I'm alive and in japan!

Hello all,

You are probably wondering "what's going on with grace". Well here i am to reasure you that right now everything is settling in and great. However, it was a bumpy road getting here. I'll start at the beginning.

The flight was soooo long. 10 hours and I couldn't sleep durring it, because the lady infront of me wanted to keep her window open with the bright sun shinning in. Oh well, atleast I had my cd player and I took way too many pictures of the view out the window. Finally I got to Narita airport. I grabbed my carry on (waying 20 pounds!), my coat, sweater, umbrella, pillow, and laptop (my arms were going to fall off) and headed out the plane. After I went all the way across the airport sweating like hell and dragging all my goods I got lost. I started wandering all confused, surrounded by signs in Japanese. Well my daized look payed off as a friendly Japanese airline employee started waving at me desperately to show me the right way. So I got to where my suitcases were and waited (I wanted to fall asleep by this point on my pillow).

I waited and waited at the conveyor belt and finally my HUGE heavy suitcase came around. I looked quite silly in my flapper hat, long pearl neclace and pink top trying to lug this bag. Luckily a friendly Japanese man jumped to my aid and loaded my suitcase on my cart. So, finally i had my stuff (by this time it was like 12 in the morning vancouver time). I headed for the exit and there was a woman waving a sign that said Ms. Grace Hiebert. "That is me, that is me!!" I yelled out. She passed me off to a friendly Japanese man who took me to send one of my bags to my apartment. He then escorted me outside and waited with me for my bus. I tried to practice my 4 Japanese phrases I knew with the him. He laughed and said i was "very good". ha! Then the bus came. A old Japanese lady was infront of me and was having a hard time stepping up the one foot onto the bus. So immediately I reached out and hefted her up onto the bus. She was so thankfull ("Domo, domo!"). So I'm on the bus and I walk towards the seats. Immediately the bus driver starts yelling "Chotto, chotto!" I turn around, cofused, and say "Oh, I guess these seats are resurved" and moved farther back in the bus. He, meanwhile kept yelling "chotto!". Finally I realized that I was supposed to have given him the bus ticket I was clutching in my hand. So I turn around and meakly said "I don't speak Japanese, sorry". This response is met with much laughter and applause from the passangers on the bus. So, I turned around to find a seat and the lady who i helped get on the bus is gesturing for me to sit accross from her. She then turned to her husband and in Japanese explained how i helped her. It turned out that she and her husband were also just arriving to Japan from Vancouver (the only English word she seemed to know as "Vancouver, Vancouver!"). She was so sweet. She reached over and gave me two Halls out of a package, saying "Vancouver!" while pointing to them. I just smiled and nodded dumbly. I was so tired by this point and my bus ride was 3 hours.

Finally I got to Kofu stop and I got off the bus and looked around not seeing anyone. Suddenly a man by the name of Sukuki san appeared out of nowhere and his first question was "Is Japanese okay". To which i responded "no, english". Oh dear, i felt like such a dunce by this point unable to speak their language. So he proceeded to use a mixture of hand gentures and his electronic dictionary to tell me a car was coming soon to pick me up. Soon another man Tsutomu San (whose name was pronounced Ss-tom San) arrived with a lady named Hiroko San. They also new almost no english but eagerly looked in their dictionary to say a car would be coming soon. The lady Hiroko was quite cute with a sweet little round face with dimples and a pink cardigan on. She looked wide eyed at me and totally seemed in awe that I was from Vancouver (yes, I was an instant celeberity in her eyes :). Suddenly I heard singing and I saw this teenage Japanese guy on his guitar singing away near the busstop. I took a video clip (which i will have to show you later as i am using this internet at my neighbour Li-Mei's house).

Finally a car arrived and another Japanese man with an utterly unprouncable name (it had a lot of s's and t's in it) got out and helped load my (insanely heavy) bags into the trunk. I got in and Hiroko sat beside me, and began stairing at me totally in awe. I looked over and smiled uncomfortably. She said "Vancouver very different?" and I say "Yes, everything is bigger". [I have to mention at this point the first things I noticed about Japan with my half asleep eyes were that the cars were mainly very small and boxy (sorta like smart cars but more shaped like a a box), the houses were in general small and squarish, and most of the roads were very narrow.]

So, we were driving in the car towards my apartment. Suddenly we stopped at what looked much like a 7-11 on the outside (they actually do have the 7-11 brand here too), but inside all the food was Japanese. I was lead in by my small enterage and told they would get me breakfast food. I looked around half awake (by this time it was probably 3am Vancouver time) and had no clue what most of the food was. I really felt like an alien in an alien land. Confused I went down an aisle where I saw some noodles packaged in bowls. I asked Tsutomu San "which is good". He didnt seem to understand what i ment so i just randomly grabbed some...in the end my "breakfast consised of some kind of unidentifiable canned drink, some kind of pudding with fruit in it, and a bowl of noodles. hehe, welcome to Japan!

So, finally we get to my apartment and the first thing i noticed was the beautiful tatami matting on the floor and the sliding doors throughout. But, when I got to the kitchen all the contraptions looked so ancient. I asked how to turn on the hotwater and thus began a half hour adventure of turning nobs and pressing buttons. Eventually my neighbour Li-Mei appeared (hearing our racket im sure) and offered assistance. Luckily she spoke fluent Japanese so she was abble to act as translater between me and the others. Then we got to the bathroom! Oh my goodness! My bathtub was the shape of a deep cardboard box and there was a daunting contraption full of nobs beside it. Li-Mei proceeded to show me how to turn the hotwater on for a shower ("turn this nob on the bottom to "on", then this nob up here turn it to 90 degrees and hold for 10 seconds then turn it all the way around the left one full time"). Oh dear!

