Thursday, October 28
FREEDOM!
Tomorrow I will be allowed to go home from the Hospital. This makes me happy, so happy that I'm not going to post another depressing blog about this place. Nothing about the food, nurses, or their perfectionism. Instead, here is a picture of Bruce Lee... being cool...
Friday, October 22
This place drives you crazy, man...
The things you see in a hospital freaks you out. Like, I've been in hospitals before, but never one where I don't have access to television, books, and internet is limited. Luckily, I have a phenomenal Doctor who has a WiFi internet thing that allows me access to the internet anywhere and he lets me borrow it when it when he is here.
Regardless, certain things you hear and see cannot be un-hear and unseen. For example, lights out is at 9pm (21:00) and I follow this rule obediently -- like a good gaijin (foreigner). However, my roommates -- 5 of them -- do not follow this accordingly. My immediate neighbor, while nice, is noisy. He brushes his teeth after lights-out for several minutes. While I applaud his commitment to oral hygiene, is there not a better time to gag yourself with a brush; like, perhaps brush your teeth before lights-out. It's a habitual thing as well. If it was once, certainly understandable, I've had that scuzzy feeling on my teeth and had the immediate urge to cleanse it. Yet, every night this happens. Afterward, he breaks open some containers and makes generally as much noise as possible without screaming like ninny. His neighbor, who has a window, snores. While I understand his inability to control this, what I don't understand is how a 5 foot 6 inch man can make so much noise and not wake himself up. More so, he'll talk in his sleep. I've nicknamed him the "Walrus" due to the volume which his voice commands. You'll hear a loud snore followed by some Japanese that far surpasses my own. How depressing; his sleep babble Japanese is putting my education to shame.
Mostly, the other roommates are quiet with their own idiosyncrasies. One gentleman talks to himself, quite often. Another appears attached to his computer, leaving it on all hours of the night. The quietest amongst them is the one farthest from me. How ironic, or perhaps, how poetic.
Still. The way this 病院 operates is astounding. The nurses are friendly, as are the Doctors. The food is timely. Everything works on a perfect schedule. Amazing. However, with that certain level of perfection, my freedom is jeopardized. I wish nothing more than to be free, however, I am being held captive against my will. I am not a Doctor, nor have I ever claimed to be. But, I am calling shenanigans on why I am being held here. There is something called CRP, it has something to do with Protein and my immune system. My CRP is currently, so my blood says, at 4.66. Normal, whatever that means, is below 0.3. Holy shit, that's a big difference. So much so my freedom becomes even more fleeting. I hear, through the grapevine, that if it maintains around 2.0 or below, my freedom will be more imminent.
My next post will deal with the food. Oh, my, how the food is original. Ugh.
Until next time,
-Gregor
Regardless, certain things you hear and see cannot be un-hear and unseen. For example, lights out is at 9pm (21:00) and I follow this rule obediently -- like a good gaijin (foreigner). However, my roommates -- 5 of them -- do not follow this accordingly. My immediate neighbor, while nice, is noisy. He brushes his teeth after lights-out for several minutes. While I applaud his commitment to oral hygiene, is there not a better time to gag yourself with a brush; like, perhaps brush your teeth before lights-out. It's a habitual thing as well. If it was once, certainly understandable, I've had that scuzzy feeling on my teeth and had the immediate urge to cleanse it. Yet, every night this happens. Afterward, he breaks open some containers and makes generally as much noise as possible without screaming like ninny. His neighbor, who has a window, snores. While I understand his inability to control this, what I don't understand is how a 5 foot 6 inch man can make so much noise and not wake himself up. More so, he'll talk in his sleep. I've nicknamed him the "Walrus" due to the volume which his voice commands. You'll hear a loud snore followed by some Japanese that far surpasses my own. How depressing; his sleep babble Japanese is putting my education to shame.
