Wednesday 31 March 2010

Jobs and vomit and surprises, oh my!

It's been a busy week here in the 'vinegar arrow' household! Well, not that busy, but I guess because I've spent most of my waking hours cleaning up vomit, washing vomitty clothes, and having heart palpitations every time Ashton coughs for fear of projectile vomit, I haven't had time for much else.

I won't go too far into the gory details, because, you know, nobody wants to hear that shit. But Ash has had some horrific tummy bug for about a week and he's been shitting through the eye of a needle and vomiting all over the shop, poor little bugger. Another example of incompetent J-doctors has shone through. I don't always diss the J-docs, with adults I don't actually have any complaints, they are usually very thorough. But with kids they are such pussy wankers, they won't give the kids anything that works, just lolly water to put the mother's minds at ease. I need to find me an old school pro-drug doctor I think. After almost a week of J-meds, mushy rice and fish that was being thrown up after about 5 minutes, I took matters into my own gaijin hands and told Grandma to bugger off, he was having dry toast and flat lemonade for dinner. She muttered how scary that remedy was but it was the only thing he's kept down so I'm sticking to dry stuff and sweet liquids to keep his energy up, and she can bite my big, fat arse if she doesn't like it!

In between all this vomit action, there have been some other exciting developments! Last week was Ryo-chan's birthday, not only did I get him a present he actually genuinely likes, but I also organised (and kept a secret, miracle!!!) a surprise birthday party for him. He almost cried, he was so surprised! He told me later that nobody had ever bothered to do anything special for his birthday so I was well chuffed! We managed to get about 20 people together for dinner in Osaka and then some of us went for drinks and bowling afterwards, was lovely.
I told him we had to go meet some senpai friends of mine I met in China, he spent the whole week before bitching about how he didn't want to go and that he didn't want to meet any Chinese friends of mine, so it was an even better surprise because he wasn't looking forward to it at all!

The other good thing that has happened this week, is that Ryota has scored a new job. I'm incredibly relieved, his old job was just so unreliable, rainy days or when work was slow were always days off and that just scared the shit out of me. But from the middle of April, he will be working for our local city office doing similar work to that he does now but will be set hours and any overtime will be paid, plus we get insurance and all the jazz that comes with a city office job. Yay! He'll also have Saturdays off, two whole days in a row off, god what will we do with ourselves?! I'm very proud of him, there were 4 positions available but only 1 of them was a full-time with renewable contract position, and he got it!

Just reading this post back, it is incredibly optimistic and lacking sarcasm for me! Must be in a good mood... OK, back to scrubbing vomit out of my shoes...There may very well be a sarcasm laden, dark post to be written after that job...

Tuesday 23 March 2010

All for a shitty bear..

The fascinating and surreal phenomenon of Japan's mix of ancient and modern culture is usually something I enjoy, often something that makes me giggle and sometimes something that pisses me off in a big way. Today was a day I did not giggle or enjoy, I was well and truly pissed.

An example of the good mix would be, say, Kyoto. Kyoto station is an amazingly modern architectural masterpiece, with train lines intertwined with modern structures, countless beams and glass ceilings, shops and restaurants. Yet minutes away are ancient shrines and temples with magnificent gardens reflecting the old Japan that is so popular on postcards.
The funny mix would be, for example, an old school Japanese grandpa on the way home from the public bath in his kimono like robe and little wooden slippers texting his grand kids on his mobile phone.
And today, I got hit with a dose of 'FUCKING JAPAN!!!' that I sometimes get, which then forces me to look into careers and choices in a country that doesn't piss me off as much, however I usually get bored and do a facebook quiz...

I have to say though, I was in a bad mood to begin with already today, it may be the cold rainy weather, or the fact that I still have a freaking cold, or that I have to work until 7pm to accommodate my rich, annoying student. It also doesn't help that Ryota is at home for the 3rd day in a row, which is nice but means more coffee cups and crumbs for me to get anal retentive about, not to mention that he doesn't get paid for rainy days, hence my working until 7...

Anyway, can I waffle on any more!? Nope think that's the end of the waffling...

So what happened today. I usually go by bicycle with little Ash to our local suupaa. The Obachans are friendly, I know exactly where everything is and I feel safe there. It's my safe suupaaa..
But Ashton has taken a liking to fucking Pooh-san cereal, which alas isn't available at my local safe suupaa. So seeing as though it was raining and I was going in the car anyway, thought I'd make the trek to the next suupaa over, with it's big fancy car park and array of different carts, this isn't a tiny family supermarket, it's a big chain that even sells fresh coriander! (A gem in Japan) Not sure if it's Japan wide or just Kansai, but the name is Mandai. Shame Mandai. Shame.

