酔っぱらいたいん。

ええとね。僕は凄いうんざりだ。４時間にコンピュターを修理することを試みた。昼ご飯を食べて、テレビを見て、タバコを吸って、シャワを浴びた、それで、今な何もすることがない。
僕は日本語で話さなければならない。も、全部忘れてしまいました。日本語で話さなければ話すほど、だんだん忘れるよ．
そろそろ、も一度タバコを吸うのように行くかもしれません。グレグさんは僕に電話すると、いいよ。

Stupid fucking asd*(&AE$hjsdf

So I bought this antenna, right? To make my reception better for my iBook, and I have to wire it into my Airport Extreme card, which, according to the directions, is incredibly simple.

I ordered the antenna, the one that says, "For all white iBooks" yea? Figured that would work.

Of course not. The one that I have is the newest version of the iBook, and apparently they reworked the internals of the thing and the AE card is no longer accessible from underthe keyboard like it used to be. In fact, it's not accessible from under the lower shield under the computer either, much to my chagrin.

Stupid fucking thing, I had it shipped out here to Japan and the thing is pretty much useless. I posted my problem on a couple of message boards, three to be exact, and none of them have had any responses, nor many views either. It's entirely frustrating, cause all I want to do is hook the damned thing up and have some better internet, but it appears that no one upon no one has tried to take this thing apart since they redid them and so there are no posts anywhere on the internet, which I have searched exhaustively in the last day or so for a diagram or a walkthrough or something of the sort.

So, after however much the antenna cost, and the price of a Torx driver set which I needed to take the back off the iBook, and the warranty which is doubtless void now, I am stuck right back where I was a day or two ago, with a crappy internet connection and a hole in my pocket. Such is the way of things I suppose. All projects have a snag.

What hacks me off though is that when I placed the order there was a mandatory field for what kind of computer specifically I was running to ensure compatibility, and then when it arrives, it doesn't work. Thanks, guys. Really appreciate it.

So maybe in a day or two if someone decides to get back to me from the store or from the message boards I will have an answer and maybe even an installed antenna. Who knows. I suppose I'll let you know.

You've Got To Be Kidding Me

By the way, Ben, Genki means lively/energetic.

So after the fiasco of my previous entry, I got ready for work yesterday and made absolutely sure that Mallage Kashiwa was were I was supposed to be. I checked all my cover sheets, and went over everything again and again just to make sure. Finally, confident in my choice, I headed out to Mallage for my 1:20 shift.

I walked in and Dave and Allen are in the office, and the first thing they say is, "See? I told you, and he's not even on the schedule." Oh Lord. So there I was, not on the schedule, but for some reason Dave had been brought out from Kashiwa. Why is beyond me. I thought I was supposed to have observation yesterday.

Just as I am taking this in, I turned on my phone to call HQ and get a text message from Bryan saying that I'm on the schedule for Kashiwa that day at 1:20, as a heads up. So when I called HQ and told them what was going on, they asked to check my coversheets, of which I had none, and then Mallage branch had no record of giving me a cover sheet, so I was off the hook on this, it wasn't my fault. So then I had to find a way to get to Kashiwa as soon as possible, and wound up taking a taxi which Nova is going to pay me back for.

I got to Kashiwa about ten minutes into when my first lesson should have been, they had to move my lesson to another teacher whose student was a no show. So thankfully again no one had to be cancelled, but all the same. I got a free period then, which was nice, and then my student after that no showed, so I had a lot of free time really.

The rest of my day at work was interesting and...fun filled to say the least. I got to explain to people over and over again that it was not in fact my fault for not being there at the start of my shift.

After work was much better, in that I got a call from Greg saying that he had his interview for the job he wants as an actual public school teacher, and that it went really well. So I ment up with him in Kita Matsudo for drinks and sushi, and all was well. We had Toro, the very most delicious of tuna underbelly, and basashi, which is raw horse. It was amazing. Fantastic, and I felt like a terrible person for eating and enjoying it so much. Horse is just one of those meats that, as a Westerner, I wouldn't think would be alright to eat raw. Apparently I was very, very wrong. Deliciously wrong.

Oh Dear sweet Jesus Lord....

Oh….dear Lord, how to put the last 24 hours into words. As I type this, I am exhausted to my core. Every inch of me is weak, stressed, and tired. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, I had a great time getting to be this way, but….oh man. I’ll just get started with it.

So, yesterday, the 22nd, I’m kickin it around the house, getting ready to go meet Greg when he gets off work. I get all dressed and ready, and I head out. I meet up with him in the train to Kashiwa to meet one of his friends, and have a quick drink. His friend doesn’t come through, so we chilled outside the station and drank Yebisu and whiskey.
While we were drinking I took a picture of a sign on a nearby ashtray that read: “A lit cigarette is carried at the height of a child’s face.” Also, a bunch of kids were sitting around playing guitar and singing, and one guy was singing that “Last Christmas I gave you my heart” song so we started singing along, and I remarked on the irony of hearing that song here in Japan. You’re never safe from that damned song. It really is everywhere.

So we got on the train and headed to Shin Matsudo, where we hopped on the Musashino line express train to go to Shin Kiba, the location of the venue: ageHa @ Studio Coast. The problem apparently with that line is that it forks, with little warning which fork it will take, and according to Greg, it sometimes just stops at a station then goes back the other way, again with little warning. But we made it to Shin Kiba without a hitch, and walked towards the venue, when we saw four giant skylights and a massive building across the river. Sweet action. This was a huge event.

Once we were inside, we had a couple drinks, and started in on the main stage arena, one of four stages at the event. That early in the night, maybe 11:45, there weren’t too many people, but Greg and I were just getting down listening to DJ Remy. It was funny because the event cameramen were pretty much always filming us, doing close-ups and all that. People were just watching us dance. More and more people migrated onto the dance floor, and it was fun. We decided to explore the other rooms, and the second, the Rose Room, was rockin some good beats. So Greg and I start dancing, and there it happens again: “Hey! Watch the Gaijin dance! Wow!” Everywhere we went, some or other brave Japanese kids would come dance with us and we’d all scream and laugh and own the place for a little bit. We must have talked to a dozen or two random people that just wanted to have a good time near us during the course of the night.

