Japan's Unlikely Visitor

October 31st - Busy Halloween Times

How is everyone? I’m sorry for not posting before now, but life has been busy and constantly evolving… leaving me with a hard time finding things I want to express in a medium like this. It’s Halloween day! And I’ve got my third Halloween party in the last week to go to tonight, so times are high on the celebrating…

In general, things have been just rolling along here. Everyone’s so happy this weekend because we finally have a holiday from school. Thursday, Friday and Monday are all class-free, so many of the international students are traveling around to various places in Japan. I might have done that too, but… The reason we have this holiday is because it’s school festival weekend! People from America (including me) might have a hard time imagining what this kind of festival might be about, but in Japanese schools it’s quite an important event for student life. At Nanzan for example, all the student clubs and organizations on campus (of which there are many many fairly serious ones - clubs are what students do here as far as extra-curricular activities go) set up some kind of booth or area in a classroom to celebrate something. Many have games, some have more informational and showy type sessions. For example, the Coffee Hour club I’ve helped with a lot, which strives to bring Japanese students and international students together, set up a room as what they call “Cafe de World”, where they’ll have people talk about their experiences abroad, as well as show all kinds of pictures and maybe even little events. I’m supposed to do something there for an hour each day too (the festival lasts three days - Saturday through Monday), so I’m a little nervous! I’m sure it’ll still be fun though. It really is just like a big festival that might happen anywhere, but they’re sponsored by the schools here… it’s interesting and a new experience. That’s why I wanted to stay here over the weekend instead of go away like so many others. Maybe if I hadn’t gone to Tokyo when I first got here I’d want to go somewhere, but I’m content experiencing this right now… From what I can see, there’ll be plenty of time for traveling during winter break and the spring when Japanese students are on vacation, and this is a precious opportunity that otherwise I couldn’t help but miss not having been brought up through the Japanese school system.

Notice I mentioned “when Japanese students are on vacation”… The reason I did so is because in the large part of my time here, I find myself hanging out and doing various things with Japanese students. I almost feel like I’m avoiding other international students… but I’m not doing it consciously! The Japanese are just so interesting, and as you know, getting to know them is why I came here. At first I saw them during club meetings, parties, maybe a dinner after a party, and of course karaoke… Lately though, it seems like I’m doing some slightly different things. For example, just Wednesday I went out with one girl and an international student who’s in my Japanese class to see a movie - my first time to a movie theater here, and boy it’s a different experience than in America - and afterward to an izakaya for food and drinks. An izakaya is a casual type restaurant here where they offer many selections of food that the group orders as a whole and then generally shares among each other. Food, and even drink, sharing in general is much more common here than in America I’m discovering, and so I suppose it follows that at the common hangout restaurants like izakaya, that’s just the basis of how things are served… Here’s a picture of me and a group of friends at an izakaya. Note this is not just three people like in what I described above that happened on Wednesday. That’s what I’ll be describing next…

This picture was actually taken when a few of us went to an izakaya after participating in the Hisai Matsuri on Sunday. That was some experience, I tell you… We participated in a contest run locally by producers of a popular TV show, and as those of you who know Japanese TV can attest, it was quite interesting… First of all, since we had to be at the location for rehearsal early Sunday morning, I decided to stay with some other of the students in a hotel the night before, since it’s over an hour trip to where we went. Here’s the crew after we completed a late night game of cards in the room…

To give you a little background, the group of people who went on this are part of what they call here a “zemi”, basically a kind of 4th year seminar, but it’s a bit different than how we know ‘em in the US… One of the Japanese girls in the class lives in this city and helped arrange everything for us. This isn’t really the type of thing I thought I’d be doing in a class here… To give you an idea, here’s a picture of us in the rehearsal room having a bit too much fun… The girl in front is the one I mentioned who helped organize the occasion for us.

For the competition, we did a dance to a popular Japanese pop song, but in the end we couldn’t beat out the cute kids we were competing against, and we didn’t win the $1,000 prize… We did, however, win the special prize (a bunch of ramen), and got enough of a score to get a medal too. The celebrity who hosted the show even gave us a nice signed poster. Here’s a picture of all of us afterward with him, another host, and  the ramen, as well as one with the smaller prizes.

Beyond that, and back to what I was talking about before, for the first time I really feel like I may be becoming part of a good group of people - those that participated in this. When I first got here I mostly was able to meet first and second year students, people who are interested in talking with foreign students but maybe not necessarily hanging out as much. Lately though as I’ve gotten to know older students - mainly fourth years such as ones from this class as well as a few others I’ve met elsewhere - I feel like I’m really starting to make some good “friends”.

For example, a girl from this class invited me to the Halloween party tonight that they’ve put together, and everyone also invited me and the other international students in the class to join them in their monthly “nomikai”s, the first of which is just a couple weeks away. A nomikai is something that can’t really be translated well into English, but it’s an occasion where people who are part of some group, usually a club or company, go out for drinks (and maybe a bit of food). Those of you who know a bit about Japanese work life and culture might know this kind of thing very well… Anyway, a bit more background is called for I think…

The Japanese students are taking this zemi to kind of follow them through writing their senior thesis, or sotsuron as they call it here. As such, they are all in the same major and have been together for at least the past couple years as they’re finishing up their university studies. It follows then that they’re all quite close, as can be seen easily in such things as them all using nicknames in class, even with the teacher (who by the way participated in the dance this past weekend - you might be able to notice him as one of the older guys in the pictures ^^). Thus, being able to hang out with such a tight group is a nice experience. That said, what I fully feel about it is hard to express because it follows that Japanese sense of belonging… I think as time goes on I’m just becoming more and more Japanese…

Probably part of the reason I haven’t posted much here lately is because instead of just seeing things that I can post random pictures of, most of my experience has been a social one. Sure pictures have been taken, but if you don’t know the people involved, they probably don’t mean as much… As far as I’m concerned, my time with Japanese students (and others) lately has been invaluable. My Japanese speaking skills have improved dramatically in just the two months I’ve been here, with new Japanese I meet sometimes even saying I’m fluent. I know I’m not there yet, but it’s still nice to hear. Also, it’s been a precious time to just learn about people. Sure I hang out with everyone for fun, but I’m also interested in what they think about life… where they’ve been, where they are, where they’re headed. Some things are the same, but some things are very different. I prided myself on knowing a good bit about Japanese society and culture before coming, but actually experiencing it is giving me a depth of understanding I could not possibly have received elsewhere.

