I don't know where else I would see this.
Thursday, June 19, 2008
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
Thursday, June 12, 2008
Wafting through Hong Kong
So now I've been to China. Or at least a bit of China. Hong Kong specifically. KL was there for work and I had nothing to do so after a moderately priced ticket was found, I hopped on a plane and flew the 4 hours it takes to go from Japan to the Motherland of all Asian languages.
There are stereotypes about China and the Chinese. Some of those you may have heard before, painted with that unflattering, broad brush of ignorance: that the Chinese are a loud, rude, spitting, smoking, pushy, yet somehow an extremely entrepreneurial people. I, unfortunately, have to agree, especially coming from Tokyo, Japan. If you paint with that same broad brush in describing Japan, you would say the Japanese are a stoic, busy, quiet, respectful, harsh, and extremely organized people. They don't really talk when they walk the streets of the city. The Japanese subway has got to be the quietest metro system on the entire planet. There are signs on all the trains telling you not to use your mobile except in assigned spaces at the ends of a train-car. It is not that way in China. The Chinese talk, yell, laugh, complain, cough, and generally make as much noise as possible at all times. Don't go for the solitude.
I got off the plane and KL was waiting for me. What a sight for sore ears. She spoke English to me! I have not yet found the beauty that probably resides in the Chinese language. It's a hidden beauty… deeply hidden. There are gargantuan amounts of "tsu schwan, tings zows, and ching dows". It just doesn't sound "pretty" to my Anglo ears.
As for the industrious stereotype of the Chinese people… well, it does seem like as a whole, they are always on the make. They will make money… period. Do not underestimate them. It seems like the country already makes all of the world's goods, and they want more. Now to get themselves up to the top of the world in manufacturing, they have let the natural beauty of their land go to shit. Absolute shit. Hong Kong does not see the sun anymore. I never saw it during my four days there. Not a peek. What you see on a supposedly sunny day is a lighter grey sky. Possibly a thinner amount of smog, but there's always the omnipresent smog hiding the sun. And my, oh my, do they ship. On the wonderful airport express metro you go right by one of the shipping centers. That port has more goods in one place than I have ever seen in my entire life: stacks and stacks of orange, red, and green metal containers waiting to be loaded on an endless line of cargo ships.
After the easy and smooth ride of the airport express (I think Hong Kong's metro is the easiest to use that I have ever encountered… in the US and abroad. Just a wonderfully designed and executed mass transit system), we hopped into a taxi. They look much like the taxis in Japan. They are Toyotas and you don't open the door, the cabbie opens the door for you. But once you are in the car, you see the difference. White gloves do not adorn the hands of these men, and there is crap everywhere inside these cars. I would gladly eat off of almost any surface in a Japanese taxicab. I shudder to think the last time the Chinese taxicabs I rode in were cleaned. And they are not comfortable. For some reason the same car in both countries ride very differently. You feel a bit pampered in the Japanese taxi. I felt a bit carsick in the Chinese taxi. There is more movement… like you're riding on broken shocks or the seats have broken springs.
Fighting back the nausea, we finally made it to the hotel. Locals don't stay at this hotel, I'm told, because it is next to a funeral home. I don't mind the funerary proximity as long as the bed is comfortable and price is right. But I did find something that I do mind: the smell around the hotel. Or should I say, stench. Exiting the jolting cocoon of the cab, the scent of Hong Kong hit me. Do you like Chinese food? I do not. I will not eat it in a house. I will not eat it with a mouse. I do not like the food. I do not like the sight. I do not like the texture. But what we're talking about here is the smell. The sickly sweet smell of sauce sloshed on, in, and under food that has been seared, baked, and usually fried. That is the first thing you notice about this particular aroma. Hold that thought of all the good smells you’ve encountered in a Chinese restaurant and then move that smell into the category you reserve for "old" odors. The saucy smell of this city has been sitting out in the open, hot, and humid air for quite awhile. It's like what happens when you forget about fast food in the backseat of your car and let it sit there baking in the summer sun for hours. That type of aged and mushroomed fragrance is the base of all sniffs your proboscis shall sniff in Hong Kong. But it’s not french-fries that begin this perfume; it is the aforementioned whiffs from food prepared by and for a Chinese population. Now add garbage and pollution from this people-packed place. The holy triumvirate of fetid odor. It does not go away. This bouquet is the exhalation from the city of Hong Kong.
Right, so now we've covered what it smells like. Not pleasant for me, but you may love it. We'll move on to the sights of the city. Hong Kong is not the paradise of Asian architecture an Anglo brought up on Kung Fu movies would expect. In fact, I don't know where that place is. I have not found it except in celluloid. Hong Kong looks like Chicago. There are huuuuuuge housing project / Cabrini Green-type buildings rising all over the place. And they are either grey, brown, or horrible faded pastel greens, pinks, blues, and yellows. I later found out each apartment in said homely edifice is worth about one million US dollars. I am not shitting you. Hong Kong is made on and of money.
"Sure the outside is ugly. The landlords don't care about upkeep. They care about the rent, but the inside is completely different. You can do whatever you want with the inside of your apartment. I've been in some really nice apartments over there," our guide explains one night. And I'm not saying it all looks like that, oh no. There are plenty of resplendent glass-encased buildings on the shore, great big things that glint faintly in the smoggy day haze. You just don't appreciate these architectural marvels because they are right next to the structures that scream housing project. And this city is building on top of itself. There are roads that corkscrew up and over while others take you just under the shadow of the rising hills. I fear they would all come a tumblin' down if the plates moved under this city on the sea, just like the massive 7.9 quake did to mainland China.
That night, we ventured out to the streets to see what a bar, bistro, and the midnight ball is like on this side of the Pacific. Picture Buckhead in Atlanta, River Street in Savannah, the French Quarter in New Orleans, or Sunset Boulevard in LA, and you have a good idea what the "nightlife" is like. There are quite a few pubs (it was a British colony after all), a few streets full of brightly lit neon bars, several cheesy restaurants, many upscale cantinas, and a few hidden private clubs that contain a hidden fee. You have to join these places to partake in their beverages or pay upfront at the door. Very velvet rope-ish.
We had a tour guide who was as knowledgeable as she was beautiful. She had to "buy-in" to the bar to own the privilege of paying to drink there. The policy keeps out the riff-raff, and you notice immediately the club itself is dressed to impress. Dark rich colors are everywhere. Chairs and couches are decked out in soft felts and strong leathers. Actual chains hang from the ceilings to metallically separate you from the other well-to-drinkers a few feet away. There are couches that you reserve instead of table. And if you so happen to be resting your keister there when the owner of that booth shows up to do their drinking you are requested to move from. Oh, did I mention there is a fish tank full of sharks? Yup. Sho nuff. Actual living breathing terror of the deeps. They aren't the great white version, but they're there.
So what do we do in this one name anything-but-a-dive? We have a bottle of champagne. Of course. Don't know if I have ever ordered a bottle on champagne outside of a strip club. But while the sharks twisted and glared I helped drink that bottle dry. (I’m talking about the bar in Hong Kong silly, not the strip club) Finally the pulsating music rose to such a clamor I could not hear or be heard. So sharks or no, we left for calmer environs.
This bar had green lighting and was plenty ready to pour shot after shot down our eager gullets. Again, they turned the volume up to 11. Get it. It only goes up to 10. It was 11. My clothes were literally vibrating as the beat went BOOM-badda-BOOM-badda-BOOM. To stay in these taverns long when you have already seen the better years of 30 slink away behind you, there is something vital to incorporate… booze. I found my way to the right liquid volume of alcohol and all of a sudden the audible volume, nor the heat, nor the constant bumping of others, seemed like such a bother. So Hong Kong's nightlife is basically like the nightlife everywhere. There are just a lot more “tings zows and ching dows”.
