Back to normal life

Sigh
Summer's over. As much as I'm glad that it is no longer the crazy hot that personifies Japanese summer, it is always a little deflating to realise that I have to go back to normal life.

And yes, I do like my job, and, once I get there, I usually have a lovely time, but that bit in the morning when I have to make myself get up, get washed and get to work is still not so fun. Especially after a lovely long, lazy summer holiday.

I went to the gym to sort my membership out today, and I will start back there at the weekend. I've convinced myself a few trips to the gym will get me marathon ready, just by virtue of going in the door. I went to my first running club since the beginning of August too, and, oh boy, that was 10kms well earned. I was shattered when I got home.

So, normal life is back, summer's over and it's all systems go until, um, next week, when we have a 3 day weekend. Heh heh

The new washing machine (because that's what passes as fun around here)

You can imagine my delight when I arrived back from a long stint at home to find the washing machine broken. That's always a good welcome home. Luckily, I had done my washing (OK, I admit, Mum helped) before I left England thanks to my weird "thing" about carting dirty laundry thousands of miles around the world, but there was still the problem of what to do when the clean clothes ran out.

So, Michan was sent to the electrical store (not by me, I'd have gone myself, but Kaori has a bad back and couldn't be bothered) to collect some brochures. I was pretty pleased with that, because I wasn't sure how long it was going to take for the roomies to get around to looking into a new one (they tend to take a while to get around to things). I had thought I was going to have to do it, and make them live with my choice. So hooray for that, I know nothing about washing machines.

I was quite keen on the idea of an Arashi (Japanese boy band) washing machine, at least the brand that they advertise, because in the brochure they were doing the laundry. The thought of Arashi sorting out my washing, and possibly the ironing, made me pretty happy. Especially the ironing, I hate ironing. Turned out the boy band didn't come free with the washers and those ones use loads of water. So, we settled on a different one, with a blue lid. I liked the green lid, but that was smaller, which is bad, apparently.

So here I am, with a load in the washing machine, hoping I've pressed the right button, because the instructions are in Japanese and I've given up trying to read. Fingers crossed the clothes makes it out in one piece.

Never rely on Japanese TV to entertain you

Why? I hear you ask.

Well, it's just that it's, um, bad. The vast majority of what is broadcast is utter pap.

And yes, it's not as if we don't have bad TV in England, we really do, and I've wasted many an hour on it. I mean, I'm a person who voluntarily watched the Real Housewives, and liked it. It's just that when I watch Japanese TV, I expend so much energy trying to work out what they're saying that I can't help but feel somehow cheated when it turns out they weren't actually saying anything of any value whatsoever. Obviously, if it is a show with comedians dressed in "comedy" Lycra suits and/or some other "hilarious" costume, I don't even try to understand, even I can sense that that won't be intellectual debate.

Tonight, I decided to give Japanese TV just a little break and watch a variety show, there seriously wasn't anything else on. Variety shows in Japan are more like panel shows in the UK, a bunch of comedians commenting on stuff, only not funny. I settled on a program about dramatic weight loss.

These types of shows are really common, take an extremely large lady, put her on a diet and then weigh her on national TV. Obviously there are before and after pictures, the before ones taken in a bikini for maximum humiliation, the after ones taken in a gorgeous dress with professional hair and make up.

Now, I know we have this type of thing in magazines in England, and the before and after pictures do pretty much the same thing. God forbid we should allow a fat woman to wear a nice dress and make up, just in case the 5 stone she will lose doesn't show in the after pictures. 

Tonight's show went a little further. They showed these poor women in the compulsory unflattering bikini, and then zoomed the camera in to make sure we all could see how fat she was. Some poor woman jiggling her thigh fat on TV is not really helping anyone. We then were treated to watching these women get lymph massages, watching the "talento" in the studio have a good laugh at how painful it was. Then, the women were shown walking in the pool, again with close ups of the jiggling bits, just in case we hadn't got the message that these were some fat women.

