the vestibule of success

Life is good. Almost finished with the post-Golden Week (Japanese Spring Break) push and onto Obon (Japanese August holiday), which is my favorite time of the year, as much as I hate the icky-sticky-greasy-sweatwhileyou'restandingstill-summer in Tokyo. Why? Two weeks of paid vacation baby! You can't beat that. The battle plan is an absurd 20-hour ferry ride from Ibaraki prefecture (neighbor to Tokyo) to Hokkaido, followed by a week of kicking it.

The northern-most island in Japan, once disputed Russian territory, including a city designed by an American architect and more country roads than you can shake a stick at, Hokkaido is a far, far cry from the cramped lifestyles of Tokyo. I'm eagerly awaiting going there with a few of my dearest European brethren, whom I shall refer to in abbreviated fashion: L, a sassy girl from somewhere in England that is not London, is a close friend and my bad influence a.k.a. drinking companion. We recently drew omake (4-panel comics) about two of our favorite school staff members at work, seeing as how we agreed they both deserve their own cartoon or something. Next is S, originally my Japanese classmate, a computer programmer and an altogether good-hearted individual with a passion for traveling the globe. Finally, a Welsh fellow I don't know well except that he seems cool and is in good with the others. Two of those three also happen to be licensed drivers!! If I miss anything from the States besides good pizza, it is most certainly roadtrips.... although roadtrips around islands aren't exactly an option where I'm from (and don't even open yer yaps, Long Island does NOT count by any stretch of the imagination) Should prove to be an interesting journey.

Before that, 3 more weeks of the work-crunch; although in reality a lot of my part-time work (namely kindergarten-stuff) from my second job is almost finished until September. I'm currently sifting through Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged when I have time for it. I recently caught up with Gantz, my favorite horror/action/pulp comic full of vampires and alien invasions, and am now reading JoJo, a cult classic of Japanese comics full of quirky and unique characters and superpowers named after bands. And lots of blood!

Musical taste has taken an unforeseen dive into screamo, post-hardcore and hip hop lately: At the Drive-In, Wu Tang, Eric's Trip, Modest Mouse, Maudlin of the Well, Small Brown Bike, End of a Year and Ceremony (the one hardcore band on the list), just to name a few. I feel like 11 years of metal is finally starting to burn me a bit and I need to look to other things. Why can't more bands just have good, unique vocalists like all of the above? Such is the way with anything I suppose: If there's a lot of it, most of it sucks.

I think I rocked the N2 JLPT, (new-format level 2 Japanese Language Proficiency Test) a few weeks back, but I won't know until September. The whole experience was worlds apart from the autumnal/winter isolation and late-night crams that went into Decembers finger-of-god, skin-of-teeth passing grade, and was in the spirit of summertime an exciting romp through the land of new things, namely being able to listen and read a lot better than I could 6 months back. Dating someone native in Japanese might have helped the former, and no question my addiction to text and imagery definitely aided the latter. But really it teaches me the greatest lesson of all: all things take time. I want to be better at Japanese today, and I can be, but only by seemingly invisible increments. So inch by inch I crawl towards some unknown vestibule of success. What is success? And why on earth is it contained within a vestibule? Such are the questions that no man can answer.

Other topics of relevance to my life which remain yet unmentioned: discovering a good American crime-drama a.k.a. The Wire (8 year late-pass please); coming to find hipster-infested, gyaru (blonde-hair barbie-doll type girls)-ridden Shibuya is my favorite hangout spot in Tokyo; a slight grimace at (but overall of) enjoyment of the single life; a dive back into some junkier foods and not having enough time to do proper workouts as of late; thinking what a shame it is the days can't be like the nights in the summer in the city; and wondering why other countries don't have genres upon sub-genres of comic books for every conceivable notion from robotic monsters to making a band to raising children to old people exploring the moon to whatever else the imagination can whip up.

That's all.


"Everything flows; nothing remains." - Hermaclitus

The relentlessness which may be felt

The restlessness which may be felt when one hasn't written in over a month is not to be underestimated. It's as if I were scrawling out my thoughts on papyrus and tossing them into a river to dissolve, whilst a few special pieces catch rocks and somehow escape a fate of dissipating in an ever-changing body of water. What few scraps of papyrus I have retained I will share with you here. All I can say is it feels good to be blogging again, equitable to greeting an old friend or busting out the guitar after a week's hiatus.

