Living/Working in Japan in 2003: A New Hope or Does the Empire Strike Back?

If 2002 ended on a relatively high note, 2003 would become a very challenging year for me. Not as bad as 2004 but the intensity, the ending of the honeymoon period for Japan to me, the cultural differences and my growing alienation all would play a part as I tried to determine where I belonged in a city that imported 65 million a day. The bank would effectively teach me all I would really need to learn about corporate politics, something I honestly wish hadn’t happened. I felt like this white collared world would be akin to John the Savage losing his innocence in Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World. There would be a small bit of a redemption towards the end of the year, but I’ll get to that later.

With 2002, I managed to receive a bonus, which I didn’t realize because it was all in Japanese and I simply accepted it without asking how much, etc. I had been worried about getting fired and it was a common joke at the company because of all the pressure as well as a deprecating sense of private self-loathing for working in that type of a place. But my boss and the managing director simply pointed to some numbers and it went over my head. I think I was more stressed about surviving as the various departments played against each other in an internal war that the public never could witness. For myself, I was just a cog in a massive corporate wheel and still being shielded from the real dirtiness of the banking politics.

Sometime in the winter though, a major incident occurred that would affect me for the rest of my life. Because the move to Harajuku caused me sleep deprivation, I was struggling with my schedule, although I was more of a late night person, who did projects in the evening to occupy my free time. Also, I was going out and occasionally visiting a shady place or two such as that one club in Akasaka. However, at some point, especially with the coming of winter, I slowed down and had a hard time getting out of bed. I think part of that is simply due to my body not reacting to the cold and later I believe I either developed or discovered that I had seasonal depression where the winters affect me the worst.

At any rate, one day the 2nd in command sent out an admonishing email about being on time at precisely 9am, which was very Japanese. Because the previous year saw someone who had been hired as a contractor (I think) and had been fired due to “lack of energy” (which was he was kind of useless), I took the warning seriously as I was someone who had been coming in late a few times. I think the email was a passive aggressive way of indirection without targeting someone like me. But it was clear that I probably was one of the people that it was intended.

The following day, I again had woken up late because it was severely cold and I struggled to get out of bed. So I rushed to the train station where outside it had been snowing, something I wasn’t used to. By the time I arrived at Akasaka, the usual foot traffic had disappeared because most people were probably inside their office. But I couldn’t afford to wait on the escalator, so I rushed up the stairs, grabbing the ice cold railing with my bare hand while wearing a heavy coat. I still was pretty out-of-shape as I wasn’t exercising and had a very poor diet. By the time I reached the top, I was out of breath and only could think about getting to my seat.

Inside, the Akasaka Park Building was an absolute furnace and the elevator leading to the 22nd floor (which was where I worked) made me burn up with my oversized coat. Still, I wasn’t thinking clearly but I started to sweat from the ordeal and blew into the office, hopped into my chair and dumped my coat onto the back of the seat. The world started to spin as the room was burning up and before I knew it, everything had gone black.

I woke up a few moments later (not even sure for how long) as my boss and someone else were carrying me outside. Apparently, I blanked out and they sent me to the nurses so that an ambulance could pick me up. I wasn’t used to any of this and thought it was like those days back in elementary school where I’d run so hard that I would nearly puke. It was that kind of feeling. But they weren’t taking any chances. Because of the aforementioned delay on certain benefits (like health insurance), one of the administrators accompanied me to the hospital. I had been placed on a gurney and later given an MRI scan. They found two calcium deposits in my brain that had formed which looked like two miniature aspirins and told me I had a minor stroke. I was devastated and this weird feeling over my body where I was still shaking made me realize that this was far more serious than I had expected.

The administrator ended up handling the insurance aspect and I was sent home for a few days to recover. Everyone looked at me differently from that point on and I had to look at myself differently. People admonished me for my bad diet and habits. The doctor mentioned that I had a fatty liver too even though I only started drinking in Japan and that my triglycerides were high. But I was effectively a 40+ year old man in a late 20s body. At that moment, I knew my real youth was gone and that work was starting to take its toll on me.

If there’s one positive lesson I ever got from my mother, it’s that she would tell me that my health was the most important thing to protect. The bitter irony is that my family was horribly negligent on that especially my father who seemed like Superman until he would have his stroke the following year. My lead offered to show me how to cook better because obviously my health would impact his situation. Also, a few people said they’d hit the gym above us with me, which encouraged me to start working out again.

