From Far Away and a Little Ahead
So I'm putting this post here because FB's limit makes it hard to make a long post. Some of you know some of this, some of you know none of this, but I thought I would try and give an account of how things have been going so far...
I arrived in Tokyo on July 24th. The flight was not what I would have liked it to be, but unless you're in business or first class, no 13 hr flight is fun. I didn't sleep at all, unfortunately and the movie selection was not fun. Fortunately, all 150 of us made in one piece to the hotel in Tokyo. At the hotel, which was a string of somewhat repetitive orientation meetings; they had a great many very fancy chandeliers and my room (which was on the 14th floor) had a pretty good view (see picture); and yes, that's Mount Fuji in the background :D.
My roommate at the hotel was okay, if not a little disenchanted. She basically told me she hated the US and had come back to Japan to stay, even after her stint with JET. The first night there was a little earthquake around four in the morning but otherwise it was pretty uneventful.
At the beginning of the third day they took us all by buses (and/or planes or trains depending on where you were going) to our prefectural offices where we were welcomed yet again and then given to our school adviser to be taken to our new "homes". My adviser is a very nice woman named Miss Tanaka. She took me to the high school first but both the vice principal and the principal were out that day so she took me to the new apartment and then shopping. I've posted the video on FB with it, but I will say it was something of a shock of how unfurnished my apartment was. It didn't have A/C (which I knew about) but it also didn't have a fridge or a stove top (that's all you get in the apartments, two burners and a broiler). My adviser took me to buy the A/C (which they couldn't deliver and install for two weeks ) and the stove top, but not a fridge.
I am very proud of the fact I managed to do that on my own the first weekend. But also fortunately, the apartment is in super convenient location. I'm about a ten minute walk from all the necessities and a lot of the just nice to have stuff. In particular, second hand stores are all sort of the rage here right now (it's seen as a form of recycling) and the big one near me is called Hard Off House, or Hard Off, for short. I have no idea what the origin of this name is, but it cracks me up none the less. Both the fridge and the washer have come from there and other than it costing an extra 5,000+ yen (about 60 USD) for delivery, they're great and the service is excellent. But then again, as Mike's been finding, service is pretty good anywhere you go here. It's sort of refreshing to have pleasant and helpful store clerks again.
We're also in range of two really great bakeries (they love bread here XD), one of them has a German vibe and the other has more french styling, but they both make really awesome pastries and bread so I can't complain. I'm also probably going to need a twelve step program for the kirin milk tea if I'm not careful *L*
I won't go into much detail about my first month of work because there was not much to it as class didn't start until Sept. 1st. But suffice to say all of the teachers and administrators are really nice. I'm working with about half the English teachers and mainly with the first year students. For those of you who don't know, Japanese high schools go for three years and they're not compulsory.
My students, unfortunately, are a bit behind where they should be. I'm hoping to work on that when there's normal class, but there won't be normal class (or I should say a regular schedule) until almost October.
My first impressions of Kuki have been good ones. So far, everyone I've met has been pretty nice and I haven't run into much of the "look-at-the-gaijin" syndrome. The language barrier has been only a moderate issue, but then again, my comprehension has improved a bunch since the last time I was here. The new problem I've run into though is that when I do speak some japanese, often the other person makes the assumption I understand everything and start talking really quickly. So that part is...interesting. In general though, I have been able to make my needs known, and mostly get stuff done.
The trade offs in convenience have been fascinating as well:
1. I can pay my rent at an ATM or my utilities at a convenience store, but all the banks and post offices are only open M-F and only between the hours of like 9-3.
2. I'm in biking and/or walking distance of most of what I could ask for, but it's pretty damn hard to get a lot of larger, heavier stuff home on your own.
3. No tornadoes here, but there are still typhoons and earthquakes.
4. I have a gas range top again, but now I can't bake.
5. A lot of stuff is super eco friendly, but sorting trash is almost like solving a calculus problem.
And on the subject of trash sorting, Japan has really little to no space for landfills so as much is recycled as possible, as much is burned as possible, and then the rest of disposed of in some unknown fashion. Every city has it's on set of rules and some are pickier than others. Kuki is among the pickier cities, or so I'm told, but to give you an idea. Twice a week they pick up burnable trash, once a week are non-recyclable plastics, once a week is recyclables, but all the paper, plastics, and pet bottles/cans/glass have to all be separated; twice a month is non burnable trash, and once a month is what is considered "dangerous" trash (stuff like chemicals, flammable materials etc.). Certain things get tied in bundles, and others have to go in clear bags. Oh, and you have to rinse most of it before you put it out. Yes, that's right, you have to wash your trash. Failure to follow these rules tends to lead to the garbage men to not pick up your trash. Some people circumvent this issue by taking their trash to another city and secretly dumping it there, but with no car; there is no such option (which I'm not inclined towards anyway).