After we got good and tired from that, we went for another drink, and these people in like, I dunno giant kinda Gorilla suits with super long arms and pogo-stick kinda things attached to the ends were bouncing around the bar area with flashing green lights and bein all crazy and rave-ish. It was actually kinda creepy. I imagine if we were on E that might have been cooler. We decided to opt out of the creepy monkey people scene, and went to check out the tent.

The tent was awesome too, great music. They had these giant inflated floating jellyfisy and sea urchins, and there were little bubble machines so you’d be dancing and bubbles would float in front of you. We started dancing with this group of Japanese kids who were havin a good time, and we were bouncing up and down dancing and havin a great time. One of the girls seemed to really like Greg, and was all smiles the whole time. Very Genki. It was cute. I was starting to get pretty tired at this point, so I went to the back of the room to chill out for a sec, and Greg eventually joined. We worked on our beers, met some more kids, danced a little more, and decided to go check out the main stage again.

Armin Van Buuren was just starting his set when we got in there, at about 2am. After that, the next two hours were just me and Greg working our way to the front of the dance floor, going nuts and loving Van Buuren’s set. It was amazing. We were dancing for the next two hours straight, and holy good God….so tired. I felt bad honestly wondering when his set was going to end. Little did I know at the time my ticket had the schedule on it and I could have just looked at that. Anyway, he played some amazing music, and super Genki girl and friends showed up behind us and we all danced some more and it was great. When 4am finally came along and Van Buuren handed off the tables to Yoji Biomehanika for the closer set, Greg and I took the chance to get some water, and crash on the steps for a bit. It didn’t take long for us to realize it was time to head out, we were beat to shit.

We got our stuff, and made our way back to the station, which still hadn’t opened yet since being closed for the night. We popped into a little rice bowl shop and had something to eat, and hopped on the 5am train to start heading back towards Shin Matsudo. Well, hopped isn’t a good word. Hobbled…dragged ourselves, something like that.

I got home at about 6:40am. I set my alarm for 2pm since I didn’t need to be at work until 5pm, and crawled into my very most comfortable of beds, now that I’ve figured out how my bedding is actually supposed to work, and went to sleep.

WRONG. Fuck me. I wake up at 10:58am to what I thought was my alarm. But no, it was Nova Personnel. “Is this David? Yes? David, why aren’t you at work? What? Yes, you were supposed to be there at 10:50. No, not 5pm. Do you have your lesson cover sheet? Yea. Well, when are you going to be there? Ok. You realize of course that there will be a deduction from your salary as a result of your absence from however many lessons you miss. Alright. Bye.”

Yea. Fuck. I booked it out the door and caught a taxi to work. $20 and 40 min later I was at work, and only missed one lesson. Fortunately Allen had a free period to start, so he covered my lesson, and I had a free period after that, so no one’s lesson was/would have been cancelled. I felt really stupid, and bad. I remember looking at my schedule on my phone and seeing 10:50am on Wednesday and saying “why did I put that in there wrong? I work at 5 on Wednesdays” and changing it. Ugh. I worked my lessons, came home around 3pm, and slept for another 4 hours. Now here I am, writing this, and I will go back to bed as soon as I finish. Every muscle in my body is sore from 5 straight hours of dancing, my mind is a wreck from the stress and I’d do it all over again next week if I could. Minus the part where I missed work.

JAPANESE RAVE WOOOOOOOT

Now we're talkin. Greg and I are going to see Sasha and Digweed tonight at LaForet in Roppongi. This is going to be insane. I swore to myself last time I was here that I would go to a rave, and I have regretted ever since failing to do so. But now that I am here again, I'm going to this concert tonight, and I could go see Carl Cox on Friday if I wanted too. Yeeesh. This is just nuts.

I'll be sure to let you all know how it goes. Today I've just been doing laundry and cleaning up the apartment. I gave my futon a good beating, and I cleaned up all the crap in my room and finally unpacked that last suitcase of mine, making some more space in my room. Now, if I could just find a place to get rid of those suitcases, I'd be much better off. And put some shit up on my walls. And have my antenna arrive. There's been some sherrif Lobo movie on tv all day. Lobo, LOBO! Bring back, sherrif Lobo!

Alright, time to shower and think about getting ready. I have a long night of sensory overload to prepare for.

Long ass post

So uh, I went out last night after work to the Hub to meet up with the co-workers for a drink. It was the monthly, just after payday, get together and get to know one another kinda thing. Greg joined me, and brought his friend Taka. I got to Kashiwa, and stood around for a bit with Gabriel and Ethan and James and one other guy, drinking outside, and when Greg got there with Taka we decided to head on out to the bar. Actually, one of the J-Staff found us and told us they were already in the bar.

Anyway, Greg and Taka and I got our own little table, which was alright with me since I was more interested in hanging out with them anyway. The other, much more not really my style but I work with them so I’ll talk to them kinda people were at the other table along with the staff, so I wasn’t worried about it too much. People would migrate over and say hi to us now and again when they realized that we were having a much, much better time at out table.

So, let’s see, how much did I drink last night? Had a pint before going in, then a 1-liter beer tower, then Taka’s friend Tomonori bought us all a shot of tequila…then some more beer, and then another pint before leaving. Yea. I got pretty drunk. Greg and I were sloshed by the time we left. We had a great time talking to people though and I got to meet Taka’s Japanese friends, and practice my drinking Japanese, which is oddly just as good as it was when I was here last. Huh.

