x'mas.

christmas in japan is strange...to say the least. it is clearly celebrated, as trees are up and decorations cover stores at the beginning of november; christmas music is in every store, and most restaurants, but it is almost purely consumerist. the closest american holiday is probably valentine's day: created by the stores to sell more things, and serves the purpose of an excuse for lovers to give each other gifts. therefore, being basically alone for x'mas in japan could be rather depressing. in fact i was expecting the crappiest christmas ever. BUT after a good day hanging out with my friend/tutor, yuji, a couple really good phone calls, and an awesome plan for my substitute christmas (on christmas eve) i think it's going to be alright. today i looked at christmas lights, bought myself presents, and drank chai. tomorrow i will watch die hard, die harder and die hard with a vengeance and anything else i feel like, and eat loads of hotcakes and mellow all day long. of course i will also open the gifts that managed to get here in time.

good weekends change lives, or at least perspectives.

i've been down. i have not been happy. a lonely sad christmas awaits me. self-pity is not my friend. this last weekend? she was my friend. so this past weekend i got incredibly drunk and watched buffy talked to nihonjin visited friends went to the symphony ate yummy food and caught up with special people.



friday night was my bonenkai. this in itself was rather amazing. i caught the bus from hiroshima eki, with all the other teachers, to a posh restaurant/onsen that was famous for its garden. the bus was quiet and uncomfortable. the food was traditional japanese fair, delicious, the beer kept flowing and the seats were assigned by hello kitty. i was at the saru (monkey table). there were boring speeches, but then the real fun began with a group of teachers and staff coming out in reindeer and santa costumes to perform a dance to S.M.A.P. (i assume cause that seems to be the only thing older people in japan know about j-pop). so hilarious. and then there was bingo, and i won stuff, and more beer. and theen there was an awesome quiz game between the tables. this is where it got interesting and the high-fiving began. my table won, with little to no help from me--although i did know some of the answers. the gift was lame, but victory was sweet.

the next day i woke early and trained it out to tadanoumi, with the happy surprise of running into kate (from pdx) and natalie at the mihara station. we chatted and then split from kate at tadanoumi. nats and i wandered over to the posh (i use posh again b/c it's nats' word and now it's stuck in my vocabulary) italian. i had delicious four cheese pizza and we split an amazing cake. the whole time we both admired the beautiful raining day, looking out onto the inland sea from the classy modern italian joint. next stop was fukuyama, where we randomly ran into some JETs, including the other kate and her boy mitch. so exciting to finally meet him. nats and i then got starbucks, choco cro, and pikura (photo stickers that always turn out embarrassing). then we headed to josh's with kate and mitch, refreshed from their 'nap', and promptly got lost only to be found by crystal.



the night got rather rambunctious with tastey josh made chicken, and white cheddar cheese that out-shined the chicken just a tad. plus all the booze, good crowd and the opportunity for me to practice my japanese. the night, for me, ended ten minutes into the first episode of buffy as i passed out on my folded out chair. waking in the morning i was confused by the appearance of a futon and nats in pjs. haven't slept that solid in a while.

nats and i then hung-overly made our way to the concert the miyoshi's were attending. the miyoshi's being a very nice couple that befriended nats. mr. miyoshi being a retired dentist, i couldn't help but think of my grandfather. the music was fun, including introductions of the instruments, two kids conducting (the boy being rather aggressive, the girl being quite bored) and a monster in the back of the auditorium snoring. either that or a rabid dog. then finally we had B.L.T.s at a nummy takehara cafe and i caught the bus back to hiroshima feeling brighter and happier.

my new goal is to jump on the train and get off at random interesting looking places.

the reality.

i hate that my 11pm is portland's 6am. or that my 5pm is portland's 12am. the times that i crave conversation that is simple and what i need it isn't going to happen.

today, for example.

i woke up late, late being 7am instead of 6 or 6:30. i slowly pushed myself out of bed, helped by listening to the live broadcast of opb radio (travel with rick steves). i folded up my futon, half the bedding going in my closet, the other being stacked into the form of a couch. i turned on the heater, decided on cold cereal for breakfast, and then pulled out my clothes. i finally decided that it was cold enough for leggings under my pants, slipped those on along with an under shirt, my new turtle neck and a sweater. i munched my breakfast, including nearly gone grapes, and checked my e-mail and all other forms of communication. after stalling for as long as possible, i dawned my coat, scarf, hat and gloves and headed out into the cold. nearing the bottom of my hill i opted for the bus rather than tormenting my nearly frozen fingers with a twenty minute push of my bike up my tedious 'mountain'. the bus was of course over crowded with students. those of us waiting at the stop smashed ourselves in, my glasses fogging up, greeting the warmth of seventy-five closely packed bodies. i noticed we had left one boy behind, forced to wait for the next bus. coming onto school grounds i am greeted by those instructors that are there to monitor school uniforms. they happily pause to say 'ohio gozaimasu' to me, then return to their task of judging skirt lengths and loose ties. after changing into my indoor shoes, which now take the form of my closed toe berkies, i am stopped by one of the sweet front office girls. she drags me into the office and in broken english and japanese asks me to pose as santa and write a to her six year old son (she wants it in english since santa is american). i cheerfully obliged, asking her first to write what she wants in japanese so i can know what to say. next stop is of course stamping my hanko on the teacher registrar books, but on the way i remember to buy a strawberry mochi as they will be gone in moments. this is by far my favorite mochi. decadent to an extreme. after the four story march up the outdoor staircase, in my office i am greeted by warm air. the constant shivering days of the past weeks have ended, and the school has decided to pay for kerosine to fuel out dangerous looking stove. this is extremely important to me today as i knew that i had no classes. my day would spent at my desk. and because of this fact what i was paid for was taking an hour nap, checking my e-mail, catching up on the anarchism wikipeida entry i had started before, grading about five papers, eating lunch, snacks, reading my newly started book (you shall know our velocity) and finally writing this blog. beyond these tasks i was called by funatsu-san to confirm the change of location of my december 26th obligation, as well as a trip to the post office to change the pick up of my package to the high school and buy boxes for shipping christmas gifts home. this evening i will leave school at 4pm, fifteen minutes early per-usual, and stop at the grocery store for the week's food. i have an appointment with the mormons at 6pm, which i will have to trek out into the cold again for. and hopefully i'll finally get things organized as far as gifts go.

this is my life, in case you wanted to know.

transitions.

things are changing ever so subtly. i'm starting to feel comfortable here in hiroshima. going downtown i don't get lost, i know where the things are that i need. i feel confident enough to find the things that are new and i've heard about, that i want to see. beyond that i feel at ease. i am to the point where i know how things work and i'm in my routine. i applied to go to japan because it was the thing that was in my plan. once i got admitted i saw it as an opportunity to figure myself out and be single and solidify the person that i want to be; to be away from everything that makes my life easy and feel safe. now i am feeling safe here but i am also feeling that i am able to do the things that i wanted to do here. i am happy that i am not going home for christmas because i need to miss at least one in my life, and because not making that trip it is easier for me to reaffirm my pseudo decision to only stay here for a year. as much as i am feeling more comfortable here, and thereby more distant from everything back home, i really know that everything will be that much better when i finally am home.

the power of the blog.

i can write about what ever the hell i want! muahahahahahaa! okay...yeah the power is corupting me just a tad, but i must write of my love for the movie i just watched. i am now even more in love with john cusack after watching 'say anything'. now it was a very hokey silly movie with many faults but i still loved it; it being a tad more innocent and heart felt than many other eighties love stories. the fact that it was not a movie of predictable surface emotions really made me glad that i finally watched it. and that is one benefit of being too tired, money conscious to go out every night, i'm starting to eat away at my giant list of movies that i need to see.

suburbs cross the ocean.

so i just read an old blog in which i was complaining about american suburbs, immediately the description of the overly pre-packaged world back there in american made me cringe as i realized that i was also describing japan. well at least where much of japan is attempting to go. the overly bright artificial super markets, the clueless people buying useless food (not quite as bad in japan), and the pointless use of technology to make our lives a little less 'boring'. now much of these things are really invasions into japan. they did not originate here and hopefully there is a chance that they will not last here, but i highly doubt it. japan is going the way of the american suburb and it would take much to stop it. what is even more frightening is that i am sure that this is true the world over. a simple life where you are aware of where your food comes from, you know your neighbor's names and you can have a moment of peace to think about things--without the media tormenting you with useless information--is becoming harder and harder to find. my only hope can be that this trend is only that, a trend. and that here in japan it will fall by the wayside and the japanese people will hold on to their kind and generous ways, and even their violent heritage, just because it's theirs. i hope that as i get to travel outside the cities i can enjoy more of japan for being japan, not an imitation of america.

visiting nearby attractions.

so this sunday kate, kazuya and i headed out to miyajima on a rainy wet day that made me feel like i was home. it was interesting going to a site that is a pretty big deal in japan, when it's just across the inland sea from my 'hometown'. kate came in to visit with some outta town friends, that fell through. sandi was supposed to join us but the bus ride the night before, post molly malone's, was too much for her. so just the three of us, kate and i happily joined by my new friend kazuya, went out and enjoyed the day. there were many photos taken and many other tourists surrounding us. now what is very shocking about miyajima is the deer. everyone tells you about the deer, and i had even seen them before, but until spending a day there you don't really understand the plight of these sad deer. they are very small and survive on the scraps of the thousands of tourists. even more frightening is the fact that people pet the deer and they don't seem upset by this. beyond this depressing aspect, the island was very beautiful and you could feel the age of the shrines and the famous tori. we also partook in local cuisine and some good old kirin beer; kate and i of course eating too much, cause that's what we do.

