Running Through Train Stations and Airports. In Tokyo.

Music: Pick your favourite Disney tune. Mine is obviously, Under the Sea-The Little Mermaid.

I’m writting this while sitting in a huge hall in the Hilton Hotel with about 300 other people; 2/3 are Japanese and the remainder of the pie are just like me: foreigners from a distant land, brought to Japan by Amity to emerse their young in the English language.

While writting this I was simultaneously being bored to tears. An English company I may work for, but unthoughtful Japanese teachers I work with. This may sound a little harsh, but sitting in a stuffy room in a suit and heels on my day off, I did not appreciate the three hours of Japanese speeches by Japanese Senseis who are more than able to speak in English (they are English teachers).

Let me back up and explain how I got myself into this situation. As a company bent on making lots of money ( as all companies are), we have monthly goals at Amity. This area of my job is a little grey since they don’t really involve us foreign teachers in any of the meetings on money matters, but I do get a little bit of it from the list in the office of how many more students we need for the current month.

I don’t mind not being involved in these weekly meetings. I’d much rather be teaching my buddy Manami. But, I’d just like to point out, that many parents have signed their children up in Amity classes after I began playing with their babies in the lobby and high fiveing current students younger siblings and suggesting private lessons for certain highly intelligent children. I like to think I do my part. Furthermore, I always get my trial lessons to sign a year contract.

Anyways, for the last 6 months, Toyama Amity made all of their goals, and consequently were invited by the head honchos at Honbu (President and his sidekicks) to Tokyo Disney Land!! Manager called us into the office to tell us the news, Leah Sensei and I were the only ones to jump up and down and squeal! Disney Land!!!

I had difficulty understanding why the other teachers weren’t very excited. Free trip to Disney Land people!!! Then Manager approached me close to the day of departure to inform us that one of us had to make a speech at this Special Training. Speech?

“You guys can junkin for it; but I think that since Lindzy, it’s your first time to Disney Land, you should do the speech.”

Thanks Manager. Last time I did a speech in Grade six i spewed everywhere from nervousness.

I did fine in presentations in University so I didn’t think too much about it. The night before leaving for Disney Land, Managers directions were clear and explicit:

“I will pick you up outside of your apartment at 6:15 am. Don’t be late, we can’t miss the flight.”

Gotcha.

Seven hours later, a little (coughcough) tipsy at a concert with the rest of the Toyama crew, sipping my extra strong gin and water:

“Hey Kumiko, will Aladin be there? And Mickey? What about Pooh San?” The Japanese have all been to T.D.L like eight times each.

2:00 am …”Leah, maybe we should go home, I havn’t packed yet.” At home we decide it’s a good idea to call Ashleigh and talk to her untill 3:00 am, or some other ludicrous time about how excited we are to spend the weekend together.. or something around those lines.

I pack my back (slash throw my stuff in a pile by the door) in a drunken manner and pass out exhausted.

My annoying telephone rings waking me up.

“Shitshitshitshitshitshitshit.” I mutter when i see Managers name pop up on my phone and the ring increases, getting louder and louder, taunting me about how I’m late and probably still drunk.

I have never gotten ready so fast in my life. Manager was not pleased, but I did make it down before Leah. Good or bad, I’m not sure, since I had to sit in the front seat. I made sure to shove lots of gum in my mouth to hopefully hide the sent of stale gin. Ugh. So classy. Not.

I have also never been so terrified in a car in my whole life. Many yellow lights were driven through and many illegal u-turns were made.

Forty-five minutes later our flight to Tokyo was done and were put on a bus to take us to the beautiful Hilton. First thing I see when i walk in: Starbucks. This is the happiest place on earth. .

We waste no time, and we are at Disney Land within the hour! It was tonnes of fun and my hangover was quickly forgotten with the Disney tunes being chanted. Leah and I made our first purchase, Minnie Ears. We were officially ready for the first ride “It’s a Small World”. Holy five years old again.

It began to rain around lunch, but this did not damper our spirits, Leah and I continued to sing and dance and kick up the rain from the puddles that had formed. Our co-teachers couldn’t help but smile at our child like behaviour.

After dinner with the staff, we went back to the hotel for a hotel party with our long lost friends from training and follow up training. Reunion hugs, reunion cheers and new friendships were made. Especially with the hottie Japanese teacher from Niigata. Ping Pong.

The next morning I was not feeling it. It was 7 am, and we were supposed to meet our teachers for breakfast. Uuuugh. Yes I did vomit in the Hilton. I blame the Ebi fry from Disney Land.

It’s now 12:20 and I have been sitting in the same chair since 9:00 am. One empty glass of water in front of me and Leahs head bobbing to the right of me.

