Building connections

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I actually haven't been home for 2 days now since I went out to find TGIFridays at Yokosuka-chuo station area (literally a 1 minute train ride from the station near my house). After eating there, I hung around the station striking poses and writing emails in my keitai (cellphone).

The Japanese have a thing for cellphones. No, you don't understand, they REALLY HAVE A THING FOR CELLPHONES. EVERYBODY has one. I'm talking elementary school kids, middle aged women, grandpas, dogs, crows, and cockroaches... Okay, so I exaggerated a bit. I kinda doubt grandpas would have a need for them. Anyways, all keitais come standard equipped with emailing capability. Each one has it's own email address that the user can change (I think at will.?). Any emails received to this address essentially makes it tell us in a similar way our cellphones would tell us we have an SMS message incoming. You can set it to vibrate, or play some stupid backstreet boys song, or whatever. Same deal. But with these, you're actually checking your email when you see what whoever had to say to you. Full suite guys, you can make folders to store your messages all sorted like, and even have messages from certain senders automatically put into specific folders, block certain addresses, etc..

So, that said, you constantly see people leaning over their keitai punching away at keys, whether it's emailing, playing games (yes these things are like small computers!), surfing the net, or using the GPS. Sitting on the train (if you can get a seat!) you are guaranteed to see at least a half dozen people punching away at the keys. I've discovered that the battery on my rental keitai sucks monkey balls (that's another phrase that some of my Japanese friends have learned from me- yay!), so I kinda wanna get a new one, or something. *ponders* If I'm doing some heavy network usage like lots of emailing, or surfing, the battery lasts like ... 2 hours. >_<;

Once I got caught up with my emails and the like, I took the train into Yokohama-- so far, it seems that I'll be spending a lot of time there, so I've mentioned to Yamada-san (he now wants me to call him "Toshi" which is short for his full name "Toshinori") that since he'd previously offered for me to perhaps stay at his parents place, I am now more interested in his proposal. He told me that I can have a small room in his parents' place (which is also technically his place), or if I wanted more privacy/space, I could make his motorhome into my house, which is parked on the driveway. The motorhome would be _GREAT_ for having parties and such *grin* And he's all for parties, so I might take him up on that. I'll have to think about it a bit more. Once in Yokohama, I finally got in phone contact with one of my Japanese friends, who happened to be about halfway across Japan in my direction and was wondering if I could make it out to see her. Unfortunately, I had plans with Toshi to head out for dinner/light nightlife later that day, and by the time I could meet her, I'd likely have to turn around and head back to meet Toshi, so I had to decline. But we made pseudo-plans to meet another time-- afterall, I _AM_ here for 2 months ne! So I had a couple of hours to kill before Toshi was off work, and since I was at Yokohama station, there was plenty of things to see! A thing to note is that stations, especially major ones, tend to be HUGE centers of commercialism. Yokohama station is like the coolest thing ever! There's an underground shopping complex that surrounds the station, and even extends out underneath all the streets around the station. It actually goes out underneath most of the neighboring buildings (also part of the commercial area) and has escalators and such that connect to those building to make everything 1 big unit. 1 particular building to take note of, was the Yodobashi Camera building. It was pretty neat- about ... 8? floors tall, like most commercial buildings, and full of various forms of electronics and such. Every floor is a different type. While I was out shopping around, I noticed that my keitai battery was dying, and so I found out that I can actually take it out to an official AU store (my keitai is AU brand), and they will charge it for free (wee!) So I have to put my keitai into this little drawer, where there's a charger plug, close the drawer, and set a password on the numberpad above it. I come back in roughly 1 hour (or so the guy said) and put in my password again to unlock the drawer and receive my keitai. Nice. *mental note* Whilst I was shopping around, all I really bought tho, was some CDs. But you ain't seen nothing till you see the 1 CD I bought. 1 of the CDs I got from the shelf was a "sample" disc. The idea is that you bring this empty case to the counter and they grab a real disc from the back to give you. When I brought this sample disc to the front, the guy asked if the "big size" was okay, so I said yes. The CD case he brought me was the size of a record! But it's a CD @_@ It was cool! ^_^ I'll take a picture of it when I get it again, since I left it in Toshi's car the other night.