a good day.

basically it was a fiasco.

so the current fiasco in my life has been that the heater function on my aircon has not been working. this is a problem as it has been really cold in hiroshima as of late--actually i think it's been cold all over japan. so at first i just took it. i was going to ask the mormon girls next time they came over (seino having been in japan longer than me and speaks way better japanese) or ask my supervisor to call someone for me. but i decided to offer an olive branch and ask my new overly talkative neighbor for help. this turned into one stressful night of her running up and downstairs calling people and getting me new batteries, writing me a note to give to the realtor (who handles all problems for the small building); to be followed by a stressful day of unanswered phone calls (my unanswering because i was at work, plus i didn't want to deal with a long run of japanese that i would have to say wakarimasen to), then she (my neighbor) of course did the calling for me to my realtor and then the realtor called the repair shop and the day ended in the realtor calling my school to say that i should go straight to her next time--i get the impression that my neighbor is a bit of a nusence. basically it was a fiasco. i didn't know what was going on but i was incredibly appreciative when dogishi sensei translated for me, first with the realtor and then with my neighbor. and finally i wanted to hug fujishiro sensei as he made the final arrangements with the realtor and then the repair company for them to come fix my aircon. so here i sit under my electric blanket, watching three men install a NEW aircon, because it is too expensive to just fix the old one. what is even more amazing than the fact that they are here on a saturday and the the appointment was made the day before is that my landlady is paying for all of this. i am the luckiest JET. and the cute japanese thing was that one of the men noticed my dust bunnies and actually pulled out my vacuum and vacuumed them up for me. embarrassing, and yet sweet. i love japan.

preemptive thanksgiving pt. duo

last year i had an amzing premptive thanksgiving with keoki, scott and elena. we made turkey, cranbessy sauce, and brownies (which half of which went into elena and i raw). it was a beautiful night.



this year i was invited to the mormon girls' 'enkaiwa' night, which is the night they teach english to the community (maybe church members? i don't know). it was the cooking night and this month it was a thanksgiving dinner. now the only time i've been to a normal thanksgiving in recent years has been the half of the nights that i went to ty's (my ex's)--my family''s thanksgiving has gone a little grommet, which is just fine by me. so this was a very traditional thanksgiving for me, quite impressive considering it was in japan and half the people were eating with chopsticks. we had two ten pound turkeys, which were carved by elder montgomery--my substitute grandfather for the evening--, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes (with disney marshmallows filled with custard flavoring), stuffing, and some sort of green bean white onion, mushroom soup concoction. it was pretty awesome. and it was really great to spend the night with really nice people who were excited about speaking english (or willing to let me try my crappy japanese). i got to hang out with sister montgomery--the grandmother half of the montgomery's--and chat about being in japan, the odd things at the grocery store, why the society is the way it is, and then mock her husband for being such a clueless man. it all made me feel a little more at home. and of course i got to catch up with sister seino and sister laeuanne (monnet's replacement from new zealand), the two girls who come and talk about mormonism to me. it was nice to see them in a different, more casual context. basically a good night of community.

i'm on my way up.

so i've been rather down as of late. i had an amazing time in korea, and a pretty awesome time in tokyo before that (i'm still working on the blogs for those), but things from home are popping up in my head and i'm missing stuff. shopping for christmas presents in korea probably didn't help as i realized i would have to attach notes to everything if i wanted anyone to get what their gift was and why i thought it was cool, and even worse that i wouldn't be there to see them open them. then i realized that i wouldn't be there for my family's christmas for the first time ever and thinking about all the traditions i'm going to miss (such as christmas morning doughnuts, the circle of presents with my family and my bro and i always trying to make it even) it just makes me really sad. and then i realized that i wouldn't be seeing tyler's family (or tyler) at christmas (or thanksgiving) probably ever again, which has been my routine for the past four years, which just gets me all misty eyed. but really i AM feeling better. being able to have a random hour and a half conversation with elena just brings everything a little closer and makes it not so hard. sometimes it's just tempting to cut off everyone from home because then i wouldn't be thinking about pdx or worrying about what's going on there, but that just seems silly when those are the people that i love. so i just have to use my will power to separate my pdx life and desires from what i'm doing now without actually cutting everything out. but i feel like i can do this, hence the feeling better. reminding myself to take it a day at a time is what i have to do--which i have never been able to do in my life, but i will do now. life goes on and i only have a limited amount of time in japan so i have to milk it for all it's worth. and i'm on my way to doing just that.

the little things.

at my juntendo there is a section of 498yen movies. they are all old american flicks, most of them don't look that good, but yesterday i picked up 'charade' hoping it was something that i wanted to see. after putting it in, first there was the excitement because the movie actually played in my dvd player that is set up for american dvds. second there was the pure glee at discovering this was the movie that i have remembered from childhood, that i've been to looking to see again for a very long time. i don't know when i even saw it last, i just know it. i just love it. so tonight was a special night of eating too much lotte ghana milk chocolate and watching 'charade' and realizing that this movie may have effected more than i knew. the main character is a young spunky, horny american living in paris. she falls for a salt 'n pepper carry grant and eats too much. if you know me at all, you know this is me. for once i felt like identifying with the female character in an older film, and just ignored the moments of girlyness that sprouted in audrey hepburn's character. i knew there was a reason i love movies from that era.

first neighbor encounter.

so damn exciting! so i walked up my stairs to my third floor apartment to find a bag of food with a note attached. confusion was my response. no one i know knows i live here besides the fact that it was clearly from a japanese person. so i took the food and said sweet! i love homemade japanese food. so i head in, do my normal routine of stripping and pj-ing and there's a knock. someone is at my door...i quickly redress and answer the door. a very sweet looking middle aged japanese woman stands there. she begins speaking very quickly with words i do not know. she pushes into my genkan, keeps speaking confusing japanese, then asks to look at the photos on my fridge, she takes of her shoes and steps in, handing me her keys and coin purse for some reason. ba-i don't know why. she then takes a self guided tour of my apartment, even looking into my bathroom (my place is kinda trashed so this is awkward for me). then she realizes i can't read the note she wrote and begins to explain it to me, in fast japanese. i have no idea what is going on but she is so kind and so excited this all makes me so happy. i say good bye and all the polite things i can think of in japanese and then settle into my internet. just as i get started there is another knock on my door. she's there again! i think what she was saying that because we are friends now she'll show me her apartment (originally i thought she had a friend downstairs that she wanted me to meet). i follow down and am amazed by her wonderfully warm and friendly looking apartment. she shows me all her plants and then gives me fruit! incredibly generous. i head back up without her and again grinningly sit down and turn on my music--another knock. she has brought me a delicious rice ball. oh my god i love japan.

halloween.

oct. 30, 2006



halloween in japan is like many other gaijin holidays, it is a silly tradition that means a differnt shade of cute stuff in the stores. so for my halloween celebration i joined, what felt like, all the gaijin in hiroshima at chinatown--a bar, danceclub in the entertainment district. we danced the night away, as last trains were at midnight and first at 6am, and most of us got really drunk.

now before actually heading to the bar, us JETs and JET's friends met at alice garden--the courtyard in the main shopping area of hiroshima where all the teenagers like to hang out in CRAZY outfits. this time it was us in crazy outfits, for example all four ninja turtles and splinter, a braveheart mel gibson, a deamon via face paint by carolina, the organs of the human body and me, as the costume that only one person got without explination: evy hamond from 'v for vendetta'. we headed over to the club, i bonded with our deamon, kazuya, who become the will to my grace. i danced with kazuya, some JETs, a couple random guys, no girls :( , with some NCMO, and a decent amount of blood bled on me--buy the second drunk guy that i danced with. it was a good time, and i only babysat drunk people a little at a time.

in the end carolina, kazuya, brian and i killed time at a 24hr resturant after the club (around 3:30am). brian left, then kazuya, then carolina and headed to the astram station around 5am. finally the train arrived at six and we headed home--of course, not before i broke my earing that i can't replace in japan, goddamnit. sunday for me was a day spent entirely in bed watching movies and playing with my interent till the point that my laptop overheated. good times.

the devil wears prada.

oct. 29, 2006



originally when i saw the posters for this film i scoffed, but who wouldn't? a film about fashion and coming of age sounds like the classic cinderella story that we have all seen one too many times. the fact that meryl streep was in it slightly swayed my opinion, and then the teenage girl in me said i had to see it because anne hathaway also stared in this chick flick. and that was what i expected, the chick flick that i would come away from annoyed by the presumption that women cannot be strong and must change for their men. but, as you may have seen coming, this was not the case. now around every plot twist, every new scene, especially after the transformation montage, i waited for the media system to tell me that i should not have a career that i will make sacrifices for, that i should not be able to ask for my significant other to adjust to my life. now it was also not the case that this was a film that claimed that women should have more power than men, and that men are the scum of the earth. and don't get me wrong that can be a really fun flick to watch, but rather unrealistic under the actual definition of feminism. in 'the devil wears prada' our main character does adjust into the life of fashion and she makes decisions that go against her principles, as well as going against her relationship with her live in boyfriend, but her friends call her on the fact that she is changing as a person and not the she is abandoning her love life. there is an understanding that this is her career, and they trust her when she says that it will take her to where she wants to be. this is all very complex and is not black and white by any definition. that is what impressed me. it was not a film of easy, obvious answers. in the end the main character made the choice that we wanted her to make but for moral reasons, not because of some boy or some obligation that she felt the need to fulfill as a woman. there was even the line that directly states that we only call powerful women bitches, not powerful men; powerful men are just impressive. and in the very end there is a moment when the whole movie could have been a waste with a reunion that could have asked hathaway's character to make career sacrifices for a lover, but it left it open to negotiation. this film truly spoke to the woman in me that wants to be strong and in control of her life and feelings, one of the very few films that has done so; and i'm sure if i go in with my nit picking comb i would fine things that bug me, but after one viewing i would say this would be a movie i would show to young women and say 'pay attention! find inspiration!' and of course 'don't get distracted by the pretty clothes!'


