Chopsticks

So, chopsticks. In Japan. Are different.
They are exactly the same utensil, but... there's so much associated with them.

In America, I was always proud of the fact that I could use chopsticks. I learned when I was young, probably from my dad (cuz he goes to Japan sometimes), so I never had an issue using them. Sometimes things would slip out of my grip, but honestly, I wasn't a 日本人 (nihonjin=japanese person) so it wasn't an issue.

The first date Max took me on, we got Japanese food at this little place in Santa Barbara. And I assumed everyone could use chopsticks, so I got him a pair... He totally failed. In a cute way, but he totally failed. :D All of his food fell apart. :P I thought everyone could use chopsticks, at least well enough to eat, but that's certainly not the case, so I felt even better for having this amazing ability. (sorry Max! You're awesome in every other way.)

Sometimes I would even eat ice cream with chopsticks, just because it was fun. Americans seem to think that's crazy. I enjoyed the challenge. After a while, it was really easy. Almost easier than a spoon. And better mini serving sizes. I was so Asian-minded. So Japanese inside! My friends called me an egg sometimes, especially when I decided I was going to spend my study abroad time in Japan becoming more Asian. (An egg is yellow inside, white outside).
If you know how much I loved all things Asian, it makes sense.

Now I came to Japan thinking I could use chopsticks. Rightfully so. I had heard that there were some funny little rules surrounding chopsticks, like sticking them into food straight up and down together was like stirring the dead bones of ancestors or something. Some crazy nihonjin shit. I didn't subscribe.

(A short side note: I feel like here, I have a choice of subscribing to Nihonjin mentality or being an outsider. Not that it's this overbearing mentality of obedience and subservience and extreme patience and frequently excusing oneself , but sometimes it is. And sometimes I don't agree with it. And it's uncomfortable. But other times I figure I might as well try being on time, being respectful, trying to be quiet as possible in cafes and on the train... Sometimes it feels right. And totally more efficient, reasonable, and sensible than America. Sometimes I find myself wondering why we don't subscribe to such a mentality with certain aspects of American life. Other times I feel totally oppressed. And a little lonely.)

ANYWAY.

I thought I could use chopsticks. The way I use them might be a little different than the how the wrappers of chinese and japanese resturarant wood chopsticks say to use them, but it worked for me. As long as I could eat, I would be fine, right?

Not so.

In the cafeteria, one of the first days I was eating lunch with some friends from EAP, some of the more Japanese girls noticed how I was holding my chopsticks and immediately brought attention to it.

"Don't you know how to use chopsticks?"
"Yes..."

"Well, you're not supposed to cross them ever when you eat... It's considered impolite or insulting. We don't care, of course, lol, but you might want to fix your hand position just so japanese people don't get offended... but it's cool if you don't, you're white anyway so they'll just think you're a cute gaijin who can't use chopsticks..."

I was blown away. I thought I could use chopsticks, though! And I definitely didn't think these social rules about chopsticks would ever be important. How strange.

I started thinking I was inadequate. And not Japanese enough. I didn't want Japanese people thinking I was some lame dumb gaijin.
So I asked for help.

This sparked a long conversation about social "rules" associated with chopsticks, like the aforementioned dead grandmother ashes/bones/whatever position. (Btw, don't stick your chopsticks into rice completely upright, that is to signify that your bowl is an offering of food for a dead spirit... who would know? Here's some more tips in case you want to become an extremely anal yet polite japanese person. http://www.justhungry.com/your-guide-better-chopstick-etiquette-mostly-japanese)

We spent a good twenty minutes correcting my hand position, but the way I held chopsticks was just so different that it was very hard for me to correct it. The fingers just didn't... go.

It's the same way for me with a pencil... ever since elementary school I have held my pencil differently than everyone else. It's always worked for me. I guess I just like being a inner rebel and doing common knowledge shit differently than everyone else unknowingly. I'm sorry, Japan! I guess I'm just too American.

Regardless of my complete failure to be a polite gaijin that day, I made a resolution that while I was in Japan, I would learn how to use chopsticks the right way. Maybe I wouldn't adhere to this dead grandmother crap (actually I probably will for fear of SCARY SOCIAL REPERCUSSIONS, ooohhhh haha), but I would at least learn how to hold them right.

Every day, I have conciously made an effort to hold chopsticks the right way. It felt awkward at first and I felt like I lacked muscles in my fingers in the way they were oriented, but I knew I was making progress.

Is that what Japanese people do? Suffer through everything until they are gods at EVERYTHING in Japan and make fun of foreigners for suffering while learning their customs? (ie kanji, chopsticks, waiting for very long periods on crowded trains while being silent and avoiding people's gazes, etc)

I don't know. I'm starting to think it might be true, the longer I stay here.

But I can say that whenever I learn more Japanese, or kanji, or a custom, or how to USE CHOPSTICKS THE RIGHT WAY DAMMIT!!!, I get this wonderful feeling of high class satisfaction. I am doing something my rude, brusque, gigantic American brothers and sisters would never be able to even feasibly handle. At least, I think this is my inner nihonjin talking. She's in there. Repressed and confused. And really, really pretty.

(Don't worry, I am a rude, brusque, gigantic American myself. It happens. I sometimes feel like I should tiptoe here.)

Anyway, so now I can say that I can hold chopsticks the right way, three weeks into this rigorous psychological chopstick food torture.

This is true because it was confirmed by nihonjin that weren't even close friends of mine yet. I was hanging out with my nihonjin friend Akane and her friends after we went to see fireworks at the Hanabi Takai on Saturday night. (It was quite fun, by the way... I always heart nihon no hanabi over america no hanabi... they're just so much better and bigger and more beautiful...) Anyway, after getting sufficiently wasted with all of my new nihonjin friends and my one amazing old nihonjin tomodachi, we went to get some food and drink some more... I ordered ramen.
Without even thinking about it (you know, I was drunk), I lifted my chopsticks and ate my ramen...

The right way.

Rainbows sparkled in the sky. The lights flickered in the room. A sexy Japanese man took off his shirt, threw it on the floor, and offered me his hand.
You know it happened.

My new friend Hiro, who happens to also be a student at Keio, turned to me and said "You use your chopsticks very nicely!" I looked down at my hand, perfectly curved around the chopsticks, gripping the noodles in my ramen tightly with ease. The sticks did not cross. Once. Ever.

I smiled. And my inner nihonjin did too.