This morning I escorted my mother to the Ikebukuro Metropolitan hotel, where she took the "Airport Limousine," an express bus that runs to Japan's main international hub: Narita airport. It wasn't a teary-eyed good-bye, but one that felt just right. Me and my Mother got to spend plenty of quality time together and she had the invaluable opportunity of experience a culture more foreign than anything she had ever known before in her lifetime. She was however missing her daughters and her cats and her normal Albany New York lifestyle as any sane person (a.k.a. anyone who is not me) would, and was ready to make the trek back home. I as well was ready to taste the sweet lightness and freedom I have become so addicted to, the stuff that living single in a big city is made of. And coming home to my apartment tonight to greet no one for the first time in over 2 weeks was a welcome change of pace! (love ya Mom)

Our vacation, which I will briefly describe in typical Ben Belcher pell-mell fashion, took place over Golden Week, which is for the uninformed a week of consecutive holidays in Japan where more people travel than any other time of year save New Years or O-bon (the August Summer holidays). Although in reality my mother had a few buffer days where I was working and I set her up with some tours, or some very VERY kind former students or co-workers of mine who saw to taking care of her. One such lady who goes by the name of Junko (once referred to in this blog in fact as my "Japanese Mom") took extra special care of my Mother when I was off doing my new kindergarten teaching gigs in the mornings - which just had to fall at such inopportune a time as when my Mom was in town - mashed together with my regular afternoon/evening job. Junko in fact took my Mother to a Spa, the movies and several restaurants in the few visits they had together, and treated her to the point that my Mother was genuinely a bit freaked out, not being used to such elegant treatment. However Junko's nonchalant response of "it's my pleasure" or "be my guest" may be a rather insightful peak into understanding Japanese culture for all you armchair travelers out there. This much-cherished Japanese custom of "gift-giving" - in the sense of treating one's guest to a "service" of some kind, (which sounds like a bit of broken English or a naughty innuendo) is a good way to wrap our Western minds around such practices. To Junko the privilege of showing around and entertaining "my Mother the American tourist" was just that, and a fun opportunity for her to use her English skills and make a new friend.

Was I talking about the vacation? Side-track, side-track. So that was a prime example of how some of my friends helped me in taking care of my Mom when I had work. There were a few others, most notably my wonderful Japanese teachers Nagasawa- and Yazawa-sensei (the latter of the town I incidentally just got hooked in Ben Folds...) Outside of that, here's a list that runs down how we slammed a full-on cross-country extravaganza into a period of 7 days:

- Thursday: woke up at 4:30am, took bullet train from Tokyo to Hiroshima, roughly 5-6 hours of train travel. Checked in, saw peace museum and beautiful zen gardens. Got "accosted" (or at least preached at) by two Jehova's Witnesses posing as little old ladies. Ate okonomiyaki. Took the wrong tram cars as a result of lack of rest on my part. Enjoyed a good nights sleep (my first in a few days after far too much work)

-Friday: woke up at 7 or so. Set out for Miyajima, a beautiful island off the coast near Hiroshima. Lost money in a UFO catcher (claw machine), but I almost had that damned giant Chopper doll!!! Got stuck taking the ferry with over 200 Junior High snots on a field trip. Saw lots of deer on the island. Saw the famous floating Torii gates. Saw the world's biggest spatula. Ate fried oysters. Went up a cable car to the top of Mt. Misen. Enjoyed it all.

Saturday: woke up early again. Went to Kobe, maybe a 1 1/2 hour trip if I recall correctly. We were rather tired but managed to drop off our bags at the hotel and make it (after some argument with a grumpy taxi driver) to the Sky Buffet, a nice restaurant on the 24th floor of a downtown building. The view of the surrounding Kobe area was quite stunning, and the food was decent too. There we met Akira, a former friend of mine from University at Albany NY who is attending grad school in Osaka. We discussed the blessings and curses of living abroad and having a broader perspective of the world; the downside being you don't really fit in in your home country or the new one. If truer words were ever spoken. Kobe tour was our next stop, it was a dinky thing with annoying elevators but worth the trip. Also went to the maritime museum, which I think the Mom had more interest in than me. Still a fun jaunt.

Sunday: in need of taking it easy for a bit, we left our hotel and shot out to Nagoya where my good friend Hiro (bassist of Condemned and Disconformity, both righteous death metal bands) picked us up from the station and drove us out to his family's home in the countryside. Hiro is a Buddhist monk, practicing under his father at a temple connected to their house. Needless to say the house was beautiful, as was the whole area which was as far off the beaten path as we managed to get all vacation (although where I come from, "the countryside" does not include urban areas a mere 10 minute drive away). The whole family - Hiro's grandmother, father, mother and himself - all treated us with the utmost courtesy and respect. Me and my mother both got the break in action we needed, she read quite a bit and I hung out with Hiro. We had a jam session and he showed me how he could play the entire Final Fantasy theme on his bass (among other things of course). Later we ate his grandmother's homemade miso soup, the best I've ever had, and deliciously fresh takenoko (bamboo shoots) plucked from the garden by Hiro's father. It was of course a fun chance for me to speak exercise my Japanese as well, since everyone in Tokyo seems to want to speak English. On top of everything we received copious presents including a yukata (summer robe) for my mother! As she said: "I felt like we were being treated like royalty." Such is the way of Japanese hospitality, and the especially sweet family that I will most definitely visit again should I find myself in the Nagoya area.

