10/11/10

Days before coming to Japan, I was talking with a friend about falling in love. I forget how we began talking about the complex topic of love, but I distinctly remember responding to our conversation with conviction saying, “You know, I’m not even sure I believe love exists, at least not for me.” It wasn’t my intention to get a reaction. The words just flew out of my mouth before I could even think about what I was saying. I’m pretty sure this was said while sharing a bottle of wine.  My friend looked at me in disbelief, as if I had said, “I think the world actually is flat.” She should have said, “You are full of shit,” but kindly responded, “I know you don’t believe what you just said. I promise you will one day find love.” Knowing I had been struggling with heartbreak inflicted by my own, self -destructive involvement with men who were emotionally unavailable, she understood where my statement was coming from. What she also understood was I couldn’t possibly live life believing love was a fairy tale or maybe just beautifully scripted lie.  Still, I struggle with the voices within me shouting obscenities that I am undeserving of these pleasures, but it is always retaliated by a rehearsed motivational quote that never seems convincing. Somehow life throws random curveballs that challenges one’s beliefs without warning.  A few months later, now in Japan, I never expected to be challenged on my thoughts of love by a five year old named Hiroki.

Hiroki is a boy I teach at my school. Hiroki reminds me of myself as a kid. He feels emotions with great dept and intensity. The first time I had him in my class, he became so agitated with the idea of someone new coming in to teach him. It is difficult to explain to a child why one teacher is leaving and a new one is replacing her. Understandably, that much change, literally overnight, was traumatic to him. His mother did her best to explain to him I would now be his teacher and he would be fine.  Unfortunately, it didn’t work.

As she left, I held him back from running to her, hoping this would help the transition. I wasn’t sure why I thought this would help, but it obviously didn’t. The shrill that came from Hiroki’s mouth was painful to my ears. All the teachers ran out from their classrooms and glared at me holding the kicking and screaming Hiroki. I immediately knew I looked like the bad guy so I dropped my grip saying, “I don’t know what to do with him! He doesn’t want to be here.” I also wanted to yell, “And I don’t want to be here either!” The experience was traumatic for both Hiroki and me. One of the Japanese teachers took Hiroki’s hand and led him away. Shaking, I went into the teacher’s room and sat down. “I can’t do this,” I kept repeating. “Why the hell am I here?” A few minutes later, the Japanese teacher came into the room and unsympathetically told me I had to teach him something, being that it was my job. I sat in the Lobby, monitored by staff, teaching Hiroki an English lesson. We both looked at each other, neither one of us wanting to be there.

Weeks went by and slowly Hiroki learned to trust me. I never pushed him to like me. Despite his hesitation toward me, I felt warmth for him because I was the same as a five year old.  I disliked change, had a difficult time trusting people and never knew how to deal with my emotions.

In Kindergarten, I would literally hide myself behind a group of bushes during recess when life felt overwhelming. Because I couldn’t verbalize how I felt, hiding became safe.  I remember my sister finding me behind the bushes one afternoon during recess and asked, “Why are you playing with rocks?” I don’t even think I looked at her but had defensively replied, “Because I like it!” I’m not even sure what was going through my head at the time, but both my sister and I can vividly recall that specific interaction between us.  My sister sometimes jokes, “Yeah, you were that weird kid that played with rocks!” We both laugh.

The reason I recount this story is to remind myself of who I am today. I’m still the little girl who needs to hide when life feels overwhelming. As an adult, I question whether we actually ever abandon the five-year-old self. Seeing the kids in my classes, I imagine what they will be like as adults.  So now I view Hiroki as my five-year-old self and analyze my life as a 29 year old, slightly jaded, young woman. Now that Hiroki has calmed down and feels comfortable in my class, he’s shown me the sweetness of love through a five year old’s eyes.

