Mission accomplished

Here I am in my new place. There are trees outside, the air is noticeably easier to breathe, the streets wider and the whole atmosphere of the town much less busy than before. To think I moved about 6.6 kilometers and 4 stations away! (although I am now technically in Saitama prefecture and not Tokyo) But that's the difference a little distance makes in this cramped corner of the world. I went from cement-box city and living in a crappy one room apartment to a spacious 2DK (3 rooms, including a full kitchen) with a park visible from the window. There's a baseball diamond and a running track in the park, not to mention tennis courts I'll never use. The public library, post office and public gym including basketball courts (!!) are all a stroll away. I haven't played basketball in almost 2 years, and I hear there's a club here, I might just have to join. They know they want the tall white dude on their team. Oh, and the kicker is since it's a public gym it's only 100 yen per entry, about a dollar compared to the 9000 yen monthly I was paying before, close to 100 dollars!! Goodbye Tobu-Nerima. In fact the the night before I moved, having pushed myself to attending a friend's closeby concert even though I new better I remember walking home and cursing out every corner of the city. Ya know, because I could. Suffice it to say I'm already much happier here.

Speaking of happiness, I broke up with the girl I was seeing last weekend. That was my first real breakup over here, and we dated for almost 4 months. It's all for the best and I'm better for the experience and all that wash, but what I learned more than anything else - besides the fact that my lack of of passion for rabid consumerism a.k.a. not loving "going to shopping" kills my chances with about 99% of the women in this country - is what it's like to date in Tokyo. One word: busy. I've grown to dislike that word ever since I first moved her but most especially while I was dating this girl. People put themselves through impossible schedules here, and this particular lady was working two jobs simultaneously both of which were her own business ventures. I thought that was pretty cool at first... until I realized it meant the chances of seeing each other at least once a week (or even twice a month) was comparable to the likelihood of icicles forming in a volcano. We had fun anyhow, and I'm over the bummed out phase which follows any breakup and enjoying my newly re-discovered freedom. I could say a lot more on the subject (I sort of let it overtake my life for a while because I'm gullible like that) but I'm not the kind to flood my blog with such "emo" posts. Not when there are much more urgent things to write about, like....

-how I'm enjoying working at kindergarten's more than I had expected. Not only is the supplemental income quite a nice bonus, but the work is hands-on, high speed and excellent life experience to boot. Definitely a young man's game though, so best be wary of how long I wade in this pool (and how yellowish the water is)

-how I'm reading Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged, not because it's over 1000 pages... ok that's part of it, but not JUST because of the density and my attraction to ridiculously huge goals (see: mastering Japanese and becoming competent in Mandarin Chinese before 30; teaching at colleges; world domination) I'm intrigued because a) I like anything remotely philosophical and b) so many people love and hate this woman. I specifically remember an episode of South Park where I think Officer Mackie calls it the most boring book ever or something to that effect. Never one to blindly accept opinions, I had to see for myself. Plus the Singaporean kid who sold me all his awesome furniture for really cheap gave it to me when cleaning out his apartment. A double win situation.

-how my new place is pimped out. I can cook now: 3 burners and a decent-size fridge at long long last. I just came back from the supermarket with a haul of vegetables and meat and I am elated. My diet and workout have went to crap in the last 2 months, really got to get back into the rhythm now that I'm almost settled in.

And on and on I can always go. More writing means more to proofread though, which in turn means the less chance I'll actually do the proofreading and then you won't ever be reading this at all so I'm cutting the line soon. But before that, one more thing: My work schedule is heavy lately, that's my excuse for not putting as much into the blog.... but I've realized something very very important in recent days. Dire. On the verge of epiphany even: I like the busyness. Am I becoming a tokyo-ite like my workaholic of an ex-girlfriend? Not the case at all. I have this habit of getting trapped in my head and over-thinking in roughly 23 directions at once, and the only way to stop this train without hooking myself up to a morphine drip or going into a coma is to keep myself moving. Almost constantly. When I'm teaching, as grueling or tiring as it can get at times, I'm engaged in a dialogue with another human being(s) that has a distinct purpose. I was telling myself over and over that I had taken on this extra workload for the money, save for college this and that but it's really all secondary. What's first and unalterabley foremost is I've found work I enjoy doing! Not to mention I'm young and full of energy I need an outlet for, so I've wedged myself into the system. Sort of like that last tetris block that needs an extra bit of toggling, I didn't go quietly or without a struggle but here I am. In the machine. Part of the system. A cog in the beastly machinery.