(what is really great about this movie watching experience, i was watching something else and said to myself, 'oh yeah i kinda wanted to see 'the devil wears prada'', i then downloaded it in two hours and watched it the same night. technology sure can be friendly, when it wants to be. I HAVE INTERNET!!!)

internet tastes metallic.

oct. 24, 2006

i am so close to having internet i think i am going insane. i am taking a half day of nenkyu (paid leave) on friday to wait for the NTT guy to come and do something--i have no idea what... and ideally my modem will be delivered the same day. ideally i will be able to call someone this friday. ideally i will be able to post photos, and even this blog, from the comfort of home. ideally i will then be able to solve the dilemma that is literally driving me insane. ideally i will breath a giant sigh of relief and be able to relax and enjoy life in japan. ideally i will not go on a murderous rampage when i, as will of course happen, do not have internet on friday and am told that it will be another week before the modem shows. ideally i will be able to regain a monochrome of concentration so my newspaper lesson will not suck this afternoon. and finally, ideally i will be able to enjoy my halloween weekend no matter what happens.

mid-term exam week: day two.

oct. 18, 2006

i think i'm going to die. either because the repetitous banging of my head on my desk kills me, or because the shear boredom that is onerwhelming me now will simply stop my heart. i am too bored to read, my limited internet access is tapped out, and i've already napped all i can nap. to think i have another day of this? thank gawd it wasn't a full five day week: my guts would be dripping off the cabinets of my office, because i would have of course explored of frustration by now.

i'm more japanese than i thought.

oct. 15, 2006

looking around me i see everyone dressing like i do. and it's not even my attempts to dress japanese that prompt me to say this. if you know my fashion sense at all, you know i like to ear clashing outfits, t-shirts with floral skirts, dresses over pants, and bright colors. so bright colors only reflects a small portion of the japanese population (or much of the osaka population), but the rest of that surrounds me everyday. i don't know if my trip to japan two years ago influenced me more than i thought or i just am in tune with japanese society, from across the ocean, but my fashion is here and it is popular. besides this i ahve noticed that the long winded answer, that i know i give, is something that is repeated here. i ask students, and teachers, 'how was your weekend' and they go in to an account of what they did, not answering, 'it was fine'. i am probably reading too much into this and simply seeking out comfortable simularities, but still, creepy. i think i'm turning japanese, i really think so....

JET is a dating service.

oct. 15, 2006

anyone who argues with the title of this blog needs to take a closer look at what goes on around them in the JET program. the program starts with over two thousand people in a hotel in tokyo--okay, sure there are pre-orientations and orientations that happen in the participants home countries, but that's not where this starts. back home we all feel safe and have our people. once in japan, we are confused, lost, surrounded by strangers. in tokyo we are all exhausted and looking for people to fill the holes that have just appeared in our hearts, our lives. quickly we make eye contact, we begin conversations, we ask 'so, where have you been placed', we exchange contact information. i'm sure a little hooking up happens, despite the exhaustion, but mostly i believe tokyo is a hunt for the bootie calls that will happen in the following year. followed by this, in my prefecture, is an annual prefectural orientation for all JETs in hiroshima. second, third and first years gather fro a three day conference in downtown hiroshima. there are hotel rooms for those outta towners and the locals spend a lot of time there, too. i feel like the second and third years only show to get a look at the new crop, to decide if there are any perspective candidates for dates. many have cell information now, many are smiling and winking at each other. by then end of the three days there is some hand-holding, and shared glances that indicated decisions have been made and people have broken off into paris. to extend the opportunities for dating there is one more orientation. here it is only the first years, but they are all trapped in a hotel for a solid week, away from downtown and outside influence. here is where we see some serious shit going down. waking up in strange beds i'm sure happened, along with drinking too much and not actually learning anything at the mandatory japanese language and culture classes. by the end of august most relationships or potential relationships, have been established. who is a possible mate or bootie call has been lined up, and those returning JETs have made claims on the fresh meat. from here we see the pairs forming, the couples appearing and the impressive quality of the 'JET dating service'.

decisions.

oct. 15, 2006

so i'm sittin' on the bus, leaving kannbe, appreciating the fact that i have a laptop (thanks mom and dad) and listening to some nifty music (thanks sandi). kate and i just had an amazing weekend of gilmore girls, a beautiful onsen and too much chocolate...and a little spaced and crepes and hot cakes. the tension in my shoulders is almost gone; and i've nearly forgotten that i have to go to the horrible doctor's tomorrow, where i have no idea what will happen. this weekend was exactly what i needed. so non-productive we didn't even get to planning our trip to south korea, that's happening in three weeks. and i just passes a sign with a photo with what looked like two boys either about to kiss, or just finishing kissing. japan is a little confusing...




my mind has been on the question of how long am i going to stay in this beautiful country that can be realy frustrating and oxymoronic. my heart says that i need to go home to portland for my family and to continue the friendships that i made and solidified during my senior year. my mind says that all of that will be there if i stay for two years and that living in japan will not happen again. this is only once in a life time. and that if i want to do the traveling that i want to do, india, nepal, vietnam, cambodia, and possibly europe, there's no way if i only stay a year...and my heart kinda agrees with this last part of travel. to see the world in a lifetime is an immense task, and i have been given the head-start of a free ticket to asia. how the hell can i not use this for all it's worth. and the more i think along these lines i the more that i know i have to stay for two years. and the more i know that i have to stay for two years the more my heart breaks for what i am now missing in portland, which is of course is ridiculous, because shit, i'm in fucking japan! a country tha many americans, many of the people i know, will never get to. any pain and sadness that i feel is just payment for this opportunity. just thinking about it now i know this to be true. but then i go on to the thoughts of, why do i think i need to punish myself to experience life? why do i think i need to punish myself to find myself? but misery breeds strength, and strength breeds a happy and fulfilling life. i know i'm on the right path, i just sucks sometimes. and i have met some amazing people here. i am creating friendships that will be important, at some level or another for the rest of my life.

it will all come down to how much i desire to be in portland in february.

peanut butter.

oct. 14, 2006

i never peanut butter was all that important. now i am in japan. now eating peanut butter straight out of the jar seems completely resonable. adding chocolate ships (that cost 268yen for a handful) makes perfect sense.

strange things are happening.

i smell trouble.

oct. 12, 2006

i see a nasty trend beginning at my base school. a couple of the teachers have decided to cancel my lesson 8 class today. i am slightly forgiving because midterm exams are next week, BUT that means i won't be meeting with these kids till novemeber--next week is tests and then i start my rounds in the 2nd year class. my predessor taught maybe one lesson a term with each class and there is no way in hell i am going to stand for that--i just hope i get a say in it...

my long weekend.

oct. 11, 2006

so this past weekend was hella busy. friday night i went downtown to meet with my travel agent and book my sapporo trip. i ended up getting dinner, accidentaly ordering a bottle of wine instead of a glass. i tipsily ran into (not literally, wasn't that drunk) sandi and dob. sandi went home, dob and i had beer. saturday i slpet in, but then i did a little shopping and then went to a kagura festival at a local shrine (B-T-W shrine is for shinto, temple is buddhism) with carolina.



it was traditional performance folk dance, very interesting. i ate too much ita-yaki (?), which is fish shaped pancake with azuki paste inside. mmmmm...drool. sunday, woke up early, met carolina on the JR and head to saijo. there we joined kate and natalie (and eventually dob and some other JETs) for the sake festival. an all day drinking fest, 1500yen for as much sake as you can handle (although, the teacher that i ran into from school, told me that last year the glasses were bigger). it was a good day of sampling some really nice sake, then chugging some really bad sake--marking each glass off on our hands. (i had sixteen--although 2 were in the form of sake mochi).



and by the end of the day, the coorodened off grounds were mostly filled with drunk gaijin running around being...well, drunk gaijin. sadly my friends and i weren't that drunk, as we paced ourselves and ate way too much food and ice cream. <--perchance why i am broke and don't feel well this week. after the fest we all went to catch our respective trains to respective places of crashing. carolina decided to join kate, natalie and i to stay at natalie's in tadanoumi. we had to shove a very drunk yamagouchi-JET off on Dob, as she knew she couldn't make it home by herself--damn was she drunk. the four of us got to experience a scary interesting part of japan: a man, while looking for the train, fell on to the tracks. it took a moment, but three men jumped down and, very efficiantly, picked him up and put him on the platform. five minutes later the EMTs showed up, and the guy was able to walk away, but he reaked of pot and probably had a pretty good time at the sake fest, too. it made me really mad because it just was reasuring the japanese system of having really strict laws against marijawna. after that excitement, we hopped our train, natalie traded numbers with a canadian living in mihara; i flirted with a cute japanese boy, who's number i shoulda asked for. grr. and we landed in tadanoumi. from there we decided to walk to the fancy pizza place on the highway. now tadanoumi felt much like a seaside town in oregon, a couple places for the tourists, but the rest you would pass with out noticing. we had a very nice walk past nats' (natalie's) school and eventually found the pizza joint to be closed, a couple hours closed and turned around; which i think worked out for the best. back in town we ate at a small little resturant, one that apprently natalie's pre-pre-predesor ate at every night, and we became minor celebrities--completing the day of an interview for saijo university; a photo for my teacher; with, here, an autograph for the kind owner/cook of the eatery.



