Requiem for a Fuzzy Critter

Six months before I arrived here in Japan my next-door neighbor found two kittens -newborns- under a tree in the park near our apartment. They had been abandoned to die by someone whom didn't want to have their cat spayed, but also didn't want kittens. Since they were way too young, their lives would have been extinguished if my neighbor hadn't found them and taken them to the local vet.

Japan is a harsh world for the domestic breeds of feline; Dogs are revered here but cats are kinda looked down upon. Though it seems that neither dogs nor cats are treated particularly well, the cats do seem to get the short end of the stick. There are no animal shelters here, strays are tolerated mostly because the roads are very narrow and treacherous and the high animal fatality rate on them does a good job of controlling the populations.

So, the vet took in the two little balls of fur and cared for them for three months, bottle-feeding them and nursing them back to health. They did this free of charge and out of the kindness of their own hearts.

These two kittens, both female, were given the names Genki-Chan (smaller, and much more energetic) and Kitty-Chan (Quieter, and brain damaged) by my neighbor when they were given back to him after their condition had stabilized.

When asked why he named the brain damaged one "Kitty-Chan", my neighbor would reply: "It seems that when a child is mentally retarded here, they seem to get locked in a "childhood cycle" by the adults, regardless of how old they are. Always being referred to by cute names... KittyChan will never make it to CatKun or CatSan, she will forever be known as "KittyChan" because of her condition." My neighbor is also a Junior High English teacher, and as an American, he is also getting some interesting insights into Japanese culture.

Genki-chan became an outdoor cat rather quickly, going outside for many days on end. We suspect that perhaps she had another house she visited on occasion. Certainly, she would paw at my window from time to time and I would let her in whereby she would promptly curl up in my bed and go to sleep. Over the last year, she returned less and less often.

KittyChan, however, was very much afraid of her own shadow. She would go outside, because her sister would, but, not being half as adventurous, she would come back as soon as she possibly could and retreat to the apartment.

KittyChan had balance issues and had difficulty jumping up onto things, so she didn't like being outside, which was full of tall things and loud cars and mean tomcats. So the neighbors had built a little house for her in their apartment (Which, like mine, was very small to begin with), and they let KittyChan have her own small world.

KittyChan also had sporadic heath issues. At one point I had to take my neighbor and a very unhappy KittyChan to the vet so that they could clear a urinary blockage. We took turns scratching KittyChans head so she would calm down, but she was a very unhappy kitty (She was also in a box... Which would definitely make anyone unhappy... But we don't have much in the way of cat carriers for her).

Our apartment complex doesn't allow for cats, and thus our neighbor lived in constant fear that somewhere along the line someone from our apartment complex would find out about KittyChan and GenkiChan and would fine them or demand they move out or something.

KittyChan visited my apartment rarely. She would very quickly discover that it kinda looked like home, but smelled different and things were moved about, she would ultimately freak out and I would have to take her next door. Her round form shivering, back to a place that made sense to her.

During summer break, my neighbors decided to take a trip about Japan. They left KittyChan in my care. I tried to bring her to my apartment, but she just stood on my bed -shivering- and cried. So, once or twice a day I'd go over to their apartment and scratch her head and talk to her and keep her company.

When Jessie came to stay with us, she helped take care of KittyChan with me and -after a fashion- KittyChan grew to think that maybe Jessie and I were not so scary after all.

For KittyChan, this was a major accomplishment.

GenkiChan, on the other hand, was turning into a regular cat; she was sweet and kind, showing up at my apartment every week or so to hang out with me and explore my strange place-which-looked-like-home-but-wasn't. Then she'd settle down and go to sleep on my bed. Sometimes, if I was napping, she'd curl up next to me and purr.

And still her sister followed her outside for a little while... Trying very hard to be normal like Genk... But in the end, she just couldn't take the outside world and she'd retreat to the neighbor's apartment.

When I'd go over to spend some time with my neighbors (They are from New Mexico, and they make an excellent burrito... Something that is sorely lacking here in Japan...) KittyChan would always be there, very confused that the number of people in the apartment was different than the last time she checked. But after a while, she would let me scratch her head, and somewhere along the line, she would even calm down. In the last few months, she even seemed to get the hang of jumping up and down off the bed (Our beds in this apartment complex are raised about 4 and a half feet off the ground with a very large storage space underneath). She still seemed to scramble for purchase, but at least it wasn't a crash landing any more.