On a slightly different subject, something a few of you might be curious to know about since I’ve talked about hanging out with so many Japanese people is whether I have found anyone as a really close friend, or even girlfriend… I mentioned those fourth years I feel I’m getting closer to earlier, but as for the girlfriend, it’s something hard not to think about around here, because it seems whenever I go out with Japanese people, guys or girls, especially if sake is involved, they always ask if I’ve found a Japanese girlfriend yet, and when I tell them no they generally answer either “Why not?” or “Oh I’m sure you will soon”, as if it’s somehow assumed. In fact, just this past week my best guy friend, who’s Canadian and lives in my dorm, started dating a Japanese girl. I’m sure that’s the type of reason they think it’s so common. But yeah, nothing for me yet, just a lot of friends :) But we’ll see if things are the same after the party tonight… ;) There is this one girl…

Geez, has it been only two months? In some ways that seems like a long time, but in other ways it does seem all too short as well. One thing I can say is that in the next two months, not even to mention the next seven, if I have a wealth of experience anything like I’ve had in these two months, I won’t ever be able to deny I haven’t tried to live my life. I wonder - how could the future possibly measure up? To me though, right now, the possibilities are beginning to seem endless. I already have experienced more things - fun times, interesting observations, just personal and shared feelings… - than I could possibly write down in something like this. Maybe some day we’ll be able to really talk about them, but for now, I’ll keep moving along, and I hope you will too. :)

Sights of Nagoya Take 1!

Hello! Rather than updating Friday’s post, I figured I’d just make a new entry with the pictures I was finally able to upload! I’ll try going in some kind of chronological order… though it doesn’t make all that much difference. First off, just the other day I was talking with one of my friends (Alvin, whose picture you’ll see shortly) about the difference between hanging out just in our private dorm room or in one of the lounge areas. He says when he’s in his room, he feels rather detached from the whole experience and as if he’s nearly even back in America again. It doesn’t really feel too much like Japan (because our dorm rooms are really quite similar to those back in the states). However, since I knew he lived in the basement, I asked him what kind of view he had. He said “Oh… just of the street… nothing special.” I nodded to myself and went on to talk about how, since I’m on the second floor and our dorm is on top of a hill to begin with, even in my room I can’t help but feel like I’m in Japan because my view is wonderful… and here’s a little bit of it for you all:

The houses tight together, the rolling hills, the observation tower in the background… Coming from Indiana, this and what else I can see screams ‘Japan’ to me. After it gets dark the tower even lights up until it closes at 9PM, a beacon of yokoso - welcome - to Japan for me. Plus, the houses are of a slightly different style than you’d see most places in American cities too…

The first really interesting, long and fun thing I did upon arriving here was going to the Higashiyama Zoo, of which that tower I can see from my window is the centerpiece. Since that was such a fun time, and since we had so many interesting people along with us, I have many pictures from it to share with you all. Actually, I took many more pictures of the animals, but perhaps I’ll leave them for a later ‘Animals of the Higashiyama Zoo’ post. :) For now, I’m focusing on the fun times had with others.

First of all, a couple of pictures just of the group that went. At the top/left is a Korean friend from my dorm with probably all of the girls that came along with us. Bottom/right is of me and a few of the girls I hang out with most - the one next to me is Haruka, and the two on the other side of her are actually international students as well - Natalie from Hong Kong and Yoshou from Taiwan respectively. Good people, all of them. :)

Next we’ll take a little break from the people to show a view of Nagoya city from the top of Higashiyama Tower.

You can see it’s a fairly large city, even though it may not have the skyscrapers of a place like Tokyo. The pair of tallest buildings far in the distance in the center are the central administration towers for JR, Japan Railways, which operates most trains in Japan aside from local subways. It’s a nice sight, isn’t it? Because of all the hills the university’s campus and my dorm are built on, I get views similar to this every day…

Now, back to the people and a little more ‘fun and interesting’ time. At the zoo, there was a little playground with big stone turtles that you could crawl inside and atop of. My friends being the fun-seeking people they are, even though we’re all mature college students, of course had to try them out…

The top one is Alvin, the friend from the dorm I told you about earlier, and a couple of embarrassed girls that tried to fit into the too-tight space together - Aya and Yukiko. The bottom one features Haruka and Cheon, my Korean friend, on the top with Aya and Jared, another dorm friend, nestled comfortably inside. I swear, everyone around me here is crazy.

Speaking of crazy, why do I feel like I have to go to karaoke? Because it’s Japan of course! Following is a picture of some of the girls and guys who I went to karaoke with last week having a great time singing along. And you know what? I believe I’m going again Saturday with a mostly different group. The fun never stops… Notable people in this pic are Aya again on the far right, and Jared and Yukiko on the far left. Kendrick, seen singing next to Jared, is also one I’ve talked quite a bit with here. Oh, I suppose I should introduce a little more… Jared is from near Ottowa, Canada, and Kendrick is from Mississippi, bringing some good ole’ southern flavor to Japan. Alvin who you’ve seen above is from Arizona State University, apparently the best college in the country (according to him of course).

Whew. Looks busy, eh? What better way to wind down from a week of walking around the zoo, visiting tall towers, and going to karaoke than having a yakiniku barbecue with the whole dorm gang! Yakiniku is a favorite dish over here, though because it tends to be expensive in Japan, most Japanese end up going to Korea to eat it… Weird… Anyway, here’s a picture of the guys from our dorm having fun this last Saturday:

Since this happened after my update on Friday, I’ll also relate a bit of how the rest of the day went… After having this for lunch, I scooted quickly over to a welcome party another of the social clubs on campus was having where we spent the afternoon playing games and making many more new friends. Afterward we had dinner at a wonderful Italian restaurant before saying good night and we’ll mail each other soon. I definitely would be lost without that keitai mail they have here… I was actually waiting for one from someone I met Saturday the last couple days, before meeting up with her and others at the coffee hour club meeting over lunch hour today. You know I realized that as of Saturday, I’ve now been a month in Japan. Time flies, eh? But life keeps rolling on…

Ah Japan…

September 26 - Busy Times in Japan

Hello again! Man, I hadn’t realized it was this long since I posted something here… Well, the past week or so at least has been insanely busy, so I have barely had time for any internet access much less enough to post something. I thought this might be a good time to post though, because like I said, I have been busy, so many things have happened lately!

