ダニエルの冒険

I took a fresh towel and left it on the edge of the sink before I stepped into the shower. I turned on the water and it all gushed out of the tap and drenched the bottom of the towel. I made do with it.

Later I went to wash my hands and as I went into the tiny bathroom, the towel fell off its rack onto my shoulder. I threw it into the shower to get it out of the way and turned on the tap in the sink. The water gushed out of the shower-head onto the towel.

Anyway, today was a great day. Got some last-minute shopping done in the morning and had yoshigyuu for breakfast. Met up with Mitsuki and she showed me around some of the town. We went to karaoke and sang together and caught the latest Ghibli film (”Ponyo”). Quite similar to Totoro in the that:

• Lots of nature themes from the start right through to the end.
• One of the lead characters is female and has a really strong personality.
• Looks like it’s for kids but there’s a lot more in there. Not obvious at all though as it’s mainly thematic.
• No idea what it’s really all about, honestly. Not sure what Miyazaki wanted to say in either.

Leaving Sendai at 9.30am tomorrow to get to Narita. I have to go through Ueno but at least that’s not too deep into Tokyo. Should take 3 hours or so from Sendai. I’ll miss Japan, but it won’t be long before I’m back.

I ate some Gyu-tan (牛タン) yesterday. The first character means “cow”. The second two mean “tongue” (it’s actually an English approximation). With my gyu-tan I also had some teiru-suupu. Read it out loud and you can figure out that it’s “tail soup”. It was all really good and gyu-tan is a well-known Sendai dish.

The waiter asked how it was when I had finished and I told him how much I enjoyed it. I confirmed that the “tail soup” was indeed “tail” and he confirmed that it was. I pointed out how it was interesting that the meal was made of both ends of the cow but nothing from the “middle”. I said “but you don’t need the middle, right?”. “Yeah, you don’t need the middle!”

If there’s two things central to Akihabara culture in Japan it’s hi-tech products and maids. If it were 3 it would be hi-tech products, maids and Gundam, but Gundam isn’t relevant right now so let’s forget about that one.

This morning I left my room and walked towards the lift. As I turned the corner to get to the to the door of the lift, a female hotel cleaner, in about her early 20s, greeted me with a great big “good morning!” (ohayou gozaimaaaasu!). She was crouched over a laptop in the hallway, with a big clump of wires connecting it to power and ethernet points on the wall. It was running some sort of software called “pointsec” and in her little blue uniform she proceeded to check all the ports were connected correctly and began logging in.

I entered the lift and reflected on how much I love this country.

The Japanese are very proud of all their Olympic teams. Today I’ve watched part of a volleyball and part of a badminton match. Looking at how slowly the shuttlecock was floating through the air, and looking at the volleyball teams hug after each round, it feels strange that they’re taken so seriously, but it’s great seeing everyone rally behind the teams. Everyone in their homes are watching TV cheering on the teams, even though they’re all the way over in Beijing.

That being said, swimming and Judo I get, and fair play to them for grabbing the gold medals in those. Just looked up the Irish teams and it looked like we’re in equestrian, rowing and sailing. Bah.

Today after work I met my good old friend Saharu and we ate some Korean food and caught up on how we’re getting on. She gave me a copy of a magazine from her school with some photos of and articles by many of the friends I made while I they had their 6-week trip to Ireland. Seán’ll be in Tokyo from Sapporo from Saturday and they’ll meet up some time next week. And it’ll only be another 3 weeks until I see Seán myself too! Not much longer before I’m back at university and my crazy foreign life comes to a resounding pause.

At lunch today I saw some policemen block off a street. After work I came by and there was a little festival going on there. There were stands set up at each end of the street, selling coupons for food and drinks, which you can exchange once you get inside. I bought some more kakigori (that’s the shaved ice I mentioned in another post) and watched a band play hawaiian music while a girl in a blue yukata danced the hula on a stage.

There’s something really enchanting about the summer evenings here. It’s so warm that it’s still messing with my head, though. I leave and get a rush of warm air, and then feel like I’m going in somewhere, because the concept of “outside = cold” is so deeply embedded in my mind. I’ve left chocolate outside and it’s melted because I wasn’t thinking of the possibility of anything melting outside, and if it gets warm the idea of opening a window still comes to mind.

Taking it easy again tonight but tomorrow I’ll meet Saharu in Ueno and have a quick dinner before she has to go back to Gunma.

Anyway, my washing is almost done!

