Way Back Track 3: To HQ

Temporal Coordinates set for the last week of March 2007. Nicely done Sherman, good boy.

Today, we’re taking a look back at RyuSensei’s move from the training grounds of Narita to his full time base of operations in Niigata Prefecture. The first problem came when I woke up and realized that I would have to haul all of my earthly possession (in two VERY large bags, plus backpack, plus laptop) on to a tiny bus, through several train stations, and Lord knows what else.

The good news was that when I arrived at the hotel lobby, we were all told that we could mail some of our stuff ahead and that it would be at our apartments the following day. That’s the glory of a federally regulated and funded post office. It would have been nice to know this before having a mild panic attack over how I was going to get all my stuff from point A to point B, but that’s life. Interesting side note, one of the ALT’s that I trained with is from Canada and he refused to mail either his snowboard or his hockey sticks claiming that to do so would tarnish his sense of national pride.

Anyway, after cramming the whole gang into a bus that was clearly designed for far fewer people with far less stuff and who are preferably several inches smaller, add the “there's always room for one more” philosophy that permeates Japanese public transportation, and you have a rather unpleasant beginning to an unpleasant trip. But we were underway none the less.

The next phase of the adventure involved all 30 of us on the train from Narita to Tokyo Central Station, from which we would split up and depart for our assignments. That got a few stares from the locals, but not as many as you might imagine. This was still Tokyo and a gaggle of gaijin is not an uncommon sight, especially near the airport. The minor miracle was that no one was separated from the group during the trip. Japanese trains are very precise machines and the doors stay open for only a few seconds at any given station. If you aren't paying attention, the doors will close on you before you even realize that you are at your station.

Those of us destined for Niigata boarded the Shinkansen, the bullet train, for the next leg of our journey. This is where it gets fun! Please note the sarcasm in my keystrokes. You see, my company had bought us the tickets, but had failed to mention that the train was over booked and our bottom ranked tickets got us in the door, but did not guarantee seats. So we had to stand, but not in such a way that blocked the aisle. What is the solution to this you may ask? That's right, the toilet. A two hour, cross country, $115, train ride . . . standing in the open area of the bathroom car holding our luggage and periodically playing twister so that people could actually use the facilities. We managed to keep ourselves entertained by commandeering a sink and setting up someones laptop to play DVDs and by switching off access to the one porthole style window (as opposed to the huge window in the normal cars). Let me repeat: 2 HOURS!!!

Once we actually arrived at Niigata station, we me our coordinators. These are company employees that are supposed to help us find our way around town, act as translator for important meetings, and generally help us get settled. Now we are all tired and stiff from the uncomfortable trip, not to mention hot as the toilet car is not air conditioned, and each lugging bags that had up to 1-3 times our bodyweight (depending on the person). In other words, we looked like a bunch of refugees from a union meeting of the hitchhikers local 407. Not the best first impression. Thankfully, my coordinator was understanding and we hit it off fairly well.

By this point, I was on my own as all the remaining members of my group had left for their own assignments. What followed for me was a whirlwind of meetings I didn't understand, names I won't remember, and buildings I'll never see again. The end result is that I have an apartment and it is FANTASTIC! It's a 50,000 yen/month apartment that I'm getting for 38,000 because the view consists of 6 inches of dirty concrete and then the back end of the next building over. It also happens to be a two room, two story apartment with full kitchen and bath! Not to mention my own assigned parking space (considered a serious luxury). It will take/took me a few months to get everything set up and livable, but that's all part of the game.

The rest of the adventure of the day involved a lot of shopping for things like a futon, curtains, and other such things. Rather dull, but I will say this, I love one coin shops (100 yen shops).

The next, and final, edition of Way Back Track, will detail the entrance ceremony at my main school, and explain an average day in my life working at a Japanese middle school.

Woah!

OK, just a quick one today. I have three points for you.

POINT 1: Go see SiCKO. Now! Log off from this computer, get in the car, and see Michael Moore’s new film. The topic, as most of you already know, is the American healthcare industry and the complete cluster ***k that it has become. By the way, It turns out that I was partially right a few months ago when I said on this very blog that the blame for American medicine can be placed on Nixon. Mr. Moore’s film includes some old audio recordings from Nixon’s Oval Office that are . . . fascinating.

So go see it. Now. I’ll wait.

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2 hours of depressing realizations later…

Wow. That is nasty and yet so right at the same time. My British friend sees me in a whole new light now that he has some idea how American’s live. All my foreign friends pity me and my people.