Monday: Visited the Nagoya World Expo Fairgrounds, a place beautifully laid out in the style of an amusement park with no rides (although one could see a Ferris wheel in the distance). There were however indoor ice-skating rinks and a water-park. Countless families went picnicking out in the open fields or just strolled around the area in the way we did, soaking in the beauty. Frankly, I would never want to be there during the actual World Expo for the same reason I ain't going to Shanghai this year: I'm not so fond of crowds. I ate ice cream and drank a beer at 11am. If it isn't obvious already these two days were the break in a flurry of vacation activities, and probably the most relaxing portions. We eventually left, stopped at a kaitenzushi (rotating sushi)
restaurant for lunch, where we tried such Japanese delights as seafood and mayo sushi, hamburger sushi and fresh octopus (among many other items more tasteful to my palate). Downtown Nagoya felt like Tokyo with 8-lane traffic, it seems I really underestimated the mass of this city! Although I've heard that, unlike Tokyo, the nightlife dies around midnight every night there.

Off to Nara! This involved a transfer at the ever-busy Kyoto station, and by the time we got to the hotel we were exhausted. It was however a first-class hotel, and I can't remember the last time I was even in one of those things. Mints on the bed, classy overpriced restaurants, that kind of place. We decided in light of our tiredness to do the only right thing two Americans in a hotel room can do: order pizza! (My mother had been wanting to try the seafood pizza as well) This proved to be a bit of an ordeal, and after about 5 or 6 tries, including one to pizza hut where I promptly hung up when they answered (since I wanted pizza and not microwaved fast food), and also restaurants that looked great but didn't deliver, we found one that worked. It seems that pizza delivery to hotels is relatively uncommon in this country, or the phone-guy was a total n00b. At any rate I managed to convince him to deliver our pies to the untrodden, mysterious ground of... the giant hotel next to the train station. And when it came it was delicious. Incidentally, I watched the movie "Fear of a Black Hat" for the first time. I love cheesy spoofs like that.

Tuesday: Spent the day in Nara. I'll leave this one to your imaginations, but to summarize the place is beautiful and an absolute must-visit (over Kyoto in my humble opinion) if you ever come to the country. The layout, the parks, the famous giant Buddha, the temperamental deer, it just creates an atmosphere. I imagine Nara would be a fantastic place to grow up or live. I felt a kind of liberation being there, despite the crowds (including a 45-minute queue for a special exhibit we happily skipped)

Wednesday: I realized the night before that since Wednesday night we would be returning to Tokyo, a good shot at Kyoto as I had originally planned was infeasible. In lieu of that however I decided we do the next best thing: go to Fushimi Inari Taisha (Great Shrine) on the Southern outskirts of Tokyo. Avoid the crowds and the urban madness of the final day of Goldenweek and get to see on of Kyoto's best and most overlooked sites? Win-win in my book. My mother dubbed the place "the land of a thousand gates," and with good reason: orange to red and every imaginable tint in between-colored gates exist in what must be the 10s of thousands in that place. It's another see to believe kind of Japan-spot, and google the name for some interesting pictures. It does get a bit redundant with all the fox-statues and the gates after a while, but the stone-steps and the great view make it a fun climb (Well, not as fun in the climbing department for my Mom, but she pulled it off!!) Afterward we had some cold soba to stave our hunger on a hot summer-like day, and happened to stumble upon a matsuri (festival) by sheer chance. (The crowds and the horse's butt we saw sort of gave it away) The name escapes me, but we got to see a dozen or so Japanese men drunk and in full matsuri-garb hoist the giant arc-like object on two long wooden poles up in the air. Although by this point I've seen a handful of festivals so they've lost a smidge of the novelty, it was of course the first time for my Mom.

Mom: "What are they saying?"
Me: "Umm, well, the literal equivalent of: 'Good! Go! Go! Go! Push! Good! UGH!'"

A few hours and a crowded bullet-train later (I barely managed to get my butt in one of the non-reserved seats! The dozens left standing in the aisles for two hours back to Tokyo weren't so lucky) we were back "home." Home being my little walk-in closet.

And that's how I spent my Golden Week vacation. So here's to you Mom, as you are in a plane most likely somewhere above Alaska or the Canadian tundratic™ (I made this word up) wastelands whilst I write this. It was a fun time, and I have this strange feeling you'll be back one of these days, assuming I'm still here.

That felt long! I'm putting off shoving my over-sized book collection into boxes for the move. Got to get back to it. I also have a fun-tastic 13 consecutive days of work to look forward too! Although F.I.D. will have a sweet recording session in the middle of all that. Life is still pretty good, but busy. Next month will cool down a bit, I hope.