Gaijin have a sort of magnetism for one another, and soon enough there were other white folks from the bar sitting at my table. Turns out that all three of them were from not only Oregon but Eugene. One was a martial arts instructor, the other on vacation, the other a manager of another English school like where I work. All from Eugene. I also found out that the Ducks absolutely obliterated the Beavers in the civil war game, about which I was very pleased. GO DUCKS. Anyway, like I said in an entry previous to this, it’s amazing that even though I’m THIS far away from home, I still get drunk with people from my hometown. There were 5 people in that bar from Eugene last night, all by chance, on a Sunday.

When Greg and I left, we stumbled our way to the station, where we joked around and jumped up and down. During a jump though, the contents of Greg’s pockets managed to evacuate their previous homes and his cell phone fell onto the tracks. Eek. So here we are, three sheets to the wind, train station platform, and Greg’s jumping down onto the tracks to retrieve his phone and I’m laughing as hard as I ever have while looking to make sure neither a train nor the rail police are coming, and oh man. Good night. Fuck was I drunk. Don’t let me do that again any time too soon.

When I had managed to make the room stop spinning, and actually fell asleep, I had a rather strange dream, which thankfully broke the chain of commonly themed dreams I’ve been having lately. I was at a house, I think I had been there before in a previous and creepy dream. The backyard was familiar, but they always are in dreams. Anyway, there was a greenhouse, and a toolshed in the yard, along with a firepit where in my previous dream I had seen a woman who was some sort of witch or gypsy performing rites and odd but definitely not happy spells/incantations. Anyway, something had happened and she was no longer there, and people were investigating the property.
I went into the greenhouse and there was a man examining the various artifacts which remained in there. (The end of that sentence was word count 666, and I just happened to look. This will get weirder as you read.) There was a worn paper grocery bag that the man was looking at, and peered into to see what was inside. As he did this, a voice spoke to me from my consciousness. It said, “Know that to look inside these things is to know your fate.” I knew it was the woman who I had seen there before.
As he looked inside the bag, a burst of dust shot out of the bag and covered his face. As the man opened his eyes, he no longer saw the world around him but stood facing a wall with a set of sinister eyes. The wall seemed to suck in on itself and a small black crack opened up and widened, and I watched from his eyes as his life, his soul was ripped out of his body and ceased to exist. I knew somehow it had happened because his life was so bitter and cold, and the void inside him had been made real, and consumed him.
When I came back to my own sight, the man was no longer there. I looked around the room for some other artifact. Being a dream, I found something that maybe should have been a spyglass, but was instead a Dorito that had curled over into a cone kinda tube shape. As I picked it up I heard the same voice, telling me what it meant to look into it. “To have now what was meant for you later.” Kind of a crapshoot given the fate I had just seen unfold, but I looked anyway.
I set down the tasty looking chip, and looked around, nothing seeming different. I was worried some crazy Indiana Jones shit was gonna happen, and as I was turning around to make sure nothing insane was going on, a woman brushed into my shoulder walking past. My mouth opened after she said excuse me to pass by and “You are, incredibly beautiful” was all that I could come up with. She seemed amused by my inability to speak, and launched into a clever set of responses, which I quickly returned as soon as I was no longer compelled to compliment her. We knew that we were a couple as soon as we started talking. I woke up after some things that involved no words at all.

I’m still thinking about what exactly that vision means. Liesl and I used to say that about our relationship. That we were meant for each other, but met each other too young for it to be forever. I don’t think either of us were ready or mature enough to handle it. I know I wasn’t. Had we met when we broke up, we’d be engaged, I suppose. Huh, I bet she says that to Hayes now, that my relationship with her prepared her to know how to make theirs work. Gag.

Curiouser and Curiouser

All my dreams lately have been about arguing with my parents. Every night for the last like four days, I've had dreams about yelling at them over one thing or another. It's odd, and I don't know what's causing them, seeing as I don't even live on that half of the world anymore.
I'm looking at the things in my room, the environmental factors which might be causing it, and hopefully I can get it figured out soon, to stop having them.

Last night, in addition to the aforementioned subject matter, I had a dream that I was going to be shipped to Tokushima for work. Like, all the time I spent here was just waiting for my flight, and that ther ewas another envelope in my welcome packet that had the information about my departure for the island of Shikoku. I woke up this morning, and was very confused, and then wondered if my shift swap that I signed for yesterday was in fact for today, and tore apart my room looking for the cover sheet just to make sure. Fortunately it was, so I have a few more hours today to get ready rather than having to go to Mallage at 10:50, only to leave an hour into my shift to go back to Kashiwa to finish my day.

I find myselff getting pissed at well, myself, for setting my alarm so early every day, until I realize half an hour after getting up that waking up 3.5 hours before my shift starts is much, much better than just 1.5 because I actually have time to wake up, get ready, and eat breakfast at such a pace that I'm not a zombie when I arrive. That, and I hate the thought of my life here being like it was in Eugene working at the MOC, waking up as late as possible before my shift at 3pm and then going to bed shortly after getting home. What a wasted life.

I had my first real voice lesson yesterday, and I learned the benefit of telling them it's my first voice lesson. I think that since I will only have voice at Kashiwa, and the people there don't all know me yet, I will just always tell them it's my first voice lesson as long as I don't recognize anyone. Brilliant David, Brilliant.

Fuck, it is so sunny right now. This is insane. It was getting to be cloudy and miserable, but, these last few days, it's so nice. Cold at night, but so nice. I can't wait to be getting steady income so I can go out and do more. I want to go to Hokkaido for New Years I think.

Whoops!

Yesterday I was at Mallage Kashiwa all day, and the only other person working there with me was Greg. What a recipe for hillarity. We had a really good day, much laughter came as a result of our shared place of employ.

But in my final lesson, I had a hard time picking out which lesson to teach, and when I did, I grabbed the lesson notebook and went into class with the bell. But I got in there, and realized I hadn't marked which page the lesson was, so I tried to open to it and realized that less on wasn't in the notebook I had grabbed. So, I apologized, ran back to the office, grabbed the other book for that zone, went back, and then opened it to realize that they were in a completely different zone altogether and that somehow I had grabbed the wrong book twice.
So, after a third trip back to the office, I got the right book, and proceeded with the lesson that went fine after that. But good God am I glad there was no one else there to see that.

