Shitsugyoteate II

Blogging wirelessly from my bedroom at my Momma and Daddy’s house…. in Oklahoma! G-D bless their technologically striving hearts! =)

I don’t even have to tell y’all how hard it is being broke! Two years in to this recession – yes, despite whatever the J-Gov says, it’s STILL going on – we’re all very familiar with the feeling by now. I’ve mostly gotten over it for real. Instead, I, like the rest of you, have learned to scale it back to something alot less fabulous and alot more pragmatic… like “if I can’t eat it do I still need it???” :-/ LOL

So yeah, being broke…. I can manage that. But through this whole ordeal, the one thing that I’ve looked forward to has been going home to spend Thanksgiving with my family. The tickets were bought back in April so the date has been set… November 24, 2009. As the months waiting dwindled to weeks and days, my anticipation was palpable. But then a monkeywrench….

Continued after the break

Ninteibi

I’ve been out of work for two months now, and it goes without saying that it’s been hard times financially. I’ve had to scale it waaaay back, so much so that my friends, who are used to me showing up, livin’ it up and generally wildin’ out at every party and event, are asking where I’ve been. I want to think that it’s all because I’ve been studying, but the truth is that I’m broke and generally not in the mood to partying. No, not even on my birthday!

Backing up a bit….

My last day in the office was August 31st. I was looking forward to walking right in the unemployment office the next day to rightfully claim my benefits. But surprise surprise, I was told that I couldn’t claim any benefits without my official separation papers, and the “official” papers I had with me were NOT the papers I needed. Naturally, I made quick and angry call to Scarecrow, who had given me the papers the day before. Only then did he tell me that the papers and forms I actually needed wouldn’t come until after my last payday, and that they had to be sent from corporate headquarters in Osaka.

It took almost a month before those papers came, and not until after repeated inquiries to both my supervisor and Osaka. I was tight, and rightfully so, because I needed to get those benefit payments started right away, especially after I got seriously shortchanged by the financial aid office at school. But yeah, the forms I needed finally came, and I was off again to the unemployment office.

This time, forms in hand, they accepted my application. They explained to me that I would receive my benefits but not until after some time. First, there was a week for which I would receive no benefits at all, then I would have to come back on my 認定日 [ninteibi - certification day], then after another week I would receive payment. Seems I missed the most important part though!

I showed up to the unemployment office fully expecting to walk away with cash in hand. Imagine then my shock when they nice young office worker politely told me that I’d get my money in a week!!! WTF I had budgeted my whole month up until that day. And the ¥1,000 yen that I had in my pocket was the only money I had left! I was seeing red!!! I collected myself just long enough make it back to the train station before I fell apart. Those of you who know me personally already know… I’m emotional. But these past few weeks have really pushed me to the breaking point, and now maybe past. Life, like the moon, waxes and wanes, but I’m not sure if mentally and spiritually I can go on like this. I certainly can’t do it financially! Today is my 29th birthday, and at the end of a very long year I’m thinking maybe my adventures in the City Under Red Sun have indeed come to an end…

Two Sun Dawn and My Jerry Maquire Moment

In the 7 weeks that I’ve been out of work, I’ve decided that for the time being at least I should focus on trying to do a lot of the things I’ve always wanted to do but never had the time to actually do. One of these things that I’ve been dying to do is to create an online magazine. Getting everything together for that though has been a process that is still ongoing. Y’all are NOT ready! LOL

In the meantime though, you know, I’ve been working on getting an internet media firm together to manage the magazine and a few of my other creative projects. In addition to managing the magazine, I want to get in to writing, publishing, and artist management. It’s ambitious, I know. But I’m starting with what I can do now, just me, my MacBook and Adobe Suite.

I’ve always down web design and development projects, so I figured I’d churn out a few projects to make some dough to subsidize my income (or rather lack thereof). I know I haven’t actually designed a site in a while, but please believe ya’ man still has it! I did after all get this blog up and running, and designed the logo. As for the extent of my skills, give me a few weeks and I think I’ll knock your socks off!

