It's impressive how different things became in the span of three days. In the first three weeks of my being here, my biggest problem was trying to find inexpensive food to bring home. Now, I'm trying to do that and socialize and play video games while still doing all of my homework. My free time is dead. It's awesome though. Every minute that I'm in class, I can see improvement in my listening and recognition and every minute I'm doing homework or looking over vocabulary and kanji, I am making new connections. The whole process is exhilarating. I can see how someone might grow to become addicted to this.
At this point, it is likely that one might infer that I moved up into the level 2 Japanese language class. For those who are still wondering: I did. It is not without a little bit of shame that I accept this promotion, as those who were already there gained their status through the use of their wits and will, while I gained my status by begging and pleading. I genuinely do feel as though the testing system is inadequate, but it did split the exchange students up into almost accurate groups. There really aren't that many outliers. Also, no test is perfect.
I love giant robots, but I've never gotten into watching Gundam and I have recently been regretting my choice to leave it alone. After all, I made the choice back when I thought it was cool not to watch things that people like for the sake of going against conformity. Now I recognize the fact that, while there are times where people will like things that aren't awesome(American Idol), there are also times where people form a consensus for something that is actually good(chocolate covered bananas). It is important to make your own choices, but it is also important that you not discount choices based on public opinion, whether that opinion is overtly positive or negative.
I'm having to squint to read the letters on the screen. I dislike being this tired. Maybe I should just type with my eyes closed and then go back and correct everything all at once, after I'm done. I'm reasonably sure that I won't be proofreading tonight, though. Not that I proofread most nights. I should hire an editor.
Oh, remind me to post pictures of the delicious Baked Apple Honey Burger I ate today at the burger place across the street. NTB.
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Roller Coasters.
I love roller coasters. The speed and the rush can be exhilarating. They do have a drawback: once they are finished I am left reeling, less sure of my ups and downs. The whole of the roller coaster experience can generally be summed up as a positive one. The ups are full of excitement, building potential that eventually leads to the rush of expending that potential screeching towards the earth in a downhill dive. Even the crazy amount of disorientation can be fun in the aftermath of a fun coaster. There are exceptions in the weak stomached, but for most people, the experience is positive and enjoyable.
It is for this reason that I question the use of roller coasters as a metaphor for life. Life has its ups and downs but, unlike a roller coaster, life's downs are awful. I'm sure that should we be given the chance, we will get back in like to ride the roller coaster again, regardless of how terrible the downs are, but the fact remains that if life's downs were as fun as a roller coaster's downs, we would never get off. It is for this reason that I have decided to revoke the roller coaster's rights as a metaphor for life.
I think that life is more like peeling wallpaper off of a wall. Sometimes, when you are peeling the paper, it comes off in awesome sheets and it seems really easy, but sometimes, no matter how hard you try and even if you use one of those nifty misty thingers, the paper sticks and you just have to keep chipping. Most of the time, once you get passed the rough part, things become maybe not easier, but you learn how better to handle how it is sticking and make better progress. It is important that you not try to force the paper, or you can chip the drywall and ruin it. It is sometimes difficult to get the right drywall to replace existing drywall, once it has been destroyed.
My last couple days have been a lot like peeling wallpaper off of a wall. I went through the testing fairly confused because of a lack of direction by my teachers and finished with a placement into the beginner level of Japanese class. I was very frustrated, but I thought that maybe they knew what they were doing, so I went to my first class. I found out that it was precisely as I'd feared and they were indeed starting me completely over from scratch. I managed to keep my temper and went home to ask some of the intermediate students what their material was like. I found out that it was also below where I was, but it moved really fast and was closer so I asked if I could move up to intermediate. They told me that all I had to do was talk to my teacher tomorrow, so I copied all of the notes and homework from a friend in intermediate, did the homework and studied for the quiz for tomorrow. With any luck, this whole frustrating week will end with me exactly where I need to be.
Also, I think we're all going to Tokyo Disneyland in a couple weeks. I hope I can ride the roller coasters.
It is for this reason that I question the use of roller coasters as a metaphor for life. Life has its ups and downs but, unlike a roller coaster, life's downs are awful. I'm sure that should we be given the chance, we will get back in like to ride the roller coaster again, regardless of how terrible the downs are, but the fact remains that if life's downs were as fun as a roller coaster's downs, we would never get off. It is for this reason that I have decided to revoke the roller coaster's rights as a metaphor for life.
I think that life is more like peeling wallpaper off of a wall. Sometimes, when you are peeling the paper, it comes off in awesome sheets and it seems really easy, but sometimes, no matter how hard you try and even if you use one of those nifty misty thingers, the paper sticks and you just have to keep chipping. Most of the time, once you get passed the rough part, things become maybe not easier, but you learn how better to handle how it is sticking and make better progress. It is important that you not try to force the paper, or you can chip the drywall and ruin it. It is sometimes difficult to get the right drywall to replace existing drywall, once it has been destroyed.
My last couple days have been a lot like peeling wallpaper off of a wall. I went through the testing fairly confused because of a lack of direction by my teachers and finished with a placement into the beginner level of Japanese class. I was very frustrated, but I thought that maybe they knew what they were doing, so I went to my first class. I found out that it was precisely as I'd feared and they were indeed starting me completely over from scratch. I managed to keep my temper and went home to ask some of the intermediate students what their material was like. I found out that it was also below where I was, but it moved really fast and was closer so I asked if I could move up to intermediate. They told me that all I had to do was talk to my teacher tomorrow, so I copied all of the notes and homework from a friend in intermediate, did the homework and studied for the quiz for tomorrow. With any luck, this whole frustrating week will end with me exactly where I need to be.
Also, I think we're all going to Tokyo Disneyland in a couple weeks. I hope I can ride the roller coasters.
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
The Bright Side.
It may be a negative way to look at it, but I've always thought that the phrase, "look on the bright side," really didn't make anything better. To me, the whole concept has a twisted way of making people ok with under-achieving and overall mediocrity. Oh sure, there are times when disaster strikes and you can use the phrase to make things not seem so bad, but it seems like most of the time the phrase is used to rationalize short-comings and mistakes.
"I slipped and destroyed my ankle, but at least I got some Vicadin."
(Don't try to take shortcuts. Think before you act.)
"I failed out of college, but at least I get to play video games."
(Too obvious.)
"I only tested into Level 1 Japanese, but at least I don't have to try as hard."
(I guess.)
The problem is that I was looking forward to the challenge. So far, since returning to academia, I have not been challenged. There have been a few deadlines that were taxing, but not really challenging. Also, since returning, there has been nothing that I've felt any real passion for. There have been things that were fun, but nothing I was actually been trying to accomplish. Until now, I felt like I was taking small steps up a very long stairway. That stairway ultimately lead me to this point, where I feel like instead of just taking a small step, I would be making a leap. I still feel as though there will be a leap, but I no longer believe that the leap will be far enough for me to do what I wanted to do with my language skills.
Instead of accomplishing my goals, I'm left to "look on the bright side," and make the best of what I've been given. I mean, I'm still in freaking Tokyo and I'm still getting to learn to speak Japanese(however inadequately). I'm going to try my best to learn as much as I can, but I've been told by one of the people in charge that there is rarely any vertical movement in the Japanese classes. Rarely doesn't mean none, so maybe I can pull something off. Either way, all that's left to me now is to do my best and to have as much fun as I can. I also would like to go to the beach.
"I slipped and destroyed my ankle, but at least I got some Vicadin."
(Don't try to take shortcuts. Think before you act.)
"I failed out of college, but at least I get to play video games."
(Too obvious.)
"I only tested into Level 1 Japanese, but at least I don't have to try as hard."
(I guess.)
The problem is that I was looking forward to the challenge. So far, since returning to academia, I have not been challenged. There have been a few deadlines that were taxing, but not really challenging. Also, since returning, there has been nothing that I've felt any real passion for. There have been things that were fun, but nothing I was actually been trying to accomplish. Until now, I felt like I was taking small steps up a very long stairway. That stairway ultimately lead me to this point, where I feel like instead of just taking a small step, I would be making a leap. I still feel as though there will be a leap, but I no longer believe that the leap will be far enough for me to do what I wanted to do with my language skills.
Instead of accomplishing my goals, I'm left to "look on the bright side," and make the best of what I've been given. I mean, I'm still in freaking Tokyo and I'm still getting to learn to speak Japanese(however inadequately). I'm going to try my best to learn as much as I can, but I've been told by one of the people in charge that there is rarely any vertical movement in the Japanese classes. Rarely doesn't mean none, so maybe I can pull something off. Either way, all that's left to me now is to do my best and to have as much fun as I can. I also would like to go to the beach.
Monday, September 27, 2010
Beer.
I have recently discovered that beer is delicious in Japan. I've mostly been drinking Asahi, but today I purchased what appeared to be some sort of seasonal brew of Sapporo and it was awesome. It's no Guinness, but it's also not as strong or imposing a flavor as Guinness. What I mean is, it's not so strong that you can drink it with only certain flavors or by itself. It isn't imposing. I'm not really a connoisseur of beer, but I know I like the beer here. I don't know why I feel so self conscious expressing an opinion on beer.
We did our kanji test today and it was less than awesome. Our previous placement test had a significant amount of what I would call "basic Japanese" in it. So much so that when I finished the test, even though I had to leave the last two sections essentially blank, I still felt good about myself. I did a decent job remembering things. The kanji test, however, did not have any real "basic kanji." Instead, it had maybe a dozen that were recognizable and aside from those, gobbledy gook. It was humbling leaving so much of the page empty.
The sakubun test was a little bit less terrible, but still pretty awful. They basically handed us two very large pieces of paper with squares on them like a chess board and told us that we had 50 minutes to write an essay either about our city or our hobbies. I proceeded to spend most of my time talking about Springfield. I talked about how we had a lot of trees and how the dangerous weather in the winter destroyed them. I talked about how Brad Pitt is from Springfield and how I'd never actually met him. For whatever reason, this was all I could thing to write, so I stopped after filling in about 3/4 of the first sheet. It wasn't until after I'd left the room that I thought of a bazillion things to write. It was not my proudest moment.
I think it's finally sinking in that I'm in Tokyo and that I'm not leaving for a long time. I'm starting to miss things. Some of them predictable, like Ryu and some of them not really predictable, like rude people. In Springfield, if I was having a bad day or week, it was a sure bet that sometime someone would do something to piss me off and I'd have a way to vent. It's really not that big of a deal if someone blows their nose at a table, but it's a reason for me to let off some steam from the day. Since everyone is polite, I just bottle up my aggression here and spend a fair amount of time angry at random people for things that are either perfectly reasonable or not worth brooding over. Surely I'm not the only one feeling this way, and yet no one warned me of it before I came. I suppose people aren't necessarily nice everywhere else that students go to study.
