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Last night, Saturday, I went to a party hosted by a friend from high school. Of course, there were tons of other people I graduated from high school with there too. It was pretty fun seeing everyone – it was also strange in a way because a lot of the evening seemed like it could have happened 6 or 7 years ago. No one seemed to have changed a whole lot. I guess that’s good…right? I mean, once we all got through the “what are you doing these days” talk, it was just like old times. A lot of those guys still hang out with each other – I wonder what my life would have been like if I would have stayed in St. Louis. Not just Japan, but going to school in Indiana separated me a bit. No regrets, just a though. Time warp experiences will do that to you.

I also figured out it’s a lot easier to introduce my job as “teaching English to a bunch of old businessmen in Japan” than just saying “teacher,” to prevent people picturing me as a high school teacher and having to re-explain later.

It was a pain getting to the party, though. I was all set to go thanks to Google Maps, but then I found out that a major bridge along my path was out. Apparently the bridge has been out for like a year, but of course I didn’t know that. So I ended up taking a different way that was only slightly different. I’m in the general area, looking for the right street. It was like Winter Garden Avenue or something, off of Winter View. I made 3 wrong turns that night, onto streets like Winter Valley, Winter Grove, and Winter River. That’s right. Every street in the area started with Winter! Talk about terrible city planning. I found out later that it’s because there is a huge park in the area named Winter Park, but still, come on!

I’ve noticed it’s a lot harder for me to blog while at home (my parents house), even though I’ve got more free time than ever and spend a lot of days sitting around and watching TV. I think with so many people around all the time, I can’t collect my thoughts as much as usual. No absolute self-reflection time to compile the rambling dribble I usually come up with. In other updates, pizza is awesome and I wish Japan had Cecil Whitaker’s or even Uno’s.

Tomorrow is New Years Eve and I don’t feel like going out at all. Does that mean I’m getting too old? I guess last year I stayed in too, but that was in Osaka after eating an illegal amount of food at the shabu-shabu place.

Here goes my attempt at a quick summary of what happened in September while I was internet-less. Actually pretty much just parties, since there were a ton of them.

First was a party with my school staff on Sep 8 with our self-study campaign prize money. Our school did a good job in terms of goals and revenues, so the head office gave us a bit of money to spend on whatever we wanted. Free parties are always good. We went to the 月の雫 (Tsuki no Shizuku) in Chiba, which is supposed to be famous for its handmade tofu. Seriously, it’s way good. I’m not talking about tofu as in a “I’m a stupid hippie who doesn’t shower, use electricity, or eat meat,” but closer to “I’m a warrior monk who killed seven people this morning with a travel alarm clock and a Bic.” Or something. But yeah, it’s really good. I like that izakaya a lot because it’s usually pretty quiet and most of the tables have their own little enclosed areas. Helping plan that party I also realized how the enkai courses are probably a good idea if you’re planning a party with more than 5 people, since it usually includes nomihoudai and a ton of food for fairly cheap. (Keep that in the memory bank.) The last time I had gone there it was good too, but we ordered everything a la carte and so it ended up costing a lot. Oops.

The following weekend, on Saturday the 15th, I had my Farewell Party with students as well as a Welcome Party for my replacement, Andrew. The party was at this place called 天狗 (Tengu) in Goi, a large chain of discount-type family restaurant/izakaya. It was OK, but I think the old place we used to go to was better. The food might have been better at Tengu, but the room was a lot more cramped and I didn’t like the way the tables were set up. The party was good, but I was super tired from waking up balls early to go from Chiba to Goi, then working all day. But overall it was a nice party and we had a very decent turnout especially considering it was a 3-day weekend so a lot of people couldn’t make it. It was pretty sweet when right before I left; one of my STP students led the entire party in the Japanese sanbonjime clapping thing. I felt famous. Awesome.

After that during the walk home I had my final and most impressive, if I do say so myself, test of hiding my Japanese with the students. The staff and about 3 students were walking from Tengo to Goi station and two of them were just talking about me hardcore, wondering about “exactly how good Anthony’s Japanese is,” since I guess they’ve heard random rumors and stuff. I guess my predecessor had told some of these students that I can speak Japanese, and also said that I “must get a lot of girls and go to hostess clubs a lot.” That’s gross but also funny – also note that I’ve only talked to my predecessor once since he left last year. Whatever. But I was of course able to completely act like I had no idea what they were saying. No reactions whatsoever as they walked behind me talking about me. Tamayo picked up the assist by saying stuff like “No, no, I think he can only say Hello.” Ha, ha.

