Fugetsu: A Review

After living in Hiroshima for nearly three years, I returned to the states with a quest: to find real Hiroshima okonomiyaki in America. In spite of a few quirks, Fugestu restaurant in Santa Clara serves up the most authentic version of this ultimate Japanese comfort food in the Bay Area—and considering that this is the first location in the chain to make the jump overseas, probably in the entire U.S. as well.

Okonomiyaki is well-known in Japan as the cheap, filling, and nutritious fare that sprung into existence during the aftermath of WWII. During the postwar food shortages tired people could stop at a local street stall for

this simple combination of grilled cabbage, eggs, batter, pork, and (depending on region) noodles. Even the name combines the character “yaki,” meaning grilled, and “konomu,” meaning, “they way you like it.” The dish aims to please.

With their grand opening on November 28, 2016, Fugetsu is a newcomer to the Bay. They made a brief appearance at Mitsuwa Market in 2015, where people waited up to two hours to try authentic Osaka okonomiyaki. (I was there too, but at the time I had no idea the restaurant was coming over for real.) Their shop is located in a series of shopping centers in Santa Clara that combine Indian, Korean, and Japanese cuisine. Situated between an ice cream shop and a Korean restaurant, Fugetsu blends right in with the Bay Area’s eclectic approach to Asian cuisine.

The interior feels like most Bay Area Japanese restaurants. There’s even the ever-present newspaper rack with BaySpo and other local Japanese language newspapers. With dark wood décor, black chairs, and red-topped tables stocked with fresh napkins, chopsticks, and all the condiments you need, the restaurant crams in a good amount of seating without feeling overcrowded. The one downside is that the grills installed on each table are for warming only—the real grill is hidden behind a glass screen to cut down on smoke.

The friend I went with was disappointed that we wouldn’t see okonomiyaki being cooked in front of us, but as a former Hiroshima resident, I don’t really expect okonomiyaki to be cooked in front of me unless I’m actually sitting at the grill.

I appreciated the bilingual menus because they had all the information in both Japanese and English. Usually menus favor one language over the other, but Fugetsu seems to cater to both Americans and the Japanese (or Japanese-American) community in the Bay Area.

My friend ordered the yakisoba, while I tried the modanyaki (“modern” plus “yaki”) which was how the menu labeled what I know as Hiroshimayaki. We also received a free appetizer (edamame) for checking in on Yelp. Although the menu said we might have to wait 20 minutes for our entrée due to the precise grilling process for okonomiyaki, we didn’t feel like the wait was too long.

Both selections felt just saucy and salty enough. The soba noodles were thick and chewy. When I cut through the okonomiyaki with my chopsticks, I felt like I was finally getting that perfect ratio of cabbage, noodles, egg, and sauce that I had missed so much. My only nitpicks were that the noodles felt a little thick for soba—almost like they were a hybrid of soba and udon—and that the pork was also cut slightly thicker than it is in Japan. But actually having noodles in the dish and seeing the ingredients in layers instead of all mixed together made all the difference. And of course all the tables were stocked with sweet okonomiyaki sauce.

There are five different kinds of yakisoba on the menu and even more choices for okonomiyaki, in addition to the appetizers and drinks. I was impressed by the number of options. Fugetsu is a full okonomiyaki restaurant and no one-trick pony. I will definitely be going back soon to try their Fugetsu special okonomiyaki (with squid and shrimp) and their spicy kimchi yakisoba.

Prices for okonomiyaki start at $12.00 for Osaka style and $15.00 for modanyaki—the usual American markup for all products Japanese. However, the portions do tend to be large.

Given the lack of okonomiyaki restaurants in even the diverse Bay Area, I hope Fugetsu thrives and starts a new trend in exported Japanese cuisine. However, my friend and I were seated right away on a Friday night with no reservation. The shop was certainly busy with most of the tables occupied and more customers coming in, but it wasn’t exactly overflowing.

