Bike riding to work?!
Apparently riding your bicycle to work is a very common and acceptable mode of transportation. It's so funny to see Japanese businessmen in suits and ties on a dingy old bike fly by as they narrowly miss careening into you. Or seeing a young, hip Japanese woman in a short skirt, knee-high socks/shoes and heels that are thin stilettos at least 3 inches in height leisurely bike towards their destination. How in the world can you ride a bike in a mini skirt and manage to pedal with such high heels?! Maybe us foreigners just don't get it.
However, I do get the fact that bikes are super important if you want to save money while living in Japan. On day two I went out with my roommate and another teacher from my group who lives two floors down to go buy bikes. I found a used bike for around $60 in gunmetal black and am liking it so far. Check me out in my business attire on my way to training this morning:
Pretty snazzy, no? I've ridden to training twice so far and will probably continue to do so as it costs me around $4 round trip by subway to go to the ECC main headquarters which is about a 15 minute bike ride away. I figure since I'm here for a long haul this will save me money in the long run.
As for anything else:
Training is stressful only because it is so much to memorize in such a short period of time. Like any other job training session give me a couple of months and I could probably fake it like an old pro but for right now it is quite stressful and very overwhelming. So much to memorize and utilize!! But I'll manage. I always do.
Sleep is a strange entity here. Most of us trainees are from North America (quite a few from Toronto) and aren't used to this weird time shift. We're all waking up at odd morning hours (ranging from 2-7am, usually for me around 6-ish) and passing out super early (definitely before midnight) because even now, a good couple of days in (one day shy of a week for me) time is still an elusive creature. We just don't know what to make of it. Much as I'd like to keep my old hours from the US I'm wondering if that is even possible. Maybe not, or at least not for another month or so....
Not surprisingly the walls of my apartment are paper thin. Even now on the far side of my bedroom I can hear soft muffled voices coming through. I wonder if there are two people in the bedroom next to me (a couple mayhap?) as I'm always hearing a male and a female voice talk. Boo to that! Thank god I have yet to hear any sort of sex sounds (maybe roommates instead?)(EDIT: FUCK THEY ARE HAVING SEX RIGHT NOW! It's midnight folks so SHUT UP!!! Dammit, this SUCKS!!!). But still, one of those things that I can't help but makes me grumpy nonetheless.
One good thing about Japan is how cheap some of the food is, especially noodles. I can buy a top-ramen type of instant noodle bowl to go for maybe around $1 or so in the grocery store but I can go into a restaurant and get it for maybe $3. Not too bad, eh? However, the portions are definitely much smaller so be prepared to eat a lot less then you might in the States where we're all uber-fatties.
And one last final thing to mention that is strange to me: I live in a shopping arcade!! No, seriously. It's like some sort of outdoor shopping mall with an overhang and a long strip of tiny mom and pop stores lining it. In the photo above I'm in front of my apartment building (the light blue area) with some sort of clinic off to the left, a bike shop on the right behind me (not yet open at 11am) and I'm facing across the street an okonomiyaki restaurant. How weird is that? If I come home late all I see are lots of metal "garage" doors closed and not a sound to be heard. I have yet to see any homeless sleep here though for all I've heard that they do. This place really isn't as bad as I thought it would be....
However, I do get the fact that bikes are super important if you want to save money while living in Japan. On day two I went out with my roommate and another teacher from my group who lives two floors down to go buy bikes. I found a used bike for around $60 in gunmetal black and am liking it so far. Check me out in my business attire on my way to training this morning:
Pretty snazzy, no? I've ridden to training twice so far and will probably continue to do so as it costs me around $4 round trip by subway to go to the ECC main headquarters which is about a 15 minute bike ride away. I figure since I'm here for a long haul this will save me money in the long run.
As for anything else:
Training is stressful only because it is so much to memorize in such a short period of time. Like any other job training session give me a couple of months and I could probably fake it like an old pro but for right now it is quite stressful and very overwhelming. So much to memorize and utilize!! But I'll manage. I always do.
Sleep is a strange entity here. Most of us trainees are from North America (quite a few from Toronto) and aren't used to this weird time shift. We're all waking up at odd morning hours (ranging from 2-7am, usually for me around 6-ish) and passing out super early (definitely before midnight) because even now, a good couple of days in (one day shy of a week for me) time is still an elusive creature. We just don't know what to make of it. Much as I'd like to keep my old hours from the US I'm wondering if that is even possible. Maybe not, or at least not for another month or so....
Not surprisingly the walls of my apartment are paper thin. Even now on the far side of my bedroom I can hear soft muffled voices coming through. I wonder if there are two people in the bedroom next to me (a couple mayhap?) as I'm always hearing a male and a female voice talk. Boo to that! Thank god I have yet to hear any sort of sex sounds (maybe roommates instead?)(EDIT: FUCK THEY ARE HAVING SEX RIGHT NOW! It's midnight folks so SHUT UP!!! Dammit, this SUCKS!!!). But still, one of those things that I can't help but makes me grumpy nonetheless.
One good thing about Japan is how cheap some of the food is, especially noodles. I can buy a top-ramen type of instant noodle bowl to go for maybe around $1 or so in the grocery store but I can go into a restaurant and get it for maybe $3. Not too bad, eh? However, the portions are definitely much smaller so be prepared to eat a lot less then you might in the States where we're all uber-fatties.
And one last final thing to mention that is strange to me: I live in a shopping arcade!! No, seriously. It's like some sort of outdoor shopping mall with an overhang and a long strip of tiny mom and pop stores lining it. In the photo above I'm in front of my apartment building (the light blue area) with some sort of clinic off to the left, a bike shop on the right behind me (not yet open at 11am) and I'm facing across the street an okonomiyaki restaurant. How weird is that? If I come home late all I see are lots of metal "garage" doors closed and not a sound to be heard. I have yet to see any homeless sleep here though for all I've heard that they do. This place really isn't as bad as I thought it would be....