The thing was that I wanted to be gung ho about this situation as it put attention on me that I didn’t want. I was certainly embarrassed and back then had no way to really communicate how I felt. These days I look at myself back then for being exceptionally foolish. If there was one thing I did learn over time from this incident, it was that no job is worth sacrificing your health. Whenever I look back on this incident, I think about Emilia Clarke’s own stroke during her Game of Thrones filming. I know she talks about it more and has her SameYou organization to help people with brain injuries. Like myself, Emilia underwent that issue at a young age, which shows that it can happen to anyone. But I will say that I knew the stroke had changed me somehow. I felt I had slowed down and a part of me had died. Ever since that time, I had been worried especially because of both my parents suffering strokes, having high blood pressure and other things that make a person feel they can combust especially under a job that induces unnecessary amounts of stress.

The other positive as I mentioned was doing more for my health. I stopped being as lazy and focused more on exercise. My boss was a bit of a nut and I would see him walk to work (he lived in Shibuya). Even in the rain, he would come in with a drenched white collared shirt and tie and tell me, “It’s just a little water.” However, that did inspire me to walk a lot more. Since I lived in Harajuku, it wasn’t hard to get back home. Basically, a straight shot up the main road then hang a right at Omotesando Dori. I think in this period, I started to really develop a love for the city in a different manner where I understood the benefits of this type of layout.

For instance, during Hanami season, I would walk through Aoyama-Botchi (cemetery) at night where the lamp posts would highlight the gorgeous pink scenery. You would see the various yattai parked at corners where you could get real street food. Then along the path you would see various people having their private cherry blossom picnics (yes, at night!). One of my favorite memories was when I walked near a Japanese group that were sitting next to the graveyard path on a large beach towel with a sushi platter and KFC meal. As I passed them, a Domino’s Pizza delivery guy on a scooter came and handed them a pizza, IN THE GRAVEYARD. I was hanging out with an Australian guy who rode his bike and we just observed this and laughed. Later, I told my friend Keiko who responded with, “Only in Japan.” Yeah, no kidding.

Speaking of Keiko, I need to mention her. Keiko (or K-chan as her friends and I would occasionally call her) was someone I met through one of those classified ads as someone looking for help with English. I didn’t have much luck with classified dating compared to my other gaijin buddies but I decided to try this out, having set my expectations really low. Turns out Keiko was someone who worked fairly close to where I was living in Harajuku at the time. She was a jewelry designer and had a very unique character that was dramatic and more like someone you might believe would appear on a J-Drama than a quiet person sitting at a desk drawing up designs.

We would hang out regularly and she would bring her friends along as they too wanted to learn English. I think at some point I showed her my apartment and there was a joke shared between us (and her friends) about dating me or living with me where she’d just have to roll out of bed to get to work. I think she lived towards Yokohama so her commute was far, at least to me. But Keiko was pretty stylish to me, really cool and fun to hang around with. She would make me laugh all the time because of her antics. She wasn’t wild but just had that dramatic personality. I discovered a lot of really cool restaurants with her, places I wouldn’t have gone by myself like Vampire Cafe as well as a curry nabe spot in Shimokitazawa.

But I recall distinctly one night after having dinner in Shibuya, it might’ve just been the two of us. We were heading back to the station slowly as it was late and she said something odd to me like, “We make a nice pair, huh?” If my head wasn’t so far up my anus back then, maybe I would’ve believed there was something between us. I don’t think at that time she had a boyfriend either and I probably had my eyes elsewhere (not just Reina or Norika Fujiwara mind you). But I know I missed a great opportunity. Keiko later got married to a different Australian and had a child. And when I left Japan I found out that she was sad and missed me. Things like that made me wish the Japanese would just speak their mind at times (outside of when they would get drunk) because she was really cool and probably would have made a great wife back when I was looking for one. Maybe the only issue I had with her was her smoking. But I know she eventually quit so my life would’ve been much different if I had been more intent on settling down back then.

Weekends, outside of the onsite rotation, were mine. Instead of strictly going to puroresu shows, I started visiting outside of Tokyo like Kawasaki or Yokohama. Part of that was due to meeting another friend of Keiko’s named Masako. She was half Japanese and half Chinese and lived over in the Yokohama Chinatown. I think when Keiko didn’t get to hook up with me that one night, she figured I could be introduced to other friends of hers (and she had a LOT). So I started to visit Chinatown in Yokohama, which was cool just to see something different. But this Masako girl…she turned out to be a piece of work. I started to like her because she was pretty and seemed like a nice girl. I think at one point I even gave her a piece of equipment like a laptop. But one day she got really mad at me possibly for sending her a message while she was at work. It’s hard to tell because I think she was telling me a bold faced lie and was a two timer. When I asked for the laptop back, she got mad and tried to put a guilt trip on me, telling me, “I thought you gave it to me.” When I told Keiko what happened, all Keiko could say was, “I don’t know about her. She doesn’t talk to me anymore.” But that could’ve been another lie to placate me.

