Video!

I uploaded some videos to google video! I uploaded about 10 but I think only three are ready.

Danny learning to bow in Korea

Brian's class learning English

Recess at Brian's school

To check for updates go to Google Video and search my full name and anything that's been put up should come up.

SIM cards, broken bottles, radio shows and salsa

I AM SO EXCITED!!!!!

So my favorite phone I ever had was the phone I bought in Sydney, Australia in 2003. I had hoped that it would accept an American SIM card but it didn't. So I got the closest looking one, but it kind of sucked. Then it broke and I got another one that sucked even more. But it was the closest looking on to my Australia phone so I stuck with it.

But TWO YEARS later the waiting has finally paid off! I've been carrying both phones (Australian and American) around with me but Japan and Korea have completely different networks from the rest of the world so not until I came to Hong Kong could I try it out.

But I actually forgot that I brought the phones with me and said to Danny, "Let's go buy a phone!" Then we got to the phone stores and I saw my Australia phone and realized, "Wait! I have two phones with me already! All I need is a SIM card!" I think he was kind of pissed cause SIM cards can be bought out of vending machines and we didn't have to go all the way to the sketchy electronics area of Hong Kong. But it was a good experience. So I got the SIM card and then we got ice cream from 7-11.

(The number is 011-852-6416-6706)

Then we went to the unsketchy part of Hong Kong! It was really nice! We walked along some harbor where everyone was taking pictures and then took a ferry across to Central train station and found Winterland! A whole big Christmas display that took up a full square block. Pretty cool.

Then we went to this place called The Fringe Club and I thought he had been saying The French Club. I thought of that FedEx ad. It's a cool bar with a stage but there were maybe a total of 10 people there and no music. We didn't stay long. Then we walked around the area with all the Western people. Very strange. It was an Irish bar next to an English bar next to an Irish bar next to an English bar. We skipped all those and went to this place that has Salsa night every Tuesday.

We sat on really comfortable couches and watched people who knew how to dance. That was really fun. I told Danny he should start going to the Essen Haus when he turns 21. Polka dancing is a lot easier than Salsa dancing.

Oh yeah and at dinner I bought a Snapple which Danny ended up putting in the pocket of his new blazer/jacket type thing. Then on the way up the stairs to the electronics area he tripped on the stairs and the bottle broke in his pocket. Diet Snapple Peach Iced Tea and the glass that used to contain it were all over the place. Actually just in his pocket. The iced tea eventually dried and we found a bakery and tried to buy some bread to get the last of the glass. Problem was it all looked too good and we decided we rather eat it than use it. We compromised and bought a croissant. Ate half and used half to get the glass out. It didn't work as well as real bread (there wasn't any) but it was a lot better than no bread.

Last things:

1) Danny's letting me co-host his radio show tomorrow night! You can listen online by clicking here on Wednesday at 8am (7am Central).
2) Danny got the code for the bathroom. It's 3223#, in case you're ever in Undergraduate Hall #1, Floor 3 of HKUST and need to use the women's bathroom.
3) We're going to go to a travel agent tomorrow and hopefully figure out this SE Asia stuff.
4) We got to sit in really fancy massaging chairs for 10 minutes in the train station. It was a full body chair. There was an adjustable built-in ottoman that sucked your legs in and massaged the bottom of your feet!
5) HKUST is built on a mountain and kind of looks like a space-age bathroom. In a good way. Lots of tile, everywhere.

What I know about t-shirt production

Sunday night was super fun! It was the perfect way to say goodbye to Japan. I did my internet thing, and then went to meet up with Shinya. While I was waiting for him a Japanese kid started to talk to me. He said he would talk to me to keep the womanizers away. Then he asked if I was a student, I said I just graduated and he said, high school and I said no, university and he said, "But you look like you're 15!" Then Shinya showed up. I was glad.

The show was an all day event. Bands started playing around 2 and KS 48 went on at 6. Shinya put me on some discount list so I only paid 500 yen for a drink ticket that I forgot to use. The bands were fun. The place was pretty empty and I kind of felt bad for the first couple of bands but then when KS 48 went on the place filled up! It was so cool. They put on a really good show. The crowd loved it. I had fun. When the show was over I went to Vodofone to charge my cell phone (you get a little cell phone locker with a charger and set up a password, all for free!). When I got back they were in a meeting with someone important so I walked around and watched some more bands. Apparently the meeting didn't go well and they seemed to be in a bad mood when they got out. I decided I should probably leave. Shinya was going to have to go to work soon and the other guys were cranky. And Errol was staying at Lindsay's and they were going to do karaoke! So I said my goodbyes and walked to the train station with a really nice girl who knew English pretty well but didn't have an email address which I thought was strange. She took my email address for when she finally sets one up. Who doesn't have an emai addressl?

Then when I was waiting for the train Shinya ran up to me. He had been calling my name but since coming to Asia I tried to stop thinking that I was ever hearing my name called, so it took me a while to notice. But what a pleasant surprise! He works for Yahoo Auctions doing customer service stuff. He works from 10:30pm - 7:30am. He told me he was really tired cause he hadn't gone to sleep last night and now he wasn't going to get to sleep until at least 8am. I told him about Red Bull in the States.

The first train that came was going to where he needed to go to but not as far as I needed to go and he said he would wait with me. That was so nice! I was really happy. He's like an actual friend I think. He said it was too bad I wasn't in Tokyo longer cause he could have shown me around a lot more. That would have been cool. I realized that after being in and out of Tokyo for almost a month I really only know the Shibuya area.

Danny wants it to be known that he wants to be a unicorn. He told me to incorporate that into this blog somehow. There, I did it.

Moving on, by the time I got to Yokohama to meet up with Lindsay, Errol and friends they were already finished with karaoke!!!! And completely wasted. I hadn't had any alcohol but I was in such a good mood from the show and my talk with Shinya on the train I was able to act just as drunk as any of them. I sang Hanson in the street without any alcohol, microphone or music. I started too high and didn't last long. But the effort was fun.

We decided to try to get me drunk. We stopped at a 7-11 and I got a can of some beer and a juicebox of sake. I never made it to the juicebox sake. The beer was plenty. We went to an izakaya (place where you orders tons of appetizers) and I ordered a "cheeze-ugh, pete-zah." I spoke Japanese. They understood me. The waiters always run at izakayas. It's fun to watch. Then everyone got lame and wanted to go to sleep. I wanted to go do more karaoke. I missed the last train back to where my hostel was so I went back to Lindsay's place and watched 50 First Dates with Sarah. I'll admit, I liked it. Then I went to sleep, woke up at 5:30am and left to go back to my hostel. First things first, I stopped at the 99 yen store and got ice cream. I had been planning on ice cream at karaoke but since we never made it there I had been thinking about it all night. What I thought was vanilla with a layer of chocolate turned out to be vanilla with a layer of red bean paste. Totally not what I was in the mood for at 6 in the morning. Luckily I was able to peel the red bean paste off and save the vanilla.

So around 7 I got back to the hostel thinking I had totally out-cooled the other kids in the room. They stayed out till 6am the previous night but I stayed out until 7! Ha! I again prepared before going into the room so I could be as least annoying as possible. Then I walked in and saw no other backpacks. I guess they had checked out. I was back to being the only one in the hostel room. I went to sleep for a while, woke up, then left for the airport.

I got to the airport pretty early. My plan was to get there early, check my bag, then walk around. I like airports. But after waiting in line for an hour I got to the desk and the lady told me that there was something wrong with the plane. The flight was probably going to be delayed, but possibly canceled and becuase of that she couldn't give me my boarding pass. I would have to come back in an hour and see what they decide about the flight. I asked if I could leave my backpack somewhere, she said no. Lame.

Turns out the flight was fine and wasn't even delayed.

The flight was fine. The guy next to me was kind of weird though. It wasn't a full flight and a lot of the middle seats were empty so I was surprised when he came and sat down in the middle seat next to me. I had the window. I thought maybe there were going to be three people. But there weren't. And he never moved. Instead, we both worked to share the arm rest and the floor space. When we were getting off the plane I saw his boarding pass and he had the aisle seat! I don't know if he just likes middle seats, didn't know how to read his boarding pass or just wanted to be creepy.

Danny met me at the airport with a sign that said THE CAT EMPIRE!!!. Funny Danny, funny. I was tired and Danny had a presentation today so we decided to skip the hoppin' Monday night Hong Kong nightlife. Don't worry, we saw some drunk middle aged white people (either Irish or Swedish, couldn't tell) on the train. The Hong Kong people on the train didn't like them. From the train stop we took a scary minibus ride to Danny's university. I was scared. Danny was used to it.

Danny's dorm is like a dorm. His roommate is in Japan right now so I can use his bed. Cool. Oh, the girl's bathroom has a code. Danny didn't tell me this. So I went to the girl's floor bathroom and pushed the door for about 5 minutes. Then i walked away and then saw a girl going to the door, pushing in a code into a keypad next to the door and going inside.

Danny didn't know the code. Or any girls on the floor to ask. So I went back and waited until someone used the code, opened the door and then I ran in behind her. I'm sure she didn't think that was weird.

This morning I slept and he worked on a group presentation he had this afternoon. Then I went to classes with him! The first one was amazingly boring. Danny called it his "reading class or something." I think it was supposed to be Chinese Literature in Translation. The guy spoke English I guess but was really hard to understand. Danny told his professor I was getting my PhD at Madison in Chinese Literature. I tried to say that wasn't true but I don't know if he got that part. Then I fell asleep. Oops. But people in that class do it all the time, and I was a guest so I was even more allowed to. People also walk in late, leave early, answer their cell phones, talk during class, so sleeping was actually one of the more considerate options.

Oh Danny also drank the sake juicebox during this class. You know, to get ready for the presentation in the next class.

