Disclaimer: My students will, of course, remain nameless. I also won't mention the identity of my employer, for reasons of employment maintenance, common sense, and plain old decency. My lawyers have also instructed me to inform you that there is a 5% chance that these stories may be entirely fictional, so if you ever meet one of my students you won't be tempted to ask them if they said these things... If you happen to be one of my students, then you can also rest assured that these people probably don't exist. But.. then, if you are one of my students, then you are probably having a really SHITTY day, now that you found out what a disaster your formerly respected Sensei turned out to be - but hey, this blog is a hell of a lesson in colloqual/online/terrible grammar, right?)
ok. yeah. that disclaimer might have been the...uh... funniest thing... I've... written.
(cough.) Try the ... (cough)... veal...
Yeah.
um... I am therefore happy to present you, dear reader, with the very best in unintentional hilarity.
Background is really only needed on one student ... We'll call him "Deadpan" or "DP" for short, because he rarely breaks his monotone or smiles... Also, if I had to guess, I would say that he has about as much experience with women as I have with the machinations of the court of the Ottoman Empire circa 1532. This, of course, makes any material on "romance" difficult and painful at best.
Btw... the textbook unit for the past month has been entitled "More Than Friends: Talking About Relationships!"
Anyway... so here are some gems from DP and some of my other language charges...
Most Common Unintentional Error:
Sensei, I was very boring on the weekend.
(in Japanese, the aren't two adjectives for describing things ("boring") and feelings ("bored"), so students tend to mix them up alot.)
Third most painful silence:
Me (to student 1): Why do you like jokes?
Student 1 (smiling): Because I like to laugh. Jokes make me happy. Why do you like Jokes, DP?
DP (seriously): I like Jokes because there are very many sad things in my life.
Biggest Mix up of the "Encouraging" / "Discouraging" lesson material:
Sensei: Ok, class, I'm going to jump out the window!!!
JGangster#1: um... That's a ....great idea??
Best Classmate/Text/Cultural Ethos Combination:
3 businessmen + 1 Antiglobalization Activist + a unit on "Genetically Engineered Foods" + the powerful Japanese belief in consensus-seeking.
Second most painful silence/"I'll prescribe Sex and the City AFTER you get through The Wonder Years" award:
Sensei: Ok, what are some things you can do to "keep the spark going" in a relationship?
DP: You should remember her birthday.
Sensei: Anything else?
DP: ....
Sensei: Hmmm... what things could you do to show someone you like them.
DP: .... I don't know. Please teach me.
Best opening to an anecdote about pets:
Happy Happy Student (female): Ok... I have a story. When I was young, I was verrry fat...
Most Painful Silence/Scariest Corporate Mind Control:
Sensei: Ok, guys... take a moment and think about your work day, and think about what makes you happy.
Student 1: Well, I like to do a good job, and I enjoy lunch, and I really enjoy coffee.... and...my salary of course. (laughs)
DP: My boss tells me that work is like wash the face. You don't think about wash the face. You just do it, and then you are happy. You are happy when you don't think about it.
Student 1: ...
Sensei:....
Studnet 1:...
Sensei: ... So... um... if you don't ask any questions... you don't get any bad answers....hmm... Student 1, what do you think about that...?
Student 1:... (thinks...)... um... (more thinking).... (nods)... Okay, sounds good.
Best inapropriate two-part verb question:
Housewife#1: Sensei, you go in, and you go out... but do you go down?
/ The voices in my head had a field day with that last one, but I managed to squeak out "doors" and "stairs" as examples of things you could go in, out and down....
Wednesday, March 22, 2006
Saturday, March 18, 2006
Look Ma! Two Hands!
So, I have a some news to contradict the last post. Apparently, this week, I did drink too much.
But don't worry, I have some madness (not the good kind) to put it all into the proper perspective.
Ok - lets get the awful imagery out of the way!
CHEERS!
While I didn't actually drink all of these specific beer glasses (just 3), I did actually empty more than this number the other night during some sort of weekday festivities (I dunno... I think it was called "huzzah! its wednesday!) but man did this pic turn out well.
Last weekend I also managed to hit up some downtown all-night-drinking-party-ness. I ended up following two of my dear chums... (for the purposes of this blog, lets call them "party sensei" and "hungry sensei".) Unfortunately, I can't really nail down specifics, as I think that a few people that live here in Japan actually read this blog now. (Yes, I'm talking to you, Captain Oldhump, among others)... so... I can't say which is which without being johnny gossip.... but its too funny to resist!)
Between them, over the course of one night in Shibuya, I managed to tail Party Sensei and Hungry Sensei, as we/they managed to chase after a number of awesome goals. I'd like to point out that I was actually reprising my role as "drunkscort" from first year, and basically trying to make sure that these cats didn't do anything toooo rash (well, unless it would make a funny story for me...) ANYWAY, Party Sensei and Hungry Sensei managed to accomplish the following with me in tow:
1) gross consumption of booze
2) unsuccessfull wandering of the streets for two hours looking for a ma-sa-geee.
3) bar visitation, disco ball theft and forced removal. This forced removal happened no matter how many sober-esque "tomodachi o sumi mass-en" (friend excuse) "tomodatchi ga drunk desu!" (friend drunk is) and my favourite "tomodachi beeru wa sugoy daiski...a gomenna sai" (friend beer super likes, sorry... so sorry) I managed to throw at the still (very) polite bar staff.
4) rolling down the stairs into a mystery puddle and still managing to be possessed of said disco ball.
5) finding RAMEN!
6) sleeping for 2.56 hours in said ramen shop. Sorry ramen shop people... as three rather boozed (ok... two boozed and one amused) gaijin folk are surely not so good for business.
here are some money shots, including a beautiful kicker of a drink from my past that some of you may or may not recognize as... DIRTY GOODNESS!!!
1) They had the only kind of karoke that doesn't get your butt kicked outside of J-Pan! Freestyle Spoken Word (or, as its known to the masses... shit. what was it.. Wrap or something)
2) The Ressurection of the Dirty Goodness, and the Passion of the Former Unbeliever
3) The Aftermath
Sadly, the disco ball was lost in a fit of pique.
Drunk Sensei: stupid disco ball. and there's pee on me, I think. I don't want this any more [tosses disco ball into a pile of garbage bags]
Brent: Nooooo oooooo My Sideburns and sense of history!!!!
Ah. what a shame....
And just so you manage to put this into perspective... I'd like to point out that we are at least three evolutionary steps above a certain level of drunkeness that is unique to Japan...
Drunken guys in suits
endangering their lives!!!
With an audience!!!
1) The Audience:
2) The Dumbass (being helped by security in the middle of the pic)
3) The Dumbass in Action
now, I have to say.... I was super impressed with the JR (Japan Rail) Staff. They are either super highly trained and heavily drilled in reacting to this sort of flagrant darwin-baiting, or this level of drunken idiocy is more common than I would hope.
I actually watched the whole thing unfold... I saw the guy stumble/slip off the platform, and within seconds there were shouting guards who had sounded an alarm system that bellowed a claxon and lit up a string of red flashing lights all along the station and up the tracks in either direction. Any train coming would have had plenty of notice and stopped well before the station. They were down on the tracks and had him up in about ten seconds.
So, good on them. Every now and again, the uniquely Japanese idea that EVERYONE should take the utmost care and pride in every area of their job/service to the greater population pops up in an amazingly helpful way. Further, I really doubt that this guy is going to see the emotional trauma of the incident as an excuse to sue the train company for building platforms that drunk people could fall off--thereby incuring public shame, humilation and scuffed hands... not to mentiont he fact that he surely swallowed a chicken beak and a finger during his tumble.
But don't worry, I have some madness (not the good kind) to put it all into the proper perspective.
Ok - lets get the awful imagery out of the way!
CHEERS!
While I didn't actually drink all of these specific beer glasses (just 3), I did actually empty more than this number the other night during some sort of weekday festivities (I dunno... I think it was called "huzzah! its wednesday!) but man did this pic turn out well.
Last weekend I also managed to hit up some downtown all-night-drinking-party-ness. I ended up following two of my dear chums... (for the purposes of this blog, lets call them "party sensei" and "hungry sensei".) Unfortunately, I can't really nail down specifics, as I think that a few people that live here in Japan actually read this blog now. (Yes, I'm talking to you, Captain Oldhump, among others)... so... I can't say which is which without being johnny gossip.... but its too funny to resist!)
Between them, over the course of one night in Shibuya, I managed to tail Party Sensei and Hungry Sensei, as we/they managed to chase after a number of awesome goals. I'd like to point out that I was actually reprising my role as "drunkscort" from first year, and basically trying to make sure that these cats didn't do anything toooo rash (well, unless it would make a funny story for me...) ANYWAY, Party Sensei and Hungry Sensei managed to accomplish the following with me in tow:
1) gross consumption of booze
2) unsuccessfull wandering of the streets for two hours looking for a ma-sa-geee.
3) bar visitation, disco ball theft and forced removal. This forced removal happened no matter how many sober-esque "tomodachi o sumi mass-en" (friend excuse) "tomodatchi ga drunk desu!" (friend drunk is) and my favourite "tomodachi beeru wa sugoy daiski...a gomenna sai" (friend beer super likes, sorry... so sorry) I managed to throw at the still (very) polite bar staff.
4) rolling down the stairs into a mystery puddle and still managing to be possessed of said disco ball.
5) finding RAMEN!
6) sleeping for 2.56 hours in said ramen shop. Sorry ramen shop people... as three rather boozed (ok... two boozed and one amused) gaijin folk are surely not so good for business.
here are some money shots, including a beautiful kicker of a drink from my past that some of you may or may not recognize as... DIRTY GOODNESS!!!
1) They had the only kind of karoke that doesn't get your butt kicked outside of J-Pan! Freestyle Spoken Word (or, as its known to the masses... shit. what was it.. Wrap or something)
2) The Ressurection of the Dirty Goodness, and the Passion of the Former Unbeliever
3) The Aftermath
Sadly, the disco ball was lost in a fit of pique.
Drunk Sensei: stupid disco ball. and there's pee on me, I think. I don't want this any more [tosses disco ball into a pile of garbage bags]
Brent: Nooooo oooooo My Sideburns and sense of history!!!!
Ah. what a shame....
And just so you manage to put this into perspective... I'd like to point out that we are at least three evolutionary steps above a certain level of drunkeness that is unique to Japan...
Drunken guys in suits
endangering their lives!!!
With an audience!!!
1) The Audience:
2) The Dumbass (being helped by security in the middle of the pic)
3) The Dumbass in Action
now, I have to say.... I was super impressed with the JR (Japan Rail) Staff. They are either super highly trained and heavily drilled in reacting to this sort of flagrant darwin-baiting, or this level of drunken idiocy is more common than I would hope.
I actually watched the whole thing unfold... I saw the guy stumble/slip off the platform, and within seconds there were shouting guards who had sounded an alarm system that bellowed a claxon and lit up a string of red flashing lights all along the station and up the tracks in either direction. Any train coming would have had plenty of notice and stopped well before the station. They were down on the tracks and had him up in about ten seconds.
So, good on them. Every now and again, the uniquely Japanese idea that EVERYONE should take the utmost care and pride in every area of their job/service to the greater population pops up in an amazingly helpful way. Further, I really doubt that this guy is going to see the emotional trauma of the incident as an excuse to sue the train company for building platforms that drunk people could fall off--thereby incuring public shame, humilation and scuffed hands... not to mentiont he fact that he surely swallowed a chicken beak and a finger during his tumble.
Tuesday, March 14, 2006
The Awful Truth About Japan
So, apparently my dear mother has taken some time in the last un-updated month to take a peek at the blog....
This is, unfortunately, a time where I have foolishly left a half-assed post about some friend of mine who is ensuring that the average virtue level of the middle aged ladies of Japan retains its "tarnished" character.
oops. my bad.
Anyway, there has been some me-related drama over the last month, but thats still no reason for me to neglect this highly important documentation of personal history. Right? Right.
Soo... lets start with clearing up some misconceptions that this blog may or may not be attempting to highlight.
Now, those of you who have met my mother know that she is an entirely wonderful woman, who has bouts of wackyness that I firmly believe are genetically responsible for at least 60% of the fun that I am able to bring to any given party. Of course, she is also my mother, which means that between bouts of wackyness** (Wackyness Anecdotes follow the end of this post) she is also given to bouts of crazy things like "worrying about me", "trying to support me from the other side of the world" or "caring that I exist." sheesh! what the heck!
Anyway... here is part of the email...
Hi Hon!
...
I find your blogs sometimes difficult to read in the sense that I worry
about your lack of sleep, your apparent heavy drinking, and the fact that
you loosely share sex comments... Would you please
just send over regular emails with some attached pictures once in awhile.
Then Gramma and I can read them. Call me old-fashioned, but I worry about
issues of privacy and about your liver and about your aging process due to
lack of sleep.
...
Love,
Mom!
So... as I see it there are a few key problems...
1) I am unhealthy
2) I drink too much
3) There are too many humping jokes on this website.
4) I won't be able to run for political office with any sort of moral fibre
5) #1-4 will probably upset my grandmother.
In light of this, I would like to share with you....