Hiroki has a girlfriend named Yuu. Both children come to my Wednesday class. When Hiroki and Yuu are together, no one else exists in their world. During the song portion of our class, they hold hands and chase each other around, ending in exhaustion, cradling one another. Usually, Hiroki wraps his arms around Yuu while she rests her head on his shoulder. They both look at me as if I’m the entertainment during a date. The other children don’t seem to notice or care about Hiroki and Yuu’s relationship. In fact, the other girls almost have an understanding that Hiroki is Yuu’s man and they should not disrupt the chemistry between them.

One student unsuspectingly sat down beside Hiroki when we were opening up the coloring books. Yuu came barreling over and body slammed the girl out of her way, the way a football player tackles his opponent. Yuu then sat down beside Hiroki to share her crayons with him and hold his hand. The unsuspecting girl stood up, pushed her bangs aside and decided a seat on the opposite side of the room was a much better choice. I couldn’t hold back my laugh. When Hiroki and Yuu get lost in their world together, I also find myself not wanting to disrupt their interaction. The care they have for one another is so pure, I want it to exist in hopes it will erase the damage I’ve done to myself. It feels slightly therapeutic.

It’s funny to think two five year olds nudge me to try and believe in love again. Seeing the interaction between Hiroki and Yuu shows me that love isn’t always complicated. In my own life, I’ve chosen to make love complicated. Over the years, romance has represented a torturous mystery filled with self-doubt and pain. Seeing the five year olds, I am reminded that love is not always filled with doubt and pain when in its purest form.

Saying this, I don’t think my idea of love will drastically change overnight, but I do feel a bit more hopeful. I don’t think this is an easy path, but I have hopes that the journey will be rewarding. And if anyone or anything tries to challenge that, I guess I can just body slam them out of my way.

10/10/10

I must be a bit lonely because I am starting to make up stories about three people I see on a daily basis.  It’s becoming comforting to regularly see these people. Their schedules coincide so well with mine that it feels like we are acquaintances.

Every morning, I pass a nice Japanese restaurant that would probably be considered fine dining in the States. The waitresses wear the traditional kimonos and serve everything on fancy trays, bowing before leaving the table. I pass this place every morning on my way to work because it is next to my apartment building.

The owner looks to be in his mid to late forties with gelled back, curly, salt and pepper hair. He looks like he could be Japanese, but there is an air of Spanish decent he exudes. Every morning, he sits outside the restaurant, smoking a cigarette while listening to a radio, blasting what sounds like something you’d hear on a Putumayo World Music compilation CD. Wearing his tweed pants and cotton button up shirt, he reminds me of the kind of guy you would see living on a remote, tropical island. The kind of man that romances young female travelers, speaking to them in Spanish with sensual phrases rolling off his tongue of how breathtakingly beautiful she is. The young girl melts as he says he never loved someone so much, while pouring her fifth glass of the finest red wine.  I call this restaurant owner, Rico.  I don’t know if that is his real name, but I say hello to Rico every morning when walking to my train stop. The days he is not working, I wonder if Rico spent the previous night playing Casanova to an unsuspecting foreign woman.

Then there is Chad, again, another made up name.  Chad is the other foreign resident in my neighborhood. I don’t see him often, but every once in a while we pass each other on the street. I don’t make eye contact because he is slightly attractive and I’m not feeling particularly attractive at this moment in my life.  I don’t even try to feel attractive here. I can’t compete with the petite Asian girls with their flawless skin, silky hair and oval, innocent eyes. But there is another reason I do not make eye contact with Chad, which are probably the same reasons he also refuses to acknowledge me in passing.

There is a strange unspoken social rule that I’ve discovered here in Japan. It seems that English-speaking foreigners who have lived here a while, make it a point not to address other foreigners when passing them on the streets. There is an uncomfortable avoidance of eye contact as if to say, “I’ve been here long enough to consider myself a Japanese resident. I will not acknowledge you because you think we have something in common. We do not! I speak the language and I’ve been here long enough to become a part of the culture. We have nothing in common. I am one of them now (pointing to the Japanese person, standing next to them, which they have claimed as their partner).

