Parental Advisory: Explicit Content

Is there a better way to begin this week than with a penis festival? Yes? No? Well, either way, Japan has one.

Apparently a good number of my coworkers were already aware of this bizarre celebration. I, however, was not expecting an article (and picture) about a giant, enshrined dick appearing on the group chat. So, of course, I immediately made plans to attend the next day. What else was I supposed to do? Besides. It was only forty minutes away.

Apparently the Kanamara Festival stems from a local tradition and a couple of legends that go along with it. The first legend is that the Shinto goddess Izamani once gave birth to a fire god. This left her weak, injured. Two gods of mining and blacksmiths, Kanayamahiko and Kanayamahime, then healed her wounds. Because of this, local sex workers near this shrine would pray to these gods for protection from STDs, childbirth, and similar hazards of their trade. The other story claims that a demon fell in love with a local woman in the area. Instead of sending her flowers and chocolates, though, he decided to inhabit her vagina.

Yup. You read that right. Just sort of burrowed in and set up shop, apparently. To make matters worse, though, the woman was to wed and, during the post-nuptial activities, this demon bit off her new husband’s penis. Whoops! Sorry, honey!

So yeah, that marriage didn’t work out. However, she got married again, hoping that this was just a freak accident. Turns out it wasn’t and now there was a second eunuch hobbling around the village. The woman finally decided to make an unusual commission from the local blacksmith and ordered an iron penis from him. Once it was ready, she “presented” it to the demon, who, thinking it was another man, chomped down and smashed his teeth to pieces. The demon then fled in agony, toothless and frightened. The metal phallus in question was subsequently enshrined there. (Source: Tokyo Cheapo)

The [drag] Queen of the festival

Now, every year, the temple has volunteers, some in drag, “put benevolent spirits” into massive, enshrined dicks and then parades these things around town for a couple of hours! Performers, food vendors, and all the typical festival accoutrements appear and much of the proceeds go to STD research.

Schlong story short, my experience there was something of an overload. Aside from my unfortunate history with phallic objects, which left me walking on eggshells all day, everything just came so quickly! The heavy weight of the crowd pressing against me, the heat of the day, and the hard railing I was crushed against were a bit too much for me. You see, there was a rather long line waiting to get into the temple area where the penises and performers were. Although I could only watch, the people inside seemed to be having a ball.

Beyond the temple’s low walls, I could see three tall palanquins bearing phalluses, each larger than the next. The first was a serious bit of wood, about a foot tall, surrounded by smaller metal versions. On the far end of the courtyard was a big black dick, standing perhaps five feet tall, complete with veins. In between those two, though, was a towering, pink Godzilla of a cock. It must have been even almost as big as the snow penis that broke my leg freshman year!

After the priest and his assistants finished their ritual for putting spirits into the statues, various staff lifted these portable shrines into the air, bouncing and jostling the statues above their heads. I half expected white confetti to explode from their tips at any second.

Once the parade left the temple, though, and began its trek through the town’s streets, all hell broke loose.

Trying to get a closer look, I had inserted myself into the massive crowd crushing itself against the walls. When the parade left, though, the courtyard was left open and the crowd thrust forward, pushing itself through the temple’s archway and exploding into the space beyond. Even if I had tried to escape, I doubt that I could have. If I thought that rush hour on the Tokyo subway system was bad, this was worse. I have been caught in inexorable undertows while swimming and been swept away by rivers and currents that no amount of strength or skill could avail against. This crowd was much like that: A force of nature. Going against that tide would have been tantamount to a salmon trying to swim against a tsunami. Thankfully I don’t think anyone was injured and, hey!, I got to skip the line. I felt like a dick for it (see what I did there?), but didn’t really have much of a choice at the time.


Inside it was much like any other Japanese festival. People prayed at the main shrine for good luck, ate and drank beneath the cherry blossoms, enjoyed performances, and bought all manner of penis and vagina-themed goods. Oh, wait. Okay, not quite like any other Japanese festival. Parents were even buying genitalia-shaped candies for their kids to munch on!

Getting in on the fun, I bought the biggest candy they had, which was about five inches of hardened sugar in the shape of a red-tipped penis. It cost 500 yen (a little under $5.00), but I thought, “When in
Rome, right?” Let me tell you, I definitely got my money’s worth out of it.

That thing took almost three hours to eat. It was too hard to chew and, even with my entire mouth around the thing, it just did not want to dissolve! It eventually got to the point that my tongue developed sore spots from licking and sucking on it; even starting to bleed a little! Those things are definitely meant for sharing.