I toddled in, got everything I needed plus the bloody pooh-san cereal, got to the check-out with my basket full to the top, did the necessary bowing that comes with the irrashaimase barking and waited patiently while cooked food was put in mini plastic bags, dry ice was put with frozen stuff and tampons were shunned to the black bag of shame. After all this frigging around I realised I only had about 2000 yen in my wallet (about $20). But no worries, supermarkets are the only place you can always rely on to take credit cards. Right! You'd think so, but no. The obachan gave me a big apology and said that they didn't take credit cards. I'm sorry, but What the fuck!?!? It's 2000 and fucking 10 and we're in the land of modern technology! No fucking credit cards!!!?? Not even VISA, which is usually accepted if others aren't. Now my hairdresser is a tiny place but they still take VISA, Lawson and Family mart take credit cards, fucking taxis take credit cards and I don't even know how that shit works!

So long pissed off story short, I had to go home and get cash and come back. They kept my basket behind the counter, so that was one thing I guess. Anyway, am back home after work now and feeling a little more relaxed.

I was getting around to writing the piss story but can't be arsed now... Stay tuned!

Saturday 20 March 2010

Ashton's words

All English I might add (although he does say manma and boo for food and drink. ) Now that he's starting to understand and use english I don't feel like such a twat when I say things and nobody else understands me!

Stay tuned there'll be a post later about wee and farting. Don't want to miss that!


Wednesday 17 March 2010

Motivation....

I can safely say I've been a HUGE porker this winter, as in eating copious amounts of great stuff, drinking loads of alcohol and not balancing it with any exercise. Was fun, but I knew I was in trouble when I put my jeans on thinking I had washed them because they were all tight and pinching my love handles but I hadn't, my gut had just expanded!

I feel gross and am too scared to hop on the scales to see the damage. Talking about it last night with Ryochan, I told him about Fi's system she had going with her hubby, who would buy her anything she wanted if she got to 60kgs. Now Ryota is cluey in this department, he knows if he says I should do that too that I'm likely to poke him in the eye with a chopstick and start signing divorce papers for being an insensitive twat so he's always careful to start any sentence with "You look great the way you are!" Clever lad. But he was being WAY too nice last night so finally I just said, "OK cut the sensitive new age bullshit, get some balls and tell me I'm a whale so I have some motivation to actually lose weight you big pussy!" (I said it in a much nicer Japanese way of course)

So he said he thought 60kgs was too low, he wouldn't have married a whitey if he didn't like something to grab on to, so he said if I got in the 60's, as in 69.9kgs is OK, he would buy me something, but that wasn't enough for me, I needed something concrete, that I could concentrate on, if it was just 'anything I wanted' I wouldn't be able to imagine having it. Soooo here was my list of things I started fantasising about...

~ A big fat diamond ring
~ A new wardrobe
~A new computer

But as I started listing these things, I thought, hmmm I can have a big sparkly diamond on my finger, but for the money it cost I could be soaking up sun and having massages on a beach while smoking a joint for that money. So I scrapped my list and told him that if i got to the 60s I wanted us all to go on a holiday. Sensible right!?

[Just so you know, TMI alert coming up here, click away if you don't want to imagine me naked, and if you do keep reading... Shame on you, you big perv! ]

But then Ryota got to thinking about boobs. (As men tend to always do...) It could be because earlier in the night while I was having a shower I realised I have nooooo tits at all compared to what I used to, it's like breastfeeding pumped those babies up like big, juicy, 'pam pam' water balloons and now they're all deflated and sad lookin. I started whining about it as I came out of the bathroom and while I was whining started on about my blubby tummy as well. Ryota did the obligatory pussy comment and then followed it with "It's cute! You look like my favourite meal, fried eggs on rice!"

FUCK RIGHT OFF, I DON'T WANT TO BE FRIED EGGS ON RICE!!!!

But good on him, it was very good motivation to get my white, flabby, rice tummy into some sort of shape. I immediately went and did about 20 seconds on the rodeo boy.

Anyway, back to my 60kgs prize, we figured if I did lose weight, my tits would shrink even more and I would have that horrid loose skin on my tummy, so my prize is a plastic surgery holiday! Birds, stones, right.. Right! Who knows if I could ever actually do it, but I think the chances of me getting to 60kgs anytime soon are quite slim.. haha slim, get it.

OK, off to rodeo boy and eat some dust for dinner.

Monday 15 March 2010

Futon fuck-ups...

We've had the rules of rice, welcome to the world of futons...

Before I came to Japan, a futon was a sofa type thingy that I crashed on when I got too pissed at a random person's party, when I got to Japan, a futon was a crappy, thin little mat that I had to sleep on and never cleaned so ended up with a mouldy sleeping space, but now, I have a comfy, cushiony futon that I looooooove to flop on to at the end of the day. I thought I had the futon rules down too, wash the sheets once a week, air the bastards out every so often, and you're sweet! But yesterday I was taught a lesson in the futon wars.