Ironically, if I pass a foreigner, I desperately find a way to divert my eyes and pretend some ridiculous advertisement poster I am walking by is much more interesting. I nearly feel a sense of panic, thinking this other English-speaking foreigner will want to talk to me. What if they think we could be friends just because we both speak English? Maybe I am arrogantly fearful the other foreigner will see me as a vulnerable, overwhelmed person, therefore destroying my facade of being a strong, independent woman in a male dominated country.  It is so challenging to feel acquainted in this country; that it becomes a daily exhaustive chore of fighting to blend in. So in other words, I understand why foreigners don’t want to associate with ‘rookies’ who are in the process of adjusting to the endless amounts of unspoken social rules that you could only know by being Japanese. Foreigners that come here work hard to find their own identity in such an unwelcoming community. Of course the foreigners who have been here a while wouldn’t want to take on the anxiety of those that just arrived in Japan. Why would they want the responsibility of making another foreigner feel comfortable when there was no one there to help them? Wanting desperately to fit in, it would be social suicide befriending another foreigner.

So I occasionally see Chad walk by and we pretend not to notice we are both Americans living in Japan. I’ve created an imagined version of his life story. Knowing nothing about him, I created this story based on how he dresses and carries himself.

Chad comes from Chicago. He is artistic, maybe a poet, a writer with some sort of theatrical background. He probably studied Japanese culture in College and dreamt of living in Japan one day. He met his college sweetheart at a house party. She is Japanese, but was only studying abroad one semester. They fell in love and stayed connected a few years before he found a stable job and moved to Japan. They are now very happy together. He is a banker who works in the foreign exchange market. His girlfriend is a petite, beautiful Japanese girl, living at home with her parents, studying to be a teacher. She hopes that one day Chad will fulfill her dream of marriage and parenthood.

The third familiar person is not someone I would ever befriend or want to talk to, but an intense, wild-eyed man I see every night when commuting home from work. I catch the 9:20pm train home. There are two stops between my work and home: Tsunashima and Okurayama. Every night, after the Tsunashima stop, this man walks through each train car as if he is a man on a mission. I’m not sure what his mission is, but his determined look tells me whatever it is, happens to be of utmost importance. 

He reminds me of the kid in grade school, with the cowlick that sat in front of you in class who never fully fit into any social group. This poor kid was the odd one who was teased for being super smart. Occasionally, this gawky boy would painfully try and have a conversation with you. In an attempt to be nice, you would smile and nod, but all you could focus on was the cowlick and wondered why conversation seemed so difficult for him. Eventually, as years pass, the gawky, socially awkward kid would grow up embracing the cowlick, growing it into a full-blown fro. Time passes and he evolves as the guy who stomps through each train car on a mission to do…something.

This guy’s name in my story happens to be Jap-Einstein, a mix between Japanese and Einstein. I added the Einstein part simply because his hair has the wiry, uncombed look Einstein wore. Because this guy has his train car-traveling mission pinned down to the second, I figure he may have a formula in his head to complete a grand plan to stop terrorists or find the hidden bomb that doesn’t exist. Jap-Einstein, once the kid with the cowlick, grew up formulating a plan to give meaning to his life. Whatever he is thinking is beyond me, but I can tell it is very important. Therefore, his quirkiness has become something familiar, something I expect every night as I commute home.  

Rico, Chad and Jap-Einstein are aspects of my life that give me consistency. They have become part of my daily routine. I laugh as I write this, knowing that if I ever actually sat down and talked to one of these men, my judgments of them will be completely wrong. I’ve come to enjoy the lives I’ve created for them. I would rather not spoil those images by actually getting to know any of them. They are perfectly fine as caricatures of my imagination that give me something to look forward to each day. 

