journal | music | travel | about
J O U R N A L
.......
Monday, November 29
[Sun sleepless]posted by peter at 00:56 .......Today was so beautiful. This part of Tokyo is completely ace. And a trip to Vietnam and Taiwan to look forward to as well. Things get a bit exciting sometimes, as further evidenced by last night's very crazy and hideous Shibuya all-nighter, oh we're banning some of those memories forever...
.......
[English teaching in Japan]posted by peter at 19:05 .......Kaori, easily around 70 and who I adore, must have been quite the flirt in her day. In I walk this afternoon to hear her announce "Peter and the wolves," at which she gestures to herself, Hideko and Hiroko, the three of whom comprise the ultimate nattery old lady collective.
"We are the wolves," she declared. "And we are very hungry."
Hysterical.
Then she points at Tim, another teacher, and whispers "he is a stray sheep."
Old ladies out of control, what can I say?
Apparently it was also "let's tell Peter how much everything costs" day, because Chieko casually dropped that her apartment is a cool 480,000 yen per month, while Kikuko said with a smirk beneath her NY tennis visor that her family had budgeted 1,000,000 yen for their three day new year break. Then she told me that organic vegetables are expensive.
I'll leave the conversions up to you.
.......
[Paperwerk]posted by peter at 11:12 .......Currently annoyed or maybe just disappointed as despite my application for 3 years, I was granted only a 1 year visa extension. And with that evaporates the idea of being able to ferry in and out of Japan at my heart's content. So I guess out is the only way I'm headed.
My aching muscles and busy schedule haven't let me back in the gym yet, but Friday is the day. More than anything I can't wait to see the drunk toothless cleaning lady who loves us. Oh, she detained us (and how!) in the corridor and told Sareh that I look like her girlfriend, which I loved because androgyny is this winter's colour, Prince and Roxy Music being suitable soundtracks I believe.
Good old Jaye and her ability to transform a vehemently declared "quiet evening in Shinjuku" into a yen-depleting red wine fiesta, but it can only be a good thing.
Have you ever tried to explain the term "fungal skin infection" in another language? It ain't no easy task, let me tell you. And relax; all is under control.
.......
[Change form]posted by peter at 12:00 .......So I ruined a rather nice Ralph Lauren silk tie by, um, washing it. Good one, eh?
.......
[Health]posted by peter at 19:20 .......Ok, so I'm 181.5 cm tall, 70.3 kg, 20% body fat and my blood pressure is slightly too high (can't imagine why).
How do I know all of this?
Oh because I've joined a gym.
Believe it or not.
.......
[Culture]posted by peter at 19:16 .......The experimental contemporary classical music concert was so bizarre.
It was basically an atonal pipe organ recital.
Many of the sounds approximated a hybrid of the Twilight Zone and the high pitched shriek for which my pseudocousin Sandra is renowned.
Enter the splendid Japanese soprano (a vast white vision in taffeta) and things really got out of hand.
It was SO weird... not only the music but also the very serious black-clad Tokyoite organists who thumped away at the massive instrument, complete with personal assistants to operate the stops.
I loved it but I think I am ever so slightly tired of the "let's see how discordant we can be before the punters stop coming" school of fringe artistry. Seemed a good chunk of the audience members fell asleep anyway.
And for that matter I'm over New York post-punk as well.
.......
[Greyer]posted by peter at 17:18 .......Welcome to that unique wasteland which unfolds between key times... an empty timeframe just long enough to do something, not long enough to do anything. I have all the ingredients for a cook-up, and I should do it because it would provide some healthy variety at work tomorrow, but I'm sure I would only just start sauteeing the onions and then have to fly out of the house in a mad rush to make the trains.
I am going to a modern classical concert in Shinjuku. Until then, time must be passed.
The Jeffrey Eugenides book Middlesex has kept me entertained all afternoon, as has the rain and the cold which I am viewing with less malice on this end of my weekend. Sometimes the most inane excursion possible (to get a key cut!) will shape a whole day in ways positive and unheard of... and thoroughly intangible and beyond definition.
Just at this moment I feel like I'm on the cusp of something I can look forward to, even if it is to a soundtrack of awful cafe jazz pop hit remakes.
.......
