For today's update I used a random word generator to brainstorm ideas for my post.
1. Taxi. There are only a handful of taxis in Shikaoi. I have used one once, with friends, on the coldest night of winter last year (-19C) to get across town. I wanted to walk but they would hear none of it. Shikaoi proper is quite compact and thus easily walked or biked across in a matter of minutes. Moving to any large city, like Sapporo, and taxis become much more prevalent, reaching levels not seen in Edmonton or Calgary. The high rate of use in big city is probably due to the sever parking restrictions derived of a lack of parking spaces. Canada is wide thus a substantial part of our landmass can be dedicated to housing cars. This is an untenable position in Japan because it would create a need to live in your car. There is no where to park downtown that isn't expensive, plus it's a headache. (The most I have seen anywhere for parking for an evening is around 5000 Yen, but normally is it is a more reasonable 2000 Yen. Big cities have many of those funky vertical stacking lots.) One can side step this situation by simply getting a taxi, many of which are often sitting around waiting for customers. Contrast this to Calgary where it is almost always necessary to phone ahead for a cab.
2. Divine. Many are familiar with the peaceful coexistence of Buddhism and Shintou-ism in Japan. Of course, here, if one uses the word "Shintou" it will often garner a blank stare. A transformation in meaning, perhaps slight, happened when the word was brought to North America for study. The word one should use to represent what we mean by Shintou is Kami-sama. The word Shintou (神道) itself is quite a beautiful in kanji, but so is Kami-sama (神様). Let me elaborate:
I have to grossly paraphrase the history of Shintou but basically it's a religion that believes that everything is possessed by tiny Gods. Tables, chairs, but especially natural objects. The religion reveres nature. The word "Shintou" roughly means "the way" and has much in common with China's Taoism. Notice the first kanji in both words; kami (神) is the character for God, or, more importantly, Gods. ~Sama works like ~san, but is much more respectful. When someone talks of Kami-sama living in a tree or rock or shrine it is his or her name they are suggesting; "Kami-sama". Shintou is a real Japanese word but I am unfamiliar with its usage. When asked about "Shintou" I get an underwhelming response. If I ask about Kami-sama I can be understood. I am not sure quite what is going on; however it seems appropriate in light of how i spend most of my day.
3. Toaster. This had to be some sort of sign. I have a lot of history with this word. Some of my most successful early writing was about toasters. It was also a word that I seemed to have gone along time without using and had forgotten. I was shocked when I read it. I have a toaster oven at my house that I like using, never being allowed one as a child. At the moment, I don't have my microwave plugged it. And even if I did the only thing I would probably use it for would be defrosting bread, which is a bit more tricky in a toaster oven. I have also been using the small broiler that I have in my stove (and I do mean small). It's more tricky for cooking because it's gas and things can go from good to black very quickly. (As a poor potato discovered last month.)
Where can we end up with this topic? The only thing that becomes a bit of a hassle without a microwave is reheating leftovers. Noodles and spaghetti do fine with a couple of minutes under the broiler. But what about delicate French soups? My only microwave rule when I was living in Calgary was that I never - ever - reheated anything in plastic. I still shutter when asked here at 7-11 if I want something heated in its own packaging. I say no and will take it home and use my toaster oven, making sure to take it out of its packaging. The reason not to re-heat anything in plastic is heating plastic can release dioxins into your food and then you eat it. They are released over time from just about everything, from vinyl siding to computer keyboards. This is easily side stepped using ceramic dishes when reheating. Dioxins are a family of related poisons. Small amounts can build up overtime to dangerous levels in the body. It is one of the hardest chemicals to cleanse the body of because of it's fat-soluble properties. It turns out that while most human ingestion of dioxin is through food; diesel fuel and coal-fired utilities, the new green energy I have heard, contribute to the majority of dioxin in the atmosphere. From here the dioxin works it way up the food chain, which humans sit convienently perched atop. I'm sure someone (e.i. Environment Minister Rona Ambrose) will be able to ignore this fact and sweep it under the carpet once it is explained to us that it will cost jobs and investment opportunity if we were to do anything about it. I know I can sleep better at night knowing that I am assured future enjoyment of my future investments as dioxins slowly acumulate in my body now.
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