The Sudo's

So Johnny Foreigner Bank call us and say "Yes, God, yes, of course you can have a loan. How much do you want?"
Nice Johnny Foreigner Bank (NJFB).
Amidst all the cheering and popping of champagne corks, NJFB say they need a couple of things from us, including some documents from Sudo home.
Cheering immediately stops. Cue ominous sound of distant thunder.
"Ahh", I hesitantly reply, "that would entail me contacting Sudo Home again, would it?"
"Yes".
Ominous sound of distant thunder grows louder.
"You wouldn't like to contact them yourselves, directly like", I offer.
"No. You need to do it."
Ominous sound of thunder growing louder and not so distant anymore.
"Right then", I mutter, "I, emm, will see what I can do".
Forked lightening flashes outside my office window. Wind begins to moan, a low and anguished sound.
Hands shaking, I pick up the phone.
I put it back down again.
I need to figure out who I need to speak to.
Sudo somebody. The guy in charge of the real estate section. The guy who rang us the week before and sent a small earthquake of panic rippling through the greater Muroran area. Him. And I can't remember the fecker's first name.
Ahh, but I have a copy of the purchase contract here with me in the office. And there is his name. Written in kanji. Laboriously translate the name - Sudo, Toshi...ko...Sudo Toshiko, that's my man.
Thunder has stopped and sunlight seems to be breaking through the clouds outside. Pick up the phone and ring the office.
"Hello, this is Brian Gaynor. Can I speak to Sudo Toshiko, please".
"Sorry", replies the secretary, "could you say your name again, please?"
Repeat my name.
"Ahh, Mr. Gaynor. Ahh, yes". There is a note of fear in her voice. In the background I hear screams, what sounds like a panic stampede to the exits, and the sound of glass breaking.
"And, ehh, you want to speak to..."
"Mr. Sudo Toshiko, please".
There is a momentarily silence at the other end of the line. I'm not sure, but I think I can hear tumbleweeds blowing through the empty office.
"Sorry, who?"
"Mr Sudo Toshiko".
"Ehh, nobody by that name works here".
The momentarily silence is now at my end of the line.
"Erhhhh..." Panic grips me too.
"Do you mean Toshihiro Sudo, the company president?" she offers helpfully.
I lose all reason and blabber, "No, no, he's not the president, he's much younger than that".
"Maybe Vice-President Sudo...?"
"No, not him either", I say in an increasingly shrill voice. "He's a young guy. Has a full head of hair. In charge of the real estate section". Christ, how many feckin Sudo's are there in the shagging company?
The secretary is by now completely convinced that everything she has heard about 'Gaynor, the mad foreigner' is true.
"Ehhh, do you mean Sudo Masatoshi..?"
"Yes! yes! of course! Sudo Masatoshi! My man Masatoshi. That's who I want. Put that fecker on the phone now!" Oh, sweet relief.
A pause.
"Sudo Masatoshi speaking".
"Ahh Mr. Masatoshi. At last. It's so good to hear your voice. Forgive me. Good morning to you. Listen, about the home loan, we need to get a few more documents from you".
"The home loan?"
"Yes, the home loan", obviously old Masatoshi hasn't had his necessary fill of morning coffee. "The bank need you to send them the following documents".
"The bank...?"
"Yes, the bank, Shinsei Bank, down in Tokyo. The bank we are getting the loan from. The bank you have been negotiating with on our behalf". Jesus, you'd swear Masatoshi ate a extra big bowl of retard rice for breakfast this morning.
Another pause. Finally he says,
"Sorry, who is this?"
A terrible feeling settles upon me.
"Ehh, Brian Gaynor, from Muroran", I hoarsely whisper.
"And this is about?"
"The house in Tenjin-cho".
"Ahh, Mr. Mad Foreigner Brian Gaynor-san. I have heard of you. I have, however, thankfully never met you before in my hitherto peaceful life. The person you need to talk to Sudo Takashi".
"Sudo Takashi."
"Yes. And unfortunately, he is out of the office all day. Will I get him to call you this evening?"
"Call me?", I mutter, "No, ask him to call my wife..."

A Star is born!

Yesterday Cian made his way-way-the-hell-off Broadway debut at the Mizumoto Nursery School Play / Performance Art / Random Body Movements Accompanied by Bad Music Show.

"A towering triumph" - The New York Times

"Spellbinding in its raw, visceral, physical intensity" - The Guardian

"What the hell was all that about?" - an utterly baffled father.