finally (after i set up and used nats' internet) i crashed. her annoying town-bell woke me at 6, but i rolled out around 9. we then had pancakes and ran (and i mean RAN) for the train, making it by seconds. the day's planned event was a tea ceromony in mihara at a shrine. a very nice woman, who nats was set up with as a contact, met us at the eki and gave us the needed papers for the ceromony and some simple instructions. the shrine was very nice, the ceromony very casual, the sweets reeally good (manju). after this adventure (nats' and kate's first tea ceromony) we went to fuji grand for lunch and had korean bbq--basically you order raw food and then cook it on a grill in the middle of your table, pretty fun, but not my favorite. nextdoor was a mister doughnut, so kate and i decided it was time to try this taughnting establishment.



we over ate. then of course i needed mochi, as it is a cure for the depression that was creeping up on me. more over eating. and finally a walk back to the train station. carolina and slept on the train back to hiroshima, and when i got home i trough laundry in the wash and proceeded to fall asleep. damn, i'm tired ust thinking about it.

i didn't think it was possible to be this bored.

oct. 11, 2006

i think my school (my second, mid-level school, mind you) is empty. i forgot that it was test week (as i only come here once a week) and i didn't bring anything to do--like maybe planning what i want to do in tokyo the weekend after next or planning my kyushu trip so i actually have some place to stay--and gaa! i am so bored. and i have no money so even if i did sneak out early i couldn't do anything. where are all these people getting money? there's plans for the hiroshima JETs to go out to dinner, but shit no. i can't afford that. but then again...i did pay for a trip to korea, i am going to tokyo and i do have another over priced doctor's appointment on monday. i hate being so good at spending every penny i have. *tear*

dinner with the mormons.

oct 10, 2006

so about a week ago (and yes, i will start almost every blog with 'so') i ran into some mormons on the street. this was exciting as they were two young women from utah and ohio. yay, gaijin! to which they said the same thing about me. we traded contact information and they invited me to their church for clam chowder and corn bread--which i eventually declined. they called, later, to get together and 'teach' me things. ideally i just saw them as potential friends outside of JET, which can hopefully still happen. tonight we had dinner, tried out the okonomiyaki restaurant i've been eyeing next to my eki. it was great to meet new people, eat good food and learn about their histories, plus the bonus of photos from home. after dinner they wanted to 'teach' me, so i offered my place and mochi. we headed back, a little more casual talking, and then they jumped into their shpeal. so, as many of you know i am not a religious person at all. i am a strident atheist and have been that way since middle school. this was a curiosity thing for me, at least so i can feel better about making fun of mormons (okay, there's a little guilt with that last sentence--omg! atheists feel guilt!) anywho, they gave their little christian background--mormons are christians apparently, just SPECIAL christians--and i already knew all the answers to their questions, what profits are, who jesus is and so on--nothing special, yet. through this i kept feeling reassured in my position. i am really happy that i don't have to depend on this abstract 'god' guy to make my decisions and be happy with who i am. then they went into the mormon-shpeal. to answer all you curious people out there, joseph smith lived in new york. he was a normal confused christian until omg! god and jesus came to him, at age fourteen--this seemed important--and told him he would be a prophet, ending the time with no prophets, hence all the shitty religions. so this is one thing that makes mormons SPECIAL. the other is the an angel told little joe where the prophets from america kept their gospels. yup, there were prophets in america. they came BEFORE the american indians and they were just as cool as the prophets in israel--see look at their shiny book! they had GOLDEN tablets, and they buried them so they wouldn't get screwed up in translation, since all the 'good' people were being killed off. by good, i assume, is meant NOT native americans. soo, basically what makes mormons different from other christians is they have both the bible AND the book of mormon, so they can compare and decide what sounds good. that and they had a prophet telling them how to think. it sounds like any other crazy religion, but it was rather sweet to see the way these girls talk about it. they were just so passionate, aww. but it was interesting how they spoke about prayer and knowing and how it let's them trust what they believe. all of which basically sounded like eastern meditation and trusting your gut. i know i'm an atheist because in my gut some abstract male guy up in the sky is ridiculous and insane and not for me. but hey, if thats how you can find peace and find confidence go for it. personally i like to be dependent on my own internal confidence and trusting my strength to get through a hard day rather than looking to some 'god' who also imposes restrictions on how i desire to live my life. i know what i need to be happy (i made a list!), i need to look to 'god' for that happiness. it kinda makes me sad that these women have to be part of a religion who puts them second to men--they can't even stop men on the street to talk to them in japan. there is enough sexism in this world without joining a faith that tells me that i am inferior.

arrgggg!

oct. 9 2006

i need my internet now!!! i am supposed to be getting it tomorrow and there's no way it's going to happen because i have heard nothing from yahoo bb. but gaahh. i need internet or i will go insane and start killing people.

i'm riding the culture shock roller coaster down to the bottom.

oct. 7, 2006

i had a week that felt normal. i didn't desperately desire portland. hiroshima was looking pretty good. my kids were being all awesome and actually talking to me. one day, while passing the JR tracks on the way home, i actually had a full and complete thought--'oh, i should look into tv sets, cause i don't think i could survive two years without a better medium for watching movies.'--that i am going to be here for two years. and then…something changed. now i can't stop eating. i'm distracted. i can't relax. i miss every little thing from home. i am depressed. logically i will come out of this. and tomorrow's massive amounts of sake and seeing the girls (minus sandi) should help my force the next up shoot in my shock, but fuck. i don't need to go home right now, but i am having trouble imagining not staying for two years because if i only stay for one it is basically impossible that i will get to go to india or do my post-JET trek of japan. but imagining not being in portland for two years literally hurts, like a punch in the kidneys. and if i did go home, for more than a week, it would screw up all my possible second year travel plans. i feel like i'm trapped on the edge of a fence. if i fall i'll be safe, but i have no idea which way to let gravity take me.

do not go to the gynecologist in japan.

oct. 2, 2006

this blog is not for the feint of heart, the squeamish or those people who do not want to hear about 'women's issues'; and let me just say that i too take offense to the vague term 'women's issues', especially after today. so be warned there are details here that are not pleasant nor modest.

background: immediately before i left for japan i was told i needed to get a LEEP done. this is a procedure that is moderately frightening to get in america; it's quite simple and therefore easy to screw up. i was advised to get it done while in japan because there wasn't time for the procedure and the follow up before i left--i was handed my file and wished good luck. whether you need a LEEP is something that you find out after your annual PAP. the procedure involves scraping the cervix to remove abnormal cells that will potentially develop into cancer. scary shit, huh?

let me just start out by saying that i really wanted to get this taken care of before i came to japan because i knew there was no way it could go good. this is not because of a lack of faith in the japanese medical system-which, B-T-W, would be totally appropriate-but rather due to the fact of medical systems in foreign countries are just that, foreign. any presumption that it will be all hunky dory and the same is just silly. now, of course, i convinced myself otherwise. this self inflicted convincing led me to think that i could walk into mazda hospital and say, 'hey, can i get a LEEP over here?'. yeah, not quiite that simple. so this a rather personal matter, but if only to make the experience seem somewhat worthwhile, i will take note of the details here, for prosperity, and those other women who cannot follow the advice given in the title of this blog.

so i begin the day continuing the procrastination that i had been practicing for the last two months, by doing a couple rows on the scarf i'm knitting. i then convinced myself that i should just get up and go. so, i headed to the JR, caught my train and got off at mukainda on the sanyo line. i got a little lost, headed for the museum instead of the hospital, called carolina for directions, and eventually found my way to the hospital. the check-in was on second floor, which was momentarily confusing, and there is where the adventure began. i found the right desk, she handed me the form, i wrote my name, we figured out what to write for my birth year and then i was handed the next form. she was sweetly optimistic and thought that my confusion was based on not being able to read kanji. another very sweet women was then recruited to read the form aloud to me. and she assumed me smarter than i am, and thought i wasn't sure of my symptoms rather than having no clue as to what she was saying. when she finally realized that i am completely clueless when it comes to japanese, especially medical japanese, she walked me over to a small room, office, thing; i was then put in a cubicle-style sectioned off 'room' with a table and chairs. [advice you can take from this: just come out and say that you don't speak japanese, stop trying to pretend] a young doctor (?) was brought over and begin to speak english (yay!), but of course, because it's japan, she said that she didn't speak english and that they had no doctors that speak english. the next step was to tell me to go to the university hospital, which they then told me was closed at 11 am (it now being 10:40) i started to freak out. this was byokyu (being the type of leave from work that is a glorified sick day) that i was on this monday morning. byokyu requires documentation, if i didn't have it then i have to take nenkyu (being the paid leave or rather glorified vacation days). if i have to take nenkyu that's one less day with elena or alex or in china or any day NOT at the doctor's or school. i think the wonderful-pseudo-english-speaker saw the tears swelling in my eyes at this point (i'd like to justify these tears with exhaustion, stress, and being called 'so young!' every time my age is mentioned. somehow being called young immediately takes away all your confidence) and she called the university hospital and found that, yes, they do close at eleven, and there's no way around it. after more finagling than should have possibly been necessary, they got the doctor to agree to see me--of course this was after finding a poor receptionist to follow me around and hold my hand. and honestly her english was rusty and therefore not that much better than the original english speaker that was handed to me. my theory is, that being the low rung on the ladder, keiko (as she introduced herself to me) could be roped into baby-sitting the gaijin, who at one point attempted to invited her into the exam room.