Upon awaking the next… afternoon, I encountered a sight I did not expect. It was the Sunday habits of the Filipino people who fill the same slot Mexicans fill in the United States. Filipinos do all of the menial jobs the Chinese don't want to do, so all of the housework, lawn work, etc, is performed by these immigrants, we were told by our tour guide. And Sunday is their one and only day off. So they physically litter the streets and overpasses with themselves. Everywhere you walked the day before in downtown Hong Kong is now awash with Filipinos. Not walking, mind you. They picnic on the walkways you use to navigate over the busy streets below. And they come with props! There are hundreds, if not thousands, of people sitting, eating, playing games, listening to radios, talking, looking over the latest thing they just bought, and they are all sitting on flattened cardboard boxes instead of picnic blankets. Where did they get these boxes? I do not know. I don't know if they brought them or if an enterprising young man sells them at the corner of every picnic sight. It's like a population of a hundred thousand homeless people exploded all over the downtown area in the space of one day. Then the next day they are gone. Nothing is left but the trash. Oh, and the smell.
The rain came to Hong Kong while I was there, water falling from the sky. In my mind, that water brings a new beginning, everything washed and new again. But not here. In Hong Kong, it was gray water falling from a gray sky. There did not seem to be the same restorative effects of H bonded with 2 O’s. KL and I were in a market looking for knick-knacks as the sky opened. Besides the various assortments of sex toys being sold on the street by 4 foot, 10 inch little old ladies (I am not kidding you), most everything in the market was crap. But if you look long enough you can usually find that one thing that speaks to you about the place you are, the experience you’ve had, and way you want to show that to other people. KL found three leather-bound notebooks. One is a small thought book with a snap and a dragon, one has The Chairman adorning the cover, and the last is the big brother of the first. I found two lighters. They aren’t good lighters, but they both have The Chairman and several Chinese characters.
As the rain came down, I asked how much I would have to part with to take these small treasures home. “8 dollar. 8 dollar,” is what I was told.
“Well, how much for two of them? I’ll give you 12 dollars,” I said.
He looked at me with a little disgust. “16 dollar for two. No bargain. No bargain here. We no bargain.”
With an “OK,” I began to walk off. He came around very quickly. I don’t know if it was a product of my bold haggling techniques or if it was because the rain promised not many more people would be out today looking for tacky lighters. But he grabbed my shoulder and sighed, “OK, OK, 12 dollar.”
Thursday, May 29, 2008
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
Friday, May 9, 2008
Apartment Hunting in Japan - Part 3
We stayed in corporate housing for the next month waiting on our furniture to make its voyage across the sea. No reason to move in if you have to sleep on the floor. When the boxes arrive it will be my job to unpack and get the house in a livable condition. It is one of the main reasons K.L. has brought me along. She will go out and work while I do the heavy lifting. I am not avidly looking for work until the move is over. So I wait. And I enjoy the wait. Japan is a fascinating place.
One of my hobbies is checking my email. I’ve gotten really good at it. Just takes a few clicks and wham-o I’m there. On this day there is an email from ABC News, “Want to go to Baghdad?” Ut-oh. I haven’t worked for months at this point. I am feeling a tad bit useless. Besides my incredible email skills that is. And I have not worked for ABC since coming to Japan. So I talk to K.L. about it. You see that is one of the main things I have learned about a relationship. Free will is gone. I can’t just do something anymore. I must ask. And more importantly, I must remember to ask! I remembered. I asked. She said yes.
So the furniture arrived two weeks later. It would be another two weeks before I would make it back from Iraq. My sole reason for being in Japan was to unpack. My sorry ass isn’t there. I felt horrible.
But I made it home, and still had plenty to unpack. We’ve put most everything where it needs to be, although there are still a few brown containers (bachelors call them disposable furniture) littering the place. We love the view. “It’s like I live in a news set”, was what she said last night as the lights of Tokyo blinked across our 8 large glass panes. And it is. A friend came over and the first words from his mouth were, “You don’t’ deserve this view. I’ve lived here for 10 years and I’ve never had a view like this.” And don’t worry, the construction hasn’t gone high enough to block anything. We hear the noise at times from their work but that just means its time to turn up the radio.
Now if only I could get the combo A/C heater to work! Damn thing’s directions are written in Japanese.
One of my hobbies is checking my email. I’ve gotten really good at it. Just takes a few clicks and wham-o I’m there. On this day there is an email from ABC News, “Want to go to Baghdad?” Ut-oh. I haven’t worked for months at this point. I am feeling a tad bit useless. Besides my incredible email skills that is. And I have not worked for ABC since coming to Japan. So I talk to K.L. about it. You see that is one of the main things I have learned about a relationship. Free will is gone. I can’t just do something anymore. I must ask. And more importantly, I must remember to ask! I remembered. I asked. She said yes.
So the furniture arrived two weeks later. It would be another two weeks before I would make it back from Iraq. My sole reason for being in Japan was to unpack. My sorry ass isn’t there. I felt horrible.
But I made it home, and still had plenty to unpack. We’ve put most everything where it needs to be, although there are still a few brown containers (bachelors call them disposable furniture) littering the place. We love the view. “It’s like I live in a news set”, was what she said last night as the lights of Tokyo blinked across our 8 large glass panes. And it is. A friend came over and the first words from his mouth were, “You don’t’ deserve this view. I’ve lived here for 10 years and I’ve never had a view like this.” And don’t worry, the construction hasn’t gone high enough to block anything. We hear the noise at times from their work but that just means its time to turn up the radio.
Now if only I could get the combo A/C heater to work! Damn thing’s directions are written in Japanese.
Thursday, April 17, 2008
Apartment hunting in Japan - Part 2
1-10-08 We have a winner!
We chose to live on the 17th floor of a brand new apartment building in the hip neighborhood of Azubu-Juban. It is the one that I described as being almost perfect. 100 square meters with a huge second bedroom and a view that goes on for days… a view that will decrease as the 30-story apartment complex grows.
That’s the good news: a decision has been made. In the U.S. after I decided on an apartment I filled out the application and signed the lease; it took as little as a day. In Japan, a day to complete the deal was unimaginable. The process began when we gave the real estate agency tons of personal information which they gave to the owners of the apartment building. The owners then asked for more information. We, in turn, asked that they include a refrigerator. They then asked for information from K.L.’s company (complete with the company’s official seal) about her employment. We fired back that they include curtains. That demand sent the real estate agent into a panic urging, “Do not push for the appliances and curtains anymore. The owner of the building is getting very angry and they may call off the entire deal over this.” So we dropped it. And we waited a week. We didn’t hear anything. Not a word. Then we waited another week. “Working on it,” is all we get. Then, another week, accompanied by some mild panic that we’d have to start hunting all over again. But then, presto! The call came in from the agents that it was done. I have no idea what changed. “Mike-san, can you meet with the owners next Tuesday at 9:30?” Well of course I can. I may have to move around some of the important things on my schedule like going to the gym, leading UGA to its third consecutive national championship on PS2, studying Japanese, or sleeping late, but it can be done.
The meeting was between myself, one of the real estate agents (another woman), and a man who works for the owners of the apartment. I was given a hot cup of green tea and a copy of the lease agreement. It’s in Japanese. I can’t read Japanese. That is what the mid level manager is for. He proceeded to read each and every line of the contract out loud… in Japanese. That is what my new real estate lady is for. She then translated each and every line into English. This was the very same contract that I had read over a few days before and had to sign. The man read aloud that the company that owns the apartment, which will heretofore be known as “the company” can throw us out of the apartment if we are found to be in violation of any number of things. Those things are as follows:
*If “the company” finds out that we have hung a lantern outside of the apartment, they will throw us out.
*If “the company” finds out that we are in the sex trade industry, they will throw us out.
*If “the company” finds out that we have opened a bar at the apartment they will throw us out.
*If “the company” finds out that we are mobsters then they will throw us out.
*If “the company” finds out that we work for mobsters then they will throw us out.
*If “the company” finds out that we associate with mobsters then they will throw us out.
*If “the company” finds out that we act like mobsters then they will throw us out.
But if we have a disagreement with any of the other tenants, we are expected to work it out amongst ourselves. For a country with as little crime as Japan has, the “company” seems awfully worried about the mob. An hour later, the lease was finally signed and almost sealed. There was still the on-site inspection to be had.
So we drove to the apartment, took the Hitachi elevator to the 17th floor, and opened the door. Time to take my shoes off. Guess I had better get used to it.
We chose to live on the 17th floor of a brand new apartment building in the hip neighborhood of Azubu-Juban. It is the one that I described as being almost perfect. 100 square meters with a huge second bedroom and a view that goes on for days… a view that will decrease as the 30-story apartment complex grows.