I'd be seeing you all much sooner than expected.

Then I went and drank with coworkers from the Kashiwa branch and hillarity once again ensued.

blah

Ugh. I had the most fucked up dream last night. I don’t even wanna talk about it.

I’ve been here three weeks now, today. How weird is that? But then again, I’m gonna say that next week too, and probably two weeks after that, and so on down the line.

I think what really catches me up is that it feels like I’ve been here longer than that. I took a look at the calendar today, and realized I’ve only worked 11 days since being here, 3 of which were OJT. So I’ve had 8 days on my own. 8 days. Feels like I’ve done so many more than that. Cause, for the most part, I have the lesson teaching part of this job down. I still need some extra focusing and technique, but for the most part, I’ve got enough of the essentials down so that I can walk into a lesson, open to a page, and say alright today we’re gonna do this. Which happened to me actually the other day at Kashiwa, where those bastards are notorious for losing files. I had a one on one lesson with a guy whose file didn’t even exist as it turned out, and I had to go up there with absolutely no knowledge of this guy or what lessons he’s done and just open the book, randomly pick a lesson and teach it, all the while hoping he hadn’t just done it the day before.

Turns out he was a newer student despite being an advanced level, and had only done one other lesson before. Lucky me.

Yesterday I had my first voice lesson. No one showed up for the first couple of minutes. Then a little girl showed up, part of Club 7, the level 7 group for voice, the least advanced, and we talked one on one for 40 minutes about foods, and the world, and other things. I was nervous, and I hated that my first voice lesson had to not only be Club 7, the hardest of voices, but one on one, which meant that I had to lead the discussion the entire time. Ugh. Oh well, I don’t really care it went alright and I haven’t been fired for it yet, so, no worries there either.

Things and Stuff

This was right after I was woken up by the earthquake. My heater started making weird noises, so I shut it off. When I layed back down, boosh. Earthquake. Weirdest feeling. Quite small though.

I had the weirdest dream last night.
I had this dream that I was somewhere, I think it was Eugene, but I really don't know. I woke up in a familiar place, but I can't recognize it thinking back. Anyway, I went to get a haircut and the shop was some girl's house, who seemed vaguely familiar. Anyway, it was pretty late at night, and afterwards we just started talking and hanging out. We decided to go to bed, but right as we were settling in, Amanda and her friend blondie showed up, and were just not gonna have me staying the night with someone else. So they did their best to distract me, and tried to seduce me. So there was Amanda, prancing around the room mostly naked, and her friend is trying to nibble my ear, and all I wanted to do was just go to bed, because in the waking world I had woken up in the middle of the night and couldn't get back to sleep, and just wanted to rest, and finally, when they realized it wasn't going to work, started going through my phone and sending text messages to people in my phone who they thought would start an upset, sending girls' numbers to other girls, and trying to call people.
Unfortunately, or fortunately for me, it was my phone here, and so they couldn't send international text messages or call anyone, and they only managed to send my phone number to Carly, who replied saying thanks, cause she didn't have my number yet. Then after they left like Matt Bliss and a bunch of other people showed up and went to bed on the floor, and the girl was like, "David, you should go, it's like 5am and we're still not asleep, and I have to get up early."
So then I woke up.
Amanda, I have no idea what that dream is supposed to mean. I think it's that you distract me from getting much needed sleep. And I think blondie was there just cause before I left you two had recently become inseperable.

Anyway, I cleaned the shower room today, because the landlord was coming to check out the rotten wood in the bathroom. When he came, we spoke briefly, and he went to his car to get his tapemeasure. After he left, the other roommates came out and were talking to me. Ash couldn't believe the landlord had come, but then again we couldn't believe his teal and black striped sleeping tights, with black fuzzy socks. So we all got a good laugh this morning early on.

Now I'm waiting for my bank boook to be redelivered, and then I am going to go on a mission to find a pillow. And maybe do the rest of my laundry. My slacks are all dry clean only, so I washed one pair last night to see how it turned out. They are ok, but are in desperate need of a fierce ironing.

Yea. Weird night. Weird day.

The One Week Review

Today was my one week review. Dara came out from Kashiwa to observe me, and give me some pointers on my lessons.
I went to Kashiwa today a bit early to exchange the rest of the American money I had in my pocket for yen. I had about $140 sittin around, and I got about 16,400 yen back. So, now I have enough to last me a couple of days. I got my bank book today too, so I will be able to make withdrawals too, so now I'm a whole lot more stable than I was 24 hours ago. Now I'm just waiting on my ATM card to arrive so I can do my banking more conveniently.

The review went well, but it started off on something of an awkward note. I was getting on the bus today to go to Mallage, and I saw another white guy. What are the odds, right? I knew right away that he was someone from another branch coming out, and I turned out to be right. So then we had the awkward small talk on the bus while waiting to get to work, which was of course the most fun imagineable.

After that though, he came and obsreved one of my lessons, for which I got good reviews. It was a solo lesson, and he complimented me on switching the roels around and making the lesson work for only one person, something which apparently the other new people seem to have a problem with. So, I got the obligatory couple of things to work on, which I assume he just kinda ticked off on the checklist because something HAS to be on the first review, and we talked a bit about life here to make sure that I was going to get on my feet alright. Then he got into the talk about how I shouldn't call in sick unless it's really serious, because of all the negative effects it has on the branch, and morale, and most importantly, sales. So yea, blah blah blah play nice jump through hoops mission accomplished. By the end of the day I think he had warmed up to me a bit and things went smoothly. I think most importantly he figured out that I wans't a tool, and that I could keep up with the topics he was talking about on their more significant and meaningful level, i.e. money. As if they aren't making enough to begin with.

For a company that has increased its workforce twicefold in the last year alone, hiring thousands of new employees and opening offices in dozens of new places, you would think that they would be a little less than money grubbing, but, alas, such is the nature of man and business alike.