The next morning it was time for an early party. I had to wake up before 9AM for a BBQ at Inage Kaigan hosted and planned by Konosuke. Despite it being at a time I would usually be sleeping, it was actually really awesome. Tons of food and drink, a lot of people – it was a good time. The only bad thing was the heat. Even at like 11 or 12 in the afternoon, the sun was completely blazing. I think most people, including me, got pretty sunburnt. After the BBQ ended around 3 or something, a group of us went to karaoke and then dinner, and then just hanging out. I didn’t head home until maybe 10PM, but when I stopped by a conbini to pick up some water, I walked by a mirror and did the walk-back thing and saw how red my face and arms were. I hadn’t noticed at all during the day, but I definitely got roasted. I don’t remember the last time my skin peeled because of sunburn. Maybe never? But oh well.

Went out with my staff on Tuesday night, one of my last days. This was after a full day of trying to tell Andrew everything I knew about classes in between actually teaching. I was tired from just talking so much. My last day was Wednesday the 19th. Before leaving school we had the usual speeches and stuff with the staff, and I got a nice pen and one of those signboard things with messages from everyone. It was very weird to finish at Goi, although I’ll be back there later to teach now and again. Went out that night in Chiba as well.

Sunday the 23rd, after Tokyo Game Show, we had Mikey, Bryan, and Nick all here from their respective JET prefectures (Tochigi, Ibaraki, Hyogo). Went to some izakaya in Chiba that I’d never been to before, across the street from Umaimonya. That was good. Had a pretty big group for karaoke, so we did that all night at Utahiro. It amazes me still how cheap that place is. I was feeling pretty tired and I’m sure I fell asleep for a bit. But it was great to have so many people in one place. And at least I wasn’t the only one to pass out:

It’s been a great Golden Week so far. A lot of free time, hanging out, eating, and most importantly, NOT WORKING. Basically, Golden Week is like a national spring break here in Japan; a week long period where so many national holidays ended up being close together that the country decided just to declare the whole week like a holiday. Technically, May 1st and 2nd this year were the 2 weekdays that weren’t national holidays, but a lot of people take these off anyway. Overall, a lot of people have a full week off at the beginning of May, including luckily AEON staff.

Sunday, spent the entire day sleeping and relaxing. Nick decided to come to Chiba/Tokyo for Golden Week, and flew up via Haneda. There is actually a bus that goes directly from Haneda Airport to Goi Station, so he took that and I met him at the station. Headed to Global Viking for dinner, that enormous yakiniku all-you-can-eat plus more restaurant up in Hamano. Checked out arcades in Chiba and Goi, and watched some of Curb season 4, which I had never seen. On Monday, we checked out Asakusa and Ueno, then stopped by the Don Quixote on the way back. The JR Holiday Pass or the Tokunai pass have been pretty useful so far this week, although I guess we haven’t been using it to the potential that we could be. Overall I think we’re at least breaking even on the value of the ticket versus how much it would cost if we bought separate tickets every time we went somewhere.

On Tuesday, had a scheduled “geek day” with Matt, Yori, and Nick. Went into Akihabara to play in the arcades, look at video game shops, etc. Also we decided to try a Maid Cafe, since none of us had ever been to one. We wanted to go to the one near Super Potato that they used in Tadano Hitoshi, but there was a long line and we didn’t really feel like it would be worth it. We just walked around and picked one, since there were quite a few around the same area. Overall, it was a really weird experience. The one we went to was really small, and had a little stage (more like a 2×3 ft platform against the wall that was only about 4 inches off the floor. Drinks, food, and coffee were of expensive but fairly normal prices for Japan. I guess where they get you is paying for maid services, which is not the sexually explicit stuff you would maybe expect when talking about a place like this. Maid Cafes are, in many ways, like sex clubs without any reference to or inclusion of sex. The nerdy customers who frequent these places are apparently perfectly satisfied with just saying Hi to a girl in a maid outfit, or maybe springing to take a picture with them. There is no kind of sexual interaction, no flash of skin, no dirty talk. In fact, the maids and stuff generally talk in a disgustingly super-cute manner. Oh yeah, maid services. We didn’t buy any of them, but we read the menu. Most things cost around 700 or 1000 yen, but they had stuff like “take a Polaroid with a maid,” “play video games against a maid,” or “have the maid do a song and dance on stage.” Really strange. During the 15 or 20 awkward minutes that we were there, this creepy guy in the corner paid for one of the maids to sing a song on stage. The entire time he just kind of stared at her like a creep. Overall, I’d have to say that maid cafes are extremely uncomfortable, expensive, and not really even that interesting as a cultural phenomenon. Or maybe we just went to a bad one.