Mostly, the other roommates are quiet with their own idiosyncrasies. One gentleman talks to himself, quite often. Another appears attached to his computer, leaving it on all hours of the night. The quietest amongst them is the one farthest from me. How ironic, or perhaps, how poetic.
Still. The way this 病院 operates is astounding. The nurses are friendly, as are the Doctors. The food is timely. Everything works on a perfect schedule. Amazing. However, with that certain level of perfection, my freedom is jeopardized. I wish nothing more than to be free, however, I am being held captive against my will. I am not a Doctor, nor have I ever claimed to be. But, I am calling shenanigans on why I am being held here. There is something called CRP, it has something to do with Protein and my immune system. My CRP is currently, so my blood says, at 4.66. Normal, whatever that means, is below 0.3. Holy shit, that's a big difference. So much so my freedom becomes even more fleeting. I hear, through the grapevine, that if it maintains around 2.0 or below, my freedom will be more imminent.
My next post will deal with the food. Oh, my, how the food is original. Ugh.
Until next time,
-Gregor
Monday, October 18
病院
Well, as many of you know I'm currently admitted to a hospital here in Japan. I have Bronchitis that is more complicated than it should be. I have Chronic Granulamatous disease, a disease that inhibits my white-blood cells from fighting bacterial and fungal infections, and so simple Bronchitis is now that coupled with bladder problems and constant fever. THE GOOD NEWS is that the bladder issues have gone, and the bronchitis is gone for the most part. I cough only when eating -- Dr. Ed thinks it's because I've activated my saliva and it runs down my throat causing the cough. Dr. Ed isn't really a Doctor thought. Speaking of which...
The staff in these hospitals are amazing. The staff always enter my fabricable -- what I'm calling my bed area, it got two hard walls and two walls of fabric hanging from movable things -- with a 失礼します！ It means "Excuse Me!", but I literally translate it as "I'm doing something rude!" They even whisper it ever so slightly at night. They help me with the procedures of getting better food, they help figure out THE COOLEST BATH IN EXISTENCE. (It's a typical Japanese bath, you shower and clean yourself first; then you get in a massive bath of EXTREMELY hot water and soak.) They've helped me with clothes, getting internet during the day, and charging my phone so I can contact family! They've truly gone above and beyond.
However, still, I don't want to be here. I want to be outside exploring Japan. Instead, I can't. It's not even that I have the ability, it's been removed from me. I worry I am missing everything; yet, I am surprised I haven't missed anything.
I've made more Japanese friends here. Mari is the nurse I have today. She is amazing. She has gotten me sleeping pills, because we have a walrus in the room. I swear to Buddha, this man is the size of Pauly Shore, yet he snores like John Goodman. She's also started a game, I have to say something in Japanese every time she enters in an attempt to help my Japanese skills. We'll see if it works, haha.
I suppose I should explain where I am, if I can even do that. I'm at the Saiseikai Chuo Tokyo Hospital. That said, every time I go to use the bathroom, I am greeted by Tokyo Tower. At night, it is truly magnificent. I am near the harbor, yet can see no water. My day consists of sleeping with some eating and IV fluid inspection/changing. I'm insanely bored. We have a Conbini downstairs which I frequent. I love Convenience stores here in Japan, they are magical places.
My spirits are high and I can't wait to be free! Haha... The nurses are hot, so I'm not without visuals, heh. But, I'm definitely ready to go!
Until next time--
Gregor!
The staff in these hospitals are amazing. The staff always enter my fabricable -- what I'm calling my bed area, it got two hard walls and two walls of fabric hanging from movable things -- with a 失礼します！ It means "Excuse Me!", but I literally translate it as "I'm doing something rude!" They even whisper it ever so slightly at night. They help me with the procedures of getting better food, they help figure out THE COOLEST BATH IN EXISTENCE. (It's a typical Japanese bath, you shower and clean yourself first; then you get in a massive bath of EXTREMELY hot water and soak.) They've helped me with clothes, getting internet during the day, and charging my phone so I can contact family! They've truly gone above and beyond.
However, still, I don't want to be here. I want to be outside exploring Japan. Instead, I can't. It's not even that I have the ability, it's been removed from me. I worry I am missing everything; yet, I am surprised I haven't missed anything.
I've made more Japanese friends here. Mari is the nurse I have today. She is amazing. She has gotten me sleeping pills, because we have a walrus in the room. I swear to Buddha, this man is the size of Pauly Shore, yet he snores like John Goodman. She's also started a game, I have to say something in Japanese every time she enters in an attempt to help my Japanese skills. We'll see if it works, haha.
I suppose I should explain where I am, if I can even do that. I'm at the Saiseikai Chuo Tokyo Hospital. That said, every time I go to use the bathroom, I am greeted by Tokyo Tower. At night, it is truly magnificent. I am near the harbor, yet can see no water. My day consists of sleeping with some eating and IV fluid inspection/changing. I'm insanely bored. We have a Conbini downstairs which I frequent. I love Convenience stores here in Japan, they are magical places.
My spirits are high and I can't wait to be free! Haha... The nurses are hot, so I'm not without visuals, heh. But, I'm definitely ready to go!
Until next time--
Gregor!
Monday, October 11
My first Test...
Today was my first test in Japanese class. A unit test on some chapter in these god awful books. I must say the review in this unit was stellar -- I can now give and receive to my seniors!
"I gave Sensei my homework!"
「私は先生に宿題をさし上げました！」
Cynicism aside, I do actually enjoy the review. Sometimes it's quite mundane, but I think it will be good for my overall studies and communication. My weakest point in Japanese is vocabulary. I just don't know a lot of words -- useful words anyway. So, the vocabulary is very helpful. I learn new words everyday, now. With daily interactions and things of the nature, I get new words and phrases and try to use them once I learn them. An example of this is "Non-smoking section" -- 禁煙席 -- when I went on one of my many excursions to my favorite Italian restaurant "Saizuriya." I arrived in Saizuriya and was greeted by the hostess and she asked something I had never heard before, I asked for her to repeat it and she said "Kienseki-desu?" and I looked at her like I was a baby giraffe figuring out how long it takes a sip of water to reach my stomach. She polietly said, hiding her disdain I'm sure, "Non-smoking?" I nodded and she showed me to a seat. There are many things in this world I abhor, one is old people on the train, but two is me looking stupid. Well, more stupid than usual. While enjoying the only place in civilization that beleives in refills, I looked up on my trusty iPhone app "Kotoba!" this "Kienseki." To my disbelief, it was there -- clear as day. "Non-smoking section" = "Kinenseki"... Amazing. Now, I just get stumped on every other word she says. But, damn it, now I won't choke on cigarette smoke.
The academics at Sophia are quite interesting. They require us to read an awful lot. I'm not sure I like that. I read in Community College, I want to sit around and theorize and philosophize[sic] and stuff. I guess I'll just have to wait till Graduate school -- unless I go to UofChicago where apparently you actually do work... I don't mind studying, but reading an egregious amount on the Introduction to Sociology? Come on, I already passed a class called that! Oh, Gender Stratification through Sociology, passed a class called that too. Eastern Religions, yup. Post-war Japan, okay you got me there. Let's read cool things, that's all I'm saying.
Seriously, though, I enjoy the classes. They're (mostly) engaging and quite interesting in their respective topics. I guess I should tell you what I am taking...
