played some taiko

And i was very conspicuous

--これを書いたの外国人

linkmania

China is officially #2, bumping Japan down a notch in the category of who has the worlds biggest economy. its KIND OF A TOUCHY SUBJECT....well, after last years bullshit and many more years of bullshit before that, getting news like this must feel pretty great

it`s not cool to link to old posts on your own blog, see? also i couldn`t find the post where i linked to that China-Japan story when it was still relevant. maybe i just imagined that i linked it.

i may have briefly mentioned before, but at the end of March, i`m relocating in a more westernly direction, within Japan of course. yep, seems like ever since `08 I just can`t stay in one place for more than a year, and it also seems like i cause riots with my absence. there sure is a lot of unrest in the world right now. well i`ve actually never been to Tunisia, Egypt, Libya or Bahrain, but I have been to Thailand Greece and South Korea

yes, some of those links are a little old. but it does establish a pattern of shit hitting the fan when i take my charismatic award winning smile elsewhere

so the latest addition to my C/V of misery would be....hey look! more pictures from Syntagma Square! quite different from the pictures i took of the place. to give just one example, no one was throwing firebombs when i was there. if you look carefully, you`ll notice that those ceremonial motionless parliament guards have finally left. also if you watch the video closely.....is that "Riot Dog" running around again? that dog must have pretty strong opinions to keep braving the molotov cocktails and clouds of teargas. wtf is wrong with that dog?

i remember lots of stray dogs everywhere i went in Greece. generally they just seemed to wander around looking for food, i didn`t know they were such POLITICAL ANIMALS *ba-dum tish*

when I leave this place at the end of March, I can only imagine what`s gonna happen to this sleepy little mountain town. in fact i can already see the conditions for chaos and unrest starting to form here, i mean, for god`s sake they are CLOSING the taiyaki place on Route 20!!!! ARE YOU PEOPLE FUCKING CRAZY

so in an effort to ensure that my little slice of Japan doesn`t suffer the same fate as the other places i`ve been to, I`ve been focusing my energies on leaving this place the right way. spending quality time with people, etc., rather than blogging.

blogging sucks! it feels too much like a responsibility

--外国人
Riot Dog says: "Austerity hurts the poorest segments of the population and tends to depress economic growth, I`m sorry for pooping in Syntagma Square."

勝利

look



that`s what a Japnese driver`s license really looks like. it`s also what victory looks like, just so you know. so for those keeping score (myself), today it`s

Me: 1
Japan: at least 5

ーーこれを書いたの外国人
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SPINACH ATTACK

right now it`s national spinach week here in Japan. not officially perhaps, but there`s been spinach in every school lunch every day since last week. doesn`t bother me too much, although I`m not sure why we`re getting spinach bombed all of a sudden. as far as greens go we usally eat seaweed and this



who puts spinach in soup? what the hell?

I suppose the reason for all this spinach isn`t really related to the one-world government agenda of the new world order as i originally supspected, and probably has more to do with vitamin C. i see kids as germ factories, and schools have more germs than hospitals, Japanese schools are no exception. one of the schools i work at is having a problem with インフルエンザ, a.k.a. the flu. everyone has to wear a mask there until PEOPLE IN THIS COUNTRY LEARN TO COVER THEIR MOUTHS WHEN THEY COUGH

coughing propels your damn germs 3 meters, that`s 300% further than talking, CUT THAT SHIT OUT

why no updates for 3 weeks? I would say that I`ve been busy, but that would mostly be a lie. although in the past 3 weeks, I`ve accomplished the following:

-got a new job placement from April onwards
-renewed my VISA (i`m talking about the passport thing of course)
-failed the driving test once

so when i came home from school, i didn`t feel like blogging in between answering emails and working on my visa application, and this driving crap has continued to be a pain in my ass too. it sucks because i`ve been driving for 10 years now, and people at the local DMV won`t trust me with a license because.......?

ironically, i don`t even need the license anymore. i don`t need a car for the placement i`m going to in April (and therefore, I`m losing the one i`m currently using). i could just give up now and it would be fine. but i`m gonna try at least twice more, because of all the time/money/mental effort i`ve already invested, plus i want to conquer this thing.

i barely remember the first driving test i took 10 years ago. i think it was something like, "if you can drive for 20 minutes without crashing and you have $25 then you can have a license" compare and contrast it with the Japanese version. crooked seatbelt? thats points off. did you slam the door? points.

somewhere in-between "we won`t fail you if you`re sober" and "forgetting to kick all 4 of the tires is an auto-fail" lies the perfect driving test, i suppose

you have to memorize these 3 courses and drive a random one that the guy tells you when you get in the car



here in Japan, there`s alot more biciclysts and scooters on the road who regularly pull some suicidal shit. there`s alot of really narrow roads here. In my honest opinion, it`s harder to drive in this country than in the U.S., what with our wide roads and lack of cyclists who don`t want to live anymore. so i can see if the test over here would be a little harder than back home. but why should a twisted seatbelt be 10% of your grade? my seatbelt wasn`t twisted btw. i failed because i braked during a curve, 20 points, THIS TEST WAS MADE TO BE FAILED

but im not stressing it anymore, because i technically dont need the license now. like i said, 2 more tries at most. i`ll be really happy with myself if i can pass though. i hate the environment enough that i`d at least like to have the OPTION of driving.

ーーこれを書いたの外国人
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