Monday 26 May 2014

Jamais je n'aurais cru que trouver une bibliothèque, avec des livres en Français et en Anglais, à 10 minutes de chez moi, puisse être aussi réconfortant.
Dans toute cette torpeur, après ce week-end en Enfer, de cette matinée de Lundi ou chaque sourire est à la fois un effort incommensurable et un poids en moins dans ma poitrine, c'est une trouvaille de l'ordre de la survie.
C'est autant d'air en plus que je peux respirer, c'est aussi calme et solide qu'un soleil orange sous un cerisier sans fleur. C'est autant de minutes en plus arrachées à la douleur. C'est aussi rassurant que l’écoute répétée d'un album de Radiohead tellement su, tellement reconnu, tellement entendu qu'il en devient une comptine qui berce et ramène a un niveau de douleur acceptable.

La sélection française de la bibliothèque de NK est une illustration pure et simple de ce que suggère l'adjectif 'éclectisme'. Il y a de tout, et surtout des choses que je ne trouverais pas en France.
J'ai donc pris un ouvrage de Francoise Sagan (des bleus à l’âme), au hasard dans la petite collection de ces romans publiés il y a plus de quarante ans, avec des pages épaisses et larges, une reliure vieille mais qui tient bon, et une étude d'un certain docteur S.Fanti, Le Fou Est Normal.
J'ai informé la réception de leur présence en faisant ma nouvelle carte, puisque Madame Acceuil m'avait indiqué que la bibliothèque n'avait pas d'ouvrages en Français.
Ils sont logés a l’étroit, entre les couvertures Anglaises et Américaines, mais ils sont bien la. Vrais. Une béquille de plus. Tout doucement. Je ne peux toujours pas manger, mais je peux marcher, je peux dire bonjour avec un vrai sourire, je peux dessiner. Je peux.

Note - ce qui peut aider:

-Une Anne, pleine d’écoute et pleine d'amitié et de recul.
-Des livres, ceux qui emportent.
-Des films bien édité à la photographie douce et saillante, pour le soir.
-De la musique connue par coeur (abolition du risque suprême et affreux d'association+reassuring).
-En parler. Absolument, en parler. A ceux concerné, et à ceux qui peuvent aider. Ça va mieux en le disant.
-Vider son sac, quand le moment est venu, sur la tête de ceux qui l'ont remplis, avec les mots justes pour soi-même.
-Un lac avec des montagnes et de l'espace au dessus de la tete. Anywhere with space. Space.


Friday 23 May 2014

on top of the top of the top






Kiki-fan-chan.

Sinon, entre autre, j'ai ouvert un compte au video club.
Pour des sous titres en pas-japonais, y'a que les Ghiblis et des grosses productions américaines. Autant revoir ses classiques. Mais je compte dénicher des petites perles une fois que mon cerveau ne se laissera plus surprendre par le fait que ah ouai, merde, tout est en Japonais, les titres le synopsis la pochette les acteurs la musique le film. Ah.

Amongst other things, I opened an account at the cd-dvd-book rental place. Appart from Ghibli movies and big american production, nothing has non-japanese subtitles but hey... I can brush up my classics. Once my brain gets more accustomed to not just give up when it realises once again that everything is in Japanese (the actors the synopsis the title the music the images), I should find some pretty interesting things.

Et sinon entre autre-bis, hier au cafe y'a un petit groupe de jeunes gens qui sont venu déjeuner, et qui en rentrant mon dévisagé avant de lancer des 'Kawaiiiiiii!' comme si, en vrai, j'étais un singe. Genre vraiment, la fille s'arrête devant moi, regarde ses copines, me re-regarde, penche la tete de coté, et a la limite de me donner un bonbon ou des cacahuètes, dit 'ouaaaaaaah! C'est mignon! Kawaaaiiii!'
Je savais pas comment le prendre alors j'ai ris à la japonaise. J'ai regardé mon boss une fois le dos tourné avec des yeux bien français qui disaient bien 'what the check!?'. Il a rigolé aussi sans rien dire, et puis quand ils sont partis il m'a glissé qu'en fait, il m'avait pas dit mais Cafeina c'est pas juste un café c'est aussi un zoo.