So I’ve been meeting with a few potential clients these past few weeks. And needless to say, it’s been HARD as HELL! I mean ,they all were interested in my work, which was definitely a good thing seeing as though I don’t have an extensive portfolio (or any portfolio to speak of right now). It was also good that they all wanted things which are well within my technical capabilities. But what was definitely not good was how much they were talking about paying! I mean I know it’s a recession, but DAMN!

I know alot of y’all out there HATE Kanye. But the man is a genius and the inspiration of genius in others. I found this clip on his blog the other day, and it so sums up so much of my interaction with my potential clients as of late.

Sometimes I so just want to scream, “Show me the money!” FYI, I do have one serious client and also is an effing genius. I can’t wait to get his project up so y’all can see what we both can do!

The Catch-Up Part II: Bills, Bills, Bills

Yeah, this definetly calls for a Destiny’s Child throw-waaaaaay-back reference! Bills, bills, bills! In the last post I wrote about some of the “gravitational forces” pulling me down. As bad as those were, there is nothing that fuels my descent into depression more than money issues! It’s something crucial, something like a black hole!

According to Mercer, The City Under Red Sun has regained it’s title as the World’s Most Expensive City! It’s true, folk! It is expensive as hell here! And to be honest, I haven’t been paid properly since I left the quite town with two shores. With the loan repayments for my apartment being deducted from my check, the hourly deductions for my weekly visits to the shrink, plus my random “sick days”, my final check has barely been enough to make ends meet. My financial aid refund served as a buffer the whole time!

But when the refund money ran out, the bills mounted! And honestly, some of them couldn’t get paid. Some of them still haven’t gotten paid, and only G-d knows when they will be. My mailbox overflows with bills. And if I wasn’t already flying into a depression before, the urgency and pressure of those red envelopes only accelerated my descent.

But it gets worse, soon I’ll be out of work altogether, and fickle paycheck will turn into no paycheck. On top of all that, because my job “sponsored” my apartment and when my work contract expires, I’ll have to either renew my contract on my own or find a new spot. At the very least, it’s going to cost at least $3,000USD! Money that I already don’t have…

My one hope is and has been my finanical package. I figure that with my unemployment and my refund, I could live comfortably while I finish school and pursue my own business ventures until either my joints blow up or the economy picks up. Wouldn’t you know though, with this global credit crisis, I can’t get approved for a loan to save my life! Every loan I’ve applied for to date has been denied, and with every passing day, my financial day of reckoning grows closer!

With so much pressure, I fell in to deep depression that even now I still haven’t fully pulled out of.

The Catch-Up: To The Brink

It’s been FOREVER since I updated this joint like I’ve really wanted. Honestly, this blog is my love and, quite literally, my life. So it’s pained me to be away from it for so long. But things have gotten really hectic here over the past month, and the two or three days that I’d normally take between posts became a week and then two and then…. it’s been a long time! I know that I do have at least few fans that get their lives from my blog! Ss much as I need to write, I feel like I owe you so this is for y’all…

The Catch-Up Part I: To the Verge (And Back)

Being bipolar, my moods are a lot like waves – rising, cresting, and breaking, on and on, forever in an endless cycle of manic highs and depressed lows. For the longest, meds helped limit those craggy peaks and troughs. But ulimately there is no pharmaceutical solution for life! And I don’t think I’m being overly dramatic when I say it seemed like the circumstances of life all came together in a perfect storm that threw me way outside of whatever bounds I was I supposed to be in.

I was already cycling down when tragedy struck on the homefront. I won’t get into here but just imagine the worst that could ever happen happening! Yeah, and then add to that how close my family is and my extreme sense of empathy. And I’m spiraling!

And then the bank started screwing around with my accounts, and unilaterally corrected some mistake on their part from months back and completely wiped out my accounts. Yeah, accounts, as in multiple accounts. I was broke and that was like the day after I had gotten paid! I know I can always call home for help when I need it – and I definitely needed it – but with my family’s attentions rightfully somewhere else, I was stuck…. in free-fall.

At work, things had gone from bad to worse, as the grim reality that I’d be out of work set in for real for the first time. I had already began formulating my next move, but it’s one thing to imagine the freedom of self-employment and then a whole ‘nother thing imagining the risk and responsibility. It was more than a little overwhelming. In the meantime though, I’m stuck in an office with Scarecrow in the boss’ chair, enduring all the personal (as opposed to personnel) BS they can heap on. You have no idea how petty it all becomes after a while. There’s a point when you’d rather someone just tell you “Eat shit and die!” than have to endure their lil digs day in and day out. And at this point, I’ve reached terminal velocity!

