Sunday, May 16, 2010

You know you've been in Japan too long when...

Not all of these are true but I'm very impressed how close its is:
  • you run for the JR line pushing people left and right, jump on the train holding the doors open to let your bag follow you on. Because you know there will not be another one for at least a minute.
  • you bow to other drivers who give you the right of way.
  • you rush onto an escalator, and just stand there.
  • you don't hesitate to put a $10 (1000Y) note into a vending machine.
  • you see a gaijin (foreigner) get on the train and think "Wow, it's a gaijin!"
  • you have trouble figuring out how many syllables there really are in words like 'building'. (Bi-ru-di-n-gu)
  • you get blasted by a political speaker truck and think "what can be done?"
  • you think the best part of TV are the commercials. - THEY'RE AWESOME
  • you develop a liking for black bean flavoured ice cream.
  • you can't have your picture taken without your fingers forming the peace sign.
  • you pull up at a gas station and wait for a bunch of Norman Rockwell type attendants to jump out and clean your windshield.
  • you go for a drink with friends back home and start pouring everybody's beer.
  • your idea of a larger home is an extra 10 square meters.
  • you glance at the clock and accurately predict the next line of dialogue in the TV drama.
  • you are not worried about speeding in the rain, because you know the cops are only out there in good weather.
  • you think birds cry.
  • you find yourself bowing while you talk on the phone.
  • you think US$17 (1700Y) isn't such a bad price for a new paperback.
  • you go to a coffee shop in your home country and order "American coffee."
  • you are talking on the telephone to your parents and your father says, "Why are you interrupting my explanation with grunts?" - Grunt is a quick ok.
  • you're talking to your mother on the phone, and she asks you what "Genki" means. (Happy, energetic,healthy) - I'm Genki.
  • you don't think it unusual for a truck to play "It's a Small World" when backing up. - ITS NORMAL
  • you think the natural location for a beer garden is on a roof.
  • you think that you can impress foreigners by drinking Budweiser.
  • you think "English literature major" is a polite way to say peanut brained bimbo.
  • you find a beautiful way to eat natto (it look like vomit). -I CAN
  • you start thinking canned coffee tastes good. -- IT DOES!!
  • you wait for the first day of summer to wear short sleeve dress shirts.
  • the first option you buy for your car is a TV set.
  • you really enjoy corn soup with your McPork.
  • you think the opposite of red is white.
  • you leave your expensive bottle of Royal Salute with a sleazy barkeeper and don't worry.
  • you pore over the hyperdia.com looking for ways to avoid riding the Shinkansen.
  • you buy a potato-and-strawberry sandwich for lunch without cringing.
  • you phone an English-speaking gaijin friend and somehow can't bring yourself to get to the point for the first 3 minutes of the conversation.
  • you stop enjoying telling newcomers to Japan 'all about Japan'.
  • you automatically remember all of your important year dates in Showa numbers. - Japanese Calender dates
  • you think every foreign movie title contains the word 'love.'
  • you have mastered the art of simultaneous bowing and hand-shaking.
  • you think it's alright to stick your head into a stranger's apartment to see if anybody's home.
  • you have run out of snappy comebacks to compliments about your chopstick skills.
  • you think "white pills, blue pills, and pink powder" is an adequate answer to the question "What are you giving me, doctor?".
  • you no longer find anything unusual in the concept of "Vermont curry". -IT TASTES NOTHING LIKE CURRY BUT ITS AMAZING.
  • you think 4 layers of wrapping is reasonable for a simple piece of merchandise.
  • you don't find anything strange about a city that puts a life sized, red-and-white painted Eiffel tower imitation in its centre, as well as a scale model of the Versaille palace for its Crown Prince. - TOKYO
  • you are only slightly puzzled by "Melty Kisses."
  • you get on a train with a number of gaijin on it and you feel uneasy because the harmony is broken.- Yup
  • you ask fellow foreigners the all-important question "How long have you been here?" in order to be able to properly categorize them.
  • looking out the window of your office, you think "Wow, so many trees!" instead of "Wow, so much concrete!"
  • you think NHK is "the Japanese BBC".
  • you think curry rice is food. - ITS DAMN TASTY
  • in the middle of nowhere, totally surrounded by rice fields and abundant nature, you aren't surprised to find a drink vending machine with no visible means of a power supply and when you think nothing of it when that lonely vending machine say 'thank you' after you buy a coke.
  • the TV commercials make sense to you.
  • a gaijin sits down next to you on the train and you get up and move. You're not prejudiced, but who knows what they might do?
  • you only have 73 transparent, plastic umbrellas left in your entrance because you have donated 27 to the JR and various taxi companies in the past few months.
  • you have over 100 small, transparent plastic umbrellas in your entrance even *after* donating 27 of them to taxis and JR recently.
  • you think rice imports should be prohibited, because Japanese consumers would never buy imported rice.
  • you think one kind of rice tastes better than another kind.
  • you rush home from work to catch the last few minutes of sumo.
  • you get a "Nihongo ga joozu" and feel really insulted. "Your Japanese is very good, isn't it"
  • you see a road with two lanes going in the same direction and assume the one on the left is meant for parking.
  • you think Japan is the only county that actually has only four seasons.
  • you pull out your ruler to underline words.
  • in getting ready for a trip you automatically calculate for souvenirs and you leave just the right amount of space in your suitcase for them.
  • on a cold autumn night, the only thing you want for dinner is nabe (hot pot food) and nihonshu (Potato Vodka).
  • you return the bow from the cash machine.
  • you can't find the "open" and "close" buttons in the elevator because they're in English.
  • you think that coffee goes perfectly well with squid pizza.
  • the Christmas music in the stores does not make you feel at all sentimental like it used to. - It still pisses me off
  • you mention "Japan Times" and "objective" in one sentence
  • you believe that the perfect side dish to eat with a juicy, deep-fried pork chop is a pile of raw, tasteless, shredded cabbage.
  • it doesn't surprise you that a case of beer has the same per unit price as a single can.
  • you think cod roe spaghetti with chilled red wine is a typical Italian dish.
  • you start to recognize Background music as a meaningful genre of music.
  • walking into a crowded bar full of non-Japanese makes you nervous, because they "look dangerous."
  • you buy a Christmas cake on Christmas eve.
  • you no longer pay any attention to what anyone does when you sit down beside them on a train.
  • when you accompany your "no" by the famous waving hand-in-front-of-nose.
  • you find yourself apologizing at least three times per conversation.
  • when you let your car idle for half an hour while you go shopping.
  • you find your self asking all your foreign acquaintances what their blood types are.
  • you find yourself practising golf swings with your umbrella on the train platform.
  • you take practice golf swings on the train platform *without* an umbrella in your hand.
  • you buy an individually wrapped potato in the supermarket.
  • you think that "Lets SPORTS yOUNG gAY CluB" is a perfectly normal T-shirt logo for a middle aged lady.
  • you order a "bottle of draft" in a pub.
  • you go to a book shop with the full intention to read all the interesting magazines and put them back on the shelf. - Wish I could.
  • you're careful to specify a nonsmoking seat on the flight from Denver to St. Louis.
  • you schedule your commute around the availability of seats on the train.
  • you think sushi at a baseball game is perfectly normal.
  • you vow to Gambaru before every little activity you engage in. "Do your best in whatever state that you find yourself in. The process is most important. The outcome is irrelevant but what matters is that you did not give up! You did not quit! You did not fall short of meeting your obligation. In whatever situation that you encounter do your utmost best."
  • you say that one of your hobbies is "doraibu." (Going for a casual drive)
  • you stupidly wait for a kampai at a gaijin party
  • you think no car is complete without a tissue box on the rear shelf and a feather duster in the trunk.
  • you ask a gaijin colleague who wears short sleeves in October, "Aren't you cold?"
  • you draw a sharp distinction between "English" and "English conversation."
  • you use the "slasher hand" and continuous bowing to make your way through a crowd.
  • all of your December Sundays are reserved for Bonenkai (end of year party) hangover recovery.
  • you are disappointed when Dominoes doesn't have corn pizza
  • you forget about July 4th, but get all worked up over Tanabata (August 15th Star Festival).
  • when it all seems normal.