Anyway, I'm scheduled for more kids training soon, and before long I will be well on my way to becoming in charge of the kids program over in Mallage. Yeeeehaw.

When I was in Kashiwa today, looking for a place to exchange money, I saw another American guy, older, walking around. When I was in the exchange shop, I saw him again coming to buy some yen. We got to talking after having been seated next to one another, and lo and behold, he and I are both from Texas, and from neighboring cities as well. He made a comment which stuck with me:
"Amazing how you can travel halfway across the world and still run into someone who grew up in your backyard."

How very true. What an odd world we live in anymore.

11-10

11-10-05 11:20am – Falling Into Step

I realized this morning that it’s been a few days since I updated my journal. Generally speaking, this is a sign that I am getting used to my surroundings, and that my routine doesn’t allow for much time in retrospection. Two weeks now I’ve been here, and I think that’s what’s going on. I’ve gotten the hang of the routine I’m capable of at this stage in my training, so, it’s just a matter of doing it day in and day out. Well, that and on Tuesday, I was busy hanging out with Greg, and yesterday I was busy, um, I dunno really, doing whatever it was I did. I updated my photo albums and things like that, but I didn’t feel up to updating my journal.
I’ve been really tired most mornings and evenings, so I think that has a lot to do with it. I’ve finally started sleeping in until a more appropriate time, which puts me at a point where I should start getting ready for the day rather than writing.
I need to stop by the money exchange today, have to rather, I’m essentially out of cash. I should be receiving my bank book at work in the next couple of days, but I need money to get to and from work, and I certainly need money to eat. I realized yesterday that I was out of cash when I reached into my pocket and pulled out a wad of American money. I’ve got around $150 in cash, so I will have plenty of money after the exchange to last me until I get my checkbook and subsequent salary advance. This is a good thing, as eating has become an increasingly important issue.
When I went to Harajuku, and then out with Greg the next day, I spent a good amount of money on some comfort items for my place, like my super adorable Gloomy doll, and my Ueno-Eki Tokyo Hard Rock Café shotglass. I couldn’t say no to it, the shotglass, I am on a mission to collect as many of them as I have Zippos at least, so I’ve got another 5 or so to go. I’ll have to hold off, however, on buying things like that until I’ve started receiving a steady stream of income.
After I get off probation, and have paid off my salary advance, I’ll be putting about 99,000yen in my pocket each month. Lemme do some quick math and see about some finance stuff. (I will leave this now, do figure out if I’m better off financially taking a chunk of money out of my pocket to pay off the entirety of a credit card, rather than have $30 out of each check go to paying it off.)

Harajuku

Today was the first day of my first official weekend. It was nice to relax, or, at least, not have to go to work. I was going to do laundry today, but it appears as if I will be waiting to do that until tomorrow.

I went to Harajuku today, to have a look around, and see if the things I saw last time I was here were still there. Lo and behold, two years wasn't long enough for the entire city to uproot itself and move. I saw the old familiar Condomania, KiddieLand, and the Shop of the Orient, where I got the puzzle box I've had, and the one I got for Greg. Oh, and this adorable little Puran Puran doll. Look at him. Awww....I just smile every time I look at him. He's saying, "Whaaaaaaat?" Look at those claws...he's so cute. If I didn't know he'd claw my eyes out given the chance, hehe.

I walked for a long time today, and it was rpetty tiring. But, all in all I had a good time. I picked up al ittle gift for my buddy Neil back home, and when I got back I had an email from Chris, my friend Amanda's older brother who's been working on Shikoku, near Matsushige. That was where I got stuck in a typhoon.

I also discovered that my phone takes pretty darn good photos. Most of these have been subjected to my inept photoshop batch processing skills, and are consequently of a lesser quality than they were before, but, the damned phone takes great pics.

But, best of all, when I got home, after eating the most interesting of mystery dinners, I got a call from none other than Mr. Bethell himself, who has finally returned from his trip to Mexico. So, tomorrow morning sometime he's gonna give me a call and we're going to get togehter and romp around like us gangstas do. It'll probably be a couple of straight hours of "Gregregregregregregreg!!!!!!!!" "Davedavedavedavedavedave!!!!!" But ya know, sometimes that's just how it goes.

I Work In a Mall.

Yes, oh yes, do I ever work in a mall. I spent how many years of my life avoiding working in malls like the plague? Yea. 23. The irony is unnerving.

But, it's a really nice, clean, upscale mall. Not that it's any consolation, but at least we get to listen to pretty much anything we want. We listened to Basement Jaxx all morning, so I was happy. My coworkers today were Sean and Arthur. Sean is a hell of a cool guy, who I hope to hang out with more before he leaves in a month. He knows Greg, incidentally, and Arthur ran into my roommate Ash at the station today on the way to work, and lives with Travis Flynn, who I went to high school with. This world is getting smaller by the second.

I was only scheduled for 6 lessons today when I arrived, so I was looking forward to standing outside and handing out tissues to passersby, but unfortunately I wound up teaching lessons in all 8 spots. I taught 6 one on one lessons, yeeefreakinhaw. Most of my lessons were level 7s as well, so that was even better. There are a lot of new people there, being a newer branch, and I, on my first day on my own, taught someone's first official lesson at Nova. What are the odds? At least she'll never know my inexperience.

All my lessons went well today. I had a really good time. If I stay there, and don't get stuck doing kids stuff all the time, which I know I will, being in a mall and all, I am going to have a lot of fun. If this is in any way representative of the days I have ahead of me, this is going ot be a fun job.

Starting tomorrow though, I become a pinball. I have 4 lessons at Moraju, then I have to go to Kashiwa for the remainder of my day, and I have much the like for the rest of the week, and next. I imagine it's because the bosses don't come out to Moraju much at all, and they want to observe me teaching. So I am going to have a lot of expensible travel, and a lot of free blocks due to it. Not so bad, I don't really mind, except for the busses, which are weird. I got to my branch alright today, no problem, aside from getting to work over an hour early thanks to getting there ok the first try. If the lessons which are observed go as well as the lessons I taught today, then I should be fine.