Meanwhile, I lost track of how many folks wanted to take my picture with that thing! I don’t know if I seemed approachable or if people were just entertained to see a white guy in leather taking dick, or at least taking part in the festivities. There were a ton of foreigners there too, which isn’t too surprising all things considered, but I seemed to attract cameras like a sailor attracts whores at the docks. 

Glad I lost my sense of dignity during high school theatre!

When all was said and done, and the phalluses had returned after their long, hard march, it was time to call it quits.

Ended up following this guy as I left.

Heading out, I decided to see just how long the line to get into the shrine was. I followed it out of the side gate, where people were supposed to enter from (whoops), and down to the street corner about thirty meters away. Then it turned around the corner and kept going until the next street corner. Past that, the line went down the street for almost a football field. Man I dodged a bullet, but wow did I feel guilty after seeing that. Just hope it wasn’t quite that crowded when I got shoved inside but, let’s be honest, it probably was. On my way back to the train station, the next performers took the stage. I know that American music dominates the global industry, but it was pretty weird hearing a Japanese man trying to sing Toto’s “Africa” as I left.







On a side note, remember that shrine I mentioned last time? The one I stumbled upon while running? I took the time to find it again last night! Many of the cherry blossoms have fallen now, but hopefully the pictures at the end of this blog will give you some sense of the serenity and ambience there. Unfortunately, I left my good camera at home because my computer’s SD card reader has suddenly decided to stop working. Sorry for the poor quality, but if anyone knows how to touch up iPhone pictures to balance lighting exposure, I’d be glad for some tips!

Anyhow, here’s the Song of the Week: “Whatever It Takes,” by Imagine Dragons. This song has been buzzing through my head all week and helping to keep me awake at my job, despite waking up at 5:30 every day for an hour and fifteen minute commute. Enjoy this while you check out the shrine pictures!

 

We Live In A Game

At long last! I have WiFi in my apartment! Haha! Get ready, internet!

This also means that, ta da!, I can bother people with my blog posts on a more regular basis! Gotta say, before this, trying to do anything at the local convenience store was not my cup of tea. Especially since I could only use their WiFi for an hour each day. An hour to take care of work, personal emails, and communications with my apartment coordinator was not enough. But yeah, now I can post blogs in my spare time, look into writing competitions, study Japanese, get in touch with friends and family, and otherwise better myself with my nearly limitless access to the web! (Read that all as “I will be browsing web comics and looking up cat videos every night.”)

Yet last week I promised more information on the move to Japan, did I not? I mean, this is technically a travel blog after all, by the furthest stretch of the definition. Well, first I would like to blame any grammatical errors, typos, or just plain bad writing on my apartment’s table, as it is the wibbliest table that ever did wobble. No, I can’t actually blame any of that on this crummy table, but I really want to. I’ve already spilled three cups of tea just by typing or turning book pages too enthusiastically.

The company I work for stuck me in a tiny apartment that, as a part of the lease, includes some “rental furniture” that I didn’t ask for and never wanted to pay for. While the refrigerator and clothes washer are nice to have, I could have gotten others for cheaper in the long run and everything else is either poor in quality or superfluous. For example, they “rented” me another induction stove when one comes built into the apartment itself. Why would I need two?! I don’t have any counter space to begin with! The wibbly-wobbly table pulls triple duty as my cooking prep area, writing desk, and dinner table. Definitely wouldn’t trust a TV on this thing, if I ever get one to play games with that is.

However, I have been so busy with the transition and settling in that video games have largely been a distant thought. I talk about them with coworkers and friends, but when I get home, I’m usually too preoccupied with feeding myself, laundry, and various other things. I’ve had the time, but I often find myself writing or reading or going out and wandering my new surroundings. Besides, I’m starting to think of this whole experience, if not careers and life in general, as something like a giant game anyhow. I mean, yes, people say “Life is a game,” but they each mean something different and often they never elaborate. For some, it’s about playing other people and out-planning them to get what you want. For some, it’s about competition and earning greater status. Me? I’m seeing this as something akin to an RPG. That means “Role-Playing Game,” for the less geeky and more socially and psychologically adjusted among you.

Even on my way over here, I could not help but think of traveling in terms of a video game. While flying over the Korean Peninsula, I thought “Huh. Between this and my flight over Russia, among other things, I have circumnavigated the globe.” I half expected to hear a “ping” at any moment and find a little achievement badge titled “Globetrotter” hovering above my head.

While at the hotel where my company was housing us for training, I thought “This is a lot like a tutorial in a video game.” The training was fun and supportive, the setting cushy, the stakes minimal, and everything about what I am supposed to be doing in the next year was more or less explained. Oh, and there was a silent, intimidating threat in the form of my new job looming over the entire thing. Company employees even showed us how to navigate the public transportation, which is unfortunately as close to a Fast Travel mechanic as I’m probably going to get in this life. Once they got us to our apartments, though, we were more or less on our own: Welcome to Level One, kids.

