this seems about right

i stole this from some forum post but found it was good in continuing with my japanese theme of the day. it was a brochure an ex pat living in japan received from his travel agent prior to flying to back to the u.s. it was basically a guide on what to expect and prepare for when you visit the u.s. here are the bullet points that i found most important:

• The yen is very strong against the dollar right now. This will make goods in America seem very cheap -- an excellent opportunity for shopping! However, remember to be polite in your use of money -- America is in the middle of economic malaise right now, and Japanese people with wads of money in their hand might be looked on with envy. Besides, if you are obviously wealthy in an American city, you may be robbed.
• Most Americans are very polite, particularly outside of the big cities. However, outside of the big cities, everyone owns guns. Inside the big cities, almost everyone owns guns. Let's be polite together!
• Most Americans think we look like Chinese or Koreans. Try not to be too offended.
• Most Americans will think that a Japanese person standing on the street is an American, unless they are holding a camera. If you are not comfortable speaking English, you might try bringing along a camera to say "I am a tourist, please don't expect me to speak English." Except, don't try this in the big cities -- tourists get mugged in big cities.
• In general, Americans consider it impolite to discuss politics. However, this January Obama will become the new president, and many people are excited! If they ask you what you think of him, a safe answer is [English] "Obama is really cool." or [English] "Obama speaks so well. Not like me. Hehe." Be very careful when pronouncing his name. O BA MA, just like Obama City.
• Ladies: if you shop for clothes, ask for where to find [English] "petite". It means normal sized. Ladies who are petite may have difficulty finding clothes which fit in America, except at specialty shops.

even though i have never traveled there, i think this list is forcing my hand and i must generate some tips for americans traveling to japan.







"it's pronounced 'o-bah-mah' motherfucker, get it right or go back to koreatown...."

this seems like a dream

seriously japan...what the fuck is wrong with you and how did you become so awesome?

the enchanted forest seems disturbing

seriously, wtf? this appeared to be a normal shopping center with a petco and safeway, but apparently watching over these stores is a horrifying goblin king that's all lit from underneath to accentuate it's tear-inducing appearance. maybe they just want to keep kids outta there.

better quit before i recycle your face

there is this old guy that lives a few houses over. he is kind of weird. he goes by many names in our house, but we most often refer to him as "abraham lincoln". i've noticed that he parks in front of our house a lot, even when the spots in front of his house are empty. he has a son that louise, dave and i refer to as "fake louis" due to the fact that he kind of looks like louis and drives a similar car. his son does the same thing. many times i will get home at the same time as one of them, only to see them park right next to me, while there are plenty of empty parking spots directly in front of their house, get out of their car and walk the couple of houses over to get to their house. now this never really bothered me. i always thought it was weird, but there is usually plenty of parking in front of our houses, so whatever...

now that louis has moved out, dave and i have been left to handle the house recycling. the last few times we have left out our recycling bin, we received a warning note telling us that they will not take our recycling if we put plastic bags in it. i just assumed that we accidentally put some bags in there, so i made it a point to make sure and check the bin before we put it out. a few weeks ago we got the note again and i was like "these recycling guys are crazy." i know for a fact that there were no plastic bags in there.

then one morning after i had taken the bin out for collection, i was making breakfast when i happened to look out the window and see abe bringing a bunch of plastic bags filled with cans and dropping them into our bin. wtf? why? now he is like 3 houses down, and if for whatever reason he wanted to put his recycling into someone else's recycling, that meant he skipped over a couple of the other houses' bins with the specific intention of putting his cans in our bin.


well now i realized that that's why we kept getting those warnings. so i went outside, emptied the cans into our bin and put the plastic bags on his front porch, hoping it would send him the message that we were onto him. well the bags were still there 4 days later, so i think any potential message was lost.

we got home late last night, so dave went ahead and put our bin out for collection. he told us that abe lincoln struck again! dave went outside like an hour after he put the bin out and noticed a plastic bag full of magazines were now in the bin. dave took the magazines out and placed them in a common area in between our houses that is yet another spot that you can put your recycling. what a weirdo.

this morning as i was leaving to go to work, i noticed another mysterious plastic bag in our yet to be collected recycling bin. apparently not satisfied with putting just his magazines in our bin, he decided he would step it up for a second round and put a giant bag of cans in our bin. so i took out the cans and placed them next to the magazines. i am not sure if the recycling guys will pick them up or not, but abe needs to stop.

this is one of those issues that's tough for me because i really shouldn't be that annoyed by it. it's not a big deal at all. i mean, besides the threat of not having your recycling picked up because some weirdo puts plastic bags in there. but it really is very annoying. it's such a mundane issue that really makes no difference in my life and yet i am bothered by it.

i guess the recycling combined with the parking issue together make a semi-viable complaint or else a questioning on why? why us? if you were living directly next door...maybe. but you don't. you can order a recycling bin for free from p.g. county and even if you didn't want to be bothered, you could leave your recycling outside without the bin and they will still pick it up. or if you didn't like that idea and were worried about your recycling getting lonely, why not put it in the bin of one of your neighbors? or in the common pickup area almost directly in front of your house? you bypass their bins and walk over to our house and put your shit there. why? it seriously boggles my mind.

because it is an issue that appears to be of minimal importance and because they don't know that we know, i will feel sort of silly going up to them and asking why or telling them to quit doing it. i also might not want to know why they have chosen our house. hopefully they're not stalking one of us (and if they are...hopefully it is jessie) instead i plan on being passive-aggressive and post a note on the bin saying something like:

To Whoever Is Putting Their Recycling In Our Bin,

If you do not have a recycling bin, you can order one for free here:
http://www.co.pg.md.us/government/agencyindex/
der/about_recycling.asp

If you still need to put your recycling in our bin, for whatever reason, please note that they will not take plastic bags and have refused our recycling in the past because of this. PLEASE DO NOT PUT YOUR PLASTIC BAGS IN OUR RECYCLE BIN!!! Thanks.

phil thinks that the exclamation points and all caps end to the note are a little too much. i'm not sure yet. i want to make sure that they notice it. but it might be too dark anyways when we put our bin out, so i dunno. maybe i can print it out on some crazy neon paper, or i can wait until the morning to put it out, hopefully getting it out there before the collection guys come through our neighborhood. we shall see.