Arrival in Tenryu

I arrived in Tokyo's Narita airport two weeks ago. A welcome end to a long flight made longer by the two and a half hour delay before take off in Minneapolis thanks to a Japanese English club in the United States that was running late for their flight. One of the students told me on the plane that they had been visiting Nebraska once we had gotten moving. I've never had any urge to visit Nebraska and was having trouble understanding why anyone would fly across the globe for a rousing week of corn and... is there anything else? When I think of Nebraska, I think of rural.

Tenryu is the Japanese manifestation of the idea of rural and a few more trips to Nebraska in my life might have prepared me a little more for what would be awaiting me here in Japan. For those I haven't already told about Tenryu-mura, I'll give a few sentences background. 'Ten' means, 'heaven.' 'Ryu,' means Dragon. Just like in Streetfighter. 'Mura' identifies Tenryu as a village, there's also Tenryu-kyo up the road a bit. That's a town. You get the idea. Tenryu has fewer than 2000 villagers spread out over a pretty wide area, with a modest main area clustered around the river, schools, village office, and train station. Of that population, The majority are over 50. There's a modest number of younger parents, and I teach all of their children. In the junior high school where I teach most days, there are 27 students. My smallest class has 6, the largest, 13. I haven't had class yet, but I've already met most of them.

The past two weeks have been holiday time in Japan. It's Obbon, a time for acknowledging and respecting ancestors as it has been explained to me by my Japanese friends. Obbon is a great time for Japanese families to get back together in their hometowns and villages and have some real quality time. No friends to speak of and no ancestors have made the past two weeks a little slow paced. But then last Thursday, I was finally thrust in front of the village at the annual Summer Festival.

The whole town, or at least those that are still capable of walking or being carried came out to the Junior high school's soccer field for a good old time with music, food, and fireworks. I met up with my vice principal and then we went down at 7 or so for our first beer and yakitoris. On the way, I was introduced to everyone. Every student I would teach, their parents, the PTA. I chatted with the Mayor and my bosses at the Board of Education. Lots of people were decked out in Kimonos, including many of my kids, while some people brought a little feeling of country from back home to me. The wife beaters, and bleached blond pigtails made it feel a little more like home, but not quite in a way I might have been expecting. The evening was a lot of fun, particularly as the fireworks started and the dancing began. By dancing, I mean 8 or so basic movements to a beat that would repeat for maybe 20 minutes. Then a new dance would begin and we would do it in the opposite direction around the circle. I joined a group of younger students and their matronly dance teacher to try to pick up the steps.

I was awful, but the gesture was appreciated and, slowly, village members with a few beers under their belts began to filter through the circle and find me to test out the English they had learned back in high school, or to get their children to translate for them. The most commonly asked question, "How old are you?" Immediately followed by, "You look so young!" This is the gist of every conversation I've had in Japan thus far. But I stuck around until the night ended fielding questions and fanning the humid country air off my face. By the end of the night I had even made friends with a few people closer to my age in the village getting back to their roots for Obbon. They all left their email addresses in my hand and left from the train station the next day to return to the cities they now worked or studied in.