Fingers

Tuesdays've Got To Go.

Tue, 10 Nov 2009 04:00:31 GMT

This post is actually about placing short contractions after long words in the spirit of the title word, "Tuesdays've". No it's not. But I have to say that I like that particular type of contraction because to me, such contractions're meaningless. You've run a mile and now you've got the choice to run either three more feet or two more feet.

The core of the issue, however, is that Tuesdays are no good. It's the longest day of work, not only for me, but for all human beings who work on Tuesdays, and especially those human beings who ONLY work on Tuesdays, if such people exist. Last week, by some bizarre twist of fate, Tuesday was removed from existence. Monday happened. I went to work as usual. I came home and slept. I woke up, went to Nanzan University for a reunion scheduled for Tuesday, found nobody there, went home in the evening, slept, woke up again, and it was Wednesday. With Tuesday gone, the work week felt more like a summer vacation peppered with occasional fun 'n games sessions.

Today, Tuesday's back. It brings with it the rain and a lack of direction. Although I suppose Wednesday is likely to come next.

Ode to Ryouji the Snot Boy

Sat, 17 Oct 2009 18:09:17 GMT

I think that I shall never know
A child whom I'd rather throw
Into a pot of heated coals
Or off the stage of a punk rock show

I can't perceive how there could be
A boy as snotty as is he
His face a-twitch, he yelps and squeals
And not a trait of his appeals

To girls sitting adjacently,
His bare feet roam habitually
And contrary to my requesting
Rarely ceaseth his molesting

I now recall that long ago,
I once predicted we'd be foes
But new moons passed whenst he were decent
Most of them not very recent

For now none doth harm frequently
Nor childishly as doth he
And should you glimpse his twitchy semblance,
Surely you would find resemblance
To the critters, ghouls, and gremlins,
Of the coming Hallowed Eve.

For he, The Boy, may think it not,
But I know he's a little snot,
And all the other tikes and tots
Can see that he's not worth a lot
So if he hollers let him rot
And let the mother grieve

Afterword: In reality I would also grieve if he rotted. I wish him well. A well distance away from me.

Mon, 24 Aug 2009 10:31:44 GMT

Happy birthday, Bri-guy! I purposely delayed this message so that you wouldn't be disturbed, since it would feel like you're being spoken to from the future, but before I knew it Sarah had already happy birthday'd you on Facebook, and now I feel ashamed that she beat me since technically I live in the future. Anyway, I hope you have a grand slam of a day!

Also, could you transmit your mailing address to me somehow, for top secret reasons?

Birthday and Sigourney Weaver

Tue, 23 Jun 2009 05:11:12 GMT

So my birthday ranged from terrible to livably okay. As I said before, Yoko and I both have colds, so we had to cancel our plans to go to Nagoya, which weren't all that ambitious in the first place. Instead, we wandered around Tajimi. We discovered a new Italian restaurant, which was good, but we kind of got into an argument there and spent half the time in silence.

After that we wandered around for awhile before deciding to just rent the Ghostbusters movies, eat some fancy cake at the local fancy cake shop, and go home. We also bought a bar for our closet. The kind that uses tension to support itself so you don't have to make any holes.

Well, two video stores didn't have Ghostbusters, and the third store did. But as soon as we left the store it started pouring rain, presumably making us even sicker since we were on bikes. Fearing this, we decided to skip the birthday cake and just go home.

Ghostbusters and Ghostbusters II were good, but not really BIRTHDAY good. When I was a kid I used to watch Ghostbusters II every single day. When you turn twenty-five and you still haven't thought of anything better to do, it puts you in a bit of a dark mood.

Also, though, have you ever noticed that the plots of both Ghostbusters movies are terrible? The performances are so good and visual effects so charming that you hardly even think about it. You really have to respect the actors, and in particular I think Sigourney Weaver has an incredible ability to make the most ridiculous concepts halfway convincing. I won't refer to the original Alien because that movie is magical in pretty much every way, but Sigourney pretty much single-handedly saved Aliens, and pushed Alien 3 to "amazing" status (in my mind).

And to those who say "What about Alien: Resurrection? That sucked!", well, that's just a sign of how incredibly sucky that movie was. Even she couldn't save it. Especially since they made her a mutant clone monster.

I guess I'll have some kind of "makeup" birthday when we're both feeling better, if that ever happens. This cold just hit the two-week mark.

Twenty-five, here it is

Sat, 20 Jun 2009 00:34:52 GMT

Today I'm twenty-five. This song pretty much sums up birthdays anymore. Please listen. It's awesome. Also, funfact: it was in the Mallrats soundtrack and never released on any other album.

Yoko and I both have colds, so there will be little to no festiveness tonight, but there's not a whole lot to do in this town anyhow.

Inner Ear Infection (Sunday)

Sun, 14 Jun 2009 03:00:47 GMT

It is Sunday and I've been sick. You know, a cold gets described as all these things, but ultimately it's just a sort of variety show for snot. How many ways can snot impede your life?

Actually it's more like watching snot reenact the migration of American pioneers across the Oregon Trail. It starts in nose country, and spreads out towards either your throat (uh, Louisiana?) or your godforsaken ears (the West Coast). Everyday it makes a stop in a new place, enduring (er, causing) whatever trials may come along with it.

Today we're in ear infection country. These Apaches can't be reasoned with so get the muskets. They'll never take us alive.

I don't think I've had an ear infection since I was about seven. Back then they used to make you drink foul, white liquid. Now WebMD is just telling me to tough it out. Luckily, Tough It Out is my middle name.

