Category: experiences

Renovations on my apartment complex are progressing. Right now, the walls and balconies on the south side are being painted. This has two major drawbacks: One, that I cannot open any windows since the paint has a very unpleasant smell. And two, that my view has deteriorated even further: My windows and doors are covered with plastic, partially to prevent them from getting (too) dirty, and partially to prevent me from venturing out onto the balcony. The painting is scheduled for all week, so with a bit of luck everything should be over by Saturday.

Since I am working on the new page, I am very busy again, and since I have always been a night owl, I have gone back to my nerdy ways and do the best of my work in the middle of the night. So, I went to bed yesterday somewhere around 3 am.

And I was promptly awakened from my slumber at 9:15 sharp, by some person starting renovation work on the roof exactly above my head – with a jackhammer. What a joy! Yes, it could have been worse because they start officially at 8:30, but I am simply not functional after only 6 hours of sleep…

At first, I did not want to leave, but after only 30 minutes of jackhammering on the roof, my opinion had changed… I spent the day in exile in the KOKOKA, where I got quite a lot of things done, albeit somewhat unrelated to what I needed to do, because I did not want to send sensitive stuff over a connection that I know is unsafe…

Anyway, I guess I won’t be up much longer today since I am tired. And I hope they have at least finished whatever they needed the jackhammer for, even though they will be working on the roof throughout the whole month. I have an appointment with my accountant on Thursday, at least then I must be home, at any other time I can leave. At least it is hanami too, so there’s a lot of pretty trees to see outside. Hopefully the weather will hold out for a while.

As the last one of four, my building now also has a scaffold outside. The construction on this has finished yesterday, and this is the current view out of my living room:

It is not as bad as I thought though. When I saw the long black sheets being hung on the other buildings I almost despaired over the prospect of living in a cave for three months. However, as you can see, those sheets are surprisingly transparent even though the photo was taken when it was quite overcast. When I open the blinds and curtains, my apartment feels like in a light fog rather than in darkness. I am quite pleased by this unexpected turn of events.

So, I hope for the best for the following weeks with respect to noise. Just today I received the announcement that the walls will be repaired in the next two weeks and that roof repairs are scheduled for all of April. I already noticed that I can hear people walk on the roof, so I better make a list of cafes for emergency retreats.

Even though the renovation works have already been delayed by a week for some reason, the whole thing is extremely organised. At the entrance to our building there is a notice board where the main developments are documented. There is also a list of balconies where it is permitted to hang out laundry – updated daily in the morning. And for the really big things we receive a special announcement in our mailboxes, colour-coded depending on what will happen.

Two weeks ago we received a blue notice telling us that the scaffolding work will commence, and that we need to remove everything from our balconies. A special place downstairs was designated for each house so that any plants on the balconies can be put there as long as the scaffolding is up. Not that I could read any of this, but in Japan, nothing can be written without a little comic attached. This one essentially says “I can’t work like this!”

When I was a child, we had friends in another part of Austria. They had a small farm in the mountains with cows and sheep and this was pretty much the only place we ever went on vacation. Since they had six kids more or less around my age, it was always much fun for me. Unfortunately, we lost touch, and the last time we saw each other was more than 20 years ago.

Imagine my surprise when I received an email from the eldest daughter just the other day! After all these years it clicked immediately again, and we have been busy exchanging photos and our life stories ever since. It’s fantastic! I still have no idea how she found me on another continent, but I guess nothing is impossible these days…

Last Tuesday, the builders have started to erect the scaffolding around my house, the last one in the apartment block. I guess they will be finished with the south side by tomorrow afternoon and do the north side next week.

In view of such developments, I have pushed myself and finally bought curtains for the livingroom and kitchen. Since I live in the fifth floor, I did not feel any urgency as there are no other buildings that high nearby from where you can see inside my home – except that other building in my apartment block, but you’d have to stand on the opposite balcony to do that, which is not really inconspicuous, not even during the night. However, the scaffolding will permit lots of people to come over and have a look so to speak, so I decided to invest in some curtains for the last two windows that didn’t have any yet.

And with this, ladies and gents, I declare my kitchen to be fully functional! Not that it needed much beyond the appliances that I bought when I moved in… The furniture consists of the cheapest IKEA table and some folding chairs, everything else was built-in. The kitchen is relatively narrow, so I thought it would be best if I can put at least the chairs away when they are not in use, which is effectively most of the time since I hardly ever entertain. Here it is:

To my shame I have to admit that the counters are not always that clean and empty. I honestly hate doing dishes, so most of the time the sink is full with pots and pans and plates that are waiting for me to do some impulse cleaning – which happens as soon as I run out of something, mostly teaspoons.