Here's an uplifting poem I wrote on the train home today:



And I leave you with this note to all listeners of anything remotely metal: Starkweather's "This Sheltering Night" is the best record of 2010, period. Go buy it. Good day to you all.

"Father pestilence rasps in cicada speech / His countenance crowned in a halo of flies / Multifaceted gaze transfixed on the hourglass / Tactile sensory perception in crepitant hands // Reveals flaws in parchment derma / A regalia of weeping sores / In this place where the air is stagnant with the weight of disinfectant and decay / An unknown geography to place his head to the ground / Commune with all creatures damned and divine / Teeth rattling tremors emanate from approaching footsteps // Time has always been the enemy / I wish to slip this skin for rebirth" - Starkweather

Thinning out

Much like my unfortunate hairline (rimshot) you can see a the blog updates here becoming more and more sporadic with time. I think this is natural with any project: it starts off with a bang and slowly loses steam. The real challenge however is to keep it going, and that's what really matters. So some months there may be only 1 post, sometimes 10, but more important than anything else is that I won't just leave it one day and never return, which is a fate left to many blogs and strikes me as a bit of a slap in the face to those who may have enjoyed reading it.

Moving is the word of the month. Everything I do seems to revolve around it. Overtime is arguably the second word of the month. Excluding the week of public holidays when my Mom was in town, I've had something like 6 actual days off in a 2 month period. That's not so much fun. Also working a lot of long days, like a 10am kindergarten gig over an hour away, and a following shift an hour in the opposite direction that goes until almost 10pm. The work itself is fine, it's the hours that can get to me a little. I try to make the best of my hours on the trains by reading or studying or vegging on the Simpsons season 5 which I just put on my iPod. Guaranteed good times.

Last night, while wrapping dishes in bubblewrap and filling boxes and other unfun activities, I lightened my mood by cooking some beef and chicken wings which I threw over bread in an open-face hot-sandwich style and downed with a bottled Heinekin I bought from Donki (a walmart-like store in Japan with a cute penguin for it's mascot). This may seem rather mundane, but it is a vast change from a) drinking Japanese beer (which is fine but entirely different) and b) my healthy diet I was adhering to for the last few months. In fact, my plan to eat lots of vegetables and less fried food, which was going very well for since January or so, has went to the dogs recently. Not 100%, because I still eat what fruits I can but I can't do any real cooking for a week or two. This is a nuisance but I'll just have to live like one of these usual Tokyo-slobs and eat convenience-store food and general shit for a while. Isn't the worst thing in the world.

What will I miss about my current neighborhood? Certainly not the crappy apartment itself, or it's *shudder* shared bathroom facilities. How about....

-my friend and neighbor Nicholas, the punk-rock English teacher
-the gorgeous walking path that helps me forget I'm in the middle of an urban wasteland
-the 100 yen store, grocery and department stores all very conveniently located next to the station
-the crazy lady who talks to her dog while he squats in a special baby-carriage-looking-thing she pushes him around town in.

That's about it.

My new place is/has:

-a spacious 3 room apartment with kitchen, shower etc....
-a balcony
-a view of the park I can walk to in 2 minutes
-located 4 minutes from my station, which will also give me access to 4 train lines and not just 1.

There's a look at it. Now back to the endless piles of paperwork and things I'm preparing. I'll have the world know that I set up my internet installation on the phone in Japanese without making a putz of myself either. Ha HA world, ha HA.

"It's one fast move or I'm gone" - Ben Gibbard and Jay Farrar

P.S. I do make liberal use of my P.S.'s here, don't I. Recording studio in 3 days. No nervousness here. I only have 2 riffs to play and a minute to record, but it'll cost over $100 easily and take 5 hours! WOOHOO!!!!

