Getting Settled Part 2: Registration and More

No, not that kind of alien....

The first thing you need to do when you are moving to Japan for more than 90 days is register yourself as a resident alien.  To do this, you have to go to your city hall for your district and fill out some forms.  Luckily for me, back during my study abroad in 2008, my host mom was nice enough to take me to get registered.  But his time, I had to do it on my own.  For whatever reason, though, both times the city hall was way on the other side of my district for where I lived.  Thankfully there was a direct bus that took me there when I was with my host family.  But this time, I had little choice but to just walk there.

While I was worried about getting lost going there (since I didn't have a phone at the time) I enjoyed seeing the more residental side of my ward.  Along the way, I passed many metal workshops, which was quite intriguing.  It was also really sunny and hot, making me sweat like a pig every step of the way XD  But thankfully,  Google Maps in Japan is very accurate, so I got there with little trouble.

When I arrived, I was a little disoriented.  \I went to the information booth lady and she very kindly directed me to the photo booth where I could take my application pictures.  When I got there, there was this curtain and I couldn't tell if anyone was inside or not.  There were no lights or anything, either, so I was kind of standing there thinking it was broken.  But one of the men sitting at the desks behind me said, in very good English "Open the curtain!"  Blushing, I thanked him and opened up the curtain, and, like magic, the light turned on.

They NEED to get these machines in America!  They're super useful and much less expensive than going to Walgreens or whatever to get them done.  It was only 600円 for 5 pictures and the lighting is brighter making it flattering and evening out your skin-tone.  It even made unphotogenic me look halfway decent.

After that ordeal, I headed to the appropriate window to get my registration started.  I took my number and was almost immediately called.  The attendant, and older Japanese man, explained the form in mostly Japanese with a little English here and there. He was very patient with me and told me to come back after I filled out the form.  The form was pretty self-explanatory with both English and Japanese for each section.  I tried to write in Japanese the parts that I could (like my address.  Thankfully, the kanji for it are pretty basic), but the form was so small for huge, terrible handwriting, so by the end of it, it looked like a toddler with a broken arm had written on it.  I handed it in and was told to wait.

After clarifying a couple of errors I made (whoops!  I am a 外人 after all), I was finished.  But then I had to request this form saying I was in the process of registering so I could get my cell phone and bank account set up.  This form has the longest name EVER and I just typed in on my American iPhone (which took about ten minutes to do since it was so long) so that I wouldn't have to go through the linguistic decathlon of even beginning to pronounce it.  The word is 外国人登録原票記載事項証明書 which, in the roman alphabet, is "gaikokujintourokugenpyoukisaijikoushoumeisho".  But, needless to say, I got them.

After that was done, there was nothing really else I had to do to prepare for work, so I've been spending the past two days with two fellow Americans who are going to be teaching with me.  It's been awesome hanging out with them and actually having some IRL social time.  We hit up Takadanobaba, Shinjuku, Akihabara, Harajuku, and Shibuya so far.  I love how laid back they are and how helpful they've been.  One of them directed me to a gem of a resource: an English speaking Softbank store near Harajuku!  I got my white iPhone and have been kind of messing with it (and kind of messed it up already :'(  ) since.  I feel a bit better about my living situation, but it's more in the fact that I'm determined to get out of it XD  I talked to the other English teacher in my guest house who has been living there for three months and his room is in the same state as mine due to the lack of space as well.  Soooooo, we'll see.

Tomorrow I start work, which ends my 3 and a half weeks of funemployment and begins my professional career.  Yikes.


Does anyone here have any interesting alien registration stories?  Any requests from anyone about blog topics you wanna see???

Getting Settled Part 1: Moving In

My roommates

Well, the past couple of days have been a whirlwind of "getting settled" (thought I feel not settled at all -__-;).  I guess I'll start from the beginning!!!

I arrived at about 2pm on Monday, September 12th.  As soon as I got off the plane, I speed-walked as politely as I could to get to customs and immigration quickly, as the last time I arrived, it was about a 45 minute or more wait.  Surprisingly (or unsurprisingly, I guess, since the flight date was September 11th), the line was quite short and I made it through.  I then waited for my two overweight bags and anxiously anticipated my final check-point through a supposedly-bag-checking customs agent.  I got them, took a deep breath, and breezed past the point.  From then on, I knew I was in!!!  I used ANA's Sky Porter to have my two bursting bags sent to my guest house.  The attendant didn't know much English, but we muddled through it together.  He was very patient with me, which I ALWAYS appreciate.  And, since I was a mileage card holder, I think I got a reduced rate, which is always a bonus!  I then headed for the train platform to meet up with my housing agent.

