It's time for Adventures Part 4: Japan! After about twenty-one hours of traveling, including a long layover in Seoul, I landed in Nagoya where I was promptly detained by Japanese immigration over technicalities with my visa. It took a half hour of people bowing to me and being vaguely polite about what was happening before it was finally decided that I wasn't some spy trying to sneak into Japan and was allowed to enter the country. Luckily, I had been able to communicate with my co-workers via email during this whole fiasco, so they were still patiently waiting for me at the airport when I finally emerged.
Maybe it's a teaching English thing, or maybe I am just really good at choosing jobs, but just as with my first day in Poland, my co-workers here were extremely kind and helpful as I attempted to get settled. They brought me to my apartment, helped me carry my luggage, showed me how to get to the school, took me to lunch, and then helped me shop at the nearest grocery store and deliver everything back home. I automatically feel quite secure and supported here.
And that's not to mention the fantastic apartment they've already set up for me. Recently redone, my place has new wood floors, new wallpaper, a practically new washing machine in-unit, and a plethora of cryptic buttons and switches that operate just about everything. My toilet itself has about ten different buttons on it, and at this point, it's anyone's guess what they actually do. But truly, there are buttons and remotes for everything: turning on lights at various levels of illumination, operating air and heating, cooking on a stove, rice cooker, or microwave, choosing the temperature of the water that comes out of my shower and sink, using the washing machine, and even operating this little video-camera device on my wall that lets me see who is at my door before letting someone in. My co-workers of course tried to explain some of these things to me, but it was all so quick that I managed to forget most of what did what by the time they left. So I basically spent an evening unpacking and pressing random buttons all over the place trying to figure out the cause-and-effect of things. I blame the jet lag for making it seem more exciting than it was probably supposed to be.
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| Welcome to the new apartment |
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| Small but cute, and very Japanese |
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| A little kitchen |
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| You must never cross this step while wearing shoes |
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| My Japanese futon |
Robo-apartment doesn't have much furniture yet, but I've got all the
basics. One thing I have to get used to is sleeping on the futon bed,
which is basically just a mat on the floor, but apparently that's how
the Japanese do it. The school's also already provided me with plenty of
dishes, linens, cleaning tools, and plastic spinning things that are
for drying laundry (I think). The space is about as big as my Polish
apartment, so it feels just right.
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| Robotic toilet |
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| A washing machine just for me! |
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| Buttons, buttons, so many buttons! |
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| I'll be lucky if I can heat up some water |
I've got so much to get used to here already, and I haven't even started
teaching yet! I think I'll manage with time and a little help. Let the
exciting (and baffling) adventures in Japan begin!