That’s the good news: a decision has been made. In the U.S. after I decided on an apartment I filled out the application and signed the lease; it took as little as a day. In Japan, a day to complete the deal was unimaginable. The process began when we gave the real estate agency tons of personal information which they gave to the owners of the apartment building. The owners then asked for more information. We, in turn, asked that they include a refrigerator. They then asked for information from K.L.’s company (complete with the company’s official seal) about her employment. We fired back that they include curtains. That demand sent the real estate agent into a panic urging, “Do not push for the appliances and curtains anymore. The owner of the building is getting very angry and they may call off the entire deal over this.” So we dropped it. And we waited a week. We didn’t hear anything. Not a word. Then we waited another week. “Working on it,” is all we get. Then, another week, accompanied by some mild panic that we’d have to start hunting all over again. But then, presto! The call came in from the agents that it was done. I have no idea what changed. “Mike-san, can you meet with the owners next Tuesday at 9:30?” Well of course I can. I may have to move around some of the important things on my schedule like going to the gym, leading UGA to its third consecutive national championship on PS2, studying Japanese, or sleeping late, but it can be done.
The meeting was between myself, one of the real estate agents (another woman), and a man who works for the owners of the apartment. I was given a hot cup of green tea and a copy of the lease agreement. It’s in Japanese. I can’t read Japanese. That is what the mid level manager is for. He proceeded to read each and every line of the contract out loud… in Japanese. That is what my new real estate lady is for. She then translated each and every line into English. This was the very same contract that I had read over a few days before and had to sign. The man read aloud that the company that owns the apartment, which will heretofore be known as “the company” can throw us out of the apartment if we are found to be in violation of any number of things. Those things are as follows:
*If “the company” finds out that we have hung a lantern outside of the apartment, they will throw us out.
*If “the company” finds out that we are in the sex trade industry, they will throw us out.
*If “the company” finds out that we have opened a bar at the apartment they will throw us out.
*If “the company” finds out that we are mobsters then they will throw us out.
*If “the company” finds out that we work for mobsters then they will throw us out.
*If “the company” finds out that we associate with mobsters then they will throw us out.
*If “the company” finds out that we act like mobsters then they will throw us out.
But if we have a disagreement with any of the other tenants, we are expected to work it out amongst ourselves. For a country with as little crime as Japan has, the “company” seems awfully worried about the mob. An hour later, the lease was finally signed and almost sealed. There was still the on-site inspection to be had.
So we drove to the apartment, took the Hitachi elevator to the 17th floor, and opened the door. Time to take my shoes off. Guess I had better get used to it.
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
Apartment hunting in Japan - Part 1
Adventures in Japanese house hunting. 11-24-07
Wear slip-on shoes. That is the first and the most important piece of advice I can give you. I bent down to untie, pull off, and walk about in my grey socks, only to shove my feet back in, retie my very comfortable for walking, but pain-in-the-ass for quick release, British shoes more than 18 times this Thanksgiving. I wish I had thought that through. Wear slip-on shoes to go house hunting in
I am looking for an apartment in
I met the Real Estate agent at my fiancée’s office. He had 12 listings in his bag of tricks. After talking with me, he cut that down to 9. K. L. is a new
We arrived at the first apartment. It’s in the ex-pat neighborhood of Hiroo. I am transported out of
At this point, the male Real Estate agent turned me over to his young female compatriot. I must say this smacks of the male chauvinism that is seemingly rampant in
So Agent #2 and I headed to the next apartment. You learn some things are universal. When you go around a town with a Real Estate agent the car will be immaculate. It looked like it had just come off the production line. Anyway, we drove to the apartment in the sky but we didn’t get there by going in a straight line. My beautiful distraction pulled her clean car into the exit of the next apartment. Instead of backing out and driving the next 100 meters down the road to the entry, she just pulled onto the sidewalk. A litany of “sumimasen, sumimasen, sumimasen” greeted my ears as she pushed pedestrians aside (not that they could hear her on the other side of the metal and glass). Sumimasen is one of the Japanese words I actually know… it means “excuse me”. As an ugly American I use it often, and I was about to, after walking into the next apartment. This one bedroom sits on the 28th floor and is a mere 480,000 yen. Our queen sized bed wouldn’t fit in the bedroom. But man oh man did it have a view.
It just so happens that on the 24th floor there is a two bedroom with the same wall length windows and 77.75 square meters, which is 836 square feet (the Real Estate company makes the conversion for us backwards Americans) of space. To own this gem, you only have to pay 580,000 yen. Yes, that is close to $5,500 a month. If you have a car, tack on another 63,000 yen a month. They want you to pay 4 months rent as a deposit. Then there is the “key fee”. In
Back to the apartment in the sky, I’m told that utilities are not included, but there is a gym and a bar. They are right next to each other so the temptation to sip instead of sweat would always be there. But it is the treadmill of the Gods. You stare off over all of
At our next apartment, I found yet another expense. Renters have to buy their own light fixtures for new apartments! I hadn’t noticed they were missing in the other apartments since it was such a sunny day. This time we went through a model apartment that was filled with furniture and the agent reminded me the dining table will not come with the apartment. Then she looked up and said, “And of course, neither will the light fixtures.” My mouth fell open. Hidden costs abound. When I moved to
We ran through the next five apartments to end my Thanksgiving Day. Some were big and some were small. Some were brand new and a few were old-er. I have never seen so much closet space. If nothing else, the Japanese know how to use the space available. Next to every door is a closet for shoes and jackets. In every bedroom there are built-in drawers, shelves, and racks. There are a few built-in desks and bookshelves. But nary an oven big enough for a turkey could I find. There is almost always a very small broiler. “To cook your fish,” I’m told. There is usually a microwave / small oven big enough to fit a chicken. In some of the apartments, there are combo washers - dryers. You have to buy your own clothes washing machine in others. And then there are the dishwashers. I would say they are a third the size of their American counterparts. We both looked at the one in our corporate housing and asked, “What’s that?” We just couldn’t believe it would be so small. Same goes for the fridge. All of the ones I have seen are at the most half as large as fridges found in the States. The top section holds food, a middle freezer section is where you can find ice, and then there is another smaller refrigeration space for more food.
At the 7th apartment I couldn’t help but say, “Wow”. It looks like the perfect space. There is a large bedroom, a decent kitchen (sans fridge of course), a nice bathroom with a washer/dryer, a decent sized second bedroom, and then a great open space. Windows abound and since it’s on the 19th floor the views are wonderful. The rent is a bit steep at 520,000 yen, but the place is 100 square meters. They want 2 months deposit and no key money. And the neighborhood is teeming with restaurants, supermarkets, and interesting stores. The problem? Half of that great view will be going away. Right across the street, construction crews have just broken ground for a 30 story apartment building. Construction will take about 2 years to complete… or exactly the amount of time we will live in
So we find our last choice of the day. The price? 480,000 yen, only one month deposit, and no key money. Also no refrigerator, light fixtures, or curtains. It is the closest to work; only 5 minutes walk from door to door. And again, the views are spectacular. We have
The next week is full of these types of trips. I think I saw two dozen different apartments when it was all said and done. The most interesting, though not the most livable, was a five bedroom. Each room was tiny and there were three different sets of stairs to climb before you gained access to the bedroom. There was a fourth staircase that leads you up to your two, I repeat, two patios. Before you get excited, the views from said-patios are the backyards of your neighbors, meaning close balconies and clotheslines. That’s it. Nothing spectacular. You do get two bathrooms for the trouble of always having to run up and down stairs every time you do, want, or need anything not in that small room.
So just like the last twenty-three times I have left an apartment, I crammed my feet into those very comfortable walking shoes againThe agent and I climbed into the sparkling Nissan and drive away. Nothing is perfect. Everything is a compromise, but we could live in at least 8 of them. I’ll have a few more meetings with the real estate agent over the next couple of weeks and try to pull my weight in this relationship. I mean, if the Japanese continue to defer to me then I had better do something to deserve it. Oh yeah, I’m male. I don’t have to do anything else. Man, ain’t life grand.
.
