The Trash Queen Bandit

I shoved down my food and had a quick shower, as I'm sure odor was another one of the offenses I had committed earlier, with my atrocious first impression. Walking around in 30 degree heat and then having someone chase you down, was a workout and a half for the sweat glans! I freshened up and hoped I would have a chance to start anew. I would have to track down that note of mine too, as they hadn't found it yet and I didn't want some other random English person knocking on my 2A apartment, I had written down on my note. But I felt like it was a safe enough code in Japan for me to use English as a lock-at least in this blockade of run-down apartments, where learning English was the least of these peoples worries!

I found the note sitting right in the same place with the lone rock sitting on top flickering in the wind. It was so pathetic laying in the middle of the cement floor, and reading over what I wrote, was even more pitiful. The desperate attempt to make friends! I guess my note plan had failed. Luckily they didn't read it, so now I could beg for their friendship in person! I crumpled it into my bag, to place in its designated garbage bin at a later time.

The bin system in Japan is pretty overwhelming for a newbie. It is unlike anything I've seen, in a wonderfully environmentally friendly way, to make recycling mandatory and keep landfill space to a minimum. But in a selfish way, I hated the effort that went along with it. There were three main types of trash: burnables, plastics and cans/bottles. All items needed to be washed out and placed neatly in each of the different colour-coded bags. The signs indicated the time and day they needed to be placed outside, the specific location and how to properly clean, cut and place it in the bin, which was after the page list of what items belonged in each bag!  I had read to that if garbage wasn't disposed of correctly, people would drop the bag on your doorstep, with a viscous note about say, how your cup of noodle soup wasn't properly rinsed (because clearly the only person in the apartment complex that can mess up this garbage thing is a dumb foreigner). Or worse yet that you could get a hefty fine if you secretly dumped it somewhere at the wrong place or time!  I stared numerous times at the instructions in my apartment dumbfounded. I decided it couldn't be done with all the confusing instructions, but mostly because of stubborn laziness.

The organized trash system.

It was all scary business, this new underworld of crime I was getting myself into. Every time I placed a can in the plastics bin, or put my burnables out on the Tuesday instead of Wednesday, I was a committing a heinous crime.  I would just have to learn to adapt to my new role as a garbage criminal. *Cue eerie music* I will forever be known "The Trash Queen Bandit," the girl that sneaks around with large bags,  places them in the wrong areas and whose trash is disorganized, unclean and messy! But maybe it could be seen in a different light, I mean I wasn't robbing people, I was giving back to the people! It would just happen to be numerous things unwanted by me. Maybe in a way I'd be seen as a hero, one persons trash is another persons treasure after all!

My new-found role as 'The Trash Queen Bandit"!

Anyways, I arrived at the girl's apartment and got to speak to them for a couple hours. One of the girls, Brenda, was originally from Vancouver and had spent many years traveling and living abroad. She was a certified teacher back in Canada and thought it might be a cool, new experience to teach in Japan. She also was a beautiful product of a whole heap of different cultures (Welsh, Native American, Japanese..I think I'm forgetting one more), so she had a curiosity towards Japan and part of her roots. The other girl, Robin, was also a beautiful Canadian, but from the other-side, outside Toronto. She had finished up her degree and worked for a year to save up and decided to come over to teach and travel Japan. Both of them had spent time researching and having a desire to go to Japan, which was something I lacked. I explained how I more-or-less had nothing else at that time, and my brother suggested just going for it so, I thought what the heck I'll go! Not that I had anything against Japan, it just wasn't a country I was pulled in by, but neither were many of the other countries I had lived in, more of a coincidence that turned out to be a great decision-so why not dive in head first!

It was so great to speak with them and return a bit of normality and luckily I hadn't scared them off with my rare flare up of super awkwardness! Brenda decided to head to bed, as she was still battling off the jet lag, which luckily for me was only a one hour difference from Sydney time so didn't that problem. Robin and I felt we had the energy so decided lets hit the town!