The pandemic has had some strange effects. My work wasn’t locked down. We still had to go into the office and prepare stuff even though we weren’t teaching (I work in schools in Japan). One of the things I made was a set of cards showing famous places in Japan for the kids to talk about.
It helped me reconnect with why I came to Japan. People who’ve read my few posts in the past will know I’ve not had the happiest time here - living in the system as opposed to visiting is very different - and I really struggle with kanji (still on level one after a couple of years). I have no interest in manga, anime or J-pop…but love ukiyo-e, the films of Kurosawa and Shindo, the ghost stories of Lafcadio Hearn and the literature of Sosski, Akutagawa and Murakami. I like the old histories like the Taiheiki too, and this is what I’ve managed to reconnect with after a long absence. お久しぶりでしょ？
The result is that I’m now in the first stages of writing a book on an aspect Japanese history. Publisher contacted and information about the required formatting received. And then, knowing I’m starting on one project a work colleague comes up and suggests another to do. Again, it’s a Japanese subject, but with links to my home country. So I can say now that while kanji and language studies have kind of hit a wall, other Japanese interests are taking off, and perhaps it’ll lead to more language learning in the future.
That would be nice, but nope.
