SE Asia posts coming to a blog near you!

Here's the first post of our trip! I'll try to be consistant with all of them but with having to find housing (going to go look at two places tomorrow) and a car here in Portland quick-like, my life is a little bit hectic (being sick isn't helping the situation any either.


I was able to land my old job back at the University though so at least I can check that off the list (they're even going through a loop hole to hire me as a temp and not a student worker so I don't have to take classes this term). 


Anyways, here's the first chapter.
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2/21/11 ~ 2:00am

Saturday night’s live went fabulously well. I didn’t screw up (or if I did I didn’t notice) and I got compliment after compliment (and even requests to come back next month and one offer to open a show for some guitarist chick named Ami Guitarra). I only ended up playing one song (Me and Bobby McGee by Janis Joplin) but that’s all they needed (gotta leave them wanting for more, right?). Originally I had planned to do two songs (the other being Bang Bang by Nacy Sinatra) but I didn’t feel comfortable with the guitar part (need to strengthen these damn hands) so I ditched it. Next time.

Feelin' it.

Since the show started so late at night (11pm) naturally everyone that came had to pull an all-nighter. But that didn't bother me (I was leaving for my trip Monday night so I had all day Sunday to recuperate). I drank more than I’ve drunk in a long time (free tequila shots at the bar? How could I refuse?!) And had to have my good friend Natsuyo escort me back to my home station because I could barely stand straight (and ended up getting off in Harajuku and spilling my guts everywhere; not one of my better moments). Sunday was not a very happening day to say the least, so I planned to just gradually do my laundry and carefully pack everything I needed for tomorrow. At around 3pm I texted my travel buddy (and now good friend) Mikaela to see what time we were supposed to meet up tomorrow night (since we were flying out of the new international port in Haneda and not Narita – an hour train ride as opposed to 2 hours –we weren’t too pressed for time).

Or so I thought.

My text message to Mikaela: “so what time we meeting up tomorrow night”

Mikaela: “…you mean what time tonight right?”

Me “…what??”

Mikaela  “didn’t you get my text???”

*checks phone* 2/20/11, 11pm: Mikaela Corney; “We’re leaving tomorrow night at 12:30am technically making that Monday morning. See you tomorrow!”

“!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

So I ran downstairs and promptly informed my host family in the calmest manner I could muster (voice a slight octave up, eyes wide, smiling nervously) that I was in fact leaving in five hours; not tomorrow. I think my host mom was more stressed out than I was for she immediately started running around trying to help me get my laundry all hung up (god I miss dryers) all the while chastising me for not being more together (if I had not texted Mikaela when I did then she would have had a very lonely three weeks). But I was able to get all my shit together (really I didn’t need any of the clothes I had washed because they were all winter clothes that wouldn’t have been suitable for the climate I was heading to); I got it all down to 10 shirts, 2 shorts, 1 skirt, I dress, socks, underwear and sandals, barely even filling half the bag (although this particular back pack, though a good sturdy back-packing back pack, was so huge and awkward that it felt heavy even without anything in it). In record time I made it to Shinagawa (our meeting point) even before Mikaela!

   

On the express to the airport I decided to start my “No Reservations” project right off the bat (I’m really excited to edit all my footage!) and got shots of us being giggly little school girls. This old grandpa who was sitting next to us got excited with us when we started filming and gave us high-fives when we were done then happily bounced off the train when it came to his stop and waved enthusiastically as we took off again. I don’t know if he knew exactly what we were excited about because we were talking in English the whole time but it was cute none-the-less.