Let’s see… Last time I really just posted about my arrival in Nagoya and the first things that happened, right? So much to catch up on! First of all, my class schedule has changed slightly. Basically I have opted not to take the Japanese literature class I was considering and instead picked up the Japanese society course for credit. We just had our first session of it yesterday (since the Japanese students here just started their semester last Friday), and it looks like it will be very fun and interesting. It’s the last class the professor is going to teach here, as well as the last semester for all the Japanese students in it - yep, they’re all fourth year students (apparently only in America do we call students Freshmen, Seniors, etc., so I likely won’t do it either from this point on)! This course is actually part of their thesis project, and so might be a little intense for them, but us international students mainly just need to observe and participate in discussions. Anyway, because it’s the last semester for all the Japanese, they’re also taking it as a kind of fun time, and telling us to relax… It sounds like our class might even be entering in some contest for a Japanese TV show. I don’t have all the details on that though, so I’m sure I’ll explain more later when more has happened with it…

Other classes are moving along. We’ve just finished basically the third week of them, so we’re beginning to get used to them a bit. The Japanese writing class I’m taking I’m actually enjoying a lot more than I thought I might - we’re writing about interesting topics, and it’s great practice for the characters and even just writing in general. The actual language class is a lot of work, but it could definitely be worse. We have our first speech coming up on Monday, so I’ll ganbaru (do my best)! Just today we received the results of an intensive exam we took last week that had four parts - speaking, listening, writing, and reading. It was intended to gauge the strengths and weaknesses of the students in the class, and not surprisingly I did better in writing and reading than in speaking and listening (since I rarely had the chance to speak much while at IU), but it kind of surprised me how well I actually did in the writing and even kanji (Chinese character) sections. I even scored nearly as high as many of the Chinese students in our class! Then again, in Japanese the kanji they know could have completely different meanings or readings… Still, they in general did quite well.

Okay, enough about school. Not everyone reading this will be interested in only that after all, right? :) My social life around here really got kickstarted last weekend when I and a few friends from my dorm went to the zoo that’s near our dorm. It was actually quite a large zoo with a good variety of animals - probably at least as large as most in the U.S. - but the most fun part of it was hanging out with the people we went with. We ended up having a group of 10+ people, which included 4 or so guys from our dorm, a couple Chinese girls from our international group, and several Japanese girls. It was a great opportunity to speak Japanese with them - probably the most I’ve been able to speak ever - and also to get to know them. After the zoo at the end of the day many of them had to leave, but 3 of the guys and 2 of the Japanese girls went a few stations down to a restaurant where we ate okonomiyaki. It was the first time for me to have that type of food, but it was quite delicious… I’d heard it was so from others before, and so experiencing it myself was wonderful. It consists basically of mixed vegetables and meat fried between two pancake-like coverings that reminded me somewhat of pizza, topped by various herbs and sauces. Here’s a picture I managed to find of it:

This is even one of those meals that you can even make yourself! The tables have one of those grill tops built right in, and the ten’in (shop worker) just brings out the fillings and other materials… Anyway, it was delicious! After we ate, we managed to catch part of a fall festival that was going on in the area of the restaurant, and saw some street performers as well as booths with all different kinds of food… One of my friends even ate basically a whole grilled squid! I couldn’t manage it because my stomach was feeling a bit queasy already…

That was a great day spent with and getting to know some people better, and at the end of it we got invited to go to karaoke with some of the girls and who knew who else on Tuesday, so that’s what I’ll talk about next…

The day started dreadfully. Class was tough, and it turned out I had to rush to do some internet homework since I wouldn’t have the chance later on. This resulted in not having enough time to eat at a school cafeteria, so I decided to skip out and try to find a quick cafe in Sakae (a place I’ll be referring to a lot in these posts since it’s basically the hang-out spot for young people in town), where I was to meet the others for the karaoke. Amazingly I did find a cheap cafe where I got a good sized bowl of donbury with pork (basically rice with deep fried pork on top and some sauces) and a bowl of miso soup for only about ￥300! That’s just a bit less than $3. Trust me, it’s cheap for something like that. Food prices are definitely something I’ve gotten used to…

Anyway, after stuffing some of that down my throat, I quickly set off to meet the group for karaoke, and it turned out we had quite a large group again consisting mostly of Japanese girls and some of my fellow international students. You may have noticed the things I’ve mentioned I’ve done with only Japanese girls… not guys… Well, for one, most of the Japanese students at my university are girls. Also though, the Japanese men in general just don’t seem as interested in meeting us international students… basically none are in the social clubs we’ve been able to join for example… so almost everyone is having trouble meeting Japanese guys to become friends with.

Well, back to the karaoke! For about ￥1000 each we rented the room for 5 hours, and as you can imagine it was a lot of singing… However, it was a good mix of Japanese and western songs, and I think a lot of us were surprised at how well the Japanese girls knew most of our American songs. For example, Avril Lavigne is everywhere around here, and even performed at that same place just last week. Crazy. For my part, it took me a while before I got the stuff figured out, but I attempted some good renditions of the Japanese songs, as well as one from Neil Diamond and even Eminem. Lose Yourself was totally the highlight of the afternoon.

