I know, it's a poor excuse. I'll go slam my head into the wall of shame now.
Actually, that can wait until after this post. I only have about half an hour to write and a ton to say. I have been gone for a while, you know. (I should warn you, this post turned out pretty long. Beware, yo.)
First things first. I added a new link under the Other Cool People's Blogs section to the right: Hyperbole and a Half. I just discovered this blog thanks to my awesome friend Ela and you should all read it. It's seriously hilarious and I really want a pet Alot now.
On to the rest of the blog.
Something somewhat strange has happened to me, something certainly unexpected. As you may recall from my last blog post, I was not exactly keen to go back "home" for the holidays. And there was really a simple reason for that; I wasn't done with Japan yet. I'd done a lot, but there was still a lot left to be done.
Well, after I got home, I basically rolled around in bed for a while, wondering why I was waking up before the sun every morning and then reminding myself that I was on the other side of the world now, so that actually kind of made sense. To be honest, I don't remember much that happened in those first few days. Lots of eating, that much is clear. After a few days of vegging about and probably doing little other than watch crappy daytime television, I think I remembered the existence of English books. The New Year rolled around and I flew down to Florida to visit a friend for a few days before returning back North. Before I knew it, it was time to go back to Japan.
Summarized like that, it seems as if nothing happened and happened quickly. An unbiased observer might think, based on that description, that I was raging inside to go back. But as I said, a strange thing happened. As more and more time passed, I became more and more comfortable where I was. I noticed more and more things that I had missed while I was in Japan. Bookstores, for instance. And an actual variety of ethnic foods. And, of course, all the people back home that I haven't seen in a long time and won't see for an even longer time.
Some bad things stood out to me a lot more, too, but for the first time in my life, I think I actually started to feel a little homesick. By the time my little vacation was coming to an end, I was actually beginning to question what the hell I was doing. Why would I want to go back to Japan? Why would I want to leave all this behind? There are people there, good friends of mine, that I will likely not see again for years. For some reason, that bothers me now.
That probably sounded a little cold. Maybe it is. Maybe I'm just a cold mofo with emotions like steel.
No, that's not right. I've just been traveling for a long time. Flying and moving house across the continent (and continents) on my own since I was thirteen and with the rest of my nuclear family even before that. Something you learn when you're moving all the time is that people lose touch with you. It's totally natural. And even if you do stay in some semblance of touch, the number of times you talk to each other will almost necessarily become smaller and smaller until you talk maybe once or twice a year. Why? Because people have lives. People have things to do and, if you're not around, then eventually you will be reduced to a minimal or non-existent part of their life. And they will be the same to you.
That sounds really bad, but it's not, really. Imagine spending the rest of your life pining after the things you've left behind. Now imagine being able to move on and live your life, unburdened by what you left behind. I think it's pretty clear which is the healthier alternative. And this is why, after about the age of eleven, I stopped bothering with homesickness.
Yet here I am, feeling the closest to homesick that I can remember feeling in a long, long time. It's fucking weird and I'm not sure I like it. But I also know that I don't want to lose what I've had there and I'm almost certain that I will. I think I like that even less. And given how little I even wanted to return home just a few weeks ago, that's really, really strange.
Still, as I said, it's healthier not to be pining, so I've developed a plan of action. I will, every single weekend, see the sights, be social, and enjoy the good things here. What matters is where I direct my focus and my focus should be forward. A backwards focus leads to that aforementioned pining, which is totally uncool. Do you think Blade has a backwards focus? Nuh-uh. No way. That dude is way too cool to pine.
So tomorrow I'm going to Beppu for the weekend, which is this cool little town on the eastern shore of the southernmost of the four main islands of Japan. That was a complicated description. Just click on the link, you'll see what I'm talking about. Anyway, it's famous for onsen (hot springs) and that's something I've been wanting to do since before I came to Japan, so I'm gonna bloody do it and I'm gonna bloody enjoy it.
As for the saga of the heater, there have been continued developments. Basically, my heater has continued to not really work. It goes on for about five to fifteen minutes, then shuts off and flashes lights at me. I've been told that when those lights flash in that particular combination and rhythm, that indicates that the seventh layer of Hell has been penetrated and-- wait, no, that's something completely different. It just means that it's shutting off for safety reasons. The question, then, is what reason and how can it be fixed.
So after a couple months of putting up with that nonsense, I asked the office to do something about it. They sent over a guy last night who basically took the lid off, banged the crap out of the regulator box outside with his wrench, put the lid back on, and called it fixed. Apparently not enough gas was getting through the pipes, so he had to force the pipes back into place so that the gas could flow properly. Thus the bang-bang-bang of the wrench on the pipes. Though at the time it looked more like a caveman toying with a bomb in the only way a caveman could: with violence.
Anyway, much to my surprise, it seemed to be working. I stood around for about an hour and the heater was still running. Hurray! I quickly scrambled to facebook and declared my victory. But alas, I was premature. After running for about two hours, the damn heater stopped again. I promptly curled into an angry, grumbly, little ball and went to sleep.
In the morning I tried it again. At first it was back to its normal five or ten minutes of working and then stopping. After a couple tries, it stayed on for another two hours of glory. But this time I was wary. I knew better. I eyed the machine and let it run, thinking it might stop on its own. But it didn't. It just kept going. I wondered if maybe it really was fixed and just happened to need a little time. So I did a stupid thing then and tried to change the temperature. It was actually getting hot in my room and I wanted to turn the thing down. Apparently "down" means "off," though, because the bloody thing stopped working altogether. It is now back to going on and then off again every five or so minutes and I am back to rage.
Seriously. I am not made for cold weather. Whoever decided I should be Canadian made a grave error.
The next step in this saga is to go retrieve a large kerosene space heater from another foreigner living in town. I have approximately an hour and a half to accomplish this before I go to class and then to sleep and then to class again and then to Beppu. In other words, I have an hour and a half to accomplish this. The office has given up on my heater. It's fifteen years old and a piece of shit and they know it. The best they can now offer is a consolation prize of a heater that is probably going to be even more of a pain in the ass.
Why is that? Because the thing about kerosene heaters is that you can't just run them. You can't leave them on while you're sleeping and you can't leave them on while you're out. And every hour or so, you have to air out the room, thus letting all the cold air back in. This is because kerosene is toxic and will KILL YOU if you don't. Also, I get to go through the fun of finding out where I can buy kerosene, how much I need to buy, and what kind I need to buy, all in Japanese. Yay! I love winter!
I'll let you know how the rest of this saga unfolds.
~Jeffles (of the rage)