POINT 2: Dick Cheney is either an incredibly stupid man or he has so little respect for the American people that it’s laughable. I’d believe either. It was recently reported by Comedy Central’s “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart,” and with both sources double checked by me personally, that Dick Cheney has had images of his residence (The US Naval Observatory) pixilated out on the Google Earth satellite mapping program. Please note that both the White House and the Capitol Building remain clearly visible. The stupid thing is that directions to the Naval Observatory are still accessible ON MAP QUEST! I wish I was smart enough to make this stuff up. Incidentally, “The Daily Show” aired this information as part of their new series: You Don’t Know Dick.

Check out the video at this link:

http://www.comedycentral.com/shows/the_daily_show/index.jhtml

POINT 3: The conservatives have now made an attempt to actually rewrite reality to suit their whims. Citing extreme liberal bias on the part of the public online edited encyclopedia Wikipedia, a new conservative site entitled Conservapedia has launched at http://www.conservapedia.com/ and it is scary. Front page articles at the time of this writing include the evils of Rosie O’ Donnell and how the British are planning to create human-animal hybrids. This encyclopedia also lists the year 4004 B. C. as the most likely point of the creation of the universe. Another definition from “The Trustworthy Encyclopedia” is this: Homosexuality is an immoral sexual lifestyle between members of the same sex. It is more than simply a sexual act, it is going beyond the boundaries that God has setup for marriage; one man and one woman.

By the way, I found this response to the liberal evils of Wikipedia by clicking on a link found . . . on Wikipedia!

I’ll leave you with that.

RyuSensei

Way Back Track 2: In Training

Temporal coordinates set for the last week of March, 2007 Mr. Peabody.

Well, this is the part of my story that I can’t really tell you too much about, without being contractually obligated to kill you that is. I speak, of course, of my company’s training regimen. I’ll leave the details to your imaginations and simply explain that various injuries occurred over the course of the week, mainly due to filling out so much paper work.

The best thing about my current situation is the hotel. This place is PLUSH! The Narita View is only about 20 minutes from the airport and has everything from an artificial hot spring（which, sadly, costs more money than I’m willing to spend at the moment） to 3 fairly high class restaurants. That is apparently common in Japan, for the really fancy modern restaurants to be affiliated with a major hotel. I picked up more than a few stares being a gaijin who was willing to eat sashimi. For some strange reason, Americans have a reputation of being unwilling to eat raw fish. Now why could that be, I wonder?

Anyway, I have had an interesting adventure here. I’ve made a new friend here, we’ll call him George. He’s a fellow American and he knows nothing from Japan nor a word of Japanese. He wanted to see downtown Tokyo, specifically Akihabara Electric Town. Since that requires a 2 hour round trip on the Tokyo Metro. Since the train system can be confusing for someone who can’t read and doesn’t have any experience with the system. Since I’d ridden this route on a previous vacation to Japan, I accompanied him.

20 stations and only one missed layover later, we were in the neon labyrinth known as the Tokyo nightlife. Being a fellow English major, George was amazed by the 8 story bookstores. That’s one of the things I live about this country, the respect for books. Bookstores in America are rapidly vanishing into a void of Bones & Ignoble nothing. Yet here, you can’t walk into a shopping center or train station without tripping over a bookstore. No wonder the kanji for “Japan” can be read individually as “sun” and “book.”

The most fun of the day was when we got back to Narita. Short version, British people are funny when drunk. We ran into a girl that saw us and started yelling “Damn Yankee” style comments to us. I eventually had to verbally, and loudly, that I was born in England as well. I was then proclaimed a real person and the jokes about having gone native began to fly.

The training went well, although I still had some serious questions about my company’s level of intelligence when I was told that my city was a new contract for the company and that I was the first ALT to be sent out there. It’s my first assignment and the company is sending me out there sight unseen. I’m either really good, or they are really nuts.

Either works for me.

Our next adventure in the Way Back Machine (v. 2.48) will include the actual moving in process. What’s more, if I can get my freaking camera to work with my new Japanese laptop, I’ll try and post some pictures at the same time.

Way Back Track 1: The Flight

Temporal coordinates set to 2007/03/19 Mr. Peabody.

Warning: Inconsistent tenses approaching.

The original notes that became this entry were scribbled in a notebook mid-flight. I take full credit for the apparent randomness of my thoughts. Before we get to that, I present some thoughts about the state of airline culture. The entire system seems geared toward the art of the vacation. It appears that no one in the planning phases ever considered the possibility that someone might use one of these “areo-planes” to actually move from one home to another.