Things are going well, I will keep my fingers crossed that continues.

11-04

11-04 10:30am – So Tired…

Man…I think I need another pillow or something, I dunno what it is, but I am tired lately waking up. Maybe it’s that I’ve been working…nah. Must be the pillow.
I have the day off. Dave has to be at work today, but, apparently most instructors get the day after training off. That will be nice, because then I will have to 8 hour days and then my official days off. A quick dip headfirst into the waters, then a chance to catch my breath before diving in completely.
So, today. Forge my way to Moraju Kashiwa. Try to find an internet connection to steal with my laptop. Stop talking in jagged sentences.
Alright, so now, we’ll listen, and repeat. Listen, and repeat.
“Did you ever wonder why we had to run for shelter when the promise of a brave new world unfurled beneath the clear blue sky? Goodbye, Blue Sky.”

12:18 – Success?

I was able to find an internet connection outside on the porch, and updated my journal with all my previous entries. That was good.
I also checked my email, which proved to be slightly less than good news.
Apparently CH2MHill is letting my mom go. Neither of my parents knows much more than that at this point, but she found out yesterday. I’m trying to wrap my head around the implications of that statement, but I’m having a hard time. Will she be able to get another job? Will she be forced into retirement? What are they going to do for income? Pac Rim can’t support them both, and lord knows that job is as unstable as any job can be. It would be nice to see my dad you know, use his qualifications for something professional, but, yea right, that’s gonna happen.
Theoretically, I shouldn’t need their support anymore. I should be making enough money to take care of my needs here, but, I guess this really is the last of the strings being cut. I can’t rely on them for money now even if I need to. I’m really glad it happened after I got set up here, to be honest.
I really hope they can work things out, I can’t imagine what that must be like for her, to have worked with them, and as an engineer for so long, only to be let go so near to her retirement.
In my traditional style, I’m going to not let it sink in much, and will go about my business normally, I can’t really afford to be thinking about that right now. I know things will work out. But I hold them both in my prayers.


8:51pm - Lost In Translation

I went to Kashiwa today, and hopped on the bus at station 4 like I was instructed. I got on the bus, asked the driver how much to Moraju Kashiwa, to which he responded 190 yen. Except, as it turns out, it was the wrong bus, and we went somewhere completely different. When we got to the final stop, he came and talked to me and we figured out where I had gone wrong. Then we got to talking about Nova, and how I work for them. He asked me about how much progress someone can make in a month, and I said, it depends, you ahve to practice a lot, but it's ok. This was all in japanese, mind you. So he took me on the way back towards the station to the nearest stop to Moraju, and I walked. The place really is in a mall. I work in the mall. Yeeeeehaw. Go me.
So, I couldn't find a bus back really, and so I ended up walking, and walking, and walking, like when I was in Italy and kinda hoped I wound up where I needed to go. I found a bus stop that was bound for the Station, so I decided to wait for a bus. When one came, the driver cruised past, all the while giving me this really strange look. I watched him drive off into the distance and hang a left before disappearing. I thought to myself...."There must be a reason other than me being a stupid foreigner to look at me like that...." So eventually I walked around the corner where he turned and oh. Yea, I'm just stupid. There was the station. I made my way back home, and bought some groceries and have been here lounging on the internet ever since. Go me. I rock.

11-03

11-03 10:03 am – I’ve Been Here How Long?

I’m having trouble deciding if I’ve been here a week. On the one hand, I left on a Wednesday…and I’m stupid. It’s Thursday. I’ve been here a week. Lot’s gone on in this week. Including the arrival day, I’ve had just as many days of work as days off. I’ve still got 4 more days of work before my weekend. Actually, you know what? Just for the record, here’s my schedule, in case you wanna call me, or something:
Monday – Off
Tuesday – Off
Wednesday – 5pm 9pm (PST – 12am-4am)
Thursday – 1:20pm 9pm (PST – 8:20pm-4am)
Friday – 3:10pm 7:20pm (PST – 10:10pm-2:20am)
Saturday – 10:50am 6:10pm (PST – 5:50pm-1:10am)
Sunday – 10:50am 6:10pm (PST - 5:50pm-1:10am)

OK. Enough of that, I need to start getting ready for the day.


11:40am – Timing

The timing’s still off on this. I tried yesterday, to little avail, to take my time getting ready and heading out there, so I didn’t have an entire hour to spare like I did the day before. Today, to my surprise, I’ve managed to get ready entirely too early once again. I’ll get this figured out soon enough.
I have to teach four lessons today. Ash made the comparison between my training and slowly boiling a frog in water. You don’t really realize how far deep you’re in to it until it’s far, far too late to look back or catch your bearings. I’m not worried about it though, you just have to roll with it and learn as you go. I’m gonna prep my second lesson right now, then head out with Ash.

