Day Four: Smog Bogies Ahoy

Smog (not the musician): They say there’s a bit of smog around Tokyo. They say it’s real bad – people wear those doctors masks everywhere to avoid the fumes etc. You get the occasional whiff of cloudy fuminess, but I haven’t really noticed. I have however noted a smattering of smog bogies at the end of the day. Today I had got a grey goblin - “Gotta catch em all“

Oiishi: What do you think of this place to the right? Seriously they had everything. Ranch dressing, mayonnaise, tomato sauce, salt, hollandaise – every condiment under the sun… Just jokes. They sold rubber johnnies and loads of em. Wouldn't want to get my Mayo from there though…

Eigo arimasen: So our two good friends Nomo San and Izumi San graciously took us to get cell phones today. And thank goodness, as the 17,000 pages of documents and contracts they went through would’ve had Hannah and I in a spin. We ended up setting up with Willcom for our phone for about 16,000 yen and about 1000 yen a month. Which is pretty cheap – BUT - check this. We got a second phone and plan for free. Absolutely free. Scorcher. One tiiiiiiiny oversight. Once we cracked into them the lady we bought them off pointed out that there was no English mode. IIE MUZUKASHI!!! (See word of the day for translation). So we’ve got a bit of learning to do there. A big thank you to Izumi for putting the contract in her name whilst we set up Gaijin cards. Muzukashii is Hannah' favourite word at the moment.

Cute local Japanese woman in Shibuya

Amazing conversations: Man vs Woman– Nearly five days in…

Hannah: We should probably do a wash soon?

Brendan: Yeah I guess * potters around looking for stuff to wash *

Brendan: You know I don’t have anything that needs a wash eh. I can't 

find anything.

Hannah: What about your underpants? You wear underpants don’t you?

Brendan: Yeah but I’ve only worn most of them once – they haven’t 

earned a wash yet. See - smell this…

Nihon-go: Our Japanese is coming along slowly – we did another lesson today digging into adjectives. My good friend Nick Head pointed out that the best way to learn is to just get in there boots and all; to be shameless and not be afraid of mistakes. Shame? I’m from Newlands* man – I have none. It’s very true though. We’ve been a little shameless but I think we could be a lot more so.

Revelation of the day: “Oh my gosh Hannah I just realized – We’re little small town hicks!”

Word of the day:

Muzukashii – Adj: Difficult. Use: Nihon-go muzukashi desu ka ne – Japanese is difficult isn’t it.

P.s. I just heard there was another tremor in Welly. Oh my gosh. Hold tight Welly-Jin. You’re in our prayers. Also, it's nice to know that we're not alone in the pacific though eh. We saw this as we entered a Shinto Shrine in Harajuku.

 * Actually I'm from Paparangi. I'm not one of those Newlands riff raff.