Lucky Discoveries

I'm still really sick, surprisingly, but I'm getting bored. I can't stop coughing, but I REALLY don't want to be in my apartment anymore. I'm in Tokyo!!! How can I spend the whole time in bed?!! (Even if it is a futon and not a bed and the futon is in Tokyo, which is really cool) So I drugged myself up and forced myself to go out.

I didn't do much at first, just walked around the area around my apartment, you know, getting to know the place. And to my great surprise, right around the corner, litteraly, is a cute little temple! It's actually not that little. It's kinda large.

Here's the entrance. Behind me is a super market and convenience store. Haha. Crazy juxtaposition.
Then you walk in and are greeted by this lovely thingy:

Along with this thingy:

And then this thingy, which seems to be the main part of the temple because people kept going up the steps in the back and praying and lighting incense and candles at the thing in front and praying.

Then there's a giant bell thingy:

And a large, ermmm, probably about 8ft tall statue thingy:

And right before you leave, this place that looks like a cemetery of sorts:

So I keep saying "thingy" because I have no idea what these things are or their significance. So I walked up to the guy who was selling charms off to the side next to the main shrine thing and asked where the hell I was. He looked at me funny and said, "tera desu," which means "It's a temple [stupid]." I added that last part. Anyways, I then explained that I was from America and had just moved to the area and I was tankenshiyo-ing, or exploring. (haha. yay Japanglish!) Then he gave me less of an "ahou-ka?-look" (that means an "are-you-an-idiot?-look") and started explaining things in really easy Japanese and I had absolutely no problem understanding him! I understood EVERY WORD he said!! That usually doesn't happen to me. Usually I just understand most of it or enough of what they say to get the general meaning of the sentence, but this time I fully understood everything he said!! Yay for small victories!!^^

But what's really weird about this whole thing is that it turned out to be a temple that people go to when they or their loved ones are sick. Crazy guuzen going on here. (guuzen = coincidence) So I bought this:

It's a little charm that's supposed to make me feel better and guess what?!!! After a while, I realized that all the sudden I DID feel better. How weird is that? I'm not going saying anything about my beliefs, but isn't it a little strange that I've been sick for almost two weeks now and all the sudden at feel-better-temple falls in my lap and the charm I buy makes me stop coughing? May the guuzens continue.

So instead of going back home, I keep tankenshiyo-ing. So I went out the opposite entrance to the temple that I had come in and crossed this cute little road right there where the little white lines are and found this great park!

Isn't it cute?!! It's really big too. It even continues across the street. The great thing about Nakano is that besides the park, the whole place is filled with trees! Here's the view of the street from a crossing bridge:

The whole place looks like this! Anyways, continuing on with my little tanken, this is the park on the other side of the street:

There's this little green pond with a ton of old guys fishing in it! Cute!

And I'm not kidding about there being trees everywhere. Look at this road. It's just a random road in my neighborhood not at all associated with the uber green park I just showed you:

It's really a nice place to live. Very residential. If I were to chose a place to live in Tokyo, this would be it, and I know I DID chose Nakano to live in, but I really just chose the cheapest apartment I could find and it just happened to be in Nakano. Another guuzen, a happy guuzen. ^^

But there is one area of Nakano, it's a really large area of Nakano, that is really close to my apartment that is filled with stores. It's like the shopping district of Nakano I guess and it starts at Nakano station and goes north.

Looks like this at a VERY unusually uncrowded time. I don't know why there aren't more people there; it's usually pretty filled with people.

It's called Ai rodo, or Love Road. Also cute, deshou?

Here's a little shop I found. The charm was really working, so I just kept shopping. Those look like flip flops, but they are really hard candy!! Crazy!! Needless to say I had to enter.

And enter I did and found these guys:

They were making the candy right in front of me! It was so cool!! This one looked like tiny lemon slices. While I was watching them, this nice lady gave me a sample of a strawberry one.

Also cute!!! I live in the cutest place ever!! I might go back and buy some stuff right before I leave as omiyage...

Then right across from that candy store, which is called papabubble by the way, is this weird little shrine looking thing. They're really big fans of juxtaposition, these Nakano people.

Here's another shot of Ai Road so you all can become very intimate with it. Or because I was having fun taking pictures every 5 seconds.

