The cat came back

Well it seems I've been neglecting my blog as of late, a particularly bad omen considering it is two-entries old; to the famished masses who eagerly wait my postings, I apologize. Just as my last dish was seasoned, so to will this one be; I'm sure you already know what the theme may be, given that we are at the beginning of 2009. Yes of course the holiday I speak to you of would be none other than Ashura. I have completed my pilgrimage to Karbala, Iraq and have the scars to prove it.

No, as much as the idea of flagellating and lacerating myself in the name of the grandson of the prophet appeals to me, I actually spent New Years here in Tokyo. For those who don't know, and I'm not blaming them, New Years Eve is a fairly sombre and family-focused event in Japan, much like Christmas in the West but even more so. Adhering to the oft-said advice that when one is in Rome one should do as the Romans, my friends and I thought we would blend this ethos with the manner of celebration to which we were more accustomed, and proceeded to drink in a sombre and diligent manner. This is the story.

In spite of my ambivalent attitude to New Year's resolutions, let it be known that henceforth I resolve to no longer drink alcohol which comes from a bottle shaped like a feline demon. As if the bottle itself that night was not warning enough, as I smelled it I became convinced that if I were to ever be in a situation where I would have to de-grease a diesel engine, I would know exactly what to use. In fact two days later, a moment occurred where I couldn't remember what 8x8 equaled and concluded this satanic fire-water had something to do with it. In spite of this, the four of us decided to sit around a small table and not only drink it, but do so at a pace which only people who wish to "equalize" would. Games involving coins, cups, cigarettes, and toilet paper were played and I must stop here because I'm beginning to feel sick again and besides, I'm certain that if my mother were to read this it would be much to her concern and I've done enough in my life to achieve that end. I'm only kidding, mom. Afterall, I somehow managed to make it to Hachiko crossing in Shibuya with my friend in time for the countdown. Well, sort of.

After thanking our taxi driver in a slurred Japanese that to him sounded like no known language, we made our way to the major intersection where we would say sayonara to 2008. I wasn't exactly cogent enough at the time to know exactly where to go, but I was able to recall two facts: one, there would be a lot of gaijin (foreigners) there and two, gaijin make a lot of noise, particularly when they're drunk; it was simply a matter of triangulating the sound of the "woo"s with the "hoo"s. As we got closer to the crossing, the noise was became louder and louder when I heard another noise coming from behind me. I knew the sound; it was the same sound a sea lion makes when it's in heat followed by the same sound pasta sauce makes when it hits the floor. I turned to see a friend of mine hunched over holding his stomach, donning the facial expression of a man who has just been betrayed. Indeed he had been. The sweet, lovable cat which courted us earlier in the evening contained booze which decided to pounce out and curiously explore the streets of Shibuya much to my friend's expense.

At this point the minutes remaining in 2008 could be counted on one hand, so I urged my war-wounded friend, in a way any inebriated comrade would, to push on:

"I'm not going to make it," he said, "go on without me."
"Don't talk like that, you're going to be fine," I replied, but deep down I knew it was a lie.
"Tell my girl that I love her, and that I'm sorry."
"I'll come back for you. Stay here."

And so with that I ran to the neon crossing by myself, unable to find neither my friends nor my cell phone, and together with tens of thousands of similarly drunk people, roughly concluded that it was now 2009 (there was no countdown clock). I returned to where I had left my friend, and saw that the only thing left of him was the half-digested spaghetti we had eaten before. I didn't see my friend again that night, and it wasn't until January 3rd that I found out he had survived and was alright. For those who don't believe me, what follows is the posting I wrote on his Facebook wall a few days after (for the sake of humanity I've omitted his name):

"*****! holy crap man new years was ridiculous! i lost you right when we got to shibuya; are you still alive??? let me know because i have your ipod and watch"


What happened after all this will have to wait for another entry and is also under ongoing investigation by the Tokyo Metropolitan Police (thats a joke, mom). I suppose in a way it was rather fitting that I should spend the last few moments of 2008 dwarfed by a leviathan crowd in massive metropolis because in a way, that is what living in Tokyo really is like.

And so I enter 2009 stage left, disease and debt free, and on fairly good terms with life. I hope you do too.

A Great Escape?

I think we can all agree that the best time for a person to enjoy Christmas is when you're a child. For many people my age, I think Christmas is a time which has lost the wonder and charm it once held, and with no children of my own, opportunities to vicariously relive it don't really exist. Also I think many of the early twenties' also don't have as much money as we would want or budgeted for, and so the perennial obligatory trips to the crowded cathedrals of capitalism don't exactly bode well with the wallets we carry. Finally, being agnostic does not add any religious flavor to my holiday outlook as it would for many people, though I wouldn't consider this as necessary as some may argue (try reading Torie Bosch's defense of an athiest Christmas http://www.slate.com/id/2207374/). In short it is quite easy for many young single people like myself to watch Rudolph fly over us this holiday season.

