Misadventures in ... America

New Direction

2009-10-03T09:50:00.002+09:00

Dear Reader(s),

You may have noticed that I almost never update my blog anymore. As this blog had been devoted mostly to the absurdities of living abroad, once I returned to my homeland I simply was not inspired to write. Or at least I had a lot of trouble finding appropriate topics. So after some thought, I have decided to try going in a slightly different direction, at least for the time being, with a series I've titled "Things That Piss Me Off." I realized that although living in New York does not typically provide me with the absurd situations I found so commonplace in Japan, it does provide me with many opportunities to be pissed off.

Warm Greetings,

MatchaMonkey

Lessons Learned the Hard Way

2009-08-28T09:24:00.002+09:00

I've been reflecting on life a lot lately. I've had time to, seeing as I'm unemployed, and I've been examining a lot of the decisions that have led me to this point. I've been working on a list of some of the lessons I've learned the hard way in my 28 years, in the hopes that I can keep others from repeating some of the mistakes I've made.

(1) Don't drink on an empty stomach; you will regret it.

(2) "International Studies" is not a lucrative major.

(3) In the same vein as the above--No one's going to pay you for being able to read Camus in the original French.

(4) Don't mix cold medicines with alcohol. You may wake up to find your car rotated 90 degrees in its parking space.

(5) Maybe almost always means no.

(6) No seriously--do NOT drink on an empty stomach, no matter how good an idea it seems at the time.

(7) Be sure you know what you're doing before you start cooking and eating your own oysters.

(8) Beer forgotten and left in the freezer will become a sort of beer slushy and make a really big mess all over your other food.

(9) Don't allow filming while playing Dance Dance Revolution. You will be laughed at by your "friends."

I've made these mistakes so you don't have to. Avoid these common pitfalls and you can lead a happy and rewarding life.

Picture Post Part I--Brooklyn

2009-06-11T02:40:00.004+09:00

So this last weekend I went to an arts festival in the Bushwick neighborhood of Brooklyn. As New York continually gentrifies, the artists keep pushing farther afield to find the next cheap, gritty, and as-yet-undiscovered neighborhood. Bushwick in Brooklyn is one such neighborhood. Prior to this weekend the only stories I had heard of Bushwick were from a friend whose apartment there had been broken into something like 3 times in the space of a year, so I was interested in seeing what the neighborhood actually had to offer. The way the festival was organized, I ended up getting a much more intimate look at Bushwick than I had expected--artists displayed their paintings, drawings or photography on their own apartment or studio walls, so the most interesting part of the festival was seeing into all these artists' homes (not to mention the free alcohol that was generally on offer).

One festival stop stands out in my mind. It was an apartment shared by two young women, quintessential young artists. Their small but brightly painted apartment was decorated with photography, paintings, and mobiles, and they each sat on a different couch, chain smoking in front of a coffee table displaying an antique type writer. One of them was clearly on something--she claimed not to know what was going on.

From that stop, we visited an artist in his workshop who made installations from found objects. After that, we proceeded to rooftop exhibit, which turned out to be a great place to end up since it offered views of Manhattan like this:

I believe if I lived in this building, I would spend all of my time on the roof. There was some very friendly graffiti to boot:

New Cost-Cutting Measures at BoA

2009-04-10T11:03:00.003+09:00

I realize that the banks have fallen on hard times. Stock prices are way down, liabilities exceed assets, and no one really likes or trusts you at the moment. That, however, does not excuse what happened to me this morning.

This morning, I merrily gathered my laundry to be washed since I was down to only "nice" outfits. As I opened my roll of quarters, the quarter on the end flopped out, revealing a nickel behind it. A nickel. In my roll of quarters. I was angry, not only because I had been cheated out of 20 cents, but because a nickel isn't worth anything when you're trying to do laundry.

And then I started to wonder, what exactly is one supposed to do in this kind of situation? Go to the bank and demand a quarter? What reason would they have to believe that you hadn't just stuck the nickel in the roll yourself? Furthermore, the 10-block walk north is hardly worth 20 cents to me.