Since I left Luna and Tsuki in Colorado with friends, I have really enjoyed having cats nearby. I miss my cats dearly, and KittyChan and GenkiChan are pretty close surrogates to Luna and Tsuki... Here we have a smart, sweet one and a mentally retarded adorable one. The parallels were stunning; KittyChan is markedly more brain-damaged than Tsuki (Tsuki doesn't have the motor-skill issues), but they both have that same, strange, lovable, wholly terrified personality. As if the parallels weren't scary enough KittyChan and GenkiChan are both black as well. Though KittyChan has the most remarkable fur; though black, it is white at the roots, which means she looks black until you rub her fur, when there are these amazing, and beautiful, bursts of white.

This morning, my neighbor found KittyChan's body under my windowsill, she had tried to jump down. She landed wrong, probably slipped on a rock and broke her neck. She died instantly.

Only a few feet from home... and safety.

An interesting solution to the Kanji issue

I just recently purchased a Nintendo DS. It's a completely over-the-top Gameboy (It's the newest generation). I purchased it because it has a touch screen which allows you to "write" in the game. Why, would you ask, would I pick up a gameboy since I've only really had a passing interest in games anyway?

Well, the clever folks here, make Kanji games for the DS. You practice writing the idiographic Japanese characters on the screen and it tells you if you did it right or not... this sold me.

You see Japanese has 3 alphabets: one for domestic words (Like and, the, but, to and at), and one for imported words (Like Beer, Computer, Convininece Store), and then a third which is idiographic (Meaning each "Letter" represents a concept or idea, like Egyptian Heiroglyphics) which is used for proper verbs and nouns. Daily writing combines all three of these in a not-very-clean, often very confusing mannor. Japanese also has no spacing, so they are thrown together in a mish-mash of characters that ramble on worse than my blog posts.

The worst of these three alphabets is called "Kanji" and it was borrowed from the Chinese nearly 1000 years ago. Thus (And this is a nice side effect), the characters mean the same thing in both languages (so I'm also learning Chinese in a limited way).

The problem is that each "letter" represents an idea... and humans have a lot of ideas.... thus to have an alphabet in which each character represents an idea... well... needless to say there are 1,945 "letters" in this alphabet (You have a character that means "Sun", and "Moon" and "Son" and "Daughter" and "Bright" and "Dark"... etc)... to make matters worse, it's imported... so every one of those "Letters" has a Chinese reading (Or a close approximation) and a Japanese reading (The word that was used at the time to represent the same thing in the spoken Japanese language). Generally, when you see a character by itself, surrounded by Hiragana (The Domestic word alphabet), it is read the Japanese way... but if the same character is written next to another Kanji character, it is read in the Chinese way... of course, that's not always the case...

Thus, a word like the Verb "To Go" is pronounced "Ii", with the hiragana (The domestic alphabet) character "Ki" following it... which sounds like "Iki"... but the same character is used in the word for bank as the last character and in that case it is pronounced "Koh" (GinKoo). You just have to know that when it is in a sentance it means "To go" and when it's put with the other Kanji it means "Bank".... There is nothing anyone can do but buckle down and learn this... the hard way...

Here's the kicker: You have to know all 1,945 of these things, and all of their various readings (And some characters have more than one Japanese reading owning from having two dialects of Japanese get merged together) just to read the newspaper... or an instruction manual...

Needless to say it is a glum prospect to sit down and learn to read Kanji, knowing that it's going to be hours upon hours of practice before you can even read a childrens' book. Even if you were fluent in the spoken language, it's years of work to learn to read.

Maia is just now passing the 3rd year Kanji test (As in what Japanese 3rd graders can read), and she has been here for 3 years... I have 1st year down (The basics, number, days of the week, sun, moon, etc), and about half of the 2nd year Kanji figured out (I know what they mean, but not how to read them). Children don't know all of the Kanji for reading a newspaper until they graduate Junior High. So it takes them 9 years of schooling to get to the stage where they can read everything in a newspaper correctly. At 6th grade, however, you are considered passing-literate. At that point, you'll be tripped up 10% or so of the time, but you can at least read the comic books...

So when Maia showed up with a Kanji game for her DS, I was totally intrigued. It makes learning these things a little more interesting than simply writing them down over and over and over... so I too purchased a used DS and picked up a Kanji game...

Of course, both of our DS's are in Japanese, and the games are designed for 8 year olds... but 8 year olds who are fluent in Japanese... so they are a little tough for us...

Which I guess is good practice.

But, as many of my friends will be interested in hearing: I now own a DS... and I am now entering into the land of pocket-video-games... I'm not above getting real games for the DS (I bought a couple)... but they really have to be interesting... We'll see.

--Me.

Just Tired

It's been a busy week and a half here... nothing major (I went on a trip! I'll tell you about that once I fix the pictures). But I'm just tired... I'll post more on Friday!

I just didn't want you folks thinking I had forgotten you guys! :D

---Me

Settin' the Way-Back machine.... The Punk

Okay, so since I have a moment or two, I'll go on ahead and talk about some of the other stories that I keep saying I'll talk about, then never do.