I’m writing this offline on my laptop on a train. I’m the 特急 (Special Express or something in English) from Kitasenju (北千住駅) to Ashikagashi (足利市駅). Finally I have more adventures to write about! Today has been crazy enough already and now I’m on my way into the heart of the Japanese countryside (well it’s no Aomori but it’s certainly countryside by Japanese standards).

The flight was delayed by 3 hours this morning. Not 3 hours late arriving, but 3 hours sitting in the tin can while they fixed it. They had to disconnect the APU (auxiliary power unit) for a while which meant that the air conditioning went down, which wasn’t fun at all.

That flight was sandwiched with lots and lots of public transportation. I got 2 buses (29 to 19th&Holloway then 28 to Daly City BART station), a train (BART to SFO) to get to the airport. Then getting from the airport to where I’m going now, I got the first train out of the airport, but got off at Narita station and waiting for a Limited Express train. That got me to Aota where I changed to the Local line for Sakiya. I changed line then to the Tobu line and had to go down one station on the Local line until I got to Kitasenju which is where I could board the express I’m on now. I don’t know how I even remembered all that.

Being back in Japan, even though it’s only been for a few hours, is making me feel like this is definitely the place for me. Until this morning I was torn between Ireland, San Francisco and Japan… but since I saw Narita and Uchida, even though it was just from their station platforms, I’ve been thinking that this is where I have to be.

On Sunday the Nakajima family took me to see some of the extended family I met last time. We had a Japanese barbecue, which is a bit similar to your usual Irish barbecue except everyone has rice, and instead of burgers and sausages it’s just small cuts you put on and eat with the rice and some sauce. We played some ping-pong at the arcade where Ayumi’s brother works, went to karaoke together, and generally just hang out for the weekend. I really love the people up in Tochigi, and Daisuke, Ayumi’s younger cousin, stuck to me like glue. He’s a really fun kid and loves games and generally joking around. He taught me some “cool” Japanese that I have to try out before I leave

That is, 「ラーメン、つけ麺、僕イケメン」
(”Ramen, tsukemen, boku ikemen”, meaning “Chinese noodles, cold noodles, I’m good-looking”, but it rhymes so it’s funny… trust me)

I got the second-last train back and the family and neighbours brought me to the station. Kumi-chan, a 6 year old girl from down the street, wrote me a letter saying how she’s sad that I’m going and I have to come back so she won’t be sad, with some new colouring pencils she won at the local festival. I had the chance to stop by the festival and play some games and eat some かき氷 (kakigori: flavoured shaved ice), and watch some older people from the neighbourhood sing enka (traditional folk songs).

On Monday I went to meet my friend Mitsuki at Machida (a town about 36km from here, 1hr by train). She is actually my very first Japanese friend and we’ve been in contact since January 2006. Unfortunately the first time I came to Japan she was in the US on an exchange programme and the second time I was here we never got the chance to meet, but finally we were able to get together and she’s just like I imagined. She mightn’t like me telling this anecdote but it’s just too cute to keep to myself: when I arrived I couldn’t see her so I rang and we arranged an exact meeting place. I went there and waited, and then saw her come out of the crowd. She spotted me as I saw and gave me a big wave, and her hand went straight into some old guy’s face. She turned and made sure he was ok, apologising, before making her way over to me. Two and a half years, and we finally meet and that’s definitely an impression I won’t be forgetting

Anyway, we had a great couple of a hours and she helped me grab some souvenirs that were requested by people back in San Francisco before she had to go back to her dorm.

On the train on the way to Machida I really felt surrounded by Japanese people… (probably because they were). One guy was playing a DS and texting at the same time, the lady behind him was watching TV on her phone, a guy in his 50s, with reading glasses propped on the end of his nose, played Monster Hunter on his white PSP all the way there, and an guy in his 60s was reading some dirty magazine in front of everyone as he waited for his stop.

It’s all those little things I missed while I was away from here. Things like the Japanese toilets, the vending machines on every corner, the clean little streets, the taxis waiting for customers cruising around, one passing every 30 seconds or so… and the little sign in the small tunnel nearby asking you to not make noise when in the tunnel please.

“Tadaima”, or “I’m home”, is a Japanese phrase I’ve been using a lot recently. It’s great to be back here, even if it’s just for a week. I haven’t updated the blog in a long time, simply because there hasn’t really been anything worth writing about. Life in San Francisco and my work are going well but there just aren’t any more adventures worth writing about. Well, now that I’m back in the Land of the Rising Sun, there are things to write about again.