Steve Solomon, Japan scholar and illustrator of Professor Solomon's acclaimed book, Japan in a Nutshell, (which I consider to be far and away THE BEST introductory book on Japan out there, and which is available to be downloaded FOR FREE on their official website, professorsolomon.com) seems to have found the answer.
Steve believes that "Kosumopuropan" may mean "Cosmo Propane," which would actually make a lot of sense, seeing as how the towel came from a gas company. Granted, there is still the chance that "Kosumopuropan" could be nonsense. However, it is my firm conviction that if "Kosumopuropan" has any meaning at all, then in the words of Adam West Batman, "the only possible meaning must be..." Cosmo Propane!
Amazing deductive Bat-Reasoning, and superior Bat-Logic!! Thank you, Steve!! Your scholarly endeavors serve you well!
Now, getting back to the subject matter at hand, I realized that in my last post, I may have somewhat misportrayed the Japanese toilet, an error which I cannot let go uncorrected. I understood, belatedly, that my American audience now is probably under the impression that Japanese toilets are all super-intelligent robotic monsters from which there can be no escape. While this is true of a considerable portion of the Jpanese toilet population, I would like my friends back home to know that there are definitely some exceptions. For instance, when you open most of the stalls in the teacher's bathroom at my school, you will find yourself confronted with this:
This creation is what is known unto Westerners in Japan as the "Squatty Potty."
Unfortunately, in public bathrooms, usually about eight out of every ten toilets is a Squatty Potty. The remaining two will be what is known somewhat inaccurately as "Western Toilets," a.k.a., the robotic monster Captain Kirk chairs of the future.
I have always taken this as an excellent unintentional metaphor for the current state of Japanese culture today. With one foot blasting off a thousand years in the over-technologically-advanced future, and the other firmly grounded two thousand years in the past, Japan clings to ancient tradition and yet over-enthusiastically aspires towards a future where science, engineering, and technology will make a better world for everyone. This strange temporal dichotomy in their culture is excellently symbolized by the variety in their toilets. Whether you use your toilet like a samurai warrior, or like Captain Kirk and George Jetson, Japan leaves entirely up to you...!
Incidentally, here's a picture of what the "Western Toilet" in the teacher's bathroom looks like:
There is a feature of a lot of Western toilets in Japan that I don't think I mentioned in my last post. As you may recall, I had previously said that I avoid pressing any of the buttons except the flush. For purposes of illustration, here is a picture of the Captain Kirk armrest of the teacher's bathroom toilet, just so you are aware of the options.
As you can see, the left most button means "stop," then there is a selection of two fanny-beam-buttons with different directional sprays of water, then the very comically illustrated "bidet" button that seems to be lifting the victim off the seat with its powerful jet-stream spray, and finally, the warm air "dryer" button. The light-up panel at the lower left is for adjusting the water pressure, and I don't know enough Japanese kanji symbols to be able to tell you what the lights at the right side mean.
Anyway, as I said, in my various encounters with these Japanese toilets, I have never pressed any buttons except for the flush...with one, and only one exception.
Some toilets in Japan will have a strange little unmarked black button politely hidden somewhere on the wall. No fanny diagrams, no Japanese kanji symbols, nothing to hint at what this button is for.
When I first saw this, I was very curious, but wary of pressing it for fear that, knowing Japanese toilets, it might turn out to be an ejector seat or something. So I stared at it in confusion for several visits.
On one occasion, however, I decided to be bold. I would press the little unmarked black button, and find out once and for all!
And so, bracing myself, I pressed the button...
And, all of a sudden, there was a very loud, 15-second-long, toilet-flushing sound effect!
...But the toilet itself didn't actually flush.
Confused, I asked a Japanese friend what on earth this meant. She told me that it was a polite "white-noise" feature, so that, just in case you felt the need to make a rude sound, you could do so at your leisure without embarrassing yourself in front of the other people in the adjacent stalls. Since it was the bathroom, a toilet-flushing sound effect was the perfect ambient noise, and it conserves water by not flushing the actual toilet!
Oh, Japan. Always going the extra mile...
...Speaking of the extra mile, in the Tokyo hotel bathrooms, if you happened to be the lucky guest who first used the toilet at the beginning of the day, this is how you would find the toilet paper:
Neatly folded into a triangle, apparently just to signify that this was the first time that this particular roll was being used.
They also had some pretty considerate contrivances for the women's bathroom, like this:
A little high-chair to put the baby in while you're...um...busy calling Scotty in the Engine Room! ...Or making white-noise sound effects...
Anyway, back to Tokyo orientation!!
Tokyo orientation was full of a lot of speeches and workshops of varying levels of interest and usefulness. The keynote speech, and most of the speeches given by Japanese government ministers were very interesting and often actually rather funny. Other speeches and workshops were not always so successful, however, and by the end of each day we were all pretty much done with it all and ready to have some fun!!
...So, as I had hinted in my last post, at the end of each day of orientation I struck out into the night with a friend to boldly go forth and explore the streets of Tokyo...!
