A Moment of Silence

Just a quick post to let you know that I have not been slacking, but mourning. For, as you are most likely already aware, a great cat of American history passed recently. Socks, the Clinton's White House cat left us at the ripe old age of 18. He was a patriot, a friend, and although the Obama administration seemingly refuses to acknowledge it, Socks was clearly the first half black, half white "cat" to take up residency at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

This blog's for you, old buddy.

Japanese Driver License Part 2 (a.k.a. That's what you get for telling the truth)

OK, so I went to Google Maps and recon'd the route from our apartment to the DMV. No big deal, just a couple of highways, no tolls, and a couple of turns. The main difficulty with such a drive is that our tiny family car has no Navigation Computer or "navicom". There is no guarantee that the road you want to turn on to will have a name or a number clearly marked. Most Japanese roads have no name at all, actually, which is befuddling for an American, to say the least. Lord knows how the postmen deliver the mail in this country, but they do with mysterious accuracy. Except for the guy who apparently throws various random pieces of mail into the rain gutter outside my in-laws' mailbox. Weird. In any case, Japanese road systems and navigation are best left for a separate post, I think. It would take too much time to explain here.

We got up early because as I believe I previously described, you have to be there within a 30 minute window or you are out of luck, and if it's crowded you may be out of luck anyway because they only take so many applicants per day. Also, there was a small paper sign there on the window indicating that on particular dates they would only take up to 12 applicants. Luckily the day we went was not busy, nor limited. We found free parking close by, signed in on the clip board and I was number 3 on the list. Seemingly going very smoothly at this point. Man, I was ready. I was even prepared to take the true false test and the eye exam which have some challenges you may not think of at first. On the true false test, you must mark your answers Japanese style: "O" for True and "X" for False. Then, the eye exam is a series of "C's" on each of which you must tell them which way the ends of the letter are pointing: up (ue), down (shita), left (hidari), or right (migi) in Japanese. After not getting lost on the way there, I should have been alerted to the fact that it was too easy thus far.


My name is called, and I go up to the desk. I lay out my translated California license, my passport, foreigner card, etc. I'm ready for anything except what the guy asks first. "So, are you in the military?" I think the haircut gave it away. As an officer and a gentleman, honor is my touchstone, so of course I say "Yes". Please revisit Part 1 below to read about my buddy who was failed after telling the truth in order to further appreciate the irony of my own situation. Doh! My first and last mistake of the day. I thought the 10 question true or false test was going to be my greatest challenge of the day, and I ended up failing the one question test that I didn't anticipate. Always expect the unexpected, but no one expects the Spanish Inquisition.

So, it turns out that when you're on SOFA status and you have a military license already you are not allowed to have a concurrent Japanese license. Something about not wanting you to rack up 5 accidents and 20 parking tickets on one license and then just whipping out the clean one the next time the cops stop you. How paranoid of them, with me being so honest and all. It seems that when you are a month out from the end of your tour, you can get paperwork indicating that this is the case and you can return to apply for your Japanese license. Great.

Thus, dejected at the time, effort and 3,000 Yen for translating my old license wasted, but still authorized to drive on the wrong side of the road, we left and went home empty handed except for the experience. One more well planned mission with no tangible results. There is always a silver lining however, as it turns out that the DMV is one of the best places in Japan to watch flocks of 20 year old girls in short skirts as they come to take their tests. ;-)

Japanese Driver License Part 1

Tomorrow, I go to the DMV, or whatever they call it, to complete part 1 of my drivers' license fiasco. If you Google "Japanese driver license", you will begin to understand why I use the term "fiasco".

I had to take a train 40 minutes downtown Friday to get my California license translated. Luckily, I had saved my old license that was issued in 2004. I got a fresh one in August 2008 before I moved because my old one was expiring in late 2009. I figured I would save myself the hassle of jumping through my butt to get a new one on any potential vacation/visit to the U.S. in '09 by getting a new license that would last 5 years. It turns out you have to show that you have to have stayed in the issuing country for at least 90 days after you get the license, which I did not. Not sure why that would matter since I've been driving since I was 16, but I suppose they have no way of knowing that. On the other hand, if I had stayed there 90 days afterward, there's no guarantee that I had ever driven other than to pass the test, nor any guarantee that I'd driven at all during the 90 day period. Still not sure what's up with that, but this is Japan and there are many rules everyone must follow to promote mutual harmony, yadda, yadda.