Well played, BoA. You just created more value for your stockholders. So when I hear that BoA's stock price is starting to go up, I'll know it was achieved 20 cents at a time.

MatchaMonkey remembers: Janet Reno

2008-03-23T10:42:00.000+09:00

I have a knack for running into random celebrities on my travels. Technically it's only happened twice, so I don't know if that qualifies as "having a knack" for something, but I'm going to stick with it.

After graduating college, I went on a two week vacation with some friends to Ireland. It was a wonderful time in my life; I had just graduated from college, was heading to Japan in a month, and the world seemed full of promise and adventure. My friends and I were enjoying the sights of Dublin in between pints of Guinness. One outing took us to Dublin Castle, where, after touring the inside of the castle, we were relaxing for a moment in the vast courtyard. After a few moments, one of my friends said, "Hey, look--it's Janet Reno."

I chuckled to myself, assuming that this of course was a joke, just my friend's random sense of humor. I assumed there must be someone who looked sort of like Janet Reno. I looked up to see a woman wearing a bright blue suit, and not just looking sort of like Janet Reno--looking exactly like Janet Reno.

"Oh my God, it is Janet Reno," I said. And my friends and I watched as she walked across the courtyard, entourage in tow.

---------------

Later that same day, my friends were enjoying yet another pint at yet another real Irish pub. It was crowded, and we were seated at the bar in a back room of the pub. Of all the pubs in Dublin, Janet Reno came a short time later to this one. She sat, with a friend, at a table near the back of the room in which we were seated.

My friends and I instantly started debating whether or not to send her a drink. In the end, we decided not to--in order to respect her privacy, or something like that. In retrospect though, man, I wish we had sent her that drink.

Chindogu

2007-10-25T13:33:00.000+09:00

Dear Reader(s),

I know it's been a very long time (3 months to be exact) since I last updated the blog. This is due to the simple fact that I recently became a graduate student. For those of your considering graduate school, a word of warning: it requires a lot of work. Like more than you've ever done it your life. Sleeping...eating...bathing...buying toilet paper...All of these things become luxuries that you will do in you "free" time. What I'm trying to say is that blogging, at least for me, gets pushed way down on the list of priorities, thus explaining my 3-month hiatus.

Why am I choosing now to break my silence, you ask? It's simple. I saw an article on nytimes.com today that I could not pass up commenting on. The article, entitled "Fearing Crime, Japanese Wear the Hiding Place," is about the recent invention of a couple of fashions designed to prevent crime. How can fashion be used to prevent crime? Well, when your skirt unfolds into an uncanny representation of a vending machine behind which you can hide from would-be attackers it's simple.

All in all a pretty good disguise, if you ask me, though a little impractical since you'd have to wear your vending machine convertible skirt at all times to ensure safety. One tip I would like to offer any prospective buyers of this product: if you do find yourself hiding from attackers behind this false vending machine, be sure to do a better job of hiding your feet than this model has done. It would be a shame to be given away by a pair of bright white sneakers.

I was a little less convinced by this design:

This convertible backpack is supposed to make a small child look like a fire hydrant. I'm not convinced. I see a lot more child than fire hydrant. And standing next to an actual fire hydrant doesn't really help the matter either.

It really only highlights a few key giveaways: (1) real fire hydrants don't wear jeans; and (2) real fire hydrants don't have small boys attached to them.

So while I applaud Japan's never-ending pursuit of innovation, I think this invention could use a few more days in the laboratory.

Rampant Consumerism

2007-07-23T05:39:00.000+09:00

If I've said it once, I've said it a million times: if you leave America and then come back after a couple of years abroad, things that you may have never noticed before become very apparent. You've seen me gush about the amount of green in America, for example. Recently I've become aware of the rampant consumerism promoted on American TV. Now I'm sure these observations are by no means ground breaking, but I like to point out absurdity wherever it lurks.

One of the first commercials I saw after returning from France was for KFC's Chicken and Biscuit Bowl, a concoction consisting of fried chicken, cheese, corn, gravy, and a biscuit all served on a bed of mashed potatoes.