Like an RPG, I found myself surrounded by other characters (also known as “people”) with lives of their own, various skills, and story lines independent from, but similar to mine. Some people had been playing for longer and had managed to achieve one goal or another, be that to get a better job or start a family or whatever.

Living here, though, I find a lot of things are unavailable to me as a foreigner, which makes my own goals seem distant. For one, I am illiterate. I can enter a bookstore and browse their selection, but I can’t even read the titles. If I buy something, there goes some precious money and there goes even more precious space in my shoebox apartment. All the while, I gain no benefit from the purchase because I lack the skill required to utilize it. Furthermore, there are also various restaurant and store owners who will not serve “Gaijin” (foreigners, esp. those of Western descent) because we cannot read the menus or otherwise communicate. They also anticipate that we will be rude, loud, messy, and sometimes do not want to serve foreigners simply because we are not Japanese. I imagine that those last people account for relatively few of those who have refused me service. Or at least I hope so.

Either way, though, if I invest more time in “training” my Japanese Reading “skill” then, like a game, I will have more areas and resources available to me. If I invest time into buffing up my Japanese Speech “Skill,” then I will have more access to services and I’ll hear about other interesting places and resources I might never know about otherwise. More points in my Teaching “Skill” would mean fewer complaints in my job report, less exhaustion, and hopefully a better recommendation when all is said and done.

Also, very much like the start of an RPG, I am making very little money. Aside from only receiving a little more than what counts for minimum wage in my home state, I have to wait two MONTHS before my first paycheck. Think that’s crazy? Yeah. I do too. We were told something about Japanese laws requiring foreigners to work at a job for a whole month before we receive any payment. Perhaps this is to prevent migrant workers from flitting about and destabilizing the job market? Beats me. I’m just speculating. The real kicker, though, is that my company also has a policy on only paying for the work done the month before, or something along those lines. So, in short, even though I have been working billable hours since March 17th, I won’t get a paycheck until mid May. They did warn us that startup expenses would be steep, but it was not until we were practically on our planes for Japan that we found out it was because we weren’t getting paid. Guess that’s why they were so insistent that we set aside at least $5,000 for when we got here. That’s the money we need for rent, commuting, and food until nearly June. We get reimbursed for transportation costs, luckily enough, but, once again, those don’t come until our paychecks do.  When that first paycheck hits, though, it’s going to feel like a sledgehammer of cash. It won’t be very much, really, but it will feel like a lot.

So these next two months are going to be rather lean. On the bright side, contrary to popular belief, food in Japan is SUPER cheap. I mean, yes, the average pay is lower than in the states and minimum wage is lower, so that drives the prices down, but seriously? A dollar for a box of tofu? A dollar for half a liter of soy sauce? Less than a dollar for a whole daikon radish or a head of cabbage? Wow. That almost offsets the pricy rent and utilities bills.

I’ve also made a little game of finding where I can get the best deals. While exploring the area, I have found a multitude of stores. Some are national chains, some are family owned. There’s even a little grocer not five minutes from my house. Each has different prices for their products, though, so I’ve been keeping tabs and figuring out when I will be in each area for business so that I can buy the cheap goods while there. It’s an efficiency and resource management game! It sounds bland, but it’s entertaining! It also gives me an excuse to wander and fill in those shaded-in parts of my World Map. Again, Fast Travel would be super convenient, but you take what you can get, no? Such wanderings have also earned some interesting local finds!

Yesterday, for example, I went on a run, as usual, but got completely lost for about a half hour. Not so normal, for me. Much like the vast majority of places built before urban planning, my town has a bunch of winding streets that snake through the cluster of hills that it is built on. Aside from getting turned around at every opportunity, I encountered one dead-end after another and then night fell. Again, normally my sense of direction is pretty solid, thanks to years in the Boy Scouts and how I just enjoy this sort of thing, but man does this place look different at night. While trying to find my way back, I noticed some soft pink and red lights floating above the hill before me. Break lights from cars? They weren’t moving though. Shop lights? Kind of spread out. Once I gained the summit, sweating and panting, I looked around, wondering what I had seen. From the top of the road, though, I could detect no hint of the lights and ran on.

Until I caught a glimpse of them as I passed the next street.

