Life in Japan

Stephen versus the Japanese Apartment Key Part I

/ Stephen Tetsu / Leave a comment

So, as I’ve made perfectly clear in just about every post before this one, my life in Japan’s been pretty cushy and awesome thus far.  While the weather’s been cold, it hasn’t been unbearable and, while my utility bills haven’t been cheap, I’m not really spending my money on much else at this point.  That all being said, a few days ago, I had my first Japanese horror story experience (aside from the unfortunate choking baby in the classroom experience, of course), an experience that I shall share with you as follows.  This is the story of the new David and Goliath:  Me and my apartment’s faulty door system.

#@$$ you, mother#!$$er!

#@$$ you, mother#!$$er!

As most anyone who knows me can tell you, I am among the most unorganized, scatterbrained klutzes you will ever meet, somehow skirting the line between being a functional member of society and being one of those people that winds up being on TLC for hoarding newspapers or whatever.  Thus, it should come as a surprise to absolutely no one that I made it halfway back to my apartment from my office before I realized that I left my key sitting in the pocket of my sports coat (I like to leave one of my suits jackets at the office so I don’t have to wear one walkign to and from work everyday- I know, I’m lazy.  Deal with it.).  On any normal day, this would probably mean that I would be S.O.L right there and then as the office would have been locked up and the back entrance to the entire building shuttered for the night (Things tend to close reallllllly early in the not-Tokyo or Osaka parts of Japan).  As luck would have it, however, it was a Saturday, meaning I got to leave the office a half-hour earlier than most of my co-workers, meaning that I managed to slink back into the office and retrieve my key before the school manager shut things down for the night.

I bet at this point most of y’all are wondering what the big deal is with all this.  “Why is this even a blog post, Stephen?” you ask, one furtive brow furrowed in disgust at the minute of your time wasted on the previous two paragraphs.  “You got your key back before you got locked out of your office, dude.  What’s the big deal?”

The answer: Yes, I got my key.  But that didn’t prevent me from getting locked out of my apartment anyways.  You see, this being ultra-modern Japan, my apartment company couldn’t just settle for a normal phallic shove-it-in-and-turn key like the rest of the world.  No, they had to go all twenty-first century on our asses and equip each and every one of the apartments in their vast empire (some 60,000 rooms in all) with a hotel-style key-card system.  Sure this sounds cool and dandy on paper but, as anyone who has ever stayed at a hotel with a guy at the front desk who isn’t a meth-head can tell you, key-cards maybe the single faultiest product of human innovation since Caveman Jack invented the square wheel.  Seriously, for something created to make locking and unlocking things easier, having to re-insert your key-card twenty times until the door finally registers it and lets you inside sure is time consuming.  But since this is ultra-modern Japan (the 1980’s version of the future), they couldn’t just stop there.  No, my apartment lock combines the best of both words: electronic key coding AND turning things.  In other words, my door is malfunction/ pain-in-the-ass paradise as I unfortunately found out on Saturday.

I got home around 7:30, my innocence still intact, blissfully unaware of the ordeal to follow.  My first attempt at opening my door was met with mild amusement.  “Must’ve put the key in the wrong way,” I mumbled to myself, still thinking about what I wanted to eat for dinner.  So I tried it again.  And again.  By that point, I was pretty damn sure I was sticking the stupid piece of crap in there the way the apartment people had told me to.  Maybe I just wasn’t putting the key in fast enough.  Yeah, that’s the ticket.

So I tried again.  And again.  And again.  Panic began to set in.  Even though it was below freezing outside, I could feel the nervous sweat welling up in my pores.  Where could I go?  What could I do?  It was a Saturday, was the apartment company even open on the weekends?  How about a place to stay?  Was I going to have to break the bank to get a hotel room for the night?  With the Kairakuen Plum Festival season in full bloom was there even going to be a room available.  Doomsday scenarios poured through my head lift mental diarrhea.  I was screwed, S.O.L.

Thankfully, that was the point where my hoarder tendencies finally came through.  (See mom?  I told you me keeping every single scrap of paper ever given to me would pay off one day!)  Buried deep within the recesses of my book bag was a crumpled copy of my initial lease agreement and on it my potential salvation: the phone number of the company’s national trouble line.

Maybe, just maybe, I’d be sleeping in my own bed after all.  Hope sprang eternal once again.

HOPE!

HOPE!

But, as with everything, life had a few more dog turds to throw in my path…

TO BE CONTINUED

3/11: Three Years Later (A Newcomer’s View: The Meaning of 頑張る)

/ Stephen Tetsu / 2 Comments
The rallying cry of an entire nation

The rallying cry of an entire nation

Three years ago around this time, the lives of millions of people living along the entire northeastern side of Japan changed forever.  Only a few kilometers east of where I sit today, tsunami waves ravaged coastal communities, obliterating centuries worth of traditions and family businesses in the blink of an eye.  Several dozen kilometers north of me, the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Plant would also be hit by massive waves that reached a reported 133 feet high in some areas, setting off a chain of events that have removed thousands of people from their long-standing homes in its radius.  Even today, more than 267,000 people remain displaced by the events of March 11th, 2011, many residents of communities that no longer exist after being swallowed whole by the churning arms of the angry sea.

Living where I do, between the greater Tokyo community and Tohoku, I am placed in the interesting position of being in a place that was spared of much of the earthquake’s wrath but one that has still suffered much of its psychological damage, affected by the disaster nevertheless.  One of my co-workers is originally from Fukushima but moved for the sake of his young family following the aftermath of the nuclear disaster.  But a short train ride away, the coastal port town of Oarai is struggling to return to normal after being hit by the tsunami (though it was further down the coast than the hardest hit areas,  the town was still hit with a considerable amount of water).  Many of you may have seen images of a whirlpool in a harbor from that day.  That harbor was Oarai.

Oarai, Ibaraki Prefecture shortly after being hit by the March 11th tsunami. (photo credit: Kyodo)

Oarai, Ibaraki Prefecture shortly after being hit by the March 11th tsunami. (photo credit: Kyodo)

But only an one hour train ride away is Fukushima prefecture, a name that has now become synonymous with nuclear disasters and radiation leaks but was even ravaged more by waves of biblical proportions that ripped out the hearts of entire communities with unwavering cruelty.  The train line that once ran from Tokyo, through Mito and Fukushima, to Sendai in the heart of the northeast now effectively stops at the border between Ibaraki and Fukushima, the tracks from that point on either washed away or smack-dab in the middle of a nuclear exclusion zone.

I ride this train ever week just about an hour from where this picture was taken.

I ride this train ever week just about an hour from where this picture was taken. (Kyodo)

Almost everywhere I look, I can see banners, signs, flyers, ads, streamers all sporting the same message: 「がんばっぺ茨城」 (ganbappe Ibaraki).  がんばっぺ, or it’s more common form がんばれ, is an interesting phrase in that while there are various ways people can translate it into English, there’s really no term in English that really comes close to capture it’s meaning.  I’ve seen がんばれ translated as “fight” (Keep fighting, Ibaraki!), “keep at it”, “do your best”, and various other forward momentum terms for putting 120% of one’s effort into doing something but none of them really seem to come close to the Japanese word, no matter how many syntactic hoops one jumps through.  So I could try to tell people in Tohoku, Ibaraki, and all of Japan to keep on fighting and to keep on keeping on, but, at the end of the day, がんばれ is all that needs to be said.  And that’s the mentality here and all across the northeastern portion of Japan I now seem to call home.  Something terrible happened but there’s nothing to do but keep がんばれ-ing until those terrible days have somehow vanished from the land.

People don’t seem to smile here as much as they should.  And after what they’ve had to go through, who can blame them?  In many ways, the March 11th earthquake signified the end of a way of life for the people of Tohoku.  While most of the international media world has decidedly turned its eye from the plight of the survivors of the earthquake save for the occasional nuclear meltdown fear-mongering, people are still struggling to this day.  Over 11,000 people were killed that day, thousands more still missing.  The number of stress-related deaths attributed to 3/11 has increased year by year.  Over 267,000 people remain refugees, countless more have been forced to move away from the long-time familial homelands.  Entire cities remain empty or washed away in the North, many never to be populated again.  It’s all enough to make someone’s head spin.  Millions of lives changed forever in the blink of an eye.  Think about that next time you complain because you can’t find a parking spot at Walmart or you have to wait ten minutes in line before you can order your triple-milk soy latte from Starbucks.

Having moved here only four months ago, I did not have to experience those terrible days after the earthquake and tsunami, the uncertainty of the fates of those that I love, the despair when someone dear never came home, the ache of a hometown lost, never to return again.  The worst thing that almost happened to my hometown was our basketball team leaving.  In other words, I will never be able to comprehend the events that continue to rock Tohoku.  I can’t relate to their sadness so all I can try to do is make them smile.  A foolish sentiment maybe, but one that increasingly drives me forward.  I want to see people laugh.  I want people to forget the troubles of their life if only for one fleeting moment.

Today is a day to be thankful for the lives that we do have, to be thankful that our loved ones are safe and sound, to be thankful for the roofs over our heads, the clothes on our back, the times we laugh when something funny happens.  Today is a day to remind ourselves of those people who unfortunately cannot do the same, a day to keep the victims of one of the worst natural disasters the world has ever seen in our hearts.  Today is a day to remember to take a page out of the Tohoku playbook.  When things are rough, when times are dark, grit your teeth, tighten your belt, lace up your work boots, and がんばれ like it’s the last thing you’ll ever do.  Maybe you’ll even learn something in the process.

Kamiashi in Iwate-ken in 2011 and 2014

Kamiashi in Iwate Prefecture in 2011 and 2014 (Kyodo)

Oh hey, I have a blog still.

/ Stephen Tetsu / Leave a comment

Howdy do, folks.  Sorry for the complete and utter lack of updates and posts over the past couple of weeks, work’s been busier for reasons that I don’t really want to get into, I’ve gone through a weird bit of soul-searching and all that jazz, and honestly I haven’t really found there to be anything that I really have wanted to write about for a while.

It’s been a cold year.  On Friday, I went down to Tokyo to meet up with some friends (more specifically the founders and operators) from my days working at SCOA and promptly got snowed on.  According to the news, this is a once in thirty year thing since the middle of March is typically spring flower blossom viewing season.  With temperatures that usually go below freezing at night, I’m fairly certain that the Japanese climate just hates me and wants me to leave.  Feh.  Good luck with that, buddy.

Life’s been good here in Japan.  Aside from an unfortunate apartment key incident (something that I will go into in greater detail at a later date), it’s been relatively smooth sailing.  Sure there’s no Mexican food here and my utility bills are astronomical but when those are your biggest issues in life, you really have no room to complain.

Anyways, life’s been good to me so far but that doesn’t ever really stop someone from striving for something more.  I like my job (aside from the hours and the typical stuff that comes up in one of these contract English instructor jobs) but I don’t really want to be doing this forever.  So I’ve been looking at other avenues.  I’m a performer, a storyteller… okay, maybe just an attention whore, at heart.  I love entertaining people.  I also like being weird.  And maybe that’s about as deep into the subject as I’m going to get for now.  Maybe I missed all the deadlines this year but 2015 lies ahead.  There’s no use in never trying.  Things may end up being more uncomfortable for me but weird hours, corporate teaching, and 250,000 yen a month (minus pension, health insurance costs [Thanks Japanese Obama], and company union fees, so really 200,00 yen a month) isn’t my ultimate end goal.

Everything I do from now on is going to be in anticipation of the next year.  I need to improve my Japanese speaking ability (I’m good enough to talk to a locksmith but I want more), I need to stop relying on my dictionary for every other kanji I don’t know how to read.  I need to improve my sleep schedule.  And most of all, I need to starting being a creator once again.

Sorry if this is all sounding a bit cryptic but one never knows who might be reading these things.

Now that I’m all settled into my life in Japan, complacency must be avoided at all costs.  I think I have  a goal now, just gotta start running the race.

Anyways, find me on all the usual avenues: Twitter, Youtube, Japanese Twitter, Japanese Youtube, Instagram, all that jazz.  I’m pretty bored at work most of the time so I’ll probably reverse stalk you in return.

-Stephen

Stephen Eats Weird(ish) Japan: Mountain Dew Cheetos

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Got a doozy for you guys tonight.  If you’re like me and have lived the typical life of a 18-24 year old American, you have revelled in many a night of eating way unhealthily and generally being up to absolutely no good.  In other words, there were many Cheetos and Mountain Dew type nights.  Well, in that case, I’ve got great/terrible news for you:  In Japan, some genius marketing department has decided to combine the two into one gloriously disturbing package.

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Behold, the chalice of misery

Me being the nice guy that I am, I decided to take one for the team and sample this strange exotic delicacy.  The result will not surprise anyone with any rational thinking skills:

It was absolutely disgusting, plain and simple.  While texturally Cheetos-y, the flavor of the corn puffs simply screamed “chemical disaster!”  I’d imagine that the genesis of this latest Japanese masterpiece was that one day a janitor at the Frito-Lays plant accidentally dumped his mop water into a vat of otherwise normal Cheetos and thus forced an entire nation to endure a simply dreadful snacking experience.

On the Mount Rushmore of arbitrary Japanese ingenuity, Mountain Dew Cheetos go up next to kendamas, washlets, and robot dogs.  The Mount Rushmore of arbitrary Japanese ingenuity would then promptly implode, leaving nothing but odd vaguely Mountain Dew-ey Cheetos dust in its wake.

If you encounter a cup of these things in a dark alley, I’d suggest that you run.  Run as fast as your stubby legs can take you.  And don’t look back.

-STEPHEN

 

Living in Japan: Do you have your papers?

/ Stephen Tetsu / 4 Comments

So I’ve been living in Japan for a good while now so I think that it’s safe to say that if America is becoming a paperless society, then Japan is probably a society with some long standing vendetta against trees. In the past four months, I have been presented with more miscellaneous forms, files, official documents, and records than in the rest of my life combined. Rest assured, if you do anything in Japan, there’s probably some sort of form for it in a random office somewhere.

Yes, Japan is meticulously organized. But sometimes there is such a thing as being too organized. Now obviously a lot of the papers in my situation have to do with the fact that I’m a twenty-two year old Japanese citizen who pretty much blipped back onto the Japanese radar after twenty years of living abroad. That said, I have heard horror stories from both gaijin (foreigners) and Japanese citizens alike about the struggles of completing the requisite papers needed to set up a life in Japan.

Now my Japanese reading skills are far from perfect but the Japanese used on these documents is usually (a) very official (read: confusing) and (b) filled with kanji combinations and characters heretofore unused in modern Japan unless your job is reading these forms. When you open up an envelope and see a solid string of ten elaborate Chinese characters typed across the top in bold letters, you know you’re in for a fun night.

So if you’re interested in living in Japan, just beware the papers. I know Kafka was writing about German bureaucracy but I’m pretty sure he meant Japan. So brush up on those oft unused kanji. Or marry a Japanese person the second you get off the plane. Either way, have fun.

-Stephen

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Stephen Eats Weird(ish) Japan: Special Valentine’s Day Edition!

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It’s another stormy, cold day in Mito, which of course means I’m spending all my time indoors.  Additionally, it happens to be Valentine’s Day, something which I usually just ignore.  But fret not, the conditions were perfect for a special Valentine’s Day Edition of Stephen Eats Weird(ish) Japan.  Dashing into my nearest convenience store (pretty sure I deserve some sort of frequent buyer discount considering all the stuff I buy from them), I scoured the sweets aisle for something interesting to eat that is also somewhat related to the choclatiest holiday of the year and found these two beauts.

booze chocos

Two different kinds of chocolate with alcohol contained inside them without any sort of marker denoting that fact (in other words, “Hey kids, wanna get drunk?”).  I’m pretty sure Americans would lose their poo if that were the case in US convenience stores.    One caveat/ potential kid deterrent is the price point.  At 300 yen, the chocolates cost roughly 200 yen (2 dollars) more than your typical bar of convenience store chocolate, probably because of the booze, though you couldn’t tell from the taste.

So in order to make the video taste test more palatable (pun intended) for the casual Youtube viewer, I have split the Valentine’s Special into two exciting parts.

In the first part, I test out the Rummy chocolate, containing, you guessed it, rum soaked raisins in a relatively normal bar of chocolate.  Sounds alright right?  Watch to see what I thought of it:

 

Then, in the second part, I tried out the green Bacchus bar, containing what was supposedly cognac but really tasted more like rubbing alcohol mixed with hand sanitizer.  The chocolate itself was alright if not more heat resistant than normal chocolate in order to keep the liquid alcohol encased inside.

 

So overall, the Rummy beat out the Bacchus in the booze chocolate Olympics.  If you’re in Japan and in a relationship with an alcoholic, you finally have a chocolate to get him.  Then again, Valentine’s Day is over in half an hour so you should probably get right on that or just buy some to give next year.  If you want to tell your significant other you’re breaking up with him or her, then the Bacchus chocolate is for you.  Nothing says “This relationship is over” more than chocolate with rubbing alcohol inside it.  That said, I can’t seem to stop eating it even though it’s probably burning a hole in my stomach.

With that, I wish you all a Happy Valentine’s Day and I hope all you chicks are getting your loves chocolate like any self-respecting Japanese girl.  (I could get started on the intricacies of Japanese Valentine’s Day but that’s practically an entire book’s worth of stuff.)  Anyways, feel free to contact me through the comments section either here or on YouTube or hit me up on Twitter.  I’m pretty bored most of the time so I’ll probably get back to you about a second after you post, maybe even a second before if it’s a real slow day.

Happy headhunting!

-STEPHEN

Boozy Japanese Chocolates! アルコール入りチョコ

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Ate an entire bag of hangover cure corn things in preparation for tonight’s Weird(ish) Food: boozy chocolates!

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Wish me luck!!

Stephen Eats Weird(ish) Japan: Hangover Cure Tandoori Chicken Corn Snacks

/ Stephen Tetsu / 1 Comment

So as I reported earlier, I bought a bag of a peculiar hangover cure-turned-snack-food-concoction from my local conbini (short for convenience store, don’t you know?).  Today, well technically yesterday since it’s currently two in the morning, I finally got around to tasting it.  Anyways, the video of me actively tasting it is as follows:

So after the relative high of the warm and rich Hokkaido Potato Buns, I was met with a resounding meh from the hangover crisps.  They weren’t bad per se but they weren’t all that awesome really, pretty much just weird Cheetos with an aftertaste and not much of the promised tandoori chicken flavor.

Now is this snack effective in warding off alcohol-induced pain? I don’t know… Can plain Cheetos cure a hangover?  If they can, then the answer is probably yes.  If not, well…

Anyways, I’ve got one other food item lined up for Stephen Eats Weird(ish) Food then I’ve either got to start looking for more stuff or simply wait for the next cycle of fresh funky flavors out of the Japanese food conglomerates.  (Japanese convenience stores usually rotate their special flavors of items every month or so but it usually seems like a day.)  If any of you, my faithful readers, have any suggestions for stuff I should eat or questions about Japan in general (“Will Fukushima radiation give you wings?”), hit me up in the comments section here or on youtube or you can reach me on Twitter @STEPHEN TETSU.  Things will only get better if you guys pitch in because I sure as hell don’t have the talent of skills to make this crap any good.

-Stephen

PS Ukon no Chikara is meant to be ingested before the night of drinking so that the turmeric (the main ingredient in the magic elixir) can kick in before the booze wreaks havoc on your insides.  I’m assuming that the situation is the same with the corn snacks as well.

A tandoori chicken flavored hangover cure?

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Found this in my local convenience store. Ukon no Chikara is a Japanese supplement that supposedly prevents any hangovers if consumed before a night of hard drinking.

What you see here is apparently Ukon no Chikara turned into a Cheetos-type corn snack. Additionally, Japanese snack food rules dictate that it must also be tandoori chicken flavored.

This could be awful

Expect the video taste test up in a few days. Until then, pray this stuff doesn’t kill me.

My suits are smelly and so are yours. (Or how I learned to stop worrying and love the Japanese fragrant suit spray)

/ Stephen Tetsu / Leave a comment

So this job of mine requires me to be in full business attire all day everyday, full business attire being dress shirt, tie, sports coat and all the dressings.  Coming from the laid-back casual business culture of California, this has been probably the biggest adjustment for me in my move to Japan.  Not only have I had to abandon my beloved shorts and sandals (which are impractical during Mito’s cold winters anyways) but I’ve had to come in to work dressed like a big boy everyday.

