Job: English teacher in Kagoshima
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This job listing received directly via Neil Reid of IAC:
IAC Academy of Language and Overseas Study is looking for an experienced native English teacher to join our team in Kagoshima. At IAC, we pride ourselves on our commitment to providing excellent English education and our personal investments to our students and their families, and the IAC family. We are looking for a part time instructor to teach three hours on Saturdays at a culutural center. If you are enthusiastic, have a great work ethic and are interested in joining the IAC family please send your resume to the address below.
Neil Reid
Human Resources and Recruitment Manager
IAC
neil@go2iac.com
WIT Life #94: Beard Papa and other familiar favorites
Anecdote Article, Food & Drink, Translating/Interpreting, WIT Life Comments Off on WIT Life #94: Beard Papa and other familiar favorites
WITLife is a periodic series written by professional Writer/Interpreter/Translator Stacy Smith (Kumamoto-ken CIR, 2000-03). She starts her day by watching Fujisankei’s newscast in Japanese, and here she shares some of the interesting tidbits and trends together with her own observations.
Today is our last full day in San Francisco, so I decided to explore some of the offerings in the immediate vicinity of where I am staying, Hotel Nikko. Here in the lobby there are so many Japanese customers that I occasionally get flashbacks to the many times I spent in Kumamoto’s Hotel Nikko at various events during my time on JET. Natsukashii!
I went for a walk to the local mall with my co-interpreter who was on a mission to find cream puffs. I had no idea that Beard Papa had an outpost here on the West Coast, but sure enough Read More
WITLife is a periodic series written by professional Writer/Interpreter/Translator Stacy Smith (Kumamoto-ken CIR, 2000-03). She starts her day by watching Fujisankei’s newscast in Japanese, and here she shares some of the interesting tidbits and trends together with her own observations.
My interpreting travels bring me to San Francisco this time, and I couldn’t leave without paying a visit to Japantown. I hadn’t been there in a couple of years, but I clearly remembered the array of restaurants, souvenir shops and an onsen-like spa I once had a soak in. I went with a friend who was craving something sweet and wanted a recommendation, so I suggested we get 白玉汁粉 (shiratama shiruko), one of my favorite Japanese desserts following ぜんざい (zenzai). We ended up at Kissako Tea where we were served by Hiro and Koji, pretending to be a charming 
couple in the picture on the right.
Kissako also had a nice selection of mochi (pictured left), including Read More
More JETAA Iron Chef — Now in Sydney
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Here’s a message from the JETAA group in Sydney, Australia about their Sushi Iron Chef Event —
Event reminder – JETAA Sushi Iron Chef this Saturday!
Will you be the JETAA Iron Chef?
That’s right – the JET Alumni association is having a cook-off! Iron Chef style!!
All former JETS and folks interested in Japan are invited to attend!
Without giving too much away, sushi will be rolled, Japanese music will be played, and yes, there will be Iron-Chef like exaggerated commen…tary, hmmms…and ahhhs from judges and fun prizes to be had!
Please come along and bring your friends (RSVP plz)
Cost per head is the low low price of $15
The location is 64 Lawrence St Alexandria
(http://www.facebook.com/l/1026a;maps.google.com.au/maps?hl=en&q=64+Lawrence+St+Alexandria&um=1&ie=UTF-8&hq=&hnear=64+Lawrence+St,+Alexandria+NSW+2015&gl=au&ei=2j7rS7S0LorGrAewlazYCQ&sa=X&oi=geocode_result&ct=title&resnum=1&ved=0CBkQ8gEwAA)
Nearest train station is Erskineville. Street parking is available.
Looking forward to seeing you there!!
Yes, New York has Japanese belly dancers, too
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By JQ Magazine’s Justin Tedaldi (CIR Kobe-shi, 2001-02) for Examiner.com. Visit his NY Japanese Culture page here to subscribe for free alerts on newly published stories.
Nahoko Sugiyama discovered her niche at an early age. As a little girl growing up in Tokyo, she imitated the moves of the Japanese idols she saw on TV. As a teenager, a penchant for clubbing set the foundation to become a dancer, and in her twenties she took up Oriental (belly) dance, Quickly becoming a popular draw through professional appearances, she decided to make a career out of this exotic form of expression.
Moving to New York in 2006 for more in-depth training, Sugiyama joined the Mosaic Dance Theater Company a year later. “One of my teachers in here is a choreographer for this company, therefore I joined it,” she explains. “We have a wide range of Middle Eastern dance numbers, not only Oriental dance, which makes us unique. We focus on theater shows, [and] have big theater shows both in New Jersey and New York every year.”