The process is basically easy and all evidence indicates that it is unnecessarily cumbersome in order to extract a certain amount of monetary compensation for giving you a Japanese license. Japanese citizens pay thousands of dollars to private driving schools because they are forced to by the system. Then, the Japanese government treats them as "professional" drivers. This results in such things as both parties being at least partially at fault, regardless of the circumstances of a given accident. If one is considered a "professional" driver, then surely one could have done something to avoid the accident. You know, like not emigrating here in the first place. Whatever. Bottom line is that most gaikokujin don't pass at the first go. You pay fees for application, photos, test car rental, etc. It all adds up to 5,000 Yen or so, I guess. We'll see. Then, after they fail you the first time, I hear you are "invited" to attend their Saturday one hour class/practice session taught by the same guys who do the testing for about 8,000 Yen or so. Are you starting to understand the system yet? My buddy did pretty well on his first test, but before the tester told him whether he passed or failed, he asked him whether or not he had attended their Saturday class. So, being the honest guy he is he says "No, I didn't". Then, the guy tells him, "Oh, well you didn't pass today, so I'd recommend going to that class". Hmmmm. Interesting sequence of events. In any case, we all pass in the end, although my buddy met a guy from Brazil there who'd taken at least 6 tests and gave him all kinds of great tips on the course. Another odd thing is that they pair you up like in high school driver's education during the test. So, one joker is sitting in the back seat watching the first guy fail. Seems like an advantage, but maybe they're harder on the second bubba. Who knows.

Tomorrow is only step 1, in any case. All you can do the first day is fill out the paper application, take the eye exam and the paper test. For foreigners translating their home country's driver license, the paper exam is a joke. It's 10 true or false questions. You need 7 correct to pass. You will probably miss one or two due to vagaries of the question or the Japanese system, but the test is given in English, and common sense helps you pass no problem, from what I understand. Assuming the best, you get an appointment for your practical exam. Gotta miss work for that I suppose. They aren't open weekends. Also, they only take applications from 0830 - 0900. At 0901, you are screwed. Come back again later. Sorry it took you an hour to get here, blah, blah, blah. Tough love.

The great irony of my particular situation is that I will drive myself and my lovely wife/translator (From the prefectural web site: * We do not have translators in house, so please furnish one yourself.) to the DMV tomorrow morning. I have a SOFA license, so I can legally drive here anyway. Maybe I'm just being masochistic, but I feel the need to have an actual license for the long run.

Wish me luck!

2009 02 15 Notes

So, we went to the mall to get towels, shelving (which we forgot to buy and will have to go back for), and groceries. Of course, we also ended up buying a new rice cooker and a paper shredder, which we needed but weren't planning on buying today. We definitely needed the shredder since I mucked up our older one with some sort of unidentified adhesive or plastic, much like I killed the one before that. Seems like a pattern.

In any case I saw this:

and I thought, " I gotta get me some of that".

It was great, by the way.

Then, I noticed a certain

Which, at the book store seems to have taken the form of Obamamania.

Good for Japan. "Audacity of Hope" is an excellent read. Particularly the chapter on his take on foreign relations.

Graduate Degree in Trash

Does your municipality require you to study and follow a trash schedule such as this?



Mine does.

• Sunday is a trash holiday
• Monday is burnable trash (a general category for stuff that doesn't fit into the others, however I suppose they assume the average citizen's level of common sense because really, what can't you burn with the proper fuel or accelerant?)
• Tuesday is recyclable paper such as white paper, newspapers, and cardboard. However, don't just put your cardboard out as is. You have to break down all boxes and fold into roughly 2 foot by 1 foot pieces wrapped in packing tape, which is nicer than how I generally wrap Christmas presents.
• Wednesday is a trash holiday except for 2 summer months when I think they take burnable trash an extra day a week.
• Thursday is for pet bottles, glass bottles, and steel cans
• Friday is burnable trash again
• Saturday is for plastic and styrofoam

If you have large objects, you have to pay for a sticker and properly dispose of them, which is quite expensive. Or, you can hail one of the recycling business junk trucks as they cruise the neighborhood a couple times a week shouting at you over a loud speaker the list of crap they will take from you. You probably have to pay them, too, but perhaps not as much. In any case, this system leads to many abandoned washing machines, bicycles, and even cars. Our trash point in particular has had a bicycle sitting there for a month. No one will touch it so it rusts. I could have fixed it by adding a seat and new tires, but then you get in trouble for having a bike that's not yours. In America, it's finders keepers for the most part, but here you can get into trouble even if what you're doing is essentially a good deed. So, again, the bike sits and rusts and is generally a blight on our street.

Do you know how to use your microwave/range?

I don't.

We bought a new $800 range/microwave, and I have no idea how to use it. It came with a massive manual. All it really has are 6 buttons and a dial. Of course since everything is written in Japanese it's an extra challenge. It seems to run forever to reheat food, although I was able to brown a pizza this morning for a snack.






These are, of course, crappy camera phone photos, but you get my drift. Besides, I'm an amateur with no opposable thumbs, so what do you want.

So, this is my blog

I'm an American cat living in Japan, and I needed an outlet for my experiences and thoughts, so here it is for your reading pleasure.

Enjoy!