Played tennis today with some work mates. It was very hot but we had fun. Apparantly the place we played at is owned by the company, which includes 12 tennis courts and several fields. Anyway, it’s good I’m getting active again as I need to get fit for Mt Fuji!! Still being planned but it should be next month!
The forecasted rain didn’t show up today but instead it was a sunny 31ºC Saturday in Tokyo. So, for the first time I was able to wheel my bike outside of my room and onto the road!
The first thing I did was find a cycle shop and register it. I read on the internet that it is the law that all bikes must be registered in Japan but there are no penalties if you don’t. So I thought I’d save the hassle and not bother. However, when I was walking home the other night, there were policemen checking people’s bikes for the registration. Since I couldn’t find much information about how to register on the internet, I thought I’d write a bit for fellow cyclists.
If you buy a bike from a shop, they’ll normally handle it all for you. However, since I bought it on the internet, it wasn’t registered. All you have to do is find a cycle shop (almost all will do it) and ask for “bohan toroku” which means something like bicycle theft prevention registration. I was asked if I had an inkan (name stamp) but I didn’t so instead he asked me for a photocopy of both sides of my alien registration card and to fill in a short form (name, address, phone number). I gave it back and he started filling in forms for about 5 minutes before coming out to check my bike, asked if it was new and I showed him my receipt (printed email) as proof I purchased it. Then, he give me a piece of paper, the registration document and then stuck the yellow registration sticker onto my bike. Cost is just ¥500 Easy.
The purpose of this process is so that in case your bike gets lost or stolen you have a slight chance of getting it back. In reality, I doubt that.
Anyway, I think my Japanese has improved as I could understand the store attendant and he could understand me! Hopefully in a few months time I can start having conversations! I enjoyed cycling for about 3 hours today, though it was pretty hot.
I ordered a bike last weekend and it was delivered this morning!!! I’ve been planning on getting a bike in Japan for some time now as I haven’t had my own set of wheels (2 or 4) for a long time. I ordered a cheap model off the internet for ¥12,400 (£60 / €75 / $120) inclusive of delivery.
It’s a Raychell MFWS-206R-08, 20″ folding bike with full suspension (the cheap stuff). It looks like it’s made of solid steel but it only weighs about 14kg. Actually, I thought it’d come in pieces but it came mostly intact. The only real thing I had to do was adjust the front brakes because they weren’t very good. It came with a rear reflector and a bell as I think that’s required by law. The mud guards make it look pretty cool and I bought a set of lights too for night riding.
The 6 speed cassette on the rear should help me out on windy days or on gentle gradients.
I did consider getting a full size, 26″ MTB. However, it seems more appropriate to try something different (small) in Japan. The added novelty/convenience that it folds should allow me to take it on trains and back home. The middle bit folds after releasing the lock and the handle bars and saddle can be removed easily:
Now, if only it would stop raining outside so I can take it out for a spin!
I got tickets to see a baseball game at Tokyo Dome!! Won it from a draw at work, pretty cool. I’ve never watched a baseball game in my life so I’ve no idea what the rules are.
We got new cellphones today! Wahey. I said the battery on my phone didn’t last more than half a day and so our boss got us new phones but that was after another colleague commented that it also didn’t have any English:
OK! It really wasn’t that bad and I was forced to learn Japanese, which is good. And any guy can pull off having a pink phone, accessories or other apparel in Japan. Haha! But it wasn’t something I shouted about.
So we got given a new Nokia FOMA NM705i. There was a choice of three colours but one (orange) wasn’t suitable for work (and pink is?) so there was either black or white. Knowing me, I chose black:
It’s only available in Japan (I guess) but works around the world. It’s a bit plasticy because it’s quite light (89g) but pretty simple to use as a) It’s bilingual b) It’s Nokia. It should have a decent battery life too and it’s smaller than my old phone so as not to leave a big bulge in my pokect -.^ But it’s not as small as my other Nokia which is about half the thickness:
It looks a bit like my old Nokia 6233 the more I look at it…
Well how about that. I didn’t need to venture out into the crowds to see some traditional Japanese festivals. It came to my doorstep instead!! I believe this was part of the Sanno-sai festival where they paraded portable shrines earlier in the week. No idea why they were on my tiny side street but it probably woke up the entire neighbourhood.
I’ve felt countless tremors in the short time I’ve been in Japan. Most of them are so small that I think I’m just imagining it. But I was gently shaken in bed this morning by a magnitude 7.2 earthquake in northern Japan. I was quite shocked (for a second consecutive weekend) to read “Earthquake rocks northern Japan” when I clicked on my daily dose of BBC news. It doesn’t look too bad though, the Japanese are quite resilient. And one of the deaths was just someone panicking and running in front of a lorry…
Seven dead in Tokyo stabbing spree (BBC) - you would normally think of Tokyo as a crime-free place, perhaps with the odd pickpocket taking advantage of unsuspecting strangers in crowded areas, but it seems this kind of behaviour - random, psychotic madness - is partly expected from the Japanese. They are often quite reserved and polite but it seems their culture also causes things to bubble up until it explodes into something crazy.
I’m glad I wasn’t in Akihabara this morning, a nice place full of electronics goods and funky cosplay people that I do like to check out now and then. Thankfully, I was fast a sleep after a night out with friends. Let’s just hope I don’t meet any mad men during my time here.
Switching to a lighter note, another thing I don’t like about being in Japan is the timezone relative to everything else I know. For example, even though England aren’t in Euro 2008 and I don’t really have any team to support (who should I support??), I would still like to watch these big tournaments but can’t.
Same thing for Formula One, except when I do get to see a race, it’s plagued with Japanese adverts that interrupt every few minutes! Much worse than ITV. Quite glad to hear it’s going back to BBC next year.
My Japanese teacher got me a birthday present - a little quiz book so I can practice Japanese! ようこせんせい どもありがとうございました ^.^ I feel bad now for not turning up at the last lesson which was my birthday. I wish I could say I was out partying but I was actually working until 10:30pm!
I went to a restaurant in Nishi-Azabu last night called Gonpachi, not too far from Roppongi. It is apparently the inspiration for one of the big fight scenes in Quentin Tarantino’s Kill Bill. When I entered I could certainly see the resemblance. A bit smaller than in the film but certainly had the atmosphere and layout. Here’s a poor photo taken with my Japanese phone:
