Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known

It’s the only way to describe things at the moment, everything just feels right.

My apartment is feeling more and more like my home every day and while I don’t have to cash to buy all the things I’d like to get for it, it’s definately cozy now and I like the things I have, so it’s pretty awesome. I like the area where I live, there is sort of an undercover market area right by the station and a couple of the stores seems to operate on a weekly basis so there is often something new and exciting. At the moment there is a hippy-esque store that just opened up and they’ll be there until Friday (the owner guy spoke to me when I was browsing), I bought some Nag Champa incence there so my place smells beautiful now as well. I love living alone (with the net) I am able to stay connected by still enjoy my own company in my own space. It is fantastic and everything I’ve ever hoped it would be.

Work is really good. The hours are slowly killing me but the people I work with are great, the kids are super sweet and I’ve been given the green light to descign part of the curriculum and give a particular program a total overhaul which will be a great challenge but also fantastic experience. I like riding the bus to work from the station, mostly because you can sort of appreciate the surroundings where as on a train it’s either going too quick, going through shitty back-of-buildings routes or it’s too packed to see out the windows.  I haven’t been paid yet (the week after next I will be paid) so I imagine getting paid will make it even better.

Next week I m going out with the teachers from work for my birthday. It wasn’t even my plan, the other teacher I am friends with (who is exactly one month younger than me) has arranged it all. I feel very special considering I’ve only worked there for just over a week. I also have the big joint birthday party coming this Friday when I get to see all of my favourite people in Tokyo and some other bits and pieces coming up over the weekend. As a total cherry on top type situation, it’s also a long weekend here. Fucking yes, that is all I can say.

It’s starting to get pretty fucking cold here. Just over the weekend a cool change has come through and the elbow length sleeves I enjoy so much are no longer cutting it. As I walked to the station this morning it was pretty rough to not have proper long sleeves on. I bought a purple hoodie and a pink sleeved baseball tee today (all from the guy’s section, gotta love Japan. I know you wouldn’t find a hot pink, mens tee with colorful writing and pictures all over it in Oz ). I am too tall for a lot of girl clothes here but the guys stuff tends to be a little longer (while still super cute) so, win win!! I bought a new bag the other day, it’s kind of fluro colored with a big smiley face and some Engrish on it “It is possible to do again even if making a mistake”. I’ve decided to make it as obnoxious as I posssibly can buy collecting as many little stuffed creatures and toys and novelties to hang off the side. There are girls here who must have about 3 kg of toys hanging off their phone but I’d rather apply that type of excess to my bag.

I am going to go make my bento for tomorrow now. If I do it now it’s one less thing to do in the morning which means I get to lie in bed and think about how much I want to stay there for longer than normal. I start late tomorrow so I will have time to dick around tomorrow morning if I make lunch now…maybe I’ll even upload the pics I’ve been promising for weeks now??

As I write, I am sitting with a headful of hair bleach. I know it’s good because there is a Blythe Doll on the box with pale yellow hair (and Deanne told me it was an alright brand). Because last weekend’s adventure with hairdye results in slightly lighter root I have applied it only to the ends and will let it bubble away (not really bubbling, settle) for a while before I go to the roots. This should give me a more even bleach and should reduce the likelihood of my hair frying and snapping off at the roots…or so my theory goes. To back it up, I bought a sort of dusty pink colored Blythe dye I must have decided that one was a bit shitty, the one I ended up with is called “Mysterious Beige” which is an oxy-moron if ever I’ve heard one. We’ll see how mysterious I am looking in an hour, shall we??

So, aside from messing with my poor, poor hair I have actually had an extremley productive day. I’ve done three loads of washing, hauled it all down to the laundromat to get it dried and bought it back, hung up clothes and folded and sorted the other bits. I bought a vacuum (doll sized, like 98% of things in Japan are) but it sucks well, was very cheap and has the added bonus of being bagless. Anything which reduces the frequency that I need to transact in a mix of English, pigeon-Japanese and interpretive dance is a great thing. I vacuum my floor, the window tracks and my futon and blankets…mostly just because I can but they feel all fluffy and clean now. I am going to invest in a futon dryer soon as well. I am absolutely paranoid about mould and dust and anything that makes my futon cleaner and nicer to sleep on it great, I’ve also found out you can use the futon dryers to heat it before you hop into bed. Imagine slipping into bed with a prewarmed mattress and sheets. Yah, I know, that’s why I want one.

** My whole head is now bleaching. That burning tingling sensation is happening which means you know it’s causing your hair irrepairable damage working **

What else? Ummm, I did all the dishes as well, so my sink it totally free of crap which is a plesant change as they’d been piling up for a few days. Leaving home at 7:30am and returning around 9:00pm means that doing dishes when I first wake up or when I get home from work is not a huge priority, so I am a grub but it’s not like I just choose not to do them in favour of doing nothing, I’d rather just sleep or eat in the 14 minutes I have before I fall asleep when I make it home of a night. I have a couple of pairs of socks who got left behind from the washing spree today to tidy up and my apartment will be picture perfect. I even cleaned the bathroom with some crazy anti-bac stuff I got at Daiso so it’s hospital-grade clean as well. Jen = win.

Yesterday after work I went shopping before I came home. Having nothing at home to greet me means I often wander around if the stores are still open, just to suss things out. I found a department store near the station I get off at for work and bought a pair of shoes! They are Brikenstock-esque clogs, except they have like a purple, checked flannel top. They are amazingly ugly in a cute way and it would have been cheaper to buy an “I’m a giant lesbian, can’t you tell??” tshirt than buy these shoes, because they do a similarly effective job of advertising the fact but I think they are cute, and they slip on which is awesome in the land of constantly taking shoes on and off and they fit me (because they are boy shoes) but really, what boy wears purple-ish, fabric clogs??

