Please... Grow up, me...

Just when I thought I grew up a little, I have to do something childish and stupid. Even though it was directed towards family members, it was unacceptable. I have put people in a difficult position, and that is inexcusable. I was much angrier than I thought I was, and should have stepped back to think a moment to look at the whole situation. I only have myself to blame for what I have done. I am very fortunate that I have such forgiving family members, and they understand the situation that I am in currently. I certainly have learned from this experience, and hope next time I act in a more mature fashion when I am stressed out.

I sent my apologies to my very kind cousin who has done so much for me. To those I have hurt in the past few days, I am very sorry. Thanks for supporting me in such a difficult time. I will keep moving forward, and hope I can make better choices in the future.

Stay Calm...

This housing situation is getting me quite stressed. I guess it's going to get a lot harder if I need 2 people to make this work... which makes me wish I was actually working. This seems impossible. Well, the good thing is that my cousin is willing to become my guarantor. However it is the problem of finding housing that doesn't require two people. I think I'm better off getting into an international house, but I guess I'll try doing this until I have no other options. Just keep going...

Cousin Hiro

It felt really embarrassing, but I finally got the courage to call my Cousin Hiro who lives in Okayama. Usually I don't enlist any help unless needed, but he seemed really concerned when he emailed me. It has been about 18 years since I last saw him. I was only 5 or 6 when I came to Japan to visit him and his family, so memories of him are quite vague. I was quite scared to call him actually. At first he said, "What would you like me to do," which was kind of hard to answer. I tried beating around the bush asking maybe if he could make a contract for me since I'm a student. Then he said that he wanted to talk to the agency because he thought for a moment that the agency I went to was sketchy, which made me start to worry that I was getting myself into real big trouble talking to the agency by myself. I explained that other students from my school went to this agency, so I guess he felt a little better. I went on to say that maybe it would be better to stay at an international house if it doesn't work out. Then he asked how long I was staying for, and I replied that I was going to be at this school for another year, and afterward I plan to find a job. At this point, he answered, "We have to find good housing then." I nearly died at this point from being so nervous. Hearing those words, I knew he understood that I wasn't going to be here short term. I actually confessed to him that I was very scared to talked to him, and he was very nice about it.

I'm kind of glad that I talked with my cousin because he will help me find good housing and maybe sign a contract for me. He told me not to panic as he'll work something out, but I can't help but feel indebted to him for helping now. I guess in a way he's repaying my parents for taking care of him when he was in the US. Though, all I hear from my mom was that he was the biggest pain in the butt. At the time, my mom had to take care of three kids, and then this 20 year old who couldn't be found. Also, he got into an accident with my parents car, and had to go to court even though it wasn't his fault. My mom actually had to teach him to explain how the accident wasn't his fault. Luckily he got off the hook, but he really did give my mom a huge headache.

Anyway, if he somehow gets housing for me, I will feel very indebted to him. Although he is family, there still is that kind of distance between us. I hope at some point I can go visit him and his family. He has a 2 and a half year old daughter, and his wife is Taiwanese. I will have to repay him with a very nice gift. Ok, sleep time as I have to wake up early to go to the agency.

Housing pt 2

http://chintai.homes.co.jp/kanto/tokyo/rosen/nanboku/eki/9214/list/rentdetail-1069170006896/?tk=3&btg=3002&roseneki=58509214

This is the apartment that I'm going to apply for while I look for other apartments. It's kind of small. Basically I put a single bed and a desk, and it like takes up most of the room. It feels like my single room in college, but with better flooring. I don't mind the room being small. The kitchen is separated which is nice. I get to put a fridge and have a washing machine. Though, the washing machine I'm going to have to buy myself. Should be interesting looking for one as I know nothing about washing machines... The other housing I looked at wasn't very good. One room had one wall that was virtually useless, so I didn't like that. Another room had exactly the right layout I was going for, but the room was on the second floor, which was basically street level. Not really disappointed yet at what I'm seeing. I think the one I'm applying for right now I can see myself living in. I'm going again tomorrow to see if he pulled any more housing.

My dad asks every so often why I want to move out of the current apartment. He also asks why I don't want to move into an international house. I keep telling him the same answer. First, the current apartment I live in, there are new people going to be living. I'm not sure how comfortable with the very very close proximity to people. Second, the walls are thin. You can hear everything going up and going down. Well, even though I can't really hear anything on the 8th floor, there still is sound traveling. Third, this furniture and layout is driving me nuts. No storage. No place to put anything. It's really annoying. Can't store underneath the bed. The small cabinet in the kitchen is practically a dud because nothing will fit in there. Plus, I really want a fridge so that I can freeze things. I'd love to be able to cook soup one of these days and freeze it so that I can use it some time later. I'd also like to make my own wontons and dumplings. Also, I feel that not having my own washer is a big pain too. There are some days where I do tend to leak a lot, so I want to kind of wash it right away, but can't because if I do, it would be 600yen for such a small load. So, I have to wait until the next washing which isn't for weeks. So yeah. I know I shouldn't be complaining, but if you forced me to live here for an entire year, I'd drive myself nuts, not to mention whoever moves in next would drive me nuts with their sound banging around constantly. I'm really trying not to be messy, but nothing is compelling me to clean up... and that's what's driving me nuts.

