I have a satnav in my car (or, car navi, if you’re in Japan).  I call her Navi, because she is annoying in a HAY, LISTEN HAY, LISTEN sort of way.

Anyway, to get to my part of town from Route 4, there’s the front way, by coming in at Lower Houshakuji and then going to my house from the south, or there are weird back ways, coming in from the north, on narrow bendy one lane roads with blind corners. I’d only ever gone down one of these back ways, and that was to get OUT of Houshakuji, not get in.

On the way back from Ujiie a little while back, I thought, welp, let’s try one of the back ways.  One of them comes in just south of the junior high school, and along the west side of the tracks until south of the station where it meets the front way in.  The other comes in just north of the junior high school. I took this one. Once Navi had recalculated, she directed me to turn left off this road, cross the train tracks (a car-passable, but not car-designed crossing over the Tohoku Line), go a bit south and cross over the Karasuyama Line, then direct to home. Excellent, I thought. Good times.

Crossed the Tohoku line, took a quick right, and headed towards the Karasuyama Line crossing.  There was, however, a small issue. (1) At this point, the Karasuyama line exists in a deep ditch carved out of the rise on which Houshakuji sits and (2) the crossing is actually a bridge, not a level crossing.  What’s the problem with that, you’re wondering? What’s wrong with a bridge?  I’ll show you what’s wrong with a bridge.

Bridge over the Karasuyama Line

That’s right. Navi wanted me to drive over a footbridge to get home.  Home was quite close, at this point too! 500m at most. I could just make out the roof in the distance off to the right. Would have taken me like, 2 minutes to get home… had it been a real bridge, and not a foot bridge.  Instead, I had to double back, cross back to the west side of the Tohoku line, drive south until that road met the other backway, and then pass the station and come in the normal way.  Disappointing, to be sure.

It would have been a great way home, if there’d been a real bridge there. Navi, bless her, she means well but she’s thick as a brick.

A traffic ticket (not mine).

People are always in a hurry.  I don’t know why.  Nothing is THAT important that you need to be in that big of a hurry. Slow down, relax, park a little further from your destination, actually stop at stop signs. SLOW DOWN.

… This is a common thing to hear from me.  It’s pretty much my most basic philosophy. Slow down, there’s no need to be in a hurry, there’s no need to get worked up.  Relax.

But, for all the talk of slowing down that escapes my gaping maw, I now see that I sure have been in a hurry.

A couple weeks ago, events conspired in such a way as to point this out to me.  I teach elementary school during the day, and two evenings a week, I teach a business class one hour north of here.  I’ve only got about a 20 minute window between finishing at elementary school and having to leave for my business class.  This particular day, on my drive to my apartment after elementary school (to change, freshen up, etc.,) things started off fine. Normal.

Then, suddenly, some woman was blocking the intersection completely while waiting for a train to pass instead of waiting it out at her stop sign.  This irritated me, and I honked at her.  GOTTA GO GOTTA GO, FRIG GET OUT OF MY WAY.

I got past her and turned the corner, only to find that my lane is blocked off by people digging a hole near the bank, and the oncoming lane is completely full of cars, backlogged due to the aforementioned train.  THERE’S NO TIME, FRIG, HURRY UP!

I finally get home, a whole 5 minutes later than I ought to have (!), and proceeded to do what I went there to do.  When I was finished, back out to the car to start my drive.  If I went my normal way, past the bank, past the school, down the hill to Route 4, I’d have to sit through the wait caused by those people digging. Again. THERE’S NO TIME, FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF.  So, I decided to take the back way, suggested by my satnav.  About 5 km north, my back way meets up with Route 4, and it’s about the same distance.  Good times.

So here I am, on this back road, a side road that is probably popular with ppl wanting to avoid traffic and go their own speed.  I look down and I realize I’m doing 80km/h, which is clearly speeding, so I slow down, and continue driving this bendy road.  I look at the estimated arrival time on my satnav, and realize I have lots of time, so I slow down a bit more.

I round a corner, and I see a cop car hiding in a bush. I slam on the brakes (as is my habit when I see cop cars), but it was too late.  The lights go on, and a man with a flag directs me to the parking area. I’d been caught in a speed trap.

“So uh… we pulled you over for speeding, yes?”

“I know.”

“How fast were you going?”

“Around 60, I think.”

“This is a 40km/h zone, you know.”

“Really? I thought it was a 50.  My bad.”

“We’ll have to wait for the printout from the radar to be sure of your speed. Can I see your license?”

“Sure.”

