Saskatoonians out to see the river's high level in July 2005

The South Saskatchewan river overflows a walkway

The weir disappears

The weir at a more typical water level

A going away dinner

Tonight we had dinner with our Japanese conversation partners, Yuko and Azusa. By "Japanese conversation", I mean that Yuko and Azusa can practice speaking English - since "conversation" would be a huge exaggeration of our Japanese ability at this point.

I recently read a book titled "Japanland" by Karin Muller. She lived in Japan for a year making a low budget documentary film on Japan, and then wrote about her experiences. She makes a number of statements concerning Japanese culture, and we thought we'd ask the experts - Yuko and Azusa - if these observations were true.

Traditional Japanese culture and events. We asked Yuko and Azusa if they had seen Kabuki theatre ("No"), Yabusame (archery on horseback - "on TV"), and Iaido. I had to explain what Iaido was - so not surprisingly, they hadn't seen it. I wasn't surprised, as the only website I'd found on Iaido was a club in Berkeley, California. A later search revealed dojos in Indiana and the Canadian national Iaido site. Maybe the real Iaido sites are only in Japanese . . .

But I also get the feeling the Karin Muller searched out unusual or fringe aspects of (not so) modern Japanese life that are in line with Western expectations of Japanese traditions, and not so much an interest or concern for modern Japanese. And many of these episodes (inside a Sumo training academy, befriending an apprentice sword maker, going through an annual purification ritual with an ascetic mountain cult) do make for interesting reading.

New Human Beings. As for modern Japanese life, she did live for much of the year with a Japanese family which included a 27 year old, unmarried daughter. She claimed the twenty-something generation in Japan is called the New Human Beings (for which she did not provide a Japanese translation). Yuko and Azusa had never heard of this, and I had to even explain the North American practice of naming generations (Baby Boomers, Generation X, etc.). They didn't think any generation in Japan had a name. Meeting with Yuko a few days later for coffee, she recalled their her parents generation is called "dankai no sedai", which she wasn't sure about translating, but thought it might be along the lines of "generation with too many people" (and would be the same generation as the Baby Boomers).

Love & marriage in Japan. Miss Muller did a mail out survey of young Japanese women on love and marriage. We asked Yuko and Azusa the same questions, to see if we got the same answers. Japanland said that 30% of all marriages in Japan are arranged, not in the sense that the bride and groom are betrothed in childhood and never meet until the altar, but that the parents are involved in suggesting that so & so might be a good partner, setting up dates, and so forth. After a bit of thought, Yuko and Azusa agreed that this was true.

What's the most important in a potential husband? Love, earning power, or similar socio-economic background? Both Yuko and Azusa (independently, as we asked them at different times) said, "earning power."

"But," said Yuko, "if you ask a woman, she will tell you love."