And then, when it couldn’t get any worse, school comes in and really starts to kick my ass! Not that I could really concentrate anyway with everything else going on. It was one thing to read the chapters. But then, all the work was done on the computer in a program that didn’t work on Mac! Like for real, what kind of ish is that?!?! I just couldn’t be bothered! My eyes were focused…. on the impending crash!

Being the Boyfriend I Want to Have

It’s taken me longer to post than I would’ve liked. I’ve been pretty busy with work and school. But I’ve also been trying to take it easy, real easy… on my bank accounts. Truth is, I’m broke as hell and I just didn’t have the will or money to do it up as fabulously as I had been as of late. That funk has colored everything in my life. And I really didn’t want to blog about being all sad and depressed with no money, sitting in my apartment knocking off cartoon after cartoon of Häagen-Dazs Tiramisu ice cream (which is alternately, frozen crack and sex for your mouth). Nah, this really ain’t that kinda blog!

On a much lighter note, I came across this pic a few days ago on the net. Looking very much an upscale, Japanese version of a suicide vest, the Konkatsu [婚活: marriage-hunting] bra features a stop clock counting down to a set marriage deadline. According to the write-up on Japan Today, J-girl’s not gonna end up splattered on the sidewalk when the clock runs out though.  Nah, nothing happens unless an engagement ring is inserted between the cups,  at which point  “The Wedding March” plays to celebrate the pending nuptials.

Ridiculousness, I know! But it made me think. In my last post, I wrote about wanting to be in a relationship. Starting and maintaining a relationship in the City though is hard… for a million different reasons. It’s easy to get discouraged, and honestly, I don’t know anyone who hasn’t felt that way at some point. My recent “adventures” with the Seaman, Hershey and Half J have only made me that much more discouraged, like something is wrong with me.

Something wrong? With me!?! See, initially, the thought alone triggered my usual hyper-egomaniacal responses, like “Ain’t ish wrong with me!” But you know what? For once, I can admit it: something was wrong with me. That being that I didn’t actually carry myself like I wanted a relationship. Until recently you could’ve found me out, all drunk and loud, eyeing down everything moving, being anything but “boyfriend material” and in places everywhere but where you’d find a boyfriend. It wasn’t a good look! I’ll apply it to myself here… EPIC FAIL! Epic fail, indeed!

So my first move is act like I do indeed want a relationship. But this isn’t so much about impressing some block-head boy! No, this is about me loving me, taking better care of myself, and letting the love I have  naturally within radiate out. Simply put, I need to be to myself the boyfriend I want to have. And maybe that is somehting we all need to do… to be for ourselves the partner we want to have. Like the diva says: If you don’t love yourself, how you gonna love anybody else?

Do You Know Where You’re Going To?

Do you know where you’re going to?
Do you like the things that life is showing you?
Where are you going to?
Do you know?

Yeah, I’m having a Mahogany moment! LOL….

All jokes aside, things haven’t been the best here as of late. I know, I know, it seems like I’m having a fabulous time. And I am… when I’m out. When I’m home alone though my mind turns to the all the problems I’m facing and the troubling uncertainty of the future. I’ve avoided dealing with it all for so long but my time is running  short, and now I gotta move.

Job
So my contract at my current job ends on August 31. I’ve spent the past 3 months as something of a lame duck around the office, doing everything (i.e. this blog) except work. I honestly haven’t really looked for another job because I’ve been ambivalent about working here in Japan. My experience with Japanese companies and inter-office politics has been less than pleasant and that’s soured me somewhat against working for another Japanese company, especially one that doesn’t have a forward-looking, global perspective.

In my estimation, I could maybe survive on my unemployment benefits and financial aid refund. Instead of working I could focus on my creative projects which I’m dying to get out of my head. There are the T-shirt ideas that me and No. 1 have been trying to knock out since last year. There’s the novel my fingertips are aching to pound out. There are the hip-hop parties I want to put on Ni-chome.  And then there’s the online magazine that I’m hoping to rock the City with…. if only I had more time. Not having some lame 9-5 Pac-manning my time (and energy) might be just what I need to help me discover what I’m supposed to be doing in this life.

