Darker days

Summer is finally over.

Mindless optimism isn't always the best response, but sometimes it's the only one available. I've been playing the mindless optimism card for a while now, but it's getting harder and harder to ignore the fact that things have not necessarily improved for us. Indeed, darker days haven't been seen since we were stranded in Brisbane.

This was supposed to be the big pay off that we were working towards, but it's beginning to look suspiciously like "same shit, different bucket." I'm drinking too often to try and sleep, but I've decided I'm better off being an industrious insomniac than a lazy sleepy drunk. Maybe I should start evolving my own Tyler Durden? Is that really how desperate our situation has become?

I've been besieged by computer disasters. After nearly 5 years of service, my laptop is beginning to falter in her step. I really can't afford another computer right now, so I thought I would try and free up all her memory to help her run more smoothly by moving (not copying, moving) all the photos to an external hard drive. Which then had a fatal error and I am currently in the process of getting it replaced under warranty (which is turning into a nightmare in itself because I need to have an American address before the company will deal with me - luckily Krista is helping me with that one). The photos however, are gone.

I had backed up everything prior to July, but August, when we were traveling around in the Obon holidays, that's all gone, and everything subsequent to that has gone too. I feel empty inside. My photos are a great source of joy to me, when I feel lonely or like I am forgetting the good things in my life, a quick trip down memory lane by opening iPhoto has made me feel better. I also feel a lot like I haven't got very much to share with you all, being so far away, and my words being so empty and hurt at the moment. I can not say it has been anything less than an extremely painful and unhappy time.

Work hasn't improved. We are still subbing two days a week. I find myself resenting the teachers who don't sub. I came here to teach, just like they did... but I am not given the same opportunities they are to do what they do. As I have only one stable shift, I find it impossible to adapt to my circumstances, for my circumstances are constantly changing. I am not enjoying teaching at the Web School two days a week. It gives me a sore neck due to the lack of ergonomically sensible seating arrangements, and I don't get to know the students very well. I only have 3 or so regulars, and the rest are a hodge-podge of first timers. Don't get me wrong... the students, well, they're still lovely, and the staff, well, they're OK - at some schools they are, anyway - but I feel like the company has mislead us about what our duties would be like here. And that feels like a betrayal of trust. We trusted them enough to sell our car and put all our savings on the line for this. We trusted them a lot. That they are now beginning to admit that they deliberately misled us, well, that feels unforgivable. My two year plan in Japan, is looking like it might now be less than one, because the working conditions are not good enough for Tom and me. We had more stability when we were temping back home. Which seems so ironic, when part of the reason for coming back was to have stable jobs.

We were told in a Personnel Workshop a few weeks back that we would have stable shifts by the end of October. This remains to be seen, and with the track record of bending the truth or just flat out lying that the company has, I must admit to being slightly skeptical.

I went to Tokyo for my birthday with Tom. We had a lovely time, spent far too much money, galavanted about and got a feel for the city. It reminded me that I had asked to be stationed in Tokyo, to which the company representative said that "we don't have couples in Tokyo." I asked why, and he said that they didn't "...have couples accommodation options available", to which I said, "I can arrange my own accommodation" to which he said "no - you are forbidden to find your own accommodation." We were told Osaka or no Japan, and at the time, I was so desperate to get back over here, that I compromised and came to a city I never wanted to be in.

Have I learned nothing from the Brisbane experience? If there is only one place you want to go, then don't go elsewhere... go there!

Anyway, we went to Tokyo, I took a stack of photos, of which these few remain. Thank goodness for the facebook or I would have nothing to show you at all.

Hiroyuki Sakai's restaurant in Shibuya

Tsukiji Fish Market

I have started looking at job websites in Tokyo, with an eye to move there at the end of this contract. If I do not manage to secure a job there, then I will quit the company, and go stay there in a gaijin house for a month or so. It may actually be a more rewarding experience to do it that way, anyway.

I feel gutted. Last time I was here, Japan was such a great experience, and now that we're back it's being a terrible experience. These dark days, were not what I was hoping to be sharing with my love. Now that the equinox has passed, we head inexorably toward winter, and who knows what lies there.