Miss/Won’t Miss – Part One: Won’t Miss

Oh, sweet hotel heat, rain down upon me like a gift from the Gods. The Gods of Heat. I guess that would be Satan. Rain down upon me like a gift form the Dark One! If this is evil then I don’t want to be good. I like to keep my Japanese hotel room at a room temperature just hot enough to boil an egg on top of the television set. Eggs taste better, I have found, when boiled over the wackiest of Japanese game shows. Anywho, today was another day of inclement weather with patches of cold suck followed by spots of even colder suck…with rain. It’s a good thing I’ve toured Osaka enough to be satisfied our I’d feel somehow weather cheated. Still, I did pull myself way from the comfy bed and heated room for most of the day to meet up with my one time trainer for a coffee and also to make one last appearance at the Company office to place a few ensure-you-didn’t-manage-to-screw-something-up phone calls. Things on that front seem to be progressing as they should be and coffee conversation with the trainer was a nice full-circler. Things began 13 months ago with this guy and they are ending with this guy. This guy makes a good bookend. During our hour or so talk over an amazing almond tasting coffee he asked me what I’d miss about my time in Japan and alternatively what I wouldn’t. Good questions. I tossed out a few stock answers without much thinking about them but after we had said our goodbyes I decided to take a bit of a walk. Now the rain had subsided but it was still a touch frigid but seeing as how I was near Namba, not to mention that glitzy area by the hotel with the tower, all light up and neony, I decided to head on down to Dotombori to get a few shots of the neon’ness of the city that I never managed to get on my previous trips here. I figured I could walk it as the map indicated that I was in close proximity to Namba Station. So I came, I saw, I took photos of neon, lights and a tower and while doing so I gave more thought to those questions I had been asked earlier. Miss/won’t miss. Well, let’s start out with the negative.

WON’T MISS
 The Language Barrier: Hey, this one is obvious. It’s my own fault, though. I admit it. I never made it passed lesson three on those underwater robotic learn Japanese lesson MP3s. The Miyagi counter was never heard from again. Still, it will be nice to not have to find alternate methods of communication. I’ve enjoyed my newfound miming skill but would rather not have to go into an entire Broadway production when I want cream in my coffee. Then there is the writing I can’t read which lead to less cooking and uncertainty over restaurant menus. I’ve called it the Foreigner Daze, spending most of my time under-using my sense of sight and sense of hearing. Outside of the apartment and classroom I was blocking things out and soon that just became an unconscious thing. I didn’t understand the posters or ads, for example, and after awhile I no longer saw them Ditto for conversations and announcements. I discovered things I liked and basically stayed that course for my entire time here. If there is regret it's that I wasn’t as adventurous as I should have been due to language worries.

 Money on receipt: I when I first got here I thought this was a single store phenomenon but it’s not. It’s the set way of Japanese clerksmanship. I wonder if there is a training manual. Furthermore, I wonder how such things like money on the receipt evolve to just become a cultural norm. Some new Darwin should get on to researching that one. This is just one of those little things that became a big irk. When you purchase something here you can expect two things: 1) that it will be over-packaged and wrapped. Bags with tape across the top or boxes and bags or straws and chopsticks. This isn’t so bad save for the waste. It’s the 2) that gets me. When you are handed back your change it is placed on top of your receipt. If your other hand is occupied with your purchased item then getting the change into your wallet becomes a little dance. It slides all over the receipt. You’ve got to have some balance if you want to get it into your wallet. Or you just drop your bag. The Money On The Receipt Dance just didn’t catch on with me.
 High fruit prices: It will be nice to get back to a place where an orange doesn’t cost you $2 and you don’t have to sell off your first born to get yourself a basket of strawberries.

 Chopsticks: I tried…oh how I tried. My chopstick skills have improved. My old friend Red will contest to this after she sees my advancements since our practice meal of Pho a few weeks before leaving Canada resulted in my shaming myself by asking for a fork. I have become fairly competent with rice but noodles still result in a splatter fest. My white pants tell the tale. I have tried to avoid sitting next to people on those restaurant benches just in case…they could very well become the recipient of an unwanted shower courtesy of myself and a bowl of Ramen. I can’t say I didn’t get my fair share of practice with chopsticks. I just never could get the hang of them. Instead I worked with the stab and scoop methods. Though I realize that this is a staple of the Japanese existence I never could get beyond the rational that a fork and spoon would just be so much easier, cleaner and less time consuming. Seriously, trying picking up single rice leavin’ with those sticks. Bring back the sporks! I welcome you!

 Heatless: Do I really need to elaborate here? I think my gushing of love over my hotel heat has been enough. Here’s the short math: No insulation + Japanese homes + winter = DAMN FREEZING! Canada may be cold, yes, and sure we may have about 400 feet of snow in Ontario at the moment but it will be good to return to a place where you can actually go inside to warm up. I can honestly say I’ve never woken up in the middle of the Canadian night to see the mist of my breath in front of me in my room nor have I ever stuck to a Canadian toilet seat.

 Shrinkage: Everything here is reduced in size and portions. This hotel, for example, has room doors a little larger then hobbit-sized. The relative height of your average Japanese person is considered short by Western standards. In fact, by Western standards I am considered short but here in Japan I am a giant. Okay, that I WILL miss. But this sword is doubled in it’s edge. Being a giant is nice but banging your head on entranceways is not. Then there are the food portions. If you hunt around you will find joints that will give you a lot of meal for your buck but generally the meal rations lean towards the small size. Breakfast is a prime example of this. No Grand Slam here, kiddies. You get a piece of toast and an egg with your coffee. Small pieces of meat, single pieces of sushi, soup balls for midgets…hell, even the western meals consisted of a piece of beef and maybe three vegetables…that’s three pieces of vegetable…not three types. No, I will not miss the shrinkage.

 Floor sleeping: Like chopsticks this is one of those facets of Japanese life I couldn’t get used to as proven by my attempts back in the summer to make the couch into a Western-type bed. If it came down to it I could sleep nightly with only a few inches separating me and the floor but if given the choice I’m going to have to go with the elevated bed that I don’t have to pack up, air out or worry excessively over the quickness of mold attraction. I found myself last week looking forward to the bed shown in the photos of my hotel room not to mention the comfy mattress awaiting me back at the family homestead. I will say one thing for the floor sleeping, though. It did wonders to my back. I have such great posture now!

 Finally…squat toilets. How are these things still in operation!?!?!?!?