Day 76 – Cultural Pre-Port

Nov 12th

Julie’s Birthday
Julie turned 22 today! After she left for breakfast in the morning, I made a big sign for our door to wish her “Happy Birthday” and then proceeded to hide tons of little notes all over the room in her things. (I got the idea from Dad, who used to hide post-its all over my elementary school classroom after parent-teacher conferences. Thanks, Dad!) Some notes I just attached to her pictures hanging on the wall, others were in her pill jars or open M&M bags, but the best one was hidden in the cap of her shaving cream. I could hear her chuckling in the shower that afternoon when she found it. I still know that she hasn’t found half of them, but I think she really enjoys finding little surprises randomly. I also brought home this jasmine grass ball from Shanghai that is not only cool looking, but also dispenses a delicious smell. It works especially well when a guy friend of ours comes to our room and leaves “butt sweat” on her bed.

Cultural Pre-port
The population of Japan is approximately 127 million, which is about 99% percent ethnically homogenous. Most practice Shinto and Buddhism, while Confucianism, Christianity and Islam are also practiced. Because of this uniformity, they generally all follow the same ethical and cultural mannerisms. Below I listed a few just to give you a taste:
- Don’t walk and eat at the same time… you will look like a sloppy American.
- Do appreciate Hello Kitty, which is the national icon of the Sanrio Company
- Do not forget to slurp your noodles... it means you like them.
- Try to avoid with chopsticks: spearing the food, rummaging around in a dish, using the other end the other of your chopsticks to take food from communal plates, passing food with them, waving them above a dish while trying to decide what to take next, standing your chopsticks vertically in your rice,
- Do bow and smile to greet someone.
- Wait until everyone’s glass if full before saying cheers: ‘kampai’!
- When sitting on the floor, either tuck your legs underneath you or sit cross-legged. Don’t stretch your legs out in front of you.
Otherwise, they basically told us that we are all going to stick out like sour thumbs being as we are European looking and mostly too boisterous for their culture. We all promised we would behave ourselves.

Registration Daze
So, I signed up for four hours of free internet on the ship to register for spring classes and housing at Vandy. The time slot was from 3AM to 7AM, since that is when students are not burdening the internet. It was pretty creepy being awake at that time especially since everyone was asleep trying to rest up for Japan. The boat has been especially rocky through the South China Sea, so things were creaking and banging all over the place last night. To bask in my isolation, I played that song “All By Myself” a few times, while I spent about 15 mins dealing with administrative things and the rest of the time on iChat, Facebook and Japan travel sites.

Highs and Lows
My “high” was finding the seasickness bags randomly scattered around the ship again, marking the ominous return of rocky waters. My “low” was realizing the Japanese have so many rules to eating with chopsticks.