Wednesday August 9, 2006

10:30pm

I am in Japan, I am in Miyagi Prefecture (state), I am in Ishinomaki shi (city), I am in Monou –cho (town), I am in my house. My house, but not yet my home. I have so many emotions going through me right now. Everything is so foreign, yet I am the Geijan (foreigner).

I am living a new lifestyle, one that I have not experienced before. Not only is everything here completely different but I do not have the luxuries that I have in the past. I need to make my money stretch until I receive my first pay check. I spent probably less than $100 in Tokyo, but it turns out I got a new house. I was supposed to live in my predecessor’s house but they told me that it was condemned. At first they told me it was because the door did not close. Then, later, they informed me that it had a bug and mouse problem. So, here I am in a completely new house. It’s directly behind my preds house. New house, great? Yes, I guess at least I’m not living amongst creatures. But, now I have to purchase a lot of things that I was not planning on doing. For example, I didn’t bring a hair dryer or any towels simply because those are things that my pred has. Now, I have no towel to get out of the shower with tomorrow and nothing to do my hair and look professional. They are letting me go into his house tomorrow and take what I need. Back to making money stretch. They took me grocery shopping today and I only bought very few things. Not even enough for 4 meals and it cost me equivalent of $20.00.

Let me get a bit more positive here. I have my own house! The outside looks pretty dumpy – but don’t let it fool you. The inside is beautiful. I have a bedroom, a study which could be a bedroom but I am making it into a study instead. Also it comes with a living room, a bathroom, and a kitchen. I have never lived in something this size by myself. Two of the rooms have tatami mats. I almost prefer them over rugs. My other floors are hard wood or tile. Thankful for me, I am short. My ceilings are probably only 7 feet. However, the doorways I’m pretty sure aren’t even 6” tall. I’m sure Jon will be hitting his head on my lamps that hang down from my ceiling. I have a back porch sort of. My windows have this paper where a western house would have a glass window. Then, when I slide them open,which can only be done one half at a time, the left sides have screens and then the right sides have glass. My living room and kitchen have screens where I can open the doors to do it. I don’t feel completely comfortable leaving the living room one open because it does not lock when you have the doors open so the screen lets in a breeze. It's really convenient though because during they day I do not use any electricity because it is so well lit from the sun. I was supposed to have air conditioning with my predecessors house, but this one does not have it. It also looks like it will be quite a long time until I can get a cellular phone or internet connection. Ok, back to my house. Showering. I have this weird tub thing. It’s like a box that is 3 feet off the ground. Then, there is a shower head. But nothing that holds it up or a shower curtain. Additionally, it just drains onto my floor and then that drains out of the floor somehow. To turn it on to get hot water is kind of confusing. Hopefully, I do it right. It is really weird, I think it is heated by kerosene. Next, everyday items. My microwave is in all Japanese characters. How do I use it? In addition to this, my washing machine is the same way. Even more confusing than pushing buttons is the garbage. I am required to sort my garbage. My supervisor, who speaks no English, gave me a poster that explains what garbage goes into what color bags and which days of the week it is collected. The problem is…the poster is all in Japanese. I have no clue what the hell goes in what bags. So, there are my everyday problems. The Kyoto-Sensei (Vice Principal) lives in the house next door to me. She, also speaks no English.

My JTE (Japanese teacher of English) that I will work with in Junior High School helped me grocery shop. She spent a few months living in the USA when she studied at University. For the most part, she has great English. She does all the translating for the other people and I that I have to meet. It’s hard meeting people here. I say like two words in Japanese and they rattle off all these questions and I just stare idiotically (is that a word?) at them. She has twins – a girl and boy – age 5. I went into their nursery school to pick them up. They all ran up to me and hugged me and asked me to come back tomorrow. The kids were adorable, I’m so happy I will be working with younger kids.

I have explained the vegetarian situation to everyone that has been taking care of me since I came in. They seem to understand quite well. It is a shame that I cannot eat the school lunches because it converts out about to $3.00 a lunch which is what I was paying in Plattsburgh for my lean cuisines. Oh well, at least I have more control over what is going into my body and remaining healthy. They claim a lot of people gain weight in Japan because there are so many carbs involved in the diet and a lot of things are fried. All the healthy food is incredibly expensive. Thankful for me being a vegetarian, my body is already very used to the a lot of carbs.

Now, keeping healthy. I took my bike out for a ride this morning. I wanted to see exactly what Monou has to offer. My bike is probably from 1980. It has a basket on the front of it which really creates some balance problem. I really foresee myself filling my basket up with groceries or something and falling over. I can't drive my car for the next month because of alien registration reasons. People in my office will be driving me to schools for the next month. That is perfectly fine with me. I'd prefer it for the next year if it meant I did not need to spend my money on gas or other car expenses. I'm going to try to ride my hideous bike everywhere.

Back to that bike ride. I hopped onto my bike and went for a ride around town. I decided it was a pretty safe time to go since most people will be at whatever the heck they do for employment around here. This way I won't be stared at as much. The roads are incredibly narrow. I went to a driving in Japan workshop at my orientation and they warned us about it. They said to be aware because there are no shoulders (and there aren't) and in place of a shoulder is a deep pit (which there is) and then you fall into the rice paddies (which you would). This the Japanese call a Geijin trap (see above for translation). I can see why. It only makes me more nervous to drive, but at the same time it's scary riding your bike in the street. Thankfully the speed limit is incredibly slow. I found my Junior High School and basically that was it. I must be in a residential area of the town. Saijo-san, my supervisor is going to take me around today to show me the elementary schools. This should be interesting because he doesn't speak English. He is an incredibly nice man though. It makes the silence less awkward since there are no expectations since neither of us knows each other's language. I met the music teacher-Yasco – who is apparently the best English speaker in my Junior high school. She invited me over to her house next week and I accepted. It is nice that i will have companionship. Last night (my first night here) was kind of hard for me. Today, I feel a little bit less anxious. But I don't feel completely comfortable. I have to remember this is how I felt my first time at Plattsburgh and also in Australia. I adapt well – it just takes time. I know 4 people out of 8,500. I'm getting there. Haha. I saw my across the street neighbor, he looks relatively young, maybe under 30. Once my Japanese gets better I can go introduce myself. The guy that installed my utilities was also younger - he knew a few words in English, but I can see making friends with Japanese people is going to be impossible until I actually learn their language.

In the distance of my house I am surrounded by smaller mountains. They are probably smaller than Poke-o-Moonshine (for those around Plattsburgh) but they are pretty to look at none the less. I am trying to find people interested in hiking (haiku) for my free time. Last night, beginning at around 10:00pm, there was this PA announcement that was going off like every 15 minutes. It was really bazaar. I have no idea what they were saying or why a PA announcement goes off late at night in a town. It's kind of creepy to listen to. I wonder if this town has a curfew or something! I doubt it, that would be nazi-like in my opinion.