So, Toshi and I got together, and we were planning on hitting up TGIFriday's (yes, again- but I wanted to try some other stuff I haven't tried yet on the menu.. some of the slighly Japanized items...). What's nice is that TGIFriday's is an "English friendly" restaurant in that all the staff speaks english at a very respectable level. Of course, I still responded in Japanese whenever possible hehe. So anyways, we _WERE_ gonna go there, but the lineup went right outside, so we decided against that as we were hungry that day, not next week. SO! We went up into one of the 3 mile high buildings surround the Yokohama station, typically, I guess, the top 2 floors or so are restaurants. We went up and found ourselves a buffet style place. I'd say that out of all the places I've eaten here so far, that was the worst, but really it wasn't too bad. The deserts were really interesting/good. I had 1 in particular.. it looked like maybe a pumpkin pudding or some such? (think pumpkin pie filling with a dab of whipped cream on top, in a little bowl), and when I first tried it, it was really weird @_@ But after eating about half of it, I'd decided that it was actually VERY good! I quite enjoyed the deserts there, but the food itself was kinda meh. 1 thing I noticed, at least, at that particular restaurant, was that Japanese people put weird shit on their pizzas. I mean _WEIRD SHIT_. In the buffet section there was a couple of small pizzas that we could take some slices of, and one of them har CORN on it! WTF?

Anyways, after we were done there, Toshi took me for a drive around to see stuff. Tonite was the night for us to go see Roppongi, the district that's famous for being -really- busy with not only Japanese, but gaijin (foreigners) at night. You can -almost- think of it like the red light district, except there's also some respectable night clubs mixed in with the stripjoints and meat markets. We went and parked in one of those automated parking facilities that we don't have in Edmonton (Canada?)- it's very cool. You pull up onto this pad, and get out of your car, walk inside and get your ticket. Your car is sitting on conveyor belts (1 under your front tires, the other under your back tires), which move your car sideways thru a doorway that opens. Inside that doorway is an elevator deal that lifts up your car and basically slides it into a cubbyhole wherever there's an opening, likely multiple stories up. It's very cool, and I've heard of 1 in Tokyo with glass walls, so if I see it, I'll take a picture of it. Anyways, the building parked our car for us, so we went out for a walk in Roppongi- we were both sorta tired so we didn't wanna stay long, but we walked the main streets of Roppongi, just to see the sights/people/etc... And we got to one end where we were considering having a beer before returning, but ended up deciding against it and just make the walk back to the car. I definately wanna go back at an earlier time when everybody's not already drunk. The 1 thing that really got on my nerves about Roppongi tho, was that all the "adult" places such as stripjoints, had black guys working the front to "advertise"- and they were fscking loud and annoying! Speaking Japanese with a HORRIBLE accent, and always in your face as you walk by. I tell you, if it was legal to kill stupid people... >_<; After we finally got back to the car, Toshi and I headed out to where his Yacht was moored to crash for the night. Since Toshi was really worried about his brakes in his car, he didn't wanna drive too much, and his Yacht was moored nearby, so we went out there. Technically, his Yacht is actually smaller than his powerboat (which was QUITE big!). The Yacht has enough room for 2 people to comfortably have a small party/sleep. 3 or 4 people could sleep there, but you'd better be couples *grin* His powerboat has room for likely 10 or more people to have a comfortable party, and could easily sleep 4 or 5, unless you're all very friendly with each other ;p

After crashing there, we got up in the morning and went inside to the Yacht owners club, bought some soap and had showers. We went out and dropped off his car to get the brakes fixed, and went to a restaurant nearby for a bite to eat. It was better than the buffer from the night before (probably because it wasn't technically a buffet!), and you could get an extra large serving of rice for free if you so desired^^ Nothing fancy except that one of the drinks they have there I'd heard of before but never had the chance to try. It's called "Fanta"- a carbonated melon flavored drink. @_@ Weird, but actually quite good. I'm just not a huge fan of carbonation, unfortunately... After we finished, Toshi went off to get his car, and I ran across the street to Toys R Us. They have those here! w00t! So I had to take a picture of the weird Japanese sign, hehe. I'll have to go back and take some pictures inside- - they have a whole section devoted to these Samurai armor display things that sell for like $600 ^_^ Toshi had previously gone online and looked up the girls who were fueling up their boats when we had arrived to fuel up his powerboat. They were instructors at a new boat license school that was opening today, so we headed out to the opening day events. Business opening parties are apparently a big thing here- we got free alcohol and free food- and 1 of the girls was giving some of the guests rides around in one of their boats. All we had to do was talk to the president of the company for a few minutes, and he gave us our food/drink tickets^^ Shortly after arriving at the building tho, one of the girls greeted us and gave me some complimentary wine-- Toshi talked her up a bit, and found out that she speaks english as well, so her and I started talking a lot smoother. It turns out that she studied english in Vancouver for like 2 years! And she has an incredibly cute English-speaking voice. *keeps* Anyways, she said that she doesn't really have much chance to keep up her English practice in Japan at all (she had left Van about 4 years ago now...), so I offered to get together with her on occassion so she can practice a bit whilst we go have dinner/coffee/etc.. She told me her hours and such and said I could show up anytime. Toshi, as it turns out, actually liked the other instructor more (beats me, but I get the cute one!) so he managed to get himself introduced to her. Of course, since the 2 of them were technically working that day, we couldn't monopolize their time, so we went downstairs to the restaurant for free alcohol/foods. Yay! More stuff to do here! We'll be back, for sure. If for nothing else, for me to do language exchange with Kikumoto-san, the girl who speaks english amazingly well. Sometime tho, I'll have to figure out how to get there on my own accord instead of relying on poor Toshi to take me around. I think I'm doing pretty good so far tho^^

