Forget Harder or Smarter, Work More

I've been having a hard time getting accustomed to working full-time. Blame my generation (hell, everyone else does). I know, I know, it's something that everyone has to get used to, if it wasn't work they wouldn't call it "work," a penny saved is a penny earned, cat's in the cradle and the silver spoon, I am the walrus, etc. etc. I think my problem is amplified, though, by starting full-time work here in Japan: up until now, I've worked solely as a dishwasher, a Toys R Us "associate," a teaching assistant, and a pizza delivery driver (in that order) -- all less than 20 hours per week, each one requiring little more than a pulse and a pair of pants -- and now I've plunged into the most hardcore dedicated workforce this side of the Doozers from Fraggle Rock. Or, put another way, having taken my first tentative baby steps, I've decided to skip walking and running and go straight to bareback elephant riding.

A staple of pop culture for much of the 1980s (if my old school Dilbert anthologies are to be believed) is the idea that Japan has marshaled its workers into almost superhuman efficiency. Putting aside the current state of the economy, for a long time in American business there was a struggle to be more like the Japanese. I realize this ambition has probably been dead for a long time, but let me just put it to rest for any employers in America: your employees will never, ever be as committed or loyal as Japanese employees. Ever. You can give your employees all kinds of incentives and benefits to being invested in the well-being of the company, you can hand out salary incentives and profit-sharing and overtime and benefits (none of which they do in Japan), you can copy the Japanese exactly and have your employees do calisthenics and retreats and mandatory bonding activities, but you'll never, ever conquer the fact that they will always prefer to be somewhere else. There's just something magic about employee behavior in Japan that can't be replicated elsewhere. Even if Japanese employees hate their job and everything about it, they keep that free will shit to themselves.

Of course, this has already been well documented on this fine website. But to give you a further example of the level of dedication I'm talking about, let me recreate a typical morning for your enlightenment:

Every morning, I roll into work at around 9:25, a full 5 minutes early (this being about 110% for me). By this time, the Japanese staff has already been in for...well, I have no way of knowing since I've never been more than 5 minutes early to work. I've heard that the day begins at 8:30, which is fun, since the school day begins at 10:30. I can only imagine what happens between 8:30 and the morning meeting at 9:30ish, when the fun really begins.

The morning meeting includes at least one of the higher-ups and anywhere between three and six helper teachers; I assume the classroom teachers have already done their own morning meeting by this point, because they've already moved down to their classes. Every day, a different participant is tasked with conducting the meeting, which means that she announces (shouts) what they will do just before doing it, i.e., "Now we are starting the morning meeting for January 27th!" First, the teachers recite the "Harumidai Kindergarten Affirmation" in unison. Now, my Japanese is somewhat sketchy (yes, still), but I can puzzle out the basics: "Today, Harumidai Kindergarten will become #1!" This is followed by reading a passage aloud from the official Harumidai Kindergarten teacher's book, typically a story or anecdote about friendship or opportunity or motivation or some crap. This, too, involves everyone shouting in unison. Side note: absolutely anything sounds creepy as hell when it's read aloud in perfect unison by a group of people.

Next, some issues of the day are discussed. I tune this part out, since it's usually pretty boring, but I should at least mention that there is a strict protocol for posture and body language during meetings, all of which was demonstrated in a 3-hour seminar given by our principal last year, every word of which I expect to hear again in a few months. The end of the meeting is my favorite part:

1. The meeting leader announces that the meeting is over.

2. At the top of their lungs, everyone chants, "私たちは空いている！" twice. I've had a damn hard time figuring this one out, since "空いて" means "empty" in the same sense as "my stomach is empty" or "the bathroom is unoccupied," so the teachers are essentially saying "WE ARE EMPTY!" I've been told that it has connotations of being receptive and eager, but still. Damn.

3. The meeting leader directs them to clap. Which they do, for about 3 seconds. Again, yes, in unison.

4. The meeting leader directs them to stop clapping, so they punctuate their applause with three synchronous claps, like, CLAP! CLAP! CLAP!

5. The meeting leader directs them to bow.

6. They (informally) thank each other. For...something. Clapping well? Probably for putting up with their clapping, and for helping them become as empty as they can.

As with all the bowing, the souvenirs, the frequent working weekends, the late hours (junior teachers are expected to be the last to leave), and the expectation that medical leave be accompanied by copious apologies and repeated explanations of one's illness to every staff member, the morning meeting wouldn't really fly in other places.

Of course, it's conditions like this that make Japan such an appealing place for people outside the system. This is how good cars get made. When a friend from Pittsburgh came to visit, he kept commenting on how sparkling clean Osaka is, which is especially striking because Osaka is considered one of Japan's dirtiest cities (it could have something to do with Pittsburgh, but that's neither here nor there). Why is Japan so clean? Because shopkeepers are expected to wash the sidewalk in front of their store every day. Because schools don't employ janitors since the school is cleaned every day by the teachers and students as part of the school day. Because, in short, doing shitty demeaning tasks like scrubbing tea kettles and cleaning mud is, depending on the day, part of your job, and in Japan, your job is what you do. I know that Americans do what's expected of them at their job, but I put it to you: if you showed up to work one day and it was just suddenly understood that all employees were expected to perform some new menial cleaning or organizational task, what would your reaction be? Would you protest? Quit? Grumble, at least?