We have our interviews tomorrow morning and then I guess we're going to start into the meat of our classes. I'm very excited for things to get going. I feel like a bowling ball that someone picked up from the shoot thinger, put their fingers into my holes and then got ready to throw me and then didn't. I don't think they meant to tease me, but it's good for the ball to acclimate to the climate of the bowling alley before you throw it down the lane. If you don't take care, you won't make a strike or, worse still, it's a gutter ball. I'm just sayin; if I start classes too early, I'll end up in the gutter. I'm not sure where the gutter is in Japan, but it's probably not as awesome as whatever a strike is in Japan.
We did our kanji test today and it was less than awesome. Our previous placement test had a significant amount of what I would call "basic Japanese" in it. So much so that when I finished the test, even though I had to leave the last two sections essentially blank, I still felt good about myself. I did a decent job remembering things. The kanji test, however, did not have any real "basic kanji." Instead, it had maybe a dozen that were recognizable and aside from those, gobbledy gook. It was humbling leaving so much of the page empty.
The sakubun test was a little bit less terrible, but still pretty awful. They basically handed us two very large pieces of paper with squares on them like a chess board and told us that we had 50 minutes to write an essay either about our city or our hobbies. I proceeded to spend most of my time talking about Springfield. I talked about how we had a lot of trees and how the dangerous weather in the winter destroyed them. I talked about how Brad Pitt is from Springfield and how I'd never actually met him. For whatever reason, this was all I could thing to write, so I stopped after filling in about 3/4 of the first sheet. It wasn't until after I'd left the room that I thought of a bazillion things to write. It was not my proudest moment.
I think it's finally sinking in that I'm in Tokyo and that I'm not leaving for a long time. I'm starting to miss things. Some of them predictable, like Ryu and some of them not really predictable, like rude people. In Springfield, if I was having a bad day or week, it was a sure bet that sometime someone would do something to piss me off and I'd have a way to vent. It's really not that big of a deal if someone blows their nose at a table, but it's a reason for me to let off some steam from the day. Since everyone is polite, I just bottle up my aggression here and spend a fair amount of time angry at random people for things that are either perfectly reasonable or not worth brooding over. Surely I'm not the only one feeling this way, and yet no one warned me of it before I came. I suppose people aren't necessarily nice everywhere else that students go to study.
We have our interviews tomorrow morning and then I guess we're going to start into the meat of our classes. I'm very excited for things to get going. I feel like a bowling ball that someone picked up from the shoot thinger, put their fingers into my holes and then got ready to throw me and then didn't. I don't think they meant to tease me, but it's good for the ball to acclimate to the climate of the bowling alley before you throw it down the lane. If you don't take care, you won't make a strike or, worse still, it's a gutter ball. I'm just sayin; if I start classes too early, I'll end up in the gutter. I'm not sure where the gutter is in Japan, but it's probably not as awesome as whatever a strike is in Japan.
Sunday, September 26, 2010
Almost ready.
I'm starting to get really antsy from no classes or work or anything. I've had a lot of adjusting to do, but it still has amounted to a lot more free time than I'm used to. I have looked forward to studying Japanese here for a very long time, but I think that now I'm looking forward to it more than ever. I'm just really anxious to start my journey towards fluency. I just hate the fact that we have so many placement tests before we start. I understand the process, but I hate it still. I very much dislike having to study for tests that I really don't know how to study for.
I completely blew off studying for the kanji and composition tests for tomorrow. Partly because I really needed to take over the world as Ramsess the II and partly because I don't think I'll be able to learn enough kanji to place me high in the classes and I don't think studying the ones I know is going to get me anywhere, either. I know most of the readings for most of the kanji that I know fairly well. I don't know all of the compounds that I could know, but I also am at a loss as to how I come up with more without someone telling me. Somebody should invent a machine whose sole purpose is to take a list of kanji and spit out every possible compound combination. Someone call Steve Jobs.
I met Billy's host mother today. She was really cool. Very patient. I feel a little bit bad because I couldn't contribute as much to conversations as I would have liked, but I think she understood. It was funny listening to her and Billy speak to each other about me, though. My listening is significantly better than my speaking at the moment, so I can understand a lot more than anyone realizes. They didn't say anything mean, but it was still kind of funny. I'm getting pretty decent at using context clues to identify unknown words. I didn't think I would be able to gain that skill in Japanese, but I suppose it makes sense that I would. I didn't ever think about it much before, but that's probably a necessary skill in any kind of language acquisition.
I was going to blow off my blog tonight, but then I didn't(obviously). I feel like it would be setting a bad precedent letting video games keep me up so late that I don't do what I should do.
I completely blew off studying for the kanji and composition tests for tomorrow. Partly because I really needed to take over the world as Ramsess the II and partly because I don't think I'll be able to learn enough kanji to place me high in the classes and I don't think studying the ones I know is going to get me anywhere, either. I know most of the readings for most of the kanji that I know fairly well. I don't know all of the compounds that I could know, but I also am at a loss as to how I come up with more without someone telling me. Somebody should invent a machine whose sole purpose is to take a list of kanji and spit out every possible compound combination. Someone call Steve Jobs.
I met Billy's host mother today. She was really cool. Very patient. I feel a little bit bad because I couldn't contribute as much to conversations as I would have liked, but I think she understood. It was funny listening to her and Billy speak to each other about me, though. My listening is significantly better than my speaking at the moment, so I can understand a lot more than anyone realizes. They didn't say anything mean, but it was still kind of funny. I'm getting pretty decent at using context clues to identify unknown words. I didn't think I would be able to gain that skill in Japanese, but I suppose it makes sense that I would. I didn't ever think about it much before, but that's probably a necessary skill in any kind of language acquisition.
I was going to blow off my blog tonight, but then I didn't(obviously). I feel like it would be setting a bad precedent letting video games keep me up so late that I don't do what I should do.
Saturday, September 25, 2010
Fear and Blendy.
Today was our welcoming party at school. We all got together at the Sky Hall, which is at the top of the tallest building on our campus, 16 stories. It's not incredibly tall, but the hall has wide open windows all the way around it so you can see an incredible view of Tokyo. You can also see a mountain that I was told was not Mt. Fuji. It's apparently way smaller than Fuji, but it's huge still. Seeing Mt. Fuji is definitely on my list of "things to do."
Our party was really cool, but it did have an awkward part where all of the exchange students had to do self introductions. By this time, we've gotten pretty used to it. It's sort of a ritual that you are taught first semester.
Hajimemashite. (Nice to meet you.)
Boku no namae ha(pronounced 'wa') Dustyn Covert desu.
Douzo yoroshiku onegaishimasu. (lit. Please treat me well.)
So far, that iteration is about as formal a presentation as I've seen. There are shorter ways for less formal meetings. You can leave out words here and there, but it all amounts to roughly the same thing. In any event, I somehow ended up almost last so quite a bit of tension had built to me. Usually I take the lesson I learned from the band-aid all those years ago and just get it over with, but by the time I saw what was going on, I ended up at the end. Anyway, because of all the tension, I deviated from the original plan of just following the script and what I said came out more like this:
(Awkward wave.) Hi.
Boku no namae ha Dustyn desu.
Just Dustyn. I don't really do the whole last name thing.
Etoooo.(Umm...)
I am afraid of all of you, so I might act like I don't like you, but I don't not like you: I'm just scared.
I was afraid I was going to offend them, but I think it came out alright. Some people told me I said what everyone was thinking, maybe the same things that Japanese were thinking, too. Either way, I spent the rest of the day working with my language exchange partners and that fixed a lot of my fears. I'm still not entirely comfortable speaking, but I know the words are in my head; I just need to find a way to get them out without sounding so stilted.
Our party was really cool, but it did have an awkward part where all of the exchange students had to do self introductions. By this time, we've gotten pretty used to it. It's sort of a ritual that you are taught first semester.
Hajimemashite. (Nice to meet you.)
Boku no namae ha(pronounced 'wa') Dustyn Covert desu.
Douzo yoroshiku onegaishimasu. (lit. Please treat me well.)
So far, that iteration is about as formal a presentation as I've seen. There are shorter ways for less formal meetings. You can leave out words here and there, but it all amounts to roughly the same thing. In any event, I somehow ended up almost last so quite a bit of tension had built to me. Usually I take the lesson I learned from the band-aid all those years ago and just get it over with, but by the time I saw what was going on, I ended up at the end. Anyway, because of all the tension, I deviated from the original plan of just following the script and what I said came out more like this:
(Awkward wave.) Hi.
Boku no namae ha Dustyn desu.
Just Dustyn. I don't really do the whole last name thing.
Etoooo.(Umm...)
I am afraid of all of you, so I might act like I don't like you, but I don't not like you: I'm just scared.
I was afraid I was going to offend them, but I think it came out alright. Some people told me I said what everyone was thinking, maybe the same things that Japanese were thinking, too. Either way, I spent the rest of the day working with my language exchange partners and that fixed a lot of my fears. I'm still not entirely comfortable speaking, but I know the words are in my head; I just need to find a way to get them out without sounding so stilted.
Friday, September 24, 2010
Oh man, placementing.
As it turns out, placement tests are not fun at all. I mean, most tests aren't really fun, but placement tests are even not fun in so far as tests go. There's nothing quite like going into a test with little or no information for the formatting or weight of grade knowing that the sole purpose of the test is to judge you and determine what your next year is going to be like and how much you will learn. From what I learned from talking to the other exchange students, most anyone who knew any Japanese coming in, made it through the third part of the test without much trouble. The fourth part was nigh indecipherable and the fifth and final part was gobbledy-gook. It may as well have been written in a foreign language. I obviously don't know what my score is for the parts that I finished, but I am fairly confident that I didn't miss too many. I just want to get into the second group.
After the awful test, I had my first class and it seems really good. It's about contemporary media in Japan. The class is taught by three separate teachers in three separate sections. Sort of like taking three single credit classes, but all in the same block. They call it "omnibus" format and it's the first I've heard of it. The first teacher is teaching us about Japanese newspaper. He seems like a pretty cool guy. He made a few jokes and his English seems to be pretty incredible. All in all, I think it should be pretty fun.
I got to start a game of Civilization 5 today and it seems really good. I really like the hex system and the new way they handle combat is really nice. Funny watching anyone with guns mow down everyone else. I really like the way ranged works, too. Never made sense that archers got into melee range before. I look forward to schooling some friends in it, but I fear that I will be unable to find a block of time that matches with one of their schedules. Oh well, I'll have to try anyway.