This Friday, she will perform at Manhattan’s Arena Event Space with six other dancers as part of the Alternative Belly Dance Show.
Job: Part-time English Teacher to Japanese
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Hills Learning, a language school in New York City, is working on an exciting and new curriculum for Japanese who would like to learn English in New York City. The course is called “New York Cultural English,” and is currently looking for the right teacher for the job.
Ideal candidates will have previous experience teaching Japanese and Japanese language skills.
New York Cultural English
– 10am to 12pm on weekdays (Mon, Wed, Fri) available
– Fri 12 to 2pm, and some nights also available
– Looking for a culturally savvy teacher who has a background in the Japanese language.
– The course is designed around cultural events and activities in New York City, so cultural knowledge and a fun, energetic personality are strongly desired
For more information about the school: ;Language School New York
By JQ Magazine’s Justin Tedaldi (CIR Kobe-shi, 2001-02) for Examiner.com. Visit his NY Japanese Culture page here to subscribe for free alerts on newly published stories.
As reported at Sakura Matsuri earlier this month, cosplay (costume play) is a growing trend among youthful patrons of public Japan-related gatherings. Last year, New York’s Japan Society hosted its first-ever cosplay party as part of its KRAZY! exhibition dedicated to anime, manga and video games. The event was a sold-out success, drawing nearly 500 fans who expressed their visual zeal (not to mention their tailoring abilities) for the more contemporary facets of Japanese culture. This year’s edition, fittingly titled Cosplay Party 2.0, kicks off Saturday, May 15, and is expected to top last year’s inaugural event.
The day promises a chance to meet and mingle with other cosplayers, nonstop musical entertainment by cosplay DJ Ruby Red, a photo booth, free admission to Japan Society’s current exhibition Graphic Heroes, Magic Monsters and a full-tilt costume competition, hosted by Uncle Yo and judged by World Cosplay Summit 2009 Team USA along with guest judge and Japan Society artist-in-residence Hiroki Otsuka. During the party, Japan Society’s theater will host New York’s big screen premiere of the anime film Evangelion 1.11: You Are (Not) Alone.
Tom Baker interviews 2 movie directors, pans one manga
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Tom Baker (Chiba-ken, 1989-91) is a staff writer for The Daily Yomiuri. He usually writes for DYWeekend, the paper’s arts and leisure section. You can follow Tom’s blog at tokyotombaker.wordpress.com.
He recently interviewed Shane Acker, director of the animated film “9” and Richard Kelly, who most recently directed “The Box,” a thriller starring Cameron Diaz. He also reviewed the manga “Hot Gimmick.” Here are some excerpts:
Shane Acker
[The characters in the movie are all animated dolls with numbers instead of names.] A different personality aspect is dominant in each one. Rigid orthodoxy is represented by leader 1 (voiced by Christopher Plummer), creativity by inventor 2 (Martin Landau), bravery by warrior 7 (Jennifer Connelly) and so on. Elijah Wood does the voice of 9, the truth-seeker of the group, and John C. Reilly voices his timid friend, 5…
The most amusing character is 8 (Fred Tatasciore), who embodies sheer physicality. In one scene, he achieves a moment of strange bliss by stroking his head with a large magnet, an activity that Acker called “degaussing himself.”
“In film school, especially in the days of video, if you had a videotape and you wanted to just wipe it clean, there’s a degaussing machine, which is basically like a supermagnet, and you would wave the videotape over the degausser and it would just take off all the footage that’s on there,” Acker explained. “So that’s the kind of idea, he’s sort of wiping his memory banks. You realize why he’s so dumb.”
Richard Kelly
Imagine that a mysterious stranger has just handed you a wooden box with a red button on top. He explains, rather convincingly, that if you push the button two things will happen: Someone whom you don’t know will die, and you will receive a payment of 1 million dollars…
In writer-director Richard Kelly’s movie The Box, based on a short story by Richard Matheson, the stranger’s name is Arlington Steward (Frank Langella), and he is conducting a high-stakes social experiment by visiting the homes of middle-class American couples and offering them the choice of pushing the button or not.
“Tonally this movie crosses a lot of genres,” Kelly, who previously wrote and directed Donnie Darko (2001) and Southland Tales (2006), told The Daily Yomiuri in a recent phone interview. “It’s a science fiction film, it’s a domestic melodrama, it’s a suspense film, there’s elements of horror in it, and there’s also some black comedy inherent…The conceit of pushing this button on this contraption and someone you don’t know dying is very mischievous. Anyone who would build this contraption and make this offer is smirking when they do it. And Matheson was smirking, I’m sure, when he wrote this short story.”