- Japanese 2
- Religion, Modernity, and Postcolonialism
- Religion, Culture, and Society
- Post-war Japan: Society
My dorm processes a colorful crew. I enjoy the company of our crew very much! We went out for Nomihodai again this weekend, however, there were these annoying drinking games that made it quite difficult to actually enjoy your drink. Now, true GAMES are all well and good. But, RULES are fucking retarded. One RULE was "You aren't allowed to point or say the word 'Drink.'" The pointing thing was fine, I generally don't point at people anyway. The word "Drink", however, is intrinsic to drinking. One must inevitably say "drink" when you are consuming liquid. That RULE is all well and good, too. Only caught me once with it. The next rule bothered the living fuck out of me. It was, "There's a little man living in your beer. Every time you take a drink, you must remove the man, consume your beverage whilst holding the man, and then placing him back into your beverage." What the crap. That's was soooooo annoying. I only got caught the first time, because I had no idea what was going on, but that turned me off immediately to the little man living in my drink. That little man can go off himself on the Chuo Train line with the 1000 other people. Next time we Nomihodai, I will not participate in the little man shenanigans claiming he died by instantaneous Jeet Kune Do explosion and anyone who questions me will be next. Fuck you, little man. Get out of my beer. Haha... The simple things in life.Today's a national holiday, so the trains were quite clear. I managed to get on a Super Rapid Train that skipped all stops that are tiny on my way home today. I got off at Mitaka to switch back to the regular Rapid, so i could actually get home. Well, I'm going to do some homework and laundry.
-Gregor
Sunday, October 3
So sorry! I am here!
I apologize for the lack of updates for the past two weeks, I've been insanely busy. I believe I left off on Monday of last week and we shall start there in outline form. Yay!
I don't remember Sunday, it must've sucked. But, Monday we went to AKIHABARA! The ANIME CAPITAL! I was salivating.
Upon our arrival, we were bombarded with visuals of "Electric Town." There were so many images of Anime girls, so many vendors and shops. It was amazing. My heart was aflutter. That sounded gay. Well, I was excited, to say the least. We wondered into Gaming stores to find NES, SNES, Sega consoles, everything gaming. We didn't go into a lot of anime stores because of the group we were with, but I plan on going back to get some cool swag. We did, however, go into a capsule store! You know those capsules that are freaking awesome? Yeah, that store. We each bought some random ones, but we all bought a single "Gacha Gacha" man and I got the "? guy."
He is currently attached to my phone. Akihabara was truly an experience and I can't wait to go back.
The rest of the week was kind of casual and of no great importance. Except, we did go out for another Nomihodai! I got wasted again, haha... Friday was the first day of classes and they were pretty cool, I suppose. I'll leave that for another post.
Lastly, yesterday, we went to Asakusa! It's a big shrine thing. We all got our fortunes and only two of us avoided the "BAD Fortune"! Thankfully I was spared and got a Regular Fortune while Maki got "BEST Fortune"... That sentence is hard to read. Basically, one Good fortune, one regular fortune, and seven Bad fortunes. Haha... It was quite fun!
Today was quite boring, just studied. Tomorrow I've got a quiz in Japanese! Yatta! Haha... My next post is going to be about grievances with Japan. They need to refill my damn drink... Haha.
- Went to see Studio Ghibli's new film Karigurashi no Arrietty. It's based in
Koganei, the town at which my dorm is held and is based on the Borrowers' story. It was amazing. I was 40-60% on the dialog, but I mostly knew what was going on. The music and visuals create a stunning presentation and a healthy addition to the Ghibli family. The soundtrack is phenomenal...
- Tuesday was the day of the Japanese Placement Test. This was the most demoralizing test I have ever taken, haha... It's purpose is to place you in an appropriate Japanese class, the inherent problem, however, lies in it's level. It's made for the higher level Japanese students and their placement. Less that two years of studying and you're kind of just placed somewhere. Our dorm was placed in various classes, ranging from Advanced to Japanese 1. That's right, people who have studied Japanese and who know Hirigana and Katakana (the alphabets) are expected to RELEARN this shit. An egregious misuse of the test. I was placed in Japanese 2 and said "Fuck it, I'll take it." At least I won't be in there saying "A.... A... I.... I.... U.... U...." for two hours everyday. The people placed in Japanese 1 later contested their results and were placed in 1.5 (that's right they break it down further).
