Japanese Surgeon's Daily Life

Reception

　　Two German people are supposed to come to my house tomorrow. My family is a little nervous about welcoming them. We have never accommodated foreigners, so we don't know how to provide for them. They are members of Jazzchor Freiburg, which plans to do their concert tour in Shikoku, which is the smallest island of the four big islands of Japan.
　　I looked for some information on the favorite dishes for foreigners who recently visited Japan. The result was unbelievable for me. Okonomiyaki, Takoyaki, Ramen, Udon,,, ,these are not bad, but very cheap. I wondered why they didn't want to eat Japanese traditional dishes like Kaiseki, which is though a little expensive.
　　I ascertained their schedule. They'll hold the concert at first in Kochi prefecture, which is on the Pacific coast. They will have Sahachi, Kochi's local dish, which consists of various fish from the Pacific Ocean. After the concert in Ehime, they will move to Kagawa prefecture, which is well-known as the "Udon Country" across Japan. We omitted seafood and noodles from our menu. After so much thinking, we were at a loss, and finally we chose the easiest plan; broiled meat in the garden.
　　Next, we prepared a Japanese-style room for them. It has a tatami and an alcove where art or flowers are displayed, and would be interesting to them.
　　Anyway, we are really worried or frightened about them, because we are eager to make them happy but we don't know what they want to do and see here in Matsuyama. My wife will take a half day leave tomorrow. She'll start preparing dishes from noon. A and I will go to the City Hall to pick them up. Both anxiety and expectation that we'll have a good time lie in my mind.

• (Vocabulary)
• reception 　歓迎会, 祝賀会, (結婚などの) 披露宴; 歓迎, 出迎え, もてなし
• provide …を提供する, 供給する, 用意する
• The university should provide more facilities for disabled students. 大学側は障害のある学生のための設備をもっと増やすべきだ．
• provide sth for sb ＜人＞に＜…＞を提供する
• Free parking is provided for hotel guests. ホテルにご宿泊のかたは無料駐車場をご利用いただけます．
• provide sb with sth ＜人＞に＜…＞を提供する
• We were provided with food and drink. 食べ物と飲み物を出してくれた．
• provide sth to sb ＜人＞に＜…＞を提供する
• The water company provides services to eight million people. その水道会社は800万人に水道用水を供給している．
• at a loss 途方に暮れて
• alcove アルコーブ (壁の一部を入り込ませた空間)

Historic Heritage Site

　　We got to an old building that is shown below. It was the ruin of a hospital and looked like it had been built 50, 60, or more years ago. It had an atmosphere of a historic heritage site. I've seen such buildings and posted some pictures before.
　　To tell the truth, I know a story about this ruin. The physician who built this hospital was a friend of my grandfather, who passed away at the age of 97 in 1990. The physician apparently seemed to want someone to inherit his hospital, but he couldn't find a person who would take over his hospital. This former hospital would be the property of his relatives now. My mother told me that if I became a doctor 20 years earlier, he would offer it to me. I imagined the scene and felt funny at my grandfather and his friend playing go (a kind of mental sport) over the topic of me. My grandfather seemed to recommend at most a ten year-old me as his successor.

• (Vocabulary)
• inherit　(財産など)を相続する; (性格・容姿など)を受け継ぐ; (難題・借金など)を引き継ぐ; (不要になったもの)をもらう, 譲り受ける

Kashu, My Birth Place

　　Kashu is the name of a small village where my parents lived in their twenties. I was born there 52 years ago. Even now it is considerably far away from the prefectural capital city, so this village must have been an extremely rural place in those days.
　　We dropped in at this village and looked for the house which my parents rented 50 years ago. The scene completely changed and they managed to find the place where our house was built, but the house had been demolished and a storage shed was there. I was sorry not to be able to see the house, but my parents found a woman who used to be their neighbor. She remembered me, and told me a fantastic story about the day I was born.
　　In the tiny isolated village, there was no doctor. Old ladies who had experienced their own deliveries used to attend the delivery as a so-called midwife. The delivery wasn't always safe. After giving birth to me, a midwife advised my father to feed my mother something nutritious, like carp. There was naturally no supermarket. He went out to a nearby pond whose size was about twice as large as the average ballpark. The purpose? Of course, in order to catch a carp for my mother.
　　You know what, he caught a big enough carp to amaze the village people. The midwives and neighbors seemed to believe that this baby must be gifted.