Snow Country

Wed, 10 Jun 2009 05:43:23 GMT

A new song!

You know the spiel--amateur recording, sorta sounds like crap. Try listening on headphones.

Here's the lyrics.

There's no way to stop the rain,
It persecutes the driest plain and overfloods the paths that we have walked for days and days
And there's no use in recreating melodies nor memories,
No I want something more unique to fill my nights and days

We have got to get out of this mess, yeah
So why don't we find someplace that's a little less stressed than this?
'Cuz I just want to forget all of these crazy days
So why don't we go up North where we can chill?

There's no way to bring that rain when water's all gone down the drain
The grass is always greener where it dances with the grain
And window panes nor cellophane shall block views of the inhumane
So let's find someplace more opaque and wander in the maze

We have got to get out of this mess, yeah
So why don't we find someplace that's a little less populous?
'Cuz I just want to forget all of these crowded days
So why don't we go up North where we can get away?

In the Snow Country
We'll forget this all
In the Snow Country
In the Snow Country
We'll forget this all

There's no way to beat the sun
It cuts the rules for everyone
And lords itself above us with the promise of the day
And I'm not blamin' anyone for poison that has touched this tongue,
No I'm just saying toxically I've got to get away

'Cuz we have got to get out of this mess, yeah
So why don't we find someplace with a little bit more finesse?
'Cuz I just want to forget all of this senselessness
So why don't we find someplace where we can break down?

Oh it's the Snow Country
We'll forget this all
In the Snow Country
In the Snow Country
We'll forget this all

We've walked for days and days
We've walked for days and days
We've walked for days and days
We've walked for days and days

In the Snow Country
In the Snow Country
We'll forget this all
We'll forget it all

'Cuz we have got to get out of this place, yeah
So why don't we find someplace with a little more providence?
'Cuz I'm just looking for a place to bury my pain
So why don't we head up North where we can change?

Link! (Might take a few hours to upload)

Flying is scary

Tue, 02 Jun 2009 16:33:28 GMT

I used to be all right about flying. They say children have the most active imaginations, but it wasn't until reaching my mid-twenties that I was able to envision my own death with such vivid terror. I find now that every time I get on a plane is more excruciating and nerve-wracking than the last. Sixteen hours is a pretty big window of time to allow something--and take your pick of WHAT thing, since there are about a billion choices--to go wrong. And every time I make the trip I'm just increasing my chances, if by only a miniscule amount.

Then there's been this story. Horrifying. The odds of dying in a plane accident may not be very high, but when you're the lucky winner, you're in for one of the most horrible methods of death I can think of. My new assistant at work used to work as a flight attendant, and she was telling me today how it's not so bad, that if you die in the crash it's nearly instantaneous. "It's just like, boom, dead!" she said comfortingly.

Yeah, that's the instant that the plane crashes. But that doesn't account for the preceding minute or so of plummeting to your absolute death as the sub-par airline food returns up to your mouth. Even worse is if you somehow manage to survive the initial impact but then find yourself in the middle of the Pacific ocean, either drowning or floating hopelessly until you starve to death or get eaten by something.

How do people who fly a lot fly so much?

And on that note, I always thought teleportation was the substitute for me, but then a couple weeks ago I saw The Fly. Holy shit.

Sat, 23 May 2009 02:32:28 GMT

I just had a rad dream where I was still in Japan but all the shop clerks were replaced with American rednecks who were even more prejudiced. When I went to check out at a store (I was buying a white board which I had tested out while waiting in line by telling a random girl in the line "Let's write a poem. What's your favorite color?" (her favorite color was a color I had never ever heard of!) and which had impressed me even though the marker was dripping shitloads of ink) clerks started silently signaling each other until one came over to assist me in checking out. When it was my turn to pay, the cashier lady didn't even look at me, she just whispered the price to the assistant, which was in yen. I was like "Hey, I understand English."

I couldn't write a scene like that if I tried. Dreams are cool.

But seriously, pet peeves about cashiers in Japan:

1) Speaking to me through whatever Japanese person happens to be standing next to me, which is a sign of the following (incorrect) assumptions:

-White people don't understand Japanese.
-Japanese understand white people tongue.

2) Speaking to me in bad English on the assumption that my Japanese is even worse. I had a door-to-door saleswoman tell me to go home once. She didn't mean it. Besides, I WAS home.

Usually people aren't that shitty, but it happens. Sometimes they also give me the finger. Just kidding.

I AM REVIVEN!!!!

Mon, 18 May 2009 04:33:24 GMT

So add it to your dictionaries now.

Finally got a new computer. I can't remember if I already explained, but my beloved and only four-year-old iBook met an untimely and drunken fate over our long holiday ("Golden Week") when I accidentally spilled beer on it and then submerged the entire unit in a soapy, water-filled bathtub.

A friend told me it would work!

Anyway, it was already unusable once the beer had been spilled. And as much as it stings to suddenly part with two thousand dollars, which was most of my bonus for putting in a whole year of loyal service to my company, it sure is exciting getting a new computer. These new MacBooks are sleeker than speedboats covered in glass dolphins. And that's the second sleekest thing I can think of. Next to new MacBooks.

Fun times ahead. I suppose I should use this as an opportunity to urge all you friends to get Skype if you don't already have it. We could be talking in real time, whenever we want, for free, with video for crying out loud. And dammit it's lonely out here. Last week I saw a moth and I wouldn't let him leave.

BLINK!

