Day 10: Kawasaki-shi adventures

MOVING IN TO THE DORM

      Today I have finally figured it out... Every day, regardless of the day of the week, big and small trucks are parked in front of our dormitory and workers carry millions of boxes inside. Before I was thinking, that some floors of the building were not yet finished (it is a new building and just got constructed). But I was wrong, all the rooms are finished.

      Finally Japanese people explained, that those are transportation companies bringing stuff of the students. Students move in the dorm for a long period of time and their rooms are not as equipped as ours (only bed, a table and a cupboard and a chair). Thus their parents buy TVs, washing machines, microwaves, other kitchen equipment, lamps, chairs and more things. They usually have to hire a transportation company for that because it is really a lot of things. I remember when I was living in dorms in St.Petersburg, it was a little different. =) 

ABANDONED BIKES

      As usually we went for a run with Ondrej. Today we took a new root in a new neighbourhood. Along the way we spotted a garbage place with a few bikes there. Apparently, their owners didn't want those bikes anymore and wanted to get rid of those. We decided to take a closer look. The bikes were not new, on with rusty chain, but still in a great condition. Wow, great success for us! We don't need to by a bike now! That's what we were thinking until we figured out that the bikes were locked. All Japanese bikes have a small lock on the back wheel. So Japanese people do lock their bikes, we just didn't notice the locks before... 

     Having looked around, in a pile of trash we spotted 3 more old bikes. We decided to leave them there. But other 2 newer bikes were definitely still in a good condition and no one needed them anymore. Why do people lock a bike when they throw it away... This is what we couldn't and still can't understand... If someone can explain that to me, please do! 

PACKAGED FOOD 

     Prices in Tokyo are really high. It is one of the most expensive cities in the world for a while. What I found interesting, is that often to cook yourself is more expensive than to buy already cooked meal from a supermarket. 

     In Japanese supermarkets there is a great variety of cooked packaged food in a range from 2-5 euro. From sushi and maki to rice with salads and meat. You simply need to pick one (of many) and heat it up in a microwave. Eating habits here in Japan are definitely different from those in countries I have lived before. Apparently I am not the only one buying this packaged cooked food, as every day supermarkets have it in quite high quantities.

     Around a hundred meters from the dorm there is a place that sells only cooked packaged food. You can choose either from already cooked sets or order a set or a meal and wait around 10 minutes before they will cook and package it for you. Once I picked up a set of packaged rice with meat and salad and wanted to pay. The lady started to explain me something, but with my not yet high level of Japanese I couldn't understand what it was about. Turned out, that the packaged food I wanted to buy was already outdated (if this food is not sold in a few hours it goes to waste). So they asked me to pick another set and threw the initial one away. This is how it should be! Really impressive. 

JAPANESE POLICE

Here is a scene of Japanese police kicking out illegally parked cars. Japanese-style. 

BIRTHDAY PARTY 

     The first unproductive in terms of activities day so far (had to work till the evening). As I couldn't concentrate anymore, I went downstairs to hang out. Today was a birthday of Japanese students, our residence assistant, Kyohei and the people were supposed to gather downstairs in a small room to celebrate.

     The Japanese birthday seems to be a little different from European or Russian one. People were just hanging out and talking and drinking tea with Japanese cakes. The birthday party was supposed to start downstairs at 20:00 and last till 22:00. That is exactly what happened, 5 minutes to ten everyone left the room and went to a park to continue celebrations there. 

     By that time, our CEMS students have all arrived to our dorm and we decided to occupy the small common room downstairs. Kotani-san was awesome as always. He told us stories, that he has been to Prague and to Lisboa, and to Vienna. He said, that in Vienna he stayed all the time in heurigers (traditional wine places around the city). He kept filling our cups with different tea flavors and bringing his Japanese cakes and other sweets. I was wondering, where is all that supply from... Apparently, when Japanese students move in the dorm, the first time they come with parents and it is polite to bring some sweets or presents to the residence chief (in our case Kotani-san). 

     Seems like our CEMS people also liked Kotani-san a lot, as they were impressed by his hospitality and great English (unusual for Japanese person of his age). The phrase of the day by Kotani-san: "Take it easy, guys!" LOL 

DAY 5: First Sunday in Japan

     In Japanese sunday means a day of sun (like in English). This day of sun was actually the first day in Tokyo so far without sun is´itself. But the e´weather was still very warm and nice. 