The kids, in the true spirit of Fame, put the show on right there! And we all watched. And wondered. What do they mix in to the school milk?

For an exclusive look - only for you, esteemed readers of the Gaynor-Takahashi Blog, all three of you - click on the link below and experience the true majesty of motion that is the human body.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TP4Mf5cQmqg

The school year here in Japan ends this month so March is a seemingly never ending procession of graduation ceremonies. They like their graduation ceremonies here. Oh, they really do. You finish in the Nursery School and go to run out the door - not so fast, graduation ceremony. At the end of six years in elementary school - graduation ceremony. Get through Junior High School - hey, graduation ceremony. Go on to High School and three years later, a tad predictably at this stage, graduation ceremony. Higher education beckons and yes, four years later, you've guessed it, graduation ceremony. Maybe your ambitious, continue your third level studies and do a Masters, and lo, and indeed, behold, a whole two years later, another graduation ceremony, just in case you had forgotten what the preceding five were like. And maybe by this stage you have become a hardcore addict, who desperately needs his fix of bathetic speeches and arcane rituals, so why not go for broke, get a doctorate and three years later find yourself at yet another graduation ceremony.

Then, of course, there are the corresponding 'Entrance Ceremonies' for all these educational milestones. And somewhere in between, maybe a smattering of actual learning.

Gnarly

The weekend before last a big low pressure system bullied its way over Hokkaido, bringing with it gale force winds, sub-zero temperatures, lots of snow, and most importantly, a big, heavy, winter swell.

The waves were easily the biggest this season so far, the occasional break topping three metres. It meant that Itanki beach, my usual surf spot, was closed out, so I ended up down at Uzu, where there is a left hand point break that only really works on a combination of a big swell and low tide. And we had both the Saturday before last. 10 fools, their surfboards and more enthusiasm than sense. A little too early in the season for my liking - the paddle out and the duck diving were fairly intense - but the reward came with three great rides on some big, big waves.

(In the the photo above, there are three surfers in the picture. Can you see them?)

Birthday Girl

It was Sanae's birthday last week. She turned 35, no wait, 34 I think, no, no, she's claiming she is in fact 33 but that may well be early middle-aged despair talking. To date she has received the sum total of one, yes, count 'em, one birthday card, from her beloved husband (and she is not happy about that people, not happy at all). To make up for the cruel, heartless, cruelly heartless indifference of everyone else in her so-called 'family', I whisked her off to the Windsor Hotel for Sunday lunch. Or rather, 'prolonged Sunday grazing' as it should really be called. The Windsor Hotel (host of the 2008 G8 summit, trivia fans) does this rather good all-you-can-eat buffet on a Sunday and the three of us put it to the test. The deserts get an overwhelming thumbs up (God, the cream cheesecake with the raspberry sauce..), the sauteed oysters, equally fine, with the meat dishes penalized a point or two for the overpowering sauces they were served with. The curry, though, was damn fine, the chunky tender pieces of pork and the dry, saffron flavored fluffy rice putting the lie to the myth that the Japanese can't cook a decent curry (though, by and large, they can't). The way Cian savaged the bread rolls means another three stars there, and of course there was the spectacular view from the restaurant itself, with the azure blue of lake Toya below us, and the snow clad majesty of Yotei-zan looming in the distance.

After the lunch we decided to go a for a premptive walk before our stomachs exploded. However, Cian refused, so Sanae had to carjack the hotel's courtesy Roll Royce and we had a race to the beach at Uzu. We ditched the Rolls in the water and ambled along the sand, pretending to be overweight American tourists before the cold wind drove us into my car and back home (with Cian alternately snoring and farting the whole way back. Too much raspberry sauce).

All in all a nice day out (solitary birthday card notwithstanding).

Super Tsunami Sunday!!

(Pictured above: The author Tsunami spotting)

So, there I was in the water, on a perfect Sunday morning – or what passes for 'perfect' this time of year: no wind, no snow, faint fog in the air to cut down on the sun's glare, bang on low tide, and waves, nice, shoulder high, crumbly waves, rolling through one after the other. Admittedly my 7mm 'dead squid' wetsuit was a bit heavy, and the sub-zero air temperature made bloody sure you wouldn't mistake Itanki beach for Hawaii, but, and this 'but' pretty much forgives everything cold and winter like, but there was only me in the water.

Like I said, on a Sunday morning.

At low tide.

With sweet, forgiving, shoulder high waves.

Unbelievable.

Whooarrrrr went I as hung ten, fifteen and other multiples of five on wave after wave. And each time I rode one into the shore I would cast my eyes up to the car park and check for the hoardes. But they never came.

Unbelievable. Bordering, perhaps, just a shade on the spooky side too.

Anyway, I had been doing my best Laird Hamilton (google him, non-surfers) for close on 50 minutes when I espy two guys running down from the car park towards the shore. Waving at me.

I wave back. That's the type of friendly surfer dude that I am.

They wave back. They're friendly guys too. I'm feeling a lot of love down here in Itanki beach this Sunday morning.

They keep waving. Dedicated friendly guys. Actually, it looks more like their gesticulating rather than waving. Kind of gesticulating for me to come in.

I am still pondering this when I espy (I never just 'notice', I always 'espy') flashing red lights and a police car pulls up in the car park, a member of Muroran Five-O leaps out, comes running down the beach towards the water waving, no, him too, gesticulating at me.

Man, I think, they want to arrest me for being just too damn awesome on the water. I consider making a break for it, or at least catching another wave before they take me away to the Hokkaido equivalent of San Quentin, but they getting fairly frantic so I figure I'd better paddle in before the bullets start flying.

Turns out the two guys are from the Japanese Coastguard and I think they and the policeman are just as surprised to see me, a foreigner emerging from the water, as I am to see them.

“Do you speak Japanese?” I do. Not all the time admittedly, but when I have to.

“You have to stop surfing. It is too dangerous. There is a tsunami coming!”

I peer anxiously over my shoulder but all I can see is wave after unridden wave.

“Are you sure?” I ask them, casting another glance at the suspiciously tsunami free ocean.

“Yes, yes. The earthquake in Chile, you know, yesterday, there is a big tsunami coming. Coming fast. You have to leave the water now.”

The policeman pats his gun holster for added emphasis.

Actually, he doesn't. Rather he half heartedly waves this small fluorescent red baton he's holding. Part of me thinks they may be jealous locals, envious of my free-flowing, jazz like improvisations on the waves, a sort of surfing Miles Davis (though without the crippling heroin habit). Another, more sensible married-man-and-father-to-a-three-year-old-son part of me thinks of Thailand, Indonesia, Sri Lanka that Christmas Eve a couple of years back.

I decide to head for the high ground.

Postscript:

Two days later the local newspaper reported that Muroran had indeed been engulfed by a 10cm tsunami. Yes, that's right dear reader, ten whole centimetres of oceanic fury. I owe my life to those two coastguard guys.

Walking..., no falling down in the snow!

I have a backlog of posts to get through from the previous week, so without further ado we will begin with last Saturday's walk in the woods. This time the woods were up in the mountains behind the university, home to foxes, deer and bears. In other words, Cian-type country. The boy wanted to go hunting, replenish the winter supplies, but Mammy wouldn't let him. Said he could hurt himself. So Cian reluctantly put his ivory hilted bowie knife away, wiped off the camouflage paint and had to make do with simply walking.

But not for long. There had been a thaw earlier in the week, so the snow was soft and sinkable, and walking quickly became postholing. But luckily Cian had a plan B. It was called 'Daddy's shoulders'. Up he went, and down I went into the snow. Stumble, trip, stumble, trip, stumble, stumble, arrrraghh, feck, arse, feck, stumble, trip, etc. we went through the woods. I think the foxes, deer and bears were watching from behind the trees and laughing at us.

Home loans

Home loans. Grrrrr!

As I wrote in a previous post, we are in the long, ever more protracted process of buying a house here in Muroran. What we thought would be a relatively pain free experience has turned into a grim, grubby ordeal, akin to Ireland's scrummage at Twinkenham last Saturday - lots of effort, very little gain.

To give you the Reader's Digest version of events: Back in January we went to our local bank, the Hokkaido Bank (henceforth referred to as 'them feckers'), to apply for a home loan. As Sanae and myself are both in public jobs, we are about as gilt-edged, triple A+ worthy loan applicants as you can be - the sort that are highlighted in the bank's end of year financial report to show just how prudent they are in dealing with their mortgages. So first day, smiles all round as them feckers gladly handed over the application forms, told us to sign here, here and here.