Friday, May 7, 2010

Bikes, Trains, Streets and Parks

The street art in Taipei was defiantly different. Everything from the city planners or from the graphite looked great.





Overall, I was really surprised to see how westernized Taipei was. It really had a different feel to it then Japan, but it was also very different from what we had imagined. At times, it didn't feel Asian at all, not until we looked up and saw all the signs written in Chinese characters. At night the streets light up like a giant billboard. Shops pilled on top of each other. Each building having numerous businesses or restaurants in it. There are a few places like that in Kyoto but nothing to this scale. Taipei is one of the most concentrated places in the world. It felt like it too especially in the subway.

The subway system is amazing. Very modern and the flow of people from one area to another can be very overwhelming. As big, fast and developed as the subway system is. It honestly felt that I was like a canned tuna. The amount of people in Taipei is packed and eventually they will have to build a lot more to keep with with it. The Chinese names allowed me to have a little fun. This kanji means West Gate.



Not everything was westernized. One thing that was nice to see was even though the city was bustling, every once and a while we found a little Zen garden.



Thursday, May 6, 2010

Dirty and Noisy Bikes

Taiwan is about a 2-hour flight from Osaka. Remember that that is 2 hours flying straight south. In the middle of December, that meant going tropical for us. Now, this post may seem a little harsh but this just the first impression we got coming off the plain. In comparison, Japan is very different. Within the first few minutes of arriving, I already missed Japan.

