Let Jagg

Today was easily one of the most exciting days of my life. I think that my body slash mind knew what an amazing, fun, Japan filled adventure the day would turn out to be, and therefore allowed me to get up at 7:00AM feeling well rested and exuberant. Or it might have been because waking up at 7AM in Japan means really waking up at 4PM in "The States" as we like to call it here. Either way, when I got up this morning I was ready for whatever the day was to bring. Little did I know however that the day would bring me such things as awkward interactions with pachinko attendants and stimulating conversation in Japanese with a middle aged ramen bar waitress.

The day started off with some pretty trivial things like a tour of the base and a brief presentation about some Camp Adventure and other military procedures and regulations. But after walking around the military base in a large, cumbersome group and talking about why it's bad to rob stores in the bar district after drinking excessively was when the real fun began. First on my list of to-dos was to explore the NEX and Commissary on the base. The NEX is essentially a Target, Best Buy, and Dillards all rolled into one superstore with really reasonable prices. I was impressed actually. Additionally, there are some really buff, intimidating guards that line the perimeter and check your passport to make sure that you have 'clearance' to enter the superstore. And when I say buff intimidating guards, I really mean tiny Japanese girls that sit at a desk and don't speak any English. Anyway, I went to the NEX, was thoroughly impressed by their selection of what seemed to everything on the Earth that has existed, ever, and then bought a case for my ipod. After the NEX party, I checked out the Commissary, which is apparently Japanese for GROCERCY STORE. Here I bought a bunch of things in bulk like white rice, frozen boneless chicken wings, and frozen sausage patties in an attempt to save some money. I figure if I don't spend a lot of money on my solid food intake, I will have much more money for the important things like climbing Mt. Fuji, futuristic robot vending machines, and the infamous "Love Hotels" scattered all throughout this wondrous country. (That was a joke, Erin.)

I found out today as well that the military likes to come up with all sorts of fun, interesting, and also useless names for things that already have existing names. Oftentimes the new names involve very hard to remember acronyms or made up words that have nothing to do with the actual function of the thing has has been named, kind of like COMMISSARY. I also made the realization today that if Japan weren't such an alluring place, I could very much be perfectly content spending the next three months on this base and still have plenty of things to do and places to eat at. Seriously, this place is huge. Theres a bus line even (granted there are only two buses, one labeled 'clockwise' and one labelled 'counterclockwise'). Fortunately for you and me however, Japan is nuts, so I won't need to spend much time on my base aside from the required job doing and sleeping that I should probably do.

Dinnertime was the first real chance that I had to explore the homeland of my heart. I gathered some of my most trusted allies, packed up my exploration gear (camera, trident layers gum, Japanese phrasebook) and penetrated the glorious city of Yokosuka, hard. My first mistake made itself known almost instantly. In a fit of foreign explorative passion I easiy broke away from my group of friends, finding myself very much alone as well as breaking Camp Adventure's cardinal buddy rule. Quickly I realized that I should have chosen some allies with either a faster average walking speed, or a higher general level of foreign explorative passion. I amended this

situation very level-headedly using an unnecessarily loud voice coupled with words such as: hurry, the, friggin, balls, and up. Needless to say, there were no more issues with the group sticking together after this.

Our objective for this mission was to acquire edibles, but since I was in such a frenzied state I quickly exchanged this objective with one that involved the shiniest, loudest, and flashingest thing that was within view at that particular time. I imagine that this behavior annoyed my travel group, only because my travel group made a point to vocalize their annoyance with my behavior. There was even a point where I led my group up into a seven story pachinko parlor, thinking for some reason that there would be food on one of the higher levels. If you are unfamiliar with Pachinko, it is pretty much the Japanese equivalent of slot machines, except that when you're done, you bring a basket full of the small metal ball bearings that you have steadily been collecting to the desk to be weighed and cashed out. It was very, VERY loud in this building, and before we reached the fourth floor (which was closed) we were caught by a Pachinko attendant and ushered out in an extremely polite yet forceful way. On our way out, I participated in what would barely pass for a conversation with another attendant, this time female, and asked her where I could find food by repeating the only food words that I know in Japanese, such as 'oranju jisu' and 'sushi'. She said some Japanese words which I have never heard before, pointed in about nine different directions (one of which was straight up, I'm not kidding), and then we were off.

A couple minutes after our Pachinko adventure I ended up leading my gang of hungry, somewhat hateful travelers to a very decent looking ramen bar. The ramen bar ended up being a really solid find, and the good food helped everyone forget how incredibly incompetent of a travel leader I was. I would love to describe our dinner experience in a much more vividly hilarious fashion, but it's getting late and I have just been informed that I will be swimming 600 meters tomorrow morning to prove to my supervisors that I actually do know how to swim (HA IF ONLY THEY KNEW THAT I'M ONLY A MEDIOCRE SWIMMER AT BEST. I HAVE NO IDEA WHY I WAS USHERED SO STRONGLY TO BE IN THE AQUATICS PROGRAM).

Well folks, sorry to cut this blog short. Maybe tomorrow I'll continue talking about my adventures, because surprisingly, I didn't spend a lot of time talking about the actual events that happened today, but rather the useless logistical in between parts of all those events. Anyway, here are some pictures in the meantime.

This amazing woman was our server for the night. Our friendship started when she asked me what I wanted, and I responded with "What would you recommend for me?" in quite possible the worst Japanese that has ever been spoken my a 21 year old Filipino man. Our undying bond was only strengthened when I asked her to pose in a picture with me. Just take a moment to appreciate that look of pure, unadultered enjoyment upon her face in this picture.