Dollars and a lack of common cents

The days in Choshi have grown short, and rain and snow are falling little by little.  These days, everyone is used to the job, the life, the tranquility of Japanese living.

On the other hand, those demons known as student loans likely lurk, lying in wait for many of us, ready to spring up and attack at any moment.  For me, the loan monster has been on my tail for nearly 3 years, and I've got to be honest, I'm tired of running.  I wonder if perhaps our money could be put to better use than sitting in a savings account that earns 1% a year.

In general, inflation proceeds at a rate of 3% per year.  So, if you have 100 dollars in your savings account, you've lost 3 dollars to inflation every year you let your money sit, and you might currently think that's actually good to let interest accrue. Note that your 1% return in interest is just 1 dollar, which inflation already demolished thrice over.  The fact is that big banks offer you paltry returns, and you actually lose money if your money is sitting below 3% interest.

3%? That sounds impossible.  Where are you going to find an account that will offer more than 3% return annually?  The answer is, I don't know.  All I know is that loan interest accrues at a rate somewhere between 5 and 20 times the rate at which interest in a savings account does.  How are we EVER supposed to get back on track with our finances?

Perhaps investing is the way to go? Stocks? Hoarding cash? Living frugally for a few MORE years? When does it end?  Will we ever be free of the debt demon?

Thankfully, Japan is liberal with its wallet, and does ALTs a great service by allowing us a period of both easy living and great earnings.  For many, JET offers the chance to escape debt and--would you believe it?--actually SAVE money!  We sure are lucky.

It's not really until you witness and calculate for yourself how much your loans are REALLY costing you -- adding in the interest you might pay over 5 years, versus 2, for example -- that you realize every dollar you don't put towards your debt is hurting you exponentially more than a single dollar.  Factor in regular inflation, lack of interest accrual in your bank account, and the high rate of interest for loans, and it seems like a truly mountainous task. Are we to live on ramen noodles, living in the basement of our parents' homes for a bit longer just to not owe anything to the banks?

What's a generation of soul searchers to do?

Mori Tower is the reason I bought a camera that cost as much as my car.

Well, that's a bit of an exaggeration, but here's the story:

In 2009 we discovered a place called Mori Tower in Roppongi, a very fashionable, trendy area, full of upscale shopping and amazing scenery.  I vowed to return to Mori Tower, which gives you a full 360 degree panoramic view of Tokyo, and I vowed to do it with a camera that would do the scene justice.  Unfortunately the photos and videos I took capture about 10% of the breath-taking-ness of standing on the 53rd story overlooking the biggest city in the world; how could I have thought I could capture it in a snapshot?

Before the new year, I met up with friends Victor and Jessica and we spent two days touring a bit of Tokyo.  Here are just a few of the incredible scenes we witnessed.

In chronological order of the weekend, some highlights:

The following shots are from Mori Tower's 53rd story.

This floor of the tower actually has several gift shops, smoothie place, and a full-service bar with lounge music.  As it's panoramic, you have a full view of the entire city of tokyo, and at night, the lights blow you away.  

This time, there was, of course a Christmas/holday-esque cheer in the air, with plenty of decorations.

The sun is beginning to set.  If you've already been to Mori Tower and are visiting for a second or third time, this is the part where the butterflies in your stomach start going crazy in anticipation of the night.

Stickers up on the wall in support of those affected by the Earthquake in March. People wrote personal messages of encourage to the people of Tohoku.

Obligatory self-photograph, but this scenery beats a bathroom mirror any day.

Here comes the night!!

Goosebumps and chills... pure beauty.

The bar was featuring this new whiskey that night, we got a glass (it was eh).

For the first time ever, we were able to actually go on TOP of the tower, a few more stories up!  This is the first time that this deck hasn't been closed due to strong wind or weather, so we seized the chance to check it out.  It was SO COLD up there!

Next, here's a video that shows the progression of the sunset from the tower:

After the magnificence of Mori Tower, we had delicious ramen! This ramen place, called Ichiran, has a little mini-cubicle for each customer, so we ended up eating our delicious ramen with a fantastic view of a screen. So here's the soup:

The next day, we met up with a few other friends, and somehow navigated through insane Harajuku foot traffic:

And, this was my first time in a capsule hotel!  It was a little different than I expected: the place we stayed at was more for foreigners, so the capsules seemed really big for that reason.  It was nice and cozy in there and there was even a shelf and a reading light.  Nice for claustrophiles like myself...

And, to finish off December, I was able to actually spend Christmas with my family through the miracle of video chat technology.  Snapped a quick shot of everyone gathered near the tree as we opened presents, and I couldn't have been happier.

Being able to once again see the sights from Mori Tower and also to capture them a little more clearly with a decent camera was an experience I'll never forget.  Mori Tower itself is worth the price of an airplane ticket to Tokyo. It's humbling, inspiring, encouraging, and terrifying all at once, and it feels like you're on top of the world.

That does it for this edition.  Everyone stay warm out there!

A look back on 2011: "The year that was just so-so."

Upon waking this morning I was delighted to discover I'd somehow ended up in the year 2012.  2011 is now nothing but a shadow of the past and we can all feel free and confident to walk into a brighter future.  Well, these are the things that were swimming around in my head, until I read the news headlines this morning:

World rings in 2012 and bids adieu to a tough year

So what, even the media agrees that 2011 was kind of a downer?  They go on to list all kinds of reasons: hurricanes, earthquakes (this one's Japan, of course), tornadoes, and could forget the terrible on-going unemployment of many millions of Americans during this eternal economic downturn?

