I guess I'm overdue for an update. I'm overdue on a lot of stuff, but that's okay, because so are some people in charge of my well-being (see: delayed scholarship funds causing me to starve). I've been through a bit of a roller coaster, and that's stuff I really need to get into soon, but it'll probably be another day. As for pictures, that's going to have to wait indefinitely. My camera has disappeared, and I'm not sure if I'll be able to find it. Sorry folks, that's the way things go.
Ok, so Tokyo: I could tell you about navigating Shibuya and checking out the view from Roppongi Hills and stuff like that, but there really isn't anything of relevance to this blog that I could come up with. It's a lot more fun to talk about how much I drank. All jokes aside, the nommunication is really where intercultural relationships shine.
On my last day I met another of my penpals, Chihiro. I was kind of surprised to meet her in person, because 1. she's ridiculously beautiful, well-dressed, and well-spoken and 2. she was very normal, and I seem to be good at attracting characters. That was true then, and it's still very true here in Hirakata. She was very sweet and nice to hang out with, but I didn't get to hang out with her very long.
On another day Big Mama was nice enough to invite me to a kaitenzushi (revolving conveyor belt sushi) with a bunch of her employees. It was one of those places that takes its haul from Tsukiji, the king market of fresh Japanese fish. I was told I could order anything I wanted, so that meant fatty tuna which is the fish of the gods. Needless to say, I was very pleased. At some point a couple of K's friends came over, a guy and a girl, the latter of which was introduced to me as being single and cute. She was, in fact, cute. Someone said that when I introduced myself to the two of them, I smiled to her but not to him. "It's because she's cute," I nonchalantly explained in Japanese. Giggity. I also introduced them to the American magic of sake bombs. I will never get tired of doing that.
I kept coming back to the same neighborhood bar. I wish I could remember the name, but that's not how my brain works. On one quiet night (and most nights were pretty quiet anyhow) K noticed a girl sitting alone at the bar, so she prodded me to go talk to her. The owner of the bar was not around, just the girl bartender who seems to be the only other person who works there (and just does not make a good enough hot wine). So I ended up chatting the two in almost exclusively Japanese as I became exceedingly inebriated. I tell you, you don't know what it means to be a traveler until you've told your life problems to a bartender in a language other than your own. I'm a hilarious hot mess even overseas. The bartender is a character, I swear she kept mocking me in fast Japanese, and when I asked her to repeat herself she would just give me a comical manzai face. She was definitely on the list of insane Japanese women I've met. The other girl was pretty casual. I don't know her story, but she had a sense of humor. And before you ask, I wasn't interested. I think at some point I told the bartender that Japanese was difficult for me because I kept thinking hard about it instead of just saying what was on my mind. She told me a philosophy for traveling, which she stated in English: "don't think; just feel."
There was also a restaurant-bar we went to that served youshoku (Western food). They had pretty good tacos. It gave me a weird vibe, because they were constantly playing loud 80s rock. Japanese 80s rock. And everyone was drinking and singing along. It was like being in an American tavern where fat old men are chugging Buds and singing along with Boston. My stepdad probably would have felt right at home. I was introduced to the owner and several employees who were hanging out at the front. People loved to talk to me, because aside from being foreign my Japanese was also adequate enough that I could tell a little about myself. I really am big in Japan. Or at least Asakusa.
Well, there's not much else to say about Tokyo. It was really just a casual vacation stop for me, and it was definitely worth my time. I think my time there was less about stepping into another world so much as just watching my own world get turned inside out into like a funnel, crossing over at the spout in something like an hourglass shape to the side of another adjacent funnel, just to find out that the mouth is the same on the other side. If you get what I'm saying here, I salute you. What I mean is that even on the other side of the world, things are still basically the same. There's still drinking, there's still bad classic rock, there's still social gatherings of the same variety. This shouldn't surprise me really, and I don't think it does, but I still feel a little shock at the reality of how easily I can fit in in Japan, as easily as if I were just visiting another state in America. The world really is smaller than we think. Perhaps I really shouldn't contemplate so much. I think for once turning my brain off might bring me closer to the reality of the world around me. Don't think; just feel.
End of the second chapter
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