Quirks

So one thing I noticed after a couple of weeks of being in Japan is that the Japanese tend to have an unusual fascination with blood type.  It started with my cell phone profile where under "Birth Date" there was a "Blood Type."  Then I began to see little cell phone charms with blood types on them.

At first, I was extremely impressed.  I thought, "Hey, the Japanese are pretty diligent about their blood type. If you ever get into an accident, your blood type could be found anywhere on your person -- cell phone, key chains, etc."  However after a quick google search, I was slightly disappointed to find that blood types are just another horoscope in that there are people who believe blood type can determine personalities and compatibility.

For more information into this interesting cultural quirk, the BBC just wrote a pretty good article on it.

Silly Mnemonics

So on the way over to Akihabara today, Matt decided to teach me the days of the week in Japanese.  He first tried with a song... which I then managed to demonstrate how impossible I am to work with when it comes to pure verbal instruction.  We went over the song at least six or seven times, but I could neither memorize the words to the song nor show any comprehension as to what the meaning behind those words were.  But later on the train, he suggested that I create a mnemonic.  His advice was to just create any image that I would then associate to the word, but for me in my mind's infinite complexity, I needed to find a way to not only connect the sound of the Japanese word but also the kanji.  So here's the end result (sound associations are in blue and kanji is in red):

Getsuyoubi (月曜日) - Gettysburg fought on a Monday during a full moon
Kayoubi (火曜日) - King Kai, a fiery guy, works out on Tuesday
Suiyoubi (水曜日) - Sue swims on a watery Wednesday
Mokuyoubi (木曜日) - I plant plants in Mokuleia on Thursday
Kinyoubi (金曜日) - My kin gets paid on Friday
Doyoubi (土曜日) - The dirty doe eats dirt on Saturday
Nichiyoubi (日曜日) - Nietzsche hates sunny Sundays

The Scare

Okay, so here's the story which I think is my favorite story to tell about my stay here in Japan.  Be warned; this story is best told than read, so continue reading at your own discretion 

It started off with me texting back and forth with Matt as I was returning from Kawaguchi (3pm).  Our conversation basically ended with him saying he'll have curry ready when I got back home just as soon as he did a quick run to the store for some bread.  With that said, I thought nothing more of it and returned home (6pm).

Oddly enough though, when I got back to our apartment (and this was maybe three hours after I had been texting him) the door was locked.  I didn't think much of it, perhaps he had put off going to the grocery store until later in the afternoon, and he had just popped out.  So I just went down to our apartment common area to wait for his return, so I could get into our room.  As I was waiting in the common area, Sebastian came in and as soon as he saw me, said in his French-Canadian accent, "Did you know the police had gone to your apartment today?"

Apparently, another one of our neighbors had heard the police knocking around and asking for the people who lived in room 2-something or another.  All Sebastian gathered was that they were looking for a tenant who had just recently moved into the apartment, which left it to either me and Matt or the Koreans.  I was hoping it was the Koreans.

This seriously worried me.  For the next half-hour, worse case scenarios began to play through my head.  Maybe we had managed to do something illegal in the country, and the government would deport us?  The guys in the lounge didn't really help to allay my fears.  The consensus amongst them was that Matt was probably taken in to the police station.  What didn't help was that Matt hadn't been answering my calls or texts to him.  Charlie guessed that Matt may have gotten into trouble during one of his trips to the maid cafe.  Sebastian's theory was that he had gotten into a fight with someone.  I was worried about telling our manager about it since police involvement could affect our contract.  By this time, it was around 8pm, and Sebastian offered me fixings to make a sandwich.

With all this waiting around, Sebastian and Charlie decided to try and let me into my room by picking the lock.  They went at this for a good half hour or so until Carl, the manager, came up and told them to "Let a professional hand it."  Carl then proceeded to take the door off its hinges.  By no means was this an easy feat.  He worked on it for a good forty-five minutes with Eiji, our next door neighbor, nervously looking on.  Carl swore everyone to secrecy about taking the hinges off our door and somewhat causing it noticeable cosmetic damage.

At this point we told Carl about the police coming over and that missing Matt was probably in police custody for reasons unknown.  Upon hearing this, Carl simply shrugged it off saying he had had run-ins with the police before and it could be over something as petty as saying something while drunk, but gave his own crazy theory that Matt was probably in to little boys.  Around this time, Matt finally texted me back with a message of "I'm at the police... I'll be back soon I think.  Already been 4 hours about."  Upon receiving this, I immediately told the guys in the lounge, and once again theories began to fly.

Finally, an hour later (9:30pm), I get a call from Matt saying he's gonna be dropped off at the station and would be walking home from there.  However all evening, it was pouring rain, so I asked Carl to if he could give me a ride to the station in his car, and he happily obliged.  Just before we left the apartment, Eiji came out and asked me if either me or Matt had anything for dinner yet, which for Matt, was nothing.  So Eiji offered to make us curry while I went out to get Matt with Carl.

In the end, the whole police business was over nothing.  Matt, being the cheap man that he is, had taken one of the bikes that had been left at the apartment building and asked the police where he could find free parking for the bike.  When asked to provide registration for the bike, Matt couldn't provide any since it was borrowed, and when it police looked it up, the bike had been reported stolen two years ago.  All this caused an investigation, with fingerprints and mugshot, that lasted for a good five hours.

