Gomi 2

I noticed an empty PET bottle under the seats as I sat down on the right side of the train. I saw an empty Starbucks beverage container under the seats on the left side of the train. I had no idea the locals were such litterbugs. Some may blame the trash on the foreigners. Sorry you Nippon nationalists and crusaders, but you can't explain away all your problems with your gaijin theories. What's with the cigarette butts I see on the streets? I was walking through a dark street one night and a young couple walked by while smoking. One of them dropped a butt on the ground without putting out the burn. Only YOU can prevent forest fires.

Cooling

Recently the air conditioning on the trains has been lacking the arctic chill. Air blows from the vents, but it feels like just a fan. The weather hasn't cooled down that much to warrant a change in train temperature. I wasn't aware that the natives enjoyed practicing Cool Biz on the trains. It's strange that during the humid summer, the train was one of the places to find comfort. During the spring and fall, it's a place of discomfort.

Granny

Lines had formed waiting for the train and I noticed that an old lady came and stood near the front of my line. When the train arrived a few minutes later, she cut in front of the first person in line and waited for the doors to open. I figured maybe granny had bad legs and needed a seat. No big deal. The doors opened and she entered the train without hesitation. She hindered the movement of people trying to get out and kept walking towards the seats. She crossed the line from neediness to rude when she ignored the people trying to exit the train. There were no seats to be found, but she got lucky and another woman offered her seat to granny. It seems as though the Nihon-jins like to reward rude behavior. I must be experiencing culture shock.

Cockroach

I ordered a setto at MakkuDonarudo tonight and it started off ugly. The soda machine had broken and only non-carbonated drinks were available. The anti-soda government lobbyists must've struck again. I settled for a random drink and received some satisfaction in seeing that they gave me a lot of fry potato. I noticed a small cockroach scurrying along the floor as I ate and tried to smash it with my foot. It escaped and I saw it crawling up the wall later. I guess the restaurants don't have much health standards. They can protect people's health by not allowing them to drink soda, but they can't protect people from the roaches. Perhaps I ate some roach eggs or roach poop with my setto. Delicious. At least I didn't eat pesticide-tainted rice sold by Mikasa Foods.

Sunblock

Sunscreen is rather expensive in the land of the rising sun. A 35mL bottle costs about 350 yen. In Norteamericana, a 236 mL tube costs about 900 yen. Notice the enormous difference in size there. The biggest bottle I've seen at the ordinary drug stores is 60mL. The Nippon natives must've developed a freakish natural resistance to sunlight. They're anti-vampires.

Roadblock

When entering the train there's usually a preference order of location that goes in this heirarchy:
1) the corner seats because there will only be one person at most sitting next to you, you're close to the exit, and you can lean against the wall
2) a seat with an empty seat on the left and an empty seat on the right
3) a seat with a person on only one side of your body and an empty seat on the other side
4) any open seat
5) the standing spot in front of a corner seat because you can get the corner seat if the person leaves
6) The spot next to the doorway because you can lean against the wall without the need to hold onto anything
7) a standing spot in front of any seat
8) a standing spot where you can reach a handrail or handgrip for balance
9) a standing spot not in front of the doorway
10) any standing spot

Sometimes the people like to block the way into the train by doing an alternate version of spot #6. Instead of grabbing the spot and turning their body so that it's not blocking the door, they enter the train and barely walk to the side. They just stand there and slowly turn around so that they're blocking nearly the entire side of one door. When the roadblock occurs, it can become difficult for traffic to leave and enter the train. The roadblock can be especially annoying when it's caused by the person at the front of the line entering the train.

Today I saw one woman pull this stunt as she got on the train. She then stayed in front of the doorway until a few stops later. Maybe she was a pervert and liked the feel of people brushing against her as they squeezed to get in and out of the train. I think she likes to read manga about people standing in front of train doors. Her fetish is getting out of control.

Soda

I ordered a combo meal from McDonald's with no ice for the drink. The drink felt light so I opened it up and discovered that the already small cup had only been filled up halfway. There must've been some kind of cultural miscommunication. In North America, "no ice" means either "I want a less watered-down taste" or "I want more soda" or both. Fast food employees oblige by still filling the soda up near the top of the cup despite the lack of ice. Here in Nippon, "koori irimasen" means "I want to see how much I'm getting screwed over by ordering a drink." Yes, it's still a rip-off if you buy soda at McDonald's no matter what the country is, but you feel a lot more ripped off here.

Futotta

I stood patiently in the food line at a buffet when a chubby female kid cut in front of me and started grabbing food. Hey kid, the ocean called. They're running out of shrimp! The jerk store also called. They're running out of you!

Smelly

I ate dinner at a sushi bar tonight. The place was full and while I was eating, the couple next to me finished and left. Two old men took the open seats and I immediately got a strong whiff of body odor. I couldn't continue my meal and had to leave. I sthink(sp) there may be a problem with the deodorant in Nippon.

Gomi

I bought supplies at Costco a few weeks back and stopped by the food courts to get a hotto dokku. The Costco hot dog has been one of the foods I've been craving since coming here. It's a little more expensive than back home, but it still comes with the refillable soda. The refillable soda isn't such a great value considering that you can't take the soda out of Costco. There's nothing to prevent you from doing that except that once you finish the soda, you'd have to carry it around forever because of the lack of trash cans in this barren wasteland. The time-honored American tradition of refilling your soda and taking it on the go has been spoiled by the anti-soda government here. I did buy some 12 packs of soda and had them shipped back to my residence. Costco was the first time I ever saw a 12 pack of soda in this country. Maybe it'll be the only place that I'll ever see it.

Squat

I visited a temple this afternoon in the sprinkling weather. I had to take a dump while walking around and managed to find the restrooms in the temple area. It was a generally clean bathroom with no stench and it had four squat toilets. The Asian-style squats were expected given that the temple is extremely old. What shocked me was that these were not old squats. They had hand sensors rather than handles for flushing the toilet. Now why would they update the squat toilets with sensors when they could have just replaced them with Western-style toilets? Who was the Mr. Spock behind that decision?

Banking 3

I went to the ATM around 8am today and it said that I would be charged a fee for using the ATM after hours. I accepted the charge because if I didn't withdraw money right then, the bank could be down for another three days. The shareholders for this company must be billionaires from charging all these fees. I think they must've closed all their banks for three days so that they could upgrade the computer software to charge more fees than before.

Banking 2

My bank and all of its ATMs have been closed for the past three days. This is one of the major banks in the country. Thanks. Thanks a lot. I can't get cash in a cash-based society.

Yamanote walk

A few days ago, somebody told me that one of his hobbies is walking. I told him that I once walked with a friend from Tokyo station to Shibuya station and asked him what his longest walk was. He said that one time in college, he and a bunch of friends walked the whole Yamanote line all night long, starting and ending at Tokyo station. It took them about 10 hours to complete. What in god's holy name are you blathering about? I asked him if they were drinking, but he said they were all sober. When I got home, I looked up walking the Yamanote line and apparently it's some kind of urban challenge that some people do.

Banking

One night last week, I went to use one of my bank's ATMs. I got a warning before withdrawing that I would be charged a fee for withdrawing outside of normal hours. I refused and decided to get money the next morning. I withdrew money last weekend too and I saw on my passbook that I got charged 105 for the transaction. I can't read the language, but I'm pretty sure that's a weekend transaction fee because I'd never taken out money on a weekend before and never got that fee before. What kind of hillbilly banking system do they have here? These fees reminded me of the Washington Mutual and Southwest Airlines commercials that advertise no extra fees unlike their competitors.