Castles and Buns on a Monday Afternoon

What an unusual afternoon....

After a totally uneventful morning of no classes, which I spent planning my Spring Break trip, I was pretty much resolved to an afternoon of boredom while I waited until I could go home. But things got rather interesting.

First, I *finally* got around to walking up to Koyama castle, which perches on the hill next to my school. A castle you say? You mean you work within walking distance of a historical Japanese castle and you haven't bothered to go yet? I know .... but seriously, it's a small castle, and a replica, and it can be seen perfectly fine from below, so I never went out of my way. But I had a lovely time up there today! The weather has gotten warm, the flowers are in bloom, and there was hardly anyone around to disturb the peace (except the groundskeeper with a leaf blower, just my luck.) You cannot go inside the castle, but there are numerous gates and shrines around it that made for a really enjoyable stroll. The REAL undiscovered Japan - it is silly that whenever I visit a major sight I gripe about all the tourists, yet there are really cool places right in my own backyard that I never visit. Silly silly silly....

When I got back to school I was immediately bombarded by one of the English teachers and two students, saying, "Ah, Nikoru, we have been looking for you!" I got this brief sense of embarrassment that I had been off wandering around at one of the rare moments where my help was actually needed, but it turned out to be pretty minor - they just needed me to identify a song for them. They two students were part of the school dance team, and they were putting together their routine for the upcoming school festival. They had found their song, but wanted to know what it was about. One of the girls had saved it on her cell phone, so she played it for me right then and there. I couldn't figure it out for the first few seconds because of the poor sound quality. So I leaned closer to the phone...and then I hear it loud and clear: ".....look at her butt, it is like, so big! I know, she must be one of those rap guys girlfriends..." I just about died laughing.

So, if you are reading this and don't recognize those lyrics, it just means you were not a teenager in the early 90's. But those of you who DO know the song can understand how funny that moment was for me - AND the girls wanted me to explain the song to them. Oh, wow..... finally something to do! Does this qualify as a teachable moment?

I grabbed a paper and pen and sat down with them in the other room. By the way, these were *not* English course students, so their English ability is really limited. But I managed to explain the basic premise of the song using a fair amount of gestures and my bad Japanese. (Sounds embarrassing, but it is the sort of thing that I am actually used to by now.) I was able to get across that the song was by a man singing about how much he liked big butts, and the talking part in the beginning is two girls shit-talking about another girl with a big ass. Needless to say, they thought that was pretty damn funny.

They asked if I could write down the lyrics of the song for them, so I went to the computer room and printed them up. They gazed at the pages swimming with unfamiliar English words, and then made a good attempt to figure them out. One of the girls seemed pretty intent on having me explain what every line in the song meant - we got to the 3rd line before I had to just tell her that it would be waaaay to complicated for her to understand because the song is almost all slang. Even if I sat down with one of the English teachers, it would still take hours to explain everything in that song. And given the nature of the lyrics, I don't think I'd really want to do that...

It got me thinking though - what an amazing way to teach Japanese students about a very interesting part of American culture. Think about it - in order to fully understand Baby's Got Back, a person has to first know about African American culture and how it contrasts with "white America." The conversation in the beginning of the song is two white girls talking about a black girl with a big butt. And then Sir Mix A Lot comes in a reassures all the black girls that he LIKES big butts. He is essentially suggesting that black women reject the idea that skinny = attractive and be proud of their curves. (It could *almost* qualify as a female empowerment song if it wasn't for the fact that it still completely objectifies women as sexual objects.)

It might be hard to appreicate this if you have never lived in Japan, but a song like Baby's Got Back is an absolute treasure trove of cultural insight. The vast majority of Japanese have no clue about race dynamics in the US, so there is actually a lot you would have to explain in order to fully explain the song. Not to mention the slang - now that would be educational!

Well, I know what I am teaching in my listening class next term!