There are of course many reasons to frown upon Christmas. I like to consider myself decently educated, and I do retain much of the youthful idealism of my university days, so it is hard to watch an advertisement aimed at convincing you that 'family' and 'Christmas' are synonymous with 'camera phone' and 'warranty', and not think of all the reasons to get angry. I am sure that many people have argued that the Christmas before being hijacked by corporations and the bleached-white mess we see now is almost completely unrecognizable and so for this reason and others, most people, I would wager, have at one time or another fantasized about being able to escape from Christmas just once, and I most certainly counted myself among them. This year, living in Japan has allowed me to do just that: avoid Christmas. Is this good or bad?

Before I get into that, I should first say a few words about how living in Japan has allowed me to avoid Christmas. Easy. It simply doesn't exist here. Well that's not entirely true, but the attempt, if it exists at all, reminds me of the basketball game in high school where I took a free throw and didn't even hit the backboard. From what I've gathered, the holiday traditions which exist here consist of Christmas cakes sold at department stores, trips to various places to see "winter illumination" (Christmas light displays), and fake snow in the clothing displays. I think the only time I ever saw Santa was on the train advertisements, but he was dressed in green and white and instead of gifts, was giving advice on how to be environmentally friendly (a digression not to be condemned, by the way).

So having effectively been insulated from Christmas, I can now comment on whether such emancipatory daydreams, once fulfilled, are gratifying. The answer, rather unsatisfying itself, is yes and no. Yes in that I miss the commercialized Christmas as much as I would a tumor, but no for all the other reasons, the reasons that matter: family, friends, food, festivities, and fun, just to start with the letter F, and all these things, on balance, far outweigh the ephemeral discontents of the season. Of course, I didn't have to go all the way across the Pacific to realize this. I suppose I knew it all along. I suppose that when we're bombarded with all the messages from various marketing departments, we sometimes just want to forget it all. But there is a way to get rid of all that corporate red-and-white junk and the advice comes from none other than Paul Anka and Lisa Simpson:

Paul: To stop those monsters one-two-three,
here's a fresh new way that's trouble-free,
Its got Paul Anka's guarantee....
Lisa: Guarantee void in Tennessee
Together: Just don't look, Just don't look.
Just don't look, Just don't look.

So next year, if all goes according to plan, I will once again celebrate Christmas in Canada, where it is not pronounced "kurisumasu", and the food is more than a white cake. And, if all goes according to other peoples' plans, the ads will start Nov. 1st. But this time, more than ever, I'll be looking forward to it, and not at the TV.

On that note I will finish with the timeless words of Dr. Seuss in a book once read to me by my mom:

And the Grinch, with his grinch-feet ice-cold in the snow, Stood puzzling and puzzling: "How could it be so?" "It came with out ribbons! It came without tags!" "It came without packages, boxes or bags!" And he puzzled three hours, till his puzzler was sore. Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before! "Maybe Christmas," he thought, "doesn't come from a store." "Maybe Christmas...perhaps...means a little bit more!"

From out of the strong came forth sweetness

In the beginning, there was nothing. Eric said, "let there be blog", and it was so. And from out of nothing came something; what was first void became substance. What was shapeless became form....

By virtue of its proximity to the top (or bottom) of the page and the feeble attempt at a Genesis-like opening, I have no doubt you have already guessed this is my first entry. Truth be told, I had prepared a rather lengthy inaugural manifesto but after considering most people's attention spans, I thought I'd try to be terse. I also have no doubt that at this point you observed the esoteric vocabulary I write with, and perhaps made less-than-flattering speculations as to why. If you will give me a few more minutes, I'll get to that shortly.

I think its best that I lay out a few of the reasons why an average person such as myself would choose to spend his time and effort into convoluted entries on a web page that I imagine would have the same amount of effect as throwing a bucket of water to a lake. And by, "few" what I mean to say is "one".

Astronauts, upon returning to earth from space, become susceptible to a variety of health problems due to their exposure to a zero-gravity environment. And so to combat these effects, the average astronaut devotes a remarkable amount of time to physical exercise while on board the space craft ( I read it was as much as 4 hours in a 16-hour period).

The continual use of a tip-of-the-iceberg amount of English places me in what I would consider a zero-English-gravity environment and I find myself from time to time suffering from a linguistic form of the muscle atrophy astronauts experience. For anyone who has read Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes, I imagine my situation is not unlike Charlie in the latter half of the book. So I decided that writing in a blog would be part of a concerted effort on my part to keep the razors sharp.

So what comes in the following months will be the thoughts, opinions, and feelings transcribed from my too-big-for-one-size-fits-all head to this page as part of my commitment to staying sharp, a sort of linguistic running machine, if you will.

This and the fact that my friends no longer talk to me.

I will close by leaving you with some words from Jeremy Hillary Boob, Ph.D, a man(?) whose existence is a continuous reminder to avoid LSD:

Jeremy:"If I spoke prose you'd all find out

I don't know what I talk about."

Ringo: Jeremy! Can it be you?

Jeremy: Can it be me? I think you'd better inquire of the guard,

For when I was captured, they took all my cards.

George: Do you speak English?

Jeremy: Old English, Middle, a dialect pure ...

Paul: Well, do you speak English?

Jeremy: You know, I'm not sure!