The Awful Truth About Japan
There are these entire strings of pesky times where I don't drink, party, get lost, fall alsleep on stairs, fall down stairs, fall alseep on trains, or even get felated by santa claus! (see December 2005).
These times are called "Weekdays". which is why I only update about once a mon...cough...cough...WEEK.
ish.
Anyway, to help sweet mums feel better (and becuase I am enjoying this post as well) I would like to detail a REGULAR day.
Come back!
I'll try to make this funny. Seriously. and I won't make it a habit.
To add to the incredible excitement that nearly matches the glee on all of your faces when you realized that I was (indeed) not dead, but being a posting slacker! The first part of this was written by CELL PHONE, with no predictive text)
well, im a bit sad that you only think im talking dirty and drinking, but this just happens to be the stuff i find most amusing.... and since i only write one post each week, you are definitely getting a skewed view...
actually, most of my days sound like this....
1025 get up
1045 turn off snooze and get up for real
1055 ok. seriously, youll miss the train if you dont get up!!
1057 get up, shower, eat toast, walk to train station.
1133 see train crossing gate descend, sprint the last 300 metres, including two flights of stairs.
1135-1139 pant heavily while being stared at by disgusted japanese people.
1150, change and prep/review first lesson.
1200-2100 teach
Anyway...
teaching:
40% actual instruction of students.
10% prep of props, highkighting lesson plans,etc.
10% walking to get food, getting food, reheating food, eating food.
On most nights, I actually just come home, snag a bit of action on teh intre-web and/or watch a movie or something. Contrary to popular believe and the evidence presented regularly in the Weekly World News, my life really isn't that exciting. But I have bouts of funnyness, and these are the ones that I would like to contribute to posterity.
So, dear reader (I'd add an "s", but I'm suspicious about the fact that I may need to do some active work to earn that s back after the latest hiatus)... let us make a pact.
I will continue to have shenanigan-filled adventures and I will share them on this site. They will of course, be interspersed with bits and pieces of other-ness that we can call "weekdays"...but I'll try not to mention them on this site if I can help it.
I will also attempt to send at least pg-13 rated emails to the rest of my folks. They don't want to hear that I got plowed (in any sense of the word... )
You... well.. shit. promise whatever you want. I'm still making a pact with you and you can't stop me.
OK! lets do an update on those 5 points!!!
1) I am unhealthy
Ok... I didn't address this one at all, but my pants are not wear-able without a belt, and I can see a noticable lack of additional chin-ness on me. I'm not that much lighter, but I'm certainly thinner. I am also de-balding after removing the stress-madness that was my old career. Sleeping more is a work in progress, but I am doing my part by sleeping in uber-much.
2) I drink too much
Well, lets call this one 23% de-bunked. I drink too much on some weekend days, but mostly I am a good boy. Unfortunately, I suspect neglecting to mention these nights in glorious "worstpossibleinterpretation-o-vision" would make for a blog about as exciting as a Reality TV show populated with honest, upstanding individuals with a healthy amount of self respect. (or perhaps "as thrilling as Jerry Springer with all the chairs nailed down...")
Anyway... I do drink a decent amount, but I don't ever find myself NEEDING to drink. I'm happy to go out w/o the booze too. ...
Where is "rationalizing" on the 12 steps again? Somewhere after "admitting it", right?
3) There are too many humping references on this website.
This point is entirely without any sort of penis.
4) I won't be able to run for political office with any sort of moral fibre.
With all of the "baby" jokes that D and I make, I have bigger problems than this blog.
5) #1-4 will probably upset my grandmother.
I am currently in negotiations with Fox News to report this blog as the result of the "liberal bias" of the internet, and that since the Internet was invented by activist judges, it is actually reinterpreting the wholesome conservatism that I think.
So, to conclude, out of a possible 5/5, I scored...
1.23/5
So... I really didn't accomplish anything. nice.
GIMMIE A P
GIMMIE A R
GIMMIE AN IORITIES!!!!
Thats right!
I hope you found this all at least 123/500 as amusing as I did.
Welll... thats it. sleepy time!!! More soon!
** As promised. the post script!!!
My Current Top 5 Merry-fam Wackyness Incidents
1) any Merry-fam Christmas dinner when the uncles start making naughty jokes and our dear Gram does the "Sweetest, nicest lady-chef + matriarch in the world/Rush Limbaugh Cheerleader" Jeckyl/Hyde thing.
2) That time we all split about eight bottles of wine (including the best and most misspelled gwertstrameiner bottle ever) and went out for indian food.
3) Family Ski trips. 'nuff said.
4) That time we replaced my sister with my brother's (ex) girlfriend for Christmas Tree decorating. I mean... we called! but she was on the phone... and it was just one decoration to start... and she'd be down soon... oh... lets just take a few pictures... oh! hi! don't worry... we saved you some tinsel....
5) Summer friday nights, when I arrived last to find the whole fam half in the can and all the way in the pool. JEALOUS. gah.
Feel free to offer your own suggestions if you have witnessed any.
Runner up: oldie but a goodie - that time in high school when the rest of the fam showed up after letting me host the prom after party HAVING ALREADY ACQUIRED A NEW CARPET ON THE ASSUMPTION THAT ONE WOULD HAVE BEEN RUINED DURING THE FESTIVITIES.
Somebody slap me for daring to use caps lock. seriously.
This is, unfortunately, a time where I have foolishly left a half-assed post about some friend of mine who is ensuring that the average virtue level of the middle aged ladies of Japan retains its "tarnished" character.
oops. my bad.
Anyway, there has been some me-related drama over the last month, but thats still no reason for me to neglect this highly important documentation of personal history. Right? Right.
Soo... lets start with clearing up some misconceptions that this blog may or may not be attempting to highlight.
Now, those of you who have met my mother know that she is an entirely wonderful woman, who has bouts of wackyness that I firmly believe are genetically responsible for at least 60% of the fun that I am able to bring to any given party. Of course, she is also my mother, which means that between bouts of wackyness** (Wackyness Anecdotes follow the end of this post) she is also given to bouts of crazy things like "worrying about me", "trying to support me from the other side of the world" or "caring that I exist." sheesh! what the heck!
Anyway... here is part of the email...
Hi Hon!
...
I find your blogs sometimes difficult to read in the sense that I worry
about your lack of sleep, your apparent heavy drinking, and the fact that
you loosely share sex comments... Would you please
just send over regular emails with some attached pictures once in awhile.
Then Gramma and I can read them. Call me old-fashioned, but I worry about
issues of privacy and about your liver and about your aging process due to
lack of sleep.
...
Love,
Mom!
So... as I see it there are a few key problems...
1) I am unhealthy
2) I drink too much
3) There are too many humping jokes on this website.
4) I won't be able to run for political office with any sort of moral fibre
5) #1-4 will probably upset my grandmother.
In light of this, I would like to share with you....
The Awful Truth About Japan
There are these entire strings of pesky times where I don't drink, party, get lost, fall alsleep on stairs, fall down stairs, fall alseep on trains, or even get felated by santa claus! (see December 2005).
These times are called "Weekdays". which is why I only update about once a mon...cough...cough...WEEK.
ish.
Anyway, to help sweet mums feel better (and becuase I am enjoying this post as well) I would like to detail a REGULAR day.
Come back!
I'll try to make this funny. Seriously. and I won't make it a habit.
To add to the incredible excitement that nearly matches the glee on all of your faces when you realized that I was (indeed) not dead, but being a posting slacker! The first part of this was written by CELL PHONE, with no predictive text)
well, im a bit sad that you only think im talking dirty and drinking, but this just happens to be the stuff i find most amusing.... and since i only write one post each week, you are definitely getting a skewed view...
actually, most of my days sound like this....
1025 get up
1045 turn off snooze and get up for real
1055 ok. seriously, youll miss the train if you dont get up!!
1057 get up, shower, eat toast, walk to train station.
1133 see train crossing gate descend, sprint the last 300 metres, including two flights of stairs.
1135-1139 pant heavily while being stared at by disgusted japanese people.
1150, change and prep/review first lesson.
1200-2100 teach
(ok... I'm typing with a real keyboard again. that might not look like much to you - but that was TWENTY FIVE MINUTES of my life that I'll never get back! I could have been bored, or staring out the window, but instead I spent my precious train-transit time concocting that wonderful bit of awesomeness for YOU dear reader.)
Anyway...
teaching:
40% actual instruction of students.
10% prep of props, highkighting lesson plans,etc.
10% walking to get food, getting food, reheating food, eating food.
10% - wasting time/ reading the newspaper, magazines and goofing off.
5% paperwork
5% doing company stuff, emailing my schedule, answering email, aggregate of attending meetings, etc.
2% being a wiseass to students standing in the lobby waiting for lessons.
8% explaining said wiseassness and comments like "turn down the suck!"
mean, as well as answering straightforward questions like "I have a two part verb question, sensei... you go in, and go out, but do you go down?" while not cracking a smile. (I seriously almost lost it, and if that came from anyone other than a 50+ year old housewife, I would have answered "whenever possible")
10% pooping. (not really, but I realized that the rest only added up to 90%, and this seemed like as good a time as any for a poo joke.)
/ Aw crap. We can officially declare that I have failed in my attempt to disprove #3 above. Shiat.
Anyway: 900 - 915: finish paperwork, get changed, leave work.
fun night: meet a friend for dinner. two of my best friends here are not heavy drinkers, actually - one doesn't drink at all and the other drinks the odd glass of wine now and again, so usally we don't drink, but do enjoy healthy chat and fun times.
I do drink sometimes on weekends, about as much as I did in Canada, but now it leads to wakcy adventures, instead of just going to sleep, etc. Generally if I drink, its about 1 night a week of sizable drinking, and maybe a beer or a glass of wine or two on another night with dinner. Actually, health wise, I am doing a lot better - my weight is down a lot (about two inches off my waist) and my hair is growing back from lack of stress. The sleep still needs tweaking, I guess, but I am generally getting no less than six hours, and most often about seven. Weekends, I get 9-10 hours, actually, as I stay in bed until the afternoon.
This weekend, for example, I did stay out all night on sunday, and that is/was a VERY funny drinking story, but I feel that presenting it now would undermine the main point of this post. You can look forward to it soon though.
ANYWAY.5% paperwork
5% doing company stuff, emailing my schedule, answering email, aggregate of attending meetings, etc.
2% being a wiseass to students standing in the lobby waiting for lessons.
8% explaining said wiseassness and comments like "turn down the suck!"
mean, as well as answering straightforward questions like "I have a two part verb question, sensei... you go in, and go out, but do you go down?" while not cracking a smile. (I seriously almost lost it, and if that came from anyone other than a 50+ year old housewife, I would have answered "whenever possible")
10% pooping. (not really, but I realized that the rest only added up to 90%, and this seemed like as good a time as any for a poo joke.)
/ Aw crap. We can officially declare that I have failed in my attempt to disprove #3 above. Shiat.
Anyway: 900 - 915: finish paperwork, get changed, leave work.
fun night: meet a friend for dinner. two of my best friends here are not heavy drinkers, actually - one doesn't drink at all and the other drinks the odd glass of wine now and again, so usally we don't drink, but do enjoy healthy chat and fun times.
I do drink sometimes on weekends, about as much as I did in Canada, but now it leads to wakcy adventures, instead of just going to sleep, etc. Generally if I drink, its about 1 night a week of sizable drinking, and maybe a beer or a glass of wine or two on another night with dinner. Actually, health wise, I am doing a lot better - my weight is down a lot (about two inches off my waist) and my hair is growing back from lack of stress. The sleep still needs tweaking, I guess, but I am generally getting no less than six hours, and most often about seven. Weekends, I get 9-10 hours, actually, as I stay in bed until the afternoon.
This weekend, for example, I did stay out all night on sunday, and that is/was a VERY funny drinking story, but I feel that presenting it now would undermine the main point of this post. You can look forward to it soon though.
On most nights, I actually just come home, snag a bit of action on teh intre-web and/or watch a movie or something. Contrary to popular believe and the evidence presented regularly in the Weekly World News, my life really isn't that exciting. But I have bouts of funnyness, and these are the ones that I would like to contribute to posterity.
So, dear reader (I'd add an "s", but I'm suspicious about the fact that I may need to do some active work to earn that s back after the latest hiatus)... let us make a pact.
I will continue to have shenanigan-filled adventures and I will share them on this site. They will of course, be interspersed with bits and pieces of other-ness that we can call "weekdays"...but I'll try not to mention them on this site if I can help it.
I will also attempt to send at least pg-13 rated emails to the rest of my folks. They don't want to hear that I got plowed (in any sense of the word... )
You... well.. shit. promise whatever you want. I'm still making a pact with you and you can't stop me.
OK! lets do an update on those 5 points!!!
1) I am unhealthy
Ok... I didn't address this one at all, but my pants are not wear-able without a belt, and I can see a noticable lack of additional chin-ness on me. I'm not that much lighter, but I'm certainly thinner. I am also de-balding after removing the stress-madness that was my old career. Sleeping more is a work in progress, but I am doing my part by sleeping in uber-much.