After that, those of us who were left (which were a lot of the same left Saturday) found a restaurant to eat… yes! Okonomiyaki again! Awesome. One of my friends from my dorm swears that must be the favorite food of the one Japanese girl who’s kind of led us to these places so far… though she denies it. We’re beginning to wonder if she really knows what she likes…

The next day, Wednesday, our program sponsored a trip to one of the large Toyota plants south of the city. For those who don’t know, Aichi-ken (which is the governmental district Nagoya rests in - kind of like a small version of a state in the U.S. Small is the word too - Nagoya city takes up about half its size) is where Toyota was founded and its headquarters still resides. It was interesting, though not so much different from a regular factory tour, except at a museum they had there some things were quite cool. For example, they showcased a lot of their ideas for the future, one of which is… companion robots! You know the high-tech robots Japan is known for? Well, Toyota is one of the companies that promotes them. In fact, we got to witness a performance by a trumpet-playing robot. He played with so much emotion songs like Somewhere Over the Rainbow - as well as of course incredible ‘skill’ - that it wouldn’t be hard to imagine he may even have been nearly human…

Aside from the technological wonders though, this trip was another great time for socializing, though this time with just other international students instead of the Japanese. Still, I talked with one friend from my dorm quite a bit (named Jared), as well as a couple of the Chinese girls we went to the zoo with. We might even be doing karaoke with them next weekend. Everyone here is so excited to be invited places… though apparently whatever the relationship the guy is expected to make the first move. Talk about stressful…

Oh, this offers a good opportunity to talk about something else. I managed to acquire a Japanese cell phone (called keitai) not long after my last post. First of all, even though it was the cheapest one (free basically with signing onto the service), it’s still leagues neater than even an average one in the U.S. For example, I can watch TV on it for free… it has all kinds of crazy animations and other tools such as a dictionary… Oh, and of course it’s perfect for text messaging. Text messaging (called mailing here even though it’s basically just between phones) is nearly a vital part of having any kind of social life here. It’s how I’ve kept in contact and invited some of the Japanese girls out to do things… and also how I’ve stayed in contact with my dorm friends and the Chinese girls from the program. Keitai. Don’t leave home without it.

While typing this post and posting that okonomiyaki picture I’ve realized I can upload pictures in general it seems, so I’ll try to upload some of the other pictures I’ve taken in the next week to showcase more of what the city is like. For now, I think I’ve written quite enough, no? :) It should be enough to keep you busy on a Friday…

Until next time…

September 9 - Hisashiburi!

Hisashiburi! I use the Japanese term for “it`s been a long time”, even though I guess it hasn`t even been nearly two weeks, ne?

As you can imagine, these past days have been very busy getting set up and registered both in my new home of Nagoya as well as my new school for the year. On the 1st, I had terrible fun navigating the Tokyo subway with my two large, heavy pieces of luggage. My shinkansen was scheduled to depart from Tokyo Station at 11AM, so I thought that by leaving my hotel around 9:30-10 I`d have plenty of time to take the quick Ginza subway line there and maybe even pick up a bite to eat, right? Horribly wrong… I ended up boarding the shinkansen train bound for Nagoya with barely minutes to spare, having eaten no food, and having lugged my luggage halfway across Tokyo it seemed. Could I have done it an easier way, and maybe packed more lightly? Well, I don`t think I could have packed more likely, though I could maybe have paid for delivery… but this worked out. And if I only knew the food experience was just the beginning…

After arriving in Nagoya, a student from my program picked me up from the station and we headed for my dorm, after which I had a fun check-in procedure since the dorm concierge didn`t speak any English, and my student escort not much more, but I think I got everything taken care of.

The next week or so was a spiral of meeting people, starting orientation, and getting registered to live in Japan. I got acquainted with the cheap stores near my dorm, including a 99 yen (about 90 American cents) shop which we`ve all come to love for necessary items and food. We started orientation at Nanzan University with our language placement test (which I achieved a decent level at - one I`m happy with at least), a grand welcome ceremony where the university`s president (a French dude) and the program`s directors spoke, and a nice party where we met some more folks. This continued on with orientations to all the different things about university life, up until registering for classes and acquiring books the last couple days.

My class schedule looks something like this: most of it will be the intensive language course, and I`m also taking, for credit, a course on Readings in Japanese literature (entirely in Japanese which should be fun), Japanese Religions, and Japanese Writing (for writing practice at my language level). You might think literature and religion courses might be a little different for me, but they`re classes I need to take to fulfill requirements to graduate from IU… which I of course want to do. Thankfully I`m able to take them at least. Oh, and I also signed up to audit a course on Japanese Society, which IS more in line with what I do. Why audit, you ask? It`s also entirely in Japanese, looks extremely difficult even for Japanese students, and I don`t need the credits. I`m not sure if I could do all the work required at that level, but if it does look like I can, I could always add it as a regular course on my schedule. For now, I`m playing it safe. I have some time to decide.

Otherwise, I`ve done a lot of shopping for necessities, registered as an alien in my ward (kind of like a township), applied for an inkan (a personal seal needed here for doing things like opening a bank account), and even acquired a Japanese cell phone. The deal I got was darn cheap, and it`s still a heck of a lot better than most phones you can get in America. I can even watch TV on it free. I`m not posting my number here though because my minutes are limited. :) Going through the procedures to get a cell phone was fun, and so will be signing up for internet in my dorm, which it looks like I`ll be able to do in about a week to get set up a couple weeks from now. When that happens, you`ll hear from me a lot more.

I`m still not used to the food, though I think it`s getting better. There are at least plenty of cheeseburgers and hot dogs available if I need them. I`m trying to be Japanese and hang out with people more often, but when I do that my meals usually tend to become delayed or even non-existent… maybe I`m just much better off on my own…

I`ve been very congested the last few days with allergies or a cold or something. It`s not really bothered me aside from the fact of congestion - no sore throat or headaches or anything - but the coughing and hoarseness of my voice is annoying. Hopefully that will improve soon. Maybe I`ll have to check into what kind of allergy medications Japan has.

Oh… and a resident of my dorm drowned in the public tub over the weekend.

Interesting stuff, huh?

Sorry for no pictures. I`ll get some uploaded when I get internet in my dorm, or can hook up my computer at school. Until later - ja ne!

August 31 - Japan Day Four

Today was supposed to be a more relaxing day, and it started out that way, but it ended rather differently. I slept until about 11:30, and hung around my room for another hour or so. Then I hopped on the Ginza line to Akihabara Suehirocho station to see what was going on there on a Sunday. It was definitely much busier, and at least every block or so there was a maid advertising one cafe or another. In one little area under an overpass there were even three maids just steps apart handing out the flyers.

