Looking for an Apartment?

Yes, home mate do make me happy! And I’ll even lip your stocking.

This banner just happened to catch my eye outside of a well known apartment finding agent as I was walking to the station this morning. And though living with what they call an “apartment mate” here is apparently popular (according to my choices for housing options with the university here) this is not any type of advertisement for such a thing. I thought so at first though, and was under the assumption that in a desperate attempt to find customers they made a proposition of (perhaps?!) living with a beautiful woman. The first thing that came to mind was, as you read above, “Yes, in fact, home mate do make me happy!” The slight mishap in the English makes it all the more funny. It gave me a laughing start for a somewhat melancholic day.

I hope to share more random pictures and feelings like this on a regular basis so please look forward to it and keep reading!

Writing from Koganei, Tokyo, Japan | January 28, 2009

‘Cross the Hall

Last night I arrived home to see this sign on the door across the hall. Kinda funny considering I’ve put up with him slamming his door at 3am every morning for four months. As if silence wasn’t implied as a necessity in a place where people are sleeping at that time. The biggest hypocrite ever… Any ideas for how I ought to respond? I came up with a few. Maybe a “Please don’t a hypocrite.” sign on my door. (Because he also forgot “be” in his sign.) I guess for now I’ll just reciprocate what he’s suffered me through before. Quite honestly it’s not my tactic. I prefer not to show people they’re getting to me. And really I must be accustomed to this because it doesn’t often wake me in the peak hours of the night. It’s just the hypocrisy that pushes me over.

The fact of the matter is that this is directed at English speakers. It’s directed with a sort of automatic assumption that we, the foreigners, the Americans, the non-Japanese are bad. And annoying. And break rules. And can’t read Japanese. (That last one is a bonus.) Sure, so what? No big deal. It’s not so uncommon. Especially when you’re the subject of such discrimination you begin to see it more clearly. I guess I can group it in with lots of other happenings. Such as how the dorm head (ryouchou, as I mentioned before) always seems to come only to me to first of all complain about some rule being repetitively broken (like doing laundry after 10pm or using the dishes in the cafeteria that are only meant for use with dinner and breakfast). He then tells me to pass it on to everyone else because he can’t speak English well (not because they can’t understand Japanese well). I’ve come to realize that he only comes to me to say these things and never goes to anyone else – especially the Japanese people. The fact is, the only hair clogging the drains in the shower is black Asian hair, but he’ll still complain to me.

Is it just that I’m gullible? An easy guy to complain to? That sort of thing? I don’t know. Sucks if so, but I deal with it and get along one way or the other. I’m not like the dead guy I saw taken away on a stretcher the other day. At the end of the day they’re still the ones jumping off bridges in front of moving trains. This whole thing is still quite the wrack on my brain and I’m quite the stickler for thinking about this kind of crap.

Down the hall, easily in view of anyone who has a bodily function involving a bathroom, you can find the following sign in Japanese:

The top characters translate simply to silent. Below it are four lines designating what type of silence. From right to left: The act of not running in the hall. The act of not talking in the hall. The act of not dragging ones feet. The act of closing the door quietly. Hmm… Nope, I think he’s in the clear for slamming the door at anytime he likes.

In the end, isn’t a sign in Japanese directed at those Japanese individuals and a sign in English directed at those English speaking individuals? I wonder if maybe I should just pretend I can’t read it… That’s what the others do with the sign in their respective language. Basically nobody follows those four rules whether Japanese or not. You only find quiet time around here in the middle of the day while everyone’s at school.

Reminds me just yesterday I stood at the counter in McDonald’s listening to the entire staff talk about me rather rudely and audibly in Japanese as if I couldn’t understand them. Just before they screwed up my order (the reason I was standing there again, late for class) the girl behind the counter attempted to speak English to me repetitively after I was ordering in clear Japanese. That’s probably what screwed up my order in the first place. Yeah she was just trying to help, I get that. But I guess I’ve just experienced this occurrence far too often and was finally fed up. And the fact is, I was using Japanese!

So yeah, there’s my rant. Sorry to bother anyone reading all this. It’s hardly finished but I can stop there. And I’m sure as time passes I’ll reaccustom myself to everything, because in the end noone’s going to stop trying to take my order in English, staring at me on the train or acting like a crazy person only around me. On a side note, I’m right now heading full on into exams and finals week, so I probably won’t be posting on here unless I can find the time. Toodles!~

Writing from Koganei, Tokyo, Japan | January 21, 2009

Koo-soo-ree

Been awhile everybody! Missed me? I’m sure.

So, let’s say about two weeks or so ago I was nearing the end of yet a second occurrence of a cold/fever and at the same time nearing the end of my small medicine supply. I was dwindled to asking my friends in the dorm for medicine (thanks again guys!) and my sickness began getting worse. Rather upset with and tired of being sick for a whole week I decided to break my little protective bubble of not using or wanting to use kusuri (pronounced as in the title of this post) – the Japanese word for medicine.

The first thing I got was this type of throat lozenge that looked like a lifesaver. I got it out of dire necessity and found that it basically did absolutely nothing. Just a pricey cough drop, no better than those stacked in the picture. Next, a day later, I decided to head to the pharmacy and grab some actual medicine and ended up with this oddly named brand called Paircoal. It had an odd taste and color by comparison to medicine I’ve taken before in the states.

The next morning I felt like a new person. It was like the “make happy” drug. And man it made me not only better in the realm of sickness but made me feel happy for a new day the next morning too! And I took it a few days consecutively and got better really fast, feeling good the whole time. That’s a pretty simple, nice and easy first experience for Japanese medicine. Glad it worked, otherwise I might be sick still now.

Writing from Koganei, Tokyo, Japan | November 30, 2008

K-tai Denwa!

A.K.A. Japanese cellphone! That’s right “Japanese” cellphone. Because no cell phone anywhere has anything on these phones. Any Japanese cellphone has the right to be called a keitai (kay-tie) because it really is something different.

I used to think Japanese cell phones were so far advanced compared to those American ones you guys are using right now. Well, just a few days ago I got my keitai – the Japanese word for cell phone. This phone isn’t far advanced compared to American phones, it’s in a different league! It is amazing the things this phone can do. In addition to that its more useful size, large screen and durability when it comes to being dropped. Everyone who has a phone here, if they’re not rich enough to buy new ones all the time, has had it for quite sometime and still it works perfectly.

Standard specs on any keitai are mail (like texting but better and closer to e-mailing), an infrared scanner to allow phones to transfer contact info to another (so we don’t have to enter a person’s info by hand – genius!), a web browser with internet, a barcode scanner that allows you to scan special barcodes on ads and send you to a website for it, the ability to type in Japanese and English (the Japanese even includes a feature like T9 word where it will try to figure out what you’re typing after just a few characters), close to 500 emoticon-like mini-pictures for use in mail messages, a ton of games and applications, a camera for videos and pictures as well as another camera on the opposite side of the phone so you can easily do a video call, and lots of other features I have yet to find or figure out. A few more specs included on most keitai are TV and GPS, though these aren’t on mine.

Oh, I also have the ability to basically add money to my phone and use it to pay for things as well as use it as my rail pass. This really is a keitai society! A final thanks to Kaz for helping me out with the language while getting the keitai.

Simple yet amazing!

Writing from Koganei, Tokyo, Japan | September 26, 2008