[Five to four]posted by peter at 22:33 .......I am becoming rather fond of Tokyo People's Cafe, here in Komazawa, not least of all for its free Internet, but also for its array of tasty vegetarian salads.
Today I requested to go four days a week at work. I was refused. I hate them. So much.
Thank goodness for the sick day concept.
About to go for a walk in the park with Mel, my housemate. It's late, but this is Japan so we needn't worry even though I did hear rumours of someone being murdered there recently. I find it all a bit hard to believe actually.
.......
I must write about the Japanese guy who accosted us in the alley outside our house, asked for English lessons and then didn't show up at the agreed-to time despite the fact that we had made pomegranate, walnut and baby leaf salad and bought stacks of red wine. We hate him.
.......
[Beta]posted by peter at 11:07 .......My site isn't working.
Of course if this message appears then the opposite is true.
.......
[Roads]posted by peter at 19:48 .......One year in Japan but the best news is that I'm going to Vietnam for Christmas with Ms Pippa!
.......
[For want of stories]posted by peter at 14:08 .......So with all the technology in the world I still can't do Internet banking on a Mac. Of course not, why would I be able to?
I am relishing one very much needed day off at the moment, sitting in a rather fab cafe beneath the tracks in Shibuya. Last night our landlord burst into the house at 12am with three thugs threatening to evict the French guy because of the cat (which nobody wants anymore after it filthed up the living room), and what ensued was an argument which spiralled on and probably didn't get resolved but I wouldn't know because Sareh and I stormed out to catch the last train to Shibuya, hissing "we NEED to go out" and slamming the door for effect. We went to our favourite punk bar where they always play Frente! whenever we arrive and caught a cab home at around 3.
I am yet to fully organise my new room. It's looking quite good despite the hideous bunk (!) bed, and I bought some lurid fairy lights to contrast with the other more subdued and stylish elements that I have used to adorn the unusually-shaped space. I'm getting quite good at this whole interior thing now, even if I do say so myself.
My list of needs include new work shoes and a good winter coat suitable for work and play. Difficult, difficult. Oh, and a plane ticket to Vietnam; I have my name on a waiting list which I just don't understand at all.
Being back in the classroom has been interesting... it's so easy and generally enjoyable, but honestly, I think it may just be starting to wear ever so slightly thin...
.......
[From Hachiko]posted by peter at 00:03 .......Two strangers in Hong Kong told me I have a lucky face, and one of them then asked to see my hand.
It was like, how would you even know?? I'm wearing vintage sunglasses...
Still longing for HK. My new house is great but the landlord is a complete fuckwit... he stole some of my bedding and didn't leave the key as arranged. I still can't get in by myself.
Work is dire but I'm thankful to be alive.
.......
[People can make a home anywhere]posted by peter at 22:42 .......And at the end of the day it's weird being back in Tokyo.
I bought two tshirts to compensate. One is navy with random green stripes and statements such as "Im museum", and the other is grey with loads of sinister birds. Birds! I hate birds. But Genta made me buy it because it's who I am.
.......
[South China]posted by peter at 01:16 .......I clearly need to live in Hong Kong.
It is every bit as wonderful as I remembered, and maybe even moreso as the city seems to have undergone somewhat of a coffee and health food revolution since the last time I was here. And the people are great, with loads of rude attitude which I love.
The only bad things I have noticed are the closure of a good vegetarian restaurant (they couldn't be bothered paying their rent according to the eviction notice or whatever it was pasted on the green roller door) and the replacement of the beautiful BBC English train announcements with ones that border on "like, yaah" valleygirl at times. Or maybe I've misidentified a Transatlantic accent – after all, Hong Kong is Asia's world city, purportedly.
I tried Ben and Jerry's icecream for the first time. It is rather good, but not that good. My feet are killing me, as the chocolate brown All Stars with green and brown striping on the inside and tongue back (which you can fold out to reveal) that I bought in Tokyo shortly before going to Australia seem not to have completely worn in at this point in time. There is nothing like blisters to cap off a wicked city experience.
.......
[Mystery flight]posted by peter at 06:24 .......I've heard nothing of the American election, I'm on my way to Hong Kong (where I have no accommodation) and I am as scared about the future as I've ever been in my life.
Which isn't to say that things are bad.
Talk soon.
.......