2) I drink too much
Well, lets call this one 23% de-bunked. I drink too much on some weekend days, but mostly I am a good boy. Unfortunately, I suspect neglecting to mention these nights in glorious "worstpossibleinterpretation-o-vision" would make for a blog about as exciting as a Reality TV show populated with honest, upstanding individuals with a healthy amount of self respect. (or perhaps "as thrilling as Jerry Springer with all the chairs nailed down...")
Anyway... I do drink a decent amount, but I don't ever find myself NEEDING to drink. I'm happy to go out w/o the booze too. ...
Where is "rationalizing" on the 12 steps again? Somewhere after "admitting it", right?
3) There are too many humping references on this website.
This point is entirely without any sort of penis.
4) I won't be able to run for political office with any sort of moral fibre.
With all of the "baby" jokes that D and I make, I have bigger problems than this blog.
5) #1-4 will probably upset my grandmother.
I am currently in negotiations with Fox News to report this blog as the result of the "liberal bias" of the internet, and that since the Internet was invented by activist judges, it is actually reinterpreting the wholesome conservatism that I think.
So, to conclude, out of a possible 5/5, I scored...
1.23/5
So... I really didn't accomplish anything. nice.
GIMMIE A P
GIMMIE A R
GIMMIE AN IORITIES!!!!
Thats right!
I hope you found this all at least 123/500 as amusing as I did.
Welll... thats it. sleepy time!!! More soon!
** As promised. the post script!!!
My Current Top 5 Merry-fam Wackyness Incidents
1) any Merry-fam Christmas dinner when the uncles start making naughty jokes and our dear Gram does the "Sweetest, nicest lady-chef + matriarch in the world/Rush Limbaugh Cheerleader" Jeckyl/Hyde thing.
2) That time we all split about eight bottles of wine (including the best and most misspelled gwertstrameiner bottle ever) and went out for indian food.
3) Family Ski trips. 'nuff said.
4) That time we replaced my sister with my brother's (ex) girlfriend for Christmas Tree decorating. I mean... we called! but she was on the phone... and it was just one decoration to start... and she'd be down soon... oh... lets just take a few pictures... oh! hi! don't worry... we saved you some tinsel....
5) Summer friday nights, when I arrived last to find the whole fam half in the can and all the way in the pool. JEALOUS. gah.
Feel free to offer your own suggestions if you have witnessed any.
Runner up: oldie but a goodie - that time in high school when the rest of the fam showed up after letting me host the prom after party HAVING ALREADY ACQUIRED A NEW CARPET ON THE ASSUMPTION THAT ONE WOULD HAVE BEEN RUINED DURING THE FESTIVITIES.
Somebody slap me for daring to use caps lock. seriously.
Sunday, February 26, 2006
Booty followup
So... I just got this email:
In case you're wondering, I did in fact go celebrate with her. We celebrated a few times that night, and then again in the morning. All the celebrating left my abs pretty sore, but other parts of me felt dandy. Celebrating is fun. I recommend it.
Good work, my anonymous buddy. That there is some good, clean fun.
I'll return us to our regularly scheduled PG programming soon. Until then, you can feel free to block this this post out of your memory, and claw out your eyes.
hugs,
me
In case you're wondering, I did in fact go celebrate with her. We celebrated a few times that night, and then again in the morning. All the celebrating left my abs pretty sore, but other parts of me felt dandy. Celebrating is fun. I recommend it.
Good work, my anonymous buddy. That there is some good, clean fun.
I'll return us to our regularly scheduled PG programming soon. Until then, you can feel free to block this this post out of your memory, and claw out your eyes.
hugs,
me
Saturday, February 25, 2006
Interlude: Textnanigans
I have to share something with all of you. Short, sweet, but so brilliant.
A friend of mine has a penchant for dating nice Japanese ladies, most of whom are rather friendly, and some of whom are rather insane. I don't really know where he finds said ladies, but he seems to have a talent for either finding the mad ones or bringing out the madness in otherwise very normal people.
Anyway, one of my favourite side effects of this habbit is a stream of mostly hilarious text messages, the best of which he forwards on to me.
For the most part, I just chuckle, but this one merits sharing:
"i got HIV test result today. im clean. come celebrate with me".
That is all. I now return you to your semi-regularly scheduled program.
Huh? What's that? Did he? I don't know. But I'm going to send him this link, and he can surely leave an anonymous comment to answer that burning question for all of us.
/heh. burning.
A friend of mine has a penchant for dating nice Japanese ladies, most of whom are rather friendly, and some of whom are rather insane. I don't really know where he finds said ladies, but he seems to have a talent for either finding the mad ones or bringing out the madness in otherwise very normal people.
Anyway, one of my favourite side effects of this habbit is a stream of mostly hilarious text messages, the best of which he forwards on to me.
For the most part, I just chuckle, but this one merits sharing:
"i got HIV test result today. im clean. come celebrate with me".
That is all. I now return you to your semi-regularly scheduled program.
Huh? What's that? Did he? I don't know. But I'm going to send him this link, and he can surely leave an anonymous comment to answer that burning question for all of us.
/heh. burning.
Tuesday, February 21, 2006
Thailand: Part 1 - Its about Thai-me
First and foremost, I would like to apologize for the terrible, horrible, awful-osity that is the title of this post.
Ok, now to minor matters.
Being Late
I know I said tomorrow... but what I really meant was... you know... the time schedule you use when your mom tells you to "come on in! its time for dinner!" and you say "ok, I'll be there in five more minutes"... and you really mean FIFTY five more minutes, or at least, as long as you can go before marches right out there, mister, and you just wait till I get my hands on you...
um... yeah. you know. that kind of I-swear-that-never-happened-to-me kind of childhood way.
Those kind of five minutes.... that kind of tomorrow.
Travelling with Brent 101: preparedness schmeparedness.
Um... so I went to Thailand. And it was swell.
I'll share just a brief anecdote to start us off and we'll do the rest... um... tomorrow.
We'll fast forward through the madness that is my traveling style... you can surely imagine. I do research on the places I go inasmuch as finding them somewhere on a globe and confirming my flight. Sometimes, if I'm in a good and/or bored mood, I might go so far as to book my hotel, but I do kind of enjoy just showing up in a place and seeing where I end up. Having done this in both Paris (where I don't really speak the language and everyone automatically hates you because they think your American... or they just hate you because thier Parisians and they hate everything....um... yeah.. ixnay on the idetrack-say, hey?) and in Amsterdam, where getting high and watching people fuck on a rotating bed is frowned on by the cops/general populace to about the same degree you get frowned on when you don't cover your mouth while yawning. Which... made it ... hard to find a hostel... room?
Ah, shut up brain, or I'll stab you with a Q-tip.
So anyway, I didn't book shit. I just ended up there with the name of a hotel from my co-worker and a vague idea that I wanted to chillax and see some stuff.
385 Long Lost Brothers
I actually didn't pull in until close to ten or eleven, so that meant that my "sightseeing" was pretty much a taxi ride and wandering around through the streets of bangkok being crazy. Met some cool folk, and found out that I actually have 385 brothers that I didn't know! In fact, all of them are pushy thai salesmen (which, yes... if you know me well, you may not be surprised to find out). So, every time someone wanted to shake my hand, suddenly it was like "My Brother!! and they then try to physically man-handle you into their store.
Of course, don't you think that my 385 brothers were big believers in customer service or whatnot once you were in their 385 stores, but boy oh boy did they ever work hard to get you in the door. The price of any one object is actually dependent on an interesting scale called "how much can I pull out of this foolish, foolish white boy". I noticed this when someone tried to charge me 1900 baht (about $50) for three t-shirts. I laughed in his face without a moment of hesitation... so his grin slipped a bit and he offered them for 190 baht each ($5)... I ended up haggling him down to 150 a shirt (because playing games with people's livelihood is a lot more fun once you realize that if he's really going to lose the money he's trying to save for his poor, sick grandma, he isn't going to sell you shit. So...bargain as hard as you feel like).
Think Pink.
So, the next day I met Sophie, my comrade in textbooks and sketchnanigans (and fellow veteran of many a Tokyo coffee shop) at the airport. She came a day later than me for mundane and unfunny reasons that I shall not even bother with, because talking about someone else on MY blog would open an entire can of non-inflating-my-overlarge-ego worms that no-one wants a part of.
So anyway... I picked up Sophie and we hightailed it to a tailor to get fitted into some custom threads. Which we will come back to.
But..if..., um...ever... a friend of yours tells you that he wants some new shirts in a certain silk fabric, and you find that fabric only in pink, and your other friend tells you that he'll look gay, and even there is nothing wrong with looking gay, well, except for that kind of false-advertising, sending the wrong kind of message kind of way...then maybe you shouldn't go ahead and ignore the girl-advice and buy your small-town Canadian friend a custom tailored pink silk shirt for the dance bar. Just so you know. I heard about something like that happening, so... you just watch out. If ... um ... you're ever in Thailand looking at ... pink silk shirts.
Ok. its nearly 5 am as I finish this, and I am trying to catch up on my sleep debt, rather than run up a massive balance that resembles my Visa card. So...
If you can read this line, I haven't edited out the typos yet. Sorry. If grammar/spelling are important to your blogging experience, please return at a later date.
Or don't, cause I'm leaving that line at the end, and you already burned at least five minutes of your life that you'll never get back. Sucker.
Ok, now to minor matters.
Being Late
I know I said tomorrow... but what I really meant was... you know... the time schedule you use when your mom tells you to "come on in! its time for dinner!" and you say "ok, I'll be there in five more minutes"... and you really mean FIFTY five more minutes, or at least, as long as you can go before marches right out there, mister, and you just wait till I get my hands on you...
um... yeah. you know. that kind of I-swear-that-never-happened-to-me kind of childhood way.
Those kind of five minutes.... that kind of tomorrow.
Travelling with Brent 101: preparedness schmeparedness.
Um... so I went to Thailand. And it was swell.
I'll share just a brief anecdote to start us off and we'll do the rest... um... tomorrow.
We'll fast forward through the madness that is my traveling style... you can surely imagine. I do research on the places I go inasmuch as finding them somewhere on a globe and confirming my flight. Sometimes, if I'm in a good and/or bored mood, I might go so far as to book my hotel, but I do kind of enjoy just showing up in a place and seeing where I end up. Having done this in both Paris (where I don't really speak the language and everyone automatically hates you because they think your American... or they just hate you because thier Parisians and they hate everything....um... yeah.. ixnay on the idetrack-say, hey?) and in Amsterdam, where getting high and watching people fuck on a rotating bed is frowned on by the cops/general populace to about the same degree you get frowned on when you don't cover your mouth while yawning. Which... made it ... hard to find a hostel... room?
Ah, shut up brain, or I'll stab you with a Q-tip.
So anyway, I didn't book shit. I just ended up there with the name of a hotel from my co-worker and a vague idea that I wanted to chillax and see some stuff.
385 Long Lost Brothers
I actually didn't pull in until close to ten or eleven, so that meant that my "sightseeing" was pretty much a taxi ride and wandering around through the streets of bangkok being crazy. Met some cool folk, and found out that I actually have 385 brothers that I didn't know! In fact, all of them are pushy thai salesmen (which, yes... if you know me well, you may not be surprised to find out). So, every time someone wanted to shake my hand, suddenly it was like "My Brother!! and they then try to physically man-handle you into their store.
Of course, don't you think that my 385 brothers were big believers in customer service or whatnot once you were in their 385 stores, but boy oh boy did they ever work hard to get you in the door. The price of any one object is actually dependent on an interesting scale called "how much can I pull out of this foolish, foolish white boy". I noticed this when someone tried to charge me 1900 baht (about $50) for three t-shirts. I laughed in his face without a moment of hesitation... so his grin slipped a bit and he offered them for 190 baht each ($5)... I ended up haggling him down to 150 a shirt (because playing games with people's livelihood is a lot more fun once you realize that if he's really going to lose the money he's trying to save for his poor, sick grandma, he isn't going to sell you shit. So...bargain as hard as you feel like).
Think Pink.
So, the next day I met Sophie, my comrade in textbooks and sketchnanigans (and fellow veteran of many a Tokyo coffee shop) at the airport. She came a day later than me for mundane and unfunny reasons that I shall not even bother with, because talking about someone else on MY blog would open an entire can of non-inflating-my-overlarge-ego worms that no-one wants a part of.
So anyway... I picked up Sophie and we hightailed it to a tailor to get fitted into some custom threads. Which we will come back to.
But..if..., um...ever... a friend of yours tells you that he wants some new shirts in a certain silk fabric, and you find that fabric only in pink, and your other friend tells you that he'll look gay, and even there is nothing wrong with looking gay, well, except for that kind of false-advertising, sending the wrong kind of message kind of way...then maybe you shouldn't go ahead and ignore the girl-advice and buy your small-town Canadian friend a custom tailored pink silk shirt for the dance bar. Just so you know. I heard about something like that happening, so... you just watch out. If ... um ... you're ever in Thailand looking at ... pink silk shirts.
Ok. its nearly 5 am as I finish this, and I am trying to catch up on my sleep debt, rather than run up a massive balance that resembles my Visa card. So...
If you can read this line, I haven't edited out the typos yet. Sorry. If grammar/spelling are important to your blogging experience, please return at a later date.
