QUESTIONS AND KRAMSWERS

Sukiya's three cheese beef bowl.

From @Ben_BC via Twitter:

Q: What is the best food you've eaten? The worst?

A: This is such a hard question. I've had so much great food since coming here, it's hard to pick just one thing. I wish I could say something super exotic and strange has been the greatest, but I can't.

I really love Sukiya, a restaurant that specializes in gyuudon (beef over rice) and Japanese style curry. I totally avoid their curry (there's a much better game in town for that), but their gyuudon is amazing. I prefer the garlic or three cheese beef bowl.

As for the worst food, I can't stand natto (fermented soy beans). Everything about it disgusts me. The taste, the smell, the texture, the consistency. Just awful. You are supposed to eat it over rice, but I don't know why you would ruin perfectly good rice like that.

Q: Are you really that much taller than everyone?

A: By and large, yes. To be fair, I'm pretty tall, even for an American. I'm 6' 4" (193 cm), so it's not very common that I spot someone who is taller or even as tall as I am, unless they are also a foreigner. Every so often, I'll spot some Japanese guy who is, and it kinda freaks me out. It's not a frequent occurrence, but it happens.

Q: Thing you have geeked over the most?

A: Being a huge Japan geek before ever living here, there were certainly expectations about all the amazing things I would see. For the most part, those things lived up to their promise.

Akihabara, a district of Tokyo known for it's high concentration of geek-centric businesses, was all I'd hoped it would be. Imagine a giant mall (as big as four or five city blocks) full of arcades, comic books, video games, DVDs/Blu-rays, costumes, collectibles, and even themed restaurants and cafes. The streets are plastered with giant billboards advertising the latest anime and games. I love it, and if you're into this kinda thing, you'll love it too.

The rooftop garden at the Ghibli Museum.

I also geeked pretty hard over the Ghibli Museum. Imagine the "magic" of a Disney theme park, but way more chilled out. It was awesome.

The most unexpected thing I geeked out over was a DVD of Anathallo performing live at a venue in Tokyo called o-nest. To my knowledge, this DVD is only available in Japan and did not have a very large print run. I managed to pick it up at Book Off for 500 yen (about 5 bucks). That was a good day.

From @amandaSTROY via Twitter:

Q: How prevalent is mental illness, and which types are the most common?

A: I can't say I expected to get a question like this, but I will try to answer it all the same. I am not a medical professional, so I can only surmise an observational response. Please bear with me.

First of all, Japanese have the highest average life expectancy worldwide (82.6 years), so I'm sure cases of Alzheimer's disease and senile dementia are much more frequent. Secondly, Japan has one of the highest suicide rates globally (about 24.4 suicides per 100,000 people), so clinical depression likely has some place in those numbers. If we're including eating disorders categorically within mental illness, its hard to ignore the fact that Japan is #2 internationally in eating disorder-related deaths (just below the U.S. of A.).

The above is what I could assume from some quick fact-checking. In my personal experience, I have encountered a number of individuals with some noticeable mental disability, whether it's mental retardation or some form of autism. I would say I notice it about as often as I did in the States. In fact, one of my students has some form of high-functioning autism. Dude is a beast at English when I can get him to focus, which is our biggest stumbling block.

From Nicolle via Facebook:

Q: Compare your connection to the culture before and after the national devastation.

A: If anything, I feel closer the culture and people of Japan. As the events continued to unfold post-quake - with the tsunami, the nuclear reactors, the rolling blackouts, and the food shortages - I was continually amazed at how calm everyone was reacting. It made the events of this epic (I hate to use this word, but I feel that it's completely apropos here) disaster seem much less than it was.

I'm not going to say that there was no looting (because there was), and I'm not going to say every decision made by the Japanese government and TEPCO were the best possible options (because they weren't). All I can comment on is the reaction that I observed from my home.

I stood shoulder-to-shoulder for more than an hour with people waiting to buy food and water at the grocery store. No one showed a single sign of irritation or anxiety. I waited in line for more than an hour to put a voluntary 2000 yen ration of gas into my vehicle, and I didn't hear a single car horn or see anyone try to cut in.

But most importantly, I talked to my students, who expressed concern for the current situation, but ultimately had high hopes about Japan's ability to recover from this. I will not say that this is because Japanese have a predilection for sitting back and accepting everything. Most of my student don't trust a word of what their government or TEPCO is telling them. These are free-thinking people, like everyone everywhere, who are doing the best they can in the worst of times. I couldn't be prouder to live amongst them.

From Joshua via Facebook:

Q: How insanely popular is Pokemon?