And amongst other things-bis, at the coffee-shop yesterday a group of young people came to eat. As they came in and passed the bar by, behind which I was washing up, the girls stopped, moved their head to the side slightly, and threw some 'Kawaaaiiii! It's cuuuttteee!' up in the air towards their friends, about me, exactly as they would if I had been a monkey. They were staring as much as possible while trying, quite unsuccessfully, not to be rude. I wasn't sure how I felt about it so I tried to laugh, Japanese way. Then I turned around and gave a look to my boss that said 'what the fheck?!'. He laughed a little too, but not really, a sort of embarrassed but not to seriously embarrassed laugh, like mine. Once they were gone he told me he had forgotten to mention that Cafeina is also a zoo.

Rien à voir avec le fait que Roman et Gina ont lancé tous les deux sans raison apparente qu'en vrai je ressemblait à un chat (ouf! au moins un chat c'est approchable, tout n'est pas perdu).
Rien à voir non plus avec le fait qu'en plein milieu de tout a fait autre chose, Keitaro-san s'est retourné vers moi pour me dire 'hé mais Fan-chan, en fait, tu ressembles trop à Kiki'.
J'ai dit nnouaaaai. Mon frère dit pareil. Me manque juste un énorme ruban-oeuf-de-paque rouge sur la tete. *

Nothing to do with the fact Gina and Roman told me, with no apparent reason, in the car, that I really behaved like a cat (ok, a cat is approchable, everything's not lost).
Nothing to do either with the fact that while Keitaro-san was doing something else, he stopped and said 'Hey, Fan-chan, I got it, you really look like Kiki!' 
Nnnnnyeah. My brother says so too. I just need a massive red ribbon the size of a house on my head. *

Entre ca et le fait que deux personnes (garçon et fille) (et pas cons) (et gentils) m'ont appris que les grandes étrangères aux yeux pas marrons, au Japon, ça se touche pas, ça fait juste peur, j'suis pas prête de trouver un p'tit choupi à qui faire des câlins moi... Passe moi le chocolat.

So between this and the fact that two people (male and female) (and not dumb) taught me that tall foreigners with green or blue eyes were looked at with awe and fear, as in look-but-don't-touch, I'm still a long way from finding a nice guy to cuddle... Pass me the chocolate.


*Oh ca me donne des idée ces conneries, parce qu'en plus au Japon les balais sont VRAIMENT comme celui que Kiki chevauche.. et y'a un chat à la maison. Ok.
Chhhaaaatt? Viens la, viens voir chat...
*Oh oh... that gives me an idea, because actually the brooms in Japan REALLY are like the one Kiki flies on, and there's a cat in the house. Ok. 
Kitty kitty? Come here kitty kitty...

Wednesday 21 May 2014

Roh nan mais les filles, quoi.

Nan mais moi je veux bien, hein, le Japonais c'est difficile, pourquoi que tu t'en vas la bas, ils mangent des trucs chelous, ils ecrivent pas pareil, tout ca... Tres bien.
OK le japonais c'est pas comme faire des crepes ou faire un creneau, ca prend plus de temps et c'est plus difficile.
Mais.
Je voulais acheter du mascara, pour faire ma belle des fois, genre ça y est je suis une adulte responsable qui des fois se met un coup de peigne tout ca.
Bah v'la ti pas que si je tape 'mascara' sur le site d'Yves Rocher (tiens je vais acheter du deodorant ca fera pas de mal non plus), y'a 21 different mascaras (si si en vrai).
Vingt et un. Differents. Types. De Mascaras.
Alors jveux bien, les japonais(es) ils sont complique mais alors les meufs francaises aussi hein...
Bon quelle Léa je vais devoir appeler pour m'en sortir moi... Peut être je vais prendre au hasard. Mouaip.

Sleeping Sleepy

Reminder to myself:
The good thing about being an au-pair (and an adult), is that if it's been raining for the past 24 hours, once you got up at 5.50 and did all you had to do and the kids are gone, you can (you don't have to but you can) go back to bed put the heater on and finish that rental Ghibli dvd while eating maple jam (yes, Japan has maple jam, which is what it sounds like, maple syrup slightly solidified into a jelly jam texture).
Until you make chocolate chips cookies. WHAT! It's raining I said!!!

Monday 19 May 2014

Waterfall Wednesday

Last wednesday, I received a call early morning and my heart sank as I thought I had forgotten to go to work.
But no. It was my coffee boss asking me and other colleagues if we wanted to go in the mountain see some waterfalls.
I can't say f*ck yeah in Japanese, so I just said a very loud and enthusiastic yes.