the next fiasco was of course just waiting. here was a comfortable position, being kept waiting by the doctor. i've done this before. the underlying terror subsided for a moment. keiko had to disappear for a bit, to appease her boss, and i took a doze. keiko returned and, finally, i was called. now i didn't realize this till later, but the doctor calls the patients' names. he sits in his little office and calls them from a speaker, even though there's a nurse right there who comes and retrieves me and could easily call my name without the need for extra technology and a creepy booming voice from above. must be an authority thing. at this point my stomach was all butterflies on the way down the hall, i stepped beyond the yellow curtain into the doctor's office and my butterflies stopped: he looked like a decent human being! and once he uttered the word 'dysphasia' my butterflies dropped dead. this is the word i needed to here. he knew what i was talking about. he pointed to the acronym LEEP on my file and asked if i had had it yet, and he spoke english! sort of...better than i spoke japanese, anyways. through a mix of broken english and a little japanese he said that today we would do a biopsy. which is better than i expected, this was only one step back rather than all the way back to a PAP smear. next, i was told to go to exam room four.

i figured i'd be kept waiting there for fifteen minutes, or so; turned out not quite the same as the american gyno. firstly, i was unsure that i would get seen right away so i was very confused by the tiny changing room--even though looking back it makes perfect sense--so i tried to get keiko to follow me in. she eventually convinced me that i went in alone, 'for one person.' i then did the changing thing, and went past yet another yellow curtain. okay, so this is where i started to freak out. now i've had this procedure before, i know the story: it is uncomfortable to our modest sensibilities and it is painful. what made it bearable in the past was the nice conversation that the doctor engaged me in, to distract me. so going in this time, i knew i wouldn't get that, the language barrier being a giant chasm, but i was not expecting the separation that the exam room forces. first there was the chair. chair, not bench or table. this was not something that i really wanted to be sitting for, but i took a look and assume that it adjusts. oh, but looking. no, that was a mistake. i glanced down at the floor below the chair and there it was, blood. yeah, fresh red blood splashed on the floor. firstly, this is bad for simple sanitary reasons. second, it's blood. some one was just in that chair bleeding. i am about to be in that chair. i am about to be bleeding. i am about to run through the yellow curtain, out the door and escape this whole shitty thing. i mentally scream at my butterflies to calm down and wait for the nice nurse to help me into the chair. then the chair. *twitch* i sit down and try to not think about the lack of sanitation with only a small paper that is protecting me from where the last victim possibly infected this monstrosity. and you think stirrups are bad? try a chair that first tilts you back, to who knows how far, and then the leg supports that automatically separate. they just kept going and going. i didn't know when they were going to stop. not a good feeling when you are at your most vulnerable.

so there i am splayed like a damn pig for slaughter, and i haven't even mentioned the worst part: there was a final yellow curtain. this sucker's only purpose was to separate the top half of me from the rest of the exam room. common sense tells me that this is to protect the sensibilities of the poor japanese women who have to sit in this torture chair. if i was in a logical mood at this moment i could have focused on this and found the cultural difference interesting, but as you may remember, i am splayed like a pig ready for slaughter. i am not calm or logical. i am nervous as hell and letting my american perspective tell me that this curtain is about shame. and honestly, it is about shame, but being an american (which is a nice thing when being able to hold this perspective, in most situations) i have no shame associated with my vulva or vagina or any of my parts--and, yes, this is something that i had to work towards being raised in a phalocentric society, just like every other woman in the world. but i am quite happy with my vulva and not really that embarrassed to have a strange man looking at my parts. but what is bad is when that strange man won't look me in the eye and my poor vag is facing out into the exam room and to whoever walks by and she is a thing, not part of me. just this faulty body part that is being fiddled with by a japanese man who probably doesn't even know how to treat one right in a romantic situation. after being told to relax, ha! i was poked and prodded--the whole time watching shadows of large tools cast their shadows on my yellow privacy curtain; the soundtrack of an old black and white horror flick is playing in my mind as i sit there wincing for ten minutes. then, i am finally set free! this is, of course, after the doctor has left so there is no chance of me making eye contact with him while i am half clothed, only my little towel protecting my lost modesty.

i then re-clothe myself, silently scream in discomfort at my reflection in the changing room mirror, and i step out to find the smiling keiko is still waiting for me. we walk down the hall together and she asks at the doctor's curtain if i am supposed to come in and talk to him. we go through the barrier, i sit down, and i am told six times that i am supposed to take out the gauze at six and then am handed a slip of paper with phone numbers, 'if you have a lot of bleeding call'. not exactly what you want to hear, but step back a moment. gauze. so this is not normal, at least by american standards. one of those things that they repeat over and over is that when you have an unhappy vagina leave her alone and let her fix herself. she's a clever gal and knows what to do. so, when they told me about this gauze my first instinct was to say no fucking way am i keeping this in till six. but then there was the list of phone numbers...maybe i should just listen to this guy. who knows how much cutting he did down there. who knows how much of a mess my cervix is in now. he schedules my next visit for two weeks later, when the test results will be in, and the whole time i am still frustrated with this system of separating the exam room from the information that is important to me. after more rigamarole of copying my files and being handed my bill, keiko walks me down to the cashier and there is, of course, one more kick in the pants for me. i am charged 8500yen. this is much more than i expected, as a friend only paid 4000yen for six x-rays and two shots. i somehow suspect that japan really does have no understanding of the birds and the bees and that even in this population 'crisis' they don't subsidize for gynecological procedures as much as for others. either that or they were playing the 'let's screw the gaijin' game.

in conclusion, this is a day i desperately want to forget, and definitely one that i do not want to relive, but the alternative is using all of my nenkyu and more money than i have to go home and get it take care of there. at the very least, i get to see keiko again. [advice you can take from this: have low expectations, expect to be confused frustrated and scared; and, if at all possible, don't even go.]

the kids are starting to warm up to me.

sept. 28, 2006

so first there was haruna and her friend 'ryn'. they came back the next day and fujishiro sensei made haruna sing for me (she sings traditional japanese poetry and won first place in hiroshima prefecture). absolutely amazing. next i went to the ESS club and got to chat with the girls there. haruna and her friend came back a third day with a third girl, and then today there were five of them. it was so cute, each of them had one question that they wanted to ask me. one girl asked me what my favorite pasta was, haruna asked where i lived in hiroshima, and of course she lives in the same area. she is my very sweet japanese high school twin. hehe. another girl asked me who my favorite actor was, i listed off some they knew and then zach braff. of course they had no idea who i was talking about so i imdb-ed him and they all approved of his little sexy picture. another girl had brought letters from a pen pal to ask about a couple words (very curly hard to read cursive was the problem).



and in class today i was exhausted, so i just ended up sitting on a desk at the back edge of the students. i called out directions from there and even had them pass back papers to me while still sitting on the desk. but what was cool is there was one boy i sat near and he kept turning to me and waving. i would do my to-cool-for-school single motion wave, he would then turn to his friends and say, 'kakoii' (cool). this occurred like 5 times. what made it even better is with some prompting from the sensei he actually asked me questions about the assignment and i was able to correct his sentence. i think he actually understood the changes i made and was sort of able to figure out the sentence i wanted him to write (i would only say it once so he couldn't just copy it from me). AND later he was trying to say that his friend looked like a salary man, which came out more like, 'he likes salary man'. but after a couple repetitions he picked up the 'he looks like...'. so kick ass. and the cuteness of him (besides the whole kakoii thing) was that he caught me with my glasses off as i was rubbing my eyes, he looked shocked and then turned to his friends and the sensei and said that i was pretty without my glasses on. the sensei motioned for him to tell me in english, which of course he didn't, but awww what a cutie. hopefully all of this will lead to more students visiting me and more students talking to me. i know it's jsut because they don't know that i'm a nice person, they don't know that i won't make them talk really hard english or laugh at their mistakes. hopefully it is just all a matter of time and soon i'll be able to figure out a way to talk to students everyday and challenge some of their english skills. or at the very least have them warm up enough to me to come and ask for help on their homework. hmm...maybe i'll try to set up a time and place (not my office) where i can sit and be there just for homework help. tutoring is where my experience is....

short hair is the way for me.

september 26th

i have gone from really short hair to shoulder length locks ever since my eighth grade year in junior high. it took me two tries, but i went from the long curly-ish hair of my childhood to the short spunky pixie cut that i still love now during that fateful last year before high school. since i've embarrassed short hair, i've had at least two friends cut their hair like mine because they liked the way it looked. i've also had other people tell me later, that they only cut their hair short because of the way mine looked. of course, this is quite the ego boost for a nerdy high schooler and an even odder college student, but it has now crossed that line. that line that tells me that i should blatantly ignore anyone (including my dear brother) who tells me i should have long hair. okay yeah, every once in a while i crave those cute braids that i wore every day when my hair was long enough for them, but come on, when a japanese high school girl cuts her hair to look like your short pseudo faux-hawk it's time to admit short hair is the way to go. don't get me wrong, looking at it on her it's a cute cut. but i feel that when this is a repeated occurrence, it's not just about the cut. it might have a little to do with the hair on my head. and to turn the focus away from my glorious, abundant hair (this is an ironic statement now, as my hair is nearly all 10mm long at the moment), and say that this girl has balls. the kind of balls that guys only wish they could have. you rock, haruna.

flashback!

