So!

Hiya.

Today's post is going to be a bit of a grab-bag; a few pictures, a few tidbits about Tokyo and Japan, a few notes on what it's like to live here, a few observations on the people and the place. And, of course, for those of you who come here not to read the words but just to look at the pictures: pictures. In fact, here; if you're one of the people who only look at the pics, then just scroll down until you see the big bold type slightly down the page, which I've put there solely for your benefit. There's quite a block of text coming up, you see, and I'd rather not you went scampering off to Flickr every time there's a paragraph change. All for your benefit, you see? Say I don't love you.

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So. The first and most pertinent thing about living in Tokyo, naturally, is the language. Moving to a country with a Germanic or Latin language, where you can pick out a word here and a word there from inference based on common roots, is one thing; moving to a country where the language not only doesn't share common roots but is in fact built, from the ground up, grammatically and conceptually, in a completely different way from yours - that's kinda tough. In addition, most people here don't give a flying Hasselhoff about speaking English. If you don't have a few basic Japanese phrases to fall back on, you're going to be stared at quite frequently with a look that can only be described as apologetically hateful.

I'm a fan of words and languages, and the Japanese one so far represents a very intriguing enigma, a hard code to crack. I can't wait to tell you more about it, but I'm afraid my limited knowledge at this point precludes any further musings. So, until I glean a deeper understanding of this beautiful and unique language, let me share with you this Engrish I found.

(Ha ha ha, yeah. Cheap shots are easy. But hey, after two solid months of saying "thank you" to people when I almost swerve into them on my bike and saying "that was yummy!" when people give me my change back at the grocery store, I deserve a bit of release. And anyway, you're gonna find it funny.)

So last weekend, in Hakone, we went to a soba restaurant (soba is the word for Japanese buckhweat noodles; like regular noodles, only thicker, vaguely bluish-tinted, 10x healthier and 100x less tasty). It was a lovely, cozy, mom-and-pop style establishment (Hakone is one of the few places in the world where McDonald's hasn't managed to stretch its filthy tentacles), and within a minute of reading, it became readily apparent to us that the English menu had on that fine day been bestowed upon us solely through the good graces of our friends at babelfish.altavista.com.

The delights on offer included "The enjoying the moon of the buckwheat noodles," "The flattery turtle of the buckwheat noodles," and the very succinct "It boils guts." Additionally, if that wasn't enough to sate ya, they graciously offered "It puts with the grated yam and it eats," and, to finish you off, the delicious "it piles up 3 paragraphs of cold buckwheat noodles."

I am absolutely not making this up. I wish I'd taken pictures.

Anyway.

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The second thing a small-country bumpkin like me notices is the sheer size of everything. The buildings. The place. The population. Being able to walk out of your door and disappear into a large crowd of people, most of which are dressed funnier than you, is an exhilarating experience for someone who's lived the bulk of their life in a place where your cousin's best friend's cousin totally heard you sneezing three seconds ago, and your sister's already sending you an SMS about it saying "OMG is it true??" because she needs to confirm it for the local paper who are about to run a four-page spread on it for their weekly exposé, "PEOPLE WHO TOTALLY SNEEZED THIS WEEK OMG."

I can go anywhere here and be anything. I can walk into a restaurant and pretend to be a German opthalmologist (as long as none of the patrons suddenly need emergency retinal surgery, in which case I'm in trouble [especially since I only speak German]), or storm into a shoe shop and pretend to desperately require clown shoes.* And I can do it all without worrying about anyone recognizing me at the next house party or dinner date or funeral I go to. It's really quite something.

And the buildings. Oh dear, the buildings.

(HI, PICTURE PEOPLE. HERE IS WHERE YOU SHOULD BE SCROLLING TO TO SEE SOME NICE PICTURES OF JAPAN. THANK YOU. I AM DOING GOOD AND HAVING MUCH FUN HAPPEN TO ME IN TOKYO. BYE BYE.)



































Some of the architecture here truly and sincerely boggles the mind. I haven't been this flabbergasted by buildings since... well, ever. The whole concept of what even constitutes a building is so different from home that I'm thrilled to my fingertips whenever I walk down a new street.

Here's some more:



































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Aside from the buildings and the language, there's just the sheer novelty of the place. There are so many things about the Japanese way of life that are so subtly (and radically) different from the way we do things in the west. A couple of examples off the top of my head (more will be forthcoming later):

- When you walk into a store, without exception, every person who works in the store says "Welcome." Usually they keep saying it to you - at regular intervals - until you leave the store, at which point they say, "Thank you." Every single one of them, even that dude stacking the shelves way over in the corner. And before he hands you your change, the clerk will have said, in this order: "1. Welcome. 2. Yes. 3. Thank you. 4. Your purchase comes to [amount]. 5. You have given me [amount]. 6. This is your change, [amount], in bills, and this is your change, [amount], in coins, off the original sum, [amount], which we have charged you. 7. Here is a bag, in which I am putting your purchases. 8. Thank you for shopping here. 9. Thank you so much. 10. Thank you."

- Japanese people are world-class me-firsters. I thought Icelanders were rude when it came to butting in front of people, but I see now that I've been swimming with the goldfish my whole life. The Japanese can butt in with the best of them. If I find myself at Shinjuku Station during rush hour, I might as well just sit my ass down with a book, 'cause try as I might, I'm not going anywhere unless I pull some serious Hulk Hogan shit on people. I'm talking clotheslines and triple suplexes here.

- Being left-handed is considered generally rude.

- Old Japanese ladies are to be underestimated only at your own peril.

- When the Japanese try to do Christmas, they fail miserably.


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So! A couple of things I'm thinking I might do with this blog. Aside from just sporadically reporting on whatever weird and wacky things I find over here, I want to have some semi-regular features. I'm thinking I'll do features on each of Tokyo's major districts (Shibuya, Shinjuku, Ebisu, Harajuku, et al), complete with pictures, a listing of major attractions, and my general jangled impressions of the whole shebang. I'm also going to do little profiles on weird consumables I find in Tokyo: funky candy, strange drinks, ridiculous food, etc. And if people want to try something for themselves, they just throw in a comment to the appropriate blog entry and a little care package will be on its way, containing the ridiculous food item in question.

Like it? Hate it? Wanna see it? Wanna see something else? Sound off. The comment button eagerly awaits your loving touch.

Okay, I think that's quite a bit of talk for one day. I'll check back in soon. Once again, much love and respect to one and all. Smoochies.



*in German, naturally.