Out Of The Loop Line

The Tax Man

2011-05-02T12:25:00.002+09:00

The letter was sitting on the coffee table when I got home from work. I plonked myself on the couch and scooped it up. Slowly moving my eyes over the characters, I was able to make out my name, and that it had come from the offices of the City of Osaka. This could only mean one thing: that they wanted money from me, and lots of it.

Every year the good people of the City send out their city resident taxes, a charge based on your previous year's income. For me, this means a couple of hundred thousand or so of my hard-earned yen will vanish from my wallet, in my choice of one whole payment or four bi-monthly installments. It's a cruel ex post facto system: receiving money for your hard work that you can hold, smell, and stroke, easily falling under the impression that it's actually yours to have and to spend, only to have it ripped from your grasp several months down the track by the tax man. Sure, I understand how it all works and know what the letters are when they arrive in my mailbox, but I have still not yet trained myself to anticipate them; they never cease to catch me off guard each year. The whole process seems akin to placing a toy in a child's hands, letting them play with it for a while, then whisking it away, never to be seen again. And just like the child in said scenario, upon opening these letters I would bawl. Each and every time. An inhumane trick still cuts deep no matter how often it's played.

Just for once I wished the city would contact me with something positive; something beneficial to me. Why did they always have to be so mean? Why did they always have to take take take? Why couldn't I ever peel back the seal to reveal a simple note saying:

Dear McMahon Jeremy, we at the City of Osaka would just like to say a big "hello!" and "we hope you are well". We truly value your presence in our city and thank you for choosing us over that egotistical Tokyo. Or

Dear McMahon Jeremy, as part of our gratitude for your consistent payment of taxes on time, we would like you to accept this voucher for a complimentary full-course dinner for two at the Hilton Hotel. Or

Dear McMahon Jeremy, we wish to inform you of an unfortunate error in our records. We regret that we have greatly overcharged you in previous years and we would like to return this money to you promptly. Please find enclosed a cheque for ¥500,000. This is something they would never do in Tokyo...

But no. As I tore off the end of the envelope and unfolded the letter I saw that, yet again, I would be putting on hold those home furnishings I had forever been saving up for, and instead handing over the money to some disgruntled teen behind the counter of the nearest convenience store. However, there apeared to be something strange about this particular payment. Despite being large, it didn't come in a booklet form that allowed four easy payments. They were requesting one whole payment. And... they wanted it in four days time! Something was definitely skewiff here; this didn't seem like my usual city taxes.

I scanned over the letter for clues, the kanji characters floating off the page and passing through my eyes into my skull, my brain instantly rejecting them and ricocheting them back out into the atmosphere. I really ought to study more. Eventually I located a couple of familiar characters, and as soon as I had processed them I hoped to hell I had read them incorrectly. The taxes were from Minato Ward, a section of the city where I used to live up until late last year, and they were dated from 2006. Four years ago?! They were billing me for taxes from four years ago? This didn't make any sense.

According to the bill the taxes had been gradually accruing interest charges over the years and had now increased by 50% on the original amount. My failure to pay the bill had caused the amount to mutate, fester and feed off itself so that it now resembled a behemoth destroying everything in its path, unable to be taken down by the careful aiming of a single open wallet. But I had never ever come across this bill before in my life. It had to be the first time they had sent it to me. How on earth was I supposed to pay something that I didn't know existed?

I clicked. Of course, 2006 was the year that I had been away from Japan for eight whole months. There were multiple reasons for this, the foremost being that my father had been struck with illness and I had wanted to spend time with my family again. I had also grown fed up with my teaching job and needed a little break from Japanese life. But now it made sense - whilst I was away they must have sent me my taxes sometime in the middle of the year. I never received them, and when I returned I had a new address, albeit in the same ward. So wait, if I had returned to the same ward and registered my new address with them, why hadn't they just sent me a follow-up bill, stating what I had owed in my absence? I could have received the bill, been made aware of something I would certainly not have thought about otherwise, and paid it off. Oh my god, they held this information from me for nearly four years, only making it known once I had moved to the other side of town, all the while letting the interest grow so that they could collect more money from me! The savages!

A foreigner in Japan often likes to jump to the conclusion that the country is out to get them. We regularly feel that people deliberately discriminate against us and aim to make our lives here complicated and perplexing, enough that we'll eventually crack and just pack up our bags and leave. That waiter in Sukiya pretended not to see me nor hear my many cries of "sumimasen!", choosing instead to serve those salarymen who came in after me! That policeman purposely left that old unlocked bicycle sitting on the street on my walk home and then hid around the corner, knowing that he could pull me over riding away on it and lock me up for the night! I felt that way now. How dare they try this on! Who did they think they were, aspiring to get away with such thievishness? I would pay them a visit and get this matter sorted out.

On the train to Bentencho a few days later, I played out the confrontation in my head. I would walk in and feign any understanding of Japanese, asking if anybody there spoke English. A reluctant gentleman would be pushed forward by his colleagues and I would slowly and carefully explain my situation to him. He would understand that, yes, this poor guy had been hard done by, and would ask me if I wouldn't mind just paying the original amount owing, free of the interest charge. I would say sure, sulking a little internally at having to pay anything at all but all the same thankful that it wasn't any larger. We would part ways with a bow and smile and I would stroll back into the sunshine and grab some lunch at a swish little restaurant somewhere nearby, paying for it with a thousand yen note that happened to blow across my path along the way. A fine day all up.

But as the train rolled into Bentencho station I remembered that they didn't have swish little restaurants. I used to live here after all. I was also well aware that the area reeked of ominousness, from the absence of restaurants and shops and greenery, to the presence of factories and noisy motorbikes and old ladies scooping discarded noodles from garbage bins. My confidence wilted with my first step onto the street. Not only was it overcast, if the sun had've been out it would've been obscured by the lurching highways and train lines overhead, and the black smoke pouring out of the many trucks that thundered along the main road.

