Crazy Week

By Crazy Week, i mean my pay day and today...

the bank that i have for payroll right now is so retarded that they charge u service fee if u use their ATM after 6pm... in order not to pay that stupid fee, i opened an account with another bank with which i can withdraw from ANY ATM in the WORLD without charges... and this past wednesday was my first pay day... therefore, i went to withdraw most of the cash from my stupid old account at 5:50pm... carried a load of cash and walked over to a 7-Eleven to deposit that load of cash intot the ATM there... it was fun to withdraw that much cash at one time, especially the counting part to make sure the ATM spat out the right amount...

as for today, it's our japanese presentation day... the 5 of us in the beginner class had to write an essay (in english) to talk about our life so far in japan and our teachers translated the essays for us to japanese... and today is the day to present such translated essay to our future co-workers and boss... at first, we were asked to memorize the whole speech... but it wasn't working out as the speech was only a much of random syllables that we could barely understand... so we all ended up reading from a piece of paper, and the main thing we spent most time practicing was pronounciation and intonation... anyway, it went well... everyone was happy... the first part of japanese lessons are over... after that, the guys living in nakahara made a trip here to Fuchu to join our Chesnut Festival here... the festival started at 9am and ended at 9pm... those guys showed up at the fuchu station at 8:40pm... awesome... by the time we got to the shrine... the festival was over... but the good thing was the food stalls were still open... so we basically walked around and ate along each stalls... i guess that's more fun than going to the actual festival... at least for us hungry foreigners... after eating, some of the guys wanted more booze... so we went to a supermarket and they got more juice and japanese souchu... they were mixing drinks right in front of the exit of the supermarket and some random japanese guys joined us and said "Ganpai" to us... well... this is a crazy country that i am in

Another Long Weekend

this long weekend is not as eventful as last one... last long weekend: 鎌倉 to visit the beach, temples and shrines... 横浜中華街 to have all-you-can-eat dim sum... costco (yes, they have costco here, and the layout is exactly the same) to buy groceries and eat cheap hotdogs...

as for this long weekend, we had all-you-can-eat pizza and pasta on friday at 渋谷... the train ride back home is the craziest i have ever had... the train was so packed that i could barely move... and what made it worse is everyone next to u was sweating (and for some unknown reason, they were all guys)... yesterday, i was supposed to go 栃木県日光市 with Herbert and Matt's... but i didn't feel very well yesterday, so i decided to pass... instead, i went to get my 外人カード (foreigner ID card), got a hair cut (not too bad given the guy could understand my broken japanese... but i will go to 渋谷 next time since they have english-speaking stylists there and it's not that much more expensive)... today, i just walked around 府中... i was quite tempted to buy the 12,000円 mini bean bag at muji... but decided to save the $$$ to buy digital camera later instead... nonetheless, still picked up some folders from there... on the way home, went to a supermarket to see if they had cheap stuff that i might need... in order to compensate myself for not getting the bean bag, i got a discounted L-shaped (to support your back) cushion for only 1,000円... what a bargain... hahaha

My New Toy

a cell phone which i can watch TV on (for free)... i can also go online to check my gmail, train schedule, train route, news, weather etc

My Co-workers (my fellow Japanese class classmates to be exact)

Most of them are freaking alcoholic...

Most of them (including myself) are freaking 食べ放題-holic... all-you-can-eat Korean BBQ twice, all-you-can-eat dim sum once... basically, we are having 食べ放題 every week... that's how you get full in this country...

A Little Update on My Life in Japan

OK.

8/30, Thu: I took the 10:30 from Hong Kong to Narita. Got to Japan at around 16:00. Got on the bus to Tachikawa at 17:00. Reached Tachikawa at 19:20. Took a taxi (with a Japanese HR) and reached my dorm at Fuchu at 20:00. Met my roommate who is a Japanese. Met the other 2 hires from US, Nit and Herbert. They both went to Berkeley. Went to a supermarket to get some food drinka dn daily necessities.