After the awful test, I had my first class and it seems really good. It's about contemporary media in Japan. The class is taught by three separate teachers in three separate sections. Sort of like taking three single credit classes, but all in the same block. They call it "omnibus" format and it's the first I've heard of it. The first teacher is teaching us about Japanese newspaper. He seems like a pretty cool guy. He made a few jokes and his English seems to be pretty incredible. All in all, I think it should be pretty fun.
I got to start a game of Civilization 5 today and it seems really good. I really like the hex system and the new way they handle combat is really nice. Funny watching anyone with guns mow down everyone else. I really like the way ranged works, too. Never made sense that archers got into melee range before. I look forward to schooling some friends in it, but I fear that I will be unable to find a block of time that matches with one of their schedules. Oh well, I'll have to try anyway.
Thursday, September 23, 2010
Boo for Studying.
I strongly dislike studying. I won't say "hate." I feel like "strongly dislike" carries about as much weight as I feel on the subject. In almost all situations, if my brain can find a use for something, it doesn't get rid of it: it just ties it to whatever can use it and then when I need it, it comes out. For some reason, with my Japanese, it's not working like it should. I mean, sometimes I have it but sometimes I don't. Also, I managed to forget a million words over the summer. I'm sure that I'll do fine here, but I just hate having to test into a class. It's especially frustrating because I know there are going to be things that I know that they won't ask and things they ask that I don't know. There is no reasonable way for me to prepare for the test. I just don't want to end up in the beginner's class.
It rained crazy hard all day today and we finished the day with the temperature the lowest I've seen it here. I think it's just below 70 degrees and it feels way colder than it should. My stomach has hurt all day and at first I thought it was just too much curry, but now I'm thinking maybe it's some sort of flu. That would explain the feeling cold when it's not really cold and the stomach pains. Then again, with all of this stress from the placement test, maybe I'm just tired. That's probably it.
It rained crazy hard all day today and we finished the day with the temperature the lowest I've seen it here. I think it's just below 70 degrees and it feels way colder than it should. My stomach has hurt all day and at first I thought it was just too much curry, but now I'm thinking maybe it's some sort of flu. That would explain the feeling cold when it's not really cold and the stomach pains. Then again, with all of this stress from the placement test, maybe I'm just tired. That's probably it.
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Crab battle.
So, I was up until nearly two o'clock in the morning trying to get Final Fantasy XIV working. About a month ago, well before I'd left for Tokyo, I wrote Square-Enix and asked them if it would matter if I bought a Japanese version of their game. I wanted to know if I would be able to activate a Japanese CD key on an American account. They informed me that, no, this would not be a problem and that I should go ahead with my plan. Well. As it turned out, their system will not allow you to activate a Japanese game on an American account. Further, they will not allow you to use an American credit card to pay for their service. Even furtherer than that, they won't let you use American currency to purchase their ghetto online currency for a Japanese account, either. That is why I got to spend nearly four hours today translating a Japanese account menu system for FFXIV and wandering back and forth from 7/11 attempting to purchase Crysta currency in order to activate my account.
Probably none of you will have to worry about this, so I'm going to tell you about it so you'll know how awesome the FFXIV account set up is in Japanese. First of all to set a baseline, the English account set up isn't much better: Square doesn't want to handle foreign currencies, so they have contracted the use of a couple different third party companies. The main one that you would set up automatic monthly cash withdrawals for is Clickandbuy. Clickandbuy is famously bad. They are known for charging customers extra money and then hoping no one catches it so they can keep it. They are very easy to work with when trying to get this money back, but if you don't catch it, they don't say anything. They work more or less like a crooked paypal. You have the option of either allowing Clickandbuy to pay your account, or you can use Clickandbuy or Paypal to purchase Crysta which you can use to pay your account. It's not super hard to figure out, but it is a whole lot more of a pain than World of Warcraft or Eve or ...anything at all.
The Japanese system allows you to set up a direct credit card charge for your account, but if you don't have a Japanese cash card(I don't get mine until Saturday) it doesn't really do you any good. They also allow you the option of using paycards or Docomo points(I believe you get these for shopping, but I'm not 100% sure). The paycards are the best option for an American living in Japan, but the trick is acquiring them. You can probably get them from a video game store, but I didn't want to go to Akiba just for a paycard, so I chose the (seemingly) easier path of using the machine at 7/11. Well. I went to 7/11 once and couldn't figure it out. From what I could tell, the machine had to be built into the ATM machine, but it appeared to only work on getting money from existing cards, but not adding money to cards or selling cards. I wandered around the store looking for cards, but couldn't find anything. I then went back to my dorm and looked online to see if there were directions online and there weren't, so I went back to 7/11 and figured out that you use the copy machine, yes the copy machine, to purchase online currency. Apparently, those things can sell you a million things and be used to do almost anything. Pretty impressive.
So, I took my new currency back to my game, figured out how to deposit it into my account which turned out to be fairly easy. I then tried to log onto the game and, after it said that the servers were congested for about a half hour, followed by another 15 minutes of claiming some kind of maintenance that wasn't reflected in the server availability list, I learned that even though I had deposited the Crysta onto my account I still hadn't activated the automatic billing for the Crysta. Well, "this seems like an easy problem to fix," I thought to myself. Not at all. I went to the button that I had google translated to be the monthly bill pay button and it just said that I hadn't set it up. I went to all of the other buttons on the "Pay your Bill" section and nothing worked. After another hour of translating pages, I found out that for whatever reason, after you deposit the Crysta, you have to go to the account menus which previously had nothing to do with billing and, unless you're paying with Crysta, continue to have nothing to do with billing to tell it to pay my bill once a month. The best part of all this is: your first month is free! You just have to assure them that you will be able to pay, should you still want to play after messing with their idiotic system.
Well, I feel like a very long rant about Square-Enix and their very frustrating menu systems isn't what most people want to read, and I apologize. I considered deleting it and writing something else, but it's almost eleven and I'm exhausted. I also think it's funny that I wrote Square an email asking them if I had alternatives last night and have yet to get a response. I'm glad I figured it out on my own.
In other news, my pants no longer fit and it's frustrating.
Probably none of you will have to worry about this, so I'm going to tell you about it so you'll know how awesome the FFXIV account set up is in Japanese. First of all to set a baseline, the English account set up isn't much better: Square doesn't want to handle foreign currencies, so they have contracted the use of a couple different third party companies. The main one that you would set up automatic monthly cash withdrawals for is Clickandbuy. Clickandbuy is famously bad. They are known for charging customers extra money and then hoping no one catches it so they can keep it. They are very easy to work with when trying to get this money back, but if you don't catch it, they don't say anything. They work more or less like a crooked paypal. You have the option of either allowing Clickandbuy to pay your account, or you can use Clickandbuy or Paypal to purchase Crysta which you can use to pay your account. It's not super hard to figure out, but it is a whole lot more of a pain than World of Warcraft or Eve or ...anything at all.
The Japanese system allows you to set up a direct credit card charge for your account, but if you don't have a Japanese cash card(I don't get mine until Saturday) it doesn't really do you any good. They also allow you the option of using paycards or Docomo points(I believe you get these for shopping, but I'm not 100% sure). The paycards are the best option for an American living in Japan, but the trick is acquiring them. You can probably get them from a video game store, but I didn't want to go to Akiba just for a paycard, so I chose the (seemingly) easier path of using the machine at 7/11. Well. I went to 7/11 once and couldn't figure it out. From what I could tell, the machine had to be built into the ATM machine, but it appeared to only work on getting money from existing cards, but not adding money to cards or selling cards. I wandered around the store looking for cards, but couldn't find anything. I then went back to my dorm and looked online to see if there were directions online and there weren't, so I went back to 7/11 and figured out that you use the copy machine, yes the copy machine, to purchase online currency. Apparently, those things can sell you a million things and be used to do almost anything. Pretty impressive.
So, I took my new currency back to my game, figured out how to deposit it into my account which turned out to be fairly easy. I then tried to log onto the game and, after it said that the servers were congested for about a half hour, followed by another 15 minutes of claiming some kind of maintenance that wasn't reflected in the server availability list, I learned that even though I had deposited the Crysta onto my account I still hadn't activated the automatic billing for the Crysta. Well, "this seems like an easy problem to fix," I thought to myself. Not at all. I went to the button that I had google translated to be the monthly bill pay button and it just said that I hadn't set it up. I went to all of the other buttons on the "Pay your Bill" section and nothing worked. After another hour of translating pages, I found out that for whatever reason, after you deposit the Crysta, you have to go to the account menus which previously had nothing to do with billing and, unless you're paying with Crysta, continue to have nothing to do with billing to tell it to pay my bill once a month. The best part of all this is: your first month is free! You just have to assure them that you will be able to pay, should you still want to play after messing with their idiotic system.
Well, I feel like a very long rant about Square-Enix and their very frustrating menu systems isn't what most people want to read, and I apologize. I considered deleting it and writing something else, but it's almost eleven and I'm exhausted. I also think it's funny that I wrote Square an email asking them if I had alternatives last night and have yet to get a response. I'm glad I figured it out on my own.
In other news, my pants no longer fit and it's frustrating.
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
Lethal Weapon.
I look back on my life and I wonder how much time I've spent waiting in line at midnight releases and how much time I've presided over midnight releases and I am elated. I wonder if maybe that's the wrong feeling. Should I feel shame for all of the time wasted? Maybe I should feel guilt for the money I have spent on all of these limited edition games I just had to buy on release morning. I'm not sure if I am being selfish or if maybe I should move on to more important things. I mean, I'm where I've wanted to be since I played Super Mario Bros. on Christmas day in 1986. I may not have realized where I wanted to be as I sat there excitedly clutching my controller, experimenting with the best way to hold this device that, while it was so foreign to me then, would soon become almost an extension of my will, extending into this new electronic fantasy world allowing me to take control where previously I had little.
So, being as how video games are what brought me here, is it wrong that I still cling to them? Maybe I still crave the control and the fantasy. Maybe this part of my life I am experiencing now isn't what I'd hoped and I still crave the fantastical and the magical. Maybe I have spent so much of my life steeped in fantasy that I've become a junky and I need to find some sort of video game methadone clinic to help me break my addiction? I could be looking at this too closely. This could be me trying to form justifications where the simple answer of, "I just like playing video games," would suffice. After all, who do I really have to answer to? Ultimately, who am I accountable to other than myself? If I am happy spending time and money playing games, do I need another reason?
I feel like these are all good questions for me to contemplate, but I'm about to start patching, which means my game will be finished installing soon and then I'll start playing and my questions will disappear. Maybe not completely, but they will certainly disappear until the next midnight launch I go to and realize how much more tired I am than the last midnight launch I went to.