I took a deep breath of stale air and threw my shoulders back and my head high. I was going to get what I wanted, what was just. The tax office was just a short walk away and as I passed through the automatic doors I entered a cavernous space filled with an array of desks and cubicles stretching as far as the eye could see. People scurried about and clacked on keyboards and answered phones. I took the letter out of my pocket and began unfolding it as I approached the counter in front of me, where four pairs of male eyes peered up from behind computer monitors. I chose the greying guy directly in my path and as I proceeded forward he slowly rose from his chair and backed away from the desk a little fearfully. The other men, all similarly deeply entrenched in middle age, sidled up to him in a show of support, should I leap over the desk at any second, wielding a foreign language and heading straight for the jugular.

I asked if they spoke English, in English; my theory being that if I pretended I didn't understand what they were trying to explain to me they might give me what I want. A guy who knows the language well knows the rules well too, right? I wanted to plead ignorance of everything, except letters that found my mailbox. If the bills come, I pay 'em. If they don't, I don't know what the hell is going on. One of the men asked me in Japanese what I wanted and I repeated, "English. Do you speak English?" They broke into a confused panic, frantically looking this way and that, muttering to themselves and each other until finally one man asked me to wait and ran off into the deep recesses of the office. The others composed themselves and straightened their ties, and the first man motioned to the letter in my hand, asking me if I had come here wanting to pay that. "I have a question," I responded tentatively in Japanese, claiming that I didn't understand the language, carefully releasing each word with an unassuredness as to whether or not I was making any sense to them. A fine acting display.

A moment later they pushed through the reluctant winner of the "You Get To Speak English Whether You Like It Or Not, Because You Once Bragged About Having A TOEIC Score Of 600" competition. He was another middle-aged man, and as he strode up between the cubicles he took deep breaths, fixed his hair, and wore a smile that suggested a mixture of joy, fear, embarrassment, and customer service. We sat down at a desk and I slowly explained my situation to him. He vaguely understood, and managed to pull up some information about me on his computer. He explained what I already knew about the taxes being based on my income from my teaching job in 2005. He listened and took notes as I outlined my timeline, and scratched his head when he wasn't sure how to proceed. Through a little back and forth we determined that I had exited and re-entered the country on the same visa, and that I hadn't received any notice of my taxes because I was in Australia at the time. I still hadn't received anything until the other day, and now I was faced with an interest charge I didn't feel I should have to pay. He nodded in agreement. It was all going very well, I thought. He genuinely looked like he empathised with my situation, and was going to do all he could to help me. We would surely be smiling and bowing a few minutes from now, and I'd then head into a fresh burst of sunshine, stopping to bend over and pick up that lost money.

The man stood up. He told me that we needed to go up to the third floor. Ok sure, I thought. Let's go up to the third floor, they probably handle the money up there, and the computer that can print a new, reduced bill. I eagerly followed. The third floor looked just like the first floor: wide, deep, and buzzing with activity. It took the man a few minutes to get anybody's attention. Eventually he spoke to another gentleman, who asked us to take a seat on the couches near the entrance as he headed off in the opposite direction. As we sat, the English-speaking man turned to me. "Why you go back the Australia?" he asked. "Oh," I said. "Um, my father became sick. Cancer. Er... gan?" Again I pretended to possess just a smidge of Japanese vocabulary. As I said the word "gan" I looked at him with doleful eyes, and thought this play for compassion definitely wouldn't hurt my cause. The man nodded sympathetically.

After a minute or so the other gentleman reappeared and asked me to stand. He signalled for me to follow him and led me around the front counter and into the work area. We weaved through partitions and desks until he motioned for me to sit in a chair by a desk in the corner of the room. I sat myself down and placed the bill on the desk. This was great. Things were happening; we were going to get this situation resolved. I had stated my case, proven my innocence, and garnered their support. I could hear my English-speaking friend and the other man conversing behind me. My friend was relaying all that I had told him: about going back to Australia because my father was ill, and about never receiving any notification of any payment I was supposed to make once I had returned. I expected they would be slapping a revised bill on the desk in front of me any second now, asking me to pay the smaller amount and apologising for the inconvenience. Yep, slapping it right on the desk in front of me; the desk with numerous ink stains and bits of ply chipped off the corners. The desk with giant scratch marks running from the centre to the edge where I sat. The desk with giant scratch marks? What were they, were they from fingernails? What on earth had happened here previously? I slowly began to realise the oddity of having been sat down in a remote, poorly lit corner, away from all the other people. I hadn't picked up on this as I was being led here; my head had been swimming with the stress of the situation. And these scratches. Had there been a scuffle of some sort? Had someone been dragged away kicking and screaming to a side door, their pleas for mercy unheard over the ringing of phones and whirring of photocopiers? Oh fuck, was that blood spatter running up the wall alongside me? What was that? It was certainly a darkish reddish brown, and hardened. What happened here?

I attempted to spin around in my chair just as another man sat down next to me. I hadn't seen him prior till now, and his demeanour was most sober. He had jet black hair and a big nose that curled down over pursed puffy lips. He wore thin gold frames and a cheap suit with specks of dandruff on the shoulders. He leaned in and pointed to the total amount written on the bill on the desk in front of me. "You... must... pay," he said robotically and matter-of-factly. Ok, who was this guy? I pointed at the original amount and then the interest charge. "This is ok," I said. "I pay this. But this, no." He considered this for a moment and then stood up and walked away. He stepped around the nearest partition and began muttering with somebody else. I turned in my seat and glanced back into the office behind me. My English-speaking man was nowhere to be seen, and the other man was seated back at the front desk again, serving customers. They had palmed me off onto another person, and this new person was not in the possession of any English nor, it seemed, any understanding of the situation. How utterly vexatious. This mission had just taken a turn for the bad.

