Im Jet Laggin Check It And See, Jet Laggin Jet Laggin!

August 17, 2008


Once again my sleep was very off and on the whole night. By 4:00 am I was wide awake, gave up on trying to sleep and instead just did some reading. By early morning I had progressed to filling out paper work required for my orientation (as well as for the Japanese government).
At around 9:00 am I wandered to the Kinshicho station to try and find a Nova branch, I needed some information. After asking some people for help finding it (which to lead to a lot of laughs due to both parties having no idea what the fuck the other was saying) I finally found the office buried within a mall. Of course it was closed until noon, so I decided I might as well take advantage of the situation and do some shopping.

The mall itself wasn't exactly like an American mall. It was more-so a large building, similar to American office buildings, separated into 9 floors of merchandise- similar to a department store.
So I took an escalator from floor to floor and wandered around looking for a wallet (my current one is getting pretty worn out), a bandana (since whenever I go outside my face instantly becomes covered with sweat), an ethernet cable (my roommate had a DSL line installed to a router, so I just needed a cable to use it) and a ground-lift for my computer. Japanese outlets only have the two out of three holes, otherwise they are essentially the same as American outlets. American power is 110 volts at 50 hertz, Japanese power is 100 volts at 60 hertz.

I was only able to find a ground lift for my computer and a lighter. Yeah, I decided a lighter would be a good thing to have...cause...it's...fire.

From there I just wandered around the whole town trying to get a feel for what was around me, also keeping an eye out for a photo booth (I needed some passport photo's for my alien registration card application). It struck me odd that everyone around me was either wearing a suit, or riding a bicycle. Yeah, bicycles are big here, and no one locks them up. I guess when you buy it you have to register it with the city, and then they put a VIN on it. Everyone is pretty honest in Japan though, a good example would be Tim's phone that was left behind at the club. In America whoever found it would just hawk it off on EBay. In Japan people go out of their way to make sure lost items get back to their owners, so the worry of having a bicycle stolen (for instance) is just absurd here.
I also noticed that many people went out of their way not to make eye contact with me, or if they did they would instantly break it and look down at the ground. After some conversations about this later on I've learned that this isn't so much of a racist action as it is a shyness action. Apparently it's mostly a Tokyo shyness, and anywhere else in Japan people would nod at you just like anywhere in the States.

I walked backed towards my apartment to grab some food from the grocery store, brought it back to my apartment and ate it while I watched the first half of "Hot Fuzz."
Again the sinking feeling of "What am I doing here?" started to set back in.
This was strange to me because I've traveled the U.S. many times over, and have seen a good portion of other sections of the world. Whenever I'm alone I've never really felt out of place, or regret for where I was. Yeah there's been points in my life where I've felt unsure about what I was doing, but this was a different, MUCH stronger unsure. Upon reflection I think it may of had more to do with working 3 months solid and now being in a situation where I was sitting around with a bunch of free time. The combination of feeling like I should be doing something, combined with being in a new place and starting a "new life" per say...it all seemed to have a very sickening effect.

Half way through the movie I decided to wander back to the Nova office to get the information I needed from them, which was a success. While I was there I also asked if they could point me in the direction of a photo booth. Oddly, the front desk staff (3 cute Japanese girls) didn't speak English very well, so the whole situation involved these adorable girls collaborating on a photo booth map for me...which contained many more hearts and starts than a photo booth map should.
I thanked them and went on my way, following the directions on their map. It did indeed lead me to a photo booth, but of course in fashion with the good ol' Heck luck, the booth was out of order (which took a few minutes to figure out, I didn't know if it was me that was screwing up or the machine).

I decided to get a train ticket and try riding to a couple other stations, I was told that most stations have photo booths. A few hours later I disproved this theory as much as a theory can be disproven.

I wandered back home in utter defeat...but I guess at least I found a ground-lift?

I watched the last half of "Hot Fuzz," took a nap...and from what I remember (this was a few days ago) my nap lasted from 4:00 pm to midnight. FUCKING JET LAG! Of course there was no one around at midnight, so I just laid in bed for a few hours waiting for morning to come.