(we ended up having five different currencies in our
wallets by the end of this trip)

At the airport we ran into our first little speed bump. For some strange reason the names on our tickets were different than those in our passports but the attendants got it sorted out. Haneda airport is pretty small in comparison to Narita, but it’s clean and has that “shiny new” look to it (It used to be an airport that only flew domestic and flights throughout Asia but they’ve remolded and now include flights world-wide). Going through immigration was a chuckle for we couldn’t seem to get our departure cards filled out right and the immigration officer who was helping us kept on giving us a hard time. Then we were through, in no man’s land (did you know that the area past customs in airports was considered “no-man’s land”? Explains why all items are duty free…), giddily waiting for boarding. As we were in line to get our currency exchanged we ran into a rather cute Canadian boy who just so happened to be going the same way we were (and just so happened that he was a model in Japan a couple years ago—but we all know that doesn't really count) and he almost had the same flight as us (as well as seats right next to ours!) but it turned out that his flight was with JAL and ours was with ANA, both leaving at the same time, to the same destination. Needless to say we never saw him again. 

Alley to our Guest House
Photo courtesy of Mikaela Corney

Landing in Thailand was one of the most magical moments of my life. As soon as I stepped off the plane  and smacked into the wall of humidity all the sleepiness lifted away (I don't know anyone who can sleep on a plane) and was replaced with awe and excitement. We had no idea where we were going or even how to get there so we just followed all the other white people (worked every time) and snagged a taxi outside the airport. Took about an hour and a phone call to reach our guest house (the only one we booked in advanced) but we made it safe and sound (didn't even have to haggle with the price). The guest house was perfection tucked away in a little corner alley. Rock hard beds, ceiling fan (none of our guest houses had AC), no glass on the windows –just screens, have to self flush the toilet and no hot showers. Perfect. 

 An Australian guy (never caught his name) lives/works there and was a very helpful guide/what  should(n't) we do around the area, etc. He was a very chill guy, curly brown hair down to his chin that was beginning to gray, surfer dude shorts, Hawaiian shirt (although when we arrived at 7am he greeted us in boxers, shirtless --obviously forgot our reservations). He is very much one of those dudes who just goes where his feet takes him and can just be a dude. When I asked him why he left Australia, he just said he came here one day and never went back. Okay; I can respect that. 

Bluefin Guest House
Photo courtesy of Mikaela Corney

There were not very many people staying there from what I could see but the place was very spacious. The kitchen and sitting room area was open; no doors or walls blocking the outside. Stairs led up to the guest rooms. There were a couple buildings in our little closed off area and I couldn't tell if they were all part of Bluefin or not. All except our building were inhabited by Thai people so I don't know (maybe Bluefin included apartment buildings too?). The showers were outside of our building, down a ways. They were like showers one would find at a camp ground. Single stalls lined up, equipped with toilets; the need for flip flops was never so apparent. After we checked in we marched directly up to our beds and passed the fuck out for a good four hours.

retarded face moment
Photo courtesy of Mikaela Corney

More alley outside our GH
Photo courtesy of Mikaela Corney

See that bucket there?
That's where you got the water to
flush the toilet. It was actually kinda fun.
Photo courtesy of Mikaela Corney

Never slept on a bed harder.
Photo courtesy of Mikaela Corney

They had a beautiful garden outside
with a nice sitting area.

This little guy (who is named Meow, but whom I re-named
Francis) was all over us all the time. Very friendly but
crawling with fleas.
Photo courtesy of Mikaela Corney

Mikaela likes Francis, hates his bitting buggies
(seriously, she was covered in bites the first night.
I held out for a little while and I thought she
was going to get all the bad luck, but they caught up
with me).
Photo courtesy of Mikaela Corney

Next chapter -- Bangkok and the Royal Palace. 

PEACE OUTSIDE

Jamie 

Jamie Bower, No Reservations.

...doesn't have as nice a ring to it as Anthony Bourdain but we'll work something out later.

Anthony Bourdain, for those unfortunate souls who don't know, is my hero. I want to be him when I grow up (minus the changing into a man part). He is a chef, but those that have eaten my food know that becoming a chef is not in my box of repertoires. Most importantly (for me anyhow) is that he is the host of the Travel Channel Show "Anthony Bourdain; No Reservations". In a nut shell, he pretty much gets to go all over the world and eat, drink and talk to awesome people and just be overall awesome. Those who have not seen his show should immediately watch this clip on Tokyo~



See what I mean? This is my dream job. The only difference would be that I would have to incorporate my knowledge of linguistics or something into the show since I lack in any culinary skills (which is what he focuses on, and I don't wanna be a copy-cat anyways).