Monday, March 3, 2008
Size Matters
Size matters. Nothing brought that statement to life better for me than the moment I was staring at a Japanese man’s rear end, crammed on the escalator moving up out of the subway.
As a woman who’d grown up in America convinced I was a malnourished midget at my (once believed) diminutive 5’2, 115 lbs, I couldn’t help but notice the immediate difference between my size and most of the people walking in the street. There was no significant difference, other than the fact that I was definitely on the beefier end of the female sizing chart. Add the men, too. Size 26 belts must be flying off the shelves at the Japanese equivalent of the Men’s Warehouse because that’s all I seem to see, subway escalators not excluded.
For the first time in my life, I have the opposite problem from what I experience in the US—finding clothes is still a challenge, not because the XS is too big, but because the M is too small.
“Sumimasen,” I’d asked the shopping clerk at my last (and final, I swear) trip to a Japanese designer boutique store. “Size large?”
The clerk, who couldn’t be more than five feet tall and 90 pounds, furrowed her brow.
“Grande! Big? Super size?” I painted an imaginary larger shirt around the shirt I had brought into the dressing room.
The clerk’s expression didn’t change. With a clipped British accent she said, “No bigger size than medium.” She grabbed the rotten shirt and spun her heels.
I immediately went to the lingerie shop next door and bought a C cup bra, which had no business being more than an American size B. Maybe a size A. Might as well use the system to my mental health’s benefit.
The size issue doesn’t stop with clothes. As I began to unpack our boxes that arrived in our new Japanese apartment, it became clear our American sensibilities and new Japanese framework were about to collide.
I held up one of the sole items I adore from Mike’s bachelorhood—his Big Lots bowls. They’re ceramic works of art: swirly blue, red, yellow and brown. I can fill them with my morning granola and yogurt and eat to my heart’s content without refilling. Entire cans of soup happily rest in them and not a drop will spill over the side. And don’t even get me started on big helpings of brownie ice cream sundaes! Those 99 cent wonders are made of some crazy bone china and won’t chip, unlike all my silly plates.
I pulled them out of the box one by one and opened up the dishwasher to give them a good wash before I filled them with my favorite foods.
I positioned the first one, my favorite blue bowl, in the lower rack. It ate up the entire right side. I looked at the second one and wondered how I’d get it into the remaining space. Now granted, I never excelled at spatial dynamics, but a PhD wouldn’t be able to figure out how to get more than three Big Lots bowls into this itty bitty excuse for a dishwasher.
I positioned the three bowls and pulled out the top rack for my mugs. My love for the Big Lots bowls come second only to my giant mugs from around the world. I like the enormous gluttony of giant mugs, so heavy that you almost have to lift it with both hands. I love a giant mug of coffee in the morning and a giant mug of chamomile at night. It’s my thing.
But it’s apparently an American thing, for not a single mug fit in the top rack. Japanese teacups, water glasses, and beer mugs (except for at one luscious brewery we found) are all incredibly small, more like shot glasses than the actual 6 to 8 eight ounce glasses you’re supposed to drink a day. I bought a mug from the sumo match I went to and even at that venue, with a picture of the champion sumo wrestler emblazoned on it, the mug couldn’t be bigger than three ounces.
I slammed the dishwasher shut and rolled up my sleeves to start hand washing our too-damn-big American dishes. I shouldn’t be surprised our American dishes didn’t fit. Two pairs of Mike’s pants and the washing machine is full. We’re just too big for the place.
“I miss Costco,” I told the sink full of plates and mugs. I drifted off to that happy place in my mind, meandering through a parking lot full of gas guzzling SUVs and minivans and fighting for not just super-sized carts, but those flatbed carts. Flash your white, blue and red Costco membership card, and you’re drifting through aisles and aisles of gigantic goods. 9 pounds of imported Havarti cheese for $69.99! 72 rolls of Charmin toilet paper for $11.99! 128 ounces of Tide detergent for $12.99! Six bottles of Tapatio hot sauce for $9.99! And don’t forget the double sized bag of Ghirardelli chocolate chips, enough to bake six dozen cookies! But there’d be no room here in my Tokyo kitchen; my four cupboards already full after unpacking only one of my seven kitchen boxes.
I moaned about Costco and American gluttony to Junko.
“There is Costco, but very far away. Maybe not so big stuff,” said Junko. I simply could not imagine it. I bitterly called her a liar.
“Are you homesick?” Junko asked. “Is natural, don’t you think?”
“No, I’m not homesick. I just miss having a lot of crap available to me,” I said, realizing how silly I sounded. Too late to self-edit, I thought.
“That is VERY American,” Junko exclaimed, pointing her finger in the air.
“It sounds horrible, but it’s true. I’d love to have just five minutes in Costco. Like I’m a contestant in ‘Supermarket Sweep.’”
“Game show on shopping?” Junko asked, as if I’d lost my mind.
“Like you’re one to talk,” I fired back, pointing at the Japanese game show on Junko’s TV where contestants were pushing eggs along the floor with their noses. “Supermarket Sweep is pure genius. It was this game show where you had a certain amount of time to buy all the crap you could. The team with the highest grocery bill at the end won, or something like that.”
“Sounds terrible,” said Junko, going back to her computer screen. “We have to go catch taxi or we’re late.” Junko and I were going to an event thrown by the North Koreans living in Japan network. Given the nuclear crisis in the Korean peninsula, this was a group we needed to know.
We entered the ballroom of the event to grandiose music and two giant pictures of Kim Jong Il and Kim Il Sung, the current and former dictators of North Korea.
“Birthday song,” said Junko. We were at a party held in celebration of Kim Jong Il’s birthday. And in honor of the DPRK leader’s birthday, six gigantic tables full of food awaited. Not just small little sushi plates or mini bento boxes, but extravagant plates of cheese, giant chicken, and big racks of lamb. It was as if I’d been transported to France or Italy, and exactly what I would have expected Kim Jong Il might actually order up in North Korea, despite his starving masses outside his doors.
“I have never seen so much food in Japan before,” I whispered to Junko.
“Eee. It’s lot, huh?”
We weaved our way through the crowd to meet the president of the organization and the media liaison.
“Meet, onegaishimas,” said the organization’s media man, extending his arm to the man next to him.
“Kochira wa Kim-san desu,” he said, and the small man stepped closer to Junko and I. And older fellow, he couldn’t be more than five feet tall, maybe.
“Ahn young hashamika,” the man said, bowing politely. Crap, I thought, trying to switch off the Japanese in my head and getting my rusty Korean engine started.
“Ahn young hashamika,” I said back, relieved the right language came out.
“You speak Korean!” Junko said.
“Chotto,” I said to her in Japanese. I didn’t want to mislead her and let her think I could actually converse intelligently in the language of the old country.
Weaving between English, Japanese, Korean and a couple of phrases in French, the older gentleman and I pieced together a hodgepodge of conversation. The man was a professor at Tokyo University and had grown up in Japan, ethnically Korean, with a family that traced its roots to North Korea. When the war raged on the Korean peninsula, the refugees fled to Japan. Those who had wealth survived and blended in. Those without and held the unpopular political view and with the North suffered discrimination for decades.
I’d never had a conversation with someone who identified with North Korea, a people my parents had warned me could suck all the freedom and intelligence out of my skull and replace it with evil and injustice, just by mere proximity to them. A polite man, he struck me as an academic and a gentle soul. What was remarkable about this man was that he was so unremarkable, packaged in a (what I decided after bending my neck down to listen to him) 4’9 frame.
“Interesting party,” I told Junko on our way out, “Tokyo is really so full of interesting people.”
“But no Roscoe in downtown,” she kidded.
“Costco. Respect the name,” I said.
No Costco, she was right. And anyone who says size DOES matter is probably saying such from their three car garaged suburban house, sipping a 2 liter coke chilled in a sub-zero XL fridge. But other things can make up for lack of size. On occasion.
As a woman who’d grown up in America convinced I was a malnourished midget at my (once believed) diminutive 5’2, 115 lbs, I couldn’t help but notice the immediate difference between my size and most of the people walking in the street. There was no significant difference, other than the fact that I was definitely on the beefier end of the female sizing chart. Add the men, too. Size 26 belts must be flying off the shelves at the Japanese equivalent of the Men’s Warehouse because that’s all I seem to see, subway escalators not excluded.