So: Set the Way-Back machine for November 2006... And I'll write the post as it was just after the incident happened :D

---The Punk--

For the last few months, I have been suffering from a wobbly wheel... not really a wobbly wheel per se, but at about 40 Km a hour or so there is a noticable bump in my steering wheel.

I've checked the tire, but it seems to be fine (A little worn, maybe, but fine nonetheless).

It has been getting progressively worse and so about a week ago (This was in November, keep in mind :D), I gathered up my neighbor and we went to the local Yellow Hat (Which is Japanese for "Auto Parts"... okay, so it's really Japanese for "Yellow Hat"... but it is an Auto Parts Store... I don't know what a Yellow 10 gallon hat has to do with Auto Parts, but it makes sense to the Japanese...).

We pull in there and see that they are having a sale on tires. This is very convinient since I believe my problem is in my tire and therefore I need new tires.

I find a tire that I like, in my cars' size, and the price looks good (About $100, so that should be about $25 a tire...)... what does this Kanji mean? I ask my neighbor, who is far better at Japanese than I...

Oh, he says, that means "Per unit" as in $100 per tire...

My eyes get very large... Oh... I say simply...

And we leave... $500 for putting tires on the car (I have a normal spare on the back) is a little much for me.. in fact, $200 was a little much for me at the very end of the month.

So I continue driving about.

So, it is raining, a cold, nasty November rain and I am on my way to school when the bumping on my steering becomes almost uncontrollable and as I start driving from a light, becomes really obnoxious... so I turn onto a side road (It should be noted that most Japanese streets are two lanes wide exactly, and pulling over will block traffic, so I pulled onto a side street... which is one lane wide... and I'm blocking the entire road.

My right front is flat... it's so flat that it has popped off the rim of the wheel and is happily flobbling all over the place and smiling at me as if to tell me I really should have spent that $200 a while back to replace it...

So I grumlbe a little and as I get back in the car I notice a line of cars waiting patiently behind me (They can't get around me)... So, on the rim, I drive a little farther down the street and pull into some persons driveway. I would like to remind people that it is still raining... so I open the back of my car and pull out the spinner bar...

And notice there is no Jack.

Great... I have a spare on the rack behind my car... but unless I'm Hurcules, I'm not getting that tire off...

So I call my IC.

Side story: An IC is a person (Usually a stay-at-home mother) who is on call for my company to help in situations just like this one. My particular IC is about 2 months younger than me, and pretty durn cool. I really like working with her because she is a real hoot. IC's are generally fluent in English, and their primary job it to communicate with the "locals" when we have no clue what kind of trouble we are getting into.

Okay, so I'm calling my IC.

"Moshi Moshi?" She asks (Hello?)

"S-San, Punk Desu!" I say. (I have a Punk!)

Because, you see, in Japanese, the word for flat is Punkuchiyuru (Puncture)... but that's too complicated to say, so they shorten it to "Punk"... Of course a delinquent child is also called a "Punk", which I guess means the Japanese think delinquents are flat... Well...

"Oh no!" She says, switching to English, "Can you change it?"

"No! I don't have a jack!"

"Okay, I'll be there in 45 minutes (She lives quite a ways away from where I am).

By this time, I notice a man coming out of his house (The one in which I have pulled in front of), he is carrying an umbrella, and has a rather severe look on his face.

"Is there a problem?" He asks me in Japanese.

"I have a flat. But I don't have a Jack."

He looks at the flat tire and then waves to me to follow him into his garage.

I pull my car into his garage.

He pulls the jack out of his car and starts to change my tire... without so much as a comment, he changes my tire, puts the spare on and then quietly puts the jack away.

I bow a gazillion times and say thank you a lot... but he seems not really concerned...

He watches as I pull out and get back on the road... and then, as he came out, he went back into his house...

I call up S-san and tell her I'm okay, she meets me out there anyway (By that time she was already halfway to where I was). And so I tell her the story of the man at the house.

She seems pretty surprised too...

It's interesting... I mean I know I was in his driveway, but he could have done many things rather than help... I can't help but think that in America I would have been threatened with all kinds of nastiness if I hadn't moved my car to some other location to wait the arrival of my IC...

I just think that man was a really good fellow. Even with a severe face and never so much as cracking a smile once...

Hmm..

Anyway, setting the Way Back to today, I have replaced both fronts with brand-new tires and I'll be getting the backs done a little later.

I do have a jack... but it was wedged under the passenger seat... which is probably the last place (Save the Engine Compartment) that I would have looked for a jack...

Anyway, all's well that ends well...

And I have a great story of a really nice person.

--Me.