China Town

Shorompo,,, yum!

Chukagai (China Town)

Well, I finally finished training for the new job.  It was alright, and I learned a couple of new tricks.  The new kind of contracts are a bit odd though, but I think I can thank the unions for that.  Anyhow, it thankfully has cooled off quite a bit lately… not enough to be really comfortable, but enough not to feel like I am about to melt away.  Some of the people I met were really good teachers, and some of the others… well… I think that consideration of another full time endeavor may be in order…  To be nice about it.  The main office of my new company is in Yokohama, and is really near the China Town there, which means I have been stuffing my face with Chinese/Japanese food.  The reason I put that slash is that its food made for Japanese people in a Chinese way… Much like American Chinese food is not real Chinese by a long shot.  But where American/Chinese is cheap and low quality, Japanese/Chinese tends to go the exact opposite route.  At the Yokohama Chinatown (Chukagai), there seemed to be a greater mix of the low end crap…  I would recommend just stuffing your face with stuff from the street vendors.  They are a little more expensive, but they are delicious.  I had something called shorompo...  These things are amazing...  Imagine a potsticker that intentionally has a lot of meaty juiciness left in it.  I took a huge chomp out of one and it almost sprayed across the street!

Making a shorompo (kind of like pot sticker but way better... and jucier)

I have done almost everything a new foreigner immigrating to Japan has to do.  I went to a doctor’s clinic in Tokyo, where the doctor has an excellent reputation and can speak English quite fluently.  That was a real plus for me.  I have opened a post office bank account, registered as an alien (I always think that is rather quirky to say) and have done a lot of shopping for the basic set up stuff.  The station that I am closest to is Machida station, which is actually in Tokyo, although I am not… I am just on that border to be considered Kanagawa.  It feels quite odd, because my apartment feels like I am way out in the country, but once you hit Machida station, you may as well be in the center of Tokyo.  There is just oodles and oodles of shopping on one side of the station.  The other side looks cool, but I have yet to really explore it.  I am living next to a huge public housing area.  What that means in Japan are people need a subsidized place to live and they keep it relatively nice.  In America it means drugs and gangs… I should know, I lived in public housing before. There is one Udon chain here I love called Marugame... and it is hubba hubba!

No old noodles here... They make em fresh, boy!

End result... Bliss... with fried things on the side

This is my last week to really goof off before work starts.  Sure I have done this kind of thing a lot, but in truth, I am still a little nervous.  It has after all been a while.  It is how I started down this long road however.  From an Eikaiwa, to Japanese public schools, to the South Carolina Department of Juvenile Justice, to teaching American history and Geography in a High School, and back to the  Japanese public schools again…  I don’t know quite what to expect.

On a different note, I have been addicted to nerd-rap lately… They actually have a really good beat to them, despite the silly background or topic.