People have asked me the same question for months: Aren't you afraid? And the answer has been, almost universally, no. I'm not afraid of this trip. I'm not afraid of being here, finding work, making friends, or being lodged in a country where I have a limited command of the language and culture. My fears here are the same, in fact, as they are at home, if and when I choose to allow myself to dwell on them. I fear failure, in a general sense. I fear my own weaknesses. I fear that I won't be healthy mentally.
Those fears, however, are offset by my knowledge that I am strong, that I rarely fail, and that my willingness to feel and my willingness to acknowledge my feelings to myself and others is healthy. My biggest fear and saddest failure has already occurred and that situation is and was largely out of my control, so I've already experienced one of the worst things, relatively speaking, of course, that could have happened to me, whether I'm here or anywhere else.
So, the answer is no. I'm not afraid. I refuse to be. Life should be embraced, never denied for the sake of fear. Fear is a choice, and I choose another path. This is as good of a place to rebuild my life and myself as anywhere, and probably better in many ways than most. And, in 2 years...grad school.
In more practical news, I'm leaving my current couchsurfing host for my friend Rebecca's apartment today. Tomorrow I move into my new place, although the exact time is still yet to be determined. I'm going to stash my luggage in a train station locker so that I can move around a little more freely. I'm really excited to get my own space and some privacy and begin actually settling into my new life here. This place will not be home for a while (or maybe ever, for that matter), but it'll be one step closer tomorrow. I am glad. The search for work also begins in earnest in the morning on Thursday, sooner if I can find an internet connection that doesn't drive me utterly insane.
Final thought: all of this blogging has me seriously considering what it would look like to write a book. I've always been intrigued by the idea of writing, but this period in my life has me motivated in a way that I've never been before. I have to restrain myself from writing more for this blog, because I want it to be a convenient way for my friends and family to catch up on me...but I could easily write way, way more than I am right now. Hmm.
Showing posts with label Tokyo. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Tokyo. Show all posts
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
Monday, October 13, 2008
Some frustration.
I simply cannot...cannot...find a decent fucking free wireless internet connection in this town. I had no idea that the largest city in one of the most technologically advanced countries in the world would stingily dole out wi-fi like it is composed of goddamn golden sky nuggets. Frustrating...very frustrating. I know that the whole city is covered with 3G, but I have neither an adapter nor a service provider nor the money to acquire either. So, looks like I'm just going to be angry about internet connectivity for at least a few more days.
While I'm bitching, I should also point out that coffee here is outrageously expensive. While I have had some really good coffee for $5 for a tiny cup, a lot of it is undeniably crappy. Also, the two guys I've been staying with aren't coffee drinkers, so I can't even make the delicious Stumptown that Briana sent with me. Today, I've simply broken down and spent stupid amounts of money on coffee. I won't be able to do it much in the future, but I've allotted for a certain amount of splurging for my first week here. I am, after all, on something of a vacation. I'm not here to be a fucking monk, and I think anyone who knows me knows that being a monk is a virtual impossibility for me under any circumstance. Self denial? Not my strong point. Not so much. Life is too short.
Good beer is also something of a commodity, although I did find some decent stuff in a store on my first night. So, it's not impossible to find, just not that widely available. Rather than drink crappy beer, however, there's a super light, relatively cheap alcoholic beverage similar to American malt beverages, but lighter, not sweet, and without the shit-tastic aftertaste.