11:55pm – On Probation

Well, it’s official. I’m on probation. Now, normally I would think of that as a bad thing, I’ve never been on probation in my life, but, for now, it’ll do. It’s actually a good thing for once. It means that I successfully completed my OJT, and starting Saturday I’ll be on my own essentially. I get the benefit of tomorrow off, as opposed to starting right up at 5 or so and having 4 lessons straight away. But it also means that on Saturday I will have a full day of 8 lessons to start up on.
Tomorrow I will still head over to Moraju Kashiwa, or, as it’s properly named, Mollage Kashiwa, to scope the place out and get used to how to get there. Mallage. Mall-age. Lol. I will be getting used to buses too, cause I have to catch one to get to my work every day. Yeeeeefreakinhaw.
Today wasn’t so bad at all. I had a group of 4 level 4’s to start, one of whom was a challenge from level 5 who I observed my first day in training. Then I had 3 level 6’s, one of whom was a no-show. Back to back wasn’t really so bad, but I imagine with less prep and support it might get hectic.
The second grouping was 4 level 7A’s, followed by a one on one level 5. Both sets went pretty well, actually, and I was able to achieve most of my goals for my lessons. I kept the enthusiasm level up the whole time, and in every lesson laughter was an integral part of the experience. My last lesson, the one on one, was about bargaining, and she drove one hell of a bargain. I think we spent about half the lesson laughing about it. I didn’t really realize that she was a low level 5 until I read the review of my lesson, after which I realized that was a pretty good explanation for her lack of comprehension in certain areas. Duh. I was too busy enjoying myself to notice.
By and large today went well, though I found myself a lot of the time outside of lessons kinda spacing out and not being able to focus. I think it was because of being in high stress mode, and being in the mindset to act quickly and think about lots of things at once. When presented with a slow, or singular stream of information, I tend to lose focus, which I certainly did. But, as Alex put it, we made this week easy for him, so it couldn’t have been all bad.
I think he and I both know I’ll do well out there. I’m not worried about my ability, and I don’t think they are either. I just don’t want to be cocky about it at all, I know I’m due for a humbling pretty soon. But, all in all, I’m really excited about this. And I can’t wait for Greg to get back, so I can share my experiences with him. He’ll get back on my days off, how convenient. 便利　べんり、benri, convenient. As opposed to 不便、ふべん、fuben, inconvenient.

11-02

11-2 10:21am – Being Like Emeril

Today I’m gonna have to BAM! Kick it up a notch. I paid pretty good attention to what Walter did during his lessons yesterday, and I think I picked up a lot of good pointers. In terms of the pace of my speech, and giving clear instructions with good clarification and re-confirmation, I think the most important part is to think of it as almost a game. Take it easy, be confident and in charge, and make it somewhere I can relax, and have fun with the tasks. Alex and Walter both have this sort of approach during training and lessons like what we’re doing is almost a game show. And man, can I ever do that. So, as long as I keep in mind the things that have to be done, and in what order, I think this is going to be phenomenally easy after a point to B.S. and do on the fly. So from here on in, it’s all about the confidence, and relaxation.
As far as corrective feedback, I think I can manage that, it’s just a matter of being ok pointing things out, instead of just ignoring it, or asking them to repeat things.

Alright, now I gotta get ready for the day, and head outta here. I think I will leave a little earlier than I did yesterday, so I don’t have an entire hour to kill before training starts.

I decided to go with my black shirt today, because my white one is a little filthy from the first couple of days where that was all I had to wear. I’m gonna have to wash it soon, along with those pants, and hope for the best there. There are no dryers here, so, it all gets hung up. It’s bullcrap.
The problem with my black shirt is that, well, it’s a smaller shirt than the rest of them. I bought this shirt to be a snug fit, because I was always planning to have the sleeves rolled up and the collar unbuttoned. But now it’s a work shirt, and so there are some difficulties. The collar isn’t so much an issue, but the sleeves are. When they’re buttoned, my right wrist is very tight, and that’s an issue with my piercing. I had to take a pair of scissors and make the button opening wider, and now it’s alright. I still have to worry about my sleeve creeping up and exposing it, especially during training. I think with how self-conscious I am right now I’ll have no problem keeping tabs on it.
Having said that, I’m a sexy bitch in this outfit. It’s nice to have an outfit that is, you know, more fitted. The other shirts I have are like tarps. Collared, pressed, neatly buttoned and coordinated tarps.

10:17pm – Not Half Bad

Not half bad, really. I mean, like, 45% bad, but, not half. We taught three lessons today, on our own, without any help, just someone looking on from another room. The first one, a 7A group, well, to be honest I’m drawing a blank. I honestly don’t remember much of it at all. Eek. I know stress clouds the memory, but, sheesh. I remember that they were a pretty good group, and by and large it went pretty well. Ryan, the teacher who reviewed my lesson gave me good feedback, and I also remember that I…was talking about…passports…tickets the airport! We talked about AHH!!! I remember. Ok, so, there were three students, two girls and one boy. One was a guy who had some problems in his life over the last two years, he was about my age I’d imagine, but apparently he had some problems coming in after drinking. Anyway, he was really good in class, and in his other lessons that day. I never would have known he wasn’t a good student at some point. He led a lot of the discussion sometimes, and helped me clarify a couple of questions like, “Why is ‘Did you pack this bag yourself?’ important?” We had a couple odd moments, but, we laughed through them, and everything was alright.
My next lesson was not so lucky. I had a group of 2, 7B students, one of whom showed up 15 minutes into the lesson. Apparently she’s notorious for showing up late. The lesson was about introducing yourself. I was halfway through the Language Input section when she came in, and I had to kinda work her in to what we were already doing. It was difficult, because they were of a slightly lower level, and giving clear, well-understood directions is a lot harder. There were a lot of awkward moments, but, thankfully we got through them and made it to the end. I hope I don’t have toooooo many more lessons like that, it was a bit stressful but I know I learned a lot.
After that, and lunch, came my last lesson, a group of 2 level 4 students. There ware supposed to be three, but one called in. That class was a blast. We talked about photographs, and vacations, and picked out our favorite pictures from groups and talked about ones we didn’t like and why. There was a lot of good conversation, and a lot of independent thought. The guy in the group had noted in his file that he was distant and quiet, and tended to go off on tangents given the chance. I found out quickly why this was written, but I blame the instructors for the comments more than him. He didn’t seem to like talking about the subjects, he wanted to talk about things he cared about, and given the chance, talked about getting arrested in Mexico for drinking in public rather than what he didn’t like about the photo of the room with the chairs that are half cut off. I can’t say I blame him. He must be frustrated like I was, learning Japanese, when I was forced to talk about boring subjects. I didn’t talk about much anything either, but, given the chance to talk about what I wanted, I opened up and had a great time. He was the same way. I wanted to encourage that however I could, so after a time I kinda changed the course of the lesson to encompass the vacations they took where they took pictures they liked, and what experiences they enjoyed. Theeeeeen the talking started, and the good times rolled on out. It was by far my best lesson so far, and afterwards my trainer and my co-trainee all had a good time joking, and getting ready for tomorrow, where I will have 4 lessons, in pairs, to get ready for having consecutive lessons.

