Ran into a few articles about unemployed in Japan sleeping in internet café’s after being laid off and thrown from their corporately sponsored houses. Wth! Both Japan and the Netherlands have similar unemployment rates now, around 5%. The difference is, I’m not hearing about people having to sleep outside because of it. It’s been in the news since ages, but still. I still remember the blue tents from the last time I visited. Stats. Don’t let me whop out these because I swear I’m going to cry. I ies visiting a third world country.
Posts Tagged ‘japan’
02.23.2010
02.22.2010
Quiet time~
Nu even niet! So it seems the quiet has somewhat returned. Goooood. Gives me the peace of mind to actually be productive in the evenings. For how long it’s going to be quiet, I don’t know. My guess is: not for very long. My maaneeja~ is leaving. Three weeks from now he’ll be gone. CIO-san should give me someone new to annoy. I’d hate it if I have to “report” to someone that I can’t annoy because they’re never there. *rests in the uselessness of existence* They say chaos is hitting the islanders hard. I didn’t notice. Guess I’m true native island folk: don’t need anyone to get stuff done. The last is very important, because in my FOF joint it won’t work.
I went out to dinner with my friends last weekend! <3 It was fun, and I gained a kilogram. haha. It was the first time I could actually eat that much it was that delicious. This year asof the 10th of October (Bochan nominated) the three of us will know each other for TEN YEARS. TEN. Can you imagine being stuck with me for 10 years of your life?
As for my travels~! I’m getting more and more excited! Currently waiting for some sites to update (incl. Hyperdia) to look some trains up. It’s been hard work preparing and still have lots to do. It’s odd really, I only do it when I go to Japan. I might not speak French and to be quite frank the French can be a lil bit snotty to tourists, but I have no problem going there with only minor preparations. A fairly large part of that can be contributed to the rather large gap between you and other people you feel when in Japan… Hmm, can’t quite put my finger on it. People often ask me “what the hell is it you have with Japan?“. Um, I studied information sciences. Check your stats among those, Japan is a disease.
Seriously? I think it’s because when I’m in that country; for once I can feel different and I don’t have to feel bad about it. I quite pride my uniqueness over here, but it’s like … even though there’s many many assholes in Japan too, I don’t feel like I need to be in *superattack testies mode*. Which is the definition of a vacation for me, going somewhere where I can be me without feeling so pressured to fit into a little cubicle. As a complete outsider, “no pressure” if you can tolerate the staring in some places and the school kids of course. I quite like being a zoo animal lol. It’s going to be less since I’ll be in the big cities this time, but even there…
Any other (western) country I’ve been to doesn’t quite make me feel the same. This is all in my mind of course. Kind of. I guess it’s so different it makes me feel normal. lol.
02.03.2010
Different? I think not…
I signal an interesting post on arama.
Grossberg said a common problem at Japanese companies is “group think” that makes it hard for an individual to raise a troublesome issue.
“It either falls flat and people ignore it, or it creates a problem for the individual who brings it up,” he said.
I think the last certainly is a cultural overstatement that favours non-Japanese companies. First sentence of that quote I’ll buy as something generally containing truth. I sometimes wonder what that is like working at a Japanese company with 99% Japanese… lol.
01.24.2010
New topic of focus: food
Last year I made sure I finished my schedule and everything that’s on my “sightseeing list”, so now it was time to shift focus to the good noms!
When I went to Japan in 2007, I didn’t have a clue where and what I was eating. Basically what we did was just walk around, select one by our noses and then having no clue what so ever if the restaurant had some type of specialty or something. It will remain a challenge for me to actually know what I’m ordering (a) if the menu’s do not contain pictures, (b) are not available in English and (c) if the staff looks at me sheepishly when it comes to using English. Thanks god I’m not a picky eater. So, to prevent this and to get the maximum out of the experience of eating in Japan, a little research is required. I’ll end up with a list of about 30 restaurants, somewhat scheduled to my day plans where I actually know what I’m going to be eating!! Sometimes however, it is better not to know. LOL. It’s good to know that you’ll be going into a restaurant that serves Okinawan specialties, or Hokkaido specialties or whatever. You seriously can’t tell if you can’t read and/or know little about what dishes come from where.
I downloaded an enormous heap of VVV6 to kind of assist me on that, in a fun way. Any restaurant that has been on that show for the past year has a small chance I’m dropping by to have the same dishes as V6. I got all the restaurants I could decipher and find on maps in a separate document, and this I’m now starting to map to my “Guide to good noms in Japan“, I mean, The Tokyo Restaurant Guide for dummies gaijin! Thanks to that show I know a hell of a lot more about Japanese food.
XD! YamaGoldfish just wrote about nabe! I actually put one in the guide specifically. I know it’s more of a winter dish, but they’ll just have to serve me that one in spring.
I also seem to have found a crab restaurant. I believe they call it “ka~ni”. In dutch that sounds more like (kannie, or “can’t do”). I love crab <3.
In any case, that’ll be the last step in “what to see, do and eat”. A lot of hours went in there, hope they were worth it.
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