So, being as how video games are what brought me here, is it wrong that I still cling to them? Maybe I still crave the control and the fantasy. Maybe this part of my life I am experiencing now isn't what I'd hoped and I still crave the fantastical and the magical. Maybe I have spent so much of my life steeped in fantasy that I've become a junky and I need to find some sort of video game methadone clinic to help me break my addiction? I could be looking at this too closely. This could be me trying to form justifications where the simple answer of, "I just like playing video games," would suffice. After all, who do I really have to answer to? Ultimately, who am I accountable to other than myself? If I am happy spending time and money playing games, do I need another reason?
I feel like these are all good questions for me to contemplate, but I'm about to start patching, which means my game will be finished installing soon and then I'll start playing and my questions will disappear. Maybe not completely, but they will certainly disappear until the next midnight launch I go to and realize how much more tired I am than the last midnight launch I went to.
Monday, September 20, 2010
Manga FTW.
I made my first purchase of manga, today. It's hard to believe that I had advanced so far in my nerdhood having acquired no manga. I don't think that the acquisition of manga is necessary for the proper growth as a nerd, but I feel like if I were to be likened to that of a physically malformed creature, I would have one leg longer than the other or a missing toe or two. I'm essentially an eight toed nerd right now, and now I need to read vast amounts of manga in order to grow my last two toes. I've not read much of the manga that I purchased, but from what little I've read, this should be the funnest toe growing I've ever been a part of.
I also posted on a forum for the first time today. Well, posted something that was a legitimate topic and not trolling or trying to win a contest. I'm full of landmarks today. Maybe I should put on pants and go fight crime in Tokyo tonight. There aren't really any violent criminals here, so it's probably the safest place to break into the world of vigilante justice. Also, if I want to be judge, jury, and executioner of my vigilante laws, I won't have to worry about making any hard decisions. If I catch someone j-walking, I'll only have to club em a little or something. No hangings or crossburnings. Well, maybe one. Just to set an example for further minor law infractors.
I feel like no one is really reading this, so I'm going to say some offensive things and see if anyone complains. Maybe if I say some offensive things, I will get reprimanded by the scholarship board and they will revoke my dollah dollah bills yall. Maybe I should just ramble for a while and then change the subject back to something cool like chocolate chip melon bread and curry and sushi.
I love chocolate chip melon bread, curry, and sushi. Not all together in some sort of paste. Not to eat, anyway. I mean, I wouldn't eat the paste, but I would eat the items individually. If it was a paste, I would use it to exfoliate my face and make my self look and feel younger. An individual items, I would eat the curry for lunch and then the bread as a snack and the sushi for an early dinner. I'm reasonably sure that my writing today is making so little sense that if anyone is reading it, they won't anymore. I promise that I will come up with something awesome tomorrow. Or, I will try to make my ramblings make more sense and possibly be entertaining.
I also posted on a forum for the first time today. Well, posted something that was a legitimate topic and not trolling or trying to win a contest. I'm full of landmarks today. Maybe I should put on pants and go fight crime in Tokyo tonight. There aren't really any violent criminals here, so it's probably the safest place to break into the world of vigilante justice. Also, if I want to be judge, jury, and executioner of my vigilante laws, I won't have to worry about making any hard decisions. If I catch someone j-walking, I'll only have to club em a little or something. No hangings or crossburnings. Well, maybe one. Just to set an example for further minor law infractors.
I feel like no one is really reading this, so I'm going to say some offensive things and see if anyone complains. Maybe if I say some offensive things, I will get reprimanded by the scholarship board and they will revoke my dollah dollah bills yall. Maybe I should just ramble for a while and then change the subject back to something cool like chocolate chip melon bread and curry and sushi.
I love chocolate chip melon bread, curry, and sushi. Not all together in some sort of paste. Not to eat, anyway. I mean, I wouldn't eat the paste, but I would eat the items individually. If it was a paste, I would use it to exfoliate my face and make my self look and feel younger. An individual items, I would eat the curry for lunch and then the bread as a snack and the sushi for an early dinner. I'm reasonably sure that my writing today is making so little sense that if anyone is reading it, they won't anymore. I promise that I will come up with something awesome tomorrow. Or, I will try to make my ramblings make more sense and possibly be entertaining.
Sunday, September 19, 2010
大海原。
I got to see the ocean for the first time today. I mean, it was pretty incredible, but I saw it while zooming by on a train so it's not like I really experienced it. I didn't go for a walk on the beach and I didn't build a sand castle. I definitely didn't get to go surfing, but I'm afraid of surfing anyway. My initial impressions, though: big and wet. It was definitely big and most assuredly wet. I really wanted to swim in it, but I'm reasonably sure that there aren't any swimming beaches near here. In any event, I liked the ocean and would like to experience more of it.
The train also passed Tokyo Disneyland. That seems like a fun place. I didn't see any rides, but there were a lot of buildings in the way. One of the buildings was a giant one that had "Cirque du Soleil" written on it. If they have Cirque du Soleil performances on some sort of regular schedule at Tokyo Disneyland, then I definitely must make a trip. I've never seen Cirque live, but I've seen quite a bit of it on tv and DVD and I would love to see it in real life. Maybe if I wear my silly shorts, they'll let me get on stage.
So, as it turns out, the subway maps in the cars here can't be trusted. Me and Billy spent a great deal of time on the subway trying to get out to Tokyo Game Show, which was in Chiba. What should have been a roughly forty-five minute trip turned into something like a two-three hour trek. There were no stars and we didn't have to battle Sauron at the end, but it was definitely a trek. Of course, calling the trip a trek implies a lengthy voyage in a single direction and this probably means that spending an hour riding trains in circles disqualifies our trip from having "trek" status. Suffice to say that we spent more time lost than we spent actually at the show, which was awesome by the way.
Being in a giant room surrounded by video games and booth babes, inundated with the sounds of jpop and the smells of nerds was an almost religious experience. If Tokyo Game Show was my church, then the Square-Enix booth was my altar. The first thing we did was elbow and claw our way to the giant T.V. set up like some sort of nerd catching bug zapper, but instead of zapping, it filled your head with awesome and filled your heart full of expectation, making you hungry with anticipation. From there, we mostly just wandered around, trying not to look creepy while we oggled the booth babes.
This was my first experience with booth babes. There was a time where I would have considered the argument that jobs like this only serve to objectify women and denigrate society and all of that. But, after actually witnessing booth babes in action, I was more than a little impressed. For one, these lovely young women are getting to come to work and dance and play video games. If they hated dancing and video games, I could maybe see a drawback, but they were clearly having more fun than they had any right to have for how much they were getting payed. I will say that their clothes could not be comfortable, but most of them were wearing flats, so not too bad. The other thing is, these girls aren't really being objectified by most everyone around. The people at TGS put them on such a high pedestal, that they had to feel like princesses or some sort of gentry. I mean, it's not like an ego boost or something simple like that. It was just something I noticed when I looked at them. They didn't have the look of a prostitute out peddling herself for money or the defeated look of a stripper, so far beyond the self defeat and shock of turning to stripping that all pride is dead. They had this mix of pride and joy that is rare in someone in a regular job, never mind someone peddling games in sexy clothes.
Also, I think that Gamestop would be more popular if they used the Xbox booth babe uniforms for everyone.
The train also passed Tokyo Disneyland. That seems like a fun place. I didn't see any rides, but there were a lot of buildings in the way. One of the buildings was a giant one that had "Cirque du Soleil" written on it. If they have Cirque du Soleil performances on some sort of regular schedule at Tokyo Disneyland, then I definitely must make a trip. I've never seen Cirque live, but I've seen quite a bit of it on tv and DVD and I would love to see it in real life. Maybe if I wear my silly shorts, they'll let me get on stage.
So, as it turns out, the subway maps in the cars here can't be trusted. Me and Billy spent a great deal of time on the subway trying to get out to Tokyo Game Show, which was in Chiba. What should have been a roughly forty-five minute trip turned into something like a two-three hour trek. There were no stars and we didn't have to battle Sauron at the end, but it was definitely a trek. Of course, calling the trip a trek implies a lengthy voyage in a single direction and this probably means that spending an hour riding trains in circles disqualifies our trip from having "trek" status. Suffice to say that we spent more time lost than we spent actually at the show, which was awesome by the way.
Being in a giant room surrounded by video games and booth babes, inundated with the sounds of jpop and the smells of nerds was an almost religious experience. If Tokyo Game Show was my church, then the Square-Enix booth was my altar. The first thing we did was elbow and claw our way to the giant T.V. set up like some sort of nerd catching bug zapper, but instead of zapping, it filled your head with awesome and filled your heart full of expectation, making you hungry with anticipation. From there, we mostly just wandered around, trying not to look creepy while we oggled the booth babes.
This was my first experience with booth babes. There was a time where I would have considered the argument that jobs like this only serve to objectify women and denigrate society and all of that. But, after actually witnessing booth babes in action, I was more than a little impressed. For one, these lovely young women are getting to come to work and dance and play video games. If they hated dancing and video games, I could maybe see a drawback, but they were clearly having more fun than they had any right to have for how much they were getting payed. I will say that their clothes could not be comfortable, but most of them were wearing flats, so not too bad. The other thing is, these girls aren't really being objectified by most everyone around. The people at TGS put them on such a high pedestal, that they had to feel like princesses or some sort of gentry. I mean, it's not like an ego boost or something simple like that. It was just something I noticed when I looked at them. They didn't have the look of a prostitute out peddling herself for money or the defeated look of a stripper, so far beyond the self defeat and shock of turning to stripping that all pride is dead. They had this mix of pride and joy that is rare in someone in a regular job, never mind someone peddling games in sexy clothes.
Also, I think that Gamestop would be more popular if they used the Xbox booth babe uniforms for everyone.
Saturday, September 18, 2010
OMG drums.
For the better part of today, everywhere I went, I could hear drums and flutes and bells. I'm not 100% sure what the festival was, but there were a lot of people with a lot of portable shrines stomping around town. I listened for them all day in my room, hoping they would come close enough for me to get some cool pictures from above, but none did. It was really neat, though. When I was out walking, if I got out of earshot of one troop of partyers, I would wander invariably into the presence of another group.
I got to witness my first domestic disturbance, today. Normally Japanese people seem to be very composed, concealing their emotions behind a facade of manners and politeness. The two people I saw were not concealing any emotions. I think the guy may have been, but I couldn't be sure. It all started when the woman starting yelling at the man a lot. She grabbed the younger girl, presumably their daughter, and walked off ahead of the guy. The guy, still attempting to salvage what was to become a very emotional situation, kept talking to the woman, but she was beyond discussion and leaving with the girl. The guy then threw down his cigarette, grabbed the girl and started off in the opposite direction. What I found interesting was that after he threw the cigarette down, the little girl stomped on it to put it out. Interesting that there would be that kind of wherewithal in the middle of such a stressful event. Anyway, the fight just seemed like it was between who was going to get the little girl. After a while, they just all left together, so maybe they decided that they should go somewhere else and settle their dispute, rather than airing their dirty laundry, so to speak, while walking down a crowded street.