"There's not much to knowing cuz things change too quickly these days" - Small Brown Bike


P.S. I had this floating for a week waiting for a proofread. I just proofread half of it and said screw it. No one's paying me anyways!! =)

It will be mine

I know I've thought countless times in the last week "hey I could blog about this." Sadly my flux of ideas doesn't correlate to the time I leisurely sit in front of my computer typing up entries, so I'm sure much has been lost. I am only human after all.

As for how I think and do things, I've been schooled on my own high-rises and gutter-balls, and it boils down to a simple idea: I'm creative and great at coming up with ideas, but I'm not so great at organizing and executing them. This isn't to say I'm incapable of the latter, but it doesn't flow as freely as the former does by any stretch of the imagination. It comes out in almost everything I do: my erratic yet dutiful studies; my haphazard but relatively effective speaking style in Japanese; my teaching method of the same cloth; my admittedly random, somewhat sloppy but unique(?) take on playing guitar, and so on. Even here, where I post on an unpredictable timetable and a kind of "when the spirit moves me" mentality. And my posts are equally as disorganized as every fiber of my being, as they reflect my thoughts. It's the kind of thing that you don't realize about yourself until somewhat steps up and calls you out on your eccentricities, because you are always too close to yourself to have any perspective or know better. It takes others for me to step back a minute and realize what I'm doing, and I'm glad they do - I'm still trying to figure me out.

At any rate, I blame too much creative learning and my lackluster abilities in Math- and Science-related curriculum. Curse you post-hippy, free-thinking education system!!!

I bought a new guitar today! But why the sudden urge? Another backwards explanation is in order: the weather was so beautiful yesterday (Sunday) that even a nasty hangover couldn't keep me down. In fact in a somewhat sloth-like state, the whole outside world teeming with new life, I swam in sunbeams that semed a surreal paradise which time had forgotten. I looked at the stone bench on the gorgeous verdure-covered walking path near my apartment and thought how I'd love to sit in the shade and play an acoustic guitar in this perfect weather. (before summer comes and turns this whole damned city into a sticky and miserable jungle) I have an acoustic guitar back in the states, but due to obvious spacial constraints refrained from bringing it with me on any journey nigh on 7000 miles. It's a decent guitar, but it's slightly warped from slight misuse and always sounds slightly out of tune anywhere above the 7th fret. So I left the old girl behind, and the mild longing for a new one has been itching at my gut for quite some time. Itch relieved. I'll post a picture? Naa, I'll never get around to it, who am I kidding. It's a 30-year old Humming Bird in amazing condition with only a few scratches that I got in Ochanomizu from a used guitar store for under 20,000 yen (around $200). What a steal!!!! I'd heard that there were amazing finds to be made there, but holy crapoly. One look at that baby and it was like the scene with the Stratocaster in Wayne's World, minus any Stairway to Heaven. I tried only one guitar, and bought it 5 minutes later. No regrets here, my apartment is a much happier place now.

--

I wrote all of the above about 3 days ago (not going to to try and blend it seamlessly together, no point) but knew I didn't have a complete entry. Here goes le finish:

March is crawling to an end, the cherry blossoms are just starting to peak out in places, and there couldn't be a more appropriate time of year to be reading "Hokkaido Hitchhiking Blues." It's a solid travel book, and enlightening on Japan. I recommend it.

Lately I've been thinking of humanity's frightfully minor status in the universe at large, or to quote H.P. Lovecraft: "terrifying vistas of reality, and our frightful position therein." I think it's a combination of being heavy into this Moby Dick audiobook - a lot of philosophizing, sea-is-great-we-are-small kind of stuff, not to mention biblical sh*t goes down in it - and it being spring time. The world spins on and her seasons roll by and we are merely lucky to experience them by circumstance; it isn't like we help cause them, and if anything we pollute them with our humanity. Silly humans. But being one I can't really knock them- er, us so hard.

I've got a lot of real world stuff to do: Taxes, fleshing out Golden Week plans with my Mom coming to Japan, studying super hard for level N1 JLPT in December (and level n2 for kicks in July). As for the n1 test, I'm banking on surpassing a 50% score. The minimum pass is 70%, and maybe if I didn't have to work I could study enough to get that in a year, but it's doubtful. It's a huge leap in difficulty, and a pass = fluency (on paper), so it's no small task. No, my real goal is to pass this almighty personal benchmark by 2011, which would mean I've "mastered" the Japanese language in about 5 years. Then I'd be able to shift my attention to the true pandora's box (and possible money-maker), Chinese!!!

How I wish I had a better grasp of where I was going with my life sometimes. Things are good now, but they can't stay this way forever. Changes have to be made eventually, but it's a "maybe next year" scenario. Every year?? Hrrmmmmm who's got a time machine I can borrow? Some Back-to-the-Future 2 style action is in order... minus the Biff.

