I am no longer "Alone in Kudamatsu." Havent been for a few years, actually. I just moved with Motto from Tokuyama to Hiroshima. Yup, that Hiroshima, from your history book. But the name "Alone in Kudamatsu" stays. "Living in Sin in Hiroshima" is too wordy.
I love it here in the big city so far. Ive never lived in a real urban place with a population of over a million. Just today Motto and I were walking back from the grocery store and took a moment to notice how huge the high rise we past was. Like a couple of country bumpkins we stood there, noses pointed up, counting the stories. 33. So tall. We were impressed.
Motto: Can you imagine if you were building that?
Me: What do you mean?
Motto: Standing up there working.
Me: It'd be so windy.
Motto: Would you live on the top floor?
Me: Probably not, I'd think about jumping too much.
This apartment is a lot bigger than the one back in Tokuyama. We got a bedroom, a tatami room, a kitchen, a genkan, and a bathroom with a mirror and sink! I was so excited about that. The last apartment had a sink and tiny shaving mirror in the shower and that was it.
Strange noises:
10 p.m. church bells. Church, really?
Upstairs neighbor plays loud 90's Alt rock on Saturday nights.
Nightly slapping sound. Like someone is quickly whacking a fat man's back. Duration: approx 20 mins.
Good points:
Living downtown and can get a burrito, Starbucks decaf iced coffee, falafel and Subway sandwich in one afternoon. I dont, but I could.
Small American-themed cafe downstairs in my building. Serves coffee, cocktails, and Japanese food. The owner has big glasses and a motorbike and we say "konnichiwa" when we see each other.
Okonomiyaki restaurant around the corner has a friendly cook who makes me vegetarian food.
A young vegetable vendor guy stands downstairs with some cheap random veggies some days. Old ladies walk by and buy single cucumbers and slip them in their purses. They all seem to know each other pretty well.
Squeezed 20 guests inside for my housewarming party.
Someone keeps their wifi unlocked and it's super fast.
Bad Points:
Raspberry-chan's new room is on one of our balconies. Motto got sick of being attacked by her and we cant let her chew up the floors and wooden moulding anymore. So she's outside like some sort of animal.
I bought some new furniture and now I finally own a bed. But too be honest I miss the futons.
Motto got that insane bookshelf (pictured left) at a refurbish shop. I told him if he wants to keep his million DVDs Antonio gave him he'd better find something to keep them in.
I tried to take pictures of the place. But a video tour will probably work better. I'll do that someday. Or you could come visit.
I should make a Drunk Vegetarian Guide to Hiroshima to accompany my Fukuoka one.
Finally finished a project I've been working on for a while, LearnNihongo.com. It's a website for Motto's online Japanese lesson business. I've been studying CSS feverishly for months trying to make a site that looks professional and can serve as a portfolio piece to get me more jobs as a web designer.
The site has come a long way from this:
You can tweet this link to help spread the word about the site, and follow @learnnihongo for a new Japanese vocab word everyday.
Put a new small comic up over on the sketchblog, for those of you who dont subscribe to that feed. There are a few new things over there. Not a lot, dont get all excited.
As a side note, my new favorite word is delase. Coined by Motto, this word is a combination of "delete" and "erase" that only a nihonjin could think up.
(Hint: because R's and L's are interchangeable to them.)
A few months ago Motto and I went to an ink painting class in Yamaguchi City. I'm blogging about it now.
It was one of the most fun things we'd ever done together. We woke up early and drove to the community center. The instructor was apparently a big famous ink painter who really wanted us to learn how to paint asparagus.
Neither Motto nor I really knew what was going on in the beginning. I didnt because I couldnt understand what anyone was saying, and Motto didnt because Japanese people are confusing. We had the wrong supplies. Instead of our bottle of ink we actually needed a black stick (charcoal maybe? condensed ink?) and a block to rub it on. We spent 10 or 15 minutes rub rub rubbing the stick on the block with a splash of water. Then, viola! Ink!
After the ink materialized there was a long explanation that bored me to death as I was itching to pick up my paintbrush. Enjoy the video below to see what I mean.