11-01

11-01 10:19am – Getting Started

Yesterday’s orientation wasn’t nearly as bad as I thought it would be. I received a copy of my contract, which was nice, and it went over all the salary information I needed. There was another packet I received which contained the complete breakdown and totals for my salary at probation and regular rates as well, so I can do the complete math on my expenses here now. I won’t receive my first paycheck until Dec. 15th, so I went ahead and opted for the salary advance. I don’t have to spend it all, but it’ll be nice to have the padding if I need it.
While on probation, I’ll be making 229,000 yen per month. Probation is mandatory the first two months, and after that it can be extended month by month as needed. I don’t plan to need much more than that. After that I’ll be making 244k. Now, this first paycheck there will be a lot of deductions which won’t normally be there, for instance my medical insurance is being charged until the end of January, and after that it will be charged monthly, so that’s a chunk of change. And then the setup fees for my phone, and the couple days prior to November I was here in terms of rent, and so on. Additionally, I’ll be paying off the salary advance in thirds, so, there’s that too. But, even after doing the math on all that, it still seems that I’ll be pocketing around $525 a month, even after my bills back home are paid. I am positive I won’t actually pocket this amount. That money really just represents 59,700 yen I can afford to be off in my calculations.
I work ~30 hours a week. I have Mondays and Tuesdays off.
Met some cool people at the orientation yesterday, afterwards we went downstairs and had some drinks. We all gave Phenlan our phone numbers and email addresses, so hopefully she will send those out to us, and we can maybe keep in touch. As Tim noted, “Don’t worry about it too much, you’ll never see them ever again, really.” Which I can understand. It’s going to be a busy, busy life pretty quick here.
I have my set of three training days starting today in Matsudo, after which I will be working in my own main office of Moraju Kashiwa. I’ll sit in on lessons to start with, and then I will take over part, and then the other part, and then I’ll lead with someone watching. Hopefully that will span the three days, but I have a feeling the third day will be all me teaching under observation. But, like always this is purely speculation. We’ll see.
My phone is a Nokia 6630, and it’s pretty sweet, though a little larger than I’m used to. It has a 1.3 megapixel camera though, which is nice.
Alright, time to take a shower and get ready for my first exciting day with Nova.


10:45 pm – Looking Back

Well, that was interesting. I met up with Dave, the other guy with whom I am training, at Matsudo today, and after a brief lunch, headed over to the Nova office where out OJT, On The Job Training began. I remember reading Greg’s entries in his journal about these first few days, and how worried he was, and I suppose I carried a bit of that with me as I went through the lesson training. For the first half of the day, from 1:20 till about 5pm, we just went over each part of the lesson and then performed them to the other, and the trainer. There were the obvious train wrecks now and again, but by and large things went smoothly, at least for me. Dave had some difficulties, and if I had similar ones I was largely oblivious, due to the stress. I will admit that enthusiasm is one of my strong points, and I think that the times where I might not be so strong, it carries me through for the most part. Kerry, the area manager, stopped in at one point before lunch, and spent some time training with us. Of course, it was when we were getting to the hardest parts of the lesson, so she couldn’t really see me shine all that well, but there was some good humor shared between the trainer, her and myself.
On the way to lunch, she mentioned that Greg and I knew one another. I told her that I have a great deal of respect for one another, and the odd coincidence of wanting to come teach here that we announced to one another at the same time. She said that she could already see the similarities between the two of us, and that he does very good work. Then, managing to completely jinx me, she said that she had equally high expectations of me, to which I responded that I would do my best.
Dave has to cut his ponytail. I feel bad, cause it’s clear that he has some unruly and curly hair. I look forward to seeing how he manages to style it once it’s cut.
Anyway, today was a full 8 hours, and I was pretty damn tired at the end of it. I went over to the internet point nearby and checked my email and all, then set about going home. I picked up a sandwich or two and a bottle of green tea, and made short work of them once I got home. So here I am, 5 till 11, and I think I am going to sleep like a log tonight, for the first time really since arriving. I’m guessing I’ve already lost a couple pounds since being here, if not from the diet and exercise then the stress. I anticipate returning to my preferred, emaciated state before long. More as time progresses.

OJT

Today was On The Job Training. Yeeeeeehaw. I met up in Matsudo around 1:20, and quickly started in on the schedule which had me teaching the first half of a lesson to a group of beginner students after 4 or so hours of training. Good lord.

I was a little nervous at first, we went over each part of the first half of the lesson and practiced on each other and the trainer. Of course, there were some train wrecks, but, for the most part I muddled my way through it and had a marginal amount of success. Kerry, the Area Manager, stopped in for a bit and participated in the training, which was nice. I hope to stay on her good side, because from what I understand if I were to not, it would be Hell.

On the way to lunch, she pulled me aside and mentioned that I came here to work with Greg. I spoke highly of him, and she mentioned as well that she can already notice the similarities between his mannerisims and my own. Which is true, from the get go he and I shared a lot of things in common, and hopefully his success here so far will be shared as well. She told me she has high expectations from me to match his, and I told her that I would do my best to live up to them. Eek. Big shoes to fill. Literally. That man has LARGE feet.

Anyway, the lesson itself didn`t go nearly as bad as I thought it would. I spoke a little too quickly, and didn`t check for comprehension enough, but, everyone has to have something upon which to improve, so I`m not too terribly worried. Just as long as I manage to improve.

Tomorrow will be the second half, and by the end of the day I will have done three lessons, two of which will be on my own, under observation.

I got my phone at Orientation the other day, a Nokia 6630, for those of you who want to know what kinda crazy technology I`m rockin.
Anyway, I have to catch a train home and make myself some dinner, so, for now, jya mata.