The second class was a lot more fun. It was an entrepreneurship class and there were 3 groups presenting their business plans, including Danny's group. The first group was going to start up a skydiving site. Their presentation was ok. The second group was going to start up a "customizable t-shirt" business. Oh my god. I never realized how much I knew about t-shirt production. And they didn't know any of it. They had so much wrong information and lacked so many really important details!! I could have asked so many questions that would have made them look really bad. Some people asked questions they couldn't answer which made me happy. I really didn't want them to get away with being so dumb. Wait, I'm not mean. If they were just dumb I would have just felt bad, but they based their whole presentation on them being funny rather than on actual information and everyone gave them As and A+s on the peer evalutations! That's why I would have liked to be able to make them feel dumb.

To be fair it was only a minor assignment and most of the class is made up of international students and I realize that 1) business plans are annoying and it's obviously hard incorporate everything into a 15 minute presentation and 2) sometimes quality work for class isn't a top priority when you're studying abroad.

So it was just a strange experience. I felt really smart. Thank you Party in the Park and The Cat Empire I guess.

Danny's group presentation went well. He was energetic (drunk) and explained the plan well. But then someone asked some financial info which made the professor notice that the CEO of the company was only making $30,000 Hong Kong Dollars (HKD) a year. It's about $7.75 HKD to the $1USD. Yeah, you do the math. Oops.

I think I'm going to go see if I can buy a cell phone now (Quad band, worldwide)! Stuff is cheap in Hong Kong!!! I got a huge salad with egg and tuna and it was less than $3, and bananas were so cheap ($0.25) I got two! Exciting! The entire train/bus ride from the airport to Danny's stop was no more than $4.

But first I'm going to stand outside the bathroom again.

One month?!?!?!?!

It's November 27th!!! Oh my god. It's a beautiful day outside so I'm going to try to keep this short.

Friday - Osaka

I finally had my turkey diner. It was 1300 yen for a sectioned cardboard plate with turkey, stuffing, vegetables, a roll, and at most half a teaspoon of jellied cranberry sauce. I paid an additional 500 yen and got a slice of 'sinomin apple pie.' It was really good. Unlike Thursday night, Friday was packed. Every chair at every table was full. I ordered the plate at the bar and he asked where I was sitting. I said, 'um, here?' There was one other guy at the bar who I ended up talking to for a little bit after a conversation about favorite Friends characters with a Japanese woman (who came with her American boyfriend). She liked Monica and Joey the best. I said I liked Phoebe and didn't really have a favorite male character. She was very jealous that I lived in New York. I feel like she thought I passed Courtney Cox walking her dog on a daily basis.

Anyway, the guy at the bar was named Max. I told him my sister had a hamster named Max and he said, 'Oh, usually it's their dog.' I told him we never had a dog which is probably why Max went to the hamster. He lives in California but originally from Argentina. He had just arrived in Japan and when I said something about it being difficult he gave a 'well it's not as bad as some places I've been' or some cocky backpacker statement. That didn't get him off to a good start but he was actually fine after that. He told me about Argentina and how it's like the France of South America because all the other countries think they're stuck up.

His joke-

Q: Why do Argentineans stand outside smiling towards the sky when there's lightning?
A: Because they think it's god taking a picture of them.

Ha ha!! We talked about backpacking for a little bit. About the freedom of making decisions. I had kind of thought about it before. In Madison people kind of cared about decisions I made and here it very rarely impacts anyone else. I can spend 3 hours at a department store's stationary section and then go to a train station and just jump on the first one that comes and it doesn't make a difference to anyone else. It's quite a freedom I guess.

I didn't stay at the Thanksgiving place too long. Shit Creek wasn't playing, it was a guy named Brent who played Beatles, Eagles, Mr. Big and Four Non Blonds covers. I wanted to get to the show! I felt bad leaving Max (he eventually found a table and I had sat down with him) but he said he was just about to leave too. I didn't really want to invite him to the show. He was nice and it was nice talking to him but he had a button down shirt with the top button undone to show some chest hair so I had this feeling he wouldn't really enjoy the show too much.

THE SHOW!!! It was fun. It took me a really long time to work up the courage to actually go inside. I didn't know if the guy would remember me or if he actually thought I should come or if I would like the music or if everyone would already know each other. I walked in, paid and kind of took a spot near the sound board. The place was pretty small. The band of the guy who told me to come had already played. They had gone first. I felt kind of bad. The second band was like a death metal band. Not my usual cup of tea but it was fun to just see people getting into the music. The crowd was a pretty nice mix of every alternative group. There were some tiny cute girls bopping in the front (even tinier and cuter than the ones in the States), some stoner kids, some thug kids, the mod kids, some punk kids and even a creepy drunk old guy! The third band was just two guys doing kind of an Irish folk/punk thing. One guy with a guitar and one guy who sang and played a tin whistle. I couldn't believe his voice. It was the gruffiest sound I've ever heard come out of a Japanese mouth. He was singing English words with an Irish accent. But then he would end the song with,`arigato` (thank you) in the expected Japanese voice. His guitar had Guinness and Murphy's stickers all over it. I asked if they had a CD but they didn't and then I asked if they had a website but he didn't remember it. He told me their name so I'll try to look it up. There were DJs between the sets and they were really fun too. The bopping girls would go from bopping in front of the stage to bopping in front of the DJ. It would a fun show. I eventually found the guy who had given me the flier at his store. He was excited to see me for about 2 minutes. He asked if I came by myself and I said yes and I think he thought I was trying to hit on him and that made him feel uncomfortable. We didn't really talk much after that. His English wasn't really that good and I didn't think `Oh, I'm not trying to hit on you, I have a boyfriend` would translate well, so I just hung out by myself. I guess in Japan, it's the girl's responsibility to pursue the guy and not vice versa. That make the whole Western guy/Japanese girl phenomenon make a little more sense. It's got to be pretty cool to get hit on for the first time, especially if it's some `tall` foreign guy. The guy was fun to watch though. He knew a lot of the words to the other bands songs and would kind of bop around while leaning into the stage during the bands sets.

One guy who did talk to me was a kid named Ben. He's from Minnesota and has lived in Japan for the last three years. For the past year and a half he's been an apprentice at a tattoo shop in Osaka. He was really nice and helpful. When I was telling him my name I said something like, `Yeah, Beth. It doesn't translate into Japanese well.` To which he replied, `nothing translates into Japanese well.` Good point. Also all the kids at the show were part of his crew or whatever so after he talked to me some other people (tried) to talk to me too. One of the boppy girls asked me `what is your name?` and `how are you?` After we got through that there wasn't much more to say.

There was a band called Supa Haze and then some space jammy band that I started to fall asleep during, so I went back to the hotel and watched Mickey Blue Eyes. This is my second random, only-watching-it-because-it's-in-English movie. First one was 'Breaking All the Rules' with Jamie Foxx. (Thank you Erica for looking that up!)

Saturday - Osaka --> Tokyo

Saturday morning I woke up, walked around Ame Mura some more and got an Ice Dog (soft ice cream in a fried dough `bun`). Man, these Japanese think of everything. I stopped by Ben's shop to say thanks, goodbye and some tattoo questions (not for me, Mom, for Michael Thompson). He was super friendly and helpful and gave me a bunch of stickers and postcards.
He also gave me this brochure that his tattoo shop put together of a whole lot of art. He dressed up and took a lot of pictures for it. They're really funny. When I saw him at the show I thought I totally had this kid all figured out, standard `punk rock rules, everything else sucks` kid. I was so wrong. Turns out he's really nice, fluent in Japanese and is probably the best cross dresser I've ever met! This is his flickr account... http://www.flickr.com/photos/93498352@N00

After deciding to be friends on MySpace I left Ben's shop and went to the train station, back to Tokyo. Osaka was really cool. Except for my one freak out day (due to Thanksgiving, Kyoto being lame and woman issues) I had a good time. I feel like I know Ame Mura now, kinda.

The backpacker's guesthouse in Osaka had a flier for a backpacker's guesthouse in Tokyo that was in this area I hadn't been to before. I made reservation (dude spoke English! I got through Beth and Charpentier!) It was in Roppongi. Crazy, crazy place. It's not even Japan. It's all foreigners. That's why they're not anywhere else. They're ALL in Roppongi. There were people of all races, I heard like 30 different languages, the bars all give special deals to foreigners, crazy crazy crazy. When I heard Lindsay and Sarah talk about it they said it was kind of the red light district of Tokyo. Kinda sleazy and dirty. Yeah, it definitely was, but I was fine with that. There was a Citibank and an internet cafe so that's all I really look for in an area. The internet cafe was actually another store of the same chain of the one I always go to (in Shibuya, where I am now). But this place had English PCs and English keyboards. It was weird though. I've gotten so used to the Japanese keyboard that I kept messing up on the English one. (The letters are the same, but all the punctuation keys are different.) I'm kind of glad that I didn't know that place existed until now. It's very very un-Japan. The tour guide in Kyoto asked if I would ever consider moving to Japan. I (lied and) said maybe and he said make sure not to get stuck in the golden prison (referring to people who live in Japan for years but only hang out in ex-pat areas and never learn the language, experience the culture, etc). Without seeing Roppongi, I hadn't realize it could be so easy.

Then there is Roppongi Hills which is just this area with fancy fancy apartments and fancy shopping and a huge Hyatt at the top of the hill. The street was lit up with blue and white lights on all of the trees (sponsored by Ray-Ban!). I hung out in the Hyatt for a while people watching. And going to the bathroom!!!!! WOW!!! How nice! Each toilet is in it's own little room and the seat is warm (of course) with like 30 different buttons! It was really fun. The sink was all crazy and weird and then they had a stack of actual terry cloth hand towels to dry your hands! It was soooo nice. I forgot how much fun fancy hotel bathroom were.

So that was my night last night. Very un-Japanese.

When I got the train station in Tokyo I really wanted a Japanese meal (rice, soup and some other stuff). I saw a soup place that had an English menu and rice so I settled for that. I got some onion potato cream soup and a bowl of rice. They didn't give me chopsticks, only a spoon and I was surprised how awkward it felt to use a spoon to eat the rice.