I managed to get my classes registered today. That was pretty incredible. My assigned adviser is currently living in Australia(I think), so I had to go to an interim adviser with one of the other exchange students, Kaitlin. We left this morning with an hour to get there because we were afraid we'd get lost. As it turns out, we walked straight to the building with fairly little effort and then spent 20 minutes wandering the halls of the second campus looking for our adviser's room. We went to all of the places that the room should have logically appeared, but to no avail. We eventually decided we should look at the maps on the walls and cross reference them with the posted arrows pointing to ranges of room numbers and found out that for whatever reason, rooms weren't arranged in any sort of logical pattern. It wasn't as though the numbers were fed through a wood chipper and wherever they landed, a room was built, but the rooms were definitely not layed out in a pattern I was accustomed to seeing.
Once we found the room, we finally were able to decide what classes we would take. She took a few random Asian studies classes and I took the block of language that I'm required to take and then added a Saturday culture class and a Friday seminar class about Japanese media. The Saturday class seems like it will be awesome because most weeks we go on field trips around Tokyo and see things that I probably wouldn't have seen otherwise. We have to write something like six papers, but that's no big deal at all. The seminar class seems really neat, because it's taught in four sections and each section has a separate expert teaching it. It seems like it will be really difficult, but it should still be fun. I think I start classes at the end of this week, so I'm pretty excited.
I got to witness my first domestic disturbance, today. Normally Japanese people seem to be very composed, concealing their emotions behind a facade of manners and politeness. The two people I saw were not concealing any emotions. I think the guy may have been, but I couldn't be sure. It all started when the woman starting yelling at the man a lot. She grabbed the younger girl, presumably their daughter, and walked off ahead of the guy. The guy, still attempting to salvage what was to become a very emotional situation, kept talking to the woman, but she was beyond discussion and leaving with the girl. The guy then threw down his cigarette, grabbed the girl and started off in the opposite direction. What I found interesting was that after he threw the cigarette down, the little girl stomped on it to put it out. Interesting that there would be that kind of wherewithal in the middle of such a stressful event. Anyway, the fight just seemed like it was between who was going to get the little girl. After a while, they just all left together, so maybe they decided that they should go somewhere else and settle their dispute, rather than airing their dirty laundry, so to speak, while walking down a crowded street.
I managed to get my classes registered today. That was pretty incredible. My assigned adviser is currently living in Australia(I think), so I had to go to an interim adviser with one of the other exchange students, Kaitlin. We left this morning with an hour to get there because we were afraid we'd get lost. As it turns out, we walked straight to the building with fairly little effort and then spent 20 minutes wandering the halls of the second campus looking for our adviser's room. We went to all of the places that the room should have logically appeared, but to no avail. We eventually decided we should look at the maps on the walls and cross reference them with the posted arrows pointing to ranges of room numbers and found out that for whatever reason, rooms weren't arranged in any sort of logical pattern. It wasn't as though the numbers were fed through a wood chipper and wherever they landed, a room was built, but the rooms were definitely not layed out in a pattern I was accustomed to seeing.
Once we found the room, we finally were able to decide what classes we would take. She took a few random Asian studies classes and I took the block of language that I'm required to take and then added a Saturday culture class and a Friday seminar class about Japanese media. The Saturday class seems like it will be awesome because most weeks we go on field trips around Tokyo and see things that I probably wouldn't have seen otherwise. We have to write something like six papers, but that's no big deal at all. The seminar class seems really neat, because it's taught in four sections and each section has a separate expert teaching it. It seems like it will be really difficult, but it should still be fun. I think I start classes at the end of this week, so I'm pretty excited.
Friday, September 17, 2010
Everywhere is awesome.
We went shopping today and rode the subway all over town. The primary purpose of said shopping was to obtain a man bag for yours truly. I am reasonably sure that I am not an actual homophobe, but I will admit that it was not without a little bit of difficulty that I was able to obtain my man bag. We wandered in and out of almost four hours worth of stores before I found what I considered to be the "right" bag. Now, I have no idea if the pickiness with which my bag selection process was undertaken is any indication of the degree of femininity residing inside me, but I am somewhat happy to say that I did find a man bag and it was in Yodobashi, of all places.
Yodobashi is like Best Buy, but it has somewhere in the neighborhood of nine floors. I would hazard a guess that the entirety of Best Buy could fit in the first two floors. The place has a lot of electronics. It also has a lot of employees. On every floor, there is a full checkout staff, along with a person or two whose job it is to bag all of the cashier's customer's orders. Were it not for the seemingly endless flood of people spilling into the store and the amazing location, I would wonder how they make money at all. The store is situated right outside of the Akihabara Showa exit/entrance, so a great deal of people walk by it every day. Most tourists, myself included, don't even need a reason: they just want to see what a 9 floor electronics store is like.
After we got done with all of our(my) shopping, me, my room mate, and Billy returned to my room where I was able to help Kyle get to my house. Kyle then ripped on me and my friends, took us to eat delicious food, and bought us beer. It was pretty incredible. I am very appreciative of Kyle for his awesomeness today. I really hope that I can get done with my thing tomorrow in a reasonable amount of time so I can attend TGS with him.
Yodobashi is like Best Buy, but it has somewhere in the neighborhood of nine floors. I would hazard a guess that the entirety of Best Buy could fit in the first two floors. The place has a lot of electronics. It also has a lot of employees. On every floor, there is a full checkout staff, along with a person or two whose job it is to bag all of the cashier's customer's orders. Were it not for the seemingly endless flood of people spilling into the store and the amazing location, I would wonder how they make money at all. The store is situated right outside of the Akihabara Showa exit/entrance, so a great deal of people walk by it every day. Most tourists, myself included, don't even need a reason: they just want to see what a 9 floor electronics store is like.
After we got done with all of our(my) shopping, me, my room mate, and Billy returned to my room where I was able to help Kyle get to my house. Kyle then ripped on me and my friends, took us to eat delicious food, and bought us beer. It was pretty incredible. I am very appreciative of Kyle for his awesomeness today. I really hope that I can get done with my thing tomorrow in a reasonable amount of time so I can attend TGS with him.
Thursday, September 16, 2010
雨。
I love rain. I love the kanji for rain, too. To me, it looks like a window with raindrops going down it. From last night until now, it's been raining off and on in Tokyo and it's been beautiful. It hasn't been like the giant storms that I'm used to in Missouri, but more intermittent and calm - even when it's pouring. The best part is that I get to watch it rain from my balcony. I feel like I have box seats at a show, except no one realizes that they are stage because no one looks up.
Watching the people in the rain is the best part. The sound of the droplets hitting the buildings and streets around me is very calming and soothing, but the people are just neat. The vast majority are 100% prepared for the rain. The women always carry an umbrella on them, come rain or shine. My assumption is that umbrellas are more fashionable than wearing sunscreen and if you have it with you, it serves the other function of being prepared for rain, should it happen. The men don't use umbrellas in the sun, but they usually have them in the rain. I just enjoy watching all of the umbrellas beneath me, filling the sidewalks. It's like watching a dance, seeing them just miss each other when passing closely or while walking near each other.
Today I got to meet my Language Exchange Partner. I have been looking forward to this day ever since I first learned about it this summer. I had imagined every possibility, but I still managed to be surprised(albeit pleasantly). In Japanese, there is no pluralization of nouns. If you say there are nine people, it literally comes out as something like "it is nine person." Basically, they tie the number nine to the amount of people, and the fact that it's plural is assumed. So, when I had been told that I was getting a "Partner," I took this to mean that I would get one person to help me. As it turns out, they took the word "partner" and used the meaning that it would put us into a group together. I have four partners. I didn't get to meet one of them, but it was still cool to meet them.
If any of that previous paragraph is wrong, feel free to correct me. That's just the only reason I can see for the strangeness of the whole partner situation.
Watching the people in the rain is the best part. The sound of the droplets hitting the buildings and streets around me is very calming and soothing, but the people are just neat. The vast majority are 100% prepared for the rain. The women always carry an umbrella on them, come rain or shine. My assumption is that umbrellas are more fashionable than wearing sunscreen and if you have it with you, it serves the other function of being prepared for rain, should it happen. The men don't use umbrellas in the sun, but they usually have them in the rain. I just enjoy watching all of the umbrellas beneath me, filling the sidewalks. It's like watching a dance, seeing them just miss each other when passing closely or while walking near each other.
Today I got to meet my Language Exchange Partner. I have been looking forward to this day ever since I first learned about it this summer. I had imagined every possibility, but I still managed to be surprised(albeit pleasantly). In Japanese, there is no pluralization of nouns. If you say there are nine people, it literally comes out as something like "it is nine person." Basically, they tie the number nine to the amount of people, and the fact that it's plural is assumed. So, when I had been told that I was getting a "Partner," I took this to mean that I would get one person to help me. As it turns out, they took the word "partner" and used the meaning that it would put us into a group together. I have four partners. I didn't get to meet one of them, but it was still cool to meet them.
If any of that previous paragraph is wrong, feel free to correct me. That's just the only reason I can see for the strangeness of the whole partner situation.
Wednesday, September 15, 2010
お風呂に入る～
I'm starting to love baths. I know that it's disgusting and I'm sure to spray myself off after, but the whole act of sitting in a tub of hot water thinking about the day or the night or the next day or where the bubbles come from or whatever is incredible. I spent my last bath just thinking about how I liked to think whilst bathing. All I need to do now is build up the courage for public baths so I can think about things while bathing in public. I mean, everyone else is naked, so I shouldn't be embarrassed, right? I don't have any tattoos or anything else that might draw the attention of the angry bath police. I should have practiced public nudity at home so I would be good at it here.
I met two people that I'm reasonably sure don't hate me, today: Kimi and Kaitlin. They are both almost the exact size with the exception that Kimi wears bigger pants. They are both into anime and nerdy stuff to an extent I did not think possible of their gender. I'm not trying to sound sexist and I really don't think I am being sexist. It would be like if a biologist was tromping around the jungles of South America and found a pink anaconda with little star shaped speckles all down its back. I always knew that, in theory, nerdy girls existed, but I had not met any steeped enough in nerdyness to draw my attention until today. I am considering challenging them to a sword fight. Possibly an umbrella fight, if swords are unavailable.
