Moving to Ine-town

Moving to Ine-Town

I left Tokyo yesterday with my Kyoto prefecture group. We walked to the Shinjyuku train station where we caught the train to Tokyo station. There are a lot of Japanese people in train stations. At Tokyo Station, we bought bento lunches and couldn’t resist the delicious looking pastries sold all around the area. I got some pudding! This would not be worth mentioning, except that my little pudding was wrapped in a box with two packs of ice so it would keep, a little spoon, and then put inside a bag. It was a frivolous waste of paper, and so it could only be Japanese. From Tokyo, we hopped the shinkansen, bullet train. It was sooo comfortable! We got to eat our lunches and look out the window at the countryside and industrial areas, and we even got a pretty good view of Fuji-san (see the photo!). I unfortunately sat next to a person who wanted to chat the whole time... but dammit, I was reading the last Harry Potter book and things were getting CRAZY.

We arrived at Kyoto station. The first thing we did after departing the train was take a turn into a shopping mall. I was more and more confused as we climbed floor after floor on the escalator. On the 9th floor, we arrived at our Contracting Officers' office! We were filed into a small room filled with Japanese people in chairs. I had no idea what was going on, but I felt like we had been tricked into being sold as gaijin slaves. Finally, someone Japanese said something long and formal in Japanese and everyone stood out of their chairs and came towards us. A tiny lady in her late 40’s and a tiny man in his early 50's greeted me. Nishihara-san and Umezaki-san, respectively. Of course, I didn't know this until three hours later. The two took my bags and me to the car (Japan’s re-imagining of the station wagon). From there, we began our long drive to Ine-cho, where I will be living for the next 365 days or more.

The drive was immediately awkward. Umezaki-san and Nishihara-san speak about as much English together as I spoke Japanese two years ago (essentially none). My Japanese communication abilities are passable at best "Me are Rachel. New English to teaching, enjoyment!" However, the fact that I’ve never spoken to a Japanese person outside of a classroom paired with the backwater characteristics of the Tango Peninsula dialect [Tango-ben] made it almost completely impossible to understand what was being said. Facts were somehow exchanged, although they were almost entirely incorrect. The first; I am from Seattle. I don’t know how on earth this came across. I mentioned that I was from Los Angeles and my parents lived in Turkey. I told them I had eaten horsemeat and that I enjoyed swimming. At one point they argued about Washington DC and Washington-shyu (state). I mentioned that they were different, and that my grandparents lived in Seattle. From this, I must have somehow communicated *oh by the way i live in Seattle and am from there somehow* Though, I'm sure it's all my fault. At least I know what presents to get them from the US - Ichiro Suzuki merchandise. They asked me a million questions about him, and had I seen him. I had!

They took me to a department store (Mipple!) where I was encouraged to buy a small bowl, a pair of chopsticks (hashi) and some toilet paper (in retrospect, an excellent idea). I also made sure to buy soap and shampoo. Afterwards, they wanted me to buy breakfast. Well, I don’t know what I want for breakfast and I am too tired to translate every box of random noodles. I broke down and bought a box of frosties, because cereal is western and after that they left me alone.

Before they took me to my house, I had the amazing pleasure of going to INE KYANPU (camp). I met a bunch of kids and teachers, all of them adorable. One in particular kept running up to me and saying "Harro!" and running away. I finally cornered her with two friends and asked her name. None of them would talk. I know they understand me. So I asked in Japanese if they had forgotten. Then they ran away. I love kids. I also had some real-deal meat off the BBQ and yakisoba along with delicious tea. They gave me too much though and kept trying to give me more. I don’t think I’m actually going to be losing weight here... I’ll probably be a sumo by the end of a year. After a half hour, we said our goodbyes and left back towards Ine.

They brought me to my house. It is the most amazing house I have ever lived in. It is meticulously clean, smells amazing and everything is perfect. I have a big tub, a toilet, a living room, and kitchen with dining nook, two bedrooms and a huge study. I get to sleep on a futon, I have paper sliding doors, the neighbours are very friendly so far, and I have lots of random Japanese switches that I can’t begin to understand. It’s wonderful. It’s across from a farm, and up on a little green hill. Everything is green.

The downside to living in a muggy seaside village on a hill? Probably the amount of Jurassic-sized insects that are dying to get inside my home. I only saw a handful, namely giant ants, around the area. A big moth also landed on my window to say hi. It couldn’t get in, but anyone who knows me and moths... (THEY CAN'T SEE WHERE THEY'RE GOING AND IT'S TERRIFYING!)

I didn’t unpack or do anything when I was finally left alone. I took a bath, spread out my futon (after wondering what exactly makes a futon a "bed") and went to sleep early. The sounds were really strange; loooots of animals live out there. It made me a little nervous, but the futon was too squishy for me to keep awake worrying about it. I was asleep in no time.