After the geek day, we headed back to Chiba and were just hanging out in the Hana no Mae up there, which is very different form the Makuhari one, but a really nice place overall. Hana no Mae is another one of those Japanese restaurants that changes their menu with the season, and apparently the “new” menu now features horse meat and a whole selection of whale dishes. I’m going to try them sometime over the next few months just to say I did. After that, Yori headed out and Brian took his place after spending a day showing his mom around Tokyo. So it was me, Nick, Matt, and Brian. We then proceeded to Utahiro for 2 hours of karaoke. As if that wasn’t enough, we then headed to Kamatori, sort of near where Matt lives, for more karaoke. Of course by this time it was after 11, meaning we had to commit to all night. Oh well, we were having fun and it was Golden Week. Overall a very fun night although as expected making it all the way to 5AM was very very rough. Surprisingly, I think this was the first all-night karaoke session where I didn’t fall asleep, although Nick and Brian were sleeping for about 15 or 20 minutes near the end of it. As they did that, I played a bunch of Kamen Rider songs just to watch the videos in a daze.

Got back to Goi around 6AM, then showered and went to sleep until the late afternoon, which felt absolutely amazing. Completely refreshed. Some people would see waking up at almost 4 int he afternoon a complete disaster, but I see it rather as a great triumph. Finally got out of the apartment and headed to Soga with Nick to see Spider-Man 3 and eat tacos. What’s that, Spider-Man 3? Already!? Yep. And that will deserve it’s own blog post next…

The above title is not some kind of indication that things were going badly, but rather it’s the catch phrase of the now-former head teacher at my school. He and our assistant manager transferred to different schools in March, in turn giving us some co-workers/staff at the school to replace them. This is not including the first replacement assistant manager, actually a friend of mine who some of you know, since she came and went within just a few weeks. There were many reasons, but I think a bit part of it was the fact that Japanese staff at these schools work long hours, get paid terribly, and have pretty much the worst job. But ah well.

So it’s already Monday night, meaning that another weekend has come and gone. This past week was about as uneventful as can be, with the exception of the new co-workers starting. Luckily, they fit in well and things are going good. With the coming and going of teachers, as well as new kids classes starting to coincide with the new semester/year at real schools, my schedule has also been a bit changed. I teach a few extra classes a week, which overall isn’t that much of a pain but of course not too great. Of note are the two new kids classes I have to teach, both of which are middle elementary, meaning I think 3rd and 4th graders. Before this, the youngest kids I taught were 5th graders. Teaching the classes really aren’t that bad; in fact some of them are better/more fun than adult classes, and the kids are definitely better at making jokes. I also now teach Voyage, one of the lowest level classes at the school, which is a bit tough. When teaching people with English that low, you have to slow down to almost a ridiculous speed and also use a lot of gestures and stuff. Imagine Chris Tucker yelling at Jackie Chan in Rush Hour, only I’m the black guy in this situation.

On Saturday night after work we had a Farewell/Welcome party at an izakaya near Goi station, Yushun, which was my first experience of a big school party with a lot of students (over 50) there. It was overall a fun time and better than what I was expecting, even with the official ban on me using Japanese. I’ve gotten really good at hiding the fact that I understand Japanese in front of students. Some students were pretty tricky though and would ask me stuff quickly in Japanese and I would nod or answer in English, but they would know that I at least understood them. Part of this was done on purpose, because it got a pretty funny reaction. Also sometimes I would just tilt my head and be like “huh?” They’d love this because I would give a good few seconds pause before doing it. Sunday was another Sunday Open, which means that I got to spend my entire afternoon at work rather than doing what I would want to be doing on my day off (ie, sleeping). These Sundays Opens are definitely one of the most bogus parts of my job. If my calculations are correct, though, I shouldn’t really have to do these ever again. I wouldn’t be surprised if AEON tries to sneak attack me with one at some point during the summer, though.

Just a few more weeks until Golden Week, the national spring break! A full week to do absolutely nothing.

I’m attempting to cover the highlights of the past two weeks or so, which was pretty much just one weekend (March 24~26).

Ari came to visit Japan about a week and a half ago, beginning his long Asia trip. Bryan was able to take like an entire week off from work, so he came down from Ibaraki 2 weekends ago when Ari got in. First night was spent pretty proper; Umaimonya (旨いもん屋) in Chiba followed by all-night karaoke at Utahiro with those two (Gaijin Voltron) and Blanchard. Everything was going fairly normal at karaoke until the door was opened and hallway singing began again. That was actually fine except for some weird drunk Japanese guy coming in and groping Brian and Bryan (see pic). He later returned a few times to put on terrible songs like Jack Johnson or some other stuff like that. We eventually got rid of him and he never came back.

I don’t know why I try to do all-nighters after waking up at 8AM and working all day on Saturdays, because I always end up getting super tired around 3 or 4AM and fall asleep. Anyway, at 5 we left the karaoke place and Blanchard grabbed a taxi back to his place. Me Ari and Bryan made the painful hike to Chiba station in anticipation of the first train. The post-all-nighter walk to the station wasn’t as bad as in the winter since the weather is warmer now. Unfortunately we were too tired to wait for McDonald’s to open at 6:30 for breakfast, so we grabbed the Uchibo Line back to Goi and crashed on my floor for a few hours.

After only sleeping for about 4 or 5 hours we got up and headed to Makuhari for the “Jumbo Flea Market.” Talk about disappointing. It was only in 1 hall of the Messe, which was actually fairly big, but the things that people were selling were awful. There was an overabundance of womens clothing and socks. None of the bikes, sofas, toys, or video games that I was hoping for. And no samurai swords to send home to my dad. Defeated, still tired, and now hungry, the 3 of us headed back towards Kaihim station. It was also now raining pretty hard, but luckily thanks to the covered walkways we were able to make it all the way from Makuhari Messe to Plena without getting wet until the very last leg, where we had to take a few steps in the rain. Along the way we were trying to decide on what to get to eat, and somehow all got in the mood for omurice (オムライス), which is a weird Japanese dish. It’s pretty much fried rice inside of an omelette, and many times this is then covered by either ketchup, curry sauce, or beef stew. And yes it is delicious.

Spend the day in Makuhari, playing in all 3 arcades and hitting up Carrefour. That night I had company-paid-for dinner with my school staff (thanks to some prize money from the head office or something), and we had decided on going to Taiyourou (太陽樓), that Chinese buffet in Plena. Ari and Bryan headed off to drink with Shin-san and a bunch of other Spring 05 IES kids who were in town for vacation/Kanda grad. Dinner was really good, although I was pretty tired after the previous night and the lack of sleep. After dinner and playing around in some arcades (again) with my co-workers, I headed out to meet up with Shin-san and everyone at a ramen shop in Shin-Narashino. After that we headed back to my place, stopping at Jusco on the way at Inage Kaigan because I thought they would have bath towels for Ari and Bryan to use, since I didn’t have any extras. Since only the grocery store section of Jusco was open at 11PM, they had no bath towels so they guys made due with what they could find: cleaning towels. They each bought a bag of towels to use the next day. Note to self next time I plan on having guests: get some real guest towels.

Monday we slept late and went to Kappa in Hamano for some binge sushi eating. That night was the main event; finally a return to Y’s in Makuhari. I hadn’t been there since August, and for Ari and Bryan it had been even longer. Had reservations at the usual center counter courtesy of an e-mail to Matsushita-san. It was a great time. Had a pretty decent turnout, with Duy and Minami coming and people Bryan invited from Ibaraki. Food and drink was of normal standards, with the fried food, salads, Pocky, Nikka, yakitori, random mystery meat, and the dessert tray near the end that caused every female in the place to jump and race to the buffet. After closing we just loitered outside the Techno Garden for a while before most everyone headed into Tokyo while I went home to crash since I had to work the next morning. All in all a successful Y’s night. If they’re open during Golden Week, I think I’m going to definitely try and organize another.