• (Vocabulary)
• shed  物置, (物置)小屋; (電車の) 車庫, 倉庫, 作業場
• a tool shed 道具小屋
• birth attendant / maternity nurse / midwife 助産師

Osada Primary School

　　We reached the former Osada Primary School, at which my father had worked about 40 years ago as a teacher. This place was one of the purposes of today's drive. The school was half demolished, and the rest was utilized as a storage space for the village's cultural heritage. My father looked like he was recalling the pupils whom he taught at this school. This school was only 5 kilometers away from my then house, so I sometimes went to the school and spent a lot of time with pupils of this school. This school was a really nice memory for me too. I wish that someone out of those pupils find this entry and sends me an e-mail. I set the name of this school as a keyword.

• (Vocabulary)
• demolish (建物など)を取り壊す

（KW:大佐田小学校)

From the Top of the Peninsula

　　We got to the highest point of the Sadamisaki Peninsula and took some pictures. As you can see, wind power generation picks up steam here. A strong wind passed by around here from the Pacific Ocean to the Seto Inland Sea. I thought that it was a nice idea to build the plant here, but recently the noise of the wind generators annoys people living around here. The authorities are conducting  research on the influence on humans. The second picture is of the ferry boat connecting Yawatahama city and Beppu City, which is well-known as the mecca of the hot spring freeks. Anyway the sky was clear, and our drive was really comfortable.

• (Vocabulary)
• aerogenerator / wind (power/ turbine) generator　風力発電機
• pick/build/get up steam (gain/gather steam とも)　(計画・活動などが)勢いづく, 弾みがつく

A Monument

　　We drove along the seaside of the Seto Inland Sea to Mitsukue. I wrote about this village before. This village is known as the place for the military drill of the attack on Pearl Harbour. When this air attack was conducted, five small 2-men submarines were ready for suicide attacks. If some military vessels came out of the bay, they were supposed to attack them. Ten young men (two for each submarine) went on the mission and only one was rescued from a stranded submarine with a mechanical problem of the compass. The rest of the nine people were missing in action. They are honored here as heros. The monumet is for them.
　　The second picture is of Mitsukue Bay. You can see a ship of the Japanese Coast Guard in the center of the picture. The role of this ship is as a lookout for a terror campaign against the Ikata Atomic Power Plant, which is about 10 kilometers away to the east from here.

• (Vocabulary)
• terror campaign テロ活動

Old House

　　The age of this house is more than 50 years old. You might say, "Why did I find it out?" That's because I had lived in this house for a year 50 years ago. When my parents rented this house, I was only one year old. Naturally, I have no memory about this house in the tiny fishing village. However, listening to my parents' talk, I could imagine their good old days.
　　The domestic fridge wasn't common in those days. My parents couldn't keep fish fresh and could get raw fish from the fishermen only when they came back from the fishery. My father told me with deep feeling that the fish were very good. The fish were more valuable than those at present. My parents didn't have a TV. Not having a TV was inconvenient, judging from the present life style, but it was never unhappy, my father continued. I thought it might be.
　　In this 50 years, we surely have acquired many useful and convenient things, but, I thought, we might have lost as many good things.

• (Vocabulary)
• speak with deep feeling 感慨深げに語る

 
(KW: 瀬戸町足成)

Gozega Pass

　　Did you find the gutter-like structure on the stone table in the first picture of the last entry? This gutter is the method for serving someone. A small bunch of somen flew out into the gutter and people skimmed it from the flow. I don't know who figured out this way of eating somen, but it was a nice breakfast in the natural cool breeze.
　　After breakfast, we went up the valley, of course by car. The picture shows the highest point of the road, Gozega Pass, from which we could see both the Seto Inland Sea and the Pacific Ocean.

