Golden Week rant

So Golden Week just finished yesterday and it started out hectic, but I decided I wanted to relax for most of the end of it before coming back to work. Today is my first day back and, luckily, I only have two classes as one was cancelled and the other is only every other week.

For those of you who don't know, Golden Week is kind of like Spring break, but without any religious holiday like Easter- or at least there isn't a holiday that my students or coworkers have mentioned. It makes going out of your apartment somewhat unbearable as people flood into every nook and cranny during this time. It also makes travel within and out of Japan terrible. But travelling TO Japan is pretty awesome. If I'd known and planned better I could have had someone come visit me for ridiculously cheap, but maybe next year?

This time alone did help me think about what kind of life I want while here and what kind of life I DON'T like while I'm here. Basically, I don't want to be a drunk idiot gaijin (foreigner) like some other people I saw at the beginning of this vacation. One in particular rubbed me the wrong way and I feel that eliminating toxic, energy-sucking d-bags like him will make my stay here much better because he's that guy who never got over being in college and tries to re-live it every weekend. I'm all for going out, but not if it's the same routine of getting wasted and being a loud jackass. He does other stuff besides drinking too, but he's that guy who shouts in a silent room, always hoping for even more attention. So even if he's doing something interesting that doesn't include getting shitfaced (rarely) his mere presence makes it not as enjoyable for me. The big problem: I work with him. So I have to see him two days a week and when I see him tomorrow I can only imagine what kind of BS will spout forth from his lips.

One more rant, but this time on being a foreigner in Japan: the racial profiling. Obviously I'm not black and don't know what it's like to be black, but living here and trying to quietly shop in Japan is crazy because you're treated like a circus freak. I feel like it MIGHT be as close as I'll ever come to being racially profiled like many of my black friends back home have told me in story after story. I mean, I do stand out a lot. I DO have blond hair now and I am sometimes a good foot taller than a lot of people here, but for fuck's sake, people! Do you have to be so obvious about it? They try so hard to be subtle, too, but it just makes them stand out to me even more. Usually they're just curious, though, and will casually walk and stand next to me like they're interested in the item two feel away. Now at first I didn't realize what was happening, because I usually make a list of stuff I need then just go to that section and grab, so I can get the Hell outta there ASAP. So I just thought it was a Japanese culture thing when people would browse the shelves next to me, but not actually pick up anything to put in their baskets. But then I'd realize they were then in the next aisle with me- huh? I just picked up laundry detergent and now I'm buying cashews seven aisles away and yet here you are! Coincidence? So I developed a little game where I leave an area as soon as a Japanese person appears and then see what happens. Usually almost immediately they walk away from the area, but all the while keeping their eyes on me until I turn around and I look straight at them- then they fucking bolt. The other game I've played (mostly with older Japanese guys) is staying in the same place for as long as possible to see how long they'll hang out before getting bored and leaving. Let me tell you: older Japanese guys are very patient. I hung out at one of those bargain bins for about 5-7 minutes with this old Japanese guy where we would take turns picking something up and returning it to the bin. Finally I put something in my basket and walked away, and he immediately followed. Hilarious!

The good thing is because everyone's always looking at you, it's pretty easy to ask people questions- when my Japanese doesn't totally suck anyway. It's also really easy to make friends with people because they're interested in you and want to ask you a million questions- usually starting with "Why did you come to Japan?" It's a valid question, but one that's not easy to answer because there are a tons reasons why I came here: my break up with Scott, I wanted to live abroad, I'm trying to further my career, it seemed like an easy way to break into teaching internationally, etc. etc. But it's pretty hard to answer any of that when they speak cavemen English and I speak about 20 words of Japanese. So usually I stick to "I'm interested in Japanese culture." It's a true statement, but I could easily add another 100 countries to the list of places where I'm interested in the culture, language, etc.

Hopefully, I can add some more later that's not so ranty.

STOP THE AIDS!!!

As some of you might or might not have seen on my Facebook account, I went to a Penis festival last Sunday in Kawasaki and had a blast! I've tried to make the link available on my F-book site, but if you have trouble I might have to "invite you"- which is weird, but maybe safer for my personal info...

Anyway, so the Penisfest was pretty awesome and I had a great time at an African festival that Kenyetta, Michaela and I went to right afterwards. There was food from all over Africa (I got some hummus from Morocco, but no pita bread- WTF?), and some food from Benin and Nigeria- yummy! The Nigerian stuff wasn't as good as Tobore's, but beggar's can't be choosers, right? There was also an African band playing and shops from all over Africa selling cool stuff, some of which reminded me of that cool African import store in Adam's Morgan, DC. Then Michaela saw a Senegalese guy she knew, I got to practice my shitty French for a second, and then we headed to another part of the area to take some pictures. Afterwards we walked to the Yokohama Ferris wheel and accompanying park attractions and then we saw some Japanese guys practicing Parkour- AWESOME! For those of you who've never heard of it, one of the most famous people who has started a movement called free running (similar to parkour) was chased by Daniel Craig at the beginning of Casino Royale and his website can be seen here:

http://www.foucan.com/?page_id=75

Anyway, so we saw some guys in a bicycle parking area and they were jumping from bar to bar with each bar being about four feet apart and only about two inches in diameter- not one of them fell!

We watched that for a few minutes before strolling towards the metro- all in all a wonderful, but exhausting day!

Then the next day I met up with my fellow English teacher Luke and we explored the Botanical Garden near his house (he'd been there before), but the cool thing about this place is it is especially designed so that each month different parts of the park are in bloom or there's something interesting to see: last month there was a section of plum trees in bloom and this month the sakura (cherry blossoms) are blooming. There's even a firefly month! Pretty cool way to keep people coming back to your establishment...

After a stroll in the garden (and a hilariously creepy moment watching some carp) we went up one metro stop and Luke took me to this 100 yen sushi place. Now 100 yen is about 1 dollar, so that's pretty cheap for sushi and it was still pretty fresh, but the coolest part was there were two separate conveyor belts: the bottom one was the normal, run-of-the-mill conveyor belt sushi, but the top one (where you can order from a touch screen computer) was delivered via a mini-shinkansen! It was REALLY cute! For those of you who don't know, the shinkansen is a bullet train that seems to have a weird cult following in Japan and is loved by foreigners and Japanese alike for its Zen-like efficiency...so I've read anyway. It's expensive as Hell, but I will be taking it to Obama City on the 19th and 20th and will let you know if it's worth the hype. Here's a link describing it:

http://www.japanrail.com/JR_shinkansen.html

Anyway after that we went shopping at a store called Seiyu? (which turns out to be a subsidiary of Wal-Mart) and I bought these hilarious goodies:




Front:



Back:




Then we went to a wonderfully cool store called Don Quijotes and I found this odd beauty (it's a weird, but poignant hat with the fleur-de-lis on it considering the "Thou Shalt Not Kill" billboards all over NOLA when I lived there, although I'm not too sure who "IT" is supposed to be- a child called "IT" maybe?):





One last thing I bought from Don Quijote (and YES it's ALL what you think it is):








One for the road: a video I made from the Botanical garden: