"Zoe's Birthday"

Wednesday night there were celebrations for Zoe's birthday. Zoe's the British girl from orientation. About fifteen of us went to a 280 bar and later to karaoke. This was my first time in karaoke in Japan and I should say that I'm disappointed in both the price and my singing. Karaoke's probably the most popular entertainment activity in Japan, though I've decided that if I do it again, I'd much rather do it with Japanese people (rather than British people) who I might be able to convince that "this is how the song is supposed to sound".

After growing tired of the karaoke room, Mark and I decided to explore the enormous karaoke building and made our way up through dark floors of rooms that weren't being used. It was kind of like being in an abandoned castle that has Ferrari- and soccer-themed rooms. We made our way up to exploring the attic and actually found our way onto the roof, which was pretty exciting.


"Run-in With the Law"

A funny thing happened on my bikeride to the train station yesterday. As I weaved through the narrow streets near the train tracks, a man in some kind of official-looking jacket began biking alongside me and starting telling me to do something in Japanese. I didn't know what he was saying, but it was pretty obvious that he wanted me to pull over.

I had been advised that, when dealing with the authority here, it's much easier to just pretend you speak absolutely no Japanese than to try to work things out since htey'll usually just give up, but he and I stopped and explained that I couldn't speak Japanese. He continued to interrogate me in Japanese, but I just kept the puzzled look on my face and replied in quick, confused-sounding English.

He then pulled out a police badge and asked me for my passport. I patted my pockets with a look on my face saying "Ooh, sorry, I don't have it", and he nodded. "Gaijin Card!" he ordered. Apparently, at all times foreigners have to carry around with them either their passport or gaijin card (alien registration card) for curious policemen. I pulled out my gaijin card and showed it to him. He examined it closely, then his eyes lit up, "Nova!!" he exclaimed with a smile. I guess it says where I work on my card. He decided to let me go, but warned me to keep that card on me.

I later asked my students what all that was about, as in why would they just come up to me randomly while I was obviously on my way to work just to hassle me for identification. I didn't really get a straight answer, but they didn't seem to think that targeting foreigners for this type of ID-checking was anything unusual.

A similar thing happened to me back in Rome in the summer. Sarah and I were meeting with a group of backpackers and some guides to go on an evening tour and pub crawl and met by some fountain. There was a couple standing nearby who I noticed were staring at us suspiciously. They started to walk away, but then threw on police vests and jogged over to us. They asked to see all of our ID and when they found out that our American guides were in charge, they threw them in a police car and drove away. There were people from across the fountain laughing and filiming us with video cameras. So there we were, about 15 backpackers from around the world, just standing there, not understanding what was going on and waiting for them to bring our guides back. After about ten minutes we gave up and just raided a liquor store and went to drink in Campo di Fiori square and it ended up being one of the most fun nights of the trip. This story has gotten way off-topic.


"Water Troubles"

Today, in the middle of my afternoon shower, with my hair full of conditioner, the water just stopped. We had been getting notices for a number of weeks with the date 1/27 on it, but couldn't figure out what it meant. But I think I figured it out... it was "no water" day. So I made my way to the sinks and was able to use the remnants in the tap to rinse out my hair. But it was still annoying. Since I didn't have the chance to shave, today's going to be my first day without, as Nova calls it, "excellent appearance".


"Let's Misuse English Words"

***Japan Topics***
TOPIC #2: The word "let's"

Since I arrived here, I've noticed one main things with the English of advertising: the excessive use of the word "let's". You see, Japanese is full of little word-endings and gimmicks to make the phrase sound more polite. With English's lack of politeness, Japanese-speakers scramble to find words to make it all sound less confrontational. Here's where "let's" comes in.

In my first week here, I went to a restaurant. The waiter who sat me, struggling to put together a sentence in English, said: "Let's sit down!!" and motioned towards a table. "Let's!" I agreed, but he didn't come sit with me. Instead, he just kept working as if he'd never even made the offer.

But then I started hearing and seeing this word all over the place. The big photo machines at Yodobashi Camera, for example, have the big catch-phrase "Let's Photo!". I'm attaching a picture of a fun-sounding restaurant sign in Shinsaibashi:



Another word that seems to be overused is "corner". Back on my quest to find a towel in November, I was confused by having been directed by numerous storeclerks to go to "___ corner" (such as "second floor sporting goods corner") and find that the area that they described had nothing to do with a corner. I still haven't figured out if this is some kind of direct-translation issue.

Time for work again. It's Friday, but I'm not moving into much of a weekend... I've agreed to take Lee's all-day shift Sunday in exchange for him taking mine at the end of next month and a little extra cash. Talk to you soon,

Ryan