Occhokochoi Ahoy: New Home

(I’ve had nothing to do at the Board of Education as of late, so for your entertainment I have written you all a book.)

Well, I finally made it to my new home, and after what seemed to be quite a long wait I now have internet. The BoE (Board of Education) hooked me up with the same internet my predecessor had, which he said wasn’t always the greatest, but we’ll see. It’s not that swank fiber optic stuff that other JETs rave about (I don’t even know if I can get that here) but at least now I have some sort of contact with the outside world. (Even better, the people at the BoE found an old TV they let me have so I now can watch a handful of Japanese channels. I’m ridiculously happy for the noise, especially for the listening practice. Plus, it had been over a week and I hadn’t seen the SoftBank dog-dad or the kodomo tencho car salesman or any of the other commercial mascots I got used to seeing during my stay in Nagoya. NOW I’m in Japan).

So anyway, getting here they herded us all onto a bus early on Wednesday to go to the other airport in Tokyo I hadn’t been to before (there were quite a few of us – I think we were the biggest group of all the prefectures, not surprisingly). Upon arriving at the airport several of us noticed the bright yellow Pokemon plane – I was not one of the first to spot it, but I was prompted to look when half the bus exclaimed in joy and started taking pictures of it like a bunch of happy 8-year-olds (that made me a happy nerd too). There was also a plane with Gundams on it next to our gate, which we were able to see (as I sipped my last taste of Starbucks until I head back to Sapporo for orientation) due to our plane being delayed 40 minutes for some reason (just like home). Unfortunately our plane had no nerd logos decorating it, but they do have cameras outside the plane so you have a bird’s eye view of takeoff and landing on the TV screens. Not sure if I really liked watching how much they kind of skid around during that though.

After we landed at Chitose Airport and got our bags we went out in small groups to meet our supervisors. Somehow I got at the back of the line and went with the last group. After a long walk across the airport I then got to meet up with my supervisor (along with another supervisor with a new nearby JET I had been talking with at orientation and before that via facebook) and we all set out to catch our next plane out to the eastern edge of the island. We didn’t have too much time due to the delay, so we got some neatly boxed sandwiches and ate them at the gate. Then we went through the gate, down the stairs, onto a bus, out a short distance to the plane, and hoped on one of those tiny little noisy things that only holds a handful of people. My supervisor and I were at the very back next to the can. We didn’t talk much, mostly because we couldn’t hear anything, but at least it was a short flight.

Upon arrival we drove into my town and I got to meet about half of the people at the BoE. My supervisor also took me to the big store down the main road to get some simple groceries, and then I was left alone to settle into my new home. Full of furniture that’s not mine and (at the time) no TV, internet, or any other sort of way to connect to the outside world. That part kind of sucked since I didn’t really know what to do with myself yet, but my predecessor left some DVDs behind so I had some Family Guy to listen to while I unpacked. He also left a bunch of other stuff I need to figure out what to do with, since everything in the main room feels really cluttered at the moment.

I’ve also used what little time I’ve had around the house to do some cleaning, since I got tired of the dirty walls (I can still see a circle where a clock or something must have been hanging for who knows how long at one point), but minor complaining aside it’s a very nice set up for a newbie in Japan living off neighborhood hand-me-downs. My bedroom is huge (with a big fan left for me since I have no air conditioners), as is the closet, and I have a couple more closets I might try to cram some more stuff in to sort of free up some room (like the giant snowboard I’ve been left). I don’t have a fancy control panel toilet or anything like that, but everything works fine. Quite nice.

For the first few days at the BoE I was taken around town to do such things as introduce myself at the library and city office, and get paperwork taken care of. My supervisor also took me shopping for things like groceries and cell phones (which I’m still pondering over since I went home with pamphlets full of kanji describing phones and billing plans and my electronic dictionary is not working to help me decipher it). She also took me out to eat at several good restaurants around the area, which kind of made me realize that I’ll probably have to get a car here at some point if I want to keep enjoying the town. It’s a lot bigger than I thought it would be, and it really is right next to the bigger city of Kitami.

