Company Lifers

We successfully departed the bus and managed to find our way to the next secret location of training. The material in these sessions were as dry as having a mouthful of flour. My head nods up and down, but there are only 7 other people sitting cross legged, in an actual classroom that is taught in, so I could only get away with my ten second micronaps. I read through the alphabet and other colourful posters around the classroom about 80 times to try to stay awake. We were made to read up to 20 pages of homework each night, again on the most dullest, most common sensical material on the planet, such as: if a child does not want to participate in a game do not force them, encourage them on for half a minute and then continue on with the other students in the game, which was read out to us word for word! Even recollecting this stuff now is putting me in a sleep coma (maybe I've found the cure to insomnia, this company's training manual for teaching English)!

Real life people more disturbing
than the movie "Requiem for a Dream."

Our trainer that we had day in and day out (sigh) was only getting worse. Not only could he embody a full-on child (which is disturbing in itself), when demonstrating what a child might do in an acting out of a classroom situation, he seemed to be getting more and more excited about the material as we went on. The amount of wedgies and bullying this guy must have gone through as a child, was so apparent that the permanent psychological socially awkward effect was in full inflammation! He was a company lifer, as I've dubbed him, he breathed in and out the joy for working for a company, that he knew bullied him around and kept him well underpaid and respected. He even got on with Big B (if that was proof in itself for his LBH (recap: Loser Back Home blog) status)! It was cringing to hear some of the things he said, but at least the cringing part kept me awake at parts. I'd nod off, then wake up to him making heavy breathing noises and nearly bouncing off the wall in excitement for working at this company.  It did unfortunately, keep my mind occupied in imagining how people like him function in day-to-day living. I'd imagine this 90lb scronny man about 5'2 bouncing off the wall at a grocery store: "Gee boy only $15 for all these groceries, oh golly gee its my lucky day!" ....Cringe! There are things in life that are more disturbing than the most graphic horror movies.

We somehow found our way and we're barking back and forth to each other on which bus we needed to take. There was the stand we were at but there were several different buses leaving from that place. I was nominated, with my Japanese phrase book in hand, to hop on every bus that came by to ask (in my horrible Japanese) if the bus went to this particular stop. About the third time in the bus driver answered the familiar words "Hai"(yes). I turned around, gave the other girls the thumbs up and turned back to him. 

Japanese buses work very differently from what I was used to back home. Once you enter the bus you take a ticket (just like the wait tickets at banks with a number on it) from there you find a seat (it also seems that sitting at the front of the bus is the cooler thing to do, in my observation, than at the back of the bus). Above the driver's head there will be a light up board telling you the prices from stop 1-50 about how much you need to pay the driver once you get off. A very well-thought out system if you ask me. This was my first experience on a Japanese bus and ours seemed pimped out too! There was a lady that spoke at each name of the stop and a light that would move across another screen to say the name of the bus stop just passed and coming up. There also is another odd thing that you'll notice, the bus driver's wear Britney Spears types of microphones and speak the stop name and also say something once they stop at an intersection and drop people off. 

The microphones Britney Spears made famous, now on
shy, timid, Japanese bus drivers.

You really could never get off at the wrong stop unless you were trying too! I never figured out what the bus drivers said when they stopped, but found it quite interesting, as something like this, back home would never suffice. 

I'm not knocking bus drivers as it's an honest career choice back home, BUT there are a lot of miserable bus driver's I've met, in my time, of grudgingly having to use public transport. I can just imagine if they implemented the microphone on every bus driver the stories we would all be exposed to. I'm picturing an grumpy old man, that should be retired, looks like his cholesterol levels could reach critical level at any second and hates his job and makes sure you know of it (I'm thinking along the lines of Chris Farley in 'Billy Madison')!

The stereotype of the bus driver back home, which would
not be a wise choice to equip with a microphone.

What class act stories would we be exposed to then? This would never work. I'm sure the complaints would skyrocket from some of the foul-mouthed bus driver's, I've met in my time, that I could hear without a microphone. 

The Amazing Race

We drank and drank, until finally we realized the time and said our farewells. Karla and Toby were leaving bright and early to head up to Tokyo to finish there training. The split was happening and all of us that were left behind were scared of the concentration of Big B, we would have to endure!
Our third day of training was on it's way. It had already felt like an eternity, what more could another week and a half bring to us!?