I met the super friendly and helpful housing agent at my main train station.  I was immediately excited because my area looked (and is) really cool and vibrant.  We chatted a bit while we walked to the place, knowing it was a straight shot from the station since I Google Street Viewed it about a million times.  I was full of hope and ready to start off right!!!  Now, when I was told I was going to be living in what the Japanese call a "guest house", I was picturing something more along the lines of a dorm: communal spaces, semi-furnished room, etc.  Well, while that's the case with many places, I was not fortunate enough to have gotten that privilege.  We walked to the building (which was actually the one to the left of the one Google Street View showed me) and climbed the stairs to the 4th floor.  With each passing step, the stairs got narrower and steeper.  My first thought was how much of a pain it was going to be to have to carry my 140lbs worth of luggage up there, unassisted (thankfully the nice porter who delivered them for me took on that challenge).  I soon realized this wasn't going to be a dorm-like situation.  We finally reached the 4th floor which opens up to a balcony.  It seemed very nice and quaint.  But then, we got to my actual guest house.  To describe it best, it would have to be like a 4 roomed apartment with each room gutted and rented out separately.  But this is not a "Western" apartment.  This is a Tokyo apartment.  First walking in, I immediately saw the kitchen.  I was really looking forward to cooking a lot while I'm here, but the standing area in the kitchen allowed for one to merely pivot while cooking something.  Oh well, I thought, I can deal,  Then, we came to my room.  It took him a bit to get the lock undone, but when he finally opened the door, I died a little inside.

While I don't have a tape measure to actually give a proper size, I'd estimate that it's 8ftx8ft (or 4.5 tatami mats, as advertised on their website).  The only furnishings it had were a very nice refrigerator with a freezer, a pointless and space consuming coat rail that I instantly hated, a box containing my futon I was promised, and "sofa bed".  I was horrified.  While the "sofa bed" (a thick mattress that can be laid flat like a bed or folded into different positions like a sofa) is surprisingly cool, I have no shelves, no dressers, no closets, no storage space whatsoever.  I have no way of unpacking as I have nowhere to put anything.  My room is a total disaster right now with a bleak foreseeable future. 

Let me put this into perspective.  I'm really happy and grateful to have a place in Tokyo and to just be in Tokyo in general.  But I do not think I can live her any longer than I have to.  It feels like a prison cell.  I've talked to a lot of my friends and family and they keep saying "Oh, well, spruce it up and make it homey!" but there is absolutely no way right now to do that.  I'll have to invest in some sort of dresser for sure and I really really need a desk.  My back is dying from the awkward positions I've sat in to use the computer.  Gahhh, how desperately do I need Wal-Mart in Japan.

I'm actively seeking new living quarters right now.  I am desperately pleading for my friends living in Japan to give me some sort of advice on what to do.  I have a contract to the end of the year.  Save me ;o;

Journey to Here

From meeting other people my age who are interested in Japan, I tend to find a common starting point: Sailor Moon. From watching Sailor Moon as a young child, a subliminal attraction to Japan grew within me. The colors the shapes the sounds and the magic tantalized my young, curious mind. Of course, this interest grew with the introduction of more shows and even more video games from the land of the rising sun.

After some weird years in middle school and high school, college came, and with it the opportunity to decide what I want to do with my life.  It was also my first opportunity to study Japanese. I went to a smallish liberal arts Jesuit school in Seattle. While I had a variety of majors (computer science and international business being the two majors I opted out of due to lack of aptitude/interest), studying Japanese was a constant through my education, starting my very first quarter of school.

This lead me to decide to study abroad at a sister Jesuit school in Tokyo, Sophia University (上智大学), for one semester. I was there for four months and cherished every moment of it (well, the moments not in class....), living with a real Japanese host family, joining a real Japanese school club, and going to real Japanese places. But it was not all sushi and Pokemon. There were definitely some undesirable aspects. But overall, this time was one of the greatest in my life where I've made the best friends anyone could ask for.

During my time between returning from study abroad and the end of my college career, I attempted several times to return, but lack of funds ultimately cut that dream short. I finished undergrad, ending up with a double major in International Studies and Asian Studies with a focus on Japan. Buttttttt, there's not much of a market for that sort of thing. So from January 2011 to August, I worked an entry level job that wasn't going anywhere for me. I was planning on saving up to go to language school, but I couldn't survive the separation from Japan that long, so I followed the footsteps of many a college grad and turned to the English teaching option to get me over there FAST. So now, here I am, three days before my initial training and starting my blog.

Now I'm going talk about what I want this blog to be. First, the explanation of the play-on-words title. The Japanese characters read NI-HON-SHIN. The first two characters together mean "Japan". The last two characters together mean "true feelings". So, the purpose of this blog is to share my true feelings on Japan -everything from the positive to the negative. These are my own personal opinions are they will probably contain some factual errors and irrational thinking. You are free to disagree to me (in fact, I'd like some discussion!).

This blog will also mostly be just a synopsis of my daily life as I live out my days in Tokyo.

I also want this to be a positive-minded resource for anyone who aspires to come to Japan to live, work, or study.  Many websites for Westerners interested in coming to Japan are usually full of bitter expats who want to keep out as much competition as possible.  This will be a positive space for those seeking advice.  The main reason I was able to get where I am now was through networking, so I want to give others that opportunity as well.

Enjoy!!!!


Special thanks to:
-Caroline Josephine for inspiring me through her blog. It motivated me to get over here as well as write this blog!!! She's an amazing writer and a true friend!!!
-my friend Emie for coming up with the name.
-my friend Julie for pushing me towards Japan and being one of my bestest friends and giving me tons of great blog ideas.
-oh, and to my parents, I guess.............. <3