It was just beautiful. The water was freezing cold, but I got in anyways with Keitaro San and Yu-kun, Maya-chan (Maya l'Abeille) decided she'd just taste the water with her feet and eyes.

Maya chan and Yu-kun, whom I work and worked with at Cafeina.
My boss, Keitaro-san.



On the way to the waterfall



Keitaro-San, my boss at Cafeina. He didn't want to go in the water, but he couldn't be  defeated by a French girl I think,
 so when I undressed he dived in too!



Maya-Chan

Maya-Chan


There wasn't anyone but us four, amazed and laughing. Then we dropped in an old school eating place, I ate my own weight in vegetables, and went home.



Vegan can eat in Japan, stop being a know-it-all pain.









Jim- You're okay?
Me- Sure, I'll get better in a few days.
Jim- You know what my mother would say to you?
Me- What?
Jim- That guys are like buses. You missed one? Just wait ten minutes and another one will come.




Madame rateau j'ecoute?

So you let the love fill your heart and then there's so much of it you cannot hold it anymore, it needs to flow out,
so you let it flow into your hands, or into your mouth (I chose my mouth because I knew something wasn't quite right, and I knew if I let it flow into my hands and they got free I would get so hurt my ribs and lungs would collapse).
So you let it flow, you let it out, and then what happens is that it mixes with the air, and it blows in your face.
Ça t’éclate littéralement au visage. Y'en a partout. Ça coule sur tes cheveux et ça dégouline de tes yeux devenus sales.
There's no reciprocity, it's as simple as that.
That feeling of getting embarassed and hot and sweaty when (s)he's around, it's only you. The care you want to cover all of his being and spirit with, it just doesn't have anywhere to go. You only have to wait until this mess dries up.
You take a shower, you have a good cry, you smile to your colleagues when you feel you can, and hope it will dry soon. And it will, if you let it go. If you stop mourning what could have been and cherish what has been instead. If you let go of the idea that yes, it's fucking hard to find people you can talk with, talk about anything, and it's rare to find people you want to hug so bad it's like your stomach disappears completely when you suppress the urge to do it, because of all the uncalled and invasive feelings that were born somewhere somehow and were flattened at once on your head and now have nowhere to go.

So you think, you'll find a great escape in art, you'll get lost into somebody's painting, you'll carry on drawing lines from smoke from a cigarette stuck into some animals mouth and it will clean your synapses somehow, and you have good friends, and the weather is nice which lighten things up.

You think all this, but what you feel is a big black bird crying in your chest, squashing your heart in its claws, slightly on the left.
You feel sad as fuck as you bravely struggle against the terribly tempting idea of blaming yourself for everything.
You think all this, but what you feel is your heart hurting. At least it's there, c'est deja ca.

You think it will be ok tomorrow (and it will), but today, now, you get lost into your cup of coffee wishing you never met and never fell in love and never realised what unreturned love is.

Wednesday 14 May 2014

tanukisan





Yesterday I slept most of the day.
I woke up to drink a hot chocolate, draw a little, then fell asleep again.
I have big burns from the sun, the pain woke me up, then I fell asleep again.
Then draw a little more, then slept.
The joys of taking a job on my only days off.
No rest for the wicked hey,





Tuesday 13 May 2014

Cafeina fun.

Staff break


Who da heck is this? J'sais pas c'est Rika elle m'a dit vas y met un chapeau


Maya chan


Paola wins the award of the 2014 life saving friends for sending me Yorkshire Tea and putting down sweet sweet words in a oh-so-british card just for me. 
See how I seem to be breathing again now that my addiction can be fed?

Yorkshire tea, my love.




Monday 12 May 2014

     Roman (4 ans):

-Bon Roman, j'met du eyeliner ou pas?
-Ouai!
-Voila. Encore?
-Ouai.
-Voila! C'est bon?
-Héééé... ON DIRAIT UN CHAT!!!

     Gina (7 ans):

Gina -Caliiiiinnn
Moi -Ok. Calin.
Gina -Han, Fan-san, t'as un grand nez!
Moi - * pleure, crie, putain de pays ou tout est petit, les jambes les pieds les nez, tout *
Moi -Amandaaaaa-san, Gina elle m'a dit que j'avais un grand neeezzzz heeeuuuuu!!!
Amanda -Nan nan mais, en fait c'est un super compliment de la mort au Japon. C'est flatteur.
Moi -Gina? Moi, grand nez? Ca fait peur? C'est mignon? (En Japonais, y'a une lettre de difference entre 'mignon' et 'effrayant')
Gina -Mais nan! C'est MIGNON!