He reappeared from behind the partition and sat down again. I hoped his little aside had shed some light for him and he was coming back to make good. Again he placed his hand on the desk and rested his index finger under the total amount. He had ugly, stubby fingers, upon which were fastened minute nails that stopped well short of the tips. Did he ever have a need for clippers? I hated his fingers, and I hated him as the same words again dispensed from his bloated mouth, coated in deep monotone: "You... must... pay." Again I stipulated what I was and wasn't willing to pay. He placed a second piece of paper on the table. It was the timeline my English-speaking helper had written up downstairs. Had my helper deserted me, choosing to throw me to the wolves and go back downstairs to finish his coffee? Was he under the impression that he had left me in the care of good people who would help me out, or did he know that they were warming-up the "bad cop" segment of the interrogation? The fat sausage-fingered man proceeded to point out different times on the paper in an attempt to explain that I hadn't paid what was due four years ago, and therefore I had to pay the total amount here today. I threw my hands in the air and again pointed to the two amounts. "This, yes. This, no!"

He rose to his feet again and wandered off behind the partition. Once more I heard two voices quietly muttering their next tactical move. I wondered if it was time yet for the electric shocks. I was becoming very flustered and breathed deeply to regain my cool. I wiped my sweaty palms on the sides of my jeans, and contemplated my next move. Perhaps it was time to string together a little Japanese. I really wanted to just get up and walk out, but that would leave me still having to pay the full amount. What to do, what to do?

Mr. Barbecue Hands sat down again. I really despised this guy, to the pit of my stomach. He thought he was hot shit, appointing himself to take care of the rapscallion who had strolled in here thinking he could get away without paying his taxes. He was getting enormous satisfaction out of letting the foreigner know that this was not his place to make demands, and if he didn't like it he still had to pay or get out of the country; go back to America or whatever place he said he was from. I imagined him in his home, verbally abusing his wife in that monotone voice, ordering her to fetch him a beer and his dinner. I imagined his two kids running to hide in their rooms whenever he arrived home; distressed that their days had been ruined by the return of their heartless, soulless father, and vowing never to turn out like him in later life, this exponent of evil. Fuck this guy.

He reached out and touched the bill. "You... must... pay." Oh god, no. No! It had actually happened. The universes had aligned in such a way that the fabric of time had been compromised and we were now stuck in a time loop, resetting itself every few minutes. This nightmare was going to play on forever. My own Groundhog Day. I felt a sudden compulsion to re-tap the two totals and once again declare that I was fine with paying the lesser of the amounts. I couldn't suppress it; my faculties were now being controlled by an external force. He shook his head and I threw my hands in the air again. Any second he would get up and walk around the corner for yet another consultation and the needle would jump backwards on the grooves and we would do it all again. I had to try something to break this deadlock; to restore things back to normal. I summoned all my strength and propelled myself forward in my chair. My chest slammed into the desk and my mouth shot wide open. "Why didn't I receive any letters?" I blurted out in Japanese. He didn't flinch, and without missing a beat delivered an answer he had all prepared, as if anticipating my exact question. "You received many letters." "Please show them to me," I said, trying to sound calm and polite in my second tongue, but coming across more disbelieving and hurt.

He vanished for a few minutes and returned with some printouts. He placed them on the table in front of me. Not that I could read them, they were all in kanji, yet I could make out dates running down the left-hand side all the way back to 2005; some which had identical words printed next to them, I'm guessing to denote when they were supposed to have sent me my bills. He pointed to a date in October 2006, and asked me if I had been in the country at that time. "Yes," I said. "Since August I was in Japan." "You received a letter at this time," he continued. Eh? "Eh?" I replied. "No, no, no. Didn't receive." "Yes, I sent you a letter at this time and you received it." "I definitely didn't receive a letter. No way."

Here he was feeding me drivel that I had well and truly gotten this bill from them back in the day, and I had what? Chosen to ignore it or throw it away? Why would I do something that stupid? And why had I paid, in full and on time, every bill that had come my way since? Let's say the printouts didn't lie, and they sent out a bill only to have no payment come their way. When did they send the bill again, adjusted for interest? And the one after that? And where were the hired goons banging on my door and demanding payment or seizure of my assets, as I have heard has happened to other folk? Where were my goons?! I deserved goons!

"So, when was the next letter?" I asked. "How many letters sent?" My Japanese was on a roll now, though it hadn't disconcerted him in the least that a guy who could say nothing before now refused to shut up. He ran his finger up the page and counted the dates when letters were sent. "There's this one," he started, pointing to the aforementioned October 2006 date. "The next one?" I queried. He continued moving his finger up the page. He tapped his finger on a few dates, but instead of counting just broke into an unintelligible mumble that petered out after about the fourth tap. "Ichi, nmfphsmmmnmnnpmn..." "How many?" I asked. He repeated himself to the note, a tap and "one", followed by a few more taps and a prolonged low noise that left me wondering if he hadn't fallen asleep. This guy was clearly bullshitting me and just didn't have the conscience to fully deliver the ruse. I was willing to bet those other dates were just bills for subsequent years; all fully paid up. I leaned over to get a closer look and he yanked the sheets away, arose and walked off.

The realisation had now hit me. These people were not willing to accept that perhaps their bill had not been delivered to the correct mailbox, and that perhaps I had since somehow gotten lost in their system and never received any follow-ups. They were not able to lie well (maybe seeing as how I had suddenly magically acquired the ability to speak the language I may have also acquired the ability to read it, hence the quick exit of the printouts), and were not able to give me the benefit of the doubt nor admit any wrongdoing. Unfortunately I didn't possess the language skill to take this any further. And what good would that have done anyway? They held me in the palms of their hands and could do whatever they wanted to me.

I felt overcome by a wave of sorrow. Here they were, in the position to do right by someone and help them out of an unclear situation, and they were choosing to do otherwise. They lacked the benevolence or even the capacity to see a way to make this fair for the underdog, instead being mechanically compelled to stick within the rules of their existence. It wasn't in their DNA to comprehend that a bill could be wrong, or that a letter wasn't properly delivered. If it was what their technology and methods prescribed it to be, then anything outside of that realm was unfathomable. An office filled with automatons. So it came as no surprise when he sat back down beside me and once again repeated those three unflinching words on his English voice track:

"You... must... pay."