We had to leave the house at 11am as we had to go to FIL's place so I could sit on my knees for an hour while a monk chanted at Ryota's dead grandma's ashes. I really don't see why I have to sit through this shite, I never even met Grandma and I'm told she wasn't too keen on the foreign gals anyway and probably would have spit on me or something! (Not quite that bad really). Anyway, every so often we have to go and do the religious ceremony bullshit. So we woke up at about 10, leaving us not much time to get fed, ready and out the door. Now the weather in Japan has been sooooo crappy lately, lots of rainy or cloudy or cold days so I thought I'd wash and leave the sheets out to dry and air out the futons while we were there as it was really sunny for a change. I knew we were probably going to be home either as it was getting dark, or after dinner, but you know, it's a funeral type thing, it's not like I was going to be out raving until 4am or anything! (I wish!)

As it turned out, we got home at about 9pm, but it wasn't that cold and it wasn't raining or anything, but as I came down our little dirt path, it became apparent that I had been the talk of the Obachans since sun down... Obaachan met me before I got in the door and since I had been swilling beer since about 12:30 I gave her a cheery "konbanwa!" only to be met with this:

WHATTHE FUCKWHEREHAVEYOUBEEN?!

THE FUUUUUUTTTTOOOOOOONNNSSSSS!!!

YOUCAN'TJUSTLEAVETHEMAFTERDARK!!!!

YOU'RE GOING TO CATCH A COLD AND DIE FROM CHILLY FUTON SYNDROME!!!! DIE!!! DIE I TELL YOU!!!

She was seriously almost hysterical. I thought it must have rained and I hadn't noticed through my beery haze but she said it hadn't but it had nothing to do with it, futons are not to be aired out when there is no sun. BIIIIIIIIIIIG no no. I actually started giggling and assured her I would go straight upstairs and put them inside, as I was closing the door she also told me that all the Obachans had been calling my name when it got dark in case I had forgotten and the crazy cat lover next door had actually gone to Obaachans house to inform her of my futon fuck up. Now I know I'm from the land of clear skies and little pollution, but really, we are not going to die from sleeping on a futon that has been hit with moon beams, right...? Right?! Come on people, I'm freaking out that we all may drop down dead at some point today!

Thursday 11 March 2010

Gaijin janken...

I'm not fucking with you here either. A group of Japanese ladies actually did janken to see which of them would have to deal with the foreign girl yesterday.

Perhaps I should explain, yesterday, little Ashton boy was enrolled in kindy and my mother-in-law can blow me, because I've decided he's going whether she and her chorus of kawaisous like it or not. To spare us the pain and guilt the in-laws would have put on us, Ryota and I have enrolled him on the sly, and only yesterday told them about it. I didn't have 100% confidence in the speaky of the Japanee for the orientation thing, and of course the in-laws all snubbed me in the help department because they think I'm going to psychologically damage my son for life for sending him.

So, I toddled off with the little lad to the kindy with all my paperwork and information, rang the bell and was ushered inside with all the other terrible mothers about to subject their children to the abuse of kindy involving sand pits and Disney aprons. When I walked in there was the usual choruses of "kaaaaawwwwwaaaaiiiiii, yappari shiroiro neeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!" (Oh he's so cute and of course he's so damn white!!) in Ash's direction which he lapped up as usual the little attention whore. And then out of the big group of ladies wearing the pink smocks and name badges, they pushed one of the older ladies forward and she cleared her throat and...

Scared kindy teacher: KOOTOOOOBAAAAA WAAAA DAIIIIIJYOOOOOBUUUUUU???? (Literally- "ARE WORDS OK?")

Me: (I didn't realise it but obviously in Osaka-ben) Err, yup I don't get everything but I'm pretty much fine and can understand, thanks.

Sensei: Oh thank fuck for that I thought we were going to have to do sign language with you love, and you speak the Osaka-ben and all!!!

Me: Well, as I said, not perfect but I generally get the jist, so just go slow with me lady and we'll be fine. Yoroshiku blah blah...

Sensei: Don't worry, you'll be fine with your language, you're sooooo much better than we thought, we spent the whole morning deciding who would have to talk to you after seeing your file had a half-whitie red flag on it and ended up doing janken and I lost! HA! Er.... I mean, I'm glad I lost... ahh... ahem, come sit on this tiny midget chair love!