One of the draws of Akiba is some storefronts show different animes. I’m not sure if they’re new animes that just came out on DVD, special ones created by the store, or what, but they draw crowds of otaku (young men who like anime). There were a few watching one the other day, but not enough to take too much note. Today though the groups were bigger. For example:

There was also this truck that would drive around the Akiba area advertising an anime. Even though it’s just a truck, it’s curious because of the strangeness of the ad, and that it even played music from the anime that you could hear a block away. I take it the music is performed by the real life girls on the edges of the poster:

I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned it yet, but if you don’t know, Akiba is known for its electronics stores, as well as its being a center of the commercial anime (Japanese cartoon) industry. There are many young men in Japan whose hobby is almost strictly anime (the otaku), and so Akiba is the place for them to go…

After seeing some sights in Akiba, as well as eating lunch at a Mos Burger (a Japanese burger chain), I hopped on the Yamanote line for the long trip around the city to Harajuku. It was long, but cheap - at 160yen, the lowest fare charged for a train ticket. I really didn’t do much here as it was completely packed, but I saw a few more people dressed up as maids and in other outlandish outfits. I say “people” because in both here and Akiba there were quite a few crossdressers… For sake of your eyes, I won’t be including pictures of them. :)

After walking down Takeshita and Harajuku streets, I decided to save a bit of yen and do a little sightseeing by just walking the way down Aoyama Street back to my hotel. Along the way, I entered into one of the older parts of Tokyo with some of its more traditional sights - the longest I’ve spent in a place like that so far. There was a section of the Meiji Shrine complex where, after sitting on a bench to plan my route, I got bitten probably 10 times by mosquitoes. Sigh. At least I don’t think Japanese mosquitoes carry malaria. I did get this picture of one of the shrine museum buildings while in that park though:

From here, I walked around the Akasaka Imperial Residence, which is a palace that used to be one of the residences of the emperor, but is now used to house visiting dignitaries. I didn’t get the best picture of it since it was fenced off, but it’s the very large, wide building behind all the steel and trees:

After seeing all of these “parts” of shrines, I thought it would be good to actually see a real shrine. Aside from perhaps Meiji’s, what better one to see than the Yasukuni Shrine? For those who don’t know it, this is the controversial shrine that Japanese prime ministers have sometimes visited to pay respect to the Japanese soldiers who died in World War II and are enshrined here. Some of those enshrined include convicted war criminals, so China for one doesn’t like it when a head of state visits… Here are views of a couple of the buildings - the first, the actual shrine, and the second, an annex building. As usual, it started raining when the evening fell, so several people had their umbrellas out.

After this, I made the long walk back to Akasaki-Mitsuke station, which was longer than I expected, and since I was nearly dying of hunger and thirst and fatigue by 6:30PM when I arrived there, I looked around for food and ate at a wonderful Italian restaurant. I drank some kind of fruity beverage made with some alcohol brand I don’t know, and had fetuccini with tuna and mushrooms. It was also the first time I have used real silverware since coming to Japan. It was good, though I had to force the last few bites down. I’m thinking I might just have to start eating everything in small bites from now on…

Well! Tomorrow I check out of my hotel and hop on the Shinkansen at 11AM to Nagoya and my university. A student is supposed to pick me up, so hopefully it’ll go smoothly. Depending on how things go at my dorm and if anything interesting happens (which I’m planning on pretty much just resting and studying for at least a couple days…), it may be a little while before I post again. In the meantime, I hope you enjoyed my little tales of my adventures in Tokyo. :) I’ve definitely enjoyed my time here, despite the food issues. The concert last night was just about the icing on the cake. I’m not sure if Nagoya will be as interesting, but after this the time to rest and focus on my studies may be just what I’m looking for…

August 30 - Japan Day Three

Has it been three days already? In some ways that seems short, but for the most part it seems long. I suppose that’s a good thing - don’t want this to fly by too quickly!

I began the day by nearly oversleeping. I was to meet my friend from Yokohama, Maki-san, at my hotel between 9:30 and 10, and when I woke up and checked the clock it was 9:30. XD That’s what I get for being out at Roppongi so late at night I suppose…

Speaking of which, I suppose that’s really where I should start, huh? Since I didn’t talk about it the night before. For those who don’t know, Roppongi is one of the most… notorious…? bar scenes in the world. Something I didn’t really realize until I got here though, was that it’s really the place for foreigners to go. There were plenty of people who spoke English around, and being an obvious foreigner myself, about every few steps there was a black man trying to get me to come in for a “look” at one of the endless clubs that lined the streets.

I don’t describe them like that being uncaring, but it just struck me so much that every single one was a black man, when there are so few people like that around. Eventually one did get me into the bar when he claimed that it was just a regular bar - nothing fancy or too risque - which was what I was looking for. Drinks still weren’t the cheapest, but it was an interesting experience. There was a hostess inside, and it was an interesting variety of customers (mostly guys, though the guy working outside put much effort into getting a group of three Japanese girls to come in for a little while…).

So back to the morning. I met up with my friend, and after a short discussion of what to do, we headed off to Yokohama. The biggest impression of Yokohama is that… yes… it is definitely a port city as that’s obviously what it thinks of itself. One of its signature buildings is shaped like a sail billowing out into the Pacific. It has a huge shopping mall in a place called “Harbor of the Future”. We also went on an actual harbor pier… which was a very elaborate wooden building. Another small quartet was playing classical music (and one was singing too) inside. Apparently these kinds of concerts/shows are regular here.

The following pictures are of that pier and the skyline - the tall building on the left is Landmark Tower and a part of that big mall. The one pointing toward the camera on the right is the Intercontinental Hotel - the building shaped like a sail. You can’t see it as well from this side, but on the other it’s bowed in to have kind of a rounded arrow effect toward the ocean. The hall for my concert was somewhere in this mess near the harbor too. :) For the pier, you can see it’s wooden - below this ceiling is the hall which included where the quartet played.

Anyway, before we did anything else we went to Chinatown to get some lunch. I hear Yokohama’s China Town is one of the biggest in the world. I’m not sure if it’s quite as big as San Francisco’s… though I may not have walked around all of it. After sampling many types of the Chinese food at one restaurant where you could choose all you can eat from 100 dishes, I decided enough was enough and we moved on. I think I just can’t eat as much as I used to… though maybe the type of food doesn’t help as much either.