I complained to a friend a while ago that it made me angry to sit through 3 hours of Japanese speeches that I wouldn’t be able to understand when I work for an English school. But then I realized I would be in a Hilton hotel, all paid for, after a huge breakfast buffet, the day after a free trip to Tokyo Disney Land. I guess I shouldn’t complain too much.

My speech was a mess. I was nervous and the lights on the stage were bright and the faces before me were bored. There was a lot of erratic bowing and Arigato Gozaimasuing.

“So, Leah and I were supposed to junkin for this, but then Manager pointed out that it was my first time to Disney land, thanks Manager. I’m very grateful….blahblahblah.”

Luckily, Ashleigh, Leah and I made a clean getaway from the Japanese staff and the rest of the amity crew for a day in downtown Shibuya, one of our favourite places to shop and get some delicious subway sandwhiches. Ps. Its bargain season…

Of course, the day had to end with Leah and I sprinting through train stations to get our bags we had stored in the wrong station and trying to catch connecting monorails to make it to our flight home on time. We couldn’t help but remember our Manager’s explicit directions before leaving us to go to Shibuya.

“Be on time, be punctual.”

Gotcha.

note: junkin is Japanese for “rock scissor paper”, which I think we can all agree, could solve many of the worlds problems.

AAAAAAAAAA

Music: Time to Pretend-MGMT

AAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I have less than three months left in Toyama, in Japan, at Amity, with this life!!!!! How did this happen?!?! It’s those damn time warps! Unaware, they suck you in and spit you out somewhere in the future, leaving you wondering how the hell you got here. Twenty-four years old and almost at the end of my year long contract with just the short summer months left, I can’t even believe my existance.

I am quite the unbelievable person. Read into that however you like.  The point of that statement was to share with you a story of mine from the road.  (I can’t help but think of driving around in Andrea Bannons and Jess Kuepfers cars in high school…you two will love this one).

So this all started on my way home from Sado island with Leah, Natalie, Andy and Tannis.  We were getting off of the ferry with just twenty minutes to catch our 8:11 train (the last one) back to Toyama.  We had to walk to the train station though, and the last time we did the walk it took.. 20 min.  So as you can see, we were in quite the rush.  Luckily (ah caught you! you thought we were gonna screw up so soon?) we made it to the station at 8:10 with a minute to buy a ticket and run onto the train.  Trains leave on time here.  When i say on time, I mean to the T without fail.  It was a running- twist-your-body-sideways-to-make-it-through-the-doors type boarding.  Exhausted from our sprint to the station with backs full of camping equipment we settled into our two hour train ride back to Toyama with books and heavy eyelids.

Approximately two hours later, pulling into a station :

“I don’t remember being here. “  Tannis says to me after being stopped for four minutes at this particular station.  I look up from my book to take a look at the station we are at, which looks exactly like every station in Japan.  Concrete with blue signs telling you which station you are at, and which station is next as well as a vending machine or two.

“This doesn’t look familiar Tannis?”

“Well, I just mean that I don’t remember being in this city.”

“It has been two hours and I don’t recognize the names either.  At this point we should be at least in Uozu.”  I let out a small laugh after a thought. “You know, it would be funny if we got on the wrong train, cause I just looked for the train that was leaving at 8:11.  I figured we didn’t have enough time to wait for the signs to change to English, and Leah said the train left at 8:11, so I just took note of the train on track four leaving at 8:11 and hopped on.”

“Well you weren’t the first one on the train were you?”

And there it is folks.  “Uh… yah…”

Tannis stands up abruptly and I quickly follow suit after realizing my mistake.  We ask a Japanese girl if this train goes to Toyama, and she just gives us that look.  You know… that one.

We get the help of a train conductor, and he informs us that this station luckily has a train going to Toyama.  Phew!  So we go upstairs to talk to the train masters.  We must have been quite the site.  Five gaikokogins (foreigners), dirty, tired and sunburnt from the beach coming into a station up north (four hours north of Toyama to be exact) looking worried.  It takes four of them to help us out.

“Jijetsu, here.”  Says the hot train conductor putting his hand on a spot on the wall. “Toyama, here.” Puts his other hand a foot below the other one. “You are here.”  He puts his hand north of our first location.”  Thanks for stating the obvious buddy.  There was a train, but its an express train to Osaka.  Which I imagine can only be super expensive, considering its 8000 yen from Toyama to Osaka.

After a half hour or so of waiting in the waiting room, four train masters approach us (yes the good looking ones… under better circumstances and nicer smells… I suspect this isn’t the time though) and escort us to the office.  I felt a little like a convict.  Especially the way we were getting stared at.  They cut us a deal though and we only had to pay an extra 1000 yen ($10) and the train would get us there in 2 hours since it was an express.