So I've had a spark of genius (or silliness for those nay-sayers) and I am going to grab my dream job by the nuts and take control. I will use my upcoming travels in to South East Asia as my first "episodes" and I will film them using my handy-dandy video camera (literally video, no digital film for me). I'm not going to go into details about it (no copy-cats!!!!) but I will say that I need some help. I know nothing about video editing and it would be nice to get some recommendations for some software. I use a PC (screw you Apple and your better-ness) so whatever is compatible with PCs, please let me know what and also where/how to get them ((i.e. for free!!)). Any other video related/filming advice is also well appreciated. It will take me a long time to get this all edited and cleaned up, so don't expect anything right away. These things take time, it is known (haha, geek alert for anyone who knows what i'm quoting).

Also my show is this Saturday at Shibuya La Mama  

come and watch if you dare!!

PEACE OUSTIDE
~JME

Pictures from my ill fated show~

Ill fated meaning how horribly it went on my part (Maria was great of course)

I look like I wanna kill someone.... 

concentrating WAY too hard...

wow, awkward moment. 

Well, in about a weeks time I'll be saying hello to try dos~ wish me luck! 

PEACE OUTSIDE
JAMIE 

Korean meat squirt

This weekend has been both relaxing (which I desperately needed) as well as a little productive. Well, productive only in the sense that I figured out which songs i'm going to perform in two weeks. I taught one lesson as well (which will be the focus of this post).

I met up with one of my best students (and friend) Yuriko, to have our weekly discussion on linguistic theories in English (see why she's my favorite?). During our discussion we somehow got on the subject of Chinese New Year, which led to us going to Korea Town, aka Shin-Okubo (because the big China town was too far away; Korea town was in walking distance).

Koreatown is much like you would expect it to be; Korean shops, restaurants, supermarkets, advertisements, etc cut into a small section of town. This section of Tokyo is called "Shin-Okubo" officially and it's accessible from the Yamanote line, just one stop after Shinjuku going towards Shibuya.

Like a Chinatown only with less China and more Korea. 

 We walked there easily enough from Higashi Shinjuku (East Shinjuku) and on the way we past under this sign:

"American Blvd" This way -->

We didn't follow it but there was a 100 yen shop (dollar shop) across the street called "US MART" which didn't sell anything from the US (except for a penis toothbrush which we figured might be from America) but I did find an apple flavored Oreo candy bar. It was interesting...not bad, but not my favorite. Tasted exactly like it sounds; apple flavored Oreo. Anyway..

Massive crowd. I was a little intimidated. 

Once we got into Korea Town it was instantly recognizable as such. What gave it away other than the intelligible Korean signs? The hundreds of girls crowded outside of numerous idol shops.
Now i'm not talking about religious idols (although most of these girls probably revere them as gods) but rather pop idols from Korean. At these stores adoring fans can buy anything from posters to pens that have their fav artists image stuck on it. We braved a look around inside because they also sold beauty products and my friend wanted some new skin care stuff (and I guess stuff from Korea is supposed to be good?). 

Once it would have been prudent for me to
know who all these people were; but then
I hit puberty. 

The posters of these pop idols staring at me from all over the walls was a little unnerving, as was the fact that guys were also in there buying just as much goods as the girls (they say they're in there buying things for their GF's but we all know they bought those 5 posters of Tohoshinki for themselves). After fighting our way out of that mess we found a Korean grocer and proceeded to buy corn tea (yeah, tea from corn; sorta tasted like liquid popcorn minus the butter), kim-chee (pickled and spiced cabbage), and Korean cookies (cookies). 

