Tokyo: Part 1

I just arrived back from Tokyo, after spending the last four days in that remarkable city - It was a great trip, marred with only a couple of hiccups. Unfortunately, the first one occured just as we got there.

The main International airport to Tokyo is called Narita. It's over an hour away from the city, and while there are multiple means of transportation, most are not well-explained in English. We decided to take the train-system, for which we purchased a (quite expensive) ticket.

We were told to simply go down a tunnel and get in the train. With no clear signage, though, we got on the wrong one. Two very long hours later, riding along who-knows-where, we somehow made it to the city, and were momentarily relieved.

But then came the Subway.

This is the Tokyo Subway map. You might recognize the random colored-lines as something that you drew when you were three years old. For someone to properly read it, they almost need a PhD (this picture is only a partial Subway map).
Long story short, it took:
-Some friendly people
-A lot of head-scratching and
-A ton of luck

...but we finally made it to the Hotel in one piece, roughly 4 hours after landing in Japan. Whee.

We stayed in an area named Ikebukuro, in a neighborhood called 'Sunshine City'. After our trek to find the hotel, we decided to only explore the nearby area, but were pleasantly surprised.

I might be a geek, but Japan is the land of geeks. Very near to us was a vibrant pedestrian-mall, where there were (among other geeky things) several 'Game' buildings - gigantic buildings that are essentially just huge arcades. When I say huge?

They each had at least 8 floors. Fourty to fifty machines per floor.

Geek heaven!

Each floor is dedicated to some type of gaming - The first floor in this building (which was owned by Sega) was only crane-games. There were floors for token-games (where you could win tickets), floors for racing games, floors for card games, and even game-floors that were women-only.

Men could go in only if accompanied by a woman - The sign at the entrance said that if a man was caught without a woman, he would be asked to 'prove' that he was a woman.

I don't quite want to know what they mean by that!

That arcade-floor wasn't the only thing that was Women-only. This picture is from the Subway - the first car, between 7:30 and 9:00am is Women Only.

It's a tough world we live in.

I'll update you on the rest of the trip a little later - Stay tuned!

Things to Think about

Things that have happened since I left:
-World Economic Crisis
-OC Transpo Bus Strike
-Crappy winter
-Ottawa Senators missing the playoffs for the first time in a decade
-Rainy as-heck summer (thus far)

Clearly, it's a direct correlation with me being away.

Sorry about that.

Picture Snatching, Movie Watching

I managed to snatch pictures from the GEC public hard-drive (where the 'official' GEC photos are kept) - many of them showing us 'in action', such as this one here, during one of the parents meetings.

I'd been trying to think of how to get them on my computer for a few months, 'til it occured to me that I could just upload them directly.

Picasa is awesome.

This past week was the last of two Foreign Teachers, as well as one's first week. From here on out, there will be people coming and going almost weekly - it's going to be a very strange last few weeks.


To try something new, I went and watched a Korean movie in theatres today - no subtitles. I think the edge that foreign-language films really have is that you really can't tell how deep or shallow that dialogue is. The story itself was decent enough, and everyone around me seemed to enjoy the film (It was themed on a theoretical Tsunami hitting Korea).

The genre was kind of strange, though - it seemed to be a light-hearted, comedic movie for the first half, then becomes very tragic and sad, then ends on a lighter note.

Two days 'til Japan!
See you when I get back - I'll try to avoid Ninjas.

And Now...

Video Blogging is hard.

Bullet points win.

Circle Your Calendar

Bullet-point blogging: For lazy, tired people.

-I booked my flight-ticket home, this morning - I'll be landing in Ottawa August 29th, at 2:40pm.

-I ate duck today. It was good.

-The new Harry Potter movie is okay. Movie theatres full of kids (that have to pee every three minutes), however, are not.

-It's raining, lately - alot. I don't like it.

-Job-hunting from overseas is hard.

That is all.

''Dream Park''

Ever wake up in the morning, and wonder 'Hey! I wonder where the biggest Land Fill in the world is located!'?

As it turns out, i've been living half an hour away from it for the past 11 months.

GEC took the foreign teachers on one of our 'Cultural Trips' on Friday, and headed to the Sudokwon Landfill Site - an area 6 times the size of New York's Central Park (I don't actually know how large Central Park is, but it sounded impressive when they said it).

You might wonder 'Why the hell would you go to a place where they dump garbage?', and you know what? We did too! But as it turns out, the trip was a pretty interesting one - the Sudokwon Landfill is a site managed by a company, with the goal of turning a profit. They've built contraptions to harvest the methane gases created by garbage, and evidently, it creates enough power to supply 600,000 homes annually.

They also don't leave the garbage lying around, stinking up the place. For each landfill site (there are 5), they dump 8 layers of garbage (which are actually 4.5 meters of garbage, topped by 0.5 meters of dirt, each), sterilize everything, and then grow things on them.

After a landfill site is full, they have plans to create parks, golf courses, and ecologically-friendly sites where fauna can be reintroduced. Yes - all on top of garbage. They call the project 'Dream Park'.

It's forward-thinking and innovative, but I can't shake the whole 'it's garbage' thing. I don't know if I could ever go there for a picnic.

The first site was recently completed, and the next four sites are only expected to be filled by 2044 - so Korea's garbage is well-handled.

After we finished there, we headed to a Biology museum, followed by a construction site for a future Business-district (due to be completed in 2014), called Cheongna. It was a pretty cool day, and it sure beat working.

We've got one more week to go, before another week-long session break, which will be quite welcome. I'm looking forward to seeing Japan!

Happy Friday!

Flight Plans

I gave-in my official departure date from Korea, today: August 20th. My final day of work is Tuesday the 18th, so i'll have a couple of days to get my affairs in order, clean out, and pack up.

I won't exactly be rushing home, though. The flight ticket is included as part of my contract, but management allows you to go anywhere with that ticket (as long as it's of equal-or-less value than your home ticket).

As i've been planning for a few months now, i'll be heading to France and Ireland for a few days, delaying my return to Ottawa by about a week. I'll probably book my ticket home sometime during the weekend, and figure out the exact return-date.

Before all of that, though, lets not forget there's still one more trip to look forward to: Japan! GEC is having its summer break-week in two weeks, so i'll be using up my last four vacation days in Tokyo. from the 28th to the 31st.

Let's hope travel fatigue doesn't set-in anytime soon!
Cheers