• (Vocabulary)
• gutter 雨どい
• skim sth off/from sth ＜表面に浮いた油・あくなど＞を＜液体など＞から取り除く
• skim through sth＜…＞をざっと読む

Heikedani Valley

　　One hour after leaving Matsuyama, we called in at Heikedani Valley. There are lots of places called Heikedani across Japan. I'm going to tell you about it at first.
　　About 1000 years ago, there were two enormous armed groups and they were called Genji and Heike respectively. They were struggling to take power for a long time. They fought several times and finally Genji won power. Genji were afraid of Heike's revenge and chased up Heike to the last person. On the other hand, Heike got away ready to pay back someday, and they hid in the thickly forested mountains and valleys. These places are called Heikedani ("dani" means valley), where people had lived extremely modest lives not to be found by Genji. On account of this, most Heikedani are located in isolated places. The Heikedani where we visited also hid in such a place. No sunshine comes in Heikedani. The Heike people had to choose such miserable places as their habitation areas, and seekers would never suspect that someone might live there.
　　However, it wasn't all bad. Even in the severely hot daytime, people could survive the heat there. At present, quite a few amusement facilities are located at Heikedani. In the Heikedani where we dropped in, they run a somen shop. Somen is a kind of noodles as you can imagine from the resemblance between somen and ramen.
　　By the way, guess how to eat somen here, judging from the pictures. I'll write the answer in the next entry.

• (Vocabulary)
• chase up（人や動物を）追い詰める
• to the last man 最後の一人まで
• it isn't all bad 悪いことばかりではない

Western Ehime

　　I took my parents to the western area of Ehime prefecture. It was the second drive to the past, following the one on Aug. 27th. We drove down to the south on Aug. 27th, but we went westward today. I wrote the trip memos of Aug. 27th in this blog, so you can read it, if you want.
　　There's a really narrow peninsula between Kushu and Shikoku, which are two of the four big islands of Japan. This peninsula is called the Sadamisaki Peninsula. I had lived at some places on this peninsula for a total of six years. The topic of today's entries is about the places on this peninsula.
　　My mother, aged 79, has a slight sign of senile dementia, which causes no difficulty in her daily life now, but I'm afraid of its developing. This short trip must have done some good for her mental health.

Smart Dog

　　Several people came to my house and we enjoyed chatting and eating today. The new barbecue was really nice, though the number of visitors was restricted to about 10 at most due to its size.
　　By the way, I have something I want to write about. It's my dog, Mocha. Mocha looked happy to meet my colleagues, even though he met them for the first time. Mocha used to bark at anyone whom he didn't know. People who entered the garden and sometimes even people who just passed by in front of my house were annoyed by him. He was a public nuisance in the housing district. The role of guard isn't required from him. However, he was calm and obedient today. It would be the result of some training by the specialist.

http://kumo.typepad.jp/weblog/2007/03/mocha-go-to-sch.html
http://kumo.typepad.jp/weblog/2007/05/mocha-came-back.html

Replacement of Barbecue

　　My colleagues will come to my house and we'll have a barbecue in the garden tomorrow at noon. I set up the special barbecue today, but it was broken. I'm going to talk about it in this entry. This old barbecue was made of a scrapped drum can that was originally produced for oil storage. My acquaintance, who runs an iron factory, cut an old metallic barrel vertically into two parts, and one was for me and the other was for him. He attached four legs to each half. Thus, two big barbecues were made. This barbecue was big enough for lots of people to enjoy parties and was really nice, but at last the bottom fell out.
　　On account of this, I had to get a new one for tomorrow's party. I wanted to get the same size brazier as the former one, but it was considerably exceptional and I couldn't find anything like that in the shopping center specializing in outdoor products. I bought a modest one as you can see in the second picture. Besides, I bought a net table surrounding the brazier.

• (Vocabulary)
• barbecue バーベキュー（パーティー） (バーベキュー用の) コンロ
• drum / drum can / metallic [metal] barrel [drum] ドラム缶
• on account of this このような訳で
• brazier (金属製の) 火鉢, こんろ
• exceptional (能力・才能などが)並はずれた, 抜群の; 例外的な, まれな
• an exceptional student 抜群に優秀な生徒
• exceptional weather conditions 異常気象
• modest (金額・量などが)ささやかな, (価格などが)手ごろな, (規模などが)小さい
• excellent wines at modest prices 手ごろな価格でおいしいワイン

Miura Coast

　　We passed Uwajima city and reached the Miura area where I went up to the primary school. The accuracy of my memory around here was higher than before. My  memory of being 4 to 5 years old or lower was vague, but I had an intense impression of this area. I remember I used to hang around with my buddies after school in the hills and at the seaside. There were numerous kinds of amusements around for little kids. I like hiking, climbing and fishing now. This love of nature might have been made here.
　　Japan is a small country, as you know. Look at the picture of the hills. You might think that they are bare, but that's wrong. They are fields for potatoes. The width of these fields is a hundred meters and the depth is one or two meters. Their shape is just like a narrow tape. They were made like stairs. It's our ancestor's wisdom and the result of labor. You'll naturally realize how hard their work was.
　　Next, look at the second picture that shows the beautiful seaside. You'll find lots of floats on the sea. They are fish farms. Various kinds of delicious fish are raised here. The current from the Pacific Ocean flows into the gulf and brings essential nutrients to the fish.
　　Anyway, don't you think this scene is beautiful? It is a wonderful fusion of natural resources and man-made efforts.