The hostel I'm staying at now has three or four rooms each with 12 beds. I'm in Funky Room. It's pretty funky. When I checked in I noticed there were three or four other people's stuff in the room, so when I got back from Roppongi I was really careful to have everything planned out so I didn't make a lot of noise when I did my stuff to get ready for bed. But I opened the door and there wasn't anyone there. I thought I was being cool coming back at 1:30 in the morning and I was still lame. I think the rest of the people came back around 6. I haven't met them yet. This morning I crept out before any of them woke up. It was about 11am.

So when I leave the internet cafe I'm going to call Yuki and probably meet up with him. Hopefully Lindsay and Sarah too. Aaaahhh!!! My last full day in Japan!!!!!

Got to get out of the internet cafe!!!!

Last things...

1) Ken - I needed to use a subway to get to the hostel and the only subway map they had at the station was in Japanese. A Japanese looking guy came up to me and asked me where I was trying to go. I told him and he said, 'come with me, I'm going the same way.' Turns out he's from Florida (at first I thought he said Korea, that was awkward) but was born and raised in Japan and is back for a couple of weeks. Ken was his name. Ken was going in the same direction but to a stop that the two lines at left from that station still shared. Because I thought he knew what he was talking about I followed him and got on the train with him. He got off and said, 'it should only be one more stop' but that was a lie because I wasn't even on the right line. I knew that the line I wanted was green and all soon realized all I saw around me was blue. Thanks Ken.

2) The Cat Kid - Family of three, originally from California. Dad moved to Japan after 9/11, family followed 2 years later. I knew I wanted to talk to them right away when I heard the mother say, 'Do you think you're ready to go, son?' and he replied, 'Yes, mother.' Who says that? The kid was like 15 with a fanny pack, tight jean shorts and a mullet braid down his back. The mom was wearing a kitten sweatshirt. I talked to the mother for a while and when I said I had been here three weeks the mom said, `oh, so everything's still pretty backwards for you, isn't it` and I said yes.

Then the kid jumped in, `Do you have any pet cats?`
`Um, no, but my sister does.`
`Does she live on base or off?`
`She doesn't live in Japan, she lives in New York.`
`Well tell her if she ever moves to Japan she'll have a very high water bill.`
Then walked away.

Huh? It took me a minute, but I figured out what he was talking about. The faucets here turn on my pushing down and turn off by pulling up, so I guess maybe they have cats and live off base (on base everything`s American I'm assuming?) and the cats jump on things and knock into things and turn the faucets on accidentally. The hippies house was the first place I dealt with the opposite faucet and it was kind of strange. Katsura told me they're trying to stop using those kinds of faucets because during earthquakes things would fall and then all the faucets would turn on. Strange strange strange!!!

3) Louis Vitton - I don't even know if I'm spelling it right but LV is EVERYWHERE here. Little punk rock girls even have LV purses. Someone should tell them that's not very anti-establishment. The geisha guide in Kyoto told me 30% of LV sales are in Japan. Very strange. And when the California mother asked how they afford them he said a) there are a lot of fakes b) the average girl who graduates college goes on to get paid pretty well to work at a department store but still lives with her parents and therefore end up with a ridiculous amount of disposable income.

4) Bicycles - One cool thing about Japan is that cars are super expensive to own so everyone rides bikes. Super old ladies, business men, mothers with children, high school kids, everyone. It makes it kind of scary when you're on a sidewalk (especially with headphones!) and they come within 2 inches of you, but overall it's nice that there seems to be an entire country that's into the bike thing. Out of necessity I guess they're also really good at talking on cell phones and holding umbrellas while biking. Very strange.

5) I leave tomorrow! I'm kind of sad about leaving Japan. I had two superextremefreakoutandcryalot days but 2 out of 24 isn't that bad. Right? I kind of wish I could say I hated it and throw out the WWOOF book and leave the Lonely Planet at the hostel, but walking back to the hostel last night I realized at least Japan is really safe and I much rather be in Japan walking by myself at night than in Laos or Malaysia. The south of Japan (south and west of Osaka) is like this whole other world from the rest of Japan and has a lot of non-farm WWOOFing possibilities. English school, organic restaurants, bakeries and sweet shops. So I'm not going to throw away the WWOOF book or leave the Lonely Planet at the hostel. Maybe I'll be back. I don't know!

Moving on, here's an excerpt from a Danny email about the possibilities in Hong Kong!

1. Hong Kong Disneyland
2. Ocean Park (more amusement parkish, plus there are pandas)
3. Swimming in the UST pool
4. Spend a night at the beachhouse (maybe possible)
5. go hiking in the new territories
6. visit the huge reclining buddha
7. take the tram to the peak and see all of hong kong
8. see a really cool imax about the human body at the space museaum
9. sip drinks at aqua, very expensive but best view of the HK skyline
10. play mafia/kemps with my UST peeps
11. walk through all of the crazy weird markets around the city
12. eat dim sum
13. sip mochas at pacific coast coffee (free internet, lifesize chess,and videogames!)
14. party in Lan Kwai Fong, where all the bars/clubs/white people are
15. party in Wan Chai, where all the bars/clubs/strip bars/sleazy whitepeople are
16. BE ON MY RADIO SHOW! It's our last show, the wednesday after u arrive!

I'm really excited. I've passed up both Disneyland Tokyo and Universal Studios Japan (Osaka) because they seemed to depressing to go to by myself, so I really want to go to Hong Kong Disneyland.

Shinya just called! He's the singer in Killing Skill 48. I told him I would call him back. Getting out of the internet cafe now!

Meeting People is Not Easy

Oh wow. It's been a while. I'll try to do a recap. I meant to find an internet cafe a lot earlier in the day but I fell asleep. So now it's 5:45 and I'm kind of hungry so this is going to be short. I may elaborate some other time.

Monday - Tokyo --> Osaka

I `slept in` at the internet cafe and only left around 12 something. Got a 2 something train and got to Osaka around 5. I had seen the website for this budget `hotel` that tried to make itself look like a fun youth hostel and quarter of the way made reservations.　Once again, getting through `B-E-T-H` took about 20 minutes so the idea of attempting Charpentier didn't seem worth it. I said, 'You have a bed for me?' she maybe said yes, and I said `I will come.` Those are the reservations I make.

Anyway, I got to the place and it's exactly like the other super cheap hotels. Each room is 2000 yen ($17.50US) and with it you get a small bed, a small fridge, a small TV and about 5 feet of floor space. Sometimes there's a robe, a toothbrush and a towel. The public bath... room is on the first floor and is open from 6-7am and 9 -11pm for women and 7-9am and 4-9pm for men. Each floor has a toilet for men and a toilet for women. Also, you take your shoes off when you come in, put on slippers and then carry your shoes with you to your room. They still were too big. I thought I was in Japan. I tripped all the time. When you leave the hotel you give them your key and this place had an 11:30 curfew. On the website it said they didn't have a curfew anymore so I think I may have gone to the wrong place. There were like 5 places all with the same name. I showed the guy the phone number of where I had called and he seemed to gesture, `Yeah yeah, that's here` but then after I paid and got the receipt the number was clearly different.

The place was fine. I didn't shower. But they also had free internet which was nice.

Monday I didn't do much. I checked in, went to Ame-mura which is this really cool area in Osaka. It's short for America Mura which means American Village. One of the guys in the band suggested it. It's actually where I am right now. Most of the shops were closed but there was cool graffiti all over the place and I could see it's potential. Then I ended up in some huge flashy shopping arcade near the subway. These things are overwhelming. I can't handle them anymore. It's just streets and streets of people yelling to come in and buy stuff and then a Pachinko (really loud, really bright, really lame pinball/gambling place that like a casino on crack) place. I didn't stay long because I couldn't miss my 11:30 curfew. Oh, I also tried to see live music. I saw a sign for Music Bar ROCK ROCK and thought it might work. The sign was even in English! It didn't really work. I walked in and it was dead. There were 4 people at the bar. One of them was British. I asked him if there was going to be music and he said he didn't think so. He tried to ask the bartender but he spoke just as much Japanese as me. It was funny to watch. It was decided that there are DJs, but only on the weekends. I tried to think of something to say after that but couldn't and said, `Ok, thanks, bye` and ran away.

Tuesday - Osaka --> Kyoto --> Nara --> Osaka

Kyoto is THE place to go when you go to Japan, so I heard. It's where all the history and culture is. So Tuesday morning (after leaving the lame place and going to my first backpackers' hostel) I got on a bullet train and went to Kyoto. I was kind of hesitant because there are over 2000 temples and shrines and it seemed like 1) how was I ever going to make the most of it and 2) wait, do I even care? But I was in Japan, so I had to go. And that's where you the geishas are, so I thought that might be cool. So I got off the train and went to the Kyoto Office of Tourism to get an English map. It was closed. It's closed the 2nd and 4th Tuesday of each month. It didn't seem worth it to try to navigate the city without a map so I decided to leave and go to Nara )(strongly suggested by Michael Thompson).

It was amazing. I asked the lady at the tourism office for an English map and she was great. She took a map, took out her red pencil, circled the train station, circled 3 or 4 other things, drew lines on the streets between the circles and then how long it was going to take to walk between each place. She then wrote notes about what was going on at each place (deer, 3,000 laterns, nice view) and then walked me through the whole map starting out with, `This is what you should do. It will take 3 to 4 hours. We are here. First walk down this street for 15 minutes. You can take a bus, but young people like to walk.`

So I walked down this really cute street lined with this shops and places to eat. Since I don't have much time, just look through the pictures to see what I saw (when I get them up, probably not tonight. I'm really hungry). It was all really cool. The best part was that after the road of shops ended it turned into a park and all of the attractions were scattered around this huge park! And there were deer and they didn't have diseases and they walked up to people asking for food and there were people selling deer cookies for 150 yen and little kids were scared and old people were bothered. The deer didn't seem to understand the transition from having deer cookies to not having deer cookies. So they would just follow people around for a pretty long time.