"Farrrrk!" I screamed. "Fine! Whatever!" I continually shook my head in disgust as I reached into my back pocket and fished for my wallet, slamming the correct amount of money down on the table. "Here, take it!" "Just a moment, I'll get you a receipt," he murmured, completely unfazed by my outburst. As he left me seated there in my corner yet again, my hands shot forward in despair, my nails finding the exact grooves of the scratch marks as I dragged hard and deep all the way to the edge of the table. Just another in a long line, I thought. Tears welled in my eyes, but I was determined not to let this cold creature see me sob. I sucked it all back up, leaned way back in my chair and stared at the ceiling. He came back and placed a receipt on the desk. I slowly reached out and picked it up, checking it was actually a receipt and not just a restaurant menu or something, before folding it and putting it in my pocket. I stumbled to my feet and blinked a few times to keep the tears at bay. I began to walk away from the man as he thanked me, and resisted the urge to flip him off or heave a defeated "fuck you" in his direction. No, I kept my head angled towards the ground as I placed one foot in front of the other. As I rolled my eyes upwards I could see the whole office again and noticed that they were sneaking glimpses of me and whispering to each other. I had completely forgotten they existed, but of course, they must have been aware of the whole wretched spectacle.

I kept my head low as I made my way down an aisle of partitions and towards the exit; my bag slung over my shoulder and my hands deep in my pockets. I could've sworn I heard someone call out "dead man walking", but I could have been mistaken. The man at the front desk refused to make eye contact with me, and sat drooped forward with his arms hanging to the floor, observing a moment of silence. I shook my head in disbelief one last time and thrust open the swinging doors, stepping out into the open air, and not looking back. All the way down the steps to street level I inhaled and exhaled deeply. I felt not only defeated but obliterated. Passersby, noticing the look in my eyes, gave me a wide berth. The sun was not coming out; in fact as soon as I lost any overhead cover I felt the first raindrops start to fall. Something blew against the side of my shoe, but as I looked down I saw that it was not a thousand yen note, but an empty styrofoam oden bowl. I made it back to the station a little damp and stepped onto the platform and straight onto a train, vowing never to return to this part of town again. At least not until the next fabricated overdue tax bill comes my way.

© Jeremy McMahon, 2011

The Physical, Pt.2

2011-02-18T09:42:00.005+09:00

Did you read Pt.1 first? Ok, good. Please continue...

I sat the kids down on the carpet in a circle, and we all observed a quick moment of silence whilst I gathered my thoughts and they waited for something to happen. Okay, here we go. First ever lesson. They're sitting right in front of you. It's time to rock... Wait, how do I start this thing? Oh yeah, introduce yourself. Here we go. Let's blow their minds...

I sat the kids down on the carpet in a circle, and we all observed a quick moment of silence whilst I gathered my thoughts and they waited for something to happen. Okay, here we go. First ever lesson. They're sitting right in front of you. It's time to rock... Wait, how do I start this thing? Oh yeah, introduce yourself. Here we go. Let's blow their minds...

'My name's Jeremy!' I exclaimed, enunciating clearly and tapping my palms against my chest. But I got nothing. No response at all. Tough crowd. 'I'm from Australia!' I continued. I may have even done a little kanagroo impersonation, flicking my hands downward and bobbing a couple of times. Still nothing. They just stared at me with big curious eyes. Jeez, what a buncha rude little bas... oh, hang on! Maybe I should ask them questions.

'Okay, we're gonna go around the room and everybody introduce yourself one at a time. You got it?'

No, they probably didn't have it. Probably a little wordy, and unnecessary to say aloud. I turned to the girl on my immediate left. She wore a half-grimace half-smile, exposing gum where two front teeth should've been. 'What's your name?' I asked slowly, extending my hands towards her. Wow, a lot of handwork needed in this gig, I was beginning to think...

'Misa.'

Wait a minute. She just answered! I mean, she did, right? Did she say her name, or just try to alert me to the massive sweat stains expanding from the armpit regions of my white business shirt? 'Um, uh... oh... uh, one more time?'

'Misa.'

I looked down at her name tag, and sure enough, there were the letters M, I, S, and A printed on it. Misa. She had answered the question! Yay, I had officially commenced the lesson! This was going brilliantly! I was a brilliant teacher! Look out Mr. Chips!

I could instantly feel the nervousness rising up and out of my body, leaving me brimming with confidence. Or could it merely have been steam from my armpits? Either way, the ball was rolling. And they had name tags! This was going to be a cinch.

I turned to the next kid, on Misa's left. 'What's your name?'

'Yusei.'

I looked down at his name tag, and saw the name "Yusei" printed on it. This was working like a charm. Ha ha!

The next kid. 'Ryosuke,' he said. Okay, that one was a bit of a mouthful, but from what I could tell, he too had said his name. Misa, Yusei, Rio... something or other, they had all said their names. I was on fire.

'What's your name?' I said to the beaming girl on Ryo, Riyo... that last kid's left. 'Hana!' she shrieked. They all giggled. 'Hello Hana,' I continued. 'Nice to meet you.' 'Nice to meet you too,' she replied. Whoo! I hadn't even planned on that, it just sort of came out, and it worked. Banter. Ad-libbing. This was actually kind of... fun.

'What's your name?' I asked the last kid, the boy on my right. 'Unko!' he hollered. They all exploded with laughter. I looked down at his name tag and saw the name "Koichi" printed on it. I asked again. 'Unko!' he again replied. They rolled around on the floor in hysterics. 'Okay, Unko,' I said. 'It looks like we'll have to get you a new name tag, this one has some other kid's name on it.' More laughter. What was up with these kids? They were a bit nutty, it seemed. Oh well, as long as little Unko here didn't mind wearing the wrong tag for the remainder of the lesson; he appeared to be oblivious to the error, and was enjoying himself thus far.