Concerning Golden Week, after much hotel-hunting I've managed to string it together: Two days in Hiroshima, one on the mainland and one on the gorgeous, deer-infested island of Miyajima. Followed by a day in the famous port-town of Kobe, then a visit to my metal brethren Hiro's family's home in the beautiful Aichi countryside (a.k.a. middle-of-nowhere Japan), and two days to split between Nara and Kyoto, both former capital's of Japan. back in the dizzay. Before and after that me and my Mom will be doing stuff around Tokyo too, although it's really hard to decide what to the put time into exactly. Got to hit the major stuff anyway, although I secretly long to emulate Mr. Ferguson's aforementioned travel book, purposefully skipping all big cities and seeing more of the real, quaint, reflections-of-the-old-world Japan.

At times I feel like living in Tokyo is psuedo- neo-Japan (which it is). I'm not saying I want tabi (split-toe) sandals and samurai's impaling themselves in the name of honor, just more ricefields and less people who aspire to conquer the world via computer chips, or who want to speak English because it's a business language. Gah. English is such a beautiful, artistic, arbitrary language that to learn it simply for business purposes (without scraping the surface, feeling it or looking into the how and whys, laughing at the gross inconsistencies or punny possibilities) is sadly missing the point in my opinion. Although I would have to say the same for Japanese.... and probably most languages now that I think about it, if I had any right to say that or anything at all about them.

Ramblings. If you want funny pictures of stuff with more wit and less personal drivel, check out my buddy Steve's semi-famous Tokyo Damage blog on the right side of your screen. Good stuff, and he's a solid dude as well with good taste in music.

F.I.D. shows coming THIS SUMMER IN TOKYO! The new jams are off the hook yo. We have a song about "Babies in China, Metaphysics and Men on the Moon." And one called "Mixed Fries."

Until I ramble again, cyberspacians.

"Remember when you said that things would never change / You liar / Because these days things in my life, they don't stay the same / You changer" - Small Brown Bike

I won't stop screamin'

Lately I've been getting in touch with friends back home for the first time in many, many long months. My life over here has, for lack of a better term taken on a life of its own. I have made some good friends out here, but of course NY and my homies are still number 1 in my heart. Now that things have slowed down at last with vacation, it's just good to be reminded that home still exists outside this place... since living here everyday makes it rather easy to forget about the rest of the world! (At least when one is busy, as I have been)

Has my posting been melancholy, or emo or something? Well, since Ian hugged me, there is now nothing I can't accomplish. Maybe it's the beef and onions I just ate talking here, but the next few days should be really sweet. Meeting a lady friend tonight (ooOOoo), going to the beach in Zushi (an hour from Tokyo, in Kanagawa) on Saturday, and going to Nikko from Sunday to Tuesday. It sounds a bit busy but it should all be quite relaxing, I'll get to spend time with friends, and most importantly get out of this city!!!! It's so necessary to stay sane.

Other than that, my downtime has been so needed. I've been reading Haruki Murakami's "The Wind-up Bird Chronicle," and I'm totally into it. Too bad it's 600 freakin' pages, a.k.a. too fat to lug around on trains, and too long for me to finish any time soon. But I'm tryin!

Studying has become really burdensome. Maybe without mind-numbing work to balance it, it seems like more of a chore, I don't know, but I'm feeling in danger of burnout. I look at my flashcards and don't want to look at them (hence this post). It could be a result of me trying really hard but not seeing visible improvement that I want - a problem frequent at the schools I work at, where people study English full-time. But we can't expect miracles can we!

Really, I just want to be able to understand what people are saying in everyday conversations. But it takes years to get that good. My reading is actually pretty decent by the way. I read a 700-page manga monthly serial almost cover to cover, minus 3 or 4 series. I was very proud of myself. :D

Let's make this a posi-negative-posi sandwich: I am also setting up a benefit show for research about the disease my 2 sisters have, NBIA. I haven't yet mentioned much about it in the blog, although of course it's a big part of my life. You can read more about it at www.nbiadisorders.org. The only lab that does major full-time research on this rare genetic disease is in danger of shutting down, and we're trying to raise a whopping $250,000 to save the lab. It sounds near impossible, but 10,000 is already in. And I plan to get up to 5,000 more at the benefit show this December. More details coming soon, but I expect ALL my friends from back home to be there. :)

That's all folks.



"CHAPTER ONE

analyze the devices
war with thee
pieces of your destiny corrupted
rise
thriving
can you verify the lost contents

CHAPTER TWO

gravel lodged in your throat
flesh box cavity
gradual eruption probe
one that feeds
hands that caress a crooked spine
absorbing bi-products
prompt exchanges
that will deconstruct

CHAPTER THREE

move on forward
signs that will pierce like labor pains
sharp
ways of a drunkard
the dogs shall devour and lap up their blood
stains

CHAPTER FOUR

persist
the prime suspects will not restrain
with affection
recession
final effects of a broken hope
of a broken shell
of a broken yoke
walk and learn from these
deviant
loss of wealth
subservient
quarantine the divisions
the double edged sword
depth incision

CHAPTER FIVE

glutton eat your fill
divination is that of a swine babbling in their filth
beware of the things hibernating in your skull
reeking havoc
malignant cells still active
schemes that will inflict my son
schemes that run rampant

CHAPTER SIX

if the disease of self
leaves a heavy burden on your soul
it must be removed
like bricks in the belly
you will sink in to the depths" - Candiria, 300 percent Density. (still one of my favorite albums of all time)

I didn't proofread this one. Heads up!

