And I'm the butt. Still, ( 勘弁してくれよ! )

That will be all.

music: cat power - naked, if i want to tags: character building, subterranean fastness

This is not pretty.

( Flashback: 1.5 weeks ago. ) I start carrying my phone with me at all times, sleeping with it in my bed.

( Interlude. )

( Fast forward to tonight. )

( Oh, but it gets *BETTER*. ) Awesome.

ETA: So the whole time I was talking to Drainpipe Feud Lady and Kul and his wife? Massive gobs of Clearasil all over my face. It doesn't get any sweeter.

That will be fucking all.

music: lab 4 - the witch tags: asshattery, character building, subterranean fastness

( ...Drumroll, please... )

That will be all.

music: ghostland observatory - piano man tags: character building, rants, subterranean fastness

( MOUSE! )

That will be all.

tags: character building, subterranean fastness

There are some days when I just really need Japanese. "Because a suitable apartment^* was not located in time, it has been decided that I will stay with my aunt and uncle." There. Nice and to the point, and best of all, with no blame apportioned to anyone in particular.

I just got off the phone with said aunt and uncle, who are being very helpful and hospitable about the whole thing. Only problem is, while they're family, they aren't intimate family, and I feel very awkward imposing (because I don't feel I know them well enough to justify the intrusion on their lives). I was trying to explain this to my aunt, and to thank her for the help, because I am genuinely grateful. Only problem is, I could not for the life of me get the damn words out in English. Oh, I had plenty I wanted to say: 本当に助かる and お世話になる and 伯母さんに迷惑かけりたくないのに, even freakin' 恩に着る was ready to role of the tip off my tongue, but nothing useful was about to make its way out of my mouth. Which left me "Um.."ing and "Erm..."ing into the phone, sounding like an inarticulate idiot.

Not the kind of person you'd want to be 邪魔しますing your house, right?

Guh. I am not today's winner.

That will be all.

^*I would have been fine with HOOD FABULOUS PROJECT LIVING, but since mes parents are the ones cosigning on the lease, that option did not remain on the table for long.

tags: character building, grad school

( Oh, you laugh *now...* )

Anyway, I'll get around to posting the normal TWIBs and checking regularly as soon as I get my current assignment done.

That will be all.

tags: character building

( Dear AJK... )

Now I'm feeling really guilty for not going with GWU. They like me! They really like me! AU better send me to Ritsumeikan now, or suckas is gonna hurt.

That will be all.

tags: character building, grad school

( Drat )

( Bother )

( EEK )

That will be all.

tags: character building, grad school

...in the form of online graduate school applications. I had completed all the questions, uploaded my CV, statements of purpose, supplemental essays, recommenders, everything they asked of me, months ago.

So dear lord above, why did it take approximately 3.5 hours to submit them? That's 70 minutes per application. My brain is so fried I haven't even realized I'm free to relax now.

Egads.

That will be all.

tags: character building, grad school

...in the form of the Graduate Records Examination.

Got my highest quantitative score to date (which is good, because my scores on all the practice tests sucked) at the expense of having to guess my way through eleven questions in seven minutes and not being able to even finish them.

This left me rattled for the verbal, where I scored 100 fewer points than I'd done on any of the practice tests, and which has left me sour because I should have damn well been in the 99th percentile and am not, thanks to my test anxiety.

I think the writing when pretty well. Anyway, it's a huge weight off of my chest, and what better way to celebrate than obsessively updating my LibraryThing for 1.5 hours tonight.

That will be all.

tags: character building, grad school

...that The King's Man (aka King and the Clown) is being released in a country whose language I comprehend (Japan), now, when I am not in that country and thus can neither see it on the big screen, nor partake in the inevitably massive merchandising/media frenzy that is undoubtably accompaning it.

The other abiding irony is the dratted Border's Rewards coupons. I am able to go Sit With The Books once a week. I would happily exercise my option to purchase the books were I able to get to the bookstore at any time between Thursday and Sunday, when the Rewards coupons are valid. Alas, this is not within the realm of possibility. You may therefore imagine my happiness when, upon checking my email this morning, I discovered a 40% rewards coupon in the inbox...for tomorrow. >.<

And for the final irony, I've got everything in order for my applications, except for the dreaded professor's recommendation. I really do not see how grad schools can, with apparently no intended irony on their parts, state that they favor applicants with strong career experience while simultaneously requiring at least one letter of recommendation from a former professor. I doubt very many people keep in close contact with their former profs while building up that impressive employment history. Again, >.<

That will be all.

tags: books, character building, movies

Let me start by saying that a certain widely popular travel guide franchise desperately needs to update its Laos title. Given their description, I'd expected net connectivity here to consist of someone on a rotary telephone dictating zeros and ones to me, yet here I am on broadband connection that's faster than the ones I used in Thailand. For shame, Lonely Planet!