I doubled back, peeking my head through a simple stone gateway that marked a small parking lot. Within stood a dozen or so trees, with cars carefully nestled amongst them. Hanging from lines suspended between the branches hovered paper lanterns, lit from within by small electric bulbs. Through the pink and red paper, diffuse, soft colors illuminated the gravel and the leaves, staining everything in rosy hues. Tip-toeing in, I scanned the area, half expecting a cross Japanese local to shout at me for trespassing. I found a stone path and followed it for a few feet before I noticed the house set on the property. Through a frosted window, I could see a sink faucet, sponge, and other domestic objects. Convinced that I had stepped into someone’s yard, I nearly turned around before I realized that the “house” was actually the back of a small temple.

Just a few steps forward and I could see a traditional, Shinto-styled temple. Cherry blossoms fluttered in the branches above me, the occasional petal tumbling down as a breeze shook the boughs. Looking down and following the path, I found the shrine itself standing at the end. The wood was dark with age or artificial staining; smokey in the dimness, with paper talismans hanging from the front entrance’s archway. I stood at the edge of a small courtyard, it seemed, with the shrine at the far end and other structures framing the gravel-covered space, including the building that also served as a house.

Sudden, acute awareness of my foreignness kicked me back to my senses. The terror of accidentally trespassing and the knowledge that I was still lost at night with a dying phone sent me back on my run. I wish I had taken pictures for you guys. Thing is, when I finally gave up and opened Google Maps a few minutes later, the app said I was only seven minutes from my apartment. The shrine could not have been that much farther!

With that in mind, I tried to find it again tonight, hoping to see the lanterns and the cherry blossoms. Problem is, the shrine I found on Google Maps was the wrong one. This temple, far nearer my place, is called Komagata Tenmangu. Again, no idea what that means, but this was a far more foreboding locale. Almost entirely unlit at the top of nearly fifty stairs and guarded by stone hounds, whose pale fangs and wide eyes gleamed in the gloom, I was tempted to turn back right then. It did not help that I was also, once again, surrounded by houses. I did not want to seem a trespasser or look like the clueless foreigner/borderline tourist that I am, so I took a couple quick pictures and went on to try to find my original goal. No luck, I’m afraid. Went wandering around for a good hour, but to no avail.
Returning to my apartment, I opened Google Maps again (thanks to my WiFi!!!) and I think I’ve found the right place, finally. It’s called Shirahata Jinja and it is almost equidistant from my apartment to the furthest I explored tonight. Damn, but it is hard navigating this town at night! I’ll try again tomorrow.

Until I get those pics, though, here’s a little preview of what I’ll write about next week!

In the meantime, I have some studying and other work to do. If I’m going to thrive here, I really need to work on my language proficiency and I also hear other writing projects calling my name. Gotta level up my fiction and other works if I want to make a living as a writer some day soon!
I’ll talk with you all soon. Have a good week!

Song of the Week: “Shell” by NateWantsToBattle is but one song from an entire album inspired by one of the great video game classics: “The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time.” If you enjoy this tune, you might want to check out the rest of his album!

Don't Wake Me

Hey guys! You miss me?

Yeah, it’s been a while. And by “while” I mean almost five years. Because of that time gap, this post is going to run a bit long, since there’s a lot to catch up on.
For those of you who didn’t hear, I kind of quit this blog while at school because the university hired me to write weekly blogs for their honors college! It was a fun job and did enough to air the random junk tossing around my mind that this blog kinda fell to the wayside. Not gonna lie, it felt great to be paid for my writing for the first time ever. Minimum wage, sure, but it still registered as a milestone in my head.

If you’re curious, here’s a link to all of my blog posts from UMass Amherst’s Commonwealth Honors College during my undergraduate career. I had fun writing them and I hope more people have fun reading them! https://www.honors.umass.edu/category/blog-column/taxonomy/term/718

So I guess it’s catchup time. Without writing a novel for you to tackle, here’re some highlights from what you missed:

• That leg injury from Freshman year (remember the ten-foot tall snow dick?) turned out to be a benign tumor that someone FINALLY drilled out of me toward the end of my Junior year. Before that, I spent my college career in and out of a medical boot. Fun… If you want to know what that was like, check out the posts from March 15th 2015, June 5th 2015, and July 15th 2015. But it’s done now and I’m trying to build some muscle back into these chicken legs!

• I studied for a summer at Trinity College in Oxford with some other UMass students! That was weird, fascinating, hilarious, and mesmerizing. Easily one of the best summers of my life. Man but I could probably write a novella on that experience by itself…

• After twenty-one years, a handful of torrid relationships, and countless bum dates, I finally managed to get a stable girlfriend! This one thing that I had wanted so badly ever since middle school finally happened and I was only too glad to spend much of the last two years with this weirdo, nerdy, semi-goth girl. Coincidentally, we started dating only a couple weeks after my surgery and Zuzu had to put up with me hobbling around on crutches and a boot. That kind of patience was a good sign. 
  

