I put on my favourite shirt. Shaved. Tidied my hair. Snow White cancelled. But I am still ready for a good time.
I don’t feel like seeing anyone or doing anything. All I want is to become a hikikomori. But why would a lonely person want to be alone.
I meet her again. I walk her to the park and kiss her for the second time on the lips. It was her opium. I hugged her in my arms. She lived in my world while her whole life was crumbling.
You’re asleep. I write notes on your back. Maybe they will give you the nudge you need to tell your boyfriend about us.
You’re asleep again. I’m typing this on my phone. I know you’re cold in my naked flat. I know you have your duties and responsibilities imposed by society upon you. Maybe you’re hoping I’ll take them all away from you. But I’m also lost, my world is also crumbling.
He told me about pick up art. Picking up girls at clubs, how to talk to them, how to act, how to study it, how to perfect it. But I just have an emotional hangover. I should have had more scotch last night. These stories taste like disgusting medicine.
I choose an alternative path. I avoid love, fame, wealth, work. I seek knowledge, to live amongst the books and devour them one by one.
I’m listening to Lost by Frank Ocean. It reminds me of her.
The likes. The late night texts. The stickers. Swiping right. I’ve always been hungry for love.
I met Snow White tonight. She smiled at me and my auto response system engaged. I was in love. She had all the qualities to regard me defenceless: funny, flirty, kind and pretty. So many red flags. I was the fly on her spider web.
I can finally say I belong. I have a Japanese phone number. This changes absolutely nothing but the fact that I can now say that I have a phone number and call the emergency number. After Googling what the emergency number is.
I’ve visited BIC Camera 3 times so far with the goal of obtaining a SIM Card contract with a phone number. Today I successfully signed a 1-year contract with 3GB of data per month and a number to receive and make phone calls (at extra cost). This costs ¥1600 per month before tax.
The current tax level is at 8%. A raise of 3% from 5% last year. And set to rise to 10% in 2017. The rise to 8% was the first in 17 years and caused a recession in the economy. I worry about the Japanese economy.
Tonight is Halloween warm up night. The “real” Halloween happens tomorrow. Everyone goes out to Shibuya and parades around the street, showing off their outfits, meeting people, taking lots of photos and drinking. Imagine a New Year’s, Carnival, Cosplay convention and Tinder party all at once. Dressing slutty is normal and respected. Having a very hard to decipher outfit is hardly regarded as cool. And group outfits are popular.
The best things I’ve seen: About 6 people dressed as Mario Kart characters driving in Mario Kart cars around Shibuya. A group dressed as Tetris pieces. Ryu and Ken from Street Fighter performing a fight. A group of 4 Nolan Dark Knights, fitter than Christian Bale. A guy dressed as a shrine. Sora from Kingdom Hearts.
I get it now. Halloween is like fresher’s week. Christmas is like Valentine’s day. New Year’s is like Christmas. Valentine’s is Valentine’s. And White Day is Valentine’s again.
Tonight I’m Peter Parker. I’m ready.
Today I went to the Setagaya Ward Office and registered as a foreigner living in Japan. I filled in a form that asked for my name in roman characters, katakana and Chinese characters, my current address, previous country, passport and other basic info. In 15 minutes I was returned my residency card with the address written on the back. This is the first step for me to legally integrate in the country: get a bank account and perhaps more importantly a phone number.
Ivy, Shun, Tiago and myself went to ドン・キホーテ (Don Quijote) today to buy some things for my new apartment. This is Ivy and Tiago’s last week in Japan, and they are staying with me, so I also need a guest mattress and bedding.
This is the second time I walk into a ドンキ store. The first time was in Shinjuku a couple of weeks ago by accident. ドンキ is a jungle of products that spans multiple floors, selling everything from groceries to tech, halloween costumes to wedding dresses, school materials to sex toys.
We had dinner at Sushi ¥90. As you can guess from the name, this is a very affordable sushi restaurant. The quality is also a lot better than the average sushi you would get outside of Japan.
The magic of this place starts from the moment you walk in: you are given a seat number and you order your plates of sushi from the touch screen in front of you. The plates then travel on a belt from the kitchen to your seat, you pick them up and press a button to confirm they were delivered. Only drinks are served by the staff. This is great to order a dish at a time and eat indefinitely. I can see this becoming a more popular model in the future with the use of drones.
Above you can see a photo of my seat at the Sushi ¥90 restaurant in Shibuya.