Yesterday was truly surreal. Went to sleep at about two o'clock to the sounds of the roosters crowing in the powerlines (yes, they can apparently get up there. Who knew?) after a futile attempt to figure out whether or not the airport would be open tomorrow.

Ironically, it was the foreign population of Bangkok who knew about the coup first, given the fact that we all tend to be up at midnight. My driver to the airport (who I'd hired the day before), was pretty stunned--he hadn't found out till he'd woken up and got out onto the streets.

Which were pretty much deserted--pretty unnerving when you're used to the insane round the clock bustle of Bangkok. Had a really charming conversation with him about how to say 'coup' in English, and the meaning of the word. (He thought, for instance, that d'etat was some sort of abbreviation of demonstration, and wanted to know what the "etat" meant.)

Of course, had to drive right past--or rather, around--all the avenues blocked off by soldiers and tanks. The soldiers actually looked quite festive (disregarding the automatic weapons), as they were decked out in jasmine garlands and yellow ribbons and carnations (the colors of the Thai royalty).

"Take pictures, take pictures!" gleeful Mr. Driver kept urging me; I however, felt that photographing tanks from the back of a taxi during the early stages of a coup might not be such a great idea. I did get a quick shot of a couple of grunts standing on a street corner, though.

Seeing that that tack had failed, Mr. Driver then rolled down the window so that I could shake hands with the soldiers. I chickend out and settled for waving.

Anyway, that was the fun bit. The not so fun bit was the part that every bank and business was (understandably) closed, which meant that I could neither eat breakfast nor exchange money.

Am a bit worried about the fact that the military dude apparently heading the coup says that democracy won't be established for a year, as I've got some more time in Bangkok before flying to Korea. Who knows? I may just end up stranded in Laos with it's vastly superior Internet connections.

That will be all.

tags: character building, laos, thailand, travel

That's French for ( HOLY FUCK! )

I attempted to call the U.S. Embassy and ask for advice, and was put on hold for so long that my money ran out. I then decided to head to ye olde Internet cafe to see what the Embassy website has to say about the situation. Which is...nothing, although they've got several useless links to the shit bush has spewn from his mouth recently. Way to lose at life, embassy.

Thus I find myself refreshing the NYTimes homepage and reading what the Japanese news media has to say about the situation over the shoulder of the woman next to me.

All I can say is, I better get out of here tomorrow, because I don't have enough money to buy another $1,100 ticket back home.

That will be all.

PS: I should have known something was up when I stopped into the Tourist Information Bureau this evening and found it full of police in full riot gear. Unfortunately, I've spent too much time in South Korea.

location: bangkok, thailand tags: character building, thailand, travel, wtf

Fucking unbelievable. FUCKING UNBELIEVABLE

( ABSO-FUCKING-LUTELY UNBELIEVABLE )

I mean, seriously, what are the odds?

That will be all.

PS: I still have to access lj through proxy servers, and I can't read the flist at all.

location: changwon, korea mood: shocked and awed tags: asshattery, character building, korea

Marched my butt up to the Vietnamese embassy today to get my visa sorted. The hostel map was completely useless in the manner of most hostel maps. While I did manage to find the correct street on my first run, I also walked right past the embassy and back down the other side of the mountain on which it's situated. Oops.

Interesting thing--the Japanese cultural center here is guarded by five armed cops, but there aren't even any watchmen outside of the Vietnamese embassy. Its sign is also small and inconspicuous; about the size of a dinner plate. The embassy itself is not much bigger; it could easily fit into an American construction site trailer, and packs about the equivalent in creature comforts. I handed my passport to the harried dude behind the desk and was told to come back an hour later for the visa.

I arrived to find the harried dude even more harried, and to discover that my visa, far from being finished, hadn't even been processed yet. I was told to wait another fifteen minutes (which became an hour), thus causing me to miss my tour of a nearby palace. Oh well.

When I finally did receive the visa, I realised that it was for the wrong dates, in fact, it expired on the day I was due to enter the country. So back to the beginning went I. Meanwhile, I paid Mr. Harried, who then began to bitch in a sort of resigned fashion about the fact that I gave him two coins. "I know money is money," he said, "but coins!" thus making him the first person in the history of my life who has ever bitched at me for giving them correct change while they were horrendously overworked.

From there, on to Insadong--the "traditional Korean crafts and art gallery area of Seoul" where "traditional Korean crafts area" is apparently synonymous with "made in China but sold for 3-5 times more than it is there." Literally, it was the exact same stuff I'd passed over at the Silk Market in Beijing. Did find one place selling awesome bal though. I just have to decide if I want to pay the equivalent of $300 US for the one that I really like. Will probably check out the actual folk art superstores tomorrow to see if I can't find any others.

Wrapped up by stumbling onto the main temple of Korea's largest Buddhist sect in time for a service, which I recorded with my mp3 player and then probably accidentally recorded over. Still, it was an amazing experience.

