6 August 2004 (19 Av 5764)
Having left Kobe for good on Sunday, I went to Matsuyama to teach a four-day intensive summer course at Ehime University. I am happy that the very last course I was asked to teach before leaving Japan for Israel was on Jewish languages and cultures. Since this was the fourth and probably the last time to teach this course, I wanted to experiment with new topics I had never dealt with systematically, i.e., Jewish onomastics, proverbs and humor, in addition to Jewish history, religion, languages and folk music.
Humor was by far the most difficult topic to formulate from the pedagogic point of view. Although I collected what I thought were the best Jewish jokes and tried to categorize them with cultural explanations, I mostly did nothing but introduce them orally to the students. During the course I felt that most of them had a hard time understanding Jewish humor as their faces remained frozen as if they were robots. To my surprise, however, when I read their comments about the course later, this turned out to be an erroneous conclusion on my part. Jewish humor seems to have aroused more interest and admiration among them than any other topic I dealt with in the course. This is paradoxical because I saw few smiling faces when I told them jokes.
For me it is an intelligent pleasure not only to hear good jokes while shmoozing with someone but also to tell them to him or her in turn and receive immediate reactions. Unfortunately, this type (as well as other types) of verbal interaction is not part of Japanese culture, nor could I experience it this time in class. I wish I were wrong, but I have an impression that typical Japanese conversations are becoming less and less interactive and resembling more and more those of robots. Personally, I defintely prefer the Jewish way of conversations.
After the course I dropped in on my good Israeli friend and his family in Tokyo on my way to my parents' in Akita. Part of our conversation centered around Jewish humor; naturally, we started telling some juicy jokes to each other, and each one of us burst into laughter though many of them were already known to us. I felt as if I had reached an oasis after wandering in the desert for four days. I am not so naive as to depict Israel as a rosy garden, but it is good to be reminded that at least in terms of verbal interaction I can expect much there, at least much more than in Japan.
13 August 2004 (26 Av 5764)
There is at least one thing which I, unlike many people of my age, have not experienced yet in my life, i.e., to be a father. The psychology of parents, therefore, is as enigmatic for me as that of young women. Especially since I came to my parents' place in Akita last Friday to spend the last few weeks before my departure for Israel, I have been wondering what the greatest satisfaction is that children can give to their parents, or more specifically when my parents are most satisfied with their children, including myself and my sister.
I imagine that many parents will probably feel happiest when their children are happiest. But what if children feel happiest when their parents are happiest? Such codependent happiness in its totally balanced form would hardly be possible in real life situations as parents and children generally desire different things for themselves and each other.
My parents may be proud and happy that their son is about to do something that no one in the world known to them has ever done before, thus fulfilling his professional aspiration. But on the other hand, they would also be happy (perhaps even happier?) if I could live near them even by doing a not so inspiring job. Unfortunately, these two options are mutually exclusive in my circumstances, that is, I cannot have my cake and eat it, too. This is a strange feeling mixed with joy and expectations on the one hand and guilt on the other, and it, especially its latter half, overshadows the fear of the unknown in an old-new environment where I will start living and working in about two weeks.
20 August 2004 (3 Elul 5764)
It is undoubtedly an intellectual pleasure, at least for me, to study something for its own sake even if (or precisely because?) it has little or no social relevance and economic value in the place where we live, as long as it arouses our interest. This gives us a feeling that we are opening a treasure chest known to few or no people around us. This was the case when I started learning Hebrew by myself with the help of Linguaphone more than twenty years ago.
Is it, however, possible to find pleasure and perseverance in pursuing something as our occupation even if it has little or no relevance nor gives us any recognition in our society? And if so, how long can we do so? After all, we (or at least many of us, including myself) are social beings that cannot live in total seclusion.
This week I had to photocopy several Hebrew books on Hebrew lexicography I had shlepped with me from Kobe before sending them by snail-mail to Israel. Photocopying them in a place like a store near my parents' house in the north of Japan was so surrealistic as the language and content of the books had absolutely nothing to do with the place and the people there. The situation in Kobe, where I lived until a few weeks ago for five and a half years, was not so extreme as I had several Hebrew-speaking friends, but it was essentially the same outside a small Israeli ghetto there.
I have often been finding it quite difficult, if not impossible, to keep on making academic output in the area I occupy myself, i.e., Hebrew and Jewish languages for the above reason. Actually, I was almost losing patience with my situation and becoming desperate. I feel as if I had been saved by a helping hand from Israel at the last moment almost miraculously. For the first time in my life what I do for living as well as for intellectual pleasure will have a great deal of social relevance in its natural habitat. What else can I hope for? Sayonara, Japan, until I see you again. Shalom, Israel; I am seeing you again in a week.
27 August 2004 (10 Elul 5764)
I arrived in Israel this morning as was planned. The welcoming voices of my friends on the telephone have made me feel at home from the first day here. I was rather surprised, however, to hear from my closest friend that there is already a rumor about me in the university where I am going to teach: there seem to be people who do not see my appointment favorably. Of course, I can easily understand why, hence I could easily expect this, but I never imagined that I would encounter it on my first day here, though indirectly.
Envy is almost an instinctive feeling for most of us flesh and blood, including myself. I have been working on myself to eradicate this negative feeling from me, and I hope I have succeeded in this more or less. But to cope with the envy of other people toward me is another thing as I cannot control their mind directly. There is probably no perfect remedy for this, but I can already think of something that will hopefully work for most of these people. It is to excel both in teaching and research. This will not be easy as I am aware that psychologically most people will consider me equal to my Israeli colleagues when I am at least 20% better than they, so in order to excel I have to be much better than they in the area which they have learned since their childhood.
I find it rather futile to constantly compare myself with others and live in fear of their shadow as a way to dispel their envy toward me as this can in turn arouse my envy toward them. I have been trying to compete with someone else instead, that is, myself. This is not so easy as it seems, but my experience has taught me that it is a much healthier and positive way. It may take some time for my effort to bear fruit, but I hope it will work in the end. Perseverance is one of the things I have learned since my childhood when it was still considered a positive character in Japanese society.