For the first time in my life, I have the opposite problem from what I experience in the US—finding clothes is still a challenge, not because the XS is too big, but because the M is too small.
“Sumimasen,” I’d asked the shopping clerk at my last (and final, I swear) trip to a Japanese designer boutique store. “Size large?”
The clerk, who couldn’t be more than five feet tall and 90 pounds, furrowed her brow.
“Grande! Big? Super size?” I painted an imaginary larger shirt around the shirt I had brought into the dressing room.
The clerk’s expression didn’t change. With a clipped British accent she said, “No bigger size than medium.” She grabbed the rotten shirt and spun her heels.
I immediately went to the lingerie shop next door and bought a C cup bra, which had no business being more than an American size B. Maybe a size A. Might as well use the system to my mental health’s benefit.
The size issue doesn’t stop with clothes. As I began to unpack our boxes that arrived in our new Japanese apartment, it became clear our American sensibilities and new Japanese framework were about to collide.
I held up one of the sole items I adore from Mike’s bachelorhood—his Big Lots bowls. They’re ceramic works of art: swirly blue, red, yellow and brown. I can fill them with my morning granola and yogurt and eat to my heart’s content without refilling. Entire cans of soup happily rest in them and not a drop will spill over the side. And don’t even get me started on big helpings of brownie ice cream sundaes! Those 99 cent wonders are made of some crazy bone china and won’t chip, unlike all my silly plates.
I pulled them out of the box one by one and opened up the dishwasher to give them a good wash before I filled them with my favorite foods.
I positioned the first one, my favorite blue bowl, in the lower rack. It ate up the entire right side. I looked at the second one and wondered how I’d get it into the remaining space. Now granted, I never excelled at spatial dynamics, but a PhD wouldn’t be able to figure out how to get more than three Big Lots bowls into this itty bitty excuse for a dishwasher.
I positioned the three bowls and pulled out the top rack for my mugs. My love for the Big Lots bowls come second only to my giant mugs from around the world. I like the enormous gluttony of giant mugs, so heavy that you almost have to lift it with both hands. I love a giant mug of coffee in the morning and a giant mug of chamomile at night. It’s my thing.
But it’s apparently an American thing, for not a single mug fit in the top rack. Japanese teacups, water glasses, and beer mugs (except for at one luscious brewery we found) are all incredibly small, more like shot glasses than the actual 6 to 8 eight ounce glasses you’re supposed to drink a day. I bought a mug from the sumo match I went to and even at that venue, with a picture of the champion sumo wrestler emblazoned on it, the mug couldn’t be bigger than three ounces.
I slammed the dishwasher shut and rolled up my sleeves to start hand washing our too-damn-big American dishes. I shouldn’t be surprised our American dishes didn’t fit. Two pairs of Mike’s pants and the washing machine is full. We’re just too big for the place.
“I miss Costco,” I told the sink full of plates and mugs. I drifted off to that happy place in my mind, meandering through a parking lot full of gas guzzling SUVs and minivans and fighting for not just super-sized carts, but those flatbed carts. Flash your white, blue and red Costco membership card, and you’re drifting through aisles and aisles of gigantic goods. 9 pounds of imported Havarti cheese for $69.99! 72 rolls of Charmin toilet paper for $11.99! 128 ounces of Tide detergent for $12.99! Six bottles of Tapatio hot sauce for $9.99! And don’t forget the double sized bag of Ghirardelli chocolate chips, enough to bake six dozen cookies! But there’d be no room here in my Tokyo kitchen; my four cupboards already full after unpacking only one of my seven kitchen boxes.
I moaned about Costco and American gluttony to Junko.
“There is Costco, but very far away. Maybe not so big stuff,” said Junko. I simply could not imagine it. I bitterly called her a liar.
“Are you homesick?” Junko asked. “Is natural, don’t you think?”
“No, I’m not homesick. I just miss having a lot of crap available to me,” I said, realizing how silly I sounded. Too late to self-edit, I thought.
“That is VERY American,” Junko exclaimed, pointing her finger in the air.
“It sounds horrible, but it’s true. I’d love to have just five minutes in Costco. Like I’m a contestant in ‘Supermarket Sweep.’”
“Game show on shopping?” Junko asked, as if I’d lost my mind.
“Like you’re one to talk,” I fired back, pointing at the Japanese game show on Junko’s TV where contestants were pushing eggs along the floor with their noses. “Supermarket Sweep is pure genius. It was this game show where you had a certain amount of time to buy all the crap you could. The team with the highest grocery bill at the end won, or something like that.”
“Sounds terrible,” said Junko, going back to her computer screen. “We have to go catch taxi or we’re late.” Junko and I were going to an event thrown by the North Koreans living in Japan network. Given the nuclear crisis in the Korean peninsula, this was a group we needed to know.
We entered the ballroom of the event to grandiose music and two giant pictures of Kim Jong Il and Kim Il Sung, the current and former dictators of North Korea.
“Birthday song,” said Junko. We were at a party held in celebration of Kim Jong Il’s birthday. And in honor of the DPRK leader’s birthday, six gigantic tables full of food awaited. Not just small little sushi plates or mini bento boxes, but extravagant plates of cheese, giant chicken, and big racks of lamb. It was as if I’d been transported to France or Italy, and exactly what I would have expected Kim Jong Il might actually order up in North Korea, despite his starving masses outside his doors.
“I have never seen so much food in Japan before,” I whispered to Junko.
“Eee. It’s lot, huh?”
We weaved our way through the crowd to meet the president of the organization and the media liaison.
“Meet, onegaishimas,” said the organization’s media man, extending his arm to the man next to him.
“Kochira wa Kim-san desu,” he said, and the small man stepped closer to Junko and I. And older fellow, he couldn’t be more than five feet tall, maybe.
“Ahn young hashamika,” the man said, bowing politely. Crap, I thought, trying to switch off the Japanese in my head and getting my rusty Korean engine started.
“Ahn young hashamika,” I said back, relieved the right language came out.
“You speak Korean!” Junko said.
“Chotto,” I said to her in Japanese. I didn’t want to mislead her and let her think I could actually converse intelligently in the language of the old country.
Weaving between English, Japanese, Korean and a couple of phrases in French, the older gentleman and I pieced together a hodgepodge of conversation. The man was a professor at Tokyo University and had grown up in Japan, ethnically Korean, with a family that traced its roots to North Korea. When the war raged on the Korean peninsula, the refugees fled to Japan. Those who had wealth survived and blended in. Those without and held the unpopular political view and with the North suffered discrimination for decades.
I’d never had a conversation with someone who identified with North Korea, a people my parents had warned me could suck all the freedom and intelligence out of my skull and replace it with evil and injustice, just by mere proximity to them. A polite man, he struck me as an academic and a gentle soul. What was remarkable about this man was that he was so unremarkable, packaged in a (what I decided after bending my neck down to listen to him) 4’9 frame.
“Interesting party,” I told Junko on our way out, “Tokyo is really so full of interesting people.”
“But no Roscoe in downtown,” she kidded.
“Costco. Respect the name,” I said.
No Costco, she was right. And anyone who says size DOES matter is probably saying such from their three car garaged suburban house, sipping a 2 liter coke chilled in a sub-zero XL fridge. But other things can make up for lack of size. On occasion.
Monday, February 11, 2008
Charisma Man
I met a new manga character. His name is Charisma Man.
So that the significance of meeting a brand-new character is fully understood, a little background first. The Japanese love their manga. For the uninitiated to the world of manga, as I was just a few months ago, it appears to be a blend of graphic novels and newspaper comics. The art varies from exquisite detail to “Family Circus” type ink. Even if you don’t read kanji, if you look at it long enough, the story does seem to unfold a bit, revealing character-driven stories of heroism or just lewd sexual behavior. Manga has seeped into much of everyday Japanese culture, from general media to fashion. It is a cultural phenomenon so aligned with Japanese life that sometimes life here appears to imitate manga (ie, girls dressing up as maids and cartoon characters).
