It’s been a while since my last update. After the training at SVC, nothing much happened. Or rather, I just wasn’t in the mood to write. I was in one of my mood swings, where I didn’t want to do anything, wanted to disappear into my own world.
I was scheduled to depart for Japan on 14 Mar, but nothing was confirmed until I received the air-tickets on 10 Mar. The 2 weeks before I was scheduled to leave, I was very moody. I wanted out from the Expo. The lack of information & frequent changes of information pissed me off. The organizers are so disorganized!! And they don’t seem to be concerned about us. I was thinking, if this is the way they handle things & treat us now, how would things turn out in Japan? I wonder if I had made the right choice in going for this Expo. Maybe I was too blinded by the opportunity to return to Japan that I didn’t consider other factors like accommodation, salary etc. I had assumed that they wouldn’t treat us too badly. This is an experience of a lifetime ~ that of a slave. My enthusiasm for the job was gone before I left for Japan.
Upon reaching Japan, it just became worse. I know I might slip into another depressive mood soon. The signs are there. I’m trying very hard to get out of it. I duno why this is happening. Stress? Disappointment? Fatigue?
We arrived at Nagoya Airport on 15 Mar morning. Waited almost an hour before someone from Pico Art came to pick us up. That guy had serious attitude problem. He just came to confirm we are the ones he’s picking up, then walked off without a word, only to reappear again in about 15 mins before going into a café for another 10 mins or so. We just waited there like idiots. From the airport, we went straight to the Expo site. It was freezing cold there coz the pavilion wasn’t ready & the heater wasn’t on. We were just being dumped there, to go explore the place ourselves. We just walked around, before returning to the van to sleep before lunch. We continued with our nap after that before they finally decided to send us to our apartment in the late afternoon. I don’t understand why they were doing this.
The apartment was a sad case. Small room & pathetic kitchen. And the heater isn’t working well ~ imagine heater set at 31 deg & we still feel cold! There’s a split level in the room, the upper level being the sleeping area enough for 3 persons. And one bed on the lower floor. With one small wardrobe & baggage of 3 girls, this apartment is ridiculously small! And we are expecting 2 more roommates to come in on Sat. So it’s 5 gals to a small pathetic room & 1 toilet. We heard there’d be 2 more rooms in April, so it’s prob 3 to a room, but our mgr just act blur & didn’t answer our questions. What’s their problem? Is it so difficult to answer us? The futons are without covers. And we found a set of wet dirty covers. We just slept on the futon w/o covers. I’m just too tired mentally & physically to bother about anything else, except for the internet which pissed me off. They promised wireless connection. All bulls**t! No wireless connection detected. When we brought this matter up to our mgr the next morning, he said we had to get wireless card from Japan. Nonsense! Why should I get it when my laptop is in-built with it? And I know for sure it works since I used it in Japan before. So in the end he said will check it out.
We went to explore our surroundings. Very inconvenient. Nearest train station is 20 mins away by bus. No supermarkets nearby. There’re only 2 convenience stores 5~10mins away. Even getting household items was a problem since the place is so ulu. Imagine our morale when all these sunk in. I just completely switched off from then on. I can’t wait for this to end & I can go home. No, I don’t feel homesick. Neither do I dislike Japan. I just want to get out of this whole thing. It doesn’t help that all the other 8 guides feel the same too. 4 guides had arrived tdy, and similarly they were sent to the Expo site immed.
We were there since morning, helping to clean up one of the exhibit room. Total waste of time since construction is still going on around the area. It’d just end up dusty again. Then they told us to help prepare some exhibits which took us all the way till lunch time. I started losing my appetite today. No matter how tasty the chicken looked, I didn’t feel like eating. Every bento at the convenience store looked boring to me. I couldn’t finish a small pkt of maki ~ no appetite. I duno when this will end.
There was a rehearsal for tomorrow’s press conference. Although there was someone translating explanation of the pavilion into Japanese, I didn’t bother to listen. I kept thinking to myself, “Sianz, when will this be over?”In the late afternoon the attitude guy who picked us up from the airport fetched us out. He went to get some stuff while we went to get mobile phones. We spent a long time there, so much so that he was quite annoyed with us. In the end one of us bought coffee to apologize to him, pacify him a little. After that he brought us to the 100yen shop to get our household items, buy dinner, then fetched us back.This is just day 2 in Japan. Living in an inconvenient location, with little time to go elsewhere, how are we gona survive the next 6 mths here?
On a lighter note, I have a bunch of fun guides with me. No doubt half the time we are grumbling about our situation, we have cheerful & interesting characters among us to lighten the mood sometimes. I’m glad Chong-san bought the mobile phone for me when she came back, else I’d still be without a phone now, coz we simply didn’t have the chance to get one, except for the short time we had today. Even so, those who bought couldn’t get the phone immed as we couldn’t wait 1 hr for the registration to be completed, so will be collecting it tomorrow instead.
On the day I arrived, I applied for mobile phone email / sms. Emailed my family immed. And sms Evelyn, but decided to follow up with a call to her too since never talk to her for so long already. Later at nite, I emailed my meetic Jap friend & other friends. Wanted to email Xiaolin, but decided to call instead, to surprise him a little. First he missed my call, then I missed his return call. But I managed to reach him in the end. Felt weird to be speaking Japanese after almost 2 months’ break from the language. My proficiency deteriorated so much that he commented on it! Maybe it’s the language barrier, or the distance between us, we didn’t talk a lot & there were moments of silence, neither of us knew how to carry on the conversation, so I ended it saying I’m tired, which is the truth ~ I was quite stoned by then.
Liyuen reached Japan today & called me from the apartment. Seems like her apartment is much better than us. Good location, big apartment, well-furnished. Didn’t talk much to her tho. Waiting for to meet up with her tomorrow. Priscilla gave a surprise call today. Very happy to hear from her! At first I couldn’t recognize her voice coz of hp & also it was a little noisy. So sweet of her to call, to check if I’ve arrived safely in Japan. I just started complaining away to her…Tired now… hope tomorrow’s press conference turns out well… & they would let us go home earlier for the “good work”…
-- Bao on 16 March
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