Of course, the show dealt with diet. Look! This fatty has never eaten yogurt! Egads! This chubber doesn't know how to cook tofu! Watch as this extremely large lady drinks lots of beers, eats fried chicken and, shock!, two days later eats a bowl of ramen! No mention of the diets these ladies followed to reach their weight goals, no advice, just a chance to gawp at the fat people.

They showed a mother in the park with her son, and made a huge deal out of the fact that she couldn't go through the tunnel made for children. Of course she couldn't, it was made for children! They went on and on about how she couldn't run in the park with her son. My Mum never ran in the park with us, and I'm not scarred. I'd have been more scarred if she had run in the park with us, to be honest.

In the end, they brought the women to the studio, got them dressed up and weighed them, while the "talento" gasped and made patronising high pitched squeals. They kept saying how the women had become beautiful, because, of course, you can't be big and beautiful. Big is bad, remember.

Now, all of these women looked fab, and they'd all done really well, they had every reason to be proud of themselves. But, if I had lost a stack of weight and some skinny "talento", who clearly needed a bite of my sandwich, squealed at me and asked if I thought I would keep it up, I would have used my new found agility and high kicked her in the face.

I don't know what the point of this program was, other than to make fat people look like freaks. They gave no advice to anyone watching who might be trying to lose weight without the "help" of a diet coach to show them pictures of when they were 15 and telling them that was their weight goal. There was no attempt to explain a healthy diet or how to avoid getting up to 100kg in the first place. Just a chance to pretend to be helping people while really making them look ridiculous.

I could go on to a rant about skinny being the only size in Japan, and "the one shape suits all" mentality of the shops, but I'll save that for another day, just to give me something to do when I need to avoid watching TV.

My summer in pictures

I went to a lovely wedding. These are my cousins, mu uncle and his lovely new wife. Don't they all look lovely.

We celebrated Mum and Dad's 40th Wedding anniversary. Well, any excuse for a bit of a drink!

Did some London stuff. This is the Imperial War Museum.

More London stuff. The back of the Albert memorial, because I was too lazy to walk round the front.

This deer was less friendly when he realised we had no food. I've spared the picture of his back view. This park isn't so far from our house, but we never knew it was there. We aren't very observant.

More London stuff. The Geffrye museum is one of Mum's favourites, but I only went there for the first time this summer. I learned a good lesson about listening to Mum, but don't tell her I said that.

More spending time with the fam. It was lovely to have my brother home for a few weeks.

There was other stuff too, of course, but I didn't take many pictures. Mostly, I caught up with friends and family. I always think the friends I have stayed in touch with after more than 5 years in Japan are all the more precious, and therefore more worth taking time out for.

So, there you have it, my summer in (a few) pictures. Frankly, I would have thought there'd be more after almost 2 months, but there you have it.

Back in Japan

I managed to arrive in the tail end of a typhoon, which is way better than arriving in the middle of one, but not as nice as arriving long after it has gone. The bus from the airport to the next bus was fighting the wind coming along the edge of the bay, which didn't not help the post flight, travel and tiredness-related nausea, I can tell you. But, I made it back all in one piece, with all my luggage, always a bonus, and with no recollection who all the sweets I brought back with me were intended for. Probably me, thinking about it.

It was a pretty long journey, with a 6 hour layover in Kuala Lumpur airport, which hadn't changed since the last layover last month, surprisingly, and yet disappointingly, enough. I got to the gate good and early, so I wouldn't be that person running on to the plane at the last minute, mumbling something about looking all over Duty Free for that perfume, and annoying everyone by trying to cram altogether too much hand luggage into the cupboard thing. Oh, no, I would not be that person.

Next thing I knew, the airport staff were waking me up, asking me if I wanted to get on the flight. "Of course I do, silly, I already gave you my ticket and had my bags X-rayed," I thought. And then I looked around. Where had everyone gone?

