Nick's Worldwide Wanderings!

Views in the morning are a little different to views at night. Instead of ghostly neon outlines, we now see Shinjuku in its every minute detail. From our hotel room, we see people massing in and out of the worlds busiest station, trains whizzing backwards and forwards, traffic lights changing colour and cars gradually negotiating their way around the city. The chaos of the street looks like clockwork from above, the whole metropolis so tiny, and so peaceful...

From ground level, those same streets are anything but peaceful. Sunday morning brings us to Harajuku, to see the Cosplay (Costume play) maniacs dressed up in 'goth-lolita' fashion on the bridge. In conformist Japan, kids who do not fit in at school are generally bullied by their peers and are put under immense pressure by their teachers and parents to just 'act normal'. They even have a saying for it; `the nail that sticks out will be hammered down'. Here you see the teenagers who have risen above the pressure to be normal, and express their strangeness freely and unashamedly. Some dressed like Alice in Wonderland and Little Bo Peep, some with mohawks and gothic makeup, some dressed like vampires and others in glaringly bright streaks of colour, it is a parade of diversity, a celebration of weirdness. And it is 30 degrees in glaring sunlight, so today most of them are sitting under trees fanning themselves like mad while foreigners pose for photos with them.

Meiji shrine is a little more peaceful than vibrant Harajuku, an expansive forest/shrine in the middle of the city. It almost succeeds in blocking out the Tokyo chaos; except for the distant sound of rock music filtering through the Empresses Garden. We eventually check it out - a whole street full of buskers, including a group of middle aged men with Elvis hairstyles and tight leather Jeans (must be hot in the summer sun), dancing while combing their greased back hair. Put a couple of vinyl chairs and a jukebox around them, and you would fully believe you were in the 50's.
Harajuku continues to show off its diversity, and over the road from the 50's is the 60's, a huge market devoted entirely to hippy crafts.

Eventually we find our way back to our own decade, in time to head to Shibuya for dinner. I have grown to love the twilight crossing madness, the flashing signs and glittery people. There is a certain rush about stepping out onto that street, and joining a sea of faceless people as we rush around doing whatever it is we are meant t be doing.

The next day is no less jam-packed (I figure if my dad doesnt go back with chronic fatigue, I havent done my job right). We find ourselves in the ludicriously expensive Ginza, flitting around the local art galleries trying to look thoughtful. We float down the river in the rain to Asakusa, famous for its Tempura (which was delicious) and being more packed with tourists than anywhere else in Tokyo. You want to buy a paper fan? Its here. You want a Ninja suit? Its here. Thousands upon thousands of tourist shops, all built into a huge complex surrounding the famous 'Thunder Gates' of Asakusa temple.

While in Asakusa, we take the opportunity to head to a district called Kappabashi, the one stop shop for people opening a restaurant in Tokyo. You want a 100kg copper pot? Its here. You want a neon sign that says 'Elvis Presley is The King'? Its here. You want one of those 'open'/'closed' flippy signs? Its here. Then there are the things I have never seen before; like a giant diabolical looking knife, bigger and scarier than any meat-cleaver, which turns out to be for cutting up noodles. However, Kappabashi is most famous for its food, of the plastic variety. Designed for use in shop windows all around Japan, they have honed imitation food to a fine art, and are able to make a plastic version of any food realistic enough to make you drool. They are not cheap, however - An imitation beer is around $30, and an imitation bowl of carbonara complete with levitating spoon sets you back about $100.

Finally we are both exhausted, so we had to a local onsen, which prides itself as being the hottest in Tokyo. I can see why; if another onsen tried to outdo them, people would almost certainly start cooking. Basically it was just hot enough for you to think 'are they serious?', but the Japanese men sitting in the bath looked reassuringly alive, if a little red. Outside, on a wooden platform overlooking a tiny waterfall, pink people pad this way and that, none of them in the least bit concerned about being naked in front of complete strangers. It takes some getting used to (my dad did very well compared with most foreigners), but once you get used to it its the most natural thing in the world; its like an alternate universe where clothes just dont exist. The whole experience is very good for unwinding tired legs and minds, and we head back on the train back to the hotel feeling very relaxed...