At first this was a bit of a problem because, let’s face it, I’m anything but a fashionable guy (my idea of being stylish is throwing on the most random colors possible and calling it a day or dressing like Eddie Vedder circa 1995).  I could figure out the whole button-down shirt and slacks part because I’d worn those things before but when it came to ties, I was way out of my league.

Ties

When the day of my first job interview came, I actually had my mom tie my tie for me.  When the day was through, I simply loosened the tie and slipped it over my head and then reapplied it whenever necessary.  Practical and a sign that I’m obviously a genius? Yes.  A major stepping stone on my journery to full-fledged adulthood?  Not in the least bit.

The obvious drawback of my brilliant strategy was that all hell would break loose if my tie, in some horrible accident, happened to come untied.  Unfortunately for me, that happened before I even started packing for my move when, after a job interview, I absentmindedly fiddled with the thing around my neck and doomed myself to a life of tie tying and not being a total slob.

It hasn’t been easy.  It took me a good three hours to tie a tie by myself for the very first time and that came after hours upon hours of watching how-to videos on YouTube (note: Most how-to videos on the internet suck).  And even with that knowledge in hand, it still took me hours upon hours of practice to make my simple rudimentary knot not look like a pile of dog poo.  Even now, I still can only put my tie together in the most rudimentary of ways without it looking like a three year old tried to do it.

In other words, don’t expect me to be tying a foofy Chesterton Quadruple-Windsor knot anytime soon.  That stuff is way out of my league.

One thing that I have been able to do though is chose ridiculous colors for my ties.  Inspired by a binge viewing of Colin Baker-era Doctor Who, I was compelled to start wearing the most brilliantly obnoxious colors I could find.  Since my company is so stringent when it comes to its dress code, my ties are pretty much all I can get away with (and a lot of my students seem to like it, so there.)  Thus far, my bizarre tie collection only consists of a brilliantly puke-lime green tie with orange, blue, and white stripes (my go-to) and a milder tie with a pattern of what appears to be a picture of belts on it.  As time goes on, I certainly want to add to this collection because I am currently declaring war on your eyes.  And, honeslty, I kinda feel naked without a tie on now.  (No comment as to whether or not I wear one to bed.)

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Watch out (insert famously fashionable celebrity here), I’m coming for you.

Suits

The concept of suits still confuses me.  “Here’s a jacket.  Just don’t wear it when you’re outside too much or you might ruin it.”  What is it about a sports coat or suit jacket that makes so much nicer than any other form of clothing?  Is it the fact that it’s intentionally missing buttons?  Maybe it’s the fact that you can’t throw it in the washing machine lest you want to waste three hundred dollars.

And yet, we have to wear them every single day.  I guess it makes us look professional.  I’m not sure.

What I am sure of though is that whoever these suits were actually designed for does not have the same shaped arms as me.  “The armholes go a half foot under where the shoulders are, right?”

Of course all of my suit problems may just be a result of the cheapness of the wares in question.  When all of your suit jackets have been purchased through clearance or sale, you’re bound to encounter some quality issues.

And since you can’t wash them, your suit jackets wind up smelling like wet dog turds by the second month in and you start having to sit in the corner of the office so as to not inconvenience your co-workers with your rotting stench.

Thankfully, the Japanese are big on clothing spray so your jacket can smell like a field of daffodils with a few swishes of the spray bottle. (As to whether or not spraying your suit makes it smell better, I plead the fifth.)

The Verdict

Overall, I’m enjoying the whole businesswear thing more than I thought I would.  It makes me feel accomplished and dapper and those are modest victories in my book.  Plus my new-found love for awful ties allows me to still be weird without being overly obnoxious (ha!).

In other words, now I’m an adult… but not really.

-Stephen

PS, go ahead and stalk me on the social medias and stuff if you’d like.  Hell, go ahead and dislike every single one of my videos on YouTube for all I care.

PPS, any thoughts, questions, or declarative statements?  Feel free to send them to me via the comments section here OR on twitter (@STEPHEN_TETSU).  I will respond to them.  Believe me.  I have absolutely nothing better to do.  At all.  At.  All.