October 2004
5th
Frustration. I have to get this off my chest. When it rains in Japan, it really rains. Not like “soft” misty rain from Cork, or relentless boring British rain. I mean heavy “wet” rain, that, no-matter how you prepare to go out in it, you get soaked to the bone, and your feet are left literally swimming in your shoes. This has been the case here for the last 3 days, and going to and from school is not currently the most pleasant thing I can think of.
The staff at school cannot fail to have noticed that I cycle to work. I had a recurring puncture last week (well, the same puncture, but the bicycle shop didn’t fix it properly). I was late for school 2 days in a row because of it. Everyone laughed (nervous laughter, seemingly a Japanese custom to dissipate tension) “taihen desu ne!” (“how perplexing that must be for you”…something to that effect).
I’m not trying to say that I’m the only person suffering this…the other AETs are similarly p’d off I’m sure. What I’m saying is, how pathetic that every time this happens, not a soul in the staffroom offers a lift. It takes maybe 7 minutes to drive from my house to school, about 30 minutes to walk it. I got to school and everyone’s like “you don’t have a car?”. NO I DON’T HAVE A CAR!! Just like the last time it rained, or when I got a puncture! Why are you all so continually surprised by this fact!! So nobody remembers about little old me in the morning, I’m not surprised, I’m not on top of my game first thing in the morning either. But in the afternoon, they aren’t leaping to offer their assistance as I make to leave. What’s the problem with these people, why don’t they give a ____ about another person’s suffering? Oh yes, I’ll gambarimasu. You can all rot in a hot dark red subterranean place for all eternity as far as I’m concerned. But can you take my socks and trousers down there with you? They need to dry off.
Later…
Someone clearly heard my cry for help. Fuchigami-sensei gave me a lift home, so I guess I should retract my previous generalised statement to the effect that Japanese people never volunteer assistance to the needy – except that I’m not going to, ha! What do you think of that? Fuchigami lived in America for a number of years working for Johnson and Johnson, so clearly she picked up on hospitality and a superior way of doing things then! Actually, true story, Fuchigami, who supported me over the BoE issue and seems to be the only person around with a warm heart and common sense, was getting ready to leave around 3pm (she’s a part-timer), and so she informed the Shino-troll (otherwise known as the secretary) that we were leaving.
Let me digress. The secretary is this horrible vile little hobbit-creature whom everyone despised last year. She has a skewed up face with warts, a screechy whiny voice, and obesity to boot. She was renamed he “Shino-troll” because it was catchier and less crude than her previous nickname “b****-face-Sasaki”. She spits when she eats, wipes her mouth with the same crusty old handkerchief, and wears the same clothes to school everyday. Anyway, enough of this Kindergarten-esque character assassination.
So, we’re getting ready to leave, and she’s like “where are you two going? He’s not allowed to leave”, and Fuchigami is all like “yeah, but look at the rain, you can’t expect him to walk home in that”. So the troll hits back with “his contract (How on earth does she know about my contract!) says he has to stay ‘till 4.15”, to which F-sensei replies “I see…but, but, you know, the rain…”. Anyway, troll-face makes F-sensei call the BoE, who are all like “we don’t care if he goes home now, just check with the Principle”. So we wait 15mins for the Principle to finish a meeting, and he’s all “yeah, why would I care if our lad goes ‘ome now”.
So cow, sorry, troll-face, is now looking extremely pleased with herself that she’s held us up a good 20mins or so. I obviously can’t let her get away with it, curse her in a foreign-devil tongue, and give her a death-stare that would turn Medusa to stone. She won’t be sleeping tonight, or any night again for that matter, after witnessing the “rage”. Nor will she be getting any Macadamia nuts as a souvenir the next time I go on holiday.
6th - Wormtongue
And the saga continues. I was met by quite an emotional F-sensei this morning who’d met with a verbal barraging from the Principle, who found out that she’d called the BoE on my behalf, without consulting him first. So get this, the poor woman who was only trying to help me, becomes enshrined in regulation and “the way to do things” and ends up in trouble for trying to be kind. I’ve had to take some of her classes for her today ‘cos she was too upset to face them. I’m angry on her behalf, and at this increasingly silly system where everything has to be done by the book, and people aren’t allowed to use their own initiative or common sense (remember the summer?)!!
And it all gets traced back to the Shino-troll (as in troll from Shinozu school). So well versed in the regulation and “way to do things”, yet failed to notify F-sensei of the etiquette for making contact with the BoE…some might say with malicious intent. I wonder how the principle found out about the phone-call to the BoE, and did a fat ugly little birdy have a word in his ear. Honestly, the troll couldn’t survive in any other environment but a fossilised over-regulated bureaucracy where she can sticky-beak and back-stab on other people who actually do stuff (as opposed to answering the odd phone-call and waddling about the room snuffling for truffles). So yeah, my only means of protest as you can see is to type poorly constructed hate messages on the internet for an audience of about 2. That said, I’ll be keeping my eye on her now. I know her game.
18th
I feel I must apologise to my one regular reader for the infrequent updating of this site..representative of how little gets done around here! Well, for the benefit of my family, this is what’s going on these days.
I’m still going to Aikido, and received my first compliment (“you’re getting better”) the other day. After 3 months I’ve finally memorized half a dozen or so basic moves and their various applications. It is though, still a slow affair, and it’s going to be awhile before I can respond to unchoreographed attacks.
SCENARIO: A dark stormy night on the wrong side of Kabukicho. My assailant, a Yakuza, possibly high on Smack, runs at me with a knife. Great! I’ve been trained to respond to knife attacks. But hang-on a sec…shouldn’t his right foot be first if he’s attacking me with his right hand? And where did all his mates come from? This isn’t a blank featureless space with padded matting either! Oh…crap, what do I do? Erm, block with my…Crap I’m dead.
