A lot of foreigners here talk about
getting stared at, and I certainly had that experience a few years
ago, yet now that I live in a much smaller area I don't. Even my
dormmates talk about it, and yet I'm spared. So what's up? Can they
smell the Japan on me? Have I developed a distinctly Japanese gait?
Have they finally succeeded in converting me?
I did, however, catch the sidelong eye
of a half-cut 20-something as I was walking home after some Midnight
Nakau, her swaying along in my general vicinity. After the third
round she saw me seeing her and scurried away a bit.
Girl: いぇーい。
Me: (thoroughly amused) 何か？
Her (giggles, starts to go into a
restaurant)
Me: 楽しんでな！
Her: うん！
*
“Wait a second,” I say. “At the
tabehoudai just now I ended up getting four beer for 500 yen. And at
this bar I just paid 600 for one.”
My four Japanese companions raise their
glasses in unison: “Welcome to Japan!”
*
The last time I bought ice cream at the
Circle K, the girl behind the counter gave me, not one of the tongue
depressers they usually dole out, but a real, honest-to-god plastic
spoon, with star shapes cut out of the handle, even.
Me: You know this means she has a crush
on me.
Anarchy in the UK: Today, it's a spoon,
tomorrow, spooning.
*
Hecuba: I'm cold.
Me: Are you kidding?
Hecuba: This is like a Hong Kong
winter.
Me: This is like Canada in the middle
of July.
*
Walking through down the Sanjoubashi
riverbank I saw an older white guy forlornly seated on a low wall. In
at least his 50's, he looked morose and dejected, beer in hand, all
alone. I imagined that he was probably out for some young pussy,
banking on the rumours he'd heard of Japanese girls being crazy for
the white dick, and so he'd come to this hangout spot only to find
that nobody was interested in a sad, ugly old man. What a
loser, I thought.
And then I thought, oh God, that's
going to be me in a few years, isn't it?
*
I'd been too busy and too lazy to buy a Halloween costume for the dormitory party, but in a flash of half-assed inspiration I realised that if I pulled some stuff out of my closet and arranged it in just such a way, I could totally pass as a cowboy.
"What are you," people asked me, "a serial killer?"
It's nice to know that when I wear my normal clothes, I look like a serial killer.
*
I'd been too busy and too lazy to buy a Halloween costume for the dormitory party, but in a flash of half-assed inspiration I realised that if I pulled some stuff out of my closet and arranged it in just such a way, I could totally pass as a cowboy.
"What are you," people asked me, "a serial killer?"
It's nice to know that when I wear my normal clothes, I look like a serial killer.
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