My friend who visited after Christmas did comment on the relative emptiness of it all, she could not understand how I can live in a sterile environment like this, especially since she is one of those people who needs to have everything out in the open lest she forget about it. Well, I prefer to have things neatly put away. I have no use for dust catchers, especially not in the kitchen.

Although the soroban test was only on Sunday and I did not receive any official result yet, I already know that I failed it. Again. There’s not much point in hoping if you only did 9 exercises and you need at least 10 to pass… At least this time I am only partially to blame.

This time the test took place in a large meeting hall at a community center. The hall could seat 200 people; the 1st kyu candidates were seated in front, and in the back there were the candidates for 3rd kyu. Usually, the procedure is as follows: Once everybody is seated and has their soroban paraphanalia laid out in front of them, the rules of the test are read aloud: What is permitted and not, how to write certain solutions, and what to do when a rubber is needed. Then the test sheets are handed out, the candidates fill in their names and candidate number, and the sheet is placed upside down in front of them. Finally, the person administering the test says loudly: Hai, yo-i (turn your sheets around) and hai, hajime (start!) and starts the timer for 7 minutes. At the end of the time there is a loud yell of yame (stop!).

This time things were slightly different. The reading of the rules was shorter than I had remembered. After everybody had their sheets there came a general question whether everything was okay with everybody. And into the ensuing silence the woman in charge yelled yo-i and nothing else – on top of her voice and into a microphone. I am obviously too old for these kind of shenenigans because I almost got a heart attack! My hands were still shaking at the end of the first 7 minutes (multiplications, my forte) and I only calmed down after the second 7 minutes, when I realised that I had botched the divisions, again.

It’s interesting how much those little insignificant things can throw you off. And I am a bit angry too, because had this happened during my first try of this exam it would not have meant anything then, I might have been prepared for something like this and I might have done better this time. Oh well, there’s always a next time, isn’t it?

Today was a wonderful warm and sunny day – and I was quite busy all day long. A few days ago I mentioned that a friend of mine was in hospital. Today I heard that he had left the ICU and was now in a normal room, and since I was in the neighborhood anyway, I decided on a whim to visit him in hospital.

My visit was unplanned, and I arrived around 6 pm when the hospital was ready to shut down for the day. The information counter had been closed since 5:15, and there were hardly any people around. I was finally directed to the emergency entrance, where I could ask for the whereabouts of my friend. Thank goodness I don’t have much experience when it comes to hospitals, neither as patient nor as visitor. But I did notice that here in Japan – or at least: in Kyoto University hospital – access to patients is much more difficult than in Austria.

When you visit somebody in a hospital in Austria, all you need is the name of the person and you will readily receive the room number from the information counter at the entrance. Not so here: I had to give my friend’s full name, age, and his address before I was told the ward and floor he was on, but not his room number. I am not sure whether this is standard procedure, but I think my friend’s name is not very common, so it is unlikely that there were more than one with this name in the hospital today. Once in the ward, I had to go to the nursing station where I had to fill out a short form asking for date, visitor’s name, and patient’s name before a nurse finally took me to my friend’s room.

Now I know what standard rooms in Kyoto University hospital look like: I guess this particular building is about 40 years old or more. The rooms are very small, only 4 beds with ugly green curtains between them to assure some sort of very limited privacy – all doors to patient’s rooms stand wide open. Toilets and bathrooms are outside, which was normal at that time in our hospitals as well. On the other hand, at the door of each room there is an electronic touchscreen with the patient’s names; I found the contrast striking.

I was glad I was admitted to see my friend. I disturbed him during dinner, which did not look very enticing to me, but I know that only last week or so he was still on a diet of jelly… He is doing very well, in fact, he will go home on Sunday already. He claims to be a bit sad about this since he is enjoying his “vacation” and next week he will have to go back to work. I believe it’s also the young nurses he’ll be missing…

My life seems to have come to a complete standstill. I am not getting anywhere at the moment, or so it seems…

Business is very slow, to put it mildly. I keep applying left and right, but all I get are rejections, if I get any reply at all. No reply to a job application seems to be the modern version of “fuck off”, which I find extremely annoying. The job in Osaka I was talking about three weeks ago I did not get because the company was not willing to hire my company rather than myself. Well, I already had the impression that the interview did not go that well, so I was not overly flattened by this one.

