Le update
Despite the constant fear that I am going to burn down my apartment complex with the heat its producing, I now have my computer up and running again, and expecting now have Internet by the time this post goes public.
Things have been quite busy since I left Tokyo. After the Osaka orientation we were sent off to meet our supervisors; in my case a JTE at my school came along with the vice-principal. Both were very nice. ^^ The school was also quite nice and a lot of the kids were in there practicing for the school festival or doing club stuff, even though they're on summer vacation. After meeting the English teachers I went to get my gaikokujin card (alien registration) applied for and also opened a bank account. Man was that a hassle. The BoE had spelled my name in Japanese different from how I usually spell it, but it had to be matching on all documents, including my middle names since they're on my passport...
Anyway, eventually I was brought to my apartment, and they bought me takoyaki, ice cream and soft drinks and then left me to unpack. As I was aware of before I came, my apartment is extreeeemely small, however the location is pretty convenient. I think. I mean, I have an okonomiyaki shop (320 yen!!! omg :D) 45 seconds away along with a grocery store...vending machines quite close...the Hirakoen station is 3 minutes walk along with a 24-hour conbini (convenience store). The centre of town is 10 minutes away by bike. At first glance that sounds fantastic. Unfortunately school is a 15-minute bike ride, and even on the express train the more popular areas of Osaka - movie theatres, yodobashi camera, den-den town and such - are 30 minutes or more. Not sure if the small place is a fair trade for the distance from Osaka-shi, personally, but it has a few other advantages - well-lit, clean, very close to Hirakata Park, and my place is on the third floor, so I don't have much to fear in the way of bugs. I hear they have cockroaches here and the thought makes me not want to ever leave my apartment.
As long as I can comfortably arrange my kotatsu in winter...it's OK. >.>
Anyway, I'm a serial shopper when bored, and without Internet in my apartment and the sun setting at 7 pm...well, I've been bored often. I find myself at Vivre or the 100-yen shop a lot buying things for my place. I think I have everything I need for the immediate future now, other than a microwave and a Dustbuster (HOW did my predecessor get by without these things!?), and I have intentions of buying at least two low chairs and a tatami mat. I also need a second futon, but that can wait until the first time someone from home comes to visit...the other JETs have no real reason to need crash space in Hirakata, so I'm in no rush.
It's absolutely CRAZY how much stuff one needs even in a small place like mine. My pred left me many many many useful things, all the kitchenware for example, cleaning supplies and laundry things, but I still needed to buy stuff like towels and facecloths, pitchers, a fan, wastebaskets, floor mats, soap, fabric softener, etc etc etc, not to mention fill the fridge. And right now I am NOT in the mood to cook at all, ever (especially without an oven or microwave) so the fridge has stayed pretty empty. I'm also not really in the mood for playing "guess what item this is" at the grocery store when I can't read the packaging. I've been living off of lemon tea and melon pan most of the time - I actually went all the way out to Amagasaki in Hyogo prefecture on Wednesday to buy Western food from the Costco out there. The 600 yen delivery fee was worth it to get pasta sauce and a 24-pack of Dr. Pepper. >.> There was a wicked second-hand media store in Amagasaki as well where I got all the Rockman.EXE GBA games for 158 yen ($1.58) each and Fullmetal Alchemist Dream Carnival for PS2 for 1600. ($16) You can get such good deals on used books and games here! It's fantastic! It made the hour and a half trip to Hyogo worth it. >.>;
In other travel news I went to Nara, as I think I mentioned in the previous entry, and visited a shrine. Socializing with other peoples is good. *thumbs up* We saw the biggest Buddha statue there is, and I took a stab at crawling through the nostril-sized "path to enlightenment" but was wearing so much sunscreen that I had to back out. One of the others made it through, though, to the amusement of onlookers. Wish I had too - stupid sunscreen! Why did it have to be like 40 degrees in Nara that day? :(
Speaking of temperature, at this time of year Osaka rarely drops below 30, it seems. Worse, there's no breeze. Oh God it's so hot. XDDD I can't believe I'm saying this, but I can't wait for winter.
No...I take that back, I take that back. I can't wait for fall.
Anyway, so, I've been traveling all over since I had to take 4 of my vacation days while all the other teachers were off for the Obon festival. (Oh, and I missed the mountaintop kanji-burning in Kyoto, it was last night - I was so pissed!) Nara, then Hyogo, and today and yesterday I was out in Osaka proper for more orientations. The board of education paid my train fare, thank you BoE. :D There were corresponding post-orientation parties, yesterday at a pub, today at the Hard Rock Cafe. Now I have a Hard Rock Osaka shirt. :D After, since it was still light out, I made a third attempt to go to Den Den Town, which is the electronics district. Every time I've tried so far everything was closed. It all closes at 8!! Crazy. Anyway, today I made it there at 7 and had the opportunity to check out a few shops. Bought some little pithy things like keychains and a few more Super Famicom videogames. I got StarFox for 50 yen (about 50 cents) and Violinist of Hameln for 299 yen (about $2.99, I assume most of you who are reading know the conversion is about the same! just place the decimal two digits to the left), then Mother 3 in-box, mint condition for 1500 yen ($15). Neat. I got a cooling pad for my laptop because it can't seem to take the heat here, and an additional gel cooler for the AC adapter as I have a real fear of it bursting into flames. I may have to get a USB-powered fan for the adapter as well. >.< Or a laptop that doesn't threaten to explode on an international circuit. Did it do this in Tokyo? I swear it didn't!
