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I’m always saying how random and strange life in Japan is for me, and I think today was the perfect example of this. Bear with me, as I walk through my day…

Woke up, had breakfast here at the dorm. Breakfast was a potato and green bean stew, followed by toast with chocolate sauce on it. Then I got ready to head out to school. Today, instead of class, my Jissen Nihongo (Japanese) class went on a field trip of sorts. And that trip was to the Chiba Clean Energy factory, a type of trash and recycle dump. It took a train, a bus, and a 15 minute talk in the rain to get there. Once there, a tour was led by an animated character in blue named Noa. Yes, there was a video to introduce us to the place, and in various spots in the factory you press a button and watch another video or hologram with Noa. Oh what fun, just like if I were in 1st grade in the year 2040.

On the way back from the garbage center, I stopped by Tsutaya to drop off the DVDs I rented last night (the making of the Masked Rider Blade movie, and a Kishidan DVD). I also stopped by Vive de France, a bakery, and had lunch. Lunch today was a cold hotdog with cheese and mayonnaise on it (didn’t know about the mayo til it was too late), and a calzone. Not great, not bad.

After that fun, had my one other class, which was Anime. I found out that Professor Aoyagi is apparently more famous than he leads on, and there was some point in the 90’s when he was a sort of “expert” on Japanese idols (the young girls who are everywhere, usually wearing almost nothing). As an expert on the subject, doing “research” on these young girls (sounds like Jiraiya), he was featured on TV shows and in magazines. He showed us slides as proof. Pretty interesting. Also during class I was filling out postcard contest entries so I can win a Suica Penguin pillow. More on that in a future entry.

After that, went to MotoYawata to pick up my alien registration card. I now have an official Japanese form of ID! Nice! After that, on my way to the station, ate a tai-yaki (a fish shaped waffle filled with red beans). The old lady who worked the stand kicked her husband, who was apparently sleeping on the ground, when she had to move to get to the taiyaki. Yeah kind of weird, some old man laying on the ground inside their stand.

After that, had coffee with Super Sayokon near Funabashi station. That place is a lot bigger than I expected, although I’m pretty sure I’d been to that station a few times when I first came to Japan in high school. They also have a koban (police box) that looked like a giant white pill bottle.

Now I’m home, it’s really cold outside, and apparently we are looking at another typhoon coming tonight. Man I hope it comes and cancels the train lines tomorrow, cause I really don’t want to go teach at Takanawadai High school. And I now realize that today wasn’t as weird as it seemed as I was going through it. Ah well, I’m going to post it anyway.

I don’t know, it’s been coming to me more and more lately. I’m starting to really kind of beleive that there is a finite number of “people types.” Hard to explain maybe, but I’ve met too many people before that seem to be much the same as someone else I’ve met. Maybe in general, (at least to me), people call into certain categories. Definitley a little more varied than “nerd,” “jock,” “creepy guy” like you might see in stereotypical teenage movies, but kind of like that. It’s kind of weird, maybe it’s just in my head. Too bad I don’t have an extra 30 years in my life I can waste on getting a PhD in psychology and writing a book on it. Ooooh, maybe someone already has. I’ll check Google.

On Tuesday night after dinner, I turned on the TV and started watching a drama-esque program. I didn’t know what I was getting into. And that was a 2.5 hour long “Fall Drama Special” about a guy who makes Ramen. That’s right, ramen. But not the instant just-add-hot-water kind of ramen, the actual restaurant ramen that I love here in Japan.

In summary, it was a horribly cheezy drama in the way that only Japanese TV can do it. Notable celebrity appearances were by the K1 guy (big bald guy with a mustache, don’t remember his name) and the Chairman from Iron Chef. Both played ramen shop owners. There was also a guy who I think is a comedian, but he was dressed like Solid Snake and gave weird kanji phrases to “describe the taste of” the ramen.

Weird Japanese TV…

Well, today (Monday) was ANOTHER Japanese national holiday. Sports Day or something like that. I’m pretty certain that Japanese government officials have no shame in making up random holidays. I’m happy about it though.

It’s always nice to spend an entire day doing absolutely nothing. I slept until the afternoon, watched TV, left to get some dinner, came back and loafed around some more. It’s about midnight now….I’ll spend *maybe* an hour doing some homework, then off to bed.

I’m going to try to figure out my IU schedule for the spring this week before I register. Anyone taking marketing classes in the spring? Or G202 and/or Z302? Let me know; we could take a class together…

(no reason why this is here, I just like it)

I was supposed to be at Takanawadai High School, where I work, at 9AM this morning to help with the school festival’s English speech contest. I woke up at 7, miraculously, since my alarm was set to “weekdays” (I always forget that). I made it out the door, although running a little bit late. It takes about 45 minutes to get out to where the school is at. I transfer about 3/4 of the way at Nihombashi to get on a different train line for the last leg of the trip. I decided to call my supervisor at the school, to let them know I’d be about 15 minutes late.

How kind of them to let me know ahead of time that the festival was CANCELLED because of the typhoon expected to come. Great, I wake up early on a Saturday, tired as hell, make my way 30 minutes towards Tokyo, only to find out that it was for ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. “Oh, I didn’t have your phone number, so couldn’t call you earlier.” Granted, it was cancelled at 6AM, but if I would have known, then I would have slept until about 1PM. And I KNOW I gave her my number before.

It was just raining, so I went to Akihabara via Daimon station. Had a McDonald’s Egg McMuffin for breakfast. It tasted really good. Haven’t had one of those since I lived in Forest last spring, I believe. Anyways, wasted some time, came home, and bummed around all day. The typhoon-ish weather was nuts: lots of wind and rain. I don’t think we ever actually got THE typhoon. Just a bad storm.

I called Renee (my supervisor) tonight at 8 to see if she knew whether or not I’d have to go in tomorrow. She doesn’t know yet. If they don’t let me know by 7AM, I’m not going in. Hopefully it’s cancelled, I don’t want to go in early tomorrow. Either way, I have to be at the Edo Tokyo Museum by 1PM for a class “field trip.”

This goofy looking guy’s name is George Williams:

He is on Japanese TV, and if you ever get a chance to see him, you will agree that he is the most annoying person on television ever. He’s not even American (after about 2 minutes of research, I found out he is half British and half Japanese), but he MUST be giving Americans a horrible horrible name in this country.

I’m going to make this as short as possible, but it is bound to be long, as it is a rant. This guy has pink hair, but apparently last week it was green. He overpronounces everything (which might not be totally bad, as he is on a show to teach people English), but the main problem is the way he moves and his facial expressions. It looks like with every word, he is forcing a pumpkin out of his crotch. His Japanese is actually good (probably he was raised here), but he pulls off the “douchebag foreigner” image 100%. He is going bald, dyes his hair a new color every week I suppose, and dresses like an old man on vacation, ie flowered shirts, khaki shorts, random accessories, etc.

I am embarrassed to watch this guy on TV, same as the other 2 or 3 “main” Americans on TV shows here. Another is a guy named Patrick. Not as bad, but still annoying as hell. Anyway, just needed to vent about this George Williams guy. His show is only 15 minutes, thank goodness, but he is annoying enough to irritate you for the entire next day. Ari and Mike agree with me on this. If I ever see this guy walking around the street, I will seriously consider kicking him in the groin and laughing. End of rant.