…[The story is set in the 1970s because] the mysterious stranger is a character type whose day has passed, according to Kelly. “When I set out to write this screenplay, I initially was trying to figure out how to make it work present-day, but when you introduce modern technology and the Internet, social networking sites, Google maps, satellite maps, reality TV, just our media-saturated world that we live in…there is no such thing as a real stranger anymore. Everyone can be found on the Internet. You can find anyone’s house, you can go onto a satellite map with a 360-degree view.”
“Hot Gimmick”
[In this manga, a high school girl’s seriously unhealthy relationships with her would-be boyfriends is presented as perfectly normal.]
For example, the day after one of her suitors is unable to reach her by phone (for reasons that are no one’s fault), he slaps her across the face so hard that bystanders rush to offer first aid. But Hatsumi chases after him to make the following speech, which he receives in stony silence: “I’m sorry. For being so clueless. For…never being able to get your calls…I’m so sorry. I’m really sorry. For not understanding how you feel about me. I’m sorry.”
Later, when one of the boys proposes to her, she thinks, “Maybe if we got married, he’d finally be nice to me.”
She seems unaware of some basic principles of healthy human interaction, such as this simple standard: If a friend arranges for you to be gang-raped, that person is not really your friend.
WITvid #7: “I Feel Good”
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WITvid is a periodic series by Peter Weber (Saitama-ken 2004-07), the JET Program Coordinator in San Francisco.
Oh man, it’s been awhile since I’ve posted a WITvid, but I came across this one and had to share. It’s a throwback to the the early 90’s the the early years of the JET Program. Timothy Beagley aka julesvegas (Kitashigayasu 1991-’92) presents a complication Enkai video set the sounds of the Godfather of Soul. Looks like not much has changed as far as Enkais go.
Enjoy!
Job: Miyazaki Gakuen *still* needs an English teacher (Miyazaki)
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Via the Miyakaki-ken Yahoo listserv:
This is a repost for Miyazaki Gakuen, which is still looking for good teacher to cover some Junior High and High School classes. Miyazaki Gakuen is a private High School located in the heart of Miyazaki City. The job starts in September and no teaching license is required.
Requirements:
-Bachelor’s Degree
-Be a native English speaker
-Conversational Japanese skills
-Prior teaching experience is a plus
Salary is around $3,000 a month. Paid vacation includes 10 days of nenkyu and one week of spring vacation, a month long summer break, and a week of winter break. This job requires you to work two Saturdays a month (first and third Saturday from 8:20 to 12:15). Weekend hours will be awarded with nenkyu.
Interested parties should send their resume in Japanese to Ernesto Salinas at ernestosalinas@hotmail.com.
Interview with ‘Beetle Queen Conquers Tokyo’ Director Jessica Oreck
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The film Beetle Queen Conquers Tokyo explores the history and mystery of the development of Japan’s love affair with bugs, underscoring ancient philosophies that will shift Westerners’ perspectives. JQ Magazine’s Justin Tedaldi (CIR Kobe-shi, 2001-02) talked with producer/writer/director Jessica Oreck on the eve of the film’s New York premiere for Examiner.com. Visit his NY Japanese Culture page here to subscribe for free alerts on newly published stories.
Would you describe this film as a documentary, or something else?
I try not to label films too methodically. Some of my favorite “narrative” films are not “documentary” but certainly seem more honest than films based on facts. So I guess I’ll just keep it simple and call it a movie.
Have you always had an interest in insects and Japan? What made you want to go there to capture these images personally?
I have loved insects since I was a little girl, so when I stumbled onto the Japanese enthusiasm for the same ostracized order, it felt like it was meant to be. I studied filmmaking, biology and ecology in university; I knew I wanted to make films about ethnobiology, so this was the perfect film with which to start.
The Japanese concept of mono no aware (which describes the awareness in the transience of things) is invoked early on in the film. Was this the original thesis before filming, or did this thread to traditional concepts develop later in the process?
I did extensive research before traveling to Japan, and I laid out a 17-page essay that included pieces of Japanese history and philosophy I hoped to incorporate into the film. Mono no aware was just one of the many ideas that were intricately tied together within the architecture of the film as I initially envisioned it. I knew it would be part of the film’s foundation, but as the editing process progressed and I continued to refine the essay and skim off outer details, the concept of mono no aware became more and more pronounced. In this way, editing the footage and writing and editing the narration was a very organic process.
Were there any older Japanese-made films tackling this subject that you watched for reference?
As far as I know there are no other films that address this subject in particular. There are some fantastic Japanese films that have a lot of bugs in them—one of my favorites being Woman in the Dunes. But I think the Japanese film that I watched most often while making Beetle Queen was Kon Ichikawa’s Tokyo Olympiad. That movie is infinitely perfect to me.