He proceeds to copy down a bunch of information, and confirm the reading of my name (as my name is in English on my Japanese driver’s license).  The printout comes.  “Ah, you were doing 63 in a 40.”

“Yeah, that sounds right.”

“It’s gonna be a ￥15000 fine and 2 demerit points.  It’s kind of expensive, I guess…”

“Well, it’s my own fault,” I said.  “I was speeding. Your equipment is right. It’s my own fault.”

He asked me a few more questions, had me fingerprint the ticket to show that I agreed with it (because I didn’t have my registered namestamp with me — it wasn’t some sort of sinister fingerprinting scheme).  Explained how to pay and when the deadline was, and sent me on my way.  It all took about 15 minutes.  Despite that delay, and despite strictly observing the speed limit for the rest of my trip (instead of my usual 5-10km/h above), I still made it to my class with plenty of time, which somehow makes the ticket even sillier.

As an aside, I didn’t even think to pull the typical foreigner gambit of “I don’t understand Japanese”-ing until they let you go.  Nah, I was calm, I was resigned, and so I went at it in full Japanese mode.  And awesomely enough, I understood everything he was saying.  At no time did I have to ask him to rephrase more simply.  At no time did I have to resort to dodgy English-in-a-Japanese-accent.  I had a fully natural communicative experience with this cop. And that’s pretty cool.

Now, I suppose it would probably be very easy for some people (definitely me) to dwell on this ticket for one reason for another.  “Oh frig, I fucked up, oh jeez, now I have points on my license, oh crap, 15000yen is something i can’t really afford, I’m trying to pay off credit cards and save money for car inspection in October and I have to pay my car tax this month and, and, and…”

But what’s done is done.  There’s nothing that can change it.  So why not just relax and go with the flow?  I don’t think I’ve been as calm as I was in the moments after being pulled over in years.  I realized in that split second before the flashing lights came on that, for someone who berates people, telling them to relax and slow down, I’ve been in one hell of a hurry lately.

So I’ve slowed down.  I’ve relaxed.  And all it cost was ￥15000, two demerit points, and 15 minutes of my time. Life is okay.  Everything’s gonna be okay.

No matter where you live, no matter where you move to, the various procedures involved are always difficult.

I’ve been going through the steps to make myself and all my things legal this week, and it’s not so easy in some cases. First, I registered at city hall. All people who move in Japan, native or foreign, have to tell city hall that they’re in town and where etc. The name of the forms differs, but the main purpose is the same: the city is going to provide you with services so it’s necessary for them to know who they’re serving. Whatever.

This wasn’t. Very difficult thing to do. As I’d already registered as a foreign resident when I was in Toyama, I only really needed to change my address. The lady was super helpful, and explained things simply. I also joined national health insurance at the same time, which was also ridiculously simple.

Afterwards, another lady explained how to sort my trash. I was told by some residents, “Ooh, trash sorting here is very strict!” But it’s not really. Burnables twice a week (and unlike Toyama, plastic IS burnables, not it’s own category) and none burnables once a month, in 4 categories: food glass, other glass, newspaper and cardboard, cans and PET bottles. There’s also the food trash that they use to make compost, but most people I’ve spoken to hide that in their burnables because the food trash bag is troublesome and breaks easily.

It’s not so bad because most of my trash is burnable. The PET bottles and random foam trays can be rinsed and returned to the store. Bottles and cans too, at some stores. Shouldn’t be a problem, I reckon.

Next up is updating the address on my car reg and safety check certificate. This is not so easy. First, I needed a proof-of-parking certificate from the real estate agency (¥3000), and then take that to the police station to say, “Hello! I have arrived and I have brought a car! Please change my address on my license and my something else; also I will be parking here legally.”. Then they do the license while you wait, and give you the forms (¥20) for the other part which I couldn’t figure out, but I luckily had someone to help me. The registration of parking space with the cops was ridiculous. I had to have a diagram of the parking lot with my space indicated; then I had to draw a map to my apartment (which is easy in some places, but which is stupidly difficult for this place); then I had to fill in dimensions of various things (width and length of space, width of lot entrance, width of road, etc.) It was dumb and I made up values because I hadn’t measured that stuff, get out.

Next week I’ll have to pick up paperwork from the police station and then go to a transport office to register the changes that the cops made, register for car tax (boo!) here, and then get my new number plates. Whew! It’s not easy, so I’m glad the lady from my company is helping me.

In other settling-in news, I’m completely unpacked, except for the living room, which can’t be completed until next Wednesday when the last of my furniture comes. Until then, though, I’m pretty free and clear to relax and explore. More on that another time!