(no subject)
i apologise for my absence; but there were several reasons for it.
this last month, despite leaving the UN and only working four days at the english school, has been rather hectic. not only have i found a new place to live, a new job, and booked a ticket back to england for ten days, but i am also trying to compile a zine that is consuming all of my writing energy and inspiration. i am also sleeping much later than i used to, just because i can; the first week after i started this routine, i was awake at 8am every morning, bright as a button... but i have slid into a lazy routine of awaking at 9, 10, 11... nice but not very relaxing.
my old crazy flatmate murphy told me offhand at the beginning of the month that we had to move before june. fortunately, i found the place of my dreams at only the second viewing; extremely close to where i used to live, still cycleable to everywhere, cheaper, and much more homey than my previous abode. sofas, breakfast bar, soft furnishings, tropical fish, bamboo, HAMSTER (the deal breaker)... somewhere i really enjoy staying and would be sad to leave. i'm staying with an australian guy, daish, and an english guy called pete, who are both extremely relaxed and excellent flatmates. unfortunatey, although i tried to get out of paying the rent for the last place (due to having no contract, being forced out without notice and also questioning the fishiness of the whole set up; was my money just disappearing into a profit hole), after a week of hassle from murphy, i have to pay up. although i have the money- buried somewhere in england- i am trying to live hand and mouth again, after paying 3.5 months up front for the new place, a ticket to england, etc...
i also found a new job, which i will start properly from july when i get back from england, but am doing 1 day a week to accustomise myself to the new system. it's a bit of teaching with translation/editing mixed in. the hours and location are pretty horrible, but i'm hoping to do it for four months before buggering off on the 'peaceboat', a cruise ship run by a japanese NGO that needs interpreters and teachers. i'm worried about my ability to translate speeches and lectures into high-level japanese, but if that fails, i'd be quite happy to be taken aboard as a teacher, if only to escape the japanese winter (november-march) and to visit south america/fiji/south africa and so on, for free....
tonight i went back to my old place to pick up the last dregs of belongings and to leave the key. niall- the scottish drunken flatmate- had obviously done his worst, leaving an empty bottle of amaretto and beard shavings in the toilet, the strange stale stench of unwashed cooking and moulding things in the fridge. the random writing the last few flatmates have scrawled onto the walls was blurred out by thick pen and angry, jagged writing; FUCK YOU ALL, FUCK YOU ALL. FUCK YOU ALL BECAUSE I CAN'T READ YOU.
his frustration at his lack of japanese ability, and anger at life in general out here, seeped through the walls. a tight ball formed in my stomach and i wanted nothing but out of there, to get free of the strange tension. i gathered the filthy rubbish, grabbed the spare bike wheel, and fled. there was nothing but the stale aroma of abandonment and bitterness left. an odd place, and odd time.
despite spring bringing tokyo out in a rash of greenery, i miss europe so much it makes my heart ache. while england is supposedly my home, europe becomes a general mass in my memory, the home continent. fragments of my life in switzerland and barcelona seem more present than ever. stone buildings, quiet history, plazas and boulevards, cobbled streets for horses, tomato-based dishes and dark-haired men. i begin to understand the romanticism americans and asians attach to the continent only when i am so far away and contained by grey, lego-like boxes of buildings... i need to get to the seaside from this city, but the constraints of my new job and back to working 6 days a week holds little promise of respite... why do i push myself into these corners?!
this last month, despite leaving the UN and only working four days at the english school, has been rather hectic. not only have i found a new place to live, a new job, and booked a ticket back to england for ten days, but i am also trying to compile a zine that is consuming all of my writing energy and inspiration. i am also sleeping much later than i used to, just because i can; the first week after i started this routine, i was awake at 8am every morning, bright as a button... but i have slid into a lazy routine of awaking at 9, 10, 11... nice but not very relaxing.
my old crazy flatmate murphy told me offhand at the beginning of the month that we had to move before june. fortunately, i found the place of my dreams at only the second viewing; extremely close to where i used to live, still cycleable to everywhere, cheaper, and much more homey than my previous abode. sofas, breakfast bar, soft furnishings, tropical fish, bamboo, HAMSTER (the deal breaker)... somewhere i really enjoy staying and would be sad to leave. i'm staying with an australian guy, daish, and an english guy called pete, who are both extremely relaxed and excellent flatmates. unfortunatey, although i tried to get out of paying the rent for the last place (due to having no contract, being forced out without notice and also questioning the fishiness of the whole set up; was my money just disappearing into a profit hole), after a week of hassle from murphy, i have to pay up. although i have the money- buried somewhere in england- i am trying to live hand and mouth again, after paying 3.5 months up front for the new place, a ticket to england, etc...
i also found a new job, which i will start properly from july when i get back from england, but am doing 1 day a week to accustomise myself to the new system. it's a bit of teaching with translation/editing mixed in. the hours and location are pretty horrible, but i'm hoping to do it for four months before buggering off on the 'peaceboat', a cruise ship run by a japanese NGO that needs interpreters and teachers. i'm worried about my ability to translate speeches and lectures into high-level japanese, but if that fails, i'd be quite happy to be taken aboard as a teacher, if only to escape the japanese winter (november-march) and to visit south america/fiji/south africa and so on, for free....
tonight i went back to my old place to pick up the last dregs of belongings and to leave the key. niall- the scottish drunken flatmate- had obviously done his worst, leaving an empty bottle of amaretto and beard shavings in the toilet, the strange stale stench of unwashed cooking and moulding things in the fridge. the random writing the last few flatmates have scrawled onto the walls was blurred out by thick pen and angry, jagged writing; FUCK YOU ALL, FUCK YOU ALL. FUCK YOU ALL BECAUSE I CAN'T READ YOU.
his frustration at his lack of japanese ability, and anger at life in general out here, seeped through the walls. a tight ball formed in my stomach and i wanted nothing but out of there, to get free of the strange tension. i gathered the filthy rubbish, grabbed the spare bike wheel, and fled. there was nothing but the stale aroma of abandonment and bitterness left. an odd place, and odd time.
despite spring bringing tokyo out in a rash of greenery, i miss europe so much it makes my heart ache. while england is supposedly my home, europe becomes a general mass in my memory, the home continent. fragments of my life in switzerland and barcelona seem more present than ever. stone buildings, quiet history, plazas and boulevards, cobbled streets for horses, tomato-based dishes and dark-haired men. i begin to understand the romanticism americans and asians attach to the continent only when i am so far away and contained by grey, lego-like boxes of buildings... i need to get to the seaside from this city, but the constraints of my new job and back to working 6 days a week holds little promise of respite... why do i push myself into these corners?!