Japan: Ganbate!: Week eleven: Remember to just click "hai" at 7-Eleven when buying alcohol

Ohayou everyone! Welcome to the conclusion of yet another weekend in Japan. We are all starting to truly get antsy and worried because we're rapidly approaching the one-month-left mark, and while we know we've accomplished a lot since we've been here, I don't think any of us are quite ready to say goodbye. I'm kind of torn--I'm ready to go home for a month, see everyone I miss and love (and eat a ton), but I could stay in Japan for a bit longer, see the changing of the seasons. But I do miss my family and my cats and food and my friends, and I really am excited to see it all.

Karaoke Nomihoudai

This week flew by in an exhausted blur as I recovered from Tokyo, crammed in two midterms, and prepare for the onslaught of work coming up in the next week. I hardly even remember what happened in school this week...probably not a good sign, but at least I'm caught up on my sleep again.

My adorable 980 yen hoodie, so soft!

Friday night we did a nomihoudai up at a karaoke bar, mostly just hung out, talked, drank, had a good time. Saturday I went out to Osaka again to go shopping with my friends, and had some successful times finding some very cute things. One forgets how soothing shopping can be, but there is nothing better than finding something cute and wonderful, especially for a good price. Clothing can actually be reasonably priced here, if you look in the right places--Avail and Shimamura (the two clothing stores about 5 minutes from where I live) have the widest variety of sizes and prices, and are kind of like the Ross and TJ Maxx of Japan, I feel. I found a nice hoodie with Japanese on it (an incredibly rare find, trust me) for $9.80! Plus they have tons of winter coats--long, butt covering, thick jackets--for around $30. I'm trying to hold out and see how cold it gets, hopefully it doesn't get too deathly here so I don't have to break on a jacket I probably won't get to use as much in Florida.

Host boys in action, Dotonbori, Osaka

Anyway, Osaka is always a good time, lots of people watching and good food and good things. While my friends were still inside shopping, I sat outside of Dotonbori's H&M and watched all the host club guys soliciting, some different performers--including a guy who had a Ray Charles robot he had performing songs, and I never get tired of people watching. Found Tim-Tam's (the delicious Australian version of a Kit-Kat-like-thing), and two weird versions of Kit-Kat's, woohoo! My souvenir pile is getting kind of big, it's making me worried about what I'm going to have to throw away in order to take everything home... But Christmas is gonna be awesome. I'm pumped to give everyone their stuff.

I have a new love of these chocolate covered almonds, they are delicious. And at the Chinese restaurants they give you this little bowl of fatty looking broth, and you pour it on your fried rice and it's delicious. Gives it just the hint of chicken, and it's so good, trust me. My mom just sent me a care package, and I'm SO EXCITED! So a shout out to my wonderful mom, who shouldn't have spent what she did on me, but I love her so much and thank you! I'm going to get so fat and it's going to make Thanksgiving as close to perfect as I can get without being there with you guys.

It's getting dark here at like, 4:15ish now, and I am now 14 hours ahead of the East coast because of the Daylight Savings Time switch. It's also getting cold--not so bad this week, actually pretty nice with highs in the 60s and lows in the upper 50s--but next week is highs in the 50s lows in the 40s. So much for "fall weather"...

Random~~

They have so many weird, random no picture rules in Japan. A lot of stores won't allow pictures, plus a lot of places you really don't expect. Big "important" statues of Buddha aren't supposed to have their picture taken, and even this kitty (below) wasn't supposed to have its picture taken for whatever reason (and they're serious, they learn how to say "No photo!" even in English, and pretty much always catch you--I was caught for this, but at least I got it anyway).