So yeah Nara was awesome. Everything was by foot. There was a very comfortable level of people. And a couple of westerners. One guy from Nebraska was really funny. He asked if I would take a picture of him and his Japanese girlfriend. I said yes but then the camera said it was out of batteries. I said I could take it with my camera and email him if he really wanted and he replied, `How international of you.` When I asked what he wanted in the picture he asked his girlfriend, `What all do you want in the picture` which sounded extremely Midwestern to me. When I asked where he was from he said, `Nebraska? The land of... nothing? I came to Japan and saw mountains... and water... at the same time!` He was funny. Also, when he was trying to change the batteries in his camera a deer came up to them and started eating his map.

So Nara was really nice. Pebbled pathways, tons of stairs and cool things all over the place. I went to a couple of really nice places. I learned that if you want a good picture find the person with the biggest camera and take it from there. There were a lot of people with big cameras in Nara. Everything closed at 5 so then I went back into the town and stopped at a place called Drink Drank and ordered what turned out to be a big bowl with salad, chicken and big pieces of bread. It was great. Then walked back to the station, passing the coolest garbage can I've seen yet, and got on a train back to Osaka.

Wednesday - Osaka

It turned out that Japanese do have some sort of Thanksgiving thing. It's called Labor Thanksgiving Day but it's not about turkey or parades, just about having the day off. So for anything that I would maybe wanted to do, there were already 50,000 Japanese already doing it. I didn't like Wednesday. I did my laundry, which was nice, but I also had big plans for the post office which definitely didn't work out (public holiday) and when I tried to just go walk around some nice areas everything was crazy and packed with people. Eating food was (again) difficult because there were lines everywhere and I don't do well under Japanese pressure. I went to the place where I knew I would be able to order food pretty fast... McDonalds. I got to the counter, flipped over the plastic menu (Japanese one side, English on the other) and ordered. I was fast. That night I went back to Ame Mura. Since it was a public holiday all the stores were open pretty late. I saw some really funny shirts but they were all really expensive. There was a really nice guy who ran the first shop I went into and I asked him if he knew where I could see live music. He told me he was in a band and they were playing at a place down the street Friday night (it was probably something like, `My band! Friday! Near to here!` I bought a shirt from his store and he drew a cartoon on the bag. He was really nice. I'm going to go see his band tonight. I think. If I can find it. I had a good time walking around Wednesday and seeing what they America is all about. I saw a lot of Spam, a lot of Mickey Mouse, a lot of high school sports shirts, a lot of cowboy boots, a LOT of Abercrombie (most surprising, punk/rock kids love it), some Tide, some Scotch tape, and a beer can holding helmet thing. There may be an official name, I don't know. Another guy talked to me that night too. He asked me how old I was and I said 22 and he said, `me too!!!` I think he was lying. So far every Japanese kid who asks me how old I am says they're the same age. So that night was cool.

Thursday - Kyoto
So if you come to Japan you have to go to Kyoto. I was afraid that because I had such a good time in Nara I wasn't going to have a good time in Kyoto. I was right. It sucked. I took a train there, went to the (now open) tourist center. Got a map (the lady was not as nice as in Nara), got a bus map and was sent off. Kyoto runs on busses. I hate busses. I like trains, subways, trams, streetcars, monorails. I hate busses. But the lady at the tourism place said there are only two subway lines and the busses do most of the tourist spots. Lame. I went to The Golden Pavillion, The Zen Rock Garden and Nijo Castle. Each place was just a (99% Japanese) tourist march. You get off the bus, pay for a ticket, walk through a garden, get to a temple/castle, take off your shoes, walk through, put your shoes back on, go through the souvenir shop and then walk back to the bus stop. I had read about these beautiful gardens and was really excited to just see pretty stuff and yeah it was all pretty but it everything was roped off and you just followed a route. Lame. There were no ropes in Nara. And the bus rides were not short! Kyoto is just this normal city that happens to have 2000 temples and shrines in it. But it's not there one really nice park to hold them all. You pass a gas station, a McDonalds and a shoe store and then there's the entrance to the temple. It really doesn't feel that spiritual or any of that. Well it didn't for me. And also, everyone talks about how amazing all of this stuff is so I was kind of expecting like huge gold temples and a gigantic rock garden. But every time I got somewhere I kind of felt I was at one of the sideshows at the county fair. Like you see `WORLD'S SMALLEST HORSE!!!` and there`s a gate that's like 2 feet tall and you're thinking, `wow! that's got to be soooo small!' and give the guy your money and run up the stairs. Then you get to the top and you realized that the fence it only the top two feet and the stairs you ran up were 3 feet and the horse in standing on the ground and is really just a 5 foot pony like any other pony you've seen before. Yeah, so every place I went in Kyoto made me feel like that. The Zen Rock Garden, which I was actually really excited about was 25 meters by 10 meters. I guess it's my fault for not knowing more ahead of time. And being too American (wanting everything to be big and flashy). I had imagined it to be like a huge labyrinth garden maze type thing.

I should be fair. It was all really pretty. Definitely. There leaves were crazy oranges, reds and yellows. It really felt like fall. November is actually Kyoto's second most popular month (first is April) because of the leaves and also some geisha thing. So yes, it was very very very pretty.

In hopes of at least learning something, I booked a reservation with Peter someone. I can't remember his last name. He's from Canada and is the one Western to be accepted into the world of geisha-ness. He's written books and is in all kinds of documentaries and gives tours. So I paid 3000 yen to walk around with him and this family of four from California for 90 minutes. Even that was kind of disappointing. I know that he knew a lot, but he didn't really talk much. I tried to ask questions and he would answer them but for most of the time it was kind of quiet. When he did talk it was kind of half way creepy. He talked about the tea house he's a member of, and we ran into a 15 year old girl from that tea house that was going to be making her premier as a maiko (geisha in training) on the 29th. He is also married to an ex-geisha. I don't know, but the whole thing just sounds so sketchy. Girls drop out of high school to enter these 6 year contracts where they live in boarding houses and go to geisha school to learn things like walking, tea ceremonies and flute. During that time they're hired out by their houses to entertain rich and/or famous people by dressing up in expensive clothing, white makeup and fancy hair and serving tea and doing dances or something. And they get paid a ridiculous amount of money. And you can only get an appointment with a geisha if you're rich and/or famous and have rich and/or famous friends who already have connections somewhere. I think if it wasn't such an underground deal it wouldn't seem as creepy. Sorry, sorry, it's not underground, it's traditional. And everything is about face and that's why everything has to be so strict. But let me just add that during our walk we apparently passed the head of the organized crime circuit of the area. Ok, so that was my 4:30 - 6:00 time slot.

Dinner was a difficult. I ordered macaroni gratin. They had an English menu so I thought this was going to be easy. But instead of having Japanese and English on the same menu there were two different ones. And the waitresses couldn't read English so she kind of guessed which one it was similar to on the Japanese menu. So I ended up with macaroni gratin with shrimp. And then tried to say I was allergic to shrimp and I just wanted the macaroni and then it came back with squid. I figured I would try one more time and then just eat whatever came and the third time it came back just macaroni. So that was my Thanksgiving. Macaroni gratin at San Marco's in Kyoto, Japan.

I was thinking about getting a McDonalds apple pie for dessert but it didn't work because after I took my first step from San Marco's to McDonalds I started crying hysterically in the middle of the sidewalk. Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday and Kyoto was not helping me get my mind off of the fact that I was far far away from the people I loved. No one in Kyoto loved me.

After standing at each possible wrong bus stop I finally got on a bus and went back to the train station and then back to Osaka. I wrote some depressing emails then decided to try this foreigner's bar that was serving turkey dinners for $13. I went there. There were foreigners. Some Americans definitely. An American band called Shit Creek playing. There were probably about 12 tables, 5 of them completely full, 7 completely empty. I ordered a drink and gave myself till the bottom of the glass to meet people. But realized I'm a lot shier than I thought I was. I didn't talk to anyone, no one talked to me and then I left.

I ended up getting the last train back to the hostel but it only went part of the way. I had to walk the rest. I had gotten off at that stop before but all the exits I knew were being closed and I had to go through an exit I didn't know.

One thing that's really good about Japan is that it's really safe. There aren't really muggings or rapes or many bad people to people interactions. So that's good. I found a hotel and asked how to walk in the direction of the next subway stop (which is where I would have gotten off at if it had been running). The guy was helpful and I got home fine. I saw my first Japanese salaryman peeing on a street. That was kind of awkward.

So that was Thursday.

Friday - Osaka

I woke up, decided I wasn't going to let today suck as much as yesterday. I had to leave the awesome backpackers place because when I checked in on Tuesday I said three nights and since by Friday I was the only person still there they decided to close for the weekend. So I was kicked out. Nicely though. I remembered seeing a hotel in Ame Mura so I went there and got a room. I couldn't check in until 3 so I left my bag and then went to the Osaka Castle. Pretty much like the stuff in Kyoto but there were benches and I just walked around the area and didn't pay to go inside. I got back to the hotel around 3:30 and fell asleep for two hours and then came here. I'm going to go to the bar again and get the $13 turkey dinner (Thanksgiving celebration is two days, both nights featuring Shit Creek). Then back to Ame Mura for the guy from the clothing store's band. If I can find the place.

Tomorrow I'm going to go to Mt. Fiji finally. The guy from Earth Embassy gave me his cell phone number because he realized he was bad at responding to emails. Then Sunday I'll go back to Tokyo, meet up with my `Killing Skill 48 & friends` friends and hopefully Lindsay and Sarah. I got an email from Yuuki (the God shirt) that was really funny.