I was enlightened to Charisma Man’s existence by my new Tokyo acquaintance, Yasmeen. As I’m learning being an expat, a friend-of a friend-of a friend can suddenly become your friend just by the commonality of your language. Yasmeen grew up in New York and bore the glitz of the city. Almost two years ago, she’d ditched her life in the States to teach English in Japan as a means to seek adventure. A veteran of Tokyo by my standards, Yasmeen not only had tales of living life in Japan as an American, but as an American black woman.
“It’s cool, girl,” she said, a brilliant smile filling our corner of the Indian restaurant. One of the benefits to hanging with a former New Yorker is she knows where the good food in the city is.
Yasmeen held up her nan and pointed at it. “It’s like in the US, I’m just like this, plain. Just another black girl. But here, they think I’m the coolest thing ever.” Undeniably, she did stick out in the sea of Japanese faces. I’d seen only a handful of black people in Japan, and most of them appeared to be immigrants from Africa or France. I’d excitedly tried to say hello to a guy once, mistakenly thinking he was from the US. His snotty rebuke made it clear he was from France.
As if on cue, the owner of the restaurant came by and delivered free drinks, staring at Yasmeen and bowing with a glint in his eye.
She grinned at me. “They dig me.”
Not one to shy away from my curiosity, I asked, “So are you dating Japanese guys like crazy? What is that like?”
“Not exactly.” Yasmeen whipped out her cell phone and clicked the camera button. A guy’s face, his smile filling the small screen, stared back at me. He wasn’t Japanese, but a curly haired Italian. Even through the pixilated image, you could tell he was very good looking.
“Mmmmm,” Yasmeen said, flipping the phone toward her and then back at me. Yasmeen wouldn’t need dessert, now that she had her fill of this picture. “My Italian. He makes me want to move to Italy!”
“So you’re dating all foreigners?”
“Basically, because Japanese dudes are so meek! Even at the club, they just stand in the back and bob their heads back and forth. They don’t have the guts to make the moves like the foreign boys do,” Yasmeen said, her head shaking back and forth despondently. “But it’s competitive for the foreign flock. You gotta fight for the good guys because they’re all going to get taken. Even Charisma Man gets the hot chicks.”
“Charisma Man?” I asked.
“Charisma Man!” Yasmeen said, as if she’d said Jesus and I had no idea who she was referring to. “You don’t know about Charisma Man? Oh yeah, I forgot that you just got here.”
Yasmeen leaned forward, lowering her voice. “Charisma Man is the white dude who can’t get no play in the US or London or wherever. So he comes here and the Japanese chicks just flock!” Yasmeen waved her hands in the air, imitating the swarms of Japanese girls surrounding a man.
I sort of understood what she was talking about. I’d seen several examples on the streets of Tokyo of geeky white guys with very attractive Japanese women. I’d sort of chalked that up to the fact that there are tons of gorgeous women here and not so many good looking guys, in my opinion, Japanese or not. Gotta date the rate, I assumed.
“No,” Yasmeen said. “It’s like those guys come here on purpose, like they know they’ll score some hot chick just because they’re different. And you know what? They’re right. It’s the superpower of Charisma Man in Japan. That’s the only way to explain it. That sort of hook-up would never happen in the States, you’ll see.”
By “you’ll see,” Yasmeen meant that I would see when we moved over to our next stop, a Roppongi shots club. Roppongi is a mecca of nightlife for expats, Americans and Euros alike. We walked up a windy staircase to the smoky bar. The heads bobbing up and down at the bar were not just black haired heads, but broken up by blonde, brunette, auburn. Yasmeen weaved through the packed club to the corner, where a group of Italians ran up to us. I looked back on the crowd, feeling transported to another section of the world. Maybe not rural America, but this crowd had the makings of a hip ethnic joint in Los Angeles. The waitress asked me what I wanted to drink in English.
“See, Charisma Man in action,” Yasmeen pointed to the couple at the corner of the bar. A squat, balding, bespectacled, strawberry blonde leaned against the bar, his arm around a much younger, super thin, long hair Japanese beauty.
“And there,” she said, “and there, too.” I looked up and down the bar, noting with each couple, a very attractive and young Japanese woman was paired with a dopey looking Brit, American or African. Our end of the bar looked like an ad for a mail order bride website.
“How do they communicate?” I asked Yasmeen.
“I have NO idea. Though I supposed talking isn’t all that important in that sort of relationship,” she said.
I scooted closer to the bar so I could eavesdrop on the closest couple to me, the squat Charisma Man and his Japanese beauty, as they tried to talk.
Charisma Man, either a Brit or Aussie (I couldn’t quite tell): “Do you want another drink?”
Japanese Beauty: Silence, a look of confusion.
Charisma Man: Holds up his glass, “Drink.”
Japanese Beauty: Relief spreading across her face, “Eiya. Omizu, onegashimas.”
Charisma Man: Silence, his turn to wear a look of confusion.
Conversation was clearly not important in this union. But what was this? Was Charisma Man some secret Justice League of dorky white guys I’d never heard of? Do they join their covert international club and then fly over in their invisible jets to Paradise Island? Was Tokyo’s soil the reverse of Kryptonite? Did it suddenly make these ordinary dudes sexy super-studs to the Japanese? And as Mike and I wandered around Tokyo, were people wondering how I’d scored the non-dork variety?
“It’s crazy,” Yasmeen said. “These dudes get the pick of the litter with the Japanese girls and seriously, those girls act like Charisma Man is their manga-hero. And then the foreign girls like us have to fight for the scraps.”
I didn’t get the sense that Yasmeen was lacking for too much male attention after the owner of the club brought us free drinks. Maybe Charisma Man was just her way of venting her frustrations with dating in Tokyo. Maybe Charisma Man was Japan’s manifestation of the US’ white-guy-Asian-chick couple. Or maybe it was some secret manga power that American expats would just never understand.
“Okay, maybe I just won’t ever get this whole thing,” I said to Yasmeen. “But here’s my question: where’s Charisma Chick? Where is she and her flock of Japanese male adorers?”
“Oh she’s around,” Yasmeen grinned. “She’s over at the hostess club, paying for it.”
Hostess clubs are clubs where Japanese men “service” female clients, offering food, compliments and drinks. Women often pay thousands for the special treatment, none of which openly involves sex.
“So Charimsa Chick is getting Japanese love, just at a high price?”
“You got it,” said Yasmeen.
Figures.
So that the significance of meeting a brand-new character is fully understood, a little background first. The Japanese love their manga. For the uninitiated to the world of manga, as I was just a few months ago, it appears to be a blend of graphic novels and newspaper comics. The art varies from exquisite detail to “Family Circus” type ink. Even if you don’t read kanji, if you look at it long enough, the story does seem to unfold a bit, revealing character-driven stories of heroism or just lewd sexual behavior. Manga has seeped into much of everyday Japanese culture, from general media to fashion. It is a cultural phenomenon so aligned with Japanese life that sometimes life here appears to imitate manga (ie, girls dressing up as maids and cartoon characters).
I was enlightened to Charisma Man’s existence by my new Tokyo acquaintance, Yasmeen. As I’m learning being an expat, a friend-of a friend-of a friend can suddenly become your friend just by the commonality of your language. Yasmeen grew up in New York and bore the glitz of the city. Almost two years ago, she’d ditched her life in the States to teach English in Japan as a means to seek adventure. A veteran of Tokyo by my standards, Yasmeen not only had tales of living life in Japan as an American, but as an American black woman.
“It’s cool, girl,” she said, a brilliant smile filling our corner of the Indian restaurant. One of the benefits to hanging with a former New Yorker is she knows where the good food in the city is.
Yasmeen held up her nan and pointed at it. “It’s like in the US, I’m just like this, plain. Just another black girl. But here, they think I’m the coolest thing ever.” Undeniably, she did stick out in the sea of Japanese faces. I’d seen only a handful of black people in Japan, and most of them appeared to be immigrants from Africa or France. I’d excitedly tried to say hello to a guy once, mistakenly thinking he was from the US. His snotty rebuke made it clear he was from France.
As if on cue, the owner of the restaurant came by and delivered free drinks, staring at Yasmeen and bowing with a glint in his eye.
She grinned at me. “They dig me.”
Not one to shy away from my curiosity, I asked, “So are you dating Japanese guys like crazy? What is that like?”