Mon, 04 May 2009 03:08:08 GMT

I tried so hard today to go to a cafe that isn't a gargantuan, nation-wide chain, but all the small places are evidently closed on Sundays, because who wants to go out for a leisurely cup of coffee on their one and only day off for the week (no such thing as a Saturday for most people here)?

Not knowing each place's operating hours (or even locations) ahead of time, this had me wheelin' around on my bike back and forth like a paperboy with extremely premature Alzheimer's. Up the road, down the road and back again. I passed one couple four times. By the end of it I must've had them thinking I was an apparition (which, by the way, most Japanese people I've met here are alarmingly quick to assume. Hey, what's that stain on the floor? Ghost did it, spilled some cranberry juice, the spooky-ass butterfingers. Hey, whose footsteps do I hear? Ghost's, that's the only explanation. But you said Japanese ghosts don't have feet, you explicitly told me that a breath ago. Yeah but they know how to simulate that sound. You gotta sorta thwock your tongue against the roof of your mouth, like ::THWOCK:: No no no, you're just clucking, that's different. Ghosts don't do that shit).

I passed another spot by a busy road twice within about five minutes. The second time I passed, the whole area was deep in the chaotic aftermath of an accident. A large, expensive-looking thing had its front completely smashed in, another car had some other area smashed in (I didn't get a good look), and a confused woman stood with a cop in the middle of the road, making a dimwitted face that was pretty much immediately telling of her driving aptitude. I mean call it an unfair generalization, but that was definitely the face of a terrible driver and an anti-Semite.

Five minutes at most and all this. If I had hit a couple more red crosswalk signals on the way I might've witnessed the accident first-hand. I might've even been sandwiched between cars as I tried to bike across the street only to have our new friend the rocket scientist careen into me at full force in her armored soccer mom dreadnought. They don't even have soccer moms here, just their cars.

It got me thinking about how much can happen in the five minute space where you're blinking. It doesn't have to be five minutes though, and you don't have to be blinking. You could go out of town on business for the weekend and in the meantime your wife meets a hunky man with one of those chins that's been severely dented by an unhappy lumberjack, proceeds to find some point of commonality with him, proceeds to be seduced, have hot, cheaty sex with him, and become pregnant with his baby, also with lumberjack-sculpted chin. You return home just forty-eight hours later and your world has been virtually nuked.

What did I do? I left town two years and three months ago, and then I went back in December and my country had no money and we had a black president (not a bad thing, sorry). Next time I go back there'll be an epidemic and no such thing as Chrysler. In a couple years I'll go back and DC will be infested with radroaches and road warriors and shit.

When have you blinked only to open your eyes to vast change?

Ultimately I ended up settling for Mister Donut, which is not only a chain, it's just about the biggest coffee-selling chain in the entire country. I guess my resolve to help out the little guy collapsed under the weight of my sudden reminder: time is of the essence. Do what you want to do now, because next time you blink they might drop the bomb.

Also, for god's sakes, how could a cafe not be open on Sundays? It's not like any of these quaint little coffee shops offer takeout for the workperson on the go. Each one I visit is lazier and cool jazzier in atmosphere than the last. They might as well give them all names that are variations on "Sunday Cafe" because that's exactly the day you'd think they're perfect to go to on when you see them. ::Sigh, man:: What a backwards-ass place this is.

Places That Rock or Don't: Za Meshiya

Mon, 20 Apr 2009 05:08:04 GMT

Let's say you live in Japan and you're one of the millions of people who've been feeling the tug of this economic crisis. OR, let's say you have terrible, terrible taste in cuisine. Where do you go for breakfast, lunch, or dinner? Za Meshiya, that's where. "Za Meshiya" translates to "The Meshiya", or "The Food Store" if you want to go all the way, but with an even humbler kick, so I guess you could even call it "The Grub Shack" or something like that. Also, Za Meshiya is huge, so you can't miss it. It's even got an enormous sculpture of a chain out front, presumably because it's a chain store, but possibly because it's run by the insane.

Za Meshiya offers a variety of traditional Japanese dishes, served at unpredictable temperatures ranging from ice cold to warehouse crate warm, and all for unprecedentedly cheap prices. I don't believe I've seen anything there that was above the two-hundred yen range. The way it works is similar to a school cafeteria, in that you pick up your desired items, each labeled with a price tag, off a counter which is attended by a woman who is your grandma. But if you should find yourself at one of Za Meshiya's many locations one day, be sure to note that those low price tags and humble decor bear on themselves a bit of foreshadowing; Za Meshiya is the school cafeteria of Japanese food.

I went there today (whenever that was) for the second time (so it's not that bad). Boy was I hungry. "Meshi time!!!" I exclaimed as I burst through the door, terrifying my own grandma. I picked up a few items, and then cast my glance upon the bean sprout stir fry.

"Gee," I said loudly, "I could eat that."

The portion was large but it looked appetizing. And I'm no rookie when it comes to bean sprouts, I can tell you that. But then I saw the fried rice.

"Hmm, but maybe the fried rice is the safer option," I announced. After all, it's fried rice. There's no way to mess it up. But is there any health value to it? At least bean sprout stir fry is mostly vegetables, with just that little bit of protein in what looked like pieces of beef.

Bean sprout stir fry it is.

With that decided, I took my seat, took my chopsticks, and took a bite. Awful. I could've stirred a better fry in my toilet. What spices did they use, oxygen and broken refrigerator condensation? It certainly tasted like oxygen and broken refrigerator condensation. Were they bean sprouts or long, slender strips of dirt?