I had been asleep for an hour and all of the passengers had boarded, except Sleeping Beauty here. How did that even happen? A plane load of people walked past me and I didn't notice?! How's that for "Dead to the World"?

So, then I had the embarrassment of not only being the last person on (actually, there was one reprobate who was later than me because he was in Duty Free, but I didn't know about him at the time) and knowing that they had all walked past me, conked out and probably snoring. Not me finest pose, I can tell you.

I reacted with my customary charm, apologised a million times to the man in the aisle seat as I got up a few times to get "essentials" for the flight (well, you never know if you're going to run out of things to read, or need lip balm, or maybe tissues), although he might have been more accepting if I had gathered those things in my first attempt, instead of trying to climb over him to get to my bag several times.

Anyway, I'm back. And Japan thanks me for that.

No, I didn't fall down a hole

Well, you never can tell in London, the roads are full of holes...

But, no, I didn't disappear, I was just far too busy gorging on Double Deckers, lounging on the sofa and gracing the family with my presence (yes, they are so grateful).

Tomorrow I will spend the day cramming things into a suitcase, stomping my feet when I can't close the suitcase, and then conning Mum into mailing me the stuff that won't fit. And then, I will fly off, back to Japan, where, apparently, it's still hot and typhoony, which will probably make me quite cross.

It will also mean I'll probably be spending my free time sitting in front of the fan trying to stop the sweat, so I'll have lots of times to regale you with tales of my trip home. You lucky things!

What do you wear to the gym?

So, I've been in London a few weeks now, and I've been trying to work out and go running and all that stuff so that it's slightly more realistic that I will not die when I run Kobe marathon in November (although I keep hoping a bit that it might be cancelled due to rain or something...).

I've done quite well in the free work out department, I got free tickets to the gym my Dad goes to, because he just asked about day passes. It's just the local one run by the local council, but getting in free made me very happy. And then, I found out something a little bit amazing.

Nike have a Training camp, for women, in loads of places around London, a few times a week. The best part is it's free! Yay! Actually, that's not even the best part, the best part is that it's free and they give you free stuff! I got a T-shirt for just showing my face the first time. Which I had totally earned because it poured with rain while we did sit ups on the grass. While people scuttled past, looking at us like we were properly weird. But, forget feeling embarrassed! Did I mention the free T-shirt?!

It wasn't just the fact that I was doing sit ups in the rain while people looked at me like I'd got a screw loose that made me feel uncomfortable. It wasn't even the flasbacks to school PE lessons when the teacher refused to acknowledge it as cold and made us play netball wearing little skirts while she was all bundled up in a ski jacket (well, it was the 90s). It wasn't even my complete social ineptness (how does everyone else know to stand in a cirlce? And how did I end up in the middle?) What made me uncomfortable was my fashion choice.

You see, Japanese women wear an insane amount of clothing at all times, regardless of their butt size. Even at the gym, most women cover up as if they had something to hide. I once forgot the shorts to wear over my leggings at my Japanese gym and people looked at me as if I'd forgotten to wear a top. But, English women? Meh, leggings and a T-shirt, that'll do. Who cares if you've got an arse the size of Brazil? You're there to try to remedy that situation. And it's all women, all girls together, girl power and all that.

Going to a park to run around for all the word to see your wobbly bits wrapped in leggings, and not seeming to care too much about the wobble shows a certain amount of body confidence. It's OK in England to dress in a way that shows your good points, not care too much about the bad, and not feel as if you have to dress in a tent to hide the shape you are. You can even wear leggings without a pair of shorts over the top, and no one will gasp with shock. Lovely.

Having said that, I picked up a magazine the other day, and it had a whole heap of articles about famous women who are actually quite slim thinking they are huge and dieting to get thinner. Their aim seems to be size 0. It's so strange to me that, in a country of all shapes and sizes, women in the public eye are made to feel they have to look like a lollipop to be attractive. Maybe they need to grab some leggings and run around the park with the Nike Trainng Camp, their bums can't wobble any more than mine.