Bright and early the next day we had a change of location. All we were given at the end of our last training session was yet again another crumpled map with vague directions on where we were to be. Being the keeners we were, we arose at a ungodly hour to make sure we could find this 'secret location.' The directions went like this, which is a lot more difficult from our internetless apartment:

Take a train from (x station, which wasn't ours) on this line. Then change over at this station to y line and get off at z. Then take bus w to bus stop v then walk down till you see a bicycle shop, turn left continue until you see an old Japanese man sitting on the curb then answer the question to reveal your next move (ok I took the last part from "The Amazing Race" but it was getting ridiculous and as if they didn't want us to find this 'other' location).

Were we on an undercover episode of "The Amazing Race?" our map and directions sure made us question that! The time was ticking and the sweat was pouring down our faces. Brenda, Merran, Robin and I were also erupting nonsensical drama, due to our stress. "Do you really need to breathe so hard?!" "Why is this happening to us?" "Who am I and where am I supposed to go?" were the types of conversations going down, making for a brilliant spin-off of this hit TV series, if you ask me! Commentary begins: Four young girls trek out into the depths of suburbia to find a random classroom, to teach and bring English into this world. There were no cameras that were seen and no paycheck to follow once we reached our next checkpoint, the bus station.

We're we on an undercover episode of "The Amazing Race?"
our map and directions sure made us question that!

Shouting madness

I wiped the sweat from my face, after dodging multiple promotional enticements (at least this is what I was assuming they were..not one word of Engwish was spoken to me). We all cleaned up and decided to meet downstairs in half an hour. The piles of homework and reading we were given each day, was being pushed off to the side-our two day comrades were departing and what better way to send them off with a few drinks! I shuttered to myself recalling the last time I went hard on the liquor in Japan and vowed I wouldn't do that to myself for at least another week.

We all met downstairs and Karla said she heard a good deal from one of the shouting promoters. I decided I would need to put on my big girl pants and walk out there again, with a death grip on Karla's trousers. We trudged along in the hot humidity to the same spot we were at not long ago. We had our target and charged through the crowd of promoters, into the restaurant we had faith Karla had chosen wisely. There was a man, about the size of an old child, that greeted us with a big grin, which grew even wider when he heard Karla speak Japanese. We relied on Karla once again to order all our dishes and drinks.

A stranger custom for a foreigner in Japan that you will encounter, is that you must yell out to indicate to your server that you want to order. In a polite and generally quiet society, like Japan, this feels quite strange. Sitting there politely, covering my mouth to laugh and consuming as little space as my body can manage, then shouting at the top of my lungs "SUMIMASEN!!!" seems bizzare at first. You do have to yell, as usually the small restaurant space is buzzing with other people, noisy kitchen noises and of course other people's yells to order. I was dumbfounded at first when Karla shouted at the man. He was so nice, and cute and petite, what did he do to deserve to get yelled at, I pleaded to know from Karla. "It's customary to shout, or else no one will know you want to get served," Karla said.

This is one of the many things I have learnt as a foreigner in Japan, that it is quite easy to pigeon hole some of the customs and cultures you see, to be able to organize and become accustomed to what Westerner's may find odd, but it can never and will never work like this. There is always the exception. The timid, quite stereotype in a day-to-day restaurant outing, will change your mind about this with the multiple big, deep voices shouting "Sumimasen!"

A seemingly unpolite custom of shouting at wait staff.

The Split

After our break and renewal of energy, everyone was optimistic that training would continue without many interruptions, useless storytelling or painful arguments-but alas we were wrong. I can't even begin to recount how many of these occurred during the afternoon session, but I think Big B knew she had set herself aflame as an outsider and none of us had the guts to put her out. The chair shuffles, piercing glares, coughs, sighs and whispers back and forth, did not halt her efforts. I couldn't really think about what you could actually say or do in this regimented training environment, it was like psychological military training, to put up with this girl. And by the end of the day my eye started twitching uncontrollably!

