Journal lingqi's Journal: October 23: 2 minutes late, 30minutes late? 2
October 23, 2002 (9:37AM):
Heh... I was 2 minutes late to the train station, but 30 miuntes late for work. (well - not late technically, but 30 minutes later than what I hoped for -- which would make breakfast time) The moral of the story is -- never, ever let that train you were supposed to be on get away.
Here is the breakdown of the train / bus schedule numerology:
Gyoda -> Kumagaya (~5min) train leaves at 7:04, 7:19,
Kumagaya -> Hanyu (~21min) train leaves at 7:20, 7:37,
Hanyu -> Kawamata (~4min) train leaves at 7:46, 8:14,
kawamata -> company (~20min) bus leaves at 7:52, 8:20,
ideally - I hop on the train at 7:04, get to the company at 8:10 or so, get breakfast, take a nap, etc. however, since the 7:04 train left about a minute before I got to the station, I arrived at about 8:40; literally a two minute delay costed me the most important meal of the day. (I had no choice but to substitude breakfast with an ice-cream sandwich - 105 yen, if anyone is interested)
Anyway -- this brings to an important point (or not so important, but I personally find amusing) -- the case of running. Before I always told myself: that is so silly that all these people run around in train stations chasing after trains that will come again in two minutes anyway... except that, well -- okay, background story first:
Takasaki line runs between Takasaki (sometimes not so far, though) and Ueno most of the time. However, every once in a while (two, three times a day out of 50) it would instead go to shinjuku instead. So... if you wanted to go to shinjuku, you have two options. the first is to take the special takasaki line all the way to shinjuku, or you can change train at either omiya or akabane. The difference is, though (beside the change train and wait part) -- when you change trains, between omiya / akabane to shinjuku the train (usually saikyo line) runs local, while the special takasaki line runs express all the way from omiya forward (only three stops to shinjuku). So if you are lucky to catch that train, you will save yourself a lot of trouble and maybe shave off 1/2 hour or so.
anyway -- back to the story -- So I got into the station, wanted to goto shinjuku, and the saw on the board that it (the specail shinjuku bound train) is departing in about 30 seconds. in the blink of an eye -- I dropped all my principles about not ever running to catch trains (self inflicted, but princeples nontheless) and ran like the wind (actually, more like a crippled piglet, but we will leave out the details).
And I missed the train.
Now -- if I had not dropped the principles, I would still have my dignity and principles intact. but now I have nothing. the moral of the story is, (in a convoluted way) -- don't ever let go of your principles, otherwise you will end up with nothing (not even the thing you wanted to trade your principles for -- like catching the train, in my case). heh... never knew a train station can hold so many wisdom, eh?
some elaborations on the gas systems in Japan. there is the "toshi" gas (city gas), and the "LP" gas; this I already mentioned. I found out that toshi gas is your regular, run in a pipe gas (pretty much what everybody thinks of when they think "gas"). LP gas apparently is sort of a building wide propane (not sure if it's really propane, but bear with me here) system. outside the building (maybe in, not sure) there are large gas tanks (that, I assume, are green and looks like Oxygen tanks you see trucks carry, every once so often) that are replaced once every couple monthes. Apparently this system is quite common here in Japan in the not-so-urbanized areas. Considering that the place I live in is not exactly rural, I am surprised that I have to put up with this, but well, whatever...
I also found out that I may be able to return the stove to get an LP model. the sad thing is that since I got this at shinjuku (to recieve a 10% discount -- about 1000 yen), I have to bring it back for the exchange (if they will do it, even). Train ride to shinjuku and back costs 2220 yen. you figure it out.
Yesterday I also filled out some forms for automatic deduction of payments for utilities. In Japan, since you don't ever use personal cheques, paying utilites bill is either 1) (I hear) go to the post office and pay it via some kind of money-order, or 2) have them automatically debit your bank account. I chose the latter to save trouble (and stamp money). All of the forms follow a similar layout, with some major fields you fill in
1) utility user's name and address
2) paying person's name and address
3) paying person's bank name, account number, kind of account, etc
4) utility account number
5) places to put stamp (seal / inkan / hanko / bloody fingerprint / etc)
there might be other stuff, like who (between the utility user vs the paying dude) recieves the reciept, etc, but the above are important ones, me thinks
So now you know.
I also did a form to buy insurance for my apartment. more-or-less a "renter's insurance" I am assuming similar to that of the US counterparts. I can select plan between 5500 yen / year (10 million yen coverage) to 40,000 yen / year (100 million yen coverage?) I got a 7000 yen plan -- I think it's actually cheaper than the US version (10 dollar / month or so?)
Several cultral notes, randomly put together:
1) in a car, there are "levels" of seats, the one behind the driver is the best, then the other rear-seat, finally the front passenger seat is considered worst. (in fact, i see it written as "suicide seat" sometimes -- not sure why) -- so, when people offer you the "behind the driver" seat, appreciate.