I say this because I’ve spent the last two weeks trying to figure out the best way to fit my entire live into two bags in order to fit within the baggage restrictions. Anyone who has ever had to make a major move, weather it be across the city or across the country, will tell you that you always have more stuff than you think and it all weighs a ton. Well, obviously I did it as the trip went on as planned. Now, on to the scribbled mid flight notes I mentioned earlier:

The good news is that they have certainly improved the distraction technology on these flights. The days of group movie screens that you can’t ignore and evil peanuts with arms and legs that attempt to devour your soul are long one (mores the pity, I rather liked those peanuts).

These days, every seat has it’s own monitor and remote control that doubles as a video game controller. Granted, these are stripped down versions of games that you can play for free on yahoo, but when you’re careening through the air at breakneck speeds for nine hours and fifty five minutes, you don’t get to be choosy.

I was not ready to say good bye to Mom and Dad. I’ve known this day was coming for months now, but when the moment came, I still broke down in tears when Dad told me that I was talented and that I was ready for this. Naturally, my first thought upon passing through security was an overwhelming wave of “what the f%#k have I just gotten myself into?”

As I write this, I am sitting in seat 21-c on NWA flight whatever the heck over the Pacific Ocean. That’s it. At the moment, the only address I’ve got is seat 21-c. That’s because I don’t have a place to live yet. The company has yet to find me an apartment so I can’ begin to figure things like rent and utilities into my budget. So I have no idea if the $2000 in my left pocket is going to be enough to survive until I get my first paycheck in two months!

By the way, Will Ferrell is not funny. I’m writing this as Stranger than Fiction plays on my monitor. It’s a good idea for a film with some interesting commentary on literature and the nature of story and plot. There are even a few laughs, none of which come from Ferrell’s character. Please refer back to my previous comment about how fliers can’t be choosers.

OK, something amazing has just happened. A stewardess has just handed me an ice cream sandwich as a snack. It’s official, we have good airline food. Hell has frozen over.

The rest of the flight was relatively uneventful. Now it doesn’t matter how still you try and sit during the flight, your level of personal grooming will suffer after 10 hours in the air. After landing, I ran a comb through my hair and dragged my luggage off the plane and to the lobby. Now that’s more than it sounds like. Narita International Airport makes a point of placing the flights from the US at the far end of the building as far away from the baggage claim as humanly possible. It turns out that the Gaijin community refers to this as the Narita Marathon. It took me about 13:30 to complete, that’s gate to baggage carousel.

So I was unshaven, slightly disheveled hair, a strained shoulder, and probably some bad breath. This is how I met the first representatives of my new employers. Thankfully, they were used to this and I was still one of the best looking of the males. Translation: I didn’t show up in ripped jeans and a tee shirt.

That is the story of the flight from Oregon, USA to Narita, Japan. This city, which only exists because of the airport, is going to be my home for he next week as I go though the company’s training for new ALTs. But that is a story for another post.

This is Ryu Sensei signing off, type at ya later!

Like a phoenix from the ashes, I rise again! And I am now on fire.

OK, I admit it, I haven’t kept up with this blog thing as well as I wanted to. My reasons are varied, complicated, and extremely convincing. Trust me. First of all, Internet access is disgustingly limited here in Japan. I know that seems strange for a country that is perceived by the rest of the world as half a step behind the Jetsons, but it's true. Specifically in rural areas like I find myself in. Far from the urban jungle of Tokyo, the school at which I am now employed is surrounded by rice patties.

The school is wonderful; sadly, it varies from the traditional model of a Japanese middle school. Not that I mind, but I was hoping to be exposed to the so called “normal” way of doing things so that I could bring that information back to the states in an attempt to improve our own flagging education system.

Anyway, I finally have Internet access at home, or at least I will when I send this, and I plan to make up for lost time. I’ve been keeping records of my adventures here and while they may not be the stuff of legend, I find them interesting and it’s my blog so there. Over the next few days, I will post one entry every 24 hours. These will cover my time here from March 20th, my date of arrival, to the current date, whenever that happens to be.

But before we get to that, I have to make both an apology and an retraction. In a previous post, I blamed Richard Nixon and his fear of appearing communist for the lack of an American health plan. That was wrong. Nixon look into expanding Medicare but it was actually Eisenhower who vetoed the idea of a national health plan. My bad.

Continuing on the interesting trail of politics. Did you know that Dick Cheney is no longer the Vice President of the United States? It's true, Dick Cheney doesn't work here anymore. That is to say, he is excusing himself from presidential orders regarding handing over his office's records because (you're going to love this) "Cheney's office claims it need not comply with the executive order because it is not an "entity within the executive branch.""