Anyway, after Chinatown we went to the harbor and looked around that wooden pier I mentioned. Today I was just trying to relax more and take things easy, especially since I was with a nearly 70-year old man, so we mainly looked around some places. That said, I think he’s in better shape than me, at least me after already having walked around Tokyo for 24 of the past 48 hours. Then we went to that big shopping mall and looked around a bit before going back to Yokohama station and to a cell phone store to see if I could get one yet. After much discussion with the helpful service girls at the store, I found I need my alien registration card, which I won’t get until I report to Nagoya. Oh well. No rush I suppose, ne? To get to the station, we rode a squat ferry Yokohama harbor utilizes called the Sea Bass, and saw a great view of the Yokohama Bay Bridge.

Then… it was off to meet my contact for the C-ute concert!! There was a bit of misunderstanding with Maki-san about where the concert actually was, but I finally made it there, to the large hall right on the coast in the Harbor of the Future area like I mentioned before. After a little trouble with tickets, we got in and the rest was awesome. It was intense and tiring, but watching the fans was perhaps as enjoyable as watching the girls. Those guys really get into their hobby. Some of the dances they do are insane. Well, since most of you who read this won’t know much about the environment otherwise, I’ll just leave this story for elsewhere right now. :)

After the fun time, Kristin (who was my companion for the concert - she’s a grad student from Hawaii studying about the same stuff I am… she’s leaving Japan within the next few days after being here 2 years on JET) and I talked about it a good while (it was nice having someone to talk with about that stuff), and had dinner in that big mall before taking one of the last trains back to Tokyo, where I didn’t do much before falling asleep after such a tiring day (mostly the concert, especially after the three days of walking I’d already done). That’s why I’m only updating now. Now it’s off to see if Sundays are really as fun as I hear around town! Before that, a picture I came away with from the concert that was a lottery pick Kristin was generous to give me since she doesn’t really like the girl and I do…

August 29 - Japan Day Two

Hello! Today was a day of much less travel, but still plenty of exploration. Thankfully it also started with not quite so early a start, and some surprising things happened throughout the day, but I’ll get to those in time.

First off I wanted to talk about some of my thoughts on things so far after two days here and immersing myself quite a bit. To begin with, I apparently really do not like cold green tea. Hot isn’t bad, but I’m starting to think even that may have been part of the reason for my sushi problem yesterday… Thankfully there seem to be plenty of other options. I even found a Mountain Dew today :) and it really turned my energy around I tell you…

Also, I have to say that Tokyo’s transportation system is by far the most convenient I have ever seen. I expected it to be from what I knew coming in, but like many other things amazingly have so far, it surpassed my expectations. Once I found the Suica card for paying my fares, it’s a breeze getting through the gates, and I’ve not waited longer than about 2 minutes for a train. They also don’t take too long to get to any area, though I think something that helps that is the location of my hotel. There isn’t anything right here, but there’s plenty of restaurants and convenience stores (more on those later too) near the station that’s just down the street. It’s kind of in the center of town, so it doesn’t take too long to get anywhere, even along any outskirt. Still, it’s amazing. More on that later too when I get to one of the “surprising” things of the day. :P

Oh, about the convienience stores, called “konbinis” here - they are literally everywhere. From am pms like I saw in California to 7/11s and Japanese chains, they’re always around if you need a drink or a quick meal (or a cheap umbrella, like I picked up yesterday…). I don’t think you’d really realize how common they are without being here and experiencing it though.

Also, sooo many services here are completely automated. I mentioned the vending machine for meal tickets at the restaurant I visited my first night. Purchasing any kind of ticket for a train is just the same - I tell you I was a bit anxious buying my $100 ticket for my trip to Nagoya Monday from just a machine, but I suppose that’s no different from the internet really, is it? Count in the infamous vending machines (which I always get drinks from - ahh grape Fanta), and many other services I can’t think of, and it’s quite an amazing lifestyle. Still though, they somehow manage to have people everywhere helping out too… Walking down any of the major commercial streets you have people crying out advertisements all along the way, and you’re lucky to walk through a store without hearing at least a few “Irasshaimase!”s from any staff you walk close enough to. I finally managed to get a tissue pack today from one of the people on the streets - you can’t really obtain tissues otherwise. Toilet paper was getting old.

Ok, after all that, about my day!

The agenda was to take the Tokyo Metro subway to Shibuya, explore the area there, then make the trek through Harajuku and to Shinjuku. These are probably the most famous commercial centers in Tokyo. When I arrived at Shibuya, I had breakfast at a McDonald’s near the station, but had enough time to spare for some pictures. Shibuya square is basically the Times Square of Japan, and is an incredibly busy station. In fact, the intersection outside of it is the busiest in the world - it’s estimated 2.4 million people cross it every day, and it’s famous for how it stops all traffic to allow pedestrians to cross from all directions.

The first picture is of people crossing the intersection, and the second is a shot of the square. The entire wall of the building under the “Q Front” is a giant screen showing ads and sometimes a shot of the people crossing, even though it’s not really showing anything in the picture… This place is also famous for the statue of Hachiko outside the station, a dog who loyally waited for his owner after he disappeared for years. It’s famous in Japanese legend and now a great meeting place in an area that otherwise is just a mass of humanity. Here he is, with the requisite schoolgirls behind I didn’t even notice when I took the picture…

I did a little shopping in this area - there are a couple of huge record stores here, including Tower Records and HMV. Instead of heading straight down Meiji Street for Harajuku and Shinjuku, I decided to take a little detour over to Omotesando, where I believe a shop for just about every designer label conceivable lies. Louis Vuitton, Gucci, Dolce & Gabbana… take your pick. I didn’t go into any. The reason I went this way was for Kiddyland, which is a crazy toy store I heard lots about from Jake and Bethany. And yes, I did see the bathroom signs! It beautifully uses it indeed. A shot of one of the floors I thought would be funny to a few people, especially because of a certain show I went to with my mom and aunt recently:

I didn’t realize it, but by the time I made it to Kiddyland, I was in Harajuku. I made my way to the entrance to Takeshita Street, renowned for its “unique” fashion and style…

I bought a shirt that says “Harajuku” here, because Harajuku is just awesome. I’m hoping to come back Sunday to snap some shots of the fashions that were all too tame today…

After walking Takeshita and picking up a “Strawberry Strawberry” (strawberries with strawberry ice cream and whipped cream) crepe from there (that wasn’t as good as the one from Akiba), I walked past the station on the way to Shinjuku. There was apparently some huge event going on at the Yoyogi National Stadium here, because there was an unending mass of girls and women crossing the bridge toward it. Did I say there were many women at the mall in Sunshine City yesterday? Out of these thousands of people, there were almost literally no men. I’m guessing it was for a concert of a boy band or something maybe… but who knows. I couldn’t tell. In any case, I’ve seen more extreme cases of segregation here (even if not necessarily designed) than I could have even imagined in the US.

