Rocking in Hakata

Wow. I’m impressed. I wrote about the new Onmaku Festival poster last week, and I believe I mentioned that I’d love to procure one. And if I didn’t, I meant to. Well, guess what? I got 2 and a sticker! I went to the website, and used the contact form to send an email in Japanese asking about it. I was as polite as possible, but my honorifics-fu is very weak. So I may have created some new grammatical constructions. But in any event, they understood my question and mailed me 2 posters and a sticker for free! How awesome is that? I am really excited. One is on my wall, and the other is being kept pristine to be taken back to America.

The experience went so well that I decided to try it again. I went to the website for the Go Shimanami! tourism campaign and found the contact form. I copied the email address and found the one for my local tourism board. I sent a similar message to both of them about a really sweet poster that I saw up in the ferry ticket office. They called me at school to confirm which poster I meant, and I told them I’d take a picture of it and send it back. I did so, and they sent me 2 copies of that poster too! I’m really happy about it. I’m very grateful to these two groups for basically hearing out a random foreigner’s selfish inquiries and making it happen when it’s not anywhere in their job descriptions and it cost them the shipping! I’m bowled over, you might say. And I have some sweet posters to show for it. They’ll be killer memoirs.

Deas Customary Drivel

I like this story for so many reasons, it’s hard to pick one. First, the fact that an older United States Ambassador has become a bit of a novelty musical celebrity in the Paraguayan language called Guaraní. That’s pretty darn cool to start with. Very off beat and fun. Second, the fact that he’s got other languages under his belt already (apparently he’s fluent in Spanish, Portuguese, and Italian). Third, he tackled the new addition to his linguistic repertoire like a pro. He didn’t start studying Guaraní until his last month at his former post (Havana, Cuba). Yet, when he gets off the plane, he immediately delivers a 3 page speech in Guaraní. ROCK ON. Ha ha ha.

”I’ve never been to a country where I couldn’t speak the language,” Cason told The Miami Herald. “These words are very hard to retain. It’s pure consonants. You’ve got to just bang them into your head.”

In low-key Paraguay, the new ambassador showed hints of showmanship on his first hour on the job.

Upon arriving in December 2005, he stepped off the plane wearing the traditional hand-embroidered Paraguayan ao poi dress shirt and greeted local reporters in Guaraní, delivering a three-page speech. Not even embassy staff knew he had studied the language.

In Asunción, he recruited his third tutor and began watching Guaraní TV and filling his iPod with vocabulary lessons that shared time with the Beatles, Buddy Holly and Whitney Houston on his playlist. He soon discovered Guaraní music, translating 1920s songs about emigrants longing for Paraguay and Paraguayan soldiers who march into battle afraid their girlfriends will stray in their absence.

Singing in Guaraní did not occur to Cason until a few months ago, when his wife Carmen, an admirer of the ambassador’s Peter, Paul & Mary renditions around the house, recommended that he hire her piano teacher for voice lessons.

The trick to learn a language? Do it like 63 year old U.S. Ambassador James C. Cason. Get involved with the language, use it professionally and in your private life, and find things about it that interest you. And, optionally, become an unexpected pop star if possible. This is inspiring to me. (And hey, it’s not absurdly negative news / speculation for once! Yay!)

Deas Customary Drivel, Unsolicited Commentary

Credit goes to Kathy for this find: a brief bit of Japanese in the midst of a crazy American made English language kids’ movie about a group of singing chipmunks. I’ve spliced together the two relevant scenes. Since I used the time codes so generously provided, I’ve still not seen this movie and cannot tell whether or not I am accidentally giving anything away. So…apologies if I ruined your personal screening of the film. (Somehow I highly doubt it. ) Ha ha. “See, you love it, it’s Spanish!” Nice. I am incredibly skeptical about all three of the dolls’ languages. Not one of them sounds accurately pronounced. Then again, they are just prototypes. By the way, does anyone else get the feeling that they took this movie way more seriously than they should have?

Deas Customary Drivel, Media, Unsolicited Commentary, Video, 日本語