My apartment, on the 237th floor of a giant, fully automated apartment block, would be dark and smoky. It would be lit only by the flashing neon advertisements outside my window and accessible only by a cylindrical glass elevator that spoke fifty languages and could recognize who you were and what floor you wanted by the tone of your voice when you said, “Konnichiwa, XR378-B.”
I would have all the Japanese mod cons, like a futon bed that collapsed into the size of a credit card; a Ramenator in the kitchen that would offer a variety of ramen selections with complimentary chopsticks; a mechanical ShowerPal in the bathroom, which would disrobe, soap, shampoo and condition, and finally blow me dry as I watched the news on the hologram television suspended in midair like Princess Leia. My alarm clock would know when I wanted to get up and when I
I would go there, this Tokyo. I would bravely run away from all of my problems at home and strike out for a new and, fingers crossed, utterly ridiculous place. I would amaze the people of Tokyo with my wit and height. I would drink flaming pastel-green cocktails and sing Elvis karaoke songs to rooms full of adoring and utterly charmed Japanese.
Yes, this city would fix everything. Who would be my Madonna? Tokyo would.
I’m here now, obviously, and things haven’t panned out exactly as I’d planned. All the vehicles are in close touch with the ground, traffic is treacherous (and that’s just the pedestrians), some Japanese folks would just as soon have me step
But it’s a brilliant city. I finally have health insurance. Every day promises a new and exciting humiliation. And most importantly, I’ve lost twenty pounds.
I guess it’s perfectly natural for me to be asking this “why” question. Surely all travelers at one point or another have been compelled: Gulliver, Ulysses, Bilbo Baggins, Indiana Jones. Each had his own answers-and I have a few of my own. Number one on the list? The world’s biggest record store is here. And it looks like a spaceship.
I am no longer simply an American. I am a
Oh, and Brad Pitt will not play me in the movie adaptation. Sandra Bernhard will.
I want to see Pluto,
I want to have fun,
I want to turn blue,
Under an alien sun.
– Siouxsie Sioux
1
My spacecraft glides over the Shinjuku district of eastern Tokyo as I swivel giddily in my captain’s chair with all the blinking labelless buttons on the left armrest. Looking out the window, which circles the entire ship, I see the blinking lights, sleek skyscrapers, packed commuter trains, and tiny inhabitants hustling and bustling along sidewalks, across bridges, and into and out of the giant beating heart of Shinjuku Station. My craft touches down slowly and alights on top of the Takashimaya Times Square building, which looks like a giant luxury cruise liner. I rise from my seat, remove my goggles, and prepare myself to be beamed directly into the thick of the madness spread out below me. I set the transporter to “Tower Records, Shinjuku,” and seconds later, here I am.
(Actually, no. I take a plane and then a train and then walk for a bit and then sleep for seventeen hours and then start work and finally get a day off after two goddamn weeks.)
The giant Tower Records television screen just outside the south end of Shinjuku Station plays a pop video featuring a gaggle of preteen girls dressed in shiny, frilly outfits so bright and cutesy they make American child beauty pageant contestants look like Dickensian street urchins. They dance in formation-not particularly well-and stare at the camera, doe-eyed and hollow. I stand at the bottom of a massive escalator looking up at the dangerous display of chiffon and taffeta and excitedly contemplate the pastel-tinted nightmares I will have about all this later.
I’m wandering around the city for the first time, enjoying my first day off. I interviewed with a popular language school called MOBA before coming, and they assured me they could place me in Tokyo. An empty promise, it turns out, since I’ve ended up with an apartment in a town called Fujisawa an hour south of Tokyo and a job at a school in nearby Yokohama. A disappointment, yes, like a young small-town Russian with stars in his eyes must feel when he has his heart set on living in the Big Apple and instead is forced to rent a studio in New Brunswick, New Jersey. But I’ll make it to Tokyo, no problem. All I need is thousands and thousands of dollars so I can afford to put a deposit and key money down on a fashionable closet or cubbyhole in, say, trendy Shibuya or, perhaps, the East Village-like districts of Kichijyoji or Koenji. It’ll happen. I’ll just need to teach a few hundred more English lessons, sell my used diabetes syringes and Pia Zadora records on eBay, and limber up for those lap dances. I’ll be there in no time.
In the meanwhile, I’ll continue my job in Yokohama, where I’m honing my communication skills and preparing myself for a career in front of the camera in ways I never anticipated. I have taught so many lessons that I’ve begun dropping all articles, prepositions, and sometimes the verb “to be” from my speech just to be more easily understood. (“On weekend went to movie and ate nice restaurant. Food so delicious.”) I’ve also started pointing to my ears when I talk about listening to music, behind me when talking about the past, and in front of me and over a little hill when talking about the future. Even when talking to my two Australian roommates, Ewan and Sean.
MOBA is a popular language school with branches all across Japan. I’d had to fly to Boston for the interview, and though I usually choke during interviews, this one ended, amazingly, with an immediate job offer.
Admittedly, it’s satisfying to know that simply by virtue of being born in the right place I have a skill very much in demand in another part of the world. I never really considered my English degree very marketable, and neither has anyone else. College papers touting Jane Austen as England’s best Harlequin romance novelist or exploring the homoeroticism in
“Now, Mr. Anderson, do you think that, as a full-time teacher, you can deal with being asked day in and day out questions like what your hobbies are, why you came to Japan, if you can use chopsticks, if you speak Japanese, if you like sushi, what your favorite movie is, what kind of music you like, what time you usually wake up, how often you eat out, and what your plans are for the weekend?”
It was a legitimate question, one you could spend days trying to answer appropriately. But when you get right down to it, the question he was really asking was, “Tim, can you talk about yourself until you’re blue in the face?” And the answer to that, my friend, is, “I feel confident that I can.”
He seemed satisfied with this. Then he’d promptly asked me what my hobbies were.
“Well,” I began, licking my lips, “I like reading, traveling, playing the viola, and collecting records. And yoga. And swimming. Oh, and watching movies. Did I say swimming?” Of course, I could have gone on and expressed my love of gossip columns, White House scandals, Speedos, and interracial porn, but I figured in this case less was more.
“That’s good, you seem to have a lot of interests,” Jim said. “Because the teaching will take care of itself. Your