Notice how no one is crowded around the
cosmetics?

We also partook in these Korean style gyoza ( meat filled pot stickers) which were delicious and juicy; very very juicy. So juicy that when I bit into mine it squirted all over my friend Yuriko. But it was okay because she smelled delicious for the rest of the night!

Although the sign suggests that these are
actually from Shanghai China (the characters at the very top say so at least)  

Who cares where they were from though, cuz they were tasty. 

Fresh off the skillet 

Yuriko was pleased, but they looked too hot so she was like "you take the first bite, Jamie"

"Okay, here I go~!" *squirt*

It was just too good, couldn't control myself. 

Korea town gets 4 thumbs up (outta ten) simply because it was just your generic sorta ethnic community town; nothing too spectacular to offer unless you're into the Korean pop stars then I suggests going here for all your fan girl (or boy) needs. 

Tomorrow I go to my learning studio for the first time to set up my work schedule~

PEACE OUTSIDE 

Sorry Jesus but...

Tohoshinki's got it made

So, um...what country am I living in again?

DONE WITH INITIAL CERTIFICATION TRAINING FOR GABA!! WHOOO HOOO!!!!

...Sorry, but it's really been a grueling 3 days. From Tuesday to Thursday, 10am-7pm, non-stop learning how to be a good Gaba instructor/customer service bitch. That's right, customer service...my favorite. Even though I am an instructor, we are supposed to carter to the whim of the "clients" (not students), and make sure that they leave a "satisfied customer". Makes since, but I hate to look at it that way (I bow down to NO ONE, you hear? No one!) yet, I understand the importance of making sure all our "students" (clients just sounds so stiff and impersonal) feel like they're getting their moneys worth (one "package deal" of lessons at Gaba costs about a small fortune) and actually learning something, which is what every teacher in any field should be concerned about. I think just putting the "customer service" label on it is what bothers me the most so, from now on I'll just ignore that bit (but not in the sense of not making sure i'm giving my all to every student, of course).

I officially start on Monday, and I'll be working at the learning studio in Tokyo, which sounds like it will be a busy one (more money for me, whoo!). I met some pretty chill people during training, including the guy that was training us. Yet, from hanging out with all these other gaijin (foreigners) and speaking nothing but English for the past couple of days, I've sort of forgotten what country I'm living in. Every time I stepped out of the Gaba building onto the crowded streets of Tokyo was like a little culture shock experience. I've been getting home late as well so I haven't really seen my host family much (hence haven't spoken Japanese much) which has also thrown me for a loop. To top off the unbalanced-ness, last night I performed at this place called the Pink Cow (i'll get into the performance details in a bit)

Even their bathroom was made up with art work~

This place was amazingly chill. It's part restaurant, part bar; part art gallery, part stage, and all parts awesome. The lady that owns it is from San Fran and has been running her place for 11 years now. It's located in Shibuya, in the basement of some other building and it's very spacious (a rare commodity in Japan). In the front it has a little stage equipped with a DJ hole. There are tables and benches with colorful pillows strewn everywhere surrounding the stage area. Off to the left of the stage there's more seating and artwork displays (actually, this whole place in itself was an artwork display). Towards the back was even more seating and sound equipment. TV's were placed everywhere so that you can watch the performance from where ever.

Micheal discovered this fact out fast. 

Even further back takes you into this little cozy hole of a bar area where the friendliest bartender will gladly use you as his guinea pig for the various drink concoctions he thinks up (for free, if you sit there long enough). Somewhere in there is a kitchen (I saw the chef make an appearance every once in a while, but I never saw where he came from), and all the employees are foreigners with the same goal; just trying to make a life for themselves in the busiest little city around.  I have no problem picturing this place in Portland, and it made me a little home sick to tell the truth. Now, why was I there??

As mentioned before, I was performing~! Well, I ~accompanied~ my friend Maria Sekiya on guitar. I did do a solo bit as well though. How did it go?

