Hair Fish Hits Japan
Rackii (that’s Lucky, for you non Japanese speakers) me, Chicago has an pretty great public transportation system that just so happens to be color coded. When I need to get home, I take the Red Line southbound train to, let’s say, the Harrison stop and bam! I’m at my dorm. It’s sort of the same idea in Tokyo, but entirely more sophisticated and when I say sophisticated, I mean confusing (if you’ve never had to use a metro system before). My wonderful host mother drew out a totally kawaii map for me with perfect directions on how to get to Azubu (where Temple University Japan is located) from Koshigaya and back.My host mother drove me to Kita-Koshigaya station to meet another home stay student, Hayley, who I’d spoken to for sometime thanks to the genius of Facebook networking. At any rate, we were very surprised at how easily we got from point A to point B. I hear it’s super easy to get lost on a train and end up in the middle of nowhere, but we actually had the pleasure of ending up in the City so my train riding confidence has gone up through the roof. However, I’m still not used to the idea of being so packed in a train I can barely breath. The second train we hopped onto was just that packed. Riding the trains here takes a certain amount of mental fortitude I had absolutely no idea I even had.Also, everyone is ridiculously helpful even when they know (or assume) you cannot speak a lick of Japanese. The attendants at the metro station were so helpful! It was the first time in my life I’d asked someone for help, and they seemed excited to be doing their job! Things like this rarely ever happen in the States. At the most, I’d get some side eye or a very annoyed tone. This time, however, I got a big smile. Hayley and I were supremely impressed. Orientation was actually fun, but I was amazingly tired the entire time. I failed to mention, I arrived at the train station at 7:20am because my commute is a hour long and in order to get to Temple 10am Japanese time, I had to wake up SUPAA EARLY. Of course, none of my (three) alarms go off and I wake up at 6:56am, hence, the barely being awake during orientation.They scared us with all sorts of horrible things that could happen to a gaijin in the city, as told by TUJ’s (hilarious) legal dude of legality, Matt Wilson:1. Go out for a night of drinking in Roppongi, meet two hot Eastern European girls, wake up hours later after having been drugged and a bank account $2500 bucks lighter. Happened to a TUJ student a few years ago.2. If you get caught smoking pot or with any related paraphernalia, expect about 5 years in jail with labor; and that’s getting off easy. Matt recommends all TUJ students leave their “gardening” hobby on hold for the next five months. I think that’s a good idea.3. Earthquakes happen a lot here and bad things can happen because of them, such as Tokyo burning down to the ground, again. In event of such an event, it’s a good idea to have an Earthquake Kit. It’s also a good idea to contact the US Embassy and let them know you’re an American national in Japan for however long you’ll be in Japan, just in case something goes down.4. You can be arrested for looking “different”, i.e. not Japanese. If you’re found without identification (passport or your alien registration card), you can be held for 23 days for something as minor as riding a bike at night with your light off, or just looking different. Keep identification on you and don’t bring any unnecessary attention your way.5. Don’t sexually harass anyone. Keep your hands to yourself on the train so no one can falsely accuse you for feeling them up while your packed in a train car. If you feel something crawling up your leg, you have the right to scream obnoxiously and act a fool to embarrass the pervert who is attempting to molest you. Incidentally, there are women-only cars during late night hours to avoid such things from happening.So while all of this is going on, I’m also supposed to be studying and doing well in class. That’s the easy part. So far, I am deeply in love with Suntory Vitamin Water and 100 YEN stores (like the dollar store in America but infinitely cooler with much more useful stuff). Vending machines are my kryptonite, though. I mean how can you pass up a 1 dollar drink around here?! The machines glow a pretty color and make a cute noise after you choose your drink. And they are EVERYWHERE. You never have to be thirsty in the city, or without beer, or cigarettes, or energy drinks, or your daily dose of fiber, or panties, if for whatever reason you forgot to put someone before leaving the house.