** Washed out bleach, found I was a fairly even, FLAMING red. Not a bad color if it is what I wanted, but I am hoping for something a tiny bit more subtle. Threw on the “Mysterious Beige” and waited 30 mins. Well, I know what is mysterious about this beige… I think it’s safe to say that it has done almost nothing, aside from tone down the red just a tiny bit. My hair is now the color of a lightish Gingernut. I had no real idea of what I wanted, so this is a nice enough color. It looks like doll’s hair though, somrthing about the depth of the color or something, but it looks very fake. I don’t mind that, but it seems Blythe is a perfect mascot for this dye **

Tomorrow will be a total write off. I’d like to say because I will be face down in my futon sleeping off my body weight in Long Island Iced Tea but I will just be setting up a highschool gym for a Halloween Party, then wrangling 150 over-excited Japanese monsters, fairies, princesses, ghosts and whatever else they come dressed as. I am excited for my first Halloween celebration, but I’d rather have Sunday off. I have my private lesson in an hour and a half, so that means I am technically working today as well. I had planned to do it Sunday but the party ruined that plan so I had to change times. Next weekend should be better, I am having a mega combined birthday party with a couple of other people on the 31st so we get to dress up AND drink, my two most favourite things. I will have to go straight from work (to maximise my drinking time before the last train) so hopefully the kids aren’t messy next Friday.

Tonight I might have drinks with Deanne, I’m sort of reserving my decision until later this evening. I am not sure if I am going to crash early simply because I can or if I will be fine because I’m used to pretty late nights now. I’m gonna do some shopping and get my new phone so I’ll see how I go. I finally got my Australian bank card with the Visa option (thanks for the tip, Lulu!!) so I can access my cizzash from selling my car. I don’t have heaps left after paying off my loan, but it’s a nice little treat to have disposable cash!! I don’t think I’m gonna buy much aside from the new phone and a monthly train pass, the memory of being stinking poor is still quite fresh.

Better dash, off to chat with a 7 year old for money. I will upload photos, the wireless signal is being a little tempremental today so I’ll see how it feels tomorrow or Monday.

## Net was so temperamental it would not upload before I left! Home again now, having spent FAR too much money on silly things and about to go drink with Deanne!! Weeeee!!

So working is really great. I get on super well with the other foreign girl teacher there – so that is fun, the kids are incredibly sweet and I just like it. Nothing particularly stressful or demanding or anything I can’t handle, just long hours.

It does not help things that I have extreme lunch box envy, and therefore have spent my evenings scouring the supermarket and ¥100 store trying to create a bento set for myself and some deliciously impressive (vegetarian) treats to put inside, so I can compete with the students. They have the most delicious looking, elaborate bento boxes I have ever seen and it puts the standard Aussie kids lunch of a Vegemite sandwich, a piece of fruit and maybe a piece of cake/little packet of chips or some snack biscuits, very much to shame. Today I had rice, edamame, a boiled egg and a little tempura corn cake thingy. It was super yummy but I forgot to buy divider cups so all my stuff touched each other and it didn’t look very impressive, I also didn’t have any rice sprinkles or soy but I got some sprinkles this afternoon so I can have that next time. I think I’m gonna make a sandwich for tomorrow though, I am too exhausted to be bothered with a bento right now and I have an early start tomorrow and I’m pretty happy not to get out of bed any earlier than is entirely necessary, even if it is to make a beautiful lunch.

Today did have some bad points. On my walk home from work I decided that today would be giant Mountain Dew day. For the sake of my health/teeth/overall well being I have elected to only enjoy my forbidden nectar only twice a week, there are no specific Mountain Dew days, but there can only be two of them. In celebration of hump day and finishing early today I was going to partake in the ‘Dew this evening, but when I arrived at my vending machine the giant Mountain Dew and giant Pepsi have gone!! There is giant Mountain Dew in the machine right by the station by it is ¥10 more expensive than this one was! Plus, this machine was far more convenient. Balls, I say!!

Secondly, I noticed just before that the fabric on my favourite jeans is wearing through and they will soon become fairly indecent to wear in public. Because I’ve worn them on pracs and to work, the fabric around the butt and tops of the legs is wearing out from sitting on the floor, near sandpits and other rough surfaces. The hundreds of times they would have been washed during their life would not have helped this. I am totally heartbroken, they were particularly stylish or anything but they were a really good length, fit really well and could be dressed up or down with equal success. I am still going to keep them as home jeans, I’m not ready to say goodbye yet.

Yeah, so lack of Mountain Dew and coming to terms with the mortality of an old pair of jeans has tarnished my otherwise sparkling day. This time last week I only just got a futon so comparitively, this Wednesday is heaps better than the last one.

Good things about today: Buying Halloween corn chips, grated cheese and salsa from the imported food store near the station near school. Hurrah for potential nachos! I also got some TimTams and Swiss Miss. I am going to hold onto the TimTams until I really need them but SwissMiss will be lovely of an evening when I come home feeling absolutely fucked from school and it’s cold. Liquid chocolate, mmmmm. I also bought some animal crackers, they are tiny and according to the packet super low fat and a good source of calcium. I just bought them because I could, but they are tasty, so yay! I found a pet store today and saw a baby Pug and two baby French Bulldogs. Cutest dogs EVER! I kind of feel like one of those ladies who is clucky with no baby because I go and stare adoringly at them, touch all the little clothes you can buy and contemplate buying a few things just to put away for when it finally happens. I barely have time to look after myself right now though, so it will be a while yet.

I know I promised before, but pictures are still coming. I won’t have a presentable apartment until the weekend so I will absolutely do it Saturday once I have tidied up, no excuses! (Unless my free internet dies, then no, but otherwise yes!!