An unfortunate (but not altogether unexpected) hiatus

hiatus |hīˈātəs|
noun ( pl. -tuses ) [usu. in sing. ]
a pause or gap in a sequence, series, or process
ORIGIN mid 16th cent. (originally denoting a physical gap or opening): from Latin, literally ‘gaping,’ from hiare ‘gape.’

It's much to my dismay that I write this post, but as the Japanese like to say: it cannot be helped! しょうがない (shouganai). Due to an impending visit from my Mother - her first time in Japan! - and all the other aforementioned extra work I'm in the middle of: 6 day work-weeks, a weekly morning kindergarten shift topped with a normal until 10pm shift and some business overtime classes, not to mention how I tend to use my free time studying Japanese as much as is reasonably possibly, I can't expect myself to keep up the blog this month. Better to out and say then leave the loyal devotees refreshing the page every couple of days.

There is reprieve for me however; a few days before the week of Spring holidays, properly designated "Golden Week," my Mother will arrive on this fair island. Which means traveling once again across the landscape of Japan, to Hiroshima, Kyoto, Nagoya and beyond. It'll be my first time taking the world-famous bullet train as well, which should be interesting! (I did the sketchy but cheap nightbus last time..... NEVER AGAIN)

I will make quick mention however that I've also decided, after a year and a half in my current location of sunny Tobu-Nerima (a suburb on the north-western end of Tokyo, near adjoining Saitama prefecture), I will most likely be moving within the next 2 months. For the sake of being closer to my work, a bigger apartment, my own private bathroom, and a change of pace. That may also clog things up a bit on the blog-front. I am however quite excited at the prospect of it all! If only I wasn't such a packrat, and didn't insist on keeping all these books, the dresser, the kitchenette, the fairly new acoustic guitar, the 4-foot disco lamp, the persian rugs, the gold-seated toilet... well it would be a much easier task. However I'm possibly going to get a friend to rent a car and help me move, which should help ease the financial burden and also provide fodder for an interesting future blog post.

Another year contract has been signed with my current employer, who I am happy to say I'm quite happy with. It's not every man who can say he has any level of satisfaction with his job. Recently I've pondered getting a Masters in TESL (Teaching English as a Second Language) and possibly going career with it. It's not so limiting as it might seem; not only would I be more apt to get higher paying (not to mention more dignified) jobs in various other countries, Asian or European, but perhaps I could use it as a vehicle for experience. That is how I have seen my current position for quite some time, and I'm sure many others do as well. A vehicle for experience. You get paid to do a job which can be (although it certainly isn't always) fun and rewarding, and get to live in a foreign country and rack massive personal experience points.

Case in point: yesterday I went to Asakusa for the first time. An amazing place with tons of "the oldest _____ in Japan" going on - including the oldest chronologically numbered block,* something like １丁目１番１, which if you can't see it on your computer or read Japanese basically says: "1 city block of 1 numbered 1." Anyhow, the point is this kind of job drives the experience train. There's no predictable end to the need of English education in foreign countries. In a way, I could see the world and get paid to do so. Hmm hmmm hmmm. I'd also like to imagine racking up massive language fluency as well, but realistically I don't think I'll ever consider anything besides Japanese my second language, although I'd like to attain passable Mandarin Chinese. Really I would. "One language at a time Ben!" Another teacher once told me...

*all blocks in Japan are sorted and number chronologically or clockwise around a center block, and there are no street names save for major roads. Sound confusing? It is. Read more here.

This has really all been a cleverly-disguised ploy to put off an eagerly awaiting virtual flashcard deck of 100 cards. Curse this mortal coil and faulty memory of mine!!

Thanks for reading. Until May folks!!

-Ben

P.S. Popular Japanese blog Hello Damage has posted some pictures from the latest F.I.D. show, in case you want to see cute Japanese ladies, dudes in messed up costumes (NSFW - NOT SAFE FOR WORK) or the funny faces I make when I play guitar. Thanks Steve!