Desu desu desu.

This is the post for Day Two. If you have not yet read the post for Day One, for God's sake, man, scroll down and read that first. Skuroru daun wo kudasai. Hyuk hyuk hyuk.

Day Two.

"I fought piranahs, and I fought the cold. There was no one with me--I was all alone. Yeah."

I shot up at 5:30am the next morning, rarin' to go. Upon realizing that I wasn't in Kansas anymore, and that the sun was hardly even up yet, I forced myself to go back to sleep, which half-worked. I woke up again for realsies at 8am, pulled on my boots, pulled back my hair--which was disgusting because I had been sweating all night...humidity fail--and walked to the Circle K I had passed on my way in. I bought some shampoo--at least, that's what I think I read on the bottle--and breakfast. I grabbed onigiri, and some thing that looked like an apple fritter in saran wrap. Upon reading the label, I made out, "Wrong bun - Sausage." Thinking that there could not possibly be sausage in this pastry--oh, what I fool I am--I bought it, bit into it, and, sure enough. Tiny sausages. Whatever, it tasted awesome, and I hadn't eaten since God knows when. I also drank orange juice which was sitting out on my floor from the day before, but since when have I ever cared about anything.

At 10am, a strikingly beautiful young lady named Lisa knocked on my flamboyant door to walk me to the front office to check into my real room at Big Wave 21. She lol'd at the fact that I put on my shoes before I got to the special shoe-putting-on-platform...whoopos...and lent me an umbrella for the walk. If eyes could go into cardiac arrest, mine would have done so upon entering the Guest House main office. The guest house itself already looked like a middle school art project, but this was just amazing. Every wall, chair, desk, and table was absolutely slathered in ridiculous bright murals. Paintings of children, men, women, dogs, cats, trees, everything, boldly outlined and filled in with thick flourishes surrounded them along with individual English words like "love" and "bold". I stepped into the office and ten or so people all smiled and waved happily. A grotesquely obese woman at the front counter nodded. I sat down and Lisa and Hana--the proprietor, I guess--went over the guest house rules with me. The rule book was an oversized cardboard book with the solar system painted on the front, the kind of book they read to you aloud in kindergarden. Luckily they had a paper version that I could take with me. Everything seemed standard and, honestly, as long as she spoke fluent English, I couldn't really give a damn what I agreed to. I signed some papers, handed over a shit ton of yen after some calculation difficulty, and the co-manager Tadashi drove me to Big Wave 21 in an oversized van, also swimming in ridiculous primary colored designs. He lol'd hard at me when I tried to get in on the driver's side. 

After walking me through the guest house--the halls of which look like a child's spin art--he explained that I can't wear shoes and I can smoke whenever I want and blah blah showers blah blah toilet paper etc.. 15 minutes after he left, he returned, banging on my door, to deliver the message that "B.B. was coming for me". B.B.? I had only been in Japan one day and I had already made enemies. But after he left, I interpreted it to mean that Viv--"B.B"--was coming from her hostel with Kat to pick up the rail pass I got from her apartment. Figuring she probably wouldn't come by for awhile, I left on a quest for towels. 

Let the record show that I am really bad at wandering. I never know where I'm going, ever, no matter where I am, and I always, without fail, get extremely lost. I didn't wander too far this time. However, I did a good deal of aimless walking with my mouth hung open and my tongue lolled out like a Disney character from the 50's, gawking at the flashing signs and mobs of businessmen and cute boys on bicycles. Tanashi, albeit in the city, is more of a suburb than anything, so I think that no matter how far I strayed from where I was supposed to be, I would have circled around eventually. I just kind of kept wandering and walking blindly into any place that had automatic doors that would open when I walked by. Due to this, I eventually found myself inside a magical department store I later found out is called LIVIN. I have no idea what that means. Anyway, I was ecstatic because first of all, the place was air conditioned, and secondly I could see a display of fluffy towels from the entrance. Keeping in the tradition of old-fashioned animation, my eyes turned into stars and I made a beeline for them. Two white towels, a pair of shoes, and a cheap watch later, I wandered out of the automatic doors again, just as confused as I had been when I walked in. On my way back, I made a point of staring in all of the windows to see if there was anything especially interesting. I did find a tremendously cute boy working at some kind of ramen restaurant. I smiled but I looked gross, and that's bad news bears, so I kept walking. I passed Olympics, this big grocery store directly behind the guest house, and set forth on my Grocery Shopping of Fail. Purchases I'm proud of include Fuji apples (they aren't kidding, hella Fuji) and a carton of orange juice, which I can keep in my little refrigerator. Kawaii, desu ne????? Desudesudesu.

