another very old post from japan...

How silly I was for actually thinking I could do this job for 9 months! it`s been one very long (muted) scream of boredom...feeling like i`ve seriously wasted my time and talent being here. the research is challenging and full of buzzwords like nano, bio, and electronics but i just feel like i should be doing bigger and better things that are closer to my heart (i.e. public policy, community development, working on health and environmental issues etc). i`m just not passionate about working as a corporate engineer. I thought I could be because of the location and the new research but it just never happened for me. I love Japan, I love the food, traditions, religious ceremonies. I love being able to travel to places like koyasan, hokkaido, kyoto. practicing zazen and eating vegetarian meals with buddhist monks. soaking in mineral hotsprings in beautiful mountain inns in the middle of winter. i even have fond memories of several places in tokyo like the museum district in ueno and shopping in akihabara and harajuku. I am really glad that i was so fully immersed in the language and culture, and only played confused foreigner once or twice.

Culturally there are some isssues that can be quite annoying and frustrating at times: the largescale conformity whether its at work, school uniforms everywhere there`s even conformity in the recent trend of suicides (group suicides from charcoal stoves in cars or some man kills his entire family and then himself), the robotic nature of many of the salary workers and the mental health/anti-social issues that are not uncommon, the rudeness and obliviousness that comes from the crowds of people whether its in a museum, supermarket or on a train, missing chivalry i.e. people dont make a point to give up their seats for elderly or women or small children, so much environmental waste you should see how much plastic is used in these stores...pedestrians and foreign drivers beware of narrow japanese country roads and aggressive drivers; there are way too many perverts and gropers especially on the trains, and there is a large number of single men who spend huge amounts of money and time watching/reading anime, playing video games, and looking very autistic and anti-social; the general lack of privacy. Ok maybe i have mixed feelings about the people because ive had some amazing encounters with complete strangers and coworkers...overall Japan`s great, even better than the first time.

I just hate my job. I almost quit the first week in March; im still amazed that people actually volunteer to spend a very large portion of 40 years of their lives doing these types of jobs and the fact that most of my coworkers dont spend much time in the labs at all makes it even worse...i want to crawl into their heads, figure out what`s broken, and fix it for them-for free, in fact i`d feel like i was doing a public service and wouldnt hesitate to spend 40 years of my life just making sure that people dont spend theirs staring at a computer screen, making pantene #46, studying corrosion, or anything else ridiculously pointless in the grand scheme of things.

in other news i still havent figured out this whole platonic relationship thing. so i came to japan thinking im not going to play any games or flirt too much or try to be the cute, lost foreigner or anything like that. i`ll just be myself (and try not to look so sexy ;)I had a very weird, confusing summer as far as relationships with the oppposite sex and so i just wanted to keep things as simple as possible during my year here. But in my attempts to just be friendly (it`s hard not to be when you`re alone in a foreign country), eager to share and learn from as many people as possible, up for (almost) anything whether it be a town market-festival, a zazen retreat or karaoke and soba, trying to keep my nights and weekends full, i may have confused a few people here. My bad...Being around so many men all the time and living in this little city has spoiled me...way too much attention even for me. not only were people, even perfect strangers, buying me things all the time, never letting me pay for anything, some of these men have actually bought and made me gifts that they obviously put a lot of time, money, and thought into.

Anyway Ive never been so excited to write a final research paper...we`re having a farewell dinner party after work tonight and then i just need to finish clearing out my apartment. I`ll be in philly in 4 days. I can hardly believe it. winter was so dreadfully long, if i didnt know any better i`d think some extra weeks had been added just for me.