• I graduated with dual degrees in English (with a specialization in Creative Writing) and Western Laws & Ethics. The latter is a self-made major with the university’s BDIC program in which I synthesized, history, philosophy, psychology, political science, legal studies, classics, and religious studies. The idea was to better understand why various people and cultures think certain behaviors, actions, etc. are okay and others are verboten, how those cultural sensibilities change, and how we’ve codified them into law. Honestly, a lot more about people makes sense now. That being said, I have NO clue how to apply this knowledge to a career. It was just really fun and interesting while I was doing it.

• I applied to (I shit you not) 178 jobs between Christmas 2017 and November 2018. Despite three internships and other jobs on my resumé, couldn’t even get interviews for more than five. Now THAT’S a bad job market.

• Which brings me to my most recent point: I got a job in Japan and just moved into my new apartment.

So yeah. Big change, right? I’ve been hired as an Assistant Language Teacher (ALT) by a company called Interac. Unfortunately, according to my contract, I can’t give you many more details than that. No talking about the school I’m teaching at, no badmouthing or even criticizing the company (for fear of them seeing that as badmouthing), and absolutely NO mention of the kids I will teach. Apparently Japan is exceedingly strict about privacy, so even mentioning the school’s name on public media while an employee is an offense. Yikes.

That being said, I have yet to begin work there, so there’s nothing to talk about regarding the school or students anyhow! Heck, so far all I know is that I have an hour-long commute into Tokyo to teach in some super ritzy part of town. A middle-class white boy American about to teach a whole bunch of rich kids in a foreign country? What could go wrong?

To be honest, the adjustment has felt like someone introduced me to the wrong side of an angry mule. Even in the months before I flew over here, I wondered time and again if this was the right choice. A friend had gotten into the same program and I thought “Hey! This seems interesting and I’ve wanted to go to Japan ever since I was in elementary school! Let’s do it!” Yet, because I applied to the job that same day, I find myself wondering if I filled the application on a lark. I have had plenty of time since then and the interview to doubt myself and reconsider, yet here I am. Even so, I wonder if it was a mistake. I wonder if being accepted for an interview made me feel obligated on some level to see this through, especially since I could not get a job elsewhere.

Before I even left the United States, I had to do one of the hardest things of my life: Say goodbye to my girlfriend. That experience nearly broke my resolve then and there.

I know that sounds sappy and melodramatic, but it’s true. I have never had a romantic partner actually care for me that much or for that long, nor had I held such feelings for someone else. The pain was comparable to whenever I lost a pet, but worsened by the fact that I chose to do this. I chose to leave and place us on opposite sides of the world. And I don’t even know if I’m ever going to see her again. I am not ashamed to admit that I cried; the night before I left, the night before that, and when we shared our last kiss at the airport. Every time I turned in the security line, I looked to see her watching me, savoring every last chance I had to look at her. Then, one turn later, she was gone.

I spoke as little as I could to security or anyone else as I went to my flight. The last thing I wanted was for everyone in the airport to see me break down in tears. It was everything I could do to keep my emotions in check, but even so I had to dry my face again and again. By the time my plane to Detroit took off, I was more or less recomposed. My throat and chest still ached and I found myself staring at the seat in front of me, but I suppose that’s the best I could have hoped for. I even managed to doze off for a few minutes as dawn crept through the windows.

I awakened when the flight attendants came around. An older man asked what I wanted from the food and drink service, joking that I couldn’t pretend to be asleep anymore. I asked for orange juice and whatever food he was willing to part with, as a joke in turn. He handed over the orange juice and then gave me two of everything. That in itself was a surprise.

“Do you want some vodka to go with that orange juice?” Maybe he asked it as a joke. I don’t know.

I waved him off. “No thanks. I don’t have any cash. I’ve got this rule that I only use cash to buy alcohol, otherwise it’s just imaginary money.”

He laughed. “We can only use cards now anyhow.” He made an exaggerated grimace and pout. “They don’t trust us with cash anymore.”

“Ah, that figures.” I rolled my eyes, running with the joke.

Then he slipped me a nip of vodka.

“Here,” he said. “Have one anyway. Mix it with the orange juice.”

I was stunned and laughed again. “Thanks. It’s a bit early, but I’ll definitely save it for later. Flying to Japan after this.”

“Oh boy. You’ll need this then,” and he handed me another nip. He asked if I had ever been to Japan before, how long I was staying, and mentioned how many people sitting around me were going to Korea. We kept chatting for a few minutes, just like that. Almost every time he came past after that, he took the time to talk to me.