Tomorrow, we meet our Language Exchange Partners(LEP). I'm not exactly nervous about it, but I am close. I am somewhere between nervous and excited. Probably closer to excited. Anyway, I am going to leave today short because I keep passing out and by the time I get all the f's deleted from where I slept on the button, I'm ready to fall asleep again. I'm starting to feel like an f-ing yoyo. Get it?
I met two people that I'm reasonably sure don't hate me, today: Kimi and Kaitlin. They are both almost the exact size with the exception that Kimi wears bigger pants. They are both into anime and nerdy stuff to an extent I did not think possible of their gender. I'm not trying to sound sexist and I really don't think I am being sexist. It would be like if a biologist was tromping around the jungles of South America and found a pink anaconda with little star shaped speckles all down its back. I always knew that, in theory, nerdy girls existed, but I had not met any steeped enough in nerdyness to draw my attention until today. I am considering challenging them to a sword fight. Possibly an umbrella fight, if swords are unavailable.
Tomorrow, we meet our Language Exchange Partners(LEP). I'm not exactly nervous about it, but I am close. I am somewhere between nervous and excited. Probably closer to excited. Anyway, I am going to leave today short because I keep passing out and by the time I get all the f's deleted from where I slept on the button, I'm ready to fall asleep again. I'm starting to feel like an f-ing yoyo. Get it?
Tuesday, September 14, 2010
Angry face.
I have spent the better part of the day with my angry face on. I am fairly certain that I am in no way home sick, as of yet and while it can be a little bit frustrating repeating the same phrase in Japanese 3-4 times every time I talk to anyone, I am happy to be learning Japanese and I welcome the challenge presented to me. As near as I can tell, I am just becoming frustrated with all of the people I spend my days with. I think I need classes to start because I need something to occupy my mind. I'm reasonably sure that my dissatisfaction with my current company is completely and 100% my own fault. I have nothing to do or think about aside from whatever situation is of immediate concern, so I unconsciously nitpick everything. So far, I'm pretty sure I haven't done any irreparable harm to these still seedling relationships and I'm hoping that the realization that my frustrations are mostly internal will contain my ire.
I have run into a bit of a problem with my schoolmates, besides my petty irritations and, once again, I am sure this is of my own doing: I do not belong to any clique. It's a problem that's plagued me since I was old enough to lift a rattle. I used to think it was my sense of humor or personality that took getting used to, but I'm pretty sure that everything about me is an acquired taste. I'm not sure that anyone has ever liked me when they first met me. That's why I do better socially when I'm introduced or someone is introduced to me. That way someone can vouch for me and the first taste isn't quite so bitter. Our sour. Or whatever. Maybe spicy? I'm just saying, if you introduce me into a large group of people who have no prior kinship with me, I am almost always Rudolph. The problem with this situation is that I am pretty sure that the winters are mild here, so I don't see how I will get to guide a sleigh and become part of the other reindeer's games. Part of me thinks I should just sit this one out and not become the center of attention, but an even larger part of me knows that the smaller part of me needs to man up and just talk to people and make them like me.
The next couple of days are filled with meetings and orientations and tours and junk. I'm really excited, but I'm a tiny bit afraid that my language partner will hate me. I don't know why they would. I have just noticed from talking to other Japanese people, that it's hard for me to acknowledge the language barrier, so I talk like I normally do and they look at me like an idiot. I don't mean to say silly things, but it's how I react to stress. I will make a concerted effort to not look stupid in front of my partner when I meet them so as to stave off any hating.
I have run into a bit of a problem with my schoolmates, besides my petty irritations and, once again, I am sure this is of my own doing: I do not belong to any clique. It's a problem that's plagued me since I was old enough to lift a rattle. I used to think it was my sense of humor or personality that took getting used to, but I'm pretty sure that everything about me is an acquired taste. I'm not sure that anyone has ever liked me when they first met me. That's why I do better socially when I'm introduced or someone is introduced to me. That way someone can vouch for me and the first taste isn't quite so bitter. Our sour. Or whatever. Maybe spicy? I'm just saying, if you introduce me into a large group of people who have no prior kinship with me, I am almost always Rudolph. The problem with this situation is that I am pretty sure that the winters are mild here, so I don't see how I will get to guide a sleigh and become part of the other reindeer's games. Part of me thinks I should just sit this one out and not become the center of attention, but an even larger part of me knows that the smaller part of me needs to man up and just talk to people and make them like me.
The next couple of days are filled with meetings and orientations and tours and junk. I'm really excited, but I'm a tiny bit afraid that my language partner will hate me. I don't know why they would. I have just noticed from talking to other Japanese people, that it's hard for me to acknowledge the language barrier, so I talk like I normally do and they look at me like an idiot. I don't mean to say silly things, but it's how I react to stress. I will make a concerted effort to not look stupid in front of my partner when I meet them so as to stave off any hating.
Monday, September 13, 2010
Exploring.
I spent most of today exploring the streets around my dorm, ranging further than I had attempted, so far. I decided that I wanted to understand the geographical and topographical layout of the city, thinking that maybe that would give me some insight into the so far seemingly chaotic setup of Japanese infrastructure. After nearly four hours of walking around blocks and looking at maps, I can say that there is no pattern to anything here. I mean, in the States, they try to make a grid and fail. Here, there is no pretense at all to making a concurrent geometric pattern. They are all shapes that I have just now decided can best be described as "mushy squares." The whole situation is very distressing to me, although I really have started to remember where things are and the names of certain roadways. Also, the hours of walking were good exercise and they led to my discovery of a couple shrines that I have pictures of on facebook and a window full of what can only be described as Cliffordtastic.
One of the shrines I found was maybe not a shrine. It may have been some sort of daycare for very young kids or maybe just a neighborhood playground with a bunch of Shinto-looking yard statues that foreigners may misplace significance upon. Either way, it led to one of the more surreal "I am in Japan" moments I've had. I was walking down one of the very small walking roads between houses when I came upon a person sized slab of rock with some very pretty kanji engraved on it. Next to the giant slab of rock was a narrow stone path built into the concrete leading up to something like a Torii gate which lead into a small playground with what looked to be some Shinto-styled statues. During the whole time of my exploring this, I could hear what I can only assume to be a child practicing piano through one of the neighboring house windows.
I can still hear the piano in my head right now and it's been almost 13 hours since it happened. It was like all of my senses were flowing together and where maybe two hours before there was discord, at this moment everything synced up and I was completely in harmony with my surroundings. The whole world was making a sound and not only was I hearing that sound, but my presence in that place made me a part of the sound. The way I felt, standing on that worn stone path before the Torii gate, may be the closest thing I have come to having a spiritual experience.
Maybe what I'm feeling is stress from culture shock causing my brain to have to create reasons for what I'm feeling, or maybe where I was standing was actually a Shinto shrine and the Kami who lived there deigned to take pity on the lowly wanderer before it and gave me a glimpse of something I had never before seen and currently lack the words for. I think I will choose the latter.
One of the shrines I found was maybe not a shrine. It may have been some sort of daycare for very young kids or maybe just a neighborhood playground with a bunch of Shinto-looking yard statues that foreigners may misplace significance upon. Either way, it led to one of the more surreal "I am in Japan" moments I've had. I was walking down one of the very small walking roads between houses when I came upon a person sized slab of rock with some very pretty kanji engraved on it. Next to the giant slab of rock was a narrow stone path built into the concrete leading up to something like a Torii gate which lead into a small playground with what looked to be some Shinto-styled statues. During the whole time of my exploring this, I could hear what I can only assume to be a child practicing piano through one of the neighboring house windows.
I can still hear the piano in my head right now and it's been almost 13 hours since it happened. It was like all of my senses were flowing together and where maybe two hours before there was discord, at this moment everything synced up and I was completely in harmony with my surroundings. The whole world was making a sound and not only was I hearing that sound, but my presence in that place made me a part of the sound. The way I felt, standing on that worn stone path before the Torii gate, may be the closest thing I have come to having a spiritual experience.
Maybe what I'm feeling is stress from culture shock causing my brain to have to create reasons for what I'm feeling, or maybe where I was standing was actually a Shinto shrine and the Kami who lived there deigned to take pity on the lowly wanderer before it and gave me a glimpse of something I had never before seen and currently lack the words for. I think I will choose the latter.
Sunday, September 12, 2010
Lazy days.
It wasn't my intention to do nothing today. I, in fact, awoke with the intention of going with the adults to their matsuri(festival). It wasn't until I left the dorm to get coffee with the roomate and discovered that it was hot as hades outside and a bajillion percent humidity that I decided I was going to stay a fairly comfortable distance from the dorm. Also, my stomach decided it was pissed, so that was another reason to stay home. In Tokyo, it's not all that easy to find a public restroom, I've discovered. And the cops, having no real crime to deal with, will arrest you for peeing on someone's fence even though you're in an ally where no one should have seen you.
We did end up wandering around a little bit, after all. It seems strange to me that wandering around Tokyo is starting to seem like a mundane daily exercise. I haven't eaten at the same restaurant twice. I have only been to the 100 yen store a few times, but I cover a fair chunk of ground every day. Maybe it's time that I stop being a chicken and start ranging around Tokyo on the subway. I still haven't been to Harajuku or Akihabara or any of the really famous places. Perhaps tomorrow.
I took a bath just before writing this. Not a shower. A bath. I abhor baths. The very act is disgusting and repulses me just to think of it. That being said, my legs hurt and I thought soaking in the water would help. It may have, but I'm not sure the price I payed was worth the relief: I discovered that I have manifested no less than 40 new freckles on my arms and hands. As it turns out, exposure to the sun causes me to gain freckles. There still aren't any on my face, but maybe my arms will overload and they will break passed the neck barrier and start covering my face. I'm not sure I am prepared for such an occurrence. I fear the roving bands of citizens brought together under the banner of self defense to wrongfully persecute me. If you prick me, do I not bleed?
This all seemed a lot more interesting when I was going over it in my head in the bathtub. Yet another thing I can blame bathing for.
We did end up wandering around a little bit, after all. It seems strange to me that wandering around Tokyo is starting to seem like a mundane daily exercise. I haven't eaten at the same restaurant twice. I have only been to the 100 yen store a few times, but I cover a fair chunk of ground every day. Maybe it's time that I stop being a chicken and start ranging around Tokyo on the subway. I still haven't been to Harajuku or Akihabara or any of the really famous places. Perhaps tomorrow.