Kitty on sale in Osaka
Looked like regular DSH...for $1,290

Braces in Japan are insanely priced because they aren't covered by their national health insurance. I've heard figures all across the board from Japanese people and from researching online--from $7,000 to $15,000, depending on how badly your teeth are messed up, how long they have to be on, where you live, and how old you are. These reasons and more are why Japanese people normally don't get braces, and I really think it's awful that they don't--I genuinely don't know how they live normal or healthy lives when they have such bad crowding or teeth overlapping almost entirely other teeth (how do you brush properly?). I'm not hating on Japan's healthcare...except I'm hating on it. I know braces are expensive everywhere, but it seems ridiculous to have it be all but entirely out of reach for such an advanced country with such a large economy.

Cars and car insurance also have weird rules too, which is why they so often have new cars. The costs of taxes on cars that are over three years old are actually so high that most people just put a new down payment on another car and start over again, something you can read about in more detail here. It's actually pretty confusing, and really weird, but once I heard about this it makes sense--you hardly ever see "old" cars on the road, and you certainly never see things with scratches, chipped paint, or dents. My poor old Jaguar would have been banished into the pits of Hell here. http://www.japantoday.com/category/lifestyle/view/buying-a-used-car-in-japan-what-to-keep-in-mind

They are super lax about alcohol here, seriously. I've been "ID'd" once since I've been here, and not for age, but for a student discount. They ID'd my Japanese friend, but that's only happened once, and my other friend got ID'd for cigarettes once. Those beer vending machines actually don't require an ID or anything to swipe, you literally go up, order the thing, click if you are or are not 20, then receive alcohol. At 7-Eleven, the machine just pops up in front of you and asks if you are 20, which you have to answer yes to--there isn't an "iie"/no button (so they usually reach around and click it for us because we didn't realize it at first), and that's it. No questions, no second glances, just purchase. Kind of weird, kind of disappointing.

Love hotels, or "rabuho" (ラブホ) for short, are hotel rooms that can be rented hourly, or nightly, and are primarily for couples to get some "alone" time. A large percentage of Japanese people live with their parents until they're in their late 20s (and this percentage is growing, and extending to older ages), waiting until they're either married or until they have to move out to go to school far away, all because of the high costs of housing in Japan and a slumping economy that makes it difficult to obtain a high-paying job. Because of the difficulty of sneaking someone past mom back to their thin-walled, small rooms to have privacy, love hotels were born. It's usually pretty easy to spot love hotels, because they're made to stand out amongst the crowds of buildings--they can be themed, or extravagant, or just basic. They have various themes: Christmas, castles, American, Underwater; you name it, they have it. They often go for around 8,000 yen for an overnight stay, or resting during the day can be about 3,000 yen cheaper. Most offer packages of 3 hours, 6 hours, or 12 hours, all for various rates, similar to how the Internet Cafes do it. They offer erotic movies, a large bed, nice bathrooms, whatever. They are made to very anonymous, and some even have special features that make it easier to cheat if you're having an affair (a telephone that makes different sounds in the background, so it seems like you're at the office, or a train station, or wherever). It's one of these weird-Japan things, and every time you stumble somewhere and you think you're kind of lost, you'll run into one of these.

Perverts in Japan...I know this is something I keep coming back to, but the more I hear about it the angrier I get. They have this huge problem with sex and porn and perverts, and yet I feel like not enough is being done about it still. In Japan, they're taught to always be polite, quiet, conservative. While there is a trend away from this with a lot of young people, it still reigns over most of Japan, so when a guy is rubbing your butt on the train, most girls sit there and kind of just take it. If you talk to young girls now, they just say it has happened, but that they don't do anything. I can't imagine just letting some dude violate you and not say anything, or hit him or shout or something. The police are now trying to get girls to make sure they point and shout, "chikan!" (pervert) whenever it happens, as a way of public shaming, but they are finding it difficult to get it to actually work.

