Akita City: Week One

I have arrived safely and in one piece. And so did all of my luggage, which basically is my body weight packed in color-coordinating and oh-so-stylish suitcases (which both weighed 48 pounds at the airport FOR THE WIN) and duffels. And said bags are all still packed up, my clothes and books sufficating after a far too long confinement, since I don't move into my apartment until Tuesday evening after work. I dropped off the big suitcase, the backpack, and a few other small things there today when my predessor showed me how to work all the appliances in the apartment. Making the shower hot is gonna be something of a chore.

Honestly, though, I love the place. It's huge. It's convenient. It's mine. At least as long as I stay here. My pred is leaving me a lot of stuff, really useful stuff, so there won't be much I need to buy in order to make the place livable for me. Other than a coffee pot. That's gonna have to happen STAT.

She also gave me her bike today, so that I could ride around the city and start to figure out how to get places. Now, I know that I have problems with directions. Right and Left are really hard. Maps work better if you flip them upside down. However, in Japan none of the roads have names or signs with those names on them, and, I mean, if we're being real, even if they did, it's not like I can read kanji. But at least then I could match pictures. But no such luck. So - combine no road names or signs, with a route I've never taken before, with my inability to get anywhere effectively, with my further inability to ask for help (my Japanese is not nearly that good, and the directions unit was the hardest for me in class anyway), with cars driving on the opposite side of the road, and you have me, biking in circles for a hour and half when it should have taken about 30 minutes to get from the apartment to my hotel. But I did find it. After I wanted to bike into the river just to make the pain stop. Then I walked to the station. Walking felt safer.

And then I bought dinner, and the walking thing went really well. There are paper lantern displays hanging all over the city for the upcoming Kanto (paper latern) Festival. It's one of the major festivals in the Tohoku region, so I'm pretty excited about it.

Tomorrow I have to figure out how to bike from the hotel to my school so I can get there Monday. Everyone in the office has been very kind to me, and I like the atmosphere, even though there isn't much to do right now. Students are on summer vacation till the end of August. I'm planning my self-introduction lesson and taking care of paperwork. I have my own file and shoe cubby and plastic tag thingee that says when I'm there and everything.

Let's hope I don't get too terribly lost tomorrow.

Four Days and Counting . . .

I leave soon. Very soon. There are the beginnings of piles all over my room - yes, I want it; no, I don't - and I have about forty pages left in Crime and Punishment. I obsessively made lists all day yesterday.

I called the airport today and reserved a bunch of yen to be picked up tomorrow (goodbye, life savings). The idea of currency blows my mind. It's like, the paper is real, but what it represents - value - isn't really real. We move numbers on electronic databases and call that capitalism. How does that make sense? I propose we go back to the days of trading purple seashells and bartering for food. It's simple, and it doesn't involve interest.

I also re-did my blog theme...because I hadn't in three years, and my options are way, way cooler now. Bringing order to chaos since 1990!

Also-also, I bought black TOMS that I can never wear outside. Score.