For me, though, that night showed me how awesome my neighbors were: providing me with something to eat when I was hungry; attempting to break into my room; taking off the door to let me in; preparing dinner for me and my roommate; and giving us a ride when we needed it.  This was above and beyond the call for me, and I am so grateful to have them around.

My Home Away From Home

Sorry for not delivering up on my post about where I reside here in Japan.  Hopefully this will make up for the lack of updating on my part.  So big picture; this is where I live:

Here's a closer view to put it relation to well-known places like Shibuya and Shinjuku.

The thing that confuses me is that when I tell people where I live, they get very sympathetic and usually respond with things like "Oh, yeah, there's nothing really there."  I got this reaction from someone who lives in Saitama right before I left Hawaii.   I was left dreading that I would be going to another McMinnville where the closest thing in the way of a night life were three bars; where everything closes at 8pm; and where the only 24-hour establishment was a 7 Eleven.  However, I think the Japanese have something different in mind when it comes to "boring" or "uneventful" because there are tons of things within walking distance of me.  Perhaps most Japanese natives want a Shibuya in terms of a "fun" city.

An even closer view of where I live (red marks where I frequent the most).

But I was glad to see that Kurihara is nothing like McMinnville.  I'm just a 15-minute walk from the Hibarigaoka Train Station, and along the way, there are a ton of small shops and restaurants.  Let's start from the station.  Across from the station (or south if you go off the picture above), there's a Seiyu (the Japanese equivalent of Walmart) as well as a small department store.  There, I can meet most of my apparel needs as well as any household goods.  There's also a bunch of food chains like a McDonald's, Mister Doughnut, and Baskin Robin's.

If you follow the red path heading north, every little building along that path is a shop up until the first corner.  There are little boutiques for clothes, a drug store, grocery store (Olympic), meat shop, fish shop... just about anything you can think of there's a shop for it along that one stretch.  The worse is this really tasty-smelling kebab shop that usually covers the street in the delicious aromatic scents of teriyaki chicken just off the grill.  It tempts me to buy some every time I'm coming back home (usually hungry).  But if you continue past my apartment there are bunch of other stores like a 24-hour Book Off , a DVD rental place, and more grocery stores.

As for the apartment where I live, it's a guesthouse, so there are people from all parts of the world (kind of). The manager's name is Carl, a native of Sweden, who lives with his daughter who he is borrowing from his ex-wife so that she can brush up on her Japanese.  Then there's Sebatian who's from Canada and lives with his Japanese wife; Charlie, a Chicago-lite, who works part-time as an English teacher; and Eiji, a Japanese native with an impressive English vocabulary.  Apparently we also have French, Scottish, and British neighbors, but I've yet to meet them.  There's a bunch of other people living here, I'm pretty sure of it, but I just haven't seen them around yet.  The neighbors I have interacted with, mostly Carl, Sebastian, Charlie, and Eiji, are probably the best neighbors I could have hoped for.  There's a good story that pretty much sums up their awesomeness but that's for another post.

My room is definitely a lot smaller than the ad let on, but it's just the right size for two to live in.

 Here's our room in a nutshell.  The bed in the back is where my roommate sleeps.  

Where do I sleep?  That's coming up later....

Another angle of the room.  The room came with a makeshift table that I sometimes use as a desk,

 but usually  we just put crap on it. 

In case you were wondering where my bed was, it's in the closet!  

I was just the right length to fit inside (lucky me).

So yes, this is home sweet home.  As I mentioned earlier, I'll talk more about my neighbors and then perhaps I'll get around to talking about my actual adventures!  Thanks for being good sports about my delayed posts.

Beginnings

So due to popular demand, I've decided to set up this portion of my blog for my travels in Japan.  Which I suppose will kind of be like I'm writing a mass email. Note to self: Look into other formats in the future.

Anyways, I had an awesome flight from Honolulu to Seoul sitting next to the nicest Korean kid who would try to translate the meals and drink service to me.  The two hour layover in Seoul was much more exciting for me than I had expected -- in an art-geek kind of way.  Just the architecture and lighting in the airport was great enough to get me to pull out my old camera and take a few shots.

Upon arriving in Japan, everything was a breeze - going through customs, meeting up with Matt (my friend with whom I'm rooming with), getting a phone.  We took the train and met up with his friends at Ikebukuro for some ramen.

It was definitely not the kind of eating experience you'd ever find in the States.  At that particular restaurant, you have the most limited human contact as possible.  We ordered and paid for the size and type of meal up front through a vending machine.  The server, from behind a curtain that surrounded the counter, would then give you a little form to fill out specifying how you wanted your ramen broth.  Then you eat your meal in a cubicle - never having to see the face of the people eating next to you or those who serve you food (water was given through your own personal dispenser inside the cubicle). So in sum, a very interesting first meal.

We made our way to our apartment near Hibarigaoka Station.  By this time it was around midnight, and we then proceeded to get ourselves horribly lost for an hour or so.  Despite the time, though, I was surprised to see there were still a handful of people heading home either on foot or by bike, and we did make it to our final destination.

I can already tell it's going to be difficult to be consistent in blogging, but next post I'll talk more about the neighborhood I'm living in (with maps & pictures!), my neighbors, and the job hunt.