I love having random conversations in Japanese with the other tenants. Usually it's just a quick kon ni chi wa or a bow, but sometimes I get to practice my Japanese a bit. Flex my skills (lol). It's a confidence booster. As it turns out the spacey-looking younger dude down the hall (I always had suspicions - wait, still have suspicions he sniffs glue or something) is a Chinese major who has just graduated from college and can't find a job. It's a position so many people are in right now, job-hunting despite the fact that most businesses aren't hiring. Of course this situation is not limited just to Japan, but, it's as evident here, in a country so reliant on its exports that has felt the backlash of a slowed-down international economy, as it is in America.

This sure sounds like some kind of intro to an insightful blog post - gotcha! I'm just finishing preparations to leave for SOUTH KOREA in roughly 38-hours. I am naturally really excited, gonna see the DMZ (De-Militarized Zone), Seoul for 2 or 3 days and Busan for 2 days. Should be a time, either way. I'm debating what entertainment to bring on the roughly 12-14 hour trek; It's my apartment -> Narita airport -> Incheon airport -> Gimpo -> Seoul -> Gyeongsan. I wish it went as fast as writing that sentence. But I've always kind of had a strange love for long trips, they are usually pretty rewarding after all. I may read kuroame, "Black Rain," one of Japan's most famous works of fiction based on the Hiroshima bombings. I will probably also study (if you aren't sick of me talking about it by now) and play my DS for the first time in what must be over a month.

Even my 360... my wii... they are suffering from a lack of love. I can't help but feel that my priorities are shifting, I feel like I should spend my time (especially in Japan) more wisely. Someone else said I'm growing up, but this can't be true!! I'm much too young for that still. Although I suppose 100 years ago I'd already have 7 kids, so perhaps it's a fair deal.

I sprained something in my back at the gym. After my birthday party at an Izakaya in Shinjuku, then going to karaoke all night with a few friends, I made the wise(?) decision to work off my hangover, as I normally do. However, I did something wrong, and arched my back a bit too much when I should have only been using my arms, so now I got some funky neck pain and I saw the doc at the local clinic (same one that treated my arm-muscle strain a month or 2 back) about it today. Glad I got him before golden week. It turned out to be a full hour or so of electro-stimuli, massage-work and acupuncture, and I came out feeling not so much better yet, but, after some more appointments he says I'll be fine. The highlight of this wonderful lesson in pain was probably either me saying kore wa tanoshikunahi　(this is not fun) and the doc finding it highly amusing or, hearing one of the others discussing me in Japanese mere feet from where I lay. "Yea he's an American, he's from New York. He does lots of weight training and plays sports and stuff." Hmmm, iiinteresting." I mean I can't imagine they have many foreign clientele, so I'm glad to give 'em something to talk about.

Still, laying down is a bit uncomfortable in some positions and my neck/upper back is still a bit sore. Waa waa waa, I'll live!

I don't have much of anything left to say. There's nothing to do but put one foot in front of the other and go forward. One more day of work (so cruelly placed after my weekend) and it's 7 days of NOT TEACHING ENGLISH.

P.S. Late/Old/whatever. LET'S GO BUFFALO! I never liked you T.O. but save my team dammit!

"A life left half behind, though no longer blind I can't yet see. I'm not the boy that I once was, but I'm not the man I'll be." - mewithoutyou

Vacation Recap - Days 2 and 3

Day 2 - Miyajima Island

[More pictures available at my Photobucket]

After getting up and heading downtown to Okonomura (a famous building with 30 Okonomiyaki shops) for lunch for the second day in a row, we set off on our trip to the luscious island of Miyajima. After finding out that the Passmo train-fare card that Kevin got was Kanto-region only, and subsequently buying him a ticket, we made our way onto a train. 30 minutes later we were in the port-area of Miyajima, a beautiful city with an indelible view of the island (and vice versa from the islands mountain tops).


The short boat ride across the waters was quite enjoyable - it's nice to see JR (Japanese Rail) has not only the biggest train network in the country, but also its own ferry! The first thing you see in detail upon approaching is the famous orange torii gate - a symbol for a gateway to holiness in Shinto. If you see it in the morning it appears to be "floating on the water," but I preferred this shot I took later on in the day:


There were many touristy shops of course, and even a fairly big residential area away from the main streets. I wonder how much a house there runs for! I also tried the Momiji-Manju, a kind of maple-flavored bun with sweet beans inside. It was OK, but nothing to exceptional. The real novelty of the island however was its massive deer population, perhaps rivaling even Nara:

Some real gorgeous sites.