If you like Japanese cooking and want to try something new, I definitely recommend stopping by and giving Fugetsu your support. I give them 5/5 stars in my very biased rating system.

Learn more about Fugetsu at their website or on their Facebook page!

Here's a video I made. :)

My Voice

When I was in college I had to change my voice.

The weird thing is, I can't remember exactly when I did it. I think I became aware of the problem at the end of my freshman year when we had to give evaluations to the people in our Torrey groups. People told me I sounded "angry" and they couldn't understand why. I think that was the point where I realized if I sounded angry naturally, I could sound "not angry" if I put some effort into it.

My natural way of talking tends to be monotone and come from lower in my throat. And that's the type of voice I was using in class without really considering how that sounded. I never used to uptalk. I didn't think about what facial expressions I was using.

Now, my old voice was still immediately recognizable as feminine. I've never been mistaken for a male on the phone, although at one point me and my 9-years-younger brother sounded eerily similar. In fact, recordings of my voice sound too high-pitched to me.

However, at some point in college I decided to make an effort to talk like a girl. And it worked. People smiled at me, laughed along with my jokes, and in general acted more friendly toward me in both class and other social settings. Again, I can't point to a specific time when this happened. It just did.

I made some small but specific changes to my style of speaking. Instead of speaking from the base of my throat (which I think is supposed to be your natural resonance) I spoke from somewhere in the middle. Raising the pitch of my voice just a little made everything softer and gentler. I learned how to uptalk, even though I initially thought it made you sound stupid. Now I can't stop doing it. :P I added more emphasis to my phrases, even making them sing-song. I used more gestures and facial expressions.

Years later I told a friend that I had changed my voice in college and used my old voice on him. It was actually hard for me to go back to that voice because I couldn't remember what I had sounded like. But when the other voice came out, my friend was shocked by how different I sounded.

I don't want to say I had to sound dumber or that girls in general have to sound dumber just to get people to like them. I think good intentions are not enough. If you have kind feelings in your head but you're not expressing them, people won't know what you're really thinking. So you have to emote.

But maybe I do sound dumber now. It bothers me that I can't turn off the uptalk even when I want to. I don't like that I have to choose between sounding uncertain and sounding mean.

On the plus side, now I know that my voice is somewhat within my control. I changed it once and I can change it again if I need to.

"Dazzle Them with the Basics" or Trouble with Tralfamadorians: My Thoughts on "Arrival"

"Dazzle Them with the Basics" or Trouble with Tralfamadorians: My Thoughts on Arrival

Image taken from IMDB

 In 2012, I studied to teach English as a foreign language. Near the end of the course, we had a segment on culture where we participated in a group exercise. Group 1 were assigned to play tourists trying to buy sandals on a ten minute layover. Group 2 were English-speaking locals who A) viewed contact with the ground as a form of spiritual purity, and B) had no equivalent of a question form. I was in Group 3, which tried to interpret what was going on. Neither of the first two groups knew what the other one had been assigned (and us in Group 3 were ignorant of both).

As you can imagine, a bizarre scene followed, where many assumptions were made. During the debriefing after, we discussed how culture intersects with language. I thought back on this exercise when I was watching the 2016 film Arrival, which hearkens back to the roots of sci-fi film by focusing on the philosophical implications of an alien encounter rather than fast ships and loud explosions. You can tell a lot of love and creativity went into this project. It's well shot, well acted, suspenseful. And it works...mostly.

First, the positive. The aliens are the breakout stars of this movie. Unearthly, mysterious, and inscrutable, they still manage to be immensely likable. I found myself rooting for them (and at one point fearing for their safety) as much as I did for the human characters. Considering they have no faces and barely anything resembling dialog, on top of looking like something out of a Lovecraftian nightmare, that's quite a movie-making accomplishment.

It's refreshing to see an alien movie that focuses on the alienness--that feeling of smallness and helplessness that comes with encountering something totally beyond the frame of human experience. The aliens in Arrival aren't hostile; they don't want to eat us or blow up our planet. All the conflict in the story derives from the aliens' otherness: the struggle to comprehend what may not be comprehensible and the accompanying descent into fear and paranoia.