On Friday the boss of the BoE I work at took me into Kitami city to meet with the BoE there. I then got taken around the whole office to introduce myself to several groups of people (who I think I began to confuse, since I started off saying I was from Kentucky due to the whole living near Louisville thing, but then unconsciously slipped back to “I’m from Indiana” halfway through, so no one knows where I live anymore. I think I’ll stick with the Louisville, Kentucky thing though since I like watching everyone’s faces light up as if I come from a magical world made of fried chickens).

Later that day my supervisor asked me what I was doing that night and proposed that I go bowling with a bunch of people I don’t know. When she told one of the other office workers that I accepted the invite I assumed it was the office crew I would be going with and she meant that it was just people I didn’t know well yet… but after she picked me up and drove me to a yakiniku restaurant (grill your own meat at the table type restaurant) in the heart of Kitami and I was introduced to enough people to fill half the little restaurant, I realized that it was indeed a bunch of people I really didn’t know. I think it was a mix of people from the board of education and the neighboring town office, since they were all familiar with me (big surprise), probably from one of my 1,204 “pleased to meet you, I’m Danielle” intros over the past few days. I didn’t know anyone’s names though, outside of the people I’d been sitting with at the office the past 3 days. And in fact I still don’t really know the other peoples’ names…

Even so it was a fun evening. Apparently it’s good to constantly rotate around the little grill with your chopsticks/the tongs that came with the meat plate, flipping and turning all the meat and onions - something which everyone else at the table immediately started doing and then failed to stop doing until the plate was all grilled. I was kind of hesitant to snag things off the communal plate with such constant activity going on. Even so what I had (whatever it was, there was a map of cow parts on the wall and one of the meats the other people at the table couldn’t find on said picture to inform me what I just ate) was tasty, save perhaps some sort of special Hokkaido only thing that took about 3 minutes to chew.

The seat next to me had been empty since we had gotten there until a younger woman from the neighboring table excitedly sat next to me to make friends. Turns out her major in college was English but she hadn’t used it in so long she pretty much refused to speak it with me. Luckily for her (I guess) the guy across the table wanted to talk about a recent event involving a bear, but all he did was start saying, “Bear! Bear!” to me (as I was reaching for a piece of meat. They had a good laugh at my deer in the headlights expression), which gave her the opportunity to explain the story to me in English. Quite well in fact, there was no need for all the panic.

Then we went bowling! I got some bowling shoes out of the bowling shoes vending machine (after debating about the centimeter sizes), grabbed a ball, and headed to the lane everyone directed me to. And I then remembered that I can’t bowl. Everyone seemed entertained that the new girl likes the Wii and bowls on that at least, but my actual game turned out to be less than impressive (with some attempts going by where I hit no pins at all). The girl from before gave me a pointer part way through and one of my teammates kept trying to advise me throughout the game as well. Finally the head boss (I assume, since though I didn’t know him he was the only one buying everyone drinks and was still in his suit jacket) took me aside and gave me a quick pep talk/play-by-play on how to do it right. Seemed like serious business, but it actually did help and by the second game I was at least getting spares. This made me extra happy since everyone who got a spare/strike achieved a round of high fives from everyone in the vicinity. By the end of the last game I was dying for just one chance to victoriously slap everyone’s hands (One guy was really enthusiastic and loved to go “YYEEAAAY!” any time it happened). It was pretty cool.

On Sunday I went to a toshokan matsuri (library festival) at the library right next to where I work. It was a somewhat small event, but it was nice nonetheless. There were a bunch of kids running around all over the place, and I got to do such little kid things as make giant bubbles with stretched out hangars in tubs of soapy water and make crafts out of milk cartons. I also went to story time, which was an older man in the town talking about life during the war when he was a kid… didn’t know what I should have been doing during that so I just kind of stayed in my corner and used it as listening practice, I guess.