10/2/10

My left wisdom tooth began to push through my gum in my mid twenties. It was a bit sore, but not painful enough to get it extracted considering I didn’t have dental insurance and the thought of having this procedure done made me cringe.

Now, in my late twenties, in Japan, the tooth decided to rear its ugly head. About a week ago, I awoke to a throbbing pain. It was so sudden I actually thought I chewed a hole in the side of my cheek during my sleep. Examining my mouth, I noticed the wisdom tooth which had only seemed to be a small speed bump inside my mouth was now a mini mount Fuji.  I waited as long as I could to take motrin, because my inner hippie said it was best to refrain from unnecessary medication. I survived a cracked rib earlier this year, how bad could a little wise guy tooth be?

After a few days, the throbbing pain was too much. I needed constant motrin and a dental appointment. It was time to show the tooth whose boss and get rid of him.

I was able to get an appointment in a week with an English-speaking dentist. My anxiety about seeing a dentist here is a bit higher than it would be in the states not only because I’m in a foreign country and barely able to do anything without having to play a game of charades to communicate, but because the Japanese have the most hideous teeth I’ve ever seen. Don’t even get me started on the breath! Some Japanese have such an amazing collection of crooked, spotted teeth, I almost feel like applauding at the complete neglect that was taken to create such a masterpiece. Then there are the Japanese that have such a pissed off mouth that looks like one tooth is flipping you off with every smile, as if it is saying, “Fuck you and your dental floss!”

I asked my American co-worker, “What’s the story with the Japanese and their mouths? I’m so confused! So many of them look perfect with their sleek, straight-ironed hair and artfully assembled outfits, but when they smile, it takes every ounce of strength for me not to stare. Are the dentists that bad?” He claims, “It’s just not part of the culture to go to the dentist regularly like we do in the states. It’s not as important. The dentists are legit, the people just don’t use them.” Not having any type of medical/dental insurance has kept me from going to the dentist the past 5-6 years, but I still consider myself fairly obsessive about dental hygiene. Now that I have dental, I decided it was priority to take care of my tooth.

I was lucky to have staff that scheduled an appointment for me in the same building I work in. My school is located inside a large department building with everything at my fingertips; a post office, a grocery store, a 100¥ store, my cell phone/internet carrier, and my new dentist.

As I waited in the lobby, I heard the drills and scraping you normally hear at a dentist’s office. My blood pressure began to rise with each piercing sound. I kept imagining how it would feel when the tooth is removed. I worried that our communication barrier would keep him from remembering to numb my gum or confuse him into pulling the wrong tooth. I’m aware these fears are irrational and I’m not actually giving the dentist enough credit for his hard earned education. So I sat and waited, watching the big screen HD television featuring wild birds in some tropical area. This episode happens to show a mother bird feeding her eager hatchlings a plump and healthy beetle. The little chicks stretched out their necks, mouths wide open, as the mother repeatedly jams her beak into the mouths of the babies. It looks painful and reminds me of what I envision my dental experience to be. I imagine myself sitting in the dentist’s chair, with my neck stretched out and my mouth wide open, as the dentist jackhammers the tooth from my gum. As I watch the poor beetle get devoured by the birds, my dentist arrives and invites me into his office.

I walk past four others, getting work done. I can’t see what is being done because their heads face the other way, but each person is lying in a chair, drill in his mouth and only a curtain separating them from the person next to them. My dentist tells me to sit. Immediately, I realize his English is pretty basic. “Oh shit,” I thought, “How will I gesture this?”