There's good suspense leading up the the reveal of the aliens. The movie takes its time even revealing what the ship looks like, and when you finally do see it...The design and cinematography made me really wish I had seen this movie on the big screen. The characters are in the dark as well, right up to the point where they take their stomach-churning first step onto the gravity-defying ship. It's implied the last guy to talk to the aliens went mad, and you can believe it.

Anything involving the aliens and their esoteric language is not screen time wasted.

Our human characters are compelling as well. Amy Adams carries the story with her intelligence, her tenacity, and her vulnerability. She can be afraid and overwhelmed, but she also takes calculated risks--such as removing her hazmat suit so that the aliens ("Heptapods" because of their seven legs) can see her in the flesh. She's professional, but she also gives pushback to her superiors from the military when their methods get in the way of her doing her job.

Jeremy Renner also gives a solid performance as a skeptical scientist in spite of an opening line that makes him seem weirdly antagonistic. He quickly warms up to Adams' character and clearly has her back throughout the story. I like seeing a male character who gets over prejudice without turning into a whining toddler. Reasonable men exist, Hollywood.

Unfortunately, there were also some downsides for me. I'll look at the less spoiler-y first.

As you can gather from the trailer, a big theme in this movie is language, namely how our language determines the way we think and ultimately the choices we make. So I was looking forward to seeing what techniques an expert linguist like Louise (Adams) would bring to the table to communicate with these extra-dimensional beings. And I got...stuff I learned in my three-month TESOL certification course.

I with the film had given its audience more credit. I felt sorry for Adams' character--having to explain everything to these morons.

"She wrote her name on a whiteboard and pointed to herself??? What wizardry is this? No one's ever done that before!"

Are you kidding me? That is literally the first thing anyone would do when trying to breach the language barrier. I guess "Me Tarzan, you Jane" is also too deep for these guys. At one point, Louise describes her own writing as "dazzle them with the basics." I feel you, girl.

Yet at another point the military criticize Louise for teaching the Heptapods simple nouns and verbs instead of immediately trying to learn their intentions toward Earth. In response, she takes the question "What is your purpose on earth?" and explains all the assumptions you need to make before that sentence makes sense. For example, do the aliens even have questions? How do they distinguish between you singular and you plural (or are they a hive mind, which no one suggests)? Do they have intentions, or are they creatures of instinct?

But wouldn't most people realize that's not a question you can ask or answer within a few weeks of studying a language? Everyone knows that you spend the first hour of Spanish 101 learning how to introduce yourself. And that's learning an Earth language as an Earthling.

In fact, Louise undersells the problem. As an experiment, I tried translating "What is your purpose on earth?" into Japanese, a language I know okay. I came up with,

地球に来たの目標は何ですか？

Which isn't perfect, but it gets the job done. But obviously I've studied Japanese too long because I didn't realize for a while that I had completely bypassed one of Louise's big problems. In Japanese, you don't need the "you." "Coming to earth purpose is what" is a perfectly natural sentence. But it's a classic example of Japanese ambiguity that drives Americans up the wall. Apparently Japanese is weirder than Heptapod.

Another moment that made me wan to throw my computer across the room came when they figure out the Heptapods' language is only written, with no aural component. Again, the characters act like this is some mind-blowing concept we've never seen before (though thankfully it's a brief scene). Which would be insulting enough, even if they didn't spend a huge chunk of the movie TALKING ABOUT CHINA.

CHINA.

I realize it's not exactly the same thing because obviously you can speak Mandarin, but one of the most widely spoken languages in the world uses a writing system based on idea, not sound. You can't sound out a new character in Chinese like you can in English with d-o-g = dog. If you've never seen 犬 before, you will have no idea what it sounds like and probably no idea what it means unless someone tells you.

Also, we have sign language, which is neither written, heard, nor spoken.