As I walked along, I wandered around trying to get to a shrine (that I couldn’t get to unless I circled way around from where I was), and eventually made my way through a quiet residential neighborhood. I believe I could live in one of those apartments… Wouldn’t it be awesome to live in Harajuku? After stopping for a break in a tiny “park” (that was really no more than a few benches on a patch of dirt) after finding the elusive Mountain Dew in a vending machine, I arrived at Shinjuku. I wasn’t sure where I wanted to go here, although an older Japanese gentleman very kindly tried to give me directions to the nearby station. But then I saw the Kinokuniya store on the map…

I’d had trouble finding a certain book in my time here, and attributed it to not yet finding a “real” book store. Well now I had. It was the largest store I’ve yet seen in Tokyo, with floors that actually covered some good area - and it still had 9 of them. I was in true heaven for the first time since certain stores in Akiba, and easily found what I was looking for. I sure hope there’s one of them in Nagoya. If I find one, I’ll be happy and probably won’t care to go anywhere else for books or media (unless there’s perchance a Book Off too). Here’s the sign on the outside of it:

After forgetting my umbrella at the register on the 6th floor, my feet were starting to get to me and it was starting to get late in the afternoon. I wanted to see the skyscrapers, but it didn’t seem like there was too much else around of interest. I did make it to the skyscrapers at least… First here is a shot of that Do Co Mo building that I mentioned from a picture I posted yesterday, and then of the skyscraper district I also mentioned.

The Do Co Mo is the only building I’ve seen in Tokyo city proper shaped like that. The curvy building to the left and front of the other picture was described as the “Mode Gakuen Tower”. Gakuen means school, but if that’s a school, I don’t know what I’m doing going to Nagoya… I wanna go there! Due to the skyscrapers and Kinokuniya, I think I have to say Shinjuku is my favorite place so far along with Akiba, although Harajuku gets points just for its unique awesomeness.

After taking those pics I made my way back to Akasaka-Mitsuke where my hotel is near, which was conveniently again accessible from Shinjuku on the Tokyo Metro subway, in fact from a station right where I took that last picture. I ate a nice Japanese meal of tempura over rice (Excellent Tendon it was called), and now I’m back here! I watched an anime featuring voice actors I know (Kirarin Revolution for those who also know - for those such as Jake and Bethany who don’t know it but maybe should, well, you guys need to get up with the times!) while writing this up.

Now, I said there would be surprises, didn’t I? I got in touch with someone online who is going to a concert tomorrow of one of the groups that motivated me to want to come here in the first place. If you know me, you know the kind I mean… Amazingly, she has an extra ticket and invited me to go! It’s in Yokohama, and interestingly enough, I heard from an old Japanese teacher of mine who lives in Yokohama - Maki-san - and was considering going there tomorrow anyway!

So that’ll be the plan for tomorrow - go to Yokohama and spend some time with him during the day, and hit the concert at night. It should be fun as hell. I also asked him if he’d take me somewhere I can get a cell phone, because from what I hear I should be able to now. Once I have that, I can start calling some of you as well, as well as keep in touch with friends around here, who are quickly coming out of the woodwork.

Does it seem like I’m having a good time and things are going (quite amazingly) well?

~ Jacob 

August 28 - Japan Day One

Hello! Well, what a difference a day makes! In my “hello” and question messages last night I told a few of you about the issues and slight worries I was having about dealing with people and getting around here. Some of the dealing with people issues are still there… but getting around is getting much easier! Oh! By the way, about my first experience in Japan after landing at Narita airport was using the restroom, and it had one of those fancy Japanese toilets they all talk about. Funny thing, the bathroom in my hotel has one too… Here it is!

The buttons next to the seat are for all the fun stuff, and even the flush handle is special… Some of you might think posting a picture of a toilet is strange, but well, this is Japan, and I never said this blog was going to be clean all the time! :P

I began the day buying just a regular ticket to get from the Akasaka-Mitsuke station, which is the subway station just down the street from my hotel. It’s run by the Tokyo Metro company, which is one of the several companies that run the subways throughout Tokyo. Perhaps the most well-known train company (and that isn’t normally a subway) in Japan is JR - Japan Railways - but we’ll get to that more in a bit. There is no JR station close to my hotel, so the subway it is! I ran into a little problem using the ticket, but with a little help from the station attendant, I got through! Where did I get through to, you ask? Well, to the Tsukiji fish market! I was debating whether to go, but I woke up at 6 with a decent amount of sleep, so go I did! I hopped on the Tokyo Metro line to Ginza, and then walked the short distance from there to Tsukiji (no other train was very convenient, and it was a good walk in the morning!).

Waking up at 6 you ask? Well, for those who’ve not been there before, the market is only open early in the morning - if you get there after 8, you’re really too late. I was late enough as it was since I was messing with the trains and all. Anyway, Tsukiji is the largest fish market in the world, and so a tourist attraction… Here’s a picture of the inside of part of it:

People who’ve been there know, but those little forklift-type vehicles are everywhere! You have to step carefully not to get run over…

After looking around the market a bit, I thought I’d try to find one of the fresh sushi places near it for breakfast. I did find one, and ordered a relatively cheap variety sushi plate. I almost got the roe down…

After recovering from the breakfast, I hopped back on the Tokyo Metro line and rode it to Suehirocho station, which is basically in Akihabara. Ginza, Tsukiji and Akihabara (herefore known as Akiba) Are all on the east side of the city not far from the coast - I thought I’d make it a day to stay over there and see what there is to see. I spent a lot of time at Akihabara, and I’ll likely be back Sunday I believe too…

Why? Well, Akihabara for those who don’t know is a place with a ton of electronics stores, as well as hobby stores for people who well, have anime or related things as hobbies. You might be able to tell why I completely loved the place… I thought I would, and it totally lived up to expectations. When I got there, there was one pleasant building welcoming me (and everyone else I suppose):

You can probably begin to recognize the type of place this area is by the look of the building… Here’s another building, with me in front of it to prove I really am in Japan for those who might not believe it:

Again, for those who don’t know, that’s the Laox Electronics building. They sell things from appliances to TVs and cell phones in a very vertical space. Vertical is definitely the word for Tokyo - stores are laid out nothing like the places I’m used to back in the states. Each floor is very tight and small, maybe the size of a convenience store in the US, and most decent stores have at least a few floors of merchandise.