Of course, on the other hand, maybe there's something to all this. Yeah, it kind of sucks for everyone with a job, but there's something to be said for destigmatizing everyday tasks, right? In the States, cleaning up after other people is something beneath us, something reserved for the invisible lower class, millions of people who sort our garbage and pick up after our kids and wash our filthy toilets whom we'd prefer not to think about. Consequently, by choosing to keep the tasks necessary to modern life secret, we push the needs and misfortunes of the working classes out of our mind, which can only contribute to the increasing impossibility of life for the working poor.

What do you think? Putting aside the whole team spirit thing that weirdly persists past high school, would it do the West some good to learn to clean up after itself? Or is too much of our life already claimed by Work to be expected to dedicate still more time and energy and dignity to our employers?

Teaching with Dinosaurs 3

Here's the last batch of comics I've got from this year. Enjoy!

The T-Rex speaks for us all!

I never realized it, but T-Rex's posture in Panel 6 unmistakably conveys that feeling.

Maybe my favorite of the bunch, if only for the last panel.

What a ripoff!

Back to the Mines

Well, we've returned from our first sojourn back to that strange, far-off land that made our passports and most of our clothes (well, the clothes were probably made in Malaysia, but you know what I'm getting at). Our minds are still...fuzzy. Keep waking up at 5 in the morning, thinking it's time for dinner. Still getting adjusted to eating squid eyes, traffic on the left, shoes on our hands, etc. With all the confusion, we're having trouble assembling all of our recollections into anything coherent, but here are a few scattered impressions, mostly variations on the themes of Reverse Culture Shock and Reverse Reverse Culture Shock:

To define our terms: reverse culture shock is what expats suffer when they return to their home culture after living in a foreign country for an extended period. Think Brooks from Shawshank, you just get institutionalized. All of a sudden simple activities like eating a Chocolate Chip Pig-in-a-Blanket on a Stick seem weird for some reason and you start to long for some good old-fashioned sea urchin. Reverse reverse culture shock, which is a sociological term that I pulled out of my ass, is...well, that's pretty obvious, I guess.

America is big. Not just the dinner portions, which are dinosauric, not just the Midwest, which is still as full of nothing as it ever was, but the rooms stretch to obscene sizes, kitchens the size of tennis courts, hallways like bowling alleys. Even Jenn's brother's 4-room apartment, which is by no means inordinately large, seemed to have miles of unused floor space. The bathroom was half taken up by the toilet, shower, and sink, and half completely unused, something not only unheard of but actually physically impossible in Japan. An interesting side effect of getting used to different spaces (and consequently, furniture being at different heights and widths), Jenn and I spent 3 weeks in a state of extreme clumsiness, constantly tripping on chairs and tables that we were expected to be somewhere else.

We had a hell of a time breaking some habits we've formed over the last year and a half, most notably our conversational habits. Jenn and I have a fondness for discussing filthy things in the middle of a crowded train, graphically discussing sex or the quality of a recent poop, all generously sprinkled with four-letter words, secure in the knowledge that no one around will have any idea what we're talking about (and if they do, there's no chance in hell that they'll say anything).

I've gotten much worse at interacting with strangers. Every time a waitress or cashier asked me how my day was (and Lawrence being a friendly place, this happened a lot), I was struck dumb. What do I say? What do I do? What does this person want from me? Inquiring into the personal well-being of a total stranger is right up there with public nose-picking in Japan (public farting is fair game, but that's a matter for another blog post). Plus, I kept bowing to strangers and making weird hand gestures that, while a sign of politeness in Japan, are a sign of a seizure or extreme funkiness in the rest of the world.

Within 2 hours of getting back home, a whole list of things I hate about Japan began composing itself in my head: Japanese milk is terrible, sickly-sweet and the last inch of the carton is prone to clumps that plop into coffee and almost scare me enough to dump it (almost); Japanese bread is completely wretched, bland and white, thick as a pocket dictionary and nowhere near as tasty; and everywhere, always with the bowing and the apologies and the horrible little jingles that play inside and outside every shop for hours and hours and hours and hours.

But then, there are the things to be happy about. The anonymity, for one thing, is refreshing, and it increases proportionately with odd or unruly behavior: you could wander the streets in a chicken suit and never get a single glance (if you're into that). We know where everything is in the grocery store, and we don't have to stress about being able to read the labels on food (knowing for sure that we just won't be able to). And more! Something more rational coming next week. For now, please enjoy this weird, intensely foul beverage that, believe it or not, comes from the good old U. S. of A.:

Well done, America! Japan's got nothing on you for Most Disgusting National Food Product!