(no subject)

Ah, Saturday. A day of rest, except for me, because I had to teach three demonstration classes for students' parents. Of course, the teacher I was set to teach them with was ill, so I only taught one of the three and spent the other eight hours of my working day reading Kodansha's Japan — An Illustrated Encyclopedia. It is my true love, but at $300 and the weight of a small horse, not something I will be buying for myself any time soon.

Then came Saturday night, which was most excellent, because I saw Tsuyoshi Yamaguchi and Shawn Astrom, two of my favorite djs, live. It was so nice to dance to real live house - something which I hadn't done for ten months. Dancing in Japan can be somewhat terrifying, namely because the Japanese do not dance. Lack of fellow dancers has never kept me off the floor, but it's still a different proposition in this country: as the sole dancer, I usually find myself in front of the dj booth surrounded by a circle of wide-eyed Japanese watching my every move and trying their best to copy them.

But luck was on my side last night, because several djs had come all the way from Tokyo to catch this show, and they got on the floor with me. I also have their keitai numbers and mail addresses, and am quite possibly on the guest list for one of their shows in Tokyo next month. Rock.

Haruka showed up, which made things cool, and called Shingo down from Ktown to come hang out, which made things even cooler. I ended up at the club until 5:30 in the morning. Haruka was a scream the last half hour, "Jiru, I have to go to my girlfriend's house and I won't be able to get it up. This sucks. What should I do?"

Then he'd wander off and come back with another bottle of beer. "Jiru, I won't be able to get it up, I just know it."

It was fully light out by the time I went home, and as I was walking down the street, who should drive by but the Kusabiraki's, on their way to the morning market. We held a shouted conversation across the street (I'd only had three beers the entire night so I was energised and lucid), and then I headed home in time to catch the Sunday rebroadcast of my Korean lesson on NHK, which I watched, and then took a nap for four hours, the sweet sounds of 'Ryu's ' voice fresh in my ears.

So, a very good start to my weekend.

That will be all.

Temple Time: Konkai Komyoji

I'm spending far too much time online as of late. In order to make myself feel as if this serves some purpose (and to help shore up my foundering English skills), I'm going to make good on my threat of a few days ago to start writing up some of my favorite sightseeing spots in Japan. We're going to start with the temples. I love temples. I could happily spend days on end tromping about to various temples. The people I go on trips with get tired of me because all I want to do is go to temples. Today, I bring you ( Konkai Komyouji )

That will be all.

afadfiofieadiblargh!!!

As I'm sure all of you know, I'm going to China. This requires a visa. Having no desire to take time off of work, I looked into applying for said visa by mail, which is possible through the Nagasaki embassy. I got the information; my traveling companion Andy had a Japanese friend look into the particulars. We applied for our visas together at the beginning of this month.

Andy received his visa two weeks ago, although he didn't actually have it delivered until sometime last week. I did not receive my visa. Once Andy put two and two together about the mysterious missed delivery slips he'd been receiving for a week, I put two and two together about the mystery phone calls I'd been receiving throughout the same period. (I usually don't answer unfamiliar calls because of the possibility of billing scams.)

Sure enough, it was about my visa. It costs $50 for British citizens to apply, but $70 for American citizens. I longed to be angry at Andy for not thinking of this, but the fault is all mine, because I was perfectly happy to let him do the application legwork at the time. It was eight days to departure and no visa for me. I asked the woman on the phone if I could send the remaining $20 to her by bank transfer. I could not.

I emailed Andy to get the information our Japanese friend had sent him about the application process. He didn't respond for two days. Only he had, but he'd been sending short texts, which my DoCoMoFo cell phone cannot receive. I applied anyway, crossing my fingers that I was sending the money to the right division. It cost $15 to overnight the $20.

I had to work Saturday, so I received Monday off as a replacement holiday. I'd meant to get up and cracking, but 11:00 found me still lolling around in bed when the doorbell rang. Hoping against hope, I sprang up, threw a robe over my pjs and answered. Hallelujah! It was my passport (with visa), and thanks to the kindness of fate I was at home to receive it.

The COD charge was $9.50. I'd spent over $25 in total on mail order fees to apply, but dammit, I had it.

I opened my passport to gaze upon the glory that was my Chinese visa, the source of all these troubles, to discover a nice, handwritten note to the effect that visas for American citizens are actually only $60, and could I please tell them my bank information so that they could send the remaining $10 to me by bank transfer?

They must be taking cues from my electric company.

Oi.

That will be all.