I butchered everything.

This picture about captures how the
performance went; Maria, beautiful
and perfect; me, a mess and slightly retarded. 

Maria was born to sing and nailed every song; me on the other hand, well...perhaps if I had had more time to practice I would have done a better job (only had about 4 days to prepare due to finals at school and the damn job training). But actually getting up on stage and doing it was the hardest part and what counts the most right?? I mean, I actually played and ~sang~ one song by myself. I've never had the guts to do that before and even though I royally screwed up Muse's "unintended" I still got a round of applause and shouts of encouragement from friends and acquaintances a like, which made it worth it. I didn't have anyone video tape it (for obvious reasons) but I did convince my friend, Micheal to take pictures and as soon as he gets them to me I'll post them for your viewing pleasure.

Aside from the embarrassing-ness of it all, I met a bunch of awesome people. This particular night was dubbed "Ladies Night" and the focus was on getting intelligent women together to talk about how awesome we are (okay well, perhaps it was more like getting together to network and share what we're doing with our lives in Tokyo, etc). There were fashion designers, musicians, actors and theater owners, painters and dancers and just plain cool people. The Pink Cow holds loads of events to host local artists to get their work out and the owner even invited ~me~ back to the next open mic event. I also volunteered to be a model for a body-painting exhibit they're going to have in a couple weeks, so that will be exciting. AND ( so much happened last night, it's hard to type it all out) I got talked into performing at Japan Music Week at Shibuya La Mama (see previous posts for details on that place) on the 19th of this month. Yikes!!!! Need to practice. Oh and to top that all off, the guy that conducted training at Gaba just happens to be very involved in the foreigner music scene in Japan and said to keep in touch for some future gigs/networking opportunities. Thank you Japan, for giving me back my passion for music; I had lost it over these past two years and really appreciate being reunited. I feel like Japan gives a lot more opportunities for musicians than America does...or perhaps it's just that I don't know the right people in America...anyway.

One of my adoring fans, Namiko!

And possibly my #1 fan, Micah! 

The lady on the right (Joana) is the one that
will have be perform at Japan Music week. Micheal
was dragged into it as well. 

The performance by the belly dancer just reinforced the
feeling that I was in Portland rather than Tokyo. 

Overall, I give the Pink Cow 10 thumbs up and I will most definitely go back just to chill there, and recommend anyone who is coming to Japan to look it up (just follow this link to their home page). 

Now it's time to enjoy my day off.

PEACE OUTSIDE
Jamie

It was then that she said goodbye to studying and hello to the paychecks

My last final was Saturday (wtf, right?) as well as my last Japanese class (even though the final for that class was on Monday, the JPN department seemed to think that that wasn't good enough). Friday I went and signed my contract with Gaba, so it's official! I start the certification training next week (three full, 10-7 days of unpaid training; just how I wanted to start my vacation) and then I can start bringing in the money!

But Jamie, you're going to Southeast Asia for three weeks soon aren't you? Won't that be a conflict of interests?

un-paid holiday, but who cares!

 

 

Fear not, my loving audience because my contract is what they call an omyou itaku (which means something like entrusted contractor or something?) so they have no say over how much I work or when I work (although they prefer I work more than less) and although it will be a bit warui (bad) that I'll leave so soon into starting (because my paycheck is based off of how many students I actually teach; no students, no money), there's nothing I can do about it. I'll explain to the manager at my Learning Studio and I'll probably get some words of disapproval but, shouganai! (nothing can be done to avoid it). My boss at my other job (Lily English Salon) is completely chill with it so at least that's covered.

we interrupt this program...

A girl I met a couple months ago at a mutual friend's birthday party is one hell of a vocalist. However, it  just so happens that she lacks a guitarist to back her.

Her: "Jamie, do you know anyone that has an acoustic guitar and is willing to play the music I choose? "

Me: ":D,
Why it just so happens"

Her: "Would you want to perform with me this coming Thursday?"