I'd like to say I did something super interesting on my first full day in Japan. But really, I just sat around with my eyes glazed over, half asleep, flipping channels on my television. Each station is a display of bright colors, pop music, and weird humor. Tommy Lee Jones does a commercial for Mr. Boss Coffee over here, and Beyonce does one for, like, lemon water or something. I got totally pulled into this bizarre game show where contestants fill their mouths with milk, and the last person to lol at whatever weird comedic performance is happening wins the game. You raff, you ruse. As stupid as it sounds, it was really hilarious, and I watched that, along with some Coffee Prince-esque drama, for a good chunk of time before taking a shower. 

While I was in the shower, Viv had arrived, and was anxiously waiting at my room door for me to get my damp ass inside so she could get her train pass. She brought me some Mr. Donut (WHEE!!) and we tipped our hats, agreeing that, though we would be far away from each other, we'll still be in Japan, as well as Kat, so we should make some effort to road trip at some point. 

After she left, I wandered back and forth down the quiet halls of the guest house waiting to run into someone. But no one was really there. I guess they were spending their days out getting smashed in Shibuya and fucked in the backseat of Rolls Royces of something. It was sort of eerily quiet--as most of indoor-Japan has proven to be--so I locked myself back up in my room, unpacked my shit, read, amused myself with Japanese game shows some more, and eventually fell asleep. 

I'm not dead.

I'm sorry I've delayed the first real deal blog for so long. The gig is, apparently my brothers from other mothers over here only use two-pronged outlets as opposed to three, and my laptop cable suffers from the Apple curse of electronic abnormalities. But, Yuya and Ayumi helped me through the electronics store in Machida and helped me buy a converter plug and a LAN cable. THANK YOU SO MUCH YOU GUYS I LOVE YOU!!!!!!!!!11111111

Day One.

"Reach out and touch faith."

I yawned incessantly as the car taking me to Sea-Tac airport smoothly glided along misshapen I-5 South. It was completely silent in the car other than myself tapping my rings against my studded belt, quietly flipping my shit in the back of the car. Usually, the driver will bring up some kind of stupid small talk. This time, I was on my own. After about 15 minutes of nerve-racking silence, I sputtered out,

"HaveyoueverbeentoJapan?" He looked at me with big, white eyes in the rear-view mirror. (Okay, I'm not racist, but just so you can get a better grasp on the situation, the man was African-American.) 

"That where you're goin'??" 

"YES I'M TERRIFIED AHAHAHHAAHHH!!" I shouted. He immediately went into this super-enthused trip about how he thought I was some rock star because of the guitar and how it's going to be amazing and how I'm going to have the best time of my life. When I told him that there was a very slight possibility that I won't come back, he totally shit. He said that he went to Germany when he was 20 years old, and stayed for 6 years. He said they were the best years of his life. Temporarily revived by his story and encouragement, we pulled up to the airport, probably inappropriately enthusiastically waved goodbye, and I waited in line for the rest of my life for my damn boarding pass. The fun didn't end there--after waiting in the security line, the bastards confiscated my belt. Who cares that it had useless bullet shells hot-glued to it! Suggestive my fucking ass!! Anyway, I went to some random airport store to improvise by wrapping a laughably long scarf around my waist to hold my pants up. Because I apparently have this inability to purchase clothes that fit.