I began my business day in Akiba at a Book Off store, which I heard about from some friends online. It’s basically a big used bookstore that sells DVDs and CDs and stuff too (kinda like a half-price books like in Indiana…). Got 3 singles and an album for about $5. Not too bad… Then I looked in many other stores, buying a single I’d been waiting to get that just came out this past week at one. I was looking for a certain photobook too, but couldn’t find it… I figure I might be able to pick that up in a regular big bookstore the next few days in Shibuya or such. After all, there are no “regular” bookstores in Akiba…

I finally recovered from breakfast enough to have a crepe around lunchtime. By the way, I’ve bought drinks from vending machines basically all the time when I’m out - vending machines are basically everywhere, and 120yen for 500mL of grape Fanta is not a bad thing! Oh, the random thing from Akiba - one of the shopfronts had penguins in the window. I kid you not (though Bethany may not like this part…). Here is the picture to prove it!

After satisfying myself with Akiba for now (I told you I’ll be back! Sunday should be a good time - all the fun stuff will be going on since people will be off work and having fun there…), since I’d gotten such an early start I decided to head to Ikebukuro for the rest of the day and explore Sunshine City. Before leaving Akiba though at around 1pm, I caught the first of the day of their famous maids:

They were so nice to pose for the picture… Although I’m sure they are quite used to it…

So after that picture I for the first time hopped on the JR Yamanote line, since it’s the best way of getting from Akiba to Ikebukuro. At this point I had figured out enough to get one of the prepaid cards, which can just be scanned at the station entrances and are MUCH easier to deal with. It works on all lines for all companies, and I’ll be riding them enough the next few days that I’m sure it will be worth it…

Upon arriving in Ikebukuro, I found that the area between the station and Sunshine City is quite commercial, offering quite different store and shop options than Akiba… By now you may be wondering what this Sunshine City is all about. Well, it’s a huge city center that includes a large shopping mall and a possible ride to the 60th floor of the Sunshine 60 building for a 360 view of the city. I did that per the advice of one of my friends (you know who :)), and although it was cloudy and rainy (which it will be my whole time here), it was still a nice sight.

This is just one partial view out one side of the building… Tokyo is truly a huge urban center. The line of skyscrapers in the back is the Shinjuku Skyscraper District (which I’ll be seeing much more up-close soon!), and the lone building sticking up toward the left on the horizon - it’s slightly pointed to make it more identifiable - is the NTT Do Co Mo building. Do Co Mo is one of the largest telecommunications companies in Japan.

After having a nice cocoa at the top of the city, I came back down to realize the mall was literally designed for women. Seriously, I think the only men around were a scant few escorting their girlfriends… and it was quite packed. Definitely a different atmosphere than Akiba, which is mostly for men (electronics and pretty-girl cartoons, duh. I haven’t even emphasized the “pretty girl” aspect here other than the maids, but those who know me know it’s something I didn’t mind either…). End result - I really didn’t have anything to do here, except I saw my first Japanese GAP and UNIQLO stores, which I’ll get used to if I ever have to buy regular clothes here…

The one exception was a nice concert that was going on in the mall’s main plaza. It was a small unique quartet group performing what they called “Ghibli - the Best”. Studio Ghibli makes some of the finest anime moves for those who don’t already love them, and many have made their way to the states, most pronounced of which was Spirited Away, which one an Oscar a few years ago. Their music is really nice, and it was a nice break to at least stand and listen to them. Here they are:

It was a quartet of girls playing keyboard at the left, violin next in line, and cello. The rightmost is a guy playing harmonica. That might sound strange, but I’ve never heard a harmonica played like that, and it gave great emotion to the music.

Before leaving Sunshine City, I stopped at the post office which was conveniently located near the elevator to the 60th floor observatory. Post offices do much more than mail in Japan, though less since the government split them from the central banking system. Still, there one of the few reliable places to find international ATMs… I withdrew a wad of money to get me started in the next few days/weeks, and headed back to the station, stopping at Wendy’s for an early dinner on the way since it was about 4:30 and considering the day I had, I thought it was appropriate timing. Yeah yeah it’s Wendy’s, but I’ve been eating Japanese ever since I got here, and I was still a little worried about my stomach from the morning! I don’t think 3 out of my first 4 meals being Japanese is too bad - I had a small bowl of soba last night, which was another experience since I got introduced to the vending machines which dispense tickets for your meals, which are apparently common here - and when I walked by the Wendy’s, that just sounded good!

Once there, I bought the ticket for the shinkansen that will take me to Nagoya on Monday since I now had the cash after stopping at the ATM. Then I hopped on the Tokyo Metro again, which conveniently went through the Ikebukuro station, back to Akasaka-Mitsuke and my hotel. I might go out a little later for a little supplemental bite to eat and a drink, but I wanted to write this up and just send some emails from resting - you can’t blame me, can you? You should be happy from the long report. At least I hope you are… I was out about 12 hours today after all since I got such an early start…

I’ll hit the Roppongi clubs tomorrow night (Friday night should be fun there), after spending the rest of the day in the Shibuya-Harajuku-Shinjuku area I think. More reports then, though I *may* not write quite as long… Just watched some anime on TV (can you believe it was Prince of Tennis?), and now a little news is on. Weather looks rainy again. You saw what it was like in the shot of the Tokyo skyline - on the news they’re giving reports, apparently they’re having really bad flooding this year with all the rain. Mata ashita! (Until tomorrow!)

Jacob