Means cell phone. I don’t have one yet.
After writing my post this morning I headed to Imadegawa early so I could do some exploring. I got to the campus and I headed north. I decided to take turns that looked like they might lead somewhere cool, and for the most part I ended up walking around a residential district. Although, at one point I ran across a series of what appeared to be temples. Each one had an old Japanese style entranceway, and inside the grounds, each temple had a big bronze bell with a small tree trunk to sound it with, and there was usually a torii with a small shrine beyond, and a big building in the middle of the grounds that looked a lot like a temple. The only thing was that there were three of them in a row, so I wasn’t really sure what to make of them.
By that point I was headed back in the general direction of Imadegawa, so I went back to campus. I chilled in the student lounged and started reading a Carl Hiaasen novel they have there that I haven’t read yet. I headed outside around time for class. I found some people talking, but I also saw an AKP girl sitting by herself, maybe studying, so I joined her and we talked a bit. We were joined by a few other people and soon enough it was time for class.
Japanese review was productive and fun, as usual. For lunch I tried some stuff I hadn’t had from the cafeteria before; it was basically a buffet type thing where you just took a little from various dishes laid out, but it looked nicer than cafeteria or buffet type meals you see in America. I picked from a couple different dished and got a huge thing of rice, unintentionally. I said an “L” size, I mean I figured that was a fair amount, but not a huge amount. Wrong, it was like, bigger than a cereal bowl, full of rice. Ridiculous.
I managed to finish it, and the dishes were excellent, and I also had a glazed potato dessert which was surprisingly good. Then it was time for Postwar Cinema and the “Other.” It was a productive class because we talked about the readings we had to do, and I was actually able to draw on Japanese history courses I had taken in the past to fuel some of my arguments. I think it was one of my better academic moments.
After class I had promised to go to Shijo with someone. Shijo is a district in Kyoto that has some shopping mixed with some businesses; it’s a nice part of town. The purpose of the trip was to get my friend a phone. The whole endeavor took a while, because we went to one shop, where she sorted out various things and had to wait, then we had to go to a different shop to actually get the phone and have her fill out the forms and receive the phone.
Now, pretty much everyone in AKP is getting a prepaid phone, which is where you pay for the phone, and you pay for a certain number of minutes. Once you get those minutes added to your phone number, your account is valid for the next 60 days, and before that ends you have to buy another card and add minutes so your account stays valid. If you happen to forget, your phone number is still good for a year after your account is invalid, meaning you can buy more minutes and add them within that time frame, and your phone will still work. Oh, and to get free unlimited messaging is 300 yen a month.
Now, the problems I have with the prepaid plan is that 1) you pay like 100 yen per minute, per minute. Do you know how expensive that is? The yen is strong right now, so that’s more than a dollar a minute. 2) the prepaid phones are so booooooring. There’s like, two models, and they’re just…boring. I mean, ok, let me qualify that. Japanese cell phones are all pretty awesome in terms of what they can do. I mean, there are fucking phones with 13.2 megapixel cameras: that’s more than my dedicated camera has. You can watch tv on most phones. almost all phones have barcode readers, where you take a picture of a barcode on an ad, then the phone redirects you to an internet page that tells you more about the product or event advertised. So Japanese phones pretty much kick ass.
Which is why prepaid phones are boring: they can send and receive calls and messages…and that’s about it. Anything else costs more. I’m bitching though; likelihood is whatever I get isn’t going to have any cool features either, because it’ll just be too expensive, and there are better things to spend money on. However, I’m thinking contracts are better because: 1) it’s not so goddamned expensive to make calls, and 2) you can get way cooler phones. There’s one that I was looking at in the store, that’s just agh it’s so cool. They have iphones, but who cares? You can get an iPhone in the U.S.
Anyway, yeah, the whole experience made me really want a cell phone. The shitty part? I have to go with my otousan to get my phone because I’m under 20, and cell phone companies won’t let you get a phone on your own if you’re under 20. So yeah, I have to go with my otousan. This would be fine, it’ll give my otousan and I some bonding time…but my otousan works almost every day until after the store closes. His next holiday? Apparently it’s next thursday. So no phone for me until next thursday. Fun fun fun! Whoops, still griping, I’ll stop now.
After the phone business was sorted out, we went through an arcade. In America, an arcade is like, a place with video games. In Japan, when someone says “arcade,” they mean a covered shopping strip. They’re basically really long strips of shops with a covering over the top so you don’t get rained on. Most of the stores were kinda boring, but we found a great trinket shop that specialized in items with cute cats on them. It was pretty cool. I got a business card from them so I can find them again.
After that we headed back and I went home. I’m going on a field trip tomorrow for Visual Arts tomorrow and I have an oral interview in Japanese, so I have no homework. So I watched tv with my family all night, more or less. It was great.
One thing that I’ve kind of been noticing, but really took note of today, is that Japanese people seem to be very aware of their personal space. To me it seems that they establish their own sense of personal space and maintain it as long as it’s convenient. For instance, whenever there’s multiple seats open on a train, Japanese people won’t generally sit next to each other, in fact, if someone is already sitting next to another person and there’s an empty chair with no one next to it, that person will get up and move so they don’t have to sit next to someone. I don’t think it’s being rude, I think it’s just that they see that it’s possible to have a larger personal space around them, so they do it.
Another example is that an hour or so ago, I went downstairs to talk with my okaasan about the phone situation, and she was sitting in the middle of the couch. I sat down on the left side, and after a minute she moved some papers and shifted over to the right. Once again, I don’t think she was repulsed by me or anything, I think it’s just that she was trying to maintain her own personal space. I can’t really think of another explanation. I mean, Japanese people can be very passive-aggressive, but I honestly don’t think that’s it.
Ugh, I need to start making some Japanese friends. I also need to hang out with my friend who I know through a friend who is also at Doshisha right now. If I had a cell phone, it would be so easy…
-Shimon
