South Road

A quick antedote to show an instance of a Crazy Tokyo-ite: I was riding the Chuo-sen down to Tokyo station on Monday to drop off my luggage in a coin locker before meeting up with Akari and Madoka at Jyouchi Daigaku (read: Sophia University) and at Shinjuku (I think), as usual most people de-trained. One of the passengers that boarded the newly empty car was one of the strangest sites I've seen in Tokyo, which is saying a lot. He was this short man (couldn't have been over 5'3") who had the typical head of a normal salaryman - gray comb over hair, peppery mustache, Groucho Marx black-rimmed glasses. The thing that made him strange however, was he was wearing women's clothing from the neck down. He had on a black cardigan, one of those long tank top things that are like a dress, brown pants, stockings and open-toed black shoes. Oh, and a bra. He seriously looked like one of those games where the head, torso, and leg sections of different people rotate on three wheels like a slot machine and you have to try to stop them and make a complete person (you know the game; it was a bonus round in Super Mario Bros. 3); this guy clearly lost that game. I know what some people familiar with Tokyo might be saying - oh come on, there are much stranger kids in Tokyo; he's just a cross-dressing old man. But those kids are just trying to stand out and be strange. There was something eerie about him; the way he kept his mustache despite the rest of his appearance; the dramatic way he kept moving around, staring longingly out the window, crossing and uncrossing his legs, stretching his legs out in front of him and pointing his toes, draping his cardigan on himself to cover his "chest", adjusting his bra so it wouldn't peak out of his top. Keep in mind most people don't move around at all on trains so they don't annoy the people around him. This guy was annoying people, nevermind the fact that he was also drawing attention with his dress. It seemed pretty clear that he wasn't just a cross-dresser, and he wasn't trying to just stand out; he had clearly gone nuts. Oh well; he managed to make a lasting impression on me with his appearance in a town where it's pretty hard to do that.

Tonight, I met up with my tutor Takako to watch the news with her. She's helping me out expand my vocabulary and in general try to answer my questions about Japanese, while I'm trying to increase her English proficiency before she heads off to Australia for the month of february. She is pretty good at reading comprehension, but is remarkably bad at listening; she has a hard time understanding anything I say, no matter how slowly I say it. Hopefully I can help fix that. Speaking of being good at reading, I hope she doesn't read this! Anyway, Takako works way too hard and says she might not be able to be my tutor anymore; she has a full course load and works 2 restaurant jobs to earn money to chill with friends and stuff. She's basically constantly busy and has now been sick for a full week because she refuses to take time off to get better. She's crazy. But I hope she stays my tutor because (1) she's sweet, dresses rad, and is fun to be around and (2) she is a source of much needed friends!

After we parted ways, I went down to South Road, this little pub owned by my good-friend-Emiko's mom's best friend. Emiko's mom grew up in Sendai, and is now the secretary of my dad's bestfriend. The pub owner is named Teruko, and she prepared me dinner (okada, salad, oshinko, and delicious sushi) and gave me all the free drinks I wanted (I stuck to beer and sake, and avoided drinking too much after the Tokyo fiasco two days ago). The place is a favorite of a few salarymen and middle aged women, so I ended up having strange conversations with a salaryman and singing karaoke for the entertainment of all in the room. It was quite embarrassing, but they enjoyed it. Teruko invited this guy Suda to come who is a professor of Agriculture and Animal Husbandry at Tohoku University and had him bring his English teacher, a half-japanese guy from New York in his late 30s named Fujii. Fujii was nice company and had the first New York accent i've heard in awhile. Strangely, just last weekend he met Conrad, who just so happens to be an English teacher in Sendai and is my dad's bestfriend's cousin. Hold the phone! - let's have a recap of that "It's A Small World/6 Degrees of Separation" thing that we had in little South Road, the random tiny pub in Sendai: It all starts with my dad's best friend Gary. His secretary is the mother of my good friend Emiko and the bestfriend of pub owner Teruko, who knows Suda the professor who knows Fujii the English teacher. Fujii met fellow English teacher Conrad last week, and Conrad is the cousin of my dad's bestfriend Gary. And I'm David Chang, the son of Gary's bestfriend. Now try and tell me that isn't some crazy-ass shit.

Addendum: Two points of clarification - (1) the man on the train was not dressed for Halloween. For one thing, Japan doesn't celebrate Halloween much more than decorating store fronts, and second, it was daytime on November 1st when I say him. (2) Teruko had no idea that Fujii knew Conrad. She in fact has no idea who Conrad is. It was entirely a crazy coincidence.