My return to Hokkaido in summer 2006 turned out to be a crazy adventure. I first thought I’d be there for about three weeks maximum, but ended up staying in town for about seven (thanks Take-chan for putting me up for most of that time! I owe you one, as soon as you get over to Australia). But it was a non-stop adventure.
I had said goodbye to Take-chan and headed off on a four or five day adventure via Asahikawa, Daisetsu National Park, Shiretoko and Furano. After a fantastic day’s hike around the peaks of Daisetsu National Park I was heading towards Shiretoko, about 300km from Sapporo, when it suddenly occurred to me that my International Driver’s License was probably due to expire one of these days.
I stopped for dinner and got my IDL from the glovebox and sure enough it had expired about a week ago.
Those who know me well will probably be surprised at this news, because I’m usually really careful, and calculating when it comes to these kinds of things. The thing is, firstly it’s not like in Australia where when your license is about to run out you get a reminder from the RTA (those bastards. But I’m getting ahead of myself. More about them later). Also, where I had miscalculated was that after I initially obtained my IDL in Australia, I left and travelled the world for two months – Hawaii, San Francisco, London – before arriving in Japan. I was calculating from the day I arrived in Japan.
Anyway, I had to decide what to do, as soon as possible, because technically I was driving without a license in Japan at that time (about AU$4000 fine, or 12 months in jail!). I went to the nearest motor registry and tried to find out what would be involved in getting my license converted.
The first reply they gave me was that because I wasn’t registered as living nearby, I couldn’t use that particular motor registry. Which I realised meant I would have to use the motor registry back at Takayama, some 4,500km behind me.
Fortunately having moved house a few times already I knew how easy it was to become a “resident” of the area. So I looked up the nearest high-rise apartment block on Google Maps, chose a room number and went to the local town hall to change my address. Half an hour later I was back at the motor registry speaking to the same guy, getting all the information I would need in order to change my license to a Japanese one.
I couldn’t change my license that particular day, so I decided that since I was without a license, and hence probably no insurance, it was probably best for me to drive back to Sapporo and try not to drive until I had sorted out my license.
300km away from Sapporo, in the middle of a great adventure, I wasn’t happy to have to be heading back, along the same damn road no less. I was cruising along, through the mountains and the farms that look like they have been transplanted from Europe. It was getting dark. It was raining. I had just finished overtaking a truck when there was a bright flash and a “pi pi pi!” sound – I’d just been done by OBIS.
OBIS is a speed camera.
I was already pissed off to begin with, and now this. However, it’s funny to look back now and see how it all unfolded.
I got back to Take-chan’s place and parked temporarily in the local MaxValue supermarket car park. By “temporarily” I mean “for about two weeks, changing car parking places every day until I got there one day and there was a sign on the windscreen – please refrain from parking here if you are not shopping here.” (luckily I had already scoped out a small children’s playground nearby without those dreaded “no parking” signs outside of it).
Take-chan was great. I slept on a blanket on the hard floor for over a month rent-free (unless you include the seven half-full bottles of Japanese sake that I had accumulated while travelling through rice country – Touhoku).
One of the things I needed in order to get my Australian license converted to a Japanese one was proof that I had held my Australian license for more than three months while in Australia. My insistance that I had been driving for years wasn’t enough, and they showed me a Driving Record from the RTA that another customer had brought in as proof previously.
I emailed the RTA to find out what would be required. No reply. I emailed them again after about three days. And again, to a different address this time, after another three days. NO REPLY.
If you’re wondering why I didn’t just call them, it’s a combination of how ridiculously expensive (200 yen a minute) and inconvenient (you have to pre-pay your overseas minutes from the convenience store) it is to make international calls in this country, and the fact that my wireless Internet connection was a little unrealiable to make a Skype call (I tried. Many times. Matt – if you’re wondering where all your Skype credit went,… I’m sorry).
I eventually got my father to call from Australia. Simple, apparently. There’s an obscurely-named place to click on on the RTA webpage. WHY THOSE SHITHEADS AT THE RTA COULDN’T JUST REPLY TO MY FUCKING EMAIL AND TELL ME THIS I’LL NEVER UNDERSTAND. I’ll be filing a complaint with them, and also I just want to know what the hell their policy is when it comes to responding to emails.
I had heard that it takes about three weeks to get the Driving Record sorted out, so in the mean time I had started applying for part time jobs. Fortunately my timing was such that there were a stack of jobs for three weeks working the beer gardens around Sapporo. I managed to snag a job as hall staff at the World Beer Garden in Oodoori Park, run by the Grand Hotel.