• (Vocabulary)
• bare 〈原野・山などが〉地肌むき出しの
• the bare hills north of the city 市北部にあるはげ山
• nutrient 栄養（のあるもの）
• the nutrient levels in the soil 土壌が栄養分を含む度合い
• man-made 人造の, 合成の [反意] natural
• effort [C] (ある目的のための) 活動, 運動
• the international relief effort 国際救援活動

Osakihana Lighthouse

　　You can hardly know where we were from the picture, but we were at Osakihana lighthouse. It's been about 45 years since the last visit. Lighthouse is pronounced "toh-dai" in Japanese just as Tokyo University.
　　My parents were always telling me that I had to go to "toh-dai" after a great deal of learning. Naturally, they were talking about Tokyo University, but I understood that "toh-dai" meant this lighthouse. I remember that I had wondered why I had to visit this lighthouse in the future. Anyway, the appearance around the lighthouse had remarkably changed.
　　Then, we parked our car at Tanohama and Takayama where we had lived and looked for the houses which we rented in those days, but we couldn't find them. The houses had disappeared. 45 years were longer than we expected.

(KW: 明浜町田之浜 明浜町高山)

Isolation of Mentally Handicapped Persons

While listening to my father's story, I recalled a well-known injury case that had brought a complete modification to Japanesee psychiatric medicine.
Do you know of Mr. Edwin Oldfather Reischauer? He was the former American ambassador to Japan. When he was in office in 1964, he was assaulted by a young Japanese man who was suffering from schizophrenia. This incident persuaded the Japanese government to isolate people with mental problems, and they were confined into hospitals and nursery institutions. That's why we didn't see any peculiar people in the streets.
Mr. Reischauer got hepatitis due to a blood transfusion at that time. It led the Japanese authority to change its medical policy on blood transfusions. Besides, it became a cue for the thorough research of hepatitis.
Nothing is improved until something bad happens. It's one of the Japanese faults.

• (Vocabulary)
• a mentally handicapped person 精神障害者
• injury case 傷害事件
• Edwin Oldfather Reischauer  ライシャワー元駐日米大使
• institution [C] (老人・孤児などを対象とした) 施設
• a mental institution 精神病院
• medical policy / politics of healthcare 医療政策
• cue (ある行動を触発する) 合図, 手がかり, きっかけ (cue for)
• Robin's arrival was a cue for music and more wine.

Legal Confinement (座敷牢)

　　My father began uttering abruptly that he had often seen a few peculiar people everywhere 70 years ago. Maybe they were suffering from developmental problems or some psychiatric disorders like schizophrenia. Medical science was not developed enough to diagnose and treat them in those days. They were finally taken into custody for the sake of their households' appearances.
　　The rich families set up the space for custody in their own houses, but poor people couldn't. They built some kind of public confinement facilities that every household could use, and the construction site was usually in a public place like in a temple. These confinements weren't punishments so these jail-like facilities were designed to be comfortable. One of these facilities was constructed in the temple where my father had lived. He seemed to have not approached the facility following his grandparents' advice. Naturally, he was afraid to see them.
　　There was a monument on the former jail-like facility. The monument had some letters on it, but I couldn't understand them. At present, the people that I wrote about are accommodated in hospitals and nursery facilities under the protection of fundamental human rights.