My usual Saturday morning acitivties would include sitting around in my PJs, watching 80s video clips on VH1 and doing shopping of some description with D’Mummy. Now, none of those are an option for me (I even forgot to bring PJ pants/tracky dacks with me, so I am forced to lounge around in jeans). I am sitting on my new chair (yep, still exciting) reading stuff online, blogging and eating Oreos. Later on I am going to attempt to locate what I believe to be a second hand store not too far from my house. When I was pressed up against the windscreen of the cab yesterday being driven home with my new belongings, I saw a shop that seemed to have a huge amount of recycled furniture in it and more displayed on the footpath. I thought at the time “Shit! I wish that was close to my house, I’d love to get down there for a look, I am sure it will have good stuff” and what do you know, it’s right by the station on the “wrong” side of the tracks, maybe a 10 minute walk from here. My wishlist for this apartment is a set of plastic drawer thingys, a low bench/shelf unit thing, a vaccuum or steam mop to clean the floors, a shoe tower, a toaster and an electric kettle, or even one for the stove.

I have the grand total of 0cm² bench space in my apartment. I have the kitchen sink, the side of the sink bit and then the burners. If you want to chop anything you have to clear off the side of the sink or balance a chopping board precariously across some of the surfaces. The one area I use as benchspace is on top of the washing machine. All well and good when it is not in use, but when I need it there is a whole bunch of crap that needs to be rehomed in the meantime. Even the bathroom doesn’t have a shelf or counter or cabinet!! It’s not like there is really space to have counters anywhere in here but when you have no storage type equipment to contain your shit, it’s very frustrating to end up with little piles all over the place. It has been grating on me for a week now so it’s becoming the thing I need to fix, pronto!!

Some other things:

• Japanese McDonalds hashbrowns are slightly thicker than Australian MacDonalds one. It’s very curious, but in a tasty way.
• You can buy a 750ml bottle of 40% vodka here for ¥930…or a massive 3L jug of sake for ¥1,800…right in the local supermarket.
• There are some mosquitoes who seem to live in my apartment but I thought they needed water to have their babies and I don’t have water lying around? Crazy, super evolved Japanese mosquitoes, no doubt.
• When I got my phone here I signed up for prepaid because I was scared of getting a huge bill. In the like 9 days since I’ve had it I’ve burned through one round of ¥3,000 credit and I’m working on my second lot now. I know a plan will be cheaper than ¥6,000 a month, Jeebus!! Now that I know I am staying fo’ shiz I think a contract will be alright (and they don’t even charge you to break it anyways, unlike Oz!)
• I invest time, money and energy into waste disposal these days. I had to buy string and scissors so I could properly constrain my paper/cardboard (recyclable waste) and some plastic garbage bags for my burnable garbage (plastic and other assorted bits). Today I will spend more time breaking down cardboard boxes and making neat piles tied with string, rinsing out all my cans/food containers and getting it all laid out for the appropriate garbage days. Thankfully, I don’t believe there is a garbage nazi in my block seeing we are all gaijin so fingers crossed no one will get mad at me. I tried! I consulted the handy poster on what gets bundled together and when it gets collect, I hope I did it right!!
• I might buy a plant today. There is a plant store near my house with a variety of lovely flowers and plants for sale. They have a little hibiscuis, some pretty ivy or some snap dragons which have all caught my eye. I think I will go for the ivy or a fern of some type though, I’d rather have something that is pretty all the time than just flowering for a little while.

Finally, I ripped this straight from Enny:

What a difference a week makes.

So on Monday I was entirely convinced that I couldn’t do this. I was sleeping on a mat and so homesick/lonely/bewildered/depressed that it made every cell of my body ache with a pain and desperation that I have never felt before. Now, Friday night, I am sitting on a lovely IKEA chair, enjoying (dodgy, stolen) internet after having eaten a yummy home cooked meal and I will soon retire to my new (old) double futon to prepare for work on Monday.

Yes, I have a job. I went to an interview today and they were very keen, they asked me to stay for a little while and lead a lesson (which I did on the fly, go me!) and they were so impressed they offered me the job on the spot. They are also happy to be guarantors on my apartment, give me a forward on my pay if I need cash before pay day and give me a work visa. If at approximately 1pm this afternoon you felt something shift, it was just the weight of the world being removed from my shoulders. I sat on the bus, going back to the train station this afternoon after having been offered the position and just quivered. You know how when you like exercise or train really, really hard then finish and your muscles are all jelly? That was exactly how I felt. A whole week of being more stressed/depressed than I ever thought possible, it was finally over and I finally relaxed.

It is SUCH a relief. It’s not a big, flashy international school but I’m actually happy with that. It’s pretty close to my house, I get to wear jeans, the pay is on par with the other jobs I’d been looking at, the other staff are sweet and some are young also and it’s just a little school doing a program that I am pretty happy to follow. A little more money would have been nice but for right now, it feels like a great job. I know I can do it, I’m the most qualified staff member and I think it will be a really great place while I find my feet in the whole scheme of teaching full time/living in another country deal. So now, knowing that I can afford to stay and have a reason to be here, I can put down roots. Now that I think about it, I think that was why this week was so hard for me, I am a person who need to have a little comfort zone to retreat to. Although I have this apartment until today I wasn’t sure if I could afford to stay here, or even in Tokyo or if I’d have to move to find a job so the place didn’t really feel like mine. Now I know I can stay and I was so incredibly fortunate to get a whole cab load of wonderful things from a friend who is moving countries tomorrow so I now have a bunch of towels, a double futon (eeeeee!!), curtains (double eeeeee!!), plates, cups, mugs, blankets, a little shelf thingy, a lamp and one of those kind of rocky/springy IKEA style chairs with a footstool. The sound you can hear right now is of my spine weeping in joy, I am down with the whole sitting/sleeping on the floor business that Japan is so famous for but my spine is less thrilled by it. No doubt spending several nights on a mat has not helped it a great deal either, my spine likes the ergonomic IKEA chair very much.