Outside some of the local junior high students were making senbei (Japanese cracker things) and some kind of old traditional sugar candy. I got to make the senbei when the girls in charge of that stand ran off for awhile, and then I got to make the boiled sugar candy thing with some of the boys as the older people pressured them into using English with me. Two of them managed to work their way through simple introductions, though one just flatly refused to do it and went on his merry way. That seems to happen a lot since I guess people get easily embarrassed, so hopefully in the classroom at least I can get them to talk…

There were a bunch of old books laid out in the library, each one going for 10 yen, so I bought a few with some more new recipes I can try to struggle through (which turned out to be housewife magazines). After the crowd dissipated a truck came to pick up all the leftover books, and all the adults in the vicinity formed a line to pass the books from person to person. Some people were happy I wanted to help and some felt bad that they were making me work. I was happy because I got to wear those white gloves that I’ve seen taxi drivers and elevator ladies and the people who cram people into subway cars wear.

It was raining by the time that was done, but it was also time for more yakiniku, so we all ran out to this big empty garage behind the library to enjoy some grilled meat. Basically what that meant was that the garage turned into a smoke house, and soon I could barely see. Nevertheless, I had my fill of Genghis Khan (a lamb specialty in Hokkaido… sorry mom) and pig intestines (which was the chewy stuff I had eaten last time too). But after that there were beef slices and peppers and onions and such too.

After that I was wondering what I was supposed to do the rest of the night, since some other JET I didn’t know had called me a few days before that asking me to join her and a bunch of people that night for dinner. I was tired by this time, but tried calling her anyway. I ended up getting a hold of her, and while she wasn’t coming she said someone could meet me at the station in the city if I jumped on my bike and made it to the station before the next train came. For whatever reason I blindly agreed and hopped on the bike and wearily pedaled along the not so smooth sidewalks here as I got used to riding a bike again, all the while hoping I read the map right.

There wasn’t a soul at the station, but I made it there right before the train came… which turned out just to be a single car chugging along the track. No ticket booths, no ticket machines, so I stumbled on the train in a very confused manner and headed into the town.

I paid the guy at the city station, which I guess was the correct way to go about it (I had wondered at that point if there was a ticket I should have grabbed on the train as I got on, since the guy I paid was basically just taking my word about where I got on). Some other ALT from I don’t remember where was waiting for me, and we drove to some small Indian curry restaurant where there were a bunch of other foreigners filling up their bowls at the buffet line. I was still full of grilled meat, so I didn’t eat much, but I got to talk to a few other people in the area about life up here in Hokkaido. And then during that the time for the last train home passed because someone else offered to drive me home, which meant I was then dragged along to karaoke because said driver was going as well. So I got to go to Japanese karaoke.

Can’t say I’m a fan of it when I’m there with something like 9 other people I’ve known for perhaps 2 hours in the room. At the end I stumbled through a song in Japanese just to try it out, but apparently I have weird tastes in music since I’ve gotten more than a few “Err, you like WHO?”s since I’ve been here… Perhaps I should have just stuck to cheesy English songs like everyone else. I’ll have to think of a few to keep in mind I guess, since I’m willing to bet this won’t be the last time I get dragged along to one of these.

By the time I got home it was something like 1 am, so I took a shower, completely forgot to make my lunch for the next day, and went to sleep. The next morning I ended up getting up early to hastily cook some rice and make some onigiri for lunch. They were easy enough for even me to make, so no problems there (though my second attempt at the tuna stuffed ones resulted in crumbled rice and tuna when I tried to pick them up. Not sure what I did differently that ended up in such failure, but I’m bringing an emergency pair of chopsticks from now on).

