as I wanted to, thank you very much - to get to a convenience store, every one of which in the country has a supply of cheap plastic umbrellas. Actually, you never have to walk more than a short distance to get to a convenience store in Japan no matter what you want. You often have to decide between convenience stores, there's that many. The umbrellas can run from about $3 on up and really help the stores live up to their 'convenience' theme.

Cheap is the operative word here. No one cares about them once the rain stops so they get thrown away, left in umbrella stands, forgotten on trains and stashed in clusters in closets. I saw a still-life of broken, discarded umbrellas under an apartment stairwell today. My own apartment came equipped with about six umbrellas, plus, of course, my own. I know - you're thinking 'and he still got caught out in the rain'. How dumb do think I felt?

I'm planning to get a motorscooter soon, for the general convenience and especially to save myself the 15 minute walk from the train station to the university. When it rains, it's a wash, pun intended, whether I get wetter walking or riding. When it's not raining, it's humid enough that when I get to my office, I look like I've been walking in the rain. Yes, I'm already tired of the walk. I'm not a person who gives himself a lot of extra time to get where he's going and when I'm already running late, that walk is a killer. Good exercise, true, but I can get that when I get back to my apartment and forget to buy bread.

Meanwhile, back at the supermarket...

I go there pretty much daily, too. I was actually in the store for the second time yesterday because I seem to have a problem these days with my memory and don’t like writing notes. Unfortunately this tendency now results in extra trips up and down five flights of stairs so I may be revising my habits.

Anyway, when I was next in line to pay, the checker was startled to see me. This happens once in a while, but not as often as one would think. I’m pretty much the opposite of anyone Japanese - 6’1” with red hair - and I always expect to be noticed when I go out. However, that very seldom happens. I haven’t been able to decide if it’s because everyone is getting used to foreigners in Japan or they’re just too polite to act surprised. I think I’m still the subject of a lot of dinnertime conversations, though. “Guess what I saw today!”

In all the time I’ve been in Japan, it has only happened a couple of times. Once, a child yelled at me from the other side of a train platform, “Gaijin-san!” (Mr. Foreigner) and once I sat down on the train and the man I sat next to got up and left. That was a shock, but someone told me later that he was probably just afraid that he would have to speak English. That’s what she said, anyway, but she might have just been being nice.

The checker was startled, but not afraid and used the encounter as a chance to speak English.

Her: Hello. Me: Hi. Her: What’s your name? Me: Rick. What’s your name? Her: Mariko. What’s your country? (Someone somewhere teaches this way to ask “Where are you from?” to most of the students in Japan. He must be found and stopped.) Me: I’m from California. Her: How old are you? Me: Sorry? Oh... well, I feel kind of old these days. Her: Are you married? Me: Ummm..., ahh, no. Not at the moment.

Now, back home, this would be considered either pretty direct for an introductory conversation, especially in the checkout line, or as rather suggestive. Of course, she was just practicing the sentences she knew in English with no awareness of the cultural attachments that go with language. I knew that, but even then I didn’t know exactly how to answer her. I didn’t want to answer her, even though I knew it didn’t mean anything.

That’s just one of the problems with learning a second language. Words carry a lot of meaning beyond their dictionary definition and it’s hard to know that and hard to teach that. In more serious conversations in Japanese, I often apologize for my Japanese ability at the start, trying to avoid any cultural misunderstandings that I may stumble into. Japanese, in my limited understanding, has words that are used only in certain situations. Your language depends on whom you’re speaking to and what you’re speaking about. Americans are a whole lot more casual with their language, but it’s still very possible to use the right words to say the wrong thing.

We parted friends. I’ll talk to her again when I can and let her practice her English on me. I’m not going to get into cultural context with her, though. I get paid for teaching things like that.

The cherry blossoms are out. The picture here is from my campus.