Category Archives: Japan

Bigfoot, The Pen Detective, and the Knife Store

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Perhaps the oddest thing the internet has done to me is turn me into a pen detective.

This happened because I listen to a podcast about pens, paper and ink. Yes, there really is such a thing. There is also a website about it, too. (No, I don’t have a problem. I can quit anytime I want. It’s just now is not the time to quit. Something like that.)

Last week, Brad Dowdy, the founder of The Pen Addict website retweeted a photo of a pen. The pen was an orange version of a Pilot Vanishing Point (or Capless) fountain pen (the crack cocaine/gateway drug of fountain pens). The problem was, because of the photo’s lighting and the placement of the product, the pen appeared to be glossy orange and black rather than metallic orange and black. This prompted a great deal of discussion on the podcast and I said I’d go check it out. They immediately dubbed the pen “Bigfoot” because although there was a picture, it probably didn’t actually exist.

Keep in mind, I did not do this detective work because I’m a good person, I did it because 1) the shop where Bigfoot allegedly lived is an awesome place for pen addicts to visit; 2) it is near a famous knife shop; and 3) it is only three stops from one of the few places that sells size 13 (US) shoes for less than the cost of a small car. Three birds. One trip. That’s what I call efficiency.

I went to the pen shop first, found the pen and took a few pictures to prove it was the metallic version and not a mythical beast that doesn’t exist. Well, sort of. More on that later.

(Note to Pilot Pens: if that pen were to suddenly exist, it would sell like crazy. Call me. We’ll talk.)

I then went across the street to The Edge knife shop to look at a couple knives. (I ended up buying one and can’t recommend it enough for people looking for an inexpensive small knife.)

After that, I went down to Gotanda for big shoes. I came home to find the house had been flooded.

It was a great way to get out of the house and it earned me a small shout out on Pen Addict 142.

The funny part is, in the end, the only Bigfoot was me.

Lower and Lower and Worser and Worser

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Yesterday I mentioned that She Who Must Be Obeyed was going to use a minor flood from upstairs to try to get our rent lowered. I do not doubt her powers because she’s actually done this before.

First some background: when we first moved to Tokyo we lived in a tiny apartment above the storage garage of a flower shop. The rent was decent for Tokyo, especially as it came with an air conditioner, but it was still expensive and tended to shake when trucks drove by. The only good thing about it was its location. There was a store across the street, a convenience store down the street, and it was practically walking distance from Tokyo Disney Resorts.

Then both stores closed and I got assigned to the school where I work which meant I had an hour and forty-five minute commute on three different train lines. We, therefore, decided to move closer to the school.

We chose our current apartment because it was more apartment for what we were paying in Tokyo, got lots of sunlight as it was next to a large field and was about a 10 minute walk from the closest train station. It also had a little play area for kids and was far enough from the main road that we didn’t get much noise even in the few times it got busy. Granted, there was nothing nearby except one grocery store we used to call The Green Pork Supermarket because they sold us green pork (as in chemical green, not moldy green). Also, I wanted the third floor apartment not the first floor because we could leave our windows open at night without passerby’s getting to peek in, but SWMBO insisted we get the first floor as it would be easier for her to bring our youngest up a few stairs than all the way to the third floor.

Although it was out of the way and we got some dust from the field, the apartment was nice. It also had a parking area and we ended up buying a car and renting a parking place. (Yes, in Japan parking places don’t come with the apartment, they are separate fee.)

Then a bunch of things happened. First, the owner of the field sold it to a developer which meant we suddenly had houses 15 or 20 feet from our back window. This blocked most of our sunlight. SWMBO complained for a while–oddly, I refrained from reminding her which floor I’d wanted to live on–and then called the management company and got our rent lowered. Keep in mind, the Japanese take sunlight very seriously. Tall buildings often have to be built at odd angles to allow a certain amount of light past them.

A few years later, SWMBO heard that other tenants were paying substantially less than we were and managed to get rent lowered again.

In fact, if she weren’t so good at that, we’d have probably moved a long time ago. Now, though, there are other issues. Besides the flood from above, our parking area tends to fill with water prompting us to move our car every time there’s a heavy rain. There’s also bad drainage in front of our apartment and every time it rains we have a lovely mosquito maternity hospital right below our front balcony.

Now, SWMBO is going to call again. I’ll bet she gets our rent lowered. That said, I’m not sure I want her to, as that’s a good excuse to move.

The Flood and the Anger

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Today I got to see She Who Must Be Obeyed get really angry. Surprisingly, it wasn’t at me.

I had to go down to Tokyo today to do some running and buy some shoes at one of the few shoe stores in Japan that specializes in shoes for big feet. While I was away, the girls were all working on making chocolate for Valentine’s day. (As I’ve written before, in Japan the women give the chocolate to the men.) It’s actually good for me to be away when this is going on because 1) I sample and 2) there’s always some arguing going on between the chefs.

I would save my sampling until I got back from Tokyo.

However, when I returned, I walked into the aftermath of a flood. The washing machine drain in the apartment directly above us had apparently stopped up and water had flooded the apartment. She Who Must Be Obeyed discovered this when she heard water dripping on our ceiling. Then water began dripping FROM our ceiling.

When I arrived home at 2:30 or so, the management company still hadn’t arrived even though the flood had occurred at 11:00. The candy factory had been stowed in the living room and there was a pot of leftover curry on my desk. There were also buckets on the floor in the kitchen.

She Who Must Be Obeyed ranted to me about the situation and then called the management company, who suddenly started acting like a cable company. (Someone will be there. They will do something. No details to follow. You will see them when you see them.)

Eventually, the Japanese equivalent of the Roto-Rooter man cleaned out the drain upstairs and started to leave. She Who Must Be Obeyed grabbed him and made him clean our drain, too, and quizzed him about what was going to happen next. He grudgingly did the work and told us the water would eventually stop dripping.

That’s when I got mad and pointed out that just because it wasn’t dripping, didn’t mean there wasn’t still water on our ceiling. Then there was the mold and mildew problem that would occur if it was still wet. He said–in a very polite Japanese way–that he wasn’t there to do anymore than than he’d already done. Then he left.

The water did eventually stop dripping down our walls but we are still worried about what is still up there. SWMBO is already planning her argument for why we should get our rent lowered again. (Long story.)

On top of all of it, I didn’t get any chocolate.

Bad Things Come in Phones for Knives

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Today was Friday the Thirteenth and it produced a horror story. The horror story, as many horror stories do, involved the post office.

First, you have to understand, the day started well. It’s “marathon” day at the school which means there wasn’t much for me to do other than finish preparing a final exam. That part went well. Once that was over, I set out to pursue a number of simple tasks.

My first task was to get money (today was payday) and deposit part of it in the rent account. That went surprisingly smoothly, which should have been a warning for what happened next.

My second task was to mail a knife to its manufacturer in the USA for a warranty repair. I didn’t have to wait long, which was good, and then presented my parcel to the lady behind the counter. She asked what was in it, I said a knife going to the USA for repair.

There was the sound of teeth sucking. She then asked what kind of knife it was. I said it was a small folding knife and repeated that it was going to the USA for repair. More teeth were sucked and she consulted another clerk. Bringing someone else into the situation meant the situation had escalated to Wakarimasen Dekimasen and I was probably in trouble. The other clerk, who had helped me send parcels a few times, eventually told me that I’d have to wait for a while.

I frowned but remained calm (since I was carrying a knife this was a good idea, which is why I’m surprised I did it). A few minutes later, I saw the first clerk was talking to someone on the phone. I swore to myself and put the box back in my bag and waited. As rule, nothing good ever comes from a Japanese consulting someone on the phone.

Sure enough, ten minutes later, I was informed that the post office couldn’t ship small folding knives to the USA because DEAD PEOPLE! but if it was a 10 inch butcher knife that would have been okay. I asked if her if she knew what the word “Bullshit” meant. She didn’t.

Once again, I didn’t argue very long. I was already packed so I just left and went about the rest of my tasks for the day. I was, of course, carrying a knife the entire time.

When I got home, I consulted a YouTube friend of mine who is the only Japanese gun owner and knife enthusiast I know. In fact, the knife I was sending in for repair I got from him. (The problems were not his fault.)

He explained that he’d had this trouble and that it seemed to stem from a misreading of a bulletin sent by the post office about the dangers of knives and hijackings and a general Japanese paranoia of knives. He said he’d had to prove that several Japanese knife companies use the post office to ship their products to the USA and that since then he hadn’t had much trouble.

The funny part is, when I got home, there was a knife waiting for me. It had been shipped from the USA and delivered via the Japanese Post office. I guess that’s safer than shipping things the other way.

Side Note: If you’re interested in my friend’s videos and Japanese hunting, you can check out his English language videos here. Be warned, though, that some are pretty bloody and you will be appalled at how much meat he leaves behind. In his defense, he gets dozens of deer a year.

Training with Red Flags and Scheming and Shouting

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I once had a trainee talk about cheating on his wife and then yell at his fellow trainees. I had another trainee decide to skip part of the training.

This all happened because about ten years ago I started helping out with training in my company. Basically, my company recruits, or at least it used to (more on that later) from two locations. Inside Japan and outside of Japan. (This outside the box thinking tells you a lot about my company.)

After the new hires arrive, they are put through four or five days of training. They get basic TEFL teaching instruction, company policy explanations and tips on not snapping mentally and then beating your colleagues with a textbook; and they also get medical checks and, on occasion, go visit their employer.

Along the way, trainers and training assistants are watching them for any and all warning signs that they may cause trouble. We would listen for obvious red flags such as racist and sexist comments; people who didn’t seem to work well as part of a team; and any comments that indicated a too eager interest in being near junior high and high school girls.

In one training session, after I’d had a lot of experience, I was assigned a group of Bulgarian women (long story) and a couple random Englishmen. Near the end of the training, each trainee was assigned a 20 minute demo lessons. Each demo lesson had to have a warm up; introduce a grammar point; and then show a variety of lesson and the trainees ability to transition from one activity to another. They had a couple hours to plan and make materials and be ready to teach. I would also assign at least one trainee to play the part of “obnoxious little shit” (a technical term) to see how the trainees handled bad students.

One of the Englishmen got up and announced that he couldn’t think of a warm up and skipped to the first activity. He passed out a work sheet and then spent five minutes quietly walking around and “observing”. He then repeated that with the next part of the lesson. He finished after 10 minutes and the students had barely spoken. I told him he had to do it again and that he should probably figure out a way to do it right.

My favorite incident, though, happened in one of my first solo training sessions, I had a group of about 20 and most of them seemed to play nice with each other. One guy was dressed a bit casually (suits and ties were expected, at least at the time, even in summer) but he seemed to be working well with the others, although he did tend to go out of his way to partner with women.

During a smoke break, I was talking with him and a group of the ladies and somehow and for some reason he started talking about his wife throwing a remote control at him. He said she did it because he’d told her “if you don’t give me what I want I’ll just go out and find it myself”.

Red flags started popping up all over the place.

Later, I put everyone in pairs for the 20 minute demo lessons (at the time they were a pair activity). I made the mistake of pairing him with one of the quietest women in the group which let him dominate the planning.

When it was their turn, he took charge of the warm up. He then started shouting:

(points at random students) LISTEN! THINK! LISTEN! THINK! (points at own mouth) YOU CAN’T UNDERSTAND THE WORDS COMING OF MY MOUTH BECAUSE YOU CAN’T SPEAK ENGLISH! LISTEN! THINK! LISTEN! THINK!

That went on for three minutes. Once the rest of the class were suitably scared to death–even the designated “bad student” was too freaked out to know what to do–he stopped shouting and turned the lesson over to his partner.

I made several notes as red flags clouded my vision. Luckily the other trainees made most of the comments I was going to make, leaving me to only interject that I was glad he gave the response he did because I wasn’t sure if he was serious or just trying to piss me off.

I never saw him again, although he did become a big part of my training as I imitated the shouting to demonstrate a key “thou shalt not”.

I don’t know what happened to him, but I heard things didn’t go very well.

A Story of the Flouting Flautist

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Today we bought our oldest a flute and I started having flashbacks.

About 800 years ago (plus or minus a few years), when I was starting junior high school in Hayden, Colorado (or maybe it was before that when my helicopter was taking rocket fire from the knights in the Third Crusade; it all runs together) I remember being taken to a large room where some guy tried to sell us musical instruments. Although I expressed a brief interest in the saxophone, I ended up with a trumpet.

All I remember about that was the trumpet was made by F. E. Olds, who pretty much closed up shop right after my parents brought the trumpet. I also have the number $250 stuck in my head ($815 now) and that may have been the price of the thing. I played all through junior high and high school and then finally gave up the trumpet.

After delaying almost two years, and with the promise that she’ll keep using it in high school (long story involving getting recommendations is involved there) we finally decided it was time to retire the old school flute and buy her a flute of her own.

First, She Who Must Be Obeyed and I had a consult on our acceptable price range and SWMBO surprised me with number much higher than I expected her to say. After treating me with an AED we went to a local shop and began choosing flutes. This involved our oldest practicing with different flutes (and actually impressing the sales lady).

Although our oldest knew what the approximate price range was–for the record, it was not my idea to tell her–or perhaps because she knew it, she managed to play the more expensive flutes better than the cheaper flutes. I was ready to do a blind test to see if she was just messing with us, but I know from experience a better made instrument sounds better than a cheap instrument.

In the end, she’d narrowed her choice down to the Damned Expensive One and the Freaking Expensive One (not actual brand names), and seemed to be favoring the Damned Expensive One. However, She Who Must Be Obeyed kept saying to get the Freaking Expensive One and I kept looking for an AED to use on her in lieu of professional shock therapy.

In the end, our oldest chose the Freaking Expensive One and has agreed, although she doesn’t know it yet, to wash dishes for 20 years (or until she’s 20, something like that). All we, the parents, got was a bottle of cheap Bordeaux.

Yes, that’s right, the store gave us a bottle of wine after the purchase to help us ease the pain.

Putting Off Until This Year What Should Have Been Done

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About thirteen years ago I started a website. Several years ago I pretty much abandoned it. Last year I almost lost it. Something about it, though, haunts me. Today, though it’s a good chance to talk about procrastination.

The website I started was called the Crazy Japan Times. It grew out of a series of newsletters I wrote to former JET Programme members and friends. The newsletters were based around Sumo tournaments, which happen every two months, and I started adding in quirky bits of pop culture and Japanese news along with the tournament updates. Eventually, someone suggested I actually start posting it online.

That part was pretty easy. However, because I only wrote a newletter every couple of months, the site never built a regular audience and I didn’t try to monetize it. I added a section on moving to Japan and getting an apartment that’s been reasonably popular, but once it was done, there wasn’t a lot much more to do with that.

Then, around 2006 or so, I got tired of doing the newsletters and then posting them, old school style (more on that later), on the site. Even though they only came out every couple of months, the newsletters were a lot of work. I’ve added a few book reviews and a couple videos about Japanese knife laws since I stopped the newsletters, but for the most part, the site’s remained untouched. The handful of “posts” I’ve done–Sochi Olympics news and a recent Super Bowl report–have all been done on Facebook.

Last year, I accidentally almost let the name lapse, but managed to get it back. That was more habit and hope than plan, though.

The problem is, the site needs a major overhaul and update. It’s so old-school it won’t show up on mobile devices. It’s also a pain to update without doing a lot of old school html coding (yes, it’s that old and yes I still code by hand. Sort of). Because of this, I’ve been putting off the update for almost two years. (You think you can procrastinate? You are an amateur. I’ll prove that to you later.)

This is mostly because there will be a lot of work in a short amount of time with a lot that can go wrong. (This leads to swearing, some stress, and a lot more swearing.) It’s also because I’m going to have to jettison the old design and start over, which feels kind of strange.

That said, my goal is to start that site again, maybe with some guest contributors, as the daily posts here come to an end or change in 12 days. (My year of posts ends February 19th.)

Tomorrow, when it comes, I’ll start the prelims of updating the CJT. If it goes well, I’ll be really happy this time tomorrow. If it doesn’t, well, at least I’ll have something to write about for post 354.

Demons Out Good Luck In Beans On Floor

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Today my wife and children tried to run me out of my house by throwing packets of beans at me. First, though, we tried to drive our youngest out of the house.

While the USA is waking up hibernating rodents–and hoping New York Democrats don’t kill another one–all in the name of shortening Winter, Japanese people are throwing beans at demons to celebrate the end of winter and the lunar new year. (And they’re eating sushi. More on that later.)

Today is Setsubun, which in the traditional Japanese calendar is supposed to be the last day of Winter. Because it also serves as a kind of new year, it’s traditional to take the opportunity to drive out the evil spirits of last year and make room for good luck in the new year.

A lot of people do this at temples where they try to catch bags of peanuts thrown by celebrities.

This involves a couple steps. First, everyone eats an uncut sushi roll. To do this, a compass used to figure the exact direction to face (West-Southwest this year) and then everyone must eat their entire sushi roll without talking. In many ways this tradition is absurd and may be the result of clever marketing by fishmongers, but it guarantees five to ten minutes of glorious, relaxing silence at supper. Once that’s finished, everyone can talk again and finish the rest of the sushi (which can be cut and enjoyed in small bites).

After that, one family member puts on a demon/ogre mask and then gets beans thrown at her as the other family members say “Demon out. Good luck in.” The mask is then passed to another family member who goes to a different room and suffers the bean barrage. this continues until each room has suffered a barrage.

Today, though, our oldest “had a headache” (i.e. was too cool for such stupid crap) and She Who Must Be Obeyed used her make up and not wanting to ring the mask as an excuse (i.e. was too cool for such stupid crap). This left our youngest and me to take most of the abuse.

Well, actually me.