Anyway, since I had a day pass for the train and was planning to staying in my city for a few days after this, I went to Yodobashi Camera to ask about Internet service. I think the employee wanted to cry when she saw me walk in, as I was in there with about fifteen other gaikokujin the week before buying cell phones, she spoke no English and I spoke very little Japanese. We used Babelfish to hold a short conversation and I decided to leave well enough alone and call their English help line in the morning. I went to Uniqlo on the 8th floor as I'd found some nice capris in Hyogo but didn't have any more cash on me...
Uniqlo...is my new favourite place. I couldn't BELIEVE their prices. In order to fit more winter clothes into my luggage I'd skimped on the summer wear, which apparantly I'm going to be needing until, oh, OCTOBER or so. In this store the 2000-yen ($20, and I'm going to stop translating prices now) capris were the most expensive thing I got. I got two summer-y shirts, a polo and a 3-quarter-sleeve fall shirt for less than or exactly 500 yen each. How sweet is that? Seeing how I take a size EXTRA LARGE in Japan and they don't make pants that fit my hips, Uniqlo (a UK store) is going to be the only place I buy clothes from now on, I think.
Then, just outside of there, I passed a Jump store. :D Jump is one of my favourite manga anthologies here. I bought a mystery capsule (yup...Capsule Corp-style) for 700, apparantly about 25% contain t-shirts, 25% contain tote bags and the rest contain face and hand towels. I wanted the t-shirt that said "kame house" on it, but I didn't get it. An Oolong hand towel is now disrupting the ambiance of my bathroom. I wonder what the eBay market would be like for these things? How many capsules would I go through before I got the Kuririn towel or the Kame shirt? Hmmm...
Good thing I'm staying out of Osaka for a couple of days. >.>
Well, once now that the Internet is up and running, I'll feel less weird about sitting in my apartment...plus, now I have a stack of video games I need to get through while waiting for school to start up. :D
Things have been quite busy since I left Tokyo. After the Osaka orientation we were sent off to meet our supervisors; in my case a JTE at my school came along with the vice-principal. Both were very nice. ^^ The school was also quite nice and a lot of the kids were in there practicing for the school festival or doing club stuff, even though they're on summer vacation. After meeting the English teachers I went to get my gaikokujin card (alien registration) applied for and also opened a bank account. Man was that a hassle. The BoE had spelled my name in Japanese different from how I usually spell it, but it had to be matching on all documents, including my middle names since they're on my passport...
Anyway, eventually I was brought to my apartment, and they bought me takoyaki, ice cream and soft drinks and then left me to unpack. As I was aware of before I came, my apartment is extreeeemely small, however the location is pretty convenient. I think. I mean, I have an okonomiyaki shop (320 yen!!! omg :D) 45 seconds away along with a grocery store...vending machines quite close...the Hirakoen station is 3 minutes walk along with a 24-hour conbini (convenience store). The centre of town is 10 minutes away by bike. At first glance that sounds fantastic. Unfortunately school is a 15-minute bike ride, and even on the express train the more popular areas of Osaka - movie theatres, yodobashi camera, den-den town and such - are 30 minutes or more. Not sure if the small place is a fair trade for the distance from Osaka-shi, personally, but it has a few other advantages - well-lit, clean, very close to Hirakata Park, and my place is on the third floor, so I don't have much to fear in the way of bugs. I hear they have cockroaches here and the thought makes me not want to ever leave my apartment.
As long as I can comfortably arrange my kotatsu in winter...it's OK. >.>
Anyway, I'm a serial shopper when bored, and without Internet in my apartment and the sun setting at 7 pm...well, I've been bored often. I find myself at Vivre or the 100-yen shop a lot buying things for my place. I think I have everything I need for the immediate future now, other than a microwave and a Dustbuster (HOW did my predecessor get by without these things!?), and I have intentions of buying at least two low chairs and a tatami mat. I also need a second futon, but that can wait until the first time someone from home comes to visit...the other JETs have no real reason to need crash space in Hirakata, so I'm in no rush.
