Wake up in Tokyo.
my neck hurts. strangely enough, not because of the plane, or the lack of a comfortable matress - but because of all the crazy flashy things i've been trying to see all at once. i have never, EVER felt like it was daytime because of the lighting. tokyo is one big lightbulb. i wonder if they ever turn all this shit off. most of it is completely and utterly useless; who needs to see a 50000 meter chanel logo changing from blacktowhitetogreentopink at four in the morning? especially when clearly, NO ONE CAN AFFORD IT.
my flight was actually amazing. i'm guessing contintental airlines felt somewhat threatened by air canada's state of the art entertainment features, because they copied all of them. wonderful! i had the last window seat of the biggest airplane i have ever been on. the ony shitty thing was the choice of meals when they finally got to the 50th row. i had to stare at that godamn piece of quote unquote steak that really shouldnt be served as food. ever. but nonetheless, i watched 6 of the 330 movies they had to choose from, flight of the conchords and curb your enthusiasm. i slept for about two hours. the bad thing about those sleeping pills is that once you're up, you're i-need-to-go-dancing up. the fourteen hours went by pretty quickly, and i was next to this nice old lady who was going to tokyo to visit her son and i'm sure secretely wondering why on earth was i going to tokyo. good question.
the manager picks me up from this fancy shmancy hotel in akasaka. the van is superb (the company van, he says), he's dressed to the 9's and he actually understands what i'm saying. he's fragile looking with a gorgeous black trench and a goatee. most likely in his early thirties. we're already getting on really well - he lets play dj, and he bought me my dearly missed lipton iced milk tea along with a pack of lucky strikes. i whine about the price of cigarettes back home and he's shocked. "ten dollars for pack? you people rich or you no smoke so much?! i no go to canadia because i will be broke in a week".
he tells me i have four castings to go to after we drop off my overweight luggage at my appartment, "The Weekly Mansion". typical..i was semi-expecting that. unfortunately, the first casting is for- you guessed it- UNDERWEAR! i have never felt so naked in a casting room before. ever. i come in and all the other models (germans, ukranians, CANADIANS?!) are stripping and waiting half nekked to go to this other room where there's about 15 people staring you down in your goddamn underwear where you have no idea what they're talking about and knowing you haven't shaved in the five minutes you got to go in your appartment. enough said. luckily enough, the models from our agency are all such sweethearts. in the first five minutes, i met two people who live in montreal and the two cutest german girls i have ever encountered in my lifetime. we all live in this weekly mansion (the hotel names here are unbelievable) and i'm excited to get to know them all.
anyway, the minute i get back into the van they tell me i really have to lose weight, and the measurements are going to take place tomorrow. i guess that's why they still havent given me any money for food (i managed to gather up some change for a yogurt this morning). i go into the agency today (second day) and they actually told me i had to lose four centimetres before they even start my contract. does this mean i've got to stay longer? i really hope not. this doesn't make any sense. they were nice about it, and i really knew they were going to call me on that. they are also contemplating on dying my hair brown. it's really annoying though, because all of the clients are all ''ohhh, your hair is so nice white!'' and i probably wouldve gotten a job already if my hair wasn't salmon coloured. i'm fucking sick of dying my hair.
anyway, the hotel/appartment is decent. i live on the 6th floor (the people say it's really noisy on the first floor. once again - typical), and the room is fairly large. what i don't understand is the lack of ANY closets, drawers, or compartments. we both have to keep all of our shit under our bed, in our suitcase. which is really annoying hence the fact that i've packed two months of my life in there. we have a television (why?!), um...a chair. and two pretty big beds that are hard a a rock. what the fuck is up with these japanese people and their hard beds? do they actually like sleeping on that shit? i have many unanswered questions, like; why put the entrance to the balcony behind the television? why put fake drawers that dont even open (taunting us)? and last but definitely not least - why is the wallpaper always so goddamn TACKY. it's the last thing i'd like to see coming home at nine at night, giving more of a headache with it's patternsswirlsjustsotacky!!! my roomate is from russia. did i even need to tell you this? but she's actually so nice, and speaks proper english for once. and is not six feet tall. she likes saying my name after every sentence, which is real cute. she's done a bunch of campains like vivienne westwood, and i realize that models i've never met look like regular people in person. i swear, it's so strange to meet the actual model once you've seen their pictures. it's a moment of relief; that these girls aren't plastic-shiny, glistening hair, snow-white teeth in reality. but yes - her name is tatiana and i find it really adorable when i wake up and she's sleeping on the wrong side of the bed with her teddy bear. everyone's human. thank god.