The first thing we noticed was how green the outskirts of Taipei were. It looked like a jungle. I successfully caught some temples on the ride up. The outskirts may be green but the city is closer to black. What is really interesting to see in this picture is the guard rail on the side of the highway. What you'll notice is that its' black. The original colour should be a bright silver but because of all the diesel and pollution it looks so dirty. I'm sure they've never cleaned it.

That feeling kept with me all throughout the trip. My brother said that everything turns this city colour after a few weeks. Now I understand why. Gross

You may not be able to see it but this building has a strange yellow colour to it. The sky was mostly the same colour when we were there. Now I've never experienced smog before but it disgusted me and I felt ashamed for breathing in that kind of air. If the sky looks nice and blue in this picture that's due to the magic of digital correcting.
The next thing we noticed right off the start were the taxi cabs. They are clearly trying to get the New York feeling by having lots of yellow cabs everywhere. Unlike other places, taxis here are really cheap. In Japan, taxi cabs feel closer to limos. The drivers get out and open your door and dress in uniforms with little white gloves. In Taipei, they not only looked like New York cabbies but they acted like it too. They even had the New Yorker arrogance in the sense that they only spoke Mandarin. I had to specifically make a recording of my brother saying his address to play it for the driver because after a few times of trying most of them could not understand our bad Chinese.

As you can see by this pic these cabs were everywhere. I'm sure gas is incredibly expensive living on an island.

The last big difference that we saw with Japan was how many motorcycles were on the street. The feeling was like a buzzing swarm of bees on the streets. Like France, nobody follows any traffic laws. They weave between the cars, pedestrians and each other. They don't stop for red lights and to quote my brother he "honestly feel[s] terrified" every time he gets on his bike. They sort of look like a little army straight out of Mad Max. At least from anywhere in the city you can hear the army coming for you. The streets are noisier then the loudest river, not because of the honking or exhausts but because of the 3cc motors on some of these things.
In Canada, I'm not sure if we can buy these little mopeds. My image of a motor bike is closer to a Harley Davidson or something out of Easy Rider then these little things. I'm sure everyone in High School would have gotten one. We do have them in Japan but overall the street is not so congested with bikes everywhere. They run around $2000 for a new one and closer to $400 for used. If I get into school here I may consider buying one. It's cheaper then the subway.

In Taipei, if there was once a sidewalk then it's now become a motor bike parking spot. In most of the side streets you had to walk on the street because the sidewalk was just riddled with bikes. Always keeping an eye out of incoming traffic.

Most back alleys in Kyoto are empty because cars have to get through. Taipei looks like it was once bulldozed right to the ground and then planned in a very modern way. So there are a lot of back alleys that are filled with trash and of course lots of motorbikes.

Saturday, May 1, 2010

Almost Tropical X-mas

For X-mas Helene and I wanted to do something fun because a trip home would be too expensive. As much as we miss our families. Visiting Thailand was high on our list but it was simply way too expensive because thats what everyone does in this part of the world (except the Chinese) during the holiday season. (The Chinese go crazy in February for Chinese New Year) The second choice was to visit my brother Leo in Taiwan. Sorry bro for you being the second choice but Thailand sounded really awesome.

Some people have suggested to me that Taiwan is somehow Chinese property. Now, I have never been to China but from all the commercialism I saw, Taiwan is not China. I'm sure the US military will back me up on this. People tell me that Taiwan is more inclined towards the Japanese then the Chinese way. But I can tell you that there is huge difference.

I haven't seen my brother in over 3 years. I've was in France and he`s was in Taiwan with little interest to visit Canada. With freezing temperatures of +20°C in Taiwan, I can see why. I'm sure it sucks in the summer because of all the smog and humidity but for the winter Taiwan was a nice change. Tropical Winter From the 24th of December to the 28th we surprisingly found decently priced tickets to visit him.

Now in this side of the world the`re a little more liberal when it comes to some freedoms. For instance, here`s something you won`t see in the West. Maybe it`ll disappear out here too. One day. Everyone loves a good smoking room. Rather than having one cigarette you can have 19 at the same time. Now you`re in flavour country.

I`ve see stations like this at other airports, when people come out the`re followed by a big cloud of smoke. Ever see that Seinfeld episode where Kramer turns his apartment into a smoking lounge. The last time I saw one of these was in Europe before all the smoking protesting mothers started all the hooha.

Arriving in Taiwan, this sign was placed in front of us numerous times. They feel that threating the would be criminals with cute pictures of dogs would somehow detour their illegal activities.
Don`t they normally use big and angry looking dogs that are trained to jump on people. I know the bagel is a cute and probably good dog but it doesn`t exactly strike fear into the hearts of the drug traffickers.