I don’t know why he was so attentive. I had ensured that my tears were dry and my eyes clear before I got on the plane and I was confident that I had not let anything slip. He had no reason to suspect that I’d had a horrible morning. He was just friendly, generous, personable, and that made all the difference. Those little things helped put me back together. For a while, anyhow.

I still feel bad, as I did not get his name and I really had no cash to tip him with. All I managed was to shake his hand on the way off the plane and thank him again for his kindness.

The next flight, by comparison, was rather different. The flight attendant was a real pill of a woman and one of the other attendants was on the verge of shouting at some Japanese passengers to put their luggage away and sit down, as if talking louder and angrily would help bridge the language gap. You’d think that Delta would have put all of the real nice Americans on that flight to leave a better impression.

Their demeanor kind of put a damper on my mood again. Furthermore, about halfway through the flight, I thought “I can’t even understand the Japanese attendant’s announcements! How the heck am I supposed to survive in Japan?!” I was sleep deprived and hungry, both of which compounded my anxiety, regret, sadness, and everything else. Thing is, sleep would not come either.

I tried time and again, but the moment I fell asleep, I dreamt of Zuzu, just to wake crying in mere minutes. I couldn’t help but think of that Skillet song “Don’t Wake Me.”

Don’t wake me,
‘Cause I don’t wanna leave this dream.
Don’t wake me,
‘Cause I never seem to stay asleep enough
When it’s you I’m dreaming of.
I don’t want to wake up.

It hit just a little too close to home.

I wondered just how much I was giving up; whether I’m surrendering a chance to really be happy. I’m wondering too, though, whether Zuzu and I would have stayed together if I had remained in the States. Already, we had been going in different directions. She was still at school, I had graduated, and I was lucky to see her twice a month. The chances of us staying together after I got a job and after her own graduation? Who knows? Maybe this is a pain that I would have had to endure one way or another eventually. Still, it’s going to be much harder, I think, now that I am essentially alone and in a foreign country.

Soon after that thought, I discovered that I could text on the plane. Chatting with Zuzu made everything a lot more bearable, at least until she needed to sleep. Lacking WiFi at my apartment, it is difficult to stay in touch with her, since I have to walk fifteen minutes to the convenience store to mooch off of their network until my landlord gets their act together and restarts my system on April 5th. Time at the convenience store is limited, though, so I have to use it primarily to answer emails and take care of matters for my job and other pressing issues.

I know, I sound like a complete sob story and that I am just wallowing in misery. I mean, yes, it hurts, and this transition period has been nearly devastating (at least to my bank account), but there has been plenty of good too! The company’s training was fun, I’ve met some great people, and it turns out I live almost next door to some coworkers, though I cannot say as I am especially close with them yet.
I guess next week’s post will be more about the transition to Japan itself, training, and various other things. Again, I also promise that future entries will be shorter.

Until then, though, here’s the Song of the Week, just like old times.

This one goes out to you, Zuzu.