That will be all.

location: anguk, south korea tags: character building, korea, travel

( And be done with it. )

ETA: In the space of time it has taken me to decide to go to city hall and see if it isn't there, I have managed to lose my house and car keys. Killing my self would be magnitudes less complicated than moving out of this hellhole. (Pre-emptive anti-drama disclaimer: I am not seriously considering killing myself. Just saying that it would be way easier than this.)

That will be all.

mood: violent tags: character building

The shipping people came this morning, took one look at my boxes, laughed, and refused to take them. It seems good ol' Economove Japan doesn't actually carry clients' cargo from door to port; they hire a subcontractor to take it to the port for them. The subcontractor Economove hired for my cargo didn't even have a big enough van to hold the boxes, let alone worry about whether or not they were too heavy (they were; the contractor also laughed at me when I showed him the Economove documents stating that each carton could weigh up to 80 kg).

To make a long story short, after a massive back-and-forth involving myself, my supervisor, his 部下, the director of the international center and his 部下 (as well as the Economove Tokyo head office and the head office of the subcontracted moving company) I'm getting a third carton tomorrow, which I will fill with boxes from the original two cartons to make all three cartons less heavy. This means that I will be leaving my apartment a day later than planned, which means my supervisor must call the landlord to let him know, as well as the utilities companies in order to make sure that I can use electricity and the toilet.

I managed to lose my national insurance book in the ensuing upheavel, score one for me.

Man, my last two days in the city and I leave everyone with the impression that I'm a complete tool. Somebody shoot me.

That will be all.

mood: exhausted tags: asshattery, character building, japan

Yesterday I got my butt out of bed at the crack of dawn and headed down the licensing bureau.

( Read more... )

I was finished with this by 8:40. Then I sat down. Japan is not big on air conditioning, but this place was cooled like a meat locker. I was wearing a suit and I had goose bumps. I actually put my raincoat on to keep warm.

The other foreigners I'd queued up with were finished by 10:00 at the latest. I wasn't called again until 11:30. ( What exactly had taken so long?  )

( And then came the whopper. )

The woman sent me back to the waiting area. I gunned down two PET bottles out of sheer nervousness and frustration. Meanwhile, over fifty Japanese test takers got their results back; most of them seemed to have passed.

Finally, I was called back to the front. They'd taken pity on me and decided to let me take the paper test. Eureka!

I went upstairs for the test, which took all of three minutes and seemed to test more for basic brain function than knowledge of road rules. (Sample question out of ten: Is it okay to take sleeping pills before driving if they won't affect my performance?)

I passed, then it was on to the eye test and then to sign up for driving school.

So, the damage please:

Transport to and from the DMV: $4.80(2) = $9.60
Paper test fee: $24.00
ID photo fee: $1.50 x two pictures = $3.00
Driving school registration fee: $30.00
Cost of four hours of driving school: $235.00
Incidental beverages: $3.80
subtotal: $305.40

+ previous expenses ($43.50)


= $348.90

Driving school is an entry all of its own; more on that later.

That will be all.

tags: character building, driver's license, japan

Why, oh god above, does this only ever happen to me? Other JETs only have to go in for the x-ray and temperature-taking. I, on the other hand, have been annually forced to endure the full battery of horrors only a medically FUBARed country like Japan has to offer. At least I managed to avoid the terror of the mat this time. I think they realised pushing me would not be a good idea after drawing so much blood.

Ah, the blood. They insisted on taking five vials of the stuff. Five. I was told that this was being done in order to ascertain my blood type (which is BS), but lo, that bit of information was helpfully not included in the checkup results, which I received today. Pity, as it's the one bit of health-related data I'd be interested in knowing.

The others I'm already aware of: no, I am not obese. Yes, my blood pressure is fine. No, I do not have diabetes. Nor do I have tuberculosis.

The results have helpfully informed me that I 'irregularities' requiring 'strict medical supervision' were noted during my chest x-ray. As I have yet to drop dead of a heart ailment in the two years they've been reporting such results, I rather think I'm fine. (I would also like to suggest that 'irregularities' is perhaps a rather vague word to use medically. One longs to know what was irregular, and how.)

Although, they thankfully avoided the unfortunate mistake of the first check-up, which had warning lights lit up like Christmas. Of course, that will happen when you try to assess the health of a twenty-something American female against a forty-something Japanese female rubric.

That will be all.

tags: character building, japan, unhealth test

I'd made plans last month for a weekend in Fukuoka with the lovely takadainmate and cienna. I took the nenkyuu, sweating bullets all the while. (Needlessly, I might add - My old place of employment: You want vacation? What internal organs can you sell us? My new place of employment: You want vacation? Just say when!) I bought tickets to Niigata and was in the process of making hotel arrangements in that fine city.

( Surprise! )

Muddling through the above processes, it begins to register that my supervisor is on the phone discussing large sums of money. Oh no, I think. This can only be concerned with me. As, alas, it was.

( Surprise, surprise! )

おいヴェイ, as they (would) say in Japan.

That will be all.

tags: asshattery, character building, japan