My predecessor stopped by that next day to say another goodbye to everyone in the office, so I did have the chance to meet him. He came by in the evening to drop off some stuff for the house he had taken camping since his brother was visiting with him, and with that invited me to go with them to the house of some lady in the area who liked practicing English with him. That was another somewhat late night, but I was very happy I went. She was incredibly outgoing and fun and had a huge banquet spread out by the time we got there (sushi, gyoza, ramen salad). She was very much the “don’t hold back! Eat! Talk! Laugh! DRINK!” type. Her daughter (at a different junior high than the one I’ll be at) had a friend over, and the two of them enjoyed giggling at the computer and introducing us to their favorite mangas. After listening to a rather awkwardly worded “let’s learn English”-type radio show the daughter started proudly throwing around F-bombs as if they were compliments or something, much to everyone else’s amusement. That is, until her request to have the boys say it for her to get the correct pronunciation was incorrectly worded in such a way that her dad understood as not being something you want your daughter asking of older guys, so he calmly put a stop to the conversation and we continued munching on Japanese snack foods.

Tuesday I finally had a night to just stay at home, do laundry, and sleep early (still some lingering jet lag), but I also had the chance to try to install my internet by myself only to eventually pick up on the kanji enough to see that it basically said “if you’re not on windows, go find internet elsewhere to look up instructions to get your internet, since this book we just sent you is worthless.” Thanks guys.

On Wednesday the predecessor of my predecessor of my predecessor was in town with his wife and kid for a reunion with people from the town, and I got pulled into the party as well. It was held at a beer garden restaurant in the city which is apparently a pretty happening place with the locals, and it did have some good family style food (salad, yakisoba, those edamame green beans that show up anywhere beer seems to be, and – eee! – deep fried pork intestines!) I was at a far end of the table and was lucky enough to be near some of the people from my upcoming eikaiwa (conversation circle), so I got to know them a little better. But then at about 9 I got my first taste of the “nijikai,” the party after the party. We went to a snack bar, which apparently means a tiny little place with an older lady working at the counter ready so serve you whatever you want to drink accompanied by snacks and karaoke. I managed to get by without singing this time around (though it sounds like the nijikai for my welcome party next week will have karaoke, and I don’t think I’ll be escaping that), and it was fun to listen to the other people who had obviously been enjoying the beer that night belt out some songs. I didn’t want anything else to drink, but the lady running the place seemed to take pity on me for some reason (maybe I looked as tired as I felt? Or maybe she was just trying to be nice to the new kid) and she kept finding cool things to give me. First she came out with this little bottle of thick, fresh raspberry juice (which was amazing), and a little while later gave me this dumpling thing with the kanji for “celebrate” on it. Then she brought out these little juggling beanbags I tried to play with, and I was given those as a gift to. Then she gave me a little bag to take everything home in. And of course no one would let me pay anything there. Again. These people are too nice.

Yet another late night and getting up early… particularly great since this week I also got to do my first run of driving on the left side of the road. I guess it’s good that at home I was what they call in Japan as a “paper driver” – basically someone who holds a license but never uses it – since I haven’t had too much trouble adjusting to the little things like the fact that the turn signal (the “winker,” as they call it) is on the opposite side. Also the roads are (for the most part) wonderfully wide in Hokkaido and the speed limit quite slow, so I don’t feel too stressed about being a rather crappy driver. I only worry about the fact that everyone backs into parking spots, which I still can’t really do. I have to back the car into the garage when I return it, and lucky me it’s parked right next to what appears to be some kind of cop car. No pressure.

And… yeah I guess that’s about it for now. The town I live in is famous for onions, and now that it’s harvesting time I can really see why. I wake up to the earthy smell of onions in the morning as tractors drive by on the road outside my window, and this past day or two as I’ve biked past the field across from me I’ve gotten to see these giant metal cages filled to the brim with hundreds of freshly harvested onions. Mmm, onions.

Oh, I also got to see a farmer spraying his fields one day via a small radio-controlled helicopter (maybe about as long as a bike?). It was pretty cool. Though for some reason yesterday my city was one of the hottest in Japan, and the office was pretty much dying. So much for trying to escape the heat in the north. At least I have yet to see any monster spiders.

Pictures of the house to come soon, because at the moment my main room is cluttered to the brim, driving me nuts, and even though there’s like one outlet per room I want to try scooting stuff around so I’m not so claustrophobic first. Here’s the entryway/genkan, though: