We eat noodles on New Year's Eve in Japan. Yummy.
Japanese New Year's is much like American Thanksgiving. It's a time for families to get together, eat a lot, and (often) drink a lot, and like any family-oriented holidays, it reminds you of where you come from, all the goods and bads, things that have changed and that haven't.
For me one of the things that haven't changed was my father's family getting annoyingly drunk.
My uncle, who has lived in England, NY, LA, and other places, loves English and loves talking about the places he's visited. He's happy because now he can talk to me about LA. He tells me the names of the good restaurants he frequented when he lived in Redondo Beach even though I can't really afford them. He tells me how he would take Sepulveda to get to LAX because it's faster than being caught in traffic on the freeway.
And he wants to speak English, or about English.
After a Japanese singer finishes a song in English on TV, he asks me, "So what did you think of that?"
"What do you mean?"
"Her pronunciation. What do you think?"
She just has Japanese accent, like I do.
"What do you think?" He persists.
"I guess it may be difficult for some Americans to understand her words." I try to give an answer he wants.
"Right!" My uncle is happy.
"Is that so?" my mom asks.
"It's mixture of British accent and American accent. That's why it's hard for native speakers to understand," he explains.
That's a cool way to explain Japanese accent, I think.
Then he starts asking me questions about my future, and eventually calls me strange.
"Something wrong," he says, now in English.
"That's rude," I say in Japanese. "I prefer 'different.'"
"What's the difference?" my mom asks, so I explain the difference.
"You're right," my uncle says in his mixture of British and Japanese accent, "You are quite right."
"Who are you?" he asks.
"Who are YOU?" I ask, rather annoyed than amused now.
After a while my dad gets mad at his brother's persistent questioning and English speaking, and they engage in a drunken fight that seems to be a sort of entertainment for them and their mother, my grandma. At this point I start to look forward to the noodle time and going to bed afterwards, but at least I'm not alone. I escape to the kitchen with my mom and aunt. Doing the dishes and rolling our eyes at the drunk people in the next room, we await the midnight.
By the time the new year arrives, we're all calm somehow. We sit in the living room and eat the noodles together, watching the crowds of people paying their first visit to shrines and temples on TV.
