[journal] Yesterday I had to apply for an Alien Registration Card, so I can live peacefully in this city for a year. I also had to get two Certificates of Alien registration, one for the bank and one for a cell phone. This card proves that you're not some worthless bum overstaying his/her welcome (safer to carry than your passport/visa). For me, the hard part about obtaining these things was that I had to find the City Office.
Keep in mind that I get lost in Toronto. I have twice drove by my own house, millions of times gone on highway adventures that resemble circles and drove hours off tangent to my destinations. Here I am in Tokyo. There are barely any street signs and when there are, it's in Kanji (Japanese characters). I don't own a map and I can't just google map my way prior.
The first thing I did was ask the nice housemate (more on housemates in another post) for directions. He drew me a map that seemed straight forward. The next day I followed that straight forward map and never saw the second landmark. I kept walking (he estimated 5-10 minutes from landmark 1 to landmark 2) for over 15 minutes when the road I was on ended. It literally hit a wall. I walked back and saw a very cute, early 30s Japanese woman holding a newborn baby. She was well dressed and looked middle-upper class. I slowly walked up to her in plain view (didn't want to appear out of nowhere).
"Sumimasen"
She looked up at me and I continued.
"Do you speak english?"
She didn't know any english at all, not even small words. I showed her the name of the office I was trying to find and she knew I was lost and tried to tell me how to get there. We spent about 5 minutes taking turns speaking Japanese/English. It's funny if you can picture her saying a few sentences in Japanese, me shrugging my shoulders in miscomprehension, me saying a few sentences in English, her smiling shyly in misunderstanding and this going on for a long time.
I ended up learning of a vague direction (achieved by outstretched arm, pointed finger). I dug into my book and found the translation for 5 minutes, so I would know how long to walk before I had to ask someone else. I said the words for "5 minutes" and did the walking motion with 2 fingers. With bulging eyes, she shook her head very vigorously as if to say, "5 minutes? Good luck there."
Then she did the driving motion (two hands clutched and rotating as if race-car driving) and so I thought she was saying it's close to a 5 minute drive. But then she pointed at herself and did the driving motion again, then pointed to the parking lot, then to herself, then the driving motion again and I thought, no way, is this cute mom saying she'll drive me?
She pointed to her car and motioned for me to follow her. When I got about 3 meters from her car she told me to stop. I was thinking I got too close to her and her baby and she was trying to tell me that I misunderstood, and she didn't want me to follow her into her car. She continued to go into her car however and I assumed she was digging out a map of the city in order to show me how to walk to the office. I was feeling pretty silly at that moment thinking a cute mom from any city in the world would actually let some foreign stranger into her car with her and her baby. I could have been a psycho pretending to be lost. But suddenly she came out and gave me a curt bow and invited me into the front seat. She was not looking for a map of the city, but was instead tidying up the car and putting her infant into a child seat in the rear.
So I got into her big car (anyone who has a car is rich because it's very expensive to own and drive one and this was a big one) and she smiled at me and motioned for me to buckle up. She began driving and while she did I made use of the time by finding translations for words. I tried to find the translation for the word "busy" in order to ask her, "Are you sure you're not busy?" I was going to achieve this by saying only the word "busy" and then doing two actions: pointing at her and then shrugging my shoulders. She saw I was looking for a word and so she was looking down also while driving. At times I thought we might crash, but she multitasked well.
I found the word busy and I said it to her, "Konde Iru." She looked so confused when I said it. I then saw in brackets beside the translation that this "busy" related to "restaurants etc..." as in busy restaurants, which is more similar to "crowded." Basically I was calling her crowded. Then I tried another way. I thought I would instead ask her if she was "late" for anything. But then there was a misunderstanding and I think she thought
I was late so she seemed to suddenly drive faster with a determined look on her face.
I decided to forget about the entire busy/late thing and looked up the word "age." I pointed to her baby (you didn't think I was going to ask for her age did you?) and said "age." She beamed and said one-years-old. I knew inquiring about the baby was a good tact, because from her low 30s age and young baby I infered it was her first and what new mother doesn't love talking about their baby? I'm a pretty smart guy, right?
She asked me where I was from and I told her Canada and tried to explain that I was living here for 1 year and working for Nova. I then looked up the word "beautiful" and "baby" but I was smart enough to look it up in the reverse order otherwise suddenly I'd say "beautiful," wait like 15 seconds while looking for the word baby, meanwhile she thinks i'm hitting on her, and then say "baby." So I did it the other way, "Baby--Beautiful." She was so happy to hear that.
When we got there 5 minutes later she stopped the car and I said "Domo Arigato." I didn't know how else I could thank her because I know money would have been insulting. If I had a cell phone at the time I may have worked the nerve to give it to her so we could both improve our langauges some other time. I sort of sat there looking at her and smiling and when I was about to leave and say bye she told me to hold on and she reached for the translation book. She couldn't find what she was trying to say, but after a minute I figured out she was asking if I was okay getting back home. She was so
sweet, thinking that far ahead. I totally didn't want to trouble her anymore since it seemed when I stopped her that she was going somewhere with her daughter. I looked up the word taxi and told her I would be okay. I again said "Domo arigato" (Thank you very much) and then went out of the car, gave her a bow and a smile and a wave. I was a little sad I would never see her again, but I don't think I had many options.
She was such a cute sweet lady. If she didn't have a kid and was 5-10 years younger I would not have said "taxi" and instead asked her to wait for me and then invite her out for lunch.
My office experience was so good too. I had like 4 people working for me, helping me out. It was as though I had an entire team under my direction. One team was getting my alien card ready with the paper work and photocopying, another team was figuring out how I would get home (looking up taxi numbers, calling for me, finding out the approximate price) and a third team was trying to figure out what what I meant by "Reentry Visa, which I need if I visit Korea" (They grabbed a dictionary and two visitor guide books and we figured it out together). It was madness. At the end, the main lady walked me out the door, all the way outside and told me where to wait for the taxi and then
she thanked
me.
I love this city!!