Finally we were allowed to start copying the teacher's technique to paint asparagus, eggplant, and cucumbers. The teacher painted an example on my paper and then a bunch of old ladies came over and told me it was really good. "じょうず！"
After 5 minutes of painting vegetables Motto was doing quite well, creating things fit to be hung on our walls, but my veggies sucked and I was bored of them. So I started painting the teacher (I had been staring at him for 20 minutes with a paintbrush in hand, couldnt resist) and then the girl sitting across from me.
And I almost got away with it. Let's just say there was applause. But I'll never know if they were impressed with my paintings or with a foreigner who knows how to apply ink to paper. Motto acted like the whole putting my painting in front of the class and asking me to sign it and a famous ink painter taking it home as a gift thing didnt even happen. I'm not kidding. He didnt say a thing about it. Which leads me to believe it could have been an elaborate hallucination brought on by owing $18,000 in student loans to an art school.
I never do this, but I thought I should make my blog a little more useful to the Googling public. Especially after Motto had two occasions this month where total strangers mentioned knowing him through my blog. He so famous.
This past weekend Motto and I went to Fukuoka for a little getaway (my two week vacation in Texas the week before wasn't getaway enough, I guess). We left Sunday morning and decided to drive to save money. We didnt take the highway to save money. We added 3 hours to the 2 hour drive to save money. Money saved, lucky me.
Mana Burger Our first stop was Mana Burger. Motto knew after that drive I needed to be fed. Being vegetarian in Japan, I find few places that serve real food I can eat. Yes, I can find french fries and iceberg lettuce most places, but everything else is covered in meat or fish juice. Honestly, the majority of people in Japan have never heard of vegetarianism, much less met one. Youre not allowed to go against the flow here.
Mana Burger advertises themselves as "Natural Junk." The menu includes 8 veggie burgers, 2 veggie dogs, french fries, tempeh fries, nuggets, soups and salads. I ordered the Garden Mana, which is totally vegan and is topped with sprouts, avocado, and dairy free Island dressing. The burger itself was good and didnt taste like one of those disgusting Burger King veggie patties. And I was totally willing to fork over the 780¥ (about $9USD) for something I could put in my mouth that wasnt deep fried or bland as hell. (Regular burger is just 580¥)
The Mana Dog on the other hand, meh. It tasted like a nuked tofu dog on a big bun. They also put a big pile of sauerkraut on top, which seems weird. C'mon, isnt relish vegan? But I may just be spoiled from having just been in Texas eating tofu dogs whenever the mood hit me. I could see myself craving those 530¥ weiners in a few months. (They were no Vancouver street dogs by any means...droool.)
I did like the copious amounts of ketchup and mustard available! A rare thing in Japan! They also sell vegetarian food, like ramen packs, tempeh, beans, etc.
〒810-0023 福岡県福岡市中央区警固2-15-20 Tel 092-986-0759 Monday-Friday 11:00〜21:00 Saturday 10:00〜21:00
Marinoa City Next we went to the mega outlet mallMarinoa City. This was Motto's main reason for wanting to come to Fukuoka. It was pretty cool, I mean if you look at the website there is a Ferris Wheel, Smoking Corner, Children's Restroom. What's not to love? Having just visited America for two weeks I wasnt super impressed, but I could see the appeal if I really needed to get my shopping on. Not like any of the clothes in the entire place would fit me, but there are always accessories and snacks!
Places of note include the LEGO store, Muji Factory Outlet, ABC Mart and Starbucks. Even at discount prices things seemed expensive. Nothing to drive 5 1/2 hours for, especially in the age of internet shopping, but nice nonetheless.
Super Hotel Looking for the cheapest hotel possible, but something with a private bathroom and locks on the doors, we found Super Hotel. Located downtown and costing only 4,100¥ for two people (with Motto's student discount), and 700¥ for parking it was a pretty sweet deal. The bed was kind of small but the room had everything one needs: a fridge, hot water and tea, a blow dryer, air filter and a unit bathroom. The room was clean but the bathroom had mold in the cracks. I knew that wouldnt be good for my ritual hangover bath.