Several scenes in the film depict Japanese children’s love of insects. Were the ones you filmed typical of that kind of interest, or were they more passionate than most about this? How would you define Japanese kids’ relationship with the insect world compared to American kids’?
A Japanese child’s relation to insects isn’t that different from an American’s child connection—if you catch them young enough. Most young children don’t have an innate fear of bugs (from my experience watching thousands of them pass through the butterfly vivarium at the American Museum of Natural History). It isn’t until they see dad flinch or mom scream that they learn disgust or fear. What’s different with a Japanese child is that they are encouraged to explore the insect world. They keep them as pets, their dads take them on insect collecting trips, and they travel halfway across the country to watch the fireflies emerge at dusk. I am generalizing, of course, but the phenomenon is, by and large, quite widespread.
In comparison, I believe that a Westerner’s view of the natural world is, in part, dictated by the cultural heritage of what I call the Judeo-Christian syndrome, through which we see the world as a linear chain of progress that culminates in the human form and bestows the power of control to the animals with the least sense of balance. However, I think an individual’s understanding of the natural world is still mostly directly absorbed through the behavior of the people they admire, and that that is why this connection to insects continues to thrive in Japanese culture.
The author and anatomist Dr. Takeshi Yoro is the only person interviewed on-camera for this film. How did you discover him, and were there any other experts or authorities whom you considered speaking with?
Dr. Yoro is a famous guy in Japan, so everywhere we went people asked if we had plans to interview him. Eventually we just decided to call him and, miraculously, he said he would be happy to be interviewed. It was never my intent to have talking heads, but so many of the things that Dr. Yoro said felt like pure poetry—he ended up being the key to some of my favorite parts in the movie.
Generally, what kind of support did you receive from the Japanese people you worked with and filmed? What was their reaction to an American filmmaker exploring what seems to be a uniquely Japanese interest?
Everyone was happy to have us, though they were often confused about why we were making this film. We got a lot of, “What? They don’t sell beetles in America?”
What should more Americans be aware of with respect to the insect world?
Well, I hate to limit the film’s impact to the insect world. To me, the film is about much more than bugs. I have had the opportunity to observe a myriad of reactions. Plenty of people have been surprised by the loss of their fear, or by newfound knowledge, or a novel appreciation for beauty in unanticipated facets of their life. But my favorite story is of a World War II veteran who approached me after a screening of Beetle Queen. He said something to the effect of, “For fifty years I have thought of the Japanese as my enemy. And in the past hour and a half, you have changed that.”
Are there any plans to screen the film in Japan?
Not yet! But we are always looking for opportunities!
Beetle Queen Conquers Tokyo runs from May 12-18 at New York’s Film Forum, with Jessica appearing at screenings on May 12, 14 and 16. Visit www.beetlequeen.com for more info, and sign up for the mailing list at info@beetlequeen.com.
JET alum Michael Auslin testifies before Congress
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JET alum Michael Auslin testified before Congress in April about the current state of U.S.-Japan relations. Auslin is a professor of Japanese history and politics and currently the Director of Japanese Studies for the American Enterprise Institute in D.C.
http://www.aei.org/speech/100137
by JET alum Michael Auslin
Mr. Chairman, Senator Inhofe, and Members of the Committee, thank you for the opportunity to testify today on the current state of U.S.-Japan relations, and to look ahead at the role the relationship will play in future economic and security developments for both countries. Despite current difficulties in the relationship, I believe that close ties with Japan are essential for the United States to retain a credible strategic position in East Asia and for future economic prosperity in both Asia and America. Yet we must also recognize that relations between the United States and Japan will be more tenuous over the next several years, requiring close communication and a frank assessment of how the relationship benefits each partner.
This past January, Washington and Tokyo observed the 50th anniversary of the U.S.-Japan Alliance, one of the most successful bilateral agreements in recent history. Yet the past seven months of the U.S.-Japan relationship have been consumed with a growing disagreement over whether Japan will fulfill the provisions of a 2006 agreement to relocate Marine Corps Air Station Futenma from its current crowded urban location to a more remote setting on the northern part of the island. Given that the state of U.S.-Japan relations concerns not only the economic relations between the world’s two largest economies, but directly influences the larger strategic position of the United States in the Asia-Pacific region, any substantive change in the U.S.-Japan alliance or in the political relationship that undergirds it could have unanticipated effects that might increase uncertainty and potentially engender instability in this most dynamic region.