On with the lesson then. I reached behind my back and pulled out the fruit flashcards...

Fast forward ten minutes or so and I had successfully navigated my way through getting the students to repeat the names of all the fruits in the pictures, doing a flip-and-find card game, and singing a fruit-inspired ditty not unlike Agadoo. A little short of breath yet revelling in my achievements I sat the five spry youngsters back down on the carpet in a circle, moved across to the bench near the door where I was keeping my materials, and began tidying up the flashcards. I bent forward and tapped the pile of cards on the bench, aligning their edges.

From out of nowhere I felt a sharp pain right up my, uh... how do I put this? Right up in my... well, my... my anus. The shock caused my head to shoot upwards and my back to straighten, and I must have leapt a few feet into the air. My immediate thought was that I had somehow pulled a muscle or caused a spasm down there due to the high-impact nature of my, I guess you could rightly say, fruity dance moves some moments earlier. Was that even possible? And how would I explain such a thing to the school manager should I need to request an early finish to my shift in order to go the nearest hospital for observation? But as my feet landed back on the floor and I instinctively spun around I saw Unko standing behind me, laughing fiendishly.

I caught sight of his hands, clasped together in front of his chest. The forefingers were pointed straight, the middle, ring and pinkies interlocked. He resembled a shooter blowing smoke from his gun. Had... had he just poked me in the arse? Prodded me in the nether regions as I stood bent over? He had, hadn't he? What an odd thing to do.

I took a step towards him, trying to think of how I should appropriately react. If I got all shouty I might scare him or cause him to cry; not a positive start to my career as a kids teacher. It may even land me in trouble with the staff at the school, or worse, his parents. But if I laughed he may think that the act is acceptable and may try it again. No, we can't have that. If I were to pretend that I didn't like it but wasn't angry, who knows what may happen. Perhaps I could play the whole thing dow-how-how-owwww!

Suddenly I felt the same acute pain again and leapt into the air once more. I whipped around and this time saw Yusei behind me, fingers in the probing position. I was so focused on Unko that I didn't notice that another kid had sneaked around behind. I heard laughter ring out all around the room. They had gotten the new teacher good, whatever the hell it was they had just done.

And it didn't stop there. Barely had I scowled at Yusei, causing him to cower, when I felt a poke from back behind me again. This one didn't quite hit the spot, didn't quite wedge my underpants right up in there like the first two hits, plunging into my right cheek instead, but Unko was proud of his second go and cackled madly. I turned ninety degrees and threw one hand each on a shoulder of the two boys, pulling them into each other, clanging them together, then I shot my hands up against their chests to keep them at arms length. But they were both filled with adrenalin, leaning into my palms and extending their arms, desperately trying to get at me like a pair of zombies. I had to dig my feet into the carpet and push all my weight against them to keep them at bay.

There were, however, another three to deal with. Misa, Hana, and Ryosuke had all risen up now and, wildly inspired by their classmates, took turns at me. Fortunately my buttocks were clenched tight with the position I held in restraining the instigators, and they failed to gain access. After what seemed like an eternity in this deadlock position, but in reality was probably only a few seconds, Hana had the nous to step around underneath my arching frame where a much more vulnerable part of me was left unprotected. She slowly looked up into my fearful eyes from only a couple of centimetres away, revealing a devilish grin and a clenched fist. 'Oh god, no,' I pleaded to her. 'Not that.'

I had to make a split-second decision that would involve a sacrifice, and I chose to protect the future possibility of being able to father children. In grabbing Hana's wrists I unwillingly granted admission to my backside again and the other four seized the opportunity. From all angles tiny fingers jabbed, causing me to twirl hopelessly, like the final frankfurter on a plate being attacked by the toothpicks of hungry children at a birthday party. I guess I was going to have to ride this one out, my dignity all but evaporated.

... 'I couldn't believe they were doing that. I never ever did anything like that when I was a kid!'

I was back in the safety of the teachers' room after the lesson, relaying my sordid tale. The other teachers were flabbergasted. I held the attention of the room.

'You mean they were actually trying to get you in the clacker?' one of them asked.

'Right up there,' I answered with a disgusted look on my face. 'It was as if they were trying to convert their fingers into sticks of Pocky.'

They were so fascinated by my twisted experience that not one of them even smiled let alone laughed. Their eyes were as wide as saucers.

'How did you make them stop?' another queried.

'I ended up blasting them. They got really scared and sat back down.'

'I heard that from my cubicle!'

'Who were the students in that class? Maybe I know them.'

'Um, there were three boys and two girls. Yusei, Unko, Hana...'

'Unko? What do you mean Unko?'

'... Misa, Riyo-something or other.'

'Unko isn't a name. It means poo!'

'Hasn't this ever happened to any of you before? You mean to tell me that in my very first kids lesson I cop what no other teachers cop, ever?'

They responded with a mixture of nods and shakes, which I took to mean that this whole concept was entirely new to them all. Lucky me to be the pioneer.

'And they kept all chanting something too, while they did it.'

'Like what?'

"I dunno. My Japanese isn't so good. It sounded something like kancho. "Kancho! Kancho!" they were going on. At least, that's what it sounded like. Does anyone know what it means?'

More heads shakes, and people looking around at each other at a loss.

'Do we have a Japanese dictionary here?' I asked.

Byron reached onto a shelf behind me and placed one in my hands. I flicked through it, scanning the romaji words under "k". My tracing finger stopped. I had found the word.

'Got it,' I said. 'Oh, man.'

'What does it say?!' they blurted out.

'It means... are you ready for this? It means... enema.'

I had never heard a united laugh so uproarious, nor the crack of thighs being slapped so thundering. Tears streamed down all of our faces. The bell rang for the next lot of classes yet no one heard it. They instead took turns yanking the dictionary away from one another to get a look themselves and allay their disbelief.

'You mean, kids going 'round poking each others' asses and saying "enema" when they do it?'