However, we dont end up at the hotel until much, much later that night. Instead, we decide to make an impromptu visit to my host family, so that my dad can meet them, they can meet my dad, and I can give my dad stuff I want sent home minus the postage fees. Giving them only 40 minutes warning, we descend on their house at 11pm (my host mum assures me its ok, and I assure my dad in turn)...and the house is spotless! I am shocked. I know the house is not usually like this. But my host mum only had 40 minutes! I thought maybe the late warning would be a good thing, as it would prevent my mother from going into extravagant guest preparation mode. I told her again and again, im just stopping to pick up my stuff and introduce my dad to you, you dont need to do anything...It turns out that the minute I rang, she conscripted every single member of the family (including the ones who were napping) to frantically clean the house. By the time we got there, they had done the whole package - everything was tidied, packed away, swept and vacuumed. Both Riku (one of my host brothers, who had an English test the next day) and Naoya (my oldest host brother, who as an intern was no doubt cherishing his 2-3 hours of nightly sleep) were woken up to be lined up with my other host brother to be presented to my dad. In Japanese houses a visitor is expected to announce 'Ojama shimasu' when they arrive, which means something like 'sorry for causing you such inconvenience'...now I can see why!

We try our very best to negotiate with them, but my host dad adamently refuses to let us return home by train. Instead, he insists on driving us all the way to our hotel in Shinjuku, half an hour away. They seem genuinely thrilled to meet my dad, and appear to have forgotten all the commitments of the next morning in their efforts to make a good impression.

And so we end up back at our hotel at 1am, having seen just about every face of Tokyo in two and a half days...
Shinjuku, Roppongi, Shibuya, Harajuku, Ginza, Asakusa, and finally my hometown of Asaka. With just about every sight in Tokyo crossed off the to-do list, we pack are bags the next morning for a bullet train heading West.

In a rare burst of spontaneity, my dad decides to come out to visit me in Japan for a week while he has some time of work. The idea is simple enough - I advise on sights, food, transport and accomodation and he pays for it. Adults travel a bit differently to teenagers it seems, and he seems happy to pay for things that have far too many digits in the price for my budget. We both prepare to travel into an entirely different world; My dad, into the very foreign world of Japan, and me, into the equally foreign world of luxurious travel (I always thought it was an oxymoron).

We are reunited in Shinjuku station, and as Father and Son we begin our journey around Japan. Our first stop is Hotel Century South Tower. Having never stayed in a hotel expensive enough to have four words in its name, the experience is quite new to me. We walk about 300m from the station, into an air-conditioned lobby on the 20th floor of a shiny glass tower. We receive plenty of smiles, bows and other polite gestures from the well-dressed English speaking hotel staff, and then board another one of those smooth rich-people elevators where you cant tell whether you are moving or standing still. We stop off on the 34th floor, and walk into our room, which has a view every bit as good as Tokyo Tower`s. The view is characterized by tiny red lights on every tall building, which fade in and out randomly to create a very soothing nightscape.

Still, I cant sit there daydreaming for too long! Hunger calls, and I must prowl the streets to find my dad his first authentic Japanese meal. We settle for Yakitori (chicken skewers) in Shinjukus `memory lane`, a tiny maze of narrow streets with a prevailing atmosphere of economic depression. Just a block from the sushi shops and designers handbags of central Shinjuku, it serves as a reminder of `real Japan` beneath all the hype and glamour, where exhausted workers treat themselves to noodles, yakitori and beer on wooden benches.

Keen to see as many faces of Japan as possible in 7 days, my dad musters up the energy to board another train at 10pm. We only have one Saturday night here in Tokyo, and I figure there is only one place to spend it...Roppongi! He isnt much into nightclubs, but walking the length of the street is interesting enough. Here African-American men attempt to pull us into every kind of strip club imaginable, and go to great lengths to explain why going to a sleazy strip joint is an unmissable part of Japan. They are admirable for their perseverance, and annoying for the same reason, but there are a number of strategies one can use to get rid of them. You can duck into the nearest shop (none of them are willing to follow you grocery shopping), or you can just say you have a train to catch (even if you are walking in the opposite direction to the train station). After about an hour of this, we attempt to sleep whilst standing on the train back (its possible, trust me), and eventually go back to get some horizontal sleep in our 100m high hotel room. Four hours into the trip, we are both completely exhausted.

The Days
Inevitably, every day begins with waking up. I always clung to the fantasy that this time in Japan I would wake up before dawn, meditate on top of a mountain before skipping down to the morning markets to buy vegetables from a local farmer named Nakamura-san. Instead, I roll around groggily when my alarm wakes me up at 10 30am, and stumble into the shower before eating whatever is left over from my host familys breakfast.