“Don’t Wake Me” by Skillet

Night Swimming

    I know, I know. Two week unannounced hiatus. I will admit that part of my lack of blogging is simply sloth and that I haven’t had the motivation or inclination to write it. The other part is that nothing happened two weeks ago and that last week I was in Halifax and otherwise occupied.
    Yep. Halifax. Canada. My parents had decided that they wanted to do a family trip at least once this summer, so we settled on a road trip to the Bay of Fundy. That translates to sight-seeing, with my parents doing the usual touristy thing leaving me doing the usual young adult thing: A whole lot of nothing. I enjoy seeing the sights as much as the next guy, but I’m a more active person. I need to be doing something as well. That’s why I enjoy hiking. You get to head out into beautiful scenery, have some enjoyable physical activity, and then there’s the reward of whatever view you’re hiking to. However, simply walking around one town or another is frustrating to me unless it’s somewhere completely different like Venice. There’s no destination, no purpose, no objective. There’s minimal effort and I find it banal to wander around somewhere and simply “soak in the view.”
    I think I tired of sightseeing and traveling for their own sakes while I was still in Europe. Perhaps if I had a friend around my own age to get into trouble with, it would be different. Maybe. How, I don’t really know. Crossing three states and a Canadian province to simply walk around a town that looks like a quiet, clean version of New Bedford seems inadequate though. I don’t get any particular thrill from simply seeing things. I grew up looking at such pictures online or in magazines or books, so the sight itself is seldom awe inspiring. The journey isn’t much to talk about either, as most of the time you’re staring at miles and miles of tarmac or the airplane seat in front of you.
    So when we occasionally actually did something, I was nearly thrilled for the change. Example: We went to see some sort of strange, balancing rock on Long Island, across from Digby. Instead of driving up to it, my father and I got out of the blasted car and hiked for about a mile to get to it. It was a short hike and an easy one, except for over sixty stairs at the end of the trail. It also went through a lovely forest and involved a little effort to traverse. The rock itself was boring. Even so, I would have gone either way because there was an activity!
    Oddly enough, the object of the trip, to see the eighty-foot tides that the bay is famous for, was addressed last. As we started heading home, we diverted to a place called the Joggins Fossil Cliffs. Some of you may know them as a place that Charles Darwin wrote about in his “The Origin of Species.” Some of you. Not me. I’d never heard of the place beforehand. Haven’t even read all of Darwin’s book. Either way, it’s a cool place. I’m not too clear on the geology involved, but something made the area into a sedimentary rock-based fossil extravaganza. People started pulling up fossils in the 1800s and the place has been under examination and excavation ever since and they STILL haven’t found all of the fossils! There are so many of them that the institute has no need to pick up any more, which left us literally walking on fossils!
    We arrived just before low tide, so once done with our tour, my father and I took a stroll to the water’s edge. At least, that was our intention until we realized that there was about a football field of sticky, slick red mud between us and it. So much for that idea. Still, looking out across a beach that stretched nearly a quarter of a mile from the cliffs to the water, and knowing that it would all fill up again in six hours, was interesting. I only wish that we could have gone far enough to let the surf chase us back. Yeah. It’s supposed to come in that fast. It goes out far enough that there is a “Not Since Moses” fun run at the beginning of August each year that takes you across the ocean floor while the tide’s out.
    Surf race or not, I was glad to get back home. The first thing on the agenda after unpacking was to meet up with some friends and hang out. While that sounds like inactivity, we had an objective: To enjoy each other’s company, enjoy the night around us, and to watch the ocean and relax. I suppose that enjoying each other’s presence might have been what my parents, or at least my mother, had in mind for the trip. However, for someone my age, that sort of thing’s value becomes voided since you’ve been living with that person for twenty years. Friends, on the other hand, are hard to meet with especially when you’re at college. It’s a rare treat. To make it even better, at this age, there’s more room for spontaneity when you’re with friends, also known as stupidity. That evening, for the first time in all the sixteen years that I’ve lived in this town, I went night swimming. It was unplanned for, so I swam in my boxers. It was also cold, the bottom rough, and shallow. And it was amazing. Even when I later found that I’d cut up my foot on something, I thought it was totally worth it.
    This is the sort of thing that I’ve been looking for. Even though Marion is boring in general, I like to be around people who can make it seem new, or do something fun with it. I like the flexibility of being with friends; the power to do as we please at the drop of a hat and be ourselves. No matter what sort of relationship you have with your parents, you can’t really be yourself around them. There’s always some sort of expectation, some barrier either your family or society has set. It’s only taken me a long time to see just who is crazy and fun to be like that with. Those are the people I need to look for and the people I need to see more before the summer ends.
Oh God. The summer’s ending.
Shit.


Song of the Week: This happens to be my father’s favorite song by R.E.M. I hope you enjoy it as much as we do!

