Winding Down

Suddenly, our entry to Japan seems so much more precarious. We're hit with these perpetual roadblocks. Whoever thinks the Japanese are super-productive should get a taste of their housing protocol/rituals. I have this business plan: I will start a real estate company in Tokyo. People will give me money, and I will give them an apartment or a house.

This isn't just true for housing though. I walked around for about three hours last time I was in Tokyo in order to submit my Alien Registration, the Japanese equivalent of a green card. When I got there I found out the customs agent hadn't seen my visa and gave me the tourist visa instead. As a result, as soon as I left the country, my registration was canceled. ARGH.

The Yen continues to gain on the Dollar, and any efforts by the Bank of Japan to reverse this trend have been fruitless. And then there's my language exam. If you think you know any Japanese try out these sample questions:

http://www.j-cat.org/en/page/sample

I am so scared.

Ranting aside, our time in Taipei is coming to a close. We began the day with lunch with 小豬 - Little Pig, V's childhood freind, at Kiki, a Schezwan restaurant. Kiki was very solid. Things were not really that spicy, but the food was pretty damn good. I think that my love of spicy food and general spiciness threshold is even pretty high for a Korean. That said, I do an excellent job of keeping up the stereotype.

(Disclaimer: V also got some moles lasered.)

You know when you're full and eating more is just punishment, but it's just one piece of tofu and it relentlessly serenades you; that's my Taipei experience in a nutshell. And of course I eat that goddamn tofu. Curse you tofu.


Everybody in this family has a nickname related to being fat. With the exception of V and her sister, literally everyone is called some variation of "Fatty." Well not me either. They call me 俊一 - handsome/talented one. Not because I'm handsome (which I may possibly be), but because that's what my parents named me. No joke. Look it up.

In Japanese, 郭俊一 becomes Kaku, Shunichi. So everyone should just called me Shun-kun from now on. V is Kou, Shobun... That's weird, so we'll just call her Noko. Noko,

祝你生日快樂！

Anyway, we didn't do anything else really today. Little Pig works in one of the box stores that I talked about before and he took us there. All his coworkers thought it was funny that he actually came in when he was off; notably, all his coworkers are girls. Well I noted this to his face, and he verily confirmed my note.

I played some ball later and took on an older man this time. He had this super ugly jump-shot that was remarkably consistent. I housed him the first game 6-2, but the tables turned towards the end of the second game. He barely took that one from me and by then I was done. I've always thought I had decent endurance, but playing Taiwanese people outdoors is unfair. Cheaters.

So yeah, he crushed me the last game. But I had fun. Maybe next time I won't be so lazy on defense, but probably I'll just choose to stay alive.

Oh wait, one last rant. I think that maybe I don't look like a husband. People here ask if I'm V's boyfriend, and when she says no, I become her "friend." I paid a lot for that bling on her finger. Husband - lock that in, people.