Point being: This isn't new stuff. Earth languages are weird.

I'm disappointed in the lack of imagination in Arrival. There are so many ways to explore language in film, but in spite of some clever moments, Arrival felt very pedestrian.








***FROM HERE ON IN THERE BE SPOILERS***






I can't really discuss the ending of the movie without getting into spoiler territory, so if you want to see the movie as a totally blank slate, skip the rest of the review.

In addition to language, another theme of Arrival is nonlinear time. The Heptapods perceive time as all happening at once and it's this perspective they want to give to humans by sharing their language.

Okay, so far so good. But I feel like the way they develop this theme works better as a shoutout to movie buffs than in service to the movie's story. The most clever use of time and language plays with the language of film. For example, if we see one scene cut before another scene, we as audience tend to assume those scenes are meant to be in chronological order and that scene 1 will help us interpret scene 2--but that's not always the case. Sometimes movies need to show us events out of order.

Another example of film language is showing a scene out of context and then cutting to a character's reaction. Are we meant to see this as a memory? A vision? Mind reading? Without dialog, we can make guesses, but we don't know for sure.

Arrival uses nonlinear time to play with film language and give us a believable twist that fits with the setup of the film.

However, while the idea is good, the execution falls flat from a story perspective. The tragic backstory (or "front" story) they give the main character is beyond cliche. Literally think of the first sad thing that comes to mind, and that's probably it. The backstory scenes feel too sappy for the rest of the movie, and we don't need them to sympathize with the main character.

Nonlinear perspective also is key to solving the growing international conflict on earth. But the way Louise uses it...doesn't hold up to scrutiny. Briefly, Louise gains access to some highly private family information and uses it to talk down a hostile world leader. But if I were about to drop a nuke and some stranger called me and told me something only I should know, my reaction would be less "Yay world peace!" and more "Go to hell."

I wish Louise's plan were the culmination of facts we had seen throughout the film, occurring at both past and future spots in the timeline, instead of information that's dumped on her literally as she's putting the plan into action.

But the biggest issue surrounding the film's use of nonlinear time is one of character. And I've been putting off mentioning this for several hundred words now, but it's time to face the elephant in the room. Aliens and nonlinear time has been done before. Famously.

The moment you hear those concepts together, you can't help but think of Kurt Vonnegut's anti-war novel Slaughterhouse 5. But that book takes a slightly different angle from Arrival. Where in the film the aliens are altruistic beings capable of self-sacrifice who work towards a mutually beneficial arrangement with humans, Vonnegut's Tralfamadorians are assholes.

The Trafamadorians have no concept of death, so they have no regard for life. Everyone's both dead and alive to them. They feel no personal responsibility because everything that happens, happens. Their motto, which rings like a dirge throughout the book, is, "So it goes." Dresden gets firebombed. So it goes. Just accept it. The only expression of will for the Tralfamadorians is to gather as many happy moments as possible because they'll be experiencing them on endless replay for the rest of eternity.

Arrival didn't have to take the same route as Slaughterhouse 5. They could have portrayed multiple branching futures, or even multiple pasts. The Heptapods might not have a concept of death, since at one point they use the term "death process" instead of "dead," indicating that death is something they go through, not a final state. It's something to think about. But they appear to have some regard for human life and pursue their goals in a way that brings about peace on earth, so they're not heartless.

Yet the Tralfamadorian philosophy creeps in, not with the aliens but with our main character. Near the end of the film, Louise gains the enlightened perspective of the Heptapods, and it's implied (at least according to another character) that she makes a choice: to let another person die an early painful death. Louise reasons that the good times she will spend with that person outweigh the grief of parting--which after all is not truly the end.

But Louise is the only human who perceives time this way. For everyone else, dead is dead.

You could argue that Louise's choice gave this person a happy, albeit brief existence they wouldn't have had otherwise. But I was raised Christian, and I've heard that argument before. That's the line of reasoning that says God is perfectly within his rights to predestine us to hell. He created the world, he brought us into the world, and he can do with us as he pleases. It's a monstrous argument to defend a monstrous being.

