Host Family Eve

6/16/09, 8:45PM, Hakodate

Tonight is the last night of our so called quarantine; a week has passed, and no one in the program has had more than a cough (all of whom immediately were placed on a strict regimen of face-masks a la Japonais). School started, as planned, on Monday, though, and I was placed in the advanced (Jōkyū, 上級) class. There are apparently four levels: two classes of Intermediate I, two classes of Intermediate II, one class of Advanced, and one of High Advanced. Judging from the amount of work we’ve been assigned from the start, as well as the distressing level of competence in those around me, I’m happy with, and just a little frightened by, my placement. Unlike last summer, all the material is new for me. It will be difficult, but I think worthwhile.

Not only are we responsible for our standard in-class work, but HIF also requires every student to pursue an independent study project. I did some brainstorming and, after visiting the Hakodate museum of northern peoples with Jacob this weekend, decided that I want to do a project on the native Ainu people of Hokkaido. They are the island’s indigenous people, and arguably, the oldest resident ethnic group in Japan. They haven’t been treated very well historically, and theirs is a legacy in some ways like that of the native tribes in America. There are relatively few Ainu left, and their language is being extinguished with time. I want to know what opinions people around here have on the Ainu; partly out of curiosity, and partly because bringing help to the Ainu means knowing what their potential helpers think of them.

As I walked through the museum, it seemed like I was in a mausoleum of sorts; most of the tribes whose objects were being showcased had long faded into history, and all that remained of their presence, from Hokkaido through northern China up to the highest reaches of Siberia, were the spears and canoes and tunics held behind glass enclosures. A tenuous existence still remains for the Ainu, and I hope I can do some small thing so that they don’t disappear too.