Other jobs are perfect, but do just not exist in Kyoto. For the last one I applied – part-time translator of IT documents from English to German in Tokyo –  I was told that they really, really needed somebody to show up in their office three times a week. Probably to hold hands with their developers or so? And others yet, people just cannot afford me. A friend of mine has been struggling for a long time putting together a webpage that I could do virtually effortlessly until the end of the month, but she is scared about the costs involved and doesn’t even want to talk about details… It’s frustrating.

And then there is soroban. I am still practising daily because I want to take the next exam for first kyu on March 20th. This will be my third try of taking the test on this level, which means that I have been training for more than six months already… Okay, the first try I knew I would fail. I did the test then because from this level on the tests are administered not in my soroban school anymore but in an external location, and I wanted to know the exact procedure. I did much better on the second try, but I was still too nervous and unprepared to pass. Let’s hope the third try will be the final one. The exercises are not getting any more exciting…

Well, perseverance is everything.

This is also what a friend of mine needs to do. He has been in the ICU of Kyoto University Hospital for a week now with unclear abdominal pains. He seems to be cheerful though – and is especially taken with all the young nurses fussing over him – but I still have the impression he’d rather be home. All the best for you!

Did you know that today is the International Women’s Day? Yeah, me neither. I only know because a friend of mine told me this morning – when he presented me with flowers to celebrate the day.

So, guys, why don’t you buy something nice for the women in your life, like chocolates or flowers… (And while you’re at it, don’t forget your office wife aka secretary! They are greatly undervalued anyway.) Or even better: why not doing the dishes, tidy the livingroom or bring the kids to bed tonight? From my own experience I can tell you that women love men who do their bit in the household.

In any case, the whole flower thing reminded me of what one of my female friends told me: Flowers are not a good gift in Japan. Not just chrysanthemums, which are graveyard flowers even in Austria, but any type of flowers. I was quite surprised by this, and unfortunately she could not really explain why. The only reason I could come up with is that flowers – cut ones especially – will all die within a few days, so maybe this is the connotation the Japanese don’t like? However, other female Japanese friends seem to have no problems with flowers, but they have been living abroad for a long time, so this may be a Western view they have picked up.

My problems with the flowers today were more practical. The last time I received any was in the year I got my PhD, a decade ago. My grandmother had an enormous amount of vases, but except for a handful I gave them all away. And none of the vases I still have would have been fitting for the single tulip my friend gave me today. Oh well, I wasn’t a scientist for nothing; you can see my solution in the picture.

Some time ago, I complained about the amount of bulk mail I receive, especially those from real estate agents. But every now and then, something extremely hilarious finds its way into my mailbox. Here is one of those highlights I just had to share:

Those are only two of the … ahem … tasteful images on a flyer I received regarding breast enlargements. Mind you, the ad was not for a plastic surgeon, but for something far more esoteric. Another photo showed a young woman, towel clad, being massaged with a hand-held apparatus emitting bright light and looking suspiciously similar to the computer mouse I am using right now…

Anyway, the advertisement promised that within only 90 minutes of treatment your size will have increased and any potential sagging will have been eliminated. The procedure seems to be as follows: After an interview, where you are probably asked about your expertise regarding computer mice and other delicate questions, you first get a back and then a … umm … front massage with the device mentioned above, and in the end you are allowed to relax with your boobs covered in something … stimulating, I guess. That is all it takes for your bust size to increase by two cups! Except for 22.000 YEN, of course.

I cannot help wondering how plastic surgeons can still be in business after this amazing breakthrough. But maybe 2 cups up is all that’s possible, and the procedure cannot be repeated indefinitely. Then again, it’s a start.

Interesting also the target groups: Women in their 20s would want a size-up, those in their 30s want their boobs bigger and more perky, while women in their 40s just want them lifted off the ground. Anything older than that is not mentioned anymore; those women have obviously resigned and are keeping away from public view in order not to offend.

Anyway, I found this whole thing very enlightening. I am looking forward to receiving a similar advertisement – including pictures – for the enhancement of male appendages. Somehow I have the impression that massages will have a beneficial effect there too…

PS: If anybody is curious about details of the procedure, I am willing to go and sacrifice myself. Any sponsors, please come forward now!