Most of the week following (March 27~31) was pretty much spent recovering from a long sleep-deprived weekend and also battling a slight cold. Ari and Bryan spent most of the week in Tokyo. Since I can’t really take days off, I unfortunately had to miss all that. This past weekend, however made up for it, since I met up with them again for sakura and also the weirdest festival ever. This post is already way too long, though, so I’ll put it in it’s own blog entry to follow.

It’s already Wednesday night? The weeks seem to pass by pretty quickly. This is both good and bad. Good because work seems to go by fairly painlessly in the long-run, but bad because leisure and weekend time goes by just as quick. I’m also starting to realize that I’m not getting anything done in the long-run. Not that there’s anything pressing at the moment to actually get done.

Last weekend was pretty fun. Mueller and Hoyt flew into Tokyo for the weekend, so I met up with them Saturday night after work. Met in Shibuya at Hachiko, a place which always reminds me just how many foreigners are in Tokyo compared to Chiba. It was good to see some friends from the US, especially ones I haven’t hung out with in a long time. For one reason or another, March seems to be the time to visit Japan, because I have a lot of people coming this month. Unfortunately, it’s times like this that the virtual inability to take days off from work really starts to be a pain. But anyways, I met up with the guys and we went to the Starbucks overlooking Scramble Crossing to hang out. Had fun talking about people we went to high school with, the ridiculous number of people who are (getting) married now, and also trying to think of the most obscure people we could name.

After a lot of loitering, it was time to find somewhere in Shibya to go, so we started walking around looking for a deal and/or a guy on the street with a menu to bargain with. No go, but I accidentally found the Shibuya location of The Lockup, a chain of bar/pubs that are themed on an old school jail or a cave, with dark “cells” for tables, waitresses dressed in cop outfits, and monsters running around with plastic knives. Every once in a while, the monsters are released and “attack” the place, which is funny at least for the first few minutes. Almost immediately after sitting down, there was a monster attack, so it was a pretty entertaining way to start. A lot of the drinks at Lockup are also themed on jails, science experiments, zombies, and random stuff like that. I had no idea what any of the super weird ones were, but we ordered the 電気ショック (Electric Shock), which didn’t have ingredients listed on the menu, but just said it was a “super strong house cocktail.” How bad can it be, right? After we ordered them, the waitress again warned us that it was really strong. Seriously, can’t be that bad, right? Uhh… After they brought the drinks to our table and poured them from the graduated cylinder into the plastic beaker acting as a class, we realized they weren’t kidding. What was listed as the house cocktail ended up being a glass of everclear with 2 ice cubes and a lemon wedge. If a drink ever deserved to be called an Electric Shock, this was it.

After Lockup, searched around for a cheap all-night karaoke place, but unfortunately nothing was as cheap as I was hoping to be able, even after bargaining. Ended up at one of the Shibuya UtaHiro’s, and it was pretty good but not great and not as good as the Chiba UtaHiro I’m used to. My main complaint was that the remote controller and search computer were more ghetto than the current one’s, so it was a little more of a pain to use and didn’t have an English feature for the other guys to use. Overall, it was a good night. After we finished karaoke at 5AM, stopped by McDonalds for the greatest Egg McMuffin I have ever eaten. I was starving after not eating dinner the night before, and random fried foods at Lockup didn’t constitute a meal.

Mueller and Hoyt wanted to go to the Tsukiji fish market, especially since we were already/still up that early, when the market is usually at it’s peak. Sounded like a good idea, and I wanted to eat some of the awesome sushi from near there. I think the market is still open to the public, but just the auction part is now closed to tourists. Either way it didn’t matter, since after we got to Tsukiji Station, completely exhausted from an all-nighter, the station attendant told me the market was closed on Sundays. Ugh. Said goodbye to the guys and headed home, sleeping the entire way back and even sleeping past my station. It was only 1 station past though, so it was an easy backtrack. Slept til the afternoon.

The weather on Monday was amazing; almost 70 degrees Fahrenheit! Rented a bike and rode to D2 to buy some apartment supplies and grabbed lunch at Gusto, which has been renovated since the last time I was there a few months ago. Unfortunately, it’s been remodeled into more of a cafe, so while the interior is nice, the menu is different and they don’t have the Gusto Burger anymore, one of the decent non-fast-food burgers I had found around here. Oh well.