It's absolutely CRAZY how much stuff one needs even in a small place like mine. My pred left me many many many useful things, all the kitchenware for example, cleaning supplies and laundry things, but I still needed to buy stuff like towels and facecloths, pitchers, a fan, wastebaskets, floor mats, soap, fabric softener, etc etc etc, not to mention fill the fridge. And right now I am NOT in the mood to cook at all, ever (especially without an oven or microwave) so the fridge has stayed pretty empty. I'm also not really in the mood for playing "guess what item this is" at the grocery store when I can't read the packaging. I've been living off of lemon tea and melon pan most of the time - I actually went all the way out to Amagasaki in Hyogo prefecture on Wednesday to buy Western food from the Costco out there. The 600 yen delivery fee was worth it to get pasta sauce and a 24-pack of Dr. Pepper. >.> There was a wicked second-hand media store in Amagasaki as well where I got all the Rockman.EXE GBA games for 158 yen ($1.58) each and Fullmetal Alchemist Dream Carnival for PS2 for 1600. ($16) You can get such good deals on used books and games here! It's fantastic! It made the hour and a half trip to Hyogo worth it. >.>;
In other travel news I went to Nara, as I think I mentioned in the previous entry, and visited a shrine. Socializing with other peoples is good. *thumbs up* We saw the biggest Buddha statue there is, and I took a stab at crawling through the nostril-sized "path to enlightenment" but was wearing so much sunscreen that I had to back out. One of the others made it through, though, to the amusement of onlookers. Wish I had too - stupid sunscreen! Why did it have to be like 40 degrees in Nara that day? :(
Speaking of temperature, at this time of year Osaka rarely drops below 30, it seems. Worse, there's no breeze. Oh God it's so hot. XDDD I can't believe I'm saying this, but I can't wait for winter.
No...I take that back, I take that back. I can't wait for fall.
Anyway, so, I've been traveling all over since I had to take 4 of my vacation days while all the other teachers were off for the Obon festival. (Oh, and I missed the mountaintop kanji-burning in Kyoto, it was last night - I was so pissed!) Nara, then Hyogo, and today and yesterday I was out in Osaka proper for more orientations. The board of education paid my train fare, thank you BoE. :D There were corresponding post-orientation parties, yesterday at a pub, today at the Hard Rock Cafe. Now I have a Hard Rock Osaka shirt. :D After, since it was still light out, I made a third attempt to go to Den Den Town, which is the electronics district. Every time I've tried so far everything was closed. It all closes at 8!! Crazy. Anyway, today I made it there at 7 and had the opportunity to check out a few shops. Bought some little pithy things like keychains and a few more Super Famicom videogames. I got StarFox for 50 yen (about 50 cents) and Violinist of Hameln for 299 yen (about $2.99, I assume most of you who are reading know the conversion is about the same! just place the decimal two digits to the left), then Mother 3 in-box, mint condition for 1500 yen ($15). Neat. I got a cooling pad for my laptop because it can't seem to take the heat here, and an additional gel cooler for the AC adapter as I have a real fear of it bursting into flames. I may have to get a USB-powered fan for the adapter as well. >.< Or a laptop that doesn't threaten to explode on an international circuit. Did it do this in Tokyo? I swear it didn't!
Anyway, since I had a day pass for the train and was planning to staying in my city for a few days after this, I went to Yodobashi Camera to ask about Internet service. I think the employee wanted to cry when she saw me walk in, as I was in there with about fifteen other gaikokujin the week before buying cell phones, she spoke no English and I spoke very little Japanese. We used Babelfish to hold a short conversation and I decided to leave well enough alone and call their English help line in the morning. I went to Uniqlo on the 8th floor as I'd found some nice capris in Hyogo but didn't have any more cash on me...
Uniqlo...is my new favourite place. I couldn't BELIEVE their prices. In order to fit more winter clothes into my luggage I'd skimped on the summer wear, which apparantly I'm going to be needing until, oh, OCTOBER or so. In this store the 2000-yen ($20, and I'm going to stop translating prices now) capris were the most expensive thing I got. I got two summer-y shirts, a polo and a 3-quarter-sleeve fall shirt for less than or exactly 500 yen each. How sweet is that? Seeing how I take a size EXTRA LARGE in Japan and they don't make pants that fit my hips, Uniqlo (a UK store) is going to be the only place I buy clothes from now on, I think.
Then, just outside of there, I passed a Jump store. :D Jump is one of my favourite manga anthologies here. I bought a mystery capsule (yup...Capsule Corp-style) for 700, apparantly about 25% contain t-shirts, 25% contain tote bags and the rest contain face and hand towels. I wanted the t-shirt that said "kame house" on it, but I didn't get it. An Oolong hand towel is now disrupting the ambiance of my bathroom. I wonder what the eBay market would be like for these things? How many capsules would I go through before I got the Kuririn towel or the Kame shirt? Hmmm...
Good thing I'm staying out of Osaka for a couple of days. >.>
Well, once now that the Internet is up and running, I'll feel less weird about sitting in my apartment...plus, now I have a stack of video games I need to get through while waiting for school to start up. :D