1.) I am required by my lease to take my shoes off inside my apartment
2.) I have to sort my trash into combustible and noncombustible items, which are picked up on different days. I guess the lack of available landfill space has lead to the Japanese burning their trash still.
* On a side note here plastic bottles and bags are included in the combustible items.
3.) My apartment building has a "Refuge hatch". I have yet to determine what this is, but it's either a misspelling for Refuse or somewhere I should go during an earthquake.
I'll post pictures of the apartment later, or I'll just put them up on Flickr.
I'm lucky enough to have a grocery store across the street and managed to buy groceries without much trouble. I bought a few things based solely on their packaging. Such as this:
As the flames indicate, this was indeed a spicy snack. It was rings like the ones shown and they tasted like really hot Pringles. I tried to find Wasabi peas, but couldn't find them. I also bought something with Pokemon on the package, thinking it was some form of kid's snack. While it may be a snack, it looks more like it's some form of meal with rice. I was hoping for Pokemon fruit snacks or fruit roll ups.One of the women working in the store sounded like the fake cartoon character voice you'd expect to hear in Japan. She was saying "Sumimasen (Excuse me)" when she was no where near you or anyone.
I've also realized that I need to start remembering to not speak English the random people on the street. I keep saying "Thank you" to people who hold doors and then realize I should be thanking them in Japanese. I sort of wish I had taken more Japanese and understood more, but I was able to buy food today so I guess I'll be OK. I did decide that Japanese seems a lot easier than Chinese to learn and understand. Chinese just seems completely overwhelming to me. Maybe it's because I haven't had any Chinese lessons, but it just seems so much more complicated. I will say that I'm glad I took Japanese, only because now I can much more easily distinguish between spoken Japanese and Chinese. While my understanding of Japanese is pretty limited right now, I don't feel like it would be impossible to pick up a lot more. I was thinking of trying to watch Japanese children's TV to see what I can learn.
Now that everyone over there is asleep, I can make my way outside to wander around Ikebukuro and get to know my new neighborhood.
2 comments:
Incredible post, man. Regarding the language, do you find it's a must that you communicate in Japanese, or are there are a lot of people who speak rudimentary (or even proficient) English around?
IMHO Chinese has to be easier than Japanese, but I know like no Japanese so I'll shut up now.
Actually, I do try to use a little Japanese, but for the most part I have gotten by without actually saying anything to anyone. There are a fair number of people who know a bit of English. I try in the very least to say Arigato. I would bet that solely from my appearance, many people would not expect me to know Japanese at all. I would also have to think that when you live on an island nation with only 130 million residents, you might not expect many people to know your language. I realize the US is not much bigger and we suffer from the opposite situation, but in reality there are many more places that English is commonly used.
I have no idea about Chinese, it just sounds more difficult. Japanese is exactly as logical in construction as you would think. It seems like the Asian equivalent of German.
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