They were actually very nice, so I shouldn't bitch too much, but did they really think I'd go alone if I couldn't understand? I'm sure there are going to be many funny stories coming from kindy, I can just feel it. Anyway, it went well and I understood all the explanation although it was a bit overwhelming with all the info about shit Ash has to take with his name plastered all over EVERY SINGLE FUCKING item, it was like "You will be shot if his name isn't on his shirt, you understand that don't you." But should be good, he had a blast stealing every one's toys and running around, I'm just hoping kids start smacking him around a bit so he learns he can't just take shit that's not his!

In other news.... Ohh, I'm terribly late but last week's night out on the piss with the girls was fan-fucking-tastically awesome. Sassy and I got lost which was funny- two blond girls looking professional with iPhones but actually having nooooo idea where they were when they were actually about 100 metres away from the hotel, having about 15 years Japan experience between us you'd think we could have found it, but no. The drinking and the leaving of child at home was amazing, I can't wait till it's someones birthday and we can do it again.

I feel like crap, I've had this intense back pain since last night and I have a sneaking suspicion it's the achy feeling you get before a really fuck off bad cold, my nose has gone and I'm all lazy, which apart from the leaky nose isn't all that unusual. Ash has some major tooth action going on, he just looked at me last night in sheer terror as he shoved his whole fist in his mouth, poor little petal's face looked like there was some small animal gnawing through his gums, of course the in-laws still maintain his gums are just itchy and that he's crying for some other reason (probably the trauma of an hour at kindy!) We were supposed to go have coffee with Sassy today but I just felt like shite and Ash isn't too hot either.

Better get healthy, I'll need the strength for all the labelling of clothes/futons/band aids/nappies that will be going on this weekend!

Wednesday 3 March 2010

Weather is too good to blog...

It really is, well OK, it isn't that great, but the break from the horrid winter is very much appreciated and has been putting me in a very cheery mood these days, hence the lack of bitching on this blog and in general. I even spied the first ume blossoms while running last night and did a skip and a little gleeful noise escaped from me at the thought of spring and all the alcohol swilling flower watching parties that it brings.

The weather has even been making me get (less) infuriated with the blatant racism that is constantly swirling around me, another classic example yesterday. Random Obachan rings the bell to the door just as Ash was going to snoozy land so I was pissed that someone would be coming to the door anyway, open the door and conversation went like this:

Obachan: (Very politely) Ohhh excuse me, can I have a minute of your ti..... Oh..

Me: Yes. (Slightly amused at her 'gaijin shock' look)

Obachan: Are you the Okusan (wife/head of the family...??)

Me: Yes indeedy.

Obachan: (Thrusting pamphlet at me) Oh, you wouldn't understand this anyway, so just give it to someone who speaks Japanese. Is your husband home?

Me: (Pissed now and starting to close the door) No.

Obachan: American right?

Me: (Non-committal noise, bow and door closing)

I thought, fuck it, I obviously don't understand anyway so why would she bother starting a conversation with me anyway!? And to start it with the conversation-starter I hate most was just not a good combination. If I had any balls I'd tell her where to go but it's one of those 'ingrained racism' incidents that happen so often in this country, more ignorance than hate-filled intent.

Last night's racism incident was however, very intentional. SIL is quite possibly one of the most racist people I know and despite being 24, never ceases to amaze me with her old school hating. We were watching an interview with Mao Asada, who I admit is a sweet girl (although I can't look at her the same after I saw a porno mag with snaps of her hoo-haa when she did a particularly acrobatic skating mood and had wardrobe malfunction issues. *shudder* at gross J-guys getting off on that.) . Anyway, of course, all of Japan was devastated when she got the silver medal at the Olympics. Am I the only one who thinks a silver medal is a pretty fucking good effort??? I felt worse for the bronze winner, the Canadian bird who's mother had died the day before, but no sympathy for her, no no, it was alllll about Mao chan.

Now I kinda knew I was going to start something when I pointed out that silver was still good, but I was still on a high from the ume sighting so I was prepared somewhat...

Me: Silver is so good though, at least she got a medal!

SIL: It's shit, she lost to that Korean whore!!! It would have been better for her to get nothing at all than to lose to that kimchi eating bitch!!! (Ok, a bit exaggerated but I swear to god she got a kimchi jibe in there).

Me:........ So the fact that she lost to a Korean is the only thing that is bothering you...

SIL: Helllllll yea!!!

Me: But she was so much better than her, she broke all kinds of records and got an amazing score.

SIL: (Scowls...)

She actually really hates Koreans, it's ridiculous! Ash has been playing with our neighbour who are of Korean descent and he calls his mum and grandma by their Korean title, SIL was making fun of him and saying how funny it sounded until I gently reminded her that Ash calls me Mummy, Ryota Daddy and my mum, Nanna... She couldn't see how it was the same thing. Apparently English is cool so it's totally different.

God she's a twat.