`hi!beth
my name is yuuki
the day before yesterday??I drunk with you. do you remenber?
my band name is spinwake.
My favorite song is richard marks.
do you remenber me??`

I wrote back but then he wrote back saying it didn't work right and he gave his number. I called yesterday but it didn't work and then called today but hung up because I got nervous. As hard as it is to talk to people who don't speak the same language, it's even harder over the phone. But he called me back and we talked for a little bit. I said I was going to come back on Sunday for the Killing Skill 48 show. He said`You come to Tokyo on Sunday? I am happy! I want to meet you!`

It was great. I told him I would call him on Sunday.

So that was my week. There was a lot more interesting stuff that I'll try to write about soon. The women only subway cars, the super cool hostel I stayed at, and a funny conversation I had with a family that now lives on a US Army base somewhere near here. It started off with, `Do you have any pet cats?` Yeah, I'll explain later.

Here are photos from...
Nara- http://www.flickr.com/photos/wigramroad/sets/1439918/
Osaka - http://www.flickr.com/photos/wigramroad/sets/1439881/
Kyoto - http://www.flickr.com/photos/wigramroad/sets/1439949/

Not all Japanese are mean and cranky!

This was my most Japanese weekend yet. I stayed with Errol who knows Japanese. This opens up a whole new world. Not only does he know Japanese but he has friends who know Japanese and also like to have fun. That's a lovely combination to run into after being by yourself for a while.

Friday - Niggata City (where Errol lives)

Ate sushi! (Kind of) - First was a corn and mayo roll, then some fried tofu thing, then 1/2 a salmon thing, then some cucumber rolls. About the salmon, it wasn't bad, it just wasn't good. I guess isn't something that I'd go out of my way to ever eat again. Second, I didn't know about the wasabi inside the rice. My eyes started tearing. Wasabi and I are not friends.

Izakaya- A really fun place where you order some dishes for the table, and then where they're all gone you order more. And more. And more. And you have beer or some alcoholic beverage to keep you company throughout the food eating experience. By the end of the meal, you're drunk and full which is the perfect time for...

Karaoke - Yeah, that's right. It's so much more than in the States. It's not a huge bar where one person sings in front of a room full of strangers. You get a room with your friends (there were 5 all together, perfect number I think) and there's a huge TV and fancy remote to select songs. There are two microphones, so it's really just five drunk people, crouched over two microphones, singing Mr. Big at the top of their lungs. Really fun. I don't remember all of the songs but I know we had Meatloaf, Salt & Pepper, Alanis Morisette, Justin Timerblake, Oasis and then, my solo, Hanson. It was really really fun. Also, unlimited drinks were included in the price. Ice cream sundaes however, were not included in the price. I got an American Sundae and, just like in the US, it had corn flakes in it. Japan has a lot of wrong ideas about America, one being every dish we make comes with corn in one form or another.

Talking Japanese - The best part about being with people who speak Japanese is you can ask them how to say things and then say them and that leads to... communication?? Is that the word? It feels so foriegn. I think that's it. Yeah, so along with my new friends I got to talk to... fancy dressed boys on the street, the youngest cab driver evere seen in Japan (he was 30, cab drivers are usually plus 50), a drunk couple on the train platform, and more drunk kids on the train. FUN FUN FUN!!!! I then did something very un-Japanese...

Lost My JR Pass - I forgot how sometimes you're not great at things when you're drunk, like putting small really expensive pieces of paper in secure areas. I guess I put it in my back pocket or something, cause it totally fell out on the walk from the train station to Errol's apartment. Friday night I definitely didn't notice. Saturday morning we were kind of in a rush to get to the train station to go to Yuhiko, so I looked for it, but when I couldn't find it figured it was just buried somewhere and I decided I would just pay the train fare this time ($13) and find it when I got back on Sunday. On Sunday, I got back, went through every part of Errol's apartment, couldn' t find it, Errol called the station, the police and then we went out to retrace our steps. On the way back to the station I found it on the side of the road in a muddy gutter type area. BUT, I'm a super genius and I was carrying it around in a plastic bag, so it was fine! It was a little wet, but not muddy at all! So we went back to Errol's and hung it on the laundry line.

Back to Saturday

Saturday - Yahiko in Niigata - Ken (Niigata Prefecture, like State)

Yaki-niku-don - Took a train about an hour outside Niigata City, where Ayumi (a cowork of Errol's)'s parents live. Shet met us and we went to eat at a place I would have had to skip by myself. I got terinikudon. That means grilled (yaki) meat (niku) on a bed of rice (don). It was really good!! The meat was beef and in addition there were peppers and onions and a sauce that I liked. She and Errol taught me the kanji (borrowed from Chinese) characters that represented the teri, niku and don so maybe I can find it on a menu in the futre!

Kiki Festival - After lunch we walked through a park and then went to a shrine where they were having the Kiki Festival. There were a lot of things going on. First, chrysanthemum(`kiki` in Japanese) flowers all over the place, then some bonzai trees, the winners from the rice competition (got to see the pictures of that!) and lots of little 3, 5, and 7 year olds dressed up in kimono for the 3-5-7 Celebration. Duh. If you're one of those ages it brings good luck if you dress up and go to a shrine and have your family take lots of pictures and video of you trying to walk in very silly shoes. Overall, a really beautiful, nice place to walk around in. There was also a food vendor area where Errol got some octopus stuff. I passed. As I was taking a picture of the plate of octopi the guy behind the table said `I used to think people were taking a picture of me, then I realized I'm not that cool and they're only taking a picture of the octopi.` Errol translated and then went over and asked if I could take a picture of him because I thought he was cool. He laughed and then posed.

Fish Market (I forgot the official name) - There was a lot of fish. I zipped my jacket all the way up. Fish smells a lot worse than crab and squid. I felt bad whenever I would tell someone I didn't like fish because the second question was always, `Ooh, so Americans don't like fish? Japanese love fish.` The whole `individuality` thing is lost. Errol on the other hand, loves fish, so we tried to use that as an example of `personal differences.` It's hard represting an entire country. I'm kind of weird. And so is Errol. Japan must be very confused.

Onsen (public bath houses from natural hot springs) - I did it. I got naked and `bathed` with probably 100 Japanese females from age 5 to like 95. I figured if I didn't go with Ayumi, I probably would just end up skipping it all together. To be confused is one thing, but to be confused and naked, yeah, it wouldn't happen solo. So the bathing thing is kind of weird. You first sit on a upsidedown plastic tub and wash yourself. Then you go into the mineral baths. I t was like 500 billion degrees and I couldn't stay long without feeling like I was going to pass out. But, I was in there for long enough to completely ruin all of my sterling silver jewelry. Yeah, I forgot to think about that. When I first noticed that my silver rings had all turned some wierd blue/brown/purple color my stomach dropped. It didn't feel good. A lady saw me freaking out and told Ayumi that a jeweler can fix it. That's half true. They're not blue/brown/purple but they definitely don't look like before I went in. He said curry, stomach medicine and toothpaste may also work. I haven't tried them yet.

Dinner at Ayumi's parent's house - There was a lot of food. We ate, watched volleyball and then Dad & Friends came home. Completely wasted. Oh my god. I don't even know where to start. None of them really know English and they knew that I didn't know Japanese but that didn't stop them from talking to me. A lot. They would look at me, say stuff, then look at Ayumi or Errol and wait for one of them to translate. The questions were, 'Where are you from? What baseball team do you like?Is (insert name of probably somewhat famous Japanese baseball player name here) famous in America? Where are you from? Do you like him?' What sports do you watch? Where are you from?` Answering `New York` just started the whole cycle again. I should really learn about the Japanese guys in baseball. People would like me a lot more here. One guy was Ayumi's father, one guy had won the golf game they had played before they started drinking, one guy was right wing and saying weird stuff that upset Errol and then said it's good we came to Japan becuase the US has no culture. The other guys replied he was acting like a Korean or a Chinese person, saying that his own country is better than another country. That's one thing I didn't realize before coming here. Asia is one big dysfunctional family, with North Korea (as someone Friday night put it) as 'that crazy uncle who talks about what he can do with all the shotguns in the attic and you don't know 1) if he's serious or not or 2) if he's crazy enough to use them.' So yeah, being called Korean or Chinese is about the biggest insult you can give to a Japanese person. Very strange night. When the friends went home and Dad still wanted to have fun he did what any drunk middle age man would do... got out a calligraphy pen and wanted to write a kanji character. Ok. And then wanted me to write one. He choice `ai` which I think means forever, because that's what the prime minister had Laura Bush write when she came to Japan. And since I was female and from the US it seemed appropriate. Flickr has the finished product. Errol then wrote Niigata in Kanji (I think) and then Ayumi wrote yaki-niku-don and gave it to me to keep! Now I can walk into any place and hold up the piece of paper and hopefully get food I like! It was really an interesting night. One thing that made me pretty uncomfortable was the husband/wife dynamic. While the husband sat at the table drinking with his friends and spilling wine, breaking glasses, etc, she was just often running back and forth cleaning everything up. They barely spoke and after he was done with the kanji he went to sleep. Also, in Niigata they have a slightly different dialect and when he was talking to Errol he said something like their dialect is especially good for ordering wives around or something like that. I was shocked. Not right away because I had no idea what he had said, but Errol eventually translated and yeah, it was pretty weird. I guess the deal is, in Korea husband beat their wives pretty regularly, so if the worst Japanese husbands do is ignore their wives, at least it's not as bad as Korea. Very very strange. And Ayumi is really smart. She got her masters in International Relations and Environmental Policy or something serious and important like that. So I wonder how she feels hearing her father say stuff like that. If it's normal or if maybe kind of bothers her. I don't know, but I wouldn't want to ask. Anyway, it's not like he was mean to her in any way, and she was definitely at the table most of the time, there was just kind of a weird vibe.