'That is sooo depraved!'

'What ever happened to kids innocently playing marbles, or having hobbies like that?'

'I'm sure "marbles" exists here too; it just means reaching slightly more under...'

'How come it's never happened in my classes?'

'Do you want it to?!'

'Bend over a little more, it will happen.'

'Or maybe they just like Jeremy's butt. Hey Jeremy, spin around, give us a look, it must be fine!'

And so the banter went on. I would later discover, through continuous interrogation of students and friends, and consistent firsthand experiences, that kancho is actually a very common prank amongst youngsters in this country, and is practised almost to the extent of being a national pastime. Why someone would want their fingers smelling like another person's rectum is beyond me, yet the act enjoys a status much grander than the old "wedgie" back home. It is a skill honed in one's youth, then maintained through puberty and brought out on special occasions during adulthood. That which would seem to verge on sexual harrassment or assault in some countries is cheerfully dismissed as childish shenanigans, even when the culpable fingers are attached to, say, a 40-year-old businessman. I once saw a TV programme where male and female comedians alike were doing it to each other as they walked down a shopping street. They all accepted it with an embarrassed laugh when they were on the receiving end, and exercised great cunning and stealth when they decided it was their turn to deliver. Men and women of the cloth, if you will. It's a Japanese tradition that is not set to die out any time soon, and foreign teachers represent a whole demographic of naïve, unsuspecting targets to any budding kancho enthusiasts out there.

Despite all this, next week I strolled into the same class with a broad smile on my face. Although the students began wriggling their fingers in anticipation and whispering methods of attack, I was confident that the six pairs of underwear I had put on that morning would be enough to thwart even the most aggressive thrusts.

The Physical, Pt.1

2011-01-24T18:24:00.008+09:00

I had survived for fourteen months. Fourteen months without being assigned any kids classes. For anyone to last that long whilst working full time at an English language school in a surburban area was nothing short of a miracle. Most were lucky to hold out for two, maybe three months before they received the call up, but for some reason or another I had slipped under the radar.

There were other teachers at my school, trained and more experienced, taking care of those classes, and they had yet to quit their positions and move on to greener pastures. The general practice was that, unless a new teacher specified that they particularly wanted to teach kids, each new employee was given a short reprieve whilst they got their footing in adult classes first. Once a teacher left the school, or else demonstrated a disturbing ineptitude for dealing with children, someone would be required to take over. But I had held out for fourteen whole months, even witnessing others who had come after me get picked.

What was my secret? It's not as if the Head Teacher hadn't approached me on numerous occasions and asked if I'd like to take on a few groups of little tikes; he had. I always said I didn't have the passion for entertaining young, screaming, underdeveloped humans, and that it would be a disaster waiting to happen, placing me in a room with them. I imagined myself accidentally doing something like stepping on a child's face whilst trying to extinguish a fire that had somehow ignited in the corner of the room as I was attending to another kid who had gotten their leg stuck in the ceiling fan. And all this during the introduction part of my lesson. The coming together of two elements that should never be mixed could prove catastrophic.

It had been an accepted speech that had continued to buy me time. Whenever the topic was raised by my colleagues about why I didn't have any kids classes of my own, I would successfully shake it off, by either swinging the conversation towards something else, like the agony of being in a small cubicle with the eccentric adult students that I had endured earlier that day, or by saying that I had put my hand up numerous times but the powers that be had decreed that my teaching style was not suited to juniors.

But they had grown more envious and suspicious over time, and I had to keep my stories straight so that one of them wouldn't decide to take the matter further, say, to the Head Teacher himself. They had to pity me; to understand my plight. I had even considered appropriating a true story I once heard about a guy who requested a transfer to a school with only adult students, because secretly he was a virgin who was not accustomed to another's touch and was horrified to find he would unintentionally spring a boner whenever the children got close to him in class. I could put myself in the role of erectus automaticus, pretending that I suffered from that very affliction. However, in the end I thought it best not to use that story; the cons definitely outweighed the pros.

Many times each working day I would see other teachers gather up their things as the bell rang, and herd a group of children down a corridor to the kids room whilst everybody else headed to the cubicle area for their adult classes. They would always return to the staff room after kids class looking frazzled and sore, demoralised and broken, like someone who had just gone a round with a heavyweight champ whilst being forced to watch a snuff film. Their hands shook as they tried to put away their class materials, and they spoke of their students in tones of disgust and dismay as they relayed their antics:

"Daiki ate a crayon that had been up Shunsuke's nose."

"Genki took off his underpants and threw them out the window."

"Asuka vomited on herself and gave me a hug."

I would chuckle at the stories and pity my colleagues, all the while harbouring a deep fear that the day would come when that was going to be me sharing tales of horror whilst wiping vomit from my tie with a damp towel.

And then my time came.

The head teacher sat me down one day and perched himself opposite. He looked decidedly nervous and solemn, and for a moment I thought he had come to share convicting evidence of me gallivanting in nightclubs the evenings before those many sick days I had called in. I needed an extra pair of hands to count how many times I had done that so far during my time at the school and, if found out, the punishment could have been severe. But if only it had been that.

"Jeremy," he said. "As you know, a couple of our teachers will be quitting and returning to their countries this summer. Now, I know you don't want to do it, but we need for you to start teaching kids classes. If you can't do it, then we'll have to move you to another school, as we need all our teachers here to take on a few classes each week."

I slumped back in my chair, and took it all in. They needed me to step up, or else they had no option but to ship me out. I really liked working at this school; I didn't want to have to transfer. All I had heard were terrible things about other schools, from arsehole managers, to grating coworkers, to heavy teaching loads, to psychotic students. My school had none of those things. In fact, teachers from other schools who came to cover a shift at ours always remarked upon how great a place to work this was. And I got to work with good people who had fast become my best friends. Plus, if I did get found out about my constant days off and addiction to Osaka nightlife, having gotten myself into a position where I was highly valued and needed by the school could override any proposed disciplinary action.