Me: "Would I!"

So I'm accompanying her on guitar this Thursday at a place called The Pink Cow (more details to come) in Shibuya and I am totally stoked!

Except I just realized that my last training day falls on Thursday so I'm going to have to beat feet to get there and perform in my suit. But whateva; I look good in a suit ;D

-------------------In unrelated news------------------------

Everyone should read this article about the "Tiger Mom" and seriously think about what it talks about because next post will be on it and I want to hear your opinions as well!

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,2043313,00.html

PEACE OUTSIDE

Arts and Crafts at 20!

I had my second interview with Minerva Intelligence (that's their official name! Spoooooky) last week was it?

I was going to win this battle. 

I was told that it was going to be more of a trail lesson to see how I teach and less of a question/answer how do you deal with grumpy customers sort of deal; so I was relaxed. This is my element. I already went through this process with my second interview with Gaba so I was ready.

There were about 6 of us waiting in the little cubical shaped room, and when the nice recruiter walked in carrying purple books titled "Magic Time" with white paper, coloring crayons and safety scissors, you could see the same thought running through everyone's head "uh oh". Our task was to create a full 50 minutes lesson plan introducing shapes, and we had to include a song and a game; all in the course of thirty minutes.

So...are we actually going to be teaching children then?

Recruiter man chuckles (he was rather chuckly actually) and said "weeeell", in his Kansas drawl accent, "yes and no". Yes and no? What the hell kind of an answer is that?

Well, minus the suspenders and
goofy shirt.

He went on to explain that our "children" were in fact going to be all the other "contestants" in the room, including himself and one other guy that worked as a teacher there and looked a lot like Steve Urkle. Depending on where each and every one of us decided to place our maturity level during the lesson was up to us. He himself said, "Tomorrow I turn 63, but today i'm going to be about 6".

Let the arts and crafts commence! We all started frantically cutting out shapes and grumbling about how we didn't know any songs and looking over each other's shoulder to try and steal ideas. At the end of thirty minutes Mr. recruiter comes back in and says "shall we begin?", and we all get commanded to sit criss-cross apple sauce in a circle on the floor by the first one up.

Problem Child's Micheal Oliver
standing in for
Oreo.

I ended up going second, and decided that instead of using a song that everyone knows, I was going to write my own song...about shapes. It's going to go platinum. I think I handle things very well, especially when Mr. Recruiter's 6 year old personality named "Oreo" turned out to be the dreaded "problem child". Needless to say though it was all fun and games; literally, and I don't think i've had that much fun at a job interview ever. This company has really great energy and would be awesome to work for.




So, the million dollar question. Did I get the job?






no.


They were sorry to inform me that they would have hired me if only I were able to stay in the country longer. Please contact us again after you graduate and decide to come back to Japan.

Thank you, I will.

Now i'm just waiting on Gaba to call me back. Said that because I had a schedule conflict with their training days (curse you Japanese final!) they wouldn't be able to let me know if I got the job until February. So i'm left at the edge of my seat waiting, waiting, waiting. I don't see why I wouldn't get the job though so...yeah.           

BTW, I really <3 this song.

"The Goddess That Lives in the Bathroom"

Just porcelain holes in the ground. 

It's about how this girl was pretty much raised by her grandma and she would always help around the house, except for when it came to cleaning the toilet. To that, her grandma would tell her (The chorus line) "There's a beautiful goddess that lives in the bathroom and if you clean the toilet everyday then you'll become as beautiful as her". I asked my host family if this was a widely spread belief and they said yes because, in the past Japanese homes were equipped with Japanese style toilets instead of western ones and would smell horrendous if you didn't clean them everyday. The song goes through how the singer grows up and away from her grandma and then her grandma dies without her getting a chance to say goodbye. Ends with her  wondering if she really has become as beautiful as the goddess or not. Like I said, sad and sweet.

Love you g-ma! (But i'm not going to clean your toilet). <3