- That Thursday, I went out for my first "Nomihodai" or drinking party. Now, I had alluded a few of the previous ones by being ninja, but this one had food! So, I was there. It was a blast! We all got hammered! I've never been THAT drunk before and never drunk as an adult. I was plastered. I am happy to report my Japanese skills skyrocket and my martial arts stay intact. ;)
- One of those days we had Orientation where we learned a hole bunch of interesting things about "how long my index finger is" and "if I fall asleep, do they care?" It was boring. The best part was the Japanese guy talking about not being drunk on campus. You'll apparently be kicked out of Japan! Oh, snap! And, the Clubs and Circles. There are few that interest me, but I'll get into that in a minute. The Orientation ended and we had 4 hours to kill before we had to be back for The Welcome Party.
- The in-between was fun, we went somewhere. I'm pretty sure we went to Shinjuku. We did! Okay, sorry.... We went to Shinjuku and walked around a bit, a lot, a f' ton. We returned and I was grouchy and tired. I sat in the air-conditioning by myself a bit to cool down and then joined the gang outside. The Party was about to begin.
- The Party was... interesting. While a clever idea, we all just stayed in our respective groups and any who tried to migrate were shunned. Not literally, but slowly ostracized. A few Japanese had true autonomy and were able to freely move, as if they were omnipresent.
- The Karate club presented at the Party and intrigued me greatly. The Black belt did a quik Kata. It commanded a sense of respect through yelling -- it's the source of their power. Like my inability to spell quick. Afterward, the Green Belt and Black Belt sparred. Bruce Lee once called Karate tournaments "Organized Despair." The sparring was not much different. I mean no disrespect; however, wearing gloves and punching each other in the stomach is hardly sparring. Flashing a kick, but pulling back right at the last second is not sparring. Perhaps an organized display, I'd certainly agree. Or, even, an impromptu display of techniques; but, certainly, what they were doing was not sparring. Again, no disrespect. Merely my observations. Now, having said that, I may actually take this Karate. I just hope the "Master's" don't want to "test their might"...
I don't remember Sunday, it must've sucked. But, Monday we went to AKIHABARA! The ANIME CAPITAL! I was salivating.
I must specify that I am not an Otaku. An Otaku is, for lack of a better term, an anime nerd. It literally means one of obsesses.I enjoy anime, but there are millions -- in the US ho surpass me. I generally like the type of anime that most others don't. For example, on Cartoon Network's Toonami they had several anime. Most remember Dragon Ball Z, Sailor Moon, Gundam, but not I. I remember Tenchi Muyo. I like the stories about the hapless nerds who stumble upon numerous beautiful women. If you judge me, I know Kung Fu. Not really, but I do.
Upon our arrival, we were bombarded with visuals of "Electric Town." There were so many images of Anime girls, so many vendors and shops. It was amazing. My heart was aflutter. That sounded gay. Well, I was excited, to say the least. We wondered into Gaming stores to find NES, SNES, Sega consoles, everything gaming. We didn't go into a lot of anime stores because of the group we were with, but I plan on going back to get some cool swag. We did, however, go into a capsule store! You know those capsules that are freaking awesome? Yeah, that store. We each bought some random ones, but we all bought a single "Gacha Gacha" man and I got the "? guy."
He is currently attached to my phone. Akihabara was truly an experience and I can't wait to go back.
The rest of the week was kind of casual and of no great importance. Except, we did go out for another Nomihodai! I got wasted again, haha... Friday was the first day of classes and they were pretty cool, I suppose. I'll leave that for another post.
Lastly, yesterday, we went to Asakusa! It's a big shrine thing. We all got our fortunes and only two of us avoided the "BAD Fortune"! Thankfully I was spared and got a Regular Fortune while Maki got "BEST Fortune"... That sentence is hard to read. Basically, one Good fortune, one regular fortune, and seven Bad fortunes. Haha... It was quite fun!
Today was quite boring, just studied. Tomorrow I've got a quiz in Japanese! Yatta! Haha... My next post is going to be about grievances with Japan. They need to refill my damn drink... Haha.
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