I gurgled a bit as I choked down the first mouthful of disappointment. A table of hungry salarymen glanced over at me, smirking. Not good. Cheap, shitty food is like milk to these people. I can't afford to show them any weakness. I'll be the laughingstock of the Grub Shack. I choked down another bite. Okay. Maybe I can get into a comfortable rhythm. Bite, bite, deny reality. Bite, bite, deny reality. Luckily, there was a giant pitcher of tea on the table, which, though also dirt-flavored, was tea, so I didn't even notice. I occasionally washed the horror out of my mouth with a cup of tea, trying not to look too desperate.

I just had to be the big man and pick up the largest entree available. Now I was responsible for dealing with a virtual mountain of excrement, with people's leering gazes upon me from all sides. I knew just how Obama felt.

A group of high school boys watched me gleefully as I struggled. The seconds went by like centuries. "Look at that guy with the fully in-tact eyebrows. What a doofus! Snicker!" one of them said, actually pronouncing the word "snicker".

"Totally radical!" another added.

A bead of sweat trickled down my face, cascading into my cafeteria dirt. Ah, some salty water ought to up the flavor a bit. Bite. Nope. Bite, bite, deny reality. Bite, bite, deny reality.

The whole lunch went more or less like this, for about three excruciating decades. I'm an old man now, but I've come here today to tell you that Za Meshiya is not a great place to eat lunch, especially when there's an Indian restaurant a block away where your girlfriend works and you can probably get free chicken soup or something like that.

Technically not too late yet!

Thu, 02 Apr 2009 02:08:36 GMT

Happy birthday, Sarah!

April Fool's in Japan

Wed, 01 Apr 2009 15:26:26 GMT

Well, another April Fool's Day has come and gone without incident. I still feel like I've never really experienced this holiday the way it's supposed to be experienced. Where do you have to go to find people who are all fooling the shit out of each other all day, only to stick out their tongues, slap their asses and head for the hills?

Obviously not Japan. I was surprised to learn today that April Fool's Day does indeed exist in Japan. You'd think that with all the bowing and needless apologizing they do here, a holiday dedicated to the act of making people look foolish wouldn't vibe so well with the people. And to an extent, you'd be right. The second thing I learned today was that in Japan, April Fool's Day is "the day when it's okay to lie."

I guess that's sort of right, in the sense that lying is essentially the simplest type of prank one can pull. Example:

Sally: Hey Billy. Today I had sex with another man.

Billy: What? But I...I l-l-love you...Sally. Don't you...I mean don't you love me anymore? Oh my god, this is crazy. This is so crazy. How could you? Was he better than me? I mean did he have a bigger cock? Who was it? It was Harold from the office, wasn't it? I KNEW you and him were fucking, I KNEW IT!! I KNEW IT!!!! HOW COULD YOU DO THIS?!!?!? HOW??!?!?!?! COULD YOU!!!!

....DO THIS!?!?!?!?!

Sally: April Foooool's!

But that's so lazy. Japanese people don't understand that the beauty of April Fool's Day lies in devising the ultimate prank, which may, but certainly doesn't have to, involve lying. You don't have to lie to put spider eggs in someone's handkerchief or wrap their child's daycare center in police tape.

Besides, I would've thought it was okay to lie EVERYDAY in Japan, considering all the bullshit I hear flying around at every turn. Isn't that what a tatemae basically is, anyway? Look it up, dammit.

Fraud at City Hall

Wed, 01 Apr 2009 14:12:22 GMT

I went to the city hall today to update my Proof of Being a Foreigner Card, which is convenient to have in case people mistake you for a Japanese person (which in actuality has happened to me about twice). The process of updating your Proof of Being a Foreigner Card consists of going to the city hall, waiting around for awhile, and then having somebody write your visa details on the back of the card with a ball-point pen.

In reality, you're supposed to do this within two weeks of updating your visa, which I knowingly failed to do. Being late presents no actual problem, but in the end they made me fill out a multiple choice form explaining my reason for being late. The choices were all things like "I didn't know I had to do this" and "I was too busy". My question is, does this form have any kind of impact on anything? I circled the "busy" option. I wonder if I'll be snatched up by a couple of suits in a few days.

MOORE, GREGORY DANIEL
Offense: Fraud
Details: Claimed to be "too busy" to have city official write single line of ink on back of Proof of Being a Foreigner Card when granted a full two weeks to do so.

I guess they'd be right.

More About the Strange American Girl

Tue, 31 Mar 2009 15:45:36 GMT

Note: First referenced a long time ago in the post about going to play in Nagoya and seeing a fist fight.

The strange American girl was petite and called herself "Bernice". I think she was trying to size me up and compare herself to me, which is behavior you sometimes see in gaijin, especially ones who are studying Japanese. Until we both played our open mic sets, everything she said felt mildly condescending. "I'm from near Philly. Probably closer than you really are to D.C." That's a funny thing to guess.

We had a dialogue like this:

Bernice: "So how many songs have you prepared?"
Greg: "Prepared? Just however many they let me play."
Bernice: "...Oh. So you write your own songs then?"
Greg: "Well sure, who else would?"
Bernice: "...Oh. So I guess you're a teacher?"
Greg: "Yeah, at a cram school."
Bernice: (Makes inexplicable yuck face) ...Oh. A 'juku', eh?"
Greg: "Yeah. Actually it's a much nicer gig than my old gig--working at Nova."
Bernice: "...Oh. How long have you been in Japan?"
Greg: "Two years."
Bernice: "...Oh."