If I have nothing to do that morning, I generally head to the library, my home away from home. Here, I read the paper, books on Japanese history and culture and a very relevant book titled `What Should I Do With My Life?`. Eventually, something drags me away from my abode, and I am on a train bound for some distant destination. The trains are fantastic - there are several different routes to get to the same place, and several different types of train travelling at different speeds and stopping at different stops, making getting somewhere in a hurry as strategically challenging as a good game of chess. Once I have actually decided on a train, I sit and read Manga like every other Japanese person, which I have grown to love in my time here. Except for the time when I was so absorbed in the story that I missed my train stop - then I ceased to love it for a while.

One of my frequented destinations is Vanessa`s house, where we play games in English for hours on end. Most English teachers research games and make at least a rough plan of the lesson - I usually just pretend I am a small child (its not hard for me) and do whatever seems fun. My work therefore consists mainly of building block castles and smashing them, selling pretend things at a shop, and hiding in cupboards. Vanessa also has a very good knowledge of death and funeral rituals it seems, as we end up burying a cat in the sand `coz um hes Christian`, and cremating Vanessas Buddhist mother who was innocently lying on the couch reading a book...it took me a while to figure out what Vanessa meant by `We have to fire mummy coz shes Buddha!`. When fun and games are over, I go to my old host familys house down the road to teach chemistry in English to my old host brother, who is currently attending an international school in Switzerland. Thats right my little tutorees, youve been replaced!

My schedule is hectic, so I set aside a time once a week to just sit down and take my mind off the various stresses of life. Well, a chance to sit with so much pain in my legs that I completely forget about the various stresses of life. Thats right...I am back at Eiheiji. Ok, so not the real Eiheiji, thats a little bit too far away. I found the next best thing, an associated temple which shares the same name and style of practice. You just sit facing a wall for two hours, mixed up with a little bit of walking and chanting. When you sit, you dont do anything in particular. Not trying to become a Buddha, not trying to meditate better than the guy sitting next to you, not visualizing a beach or a forest or going to one`s happy place...Just existence, and nothing else. Well, that is the ideal anyway - I tend to throw in a little bit of shuffling around on my cushion, and my empty mind is filled with noisy thoughts such as `what the hell are you doing here?`, `ow, ow, ow, ow` and `How much wood could a wood chuck chuck if a wood chuck could chuck wood?`. Still, by the time I leave I am glad I came, and I am drawn back to the old temple time and again.

The Nights
Like any hardworking man, my days generally end up at the pub.
Only a little bit of beer drinking though; mainly, I am restricted to the kitchen. I am the Igor to Doctors Dr.Frankenstein, and together we prepare delicious traditional English cuisine using flour, egg, spices and sausages. It is a very laidback place, and sometimes when we are doing nothing but staring at the walls I go outside to talk to the barstaff (two czechoslovakian girls and an Irish guy), or just enjoy listening to Beatles records. Who needs to pay for an airfare to Europe when you can just work at a pub in Shibuya?

Reheating is the true fun of it all, another mathematical game where I have to work out how to best use the two microwaves and two toasters to heat 5 different dishes, each with completely different reheating procedures, so that they all come out at once. I have learnt the golden rule of parsley (sprinkle it wherever possible), but am yet to make friends with the chip fryer since I spilt hot oil on my hand on our first acquaintance. I am gradually getting more independent in the kitchen, and yesterday all my studies paid off when I made a plate of chips all by myself.

The memory will be forever vivid in my mind...Doctor takes the order, turns in slow motion to look at me. He passes the peice of paper over to me, and silently speaks with his eyes...`This ones for you Nick`. I move into the kitchen as though in a dream, and with hands trembling with excitement, heat the oil and gently place the chips in the fryer. Is it too hot? Is the oil the right colour? Oh no! A broken chip! I look around for Doctor, but he is not there...I alone on this one. Sweat breaks out on my brow. Ten minutes later the flame is extinguished, and I limp out of the kitchen with a smile breaking out on my exhausted face and a plate of golden chips in my hand. I did it! I am a cook!

I hang up my apron just before midnight, and walk towards the station on streets paved with fashionable young things, most of them drunk no matter what night of the week it is.

I catch the last train home (filled with party-goers who couldnt make it till dawn), and generally just fall asleep with exhaustion like everyone else does. I walk home in the city twilight of 1am, strolling the empty streets with the twinkling of apartment complexes instead of starlight (there are three stars in the sky here, I counted). Some nights a dusky moon rises over the train tracks, other nights the softest mist of rain falls over my face. Some nights I am just left alone with my thoughts, reflecting on the day behind me and the months and years ahead.