Hiroko san kindly showed me how to lay out my futon on the floor and I just wanted to collapse right on it. Finally after many references to how tired I was I was left alone to sleep. Stom san said he would pick me up at 8:15am the next day for work. So I set my alarm and crashed in bed. However it was a fitfull night. I woke at 12am and got up and poored myself some water from the tap in the kitchen (which I would later find out was a horrible mistake) and went back to bed. I woke again at 2pm and was kept up by the strong smell of tatami beside me (which, not being used to it reminded me of the smell of hamster bedding) and the army of crickets chirping outside. I tossed and turned.

Suddenly I heard my door bell buzzing. I looked over at my clock which said only 5am and stumbled to the door. It turned out it was my neighbour Li-Mei who waid it was 7:30! Obviously my alarm clock didn't work with the Japanese power. I thanked Li-Mei profusely and went into the bathroom to have a shower. After struggling with the assorted nobs I finally gave up and had to have a cold shower. Not only was a SOOO tired I was also noticing that I was feeling a rising nausea in my stomach. However, I knew I was going to be picked up so I ran around madly looking for clothes. I stuffed a box of cookies in my bag I had brought to give to my office workers. Li-Mei then rung and invited me to have coffee and breakfast at her place. I went in and she introduced me to Erica who also lived in our building and worked with LI-Mei and the "International center". My nausea was getting worse and all i could manage was to sip some coffee. Suddenly Stom san appeared at their door and asked if was ready. I made a mad dash for my shoes and had to turn off my lights in my apartment. I know he was irratated that I was making him wait, but he didn't say anything directly about it.

I got in his car and he drove me accross town to the Yamanashi Prefecture Gov't building. I weakly tried to tell him i was feeling sick, however he seemed in a hurry to get us to the office. We finally arrived at this imposing looking building and went up the elevator to the office. I entered a rather small room crammed with two rows of long desks filled with office workers and at the opposite end of the room was a stern fellow at a desk, facing everyone, who I assumed was my boss. I was feeling dizzy by this point, but I noticed everyone getting up out of their seats. I was guided to the boss's desk and introduced to him. Then all the office workers were looking at me in anticipation. A fellow by the name of Masaru San (who was fluent in english) prompted me with "This is Grace, she is from Canada". It then hit me that they wanted me to make a speach. Feel a growing nausia I attempted something lame like "I am from Vancouver. I am very honored to work with you. I will try and work hard. I have brought cookies for everyone (which was met by applause). Thankyou". Everyone was still standing and stairing at me so i decided I'll make my way to my desk. It wasn't untill I sat down that they all sat down.

I then staired at my computer screen unsure what I should do. The nice lady who had picked me up from the busstop last night, Hiroko san was sitting beside me on my left. Suddenly my growing feeling that i was sick couldn't be ignored, so I weakly said "I'm sick and made a gesture at my stomach". She looked very concerned and grabbed her japanese-english dictionary to help figure out what was wrong. She then told several office wokers to her left and that set off a rush of individuals coming over to me and asking again and again what was wrong with me. Finally it got too much and I asked weakly "where is the bathroom?" I was directed to a room that was lined with stalls. I picked a stall and inside was a low toilet (like a urinal except right on the floor), I leaned over it and thought I would be sick in it. Hiroko came in the bathroom to see if I was okay. I told her how sick I felt and then started crying. She was very sweet and patted me on the shoulder and in broken english said "New move, big change, big change". I grabbed some toilet paper to wipe my eyes and headed back to the office. Somehow I was driven home and I (after throwing up) I just collapsed on my futon and went to sleep.

I didn't wake untill i heard my door buzzing. It was my neighbours Li-Mei and Erica who had brought me some special water and an o-bento lunch. There was also several bags on the floor and a note from my co-worker Hiroko san "Eat, drink and rest". It was all very sweet of everyone.

I went back to bed and rested untill 6pm. I felt alot better by then. Erica came over and buzzed my door to ask if i'd like to go over to Li-Mei's for supper. I said sure (now I had my appetite back after all the nausia). I got dressed and went over to Li-Mei's. Erica who is a Japanese descendent from Brazil had cooked this great Japanese curry and Miso soup. Everything was delicious. We then got to talking about halloween (they are organizing a big evernt for the local kids through the international center). I told them about carving pumpkins with my family so I was assigned to create the pumpkin decorations for the event. I also got to talking about working at kidsbooks and showed them the children's books i had brought, along with all the finger puppets and a large squirel puppet. Erica was very very thrilled and insisted that I throw a puppet show for the local kids. Erica also talked about the trip a bunch of them are going on to Thailand durring Christmas to bring toys to an orphanage. I told her I would really love to go. She said she would ask Courtney, who is planning the trip, if there is still space for me. All in all, it was just such a nice dinner and made me really realize how I am going to be okay here in Japan. I had gotten through this horrible bit of jet lag and stomach illness and I knew I would be taken care of.

So now we get to today. I had a GREAT nights sleep after the dinner was done and I woke up today to the sound of this Japanese announcement being projected over the city at 7am. I felt like a new person. I don't have to work today (they told me i should be off untill monday), tomorow is when we are preparing for the halloween event, and sunday is the event. It is great because I'll get to meet a bunch of Jets at the event. Also, on monday and tuesday there is a big conference for all the english language teachers in the area - so i'll meet every jet in the area then. Today I am going to go explore my area. There is a mountain directly behind my apartment that I might explore and I will look for the local grocery store and the 1oo yen shop (like a dollar store in Canada).

So all in all everything is so new and different. I really want to learn Japanese now, because it really is a "language barrier" not knowing it. I am kinda glad I got the nasty part of being sick over right away, so now I can get through anything.

Love you all and really miss everyone back home

Take care :)
grace