I really can’t say how thankful I am at the moment. Thankful to all of you for the beautiful emails and comments and FB messages, the unwavering support shown by you guys has been almost the sole reason I made it through this week. I am so thankful for my friend and her husband for giving me some of their old belongings, I know they don’t think it was a big deal but it has made my place feel like a home and not a shell anymore. I’m thankful for Deanne who has had the dubious honor of being the best friend I’ve got in this country and therefore receiving many, many phone emails from me as I’ve tried to find my way and make sense of this alternate universe. I’m thankful for everyone else I know in Tokyo, I saw a lot of people I know last Saturday night and it was so wonderful to be around something familiar. I am so thankful for D’Family, especially D’Mummy and beautiful Best who have talked me off a ledge more times than I care to remember and have let me cry to them (literally) this week and have been able to make things so much better just simply by exisiting.

I know it sounds super cheesy and lame to be so gushy after one shitty week but this has been, without a shadow of a doubt, the absolute worst week of my life. I don’t think I’ve ever had such an intense and horrible mix of emotions thrown at me ever before and it’s not something I’d wish upon anyone!! Having said that, I now know that I am far, far more capable and resilient than I ever thought that I was and that if I’ve survived this long, through so much shitty stuff, that maybe I can do this whole “moving countries alone” thing after all.

I’ve got a big weekend ahead, and not only because I have to start work at 9am on Monday morning and have to get a bunch of shit done before then!! I also get to see more friends, enjoy some sunshine (please don’t rain!!), rearrange my apartment so this space is a bit more productive and, finally, take and upload some pictures so you can see what my crazy little world here in Tokyo is looking like.

I’m sending the most positive, thankful radiant energy I possibly can out into the Universe right now. I have recieved so much light and love these past few days that I can only hope to mirror back some of that back to those who need some. I think I need to listen to some Polyphonic Spree…

I’ve been able to snatch an extremely unreliable, weak wireless connection from a neighbour. It may be someone from my building, it may be someone from the other buildings that surround me (If I stand at either of my windows, or my front door and reach as far as I can I could touch some of the neighbouring buildings, for realz) but the point is, I have a gateway to the outside world…albeit a dodgy, illegal one.
Having this portal to the internetz available in my own little hovel has improved my mood and overall well being more than almost anything else so far in Tokyo. Being a blogger the internetz is obviously very important to me, but it’s more than being able to look at LOLCats whenever I desire, or searching eBay for shit I don’t need. The internetz, now more than ever, it a wonderful thing that makes me feel less like I am laying on my futon in Tokyo so very far away from everything I know and love and more like I am in the company of my loved ones and the things that keep me sane.
The other fantastic thing? I can blog from my own computer! Japanese keyboards suck! Obviously, if you can speak/read Japanese they’d be pretty dandy but to a clueless foreigner – crap! See your space bar, well chop it into something 1/3 its current size and then either side put some buttons entirely in Japanese. If you accidently strike either one of these while you type, it will begin to type in kanji or katakana. Hitting the button again doesn’t change it back, pressing various combinations of shift and alt and ctrl and those buttons doesn’t help either. Then somehow it morphs back to English, but in a different font. Hence the reason my last post was all messed up. It shits me to tears. When you are trying desperately to milk every second of your expensive internetz café time and you have to use a keyboard which is about as useful as doing an interpretive dance when are trying to type a block of text you can imagine you’d want to pull your hair out, or scream, or cry.
So, now that I can type freely and easily, allow me to elaborate on my life thus far in Tokyo. Every day seems to get a little better, yesterday it was a bit of paid teaching work and getting an adapter so I can plug in my laptop and watch DVDs, this morning it was getting a fleeting connection to the net. Tomorrow I have an interview and I’m going to get a bunch of free furniture from a girl and her husband who are moving to Hong Kong. Sunday, I get to go to Harajuku and see a friend!! Who speaks English!! In Harajuku!! It’s just a little exciting, if you hadn’t noticed. With any luck, this continual pattern of increasingly good fortune will see me gainfully employed in the next week.
Right now, it’s 8:10am. In 5 minutes I will hear the school bell from the school that is on the next block. In 5 minutes the noise of Japanese kids chattering way before they go into class is almost deafening and then 10 minutes after that they go into class and things become quiet again. My day start at 7am when the man who parks his scooter outside my window in the concrete courtyard/alley thing between the two buildings climbs out his window and gets his ride organised for the day. I believe he lives with someone because he often speaks to someone/thing before he rides off and I know he climbs out his window because it’s sort of squeaky like mine and, well, there is no door he could come out of on that side of his building to end up in the alleyway. That’s about the big excitement for the morning around here, sometimes I hear a kid screaming blue murder but I suspect it might have something to do with going to school because it is always around that time.
I try to go for a wander every day, just to explore the neighbourhood. I live right by the train station which is handy and also good because there is a bunch of shopping to be done right by there. I like to think I live on the “right” side of the track, simply because there is more to do on my side but the other day when I went to the “wrong” side of the tracks to go to a little park I discovered a three level book, DVD, CD and game store, just right in the middle of some non-descript apartment blocks. It also has a pretty nice selection of Japanese craft books, which is very exciting…if you are a sewing nerd like me. At the park there is always a super cute dog playing with its owner. The first time it was a gorgeous, black, French bulldog wearing a t-shirt and yesterday it was a fluffy Chihuahua sitting on the park bench with an older guy watching the world go by. There is also always some perfect Japanese toddlers playing with their parents, a few older people sitting on the benches and some pigeons. The sign at the front of the park asks you not to feed cats or pigeons in this park but judging by the size of the pigeons, this rule is not frequently observed. They are the fattest pigeons I’ve ever seen and there are plenty of them that suggest there are not many cats around who are eating them.
I’m a little undecided about getting cats now. My apartment is a good size and everything, but it’s a fairly boring space. The windows don’t look out to anything worthwhile so there is not a lot for the cats to even look at and there are quite a number of stray cats around here so I’m a little worried about them possibly getting out and fighting with the other cats and getting sick. I think having a dog would be better just because there are so many other dog owners around here and so many places to take dogs out for a walk or run that keeping them inside during the day wouldn’t be so mean because there is so much to do when I come home. I also hear other dogs barking which suggests the neighbours are fairly tolerant of the occasional yap. I’m not sure, at this point I won’t get any pets simply because I am not entirely sure if I am staying or going. Clearly sorting out pets and an apartment before a job was a shitty idea…live and learn.
What else? A quick survey of my area suggests that the people here must be exceptionally hairy because there is a hair salon on almost every block and there are also heaps of dry cleaners and a few Laundromats so everyone must be particularly clean. There is also a bunch of green grocers and a few supermarkets which is very handy. I’ve almost become a raw food vegan by accident since coming here. The whole Chinese milk thing has made me a little wary of diary products, not to mention that the Lotte Koala biscuits that were pulled from Aussie shelves because of the scary chemicals are still for sale here which makes me suspicious about the other products still for sale. The raw part is just because I don’t own pots and pans and I won’t buy any until I figure out what I can get given so everything is raw. I have bought a few cooked things, so it’s not entirely true, but not far off.  Also, everyone here rides bikes, everyone. Old people, young people, kids – even dogs ride in them. I saw an older lady on a bike yesterday with a sausage dog sitting up in the basket at the front, too cute!!
I think I’ll leave it now, before it gets too epic. Just know that things are ok, not perfect but they are getting better and that is all you can ask for right? So long as things keep going in that direction and don’t get bed then I will be happy.