I took a bath just before writing this. Not a shower. A bath. I abhor baths. The very act is disgusting and repulses me just to think of it. That being said, my legs hurt and I thought soaking in the water would help. It may have, but I'm not sure the price I payed was worth the relief: I discovered that I have manifested no less than 40 new freckles on my arms and hands. As it turns out, exposure to the sun causes me to gain freckles. There still aren't any on my face, but maybe my arms will overload and they will break passed the neck barrier and start covering my face. I'm not sure I am prepared for such an occurrence. I fear the roving bands of citizens brought together under the banner of self defense to wrongfully persecute me. If you prick me, do I not bleed?
This all seemed a lot more interesting when I was going over it in my head in the bathtub. Yet another thing I can blame bathing for.
Saturday, September 11, 2010
The Alley.
We were in need of towels. My roomate failed to bring any towels with him to Tokyo, so for the last three days, he had been using a spare bedsheet to dry himself after showers. It is impressive how definitions of things like "towels" or "toilet paper" become flexible when foresight fails us and we are left without. In any event, we had spent the last three days with our eyes out, but to no avail. We actually did find a shop which dealt exclusively in the fluffy little monsters, but it is never open and has a map peppered with moon language that neither of us can decipher. So, the only towels we had found being imprisoned in a tomb enchanted by moon people, we decided to seek information from the wisest person we knew: the Land Lord.
The Land Lord is probably the jolliest person I have ever met. He speaks both English and Japanese and seems to have infinite knowledge about all things(or the ability to acquire said knowledge). He runs the International House with the help of his wife, the Land Lady. I'm reasonably sure that even if I could recollect their names, I would still use the Land Lord and Land Lady because they are important enough that they deserve two capital letters in their names. In any event, we asked the Land Lord to help us find a towel. He knew, but he couldn't remember how to get to the shop, so he asked his wife. She knew how to get to the shop, but speaks only a tiny amount of English, so through some sort of strange 4-way orgy of shared language and information and cartography, we came up with a somewhat decent explanation and a somewhat less decent map to follow to the shop with the towels.
I promise that this story is going somewhere.
My roomate and I followed the directions we were given and found ourselves in a deep, dark alley. At least, that's what it should have been. There was no room between the buildings for much of anything and yet, there were lights. And more than lights: every kind of shop you could imagine and every quality, besides. I even found a shop that dealt in bowls. Every 10 feet or so there was another restaurateur trying to eek out a living selling some sort of cooked meat on a stick or there was someone selling clothes that appeared to be homemade or a shop selling designer bags and wallets. It was like a mall in a sewer, but in place of the smell of refuse and waste, was the smell of delicious food and in place of mindless rats milling about, there were people buying and smiling and talking and yelling, "irrashaimase!" It was an incredible experience and the only thing it was missing was Jackie Chan speeding by on a "borrowed" motor cycle being chased by Yakuza.
I can't help but feel a bit cheesy with my descriptions of some things, but I really want to convey some sort of idea of what I'm experiencing and my camera doesn't work at all.
The Land Lord is probably the jolliest person I have ever met. He speaks both English and Japanese and seems to have infinite knowledge about all things(or the ability to acquire said knowledge). He runs the International House with the help of his wife, the Land Lady. I'm reasonably sure that even if I could recollect their names, I would still use the Land Lord and Land Lady because they are important enough that they deserve two capital letters in their names. In any event, we asked the Land Lord to help us find a towel. He knew, but he couldn't remember how to get to the shop, so he asked his wife. She knew how to get to the shop, but speaks only a tiny amount of English, so through some sort of strange 4-way orgy of shared language and information and cartography, we came up with a somewhat decent explanation and a somewhat less decent map to follow to the shop with the towels.
I promise that this story is going somewhere.
My roomate and I followed the directions we were given and found ourselves in a deep, dark alley. At least, that's what it should have been. There was no room between the buildings for much of anything and yet, there were lights. And more than lights: every kind of shop you could imagine and every quality, besides. I even found a shop that dealt in bowls. Every 10 feet or so there was another restaurateur trying to eek out a living selling some sort of cooked meat on a stick or there was someone selling clothes that appeared to be homemade or a shop selling designer bags and wallets. It was like a mall in a sewer, but in place of the smell of refuse and waste, was the smell of delicious food and in place of mindless rats milling about, there were people buying and smiling and talking and yelling, "irrashaimase!" It was an incredible experience and the only thing it was missing was Jackie Chan speeding by on a "borrowed" motor cycle being chased by Yakuza.
I can't help but feel a bit cheesy with my descriptions of some things, but I really want to convey some sort of idea of what I'm experiencing and my camera doesn't work at all.
Friday, September 10, 2010
Bananas and eggs.
I decided that I am going to make my morning meal some sort of combination of bananas and eggs. It seems to be both cost effective and nutritious. Also, eggs seem to be the only thing in Japan that I can still cook. Although, I can't add cheese, because I haven't seen any cheese anywhere to add. I suppose I could buy a bunch of the cheese bread type stuff and peel the cheese off and add it to my eggs and make an omelet, but that seems silly. Seriously, though.. I'll do that if I don't find cheese soon.
Anyway, more on the topic of food: I have developed a very unfortunate passion for melon breads. The reason I say it is unfortunate is because the stuff costs ~105 yen when I find it and I can't say no. The first one I found was at Family Mart(famima) and it was incredible. It was like they'd made some sort of butter or something and soaked it all the way through the bread, spreading delicious melon flavor throughout. It wasn't oily or anything; I'm just unsure how one might do that without making the bread soggy. It had this not-quite-frosting crust on the top that was amazing. It's like the first time you learn that you can bite into a honey comb. The second melon bread I bought was from some grocery store. It was smaller than the first one, so I almost didn't buy it, but I'm glad I did. It was called melon&melon bread, so I my curiosity teamed up with my obsession and over-rode my fear of disappointment at a bad value. As it turns out, there was the same sort of awesome outside melonyness of the former melon bread, but with a creamy melony center. Not like bavarian creme or anything heavy like that. It was soft and fluffy. I will try to sneak some back with me, if I can.
As much as I've loved all the foods I've come into contact with, it is hard for me to imagine finding better food. It's like when you love someone so much that you think you won't ever experience anything stronger than this. And then you meet their sister and the game changes, mirite?! I'm being silly, but I think my point is made. I have been here for but a few days. I can't let my heart become so attached to melon bread that I don't see its sister sitting next to it, can I? I must try all the breads, nay, I must try everything until I find the melon bread's sister that I belong with.
Anyway, more on the topic of food: I have developed a very unfortunate passion for melon breads. The reason I say it is unfortunate is because the stuff costs ~105 yen when I find it and I can't say no. The first one I found was at Family Mart(famima) and it was incredible. It was like they'd made some sort of butter or something and soaked it all the way through the bread, spreading delicious melon flavor throughout. It wasn't oily or anything; I'm just unsure how one might do that without making the bread soggy. It had this not-quite-frosting crust on the top that was amazing. It's like the first time you learn that you can bite into a honey comb. The second melon bread I bought was from some grocery store. It was smaller than the first one, so I almost didn't buy it, but I'm glad I did. It was called melon&melon bread, so I my curiosity teamed up with my obsession and over-rode my fear of disappointment at a bad value. As it turns out, there was the same sort of awesome outside melonyness of the former melon bread, but with a creamy melony center. Not like bavarian creme or anything heavy like that. It was soft and fluffy. I will try to sneak some back with me, if I can.
As much as I've loved all the foods I've come into contact with, it is hard for me to imagine finding better food. It's like when you love someone so much that you think you won't ever experience anything stronger than this. And then you meet their sister and the game changes, mirite?! I'm being silly, but I think my point is made. I have been here for but a few days. I can't let my heart become so attached to melon bread that I don't see its sister sitting next to it, can I? I must try all the breads, nay, I must try everything until I find the melon bread's sister that I belong with.
Thursday, September 9, 2010
Sushi, etc.
So far, my plan to spend little to nothing on breakfast is working out well. Today, I ate a granola bar that I had left from "the States" as they are called here. Some say "back home" in a sort of wistful aloof way, but those people don't have their head in the game! I don't say you gotta hate America, but you have to downplay its importance a little bit or people will doubt your resolve to be awesome in Japan! But, I digress.
Sushi, as I'd heard somewhere before, is awesome here. Who knew?! We went to one of those places most people have seen in a movie where there is a giant mega conveyor belt running in and around the store. It is big. If it didn't complete a full circle, I would liken it to some major river system like the Amazon with all its windyness. Maybe it's more like an RC car track or hot wheels track set up by a kid with unlimited resources. That got away from me a little bit. I'm gonna start a new paragraph
So yah, sushi on color coded plates winding around the room. The cool thing was almost all of the plates cost 100 yen! That's a little over a dollar for a sushi roll! I had five different kinds and spent like six bucks American! I pretty much stuck to the staples like shrimp, salmon sashimi, tuna rolls, that sort of thing, but they had a large variety of things that were just strange to see and some of which not appetizing at all. Like squid sashimi. No thanks. I'm sure I'll try it at some point, but I am gonna have to mentally prepare myself. Or corn rolls. Literally, seaweed wrapped around what appeared to be buttery corn. I mean, maybe but I've eaten a lot of corn and I can't see that being anything I'll care about. That being said, I did eat bacon sushi and that was about twice as awesome as I thought it was gonna be and my expectations were pretty high going in.
My camera is dead atm, but I did post almost 100 pictures earlier, so maybe you can look at those and think about how awesome I am? That's what I do when I look at them. There will be more to come later; I just need to let it charge for tonight.
Sushi, as I'd heard somewhere before, is awesome here. Who knew?! We went to one of those places most people have seen in a movie where there is a giant mega conveyor belt running in and around the store. It is big. If it didn't complete a full circle, I would liken it to some major river system like the Amazon with all its windyness. Maybe it's more like an RC car track or hot wheels track set up by a kid with unlimited resources. That got away from me a little bit. I'm gonna start a new paragraph
So yah, sushi on color coded plates winding around the room. The cool thing was almost all of the plates cost 100 yen! That's a little over a dollar for a sushi roll! I had five different kinds and spent like six bucks American! I pretty much stuck to the staples like shrimp, salmon sashimi, tuna rolls, that sort of thing, but they had a large variety of things that were just strange to see and some of which not appetizing at all. Like squid sashimi. No thanks. I'm sure I'll try it at some point, but I am gonna have to mentally prepare myself. Or corn rolls. Literally, seaweed wrapped around what appeared to be buttery corn. I mean, maybe but I've eaten a lot of corn and I can't see that being anything I'll care about. That being said, I did eat bacon sushi and that was about twice as awesome as I thought it was gonna be and my expectations were pretty high going in.
My camera is dead atm, but I did post almost 100 pictures earlier, so maybe you can look at those and think about how awesome I am? That's what I do when I look at them. There will be more to come later; I just need to let it charge for tonight.
Wednesday, September 8, 2010
Day 1.