...But I didn't take any pictures of it at night, so you're just going to have to suffer with this day scene I shot during a lunch break!!
Tokyo is a strange and interesting city. It's kind of like a weird, parallel universe version of New York from the year 3,000. With gigantic weird buildings that light up in strange ways, quirky little sidestreets so narrow you can barely walk down them single-file, alleyways jam-packed with steamy little unairconditioned restaurants with big buckets of gigantic dismembered fish heads (ironically meant as a form of advertisement), and numerous strange and fascinating surprises, Tokyo is like a fictional city in a video game fantasy world.
Speaking of video games, Tokyo, like other cities in Japan, is known for its multi-floor arcades, known to the Japanese as "Game Centers," in which literally hundreds of different kinds of games can be found.
It was to one such place that my friend Kate and I would venture each night after orientation.
On the way, we saw some pretty interesting things. Like this guy...!
In Tokyo, cops wear glow-in-the-dark reflective gear that is actually studded with real light bulbs that flash like they're at a rave-club. They also carry these big rave-party light-saber glow-sticks to direct traffic. I'm not sure if they wear this super flashy illumined light-up gear to be more visible to traffic or to pedestrians, but either way, it certainly made it easy to spot a cop and ask him for a picture!
(Wouldn't it be awesome if we had light-up cops in America...?!
Oh MAN, man...!!!)
Anyway, on our nightly pilgrimage to the Tokyo game center, we would often pass crazy signs. Like this...!
The city of Tokyo politely reminds you at all times not to be an elephant, please.
(...And, if you absolutely must be an elephant, please don't be a littering elephant. That's were we draw the line.)
The game center itself was a typical one for a Japanese city. I believe this particular one was five floors (I've been to one in Kyoto that had as many as nine floors...!), all lain out in a typical (though not universal) pattern, as follows.
(Top) 5th Floor -- "Prikura" glamour photo booths where you and your friends can be bombarded with so much front-lighting that your nose disappears, making everyone look really attractive no matter how bad your skin is!
4th Floor -- Psudo-Gambling Floor, where all the games that are kind of like gambling (except not, because gambling is illegal in Japan) are kept. So, you can win fake coins or tokens or Pachinko balls or whatever to trade for prizes, which you can then take to a back-alley and trade for money, because that's not technically winning money, and so it's all ok.
3rd Floor -- Music Game Floor, the floor that popularized games like DDR, Guitar Hero, Taiko Drum Master, and other such insanities.
2nd Floor -- The Awesome Game Floor, where you can play every kind of fighting game imaginable, from Street Fighter to Gundam to Pokémon, among many other, very awesome things.
Floor 1: The Claw Machine Floor -- This is my favorite floor.
Claw machines in Japan are known as "UFO Catchers," and are distinct from their American counterparts in several ways. For one thing, they are not rigged and do not cheat. They are legitimately very challenging, but all of them are theoretically winnable, depending on the type of claw and the shape and weight of the prize, etc. Also, a lot of the prizes they have are these toys that are so adorable, they totally break the Cuteness Barrier.
Behold...!
The Adorable Pink Pirate Llama...!!!
This adorable toy llama is the prize treasure of my Tokyo Orientation. I was determined to win one of them--but the machine they were in, while appearing deceptively easy, was really quite difficult. Conveniently, at any time, you can ask one of the wandering game center attendants to open the machine case and re-position the prizes if you want to try to win a particular one. Sometimes they're really nice and will try to make it easy for you by putting the prize you want really close to the edge so all you have to do is nudge it a little and it's yours!
I was SO INCREDIBLY PSYCHED when I won this pink pirate llama. Her name is Miku. She was the individual one that I had wanted most, by far the cutest one in the incomparable sea of cuteness laid out in the "UFO Catcher" machine before me. And it wasn't an easy win, either; but I was incredibly lucky and had a pretty sound strategy.
She was close to the edge, but in an awkward position, and the claw, of course, was very weak in its grab (although they do grab more strongly every few times on a cycling basis). The elongated shape of the llamas was wrong for the narrow scoop-shape of the claw, so for two tries, I managed to lift and position her towards the edge.
On the third try, however, I had a brilliant idea. Instead of trying to lift her, I would think outside of the box. Positioning the claw directly above the part of her body that was slightly overhanging the edge, I let it drop, causing its weight and motion to knock her down before it even began its grab...! YES!!! In only three tries, and for the equivalent of only three U.S. dollars...Miku was mine!!
Because of these UFO Catcher games, it's actually a very popular fashion statement in Japan for girls and adult women alike to wear toys like those won at game centers on purses, backpacks, and handbags. In fact, lots of new handbags in department stores come with little mediocre toys hanging from their straps, for you to keep if you can't win a better one, or replace if you can!
Which, naturally, led to...this!
Not since I was seven years old have I been able to unselfconsciously take a favorite toy out into the world with me, wherever I go. As Miku seems to have proven, I have apparently secretly always wanted to ever since.
Thanks again, Japan...!!!
Yours Truly,
