Tarako Tarako Tarako!

Tarako!!

Two days have passed (or maybe three), and I sensed you were all eager to hear more about Kaminocho station’s new ticket barrier. It became clear to me yesterday morning that the arrival of said barrier is a major event in the lives of many Kojima residents. As I arrived at the station for my commute to Seishi High there was actually a small posse of old people standing around the barrier discussing it. It reminded me of the ewoks staring in awe at R2D2 and prodding him with sticks. Anyway, its truly big news when the old people stare at the barrier rather than me!

The rest of my day yesterday was about as laid back as could possibly be. In fact its quite scandalous that I got paid for what was 7 hours of total relaxation. It started with my getting into work at 1pm only to be told that there was a big meeting until 3pm, so I could take off and go shopping for 2 hours. After a leisurely trip around Aeon shopping mall I headed back to sit down for the afternoon movie on TV (in Japanese, but still). After dozing through that I had a leisurely dinner whilst watching more TV. Just as I was settling down to do something productive S-sensei declared it was time for golf practice! So off we went, in his sports car, to the local driving range for an hour of practice, before he dropped me off at home a full hour earlier than I’m meant to finish.

Today was like being in a labour camp by comparison. I had two whole lessons, although one of them did include eating tacos. And between the hours of 3 and 4 I played in a mini target golf tournament with Yoshida sensei, Kawahara sensei and Toda sensei. We even had students to carry our clubs!

Despite all this stress-free living I remain on edge for the coming weekend, as a big, bad, scary typhoon is scheduled to hit mainland Japan on sunday. I’ll either be at home or in Kyoto, where I’m hoping to see the Gion Matsuri, though I can’t imagine how good that’ll be in a torrential downpour. Only time will tell…

Shocks and Surprises

I’ve titled the post as above because I can’t think of any other way to link a cockroach falling on me and a new ticket barrier at my local station. The first event traumatised me severely- I’d arrived back home in the dark of the late evening, slightly tipsy as I swerved into my bike parking space, when I noticed something moving on the floor. I saw it scurry away, then took my bike keys out of my bike to open my front door (put together to be truly “Steve Proof”). It was only then that I noticed a big buzzing cockroach on my shoulder!! Even writing this makes my skin crawl, but at the time I immediately swiped at it with my hand while simultaneously shrieking like a little girl at the top of my voice (I say this without shame- YOU try finding a big f*ck-off cockroach on your shoulder!) Once it was on the ground I stamped on it about 6 times before rushing inside.

This is only one in a series of cockroach incidents recently. They appear in my apartment on average at a rate of 1 per week, and every time there is much shrieking and throwing of things.

Anyway, onto the next bit of news, which is the new ticket barrier at my train station! It’s truly the most ineffectual ticket barrier ever. Picture a big wide open space, with about 2 metres on every side and no barriers except for this rectugular ticket checking machine in the middle. It was being watched today with beady eyes by a JR employee (one of Japan’s train companies). He insisted that, after we’d walked past the barrier to buy tickets from the ticket machine, we walk back, insert the ticket and somehow pretend to pass through an imaginery barrier before heading up to the platform. No-one looked impressed, and he was even less impressed by my grinning as we lined up to complete the process. If it led to slight amusement for me, many of the elderly residents of Kojima seemed genuinely shoocked to have to deal with such a piece of technology, and on returning home from Okayama tonight everyone gave the unsupervised ticket barrier stares of open disgust. I enjoyed the collective feeling of malcontent, and if I’d had a few more beers I’d have probably boo-ed it loudly. Obviously this saga is yet to be resolved, but I’ll keep you all posted.

Finally, I levelled the pool series tonight with a 6-1 win, before finally settling for a 7-4 victory. That leaves me and Phil at 5-5, having played a whopping 110 frames of competitive pool, and with just 33 more frames- 3 more matches- to play before he leaves these isles.