september 26th

high school, to me, will always best be remembered as incredibly late nights of sitting in the media cave going blind staring at my G4, occasionally taking tongue exercise breaks with my boyfriend. i was an a/v geek, but not really cause we were only working on a very specific project. i, we, made THSTV (tigard high school television). this was mostly comprised of filming the antics of the hilarious matt and nathan (both of whom i was totally crushing on at one point or another, if only for the way they made me laugh). 'we' consisted of a couple more crushes of mine, a couple ex's (yeah, i don't know how to keep personal life and work separate), and some other people who didn't do a lot of work. my late nights were spent editing the final product into a cohesive whole. sometimes this meant cutting together every last moment of film that had to be aired the next day (hence me being at school till two in the morning, on occasion), but sometimes this just meant putting together the segments and intros in the right order--i made it out of school only a few hours late on those nights. now, i didn't find this home till the last two years of high school, but ever since then i have been vying to get back into that hole of an editing lab. this is important to me at the moment because i relived these moments today. at my base high school there are many clubs that meet before and after school. they stay way too late and get there way too early. i could not imagine doing this in high school, when motivation is at its lowest for american students, until i of course remembered not only my early mornings going to symphony practice but my late nights and occasional weekends put in for THSTV. so i felt a little kindred spirit with those students who were putting in the extra hours, although i was never as much as an over achiever as these psycho kids. then today, the ESS club finally met and asked me to check their pronunciation for their school video, and there i was. i was back in high school, 15-16, awkward and dying to get my hands on their editing project (even if it was on imovie). of course, my better judgement said, 'i'm the teacher. i'm supposed to assist, not do'. so i sat back and watched. it was crazy. the same tiny, smelly awkward cave of a room (although i could see the setting sun from theirs). the same dedicated bossy girl (that would have been ME) and the same support staff who just did what they were told because they knew better than to try to get too involved--a little selfish, yes, but damn it looked like a good finished product. this was the first night i stayed late, all the way till seven; and there were some desperate moments when dehydration and starvation began to creep up on me, when i was tempted to skip out, but i stayed. i stayed and tried to help them work their way through the english they had written themselves. i watched as 'leo' put everything together on their emac and controlled the recording of their narration. i chatted with the cutest girl as of yet, who got all genki and excited about harry potter and 'mr. allen rickman'. i tired to explain the absence of a subject in one sentence, asking the higher level english speaker to help out. and yes, i did rush out once the last girl finished her recording, after reading through it twenty times and recording about six different takes. but she was so sweet, and was trying so hard, that it just made me smile. these english club(/broadcasting club) girls remind me of me. they remind me of high school and everything i loved about it. but they are also very much japanese high school students: hard working and demanding perfection. the one difference i saw, from the other students whom i've worked with, was that they were not overly impressed with me. oh they appreciated my help, they asked me where i was from, but they did not take me at face value. i don't think they would have blindly followed if i told them that they should adjust their project one way or the other. for that i was truly proud to help them out on their video.

forty six days.

september 21st

i checked my counter today. i've been in japan for forty six days. this seems like a significant number. somewhat comparable to what it actually feels like. but then again 46 days seems like a lot, longer than i've actually been here. forty six days is the longest i've been out of portland city limits. it is the longest i've gone without breathing in fresh oregon air. forty six days is the longest i've been without eating my mom's homemade bread. and i wouldn't be surprised if it's the longest i've been without papa murphy's pizza. and you know how i know 46 days IS a long time? i am finally enjoying the last mercury i picked up, the date of the 'one day of a time' that i am partaking in is 'july 25'. 'july 25'!! do you know how many days of celebrity mocking i have missed? i could do the math...but basically close to forty six days worth. shit.

either something is wrong with me or i should have listened to my first grade self.

september 15th

in one of my classes, where i'm STILL doing self-introduction lessons, a student asked me what i wanted to be be when i was small. translation: when i was little, what did i want to be when i grew up? i found this interesting because this is something i find rather comical about myself, or rather is a funny anecdote my mother likes to tell. my brother and i were readers from early in elementary school. i include my brother in this statement because i was only allowed to check out non-picture books in first and second grade because my brother, before me, was smart and could handle them(--my first memory of living in my brother's shadow during my k-12 ). so from a young age i liked to read, and i liked to write. not to brag or anything, but i've read the stuff i wrote in first grade and it's not half bad (for a first grader...). i actually have a vivid memory (well, maybe memory, it could just be a reinforced story) of saying that WHen I GRew i wanted to be a writer. this was something i really really enjoyed doing throughout elementary school, but lost sight of as i grew older. being the accommodating child that i was (and still am) along with being indecisive (yeah, i'm still that, too) i could not simply say i wanted to be a writer when i grew up. i said i wanted to be a ballerina, astronaut, dentist, writer. 'ballerina' because i took ballet and i guess i understood that this was something that should be important to me, even though i was the klutz of the class. 'astronaut' because space is cool, i made my own space control board in 2nd grade, and my big bro liked space. that and you can't dream much bigger than wanting to be an astronaut. and finally i had to include 'dentist' because my grandpa was a dentist--family loyalty runs deep in them here bones. and then there was the writer in me. looking back on this story, writer was the first thing to be dropped. oh, i think i still wanted to be a writer, but the story would go i wanted to be a 'dancing-dentist-astronaut' not a 'dancing-dentist-astronaut' who wrote about her adventures. now the point of the story is that here, on JET--in my first month--, i have started writing a lot. this is partly due to the need to stave off insanity and hold onto some of my ability to communicate correctly in english, but it is also linked to the fact that i really like writing. of course, i have been writing papers and school assignments for as long as i can remember, so not having these to keep me busy it only makes sense that i would start writing, if only out of habit. but i am enjoying writing for my own pleasure, and looking back at my college papers, i did actually enjoy writing quite a few of those. (<--freak). so perhaps i should have held onto that first grade dream of being a writer. maybe i would have been a creative writing major, maybe i would have gone to reed (as my childhood idol did), maybe i would be writing a book right now instead of blogging about my lost career, or just maybe, i don't have anyone to talk to and blather about my day's events to so i am typing profusely in a lonely-motivated attempt to pretend i'm still talking to my friends at home. yeah...it's probably that last one.

yesterday all my troubles seemed so far away.

september 4th

yesterday i had no internet (being at my second school) and i had no phone ('cause i forgot it for the SEcond time). i was a little disconnected.

so my second day, at my second school, went much better than the first. the kids actually paid attention (with a little near yelling from me to prompt them to do so), and i met with two girls who are very interested in going to college. because it's a mid-level high school most of the kids will not be attending college, so those that do want to are special. with one girl i was the 'interviewer' for her entrance into the university in saijo. the other girl is interested in studying abroad in america. (well so is the first girl, but she knows she wants to go through saijo u.). it was fun to actually correct english (for the first girl) with content in mind. i felt like i was actually doing something useful. with the second girl i gave her the web sites of the universities in oregon and my e-mail address. when i got to school this morning i had gotten an e-mail from her. aww. so cute! she wants to exchange e-mails and offered to help me with my japanese.. i e-mailed her back and gave her a link to the IELP at portland state and said yes to the e-mail exchange! i told her to e-mail me a couple times a week about what she is up to and said i'd try to do the same in 日本語. i'm totally psyched to have some place to practice my japanese now.

it's a different world.

september 12th--later that day...

so it's been a really frustrating last couple of days. everything is making me think of home and the people i left behind. i'd kill for a massive portland hug right now. don't get me wrong, i'm still enjoying japan. i think i have a huge advantage over some of the other gaijin because i really love japanese food (和食--washoku). going out with other JETs, i have not eaten this much italian food in my life, and i have no, absolutely no cravings for food form home. i even discovered that chai exists here, if rather inconveniently located. but those simple thigns from home--mcmineman's ruby, biking over the hawthorn, having crappy food and cheap drinks at jax, laying under the trees in my 'front yard' on campus, going to magic gardens on a weeknight, visiting great harvest after work--that are making me reach out over the pacific and cling to my portland. today every moment stretched out till i didn't think i could stand it any longer. i finally got a package from home (i assume) but they didn't put it in my box because the postman thought i wasn't actually living here. tomorrow it should magically appear in my box, but it was just one more disappointment. the school day was incredibly painful as i had to act all genki (happy/hyper) for my self-intro lessons, and all i want to do is sob on katie and elena's shoulders. to make matters just a little worse, it decided to rain just as it was time for me to bike home. of course, normally i would just ride home in the rain, enjoy the cool wet air, but my hill...it's a little much for my breaks when the pavement is dry. going down in the rain would just be asking for death. THis is where my day, my week, began to turn. yamagouchi-sensei asked takeuchi-sensei (one of the part time female teachers) if she would give me a ride home. i felt like a fool worrying about the rain, but it turned out really good. dogishi-sensei, the other part-time female teacher who's next to my desk, also was catching a ride, so the three of us had some away from schoo. they suggested we go to molly malones (the irish-gaijin haven-pub) sometime. so awesome. i had them drop me off at my grocery store. now i was planning to try to get all my things bought that i needed to at fuji grand and the hyaku-en shop in the other part of town, but now i couldn't. this meant i actually took the time to explore my supermarket. around each corner i kept finding something new, and perfect, that i didn't know how much i really wanted. there was honey--mmm, honey...--, darlingly tea, extra virgin olive oil, vinegar, garlic, eggplant, onion--ooh, onion--and mushrooms. i just felt soo much better. i went home, put my new finds away, and headed to juntendo (my 'do it your self' store that is really incredibly close to my apartment). there, again not in a rush to go someplace else, i had the time to actually look around. i found a japanese-size laundry basket, hangers, a good fry pan (for 980yen), a teapot!, a knife and cutting board, and a full length mirror. i went home, reorganized, put things away, and took out my mirror. you know i haven't really seen myself since i've been in japan? definitely since i've been in hiroshima. it's so weird how seeing yourself in the mirror is comforting. 'hey, look, i still exist!'. so basically life seems a little brighter, even if it's for simple reasons, like cooking my own dinner. a year doesn't seem impossible for the moment, whether it will be two years is still a mystery, but at least the rest of the week looks a little more feasible.

