Sick Days

I'm hanging around in my apartment wearing the same pj's I've been wearing for the past 2 days. Occasionally reading "the wealth of nations" and occasionally watching downloaded tv programs. Yesterday I watched a little bit of a Japanese cartoon in which a family had a little spirit as a guest for dinner, and the spirit commented on their table manners throughout dinner. The family actually liked this spirit. Personally I would have kicked it out, but I guess that's what makes me different from the Japanese.

Reading Adam Smith.

Sucker for taunts

Something I noticed about living in Japan is that people will never say hi to me on the street unless they are under the age of 15. And I'm not talking about white people, or even people who know me. Maybe that's not so strange after all. Maybe it's strange that 12 year olds will frequently give me long drawn-out herro's. The bratty kids have a way of accentuating the r's in English words that don't even have r's, as if to say: "Your language has r's, loser. And I can't speak it, loser." Oddly enough the taunt works. Of course I've always been a sucker for taunts, as Sarain can attest.

Boomerang

The aussies say a boomerang is a thing you lend to someone that comes back. They applied that label to a corkscrew they lent me, and it turned out to be true. Well I'm a boomerang in my ideas about Japan. It seems like staying in Japan could be feasible: i.e. I could remain sane. Only if I start working hard on a project so that I have something to show for the extra year here, will it be an acceptable decision. In that vein, I've begun to learn Dreamweaver, scope out webspace, and think about content for my long-passed-off culture/media commentary website. Perhaps I told some of you my readers about this. It's nice to be finally taking action - as of last Wednesday.

BUT the best laid plains may something something. And in my case that means a debilitating lower back pain that saps my will to live, compose, do anything. Except that this morning I feel well enough to type zee blog. Don't worry folks, it's not that bad. Mainly it's annoying and a pain in the ass, er, back. [Ahhh, the intentional 'er'. Propper-up of old chestnuts!] My other project, which may never emerge from it's gestation sack due to the absence of a video camera, is dun-da-daaa.... to make a video! About.... something!! I figure it's been several years since my grade 7 masterwork in neo-dada confusionism, replete with dream sequences, stomping football players, and yours truly as the young-voiced narrator. I need the balls of that young me! Not literally, obviously, but the chutzpah, the drive, the disregard.

Communist Japan!

Last night I heard the klok-klok of the gas man as I hung my laundry in the warming air. He is the volunteer who walks through the neighbourhood after the sun has fallen, striking a pair of hollow wooden blocks together, reminding the people tucked away in their sony filled apartments that they have to turn off the gas. If the gas is left on and there's a small earthquake, the gas pipe may crack, or the hose may come loose, and then gas will flow into the house, either poisoning or exploding. To prevent this the Japanese have invented a new position in society which is the night-walker gas man. This is the benefit of having over 90% of houses outfitted with the same heating system, and having a society that responds well to tradition and office. A few of the foreign teachers here have taken to calling Japan the world's only communist-capitalist society. Oddly enough, it seems to have more of a communist esprit than the more obvious example of communist-capitalism, the giant Middle Kingdom across the straits of Japan.

The examples of the Japanese communist esprit are many. Perhaps more accurately I should say it's a group orientation and sense of responsibility that tempers the individualism of capitalism. The school is rife with them. At cleaning time, all the students go out into the hallways and sweep up, and use sticky-rollers to pull dust up from the carpets. They wash the concrete passages outside, and wipe the floors and desks with rags. That's the ideal version. Mostly they just talk, but they are all out there with cleaning implements. The teachers go out too to provide a leadership example. There is something curious in the workplace as well, at least in the teaching workplace. Teachers who don't pull their weight are pulled along by the efforts of the other teachers. Instead of being fired, these incompetents or lazy people can rely on their peers to carry them for years, even till retirement if they fulfill their group obligations. This also has a very dark side when conflicts arise between teachers and students.

I don't think this is an example of communalism, but strange nonetheless: construction workers all wear bright overalls in a single colour, which are usually immaculate. I've passed by a house construction site to see a group of four immaculate workers on the second floor of a plywood support structure, standing and having a meeting. Their arms move with robotic precision as they gesture, not at all like the movements of Canadian construction workers I have known. I get the feeling the meeting has been going on for a while - the workers seem committed to their poses. I've seen workers disposing of garbage stacked neatly and by type, not throwing it but carrying it to the receptacle. The garbage site looked clean!

Read "Cloud Atlas"

Today I mainly read Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell. I took it to my four classes and read it during the stretches of inanity, inanity for me at least, when the Japanese teacher was teaching and I would normaly be hum-drumming. It's a novel with multiple personalities that switches after a good satisfying chunk, and I think the writer wrote it this way to avoid getting bored. I think Mitchell stitched together several disparate strands that he'd written ex-post-facto, which is something that I plan on doing with my ramblings, if they should ever acquire that critical mass that would pull them together thematically.