To read the whole transcript, go here: http://www.aei.org/speech/100137
WITLife is a periodic series written by professional Writer/Interpreter/Translator Stacy Smith (Kumamoto-ken CIR, 2000-03). She starts her day by watching Fujisankei’s newscast in Japanese, and here she shares some of the interesting tidbits and trends together with her own observations.
Last week there was an interesting article in the NYT about Chinese teachers who are sponsored by their 
government (with additional support from local school districts) to come teach here in the States for up to three year. It reminded me of JET, as well as my own experience first learning Japanese in high school. The article featured a young woman teaching in rural Oklahoma, and the cultural roadblocks she encountered along the course of her job (American students lack of geographical knowledge, pregnant teenagers, etc.). I love the quote she provides at the end of the article regarding what she hopes to impart to her students: “I want my students to have a sweet, sweet memory of taking Chinese. They won’t remember a lot of words, but I want them to remember the beauty of the language and the culture.”
It calls to mind the power of teachers and how a good one can have a dramatic effect on your future. As for me personally, I can definitely say that I would not be where I am today without the existence of my amazing high school Japanese teacher, Sensei Watson. It was her unique teaching style and incorporation of non-traditional methods, like showing us 紅白歌合戦 (kouhaku uta gassen or New Year’s Eve Singing Content) and having us write 年賀状 (nengajou or New Year’s greeting cards) before Oshougatsu that initially made me curious about this country that seemed to be so different from my own. I am eternally grateful to her for getting me started on my lifelong journey of discovering Japan!
Job: Lodestar Language School (Nagano)
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Via the naganojet yahoo group:
Lodestar Language School in Okaya is looking for qualified and motivated English Instructors to teach adults, starting in mid June 2010. Teachers will have classes at our clients’ offices in central part of Nagano prefecture.
Pay & Benefits:
- Min.250,000 yen/month (negotiable)
- Furnished private apartment provided at a reasonable rent
- Approximately 1-2 week holidays in May, August and
Xmas-New year’s period
Requirements:
- A bachelor’s degree and a perfect command of English,
- TESOL/CELTA, Japanese speaking ability, an asset
- A proper work visa. If you need sponsorship, 1-year commitment
- for full-time work agreement is required.
- Japanese or International driver’s license
To apply, please e-mail your CV with your photo and a cover letter to feline@k4.dion.ne.jp or contact Harri Satake (Ms.) at 81|266-26-1845.
Only short-listed candidate be contacted. This position is for teachers who are already in Japan.
MEGU Chefs Teach Secrets of Miso This Tuesday
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By JQ Magazine’s Justin Tedaldi (CIR Kobe-shi, 2001-02) for Examiner.com. Visit his NY Japanese Culture page here to subscribe for free alerts on newly published stories.
Contrary to its most popular form, miso is not a soup, but a seasoning (usually resembling a paste) made with soybeans and rice or barley fermented for a period of time. It’s also right up there with rice as a Japanese diet staple—in Nippon’s olden days, miso was the fundamental currency exchanged in the market. Now, New Yorkers can treat themselves to a free cooking demonstration and tasting courtesy of Marukome Miso (one of the oldest miso manufactures in Japan) at the French Culinary Institute on Tuesday, May 11.
Presented as part of the Gohan Society and FCI Lecture series with Marukome USA, the demo and tasting is hosted by Chef Noriyuki Kobayashi of MEGU Midtown and Chef Katsuhisa Inoue of MEGU Downtown. The Zagat rated restaurant maestros will apply their Japanese cooking techniques to prepare Western-style dishes, all featuring Marukome Miso. (Insert your own Iron Chef zinger here.)
On the menu for the two-hour showcase: traditional grilled miso onigiri (rice ball); thickly sliced toasted white bread with miso garlic butter; cream cheese and miso egg roll; miso bagna cauda blue cheese and miso paste on baguette with honey; miso minestrone; and washu-gyu steak with miso fond de veau sauce.
Participants will learn how miso enhances foods and flavors, gleaning tips and creative ways to boost its versatility and umami (deliciousness) appeal. And just to be clear: this is good-for-you deliciousness, since miso is made from protein-rich soybeans containing amino acids, boasts a surprisingly low salt content, contains fiber, can aid in lowering cholesterol and preventing arterial blockage, and (smokers take note) is renowned for its mouth-cleansing properties.
Learn the secrets of miso at the French Culinary Institute, 462 Broadway (at Grand Street), on Tuesday, May 11, 3:30 p.m.-5:30 p.m. Admission is free. To RSVP, contact Sarah Marino or Amy Krakow at (212) 710-0529, or by e-mail at sarah.marino@agitproppr.com or amy.krakow@agitproppr.com.