on the way to the forum, shit no, school. on the way to school today...

september 12th

there was this gawking kid. his mouth was agape, he looked like he was going to die of shock if something didn't break the tension. i smiled and said, 'ohaio gozaimasu' (good morning). he actually responded! 'ohaio gozaimasu. kyo wa ii tenki, ne?' (good morning, the weather is nice today, isn't it?) my gaijin response was, 'ii'. if only i'd added the ne, then it would have been perfect!

i am swamped at work.

september 11th

so much of this has to do with the fact that i don't know what i'm doing yet, but i still have a hella of a lot to do. seriously, i think my pred's complaints did get somewhere, cause i'm so busy i have no time to study 日本語 or even write this blog. so my days consist of (for the moment) getting to school by eight--technically classes don't start till nine and i don't have to be here to 8:30 or 8:15, but with that little extra time i can get a stack of papers graded or an e-mail written. then most days i have a class first period. at my main school, yasufuruishi, the periods are 65 min and my self-intros are supposed to take up half the period. so with the first year classes i have 20 kids, or so, and each kid asks me a question and then i ask them the same. they learn, for example, my family's names, what kind of food do i like, that only the old star wars is good, and who both bert and kitty are. every time i teach a first year class i go to two classrooms a period, so basically i will never know these kids' names. my second year classes have 40 kids, but i only have one at a time so i therefore get more 'free' time as the lessons are still only 30 min. then i have a 'break' and i grade papers. actually, i struggle with choosing what to correct on papers that were written by kids who have had little to no english grammar lessons. and mind you, these kids, if they don't know how to say it, will just translate it online or with their electric dictionaries; so, half of what they're writing i have no chance of actually understanding. (example: “it was shouted, and female college students became quiet, and, as for the break I was good because the insid of a train became quiet though it was noisy.”) then i either have another class, or i try to make it to the cafeteria before the kids. the food in the cafeteria is actually really good, and really not that expensive. besides, right now it's the only hot meal i get every day. on thursdays, before lunch i have the only meeting i'm required to attend: the english teachers' meeting. they all talk in 日本語 and then look to me, i say something about my lesson plan or 'yes, i do like my new apartment' and then i'm once again ignored. the latter half of the day is reading more papers or attending more classes. i'm supposed to leave by 4:15 everyday, but on tuesdays there's ESS (english as a second something?) club, so i hope to participate in that. on wednesdays i visit my second high school, koyo high. the fact that i have a second high school was a surprise to everyone, including me, and i have to fill out paperwork every week so i can leave my base school and go to my second school. so far i've only had one day there, but it's similar in that i will be team-teaching and grading papers. koyo high school is a mid-level school (meaning most of the kids will not go to college) so they are less concerned about grammar and intense teaching. i think that means when i grade papers i'm responding to their ideas rather than correcting how they wrote their thoughts down. also, on wednesdays there will be a dinner downtown with some of the hiroshima city JETs, so i'll have that to look forward to every week.

but my absolute favorite part of the day is heading out from yasufuruichi high. i walk down my four flights of stairs, while the girls' long distance (i assume) team is circling the school singing their dreamy chants. i go to the front of the school and trade my uncomfortable shoes for my heavenly birkies, stroll over to the bike parking, and grab MY bike. after getting organized--fitting everything into my handy basket--i hop on, peddle up the slope to exit school grounds and start the 10 min coast down my large ass hill. perfect every time.

crows.

september 8th

so on the way back from lunch i was passing a classroom and i heard a rustling noise. at the second doorway i glanced in and low and behold a crow was enjoying an afternoon snack of lunch wrappers. the crow is of course freaking out cause there's this 'big' human looking at him. he can't make up his mind--if he goes forward he has to go through me, if he tries for the other doorway, that's a ways back... he scoots around in place for a moment, i jerk in his direction to give him motivation for the back door, and he navigates his way quickly towards the back of the class, sliding on the slippery linoleum, as he scurries towards his escape. finally he's out. he jumps to the railing on the fourth floor 'veranda' and breathes a sigh of relief.

silly bird. trying to get away with a free lunch.

riding my bike in japan.

september 7th

before i left for japan i started to ride my bike--after five years of it collecting dust in my parent's garage. i wanted to get used to riding in the city since i knew it was the thing to do in my future home. i had wonderful trips cruising around portland and actually going to the east side. i learned the rules of the road and built up some stamina. now i'm in japan. bike riding is stereotypically the way to get around. the reality? bike riding is popular, but i still get shocked and confused looks as i trek my way into school. okay this is mildly reasonable for a couple reasons. firstly, i'm white. i'm the kind of foreigner that sticks out like swollen red thumb. secondly, apparently bike riding is for young people or for short trips. now my ride to school is like a mini-zoo bomb everyday. i say mini because, well there's not 50 bikes speeding down the hill with me, and the slope is a scoshe smaller. so, my bike ride to work 15 min or so on relatively flat ground, then i get to the bottom of bishomondai station and the hill begins. optimistically, one day i will be able to ride up part of this hill. yeah, only part. the fifteen to twenty min walk up my very large hill is only possible because of the dialogue in my head, 'this is good for you', 'you need the exercise' and 'think of what good shape you'll be in in just a couple months'. this is also assisted by the amazing ride DOWN the hill at the end of the day. now damn does that feel good.

beyond the large hills, that every school seems to be on, bike riding here is very convenient. all the public transportation stations have lots of bike parking (of course it's not as cool as pdx where you can take your bike ON the public transportation). every bike has a kick-stand. and because it's so acceptable, and japanese people are a little woozy, you are SUPPOSED to ride on the sidewalks. of course this gets a little tricky and involves much complicated pedestrian dodging. now every sidewalk has, in the middle, a trail of yellow paint over bumps that are (we gaijin presume) to guide the blind. so, my original assumption was that one side was for pedestrians and the other for bikes. now i'm not so sure. they just aren't consistent about it and i don't know if it's because they are adjusting for me--the weird looking girl who's skirt keeps flipping up, or there is no rule. the other difficulty is that they drive on the left side of the road here. i'm trying to adjust my instincts from swerving to the right to avoid a crash, to swerving to the left, but of course it's not that simple. so the other day i did swerve to the right and i almost crashed into this guy in a suit on his bike. he was very kind about it and said 'excuse me' in english. but earlier that day i tried swerving to the left and almost ran over a very small very frightened little girl. i thought her eyes were going to pop out of her head. i probably scared her for life. now, reasonably i could ask someone if there are any rules about bike riding and what side of the road i should be on, but i have a feeling that there aren't. this is another place where japan is an oxymoron. you think it should be orderly and clean and controlled, then you discover that there is no soap in the bathrooms at school, that everyone complains about the buses being 20 min late and that there is no discipline in the classrooms.

bug bite blues.

september 5th

so now that i am living in a much more ascesible apartment the joy of being japan has returned to me. i am actually looking forward to my days of wandering, to japanese food, to exploring, to talking to people and struggling with my japanese. the things that i find the most difficult now are little things like bug bites. this sounds grose, but i have bed bugs. actually, to be correct they are tatami bugs. now at the orientations we were all warned that bugs are big and common in japan. to this i said nah...i'll be fine. now i sit at my desk at work, giant bug bite swelling on my hip, squirming in anticipation of being able to kill those damn bastards and find some sort of calomine lotion.

fuck fuji.

september 2nd and 3rd



so i started teaching on september forth. these are simple lessons, basically i'm talking about myself for thirty minuets (or rather trying to stretch my activity for just over thirty min, and because it's japan and they do have it planned to the min). the lessons are okay, but i'm still working out how to keep the kids attention and enthusiasm. the other reason they are probably not the best lessons: fuji. so i went to mt. fuji for the weekend of the second and third. this was a hiroshima-AJET (association of JEts) trip, therefore it was rushed and intense. i got back after midnight sunday night, the bus arrived at hiroshima station at 11:10pm. my train was at 11:37. there were some other girls taking the same train, so that was nice. the trip STArted at 5:30am on saturday when i woke up. i got all ready and was just on time for the train i had to catch, then i realized i didn't have my headlamp. light, when walking up a dark mountain, is a necessity, so i ran home, i tore apart my apartment (it's still trashed) and i still couldn't find it. i had to say screw it and catch the next train. i was supposed to be at hiroshima eki (station) at 7:10, i caught the 7:10 train. i was about 20min late and caused everyone to be late for the first time during the trip (as we were the first pickup point). the bus ride was 10 and a half hours. i sat in the front with dob, a third year that is pretty cool. he's from the u.k., near liverpool. the bus stopped every 2 hours, i think it's the law so that the driver can rest. snacks were purchased and then lunch at these many stops. i was still worrying about my headlamp and hoping to buy a flashlight or something along the way. i did get the cutest stuft 'animal' ever. its my cuddle buddy for japan now. it's a gourd which is used as a traditional way to drink sake. his name will eventually be a brand of sake that i like...once i find one. after the really long drive, and a couple movies (there was a vcr on the bus so we watched snatch and clerks) we arrived at station five of mt. fuji. the stations start at number one, at the bottom, and go to nine, then 10 is the top. station five is where most people start, it's right below the tree line, and has a lodge vaguely similar to timberline. i felt a little wussy starting at the highest road, but by the end i would say i would never start any lower. at station five we all quickly hopped off the bus and were immediately chilled by the cool mountain air. we had 15min to change and get our stuff back on the bus before it had to park for the night.