There was a buffet continental breakfast that Motto *loved* but I didnt bother waking up for, since it was not vegetarian-friendly (or appealing?). Miso soup, rice, boiled chicken, pickled vegetables, kimchi, octopus calpacho, eggs, fish, hamburgers (that just means round ground meat here), and drinks.
Contemporary Bar 「瀧商店」 We didnt know what to expect when we arrived at Contemporary Bar for our 7:30 reservation. Motto just booked the place (we were meeting up with his old university friends) because they had a 2,000¥ (24$USD) nomihodai (all you can drink for two hours*) that included three food options. Plus he called ahead and they said they can accommodate vegetarians.
We were a little nervous when we went inside. Motto explained it was in the "bad boy" part of town (a store called Four Twenty across the street). It wasnt a big izakaya like we expected, but a small place with seating for two parties and a few stools at the bar. It had a nice atmosphere though, and interesting, funky decorations. A milk bottle lamp hung between the red sofas where we sat.
But we had nothing to be nervous about. The cocktail choices for nomihodai were awesome (my favorites, Absolut Vodka and Disaronno were available) and the two guys working were friendly and casual (you can see one sitting at the bar in the video). They didnt make us feel guilty for making them fetch our drinks every 10 minutes. The food was really good too, surprisingly. First a big salad with an array of vegetables, then minestrone soup (creamy and oishii!) and finally a big plate of french fries. It was all included in the 2,000¥ each. There were five of us there and enough food for all, although we did order more because we felt obliged to given how little we had to pay (and we drank all their beer).
And let me tell you, the drinks were strong. I think I had a rum and tonic, three Bulldogs (vodka and grapefruit juice) and two amaretto orange sodas. But it could have been more (who knows at that point). You can see the direction the conversation was going in the video (meaning: Japanese) and for the first hour I just kind of nodded my head along, but I swear by the end I was fluent and the funniest person in the room!
*Japanese people dont seem to see that as a challenge.
Yatai We took a taxi to a yatai so the boys could eat ramen and drink more. I ordered sho-chu (god knows why), took two sips than wondered up and down the yatai-lined street looking for a toilet. I did eventually stumble into a kombini and use the toilet. I think I may have eaten grilled mushrooms, too. I do know that I was to drunk to argue in Japanese about how I shouldnt have to split the bill. And I didnt want to embarrass Motto in front of his friends.
In the morning I put on my sunglasses, my clothes from the night before, swung by Subway for a Veggie Delite and endured the nauseating ride back to Tokuyama.
Motto came home today with a 12 pack of pink toilet paper.
It's his last week of work teaching, and he brought on a few students to a yaki niku buffet for a goodbye lunch. Motto told me he spent 3,000¥ on lunch and then when he came back to the office later there was a 12 pack of pink toilet paper waiting for him. The office lady must have said who it was from.
When I pressed Motto for more details about why they would buy him a 12 pack of pink toilet paper, or what he thought it meant, he just shrugged and said he felt lucky, because we could really use the toilet paper.
"Why are you writing about my story?" Motto just asked me, "It's normal."
Jon thinks I'm dead because I havent updated my blog in 10 days. I didnt think I was that avid of a blogger, but apparently I am. I only like to write here when something cool or bad but Japanese related happens...but, most of my time is spent cleaning the apartment (for the princesses) or what I did today: going into work for an hour then walking to the pet shop to put my nose against the glass of the bunny tanks.
The cutest bunny has been there for a week, but there's a paper post-it that supposedly says "sold" in Japanese. It's even a girl, which is good because Raspberry is too sassy for a man to come up in here and tell her what's what (and pee on her the way boy bunnies do).
So today I had Motto email me the Japanese for, "Is she really sold or can I buy her?" And I showed it to an employee. The employee politely informed me, while bowing, "Haisumimasenyoudesuschottosksjhjdgkjjsdhdjsdesuneonegaishimasu."
Or something like that. I didnt know what that meant, so I stood around a few minutes just to make sure she wasnt swooping her out of the tank and into my arms.
She didn't. And Raspberry has no sister. And I've updated my blog.
A few nights ago Motto and I hit a 711. He read comics and I explored the ice cream freezer. I was excited to find an actual dinosaur egg being stored between suika popsicles and soda ice. I bought two.