Nature of the Beast

    At the moment, I’m feeling pretty good! I kind of want to do a little dance and I’ve got a stupid grin plastered to my face while I giggle like a little kid. I’m not even feeling great for any particularly spectacular reason either. It’s just that a few minutes ago I finished writing the rough draft for the thirty-second chapter in my novel and I looked outside to find that, by the gods, it was still light out! That never happens! I mean, I’m usually happy as a dog with a stick when I finish a chapter, but I also usually finish some time between midnight and 2 AM. By then I’m too tired to do the happy dance. Right now the only thing keeping me from turning on Fall Out Boy or N’SYNC and then barreling ahead to write the next chapter is that I remembered that it’s Friday and that this blog thingy-ma-bobber still needed to be done.
    I’ve only written rough drafts so far and I still have holes in the plot’s outline that I need to fill, yet that doesn’t stop this sort of thing from feeling good. Maybe that’s the mark of finding something that you love: Spending hours on a project with no promise of reward and then being suddenly and irrationally happy once you finish part of it. It’s either that or the simple fact that you can get lost in something for hours on end without really noticing, aside from the sporadic elation when you start work on your favorite parts of the process. Perhaps it’s both. Perhaps it’s different for everyone. I don’t know. Actually, for any of you people out there with something you’re passionate about, I’d like to know how you feel when you’re involved with whatever it is, or at least how you know that you’re passionate about it. Mike Bliss, I’m looking at you. The robot in me still finds emotions a bit confusing and I’m trying to figure some of them out.
    On another note, I NEED something to be happy about because I found out that
A) My university tuition now needs to be payed (over $20,000 a year for a STATE school?!),
B) Over these past few months, when I haven’t been able to work out too much, I’ve lost about seven pounds of muscle, and
C) I’m apparently being referred to a trauma surgeon for my leg injury.
    A freakin’ trauma surgeon?! Come on! That’s a bit excessive, isn’t it? I mean, yeah, my leg still hurts some after six months and I hesitate to do anything with it, but this guy’s used to dealing with people sporting open chest wounds! The simple fact that I’ll be walking into his office is embarrassing! I can’t tell whether that or the inevitable price of the visit is worse. Having universal healthcare like every other developed nation in the world would be mighty nice right now! Bloody insurance company lobbyists. That’s one of the first things I’m going to fix when I become Supreme God-King of the World.
    Other than that, I haven’t too much to report. Treating writing a book like a regular job means that I don’t get out much and little happens to me aside from what goes on in my own head. While that can be pretty bizarre and exciting for me, it’s not something you tend to talk about. Then again, this is a nowhere town near Cape Cod. Even when I had my usual summer job nothing happened. Nature of the beast I guess.
    Anyhow, I’m going back to thinking about elves and fairies and medieval amputations! Have a good week everybody!

Song of the Week: I’m going to pretend that this song can apply to something, rather than just someone. Okay, it’s actually just been going through my head all day, you happy now?

Strike The Battle Flag!

    I love freedom of speech. I can get really irritated with the concept sometimes when I listen to the poisonous propaganda that oozes out of FOX News, yet as a whole I adore it. Aside from the moral implications of allowing a population to speak its mind and say whatever it pleases, whether the government likes it or not, wonderful things arise from the practice. I don’t know about you guys, but I rather like having comedians, novelists, singers, and artists who can express their souls and opinions without worrying about someone calling “Off with their head!” We get some fantastic stuff aside from Saturday Night Live and The Daily Show, like what happened today when South Carolina took down their Confederate Battle Flag from in front of their state capital building.
    I’ve attached a video of the event below and it is beautiful. Rather than the ravenous boos and “Southern rights” tripe that I expected, the spectators were cheering for the entire time, chanting “U.S.A.! U.S.A.!” and waving the stars and stripes. Around 3:50 in the clip, you can even hear everyone singing “Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye!” It sounded like the crowd at a football game, which I suppose is a bit demeaning to the hardcore southerners there and I am just fine with that. Perhaps it was a bit petty and perhaps it will galvanize some extremists against the north or rational people in general, but it was not overtly vicious or terribly gloating.
    The beautiful thing about free speech is that, when people have the chance to say whatever they please, they will do so. Sometimes that means that vile words will be spoken. However, I have found that people as a whole recognize and revile truly harmful public agendas. The more that a corrosive message circulates, the more people it could potentially recruit. More importantly, it also reaches moderate and rational ears. Word then spreads from their lips, explaining why the message is harmful and disgusting. What tends to happen I’ve noticed is that the message holds sway for a while, longer if the bias and bigotry that it is founded on is deeply ingrained and widespread, and then it looses clout because its adherents friends and descendants notice how poisonous it is and shy away from it. In short, the more public a harmful message is, the less harm it tends to do in the long run as opposed to the ones that are whispered behind closed doors in only sympathetic ears. Of course there are exceptions like the Nazi party where a poisonous public message takes serious root. Luckily those are few and far between
    For those of you that know me, you know that I’m not a terribly optimistic guy. I opt for realism in every situation and realism can look pretty bleak and similar to pessimism. However, instances like this one in South Carolina make even realism look good.

Song of the Week: You could call the spectators’ singing the song of the week, but here’s my own little contribution.

Failure to Launch

    Okay, I’m sorry everyone, but I’ve been raking my brain for an hour trying to figure out a topic for this week and nothing’s coming to mind. All I can seem to think about are the books I’ve been reading (The Dresden Files and The Wheel of Time series) and my own writing, which I intend to resume presently. I don’t know if my brain is misfiring or if there’s just nothing for me to say this week. Sorry for that!


Song of the Week(?): This is one I was jamming to when I finished “Small Favor” by Jim Butcher today and I can’t get it out of my head. It’s a good one, though, so I don’t mind and hopefully you won’t either. Just, for the love of God, skip the first 15 seconds or so. They're horrible and will ruin the whole song for you if you do not heed my warning. Actually, you can skip the whole first minute.