a couple of the girls were realizing that they didn't bring enough warm clothing. i had jeans, white-beater, batman t-shirt, new thermal, powell's hoodie, blue fleece, windbreaker, longjohn pants-for later, warm socks, converse, scarf (katie's) and my orange and pink kitty hat. i was feeling like i brought too much. for my bag all i had was the little guy from by backpacking bag, so i had to tie my extra hoodie and jacket to the outside. after changing, i bought my walking stick--the walking stick is a must as it is both a souvenir that you get stamped at each station AND the only way to make it up certain parts of the trail--i also asked 'light, arimasu ka?' (do you have any lights?). i bought an $18, very heavy, 'stylish' yellow headlamp, but hey it worked and i was glad i had it. the lodge closed at 8pm, the restaurant closed at 7, we were meeting at 7 at the restaurant. someone's 'good' idea. by the time we actually got in line for food all they had left was katsudon (deep fried pork) or curry. i had the curry, which had beef in it, yech. but it was food and it ran out, too. after 'dinner' john, isaac (two guys from seattle) and i went up to the third floor to sleep. we got comfortable on our three pseudo couches, isaac documented the napping with photos, and we were then promptly kicked out after only 5 min of horizontal rest. technically the lodge was open for another 15min. grr. but everybody was taking off, so i joined dob and the other 3rd/2nd years and headed out. mind you i didn't sleep on the bus, i woke up at 5:30 that morning, and it was now 8:30pm or so...to say the least this was going to be a long night. the beginning of the trail was pretty easy. i was feeling ambitious and looking forward to my upcoming workout. it was very dark and we were already pretty high up. looking out over the landscape below we could really only see clouds. it looked like the ocean. it was so se-real. looking up the mountain, we could see the lights of 'fuji town' or rather the stations that were servicing all the tourists. there were quite a number of gaijin, but mostly japanese people. our group was around 50 kids. we ran into another group of JETs that had had the same idea, hike the weekend after the season is over. there were also some other foreigners who we could have brief conversations with. i hiked up with dob and was happy to discover he also fears heights and was in the sam kind of shape i was, so we took it slow. the way the hike works is there are stations (6, 7, 8 and 9--six and nine were closed) and then sub-stations for each of the main ones. at each station you can get a stamp on your stick, which is pretty cool cause its actually burned into the stick. i made the mistake of listening to the girls who had done this before and only got stamps at the main stations, so my stick it pretty bare with only 4 stamps. also at each station they sell food (snickers bars and cup o' noodles and the like) plus hot coffee and oxygen cans. i of course scoffed at the oxygen, that is until i was close to the top and was having to consciously take long slow deep breaths (thanks yoga) to get enough air. i bought one snickers bar, and ate one cliff bar (thanks katie and elena) on the way up.



by station 8 i could barely keep my eyes open i was so tired and i decided that i had to rest if i was going to make it up the last 2 1/2 hrs to the top. lucky for me in the stations they have sleeping areas so you can rest on the way. now i thought this was ridiculous, except for if you got to the top early and want to snooze before sunrise, but at the point of station 8 i forked over my 3000yen and dob and i slept from 1:50 to 2:30am before heading out again. i barely slept, but i started out again with a definite spring in my step. the last bit to the top creaped along as the traffic jam had started. it was an actual line to the top for the last 2 hrs. now this did end up working to my benefit as i was then going slow enough that i didn't get altitude sickness. at around 5am the sun started to rise. we weren't quite to the top, but tiredness and still more line to wade through, dictated that we just sit and enjoy the sunrise from nearly the top. it was quite beautiful, not all that i'd hoped for (after hiking for 8 hours or so). but i took some photos, texted alex and mayumi (yeah i got reception up there) and enjoyed part of my last great harvest savanah bar. after the sun peaked it's way over the morning clouds we started up again.



the top was hilarious. there were just so many people, shops and civilization. okay, civilization is a slight exaggeration, but for the highest point in japan, on top of a barren volcano, there was a lot of crap up there. if we had been in season you could possibly be looking at a postcard from the mt. fuji postoffice on the peak, but it was off season--barely--so it was closed. zan nen. i used the toilet, bought my last stamp, a plaque with the date on it, and then met up with dob to head down. on a tangent...on the way up we saw this cute puppy, haro-chan, a of couple times. we also ran into him at the top waiting to head down. at that point he had a blanket tied to his back, socks on his two front feet and the finger from a glove around the tip of his tail. yeah, it was cold and he was cute. i had all my warm things on (at the hut, where i napped, i had added my longjohns under my jeans) and i was still freezing while sitting and watching the sunrise. (after the sun was up) on the way down, it was actually kinda warm. kinda. sooo...back to the order of events, after no real rest and a 8 hr (or so) hike we got on the trail down the mountain. it was only 5k, supposed to take 3-4 hrs. the was path very different from the way up. on the ascending trail there's a lot of points that were actually climbing. the whole trail was defined by chains guiding you to the top; these were very useful at the points that you had to work your way up steep rock slopes that were relatively sheer for a trail that anyone it supposed to be able to do. this climb involved a process of placing my walking stick properly, then finding a place for my foot, grabbing the chain with my other hand and heaving myself onto the the next level. this doesn't seem that bad till the air is thin, you've had no sleep and you've been walking up a hill for 5 hrs. ironically opposed to this, on the trail up, were the points where it was (basically) paved steps; these usually indicated you were near a station. so...back to the trail down: this trail was a decent slope of and loose pumas gravel. not nearly as bad as the way up, except when you're afraid of heights, you're tired and you really just want to be down this goddamn mountain. the first stint didn't seem that bad. we knew it shouldn't take that long because its only 5k, the race for the cure is only 5k. then after about an hour of trudging down the slope we ran into a sign that told us we had 4.5k left. we'd only gone half a fucking kilometer in and hour. we were screwed. but we had to keep going. dob and i kept running into amy (from new york) and paitra (from new brunswick, canada) so we kinda joined up with them. soon it was 9:30, the time we were supposed to be meeting at the bus, and we still had two hours to go, ay least. at this point we ran into kate (from pdx) at the 7th station bathroom. we took a break to catch our breath and such, then our guide (and miranda) caught up with us. he, our guide, decided to go ahead and tell the bus that we really were coming, the rest of us tried hurry up the pace. i had a nice conversation with amy about expectations of JET and the big question of one year or two. we caught up with paitra, miranda and dob caught up with the three of us, and then we all made the final stint at our five different paces. 11:30am we were at the bus. everyone else had been there for hours. the embarrassing moments of getting on the bus, last, were pacified by the fact that we still went to the an-sen (public bath) and lunch at a local hotel at the lake at the bottom of fuji-san. the trip ended in another 10 1/2 hr bus ride (which involved some sleep for me, a little of usual suspects (wish it was the unusual suspects instead) and dob's favorite, the goodfellas. and that is that. i woke up for work at 6 this morning. found my way by bike for the first time, stopped at 7/11 to print photos for class and made it in before my supervisor. i am absolutely exhausted.

my bike.

september 1

buying my bike was the most satisfying act of my life in japan, so far. i had been pining after the magical bike that seemed so far away for nearly a month. a month that felt like six. after riding almost everyday in portland, not touching a bike for that long seemed like torture. even after i had my new apartment lined up i imagined that it was going to be at least a week before i figured out where i could get a decent bike without forking over hundreds of dollars. on my first evening in my new place, after all five of the teachers who helped me move left, i felt desperate and lonely. i was in a new part of town, starving and i had no clue what to do. so, i set out to find food. now i do admit that i was eyeing the bike shops on the way to my new place. there were two on my street and there was a small hope that they would still be open and would have a decent selection. so yeah, stopped at the first one. the bikes were over $200 and the guy barely noticed me looking. i didn't want to step in for fear on actually having to speak japanese, and i moved on. the next shop (because now i've decided i'm buying a bike, screw sustenance, a bike is more important) was a little more dingy and more bikes, more USED bikes. i was of course drawn to a beautiful orange bike in the front. it had a nice basket and was well, orange. on closer inspection though it didn't have any gears. now i know that the most gears i'm probably going to get is 3, but i've been to my school, i've seen the hills that i will have to conquer, i want gears. so then i spot this oldish navy blue bike. a large, deep basket, the classic japanese gear shifter--with three beautiful gears--, the cool japanese style lock and marked down by 1000yen ($10). i do notice a newer, mat black one right next to it for the same price...but it's newer and the same price...something is probably wrong with it. i catch the owner's eye, a nice looking middle aged man (that reminded me of the guy gentiana bought her mom's bike from), and motioned at the bike i liked. i then tried to ask if the breaks were any good and he offered to let me try it out. after removing the 6 locks (it was locked to all the bikes around it) he pulled it out, adjusted the seat--impressed that i wanted it high, meaning the CORrect height--and took it out to the street. i peddled around the corner and went up and down a side street. it road like a dream! i went back, 'kore wa onegashimasu' (this one please). while he was getting his register book i picked a lock and motioned to it when he came back. he singled that no, i should take this other one, and then he gave me 3 bucks off of it. after i wrote my address, name and phone number in his book, he explained--through hand motions and simple japanese--that if i needed air or any work done i should come back to him. that was that. i had a bike. i was a happy happy little girl. i then proceeded to ride gleefully down the street, absolutely clueless as to what i would do next.