Yeah, who am I fooling. I can’t even properly fend off kancho attacks never mind knife fights. Anyway, Aikido aside, I haven’t really been getting out much. We’ve been hit by an uncommonly large number of typhoons this year (no. 23 to hit tomorrow, right in the middle of my working week…smashing). I guess I’m also studying pretty hard for the J language exam too. Not so much trawling through textbooks like at Uni, but flipping through flashcards between classes, or sticking on the listening tapes on the train. It all adds up and I think it has been beneficial. For one, I’m almost able to follow conversation, though responding remains problematic. The downside of all this is the extent to which it has revealed the stupidity of young people and the cultural malaise which currently faces Japan! I’ve earwigged on several conversations recently:
1.) In a coffee shop – 2 men, around my age.
Man A: “Hey, do you want to look at my Purikura* collection?” *Purinto Kurabu (Print Club) – like a glorified passport photo, with computerised doodley crap around the edges…people with the mental age of about 2 find these endlessly fascinating, and God help us all, put together albums of them and their friends pulling stupid faces at a camera.
Man B: “Yeah, show me. Hey man, she’s soooo cute!”
Man A: “Yeah, isn’t she.”
Man B: “No, no, really, she’s soooo cute. She’s like, really cute. Oh, man, is she cute!”
Man A: “Yeah, I know.”
Man B: “She’s like, soooo cute…”
So, on pulling myself away from this verbal sewage I noticed another 18-22ish person, a young woman, preening herself openly in-front of a mirror (well, the whole wall was a mirror) – actually standing up, about 2 inches from the mirror, unable to tear herself away from it for about 10 mins, trapped in some kind of narcissistic fantasy. Back to the two guys, who have finally stopped talking about girly games and “cute” long enough to light up.
2.) another coffee shop, somewhere else
Boyfriend (not as gay looking as most of the men in this country) – “Hey, that Roller Coaster looked cool, didn’t it?”
Girlfriend (actually, she is cute) – “Ahhh Yaada! It looked scary!”
Boyfriend (thinks – end of meaningful conversation) “Yeah. Scary.” (lights up cigarette, inhales deeply, trying to end pain now)
Girlfriend – “Yaahh! Did you see the Kitty-chan (Hello Kitty) mobile phone straps??”*
*Another meaningless accessory/junk item that young people rush out to waste money on because it’s “cute”.
Boyfriend – “Yeah”
Girlfriend – “Yahh! (A high pitched squeaky noise like a Chihuahua yelping) Can you buy one for me?”
B – “Yeah, which one do you want?”
G – “Well…they were all sooo cute! The red one was cute, and the white one was cute. Yahh!! I can’t decide! Ah, maybe the pink one was cutest!”
Okay, enough. I didn’t simplify these transcripts or overemphasize the usage of cute (just trust me on this one). I have this to say about Japan’s youth- GONE TO THE DOGS!! You’re all a bunch of worthless pansy limp-wristed pacifist narcissistic **********s!! You’re living in a fool’s paradise, your economy has gone to crap, your population “pyramid” has been turned on its head, and your middle-aged years will be a living nightmare!
In all seriousness though, the average 25 year old in this country is about as mature as a British 15 year old. Perhaps we can put it down to the affluent 80s, parents who felt at ease in pampering their children and raised a generation of spoiled brats and little emperors. They do everything for their children, including paying exorbitant Uni fees, Car fees, petrol fees etc. The children for their part, spend their Uni life not studying (because Uni is superfluous in Japan), living at home (therefore never learning independence), and doing part time jobs so that they can “play”. They have no goals or drive, and spend their time engaged in such worthless activities as Karaoke, Purikura, Doraibu (driving around aimlessly), inventing ridiculous fashion trends, and leaching off mum and dad.
According to the papers, this has given rise to 2 social under classes
1.) FREETERS – work part-time in restaurants etc, live at home well into their 30s or until their parents die. Never achieve anything.
2.) NEET (Not in Education, Training or Employment) – yeah, even worse than the above, but just hide away from Society, indeed never enter it, leeching off their parents into middle age.
Anyway, rant over…I guess what I’m trying to say is this. All this time in Japan, I thought I was missing out because I couldn’t understand stuff. It’s dawning on me now that this was perhaps the preferable situation. And if this is the judgement of a privileged Westerner, I can’t even begin to imagine what the Indians, Pakistanis or black street vendors must think of Japanese youth. Tune in again later this year for another ultra-conservative and homophobic broadcast from Saitama, Japan. Best.
21st
Just can’t seem to get rid of the typhoons this year. My own troubles pale to insignificance compared to the now 60+ who died in last night’s storm, or the entire harvest of vegetables which was scuppered in one night! Still, I think having to cycle to and from school in a typhoon for 2 days running, even though I haven’t had ANY classes, at least qualifies me to complain. The fact that no one can just say “You know Andrew, you’re really not needed today, why don’t you just save yourself the bother of getting battered and soaked to the bone and stay at home” continues to baffle and appal me. This is probably the least content I’ve been in the job, well, since I began. It’s so insulting that they think it’s enough for me to stare into space all day, not to mention a waste of money (and talent?). A little glance at the calendar reveals that I’m still contracted to this tedium for the next 9 months. Ahhh, for the love of god!! Tomorrow is another free day, Monday a test day, Tuesday and Wednesday a conference (the same one with the same speakers I heard last year), so the next class I’ll “teach” won’t be until next Thursday. I told Ricky the other day that if some benevolent company should happen to want to buy me out of my contract, I might not be averse to what they have to say! I’ve accomplished an amazing feat tonight…not only have I bored everyone else with my complaining, I’ve managed to bore myself. G’night.
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