Sunday - (Yahiko --> Niigata City --> Tokyo)
Got back to Errol's apartment, went crazy looking for the JR Pass, eventually found it, went to the bookstore, bought a book to learn Hiragana and Katakana (the two other scripts, easier than Kanji), then went to lunch at a French place. I was really happy. It came with a salad and a croissant. Then walked around, went to a shrine in Niigata City, saw a kids' playground next to it that had something like, `A Monument for the Happiness from Pine Trees` or something like that. My camera battery was charging so I didn't take a picture. We also walked along the `American Thift Store Clothing` street and went into one place that had not one, but TWO UW-Madison sweatshirts and a UW-LaCrosse sweatshirt. Wow. I tried on a shirt that had Grover in a disco clothing and it said Sesame Street Fever! But it was too big and I didn't get it. The guy was super nice. Errol and I went to dinner at a soba place where I got soba (buckwheat noodles) in some soup stuff and vegetables. It was good. He got eel and I tried some. I said something like, `Yeah, I mean if I had a gun to my head I would eat it` and he replied, `Yeah, if you had a gun to your head I would hope you would eat it.` Good point. But it's just like all the other stuff. It's not terrible, it's just not good. To me. I got a banana/chocolate/ice cream crepe afterwards.

Crazy Fun Night in Tokyo - I was heading toward my internet cafe for the night and some guy says `Hello.` I got so excited. This was the first time anyone in Tokyo had voluntarily spoken to me. I said Hi back and we started talking and then he asked me if I wanted to go to this after party for a show his band had just played. He was with a girl and another guy who seemed really cool, so I said sure. So the show had been 5 bands and one all girl hip hop act. And then they were all there at this bar with all of their friends. Probably like 40 or 50 people in all. There were two people who were native English speakers. One guy from Seattle who had been in Tokyo for 5 years and did TV, movies and rapped apparently. Then another guy, a singer in one of the bands who grew up as a Japanese-Canadian in Vancouver but was now living in Japan. It was nice because I didn't talk to them for most of the night but if the people I was talking to didn't know how to say something they would ask either of them and either let one of them say it or have it whispered into their ear so they could say it to me themselves. It was really really cool.

It turns out the group of kids I was talking to most are either in or friends with the band Killing Skill 48. Most of them spoke English really well and were really excited to have someone to speak English with. They also tried to teach me Japanese. My favorite part of the night may have been when one of the guitarist in the band, said `Let's Learn Together!` Definitely the name of the English book he had in school or something like that. The singer actually went to a Japanese high school in Knoxville, Tennessee. I think. It seems kind of strange. He said there were a lot of Japanese companies in the area so there was a high school for all the kids of the employees. Hmm...

Anyway, they didn't have any CDs, but they're available at Tower Records and HMV so I think I might buy one. They did show me their music video which was pretty cool. The song was all in English which I thought was strange because their English wasn't that good, but the American guy later told me he wrote the lyrics for that song.

So the whole group of kids were really nice, really funny and really fun. Another cool part of the night was when one of the guys asked if I had a boyfriend and I said yes and I was kind of nervous they less interested in talking to be, but instead they started asking questions about him! They asked what did he do and I told them he worked at a recording studio and they said, `Tell him to come to Japan and record us!` And I hadn't even mentioned Garbage, Death Cab or anything! And then they asked if I had pictures and when I showed them some pictures they all said, `Oh! Handsome!` and passed around my camera explaining that was my boyfriend. They were just psyched to be talking with me, not trying to make out or anything. What a difference from Australia! A lot of the girls didn't speak English as well but they tried hard and joined in with the `Handsome!` commenting. It was really sweet. One of the girls in the hip hop group actually gave me her card with her cell phone number and email address and said we should keep in touch when I go back home. I have a picture of the troopers from the night (the ones who stayed till 5:30am). Oh, and to get us to leave they started giving out sticks of gum. I liked that.

So the band has another show in Tokyo next Sunday which is when my rail pass expires. I was originally planning on going to Osaka and then flying to Hong Kong from the airport there but I think I may come back to Tokyo to see their show and then fly out of Narita the next day.

I'm so happy I finally get what Michael Thompson was saying about Japanese actually being cool, fun and into learning about foreigners. I definitely was not feeling this way earlier.

Monday - Tokyo (Shibuya Internet Cafe)
I've been sitting/sleeping here for just about 6 hours. Now that I've finished with this I think I'll look into places to stay around Osaka and head there. Mt. Fuji may not happen. We'll see.

Pictures from Niigata Weekend
http://www.flickr.com/photos/wigramroad/sets/1409222/

Drunk Japanese are a lot nicer than sober Japanese!

I just had a very very awesome/Japanese weekend but with no internet!!! I'm in the train station but only have a very short time. Oh, and I found out (while finally checking my email) that they were able to restore my old blog!!!! YAY!!! It should be at http://hippiesandelephants1.blogspot.com. I think that had to do with why this one wasn't working. But I think I fixed it?!?! Also, they told me how to view the site in English!! There's a `language` button but it was in Japanese so I didn't know I could click it! Yay!

Ok, I'll be going back to Tokyo either tonight or tomorrow so I'll do a proper blog then.

Hakodate!

Top Ten Coolest Things about Hakodate

10. I Snaffle, Therefore I Am - I saw a sign saying right as I was getting off the train platform in Hakodate. It looked like mini cheesecakes. But usually things look like something and then taste like something completely different. On Wednesday I went into Snaffle's (a fancy pastry place) and bought a white and a brown Snaffle (about $1 each). I was sent upstairs to the dining area while they `prepared` them (which I think just meant putting them on a plate) and then about 3 minutes later they sat in front of me. And get this, they actually were mini cheesecakes! Really really good. I knew there was a Snaffle stand at the station so I didn't stop in again. But when I got to the station they were only selling them in boxes of six, no individual ones! The lady (who spoke no English) worked hard to convince me that finishing them all wouldn't be a problem. It worked and I bought the box. I had bought a bag of clementines at the morning market so I felt like they balanced each other out.

9. Art Show - There was some sort of art show/design contest thing going on at the train station. It was really cool. There was one area just for fancy design stuff for the city of Hakodate, one area of scrapbooking, and then a room with pictures by little kids with their designs either prettied up and printed on a t-shirt or made into a 3 dimentional object. It was really cool.

8. International - Hakodate actually cares about tourists!!! The guidebook said be prepared for less English but wow, people actually spoke English, or at least wanted to try! Also the tourist info center was super helpful and there was a lot of English around. And not just English, but Russian too! I saw 2 Russian couples.

7. It's Kind of Like Madison - First, the city is a peninsula, but, from the mountain, looks like an isthmus. Second, they're all about their dairy. Third, there was some crazy protest today. I didn't want to take pictures cause I was afraid someone might kill me but what I could get out of two girls I tried talking to was that it had to do with Russia. And I'm thinking anti-Russia because they had Japanese flags around their arms. It was a guy standing on top of a bus with a microphone screaming stuff. With about 10 people on the ground agreeing and then 20 police ready with big white board things.

6. Higuma (is the most fierce wild animal in Hokkaido) - There is stuff about this bear all over. He's kind of like Smokey I think. He tells you things like, `WARNING YOU MUST NOT BURN MY BED JUST BECAUSE YOU GOT EXCITED!　　Be careful that you, fire don't happen, and smoke a cigarette! You lose an important thing if it doesn't do so.Be careful enough specially not to cause a forest fire and so on. And, your health is likely to be injured. You reach death when much nicotine is taken. You keep manners, and smoke a cigarette. A message from the EZO BROWN BEAR.` If it doesn't say that, it says this.

5. Mt. Hakodate - Wow. If Madison (was bigger and) had a small mountain that you take a gondola to the top of, it would probably look similar. Here is a professional picture and I took two also. One from outside and one from inside with refelctions of other tourists. I was the only non-Japanese person the whole time. I think only Japanese people check out Japan in the winter.

4. Morning Market - I wish I liked seafood! Wow. So impressive. It actually didn't even smell that bad. So huge live sea creatures all over the place. There were crabs (alive and moving) on scales, more squid than I'll ever see again and lots of smiling happy people selling it all. I asked one guy if I could take a picture and he shook his head no and took my camera. Another guy brought over a live, moving crab and said, `Hold this and smile` and the first guy took a picture. Wow. Ok. Then he said, `Do you like seafood?` and I told him I was really sorry but I didn't. First guy was wearing a Seattle Mariners jacket so I told him I liked the Mariners. That was a lie, but less likely to result in be spending money on seafood. Oh he also asked if I was from America (I heard `(blah blah blah)... America (more sounds, voice going up)` and I nodded yes and then he said, `Doko` which means where and I knew that and I said New York and he nodded. That was the first time I responded to a question in Japanese!!!! The morning market also had stands for vegetables, fruits and watches.

3. Streetcars - I love transportation systems of new cities, especially if they involve streetcars. I got a one day pass for around $6 and it's actually a system used by people other than tourists. One thing I thought was strange was that there are only two lines, the Number 2 and the Number 5. I guess 1,3 and 4 didn't make the cut. The cost (for those not cool enough to be in possession of a one-day pass) was between 2oo and 260 yen per ride. There was a huge sign that had the price per stop according to where you got on. I thought that was really cool.

2. Lucky Pierrot - It's a fast food chain only in Hakodate. I had read about in Lonely Planet buy couldn't find one until walking back to the Niceday Inn from Mt. Hakodate. There were a lot of lights on an otherwise dark street so I went to look. The outside sign said `Hamburgers and Curry Santa Claus has come to Hakodate!` What? Yeah. And then it said it again and then I realized there were like 30 lit up Santas on the front of the building. I went inside and they were playing a Christmas CD and everywhere you looked there were Santas and other Christmasy things. Woah. First I thought maybe they were just getting ready for the holidays but then I realized it was way too serious to just be temporary. I ordered ice cream (duh) and went upstairs. There were glass cases of Santas in every direction. Woah. I stayed there for a while thinking about the planning that went into it. I only got to see one other Lucky Pierrot before I left. I wash hoping it would have another crazy theme but it was just kind of black and white. I got a burger, which was fine, but the exciting part was the bun. The sesame seeds on it were real sesame seeds. I was surprised everytime I would find one in my mouth (which happened a lot thanks to the wisdom teeth holes) and it would really taste like sesame. I got into sesame at the hippie house. That may have been the only flavoring they used. Another weird thing about Lucky Pierrot- Lonely Planet said something like, `frequented by young ladies` which I thought sounded silly, but the two times I went the only other people were groups of `young ladies` and older ladies who now had kids but looked like they were trying to remember when they were young ladies. I bought a pair of Lucky Pierrot chopsticks and learned the word for chopsticks is hasu, maybe.