See!  Everything works out!  Let this just be a lesson to those that may have to get directions from me one day.  I never know where im going , even if it sounds like i do.  Mind you, i did get better after having to drive around with Ashleigh for a year.

haikus

Fireworks by the Sea

ocean nighttime swims

we won’t let the summer end.

burnt backs and ice cream

Summer in Japan

biking ’round the block

festivals, combini beers

breakfasts on the roof.

The Girls of Summer

Le-chan, the cool one

Tannis the neurotic one

Nat the nonchalant

The Golden Month

Music: Hello Goodbye- The Beatles

So long May!  You were quite the month.  You always are you beautiful Golden month you.  You were especially Golden this year though.  It may be because there is a ten day holiday in Japan appropriately named ‘Golden week’, but it may also be because it was the month where I entered the world, blessing my mother and father, some may say, making their lives complete. 

 Other possibilities of why May was so fantastic may include mothers day, a great day I’d say, where mothers everywhere are shown the appreciation they deserve.  I mean without my mom who would I be?  Nobody… literally.  Thankfully, even though the distance between mother and daughter is far, we were still able to celebrate her greatness together with some good ol’ sumo wrestling family fun, ice cream cones and combini beers. 

My ten day holiday was nothing to complain about as well and started the Golden month off just right.  Moreover, I checked off another location on Japans map.  Tannis, Leah, Natalie, Andy (Leahs BF) and I took and early morning train and a two hour ferry to a western island just North of Toyama, Sado Island.  Sado Island is (obviously) incredibly beautiful with a landscape of gorgeous green mountains, gorgeous beaches and a few old temples for good measure.  The five of us camped out in an unpopulated campsite, owned by an interesting fellow.  He was incredibly kind and gave us lifts into town, brought us a monster size bottle of sake and called up a fisherman friend to bring us (and cook for us) his catch of the day.  I have never in my life tasted such delicious squid.

Before our Sake Fairy and Squid Fairy arrived, Tannis and I realized that we made the mistake of not buying enough beer for the night by the campfire.  Standing down by the road hitchiking into town was our solution to a terrible problem.  The first truck that saw us pulled over.  He was a hickish old man, and unfortunately could not help us out in the beer department.  I was quite shocked.  A Japanese person not helping?!

Lindzy: “If he’s really Japanese, he’ll come back.”

Sure enough, twenty minutes later the little red truck was back.  The man rolled down the window and presented us with a six pack of beer.  Now thats better… for a second there I almost lost my faith in the Japanese.    Sado Island: succesful! 

The following weekend was my birthday weekend.  The big 2-4.  Yikes.  I can safely say that 23 was the best year of my life (which I did call on my 23rd birthday), so 24 has a lot to live up too.  So far, it’s doing a good job.  I’d almost forgotten it was my birthday (i guess thats what happens when you live alone…tear…), untill I walked into work only to find a treasure hunt awaiting me, by the ever wonderful Leah.  She sent me around the school in search of my presents.  I can just imagine Managers thoughts “Those foreigners are always being happy and smiling, EVEN when they’re at work on their birthdays.”  It wasn’t so bad though, Leahs little hunt made me smile from ear to ear, and my jaw almost broke when Kaisei and Sarai (my babies) sang ‘Happy Birthday’ to me after class.  Furthermore, Natalie’s surprise Ice Cream cake was definitely the… well… I wanna say cherry on top.. but somebody already called that.  Either way it was deeeelicious.

Sunday morning, Leah, Andy and I headed to Osaka to meet up with Ashleigh, Katt (who was down from Canada!!!), Alyssa and Ash’s friend Gordon.  Not a bad place to be on your birthday, let me tell you.  We shopped, we partied, we ate, we partied some more and shopped some more.  Katt even took us on a wonderful little hunt to see an amazing church… amazing for its architecture.  The architect is Katts favourite Japanese architect, and his buildings are all really cool.  The church of light was no exception. 

We finished the weekend off with a free fall drop in Namba on the side of a skyscraper overlooking Osaka city.  Quite frightening, but highly enjoyable. 

This weekend was the Sanno San Festival in Toyama which means lots of partying, lots of food, lots of good people and good friends and of course some naked men carrying shrines and more dressed up as lions throwing sticks of fire… mmmhhmmm.  Now that May is done, I’m in my last three months of living and working in Japan.  Holy toledo.  Feels like i just left Canada.  Right now I’m constantly thinking about how fast time goes, but how exciting it all is.