     Today the first time I slept in and woke up at 7 and not at five, probably bacause lack of sleep last night. After taking a bowl of rice and a coffee, I woke Ondrej up and we decided to go for a run in an hour or so.

SUNDAY IN JAPAN

     This was our first day of sun in Japan. But there is a big difference with Vienna, where nothing is open on Sunday. A convenience store around the corner is 24-7, so the morning coffee for 150 yen ( 1,2 Euro) I bought there. 

      Kotani San and his family were up quite early and greeted us with sadomasochism's (good morning). Additionally, the people were still moving in to the dorm, even on Sunday. As I have noticed, parents were helping most of the students to move in. Few of them had some tables and chairs with them, so I guess the rooms of Japanese students will be even more equipped than mine. 

     Today we took another running route. To be more precise, I rook a running route and Ondrej a roller-blading route, as he is roller-blading while I am running. We went in the direction of Motosumiyoshi metro station. The area is very nice, people are nice and friendly. Some stare at us as if we were Gaijins (foreigners). LOL

     We found a great small stream with beautiful sakura on the  sides. It took us to a large sports ground with a couple football fields and baseball diamond. There very many Japanese there, many were practicing sports, while elderly people were looking at youngsters competing. THat is a great way to spend Sunday morning. Now I started thinking, that Japanese sports culture is stronger, than I thought. 

SHIMODA STUDENTS DORMITORY

     Before we went there, Ondrej and I decided to visit another dorm (Shimoda). It is an international students dorm mostly, thus the rules there are not as strict as in our dorm. We entered easily by accompanying a random guy that we met in front of the entrance. Than without knowing, in which rooms our friends were, we easily managed to find it, as each room had a name of the student in front of it. There are 4 floors in the building, each floor has a shared kitchen. We arrived at the place around 7 in the evening, but there was no one eating, quite a quiet place. 

      Borislav had a little bottle of rice wine and was kind enough to share it with us. Larry, our colleague from Taiwan, has mentioned that in rice wine you have to look at percentage on the label. This percentage indicates how much rice was washed of at the preparation process. The wines with percentage under 50 are of superior quality' have a different name and cost starting from 10000 JPY. We had a little bottle with 70%, quite a new taste for me. 

RUNNING SUSHI

     This evening we decided to attend a traditional Japanese running sushi restaurant. The place was quite small with a relatively strong fish smell. We all took a seat around a sushi bar. It was a time to do all preparations before the meal. First we had to take a box with powdered green tea and put two scoops in a cup, than added hot water to it. I should call the taste very specific. At the next step we added soya sauce mixed with wasabi to  special plate and opened hashi (chopsticks). Now we were finally set and ready. 

     The sushi were passing by. You would only have to grab a plate of sushi that you liked. Each plate had 2 sushi on it, however the golden plate had one piece of sushi (those were tuna sushi for example). After you are done the staff simply counts your plates and you pay 105 JPY per plate (a little less than 1 Euro). Great experience! I'll come again after I learn all the names of the fish and other ingredients they put on sushi :)

BIKING CULTURE

     Japanese have a very strong biking culture. Many people have bikes, however to see a nice mountain bike or professional bike is rare. Japanese people usually do not lock their bikes. Bikes for Japanese are used as a means of transportation from home to closest metro station or to a groceries store. The distances in Tokyo are really long, thus traveling by bike is not really possible. By the way, buying a car is only permitted if you have a confirmed spot on a parking lot. 

     So everyone has one of those classical bikes looking like this. (Photo). The interesting thing about this, as bicycles are really cheap here, many people leave them unattended, because utilizing them is expensive. So there are many bikes on the streets of Tokyo that belong to no one. Police goes around bikes' parking lots and marks the bikes that have to be removed by their owners (if they are left unattended for long time). If the bike that was marked remains there for a long time and will be removed. As I understand, the bikes can be resold or demolished after. There are few places when it is possible to buy a removed bike. From what I heard, it is possible to get a bike in a great condition for up to 6000 Yen, which is really cheap in Austrian standards, however very expensive by Holland's standards (at least that is what Borislav said).