• (Vocabulary)
• keep up appearances （無理して）体面を保つ, 見えを張る
• save [preserve] (one's) face [honor] / save appearances 体面を保つ
• for the sake of appearance(s) 体面上

Backward Time Travel

　　When we drove down to the south along the seashore from Yawatahama city, my father started talking about his memory that he had lived in a temple in Minae (三瓶町皆江) with his grandparents about 70 years ago. His grandfather was a Buddhist priest. Apparently my father was afraid of his strict father, and loved to live with his grandparents. When he reached the age of going to primary school, he finally returned to his original house against his will, which was also a Buddhist temple.
　　My father nostalgically continued to explain the then transportation. According to his story, a small boat was in service between Minae and his original place, but it was not regular. Therefore, his father and he (my father) practiced riding a bicycle together and successfully went back home. I imagined the scene and felt something happy.
　　By the way, my family had lived in another rural place for three years about 15 years ago. When my family moved, my youngest daughter, A, didn't want to live with us and had lived with her grandparents (my parents) for a few months. I burst out laughing to find that my father and A were doing the same thing.
　　The pictures show the temple where my father spent time 70 years ago. The atmosphere of it had changed completely, but it sounded like a few unchanged things like an old well and the surrounding mountains reminded him of his good old days.

• (Vocabulary)
• backward [backwards] time travel 過去への時間旅行
• against someone's will 嫌々ながら

 
(KW: 補陀山見光禅寺 愛媛県西予市三瓶町皆江)

Yawatahama City

　　We continued to drive in a blistering heat. It's been hot for more than 4 weeks. It looked like it was record-breaking, but my car had enough power to cool us. We enjoyed driving on the long-forgotten road. You would think that there would be a water shortage in such conditions, but we got a lot of rain in June and the mountains stored the water that we got in the rainy season. The orange trees were vividly green, which are the famous product of this area.
　　We got to Yawatahama city. This city is located to the south of Matsuyama city and has been known as a prosperous fishing harbor since long ago, but is now suffering from a declining population. My parents had worked near this city about 40 years ago and seemed to have frequently gone to the city. They often ate "Chanpon", a ramen-like noodle, in those days. To our surprise, the "Chanpon" shop was not closed and still operated at the same place. About 20 years ago, the bypass was constructed around the city and we hadn't entered the city since then. Today, we got into the city for the first time in about 20 years and found the shop. The shop was renovated but the atmosphere of the shop must have reminded my parents of the old days. As for me, the taste of the "Chanpon" was alive deep in my memory.

• (Vocabulary)
• fishing harbor 漁港
• fishery [C] 漁場 / [C] 養殖場 [同意] fish farm /[C] 漁業, 水産業
• prosperous 裕福な, (経済的に) 成功した, 繁栄している

 

Southern Ehime

　　I live on one of four big islands of Japan, called Shikoku. It's the smallest of the four islands. Shikoku consists of four prefectures and Ehime is one of them. I live in Ehime prefecture.
　　When I was a little child, my family lived in southern Ehime. After moving to the present address, we didn't visit our former living places. I have only a dim memory there, but those places would recall vivid images for my parents. I hit on an idea of taking them to those places after an interval of 40-50 years.
　　We started for the south on the highway and dropped in at a popular area for its rural and peaceful scenery. The picture is my parents against a backdrop of the mill wheel. In the wheel house, the rice was being pounded.

• (Vocabulary)
• consist in sth 〈本質・原因などが〉 ＜…＞にある, 存する
• consist of sth (要素などとして) ＜…＞から成る, 構成される
• a dim memory/recollection/awareness おぼろげな記憶［思い出，意識］[同意] vague
• mill wheel / water wheel / waterwheel 水車
• pound [他] …をバンバンたたく, たたきつぶす
• pound sth on sth ＜…＞で＜…＞をドンドンたたく
• He pounded his fist on the counter. 彼はこぶしでカウンターをドンドンたたいた．

Summer Vacation

　　I had a week off from Aug. 27th to Sept.2nd a couple of weeks ago. I was going to visit Freiburg with my family, including my parents, to see my second daughter, who is learning German there. However, we couldn't juggle everyone's schedule around. My wife had to work, and my other daughters had projects in their universities. I decided to use this vacation for maintenance work on my house and to spend time with my colleagues and parents. I'll be writing entries more frequently in the next few days.

• (Vocabulary)
• juggle [他] 〈時間・仕事など〉 をやりくりする
• It's hard trying to juggle a job, kids, and housework. 仕事，育児，家事を全部うまくやりくりするのはたいへんだ.
• juggle sth with sth ＜…＞と＜…＞の両立を図る
• juggle sth around ＜日程・予定など＞を調整［変更］する
• project (学校での) 研究［学習］課題