So this charm was really working wonders or I was just feeling a lot better from being outside or whatever, and decided to go to Harajuku to buy my sister these glasses that she wanted and go to Shibuya to shop at Loft to get my mom these pen/pencil combo thingys that she wanted. So I'm at Nakano station buying my ticket when I see these guys at the corner.

Sorry the angle's bad and the sound isn't great and you can only see the one guy, but tough. Also I'm not really holding the camera all that steadily but I wasn't watching the camera, I was watching them. haha. Also, I'm kicking myself for not filming the song they did earlier because I kinda liked it better. It was more upbeat and they were both playing the guitar. I don't know why the guy in front put his down for this song. Anyways, right before they sang this one, they were explaining that they have a live soon in Harajuku, but it was too fast for me. So, and I'm super proud of myself for this one, after this song, it was their last one, I went up to the guy in the front and told him that I don't really understand Japanese that well, so I missed the time and place of their gig and would he please write it down for me.

He was so happy!! He was super cute and just elated that I would want him to do that. It was so funny. So he wrote down the place and time, they are playing at アストロホール (Astro Hall) in Harajuku at around 6:00pm on June 20th. I also asked their name and he got really happy again. They are called 遊吟（ゆうぎん）"yuugin" and which I think means something like a troubadour or wandering musician or something of the sort. haha. I asked him if he had a CD, and then he got really excited and spoke Japanese really quickly but I think he said that he didn't have one with him today, but I could get one at a store either now, or in the near future. I think they had just put it out or are just about to. Then I said goodbye and he shook my hand with both of his, looked me right in the eye and said "thank you" really earnestly. haha. I think he was new to Tokyo. I really hope I can go!

Then I finally made it to Harajuku. This is the famous Takeshita street:

Where I did not buy my sister glasses because I couldn't find any. Instead I bought these earrings:

They're cute, right? Then I walked from Harajuku to Shibuya, went crazy in Loft and spent a ton of money, but also got to check off a lot of people on the "have to buy present for list," so all in all a pretty successful shopping trip. Then I went home, and when I was walked back to my apartment, all the sudden I couldn't stop coughing again. People were kinda staring. oops. But I got home and shoved my face with medicine and cough drops so I'm ok now. I guess the charm has a time limit. Like cinderella.

So let's recap, shall we? I luckily discovered:

-a temple for curing sickness

-a wonder charm that temporarily cured me so I could have a really nice day

-a cute little park, complete with pond

-a super cool candy shop

-a really good, undercover, indie Japanese music group with a cute, uber earnest guy (and also my future boyfriend)

-nice earrings

Today was pretty lucky. (^-^)

Stealthy Super-Sized BUG and the Subsequent Series of Strenuous Situations

So a few days back, Sam wasn’t feeling good and didn’t want to leave the apartment and I was feeling antsy so I called up my friend and hung out in Shibuya all night. We walked all through Yoyogi Park, which is HUGE, and out through Harajuku, and back down to Shibuya station. It was a great night, just talking and whatnot. I found out that every weekend there are festivals in Yoyogi Park! Gotta check that out. Anyways, my point is not to brag that I had a good night and you didn’t, my point is to set up the true feeling of exhaustion that I felt when I was walking home.

So I said goodbye to my friend, jumped into a packed train to Shinjuku and from there transferred to the Chuo-Sobu line to get to my apartment in Nakano. Right outside the station, I meet up with Sam, who surprise! has been out almost as long as I had. Apparently a bug about 4 or 5 inches long had decided to show itself shortly after I left, and Sam had flipped out and ran out, leaving her phone and pretty much everything. So she couldn’t contact me and had decided that a good way to solve that problem was to pace from the station to our apartment, a good 10 min walk, until I got back.

So I’m dead tired and can think of nothing better than to flop on the floor and fall unconscious right there, wherever there happened to be, but noooooooooooo. I end up staying up until 2 in the morning looking for this stupid bug and I still haven’t found it!! It’s been 3 days!! Sam decides she can’t even step foot in the apartment for fear of the deadly bug so I get all her stuff, walk her to the 7 eleven to get cash, and then to the internet café to look up the nearest hotel, and then to the hotel, and then I got to walk back to the apartment alone late at night with vigorously complaining feet.

