Archive for November, 2004
November 15th, 2004
I’ve been going through a bit of a slump lately. I think a few things are catching up with me. My lack of sleep is running me down and the cold I’ve had keeps lingering. Combine that with the increasingly short daylight hours, the increasingly intense work hours and what I think might be the onset of culture shock and you have a boy struggling to stay smiling.
The good news is that step one to solving these difficulties is now complete. I’ve identified them. So, let’s move on to potential solutions.
Tomorrow, I’m planning on tracking down an alarm clock. A loud one. It has to be loud because I’m going to start wearing earplugs to bed. The loading dock, the ravens, the baby next door - their cries will all fall on my deaf, plugged ears.
That should help with the cold and that should be on its way out anyway. To prevent this from happening again, some serious hand washing has become a part of my school routine. Those kids are going to have to put their boogers directly in my mouth for me to get sick from them. And if they try that, it will be their health that’s in jeopardy.
The daylight hours thing is tricky. This bothers me at home too. November is always a problematic month for me and frequently sees me pining for some equatorial region when the sun’s hours are constant and where I won’t have to worry about these long nights. I think one thing that’s important for me is to make sure I get outside at least a little bit each day. A lunchtime walk or something will keep me a bit more sane. This might be difficult depending on which school seeks my services, but the more I see of the friendly ball of fusion up high in the sky, the happier I will be.
The work hours seem to be slowing down a little and I’m starting to learn how to deal with the long weeks. I’ve had a couple quite challenging ones and I took the second one much more in stride than the first, so hopefully, I can continue that trend.
And lastly, the culture shock. This one’s a bit trickier because I haven’t exactly been in circumstances like this before. Sure, my time in Ghana gave me my share of fits, but this is a whole new situation. (And I still blame the Larium for much of my African instability.) But, I do have a number of coping strategies to try out and some thinking to do. I’ll manage.
But for now, I think the lack of sleep is catching up with me. Keeping my eyes open is getting rather difficult. I best stop typing lest I faceplant into my PowerBook.
November 9th, 2004
Two days ago, I was enjoying a fine evening with Sarah and Hannah. We had enjoyed a delicious meal and were in the middle of watching a recent episode of the Daily Show when that ubiquitous Japanese song starts playing. You know the one, it rings out to herald the arrival of anyone to anywhere. During any given five-minute visit to the convenience store, the bubbly tune will pierce your eardrums at least a dozen times as new customers enter. It’s a wonder the employees don’t go mad.
The same tune plays when a guest arrives at my home. Perplexed at who might be interrupting my half hour of comedy power, I went to the door to find a flustered man speaking loads of fast-paced Japanese to me. He was treated to my usual barrage of wakarimasen and gomen nasai, but undaunted by my ignorance, he pressed on.
Eventually, I heard the word toilet and started to suspect what this evening call might be addressing. Sarah approached behind me and offered her assistance with translation. Apparently, what this blustery fellow was rambling about was that my toilet tank was full.
Yes, the modern industrial nation that is Japan still relies in good part on septic systems. They have some of the finest technology in the world, but they haven’t quite figured out plumbing yet. And this from a culture obsessed with cleanliness. What may be worse, however, is that some areas have sewers, others don’t. So, you know they have the technology to efficiently dispose of human waste, but they simply have chosen not to use it or upgrade to it.
A given apartment’s waste tank needs to be emptied every once in a while. The poo truck must be summoned and employees with what might be the worst job the world jump to the task of transporting feces from your tank to their truck and off to a god forsaken facility where, hopefully, it’s dropped into a bottomless pit.
The pit at the bottom of my toilet, however, is not bottomless. And this distraught neighbour of mine was coming to inform me of this fact. You see, the poo truck has to have some kind of access to the tank - there must be some opening to the outside world where their hoses can reach the effluent. That hole just so happens to be directly outside the door of this neighbour residing below me. And when there is too much shit in the tank, guess where it goes…
Yeah, it bubbles over. It bubbles over even if there is a welcome mat on top of the lid. It bubbles over then flows down the front step into the parking lot. A stream of shit, right outside his door.
