Meeting Jamie

AM

Least: By 10:40am, I was within a whisker of being late for my far-off shift near the shores of Lake Biwa. Because the timing of my journey was so tight, I had only minutes of flexibility between my arrival time and clock in. My train was running three minutes late according to the sign and according to another electronic display it was because of a "Human Damage Accident" (some guy saw the same think and made the same tired remarks). I can only assume that some poor former salary-man had decided to end it earlier in the morning - a sad price to pay for being so stoic.


Most: At 10:25am, I caught my first view of Lake Biwa and was surprised at both its size and at the industrial wasteland that surrounded it. From the deathly still airs of Kyoto it is hard to image such a massive lake lurking just behind a mountain range or two. The internet tells me that the lake is home to unique freshwater wildlife and an annual birdman competition that has run since 1977. Too bad  I will have to wait until 2010 to see it.

PM

Least: Not long after 6:00pm, I was once again lost in the JR Station maze at Umeda. I am beginning to believe that it is a living animal and changes every time I have the misfortune in visiting it. I knew that I was doomed before I even reached the wrong exit gate. To compound matters, a decrepit old man was taking a lifetime to charge his ICOCA card and my frustration only served to get me more lost. By the time I reached the Midisuji line, I felt like I'd walked a couple of kilometres - mostly in circles and at one point outside. My travel horror was capped off back at Nankai station where I missed my train by seconds - the conductor showed no mercy.


大きな地図で見る

Most: Approaching 9:00pm, Rosie and I were just finishing our meal at a local yakitori place when a youngish Japanese guy with a heavy American accent introduced himself at Jamie. What at first seemed a normal friendly introduction quickly became a bizarre and rambling monologue. Jamie was speaking as if he was straight from some acid trip from the 1960s and he actually sounded a lot like Dennis Hopper in Apocolypse Now. He spoke perfect English, but not one of his sentences made sense and we were reduced to uhuhing and yepping. His rant went along the lines of '... so man I didn't bring many apples so with my professer is was just like, man just go and check out how the water's flowing you know. I mean what is night? Turn black into day red into green man and it's either one or the other if its the other of the one man...' and so on and so forth. His goodbye consisted of a 'stay groovy' and a 'have a good life man'. Needless to say the other Japanese diners were literally staring at him with their mouths open. A truly strange experience.