Saturday 10 May 2014

I ain't waiting no more. For nothing.



I have friends,
a roof,
good music,
good food,
is this what life is about?


Thursday 8 May 2014

my dad cracks me up.

Faut pas jouer au plus fort avec son père.

Il y a peu de temps tu m'a sèchement repris sur mon orthographe hasardeuse ( pas rancunier mais une bonne mémoire ).
Je te "ferai donc signaler "... qu'à propos des espadrilles. Elles sont soit noires, bleues ou rouges, ou ? de couleur noir, bleu ou rouge ! (à vérifier car pour moi pas évident ). Ce qui est sûr c'est que, si tu mets un S à "noir", il manque un "E" (noirte (s) non! ça c'est sûr).
 Contrairement à "motif" ou là, il y a un S de trop puisqu'il n'y en a pas (de motif). 

Mon devoir d'éducation en vers toi et, ma grande sagesse ne peuvent que m'inciter à te rappeler ce proverbe Africain :" Attends d'avoir traversé la rivière avant de te moquer du crocodile "

Tuesday 6 May 2014

Arrreeeeeeeee????!!!!

Ok.
So, in two weeks my japanese has improved more or less...let me see... sugar loads.
I think I have added a good bunch of words to my regular vocab, and I also started to make sentences. Thank you WORK at a coffee shop with nice people and nice customer and nice music and nice tea and good humour.

But can ANYBODY explain to me how on earth this is possible:
there's this dude at work, whose Japanese I simply cannot understand to save my life because:

1. he never went abroad and doesn't understand using simple japanese would help me
2. I think he uses loads of slang words I never heard of
3. he talks fast
4. I just don't understand him

Well, we took a walk through the park, and you know what we managed to talk about, me and my tiny little bit of japanese and his five single sorry words of English?
No, not the weather, not music, none of those flipping EASY subject NORMAL people talk about when they don't happen to speak the same language.
No.
No, we talked about god, and the non existence of god, the big bang, the creation of the universe, fucked up childhood on his part, fuck up childhood on my part, the ridiculous habit the japanese people have here of dressing their dogs with pyjamas, the reasons why some people don't want children, depression, friendship, and forgiveness.

Anyone explains to me how this happened wins a mars bar.

Sunday 4 May 2014

The funny moment when your Japanese friend working 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. six days out of seven explains to you it's great because she's only a part-timer...


Also, I went to see someone, and he said it was fun, or that I was fun, or that we had fun, anyways: I guess something was fun.

Ok, back to sleep to wash dishes for 10 hours again tomorrow, youhouuuuuu!

Thursday 1 May 2014

Iphone update

Cafeina bosses!

Merci pour les chaussures





Yes, the cat and I have a special relationship.




Hanami in Komoro

So yeah, not only I'm hanging out in Japan, have a job or two, I also have a friend who moved in my town and that I can see every week. And what a friend.
We don't speak the same language, but give us some coffee and no language barrier is going to hold us from speaking about men, hormones, society, our dislike for the luxury industry, periods and mood swings, money, future plans, childhood scars, rating potential boyfriends walking by, and laughing our heads of at the dressed dogs in pushchairs (yes, my town is FULL of tiny horrible dogs that are dressed up in pyjamas or rain gear, and then pushed in a pushchair - I am not joking).

With mountains like we have here and a friend like りかちゃん、fair-enough, life can be good.

We went to Komoro to see the blooming cheery tree (=Hanami), in Komoro, which also happens to be where I get almost-free-Japanese-lessons in a volunteer center. I used to teach English as a volunteer for newly arrived immigrants in the UK... Now I am on the other side of the table :)

Am I in Japan OR WHAT?

Hanami!!!

For Lottemshkou!


This is another one for anybody that believes vegan in japan is another way to say impossible... In a tiny traditional restaurant, I ate my own weight (sat on the floor, yeehee) of Anmitsu which is a vegan dessert (or meal, if you eat enough of it...) with fruits and a japanese type of jelly. It cost me a whole two pounds fifty, too (oh yeah, Japan is well expensive, hu huuuuu...).






The train to Komoro is the cutest train ever...




And the view from the cutest train ever is not without challenging the Southampton-London landscapes or some parts of the New Forest...