A day of small pleasures. Like figuring out the heating, having spent several days occasionally wrapped in blankets, before thinking to ask the helpful concierge desk. The helpful concierge photocopied the instructions to the ventilator remote controls and pointed me to the underfloor-heating control panels, which I had not noticed, as they don't bear any semiotic help like “This panel controls underfloor heating.” If I had been more sensible or more cold, I would have got down to the concierge desk sooner. Now for the first time, the flat is as warm as the corridor outside. The floor is toasty.
I stayed in most of the day trying to organise schedules. Over the next 8 weeks, I have to fit in the following places in some sensible order: Kyoto, Nagoya, Osaka, Awajishima, Osaka, Tokyo, Bangkok, Mumbai, Pune, Orissa, Kerala, Calcutta, Delhi, Ahmedabad, Mumbai, Bangkok, London.
Ok, the last three are in the only order they can be, as they involve airports and planes and getting home. But the rest of it is taking some organising. I'm not complaining. But I would like a manager. Would anyone like to be my manager?
Finally I left the building this evening to walk to Roppongi, expat fleshpot zone. I didn't see many expats, but there were dozens and dozens of suited salarymen looked harried and determined. I really wanted a drink but didn't want to risk being charged outrageous prices in a host or hostess bar. I suppose I would have noticed a hostess bar by walking into it, but I am stupider than my education conveys and anything is possible and I'm on a budget. Instead, I walked up to Roppongi Hills, a flash shopping and hotel complex which is supposed to have a flash tower building and some light display. The light display was trees wrapped in fairy lights. The building was in darkness. I thought, sod it, and headed back to the fleshpot zone, where I saw women wearing low heels yet still managing to teeter. Dinner was a bowl of ramen and vegetables in a little place that was bigger than a hole but was in a wall, where the girl spoke remarkably good English. I mean, she had a London accent. I said, “have you lived there?”
No, she said. “Never in my life.”
In fact, she is half Chinese and half Japanese, and learned English from the age of 5 in her Chinese school. Which makes me think either that she had a good series of teachers, or that the Chinese are concentrating more on English than their Japanese neighbours. I had a little trouble understanding “Rozogontop?”, which was “Roast hog on top?” (no thanks), but her English was the best I've heard in days.
She also spoke fluent Japanese, though she only came to Japan aged 14.
“Did you speak Japanese already?”
She said, “No, I started from the beginning. I was like a baby. A…E…I…O…U..”
Now it sounds like she speaks it like a native. Certainly, she has perfected the screeching pitch required for greeting and leave-taking which is impossible to convey to anyone who has not entered a Japanese restaurant in Japan. Or perhaps only in Tokyo. Maybe in Kyoto it's a different screech-pitch. I hope so.
I'm probably a dinosaur - my iBook is Several Years Old - but I've just discovered Photobooth. Here, then, is my Watanabe haircut. You can appreciate the fine detail. Also, I've bleached it platinum.