Well, maybe it's lost in the text, but every question she had seemed laced with this sort of competitive prejudice, and every answer I gave elicited a caught-off-guard reaction, only to be followed by another calculated question.

Then after we played, it was like I had proven myself, and her attitude was completely different. Her questions didn't cease, but became more of the advice-asking variety, and she also kept resting her hand on me, which I actually didn't notice until she pointed out that she was doing it and then explained that it wasn't flirting, but how if it had been flirting, her boyfriend, who she had just performed with, would "kill" her. Thinking this a rather grave situation, I waved to her boyfriend, Shinji, who had prior been doing a terrible job of making himself look aloof in the corner. He came over. He was mild-mannered enough. Stoic, even. He also didn't seem to like the girl, per se, just possess her. He didn't seem to care for me much either, and he certainly didn't possess me, although he did stand and listen to us.

She asked if I was studying Japanese, and I said yes, it was my college major and everything.

"And then you came to Japan and realized all that studying wasn't worth jack," she replied.

"Actually, I think I have all that studying to thank for just about everything good that's happened to me here."

"...Oh."

P.S. Her singing was pretty dreadful.
P.P.S. Did I mention I don't like when people make assumptions about the kind of guy I am?

Japanese Beetles

Fri, 06 Mar 2009 18:33:42 GMT

You sometimes hear people complaining about Japanese beetles back in the States, but they don't realize how lucky they are that some Japanese beetles never even made it overseas.

Two varieties of large, hideous beetle exist in Japan - the kabuto-mushi (samurai helmet bug) and the kuwagata (hideous pincer bug). As the names may indicate, one of them has a terrible, samurai helmet-shaped head with enormous horns sticking out, while the other has an hideous set of pincer-like growths protruding from its already hideous face. Both are unreasonably large, around the size of a Starbucks double-shot. The Japanese, who generally harbor extreme intolerance for bugs, and are known to flinch in terror even at the sight of a housefly, have an inexplicable fondness for these two biological travesties, which they express not only by not flinching in terror, but by going as far as to collect and intentionally touch them. People look forward to the sight of these abominations as a happy sign of summer, and I would venture a guess that to the average Japanese person, an encounter with one of them is more welcome than that with, say, a Chinese person.

Children are particularly fond of these two types of beetles, and will expend great amounts of energy (or their parents' money) in an effort to obtain one of each, so that the horrible samurai bug and monstrous pincer bug can be viewed in the same space. This can only be described as "horrid".

Though the two breeds of beetle share a number of common faults, such as being terrible, they remain, like Israelis and Palestinians, oblivious to their similarities, and find themselves constantly engaged in petty disputes, such as who gets to eat the slime off the twig or who gets to shit on the brown leaf. These bug-on-bug quarrels are, as you may have already hypothesized, unsavory occasions. The already wretched creatures will grow shockingly livid for two beings with no remarkable amount of brain power, and will proceed to squirm all over one another like Greco-Roman wrestlers. They are also just as nude as Greco-Roman wreslters, suggesting to my dismay that that they're actually proud of themselves.

A young student of mine brought such a display to class once, and I was mesmerized to discover that the volume of my students' squeals of glee was directly proportional to my own escalating vomitousness, both spurred by the insects' writhing deathmatch.

Where does everybody's tolerance toward these creatures come from? Certainly not from a tolerance-enforced upbringing or any sort of ethical doctrine. Non-Japanese people are all addressed collectively as "outside people", but hideous bugs are revered as fucking samurai. Did you see those pictures I linked? They're awful!

Just awful.

Wed, 04 Mar 2009 18:05:43 GMT

Well, I'll be quitting my awesome kindergarten job later this month. I like everything about this job, except that it's far as shit and a huge waste of time. It bears repeating that it's a seven-hour commitment for 30-60 minutes of teaching. Seven hours. And one time I broke my goddamn teeth trying to get there.

So with my departure fast approaching, I thought it'd be nice to hand out some superlatives to the amazing, charming teachers. Unfortunately I'm too shy to actually tell the nice ladies, and I also never bothered to learn any of their names. Also most of these are potentially offensive.

As much as I admire the women I work with (if I forgot to mention before, all six or seven of them are beautiful and charming), I never had much of a chance to form any kind of relationship with them. They always have their hands beyond full, and I'm not really supposed to use much Japanese in front of the kids, see. So most of these ideas are merely speculations based on a year and a half of intense people-watching.

1. Most Likely To Hit on the Firemen Who Visit Once a Year - The hot one with the intense facial expression who turns out to be surprisingly submissive and kind, suggesting she's been wronged by an asshole or two in her time.

2. Most Likely to Someday Congeal Into a Ball of Concentrated Cutie Goo - The cute, youngest one who used to have no confidence.

3. Most Toothiest - The toothy one.

4. One I'd Most Like to Marry - The one I just found out is getting married soon to a guy who's not me.

5. Most Probably Hung Over a Lot of the Time - The one who rarely wears makeup and who was into judo back in school. I mean come on.

6. Most Likely to Stick Around - The one who left last year. Scratch that.

7. The Best One - The one who tries to speak English to me even when the kids aren't looking.

8. Most Likely to Actually Be Into S&M Shit - Like several of them, dude. I mean, pro'lly.

9. Most Hummingbirdlike Physique - The one whose sneezes make windows in the next county (sorry, prefecture) shatter.

10. Most Likely to Have Kids Someday - The one who's getting married.

The Water-Chugger Bachelor

Tue, 10 Feb 2009 05:16:26 GMT

The two of them sat, scoping out potential mates for Alessandra.