Thank you for the many, many concerned emails and comments, you have no idea how much they help.

xx

• Still alive.
• Monday was a very, very bad night. I was down to my last 200 yen and had a whopping headache all day that became a migrane because all I could think about doing was throwing up and escaping the light. I have only frosted windows and no curtains so I couldn`t escape to anywhere dark and sleeping on a mat was becoming well and truly shitty so I couldn`t get comfortable. I just laid on my mat and cried and cried, it was very pathetic but I couldn`t do anything else. Then I called D`Mummy and had a cry to her, then cried myself to sleep. I was so close to just packing my suitcase just to make myself feel better – to know that I could leave as soon as my money cleared. Thankfully, the next morning I just dropped into a 7-11 to check if it had cleared yet and it had! I almost cried with joy. I went and bought a futon and some groceries and other little things like pillows and a some little storage things. Last night i slept for 12 hours, it was amazing.
• Today I woke up with a new lease on life and called some schools who wanted interviews with me and arranged that and then I got a call to do a lesson as a subsitute teacher for an English language school. I`ve registered with so many different companies and schools I have lost track of what I`m doing but I agreed and did the lesson today. I can see how teaching out of a textbook can end up being soul crushing but right now, I`ll take it! It was fine, it was a group of 6 adults who were pretty nice. Hopefully more work will come soon!