8/31, Fri: Went out at 09:00 to go to the city office to apply for an Alien Registration Card with HR. Walked around Fuchu. Took a 1 hour train ride to Akiruno office (the place that I will start working in November, and yes, it's going to take an hour from my home to office). Had lunch there. Met my boss, Anbutsu-san. Went back to Fuchu and walked around. Bought sushi from supermarket for dinner and went home.

9/1, Sat: Got up at 10:00 and did nothing really important. Went out the an electronic store in the afternoon with Herbert to look for digital camera and wireless (we were thinking about sharing internet). Decided to go to Akihabara on Sunday to buy those stuff. Went out to dinner with Nit, Herbert, Ben and Lon (Ben is from Shanghai and Lon is from Vietnam, they have been working at Fujitsu for a few years. They don't speak much English, but their Japanese is really good.). Went to a food court kind of thing, but they actually had people to serve you. After dinner, went to see Ben room and seriously considering getting a TV.

9/2, Sun: Went out at 10:30 to go to Akihabara with Herbert. Nit was supposed to come but he couldn't get up. Reached Akihabara at around 12:00. Met Matt (the other US hire and he also went to Stanford) there. Looked for lunch and found a Greek/Turkish food stand. Got a really crappy gyros and lemonade. Walked around to look for digital camera. Couldn't find the store Herbert found on the internet. Gaurav showed up (an Indian guy who was hired last year). Gaurav showed us around and found the digital camera store. Herbert got his digital camera. Went to a couple different stores. Was thinking about going to a Maid Cafe, but the line was too long and no picture was allowed at that place. Went to Shibuya to meet up with Mattew (Harvard graduate hired 2 years ago). Had all-you-can-eat Korean BBQ, we also got the all-you-can-drink option. Ordered a lot of meat. While the others were trying out their alcohol menu, I went crazy with different kinds of juices and soda. They were not water-down like those in Hong Kong. I actually saw them pouring the juice out from cartons and bottles. While I thought we were going home after dinner, Gaurav and Matthew suggested going to a bar. Another round of drinking after ALL-YOU-CAN-DRINK. Some of them probably got drunk and started talking to Japanese girls at other tables. Most of the girls got scared and immediately said they got bfs. After that, they were saying stories like a lot of foreigners don't buy train tickets in Japan and they just jump over the gates. Basically foreigners (Caucasians) can get away from a lot of things.

9/3, Mon: Officially first day of work. Got to office at 08:30 and met James (another hire from Stanford) and George (another hire from Berkeley, so basically, we have 3 hires from Stanford and 3 hires from Berkley this year. How interesting!). Had a contract session with HR in the morning. Had lunch at the company cafeteria. (There are actually 3 cafeterias at the Kawasaki office. We don't pay right away when we get our food. We simply swipe our emploee ID and the amounts will be deducted from next month's salary.) The food is pretty cheap and cost around Yen300 - Yen500. Went to Kawasaki city office with James and George and Russian HR Eugene cuz James and George needed to get their alien registration card. After that, we went to Mizuho Bank to open bank account. Mizuho gave me a box of tissue as souvenir. Went back to office. Met another new foreigner, Kenny. He was hired to play American Football for Fujitsu. We all went to a sushi place for dinner.

9/4, Tue: First day of Japanese lessons. I am in the beginners' class and we have James, George, Matt Kenny and me. In the morning we had Hatta sensei and she is responsible for teaching us grammar. In the afternoon, we had Sato sensei and he is responsible for business language. Sato is pretty bad in English and a lot of us didn't know what he was trying to say. So we just kept saying "Hai" (which means Yes) whenever he asked us questions. Went to the gym in Fuchu with Nit and Herbert after work. BTW, I will be having Japnese lessons for the first 2 months and getting paid. How nice is that!!!

9/5, Wed: Forgot today's teachers' names. Anyway, today's morning lesson was on Japanese geography. We learned the name of Japnese prefectures (States/Provinces) and big cities. Afternoon's lesson was on conversation. We learned how to buy stuff at a department store. HAHA. Had dinner with Herbert at a Gyoza restaurant.