A dog barks, a street light flickers, and I fall onto my futon to wait for the next day to come.

The two most precious possessions for a traveller are time and money. Both are terrible to run out of.

Having spent an hour in transit, I end up 120 seconds late for my first shift. Much worse than it sounds, being in a culture of impeccible punctuality. Luckily, this work place is quite possibly the most casual in all of Japan, and they let it slide. My mentor, who is known as "Doctor" for some reason, strolls around the place pointing out the various quirks of the shop. We have 19 different varieties of english beer (including "Harry Porter") served in pints and half-pints, fish and chips, salt outside the doors to ward away demons, and a sign writer with a sense of humour. The toilets are split not into the usual "male" and `female", but instead into "happy" and "lonely". If you want two people in the toilet, you have to pay by the minute. Rather than happy hour there is "unhappy hour", whereby 10 dashes of tabasco sauce are added to every drink after 2am. We also have music - 6000 records, CDs and LPs to be exact (what is an LP anyway?).

I pour my first ever pint of beer. I say "omataseishimashita" (sorry to keep you waiting) to customers. Doctor tells me to help myself to lemonade from the tap and leftover bread, and any beer that is not going to be drunk is up for grabs too. Life is sweet! Of course, my time is spent in the much less glamorous end of the bar, the kitchen. I fulfill the classic stereotype of the poor british lad by peeling a few potatoes for making mash potatoes. In Japan, Fish and chips, bangers and mash and chilli con carne are exotic fare indeed, and the Japanese customers indulge in the atmosphere by communicating with gestures and broken English, no matter how many times we assure them we can speak Japanese.

Midnight comes along, and it is time to leave Britian for Japan once more. I rush down to the train station, smiling at the sight of the businessmen and trendy young people milling around the street in a drunken stupor on a Wednesday night. Little do I know that I am about to join them...I misread the train timetable, the last train left one minute ago. Oh the power that the smallest quantity of time can hold...one minute means the different between sleeping on my futon and milling on the street with the drunks of Shibuya, penniless. I have only enough money to get home, and no more, as I did not plan to be spending a night out in Shibuya! Eventually I return to the pub and explain my situation, to which Doctor immediately tries to give me a wad of cash big enough to stay at any luxury hotel. I end up borrowing 2000 yen ($20), which gives me enough left over to grab something to eat as well. I figure my money should be right now, I have enough for a night at the manga cafe, a train home and breakfast if I need it.

My love affair with manga cafes intensifies this night, as I find quite possibly the best manga cafe in Japan. Ordinary manga cafes have high-speed internet, comfortable leather seats and a range of soft drinks and premium coffees. Here I have all that, a collection of DVDs, flavoured milks, a playstation 2 and soft serve ice cream in genuine ice cream cones! The last thing I want to do here is sleep. But sleep I do, breathing in second-hand smoke (I am in the smoking section for some reason), and listening to very un-sleepy Jazz music played over the speakers. A manga cafe is a little bit like a casino - a strange twilight zone where you forget whether it is day or night amid the constant lighting and buzz of activity around you. I wake up in this twilight zone and check my phone...its 4am, back to sleep. I have an alarm set for 6:50am, enough time for me to help myself to a cappuccino, some orange juice and cornflakes before my time expires at 7. I wake up again and check my phone...just a cute little animation with the word `late!`. Huh? 9am?! But...but....but...my alarm?! I resist the temptation to step on my phone, and rush past the cappuccinos and fruit juice to the front counter.

But it is too late, the damage has been done. The value packs at manga cafes are very cheap, but the overtime is not. The first 6 hours cost $12, but for the last two I am up for $8. Normally, this would be cause for a minor grumble. However, with my scant funds, it is much more problematic. I dump my coins on the table and say `here is $4`. He looks at me. I look at him. `and umm....I dont have any more money actually`. Fortunately, they have a deadbeat form for people like me, where you can write out an IOU and run to the bank and back. After writing down my name, address, phone number (They check by ringing it), I feel they are very trusting to allow me out the door without paying. Then they throw in `oh, and if you dont come back soon, we will report you to the police`. Ah, I see...