Nonetheless, I was more encouraged about exploring things on my own. I think I had gone to Kamakura at least once. I recall it being summer because the cicada/semi were out in full force and it was humid as fuck. I distinctly recall seeing one oyaji (old fart) going to a tree where a cicada was sitting and clasping his hands around the bug. Because I hate most insects, I got disgusted seeing this oyaji snatch this nasty beatle thing up with his bare hands and just carry it around with him. Later, I learned that the Japanese believed the cicada were a sign of good luck and many cherished their buzzing as it would bring a sense of summer nostalgia. It just made me sick.

I remember one time I ended up getting lost when I tried to find a temple that I visited in 2000 with another traveler and bought an o-mamori (good luck charm/pendant). Instead, I wandered around and ended up near the beaches of Enoshima. Because my friend Keiko lived in that vicinity, I called her hoping that we could meet. Instead, she just laughed but was busy sadly. Somehow, I managed to get back to the station with my feet on fire from wandering around for two hours. I did manage to see the Daibutsu (Big Buddha) at the temple so that was cool.

Another reason I had somewhat of an interest in Kawasaki/Yokohama is because my company had its data center out there by Tsurumi. On top of weekend shift, we now started to get the Tsurumi shift because the Akasaka Park Building data center was getting old and needed to be moved for better redundancy. Also, there was another data center in Hibiya near Ginza. That one was far smaller and its main purpose was to handle the mass print jobs. Finally, there was one other major DC over on Tennozu Isle for the big company that owned everything. The DC itself wasn’t as big compared to Tsurumi but had some notable things inside, which I’ll explain later.

But Tsurumi was either loved or hated depending on the person. We had a dedicated group of contractors we called the DC Team that managed the lowest of the jobs but barely above the networking guys. They handled changing parts, cabling, print jobs, tape backup, etc. and were all on a weekly shift. One of the guys told me that they couldn’t wait to get the DC shift because it was an easy job with no supervision especially the late shift. You could basically sit around and drink all night with no one caring while getting paid. I guess in retrospect that does sound like a swell job but I’m guessing with all the camera technology these days and monitoring that type of behavior wouldn’t be tolerated.

The Tsurumi DC itself was about a 10-15 minute walk from the station in a fairly quiet neighborhood. I think there was another satellite office of the other side of the firm out there but I never visited that office. The DC itself was huge and if you got weekend shift or had to be out there during lunch time, there were only 2-3 spots to eat nearby, including an Indian buffet and a convenient store. So it kinda sucked and felt more like purgatory for someone like myself who needed to be around people back then. Getting inside the DC was like entering into a fortress. Not only were you required to have your normal office badge, but the front desk security would give you another badge to access the inside. If you lost that and no one knew you were around, you pretty much would be imprisoned until someone figured out you needed help. The interior was basically a huge cavernous warehouse and extremely cold of course. There was one floor where the DC team would sit at to monitor things or repair systems that went down.

But I did say that I didn’t want to talk about work that much at least with regards to the technical side of things. And I really haven’t but I wanted to give people an idea of what being over there in the Tsurumi DC was like because of the next story. So next to me were a Japanese pair named Tagata-san and Harada-san. Harada-san was the senpai who had been at the company for 15 years while Tagata-san was the kohai. They had their own little group that handled certain applications. Harada-san seemed like he was strung up half the time and I could hear him frequently yelling at people on the other line. I would conjecture that I learned a fair portion of my Japanese listening to him scream at people every day.

On the other hand, Tagata-san was far more soft spoken and calm. I heard he was a bit of a playboy and was popular outside of work with the gals. But these two paired together were a hilarious duo to sit and listen to everyday. But by far my favorite was whenever Harada-san would tell Tagata-san in English, “YOU MUST GO TO TSURUMI!” Because Tagata-san was the kohai, he would have little to no choice in the matter. The best one came when one day Tagata-san tried to gently repudiate Harada-san in meekly replying, “But I have plans tonight.” Harada-san then spun around like Dr. Evil in an Austin Powers movie, placed his hands over the low cubicle wall and told Tagata-san point blank, “YOU MUST CANCEL YOUR PLANS!” The rest of us were just listening to this and cracked up loudly. It was so ridiculous that it became a running joke amongst us and we would recite the infamous, “YOU MUST GO TO TSURUMI!” line.