We eventually started increasing our elevation, but opted not to take the cable car, since that's for old ladies and little kids in my opinion. It was quite the steep ascent though, and there were stairs, stairs and more stairs the whole way up. It was a bit tiring but well worth it, and after a few kilometers we had the pleasure of the gorgeous view from the mountain's top:

There was a rickety old shop at the top of the mountain so I bought some chocolate, sat on a bench and soaked in the breath-taking view. After so much time in the city, this was just what I needed. I took copious amounts of pictures of course. On the way back down we took an alternative route with seemingly less stairs and more windy paths:

Finally we got to the bottom and we were bushed. It was a fun hike and reminded me that I really should check out more of the mountains in the Tokyo area. Not much more to say than the pictures can tell, I believe.



Day 3 - Last Day in Hiroshima

[Photobucket]

I was honestly a bit sad to be leaving Hiroshima. The place we stayed, "K's Guesthouse" was very nice and the whole city just had this mellow vibe to it. I suppose it would get rather boring after a while though, and I'd have to make trips to Osaka see bands on tour and stuff like that.



We had lunch at Okonomura for the 3rd day in a row. I suppose I should explain a bit about Hiroshima's famous okonomiyaki...or maybe just copy and paste a wikipedia article:

"In Hiroshima, the ingredients are layered rather than mixed together. The layers are typically batter, cabbage, pork, optional items (squid, octopus, cheese, etc.), noodles (yakisoba, udon) topped with a fried egg and a generous dollop of okonomiyaki sauce. The amount of cabbage used is usually 3 - 4 times the amount of Osaka style. It starts out piled very high and is generally pushed down as the cabbage cooks. The order of the layers may vary slightly depending on the chef's style and preference, and ingredients will vary depending on the preference of the customer. People from Hiroshima tend to claim that this is the correct way to make okonomiyaki. This style is also called Hiroshima-yaki."

Yep. It's really delicious and seems relatively healthy, with all that cabbage in there. I am sort of craving some Hiroshima-yaki so I may have to find a shop somewhere in Tokyo. Here are some snaps of Okinomura, the famous building full of okonomiyaki stalls:

3 floors devoted to one kind of food.

The lunch rush.

Here's a crappy little video I took with my phone of the stuff being made. Honestly there are better videos on youtube if you are at all curious.

We started off the day by going to the modern art museum, which in all honesty was kind of a mistake. I mean the place was fine and as advertised, but so much of "modern art" is complete wankery. There was some before-after shot from 1973 of a guy falling asleep on the beach with a book on his stomach, so that he got suburned everywhere but there. The coolest thing we saw was a room where you were encouraged to pick up and place various instruments, and a doorway to nowhere in the middle would light up at the vibrations. Anyway, here's a few snaps:

Groundbreaking?

Our next stop however proved to be one of the most beautiful gardens I've ever seen in my life. I didn't have such high expectations and honestly we only went there because the other museums were closed for the holidays, but wow. Shukkei-en is a traditional Japanese garden that might numb you with awe if you have the chance to see it in real life. Everything is completely still except when a coy fish jumps out of the water to snatch a bug. You can see the sky in the water so clearly it looks like another world, it's just amazing.

I think tranquil may be the perfect word for it. Anyway, that's just about it, we killed time for the rest of the evening in anticipation of yet another fun night-bus, only this next one proved to be the worst of our 3 trips. No arm rests, no reclining seats and being squashed together, along with stops every hour that include announcements and lights being turned on, and to top it all off a bunch of girls from Osaka being really chatty all made it a pretty miserable journey. We were happy then when we finally arrived at 5:30am in Kyoto...

To Be Continued...

I'm back! - Vacation Recap Part 1.

12 days later I'm a little more well traveled, a little tired of riding night buses, and very satiated on good food and good times. The vacation was a big success with very few hitches overall. I'll spend the next couple posts giving a breakdown of my vacation, along with a selection of the copious number of photographs I took. (All photos eventually will be accessible via photobucket)

Day -1: Kevin arrives

As you all know my friend Kevin who is usually so on top of things slept through his original flight (which he will never hear the end of from me). What you don't know is that he managed to catch a flight out of Chicago mere hours before some huge snowstorms hit, so it's a wonder that he managed to get here on time at all. As it happened, he was arriving on Christmas Eve, my last day of scheduled work. I didn't know exactly what time he was coming in but gave him the a list of my break-times when he could call my phone, since I can't answer in class and he would be calling from a pay phone.