The decision was simple. I leaned forward and smiled at the head teacher. "I'll do it," I said. "Give me some kids classes."

On the day of my first class I received a free period beforehand to get my lesson plan ready. I had been to training, which meant that I had been made to feel like an idiot in front of about ten teachers from other schools who, to be fair, had also been made to feel like idiots in front of me and each other. We had been forced to take turns leading the group through classroom activities as everybody else had to pretend to be students. We had sung children's songs badly, and had gotten into some compromising physical positions trying to recreate common classroom scenarios for our overly bubbly trainer. At the end of it all I still felt woefully underprepared for my first class, and now had the added displeasure of knowing a new batch of people that I would have trouble looking in the eye should I ever run into them in a bar somewhere.

All the other teachers were well aware that this was to be my first day entering the unknown. Earlier in the day couple of lucky, newer ones had been loudly heralding their childless schedules; the experienced ones had worn smug expressions as they told me that it had been nice knowing me.

The lesson bell rang and the other teachers began to appear from their cubicles. Suddenly I felt a tremor in the pit of my stomach. I was a little dizzy and grabbed onto the table for support. What had been disdain for getting mixed up with kids had now evolved into fear. How could I be so scared of such tiny little things? I was going to be teaching five five-year-olds; they were likely to be more scared of me. I had what I thought to be a tight lesson plan, and all the materials I needed. Christ, I was teaching them the names of different fruits; how many complications could there be? Yet I still felt myself gasping for air beneath a tidal wave of malaise.

Rodney, an English teacher, had just reentered the room. When I say "English teacher" I mean that he was from the country of England, not that he was a teacher of English, which he in fact was, of course, or at least he gave the impression of being, as we all did. He had been teaching in the kids room last lesson and I needed to get the flashcards from him.

"Hey Rodney," I said. "Can I get those fruit flashcards from you?"

He wandered into the middle of the room and sat down at the table. "'Ere, what do you mean flashcards?"

"The fruit ones. You just taught a class of five-year-olds, right? And I have the same age group now, so I need the same cards."

"Yeah, but what's this about flashcards. What flashcards?"

Byron, an American, turned around from his point at the filing cabinet. "Wait a minute, Rodney. Are you saying that you didn't use the flashcards for that lesson?"

A grin formed on Rodney's face. "That lesson. Any lesson. I didn't know there were flashcards. What's all this?"

"You don't know that we have flashcards to teach kids lessons with?"

"Somebody could've told me, innit."

He let out a laugh as the attention of all the other teachers fell on him.

"How on Earth did you teach that lesson without flashcards?!" another asked.

"Y'know, I just did gestures, didn't I."

We all fell silent as we puzzled over this. Here I was worrying about my lesson going off without a hitch when somebody else was in the room gesticulating edible plant growth. Nobody dared to ask how he had taught the kids "banana".

The befuddlement was cut off by the sound of the bell, signalling the beginning of the next class. Well, this is it, I thought. Let's get it over and done with. I shot out of my seat and gathered my things, including the fruit flashcards which had been sitting with the other supplies all along. Before anyone else had a chance to leave the room, I strode forward confidently; out and around the reception, and off to the right, down the corridor. Sure enough, there were five kids waiting for me, and they looked up with delight.

"Hallo!" I exclaimed. "Are you ready?"

They stood up and grabbed their bags as I opened the classroom door. One kid even cheered. As they ran past me and into the room, I took a deep breath and summoned up all my courage. Here we go. I stepped into the room and shut the door behind me.

to be continued...

© Jeremy McMahon, 2011

The Platform Golfer

2011-01-05T11:23:00.003+09:00

It was a rainy autumn morning as I sauntered up the steps to the train platform on my way to work. When I reached the top I saw that my train had not yet pulled in, letting out a swarm of city workers at their final stop, who would collectively leave the unpleasant stench of tightly-packed bodies and breath in each carriage that us outbound commuters would be forced to gag on as we sat down in uncomfortably warm seats and waited to depart. I headed towards the far end of the platform to grab a seat in the front carriage of the train. This would in turn leave me right in front of the exit gates when I got off five stations away, thus saving me a whole bundle of seconds in door-to-door travel time. These cherished seconds gained would mean extra time spent with my head on the staff room table and my hands clasped around a mug of hot coffee before my first students arrived.

As I made my way down the platform I saw a man. He was in his 40s, a salaryman as the Japanised English vernacular would have it, wearing a dark suit and with a briefcase stood on the ground by his feet. Like everyone else on that particular rainy morning he had an umbrella propped against his side. Strange thing was, he was holding it upside down, the tip in his hand, the handle angled towards his shoes. A few weeks earlier at this very station I had witnessed a very rare and odd thing - one woman standing over another lying curled up on the ground, and beating her silly with the handled end of an umbrella. The incident was a few platforms away, was broken up by station attendants in a matter of seconds, and was of no threat at all to me (in fact I found the whole thing rather amusing and would go on to tell an embellished version of the tale to my workmates for the rest of the week), however the sight of another traveller gripping their kasa in such a way triggered a quick turn of the head and a wider berth as I scuttled by. I did not wish to invite any trouble on this lazy morning, nor any another morning for that matter.

At the point where I was passing the man from what I thought was a safe distance I suddenly felt the sensation that something had lightly brushed my arm. It startled me into an elaborate sideways skip that belied my claims of not being able to dance. Oh no, I shuddered. It's on, this guy wants a piece of me. My turn to cower in the foetal position whilst another human being clobbers me with a long implement. I spun around quickly, and threw up my fists with all the coordination and menace of a boxing puppet. But there was no confrontation, no precursor to a violent outburst. Instead I saw the man, head down, pointed end of the umbrella in his hands, moving it back and forth and simulating a golf swing. He was totally oblivious to the fact that he had been mere millimetres away from landing a hefty blow on a passerby.