If only I could have just found the stupid thing and killed it. Instead, Sam is now moving into a weekly mansion, while turning down our landlord’s offer to fumigate the place. So now I’m living by myself (or maybe not entirely by myself), which is fine by me. I like the apartment. I think it’s cute. ^^

But that was just another headache for me, one that I didn’t need right before and international flight.

Today, I left my apartment at 3 in the afternoon, got lost in the train system trying to get to Narita Airport, arrived at the check in desk 2 min shy of the deadline but they opened it back up for me because China Airlines is the best ever, and just managed to make my flight from Narita to Honolulu at 7:45 pm. That’s about 4 hours of train-ness. Ewwww.

Then, my plan was to sleep the whole way there, but just when I was about to sleep, they turned on the lights!! So no sleep for Hiroko. The lights were really bright. Even with my eyes closed and hair in front of my face it was still like the freakin’ Hallelujah chorus.

But then I got my bags and got through customs in less than 20 min and connected with my newly found relatives, who incidentally are the nicest, cutest people in the world, confirming our blood relation. ^^

Had some really tasty quintessential American food (complete with onion rings!), and now I’m just relaxing in front of the fan. Haha. It’s hot here.

So it has gotten nicer, but this truly is the day that never ends. I left Narita at 7:45 at night on June 3^rd and arrived in Honolulu at 7:33 in the morning…on June 3^rd. Combine that with the lack of sleep from bug hunting and bad time management skills in terms of packing, plus Hallelujah chorus lights and you get something very close to the day that never ends.

I blame the bug.

Japanglish

Oh no I’ve caught the swine! Or I’m just having a mild allergic reaction to a new environment. I’ve narrowed it down to one of the two. Either way, my head feels like a balloon that should’ve popped about three puffs of air earlier, my throat has decided to use fire as a means of personal expression, and my nose is of the opinion that dipping snot is going to be the next huge fashion trend. Yea, I’m before my time in “おしゃれ.” (pronounced “o・sha・re” meaning fashion.”)

I really love Japan and the Japanese language, but what I really love is Japanglish. The guy from the gas company who came to turn on our gas and hot water tried to speak it, but he really was only fluent in Japanese, not Japanglish. He said, “Gas 金はconvenienceで払ってよろしいです。” or something like that, excuse my bad Japanese and bad memory. Basically means, “you can pay the gas bill at your convenience.” My linguistic anthropology skills tell me this is called “code-mixing,” but I prefer the term “Japanglish.” Way more fun to say.

Sam and I are always modifying Japanese words too, but the difference is, no one understands us. We’ll be like, “Ah, that’s too muzukash!” without the “i.” Just basically making a cute language ugly and American. Just for funsies.

Another fun game is “Spot the Gaij.” That’s short for “gaijin,” which apparently isn’t exactly PC anymore to say. Oh well. (Racial slurs are ok when you’re included in the offended race. That’s why it’s handy to be tri-racial.^^) Every once in a while we’ll see other foreigners, and they stick out like the red dot on the Japanese flag. Not so hard to spot. So it’s become like “Where’s Waldo?” or “Slug Bug.” Every time we see one we’re like, “Gaij!” “Wow, look! French Gaij!” “Did you see the huge horde of Gaij in front of the conbini?”

Just something to do while swimming upstream trying to get where we’re going. It’s so crowded in Tokyo. Shinjuku station during rush hour is insane, and yet, I keep seeing these cute little elementary school kids with their big eyes navigating by themselves just like all the grumpy, underappreciated salarymen. But actually the train system isn’t that hard to get. Everything is labeled wonderfully, and on the Yamanote-sen, they even say things in English. Still, it seems like a daunting task for an 8-year-old.

Another thing I’ve noticed, Tokyo is one of the easiest places to be blind in. The being blind part is obviously still kinda tough, but there are so many adaptations for blind people. The “kippu uriba” or ticket machines in the stations have huge brail plaques of the map and fares, there are yellow bumpy paths on the floor that lead to different platforms (so literally follow the yellow brick road), and all over the streets there are more yellow bumpy things on the ground so you don’t accidentally get hit by a truck. Japanese trucks are tiny but still... At a cross walk you can push a button that makes the bird chirp noise when it’s safe to cross. It’s just so well thought out. I’m sure there’s more, I just don’t notice because I can see and I’m too busy looking for gaij.