• I am homesick. I miss D`Mummy unimaginably. I guess it`s a part of growing up and not being a Mummy`s girl anymore, but I miss her. Not to mention everyone else.　Ｔｅｒｒｉｂｌｙ． I miss speaking to peoｐｌｅ　ｗｈｏ　ｕｎｄｅｒｓｔａｎｄ　ｍｅ、Ｉ　ｍｉｓｓ　ｂｅｉｎｇ　ａｂｌｅ　ｔｏ　ｊｕｍｐ　ｏｎｌｉｎｅ　ａｎｄ　ｃｈａｔ　ｗｈｅｎｅｖｅｒ　Ｉ　ｗａｎｔ　ｔｏ。Ｗｈｅｎ　Ｉ　ｃａｎ　ｇｅｔ　ｔｈｅ　ｎｅｔ　ａｔ　ｈｏｍｅ　ｉｔ　ｗｉｌｌ　ｂｅ　ｓｏ　ｍｕｃｈ　ｂｅｔｔｅｒ　ｂｅｃａｕｓｅ　ｉｔ　ｗｉｌｌ　ｃｕｔ　ｏｕｔ　ｔｈｅ　ｉｓｏｌａｔｉｏｎ　Ｉ　ｃｕｃｒｅｎｔｌｙ　ｆｅｅｌ．　Ｉｔ　ｃｒｅｅｐｓ　ｏｎ　ａｂｏｕｔ　６ｐｍ，　ｒｉｇｈｔ　ｗｈｅｎ　ｌｏｔｓ　ｏｆ　ｏｔｈｅｒ　ｐｅｏｐｌｅ　ａｒｅ　ｇｅｔｔｉｎｇ　ｒｅａｄｙ　ｔｏ　ｎａｋｅ　ｄｉｎｎｅｒ　ｏｒ　ｓｉｔ　ｄｏｗｎ　ｗｉｔｈ　ｔｈｅｉｒ　ｆａｍｉｌｉｅｓ　ａｎｄ　Ｉ　ａｍ　ｏｎ　ｍｙ　ｌｏｎｅｓｏｍｅ．　Ｉｔ　ｈａｓ　ｔｏ　ｇｅｔ　ｂｅｔｔｅｒ，　ａｎｄ　ｏｂｖｉｏｕｓｌｙ　ｂｅｉｎｇ　ｓｉｎｇｌｅ　ａｎｄ　ａｌｌ　ａｌｏｎｅ　ｉｎ　ａ　ｎｅｗ　ｃｏｕｎｔｒｙ　ｉｓ　ｇｏｉｎｇ　ｔｏ　ｂｅ　ｌｏｎｅｌｙ．　Ｉｔ　ｗｉｌｌ　ｂｅ　ｂｅｔｔｅｒ　ｏｎｃｅ　Ｉ　ｃａｎ　ｅｓｔａｂｌｉｓｈ　ａ　ｇｒｏｕｐ　ｏｆ　ｆｒｉｅｎｄｓ　ａｎｄ　ａｌｌ　ｏｆ　ｔｈａｔ．　Ｉ　ｊｕｓｔ　ｈａｖｅ　ｔｏ　ｓｔｉｃｋ　ｉｔ　ｏｕｔ．
• Ｍｙ　ｍｅｔａｂｏｌｉｓｍ　ｉｓ　ｅｎｔｉｒｅｌｙ　ｆｕｃｋｅｄ．　Ｓｉｎｃｅ　ｔｈｅ　ｗｅｅｋｅｎｄ　Ｉ　ｈａｖｅ　ｂｅｅｎ　ｅａｔｉｎｇ　ｂｒｅａｄ　ａｎｄ　ｃａｒｒｏｔｓ　ｂｅｃａｕｓｅ　ｉｔ　ｗａｓ　ａｌｌ　Ｉ　ｃｏｕｌｄ　ａｆｆｏｒｄ，　ｎｏｗ　ｔｈａｔ　Ｉ　ｃａｎ　ａｆｆｏｒｄ　ｔｏ　ｅａｔ　ｌｉｋｅ　ａ　ｒｅａｌ　ｐｅｒｓｏｎ　Ｉ　ｈａｖｅ　ｎｏ　ａｐｐｅｔｉｔｅ．　Ｉｔ‘ｓ　ｎｏｗ　６：３０ｐｍ　ａｎｄ　Ｉ‘ｖｅ　ｈａｄ　ｓｏｍｅ　ｏｒａｎｇｅ　ｊｕｉｃｅ　ａｎｄ　ａ　ｓｉｐ　ｏｆ　ｃｏｆｆｅｅ　ｔｏｄａｙ．Ｃｏｍｐｌｅｔｅｌｙ　ｕｎｈｅａｌｔｈｙ　ｂｕｔ　Ｉ　ｊｕｓｔ　ｃａｎ‘ｔ　ｅａｔ　ａｔ　ｔｈｅ　ｍｏｍｅｎｔ，　ｍｙ　ｓｔｏｍａｃｈ　ｉｓ　ａｌｍｏｓｔ　ａｌｗａｙｓ　ｔｉｅｄ　ｕｐ　ｉｎ　ｋｎｏｔｓ　ｗｏｒｒｙｉｎｇ　ａｂｏｕｔ　ｗｏｒｋ　ｔｈａｔ　Ｉ　ｊｕｓｔ　ｄｏｎ‘ｔ　ｆｅｅｌ　ｈｕｎｇｅｒ　ａｎｙｍｏｒｅ．
• Ｉ　ｈａｖｅ　ｔｏ　ｄｒａｇ　ｍｙｓｅｌｆ　ａｗａｙ　ｆｒｏｍ　ｔｈｅ　ｉｎｔｅｒｎｅｔ　ｃａｆｅ　ｎｏｗ，　Ｉ　ｃｏｕｌｄ　ａｌｍｏｓｔ　ｃｒｙ　ｗｈｅｎ　Ｉ　ｌｅａｖｅ　ｈｅｒｅ　ｂｅｃａｕｓｅ　ｉｔ　ｉｓ　ｂａｃｋ　ｔｏ　ｂｅｉｎｇ　ｂｙ　ｍｙｓｅｌｆ　ａｎｄ　Ｉ　ｗｏｕｌｄ　ｌｏｖｅ　ｓｏｍｅ　ｃｏｍｐａｎｙ　ｎｏｗ，　ｏｒ　ｊｕｓｔ　ｓｏｍｅｔｈｉｎｇ　ｔｏ　ｄｏ　ｓｏ　Ｉ　ａｍ　ｂｕｓｙ．
• Ｉ‘ｍ　ｓｔｉｌｌ　ｎｏｔ　１００％　ｃｅｒｔａｉｎ　Ｉ　ａｍ　ｃｕｔ　ｏｕｔ　ｆｏｒ　ｔｈｉｓ，　ｉｆ　Ｉ　ｃａｎ‘ｔ　ｆｉｎｄ　ａ　ｊｏｂ　ｂｙ　ｔｈｅ　ｅｎｄ　ｏｆ　ｔｈｉｓ　ｍｏｎｔｈ　Ｉ　ｗｉｌｌ　ｓｅｒｉｏｕｓｌｙ　ｃｏｎｓｉｄｅｒ　ｃｏｍｉｎｇ　ｈｏｍｅ．　Ｉ　ｗａｎｔ　ｔｏ　ｂｅ　ｈｅｒｅ，　ｂｕｔ　Ｉ　ｃａｎ‘ｔ　ａｆｆｏｒｄ　ｔｏ　ｓｐｅｎｄ　ｅｖｅｒｙ　ｌａｓｔ　ｃｅｎｔ　ｔｒｙｉｎｇ　ｔｏ　ｍａｉｎｔａｉｎ　ａ　ｌｉｆｅ　ｔｈａｔ　ｉｓ　ｊｕｓｔ　ｎｏｔ　ｇｏｉｎｇ　ｔｏ　ｗｏｒｋ．Ｍｙ　ｍｅｎｔａｌ　ｈｅａｌｔｈ　ｉｓ　ａ　ｖｅｒｙ，　ｖｅｒｙ　ｄｅｌｉｃａｔｅ　ｔｈｉｎｇ　ａｔ　ｔｈｅ　ｍｏｍｅｎｔ　ａｎｄ　Ｉ　ｗａｎｔ　ｔｏ　ｓｔａｙ　ｍｅｎｔａｌｌｙ　ｗｅｌｌ　ｍｏｒｅ　ｔｈａｎ　ａｎｙｔｈｉｎｇ，　ｓｏ　Ｉ　ｃａｎ‘ｔ　ｋｅｅｐ　ｕｐ　ｌｉｖｉｎｇ　ｗｉｔｈ　ｓｕｃｈ　ａ　ｈｕｇｅ　ａｍｏｕｎｔ　ｏｆ　ｕｎｃｅｒｔａｉｎｔｙ　ｂｅｃａｕｓｅ　ｔｈｉｎｇｓ　ｗｉｌｌ　ｇｏ　ｖｅｒｙ　ｂａｄｌｙ．　Ｉ　ｋｎｏｗ，　ｉｎ　ｍｙｓｅｌｆ，　ｔｈａｔ　Ｉ‘ｍ　ｔｅｅｔｅｒｉｎｇ　ｏｎ　ｔｈｅ　ｅｄｇｅ　ｏｆ　ａ　ｖｅｒｙ　ｄａｒｋ　ｐｌａｃｅ　ａｎｄ　ｎｏｔｈｉｎｇ　ｉｓ　ｗｏｒｔｈ　ｇｏｉｎｇ　ｔｈｅｒｅ，　ｎｏｔｈｉｎｇ　ｉｎ　ｔｈｅ　ｗｏｒｌｄ．Ｆｉｎｇｅｒｓ　ｃｒｏｓｓｅｄ　ｔｈｉｎｇｓ　ｗｏｒｋ　ｏｕｔ　ｔｈｏｕｇｈ，　ｙｅａｈ？

