First day jitters

This is going to be a longer post.  Lots happened.  Be warned.  I use the word "shit" twice, but you're past the first instance so the next one won't be all that shocking.

Also, if you have a request for a post, please let me know in the comments.  Shopping?  Traffic?  Ordering food (I haven't done this, and I will need serious help when I do the first time)?  Right now I cannot travel outside of Tokushima Prefecture, but I have a bike and will be riding around the city.  Maybe later this month or in early June I'll take a trip to a different part of the Prefecture.  We'll have to see about that.  Now, on to the post.

It was my first day on campus meeting with people.  I started the day in more relaxed clothing, however Takashi Emoto managed to get a picture of me just after meeting the administration.  I had gone home to eat lunch and change into my suit.  Many of you have never seen me this well dressed, but here I am in my office.  I don't have the vest on, but maybe I should have.

I have a mask at my desk, but the office for the exchange professor is at least twice as large as my SVSU office.  There's a refrigerator with freezer here, and when I saw it the scene from Tommy Boy where Chris Farley's character finds the mini-fridge in his office popped into my mind.  "Hey, there's even a fridge!  You could put six packs of be... soda in here..."  Yes, I do have a little fan and could do the Darth Vader impression, but I'll leave that for later.

Here I am with the VIPs.  

We only removed our masks for the photo.   I think some would be surprised to know I was very nervous during this.  I wasn't sure what to say or talk about.  I gave Takashi some trouble interpreting (he was fantastic, by the way) by mentioning my research.  It turns out "magnetic phase transitions" is not something people talk about often.  If I recall everything correctly, the gentleman second from the left is Dr. Kazumi Matsushige.  He is President of the University.  He has a background in condensed matter physics, just as I do, which is why I was comfortable mentioning it.  His work is in atomic force microscopy.  I was asked why a physics professor would want to teach about American Culture in a humanities college.  I told them I am motivated by the stagnant thinking patterns I've been in.  The experience teaching here will force my brain to think about things very differently.  Listening to people talk and trying to read basic information requires focus on a "simple" task that I've not had to exert in a long while.  With any luck I'll come back refreshed and with a different outlook on my professor-ing.

I promised food and cooking in this post, and I will deliver.  The past two nights I've made Japanese curry.  On Saturday it was vegetables only, and last night I included some smoked chicken breast.  This is the stove top with a 9" (23 cm) pan on it.

The open bit is the wee grill I mentioned yesterday.  Just to the left is a smoked chicken breast.

For scale, this is the chicken breast on a baking sheet that just fits in the grill section.  Even if the time of year were right, I would not be roasting a Thanksgiving turkey.

 For my curry I used potato, onion, carrot, and eggplant.  I sauteed them in a bit of butter, which came as a single 200 g (about 1/2 pound) slab.

 

Once the veg was browned, I cut up some chicken and added it.  Then I added about 1 cup of water and let it come to a boil.  This is when the flavoring happens.  The curry sauce is in a sort of compressed cake-like brick.  

 I have two varieties - one spicy and one very spicy.  I've learned that Japanese spicy isn't like, say, Indian spicy.  (If you're in Midland, MI and want good goat biryani, I recommend Cinnamon.  Although I have to confirm with them about 10 times that I want Indian spicy, not American spicy.)  Here I'm using one cube of each curry.  Drop those puppies in and stir to dissolve.  Then, let it simmer for 5 or so minutes.

Before you do all of that, though.  Make your rice in the rice cooker.

Now, I'm a pretty handy guy when it comes to technology.  Manufacturers want to make things as easy to use as possible.  Some devices have poorly written instructions, but I can generally figure out what is meant by the words on the page.

Well, shit.  Google Translate was zero help.  I think at one point it translated one of the buttons as "Fire Mountain."  I pushed it, but no volcanic eruptions happened.  Online I found an instruction manual for this model.  Entirely in Japanese and in PDF format.  Unless you pay Adobe, you can't copy/paste text from a PDF in Reader, and I didn't want to hunt up an open-source program.  Even though they are simple to find.  Engage experimental mode.  

I was able to read the upper right as "menu."  It moved an arrow on the screen.  Eventually I pressed the red button and waited.  I knew to wait because the red light above it turned on.  After a few minutes the cooker started clicking like an electrical relay was switching a heater on and off.  There's a little steam vent at the back of the lid.  When I saw steam coming out of it I assumed that meant the water was boiling and the rice was cooking.  About 30 minutes after pressing the red button, there was a series of very insistent beeps, then a yellow light above the leftmost button turned on.  I opened the top, and lo, there was wonderfully cooked rice.

I did not have the wherewithal to take a picture of the finished dish.  I did, however, take a picture of my beverage.

 You can get this beer in the US, so I knew what I was getting myself into.  Later on in my stay I'll look for non-exported beers.

So, there you have it.  I am eating more than cup noodles. 

We are still in remote learning, which means my classes will be via Zoom this week.  I now have access to Manaba (the Learning Management System like Canvas or Blackboard).  Susan showed me how to post an announcement.  Whereas she took care of my Tuesday class for me, I will post for Wednesday.  I just need to figure out how to create assignment dropboxes so students can submit written work.  

If we stay stuck in Zoom school, I might have the students record themselves reading.  I could also record myself reading and ask them to write based on what they hear.  I'll probably also need to arrange one-on-one Zoom meetings to practice conversing.  Flexibility is the name of the game, I think.