When we finished eating all their food, we decided to head out to another company opening party Toshi was aware of. He knows an entrepeneur who owns some "English cafes". The basic idea is that gaijin (foreigners, again) get to stay there as long as they want "working" for a special price. The premise being that they make the atmosphere more natively English. All the Japanese who go there pay normal price, but because of the nature of the cafe, are given the opportunity to practice their English with real english-speaking natives. Since it was opening night, god knows how the rules are different, but basically what it was was that when we got there, Toshi had to pay 2000 yen (about 20 dollars) to get in, but I got in for free, AND got free alcohol! (being gaijin is great!) Once in, there were many people just basically sitting around and drinking/talking. A cafe, really, but most of the people there didn't know each other beforehand. While there, I met a couple of guys who are going to school in Yokohama (where this cafe was), so we exchanged phone numbers so we can hook up together to head out to the nightclubs and such if we so desire. Which is good, I was finding myself very short of male friends here *nodnod* Once I got my ass inside to talk to some aspiring Japanese, I found myself eventually in a group of 3 Japanese who all work for the same company- I guess they came together. If I recall correctly, it was Toshiba. 1 guy, who speaks amazing english (for a Japanese person) was an editor for the manuals- I think he was in charge of translation. I'll take a shot in the dark and say he's 40-45. Another lady there was probably about the same age range, and was also an editor, although I'm not sure in what department. The 3rd was an assistant secretary, and was probably about 21 or so. She was SOOO cute, in that she was trying -so- hard to speak english well with me, since (as I found out later) she kinda likes me. Also, she's the first young Japanese girl I've really gotten to sit and talk with since I arrived, and the young girls here do this thing when they understand something (and at some other times) that sounds really weird to foreigner ears, but I think it's really cute... at least, when done right. Heh. You can think of it sorta like somebody saying "hmmmm", but saying it for a very long time (like 2 or 3 seconds), and it getting more and more high-pitched. Kinda. maybe I'll see if I can get a recording of it sometime. It's cute anyways^^

The HUGE bummer on the nightlife here is that the trains (which are pretty much THE ONLY way to get around here) all stop running at 11:something. I think the very last train on most lines runs at 12:30 or thereabouts. That kinda kills staying out late, UNLESS you're planning on staying out until the trains start again in the morning, like 5AM. So nightlife here is either REALLY shortlived, or INCREDIBLY late. Unless you have a car. I'm SO used to being able to go home at like 1 or 2AM that this kinda sucks for me, so I'll have to adapt somehow. What I'm thinking is that on Fridays/Saturdays, I'll sleep until like 4 or 5 in the afternoon, then stay out drinking/partying until early in the morning when the trains start running again ;p Of course, there ARE alternatives to staying up all night- there's a couple different ways you can essentially "get a room" for a night. 1 being a "love hotel"- a hotel that rents by the hour (or night- but most ppl don't do that), typically for people to go to to have sex, but hey- who's judging? ^_^ Another being an internet cafe, where it's perfectly acceptable (and normal) for people to pay the 10 bucks or so for using the net all night, then curl up in front of the computer and sleep until morning. The 3rd one, Toshi told me about, and said that most people don't do it for a couple different reasons, but he said you can go to a "karaoke box" (karaoke here is done differently in that you get a seperate room for you and your friends instead of singing in front of the whole bar), and sleep in that room until they kick you out in the morning. If you can stand the noise, that is- they're only MOSTLY soundproof hehe. He said he uses that for situations where he MUST make a meeting in the morning, so it's kinda like a guaranteed alarm clock at 5am^^

Anyways, once the party of 3 were leaving because of the trains starting to wind down, I decided to take off as well. I could've stayed another 1/2hr or so if I wanted to, but since I'm still not 100%!u(MISSING)p to speed on the trains here yet, I wanted to give myself time to fsck up and get lost for a few minutes on the way home. Which I only -sorta- did. I got off at the wrong station, but I just got onto the next train. On the way home from the station, I stopped off at a "family mart", which is like a macs or 7-11, and picked up a couple foodstuff supplies for the house so I don't starve if I don't leave 1 day. Some cup-o-noodles, gatorade equivalent called "pokkari sweat", and some orange juice. Also some pocky (6" biscuits with chocolate coating- yummy!), and an "onigiri". Onigiri is a traditional Japanese food-- basically it's a ball of rice with some seaweed around the outside to hold it together a bit better. Inside the rice is some filling- typically tuna, but there's all sorts of things like crab, eel, etc... I got a random onigiri, which happened to be tuna. This was my first time buying something at a store where they didn't give me a digital display of the price, so I actually had to listen to what the guy said for the price. I was quite surprised that I understood well enough without holding up the line, since numbers tend to be one of the worst areas of learning Japanese for any student.

