I am so sweaty here. It's not even a nice hot like Thailand, its just moist. All the time. Apparently there's a hot-humid season, a rainy season (which is also pretty humid), a cold winter (which is made worse by their choice of origami paper for walls) and then some nice days in November and March I think. Japanese weather sucks.
The end of job training went ok. Pretty long days but we got to stay in a hotel, which was kind of nice. The hotel room got me used to the size of my apartment but I'll talk about that later. We went out to the bar a few more times and had some fun. My favourite night was when the Aussie and I went to this tiny Japanese hip-hop bar where about 30 Japos, dressed in ridiculous hip hop clothes were taking turns DJing and rapping on stage. Needless to say, we were the only white people/people over 5'6/people with self-respect in the place. For some reason, as we were about to leave, this guy grabbed my junk and encouraged his girlfriend to do the same. It turned into a frenzy as Adam and I had to flee with several Japanese rappers chasing us with outstretched hands, girlfriends in tow. Nothing is much funnier than Japanese hip-hop culture. If you think white guys trying to be black are funny, you should see the Japos do it. For example, these "hardcore" guys live with their parents until they're 30, read comic books for fun, and think girls are gross. But it's all about image in Japan. I watched 4 guys playing basketball surrounded by admirers, somehow consistently managing to miss lay-ups. But they had the right basketball gear on so they were good.
Mark. My God. I had had enough of that guy by the time training was over. He would ask me at least 50 questions a day, and that was with me trying to avoid him. He came into my room one night without knocking to ask me something. This was at like 3am. I thought it was some horrible dream until I saw the crumbs from the chips he was eating on the floor the next morning. We were doing some feedback form at the end and he actually asked me what his motivations for coming to Japan were. He tried to get my email at the end but I refused. I didn't want to write this email:
Mark,
Yes, shorts are the same as pants, you can't just jump into them. One leg at a time man. And I forgot whether or not you like curry, might have to give it a try. Talk to you tomorrow.
Love Bouche
So training ended and I moved into my new closet. It’s very small. I hit my head on the lights everyday. It is really nice however and pretty close to a train station, which is very handy. I am in the hair salon district of Osaka apparently. No restaurants but tons of hair salons. Sometimes I just want to scream, "I am a hungry man with a receding hair line! Stop mocking me!"
Japanese people are pretty weird. They are really shy but wear the most ridiculous outfits. I think they are shy because they don’t want to have to speak English to me and fail. Its kind of cool, if I want a seat on the train, I just get close to one of them and start whispering English. They clear out pretty quick. There are the few Japanese people who like practicing English and it usually comes out in a quick ejaculation of English, "HellomynameisYukihowareyouIamfineandyou?". But these are rare. The failure thing is the main reason they don't try their English, but apparently failure isn't followed by immediate suicide in Japan as I previously imagined. I figured if a waitress spilled your water that was it. It was like, "Uh-oh. Well, looks like the end of the line for you, eh? You've lived a long enough life. Well, to be honest, I can't really tell, you could be anywhere from 13-35. I can never tell with you Japanese. Anyways, thanks for taking our order, if you could tell your replacement about the no-wasabe thing for my sashimi before ending yourself, that would be great." I mean, it’s still really popular here, but less rampant than I had been led to believe.
They have bikes on the sidewalks here, which is very annoying, and made worse by the fact that everyone and their dog has a bike. I've almost been run over a few times and have taken to walking on the road. It’s safer. Its horrible in the rain too because they still hold an umbrella over their head while biking (actually its pretty funny), but they hate getting wet so much they will sacrifice their vision to stay dry. So all you see coming at you is a bike with little legs churning away, with an umbrella pointed at you like a lance. The guy on the bike has no idea what’s in front of him, but he's dry so he's doing fine. I've seen 4 head-on collisions. I usually just congratulate the winning knight on a good joust and move on.
So, my work. Its going pretty good. I work maybe 3 hours a day on average but some of the kids are little shits. Apparently you can't punch 6 year olds in the face here in Japan so that isn't an option. There is this communication book that you and the Japanese teacher who gets them most of the time write in, so that everyone knows which kids are problems, etc. For one class, the JT wrote, "Ayaka is a very funny girl/Ayaka was very funny today/ Good class, Ayaka was funny as usual :)", etc. So I figured she just had a good time and liked jokes. Turns out, "funny" means a sexually aggressive special needs child. I suppose, in hindsight, some people would find that funny, but I wasn't prepared for that. For an hour, I was molested more than a pre-teen Swedish boy at Neverland ranch. The kids molest themselves as well. The "kancho", also known as the "salmon" back home, is very popular. The weird thing is, some kids just sit there while it’s being done to them, with a huge smile on their face. Not even flinching. I just give them strange looks and continue on with the lesson.
Ok, almost done, I promise. I have this video I sometimes play while the kids are coming in, to calm them down while I sort them out and the song, "London Bridge is falling down" is on it. I've never really listened to the lyrics, and this might just be the Japanese lyrics, but its messed up.
London bridge is falling down, falling down, falling down,
London bridge is falling down, my fair lady.
FIRST VERSE: Build it up with mud and clay, mud and clay, mud and clay.
Ok, there's always some comedian at these meetings, very funny. Let's move on.
SECOND VERSE: Build it up with stone and mortar, stone and mortar, stone and mortar.
We're getting some progress now. Might not work for a major bridge in a city like London though. Lets keep it mind, however, if we ever have to do a project in Saskatchewan or something.
THIRD VERSE: Build it up with iron and steel, iron and steel, iron and steel.
Nice. That will probably work right? But no, the morons in charge decide that iron and steel will collapse and bend. What are you gluing this together? Something to keep in mind when you're going over Second Narrows though. So they throw that idea out and keep going.
FOURTH VERSE: Build it up with GOLD AND SILVER.
Yeah I can't see why that would be a problem. Why not? I’m sure we just have tons of gold and silver lying around. Why not build it up with panda bears and brave Frenchmen? So they figure that this might not work cause it would be stolen. So...
FIFTH VERSE: Get a watchman for the night.
This guy is sitting on a stool in the video with nothing. Not even a stick. A guy with a small rock and a medium level of determination could render this guy useless. But the big problem, according to the brainiacs in charge, is that he'll fall asleep at night. So...
SIXTH VERSE: Give him a pipe to keep him awake.
This is their solution. Smoking tobacco. So we started with a renovation of London Bridge and ended up with a gold and silver bridge with an unarmed guy sitting on it at night smoking himself to death. This is how Japanese children are learning how bridges are made. Precious metals and tobacco. I sat transfixed with rage at the TV screen while kids were headbutting walls and sexually assaulting themselves around me.
So that's about it. I'm getting the Internet in a couple weeks, which will make things easier. My address, if anyone cares, is
583-0856 (this is the postal code)
Osaka, Habikino-shi
Hakucho, 1-4-13
D-H Hakucho Biru #301
I have a couple good weekends coming up, my buddy from Saskatchewan is coming over in early August and its my birthday next week so there will be drinking and laughing at Japanese people for all. Ok, goodbye.
Bouche
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