Now, if we think about this logically, we come to a wonderful conclusion. See if you follow me on this one:

1) Cheney has just said that he doesn't answer to W.

2) So he's not a part of the president's administration.

3) That means he's out of the presidential chain of succession.

4) That means everyone else gets bumped up a rank to fill in the gap, that means. . .

Nancy Pelosi is now Vice President!!!

OK, maybe not. But it does go to prove that W is so outside of reality that his own VP/ventriloquist doesn't pay attention to him anymore. Here's the link to the article I saw that prompted this flight of wishful thinking.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070622/ap_on_go_pr_wh/cheney_secrecy

Meanwhile, back at our story, the first of the back articles, concerning the plane ride over here will be posted tomorrow.

Thank you for your patience while we address this problem and while the author is severely beaten about the head and shoulders by alien possessed chipmunks for neglecting his fans.

Comments and corrections

We all make mistakes and I made a big one in my last post. There was a communications breakdown. When I was told I had a Tokyo placement, what was meant was that the Tokyo branch office would be the one I would report to. The actual placement will be in a “small” town in the north of Honshu. The good news is that this means that I will be in a cooler climate and, having already spend some time in a Tokyo summer, this is a definite plus. Also, the nature of public transport (or lack there of) in the area will necessitate my having a car (that my employer will help pay for). This gives me a huge opportunity during school breaks, to just drive around the country and really get a feel for the land. While I was looking forward to living in the big city, this is pretty cool too.

I’m still waiting for details on my placement school and where I might be living. You know, the little things. The problem is that as a new employee, and a sight-unseen employee to boot, I don’t have the right to bug people for this information. I don’t mind, but this goes back to my wanting to always know as much information as possible before I get into any situation.

Meanwhile, I now have my work visa and am ready to fly. The downside was that this required driving into Portland and back two consecutive days. Not only is this tiring under the best of circumstances, but the drivers are INSANE!!! Did I miss the lesson in driver’s ed that said that speed limits are only recommended guidelines and that turn signals are optional when crossing three or more lanes of freeway traffic in the rain? Short of emergency vehicles and rushing a pregnant woman to the delivery room, there is nowhere these people need to go that driving a mile a minute (60 mph) isn’t sufficient.

Well, I’ve got less than a week before I have to leave the country so I’m going to cut this post a little short.

And heeeeere we go.

At long last, the real world is finally starting to get rolling. I’ve learned a great deal about my future since my last posting. For example, I now know that I’m going to be living in . . . wait for it . . . TOKYO!!! It’s a dream come true. I get to life in the city that defines cutting edge and is where the ancient past and the distant future collide. This also incorporates a good deal of revenge. That said: Up yours Bigot-sensei, up wherever it is most uncomfortably to cram things. Bigot-sensei is my old Japanese teacher who is the most prejudiced person I’ve ever met, not to mention the incarnation of everything wrong with the educational world. So this job is, in part, my way of flipping an incredibly rude gesture right up her nose.

Ranting aside, this is the best placement I could hope for. I’ve always preferred city life to rural life yet I’ve spent the last year in a spot on the Oregon map with a population of approx. 500 that is often mistaken for a squashed gnat. Moving to a city of 12 million people is a definite upgrade.

The one annoying aspect is that the placement is in Seiro-cho. Now the -cho suffix is roughly equivalent to neighborhood and generally incorporate a few square blocks. Such things are so microcosmic compared to the overall city that it doesn’t show up on any of the Tokyo maps that I’ve checked. I’m a research-a-holic and pride myself on my skills in this area. So it bothers me that I’m jumping into this without knowing what I’m getting into.

I’ve sent all the information to the folks in Japan that they’ve asked for any I’m now waiting for some paperwork to be mailed to me so that I can take it to the Japanese consulate in Portland. They’re also going to include a bunch of other pre-arrival information. But don’t worried, I’ll have no opportunity to get bored as I have 14 days to pack and be ready to move. That includes the often agonizing decision whether or not to take a given item. Not mention the fun of having to fit what will be the sum total of your earthly possessions around airline baggage regulations. I'd better move on before I launch into a telling of the shaggy dog joke that is post 9/11/01 US airport procedure.

In current events, James Cameron (SP?) claims to have found a tomb containing the bodies of Jesus Christ, his wife, and his son. Setting aside how such a find stands to topple the very foundation of 2000 years of religion with the guaranteed result in lots and lots of dead bodies, there is one question that must be asked about this alleged son of Christ: How spoiled must that kid have been? What with God the Grandfather showering him with attention all the time.

I’m going to hell now, aren’t I?