Entries this day: Dream Work new_train_line

Dream

7:26am JST Saturday 31 January 2004

I had to collect US quarters from specific years for some kind of presentation at a party or something. I was surprised to find that 1978 quarters were not round, but kindof an angled diamond shape, and featured an image of the ice crawlers from the planet Hoth on Empire Strikes Back (interesting because that movie wasn't out in 1978). Ali was interested in helping me collect quarters, but he didn't actually help me, but just made random comments about some of the coins.

Work

2:55pm JST Saturday 31 January 2004

Finished lunch at work; been listening to my mix CD that I made. Glad that some of the others are enjoying it. Kinda feel like I could fit in here. That kinda makes me wanna stay, but we'll see how gaba feels when I visit there.

Quote of the day: "Shinjuku smells more dangerous than Harajuku."

I successfully did not give my email address to a student. She was like, "this is my last Nova day and I'm worried about losing my English so I'm looking for an exchange partner." I'm not sure how much more of an opportunity I would need, but I didn't take this one. I did give her a Metropolis magazine and showed her the language exchange classifieds in the back. She seemed quite pleased with that. I also gave her Rie's email address in the US in case she wants to try and rock over to the US.

Oops there's the bell. Lunch is over. Peace.

6:13pm JST Saturday 31 January 2004

I have two homework assignments from work: how many light minutes is it from earth to mars, and what's this business about NASA having named a rock "sashimi" or something like that?

- - - -

My last lesson was these two level 4 students whose grammar was not level 4 calibre, though their fluency was pretty up there. I am happy to feel like they actually got something from the lesson. I taught them the difference in meaning between "I have gone shopping" and "I have been shopping" and "I have been going shopping."

I had presented the language and one said, "Recently, I have been going to Hawaii," and I told them that meant he must be very rich. He wanted to know why it meant multiple times, and I was like, "hmmmmm."

Then I was like, "arigh" cause I figured out how to explain it. I had the perfect tool at my disposal; a room overlooking trains at Kawasaki station.

"That train is going to Yokohama."

"That train has gone to Yokohama."

"Trains have been going to Yokohama all day."

blah blah blah bang they understand.

- - - -

To balance, another student was making the same errors I had corrected before, using the same technique I used today. I didn't notice it was the same until he started telling me the same story, and I wondered why he couldn't learn it, and I wondered what different way I could teach it. Hmmmm.

new train line

12:10am JST Sunday 1 February 2004

Holy cats.

My brain is kinda spinning from what I've seen here.

At this station (Tammachi), the Tokyu Toyoko line has been changed from going above ground level to being 4 stories below ground level. The change happened in one night. Or, actually, within four hours.

Now, granted, they didn't build this new station four stories below ground in four hours; this shit is so fly that they've probably been working on it since before I arrived in Japan.

But, yesterday, the trains ran on the tracks five stories up. Today they run right here.

The next station is still the old station with the old tracks with pigeon poo all over them. I got off at that station and followed the tracks back toward where the change occurred. The pictures didn't come out, but there are towers

       |                  |
       |----+       +-----|
       |                  |
       |                  |
       |====+=======+=====|
       |    |       |     |
       |                  |
       |                  |
       |                  |
       |   . .     . .    |

that have two sets of supports for the overhead electric cable thing for the trains to get energy. So the tracks used to be, for example 5 feet higher than they are now. Which means the train is going through where the old tracks used to be. Which means the old tracks had to be removed while the trains weren't running (during the four hour window last night) and then the new track put in place.

- - - -

Shit it's 2am; I'm tired as fuck. I was pissed at the guy in my train station for kicking me out; I just wanted a momento of this change. But all the old maps seem to be gone, and the old (unneeded as of today) posters are apparently too important to give away.

- - - -

I was glad to talk to Dan about it, and relay all the mysteries I had seen.