I would be interested to know if anyone out there had a spectacular year, as all the people I've chatted with over the last couple days agree: 2011 was nothing special.  It had some ups, some good times, but mostly downs, mostly tough times.

It's not just on a global scale, though.  For me, 2011 will be remembered as the year of loss.  Well, the year of losses - that's definitely a plural.  The losses began just shortly after New Year's last year, spiraling out of control, throwing peoples' lives in unexpected and often unwelcome directions.  During 2011, I moved from Austin, Texas, to Norristown, Pennsylvania, to Choshi, Japan, all in the span of a few months.  And while it was refreshing to have familial support and see old faces, the emotional toll of such a life-changing event has to have a serious toll on mental health.  But somehow, here I am, writing to you IN THE FUTURE, having survived the various waves made in the last 12 months. Some of that loss, one might consider "good" loss: perhaps the loss of a long-overdue dissertation that is now finally complete, or the loss of those few extra pounds you put on during your college years, or whatever it may be.

It's been rough for my family this year, not because of unemployment, but rather, for our own personal struggles. Another year gone by full of working long hours, making minimum wage (or less), watching loved ones struggle with getting their futures on track.  A lot of people moved in 2011; a lot of people got sick or ill in 2011; many people lost loved ones in 2011. If there was some way to describe 2011 as an analogy, one might call it "just like an ice cream cone, but instead of chocolate-vanilla swirl, it's rusty spoon flavored."

Now, don't get me wrong, 2011 of course had a few highlights: the late nights with the family, playing board games or Xbox, fruit-picking in orchards and eating blueberries til I burst, watching baseball on a big screen, chatting away in the local dive bars and getting to see old friends before they moved away from Norristown, and other small-town quirkiness.  The year wasn't a total bust: again, you get to eat the ice cream, but the flavor isn't quite right.

Overall, it was a year of ups and downs: emotional downs, followed by (for me) four solid months of familial love and support (and late nights with friends!), followed by a life-changing move to Japan, followed by some emotional downs within the family, countered by the sheer beauty and scope of the Tokyo night scene.  It all seems very yin-yang, doesn't it?  Good/bad, sad/happy, close/far... but in the end 2011 seemed to prove the saying that all good things come to an end.

Thankfully, with 2012 fully underway, we may happily note that all bad things will find their ends as well.

Another quick one, this one's about... COLD.

Maybe it's just MY apartment, but the way that I tell exactly how cold it is outside is, "how cold is it inside?"

A blurb about the funeral process

Happy holidays everyone!


We're in that few days of December after Christmas and before New Years' when not much happens and generally things are fairly quiet.  Of course with that comes the end of the western holiday season, but I hope you had a good one this year.  This year has been tough for a lot of reasons and many people have suffered some hardships in recent months, and so it's not more important than ever that we stick together and offer each other our support.


This was going through my mind today as I attended the memorial service for a funeral.  It was a surprise this morning when I woke up to learn that a family member of one my friends here had passed away. Needless to say, I wanted to pay my respects, so today was a mini-adventure in the culture of Japanese funerals.


A Japanese funeral service is somewhat of an enigma from a foreigner's perspective; it has every bit as much ritual as a western funeral service might but the customs themselves are wildly different.  This is somewhat elaborated on in the video below, but because my point was made rather shoddily, here's a bullet point list of the big ideas concerning  the Japanese funeral system:

•  99.81% of deceased Japanese are cremated. Chalk it up either to lack of natural land, perhaps?
• Because most bodies are burned, there is no embalming process for the vast majority of bodies.
• The average Japanese funeral is about 2.3 million yen, or about $30,000.  This comes from a combination of land scarcity and also from price gouging - Japanese families often choose not to negotiate or haggle over prices because it may be seen as disrespecting the recently deceased.
• Each of the persons in attendance of the memorial service offers up koden, or funeral money, given as a gift to the family.  It is given in a plain envelope, sometimes with black and white ribbons for decoration. Guests are also given a gift back.

When bodies in Japan are cremated, the remains are transferred into an urn by the family members, who pass the bones to each other using chopsticks. This is why using your chopsticks to directly share food with somebody while eating is considered bad form; during a cremation is the only time that it is OK to transfer directly from chopstick to chopstick.

Here's a short video on the topic:

Stay warm and safe as we head into the new year.  Until next time!

A new Christmas song for the new "Living in Japan" generation

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

(The lyrics are sung to the tune of the piano voice in the music)

I’m drinking alone on Christmas Eve

My friend Jim Beam to keep me company

I didn’t even buy a freakin’ Christmas tree, my

Whiskey’s spiked with egg nog and that’s just fine by me.

I didn’t decorate with lights or candy canes

Cause who needs Christmas cheer when you can harm your brains?

I didn’t buy gifts or even call my mom

But who needs all that jazz when you’ve got Irish car bombs?

Well, gin can ease the pain, they say

Of being very far away

And Captain Morgan knows it’s time

To open up some boxed white wine

I’ll mix a drink and shake it, stirred.

I’ll drink until my speech is slurred

While everybody fills their tums,

I’m breaking out the Christmas rum!

I’m drinking alone on Christmas Eve

(I’m only joking here, don’t take this seriously)

These happy holidays will raise my BAC

So pour another drink on Christmas Eve!

A monologue on interesting aspects of Japanese Schools

Time is flying!  This post's topic concerns some of the interesting differences you'll find common in Japanese schools.  And it's December!  Getting cold in Choshi....