We left. Then the trouble started. First up was my 'Johnny foreigner' status. Them feckers call a week later to say because I'm not a rice eating native, I can't go guarantor on the loan. Explain it's the law. It's not, as it turns out, they are just hiding behind that an excuse to mask their latent xenophobia. Then them (racist) feckers call again another week later to say that because of Sanae's prior health problems, the insurance company (henceforth referred to as 'them arses') insuring the loan aren't happy. They want a medical certificate from Sanae's doctor. This takes two weeks to get from the hospital. Then, remarkably, after we have submitted this, it takes them feckers and them arses a further two weeks to read the one page medical certificate and decide that Sanae is too much of a health risk to insure. So them feckers reject our loan application. Sanae has to be physically restrained from fire-bombing the bank building.

However, all is not lost. As the mendacity of them feckers and them arses was becoming ever more apparent, we decided to apply to a more 'Johnny Foreigner' friendly bank (henceforth referred to as the 'Johnny Foreigner' friendly bank). Even though I don't have permanent residency here in Japan, they will accept an application in my name regardless of the fact that I prefer potatoes to rice. As my health is a wonder to behold, there are no issues with the mandatory loan insurance and Sanae can go co-guarantor on the loan without having to submit a health certificate.

The only drawback is that the 'Johnny Foreigner' friendly bank is based down in Tokyo, so everything is via the post which slows things down considerably. Which in turn has had a knock on effect with the house. We were due to assume legal ownership of the house today, the first of March, with the intention of moving in by the end of this month (the house has been used as a show house up until yesterday), but thanks to gombeen antics of them feckers and them arses, that isn't going to happen.

We have been keeping the house developer updated on our progress, or rather lack of progress, in obtaining a loan, but as the days moved closer to the official close-of-contract day, tensions rose. Well, specifically, Sanae's tensions rose. I was my usual human manifestation of infinite karma, while Cian was too excited by the fact that he had just had his first poo in the 'big toilet' (see Sanae's blog for details of that breaking story).

On Wednesday night we got a call from the developer. Sanae was in the bath with Cian so I took the call. He wanted to speak with Sanae but when I explained, he said fine, he'd call back in a fifteen minutes or so. I relay this to Sanae when she emerges from the bathroom. Naturally, she assumes the worst - we can't get the loan so they want to cancel the contract and refund our deposit because they have another buyer lined up. Thunderstorm clouds swirl around her still wet head.

I, as always, begin singing a haunting four session Tibetan healing chod from the beautiful liturgy of Chenrezi, the bodhisattva of compassion, to calm her down, but extraordinarily, it has no discernible effect.

I sing louder.

Sanae tells me to shut up. She wants to ring back the developer back and beg for financial mercy. She asks me the name of the caller as they are a father and son outfit. I reply, in between verses of the chod, that I didn't catch the name, but I think it was the father.

We don't have the father's mobile number, so Sanae rings the company office to see if anyone there can give it to her. It's 8.30 in the evening and this being Japan, of course there is somebody still in the office. He gives us the father's number. Sanae calls him. The old man doesn't have a clue what Sanae is on about. Hasn't rung us at all. Sanae apologizes profusely and shoots me a look, which had I not been concentrating on the teachings of Kunzang Denchen Lingpan on the nature of mind instructions, would have disemboweled me.

The old man calls us back. He has checked with the office and nobody there called us either. But he'll keep trying. By now the office is, we imagine, on full alert, sirens blaring, people sliding down poles and rushing to their desks to try and contain the fallout from the mysterious 'Gaynor' phone call.

Sanae tries calling the son, but can't get through to him. Old man calls back; am I sure somebody from the company called? Yes, I am. In the background you can hear hysterical shouts of despair as mass panic grips the company. I offer to chant the Avalokiteshvara, the great mantra of world peace, over the phone, but Sanae throws the phone at me instead. Cian thinks this is better than watching wrestling on the television.

Another call from the old man. He can't contact his son either. Doesn't know what is going on. There is an unsteady edge to his voice. Hysteria lurks close by. In the background is the sound of small arms fire. He says he won't call anymore tonight, doesn't know if he ever will again. The forces of darkness, he mutters, are closing in...

Sanae has to be sedated before she can fall asleep, fearing that the phone call, my Buddha-given inability to take a simple message, and the subsequent uproar our return calls caused, have ensured we will never darken the door of our home to be.

All is explained the next day when the son rings, for yes, dear reader, it was him, to apologize for the confusion and proffer an explanation: with the delay in our home loan approval, he wanted to officially change the contact closing date to the first of April and had sent us some documents to sign. Sanae collapses, the release of tension too much for her; I return to my Samatha 'calm abiding' meditations, while Cian has another big boy poo in the toilet.

Phew!