By the end of the movie, Louise has become very Tralfamadorian. Collecting happy moments is all that matters. Other humans' agency? Not so much. Which would be fine if the film portrayed it as a morally ambiguous choice, or as a descent into fatalism. But the film ends with this "cherish the moment" uplifting tone that seems less appropriate the longer your think about the implications.

In conclusion, I think the value of Arrival comes down to whether you are a fan of film or a fan of story. If you're a movie buff, this film succeeds. But if you like good stories...

While writing this review, I began to wonder if all media takes place in nonlinear time. From my perspective, aren't the events of Arrival always happening? Don't I say, "Louise watches the alien arrival on the TV" and "Louise steps onto the space ship" as if those are both present, when in fact they are days apart for the character? Yet, when I actually read a book or watch a movie I have to experience it linearly the way the characters do.

 My journey with any work is linear, but it's a spiral. Each time I come back to a book or movie, I see something new, building on all my previous experiences with it. I wonder what I'll think the next time I watch Arrival.

Blog Hiatus and Pics from Japan

So last semester I had to create a blog on Wordpress as part of my homework. That's why I didn't make any updates to this one. However, I did want to get at least one post up during January since who knows what I'll be busy with once the semester really starts.

As people on Facebook already know, I spent ten days in Japan over break. And I was worried about so many things about this trip. One thing did really disappoint me, but in the end I don't think it was something I could have changed without being a fundamentally different person. Overall I saw many beautiful sights and had many cherished reunions with old friends.

Here are some of the best pictures I took on the trip.

A friendly robot at the ghibli museum

Kanazawa castle

Okonomiyaki

The Atomic bomb dome in the snow

Miyajima Torii

Snow at the top of Mt. Misen

Todaiji (home of the giant Buddha statue) in Nara

KKM Chapter 1 historical note

I only have one page today. But it took me a long time to translate the text. :P Paragraphs about Japanese history are a bit more of a job than manga dialog. But anyway...

１神の島：厳島の今昔

1 Island of God: Itsukushima’s past and present

神話や伝説が息づく島、厳島

Island of living myths and legends, Itsukushima

松島、天橋立とともに日本三景のひとつである安芸の宮島。厳島とも呼ばれ、雄大な自然と神秘的な佇まいに、古来、神が宿るとしてさまざまな神話や伝説が語り継がれてきた。天然記念物と弥山原始林と海上に浮かぶ厳島神社世界文化遺産に登録され、世界中から観光客が訪ねている。

Along with Matsushima and Amanohashidate, Aki Miyajima is counted as one of Japan’s three beauty spots. With majestic nature and mysterious appearances, Miyajima (also called Itsukushima) is known as the dwelling place of the gods, and many myths and legends have been handed down since ancient times. The natural monument Mt. Misen and the floating Itsukushima shrine have been registered as world cultural heritage sites, and people from all over the world come to visit.

標高的５３３m、宮島で最も高い弥山は、８０６年に弘法大師・空海が開創。１２００年余り、山岳信仰の霊峰として平清盛などに崇められてきた。"日本の三景の真価の頂上の眺めにあり"と言われ、原始林が史跡、寺社など多くの見どころ。

At a height of 533 meters, Misen is Miyajima’s tallest mountain. In 806 BCE the monk Kobodaishi (Kuukai) founded a shrine at its summit. Around 1200 BCE, the site became revered as a sacred mountain by the likes of Taira no Kiyomori. It’s been said, “The true value of this one of Japan’s beauty spots is the view from the summit,” and its many highlights include virgin forest, shrines and temples, and historic landmarks.