I found Rory and Alec, and boarded the plane. I was wired and kind of tripped out because I hadn't slept the night before in order to sleep on the 11 hour flight, and be ready to start my day in Tokyo upon arrival. So I popped  Melatonin that was in my pocket and prepared myself to go to sleep. For 5 minutes. 10 minutes. 20. An hour. Two hours. Around the third hour in I sort of realized that nothing was going to happen. Melatonin usually puts me straight to sleep, however in this case it did little more than subdue me. Which was still more than welcome. So I plugged my headphones into the plane's armrest and watched Paul Blart: Mall Cop, twice...in both English and Japanese. For the record, both versions blow. I pulled out my notebook and continued writing this dumbass short story I started about a man that gets kidnapped by the circus. The middle-aged Japanese man next to me asked (in English) if I was a writer. To which I overenthusiastically responded, 

"Yes! I mean--no! I mean...no. No, not at all, really." He lol'd at my desperation for human contact. We got to talking, and I found out that he had attended school in Ashland, Oregon (WHEE I love Ashland!) and that he had just moved to Kent for work. As a correspondent for some massive tech company dealing with electronics and overseas negotiations every 5 minutes, this guy was their wingman and had to make trips from Seattle to Tokyo every few months. But his wife apparently lived in Tokyo, so he didn't mind. He asked where I was from, and apparently he knew Brookings very well, having spent so much time near the ass-crack of Oregon. He said he loved the Salmon-Run Golf Course, and that he was also one of those eccentric aristocrats who drives by Coos Bay and actually buys driftwood from that crazy outdoor driftwood store. Had there been a wall, I would have slammed my head against it. However, he was very nice and friendly and had a lot of fatherly things to say about being careful and having an umbrella and not getting raped and so on. I snuck over to one of the apparently unoccupied window seats to get a look at the anticlimactic view as we touched down into Tokyo.

Alec, Rory and I waited until everyone that had connecting flights got off the plane before we left. We were delayed about an hour and a half because we had to fly around some active volcanoes on the way there. Psshh. Islands. We got off the plane and staggered out into the wettest, warmest, thickest air of all time. We giggled incessantly as we slowly plodded through the customs and immigration line. Having been awake for way, way, way too long, plus the confusion surrounding the massive cultural changes, made everything seriously funny. The Japanese men directing the line wearing face masks were funny. The Japanese signs with little mascots were funny. The wack-ass bathrooms were REALLY funny. Giggling like fucking school girls, we went out into the airport lobby to try and figure out the ATMs, vendor kiosks, and payphones. We must have looked just mad--Alec, a pale guy with a dark beard and mustache wearing an oversized Mariner's t-shirt, Rory, an extremely tall, distinguished looking young man with Versache glasses, and myself....I don't even need to begin to go there...running around speaking in broken Japanese trying to find the train to Tokyo station. After we boarded the Narita Express, the weight of the lack of sleep began to sink down onto us. We met a couple from New Zealand who just randomly decided to take a trip to Tokyo on a whim, with absolutely no plans of what to do or where to stay. They had a nice, big map, though. I commend them for that.

We separated around Shinjuku, if I remember correctly, and I blindly bought a ticket for the JR line the lady at the airport had scribbled down for me. I got on the train with my giant-ass suitcase and guitar with my sunglasses on because, in case no one told you, Shinjuku looks like a neon light show threw up on a huge pile of fiber optics. So I get on this train, and I'm freaking out because apparently the farther away you get from the main hub of Tokyo, the less English the train displays use. I asked the woman next to me wtf I was supposed to do, and she magically said she was getting off at the same station, Higashi-Koganei, and that I could follow her. I was so fucking happy I almost died at this point. I probably should have been dead anyway, actually, due to dehydration and lack of sleep. But I got off at the station and followed the crude map that was drawn for me by the owners of the Artistic Gaikokujin Guest House. 

Wandering through the streets of the outskirts of Tokyo at night rolling a giant suitcase, I think now that I probably should have felt endangered. But it was entirely the opposite. As I slowly trekked down the main drag to find my temporary room until the next day, I was passed by businessmen and young people on bikes, and for some reason I have never felt more at home. Maybe because it was so warm, maybe because it was so late, maybe because I'm just fucking bonkers, I exhaled a huge sigh of relief because it felt like after 20 years, I was finally home. I found my key and got into the violently colorful complex, lovingly named "Apple House". I dragged my enormous suitcase up three flights of stairs, and I swear it was like an episode of I Love Lucy. I'm so surprised no one came out of their room to slap me for making such a fucking ruckus in the middle of the night. I got into my room, tried to make a journal entry, failed miserably due to relentless dizziness, and passed out, happy and confused.