On the other hand, there was a job I saw posted the other day that I really REALLY want! I so want to say wish me luck but that feeling again….  ambivalence.

Apartment
So when I needed to move last year, I didn’t have anywhere near the 450,000JPY (about 4,200USD) that I needed for relocation costs. My company loaned me the money and in addition they signed my lease as a guarantor. This was a much appreciated favor at the time. But now that they’re not renewing my contract, I have to either sign a new lease or move exactly at a time when I have the money to do neither. Not to be too melodramatic but I could be homeless here in a few months if I can’t manage to finnagle something with this lease on the low low or find a new living situation. G-d knows I’ve hated my apartment since I moved-in but I’m not mentally or financially ready to move just yet.

Money
My job and housing problems are tied together by money, or more accurately, my lack of money. The City is expensive. Looking this fabulous in the City is even more expensive. And the truth is that despite all the getting around that I do, I’m always been something of financial interloper partying waaaay above my economic class. When I moved here last year I was out of work for 2 months, and money was crazy tight (read: non-existent). If it wasn’t for K-chan, my Momma and Deddy, and my Tranny Godmother, I wouldn’t have made it through. But I did! I got a job and then I got my financial aid refund, so I was aiight for a while. But with the return of the Summer, the well’s run dry. And the bills are stacking up! Even had a Japanese bill collector call the other asking for money and making their “pay-or-else” threats. LOL…. Like my Momma says though you can’t get blood from a stone! Still there’s always the knot in my stomach I get whenever people are calling demanding money that I don’t have.

Love

Over the past year or so, I’ve had a string of terrible relationships in what I characterize as bad love karma. Seems all those years of being careless with other people’s feelings have finally caught up with me. Well, that plus the fact that I (still) have a real problem with monogamy – both the concept and the execution. In any case I’ve been single for the past few months… and hating it! I’ve tried to focus on my school work and my work work and whatever else I could find to occupy my time. G-d knows that I ate my ice cream, but for some things there really are no substitutes! LOL…

I’ve had my lil’ crushes, most recently Half J, but nothing’s panned out so far. I go out with my friends and we party, and I usually end up waaay too drunk (when I shouldn’t even be drinking at all) and waaay past inappropriate… with everybody! LOL Admittedly, my partying may lead some people to get the wrong idea of me. I’m not a lush nor am I a man-whore! I guess a part of me is just lonely and the other part is trying to compensate. I want someone, someone to be here by myside for a while. I believe that everything happens in its own time but damn….tick tick.

*******

At the end of the day, I lie in the bed sleepless, my mind racing. I’m trying to find out where exactly it is that my life is headed. Wondering whether I truly am the “master of my fate” or and the “captain of my soul”. Standing on the verge of another entirely new life, I’m not so sure anymore.

Kagero

Recession or not. Broke as hell or not. I’m still trying to get it in with the partying. If you follow my blog you know I got my parties that stay in rotation on my social calendar. Kagero at Club Arch is one of them. It’s one of the very few Hip Hop and R&B parties in Ni-chome. How could I miss it?

So yeah, I was broke. But I said, “‘F’ it!” I called up the crew, turned my swag on and hit it. A night of ignorant fun ensued, made all the special by the depth of the crew. We owned the floor. And we got our lives. Felt like I hit a brick and ate the mushroom.

More Kagero pics after the break

Broke Gangsters

This has to be another case of “Blame it on the recession!”! It’s seems in these tough economic times the once venerable yakuza has had to resort to new and creative ways to make money… like getting jobs. How tacky! Some of them have taken up part-time jobs as taxi drivers, ticket resellers (read: scalpers), home renovators, etc. One of them even took to selling apples door to door. He did keep it gangster though by short-changing the lil’ ol’ ladies that happened to pay with large bills. He was busted though by some grandma who knew how to count and apparently wasn’t about to take any ish from some broke down gangster. Tony Soprano he is not! Epic fail, sir, epic fail!

One of the rival gang’s leaders agrees, saying “No outfit that puts up with such things can justify its existence.”