推古の天皇即位の年（５９３年）に創建された厳島神社は、神様と人間界と結ぶ"接点"と言われる場所。仁安３年（１１６８年）、平清盛によって造営された社殿は、神殿造りの様式を取り入れつつ海の上という自然条件も克服したなくみな造り。８００年以上の歴史の中で、機度も災害にあいながらも、ほぼ創建当時も見ることができる。シンボル的存在の大鳥居は満潮時には堂々と海面に浮かび、干潮時には干潟に穏やかな雰囲気をまとって佇んでいる。

Established in 593 BCE, the year of Empress Suiko’s coronation, Itsukushima is said to be the point of contact between humans and gods. In Year 3 of the Nin’an period, the shrine pavilions established by Taira no Kiyomori, incorporating the style of the main rooms, were a triumph over nature, an ingenious structure “on top of the sea.” During its post-1800 history, even while meeting disasters time and again, Itsukushima has managed to appear nearly the same as at its founding. The symbolic presence of the Torii gate floats boldly on the surface of the sea at high tide, and at low tide stands on the tidelands cloaked in an atmosphere of calmness.

On "Fairness"

One of the top ten sermon cliches is "fairness." As soon, as I say that word, you know what I mean. It always comes up with the theodicy portion of whatever the topic is. Something will come up like death, or earthquakes, or world hunger. For the handful of people who don't know what theodicy means, the pastor will ask how an omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent God let bad things happen. The pastor will adopt a whiny voice and ask, "But why isn't the world fair?"

Next, the pastor will grin. Because he thinks his whiny voice was amusing. "Well," he'll say. "I'm very glad the world isn't fair. I'm very glad God isn't fair. Because if God was fair He would have every right to send me to hell for my sins."

The idea is that God isn't the one mucking things up. It's us humans who created the whole shitstorm by eating from the wrong tree, and we've carried on the legacy ever since.

Just today I realized how bizarre this argument is. As Inigo Montoya would say, "You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means." Not only is human evil a bad answer to the question of why God allows evil in the world, I don't think it's even answering the same question.

Imagine you see someone molesting a child. Would it really comfort you to think, "Yes, that adult's actions are bad. But what God wants to do to that little child is an infinity of times worse"?

Think about it.

Pointing to some terrible suffering, and saying God could do so much worse (in fact his nature demands it) is the opposite of comforting. This goes beyond God causing the evil in the world or passively allowing evil to happen. It portrays a God who looks down on the petty misery we unleash on each other and goes, "Hah! Amateurs!"

Now, I guess you could say "The point is he could send us all to hell and he doesn't! He just sends most of us. See how nice God can be?"

If he still had to torture himself, does that mean he's a masochist?

Also, how is this not, "Stop crying or I'll give you something to cry about?"

I'm even sure this particular theodicy is in the bible. That human suffering is no problem because we're all sinful anyway and deserve worse. Actually, it does sound a lot like Paul and his whole predestination rant.

Interestingly, there are characters in the Bible who ask almost this exact question of theodicy. In fact, the disciples actually make it easy on Jesus by assuming from the get go that sin has to be involved in some way.

Here's John 9:1-5 (NIV version)

As he went along, he saw a man blind from birth. ² His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”
³ “Neither this man nor his parents sinned,” said Jesus, “but this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him. ⁴ As long as it is day, we must do the works of him who sent me. Night is coming, when no one can work. ⁵ While I am in the world, I am the light of the world.”⁶ 
 After saying this, he spit on the ground, made some mud with the saliva, and put it on the man’s eyes. ⁷ “Go,” he told him, “wash in the Pool of Siloam” (this word means “Sent”). So the man went and washed, and came home seeing.

Huh. 

It's almost as if Jesus doesn't think human sin caused this man's disability. Almost like his reaction is compassion instead of self-righteousness. Like, instead of explaining away another person's suffering, his job is to help. And he's got a limited window to heal people while he's on earth, but he's going to do as much as he can.

If someone asks me, "If God is good why is there evil and death and sickness in the world? How is that fair? " my answer is, "I don't know. You're right. It's not fair. Let's try to make it better."

Or maybe God just smited that guy so He could look really awesome healing him later. In that case we can all just sit on our butts and debate theology.