Oh, irony of ironies!

This post is dedicated to my friend Johnson, who constantly mocked my ethnicity.

So, there I am, minding my own business at school, when I hear the news that we're going to have what's called "Orthodox Education Day." I'm like, "Great, that'll be so relevant for me as a Protestant." Turns out, this education day thing is a big event where the school holds outdoor services and feeds people more ethnic food than any human being should ever consume. Hundreds and hundreds of people descend on our campus and eat food from places as diverse as Russia, Greece, Serbia, India, Lebanon, etc. At first, I was signed up to do manual labor, like setting up chairs and stuff. But then my friend John asked me to help him with his booth. And this is where the irony comes in.

John's last name is Shoji. He's a Japanese Orthodox Christian, as Japanese and Orthodox as they come... I never thought my mind would be mixing those two concepts, but believe it or not, there are about 10,000 Orthodox Japanese, who are the products of the long-ago Russian missionary efforts headed up by a Russian priest named Nicholas. That makes John very Japanese, and very Orthodox.

So John, knowing I lived in Japan for a year, asks me to help out. I said, "Sure!" Little did I know that would mean peeling raw ginger, cutting onions, and handling raw pork for 4 hours on one day, and then standing over a fryer the next for another 3 hours or so, frying ginger pork. Here I am, slaving away:
The guy next to me was a Russian making perogies. I thought I came here to plumb the depths of the human soul and soar to the heavens, rejoicing in the revelation of God (aka "study theology"), but instead I'm cooking Japanese junk-food while a sloppy Russian keeps splattering me with hot grease. What a barbarian.

For those of you who've eaten in Japan, our food was a lot like gyu-don, sort of Japanese junk food. We served the fried onions and pork (marinated in a ginger-soy sauce) over a bed of rice and shredded cabbage. People loved the food, but I smelled like a short order cook for the next couple days.

And here's where the irony gets even sweeter...Shoji-san wanted me to wear traditional clothing. So, here I am serving with John:
Sorry the quality is so poor. But you get the idea. My outfit was quite a hit with my fellow students...I was called the Last Samurai more than once (which reminds me of a certain somebody I know, who lived in Japan for 3 years, who is a closet Tom Cruise fan and hypocritally watches Tom's movies over and over again, but claims to have never watched the Last Samurai all the way through). But enough ranting.

The point of all this is, I am as un-Japanese as anybody could ever be, and yet I'm not even back home in the US for 2 months and somebody's already asking me to officially represent the culture of Japan. And I don't even like Japanese food very much!! Ironic, indeed.

But I have to say, it was an honor to share the little bit of Japan that I could. I even called out a few "ira shai masen!" just for kicks...John didn't think it was very funny. But then again, he never thinks my Japanese is funny. Whenever I throw some his way, he just looks at me weird, and asks why I said that. Just trying to have a little fun...but at least he now smiles a little when I give him a nice formal "O-ha-yo Gozaimasu!!" early in the morning, complete with a deep bow.

Ok, that's enough for now. Thanks for reading!