A: As popular as it's ever been. Which is to say, insanely. I would say more than 50% of my students (both children and adults) still play the games. There has been a new movie every year for the past 14 years, and the TV series is pushing 700 episodes. The newest series, Pokemon: Best Wishes!, is being heavily advertised on television right now. So yeah, it's big.

From Emily via Facebook:

Q: What has been the hardest thing about being away from home?

A: The obvious answer here is family and friends. While I miss my loved ones terribly, Skype has been a godsend for that. Other than that… Taco Bell. God, I miss Taco Bell.

Q: Was the application process difficult?

A: Not terribly, just long. It took us about three months of applying to find a job and three more months to actually get to Japan. I've detailed most of the application process in one of my first blog posts. Check it out here: "HOW DEY DO DAT?"

From Britney via Facebook:

Q: Is there anything you never thought you would miss about the states but realized that you do now that you can't have it?

A: Pretty much everything I miss about the States I kinda knew I would miss. Of course, the aforementioned Taco Bell. I also really miss [adult swim]. I think the most unexpected thing I miss is the convenience of doing pretty much anything. Until I achieve some level of Japanese fluency, things like paying my bills or asking for directions remain a small pain in my ass.

From Thomas via Facebook:

Q: Given that the universe is infinite and God is also infinite, would you like some toasted tako balls? via Facebook from Thomas

A: These things considered, I am not a huge fan of octopus. Thanks for the offer, though.

From Melissa via Facebook:

Q: What are the public restrooms like?

A: Most public restrooms are cleaner than they have any right to be, even in the most unexpected places - like train stations. Most sinks are automatic, and its anyone's guess at to whether or not the bathroom will provide a means of drying your hands. This is an occasional annoyance. Aside from these points, there are two major types of restrooms, or rather, toilets.

These two toilets exist on polar ends of a vast and chasmic spectrum. The first is a revelation. A toilet straight out of some high-tech utopian future landscape. This toilet has everything - heated seat, built-in sink, bidet, automatic air freshener, and even a courtesy sound effect maker to cover all of your rude bathroom noises.

The other, to put it simply, is little more than a glorified hole in the floor and the bane of my existence. There is plumbing and porcelain but not much else. One is expected to crouch over this torture device to do their business. I have yet to figure out how to do it without removing every article of clothing from the waist down. There are few things in this country I hate more than this toilet, no matter how clean it may be.

Q: Are there many SUVs?

A: Not really, although large cars have become very popular in recent years, specifically the "wagon" and "box" style.

Q: Are the parking spaces all really tiny?

A: Depends on the parking lot. Chain businesses usually have amply large parking spaces, and plenty to go around. The same cannot be said for locally owned businesses. Occasionally, these types of businesses will have no parking to speak of. They ask that their customers use some alternate means of transportation. It's amazing they can even stay open, but they do.

Q: Do the buses run 24/7?

A: Nope, and neither do the trains. Buses and trains usually stop around midnight and resume at around six in the morning. This, of course, depends on the area but is a general assessment.

Q: Do you guys have a car? If not, how do you get your groceries home?

A: Yes, we actually have two. Our company provides each with a vehicle to get to and from work and anywhere else we want to go within a 100 km radius. If we didn't have cars, we still have a "Mom & Pop" market across the street from us and a major grocery store within walking distance. Most people without cars ride bicycles or take public transportation everywhere.

Q: Do they have an equivalent to Sam's or Costco?

A: Yes, there is a Costco in the next prefecture. It usually takes about 2 hours to get there, so we don't go very often, but when we do, we make it count.

From Mitchell via Facebook:

Q: Do they teleport?

A: Not to my knowledge.

Q: Do they ever sleep?

A: Probably.

Q: Why are their hours so much more plentiful than the rest of the world?

A: I have yet to experience this phenomenon.

Q: How do they become JP ONLY?

A: Not sure how to answer this. It's probably just a Japanese thing.

From @alexkramermusic via Twitter:

Witness my bigness and sumo-size yukata.

Q: How often do you sense fear and/or admiration from Japanese strangers regarding your size? Any funny anecdotes?

A: I would say I sense neither fear nor admiration at any time from anyone. If I detect anything, it's usually just a bit of "good grief, he is big." When I went to Nikko, the hotel I stayed at did not have a regular yukata in my size, so I had to wear the "sumo-size." Rikishi are typically very admired. However, I am no sumotori - I'm only as big as one. I also use my size to threaten one of my students who does not like to do homework. I often ask him, "Mirai, if you don't do your homework, we will have to fight. Do you want to fight me?" He always replies with "No, Dustin. I might die." So, there's that.