I've been thinking about Maria a lot today. It was easy, the first few days, to just enjoy myself and let go of everything, but, ultimately, you can't change who you fundamentally are just because you're in a new place. It doesn't work that way, although it can be tempting to try to reinvent yourself and I will probably allow a certain amount of that reinvention to occur. Some of it will simply occur by necessity...the fact of the matter is that the Japanese are very, very culturally different from the people in the environment that I am used to, and my normal behavior verges on the bizarre for native Japanese. While very friendly with friends and family, the typical Japanese person simply does not randomly engage strangers in public (at least not outside of a bar or other socially permissible venue). That's not to say that they won't freely offer help or that they are completely unapproachable, but it is a much more withdrawn and isolated culture than that of, for example, Portland. You simply don't walk around saying hi to strangers or smiling at people you don't know, although I have found some rare exceptions. Pets seem to offer an instant exception to the norm, because they are under no obligation to obey the cultural preferences of their owners, who seem happy enough to accept the deviations. Children can offer small windows of opportunity, although their parents usually apologize profusely for behavior that I find only adorable, not rude in the least. Any perceived committed rudeness will generally result in profuse apologies, which is really often the only contact that I'll have with strangers.
In any case, I expect that my public persona will become colder for the duration of my stay, and that's fine. I don't expect to emerge from this situation unchanged, and that would kind of negate the whole point of this trip, to a certain degree, if I did. I'm not particularly worried about being isolated, because I'll be living about a 5 minute walk from Wayo and I have both old and new friends here already. Working should also greatly increase my pool of contacts and friends and there's always the internet if I'm feeling really desperate for human contact. I do badly want to get a solid internet connection as soon as possible so I can just make some phone calls back home. I would like to actually talk to my peoples.
I guess that brings us full circle. Time to stop, then.
While I'm bitching, I should also point out that coffee here is outrageously expensive. While I have had some really good coffee for $5 for a tiny cup, a lot of it is undeniably crappy. Also, the two guys I've been staying with aren't coffee drinkers, so I can't even make the delicious Stumptown that Briana sent with me. Today, I've simply broken down and spent stupid amounts of money on coffee. I won't be able to do it much in the future, but I've allotted for a certain amount of splurging for my first week here. I am, after all, on something of a vacation. I'm not here to be a fucking monk, and I think anyone who knows me knows that being a monk is a virtual impossibility for me under any circumstance. Self denial? Not my strong point. Not so much. Life is too short.
Good beer is also something of a commodity, although I did find some decent stuff in a store on my first night. So, it's not impossible to find, just not that widely available. Rather than drink crappy beer, however, there's a super light, relatively cheap alcoholic beverage similar to American malt beverages, but lighter, not sweet, and without the shit-tastic aftertaste.
I've been thinking about Maria a lot today. It was easy, the first few days, to just enjoy myself and let go of everything, but, ultimately, you can't change who you fundamentally are just because you're in a new place. It doesn't work that way, although it can be tempting to try to reinvent yourself and I will probably allow a certain amount of that reinvention to occur. Some of it will simply occur by necessity...the fact of the matter is that the Japanese are very, very culturally different from the people in the environment that I am used to, and my normal behavior verges on the bizarre for native Japanese. While very friendly with friends and family, the typical Japanese person simply does not randomly engage strangers in public (at least not outside of a bar or other socially permissible venue). That's not to say that they won't freely offer help or that they are completely unapproachable, but it is a much more withdrawn and isolated culture than that of, for example, Portland. You simply don't walk around saying hi to strangers or smiling at people you don't know, although I have found some rare exceptions. Pets seem to offer an instant exception to the norm, because they are under no obligation to obey the cultural preferences of their owners, who seem happy enough to accept the deviations. Children can offer small windows of opportunity, although their parents usually apologize profusely for behavior that I find only adorable, not rude in the least. Any perceived committed rudeness will generally result in profuse apologies, which is really often the only contact that I'll have with strangers.
In any case, I expect that my public persona will become colder for the duration of my stay, and that's fine. I don't expect to emerge from this situation unchanged, and that would kind of negate the whole point of this trip, to a certain degree, if I did. I'm not particularly worried about being isolated, because I'll be living about a 5 minute walk from Wayo and I have both old and new friends here already. Working should also greatly increase my pool of contacts and friends and there's always the internet if I'm feeling really desperate for human contact. I do badly want to get a solid internet connection as soon as possible so I can just make some phone calls back home. I would like to actually talk to my peoples.
I guess that brings us full circle. Time to stop, then.
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