I dont carry my main ATM card for security reasons, but I do have a backup emergency cash fund for times like these. I feel very clever! Until I go to enter my PIN number...what?! Ok, it must be...What?! I know my third try will be my last, and spend about twenty minutes pacing back and forth in the cold, early morning rain trying to make the number appear in my head. I try one last time...DAMN! The machine does not eat my card fortunately, but refuses to let me try again. I go back to the train station, sell a few old train tickets I never used back to the station (they will give you refunds for anything here), and head back to the manga cafe, defeated. While walking, I interrogate my phone, the source of all my troubles...turns out it was set to `manner mode`. It decided it would not be very good manners to make an alarm noise, and so it emitted a feeble vibration instead.

I empty the entire contents of my wallet out on the counter, down to the last 1 yen coin. He counts it out...You owe us 380 yen, and you have 320 yen. You are still 60 yen short. 60 yen?! Thats 60 cents! 7 minutes of overtime! Once again however, it is the smallest deficit of time, the smallest deficit of money that makes all the difference, and so I remain on the deadbeat register. I could have walked out a free man if I had just not bought that bag of chips yesterday, or if I had woken up 10 minutes earlier...At least the guy sees the humour in the situation, and tries to stop himself laughing as he follows the company line - `If you do not come here by 6 o clock tommorow, we will report you to the...ok, well, there is a possibility that we might report you to the police`.

I walk home with 3 yen in my pocket, huddling in my jacket as rain patters down around me. I want food, I want a drink, and I want a shower. But more importantly, I want to take my entire life savings with me the next time I go anywhere.

I have decided to wait out the rainy season in Tokyo, until August 18th. There are several reasons for the decision; Firstly, rain is wet, and wet travel is depressing (wet hitchhiking even more so). Secondly, travel is expensive, and expensive things make your wallet lighter. My trips around Japan are coming to an end - there are indeed many beautiful locations I have yet to so, but bankbook reality has to intervene at some point. Thirdly, I want to get to know a city, I want to taste more than one gets by just passing through. So, here in Tokyo, I decide to build a new life from scratch.

By the end of the first week I soon realize that work is one of the most important ingredients of a happy life. Though we may loath work and long for the free life, I soon find the free life boring and insubstantial. Without a purpose to work towards, days fly by meaninglessly. Strange though it may seem, I begin to yearn for a job.

How far am I willing to go to get one though? I resolve to present my case as honestly as possible, without covering up the blemishes in my employability. I dont want to give the Gods of Irony any more reason to smite me, and am also concious of my role as a representation of every person outside of Japan. Moreover though, I want my new life to be a simple one, and I do not like the thought of working a job by means of lies, half-truths and hidden facts. I trawl the city, with all its shiny lights, being simple - `Hi my name is Nick, and I am looking. I can speak english, I can speak Japanese, I can wipe tables and benches, and I leave Tokyo on August 18th.`

`Simple` also has the meaning of `Stupid`. My job prospects would be so much better if I changed it to `December 18th`, and many businesses told me this outright. `We would employ you, if you were here longer`. Perhaps I should just not mention it at all, but that would just delay the shock - judging by the colour of my skin I do not live here, and will be going back to my white little home country at some stage, and an employer would be very foolish not to ask when. Job searching is as frustrating as it is anywhere else in the world, with my enquiries resulting in all sorts of responses, from being outright laughed at (one manager actually went and hid in his office for some reason!), to the more promising people who listened intently and said `hmm...well give you a call and see, ok?`, to the people who actually do call back to arrange interviews. For two weeks, I get further and further along the path, give up my job search and sit back and wait for them to call me back, only to hit a dead end and be right back where I started. The Japanese have an onomatapoeia for frustration - `Ira Ira`. Ira Ira Ira Ira Ira Ira Ira.

Ira ir---what?! A job? Hurrah! I am sitting on a comfortable couch in a very well-designed house, teaching English to Vanessa. Vanessa is 5 years old, half-Indian half-Japanese, and likes making stories. The only hard part is getting the stories to end, as she quickly finds any conceivable loophole for some further catastrophe to occur. The king and queen kept having their castle smashed by dragons, and didnt have enough money to buy new furniture, so I tried to help them by having them build a new castle in space. But then, according to Vanessa, `the hugest dinosaur there ever was came and smashed it!`...damn, I should have made it a space-dinosaur proof castle...

Nothing ever comes when you expect it to, and job opportunities wait around a corner to attack me when I am not looking. Now that I am happy to devote all my attention to teaching, I land another job after several unexpected job interviews, and am working at a British-Style pub in Shibuya starting tommorow. My new life in Tokyo has begun!