1. The squid dance - They're really into squid and every year in the summer they have a big festival where around 10,000 people come out to, um, dance like squid. It makes me want to come back in the summer.

Other cool things.
- No McDonalds! This was the first place where I didn't see 5 McDonalds in my first step off of the train. Then getting back on the train today I realized I hadn't seen one in the whole three days! There was a KFC and I did eat there Wednesday morning after a really bad night of trying to avoid the KFC (and therefore spending way too much money for way too little food).
- Cheap! Internet was 400 yen/hour and it came with either coffee, iced coffe, tea or juice.
- People were nice and tried to speak English to me!
- Even after the markets were over there were still tanks of sea things in the streets all day long.
- One of the fancy hotels had `The Main Building` and `The Other Building,` and the post office had three post offices named after the neighborhood they were in, plus a fourth called `The Other Post Office.`
- Niceday Inn. This really cute `inn` I guess with three rooms, each with a bunk bed in it. So total capacity: 6, capacity when I was there: 1. Just me and the owner lady. She's super nice, super helpful and speaks English kind of. She speaks well but really fast and with a very thick accent so at first I didn't realize she was speaking English. She has postcards from people who had stayed there in the past. One from University of Maryland!
- Tuesday night I walked by boys breakdancing and from where I ate dinner I could see some kids skateboarding. I hadn't seen either of those things while in Tokyo (or Ohara).
- Tons of used clothing stores. A surprising number of them were closed on Thursdays, so I did't get to go inside. I went to one place and tried a lot of stuff on but it was all too small. I'm monster-sized Japan. I ended up buying a shirt. Ooops.
-Live music (kinda)! I saw my first show flyer of Japan. Also, Hakodate Beer (a brewpub I guess) promises Live Music Every Night! So I checked it out and it was a young girl in a dress playing classical music on a grand piano. So not the cheesy Japanese bar band I was hoping for, but that's ok. They also had speakers in the streets that sometimes had cool music. And one suvenior store I went into was playing an Old 97's album. And I only heard Nickelback once I think.
- Community Radio - Hakodate is home to the first community radio station. I tried to check it out but I think I had bad timing. It seemed to be empty.
-I ordered and ate ramen for the first time after a conversation with Errol...
Me: When I get to Niigata, we should go to a ramen shop.
Errol: Sure, we can do that, but you can just go in, sit down and say `ramen` and you'll get it.
Me: Are you sure it won't come with like squid or fish eggs or anything? There are pictures of smiling crabs and squid all over this town.
Errol: At most it might have pork and vegetables. No weird seafood though. I promise.
Me: Ok, cool, I think I'll try it.
(an hour later)
Errol: Beth, did you eat ramen yet?
Me: No, why?
Errol: I was just reading online about Hakodate and it says, `Hakodate is famous for their ramen, which instead of traditional pork and vegetables, often features squid.`

Right. I decided to go to the restaurant in the train station and not a straight up ramen place. I saw something I recognized (gyoza) so I ordered that really fast (I was really hungry). Then realized I promised myself I would do the ramen thing and there was a girl assigned to me that spoke English so I asked if they had ramen and she said yes and I ordered a bowl of miso ramen. It was in the biggest bowl I've ever seen served to one person. It was everything I had dreamed of (no squid). But I was already mostly full from the gyoza and the Snaffle so I couldn't even eat that much of it. Another fun thing about Japan is that you're supposed to slurp your soup. Apparently, it helps bring out the taste. I wonder how it was decided that slurping would be no good in the West? Tonight when I got into Tokyo I went to a diner type place that I had come to with Lindsay and Sarah and ordered ramen again. It was topped with breaded pork this time. Still good.

So I'm in an internet cafe again. I'm going to go to sleep now for a couple of hours. Tomorrow morning I'll go to Niigata and hang out with Errol! Yay!!!

Here are my Hakodate pictures http://www.flickr.com/photos/wigramroad/sets/1387631/

Quick

Change of plans. On Tuesday, instead of going to Akita, I decided to take the bullet train as far as possible and then contine on normal trains all the way Sapporo (in Hakkaido, the north island). But then I got to Hakodate (main city of southern Hakkaido) and liked it a lot and now I'm on day 3 in Hakodate. Tonight I'll be going back to Tokyo and doing the internet cafe night thing again. So I'll upload pictures (I've got lots, surprise surprise) and post a blog. This place is really cool. I'm finally in a city I would tell other people to come to. I order/ate ramen!

Also, I changed the phone number in the entry below. It was supposed to say 011 (0011 was for Australia, oops).

I also changed the settings so that anyone can comment. Or at least I think I did. Try it!!!

Fall Out Boy just came on in the internet cafe. No joke.

This is when it gets fun

It's 12:51am, Tuesday morning and guess where I am? That's right, an internet cafe! Couldn't be happier. Actually if the keys stuck less I'd probably be happier. But for the most part I'm in a much better mood than I previously was.

I decided that if I'm going to be lost and confused I may as well be really lost and really confused. Wait, I'll get back to that. Let me explain why I'm at an inernet cafe at 1 in the morning.

Earth Embassy never emailed me back confirming my reservation so I called them up and no one answered. Twice. So it seemed like a wise decision not to rely on them for accomodation. But I didn't want to try to stay at another hostel either. They're usually in the suburbs which means 1) I have to take some lame private line and I can't use my JR Pass 2) I have to make sure if I go into the city that I can catch the train back. All of that for check in before 8pm, an uncomfortable $30 futon and check out before 9am? Nah, not interested. So I decided I would go for the internet cafe thing. I paid around $10 and now I have this little cubicle to myself for 6 hours. There's food, free coffee and of course, a reclining leather chair. They have all different types of rooms. There are ones with lounges, ones with benches for two people, ones with beanbags and even some with huge massaging chairs. All of the cool rooms were taken so I just have my recliner, but with the addition of huge headphones and pretty dim lighting I highly doubt I'll have trouble falling asleep in it. Then, at 6am, I'm getting on a bullet train. Ok, now back to the part about `if I'm going to be lost and confused then I may as well be really lost and really confused.`

Hell yeah! Finally. I don't know why I didn't do this sooner (oh wait, it was because I was waiting to hear back from Earth Embassy). But I have the JR Pass, I don't need to make reservations and I've printed out the timetable so I'm set to go. My first plan was to take it to the northern most stop but Lonely Planet didn't make that area sound too interesting, so I'm going to go north on that line with two stops on the way, then go east to Akita and then take a train straight back to Tokyo. So it'll be like a nice little day trip, but with 186 mph trains.

I'm making it a day trip because I think I want to go to the Mt. Fuji area on Wednesday. If I find a decent place to stay the night there I may do that or may come back to Tokyo and pick some other random city to visit for the day on Thursday. Then, either Thursday night or Friday I'll take the train to Niigata and eat some ramen and learn some Japanese!

As for accomodation in Tokyo tomorrow night, we'll see. I think if I make reservations I can get one of the massaging chairs next time. I wonder if I would get bored of it by the 6th hour. Or one of the couches. Or there's always a love hotel rooms. Woah. I went into a couple of them today to evaluate price to sketchiness ratio. No one spoke English and I didn't feel completely comfortable so I didn't stay, but it wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it was going to be. I mean, it was kind of weird that you chose your room by pushing the button next to the lit up picture and that the front desk is a frosted window with a 3 inch opening so that the money can be exchanged without seeing each other's faces. Yeah, that's kind of weird. But they all seemed, I don't know, nice? Like if they wanted to they could turn themselves into good, decent hotels and have enough respect for themselves to only have one rate. But they're not 16 year old girls with low self-esteem, so I guess if they want to be creepy love hotels, they're allowed to be.

Lastly before I go to sleep, I rented a Japanese mobile phone. It's something ridiculous like $1 a minute for domestic calls and I over $2 a minute to call the US, but... free incoming calls from all over! Don't worry, I'm not expecting calls but here's the number just in case...

(REVISED 11/17, I accidentally wrote the int'l access code for Australia)

011 (int'l access code) + 81 (country code) + 80 (city code) + 3479 0545 (phone number)

or if you're drunk and using a cell phone just put in +818034790545 and it'll probably work.

Ok, I'm going to sleep for a bit now.

If I still have time when I wake up I'll try uploading more pictures. Lots of funny signs today.

Pictures from the farm

http://www.flickr.com/photos/wigramroad/sets/1362929/

Tokyo Part II, Day 3

I got really lost trying to find the hostel on Saturday night. It was in a suburb of Tokyo off of the subway. The directions said take exit 1b but if you're coming on a northbound train you're only options are exits 2 or 3. I was closest to 3, so I took it, figuring I could just walk a block or two and I would probably find exit 1b. I was wrong. I made a left, made another left, made another left and then another left. Thinking I would be back where I started, but not recognizing anything, I decided it was time to try to ask for help. I probably asked about 10 people for help. They either 1) didn't want to help me and pretended they didn't hear me 2) shook their hands frantically indicating they spoke no English 3) listened for a bit but then responded in Japanese and got frusterated when I still looked confused 4) tried to help but saw the only directions I had were in English and not Japanese and gave up.