Nakano is in northwestern Tokyo and is way less crowded than say, Harajuku. It’s very residential but not far from all the hullabaloo, as I’ve said earlier. It’s also extremely safe. All of Japan is pretty safe compared to other countries, and Tokyo is way safer than other cities of comparable size, but Nakano is one of the safer areas of Tokyo. Last night, I was out walking back to my apartment from the internet café, stopped to get some food at the conbini, and didn’t get back until just after midnight. Totally safe. I know my mom is sprouting all the grey hairs she’s every wanted while reading this, but it’s true. Japanese mom’s let their 8-year-olds take Shinjuku station home from school, I think my big, 19-year-old, American self is OK.

People are actually really nice. The internet café I went to last night was in a huge shopping center called Nakano Sun Plaza. I entered in one entrance, stayed for 3 hours, and when it was time to leave, that entrance had closed up. So I got a little lost trying to find the exit. Haha. Wish that was the most embarrassing thing I’ve done this trip, and I’m only 8 days into it. (probably gotta be standing in front of a door trying to figure out how to open it. You just had to touch it.) So, I went up to the guy at the counter of the internet café and asked him how to get to Nakano doori, which is how you say Nakano street. Not only did he tell me, but he led me there and spoke to me in Keigo the whole time. Keigo is what you use when addressing someone above you. Either he had really low self-esteem, or he was that polite. Very few people are below a 19-year-old who can’t find her way out of a mall. Side note: he used Japanglish too! “Thisは中野streetです。” which means “This is Nakano street.”

Rain and Rip-offs

So as many of you will know and/or remember not so fondly, Japan has a rainy season. And I'm right in the middle of it. It has been rain straight across my igoogle weather board. I thought we finally got a break today, so I wondered out without an umbrella blissfully ignorant of my imminent downpour downfall. (haha. see what I did there? Let's play a game called find the alliteration and polyptoton! yay word play!)

So Sam and I just moved into our apartment in Nakano yesterday. We have a ton of crap. Way more than our friend Jonathan from the Koenji guesthouse said he had for the last 4 months. We're only here for half that. But, the guy we're renting the apartment from made the whole thing so easy! He drove up in a tiny blue van, helped us load everything in it, navigated the tiny streets of Japan like a pro, gave me a ride there, helped me unload, brought us a futon (we already had 1), curtains, toiletries, and a blanket, and will deliver a small TV and couch tomorrow. All for free. And he offered, we didn't ask, just kind of nodded our heads in dumbfounded agreement. Keep in mind we had just been swindled out of $1048 by the last landlord and here is this guy bending over backwards trying to give us free stuff. He's amazing. If anyone ever wants an apartment in Tokyo, contact me and I'll put you in touch with him.

So since we are getting settled in Nakano, today we decided to do a little exploring.　Nakano is really a great area. There is a ton of shopping streets and cool places, but only in certain central areas. The rest is all residential so it’s very quiet here. No bad karaoke or head pounding base beat at night like in the Koenji guesthouse. We’re only about a 10-15 min walk to the station only about a 5 min walk to all the brouhaha.

So, we’re walking around, painting a mental map of the place and wandering in and out of stores when suddenly, crack! Pshhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!! That’s my onomatopoeia for sudden rainfall. Luckily we were in the Japanese version of Walmart called “Life” when it started. But as we were walking out the door, dududududu singing a little happy son, we almost walked out in it before we realized it was raining. The only umbrellas in the whole store were about $10!! All the convenience stores sell their most expensive ones for half that! Therefore I’m convinced that the owner of “Life” also owns “Rain” and decided to turn Nakano into Waterworld and hick up the price of umbrellas. Apparently the owner of life and rain is a capitalist.

But I wasn’t about to be one of the little people that big businesses take advantage of. No! I was going to stand up to the powers that be and the Man in one fell swoop by running out into the rain, which upon inspection at closer proximity was actually a little more of a solid sheet of water than it had appeared, and booked it to the nearest convenience store in all my full-length dress and flip-flop glory. The staff at the store where I bought my $5 umbrella were quite amused. Especially after I dramatically ran in, soaking wet, and then proceeded to peruse the aisles with sqeaky plastic flip-flop steps in search of the umbrellas sold right at the door.

So now I have learned a valuable lesson about living in Japan in late May and early June. I no longer question why every store I’ve been in, from shoes to electronics, sells umbrellas.