“Not exactly.” Yasmeen whipped out her cell phone and clicked the camera button. A guy’s face, his smile filling the small screen, stared back at me. He wasn’t Japanese, but a curly haired Italian. Even through the pixilated image, you could tell he was very good looking.
“Mmmmm,” Yasmeen said, flipping the phone toward her and then back at me. Yasmeen wouldn’t need dessert, now that she had her fill of this picture. “My Italian. He makes me want to move to Italy!”
“So you’re dating all foreigners?”
“Basically, because Japanese dudes are so meek! Even at the club, they just stand in the back and bob their heads back and forth. They don’t have the guts to make the moves like the foreign boys do,” Yasmeen said, her head shaking back and forth despondently. “But it’s competitive for the foreign flock. You gotta fight for the good guys because they’re all going to get taken. Even Charisma Man gets the hot chicks.”
“Charisma Man?” I asked.
“Charisma Man!” Yasmeen said, as if she’d said Jesus and I had no idea who she was referring to. “You don’t know about Charisma Man? Oh yeah, I forgot that you just got here.”
Yasmeen leaned forward, lowering her voice. “Charisma Man is the white dude who can’t get no play in the US or London or wherever. So he comes here and the Japanese chicks just flock!” Yasmeen waved her hands in the air, imitating the swarms of Japanese girls surrounding a man.
I sort of understood what she was talking about. I’d seen several examples on the streets of Tokyo of geeky white guys with very attractive Japanese women. I’d sort of chalked that up to the fact that there are tons of gorgeous women here and not so many good looking guys, in my opinion, Japanese or not. Gotta date the rate, I assumed.
“No,” Yasmeen said. “It’s like those guys come here on purpose, like they know they’ll score some hot chick just because they’re different. And you know what? They’re right. It’s the superpower of Charisma Man in Japan. That’s the only way to explain it. That sort of hook-up would never happen in the States, you’ll see.”
By “you’ll see,” Yasmeen meant that I would see when we moved over to our next stop, a Roppongi shots club. Roppongi is a mecca of nightlife for expats, Americans and Euros alike. We walked up a windy staircase to the smoky bar. The heads bobbing up and down at the bar were not just black haired heads, but broken up by blonde, brunette, auburn. Yasmeen weaved through the packed club to the corner, where a group of Italians ran up to us. I looked back on the crowd, feeling transported to another section of the world. Maybe not rural America, but this crowd had the makings of a hip ethnic joint in Los Angeles. The waitress asked me what I wanted to drink in English.
“See, Charisma Man in action,” Yasmeen pointed to the couple at the corner of the bar. A squat, balding, bespectacled, strawberry blonde leaned against the bar, his arm around a much younger, super thin, long hair Japanese beauty.
“And there,” she said, “and there, too.” I looked up and down the bar, noting with each couple, a very attractive and young Japanese woman was paired with a dopey looking Brit, American or African. Our end of the bar looked like an ad for a mail order bride website.
“How do they communicate?” I asked Yasmeen.
“I have NO idea. Though I supposed talking isn’t all that important in that sort of relationship,” she said.
I scooted closer to the bar so I could eavesdrop on the closest couple to me, the squat Charisma Man and his Japanese beauty, as they tried to talk.
Charisma Man, either a Brit or Aussie (I couldn’t quite tell): “Do you want another drink?”
Japanese Beauty: Silence, a look of confusion.
Charisma Man: Holds up his glass, “Drink.”
Japanese Beauty: Relief spreading across her face, “Eiya. Omizu, onegashimas.”
Charisma Man: Silence, his turn to wear a look of confusion.
Conversation was clearly not important in this union. But what was this? Was Charisma Man some secret Justice League of dorky white guys I’d never heard of? Do they join their covert international club and then fly over in their invisible jets to Paradise Island? Was Tokyo’s soil the reverse of Kryptonite? Did it suddenly make these ordinary dudes sexy super-studs to the Japanese? And as Mike and I wandered around Tokyo, were people wondering how I’d scored the non-dork variety?
“It’s crazy,” Yasmeen said. “These dudes get the pick of the litter with the Japanese girls and seriously, those girls act like Charisma Man is their manga-hero. And then the foreign girls like us have to fight for the scraps.”
I didn’t get the sense that Yasmeen was lacking for too much male attention after the owner of the club brought us free drinks. Maybe Charisma Man was just her way of venting her frustrations with dating in Tokyo. Maybe Charisma Man was Japan’s manifestation of the US’ white-guy-Asian-chick couple. Or maybe it was some secret manga power that American expats would just never understand.
“Okay, maybe I just won’t ever get this whole thing,” I said to Yasmeen. “But here’s my question: where’s Charisma Chick? Where is she and her flock of Japanese male adorers?”
“Oh she’s around,” Yasmeen grinned. “She’s over at the hostess club, paying for it.”
Hostess clubs are clubs where Japanese men “service” female clients, offering food, compliments and drinks. Women often pay thousands for the special treatment, none of which openly involves sex.
“So Charimsa Chick is getting Japanese love, just at a high price?”
“You got it,” said Yasmeen.
Figures.
Sunday, January 20, 2008
Tokyo Tempo
Tokyo Tempo:
Tokyo is set to a metronome; I’m convinced of it. And everyone, except for this expat, seems to hear it. Everyday life here moves with brisk efficiency, from buying your groceries to getting gas to taking the metro. Commuters will barrel you over if you walk too slow, so focused on walking quickly to that inaudible tempo that you’ll notice there’s hardly any conversation on the streets as they walk to and from work. The machinations of the city move like the tick-tock of a perfectly oiled clock, like the ones I used to see Tom and Jerry race through in my favorite childhood cartoons. Except the tempo in Tokyo is set at a rhythm a tick faster than the speed of most cities I’ve lived in. I won’t say I can’t hear it at all; I’m just having a hard time actually keeping up to the beat sometimes.
That’s my long-winded way of saying that there’s nothing like living in Tokyo to make you feel like a lazy waste of space. With my toddler-esque Japanese doing little to assist me in catching up with the rest of this city, I’m constantly slowing down the checkout line as I try to figure out which silver coin is the 100 yen versus the 1 yen, the clerk politely blinking at me with mild impatience. You know that feeling when those old LP’s skip a beat? I’m basically the scratch on the vinyl, at least when it comes to performing the rigors of daily life.
But then Mike noticed hiccups in the Tokyo tempo. Mike did entirely all the house hunting, so he got to see how business actually “works” in Japan. While the real estate company whipped out numerous housing options at a breakneck pace and we decided which would be Casa de Tuggle, the next step wouldn’t happen. At least, that’s how it seemed. Weeks went by. Then a month.
“What’s happening with this?” Mike asked the real estate lady. He got one of those vague answers where you’re not quite sure if it’s your lack of cultural awareness or the actual deal has fallen through.
More than a month later, the real estate company told us we’d gotten our rental box in the sky. I was delighted! The delay, I decided, was one of those strange snafus to the efficiency of life here. Mike and I set up our move date and then Mike got a call to go to work in Baghdad. So much for efficiency from the American end.
But my belief in Japanese efficiency once again deeply instilled in me, I sent off Mike with a “don’t worry!” and arranged for the movers to come move our clothes from our temporary housing to the new apartment.
On the morning of the move, at 9:30 on the nose, the doorbell rang. I opened the door to two movers, dressed in perfectly pressed, matching navy blue uniforms and glowing white gloves.
“Ohayo,” I said for good morning, bowing politely. I’ve got this whole greeting thing down, I thought proudly to myself. After the greeting I’m toast, but for the initial four seconds or so, I’m almost like a Tokyoite. The two movers came in, each weighing about 120 pounds and about two inches shorter than me. Lest you hastily judge, just know that these two tiny dudes moved those boxes much, much faster than the burly, ham-and-cheese-fed American crew who packed us up in Washington, DC. Ah, the Japanese, I thought, as I closed the door to my new apartment.
The apartment was like an icebox. We’d left the heat off, to save us from an expected whopper of a utility bill. We’d read that utility bills can be upwards of $1000 a month, so we were going to try to be smart about the electricity.
Each room has an individual heater, to save energy, I guess. I grabbed the remote for the bedroom to turn on the overhead heater and realized the 12 buttons were all in Japanese. I’d seen this in our corporate apartment, of course, but there were only six buttons on those remotes. I hit the big button. The vent opened (a good sign!) and Freon came out. I could smell the air conditioning firing up.