How was I to know? I couldn’t really. I didn’t know when it had last been emptied or how often it was required. And I rectified the situation as quickly as I could by calling for ye olde poo truck the following day.
Today, however, while I was at school, the neighbour called city hall and complained of the stains left behind on his front step. Rivulets of feces left their mark on the concrete as they made their downhill journey to the parking lot. He stated his messy case to city hall, and while I was unleashing my unending genki powers on the good children of Nakasato Elementary school, two of my co-workers went to his apartment and cleaned it. I wish they would have waited an hour for me to get back and I would have gone to do it myself, thus being spared the guilt of a totally uninvolved party having to scrub my excrement from my neighbour’s front step.
So that’s my poopy story for the day. It leaves me wondering what demented architect would think to place the lid for the tank directly outside another apartment’s door. Even a seven-year-old, if told to solve such a design problem, would not have made such a completely illogical choice (unless he was playing a malicious joke). There’s no good reason why the hatch couldn’t have been at least a few feet from the door and in the parking lot. Nope. Right under his doormat. Good thinking.
November 8th, 2004
I suppose I could be processing images right now, but I’m entitled to a lazy moment or two aren’t I? Instead, I’ve started up a game of chess and, for some reason, the computer seems to be taking an age to make each of its moves. Really, I’m not that good; it hardly needs that much effort to best me.
So, that affords me the opportunity to write a few lines in between turns (though, I suppose I could be studying the board - but like I said, I’m not that good). Again, I have lapsed in my journal scribbling duties and this will be yet another half-hearted attempt to repent. Though, in truth, I wish the computer would just hurry up.
Here’s a quick rundown of last weekend. On Friday, Kurt, Racheal, Sarah and I headed downtown to partake in some of the yumminess that is the Paper Moon Pizza Company. We chatted the evening away while celebrating Sarah’s birthday. I’ve had a lingering cold and on Friday, it was consistently keeping me coughing, so I decided against continuing the evening after pizza.
On Saturday, I woke up late and had trouble gaining any momentum. I was originally thinking of a more ambitious trip, but my slow pace suggested a relaxed day of shooting photos near the river. I wandered there and found some kids, an old man, some ducks and crows to snap then started ambling South. There was a great stretch near the river where dozens of small gardens nestled together to form a small community farm.
Once I crossed the river, I found a Russian Orthodox Church. I don’t have a clue what this thing is doing in Ichinoseki, but there it was. I then followed the sound of some loudspeakers and reached the previously unexplored (by me) Ichinoseki Sports Park. Yasakae Junior High was playing a baseball game, so I challenged myself to try a bit of sports photography.
A few of my students from Ichinoseki elementary were there and said hi. Then a few students from Hagishou arrived and said more than hi. They were rather chatty and we passed the Japanese phrasebook between us a number of times to facilitate out communication. Their school played in the next baseball game, so we watched that for a while, then they invited me to go play soft tennis with them.
The three girls and lead me to a couple guys from the school who were to be their tennis partners. We gathered under the lights and started smacking that bizarre little ball around. Why they don’t just play normal tennis is a mystery to me, but this was plenty fun once I got used to the ball. After a bit of warming up, I was even able to blast one colossal serve into the opposing court much to the delight of my students who quickly dubbed me “The Rocket.”
On Sunday, I went up to Hiraizumi to catch the temples in their fall colour glory. The day would have been great if it weren’t for the people. I just don’t get it - everyone took an inconsiderate pill and the active ingredient was highly effective. I don’t feel like getting into the methods used by everyone to treat me like crap, but suffice it to say, jerks the whole lot of ‘em.
Sarah and Hannah happened to be on the same train back, so they invited themselves over to my place to watch BBC world. Sarah also cooked dinner for us, so I think I actually came out on top in the deal.
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