Or don't, cause I'm leaving that line at the end, and you already burned at least five minutes of your life that you'll never get back. Sucker.
Wednesday, February 15, 2006
Thailand! - Photo Teaser
So, today was a rather grumpy day at work. Not that anything bad happened (in fact, it was a cheerful, albeit busy day), but rather because as of about two days before, I was wandering around a hilarious tropical paradise, sunning myself on the beach, and and doing a lot of declining to ride in a small, ill-defended go-karts that somehow manage to attain 85 km/h through congested streets and back alleys.
Yes, thats right folks, I went to Thailand. A place full of sunshine, cheap knock-off products, delicious food and lots of men dressed like women. And me. What could possibly go wrong?
Apparently a lot. Who knew?
Um.... anyway... thats another story, for another blog on another day. Or. um... tomorrow's post, anyway.
I'm going to take a day and put my thoughts in order (read: prho chra sch tin ace shun) but I thought I'd aim to amuse with a few of the photos I snagged along the way.
1) Chuck Norris-iquin!
2) VW Bar-bus
3) 8' tall hand-built metal scuplture...of the Predator.... in a clothing store.
4) Drink, Don't Drive... floors 81 through 120. (Note the subtle difference of emphasis from the North American version "Don't Drink and Drive")
I'll be back in the shenanigan saddle tomorrow to recount the following Thincidents:
1) The Accidental Full Body Aloe Incident
2) The Case of The Falsely Erect Towel
3) The Lady Boys Attack!
4) No, I don't want a !#$&!& Tuk-Tuk: secrets of bargaining with locals 101
5) "Your friend, man... she talk too much"
6) Custom Zoot Suit!
and much more.
And now a short message from our always candid sponsor:
Yes, thats right folks, I went to Thailand. A place full of sunshine, cheap knock-off products, delicious food and lots of men dressed like women. And me. What could possibly go wrong?
Apparently a lot. Who knew?
Um.... anyway... thats another story, for another blog on another day. Or. um... tomorrow's post, anyway.
I'm going to take a day and put my thoughts in order (read: prho chra sch tin ace shun) but I thought I'd aim to amuse with a few of the photos I snagged along the way.
1) Chuck Norris-iquin!
2) VW Bar-bus
3) 8' tall hand-built metal scuplture...of the Predator.... in a clothing store.
4) Drink, Don't Drive... floors 81 through 120. (Note the subtle difference of emphasis from the North American version "Don't Drink and Drive")
I'll be back in the shenanigan saddle tomorrow to recount the following Thincidents:
1) The Accidental Full Body Aloe Incident
2) The Case of The Falsely Erect Towel
3) The Lady Boys Attack!
4) No, I don't want a !#$&!& Tuk-Tuk: secrets of bargaining with locals 101
5) "Your friend, man... she talk too much"
6) Custom Zoot Suit!
and much more.
And now a short message from our always candid sponsor:
Wednesday, February 08, 2006
Don't Drink and Ride
This past weekend, Erica, one of the other teachers I met at my Vancouver training session, came down to visit Tokyo. Since she is from a rural buttfuck-nowhere (I think its litterally translated from Japanese as "honourable place for unsolicited rear coitus that is lacking the regular train service", but I'm still sometimes fuzzy on that translation stuff) town, she was very interested in seeing the big city.
Anyway, also in the same training session were Patrick and Sophie, who also work and live in this wonderful place. This weekend ALSO happened to be Sophie's Birthday Party Celebration. Most of all, though, was the stunning (seriously, in a city of 30 million odd people...) coincidence that 40-odd other teachers from my company were ALSO booked into the same restaraunt for a drink-fest following a massive scavenger hunt party.
Suffice to say that Newcomer to Tokyo + Friends Birthday + Scavenger Hunt Party is a recipie for drinking at least 3 cocktails of moderate strength, and an excuse for a few more beyond that.
/ I'd like to point out that the last Scavenger Hunt party left me with a black eye for a week.
Anyway... so... here are a couple of shots of Erica and Sophie that nicely demonstrate two points in the drinking where I was able to hold the camera-phone.
In this first picture.... lets call it between 2 and 4 drinks... Sophie is 20% Japanese (two fingers sign, which she hates and will be very displeased if she ever finds out that I've shared this) and Erica is cheerful and clearheaded!
In picture #2, we are well into the evening. We can see here that Sophie has in fact become 55% Japanese, as she is holding a karoke microphone AND is making the peace sign. Erica, on the other hand, is now blurry and no-headed.
This also clearly demonstrates the fact that I am on the road to disaster on the evening in question.
Above, picture #3, is an actual picture of "The Road To Disaster", or more accurately, where it leads to in the Tokyo area. In this specific case, it is the first thing I saw at about 10 am from the window of the train.
Unfortunately for me, I had parted from the rest of the crew and boarded my train. Being, well, recently moved into a new apartment, I am rather unfamilliar with the trains leading there. Further conpounding this error-in-the-making was the fact that I was, sadly, not lucid enough to recognise the aforementioned unfamilliarity and opt to consult any high tech devices, such as my cell phone map, signs or other people.
Therefore, I boarded the (WRONG) train, and proceeded to fall quite soundly asleep, for about three hours.
Yes. For Three Hours.
This photo was actually taken in an area of Chiba, which is on the east side of Tokyo (My apartment is in the south west, by the way). It actually took me two hours by express train to get home for noon (still quite heavily intoxicated) and promptly sleep through the latter half of my weekend.
Thank you, thank you... I'll be here all month. Try the veal.
% of friends I expect would find this funny: 96
% of Aizicks who are reacting with amused encouragement: 0
Anyway, also in the same training session were Patrick and Sophie, who also work and live in this wonderful place. This weekend ALSO happened to be Sophie's Birthday Party Celebration. Most of all, though, was the stunning (seriously, in a city of 30 million odd people...) coincidence that 40-odd other teachers from my company were ALSO booked into the same restaraunt for a drink-fest following a massive scavenger hunt party.
Suffice to say that Newcomer to Tokyo + Friends Birthday + Scavenger Hunt Party is a recipie for drinking at least 3 cocktails of moderate strength, and an excuse for a few more beyond that.
/ I'd like to point out that the last Scavenger Hunt party left me with a black eye for a week.
Anyway... so... here are a couple of shots of Erica and Sophie that nicely demonstrate two points in the drinking where I was able to hold the camera-phone.
In this first picture.... lets call it between 2 and 4 drinks... Sophie is 20% Japanese (two fingers sign, which she hates and will be very displeased if she ever finds out that I've shared this) and Erica is cheerful and clearheaded!
In picture #2, we are well into the evening. We can see here that Sophie has in fact become 55% Japanese, as she is holding a karoke microphone AND is making the peace sign. Erica, on the other hand, is now blurry and no-headed.
This also clearly demonstrates the fact that I am on the road to disaster on the evening in question.
Above, picture #3, is an actual picture of "The Road To Disaster", or more accurately, where it leads to in the Tokyo area. In this specific case, it is the first thing I saw at about 10 am from the window of the train.
Unfortunately for me, I had parted from the rest of the crew and boarded my train. Being, well, recently moved into a new apartment, I am rather unfamilliar with the trains leading there. Further conpounding this error-in-the-making was the fact that I was, sadly, not lucid enough to recognise the aforementioned unfamilliarity and opt to consult any high tech devices, such as my cell phone map, signs or other people.
Therefore, I boarded the (WRONG) train, and proceeded to fall quite soundly asleep, for about three hours.
Yes. For Three Hours.
This photo was actually taken in an area of Chiba, which is on the east side of Tokyo (My apartment is in the south west, by the way). It actually took me two hours by express train to get home for noon (still quite heavily intoxicated) and promptly sleep through the latter half of my weekend.
Thank you, thank you... I'll be here all month. Try the veal.
% of friends I expect would find this funny: 96
% of Aizicks who are reacting with amused encouragement: 0
New Apaato 2 - the NEW Apaato
Hey All... here's a short one with some pics of the new place.
I'm more than open for poster suggestions (heh.. and other stuff....) Even if Dave is the only who suggests, and I can find said suggestion, I'll put it up.
From the Entrance... this is my "kitchen"... which is about the only downside - I'm now down to a single burner, which also doubles as my... counter??? yep. thats it... a sink and about a one square foot burner/counter. Oh well. Not much cooking happens here anyway - eating out is almost the same price!
View from the door side. I'm sure you can see the minor improvement in living conditions. While I'm still moving, you might notice little things like the absence of mouldy, disgusting walls and a ratty floor.
Here's the view back towards the door from the other side...
These pics were all taken like the ones in the other apartment - by holding my camera in the corner. So, not huge by any North American standard, but not too shabby for 30 min from one of the busiest cities in the world.
Not too shabby, I say.
I'm more than open for poster suggestions (heh.. and other stuff....) Even if Dave is the only who suggests, and I can find said suggestion, I'll put it up.
From the Entrance... this is my "kitchen"... which is about the only downside - I'm now down to a single burner, which also doubles as my... counter??? yep. thats it... a sink and about a one square foot burner/counter. Oh well. Not much cooking happens here anyway - eating out is almost the same price!
View from the door side. I'm sure you can see the minor improvement in living conditions. While I'm still moving, you might notice little things like the absence of mouldy, disgusting walls and a ratty floor.
Here's the view back towards the door from the other side...
These pics were all taken like the ones in the other apartment - by holding my camera in the corner. So, not huge by any North American standard, but not too shabby for 30 min from one of the busiest cities in the world.
Not too shabby, I say.
Tuesday, February 07, 2006
New Apaato!
So, I finally convinced the company to move me to a new apartment. It wasn't that the old one was overly small, or that it was in a bad location...
Ok, fine, it was small even for a Japanese apartment...seriously... With my bed stretched across the shorter length, I had just enough room to fit my 6.5 foot bed across the entire place... even folding it in half left me without a quarter of my living space.
Then again... I could walk to work in about 11 minutes, and while Noborito isn't exactly known for being a clean, thriving pseudo-urban setting, it did have (as my appaato-predecessor Nick said) "character". And I do realize that commenting on a neighborhood with good character, is kind of like setting your someone up with a "nice guy/girl with a great personality" (for any j-folk: these are euphemisms for "ugly and not very exciting")
What really got me though, was the mould. Not only did it grow on my shower, and move to some of my toiletries, but it migrated quite readily to one of my futons.
This was indeed the final straw. So, with my best intention not to disturb the wa (harmony) of my sweet employer, I put in a nice call to head office.
/background sidebar - one of the head managers seems to have taken a shine to me... she's really quite nice, but she's taken to saying things like "brent-sensei, you're soo funny" at meetings.
SO... anyway, I called the office, and lo and behold, who should answer, but the very same manager.
K: (Japanese Phone Script - "O Denwa arigato gozaimasu. Eikawa no (School). Ko koshi K-San de gozaimasu..." .)
B: Hello, its Brent Sensei from Noborito
K: He-LLO! Brent Sensei! How are you?
B: Oh, I'm doing just fine... how are you?
K: I'm great! Who are you looking for?
B: Well.. you actually. (I'm such an ass... but I'm a smooth ass now and then)
K: Reallly? What can I help you with?
B: Well.. its about my apartment... there's a small problem.
K: (anxiously) What is it?
B: Well... you see, its the mould...
K: The ... mould?
B: Yeah... I was ok with the mould in the shower, but now its moved to my futon, and I'm starting to get a bit sick. so.... I was wondering if we could, you know...look into a new apartment??
K: You have mould on your futon?!?
B: Yeah... its been growing there for a bit now.
K: Oh my God! We'll find you something right away!
B: Well, actually.... Chuck Norris Jr. Sensei (some names have been changed to protect the guilty, the innocent and those in between that control my next raise...) has already picked out an apartment in Kuji..
K: Really? We'll look into that right away!
B: Thank you so much K-san. I really, really appreciate it.
K: No problem. We'll have that fixed up right away.
... So... not only did they find me a lovely new apartment (about twice the size, and brand new... with free internet access)... but they also booked and paid for a moving company. This might not seem like a big deal, but its definitely against company policy to lay out this kind of cash.
Total time elapsed between that phone call and when the moving company showed up at my door: 8 days.
Not bad, considering you usually have to plop down mad deposits, key money, bribes, hookers-and-blow allowances and everything else under the sun to get a new apartment.
Here are some shots of the old hell hole. I’m still snazzing up and unpacking at the new joint, but I’ll put up some pics soon.
This pic was taken with my back in the corner.
Opposite corner.
Ok, fine, it was small even for a Japanese apartment...seriously... With my bed stretched across the shorter length, I had just enough room to fit my 6.5 foot bed across the entire place... even folding it in half left me without a quarter of my living space.
Then again... I could walk to work in about 11 minutes, and while Noborito isn't exactly known for being a clean, thriving pseudo-urban setting, it did have (as my appaato-predecessor Nick said) "character". And I do realize that commenting on a neighborhood with good character, is kind of like setting your someone up with a "nice guy/girl with a great personality" (for any j-folk: these are euphemisms for "ugly and not very exciting")
What really got me though, was the mould. Not only did it grow on my shower, and move to some of my toiletries, but it migrated quite readily to one of my futons.
This was indeed the final straw. So, with my best intention not to disturb the wa (harmony) of my sweet employer, I put in a nice call to head office.
/background sidebar - one of the head managers seems to have taken a shine to me... she's really quite nice, but she's taken to saying things like "brent-sensei, you're soo funny" at meetings.
SO... anyway, I called the office, and lo and behold, who should answer, but the very same manager.
K: (Japanese Phone Script - "O Denwa arigato gozaimasu. Eikawa no (School). Ko koshi K-San de gozaimasu..." .)
B: Hello, its Brent Sensei from Noborito
K: He-LLO! Brent Sensei! How are you?
B: Oh, I'm doing just fine... how are you?
K: I'm great! Who are you looking for?
B: Well.. you actually. (I'm such an ass... but I'm a smooth ass now and then)
K: Reallly? What can I help you with?
B: Well.. its about my apartment... there's a small problem.
K: (anxiously) What is it?
B: Well... you see, its the mould...
K: The ... mould?
B: Yeah... I was ok with the mould in the shower, but now its moved to my futon, and I'm starting to get a bit sick. so.... I was wondering if we could, you know...look into a new apartment??
K: You have mould on your futon?!?
B: Yeah... its been growing there for a bit now.
K: Oh my God! We'll find you something right away!
B: Well, actually.... Chuck Norris Jr. Sensei (some names have been changed to protect the guilty, the innocent and those in between that control my next raise...) has already picked out an apartment in Kuji..
K: Really? We'll look into that right away!
B: Thank you so much K-san. I really, really appreciate it.
K: No problem. We'll have that fixed up right away.
... So... not only did they find me a lovely new apartment (about twice the size, and brand new... with free internet access)... but they also booked and paid for a moving company. This might not seem like a big deal, but its definitely against company policy to lay out this kind of cash.
Total time elapsed between that phone call and when the moving company showed up at my door: 8 days.
Not bad, considering you usually have to plop down mad deposits, key money, bribes, hookers-and-blow allowances and everything else under the sun to get a new apartment.
Here are some shots of the old hell hole. I’m still snazzing up and unpacking at the new joint, but I’ll put up some pics soon.
This pic was taken with my back in the corner.
Opposite corner.
Sunday, February 05, 2006
Weird Shit
There are no words.
A SERIOUSLY crowded train.
More from the same Nambu Line. This was friday night - last train. Man there were a lot of drunk people on this train. so many drunk people that it was very, very difficult to breathe, and about 10 people would be forced out of the doors each time they opened. The pusher guys with the white gloves were out in full force.
SWEET.
Wednesday, February 01, 2006
Its the Engrish Roundup... part 2 of many!!
So, here are some great examples of disastrous attempts at English... enjoy.
mmmm... sinnamon. so evil. Good thing they also serve "chocolate tip", in case you need some african american lovin, (but not too much... just the tip)
There are no words for this....
at least... none written by me. I'm sure a bevy of texting fourteen year olds could pull off a simmilar effort given ten minutes and some sort of "idol" contest to scream about.
The Thanks Price isn't bad... ITS' DEMO! Unfortunately, Smiles cost the bloody earth.
A noble effort, but they managed to miss both the US and the Canadian Spelling. Very Flarvorful.
I don't know why, but this is my favourite. sorry... Flarvourite.
mmm.... frozen latte froat.
I just wish they'd said "ratte", like they do in person when I try to order a soy latte.
Which is, I have to say, bloody hard. YOU try pantomiming "I'm lactose intolerant". It's really not that easy.
mmmm... sinnamon. so evil. Good thing they also serve "chocolate tip", in case you need some african american lovin, (but not too much... just the tip)
There are no words for this....
at least... none written by me. I'm sure a bevy of texting fourteen year olds could pull off a simmilar effort given ten minutes and some sort of "idol" contest to scream about.
The Thanks Price isn't bad... ITS' DEMO! Unfortunately, Smiles cost the bloody earth.
A noble effort, but they managed to miss both the US and the Canadian Spelling. Very Flarvorful.
I don't know why, but this is my favourite. sorry... Flarvourite.
mmm.... frozen latte froat.
I just wish they'd said "ratte", like they do in person when I try to order a soy latte.
Which is, I have to say, bloody hard. YOU try pantomiming "I'm lactose intolerant". It's really not that easy.
To disabled people: Up Yours. With love, Japan.
So, for a long time I have had the feeling that the Japanese have done a lot to make life better for people with physical limitations. All of the traffic lights are audible and practically every train station or other place has a wheelchair ramp or elevator. As with many major cities, some museums here have recreated many famous art works in 3d relief, so that they can be enjoyed by visually impared patrons.
The blind, I thought, had fared the best of all. Everwhere in the city, on every sidewalk, in every public buiding and in every train station, there are strips of raised material - lines for directions to walk in, and dots/bumps to indicate some sort of change, such as a door or a step... or even the edge of the train platform (which has its own unique pattern at many stations)... its really brilliant - I saw a blind woman using her cane to follow the lines... directions are easy... (eg - how many more entrances before I turn left?)
My feelings about the way some Japanese folk care for the disabled took two hits recently... one was a news article, the gist of which was this:
A brand new hotel included (as is mandatory) a number of wheelchair accessable parking spaces near the entrance. They called in the inspectors, and received their permit. Later, it was discovered that, with the permit safely secured, the hotel went along with its original plan: expanding the lobby. So where does this expansion go? why, on top of the wheelchair parking, of course! And re-paint the lines... pshaw. who uses them anyway? Nobody...right guys??
See... the next one, mind you, is better seen than written.
(especially since I've received muchos flack for not having enough photos from a certain son of abraham, who shall remain nameless.... *TALL*, Richmond-Hill-Living, and nameless.)
Have fun finding your way to the elevator in our store, you silly blind people!!
Yikes.
The blind, I thought, had fared the best of all. Everwhere in the city, on every sidewalk, in every public buiding and in every train station, there are strips of raised material - lines for directions to walk in, and dots/bumps to indicate some sort of change, such as a door or a step... or even the edge of the train platform (which has its own unique pattern at many stations)... its really brilliant - I saw a blind woman using her cane to follow the lines... directions are easy... (eg - how many more entrances before I turn left?)
My feelings about the way some Japanese folk care for the disabled took two hits recently... one was a news article, the gist of which was this:
A brand new hotel included (as is mandatory) a number of wheelchair accessable parking spaces near the entrance. They called in the inspectors, and received their permit. Later, it was discovered that, with the permit safely secured, the hotel went along with its original plan: expanding the lobby. So where does this expansion go? why, on top of the wheelchair parking, of course! And re-paint the lines... pshaw. who uses them anyway? Nobody...right guys??
See... the next one, mind you, is better seen than written.
(especially since I've received muchos flack for not having enough photos from a certain son of abraham, who shall remain nameless.... *TALL*, Richmond-Hill-Living, and nameless.)
Have fun finding your way to the elevator in our store, you silly blind people!!
Yikes.
Thursday, January 26, 2006
FOLLOW the RULES, you Gaijin Monkey, and please don't burn down our Ducky Duck.
I wanted to take a moment to relate two instances where people showed a serious amount of stick-up-the-butt-edness. One of them made me laugh, and one of them made me very grumpy. We’ll start with Grumpy.
I was out for a quick lunch/wandering party with Jess, her friend Naru and my teacher buddy Sophie, when we decided to hit up an interesting place called Ducky-Duck. Eating out here with that crew is always a little wacky, as Jess and I are Lactose Intolerant and Sophie has a Gluten Allergy… so finding a milkless, breadless, cheeseless, butterless, pastaless lunch always takes a bit of time. We eventually found something that looked like it was edible by all parties present, and wouldn’t break the bank. While I couldn’t really find much, I spotted the fact that they had a decent salad bar for a mere 500 yen. Not too bad, thought I, and went ahead and ordered it.
A little while later, they brought us a tea plate sized dish (oh…well…extra trips are no problem, thought I), and I made my way to the bar to pick out some likely vegetable victims to power me through the rest of the day. I took about half a plate full, and joined the team for some chewing.
A little while later, I went up to the front again to snag some more salad, but was intercepted by a frantic waitress who spoke about as much English as I speak Farsi. (Again, I never get upset at this because, well, Japan is a place where you need to speak Japanese. English is just a useful thing for taking money from Americans who make crappy cars…ohh.. burrrn…. Hear that GMC? That’s what you get for making a shitbox like the Oldsmobile Alero! …but anyway… I digress)
So, she didn’t speak English, but she waved her arms around really well. So, I figured she didn’t like something, so I’d just say “excuse me” a lot in Japanese, bow a few times and leave. This tends to placate anyone who seems to be wincing and thinking “Pleasedon’ttouchmepleasedon’tspeaktomepleasedon’truinmydayyouhugeobnoxiousforeignerjustpleasegohomeandleavemealone” silently with all of their might.
So I waited for the crazy lady to stop lurking and tried to play my favourite card when I’m not sure about the rules: The Dumb Foreigner.
//Sidebar: The Dumb Foreigner
I’ve remarked on it many times, but the strangest thing about Japan is the odd mixture of frustration, dismay, disgust, fascination and awe that some Japanese folk have about foreigners. I want to point out that I do believe that these people are the minority. I think most people here are polite, friendly, courteous and mostly react in an analogous way to how YOU would if confronted with a brash, wacky person who spoke about 20 words in YOUR language.
//End Sidebar
So, after the crazy lady had vacated the premises, I simply marched up their again to try and get a second small bowl of salad for my five bucks.
I was again intercepted by a manager type person (aka, foreigner dragon slaying boss type person), who managed to get “one time only” out of his mouth and cross his arms in the universally accepted (Universe (n): Japan and surrounding Japanese areas). All of this finally led me to realize that I was about to pay five bucks for a salad that could fit in my hand and consisted of about six pieces of lettuce and some watery dressing.
It was then that I swore vengeance on Ducky Duck. For the rest of my time in this wonderful country, I will never again set foot in that vegetable pinching, overzealous cheapskate home of non hunger relieving jerks. I would pass on the tradition of hatred to my sons, and them on to their sons, until it would all reach a climactic martial arts battle, with missiles and lots of kung fu grip.
Ok, this is mad amounts of overreaction, and I’ve been watching too may cartoons.
Meh… at least I finally found something to get pissed off about.
The Video Store
Apparently the people at the video store get really really freaked out when you don’t return a movie on time. Its basically like the rental video version of the apocalypse to them. They make two phone calls in one day, and when you finally bring the video back (that day), they dig out a binder and show you the receipt.
They also look really really confused, like they’re wondering what sort of horrible crisis could prevent an honourable customer from returning the honourable video on time.
It was too funny. I love these guys. And besides, I’m not sparing them any ire that could be directed at the Evil Baby-Eating, Republican Voting Ducky Duck Corporation
I was out for a quick lunch/wandering party with Jess, her friend Naru and my teacher buddy Sophie, when we decided to hit up an interesting place called Ducky-Duck. Eating out here with that crew is always a little wacky, as Jess and I are Lactose Intolerant and Sophie has a Gluten Allergy… so finding a milkless, breadless, cheeseless, butterless, pastaless lunch always takes a bit of time. We eventually found something that looked like it was edible by all parties present, and wouldn’t break the bank. While I couldn’t really find much, I spotted the fact that they had a decent salad bar for a mere 500 yen. Not too bad, thought I, and went ahead and ordered it.
A little while later, they brought us a tea plate sized dish (oh…well…extra trips are no problem, thought I), and I made my way to the bar to pick out some likely vegetable victims to power me through the rest of the day. I took about half a plate full, and joined the team for some chewing.
A little while later, I went up to the front again to snag some more salad, but was intercepted by a frantic waitress who spoke about as much English as I speak Farsi. (Again, I never get upset at this because, well, Japan is a place where you need to speak Japanese. English is just a useful thing for taking money from Americans who make crappy cars…ohh.. burrrn…. Hear that GMC? That’s what you get for making a shitbox like the Oldsmobile Alero! …but anyway… I digress)
So, she didn’t speak English, but she waved her arms around really well. So, I figured she didn’t like something, so I’d just say “excuse me” a lot in Japanese, bow a few times and leave. This tends to placate anyone who seems to be wincing and thinking “Pleasedon’ttouchmepleasedon’tspeaktomepleasedon’truinmydayyouhugeobnoxiousforeignerjustpleasegohomeandleavemealone” silently with all of their might.
So I waited for the crazy lady to stop lurking and tried to play my favourite card when I’m not sure about the rules: The Dumb Foreigner.
//Sidebar: The Dumb Foreigner
I’ve remarked on it many times, but the strangest thing about Japan is the odd mixture of frustration, dismay, disgust, fascination and awe that some Japanese folk have about foreigners. I want to point out that I do believe that these people are the minority. I think most people here are polite, friendly, courteous and mostly react in an analogous way to how YOU would if confronted with a brash, wacky person who spoke about 20 words in YOUR language.
//End Sidebar
So, after the crazy lady had vacated the premises, I simply marched up their again to try and get a second small bowl of salad for my five bucks.
I was again intercepted by a manager type person (aka, foreigner dragon slaying boss type person), who managed to get “one time only” out of his mouth and cross his arms in the universally accepted (Universe (n): Japan and surrounding Japanese areas). All of this finally led me to realize that I was about to pay five bucks for a salad that could fit in my hand and consisted of about six pieces of lettuce and some watery dressing.
It was then that I swore vengeance on Ducky Duck. For the rest of my time in this wonderful country, I will never again set foot in that vegetable pinching, overzealous cheapskate home of non hunger relieving jerks. I would pass on the tradition of hatred to my sons, and them on to their sons, until it would all reach a climactic martial arts battle, with missiles and lots of kung fu grip.
Ok, this is mad amounts of overreaction, and I’ve been watching too may cartoons.
Meh… at least I finally found something to get pissed off about.
The Video Store
Apparently the people at the video store get really really freaked out when you don’t return a movie on time. Its basically like the rental video version of the apocalypse to them. They make two phone calls in one day, and when you finally bring the video back (that day), they dig out a binder and show you the receipt.
They also look really really confused, like they’re wondering what sort of horrible crisis could prevent an honourable customer from returning the honourable video on time.
It was too funny. I love these guys. And besides, I’m not sparing them any ire that could be directed at the Evil Baby-Eating, Republican Voting Ducky Duck Corporation
Wednesday, January 25, 2006
I suck and I am still mending my evil ways… umm… yeah.
SO.
Where were we, faithful flock? As I remember it, we were about to drink some grape juice all at the same time, being careful not to spill any on our togas, and wait for the magic comet to carry us away from the evil CIA…
Crap. Sorry. That was from my other… blog.
Cough. AWK---ward… (with Apologies to Aizick Grimman)
So, Christmas was about a month ago… or exactly a month ago, so we need to do some serious blow-by-blow recovery to keep our shenanigans from getting dusty as they rattle around in my brain, lest they conspire somehow to make me look good, or tactful or culturally sensitive.
So… here is a further out-of-date update of silly adventures that I have had.
1) The craziest place on earth’
I found a place that shocked me, amazed me, and over stimulated my senses more than that time I watched a swiped copy of “Dickman and Throbbin’” at my friend Brett’s house when in Grade Seven. I am not a man for understatements, but the previous sentence may, in fact, be one.
I admit that while I have in no way grasped the worldwide insanity that is the human race, I have managed to meander to a number of parts of the world. I’ve gallivanted around Canada, the US, the Caribbean, around the UK, through Germany, France and the hazy, drug-and-sex-laden streets of Amsterdam. I have also seen a good bit of Tokyo, and of the world famous suburban paradise that is York Region.
I’ve seen some weird and wild stuff, and I do love a good amount of ridiculousness. But frankly, in a part of Tokyo called Ikebukuro, there is a city-within-a-city cheerfully known as “Rainbow Sunshine” mall.
I will define this place two definitions, one for the boys and one for the girls.
GIRLS: Shopping, living, eating, working, a world spanning antique store and an aquarium all together at last. You might know this as “heaven”, considering that there are 14 different shoe stores and a little restaurant on the 60th floor.
BOYS: “Rainbow Sunshine City Within a City” is kind of like one those Launch Arcologies from Simcity 2000 and the sequels, you know, the ones that had to blast of for you to win??? It looks kinda similar, too.
Crazy as this sounds…. Its really no more ridiculous than any semi-ridiculous part of Tokyo. In this comparatively normal place, however, is an indoor theme park called “NamjaTown”.
They have everything on earth you could ever want… that is, if you were the Evil B Movie Tacky-Monster. It is a mad warren of twisting, flashing hallways full of every kind of kitsch you can imagine.
They have a Gyoza Stadium, where 15 odd different flashy kiosks compete for your 300 yen. Gyoza are those little misc dumplings that are usually fried up somehow. Everyone goes crazy, but it’s a great place to eat.
Next to this is a seriously weird haunted house. Lanterns loll their tongues out, weird pseudo-bhuddist gods wave their arms, and (creepiest of all, seriously) twisted children’s laughter echoes through the whole place. This includes the bathroom, where the weird kids laugh when you turn on the taps. SERIOUSLY MESSED UP.
Outside this haunted house is a place where you can fish for eels. Yes, you read that right…. Fishing for eels. In a little tub. With a paper net. For 200 yen you can try to snag as many eels as you can and win little crappy stuffed animals that were surely fished out of someone’s garbage. I lost, but I’m honestly not bitter.
After passing through some velvet stairways where electronic zombie versions of famous dead rock starts anamatronicly rock it out (I’m seriously not making this up… they had Chuck Berry the Zombie doing a poorer impression of himself than Michael J Fox ever did). After that, you come to ICE CREAM CITY.
Logically, this place has about 500 different flavours of ice cream, including some that surely deserve to be treated to the dumpster from whence those crappy eel-prizes came from.
These include things like Black Sesame, Kiwi and my personal favourite for sheer wrongness: Curry Ice Cream. I even took a lactose pill and tested a bit, and yep, Curry still shouldn’t be frozen and served in a cone.
So, um.. it was f’in crazy. Check out some pics.
The Gateway to Crazy NamjaTown
Entrance to Haunted House.
Where's my mirror shield when I need it.
/Geek.
Creepy haunted cat
MESSED up heads.
Fishing for... EELS?!?!?
This is four feet from the haunted house. Aromatherapy, massage and scented oil rainforest-land
Look Everybody! Its Cameltoe Kitty!
Mmmm curry ice cream....
Geoff Sensei likey the kaa-ree ice cremeu.
Where were we, faithful flock? As I remember it, we were about to drink some grape juice all at the same time, being careful not to spill any on our togas, and wait for the magic comet to carry us away from the evil CIA…
Crap. Sorry. That was from my other… blog.
Cough. AWK---ward… (with Apologies to Aizick Grimman)
So, Christmas was about a month ago… or exactly a month ago, so we need to do some serious blow-by-blow recovery to keep our shenanigans from getting dusty as they rattle around in my brain, lest they conspire somehow to make me look good, or tactful or culturally sensitive.
So… here is a further out-of-date update of silly adventures that I have had.
1) The craziest place on earth’
I found a place that shocked me, amazed me, and over stimulated my senses more than that time I watched a swiped copy of “Dickman and Throbbin’” at my friend Brett’s house when in Grade Seven. I am not a man for understatements, but the previous sentence may, in fact, be one.
I admit that while I have in no way grasped the worldwide insanity that is the human race, I have managed to meander to a number of parts of the world. I’ve gallivanted around Canada, the US, the Caribbean, around the UK, through Germany, France and the hazy, drug-and-sex-laden streets of Amsterdam. I have also seen a good bit of Tokyo, and of the world famous suburban paradise that is York Region.
I’ve seen some weird and wild stuff, and I do love a good amount of ridiculousness. But frankly, in a part of Tokyo called Ikebukuro, there is a city-within-a-city cheerfully known as “Rainbow Sunshine” mall.
I will define this place two definitions, one for the boys and one for the girls.
GIRLS: Shopping, living, eating, working, a world spanning antique store and an aquarium all together at last. You might know this as “heaven”, considering that there are 14 different shoe stores and a little restaurant on the 60th floor.
BOYS: “Rainbow Sunshine City Within a City” is kind of like one those Launch Arcologies from Simcity 2000 and the sequels, you know, the ones that had to blast of for you to win??? It looks kinda similar, too.
Crazy as this sounds…. Its really no more ridiculous than any semi-ridiculous part of Tokyo. In this comparatively normal place, however, is an indoor theme park called “NamjaTown”.
They have everything on earth you could ever want… that is, if you were the Evil B Movie Tacky-Monster. It is a mad warren of twisting, flashing hallways full of every kind of kitsch you can imagine.
They have a Gyoza Stadium, where 15 odd different flashy kiosks compete for your 300 yen. Gyoza are those little misc dumplings that are usually fried up somehow. Everyone goes crazy, but it’s a great place to eat.
Next to this is a seriously weird haunted house. Lanterns loll their tongues out, weird pseudo-bhuddist gods wave their arms, and (creepiest of all, seriously) twisted children’s laughter echoes through the whole place. This includes the bathroom, where the weird kids laugh when you turn on the taps. SERIOUSLY MESSED UP.
Outside this haunted house is a place where you can fish for eels. Yes, you read that right…. Fishing for eels. In a little tub. With a paper net. For 200 yen you can try to snag as many eels as you can and win little crappy stuffed animals that were surely fished out of someone’s garbage. I lost, but I’m honestly not bitter.
After passing through some velvet stairways where electronic zombie versions of famous dead rock starts anamatronicly rock it out (I’m seriously not making this up… they had Chuck Berry the Zombie doing a poorer impression of himself than Michael J Fox ever did). After that, you come to ICE CREAM CITY.
Logically, this place has about 500 different flavours of ice cream, including some that surely deserve to be treated to the dumpster from whence those crappy eel-prizes came from.
These include things like Black Sesame, Kiwi and my personal favourite for sheer wrongness: Curry Ice Cream. I even took a lactose pill and tested a bit, and yep, Curry still shouldn’t be frozen and served in a cone.
So, um.. it was f’in crazy. Check out some pics.
The Gateway to Crazy NamjaTown
Entrance to Haunted House.
Where's my mirror shield when I need it.
/Geek.
Creepy haunted cat
MESSED up heads.
Fishing for... EELS?!?!?
This is four feet from the haunted house. Aromatherapy, massage and scented oil rainforest-land
Look Everybody! Its Cameltoe Kitty!
Mmmm curry ice cream....
Geoff Sensei likey the kaa-ree ice cremeu.
Monday, January 16, 2006
I SUCK... but I will mend my evil ways. PART 2
OK! We are back, from outer space, we just walked in to find that sad look upon your face....
ANYWAY... THE DINNER.
Jessica and I spent the day of the dinner was spent hanging out at dear sophie's place. We also drank a boatload of wine and ate about three pounds of chocolate while deep frying yams (or as their known here, "ee-mo(s)")..
SIDEBAR #1: YaaaaaaaakeeeeMooooo
One of the most hilarious forms of nourishment in this country, I have to elaborate on, and I have to do it here and now.
Yaki, in Japanese, means "baked" or "roasted". If you've ever had "yakitori" that is where this comes from (tori is, I believe "chicken"... but you usually say "tori-niku"... (niku is like "meat"... as in gyu-niku - beef or buta-niku - pork)... but that is enough brackets for now)...
Anyway... these guys roll through the streets with a huge ass barbecue selling baked yams. And when I say huge ass, I mean that it is a barbecue pickup truck. They also pull this genius bit of attention attraction where they yell into megaphones. (having somehow eschewed anything like the north american ice cream guy or the knife sharpening guy that roll through the streets.)
They just yell what they're selling in one long drawn out word... yaaaaaaaaaaakeeeemoooooooooooooo... yaaaaaaaakeemooooooooooooooooooo... its pretty awesome.
The yams happen to be tasty too.
/end SIDEBAR #1
So, the dinner. I WILL get through this, no matter how many times I lose my train of thought and take you on a random Being John Malkovich-esque charge through my brain.
Yeah... it was full of boozing teachers, bad jokes and lots of turkey, which I even got to carve. I don't know why they thought arming a two-bottles-of-wine-to-the wind Brent with five inches of sharpened steel and the chance to reenact grade eleven biology dissection class, but hey, they did it, and boy did I make hella short work of that birdie. It was a smallish bird, perhaps half or less the size of the one your family usually gets, but by gum, I pulled enough meat off of that sucker to feed 10 people and have left overs to boot!
(admittedly, there were some chicken legs and some vegetarians, but it went over well all in all)
I'll leave it there, but for all of you geeks out there in otakuland (that crack is for dave mccallum, who swore he would never speak to me again if I started using that word), our cake was a spiderman cake.
pictures forthcoming.
ANYWAY... THE DINNER.
Jessica and I spent the day of the dinner was spent hanging out at dear sophie's place. We also drank a boatload of wine and ate about three pounds of chocolate while deep frying yams (or as their known here, "ee-mo(s)")..
SIDEBAR #1: YaaaaaaaakeeeeMooooo
One of the most hilarious forms of nourishment in this country, I have to elaborate on, and I have to do it here and now.
Yaki, in Japanese, means "baked" or "roasted". If you've ever had "yakitori" that is where this comes from (tori is, I believe "chicken"... but you usually say "tori-niku"... (niku is like "meat"... as in gyu-niku - beef or buta-niku - pork)... but that is enough brackets for now)...
Anyway... these guys roll through the streets with a huge ass barbecue selling baked yams. And when I say huge ass, I mean that it is a barbecue pickup truck. They also pull this genius bit of attention attraction where they yell into megaphones. (having somehow eschewed anything like the north american ice cream guy or the knife sharpening guy that roll through the streets.)
They just yell what they're selling in one long drawn out word... yaaaaaaaaaaakeeeemoooooooooooooo... yaaaaaaaakeemooooooooooooooooooo... its pretty awesome.
The yams happen to be tasty too.
/end SIDEBAR #1
So, the dinner. I WILL get through this, no matter how many times I lose my train of thought and take you on a random Being John Malkovich-esque charge through my brain.