It begins with a colonial sea-traveller's tale, then moves eras and genres. It blends narrative frames so that earlier chapters are read by characters in later chapters as books. There are cross-referenced character names, and a McGuffen that I won't spoil.

Late in the afternoon I fell asleep with my head propped up by my arm, book in front of me. The teachers' room was empty except for Nick, a secretary and me, with everyone else at a meeting. My matronly, kindly neighbour is cooling to me as I come ever late in the morning. If only she knew how difficult it is for me to feel any connection to the workplace. I'm investigating jobs in London tonight.

A brand new world... (morning entry)

New post time! That means I have four minutes to write a post and then get out of my apartment. In the news today Elvis has married Kareem Abdul Jabar, and their genetically engineered children will be kung-fu stars of the future. Both giants of popularity were unearthed from their graves and reconstituted using bacteria that was found beneath the toes of the worlds oldest animal: the drosophila methusela, a fruit fly that lives to be a thousand years old and has toes. More to come later.

Veronica and Mike and Food and Movie

Veronica and Mike are over at my house. We watched "My Own Private Idaho" which has River Phoenix and Keanu Reeves as young male prostitutes in Idaho and Portland. They go to Rome in search of someone's mother and quote shakespearean non-shakespeare that's really amusing. Mike didn't like it. We almost watched "The Manchurian Candidate" which would have been a Mike-Anthony pleaser. Instead we watched a Veronica-Anthony pleaser. I guess I'm easy to please in the movie department.

Veronica was sent on a mission to take pictures of Mike and I and herself. We shall see what turned out. And then it will be posted.

We are being silly and I am being slightly drunkennated.



Veronica is sleepy. Maybe a little confused too...


Mike and I MSN even while in the same apartment.


Mike looking coolio and up


The Canadian couple! This is the state of my bedroom adornment...

Left to right: Kuni Claire and Sugi. The Power Rangers!

The deer threatening to eat my hands.

Claire feeding the deer. The evil, evil deer...

Veronica beneath the Lantern

three of us in a ferris wheel

the yakiniku place

Scurrilous Sam

I wish I had a pet squirrel named Sam who could talk. He would often be coarse and vulgar, and I'd call him Scurrilous Sam, and we'd tour the country (not this one, that one over there with the English) going from nightclub to nightclub, spreading joy.

This post is for two people: one who is named dan and the other who got bored of the previous post.

Today I looked into grad schools in London on Claire's recommendation. Apparently I got too discouraged by her initial description of LSE. She thinks I'd get more out of it than she did (nevermind that she got the highest mark you could possibly get!). The good thing about England is I've always wanted to live there and I think the schools are cheaper than American schools. The bad thing is it's rainy and there are too many English people.

Also I went to the doctor today. I was feeling sharp shooting pains in my left lung, that emanated from the centre and went through my torso and arms. Alarmed, I corresponded with Veronica, who told me to go to the doctor. Already leaning in this direction, I was galvanized and took off for my school and translation services to be supplied by my lovely tantosha. Small spat ensued (of course) and then we were on our way. The doctors (a husband-wife team in a tiny clinic) were friendly and spoke English. Also she gave birth to her son in Toronto, of all things. Mr. Doctor told me I had a benign neuralgia, and not to worry. That just means it's some random nerve pain that is insignificant. Or is it perhaps over-laden with signification? It's just such a relief to be able to see an English-speaking doctor. I had saved up many medical questions and I think I overwhelmed them a little, but they were very gracious and even gave me some compresses for my shoulder which has been painful of late. I hope to go back soon!

On the Claire visit tip, she's gone. I'm sad, and was ever so glad that she came and visited. Yesterday she insisted on going through the sketchy part of Osaka that alternated strip clubs with pricy good restaurants, but I'm glad she did because I would have taken us to a mall and how lame a last Japanese meal would that have been. Instead our Japanese meal was Korean, and bulgogi, which is their version of yakiniku. I think Claire has now tried every food that Japan has to offer. She really did have a foodish trip, and I'm inspired to do the same next time I travel to a weird place. Japan is definitely a weird place. At the Korean joint there was a matronly matron who helpfully helped us cook our meal. We didn't know what the hell we were doing with the lettuce leaves and the grill and meat, but she did it for us, hovering over us. There were garlic chunks and miso paste and cabbage salad and those go on the meat, and it is wrapped in a lettuce leaf. Then you eat it in one or two bites and it's delicious!