"I don't know, Leene," he said. This was short for Leena. "Look at that big thing of water he's got. Look, he's chugging it like he's got a hot tamale lodged in his gullet."

"How do you chug water?"

"Leene, there are two types of people who chug giant bottles of water that they brought themselves--health nuts, and emotionally unstable nutbags. And does he look like a health nut to you? Look at those chicken-ass legs. He's got chicken legs."

"Why do emotionally unstable people chug water?"

"It calms them."

"Are you just making that up, or did you hear it?"

"Look, even if I hadn't heard it from like a brilliant spectrum of sources--which I have--it would go without saying."

Leena scrutinized him quizzically.

"Okay. Imagine, Leena, you're at your wits' end. Every day is pain, and the thought of getting up in the morning fills your mouth with bile. It also fills your soul with the spiritual equivalent of bile--grief."

"Nice analogy," Leena said.

"Thanks. You know what happens when people start to lose it?"

"They start tinkering with the insides of TVs?"

"Please. There's nothing insane about my electric window idea. No, the correct answer is that they start looking for remedies. Anything to make them feel any amount better about anything. So they start thinking, 'What've I been slacking on? How can I be a healthier person? Exercise more? Sure, that'd word, except, oops!, I can't stand exercise, that's why I don't do it. Eat more greens? Okay!' and maybe half of those people start cramming spinach down their yammer-pits whenever they get the chance. The other half say 'Forget vegetables, they taste awful' and resort to drinking more water instead."

"Makes sense, I guess."

"Do you know how much water people're suppose to be drinking?"

"Eight to eleven glasses a day."

"Yeah. That's a day, Leene. Do you drink that much?"

"No."

"Me neither. That's because only looneyfolk are desperate enough to care. Them and health nuts."

"Have you ever been one of them?"

"Health nut? Sure. I once swam the Baltic."

"A loon."

"Well, yeah. You think I get all this info off cereal boxes and such? A few years ago I was loopier than a noose, honey-pie."

"So a few years ago you would've been just as ineligible as Louie McChuggerton over there."

"Hell yes I would've. Leene, you wouldn't believe it was the same person if you saw me back then. I was always ranting. Silently, or the other kind. I was a walking case of OCD, I tell you. My hair was brown back then too."

"Wow. So did the carpet match the curtains, if you know what I'm sort of implying?"

"Come on, it was OCD. The spatula I used to flip my read magazines matched the curtains."

"How 'bout your pubes?"

"OCD."

"So I guess this guy might be as eligible as you a few years down the line then, huh?"

"Please. Look at those chicken-ass legs."

Pretty Girls

Mon, 09 Feb 2009 05:23:22 GMT

There are pretty girls everywhere in Japan, even at gas stations in the countryside or at private kindergartens where I work. I attribute this to small serving sizes, fewer magazine genres, the absence of both Ben and Jerry, and enormous batches of oppression baked fresh daily.

There are pretty girls everywhere in Japan, but they are mostly the same girl repeated many times. I saw a girl today and thought to myself, "She's pretty. She could be in the Japanese equivalent of the L.L. Bean catalog--R.R. Bean." Then later, ascending the stairs of Kashiwamori Station, I saw a different girl making her way down. She, too, was pretty, I first noted, before also noting that she was, for all intents and purposes, the same girl as the first girl. All her clothes were the same, as was her hair and makeup. There was also something I couldn't quite make out on her neck, but I believed it to be either a bar code or a smudge of biscotti chocolate.

This was the same staircase that shattered my two front teeth a few months ago.

An aside about gas stations, words.

Fri, 06 Feb 2009 04:03:05 GMT

You may never find a people less eager to voice their personal opinions than the Japanese, and I've even met a few who claim that contrarily, they have no personal opinions. It's a quiet and often lonely country full of Billy Bashfuls and Meek Marthas. Sometimes people even squeak, if you lunge at them suddenly.

But if there's one case in which the Japanese don't skimp on the gab-gab, it's in greeting people at a place of business. No matter where you go, if it's a profit-making enterprise of some sort--and that's key--you can expect to have the shit greeted out of you by some greet-happy automaton. Greetings in Japanese are delivered in sonkeigo, which is bloody full-on, boot-lickingly polite, and which causes a perfectly decent word of reasonable length like "kue"--the tough guy's word for "eat(!)"--to morph into a hideous abomination like "doozo omeshiagari-kudasaimase", which takes countless eons to say completely, and translates to "Please grant me the honorable favor of the eating of the thing, though I am wholly unworthy. Also, might I add that these Birkenstocks taste exquisite."

Store clerks, waitresses, and bank tellers are required to rattle out these greetings every single time a customer enters, exits, or takes any other type of action. To present an abstract example:

Man: Enters a store
Not one, but every godforsaken employee: Welcome and thank you for the entering of the store, kind sir and/or ma'am!
Man: Pulls out his own chair. Sits.
Server/Bottom-feeding clerk: Your generosity fills me with fear, good sir!
Man: Pulls out a sandwich, takes a bite.
Serve/Bottom-feeding clerk: Please forgive my obscene display of gratitude as I thank you for the eating of the thing.
Man: Leaves without having said a single word in response to any of this completely unwarranted praise.
Everyone: We extend our unending thanks to you, good sir. Your grandchildren and your grandchildren's grandchildren will be no strangers here. Please lean slightly in the direction of our humble and unworthy establishment the next time you should pass by, that your incandescent figure and intoxicating musk might caress our senses once again.