The last guy I asked ended up having a book of Tokyo maps. But it was all in Japanese and the English I had wasn't helpful. He had no clue on how to help, but a lot of patience. An older guy on a bicylce came over and the two talked for a while. Then Bicycle Guy took off and Patient Guy said he could walk me to the place. We get to Hotel Matishubima or something like that and it turns out it's a hotel with the same name but not the one I made reservations/gave my credit card number to. But that desk guy knew where the other one was. He told me I had to get one a train and get off in two stops. I didn't understand how I could have been so off. I usually like to think of myself as pretty good with maps, directions and such. Turns out, with all of my left turns I had made my way to the next train station. So I got on a southbound train, decided to not listen to the dude at the same named hotel, go with the directions from the hostel and get off at Minowa station (one stop). This time if I couldn't find exit 1b I would ask, not just look around and take left turns. But this time I was on a southbound train. And exit 1b was right there when I got off of the train. And from then on the directions were fine. And about 2 hours after putting on my 40 lb backpack I finally got to take it off.

Turns out their computers hadn't been working all day so they didn't get my reservation, but they had a room I could have. It was supposed to be more expensive than the one I booked but for he gave it to me for the same price. I had booked a single. Something I had never done before because it seemed to defeat the whole purpose of being at a hostel. But I figured after a week with the hippies and all the communal everything, my own bath water was the least I deserved. But they were all out of singles and they gave me a double room.

Which should have been nice, but since I was already feeling crappy, hungry, tired, and not in the mood to be in Japan, walking in the room and seeing two sets of slippers, two sets of towels and two futons next to each other just made me feel even worse and more alone. I saw the extra pair of slippers about 3 hours before it was going to be Beau's birthday.

I decided to indulge. I took a bath with my own water. Before getting to Japan this wouldn't have been nearly as exciting. But here (I may have already written about this) one bath is drawn and then the whole household uses the same water. The bath is only for relaxing, cleaning should take place with the shower head, next to the bathtub, before getting in. Brian didn't have a tub, Lindsay's house is all Westerners so everyone just uses the shower, but the hippies would fill the bathtub everyday, once. And then say, `do you want to take a bath now?` I'd say sure but only use the shower. Well actually once I got in, but only stayed in for maybe 20 seconds before getting creeped out and once I went first so I filled the bathtub and then sat in it for maybe 2 minutes. It was still kind of weird.

And while the bathtub's here are a lot deeper than any bath I've seen in the States, they're really short, and I'm not that tall. So I guess you're supposed to relax while sitting in a ball.

So that was my super awesome Saturday night. I ended it with a McDonalds chicken sandwhich. See, I was really inspired by the hippie food and I came back to Tokyo thinking I would only eat healthy food, no more possibly hot dogs from 7-11. But that attempt plus my lack of Japanese resulted in it being 11pm and me not haven eaten anything all day. So McDonalds it was. Not only did they have a Japanese picture menu but there was an entire English menu on the reverse side!

There are all of these ramen shops all over but I can't go in there yet. All of their menus are in Japanese and I highly doubt they would understand any English. And I just have this vision of me, white girl, going in, pointing to a picture, acidentally ordering some fish something, being presented with something I knew I wouldn't like, having everyone stare cause I'm white (that part I know is actually true) and then not wanting to finish it after eating 2 sips. So I would be insulting the chef, letting all of the staring people down, wasting $8 and still ending up at McDonalds. Thinking about my inability to walk into a ramen shop, I started a list of things to do with/ask Errol. So far, eating a ramen shop, learning Japanese, and buying a good book to teach me Japanese.

I have a phrasebook which has come in handy maybe once. The problem is I don't want to try to speak Japanese to someone because then they'll automatically respond in Japanese. And the chance of me understanding, even to a point where I could look it up backwards in the phrasebook, is even less than me pronouncing what I want to say correctly in the first place. So my Japanese vocabulary as of today is... mizu (water), arigato gozimas(thank you),ohaiyo (good morning) and su mi ma sen (excuse me). I'll keep you updated.

So Sunday morning I wanted to get a cheap bed ($18) at the same hostel but the guy was acting weird and said they didn't have any available, only a bed in a smaller room that would be around $35. It seemed really really empty and I feel like he thought I would do it because I had just paid $50 something for the single the night before. And the night before there were plenty of cheap beds available. So it all seemed kind of weird and it's not like it was that great of a place anyway so I just left.

Day 2 of walking around Tokyo with a huge backpack, trying my best to play down the enormous size of my backpack while on the train, finding an overpriced locker to shove my backpack in for the day, getting sucked into an internet cafe (this time it was really really hot and filled with smoke, really gross) for way too long, looking for a bed for the night and trying to plan the rest of the week. I made a reservation at a Hostelling International hostel and tried to book two nights at Earth Embassy. I submitted a form online and I got an email saying they've received my request and would get back to me about availability. I meant to make it for Tues and Wed, but messed up and actually put Mon and Tues. But, they haven't emailed me back at all so I don't think they'll mind if I don't show up today.

The hostel last night was two floors in a lodging building of the National Olymics Memorial Youth Center( http://www.nyc.go.jp/e/). It was a huge huge complex with a ton of buildings, all for groups and then in the middle of it, 2 floors of rooms for me and my kind. Each room had a bed (Western!) and a desk and then there was a shared bathroom at the end of the hallway. Now I'm cool with shared bathrooms at hostels, but I've never seen such a literal interpretation of shared bathroom. Take a Japanese bathtub, multiply it by four (to a size that may actually be comfortable for one person) and then put four shower heads above the surrounding tile. That was the shared bathroom. Not my style. I figured I had showered everyday for the past week and I could skip a day. When I first got to the floor it was empty, so I almost thought`well, if it's empty I would go` but then realized it's not like I could lock the door or prevent other people from coming in. I couldn't take that chance.

One thing that was cool about the place being a huge conference complex was it had it's own Western style restaurant! I got a big plate of spaghetti in honor of Beau's birthday. It tasted like spaghetti! After dinner I did my laundry in the women's laundry room. They had seperate male/female laundry rooms. I needed 100 yen coins and there was no change machine so I was forced to buy something from the vending machine to get change for my 1000 yen bill ($10). I went with a (cold) cafe latte in a juice box. It felt very strange. The beverage was for someone older than me and the carton was for someone younger than me. But I got my 100 yen coins and the cafe latte tasted good. Even through the plastic straw.

I had to check out before 9 and the restaurant only served their breakfast sets (`Westran` or Japanese) until 9, so I was out of there by 8;30. I was really excited about breakfast but it turned out to be a scoop of cold yellow mushy stuff, slightly resembling eggs, covered in ketchup, on top of a slice of cold ham, accompanied by an scoop of potato salad, an area with a couple peices of lettuce and carrot slices and two rolls. The rolls were really good. Coffe, orange juice, milk and water were self serve which was nice. The sign said, `During break fast, soft drinks are a self-service.` It's really nice to see any attempt but I always kind of wonder who comes up with the translations and if they think that that's how it really is of if they just kind of settle for what probably makes sense.

So I checked out, thinking I would have an email from Earth Embassy confirming my reservation. I guess I should have learned from when I tried to WWOOF there. They're not really good at responding. I'll call when I leave here. I also decided that these hostel attempts keep missing the point. I'm feeling really lonely, isolated and dumb for not knowing how to read or communicate with people and I keep trying to go to hostels to meet other people in my same situation. The hostel Saturday night didn't have a living room and felt really empty (my fault partly because I opted for the single room) and then the place last night, the only other people I saw at the hostel were Asian, probably Japanese. So I don't know what I'm going to do today. It's still pretty early so I have time to figure it out. I'll call Earth Embassy and see what's up with them and if that doesn't work out maybe just check into one of the many many cheap, sleezy love hotel places that are all over the place. These signs all indicate the `stay` price along with the `rest` price. I've read that there are some pretty interesting themed ones but I bet they're more expensive and I would hope to find a less popular. And so even if I'm not meeting other people at least I won't get terribly lost trying to find it.

So ever since the accidental deleting of the blog things I think I've been realizing more and more that I really have no clue what's going on. People talk to me in Japanese several times a day and I think I just have a more and more pathetic face every time. I've found myself reading a lot more just to remind myself that there is a language that I (at least used to) have some sort of grip of. I also find myself walking into any store that's playing American music or just speaking in English. Japan apparently loves Fall Out Boy and I'll admit, although I wasn't really a fan before getting here, I now do too. This morning I spent a half hour in a pharmacy because they played Fall Out Boy (haven't been to a place playing American music where I didn't hear them), Eve 6, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Debbie Gibson and Third Eye Blind. Yesterday I even stood in the doorway to some electronics store cause they were playing Nickelback. And I hate Nickelback.

I'm going up to see Errol soon and I'm pretty confident that things will get better/easier/more fun soon. And if not, I'm leaving Japan on the 27th to go to Hong Kong, where ENGLISH IS AN OFFICAL LANGUAGE!!!!! And I'll get to hang out with Danny for a bit! I don't think I would have minded half of the stuff that's been getting me down if there was just one other person to laugh about all of it with.

That's all for now. I'm actually going to go check out what it would cost to rent a cell phone for the remaining time in Japan. I found an English magazine for foreigners living in Tokyo with an ad for Vodophone rental. My only question is if anyone at the Vodophone store will understand any English.

I just realized it may sound like I expected Japan to speak perfect English and now think they're a nation of idiots because they don't. It's not that at all. They speak a lot more English than I speak Japanese, and I'm the one who bought a plane ticket here. I just feel stupid for assuming that not knowing ANY Japanese wasn't going to be that big of a deal. Lindsay studied Japanese for 2 years at UW and she still has a hard time, so really, what chance do I possibly have?

But I'm alive, I'm breathing, I ate some version of breakfast, I'm writing a blog entry in a ridiculously nice leather recliner and I'm wearing my new supercute brimmed beanie, so really life isn't bad. Just kind of confusing.

Lastly, Danny's blog has a pretty funny recap (with lots of pictures) of our Korean experience.
http://writemoreoften.blogspot.com/2005/11/korea-what-went-down-friday-its-6-pm.html is the first part.
http://writemoreoften.blogspot.com/2005/11/korea-second-half-sunday-sometime.html
is the second part.