07.16.04
Man, I really am trying so hard to get some updates in here before I leave! For a change I actually have some things to talk about, but fuck me, there's NO TIME!!! Argh! I still have barely gotten around to cleaning and packing up this apartment, hair is being ripped out at rates I care not to describe. I'm going to have nothing left to flap in no time!! (Get it, hair... flap... ha ha... -_- )
Anyway, thanks to those that keep loading the site every couple days to see if there's anything new here. I always keep an eye on the stats and I see that there are indeed some faithful readers out there, thanks!!
Just to hold you over until I get back, there's this little gem that I saw at my favorite take-out restaurant here in town. They have a new item on the menu, tragically named the GooCup(!!) that I snapped a pic of for you dear people. Not sure what's worse, the name, or that creepy chick pointing at it, a little too pleased about something. I dare not comment further than that.
07.09.04
The sheer photographic quality of Mike Clarke's photo-blog makes me sick to my stomach with a special brand of envy usually reserved for those children on hot summer days, who can only watch as the other kids that have an allowance get to buy something when the ice cream man comes around. His photos make me feel like I'm insulting the institution of photography whenever I touch a camera, they're that good.
It's possible that I'm just jealous of his penchant for photographing people, which is something I'm not that great at, simply because I kind of find people boring. I tend to focus more on scenery and environs since my personal view is that that usually says more about the nature of people than looking at the people themselves. That having been said though, this dude makes me want to try and develop that area cause he's finding some very interesting stuff there! Anyway, check it out, you'll be glad you did.
I also came across this essay about the Japanese preoccupation with wrapping things. You may recall a while back I was bitching about the blatant waste of packaging in Japan. The essay at least slightly addressed the issue in suggesting that the act of unwrapping an object helps to complete the sense of 'transfer of ownership' and by unwrapping said object you are making it yours. I'm down with that as far as gifts and things are concerned, but why it matters with a box of fucking mini-donuts, I've yet to figure out.
The essay is a little dry and I haven't had time to do more than browse through it yet, but it seems to be pretty interesting if you're into the finer points of Japanese culture.
07.06.04
I was in Tokyo for a week; I meant to mention it before I left and even typed out a post and everything then forgot to upload it to the server. <sigh> Anyway, I'm back and have a few choice photos (of the over 400 that I took!!) that I hope to have up sometime before the weekend.
Unfortunately, updates are going to continue to be sparse for the next two weeks or so as I'm insanely busy with preparations for going home and the countless parties/dinners/etc that come with my impending departure on the 25th. Honestly, I have a farewell party or dinner EVERY NIGHT for the next week!! Woe is me. :P
Anyway, I promise that I'll make a concerted effort to get some photos or something up here before the weekend just to show that I haven't forgotten the nice people that come visit. Also, apologies to people who are waiting on email responses from me, email has also suffered during vacation and, what has now become, scramble time.
06.16.04
I took a look out my window the other day and saw this weird bug on my patio wall. Really cool looking, I have never seen it before. That kind of made me think, as I was in the middle of preparing stuff to send home, I had never seen that kind of bug before. I've been living here three years and it was the first time I'd seen it. It just kind of got me to thinking if this kind of bug has been here in Japan the whole time I've been here and it's the first time I've seen it, just think of all the OTHER bugs out there that I haven't seen yet, and may never see.
Okay, granted that point of that anecdote wasn't all that veiled, I guess the Official Hair Flap Metaphorafizer™ is due for it's 10k mile checkup. How about this one?
In the teacher's room at school, there's a sidedoor that goes down a little hallway, just for the teachers, where the Gents and Ladies lockers are. The other day while changing out of my sweaty bike gear, I noticed something I'd not noticed in three years. Down at the end of the line of lockers, was one labeled "Chad." Chad was my predecessor, the first ALT ever in Fukuma. All his students have long since graduated Jr. High and are probably all in college (or flipping burgers) by now and all the teachers he worked with have certainly been transferred. Any influence he might have had has totally evaporated from Fukuma in any observable sense. Here I am looking at the chief remains of his experience, buried away in the back of the Higashi-Chu Men's locker room.
Perhaps I should have been wondering if my experiences will amount to the same thing, if anyone will remember some of the things I did here, or if there will even be anyone here in another three years to remember that I worked here in Fukuma. Instead I found my thoughts drifting to how, for three years, all this time, only a few short feet away, this rat-fucking-bastard has had 4 hangers in his locker that I could have been using the entire time instead of my ONE goddamn hook!! AARGH, just think how well that could have dried out my sweaty shirts during the day to be nice and crispy dry by the time I don them for the ride home again in the afternoon. GRRRRRR. So much for introspection. :P
06.02.04
I called in on Friday and arranged to have my satellite TV turned off as of the first of the month. That means Monday was the last day I watch Simpsons in Japan. Yes, my friends, the end is drawing near. The world is changed. I feel it in the water, I feel it in the earth, I smell it in the air. Much that once was is now lost, for none now live that remember it. It began with the forging of the great rings. Three were given to the elves, w... ahem Sorry, got a little sidetracked there.
The fact that there's a mere two months left in Japan and that the End is drawing neigh for me and most of my friends is no longer creeping to the forefront of our minds, it's firmly entrenched and has started forging a mighty dam that could hold back even the mighty Mississippi... which surprises me, because I always thought the End would shy away from maritime ventures, instead choosing to fashion a tree-borne nest, or perhaps some kind of makeshift lean-to like I learned to make in Outdoor School. That crazy End, it always keeps ya guessing!
Last Saturday, me and Kiwi went out for drinks and then went to the infamous Lab-Z, one of the usual haunts of our crew for the past two years or so. It underscored the coming of the end yet again as it was the last night of our friend and bartender Ben. Even when we were on ground level of the building, the elevator doors were plastered with Lab-Z adverts for the event of that evening, "The Last Benjamin" complete with Last Samurai poster, photoshopped to replace Tom Cruise's head with Ben's. (And done pretty well too. I burst out laughing when I saw it cause it looked so good. ^_^ )
The whole evening was just great, at least I remember it being great. Me and Kiwi were already fairly toasty after downing drink after drink talking about New Zealand, what we were going to be doing after JET and debating wether the person at the end of the bar talking to the cute girl was her boyfriend or her sister (Seriously! It was hard to tell, and the jury is still out).
Anyhow, Ben's last night had drawn all kinds of foreigners to Lab, it was perhaps the largest non-Japanese group I've ever seen there. We had a booth next to the bar reserved just for us, something that never happens, as it's usually reserved for VIPs (i.e. skanky hoes, as I hear the kids these days refer to them). While standing at the bar, rapping with Ben and some of our friends, in rolls Soushi, who greets me with a hearty handshake and asks how I'm doing. Soushi, btw, is the owner and DJ extroidonaire of this joint. So as I'm sitting there, next to our private booth, getting a free drink from my bartender friend and shooting the shit with the owner/DJ of the place, it just hits me how good life here really is (despite the futility of the job :P ) and how much I'm going to miss it when I go back. Rock star lifestyle on the weekends VS starving artist with lame dayjob every day of the week; Which would you choose?