Yeah... it was full of boozing teachers, bad jokes and lots of turkey, which I even got to carve. I don't know why they thought arming a two-bottles-of-wine-to-the wind Brent with five inches of sharpened steel and the chance to reenact grade eleven biology dissection class, but hey, they did it, and boy did I make hella short work of that birdie. It was a smallish bird, perhaps half or less the size of the one your family usually gets, but by gum, I pulled enough meat off of that sucker to feed 10 people and have left overs to boot!
(admittedly, there were some chicken legs and some vegetarians, but it went over well all in all)
I'll leave it there, but for all of you geeks out there in otakuland (that crack is for dave mccallum, who swore he would never speak to me again if I started using that word), our cake was a spiderman cake.
pictures forthcoming.
Saturday, January 14, 2006
I SUCK... but I will mend my evil ways. PART 1
So, umm...
happy new year and all that.
Especially to those nice people in Japan (... that's you, Atsushi) who made a point of asking me why I hadn't been updating.
I could offer some lamo excuses, like, "Sorry, Jessica has been visiting" or "I've been saving up some awesome stories for one huuuge mindblowingly amazing escapade of Japananigans" but really... I've just been being a lazy ass.
Anyway, we're going to run through a few highs and a lot of hilarious "lows".
Crazy incident-evening #1: Christmas Dinner
Christmas, as you may or may not know, is actually celebrated in Japan. By "celebrated", I mean that Christmas here happens in all of its consumeristic, neon riddled, soul draining depravity, and they skip the whole family, good cheer and fellowship parts. (I won't go anywhere near describing the murderous-death-penalty-cheering-for-not-teaching-evolution-until-the-college-level-and-then-only-with-a-stern-parental-warning-crazy the religious right of the deep south of the US would go about how much "Christ" there is in Christmas here, but hey... this is JAPAN after all... There are pockets of Christianity here, but so far it has mostly mainifested itself in really eager J-Jehovah's Witnesses knock, knock knocking at my door....)
GASP...
Anyway What we have here is a bunch of Japanese girls trading their trademark short kilts for fur lined short skirts. And then a lot of them stand outside their stores and holler "-RE-Kris-mas-soo" really loudly at all the passerby. Its freaking awesome.
They also have lots of neon lights. LOTS of neon lights. Anyway... Christmas and New Years here are kind of reversed, actually. Christmas is a time to paint the town red and white with your girlfriend/boyfriend/sex friends (fuckbuddyism is rather socially expected here, and well beyond the college years into the marriage years, from what I hear... but more on that later). New Years, on the other hand, is a time that Japanese people spend in the home with their families. So, basically, if you're a foreigner here, you're rather expected to get drunk at both Christmas and at New Years.
Then again, if you know the Merry family that I come from, then you know that this isn't really a departure from the annual standard. (except that...well...this year I don't get to see Granny get boozed and make some offhanded remark that makes 90% of the table bust a gut and 10% of the family shocked and appalled. ... Man do I miss those dinners.... )
To continue this wondrous monologue, we'll flash sideways to December 25th, which is not actually a state holiday here, but happened to be a weekend, much to the delight of we small, loyal cogs in the large and honourable engrishizing machine that is my sweet company.
Christmas dinner took place in the the apartment of my dear friend Sophie Sensei, who happens to live in an apartment complex owned by the company and thus packed with teachers. As you may or may not know, Japanese kitchens generally consist of a burner and a toaster oven. (The "Pearl Villa", the mould encrusted cesspit of an apartment that I a) call home and b) am moving out of next month, may be indeed mould encrusted, but also happens to have TWO burners, a toaster oven, a small oven AND a microwave, is basically considered to be a restaurant-volume kitchen by J-Standards)
This problem was well and happily surmounted by combining the resources of five kitchens to produce a singly reasonably good facsimilie of a North American style turkey-themed christmas dinner-saster.
But you, dear reader, will have to tune in later this week for more stories, because I have class in ten minutes. heh. heh heh heh.
At least I whet your appetite, and made this blog soooo much less ridiculously empty.
Coming next week:
-The Dinner!
-The Craziest Place On Earth!
-The Angriest Video Staff Ever!
-Cannonballing a Japanese Hot Spring!
-Sumo Wrestling!
-Lots and Lots of Bad English!
Ok that is all. Remember to tune in next week, same Brent Time, Same Brent Channel!
happy new year and all that.
Especially to those nice people in Japan (... that's you, Atsushi) who made a point of asking me why I hadn't been updating.
I could offer some lamo excuses, like, "Sorry, Jessica has been visiting" or "I've been saving up some awesome stories for one huuuge mindblowingly amazing escapade of Japananigans" but really... I've just been being a lazy ass.
Anyway, we're going to run through a few highs and a lot of hilarious "lows".
Crazy incident-evening #1: Christmas Dinner
Christmas, as you may or may not know, is actually celebrated in Japan. By "celebrated", I mean that Christmas here happens in all of its consumeristic, neon riddled, soul draining depravity, and they skip the whole family, good cheer and fellowship parts. (I won't go anywhere near describing the murderous-death-penalty-cheering-for-not-teaching-evolution-until-the-college-level-and-then-only-with-a-stern-parental-warning-crazy the religious right of the deep south of the US would go about how much "Christ" there is in Christmas here, but hey... this is JAPAN after all... There are pockets of Christianity here, but so far it has mostly mainifested itself in really eager J-Jehovah's Witnesses knock, knock knocking at my door....)
GASP...
Anyway What we have here is a bunch of Japanese girls trading their trademark short kilts for fur lined short skirts. And then a lot of them stand outside their stores and holler "-RE-Kris-mas-soo" really loudly at all the passerby. Its freaking awesome.
They also have lots of neon lights. LOTS of neon lights. Anyway... Christmas and New Years here are kind of reversed, actually. Christmas is a time to paint the town red and white with your girlfriend/boyfriend/sex friends (fuckbuddyism is rather socially expected here, and well beyond the college years into the marriage years, from what I hear... but more on that later). New Years, on the other hand, is a time that Japanese people spend in the home with their families. So, basically, if you're a foreigner here, you're rather expected to get drunk at both Christmas and at New Years.
Then again, if you know the Merry family that I come from, then you know that this isn't really a departure from the annual standard. (except that...well...this year I don't get to see Granny get boozed and make some offhanded remark that makes 90% of the table bust a gut and 10% of the family shocked and appalled. ... Man do I miss those dinners.... )
To continue this wondrous monologue, we'll flash sideways to December 25th, which is not actually a state holiday here, but happened to be a weekend, much to the delight of we small, loyal cogs in the large and honourable engrishizing machine that is my sweet company.
Christmas dinner took place in the the apartment of my dear friend Sophie Sensei, who happens to live in an apartment complex owned by the company and thus packed with teachers. As you may or may not know, Japanese kitchens generally consist of a burner and a toaster oven. (The "Pearl Villa", the mould encrusted cesspit of an apartment that I a) call home and b) am moving out of next month, may be indeed mould encrusted, but also happens to have TWO burners, a toaster oven, a small oven AND a microwave, is basically considered to be a restaurant-volume kitchen by J-Standards)
This problem was well and happily surmounted by combining the resources of five kitchens to produce a singly reasonably good facsimilie of a North American style turkey-themed christmas dinner-saster.
But you, dear reader, will have to tune in later this week for more stories, because I have class in ten minutes. heh. heh heh heh.
At least I whet your appetite, and made this blog soooo much less ridiculously empty.
Coming next week:
-The Dinner!
-The Craziest Place On Earth!
-The Angriest Video Staff Ever!
-Cannonballing a Japanese Hot Spring!
-Sumo Wrestling!
-Lots and Lots of Bad English!
Ok that is all. Remember to tune in next week, same Brent Time, Same Brent Channel!
Sunday, December 18, 2005
Levels of Foodsanity
There are many examples of crazy cuisine in Asia. Perhaps there are some areas like China and Thailand that are rumoured to eat various seemingly revolting delicacies, such as monkey heads, cats, snakes, dragon flies, and so on and so forth.
Japan, however, has the best known “odd” cuisine – at least by western standards. Best known outside of Japan, of course, would be sushi in its various forms. Many people find the idea of eating raw fish to be a little unappealing.
Of course, if you’ve read my blog for a bit, or met me, then you will know that I happen to enjoy sushi very much. I even touched on whale and horse sashimi a few weeks ago. (Sorry, world. But that serves you right for serving up something that works as both lunch and a ride TO lunch. As for the whale, I won't make a habit out of it, but curiosity got the better of me.)
Next up the ladder would perhaps be fu-- … um… fu something. That blow fish that contains enough poison to kill you if it’s not properly prepared. I haven’t tried it yet, but I plan to. Mind you, I don’t intend to ask for it as take out or from some place with a dilapidated yellow sign that says something like “5%0 the price off! Good Here Eat!! ” But still… its on the list.
The next few rungs on our ladder of culinary craziness are perhaps less well known outside of Japan.
Most easily accessible to foreigners, at least in my book, would be Suzime (“sue-seh-mey”). This delightful dish is actually an izakaya (pub) specialty. Its very simple. Take a few sparrows (yes, barnyard sparrows) skewer them with a stick, and roast em whole. I think some places also batter and deep fry them, but I can’t confirm this.
Again, I haven’t eaten these yet. They may in fact be a myth that is used to frighten new teachers. If so, well, I’ll be disappointed – I’m up for eating them.
Next on the list is the dish that is perhaps the most famous gaijin repellant within Japan. “Natto” consists of fermented (aka “rotten”) beans. It is apparently quite potent smelling and potent tasting. I have some in my fridge right now, courtesy of my dear co-worker Mikiko. In fact, I am going to eat some right now (or…right as I was writing this…) and give you my first thoughts!
Haha!
….
OK! I’ve just eaten them! And the verdict is….
Meh.
They look a little nasty (gooey and stuck together), and they smell a little funky, kind of sweet and bean-ey… but nothing really awful. I’d honestly been led to believe that eating Natto would be kind of like pulling on a bib and diving head first into an outhouse after cheesy chilli night at the lactose intolerance support club.
Really, though…it wasn’t that bad. It wasn’t great, either, mind you. It was kind of like eating sticky, gooey, raw-ish brown beans. Which is shocking, considering that Natto is in actuality, sticky, gooey, raw-ish brown beans.
OK! Now that we’ve had that culinary experience. We are moving on to numero un-o! The big nasty, champion of sketchy Japanese cuisine. We are talking about something that is so famously nasty that most Japanese blanche at the idea. In fact, my Japanese friend tried to stop me from eating this, and the chef was both highly surprised and highly amused when I successfully ordered it.
Hrmm… I’ll give you a minute to think of what this could possibly be.
First clue: you order it at a sushi restaurant.
…
Second clue: eating it makes people question my heterosexuality.
….
Heh heh. What could that be???
…
Give up?
Third clue: you have to get it from a MALE fish.
Heh heh he hehehehehe…
Yep.
RAW COD SEMEN.
In a sushi roll, no less.
You can take a minute to really ponder that one…
…
I have to track down the name of this stuff in Japanese, but seriously, that’s what it is.
I’d heard rumours of this stuff from dear Nick Sensei, but I never really believed him until last week. You see, I went out for sushi with a female Japanese friend of mine last week. (This friend shall remain nameless, because I suppose it could be embarrassing for her to know that seven or eight nameless people on the internet have heard that one of her favourite foods is raw fish cum.) Anyway, this friend of mine ordered some sort of sushi from the sushi chef. Being the adventurous type, I also caught his eye and held up two fingers to indicate that I wanted the same thing.
The Chef’s eyebrows went up a bit, and my friend quickly pulled my hand down and said “no… no. you don’t want to eat this.” And to the chef “hitatsu…hitatsu..” (one, one). The conversation then went like this:
Her: umm… this is not something you will want to eat.
Me: Oh, come on. I’ll eat anything.
Her: Really. This is….kind of bad.
Me: Ok… what is it?
Her: umm… (giggles, covers her mouth)… um…. Its… ah… man…um….fish….um….ahh…..
Me: (laughing)…let me guess… .. sperm?
Her… (turning red… and laughed behind her hand)…um… yeah…fish…man….
Me: Raw Cod Semen!??
Her: ummm… yes…
Me: interesting… (to chef)… sumi-masen! Futatsu, kudesai. (Excuse me! Two please”)
The chef raised his eyebrows at me, and turned to my friend, as if to say “you didn’t tell him it was chicken or something like that did you? Does he really want fish cum for lunch??” To which she nodded…and he grinned at her and then at me.
What arrived was a single roll of sushi filled with about… oh… I dunno… 50 ml? say four or five ketchup packets worth…. Of creamy white fish cum. Yep. There was a hell of a lot of fish cum. It looked kind of like mayo. On a bed of rice and wrapped in
I am sorry, but I seem to have forgotten to bring my camera that day, so if you are going to get a picture, I’ll have to order it again.
Heh. So… stay tuned for more fish cum. Same bat time, same bat channel.
(pictures forthcoming)
UPDATE:
Yep. I went back.
Japan, however, has the best known “odd” cuisine – at least by western standards. Best known outside of Japan, of course, would be sushi in its various forms. Many people find the idea of eating raw fish to be a little unappealing.
