Asia Day Meets Superbowl Sunday

Yesterday we had our final day of classes, today was Asia day, and tomorrow we are in Japan! There were four time sessions each with six or seven choices of topics, from Asian etiquette to flower arranging to suggestions of what to do in port, followed by an Asian dinner and mandatory Japan pre-port.



Coincidentally, Asia day coincided with the Superbowl, one of the most quintessentially American events of the year. The deans and technology people arranged to have the game streamed live to the union, so after breakfast dozens of students watched the Saints beat the Colts. I watched the first half, went to an Asia Day session, then came back to watch the end. It was quite the cultural juxtaposition. It was strange to be connected to TV and commercialism after weeks without it, and even stranger to watch the game after breakfast without typical game day snacks like chips and salsa.



After the brief American interlude, I watched a Japanese movie entitled “Tampopo”. The main plot follows a driven woman who strives to operate a successful noodle place in Japan, but there are several odd side plots that have completely new characters and unrelated stories. One takes place in a Japanese household, where the mother is on her final deathbed. The husband rushes into the house, shakes his wife, and demands that she not die and instead make the family dinner. Strangely, she complies, getting up weakly and fixing dinner for her husband and kids. She serves everyone and sits down, and everyone starts eating as if everything were normal. Thirty seconds later, she falls over, the doctor takes her pulse and confirms her dead. The kids start wailing but the father insists that they keep eating because it was their mother’s last meal and they should eat it hot. Luckily, the rest of the movie was much cheerier.



After a few more sessions the kitchen cooked up a nice meal with delicious noodles, pork, and chicken. Now, I’m about to go to the pre-port which will go over some practical information for getting around in Japan. And when I get up tomorrow the Asian Adventure begins!