After spending the whole day sort of worrying about whether he even made it out of Chicago or not, whilst I was helping a staff member move some items for New Years cleaning, I finally got a call around 8:55 from Kevin telling me he's in Shinjuku station. Sweet relief. I met up with him there and was happy to see he opted to use the luggage-moving service I recommended him (just hauling your carry-on through the subways here is troublesome enough), and coincidentally I ran into a few of my co-workers and students who were going out for ramen, so we tagged along with them. Kevin got to try his first authentic Japanese ramen and learned how the coin-based ticket machines worked. He kept saying that it was so surreal being in Japan, it didn't even feel like he was there - with all the creature comforts like a plethora 7/11s and Starbucks that seem to follow one halfway around the globe.

Day 0: Bye bye Tokyo, Hello Hiroshima!

Showed Kevin around town a bit, got our bags ready and left for the bus station around 7. Me being slightly paranoid and extra cautious as I always am, I gave us ample time to find the bus station. We were standing outside for roughly an hour before people started to converge into our area with luggage and whatnot. I asked a girl in Japanese if she was going to Hiroshima, and she said "yea, we're probably taking the same bus." So all seemed well enough.

10 minutes before we were supposed to leave, wondering where the bus and where the rest of the people who were riding it could be, that same girl comes up a flight of stairs and is saying something that I don't quite understand. Something about going down, and finally I get that she's telling us to check in with the bus people downstairs in the concourse. Naturally when we got there there were nearly 100 people standing around waiting - the night-bus has gotten quite popular as of late, considering that it normally runs around half the price of the shinkansen (bullet train). We checked in, and not a moment to soon, since we only waited about another 5 minutes before we boarded. The bus was decent, comfortable enough and we could recline somewhat despite the curse of our tallness leaving something to be desired for leg-room. It was a 12 hour ride though, and I only managed to sleep for about 2 of those hours, but survived nonetheless. Kevin however could sleep through an earthquake measuring 10.5 on the Rickter scale.

Day 1: The Peace museum, the A-bomb Dome & Hiroshima castle.

It was a nice feeling after that long bus ride to be greeted cheerily by Mami at the bus station around 8:30am. Mami was the T.A. (Teacher's Assistant) for my Japanese class in my last semester of college, and I told her I planned to visit her if and when I moved to Japan. There's one promise kept. Her energy seemed contagious, and after dropping off our bags at the ryokan (Japanese-style inn) we were staying at we made way.

En Preparacion.

Hiroshima is, to me, a beautiful little city. It's so small-time compared to Tokyo that if it wasn't for the unfortunate events of 1945, it would scantly be on the radar, paling in comparison to the other monstrous metropolises I've seen thus far. The visible mountains in the distance and the sheer openness of everything was like a breath of fresh air to me. The rivers and bridges integrated with the city were also quite beautiful. Still more unlike Tokyo, Hiroshima has a tram-line that goes through some major parts of the city for easy access. Our first stop was the Atomic Bomb dome, a dilapidated building which was directly beneath the a-bomb and was therefore spared from complete destruction.

Atomic Bomb Dome.

A city view.

The Peace Park begins with the A-Bomb dome and leads to the much visited museum, so we went there next. It was big and quite beautiful despite our sleep deprivation. Mami said that she had been to the museum several times when she was younger on school trips, but was most often chatting away with her friends or not really paying attention, so this would be her chance to really learn something. After a failed attempt at a tour from a volunteer guide who seemed to be looking more for free English practice than anything else, and subsequently ditched her as fast as possible without being blatantly rude and took a subsequent sidequest to experience Hiroshima's other claim to fame: Okonomiyaki (literally: "Cooked as you like it")

Okonomiyaki

Sidequest complete and bellies full, we returned to the peace museum. As it turns out they systematically structured the museum to get gradually more and more depressing as you go through the thing. It starts off innocently enough, with a rather truncated history of events before, during and after the war. Then things get gradually heavier until you're seeing pictures of melted bodies and actual tongues and other actual bodily components kept intact to display the havoc that radioactivity reeked upon them. The most moving thing to me was the stories of individuals, broken lives and people scrawling names on bricks in vain efforts to find information on family members. I'm glad I made it through there but have no plans on going again any time too soon. There were also other cool bits to the museum like a letter from Einstein, and information such as leaflets dropped by the U.S. Government and destroyed by the Japanese during the war.

After all that we needed something lighthearted to take our minds off the monument to tragedy we just witnessed, so we went to Hiroshima castle! The place was beautiful and offered numerous photo opportunities.

Hiroshima Castle.

The moat!

Our ever-vigilant female Samurai guide, Mami-san.

After all this we were pretty beat, but still we pressed on since Mami was leaving for Grandmother's the next day and wouldn't be around to hang out with us anymore. We had some delicious Kaiten Zushi (Rotating Sushi) - you know the kind of place where they have fresh-made plates you can choose from rotating on a conveyer belt - and finally did a bit of Karaoke. I passed out some time around 8, knowing that going to Miyajima island the next day would be equally as exciting, even without Mami: less atomic stuff, more wild deer!

To Be Continued...

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For more pictues, see my future site for hosting pictures (since blogspot has a cap), Photobucket.