Of course, if you’ve read my blog for a bit, or met me, then you will know that I happen to enjoy sushi very much. I even touched on whale and horse sashimi a few weeks ago. (Sorry, world. But that serves you right for serving up something that works as both lunch and a ride TO lunch. As for the whale, I won't make a habit out of it, but curiosity got the better of me.)
Next up the ladder would perhaps be fu-- … um… fu something. That blow fish that contains enough poison to kill you if it’s not properly prepared. I haven’t tried it yet, but I plan to. Mind you, I don’t intend to ask for it as take out or from some place with a dilapidated yellow sign that says something like “5%0 the price off! Good Here Eat!! ” But still… its on the list.
The next few rungs on our ladder of culinary craziness are perhaps less well known outside of Japan.
Most easily accessible to foreigners, at least in my book, would be Suzime (“sue-seh-mey”). This delightful dish is actually an izakaya (pub) specialty. Its very simple. Take a few sparrows (yes, barnyard sparrows) skewer them with a stick, and roast em whole. I think some places also batter and deep fry them, but I can’t confirm this.
Again, I haven’t eaten these yet. They may in fact be a myth that is used to frighten new teachers. If so, well, I’ll be disappointed – I’m up for eating them.
Next on the list is the dish that is perhaps the most famous gaijin repellant within Japan. “Natto” consists of fermented (aka “rotten”) beans. It is apparently quite potent smelling and potent tasting. I have some in my fridge right now, courtesy of my dear co-worker Mikiko. In fact, I am going to eat some right now (or…right as I was writing this…) and give you my first thoughts!
Haha!
….
OK! I’ve just eaten them! And the verdict is….
Meh.
They look a little nasty (gooey and stuck together), and they smell a little funky, kind of sweet and bean-ey… but nothing really awful. I’d honestly been led to believe that eating Natto would be kind of like pulling on a bib and diving head first into an outhouse after cheesy chilli night at the lactose intolerance support club.
Really, though…it wasn’t that bad. It wasn’t great, either, mind you. It was kind of like eating sticky, gooey, raw-ish brown beans. Which is shocking, considering that Natto is in actuality, sticky, gooey, raw-ish brown beans.
OK! Now that we’ve had that culinary experience. We are moving on to numero un-o! The big nasty, champion of sketchy Japanese cuisine. We are talking about something that is so famously nasty that most Japanese blanche at the idea. In fact, my Japanese friend tried to stop me from eating this, and the chef was both highly surprised and highly amused when I successfully ordered it.
Hrmm… I’ll give you a minute to think of what this could possibly be.
First clue: you order it at a sushi restaurant.
…
Second clue: eating it makes people question my heterosexuality.
….
Heh heh. What could that be???
…
Give up?
Third clue: you have to get it from a MALE fish.
Heh heh he hehehehehe…
Yep.
RAW COD SEMEN.
In a sushi roll, no less.
You can take a minute to really ponder that one…
…
I have to track down the name of this stuff in Japanese, but seriously, that’s what it is.
I’d heard rumours of this stuff from dear Nick Sensei, but I never really believed him until last week. You see, I went out for sushi with a female Japanese friend of mine last week. (This friend shall remain nameless, because I suppose it could be embarrassing for her to know that seven or eight nameless people on the internet have heard that one of her favourite foods is raw fish cum.) Anyway, this friend of mine ordered some sort of sushi from the sushi chef. Being the adventurous type, I also caught his eye and held up two fingers to indicate that I wanted the same thing.
The Chef’s eyebrows went up a bit, and my friend quickly pulled my hand down and said “no… no. you don’t want to eat this.” And to the chef “hitatsu…hitatsu..” (one, one). The conversation then went like this:
Her: umm… this is not something you will want to eat.
Me: Oh, come on. I’ll eat anything.
Her: Really. This is….kind of bad.
Me: Ok… what is it?
Her: umm… (giggles, covers her mouth)… um…. Its… ah… man…um….fish….um….ahh…..
Me: (laughing)…let me guess… .. sperm?
Her… (turning red… and laughed behind her hand)…um… yeah…fish…man….
Me: Raw Cod Semen!??
Her: ummm… yes…
Me: interesting… (to chef)… sumi-masen! Futatsu, kudesai. (Excuse me! Two please”)
The chef raised his eyebrows at me, and turned to my friend, as if to say “you didn’t tell him it was chicken or something like that did you? Does he really want fish cum for lunch??” To which she nodded…and he grinned at her and then at me.
What arrived was a single roll of sushi filled with about… oh… I dunno… 50 ml? say four or five ketchup packets worth…. Of creamy white fish cum. Yep. There was a hell of a lot of fish cum. It looked kind of like mayo. On a bed of rice and wrapped in
I am sorry, but I seem to have forgotten to bring my camera that day, so if you are going to get a picture, I’ll have to order it again.
Heh. So… stay tuned for more fish cum. Same bat time, same bat channel.
(pictures forthcoming)
UPDATE:
Yep. I went back.
Wednesday, December 14, 2005
Its the Lack-of-sensitivity Hoe-down!
So, fellow teacher and rabble rouser Sophie and I spent Sunday carousing around a part of Tokyo called Ueno. For proper pronunciation guide (as per the railway conductor), make a sound like you are about to be sick, then add “no”. Ueno has a great many cultural treasures, like national Japanese museums of modern art, classical art, science and history.
Fortunately for the patrons of those upstanding institutions, Ueno also has a zoo. With monkeys.
…
Anyway, on the way to the zoo, there are also a few interesting cultural treasures. Like a huge statue to a guy we can call “Samurai Hindsight’s-a-Bitch”. He started out supporting the imperial forces against the shogun, but ended up ritually disemboweling himself in protest when the emperor revoked the rights of the samurai class. OOpsy. Anyway, he got a nice statue out of the deal, so I figure... it's all good.
Hrmm…. The zoo had lots of fun stuff. Like Ling-Ling, the famous panda that they pimped around the world.
They also had about 839339 places to take photos. Like this panda that I enjoyed molesting!
Oh, and some aptly named penguins.
Hmm…. In other news, if Shintoists (Buddhists???) were like fundamentalist Muslims or fundamentalist Christians and issued official “bitch slap notices” (that would be “fatwas” and “republican legislation” respectively… ). I would probably get one for doing this.
In fact, they would probably have this crazy rhoided out stone lion deliver said “bitch slap notices".
Don’t worry… I made amends by giving them a shout-out at the shrine next door. You can drop 500 yen on a little wooden plaque and write a nice message to the spirits on it.
We’ll close out the post by giving a shout out to one of my old flames from last week… the slutty pachinko bikini girl! Sophie’s careful eye spotted our barefoot Japanese girlfriend and boyfriend (she called shotgun on the guy with the purple speedo) as we passed the pachinko parlour. This time, (un)fortunately, they were wearing much more than last time.
I decided to say hello.
Fortunately for the patrons of those upstanding institutions, Ueno also has a zoo. With monkeys.
…
Anyway, on the way to the zoo, there are also a few interesting cultural treasures. Like a huge statue to a guy we can call “Samurai Hindsight’s-a-Bitch”. He started out supporting the imperial forces against the shogun, but ended up ritually disemboweling himself in protest when the emperor revoked the rights of the samurai class. OOpsy. Anyway, he got a nice statue out of the deal, so I figure... it's all good.
Hrmm…. The zoo had lots of fun stuff. Like Ling-Ling, the famous panda that they pimped around the world.
They also had about 839339 places to take photos. Like this panda that I enjoyed molesting!
Oh, and some aptly named penguins.
Hmm…. In other news, if Shintoists (Buddhists???) were like fundamentalist Muslims or fundamentalist Christians and issued official “bitch slap notices” (that would be “fatwas” and “republican legislation” respectively… ). I would probably get one for doing this.
In fact, they would probably have this crazy rhoided out stone lion deliver said “bitch slap notices".
Don’t worry… I made amends by giving them a shout-out at the shrine next door. You can drop 500 yen on a little wooden plaque and write a nice message to the spirits on it.
We’ll close out the post by giving a shout out to one of my old flames from last week… the slutty pachinko bikini girl! Sophie’s careful eye spotted our barefoot Japanese girlfriend and boyfriend (she called shotgun on the guy with the purple speedo) as we passed the pachinko parlour. This time, (un)fortunately, they were wearing much more than last time.
I decided to say hello.
Sunday, December 11, 2005
Nihonglish.... Part 1 of Many.
I’d like to spend this entry doing a quick run down of some of the best bits of English destruction that I’ve witnessed in my entire life.
(caveat)
I’d like to submit that making fun of English in Japan is like making fun of German Spelling in Quebec City. There’s really no reason that anyone ought to speak English here. Besides, my Japanese is around the level of scholarly ape-grunting with a lot of pantomime thrown in for good measure. Thus, I recognize the hard work that all these people have put in to learn a foreign language.
Plus, its dead hilarious.
(/caveat).
Lets start the day off with a few rudimentary typos.
This is a department store that really believes in connecting with customers. Unfortunately, they definitely erred on the side of "creepy" rather than "customer service". Especially if you were one of those people that saw "Evil Dead: the musical" when it was playing in Toronto...
Next up, more retail. Here, friend and fellow teacher Sophie Sensei shows off one store's awesomely enticing name.
next we have....
Chingis Kahn and Beer Stick. I honestly think this one can do without a wiseacre remark.
coming up next... I have attached a picture of the best menu ever. Check out How many mistakes can you find here??
hmm... a WHAT of Carlsberg???
Lets move from the public to the private domain…
Some of my friends sing the praises of cross language dating. One, in fact, declared that intermediate English skills make for the best relationships because you don’t really fight about something unless it is really really important. And you have to actually listen to each other, so there’s not really a lot of yelling.
And…well… I suppose that everyone speaks naked, so perhaps you can find some common ground.
Anyway…. There is a dark and awful(ly hilarious) aspect to it: the text-dump in broken English. Yikers. Its bad. In fact, I actually got permission from my dear friend to share this little gem with you all…
“i decided to leave from you. i want to concentrate new job & look for another guy. thank you for everything".
- verbatim.
It sure is a good thing that she softened the blow.
Lastly, I’d like to move on to the best homework submission I’ve ever received. I admit that the real comedy here is purely intentional (the dude is a funny guy), it was just so wickedly awesome that I had to share.
Class Homework Assignment:
Write an apology.
Student answer:
"Oh sorry, I like your wife. Because she is very beautiful and kindly. I need to her. but I yet hold nothing. So, I don't trouble you."
…word for word, thats it.
YES! (insert triumphant arm-pumping here) I love that guy.
I think we need a contest for this one. Please post the best word you can think of for the third sentence, between “to” and “her”. Try to be creative.
I think I'm going to start collecting awesome english instances.
Today's score:
Brent 10, culture shock 0.5
Yeah. thats right. I'm giving myself two points for beating down this little language party.
(caveat)
I’d like to submit that making fun of English in Japan is like making fun of German Spelling in Quebec City. There’s really no reason that anyone ought to speak English here. Besides, my Japanese is around the level of scholarly ape-grunting with a lot of pantomime thrown in for good measure. Thus, I recognize the hard work that all these people have put in to learn a foreign language.
Plus, its dead hilarious.
(/caveat).
Lets start the day off with a few rudimentary typos.
This is a department store that really believes in connecting with customers. Unfortunately, they definitely erred on the side of "creepy" rather than "customer service". Especially if you were one of those people that saw "Evil Dead: the musical" when it was playing in Toronto...
Next up, more retail. Here, friend and fellow teacher Sophie Sensei shows off one store's awesomely enticing name.
next we have....
Chingis Kahn and Beer Stick. I honestly think this one can do without a wiseacre remark.
coming up next... I have attached a picture of the best menu ever. Check out How many mistakes can you find here??
hmm... a WHAT of Carlsberg???
Lets move from the public to the private domain…
Some of my friends sing the praises of cross language dating. One, in fact, declared that intermediate English skills make for the best relationships because you don’t really fight about something unless it is really really important. And you have to actually listen to each other, so there’s not really a lot of yelling.
And…well… I suppose that everyone speaks naked, so perhaps you can find some common ground.
Anyway…. There is a dark and awful(ly hilarious) aspect to it: the text-dump in broken English. Yikers. Its bad. In fact, I actually got permission from my dear friend to share this little gem with you all…
“i decided to leave from you. i want to concentrate new job & look for another guy. thank you for everything".
- verbatim.
It sure is a good thing that she softened the blow.
Lastly, I’d like to move on to the best homework submission I’ve ever received. I admit that the real comedy here is purely intentional (the dude is a funny guy), it was just so wickedly awesome that I had to share.
Class Homework Assignment:
Write an apology.
Student answer:
"Oh sorry, I like your wife. Because she is very beautiful and kindly. I need to her. but I yet hold nothing. So, I don't trouble you."
…word for word, thats it.
YES! (insert triumphant arm-pumping here) I love that guy.
I think we need a contest for this one. Please post the best word you can think of for the third sentence, between “to” and “her”. Try to be creative.
I think I'm going to start collecting awesome english instances.
Today's score:
Brent 10, culture shock 0.5
Yeah. thats right. I'm giving myself two points for beating down this little language party.
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