I ate mine on the walk home, but Motto agreed to save his til we got back so we could document the experience. The dino egg is kept inside a balloon, or possibly a tiny condom.
Motto mentioned in passing that he wouldnt mind teaching Japanese lessons over the internet in his "spare time" (or meal/sleeping time, as most people call it). So, I of course immediately got started building him a website. It was fun and didnt take very long. I like playing around with HTML code and pop-ups and PayPal. I even used a coupon I had to take an ad out on Facebook. Maybe you will be one of the thousands of lucky Facebookers to see the ad. You'd have to have "Japanese" or "Japanese Language" or "Japanese Culture" as one of your listed interests (god knows, I dont) and you'd have to live in the States...but, who knows. If you see it take a screen shot (feel free to black out whatever unmentionable Facebook group you're trolling).
Now, you might be thinking, "Why would I pay money to talk to your boyfriend online?" Because I know I would. I mean, he doesnt usually make me pay, but... Actually, tons of people here, in Japan!, pay loads of money for Japanese lessons every week. I used to, back when I was capable of book learnin, before I became obsessed with watching King of the Hill reruns on Videostic.com. But really, if people who live in a country surrounded by Japanese would pay to take lessons, there must be something to the word "lesson" that makes you not mind throwing money at it.
Plus he's a real teacher. Plus he giggles a lot. Plus he may agree to do webcam. Plus I'm not even sure he knows what's going on. I'm not asking any of you blog readers to sign up for lessons. I hope I have a more refined audience then Naruto-obsessed-used-Japanese-pantie-sniffing-Nihonphiles. But, do go check out my amazing web-baby-making skillz. It's at http://japaneselesson.jimmyjanesays.com.
The day we've all been waiting for has arrived! Motto and I adopted a bunny! Her name is Raspberry-chan and she's the cutest bunny in this prefecture. She enjoys chewing cords, pooping in her litter box dutifully, and biting feet. She dislikes sudden movements, bananas, and when I hit her in the head with the door. I taught her one trick already, too.
It took a lot of explaining. First, I had to describe what a Sloppy Joe actually was. Then, why it is so important. He couldn't believe it was vegetarian. He kept picking up little bits with his chopsticks and screaming, "THIS IS MEAT!" He loved them, and his awe for all things American grew along with his belly.
If any of you would like to help me feed this skinny Japanese boy, please send a box of Fantastic brand vegetarian Sloppy Joe mix my way. Every box helps.
And by circus I mean my Aunt and Unlce! A few weeks ago Matthew and Kotoe came out to Suckuragi for a visit. They were in Japan to see Kotoe's sister's wedding, but couldnt resist a detour down to the Guchi-ken. Obviously, I gave them the grand tour-- Ell's ditch, Antonio's Yatai, and Shidax Karaoke.
The night started off well. What was supposed to be a bathroom break turned into an hour of Matt being pummeled by an old Japanese man at Ell's Ditch. He wanted to know Matt's name, occupation, birthplace, and you know, put his hand on his lap. After we said our goodbye's to all the drunken gaijin that make their usual Thursday night appearance, we headed to the yatai.
I'm sure Matt and Kotoe were very excited to meet the legendary Antonio and eat the oishii-est ramen within 10 square feet. Matt even got to fish out his own oden (which means Antonio loves him)!
There were some old business men at the yatai, and Matt and Kotoe chatted with some of them for a while. I don't know what they talked about but one crazy dude followed us into karaoke. After we said our goodbye's and got into a karaoke box there was a tappin' at the door. To our suprise the old business man, Antonio, and two gaijin wanted to join in on the fun.
Hilarious videos below:
(pervy old man)
(Antonio tearing it up)
(No, I wont post the one of my singing Mariah Carey, but with all the times it's been done and all the digital recording equipment available today, I'm sure it'll be on YouTube soon)
One cute thing about my Friend, Motto, is that even though his English is really good, every once in a while he runs into a word that isn't part of his regular daily vocabulary. Maybe he's only heard it once, or read it in a book. So before he says it he hesitates for a second, and then a really proud expression comes to his face.