While I was working at the beer garden I got asked many times by foreigners who were passing by just how exactly I landed the job. 99% of foreigners in Sapporo fall into one of the following groups: student, english teacher, foreigner bar manager/worker, or car export (ok, these are all Russians or Indians). A foreigner working a part-time job that was usually only done by a Japanese was a rarity, and the Japanese customers knew it too.
The truth is, I simply applied for the job, same as all the Japanese applicants. I found the ad in the free Japanese job guide. I called to make an appointment for the interview. It pays to do some research on the internet beforehand for this step. I found a thread on 2channel where people had typed up heaps of examples of actual conversations they had had when they called up about a job, so I knew pretty much what to expect. I handwrote the resume, carefully copying the kanji I didn’t know how to write (ie all of it). I went along to the interview, wore a suit, and pretended to understand everything the interviewer said.
Actually, the interview was less like an interview and more like a “Ok, we need fifty people for this job, and seeing as you don’t have a foot growing out of your forehead you’ll be starting on Monday, here’s what you’ll be doing…” I think it pays to look for the ads where they say they are recruiting 10 or more people (some of the other beer gardens were recruiting 200 people). There is a section at the front of these magazines for “tokushuu” – these are your short-term jobs like beer gardens, SMAP concert staff, and laboring (could be ok, I reckon).
Regarding my visa, I was never asked once what kind of visa I was on.
As I think I have mentioned before I speak decent Japanese. For example, when I called the first time the lady at the other end didn’t realise that I was a foreigner until I mentioned my name. Even so, I think I have the bare minimum Japanese required for this job. A friend was looking for a way to fill in the last few weeks before she went back home to the UK, so I suggested the beer garden to her. She was keen, and I knew we were short on staff, so I asked the guy in charge. He asked about my friend’s Japanese level, and I replied that I would explain the job thoroughly, and she had committed to memorise the required Japanese phrases in order to do the job (there are about six of them). I sensed his hesitation and added that I would train her in my own time. Unfortunately he said that if her Japanese level wasn’t at least as good as mine then, despite the shortage of staff, he was sorry but there was no work for her. It might have been a nice way of saying “one foreigner is enough” but it made me realise that I was quite lucky to be working there at all.
Working the beer garden was a fantastic experience. I was one of the older people working there, and so thanks to Japanese society I received a lot of instant respect. I made sure over the three weeks that I completely destroyed everyone’s respect for me by getting drunk after work and letting them all know my real personality.
There were a few cute girls working the beer garden itself, but I was surprised at how easy it was to pick up female customers. Firstly, I was a huge hit with all the customers, regardless of age or sex. I was initially laughed at by the guys I was working with for suggesting that some of the customers were cute. But I have learnt by now that guys, in particular Japanese guys, are loaded with theories about picking up chicks, but they don’t actually practice. And they’re usually wrong.
But it took about a week before I fully realised my power. I remember one day when I had six cute girls all interested in me. I had this power where I would just point my finger and they were mine. One of the good things about working a job like this is that you get a lot of practice introducing yourself and having very similar conversations. This lets you try different things out and gauge the response. I managed to put together a perfect introduction, whereby I would glean important information from them (do you live alone?) while keeping them laughing, pushing them towards flirting and talking about sex.
One thing that I think a lot of learners of the Japanese language miss out on is a chance to yell in Japanese. As a result they don’t ever exercise and develop their Japanese speaking mouth muscles, and end up speaking either too quietly (in the back of their throat) or with a strong foreign accent. Working the beer garden had me shouting in Japanese for the better part of six hours a day. If you want to see what I mean, try saying “Irasshaimase!” or “Domo arigato gozaimasu!” just like a Japanese person. You hear these phrases several times a day, yet if you’ve never tried to say them then you probably can’t. I remember my first “Irasshaimase!” at the Hilton at Otaru. It was terrible! Way to quiet, and I actually got in trouble for it.
Fast forward almost a year to the beer garden, and I was almost there. One of the guys commented it sounded forced and unnatural, so I got him to help me practice.
Apart from the language, working the beer garden had so many advantages that I couldn’t possibly list them all. I learnt so much about Japanese society. Here is an example: Picture three salarymen sitting around a table, drinking beer. They are getting close to the end of their beer, and it looks like one of them may have already finished, in which case you should be diving in offerring to take their emty glass. Thing is, if you do that then the person who is paying for the drinks will be obliged to offer to buy another one. Which is embarassing for the younger person, to drink if the person paying isn’t drinking. And it also creates a bit of a situation if it is the person paying whose glass is suddenly empty, without the other people noticing first. These little social subtleties have to be taken into account before you offer to collect the customer’s glass. And there are a similar set of rules when