Imagine the horror this image caused a person accustomed to dining on only the finest French cheese and wine. I am amazed that companies can get away with marketing such blatantly unhealthy food. The sad part is, this doesn't even come close to the unhealthiest food being marketed these days (see also the Wendy's Baconator or McDonalds Deluxe Breakfast).

I have to say that my favorite fast food campaign, the one that I really love to hate, is Taco Bell's "Fourthmeal." Yes, Taco Bell, in its infinite wisdom, has decided that 3 meals a day just isn't enough for today's active American; what is needed is a "fourthmeal" between dinner and breakfast. Many Taco Bells are open until 2 or 3AM to provide more people with their much needed "fourthmeal." Let me tell you something--I've seen a lot of Americans in my day, and the last thing most of them need is a midnight snack consisting of fried "Mexican" food.

Fast food companies aren't the only ones trying to sell us things we don't need that may actually be more harmful than helpful. The other big offender is--you guessed it--drug companies. Recently, a drug to combat RLS (Restless Leg Syndrome for the uninitiated) has been introduced and marketed on TV. Feel free to disagree with me, but as a "sufferer" of RLS I can say that it's not something I've ever felt the need to cure. In fact, a nurse once told me that the leg shaking caused by RLS was a way for the body to expend excess calories, something it would probably need to do after a Fourthmeal or Chicken and Biscuit Bowl.

On a recent commercial, I noticed some alarming side effects for this drug: "Side effects may include dry mouth, ..., increased urges to gamble, and increased sexual urges." Now I ask you, which is worse: having a leg that shakes from time to time or being a compulsive gambler? I imagine the conversation would go something like this:

"Hey Jim, how's your RLS?"

"Thanks for asking, Bob. This new drug I'm taking is really doing the trick. My leg no longer shakes and I no longer have that creepy-crawly feeling in my legs."

"That's great to hear."

"Yeah, the only problem is, I now have a compulsive urge to gamble. Can't quite seem to control it. Funny story actually--I went to Vegas last weekend and lost my family's savings. My wife is threatening to leave me."

"Because of the gambling?"

"Well that certainly doesn't help, but she's more concerned about the sex addiction I've developed. Ever since I started taking this drug, I can't seem to suppress my desire to have sex with strangers. I joined a group, but so far it's proving impossible to control, especially with my weekly visits to Vegas."

"Well, I'm sorry to hear that Jim, but at least your leg doesn't shake anymore."

"Amen to that."

Morality Quiz

2007-06-01T01:08:00.000+09:00

I was concerned that when I moved back to the United States, I would no longer have anything to write about on the blog, that I would have to resign myself to writing my memoirs of Japan and France. Oh how the events of last week proved me wrong.

Living where I do, there's basically no work available for a trilingual monkey expert, so I have had to look for work that I am, shall we say, overqualified for. The sad part is, I am usually rejected from such jobs. Last Sunday, I perused the classified for jobs that someone might possibly hire me for. There was one ad for temporary work to help stock a new store--Bed Bath & Beyond--opening soon in my town.

They were doing the hiring en masse at a hotel in town. So I went to the hotel at the appointed time and joined about 15 other people filling out applications in a small conference room. The application was normal enough; and when I turned it in, I was given a survey to fill out. At first, I thought nothing of it, figuring it to be a survey about the interview process or the company itself. But as I opened it up, I realized it was a survey of a completely different nature. It was a multiple choice and true/false morality quiz.

I hope my readers can appreciate the utter absurdity of having a morality quiz; for, as anyone who does well on tests can tell you, you have to mark what you think the teacher wants you to mark and not what you feel is the correct answer. It's all a game to score the most points. This is only the absurdity inherent in the test, however, and it does not compete with the absurdity of most of the questions.Most of the questions centered unsurprisingly on shoplifting and taking from one's company. They problem was that these accounted for 2/3 of the questions and the same thing was asked over and over.

Here is a sampling of the questions from the multiple choice portion of the quiz:

I have shoplifted in the last week.