As a result, these jobs have employees streaming out scripts of praise all damn day like it's some kind of Southern Baptist church.

Presumably due to all of the fainting and comas this has caused, as well as to the complete lack of sincerity behind any of these words, most greetings nowadays are abbreviated into a single, unintelligible spewing of sound, like a deflating balloon possessed by Satan and speaking in tongues. Example:

Guy: Walks into store.
Clerk: WHARRRRBLE-DEE-Hissssss.
Underling clerks: Sssss.

Now, these greetings generally sound the same no matter where you go, with the very notable exception of gas stations. You would think that with the barrier of a windshield separating customers and clerks, they might just dispense with the niceties altogether, but the truth is quite to the contrary. All Japanese gas stations have pump attendants that come at you in twos and threes, screaming as loud as they can so that their voices penetrate the metal and glass shield of your car. They wave you into your spot like air traffic controllers, shouting "Ourai! Ourai! Ourai!" until your car's gashole is perfectly aligned with the pump. Each customer's arrival is a celebration of life, like Cinco de Mayo. That's a great thing, especially in this gray, gray country. But why do they shout "Ourai"? At first I thought it was some kind of Chinese phrase for "Come along now!" but I asked around. I've heard the facts, sister. "Ourai", it turns out, is just them trying and failing hardcore to pronounce the English phrase "All right," which is an abbreviation for "All right, keep backing up your car," not for "All right, you can stop." Why do they use this particular English phrase instead of "Okay," which they have already thoroughly assimilated into their language?

My theory is that Japanese people just love to use English, as long as they don't actually have to learn what the words mean or how to use them, kind of like how Americans treat French, or how Taco Bell treats Spanish. In so doing, these foreign words are stolen into the Japanese (and American) consciousness and given completely new purpose. Are these words mistakes? In a sense, yes. Are they "wrong"? Well, yes. In a sense. But arguably, the phrase "Ourai" and the phrase "All right" are simply two different phrases, or at least two different mutations of the same thing. It's easy to say, "Hey, asshole, that's not even a word!" Especially if it's some pouty-faced haircut boy, or some guy trying to order a rubiladê. But what is a word? Many will tell you it's anything that's in "The Dictionary," as if it's just the one book. But to those people I urge, unwedge that elongated pole from your anus and give reality a try. When I was a kid, I often heard people in the know complain that "Yo" was not a real word. Imagine my shock when I learned that Yo! MTV Raps was 33.3% lies. Imagine my shock when I watched Yo! MTV Raps. This unreal word proceeded to spend the next twenty years pretending to be real, making appearances in both text and human speech. Most people didn't even notice its fraudulence. James B. Regular would say something like "Yo, guy!" and Henry R. Examplesworth would think "Oh, my boy-boy Jimmie just used that word that means that thing that I understand."

Don't even get me started on the word "Oh".

Before you knew it, all accusations regarding the non-word had ceased. Does this mean it's a word now? That's the only explanation I can think of, considering human beings still find the need to correct each other as frequently as possible. At what point does something go from being a sound with a meaning attached that everybody is aware of, to a word that people accept as part of their language? I don't know the answer to this, but I'm sure it's disappointing.

A friend of mine and fellow linguistic spelunker points out, however, that although English has also adopted any number of foreign words into its vocabulary to suit its own needs, in general these words come from languages of a shared origin, namely Latin and/or Greek. Consequently, most of said borrowed words are used in a more-or-less accurate sense, their original meanings preserved. Moreover, the majority of English's borrowed words come from Latin, German, or French, all of which are languages of academics; you have to go out of your way to study them (or at least, you originally did). The presence of English in Japan, or in the lives of the Japanese, on the other hand, is entirely incidental. the final, mushroom-shaped events of the Pacific War left in their wake a generation of English-speaking G.I.s who inhabited bars, beaches, and bathrooms across Japan, from Okinawa to Yokosuka (or a place that's further from Okinawa). As a Japanese, you didn't have to be some decorated literatus to pick up the basic idea of words like "love" or "communication" or "style"; they were used all around you. But "basic" means "semi-impractical" in this case, and what resulted was an understanding for this language--spoken by a wholly resentable pack of invasive water buffalo--that was as fragmented as the Japanese archipelago itself. Sixty years of filtration through various economic conditions and the wavering state of the country's balls have produced a society of people who almost instinctively find themselves fumbling clumsily with the English language and not knowing why. The final result? Bizarre, linguistic meat monsters like "nau-i" (nowwy), the adjectival form of "now" (e.g., "Those shoes are so nowwy") (though it is admittedly and ironically out of fashion), and expressions that just completely miss the point.

"You have good style," in Japanese means you have attractive proportions--long legs, a thin waist, non-bulbous forehead, comparatively fleshless face. "Style," in other words, refers to the natural, unselected features of your appearance. The meaning is perfectly flipped.

A roller coaster in Japan is called a "jet coaster," a jet being a rearward-thrusting device used to propel something, and a coaster being an object which moves without propulsion.

"Training pants," which are, in reality, pseudo-diapers used to "train" kids to take command of their own urine, et al, are, in Japan, comma, what people call track pants. If somebody compliments you, saying "Your style is so good, you'd even look good in training pants," don't panic. Just remember to thank them. "Please excuse my obscene display of gratitude as I thank you for the saying of the thing, of which my ears are wholly unworthy." Or if that's too wordy, just give 'em a "Yo."