It’s gotten so bad that their trading in their ominous dark-tinted luxury sedans for very soccer mom-ish minivans, and started recruiting salarymen as part-timers. What’s next? Will they go the way of so many Japanese companies and start allowing some foreigners? I say, let the foreigners play! We got the money!!!

Full article after the break

Ni-chome in Peril

Ni-chome is the largest gay town (read: gay ghetto) in Asia. No, it’s not the Village or the Castro or the whole city of Atlanta but it’s what the City Under Red Sun has to offer the Children. Reputedly, it has over 200 bars and clubs. Even though some of these walk-in closets that they’re selling alcohol in wouldn’t be classified as a bar any place else in the world. I don’t maybe there really are over 200 clubs, but I wouldn’t know because there’s only a very few places that are foreigner-friendly and umm, even fewer places I’d actually want to go anyhow.

Anyway…. every weekend, the tiny alleys posing as streets which make up Ni-chome are filled with boys (and a few girls) trying to get their lives. Lately, I’ve even noticed a marked increase in the number of Black boys spinning it out. And I ain’t mad at it! But for real, when I look around, really look, I’ve noticed that the gay ghetto is not nearly as crowded as it used to be. I’ve blamed the the weather. As it turns out, maybe I’ve should’ve blamed the recession.

Japan Today poses the question: Is Shinjuku’s “Gay Town” Threatened With Extinction?:

Is Shinkuku’s ‘gay town’ threatened with extinction?

“Are gays vanishing from Shinjuku 2-chome!?” exclaims the headline in Spa (Apr 21).

Straight people unfamiliar with Tokyo night life might even be surprised to learn that Asia’s “largest gay town“—an area with an estimated 300 to 400 businesses—even exists, let alone is in decline.

“Up until five to six years ago, about 80% of our patrons were gay,” says Yu, the 34-year-old male “mama” of bar “K,” a gay hangout that’s been in operation for 13 years. “Now it’s around 60%. In the past, a lot of bars refused to admit straight females, but those types of ‘hard’ shops have become fewer. The shops can’t depend on business solely from gays any more.”

According to Yu, the absence of younger people from the area has been particularly conspicuous. For some reason they no longer gravitate to this “sanctuary,” as they once did.

“I go to 2-chome, but only for special events or parties,” a 26-year-old Tokyo-based designer tells the magazine. “I’ve almost never hung out at a gay bar.” The patrons, he complains, tend to be exclusive to outsiders and territorial.

“A lot of my friends say they never walk around there, because they might be mistaken for a male prostitute or get solicited by some chubby old guy, which is a real turnoff,” he adds.

The district’s decline has already been observed some time ago by those familiar with Shinjuku. Earlier this year, author Susumu Ryu published a 276-page manga titled, in English, “Vanishing Shinjuku 2-chome—who severed the jugular of a flower garden of heretical culture?”

“When you think of ‘gays,” you get the image of those flamboyant types who mince around on TV variety shows,” Ryu observes. “In other words, they’re viewed as male herbivores. A lot of gays get depressed just thinking about going into a gay bar in 2-chome and striking up a conversation and making friends with someone they don’t know.”

It appears that what is happening in 2-chome is only part of the economic zeitgeist.

“Young Japanese don’t go out drinking much these days,” Ryu notes. “More of them either belong to the underpaid ‘working poor’ or have been laid off, and even though 2-chome tends to be inexpensive, you still pay more than 1,000 yen just to sit down and buy one drink. That’s a lot for someone who’s broke. They aren’t going there because they can’t afford it.”

“With the opening of a new subway station on the Fukutoshin Line,” 2-chome is no longer isolated,” says Bungaku Ito, 77-year-old editor of Barazoku magazine. “New buildings are sprouting up and rents are soaring. So some of the old established shops are migrating to Ueno, Shimbashi, Asakusa and other, less-expensive areas. At these places, gay patrons age 50 and over begin their imbibing from 3 p.m.

“They’re old now, and they don’t have the stamina to be night owls any more,” remarks Ito.

What do you say, mama-san? Time to let the girls (read: real fish) play in the gay ghetto? Yeah? Can the foreigners play too??? Think it over and get back to me on that!