Pervert warning sign in Tokyo

And while I understand how it happens sometimes on accident--like in Tokyo, during rush hour, when we were so packed in I literally had my friend (thank God he's gay) packed in directly against my butt, no room to shift so I couldn't feel all his business, another lady pressed up against me (where I accidentally touched her butt, several times, when I felt the urge to sneeze from her hair in my nose and tried to move her hair from my face)--fine, I get that. But there is an obvious difference between groping and accidental touching. There are no excuses, but it goes in with their sex-packed culture, men reading porn at every corner, openly, looking at sex manga on the train casually. I'm not saying it has to all become completely prudish, but there has to be some sort of line drawn somewhere, at some time. There are all the maid/whatever cafes, but in Tokyo's "red light" district that my friends visited, they also had scenarios that kind of appealed to what people desired--a situation where you picked the girl out who pretended to be an innocent school girl on a train, and you pick her out that way, leering through the next train over. I'm not sure where to draw the line with freedom and liberty, but perhaps it just has to be a big enough punishment for actually doing these things that it matters? I think I'm going to write my paper on women in Japan, based on things like salary and expectations, sex and harassment, stalking and murder. We'll see!

On that note though, Tokyo subways were crazy, super packed during bad hours, and a lot more rough than the ones in Osaka or Kyoto. More shaky and jerky than ours here, and a lot of times smelled worse, too. We didn't encounter any packers though (the people that shove people into the trains), but I felt like I was living in a clown car, staring through the crowd of people, seeing people all but flopping on top of us as they tried to swim their way through us to get on the subway. It was horrible. But they were just about as quiet or as loud as the Osaka people, depending on the time of day, with just as many drunks. I think they just like to hate on each other.

It is kind of weird, too, that many of their police officers don't carry weapons (yes, some of them do carry guns, but not always), and are generally not a very intimidating bunch of people. They seem all right, but like they have too much free time considering they do still have problems--they make frequent bicycle stops, and ask for your residence card (as a foreigner on a bike, there are huge rules surrounding it--it's like stealing a car pretty much), the sticker of proof for the bike registration, whatever. You aren't allowed, legally, to have two people on a bike at a time, and various other stupid rules that they actually stop you for--especially as a foreigner. Kind of frustrating but cops will be cops...

View from my walk home, leaves changing finally!

When I was on my way to Tokyo, there was a vending machine at one of the rest stops that had hot foods available! They had some ramens, yaki-onigiri (the fried rice ball), tai-yaki (the fish shaped custard cake thing), and different things like that. Unfortunately I had forgotten my camera and wallet on the bus that time, and didn't see it again on the way back, but I forgot to mention how nifty that was. They also have all the coffee vending machines like we have, except when they come out, they come out pretty--I've even seen them come out with whipped cream, like at Starbucks. Other than the panty machines, and the cool game machines and the mango/banana machine, I haven't seen too many crazy vending machines. Vending machines of coffee and energy drinks and soda galore, but surprisingly not too many food or other kinds anywhere. Odd.

I'm never drying my clothes in the dryer here again. It's small and useless and things are always wet, 100 yen later. Instead, I threw my clothes around my room, blasted the heat, and left for the afternoon, and everything was nice and crisp when I returned. Perfect!

Killa KT v. THE SQUATTER;
Round one: KT 1; Squatter 0

Imagine: you have already broken the seal after the all you can drink. You are thirty minutes in to your walk home, and you still have another thirty to go. Salvation! You see a Lawson, shining at the top of the hill. You sprint (stumble?) there, hurrying in, praying to use it before your friend who has to attend to "other business" does. Then it's just you and the squatter, staring eye to eye, ready to battle. Yes, if you can't see what I'm getting at, I used my first squatter toilet the other night! I was quite a few drinks in and yet somehow I still managed not to pee everywhere! Points for me! It's weird being face level with this toilet paper, feeling like a caveman, holding onto this bar and praying not to fall over. I can't imagine doing something that takes uh, "longer time" there, or changing any feminine products, afraid my hand might get too close to the squatter or to the ground (which you so know is covered in pee). Also, I've gotten less headaches since I've been here, so therefore I'm blaming them on allergies to stuff in the states. Something there drives me crazy, I just don't know what.

I think that's about it, I've got to finish my dumb midterm and study for my lesson test in Japanese. Wish me luck, and I'll talk to you all next week! Have a good one until then. Ja, mata!