Our training group was being split up, which was sad as Karla (our fluent friend) and Toby (the token Australian bloke) we're quite cool and handy to have around (Toby was the only one of us to be able to get a cell phone, as his Japanese girlfriend was able to buy it for him, to get around the never-ending paperwork and documents needed, which I will divulge to you all later in a long-winded rant)! We decided we needed a few drinks after training and to say goodbye. There were originally 13 in the group and 5 of them we're moving up to Tokyo to finish up the rest of the training. Unfortunately, our group was staying in Nagoya (one of my least favourite cities in Japan) and had Big B. The rest of our group for the next 12 days, was a estrogen overload of 7 females and 1 Big B (a species still unknown to scientists). Alcohol was definitely in order!

Running through the restaurant street of chaos

Walking back to our rusty-dusty apartments  we came across an unusual sight, lines of men and woman standing outside their stores, yelling out in Japanese. There were hardly any other people in sight and it wasn't a busy street (if you could call it a street at all). All the short-end-of-the-stick restaurant staff, that we're chosen that day to yell outside, turned to stare at us. We were unprepared for the scene we had come upon..it felt like we had to Indiana Jones think ourselves through this . Half running and walking, we bobbed our heads side to side, dodging the flyers thrown in our faces and looked straight ahead, no-eye contact with the employees, who were piercing yells of Japanese that blasted our ear drums. We weaved in and out, as quickly as possible and once we had escaped their line of firing, the noise was deadly quiet. I nervously looked back over my shoulder and the employees remained stationed and quiet, with no other people daring to pass through the narrow street of restaurants, unless prepared to commit to one in particular. It was a polite mob of chaos, for Japan, and the employees were aggressive in wanting us to come inside. I wonder if they only made their wages by getting scared looking foreigners to come in?

Once again, I had come out alive from my mishaps in Japan, surviving only
through my inspiration from a fictional hero character.

LBH

The lunch room was filled with raging gossip about Big B and our trainer. Boy we're we scared of how long this training thing could pan out for, with Big B squeezing every ounce of patience out of all of us! She just didn't get it! Most of the other people in the training group seemed within the normal range of people, but Big B was in another category, she was as my friend coined it, an "LBH." An LBH is a "special" type of person that just doesn't quite fit in. A LBH stands for "Loser Back Home." In Japan, a world of it's own, the concept of a loser gaijin, just doesn't exist, unless the Japanese person has had experiences with foreigners abroad. Like an alien entering into our atmosphere, we would be captivated by it's differences and oddities, but far from our minds would be the label of a loser no matter how different they seemed. Same goes for Japan, toss in an unusual foreigner and the same sparks of curiosity fly!

LBH's do very well in Japan for this very reason. Back home, they may have been teased out-casted and shunned and either didn't know how or want to change their behaviour, to be able to socialize on a day-to-day basis with others. This is why so many LBH's flock to Japan because they are accepted for who they are and not judged and shunned as they would be back in our culture. Japan of course would have it's fair share of people they would consider losers and wouldn't just accept anyone, but it's on this basis of being different, that all social rules you would expect, get thrown out the window. Even a person like Big B, would be more successful in Japan to be able to settle down and find herself a few friends and maybe even a boyfriend, than she would in Canada. I would say that even though her obesity (which is generally pretty looked down upon in Japan and not approached with any sensitivity), and impoliteness, loud mannerisms, overstated opinions and know-it-all attitude, would make it still a difficult process to attain, but like any alien one person will eventually step forward to learn more. It's when you are another Westerner meeting this type of weirdo guy or girl, in Japan, that you can recognize the social awkwardness and gag reflex behaviours they provoke, and safely look into there eyes (if you can manage this) and think that's an LBH in the flesh!

So next time you see a situation similar to this (Russel Simmons And Kimora Lee)in Japan you can think to yourself LBH.

Another side note update

Thanks again to everyone that has been sending your messages of concern. It has been a horrible tragedy that has struck Japan, that has more than just shaken the ground from under everyone's feet.

I made the difficult decision, after pleas from friends and family to depart Japan, within a few days time. To be in country, when one of the biggest disasters ever to hit Japan occurred, has given me an even greater respect for the Japanese culture. The Japanese people have remained calm and collected with a strong inner strength, through something that I could not hide my panic and anxiety from (even though I was far from much of the damage). Japan will once again rise up from tragedy, that has attempted to knock her down many a time, to become an even stronger, unified nation. My thoughts go out to all that were and are being affected by everything that's happened.

As my blog has been written from the start of my time in Japan (more than 6 months ago), I assure my readers that there are many more blogs to follow.

Thanks again for everyone's support during this difficult time.