Fortunately the city provides calendars with the days marked of with what goes out when so it helps some.
The other limitation I found was in dealing with being a foreign national. As one, I had to get an ID (affectionately called the gaijin card by some). However, there's usually a two week lapse between when you ask for it from city hall and when it's ready. Without this card, you can't get a phone, you can't get a bank account, and you can't get internet. My internet issue was then compounded by the company I ordered it from taking yet another two weeks in terms of setting up an appointment. It's not been a fun process, hence why it has taken me so long to make a post like this.
More fun was also had picking up Mike. Tokyo is about an hour and a half from here, but more like two hours via train to the airport. And it's two to three different trains depending on what route you take. I accidentally went the wrong direction and had a fun loop around Tokyo before I got to where I needed to go, but at least now I know how to get to Shibuya (it's where the nearest synagogue is) and I think I saw my first okama (transvestite). Once I got to the airport I found out Mike's flight had been delayed. And then once he got in, he was even further delayed at immigration because the little scanner machine they have for taking pictures and fingerprints broke and they had to move him to another line. It was a touch nerve wracking as neither of us had functional phones to be able to contact the other.
An hour late, he finally emerged and then we had another two hours back to Kuki on somewhat crowded trains and then about a mile walk back to the apartment. This walk would not have been so bad, had Mike's bag and the aerobed been about forty to twenty pounds a piece *laughs*. Mike was sadly a touch sick the next day, but he got over his jet lag in about a week.
As it stands, the apartment is still fairly unfurnished. I'm not sure how quickly we will be able to remedy that as the coming month will be a bit more expensive than the others. We have start up costs for the phone and the internet and I also have to pay the school back for my first month's rent. It's actually much better than it could be, because I am not being asked to pay back the deposit or the key money. This past weekend I took Mike to see my high school and their school festival. We also have his gaijin card now which means we might also be getting him a phone soon. Additionally, there will be a welcome party for us, put on by the teachers at my school. Initially it was only going to be a handful of the English teachers, but because of some scheduling conflicts the time got moved and now it's swelled to about 30 or 40 people. No idea where it's going to be either :P. But it'll be interesting to see how all the teachers behave outside of work, so I am looking forward to it.
In any case, now that we have connection, I will probably post more often. Or at least, I can hope. It'll be interesting to see how it goes.
I arrived in Tokyo on July 24th. The flight was not what I would have liked it to be, but unless you're in business or first class, no 13 hr flight is fun. I didn't sleep at all, unfortunately and the movie selection was not fun. Fortunately, all 150 of us made in one piece to the hotel in Tokyo. At the hotel, which was a string of somewhat repetitive orientation meetings; they had a great many very fancy chandeliers and my room (which was on the 14th floor) had a pretty good view (see picture); and yes, that's Mount Fuji in the background :D.
My roommate at the hotel was okay, if not a little disenchanted. She basically told me she hated the US and had come back to Japan to stay, even after her stint with JET. The first night there was a little earthquake around four in the morning but otherwise it was pretty uneventful.
At the beginning of the third day they took us all by buses (and/or planes or trains depending on where you were going) to our prefectural offices where we were welcomed yet again and then given to our school adviser to be taken to our new "homes". My adviser is a very nice woman named Miss Tanaka. She took me to the high school first but both the vice principal and the principal were out that day so she took me to the new apartment and then shopping. I've posted the video on FB with it, but I will say it was something of a shock of how unfurnished my apartment was. It didn't have A/C (which I knew about) but it also didn't have a fridge or a stove top (that's all you get in the apartments, two burners and a broiler). My adviser took me to buy the A/C (which they couldn't deliver and install for two weeks ) and the stove top, but not a fridge.
I am very proud of the fact I managed to do that on my own the first weekend. But also fortunately, the apartment is in super convenient location. I'm about a ten minute walk from all the necessities and a lot of the just nice to have stuff. In particular, second hand stores are all sort of the rage here right now (it's seen as a form of recycling) and the big one near me is called Hard Off House, or Hard Off, for short. I have no idea what the origin of this name is, but it cracks me up none the less. Both the fridge and the washer have come from there and other than it costing an extra 5,000+ yen (about 60 USD) for delivery, they're great and the service is excellent. But then again, as Mike's been finding, service is pretty good anywhere you go here. It's sort of refreshing to have pleasant and helpful store clerks again.
