I am being hosted by the Graduate School of Biosphere Science, Faculty of Applied Biological Sciences. The floor i work on is populated with all of the marine biological scientists - there's the Phytoplankton lab, the Jellyfish (and zooplankton) lab, the Microorganisms lab. Other floors in the building house such wonderful studies such as fish biology and biochemistry. The students on my floor got together and organized a welcome party for me and one other American who was visiting the department. I took some photos - we held the party in the lunchroom/library/breakroom.
Marine Science!
Takoyaki maker = tako is octopus, so these are balls of batter with octopus bits inside, and cooked in this special waffle-iron thing that makes spheres. I was fascinated with this process, and that anybody owned such a thing - there were two takoyaki cooker units at the party.
My host advisor thoughtfully arranged for a group of us to attend the Hiroshima Carp baseball game on the 4th of July. I am a a holdover baseball fan - a fan from when i was a kid and played tee-ball, then softball. Aside from sincerely enjoying watching a game live, i also was extremely appreciative of this particular game: on the United States' Independence Day holiday, watching the home team of a city that my home country annihilated with an atomic bomb almost 70 years ago.
Here is our group, cheering for the Carp.
At the end of the 7th inning (precisely), given that the team is winning, everyone is to blow up their special balloon like this, and wave it around whilst we sing. On cue, everyone lets go of their balloons at the same time and all the balloons fill the sky for a moment.
Me and the other American in our group decided to try to get the wave going earlier in the game. He speaks Japanese, and asked people around us if they knew "the wave". They assured us they did, and so we agreed to start it. My friend stood up and yelled, really loudly, so that everyone in our section could hear, something like "EVERYONE! Lets do the wave!!". We tried, but it was still only four of us that stood up each time. Nobody else really understood the wave, after all. And even if they did, it certainly wasn't a tradition to do at the game, so we dropped it. There are several Americans who play for the team, and when the game was over, there was a broadcast interview with several players. The first person who spoke was speaking in English, over the loudspeaker in the stadium! I was so surprised to suddenly hear (American) English being broadcast, and it was the 4th of July - i half expected the guy to start singing or reciting the Star Spangled Banner. It was so interesting to watch baseball, this American tradition, in Japan where it is now very popular and is its own tradition, albeit similar. It was a perfectly fitting 4th of July celebration for me.
Many other strange and wonderful things have happened here, including my participation in our University's weekly tea club (Japanese tea ceremony), shopping for kimono in a department store, finding all-things-matcha (its a flavoring for every kind of sweet food treat you can imagine, from cereal to soft serve) and seeing the jellyfish growing facility in the lab i'm working in. I hope to post soon about more travels including Miyajima and the Hiroshima Peace Park and Memorial. Also i'd like to write about my experience in Japanese culture, and the mirror it provides for my own culture. Coming soon!
Jellyfish that's been cultured in the lab (Chrysaora sp.)
An especially good sign
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