Afterword: I'm always impressed by the kindness of gas station clerks in the U.S. But a trip to a Japanese gas station is nothing short of luxurious. The dangers of having throngs of employees constantly screaming at a place where they inject gallons upon gallons (sorry, liters) of flammable liquid into machines that turn on by "igniting" notwithstanding, I'd bet hard-earned yen that no other gas stations in the world offer service as considerate or attentive. At the end of each trip, attendants bow self-fellatingly low, guide you back onto the road, and, if need be, will stop traffic. Say what you will about their English; those guys are ourai with me.

Sat, 31 Jan 2009 18:46:22 GMT

#9: Modern Fashion

Well, I only own about six pairs of pants, and most of those aren't even in regular circulation, so I don't guess I'm the authority to go to on fashion. But come on. If you hurl a big bucket of puke at a guy walking down the street, he doesn't have to be some world class food critic to know it's foul.

Japan often prides itself on its flourishing fashion industry, which the outside world also thoroughly acknowledges, and indeed it is this pride that has managed to trickle down to even the most blockheaded, teenaged lump of apathy living in a dilapidated village near you (or me, rather), causing him to do elaborate things to his hair that American men had both started and stopped doing in that neon, cocaine-sprinkled string of terrible decisions known as the Eighties.

Now, I don't live in Tokyo, or any big city for that matter, so I know I'm missing out on all sorts of horrific grotesqueries, but let me paint you a picture. Imagine the most metrosexual and/or emophilic man you've ever seen. Does he go to tanning salons? If the answer is "no", pretend he does. Now imagine he has a sex change. Now, although it's not exactly a fashion statement, imagine he treats both his mother and his girlfriend like shit, just as a bonus. What you've just produced is an image of the typical confident, (allegedly) attractive, young Japanese man. Again, if you dare, Exhibits A and B. Did I mention mullets are all the rage here? Yes, these photographs are an accurate representation of what I see in real life reality, for some reason.

The natural female counterpart to these female imitators is the "gyaru", which is how the Japanese say "gal", which in Japanese means a Japanese girl who is also a shallow, Californian white girl. Think Paris Hilton, except that instead of being born rich, they just leech off their male counterparts in exchange for sex or through devious mental manipulation. Before I proceed with a tirade on how I hate that they call themselves "gals", and the word "gals" in general, let me jerk myself back on track and just complain that they've latched onto the most hated type of American there is and made a highly salable fashion statement out of it.

And therein lies the problem. The most "in" people over here are those who imitate two of the most arbitrary, hideous things you could think of--Valley girls and Rod Stewart.

Young people see me at the train station, with my lack of a perm or any loud accessories and my straight teeth, and they scoff at me. They laugh in my face. And you know something? It's one of the best compliments I've ever received.

Top 10 Ways Japan Shits on Our Beloved Culture or Cultures - #10

Tue, 27 Jan 2009 17:31:17 GMT

#10: Japanese-Western "Food"

My brother Tim often recounts with a glint of trauma in his eye that he only had to be in Japan a few days to spot some travesty of an establishment trying to sell people spaghetti topped with hot dogs, french fries, and pizza with little American flag toothpicks sticking out of it or something to that effect, and I'll be damned if I don't see some kind of Frankensteinian concoction like that every damn day that I live here, or at least on the days I can bear to set foot outside anymore. Then again, the pizza places send fliers right to your door so you don't even have to go outside. Pizza menus in Japan all feature full-color photographs of about thirty different abominable variations on what is supposed to be a simple formula for deliciousness.

Observe, if you dare, Exhibit A, provided by a different but equally appalled Greg(g) living in Japan. The text is all in Japanese, but in case you can't tell from the pictures, let me assure you that some 80% of the options depicted here are chock to the brim with glistening, pulsating horror.

It starts off kind of normal. Your first option there is just a regular pizza with onions, green peppers, salami, bacon, and corn. Not too strange at all, except for the corn part. Then you've got the German Potato pizza. Not exactly orthodox, but hey, potatoes and cheese aren't such an odd couple either. Then you've got the Curry German Potato pizza. Getting a little more culturally confused, but that's all right. Curry pizza's actually pretty g...wait, what's next?

The "Meat Gratin Pizza"? What the hell? It says it contains onions, mushrooms, macaroni and parsley.

Now get ready to cry a lot.

The second row starts us off with the "Old Town Pizza", which, as you can see, is covered with giant octopus tentacles, as well as shrimp, squids, writhing fish skin flakes, cabbage, grilled noodles, and seaweed. Only thirty dollars for a large.

Next we've got the "Tara-Mayo Pizza", which features mayonnaise-soaked cod eggs, seaweed strips, corn, scallops (which are also soaked in mayonnaise), and everyone's all-time favorite pizza topping, gigantic radish slices.

Side orders include--both in this particular menu as well as in general--hot dogs on a stick, three varieties of gratin, fried chicken (extra skin), and churros.

I think these harsh realities more or less speak for themselves, so I won't belabor the point. But I do wonder what makes societies latch onto specific things and magnify them into symbols that represent things they shouldn't represent. For some reason, this country is obsessed with gratin, as well as something called "doria" which I'd never even heard of before coming here, but which is essentially the same thing as gratin. It's to the point now that when you ask a person, "What's your favorite Western food?" they're likely to say "Mm, probably gratin and/or doria, both of which are Western and great."

"What the hell are gratin and/or doria?" replies the Westerner. Welcome to the concept of this list.