I hit another button. The vent closed. I didn’t expect that. I kept hitting buttons, the vent opening and closing, the air frigid the whole time. I waited through each cycle, only to keep feeling the freezing air.
I took the remote and headed to the lobby, to ask the front desk chick what to do.
“Hai!” she said, enthusiastically grabbing my pen and writing down kanji in my notebook. “This,” she said, pointing to button #1, “is timer.” She wrote down kanji characters in my notebook. She underlined what she wrote. “Ti-mer. Set heat on, off, to be eco-efficient!” Eco is a favorite word of the home nation of the Kyoto Protocol, but eco-efficient was a new one to me. Yet another hiccup in my ability to march to the Tokyo tempo.
She went through each of the buttons, showing me each step, and writing it all down in kanji.
I went back upstairs to try again, armed with my notebook of Japanese characters.
I looked at the notebook. Button three looked the same as button four. In fact, button four looked the same as button five. I couldn’t remember which one was heat and which one was timer. I kept staring at that infernal vent. I hit button eight and finally, heat started coming out. I set it high, enjoying the warm air starting to circulate through the room.
I went into the living room to start those heaters, too. When I came back to the bedroom, cold air was once again coming out of the vent. I was going to wait it out this time, instead of hitting all the buttons in a panic like my instincts were telling me.
I went into the kitchen, to start a load of laundry. Japanese washing machines come as a single washer/dryer unit where it does everything in one machine. Thankfully, this one came with an English manual and I set it for a quick wash/dry.
An hour later, during which I continued to struggle with the maddening heaters, the dryer buzzed. I opened the door to wet clothes. Not dripping wet, but wet. Like it just decided it hated its job and wasn’t going to finish drying the clothes. I set the dryer function and ran it for an hour. Clank, clank, clank went the buttons of my jeans against the metal dryer, echoing loudly through our nearly empty apartment.
An hour later, another buzz. Clothes still wet. I set it again. Hour, buzz, wet. I set it again. Hour, buzz, a little less wet. I set it one more time, cursing at both the heaters and the dryer. Hour, buzz, still friggin’ wet. It’s been five hours. I set it again as I headed to bed. I’m not sure why it’s not working well. It’s probably operator error, though for the first time in my life I actually bothered to read the (English) manual and am pretty sure I’m hitting the right buttons. Clank, clank, clank continued the buttons of my jeans against the metal dryer. Finally. A rhythmic percussion I can hear in this city.
Tokyo is set to a metronome; I’m convinced of it. And everyone, except for this expat, seems to hear it. Everyday life here moves with brisk efficiency, from buying your groceries to getting gas to taking the metro. Commuters will barrel you over if you walk too slow, so focused on walking quickly to that inaudible tempo that you’ll notice there’s hardly any conversation on the streets as they walk to and from work. The machinations of the city move like the tick-tock of a perfectly oiled clock, like the ones I used to see Tom and Jerry race through in my favorite childhood cartoons. Except the tempo in Tokyo is set at a rhythm a tick faster than the speed of most cities I’ve lived in. I won’t say I can’t hear it at all; I’m just having a hard time actually keeping up to the beat sometimes.
That’s my long-winded way of saying that there’s nothing like living in Tokyo to make you feel like a lazy waste of space. With my toddler-esque Japanese doing little to assist me in catching up with the rest of this city, I’m constantly slowing down the checkout line as I try to figure out which silver coin is the 100 yen versus the 1 yen, the clerk politely blinking at me with mild impatience. You know that feeling when those old LP’s skip a beat? I’m basically the scratch on the vinyl, at least when it comes to performing the rigors of daily life.
But then Mike noticed hiccups in the Tokyo tempo. Mike did entirely all the house hunting, so he got to see how business actually “works” in Japan. While the real estate company whipped out numerous housing options at a breakneck pace and we decided which would be Casa de Tuggle, the next step wouldn’t happen. At least, that’s how it seemed. Weeks went by. Then a month.
“What’s happening with this?” Mike asked the real estate lady. He got one of those vague answers where you’re not quite sure if it’s your lack of cultural awareness or the actual deal has fallen through.
More than a month later, the real estate company told us we’d gotten our rental box in the sky. I was delighted! The delay, I decided, was one of those strange snafus to the efficiency of life here. Mike and I set up our move date and then Mike got a call to go to work in Baghdad. So much for efficiency from the American end.
But my belief in Japanese efficiency once again deeply instilled in me, I sent off Mike with a “don’t worry!” and arranged for the movers to come move our clothes from our temporary housing to the new apartment.
On the morning of the move, at 9:30 on the nose, the doorbell rang. I opened the door to two movers, dressed in perfectly pressed, matching navy blue uniforms and glowing white gloves.
“Ohayo,” I said for good morning, bowing politely. I’ve got this whole greeting thing down, I thought proudly to myself. After the greeting I’m toast, but for the initial four seconds or so, I’m almost like a Tokyoite. The two movers came in, each weighing about 120 pounds and about two inches shorter than me. Lest you hastily judge, just know that these two tiny dudes moved those boxes much, much faster than the burly, ham-and-cheese-fed American crew who packed us up in Washington, DC. Ah, the Japanese, I thought, as I closed the door to my new apartment.
The apartment was like an icebox. We’d left the heat off, to save us from an expected whopper of a utility bill. We’d read that utility bills can be upwards of $1000 a month, so we were going to try to be smart about the electricity.
Each room has an individual heater, to save energy, I guess. I grabbed the remote for the bedroom to turn on the overhead heater and realized the 12 buttons were all in Japanese. I’d seen this in our corporate apartment, of course, but there were only six buttons on those remotes. I hit the big button. The vent opened (a good sign!) and Freon came out. I could smell the air conditioning firing up.
I hit another button. The vent closed. I didn’t expect that. I kept hitting buttons, the vent opening and closing, the air frigid the whole time. I waited through each cycle, only to keep feeling the freezing air.
I took the remote and headed to the lobby, to ask the front desk chick what to do.
“Hai!” she said, enthusiastically grabbing my pen and writing down kanji in my notebook. “This,” she said, pointing to button #1, “is timer.” She wrote down kanji characters in my notebook. She underlined what she wrote. “Ti-mer. Set heat on, off, to be eco-efficient!” Eco is a favorite word of the home nation of the Kyoto Protocol, but eco-efficient was a new one to me. Yet another hiccup in my ability to march to the Tokyo tempo.
She went through each of the buttons, showing me each step, and writing it all down in kanji.
I went back upstairs to try again, armed with my notebook of Japanese characters.
I looked at the notebook. Button three looked the same as button four. In fact, button four looked the same as button five. I couldn’t remember which one was heat and which one was timer. I kept staring at that infernal vent. I hit button eight and finally, heat started coming out. I set it high, enjoying the warm air starting to circulate through the room.
I went into the living room to start those heaters, too. When I came back to the bedroom, cold air was once again coming out of the vent. I was going to wait it out this time, instead of hitting all the buttons in a panic like my instincts were telling me.
I went into the kitchen, to start a load of laundry. Japanese washing machines come as a single washer/dryer unit where it does everything in one machine. Thankfully, this one came with an English manual and I set it for a quick wash/dry.
An hour later, during which I continued to struggle with the maddening heaters, the dryer buzzed. I opened the door to wet clothes. Not dripping wet, but wet. Like it just decided it hated its job and wasn’t going to finish drying the clothes. I set the dryer function and ran it for an hour. Clank, clank, clank went the buttons of my jeans against the metal dryer, echoing loudly through our nearly empty apartment.
An hour later, another buzz. Clothes still wet. I set it again. Hour, buzz, wet. I set it again. Hour, buzz, a little less wet. I set it one more time, cursing at both the heaters and the dryer. Hour, buzz, still friggin’ wet. It’s been five hours. I set it again as I headed to bed. I’m not sure why it’s not working well. It’s probably operator error, though for the first time in my life I actually bothered to read the (English) manual and am pretty sure I’m hitting the right buttons. Clank, clank, clank continued the buttons of my jeans against the metal dryer. Finally. A rhythmic percussion I can hear in this city.
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