After I left the Unix team, I no longer had to deal with the various DC things. But my friend Thierry, who had been working as part of the Unix Engineering group, told me that he had gone to the Tsurumi DC one day and saw Harada-san there. I think they might’ve moved Tagata-san from the tiny two man team because of a change in the Unix group’s management whereupon Harada-san was instructed to finally take his Tsurumi shift. Thierry told me that Harada-san was really depressed and miserable that day but we kinda laughed given that we shared that whole “YOU MUST GO TO TSURUMI!” joke for a while. I’m certain that the irony was not lost upon Harada-san either. So you can’t tell me that there’s no such thing as karma in life.

I did mention the other two data centers. The one in Hibiya honestly wasn’t very remarkable. I think the non-tech people were mostly operations but I think that office would close later on. The interesting part was the underground area linking the station to various restaurants and passages where you could arrive at the Hibiya area or Ginza. It was amazing to see this expansive labyrinth built under the city. Not all sections of Tokyo had it but this might’ve been one of the bigger zones, which reminded me a little of the week I spent out in Toronto for an international Key Club convention.

Along the way there was a coffee shop like a Detour or Excelsior. But I distinctly remember this odd person sitting at one of the tables outside just zoned out. Urs (my lead) and my boss (Joe) also noticed him since we would occasionally come down that way. Each time, this foreigner white guy was always there. I think he might’ve had blue hair because we bequeathed upon him the name “Blue Man” and would joke about this guy. Sometimes, he would be passed out on the table. None of us knew what his deal was though. I think Urs spotted him one weekend and saw him praying. Joe might’ve tried talking to him as well since Joe seemed to find bizarre people amusing. He kinda reminded me of someone you’d find up in UC Berkeley wandering the streets and yelling imprecations at the world for no reason except to get noticed. But Blue Man is an example of one of the various oddities you’d encounter out there that in a way became normalized to me as time went on.

The other major DC was in Tennozu Isle. You had to take the tram from Shinbashi to get there. Unlike offices I was at, the main company owned the building I believe (I mean it’s one of the biggest banks in the world if you want to take a guess). This place was even more corporate and uptight than the Akasaka Park Building spot. And I think this was the only time I had ever been to that office. We might’ve gone down as a field trip so that I learned about this other DC that we never had to deal with. Once you got inside, you were instructed to take off your shoes to avoid static electricity. Probably, the most fascinating piece of tech there was the Casio Unix system. Yes, they had Casio Unix of all things. I have no idea what it ran, how you’d logged in, what the system ID was, etc. I just knew that there was Casio Unix being used. And we had a lot of different flavors besides Sun including HP-UX, and AIX.

The other remarkable thing was a group of people in a small room that were monitoring all the Autosys jobs in the company. Autosys is enterprise level automation piece of software that monitors and runs your batch jobs like an intelligent version of CRON with a GUI. So this group sat and watched this GUI all day long. If a job ever went into the red, they’d either page you or call you. One of my coworkers told me that they were kinda jealous about that team because they had good bento served to them. I would’ve agreed about the bento until Joe revealed how these people were more or less expendable if there ever was a fire. The DC would go on a lockdown mode within 20 seconds or so for which all the O2 would be sucked away and a special gas would spray to put out the fire. That was the only way of saving the DC as it was located in a high rise, which meant you’d get a Towering Inferno type of scenario if something did break out. But it also showed what the bank valued more.

On the bright side, the cafeteria at this office was quite good. It was much bigger and meant to serve the larger corporate foothold since the Akasaka office had more variety and accessibility to great spots. But the lunches were cheap and satisfying, which is what counts, right?

Moving from the surrounding Tokyo zones, I eventually made my way to Hakone. Like Kamakura, Hakone was such a different type of Japan since I had become accustomed to the loud, big city of Tokyo. Hakone is mostly known for its hot springs where the air smell like sulfur. There’s a lake and a special ropeway that gives you a nice little scenic tour of the zone.

I might’ve gone in the fall because I do recall it being cooler and greener.

Heck, I have photos that show the overcast sky and you can see the mist rising from the hot springs.

I made my way down to the lake but didn’t stay long as it was getting late and it would take two hours or so by train to get back into Tokyo. But it was a nice momentary escape from the bustling city noise.

Speaking of escaping, I am going to escape for a moment as this blog is getting extra long and I don’t want to have too much in a single post. I’ll continue to piece back my memories of 2003 for tomorrow.