It's morning now, and I ate my onigiri. I think I'll look up some other english friendly restaurants and head to one for lunch today. Since I'm not comfortable with the trains (ish) to get to Yokohama, I have a lot more options than staying in Yokosuka, even tho it's pretty busy at Yokosuka-chuo station anyways. Yokohama is WAY better dernit! I'll eventually upgrade myself to doing Tokyo as well, but I have yet to have the need to go, so we'll see. I have some friends out there, so maybe I'll meet some at the Tokyo station. *ponders*

w00! I spent most of my day today actually getting ahold of the remainder of my Japanese friends/acquaintances to let them know that I'm actually IN Japan now- so now I'm pretty sure I've officially covered all of that. Holy crap I didn't realize that I knew so many Japanese people! I've also had 2 of my friends say that they have other female friends that they want to bring along with them when we meet because apparently they also like gaijin* and/or are interested in meeting guys- and have requested pictures, responding with messages that can only be translated as girly gibberish peppered with little heart, and sparkle icons. I guess I can take that as a "I think you're cute" or some such. *shrug* Oh, and so you're all aware, virtually everything I'm doing out here is entirely in Japanese, so it's some good practice. The only exceptions are the few people I can speak with in English (toshi, and that girl from the boating school, and anybody I meet at the english cafe on the occassion I go), and my keitai*'s menus are in English (I spend enough time translating the japanese messages I get, let alone the menus too!).

*note: I'm gonna stop putting in translations for some of the most common words after a couple times. There will be a test. *evil grin*

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Photos

You want garnishings? We've got 'em!
Japanese are crazy about garnishings, it seems.
Recipe: Garnish lightly
Japanese cook: Okay, throw the whole garden on a stick and put it on the side!

Only the real computer geeks will get this
To the computer geeks:
To the uninitiated: Unix is a computer operating system that is always argued as better than Micro$oft's windows. NOT a beauty parlor. Well, maybe somebody should tell the Japanese that.

More computer geek only goodness
Just another shot of the same store, pretty much directly under the last one.

Cool lego!
Nobody's lego collection is complete without an official Neon Genesis Evangelion Anime Mecha Robot kit. Only just short of $100 too, if I recall correctly. Pretty good deal, for saving mankind and all. *ponders*

Tokyo tower from downtown(ish) Tokyo
Toshi was driving me back from Roppongi when he said we could see the Tokyo tower to the left, so I took this shot between the buildings. Not that great, but I'll be going to the top of the tower with my friend Kyonkyon (wow does that look stupid when not written in Japanese... here it is in Japanese:きょんきょん) sometime soon, so I'll have to take some shots from up there^^

Tokyo tower (day version)
Another shot of Tokyo tower while Toshi is driving me somewhere. Don't remember where we were going here, but he delibrately slowed down when between trucks so I could take this shot- thanks Toshi!

Japan has a Toys 'R' Us?! COOL!
This is the Toys R Us's official Japanese version of their sign. Just to the left, off-camera, is the english one as well, which is boring><
Really, the only thing I noticed that was different (other than maybe the barbies section that I didn't visit) was right in the entrance- a whole slew of Samurai armor stand things selling for about $600 a pop. They're all about the size of a small 15" TV or so, but look really fscking cool!

NEVER tell me that a road in Canada is confusing!
This is a pretty common sign on the highways in Japan, and probably in the mid-range for complexity. You can't really see it that well since the sign's LEDs run on a different frequency than the keitai's camera, but a large portion of the left side of the sign was colored red. That represents the traffic congestion in that area. Yes, there's sensors on the highways for that. Another cool sign they have is based on the traffic congestion sensors as well, and it reads out common destinations from the current Highway, and how long, in minutes, you should expect it to take to get there based on the current conjestion, if you were to stay on the highway. Japan is -really- automated!

A boring shot of me
One of my friends requested a picture of me so she could show her friend who wanted to see me. I tried sending her one from my computer, but her keitai couldn't view it for some reason, so I took this one from my keitai and sent it to her (which pretty much guarantees she can see it)

Comments

[The Clone]

Yp‰WDiž
Yes, splendid story, Jed! I love the Unix store pictures... I believe I saw the same ones on some random geek site a while ago and laughed. =) The traffic signs also sound pretty fcking cool... you gotta show me the functionality of that keitai and the features once you return to Edmonton! Have a great time with Toshi and of course; Kikumoto-san *grin* and keep in touch!