I saw no reason to confront the man, after all no harm had been done. Instead, out of interest, I stopped to watch him whilst I waited for the train. He repeatedly practised his swing, his stance measured, his face a picture of perfect concentration, his eyes following the ball from the point where he stood hunched over it all the way up to the cup... Yet there was no ball. There was no golf course, no hole, no club in his hands. There was just a man on a train platform with a growing number of feet between himself and the other people waiting for the train that morning, holding a follow-through pose with his umbrella resting on his left shoulder, and staring off into the distance.

True, I had seen many suited men on train platforms attempting to catch up on a bit of golf practice before, but I was excited this very time as it was my first opportunity to witness one fully equipped with a makeshift club. Yet as with every other such occasion I couldn't help but wonder, "Why are you doing this, here and now?" Was he an egotist, trying to let those around him know that, hey, he played golf, and he played it well? Was it something that his wife wouldn't let him do in the confines of their house, and he was seizing any chance he had for a practice? Was he in fact such a golfing aficionado that he had his mind focused on his game wherever he went; that he lived and breathed the game so intensely that he couldn't help but move his limbs in a swinging motion at any given time; that he had such a gift for the action of connecting iron to ball and ball to hole that he needed to regularly keep enacting and perfecting that motion, and that you who stood nearby on this platform today were privileged to witness in awe the graceful actions of a master of the game, a legend that you yourself could only aspire to be?

Who did he think he was, the smug fool. Are you not aware that you are not on a golf course? You don't even have a real club in your hand, how can you possibly hope to replicate an actual golfing situation or get any meaningful practice done standing in a suit on a train platform on a cold morning with nothing but your imagination and a device for keeping rain off your head? Did you hit the ball well on that swing just now, did you? Did it go in the hole, Tiger? How could you even know?!

As my head raced with these exasperating thoughts, my eyes noticed that the man did in fact have quite a nice swing. He kept his feet at a good distance, moved his wrists smoothly, and now that he had seemingly completed a successful putt and moved on to practising a tee shot at the next hole, that to this keen observer appeared to be a par three, showcased a lovely, fluid hip motion.

I began to wonder how much of a lark it might be to stand behind him and applaud each swing, or perhaps to lob an actual golf ball over his head and off into the distance as he followed through, shouting "fore!" just before the ball went skimming off a far platform and pinging into the side of a moving train. Or hiding behind a garbage bin the second the ball left my hand, leaving him utterly confused as to how he had managed to air a ball that didn't exist. The coalescence of his reality and imagination may lead him to believe that he had in fact purchased a magical umbrella, and subsequent mornings may find him experimenting with it on the platform just to see what else it might offer; scuttling back and forth and wielding it like a sword, or sitting in it like he was embarking on a mystical rafting voyage. Imagine the damage it would do to his sanity should I appear on the opposite platform with a pin flag in hand, a crowd gathered nearby to cheer as his successful shot rolled in, and a man to present him with a tournament trophy.

Golfing is not the only pastime I have seen practised in public places. The occasional middle-aged man has been unable to stop himself from gripping the pole in a train carriage and repeatedly carrying out a fancy little step he learned at dance class recently for all to see. Shoulders back and toes pointed. Teenage dancers are common wherever there is a reflective surface, and every so often you can spot two guys huddled together and slapping each other on the back of the head as they practise their manzai comedy routine to an audience of uninterested pigeons in a city park. Heck, I once even saw a young guy standing with his face only centimetres from a wall, stroking his chest and wailing the song on his headphones horribly out of key at the top of his lungs, for all to suffer through. However, golf is unique in that it is the only pastime or aspiration that cannot be fully and accurately enacted in public, that requires a little imagination and perhaps the use of alternative tools. I mean, singing and dancing require only the body - your voice is your voice and your limbs are your limbs no matter where you may be. But a man swinging an actual golf club whilst waiting for the train is likely to spend the rest of the day swinging from the bars of a cell whilst waiting for his missus to come and bail him out.

As our train pulled in and the golfer and I boarded and sat down I wondered, why is creative simulation on the nation's platforms limited to golf only? Surely there are other hobbies that can also be fine-tuned with a dash of inspiration and a sprinkling of invention whilst waiting for the local to roll in. Hobbies that would provide easily-amused commuters like myself with some mild entertainment on the way to and from work. Billiards comes to mind. Fishing. Online computer gaming perhaps. The sight of some overweight, pimply teen rotating one hand whilst frantically waggling the fingers on his other like he's about to complete World of Warcraft would be a welcome change from the swingers.

Actually, on thinking about this further it's perhaps best not to encourage such exhibitionism. As more hobbyists see it fit to take their various recreational passions to the public stage, it would inevitably lead to the day when a card game enthusiast decides to practise dealing at a frantic rate whilst waiting for the train to work, and the resultant screams of women nearby at their misinterpretation of what said dealer was doing would lead to the intervention of railway staff, which would lead to a public indecency ruling in court, which would lead to a ban on all platform gesturing in the future, thus preventing the many golfers out there from getting their much needed practice. And we can't have that.

© Jeremy McMahon, 2011

Ok, go somewhere, but then come back.

2011-01-04T14:06:00.005+09:00

Yikes, who woulda thought 2010 would just disappear like that. That's what you get for trying to complete a post-grad degree and hold an overseas wedding all in the same year. Anyway, now it's 2011, and I want to be clear that this blog thingy isn't dead or abandoned. As all it really is is a way for me to draft short stories about life in Japan, I've gone back and decided to improve upon existing stories before embarking on new ones. Thus the stuff you see here is getting a working-over as we speak. The reason for this is that the originals are not up to stratch in my book, and like I said, this is a blog for me to work on my writing.

So once the same stuff is rewritten and reposted over the next few weeks, the new stories will follow. The Physical will be reworked and completed, and then I have a whole heap of other tales to share, with such enticing titles as: The Wanker, The Instigator, The Hard Truth, The Panty Hunt, and The Renaissance Man.

All sounds like fun, don't it?