I think I already know what kind of bed I'm going to be getting. I checked online and found a bed that had drawers underneath. Not only that, you can store stuff inside the bed. That way I can get rid of the stupid suitcase sitting in the middle of my room. I can probably store my pads in there as well, and take out whatever I need whenever I need it. There's ample of closet space to hang clothes. The kitchen has cabinets to put my stuff in there, though I need a stool for the top cabinet because I can't reach the top. I'll have a nice fridge, well, probably used from someone in the dorm, but it'll be good enough. Then I'll have my washer as well. Everything will be complete~. Oh, and the walls are concrete, so you can barely hear a thing.

Housing

I went to a housing agency today. I went by myself because I wanted to start looking right away. I have an appointment on Sat to look at 3 apartments. Hopefully one of them will let me live there. The area I picked was Shirokane-takanawa. Uhh, it's slightly a ritzy place to be. However, the agent said it's a safe area to live, because I really stressed that when I was talking to the agent, and he assured me that it was a safe area to live. It's an area really popular among girls it seems. I'm going to look at 3 apartments on Sat. Each one is about 10万. Fortunately at this price range, there are a lot of 1 room with kitchen and separated bathroom all throughout Tokyo, so it was really hard to choose an area to live.

It seems like I will be living around the southern part of Tokyo. I think that's where the better housing is, and it's pretty close to school. I did pretty well today considering I have broken Japanese. Though, I felt completely bad for the guy that was helping me because I took an hour to decide where I wanted to live. Then took another hour to decide which apartments I wanted to look at. By the time I was finished it was about 30-45min after their closing time. The guy was really nice and knew that I was really concerned about finding a good place to live. I asked a lot of questions about what areas were good. Though, I think within these two months, I have to visit a lot more places to get a feel for what areas might be good for housing.

I can't say I feel optimistic at this point about finding a good place to live. I still need to wait and see if the landlord is going to let me stay at their apartment since I'm a foreigner, but I'm happy to get this ball rolling.

I'm going to hop into bed as it has turned very very cold tonight. It actually started to snow when I was going back home. The snow isn't lasting very long on the ground, but it is snowing. It's actually kind of cool. XD

Scaredy-cat

I feel like I'm such a scaredy-cat when it comes to friendship. I've been hurt so many times that I don't want to hurt others. I think also is that if I say something slightly the truth, they'll run away from me. I haven't been very strong when it comes to other people. Though, I'm happy to have my best friend with me through thick an thin. I just hope I can meet more people through the years of my life. I've already accepted the fact that for probably the rest of my life, I'll be living alone. Actually, it was pretty difficult accepting this fact, but I have learned to cope with it. I just need to keep moving forward.

Tsukemen!

I met up with my dad's friend's daughter today in Shinjuku. She took me to a great tsukemen place. I loved it. There were so many people lined up for the shop after we left. I think the people in the shop wanted to hurry up and eat because the seat next to us, two people had finished. Not only did they finish before us, they ate twice as much as us. At first I thought I wasn't going to be able to finish, but I did finish it and it was very satisfying~.

Anyway, I'm going to go off in a tangent because it's been sitting in my mind for a bit. Actually, it was a question I asked the friend I met today that I couldn't really answer myself. I asked if she had any intention of going back to the states. I keep wondering why I have no intention to go back to the states. I guess for me, I never really had anyone very close to me. Through high school, I never had a best friend. Nobody invited me to their house. Nobody invited me to the movies. I tried a few times to try to invite people to do things, but later on gave up because they said they were pretty busy or couldn't go because of parents. Perhaps I just relied too much on one person to be a best friend, but we never really became best friends. We each had different interests, and in the end, it never really worked out. Now that I think about it, I really wanted to have a best friend in elementary school into high school. Even when I started college, I thought I would be able to at least find someone who I could hang out. It just turned out the same story as in high school. I became forgettable. People made excuses saying that they didn't know if I was there or not. I'd see my entire floor eating together by the time to I got to the dining hall. I'd always end up eating by myself in the dining hall. I never really understood why people have never really liked me. I think I'm the type of person that people view as "no fun." I feel like I've been rejected by people all my life just because I'm boring or the stuff I'm interested in wasn't someone else's type of fun. Perhaps I am more complicated than people want to handle. I'll never really exactly know the truth.

For the past two years, I've learned to live a life away from family as well as a life without many friends. I knew that if I didn't learn fast how to cope with being alone in my life, I'd soon kill myself. The depression I experienced in college, I don't want to go back to that. I think for me, living in a big city is one way I cope with loneliness. If there are things to see, good food to eat, I can forget that I'm alone in this world. If I go back to the states, where would I go? No one is waiting for me to come home except my mother, but even then, I feel that when she retires, she has no intention of staying in America. Actually, my brother and I encourage her to go back to Hong Kong because having nothing to do in my hometown would definitely drive her insane. At least right now she has a job, so it isn't all that bad at the moment. I really don't think I can readjust to life in the states seeing how exciting life in Japan is. When I get the chance, I want to travel all around Japan. I know if I do go back to the states, it's not like I can't make friends. However, I think what hurts the most is that people's feelings in America aren't transparent. I don't know what worse: not telling a person they hate you or telling a person they hate you. At times I'd rather not know especially being told to stop being a friend in junior high. I know it happened years ago, but stuff like that sticks. You can't forget about it. I know people in Japan are know for putting up a front. I guess I can relate to that because I put up a front a lot of times. Though, I always try to be genuine with people while putting a front. Hmm, hard to explain.

Anyway, I have a lot to think about when my school ends next year in March. Though, I think it is almost certain that I am going to stay in Japan for as long as I can. Maybe I'll find some good friends here. I guess only time will tell.