We're also in range of two really great bakeries (they love bread here XD), one of them has a German vibe and the other has more french styling, but they both make really awesome pastries and bread so I can't complain. I'm also probably going to need a twelve step program for the kirin milk tea if I'm not careful *L*
I won't go into much detail about my first month of work because there was not much to it as class didn't start until Sept. 1st. But suffice to say all of the teachers and administrators are really nice. I'm working with about half the English teachers and mainly with the first year students. For those of you who don't know, Japanese high schools go for three years and they're not compulsory.
My students, unfortunately, are a bit behind where they should be. I'm hoping to work on that when there's normal class, but there won't be normal class (or I should say a regular schedule) until almost October.
My first impressions of Kuki have been good ones. So far, everyone I've met has been pretty nice and I haven't run into much of the "look-at-the-gaijin" syndrome. The language barrier has been only a moderate issue, but then again, my comprehension has improved a bunch since the last time I was here. The new problem I've run into though is that when I do speak some japanese, often the other person makes the assumption I understand everything and start talking really quickly. So that part is...interesting. In general though, I have been able to make my needs known, and mostly get stuff done.
The trade offs in convenience have been fascinating as well:
1. I can pay my rent at an ATM or my utilities at a convenience store, but all the banks and post offices are only open M-F and only between the hours of like 9-3.
2. I'm in biking and/or walking distance of most of what I could ask for, but it's pretty damn hard to get a lot of larger, heavier stuff home on your own.
3. No tornadoes here, but there are still typhoons and earthquakes.
4. I have a gas range top again, but now I can't bake.
5. A lot of stuff is super eco friendly, but sorting trash is almost like solving a calculus problem.
And on the subject of trash sorting, Japan has really little to no space for landfills so as much is recycled as possible, as much is burned as possible, and then the rest of disposed of in some unknown fashion. Every city has it's on set of rules and some are pickier than others. Kuki is among the pickier cities, or so I'm told, but to give you an idea. Twice a week they pick up burnable trash, once a week are non-recyclable plastics, once a week is recyclables, but all the paper, plastics, and pet bottles/cans/glass have to all be separated; twice a month is non burnable trash, and once a month is what is considered "dangerous" trash (stuff like chemicals, flammable materials etc.). Certain things get tied in bundles, and others have to go in clear bags. Oh, and you have to rinse most of it before you put it out. Yes, that's right, you have to wash your trash. Failure to follow these rules tends to lead to the garbage men to not pick up your trash. Some people circumvent this issue by taking their trash to another city and secretly dumping it there, but with no car; there is no such option (which I'm not inclined towards anyway).
Fortunately the city provides calendars with the days marked of with what goes out when so it helps some.
The other limitation I found was in dealing with being a foreign national. As one, I had to get an ID (affectionately called the gaijin card by some). However, there's usually a two week lapse between when you ask for it from city hall and when it's ready. Without this card, you can't get a phone, you can't get a bank account, and you can't get internet. My internet issue was then compounded by the company I ordered it from taking yet another two weeks in terms of setting up an appointment. It's not been a fun process, hence why it has taken me so long to make a post like this.
More fun was also had picking up Mike. Tokyo is about an hour and a half from here, but more like two hours via train to the airport. And it's two to three different trains depending on what route you take. I accidentally went the wrong direction and had a fun loop around Tokyo before I got to where I needed to go, but at least now I know how to get to Shibuya (it's where the nearest synagogue is) and I think I saw my first okama (transvestite). Once I got to the airport I found out Mike's flight had been delayed. And then once he got in, he was even further delayed at immigration because the little scanner machine they have for taking pictures and fingerprints broke and they had to move him to another line. It was a touch nerve wracking as neither of us had functional phones to be able to contact the other.
An hour late, he finally emerged and then we had another two hours back to Kuki on somewhat crowded trains and then about a mile walk back to the apartment. This walk would not have been so bad, had Mike's bag and the aerobed been about forty to twenty pounds a piece *laughs*. Mike was sadly a touch sick the next day, but he got over his jet lag in about a week.
As it stands, the apartment is still fairly unfurnished. I'm not sure how quickly we will be able to remedy that as the coming month will be a bit more expensive than the others. We have start up costs for the phone and the internet and I also have to pay the school back for my first month's rent. It's actually much better than it could be, because I am not being asked to pay back the deposit or the key money. This past weekend I took Mike to see my high school and their school festival. We also have his gaijin card now which means we might also be getting him a phone soon. Additionally, there will be a welcome party for us, put on by the teachers at my school. Initially it was only going to be a handful of the English teachers, but because of some scheduling conflicts the time got moved and now it's swelled to about 30 or 40 people. No idea where it's going to be either :P. But it'll be interesting to see how all the teachers behave outside of work, so I am looking forward to it.
In any case, now that we have connection, I will probably post more often. Or at least, I can hope. It'll be interesting to see how it goes.