He says, “Rinse.” And before I realize it, my chair turns toward the sink and pushes me toward the faucet. After I rinse, my chair returns to its original position, facing Dr. Yamanota. “What’s the problem?” he asks. “Well, I have this tooth…a wisdom tooth,” I point to my jaw, “And it hurts.” He nods. Then he asks, ”Where come from? California?” “No, I’m from Seattle.” “Oh! It’s west like California!” I smile and say yes. “Long way from home!” He remarks. “You have Japanese insurance?” I nod yes. “Okay,” he says, “I look! Chair down.” Then the chair flips me around and I’m suddenly supine with a bright light in my face. I start to laugh thinking how high tech even the dentist’s chairs are. Back home, my dentist has the pump chair that takes ages to lift or lower a patient. “Okay!” He says, “You need X-ray.” So he guides me into a little room and has me put on a jacket and sit in a chair with my chin resting on a small chin holder. Then he tells me to open my mouth and places a thick piece of cotton in between my bite. Dr. Yamanota leaves the room and closes the door. The door has a small window in which I can see his aged almond eyes watch me intently as a big machine rotates around my head. Then he tells me to get up and follow him into the office.

The X-ray shows up on his computer screen and he shows me my mouth, trying to explain in broken English that the tooth will always hurt because my jawbone is in the way. “The tooth can’t develop. In America, you call this tooth 13, 14. We say different in Japan! It’s 1,2! Funny!” And he laughs. I laugh along, not really getting the joke, but seeing he is not as serious as I had thought. “Today, I clean tooth. Okay? Chair down.” Again, the chair spins me around so I’m flat on my back. He drills away whatever buildup I had around mini Fuji. It is slightly painful and I’m confused as to what was happening. The pain isn’t intolerable so I just keep my eyes close and make small noises to remind him I have no anesthesia on my swollen gum. After he applies what looks like iodine, but feels like menthol, he tells me to spit. So I do. Then I ask, “So what do I do? Are you going to pull my tooth? Does it need to be pulled?” Then he says, “I go to Korea this day to this day,” and points to October 19^th-27^th, “But if you have the hopes of giving me your tooth, I take it.  But only if you hope for it.”

“Yes,” I said, “ I do want you to pull my tooth. When can you pull it?” Then he points to November. “Okay,” I say, looking at him, “can I make an appointment with the receptionist?” He smiles and nods. I glance at his teeth. They are not pearly whites, but they are also not glaring at me, spotted and deformed from years of abuse. I tell him thank you and I return to the counter to schedule my appointment for November 13^th at 6:30pm. 

9/26/10

Finally, payday! I was so excited to get my first full paycheck. I had budgeted a specific amount of money to get me through the first month and a half and I was down to the dollar by the time my paycheck cleared. As soon as I had the money in my Japanese bank account, I knew exactly what my first purchase would be.

Anyone who knows me knows how important it is for me to be active. After shopping around for a place to workout, that was within my monthly budget, I decided on a gym near work. Now that I had money, a gym membership was the first item on my to do list.

In Japan, when you are a member of a gym, you buy timeslots. It’s not like in the States where you just pay a monthly fee and workout whenever you like. Here, you pay a certain amount for the times you want to work out. You can rent mornings between 9am-12pm, Mon-Thursdays, just Wednesday afternoons from 3p-5pm, just Saturdays and Sundays from 9pm-11pm, etc. There are so many options; it becomes overwhelming trying to fit your life into a multicolored timetable that is specific, down to the second. I decided on Monday-Thursdays between 9pm-11: 30pm, this being after work. I wanted the option to go on the weekends, but those time slots are very expensive and it would hike up my membership another $50 per month. That, to me, is just unreasonable.

My Irish friend, whose name is Patience, jokes that she is anything but patient, has decided to go with me to sign up for a membership. I apologized in advance, knowing it will be a frustrating process being that no one at this gym speaks English and everything in Japan takes longer than you could ever imagine.

We get to the gym and a sweet girl I had inquired about membership from the week before was standing at the desk. I was excited to see her because it took me nearly 30 minutes last week gesturing to her what kind of membership I wanted. She kindly helped me through the process. Our interaction involved pointing at a bunch of colored lines on a chart written in Kanji. She would then show me the campaign posters that had the latest signup deal, all written in Kanji. Somehow we came to an agreement. Then I gestured I would come back later. I don’t think she thought I would actually come back. If I were in her position and I saw myself walk through the doors, I would have ducked behind the counter, asking my coworker to take on the responsibility. There would be no amount of commission in the world that would make me want to take on the challenge she was about endure.