all in all, tokyo is beautiful. i talked alot to all of the other girls today, and like i said, they're pretty amazing. we're going to go out for conveyer belt sushi, drink plum wine near the temple, and dancedancedance. i'm really happy here.
my flight was actually amazing. i'm guessing contintental airlines felt somewhat threatened by air canada's state of the art entertainment features, because they copied all of them. wonderful! i had the last window seat of the biggest airplane i have ever been on. the ony shitty thing was the choice of meals when they finally got to the 50th row. i had to stare at that godamn piece of quote unquote steak that really shouldnt be served as food. ever. but nonetheless, i watched 6 of the 330 movies they had to choose from, flight of the conchords and curb your enthusiasm. i slept for about two hours. the bad thing about those sleeping pills is that once you're up, you're i-need-to-go-dancing up. the fourteen hours went by pretty quickly, and i was next to this nice old lady who was going to tokyo to visit her son and i'm sure secretely wondering why on earth was i going to tokyo. good question.
the manager picks me up from this fancy shmancy hotel in akasaka. the van is superb (the company van, he says), he's dressed to the 9's and he actually understands what i'm saying. he's fragile looking with a gorgeous black trench and a goatee. most likely in his early thirties. we're already getting on really well - he lets play dj, and he bought me my dearly missed lipton iced milk tea along with a pack of lucky strikes. i whine about the price of cigarettes back home and he's shocked. "ten dollars for pack? you people rich or you no smoke so much?! i no go to canadia because i will be broke in a week".
he tells me i have four castings to go to after we drop off my overweight luggage at my appartment, "The Weekly Mansion". typical..i was semi-expecting that. unfortunately, the first casting is for- you guessed it- UNDERWEAR! i have never felt so naked in a casting room before. ever. i come in and all the other models (germans, ukranians, CANADIANS?!) are stripping and waiting half nekked to go to this other room where there's about 15 people staring you down in your goddamn underwear where you have no idea what they're talking about and knowing you haven't shaved in the five minutes you got to go in your appartment. enough said. luckily enough, the models from our agency are all such sweethearts. in the first five minutes, i met two people who live in montreal and the two cutest german girls i have ever encountered in my lifetime. we all live in this weekly mansion (the hotel names here are unbelievable) and i'm excited to get to know them all.
anyway, the minute i get back into the van they tell me i really have to lose weight, and the measurements are going to take place tomorrow. i guess that's why they still havent given me any money for food (i managed to gather up some change for a yogurt this morning). i go into the agency today (second day) and they actually told me i had to lose four centimetres before they even start my contract. does this mean i've got to stay longer? i really hope not. this doesn't make any sense. they were nice about it, and i really knew they were going to call me on that. they are also contemplating on dying my hair brown. it's really annoying though, because all of the clients are all ''ohhh, your hair is so nice white!'' and i probably wouldve gotten a job already if my hair wasn't salmon coloured. i'm fucking sick of dying my hair.
anyway, the hotel/appartment is decent. i live on the 6th floor (the people say it's really noisy on the first floor. once again - typical), and the room is fairly large. what i don't understand is the lack of ANY closets, drawers, or compartments. we both have to keep all of our shit under our bed, in our suitcase. which is really annoying hence the fact that i've packed two months of my life in there. we have a television (why?!), um...a chair. and two pretty big beds that are hard a a rock. what the fuck is up with these japanese people and their hard beds? do they actually like sleeping on that shit? i have many unanswered questions, like; why put the entrance to the balcony behind the television? why put fake drawers that dont even open (taunting us)? and last but definitely not least - why is the wallpaper always so goddamn TACKY. it's the last thing i'd like to see coming home at nine at night, giving more of a headache with it's patternsswirlsjustsotacky!!! my roomate is from russia. did i even need to tell you this? but she's actually so nice, and speaks proper english for once. and is not six feet tall. she likes saying my name after every sentence, which is real cute. she's done a bunch of campains like vivienne westwood, and i realize that models i've never met look like regular people in person. i swear, it's so strange to meet the actual model once you've seen their pictures. it's a moment of relief; that these girls aren't plastic-shiny, glistening hair, snow-white teeth in reality. but yes - her name is tatiana and i find it really adorable when i wake up and she's sleeping on the wrong side of the bed with her teddy bear. everyone's human. thank god.
all in all, tokyo is beautiful. i talked alot to all of the other girls today, and like i said, they're pretty amazing. we're going to go out for conveyer belt sushi, drink plum wine near the temple, and dancedancedance. i'm really happy here.