2) the proper way to sit on a tatami mat is to sit with your legs under you (e.g. sit on your feet -- from standing (legs together) first kneel, now sit down from kneeling position) you can point your feet to eachother to make it *slightly* more comfortable. anyway -- the casual way to sit for a guy is to put both legs in front (the budda position), and females have the opportunity to put both legs on one side (which is by far the most comfortable position) -- but sorry guys, can't do it unless you want to look sissy.
3) bath tubs: always make sure you are *clean* before you go into the bathtub for soaking. in fact, don't use any soap / shampoo / whatever in the tub -- because the water is used for the whole family -- and THEN for washing clothes the next morning. in fact my washer came with this long hose specifically for sucking water from the tub for this purpose. it's just for the first cycle only -- so your clothes still come out clean.
final little note on the washer -- washers only have cold water connections here (as far as i could see -- so using the "suck bathwater" is probabbly the only way you can get to wash your clothes in hot (warm, actually) water. I am considering doing that because of this.
I am going to take some time to answer some comments:
1) about the (real time) water-heater being technologically backwards and unfitting to the advanced image of Japan:
not really... I think they have it more because of lack of space rather than the lack of technology. In fact probabbly what they lack in space / convenience they make up in technological convenience. I can arrange for the water heater to fill up the tub at a certain time of the day, at this many litres, at this many degrees, and keep-warm at such and such temperature. all of these are adjustable. the ceiling fan can be timed, and does a myriad of heating (for drying clothes?) / cooling / air circulation and other functions I have yet to fully understand... For the particular lifestyle, they definitely got it figured out pretty well on how to make the best of it.
2) Costco and the american image:
Costco definitely tries to retain the "sameness" as the US. do they succeed really depends on how you want to judge... the layout is almost exactly the same; the feel (when you walk around) is almost exactly the same as well. The products obviously differ in some ways -- for example, there would never be rice crackers in a US costco; nonetheless, if they intended to make the patron feel the same way as the US, I personally think they did a good job. every now and then while I walk through the isles between the gallon jugs of mayonnaise and 250-roll stacks of bathroom tissue, I forget that here it is actually Japan.
3) can you survive in Japan without knowing any japanese?
I think it depends so much on many factors, you can never really say. some major ones include
*) languages you speak
*) where you live (in japan)
*) what you do for a living
*) where you buy your stuff
*) do you know capable bilingual people (who are you friends)
I think it's probabbly much easier if you are chinese / korean than, say, if you were from Kenya or something. -- There are huge chinese groups (organized crime groups thrive in shinjuku, in fact) and koreans are a dime a dozen as well. I hear that there is a chinatown in yokohama (and for all the china-towns i've seen, there are people there who only spoke chinese) -- and roppongi (spelling?) caters to english speaking forigners. Most hotels / restaurants in toyko are good about the speaking english part too. almost all the shops in akihabara speaks chinese (as far as i remembered)
Finding somebody who speaks english (or chinese) in, say, kumagaya, is not so easy however.
and then it had a lot to do with what you do for a living, and if that requires japanese. e.g. does your co-workers speak your language? do you need to talk to them / answer the phone / write emails in japanese?
and so forth.
I can, of course, use myself as a case-study. most of my co-workers know english quite well (we support overseas operations, and knowing english is an requirement) -- and the only other time i might need to use japanese is shopping and the such. IF i do all my shopping in costco, i can get by without japanese too (in fact, you can anyway anywhere -- just hand over money and point to what you want to buy). I am willing to bet that without seriously trying to learn japanese, I can spend the whole two years here and go home no better than when I came (which is a great fear of mine, considering that my english is already degrading).
but of course, while you can "survive" in japan without an ounce of japanese -- it's probabbly not a good idea anyhow -- i mean, it rates right up there along with "self mutilation" -- why would you want to lead such a harsh life -- instead of just learning some japanese?
oh yeah... last thing. comments are cool. i left it on so that hopefully whoever reads this can point out future pitfalls i may encounter (as much fun as they are -- i think i can do without some of them), and whatever else worthwhile you might have in mind. but it's here for the world to see, though... so keep that in mind before getting too carried away.
Paying bills and running to trains (Score:2)
It may depend on where you live, but you should be able to get utilities to send you bills you can pay at your local convenience store. I personally prefer this method, since I can verify what I'm paying before I pay it--last time I moved, my old gas company neglected to cancel the automatic debit on my account and I had to go through about three phone calls back and forth to get my money (about 5000 yen) back.
As for running to trains, once you get familiar with a particular station/route you get a sense of how long it takes you to run how far. I personally try to time things so I don't need to run, but when I do run I make the train about 70% of the time.
Use Jorudan, signs, language (Score:1)
Have you tried using Jorudan's train station search page [jorudan.co.jp]? It calculates for you how to get from one station to the other, with different criteria such as cheapest, fastest, easiest. I use it all the time for my longer trips.
achurch is right about the bill paying. You don't have to read that much japanese, just look for the friendly convenience store icons such as 7-11, family mart, lawson's, etc.
Also about language. Use every opportunity to speak/read/write/think Japanese. If you need to network with other expatriates to get your creature comforts, that's all well and good, but...
piyo