The process, as I thought, was difficult and frustrating. I had to write Kanji, which I do not know. So, the sweet Japanese girl would write out everything in Kanji and I would copy it onto the documents. Then, I had to sign up for something like a credit card that was only used for the gym membership to ensure payments each month. So there was a credit card application, in of course, Kanji. After this, we had to fill out the application for the gym and make sure I was a legit legal alien, showing my passport, my alien registration card, proof of my bank, work information and so on.

Luckily, Patience was there. She is the queen of gesturing. Her gestures are impeccable. She would throw her hands in the air, motion around in animation, and somehow, the Japanese person would completely understand her. Then the Japanese person would gesture back and she would somehow understand, while I stood there wondering what just happened. “Oh! They want to take a wee look at your passport and make a copy!” She would turn to me saying this with her Irish accent. “Um, okay…here’s my wee passport,” I would say, handing it over confused and bowing because that’s what seems appropriate at the time.  

Nearly two hours later, I could tell Patience’s patience was wearing thin, and so was mine. Whenever a page was turned, Patience would say with optimism, “Done?!” and gesture the way a referee in a baseball game would show a player is safe. Then the sweet Japanese girl would giggle and say, ”Eh…N-O.” Then Patience and I would look at each other, eyes drooping in visible exhaustion and I would remind her how awesome she is for putting up with this shit.

Two and a half hours later, I was a gym member that could start using the gym in a week. Did I mention you have to start the membership at the beginning of the month?

We then, made our way to an international café in Takadanobaba (say the ten times) because a friend emailed me telling me this place had free wifi. Free wifi is unheard of in Japan. In fact, wifi in general is unheard of. You either go to a sketchy internet café and buy time on a PC that is so slow it takes 30 minutes to send three emails, or you buy a gadget that hooks up to your computer that allows you to use dial up speed internet at the nearest McDonald’s or Starbucks, for an additional fee, of course. Takadanobaba is about a 30-45 min commute from our apartments, but it was worth it to be able to sit with a glass of wine and a hummus plate while typing on a familiar keyboard that connects you with loved ones.

Patience and I took turns using my computer to check emails, write to family and scope websites we’ve wanted to scope out but didn’t have the desire to waste precious time or money at a sketchy Internet café. Meanwhile, in the background, the café was hosting poetry night. An emo Japanese kid was sharing his deep, dark feelings over the mic. I had no idea what he was saying, but by the dramatic pauses, mid sentence, and the intense interest from the audience, I knew it probably had to do with lost love or a romance that had gone awry.

After a few hours at Ben’s (www.benscafe.com)  we’re on a first name basis now, we decided to try a Mexican restaurant my coworker told me about.  This place called, Junkadelic, in Nakameguro, about 20 minutes from my apartment. Apparently, it is suppose to be authentic. Being a skeptic, I assumed it would be good, but maybe not great. I didn’t care though, because Mexican food is one of the few types of food I can eat without having an allergic reaction. I’m finding that most of the Japanese food causes me to have allergy issues and I’ve been bored eating the same thing everyday. So, no matter how good or bad the Mexican food, I knew it would be much better than what I had been eating daily. And it was.

Junkadelic was AMAZING! (http://www.eok.jp/restaurants-bars/casual-dining/mexican/junkadelic) It is my new favorite spot, aside from Ben’s Café. And it seems to be the favorite hangout for all the other English speaking foreigners too because every seat was filled with them. After Patience and I satisfied our Mexican craving, we decided our day was done. As we left, one of the servers saw it began to rain outside and he gave us each an umbrella. “See you later!” He said cheerfully in broken English. “Yes, you will!” I said. It was cheesy, but I meant it.