Granted, throwing food at me is probably not the best way to get me to leave the house, especially when the “beans” we use 1) are actually coated sunflower seeds, mini-almonds and mini-pumpkin seeds; 2) are still in small bags; and 3) are highly addictive.

Poor little demon. Everyone wants him gone.

Poor little demon. Everyone wants him gone. (So they should stop feeding him.)

A Super Bowl Without Chips or Salsa or Beer

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Although I managed to watch the Super Bowl, I have to admit it loses something at 8:30 in the morning on a Monday.

(Note: Officially, today I worked and wrote an exam.)

Basically, I was the guy in the GoDaddy commercial who didn’t have a party because he had to work (and wants to die younger and raise a kid who sings Harry Chapin songs and stars in Nissan commercials). But unlike the guy working in the office, I had a way to stream the Super Bowl and could watch it while I worked.

Unfortunately, because the Super Bowl started at 8:30 in the morning here in Japan it was way too soon for chips and salsa and little too early for beer.

Also, getting proper chips and proper salsa here in Japan requires shady mafia connections and/or exorbitant personal loans.

Despite the dry nature of the event, eat least for me, it was fun to watch it with friends all over the world as if we were all in one room commenting on what we were seeing. Seeing their comments and inflicting my comments on them, even sight unseen (or perhaps especially sight unseen) brought back some of what makes the Super Bowl fun.

Another part of the fun for me, especially when I don’t give a crap about either team, is seeing the way the commercials change from year to year. Last year’s seemed more patriotic, but since one of this year’s teams was called the Patriots, I guess that would have been seen as press bias (and we know how worried the press are about seeming biased).

However, there has to be something between “America, F@#k Yeah!” and “Let’s all take pills together, hold hands in a circle, and die.” (Cue cowbell and “Don’t Fear the Reaper.)

I see Nationwide has defended killing a kid during the Super Bowl (so to speak) by falling back on the notion that they were just trying to start a conversation about kid safety. By the same logic, if I call a woman a “Fat Bitch” I can defend myself by saying I’m trying to start a conversation on societal weight standards and sexist language.

Next year, if I’m “writing an exam” again, I may find a way to have proper chips and salsa, or a bowl full of Chex mix nearby.

If I do, though, I’ll end up being the fat bitch.

Resistance Friends and Getting Pushed Around

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It’s a sign that I attend too many knife shows that 1) the organizers are sending me invitations and 2) I’m starting to make friends with some of the knife makers.

Today, however, there was a surprising amount of pushing and shoving going on.

Today was the Ginza Blade Show, which is the first knife show of the year in the Tokyo area and, if today was any indication, is also one of the best attended. Since my short bout of flu seemed to be over (except for the feeling of weakness caused by taking medicine and then suddenly going off of it) I met up with my Canadian friend and we ventured down to Ginza.

I got there second and my Canadian friend was deep into temptation.  He kept reaching for his credit cards and then snapping his hand back to a safe location. He accused me a not warning him that it was a fixed blade show (he’s a big fan of fixed blade knives) and I said I didn’t know that because we hadn’t actually visited that one in 2014.

Being the first show of the season, and being in a small room, it was too crowded for comfort. On several occasions I was looking at at knife and then suddenly found myself being pushed out of the way or over the table. I had to try to catch myself without dropping the knife, stabbing someone, or cutting my hand on the other knives on the table.

When we weren’t being pushed around, we talked with Ihara To-un, an older knife maker who’s kind of become our friend (at least he said we were his friends, right before interrogating me about whether or not I’ve actually used the knife I bought from him–I assured him I have). My Canadian friend made an order for a knife while I reached for my credit cards and then snapped my hand back to a safe location.

We also had a nice chat with the very colorful “Hank” Ishihara, who dresses like a cowboy, usually has a fake revolver on his table and makes knives that are more art and jewelry than functional. His knives are intricately carved and often have stones set in the blade and he proves you can shine light through it. His knives are right at the edge of tacky, but are still kind of cool in an expensive “I’d rather have that double-ended liner-lock pocket knife than a MacBook Air” kind of way.

There was also a guy who made knives from materials like onyx and agate which, while beautiful, seem rather impractical. That said, he has his sales pitch down and proved they could cut. Once again, they were kind of cool, but seemed different for the sake of being different. (They also seem like something you could strap to your ankle and carry through airport security, which makes them a different kind of cool.)

In three, weeks, we head to the Tokyo Folding Knives Show, which is one of the more interesting shows. I’ll have to leave my money and credit cards with She Who Must Be Obeyed before that one.