Right, seeing as I left on such a bad note I figured that I should maybe update just quickly to put your minds at ease.

I moved into my place yesterday, it’s quite a bit bigger than I expected which is awesome and it’s in a really cool neighbour hood. There are a bunch of supermarkets and green grocers as well as heaps of hair salons..for some reason. There is kind of like a variety store as well which sells awesome clothes for so cheap and futons and stuff and lots of fantastic smelling food places around as well, I even found a hundred yen store! The station is right by my house, but not so close that the sound of the train is a problem and when you exit the station you get dropped right in front of a 24hour MacDonalds. Deadly.

However, I am still poor. Still waiting for my money to clear on my prepaid visa so I’m skint. I bought some bread, carrots, juice, iced tea, crackers and jam yesterday so I can eat for three or four days which should be more than enough time for the money to come. Moving countries in the middle of an economic meltdown in a shitty idea, last time I was here the Aussie dollar bought around 85yen and now it’s sitting around 66yen. Fuck!

Last night lovely Deanne invited me to the birthday of one of her friends. I met the birthday girl last time I was here and she is entirely lovely also and it improved my mental health immeasurably to be around people who understand me when I speak and who know why I’m looking like a deer in the headlights at the moment. Coming home and sleeping on a mat wasn’t great – in fact it was almost entirely shitty but I made it, I got a little sleep and when I am rich and famous I can laugh about it. Last night also saw a cool change come through which I really appreciate…having no blankets and all. I was wearing a singlet, a tshirt, a hoodie, a knitted jumper and another top last night as well as long johns (from when I was in the bush), tights and wooly socks. It was fucking horrible and this morning I resorted to pumping up my airon (that smells like wee went up my airon (that smells like wee when it’s turned on) and sleeping under the warm breeze. Very uneconomical considering I was heating a whole big apartment with no curtains for insulation, but desperate times/desperate measures. Right?

Last night I think I might have been able to score some apartment stuff. One couple is moving to Hong Kong and another person had to go back home to hospital so his stuff is being sold by his friends. Until I get a job I can’t really buy new apartment stuff because any money I get through now I want to hold on to so　I can pay the rent and bills next month。So getting used stuff would be awesome, I don’t even care how old or wrecked it is! I have nothing!

I better wrap it up now, gotta write down some stuff from my emails so I can get some more interviews happening this week!

Appreciate your bed for me!!

I can’t do this, Tokyo is just better than me.

I have spent the last 20 minutes sitting in my room crying and it’s not making me feel any better, it just makes me feel more and more like I should just give up and go home. I feel slike such an idiot thinking I could do this and I’m so embarassed because I feel like everyone else could see that it was going to be outstandingly shitty and just humored me. I truly thought I could do it but I am pretty sure I was wrong, very, very wrong.

Tomorrow I have to go to my apartment. I can’t afford to buy a futon at the moment so I have a bathmat to sleep on and just to retain a small amount of dignity I bought a Swiffer thing so I can at least wipe the floor clean first. I then get to choose between eating, buying an iron so I don’t look like a hobo when I go out in public or being able to afford to travel to job interviews. I have about ¥4000 yen to my name, wonderful D’Olds transfered some money onto my prepaid visa but that can take 4 business days to clear so I can’t really afford to exist right now. Thanks to the meltdown of the world economy and the currencies going they way they are, in 4 days time the several hundred dollars that has been transferred should buy me a notebook, a Mountain Dew and a train ticket to Harajuku. I didn’t even know it was possible to be this poor, I have actually thought about trying to get hit by a car because that way I might be able to get some sort of monetary compensation and in hospital they feed you.

I have told the guy I can’t afford my cats, so they won’t be coming but he is going to save them until next month for me. I had two interviews today but one of the schools has already emailed me and said they don’t want me which must be some kind of record, I don’t think anyone has ever failed so badly in the history of the world. I am going to register as a private English tutor, there are several hundred thousand English tutors in Tokyo so it’s hardly a fool proof method to making money but I am pretty well desperate.

I feel so, so stupid. I feel stupid that I wasted so much money getting here, I feel stupid that I must be the only education degree holder in Japan who no one wants, I feel stupid going to invterviews and being so wildly unsuccessful, I feel stupid for telling so many people I was coming here if I’m going to turn around and go straight back home.

The upside is that I can’t afford to get back to the airport right now, so I guess I have no choice but to try and stick it out for another day. Odds are one of these days things will be slightly less shit, simply because they are already so shitty I don’t know that it can get much worse. Either way, if the next time I blog is from Oz, don’t be too surprised. I’ll try to keep going but I just don’t know if I can.

Sorry this is the last blog post I’ll leave you with for a while! Fingers crossed that the next one is better.

Let me just say that it feels like I have been in Tokyo for 25 weeks, not just 25 hours. I got straight into it today and had an almost entirely shitty time doing so, but got there in the end.