I should start by talking about the flight over here, but I don't want to, so I'm going to talk about being here. I may jump back to the flight at the end, for those who are interested.
So, Tokyo is awesome. Everyone seems nice and has been more than willing to deal with my paltry speaking abilities. I mean, so far the rumors I'd heard about "everyone speaks English here" are exaggerated at best. Randomly, someone does speak a little bit of English, but the vast majority either don't or don't want to. Either way, we can usually find a way to communicate.
Ugh, I can't think of a way to type this without sounding dumb so I have to talk about the airplanes first. The first airplane ride was good enough. The plane was roughly the size of a shoe box and I didn't see how it didn't just get batted out of the sky by any errant gust of wind, but we made it to Dallas ok. I'm assuming the trips are short in those because if they were longer, the sky gods would notice and down they'd go.
The monster airplane that went from Dallas to Narita was totally different. I'm pretty sure that it doesn't use fuel. I think it eats the smaller planes. In any event, that ride was miserable. It wasn't too bumpy or anything, but being stuck in the least comfortable chair I've ever sat in and watching the first half of about 6 movies only to have an error come up and cancel them sucks. I took a lot of Dramamine, but I feared that I would be drowsy when I landed, so I stopped taking them after a while. As it turned out, my sense of time was very far off and I should have taken more because I just ended up being awake for the last six hours of the flight.
We landed in Narita at 3:17 on Wednesday afternoon. I spent my first half hour in Japan getting cut in front of repeatedly at the currency exchange bank, because I would let like six inches go by without moving. Learned how to operate lines in Japan though. I then got to try to use a phone to tell Nao I was in Tokyo. If I haven't said so before, Nao is my awesome super-cool friend who lives in Tokyo and volunteered to help me get around. After successfully calling Nao and talking with her voicemail, I sent to the handy-dandy luggage courier place and had my luggage sent. Soon after that, Nao paged me on the intercom and showed me how to buy a ticket for the train.
The train ride was incredible. That was when it started to sink in where I was and what I was doing. Up until the train, I had went from a room to a room to a room, never seeing outside or anything truly different. The first thing I noticed from watching scenery blow by on the train was that Japanese waste no space at all. If there's a big gap between buildings or roads, they plant rice. If there's a smaller gap, they put in a parking lot or go ahead and build more apartments. Also, people drive crazy here. I've seen markings on lanes or whatever, but they seem more like recommendations and less like steadfast rules. Our taxi ride was scarier than either of our plane rides.
When we arrived at the dorm, I met too many people with too many names for me to remember. The apartment managers seem really awesome. They are an older couple who both seem very strong in their convictions. The man laughs a lot. I like him and I'm frustrated that I can't remember their names. I'm so bad at names. In any event, they showed me and Nao to my room, where we decided we would go get dinner before I settled in.
We took off walking towards nothing in particular, which is totally awesome that you can do here. We wanted to eat and didn't know where anything was, but if you walk for a block or two in any direction, you'll find something you want. The first place we came to, Nao said was awesome, but they had a refrigerator put in an awkward position where even Nao had to turn sideways to get through, so I didn't stand a chance. I would have been incredibly embarrassed, if the lady who ran the place wasn't already so. She followed us around with many "gomen nasai" and bows until my embarrassment faded. I'll be honest though, it was a little bit frustrating losing out on a new experience because of my size.
From the tiny place, we went around the corner and found a ramen restaurant what's name eludes me. I should take notes while I'm out so I can remember names. This place was awesome. Let me just say, for those of you who are unaware of the difference between American style ramen and Japanese style ramen, Japanese ramen is almost like a work of art: they have a bed of noodles and broth, but then there are layers of various vegetables and meats or dumplings in a giant bowl. It's a very pretty meal. I didn't do terribly poorly with the chopsticks, but I definitely mangled a few of my dumplings into being relegated into the spoon which is normally only used on broth. The cheater spoon. I got broth all over my shirt, but I apparently eat like some sort of brain-starved invalid in any language.
After we left the restaurant, we made a very uneventful trip to the convenience store and I got some awful unsweet green tea. For future reference, if the bottle is dark green, don't buy it. I left Nao at the subway station and walked the rest of the way back to my dorm, where I met my new roomate, Scott. He seems like a nice guy, so far. He comes from Georgia, has a girlfriend who has a kid back at home, and has studied abroad in like five other countries. I let him use my google voice account to call his girlfriend.
I am sure I'm missing stuff, but I'll likely be writing a lot in this thing, so I'm sure it'll come out sooner or later.
So, Tokyo is awesome. Everyone seems nice and has been more than willing to deal with my paltry speaking abilities. I mean, so far the rumors I'd heard about "everyone speaks English here" are exaggerated at best. Randomly, someone does speak a little bit of English, but the vast majority either don't or don't want to. Either way, we can usually find a way to communicate.
Ugh, I can't think of a way to type this without sounding dumb so I have to talk about the airplanes first. The first airplane ride was good enough. The plane was roughly the size of a shoe box and I didn't see how it didn't just get batted out of the sky by any errant gust of wind, but we made it to Dallas ok. I'm assuming the trips are short in those because if they were longer, the sky gods would notice and down they'd go.
The monster airplane that went from Dallas to Narita was totally different. I'm pretty sure that it doesn't use fuel. I think it eats the smaller planes. In any event, that ride was miserable. It wasn't too bumpy or anything, but being stuck in the least comfortable chair I've ever sat in and watching the first half of about 6 movies only to have an error come up and cancel them sucks. I took a lot of Dramamine, but I feared that I would be drowsy when I landed, so I stopped taking them after a while. As it turned out, my sense of time was very far off and I should have taken more because I just ended up being awake for the last six hours of the flight.
We landed in Narita at 3:17 on Wednesday afternoon. I spent my first half hour in Japan getting cut in front of repeatedly at the currency exchange bank, because I would let like six inches go by without moving. Learned how to operate lines in Japan though. I then got to try to use a phone to tell Nao I was in Tokyo. If I haven't said so before, Nao is my awesome super-cool friend who lives in Tokyo and volunteered to help me get around. After successfully calling Nao and talking with her voicemail, I sent to the handy-dandy luggage courier place and had my luggage sent. Soon after that, Nao paged me on the intercom and showed me how to buy a ticket for the train.
The train ride was incredible. That was when it started to sink in where I was and what I was doing. Up until the train, I had went from a room to a room to a room, never seeing outside or anything truly different. The first thing I noticed from watching scenery blow by on the train was that Japanese waste no space at all. If there's a big gap between buildings or roads, they plant rice. If there's a smaller gap, they put in a parking lot or go ahead and build more apartments. Also, people drive crazy here. I've seen markings on lanes or whatever, but they seem more like recommendations and less like steadfast rules. Our taxi ride was scarier than either of our plane rides.
When we arrived at the dorm, I met too many people with too many names for me to remember. The apartment managers seem really awesome. They are an older couple who both seem very strong in their convictions. The man laughs a lot. I like him and I'm frustrated that I can't remember their names. I'm so bad at names. In any event, they showed me and Nao to my room, where we decided we would go get dinner before I settled in.
We took off walking towards nothing in particular, which is totally awesome that you can do here. We wanted to eat and didn't know where anything was, but if you walk for a block or two in any direction, you'll find something you want. The first place we came to, Nao said was awesome, but they had a refrigerator put in an awkward position where even Nao had to turn sideways to get through, so I didn't stand a chance. I would have been incredibly embarrassed, if the lady who ran the place wasn't already so. She followed us around with many "gomen nasai" and bows until my embarrassment faded. I'll be honest though, it was a little bit frustrating losing out on a new experience because of my size.
From the tiny place, we went around the corner and found a ramen restaurant what's name eludes me. I should take notes while I'm out so I can remember names. This place was awesome. Let me just say, for those of you who are unaware of the difference between American style ramen and Japanese style ramen, Japanese ramen is almost like a work of art: they have a bed of noodles and broth, but then there are layers of various vegetables and meats or dumplings in a giant bowl. It's a very pretty meal. I didn't do terribly poorly with the chopsticks, but I definitely mangled a few of my dumplings into being relegated into the spoon which is normally only used on broth. The cheater spoon. I got broth all over my shirt, but I apparently eat like some sort of brain-starved invalid in any language.
After we left the restaurant, we made a very uneventful trip to the convenience store and I got some awful unsweet green tea. For future reference, if the bottle is dark green, don't buy it. I left Nao at the subway station and walked the rest of the way back to my dorm, where I met my new roomate, Scott. He seems like a nice guy, so far. He comes from Georgia, has a girlfriend who has a kid back at home, and has studied abroad in like five other countries. I let him use my google voice account to call his girlfriend.
I am sure I'm missing stuff, but I'll likely be writing a lot in this thing, so I'm sure it'll come out sooner or later.
Tuesday, September 7, 2010
I'm ready.
It's sort of strange. The passed few months leading up to tonight, I've worried about everything from whether I actually speak enough Japanese to do well at Toyo University to worrying about if people will make fun of my because of my weight. I even spent a few hours one night worrying that Toyo would turn out to be some sort of crazy international organ stealing organ stealing organization. I had decided that when I got to my dorm, I would be drugged and harvested and ... well, the fear gets too silly for me to finish it.
In the span of the last three days, everything has changed. All of my silly fears are gone and replaced with this resolve that up until now I feared I was incapable of. I truly feel ready. I am still somewhat afraid that gremlins will destroy the wing of the airplane as I watch, helpless, from the cabin, but I think I will quash that fear with dramamine. I have brought enough for the entirety of the trip from Dallas to Narita.
Tomorrow, I will be posting from my dorm in Tokyo. I intend to take a bazillion photos of everything from my departure to my arrival at my dorm. I'm pretty sure that I can't post a bazillion pictures on here, so I will likely force everyone who wants to see the pictures to go over to facebook and see them there.
It's now 1:00 A.M. so I will try to squeeze in a few hours of sleep before my big day tomorrow. Bye!
In the span of the last three days, everything has changed. All of my silly fears are gone and replaced with this resolve that up until now I feared I was incapable of. I truly feel ready. I am still somewhat afraid that gremlins will destroy the wing of the airplane as I watch, helpless, from the cabin, but I think I will quash that fear with dramamine. I have brought enough for the entirety of the trip from Dallas to Narita.
Tomorrow, I will be posting from my dorm in Tokyo. I intend to take a bazillion photos of everything from my departure to my arrival at my dorm. I'm pretty sure that I can't post a bazillion pictures on here, so I will likely force everyone who wants to see the pictures to go over to facebook and see them there.
It's now 1:00 A.M. so I will try to squeeze in a few hours of sleep before my big day tomorrow. Bye!
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