Wednesday morning went well. I checked in 27kg without a hint of trouble (thank you Jeebus!!) and may have done irreperable damage to my spine by packing my handbag and carry on bag to the brim, but I was able to take everything I wanted to. No tears at the airport from myself or D’Family which was nice and I got a whole row to myself for the flight. Everything was just peachy keen, customs went quickly, my luggage came out quickly, I bought my ticket for the bus and it arrived mere seconds later. I checked into the hotel without a worry…then it all came crashing down. It hit me hard that I had moved countries, was in Japan all alone (and, just as a bonus, didn’t have a great deal of money on me). I’m pleased to report there was no tears but I did have an overwhleming urge to tuck myself under my wee desk, right in the corner and hold my knees and rock. In trying to deal with all of that I forgot to take my brain candy. I know, right. Clearly I am setting myself up for the dump.

I woke up at 5 this morning and was wide awake, came online and chatted for a bit then went and hopped in bed for a second to warm up (because the aircon is either arctic or steamy, no in between). My warm up turned into three more hours sleep and I woke up about 9:30am. My plan for today was 1) Register for my gaijin card (Alien registration which basically is a card that says I legally live in this city and I’m not a lowly tourist [though not far off]) 2) Get a phone 3) Get a bank account 4) Go sign my apartment papers, get the key and all of that. Logical, right? You can’t really sign up for anything without a gaijin card so I figured I’d get that sorted first and the rest would fall into place from there. Reflect on that for just a moment, and then I’ll tell you how my day actually went.

I set off at 10:30am to the Ward Office, after getting lost I arrived at 11:10am. Not so bad. I sorted out which counter I needed, filled in the paper and waited to be called. A lady speaks to me in Japanese I don’t understand and then I realise she wants the address of where I am staying, I look in my purse for the business card for the hotel but it’s not there. FUCK. After confirming that was all I needed I went back to the hotel (30 min return trip), got the business card and went to put it in the little side section of my purse to find the oringal business card I’d lost in there. DOUBLE FUCK. Get back to the office, fill in the address, lady goes to check form and I wait. She comes back and tells me in Japanese, then broken English that the hotel address is wrong and that I can’t register a hotel as my address. Yeah, this is right after she’d seen it was a hotel on the form to begin with and after I walked back and forth to get the address. At this stage I considered crying and/or rebooking my flight straight back home but decided to try my luck with the real estate instead. Before I left I confirmed that if I returned with an apartment contract that I could get the card.

I hopped on a subway line I’d never been on, travelled 20 minutes to God knows where and then tried to remember where to go from there. I walked down the street looking for the building I was meant to be seeing and I couldn’t, after 15 minutes of aimless wandering I called the office to find I’d been going to completely wrong way and had to turn back and go the other way from the station. I went the other way looking for the building and still couldn’t find the place that was meant to be instantly recognisable so I called again. My real estate agent told me to stay put and she’d come and get me, I saw another gaijin emerage from a non-descript, non-signed building and she waved me down. We went to the office, signed some papers and she explained the ins and outs of the contracts and all. She also gave me my instructions for when my garbage gets taken and how to actually get to my place. I paid the rest of the money I owed them which worked out to be slightly less than they quoted which was my first win for the day. Hurrah!!

I walked out of the office feeling quite chuffed and started to think that it wasn’t all turning to shit after all. Another trudge back to the ward office, another form filled and finally this time, an application which is now in progress. In the meantime I got a certified copy of my registration to prove that I was absolutely and entirely legal for signing-up-to-stuff pruposes. I left the ward office and went straight to Softbank, and asked the unwitting clerk if he spoke English. He tried to deny it, but I asked if he spoke a little and he agreed so off I went. In a mix of broken English and pigeon Japanese with a little help from print outs from a Yahoo online translator, I was able to sign up for a mobile. In Japan, you buy the phone and charger separately which ended up costing more than I wanted to spend so I reverted to a slightly shitty mood but kept that to myself as I already had the poor Softbank guy shaking as he held all my papers, I didn’t want to make his afternoon worse. He registered my phone for me, recharged the credit and set my email address, I gave him the cash and when he returned with my change he told me that the phone was on discount at the moment so I got ¥2000ish yen back. Yay!

After all of that I went back to my hotel. I was going to find Donki (another cheap, crazy store in Japan) but I was far too mentally and physically exhausted to do anything more. I had a feast of Subway and played online for a bit before heading to Harajuku to Daiso to get some apartment stuff. Having an extremley minimal budget and space to work with, not to mention the fact I’d never set up an apartment before saw me standing in front of the row of kitchen sponges, for far longer than is necessary, trying to choose the best one. After that it got a little easier and I ended up with some dishwashing liquid, a big towel, a hand towel, 2 sets of coat hangers, an air freshener, a shower mitt, a small set of cups, some toothpaste, Sunchips, liquid sugar and lemon for flavouring iced tea, a comb and some mobile phone accessories all for about $20. Not too bad!

You’ll notice that a futon was not included in today’s plans. I was so not in the mood to shop for one today, not to mention the fact I was very over shelling out large amounts of money. I have two job interviews tomorrow but hopefully I can squeeze in some futon buying time or I will be sleeping on my towel on Saturday night. I have to be home all Saturday morning for the gas man to come turn my gas on and then I have plans on Saturday night so time is of the essence!

Sorry I don’t have anything more worthwhile to share, today involved hours and hours of walking and spending lots and lots of money and all I have to show for it is a tiny phone, a key and a bag of stuff from Daiso. I’ve managed to burn through the same amount of money that lasted me 10 days last time in less than 24 hours, it’s terrifying. Thankfully the large payouts are finished and with any luck the money will start to come back in again soon. I move to my place on Saturday and unless I can steal wireless from my neighbours I will drop off the radar, maybe for a few weeks. I assure you I will be back, I don’t have the slightest desire to quit blogging but as you might appreciate I have bigger fish to fry just for the moment.

Hang tight, ok?