It's All In The Execution

Sunday, November 25, 2007

It's All In The Execution

Tomorrow morning is my job interview with Interac. Kind of odd how quickly a month went by. Much faster than the two or three weeks it took them to get back to me in the first place and set up the interview. I went and got my hair cut today to look nice for it, and ran into a bunch of the mall employees I always used to talk to, so that was nice. The people at Brave, where I get my hair cut, were very friendly, and all of them mentioned that my Japanese has improved a lot since they last saw me. I think that's because I actually spoke, and my nods and smiles actually corresponded with tag questions or yes/no ones, instead of open ones which kinda end conversations in their tracks, as I should well know, being an English teacher and experiencing them on a regular basis.

Anyway, I started preparing for my interview a little while back, thinking about what I'm going to do for my little 5 minute video presentation, but when I was reviewing the information they gave me on Saturday I discovered that they want me to bring my diploma with me, something I, as I would assume most people, don't have on them at any given time. It's sitting on my wall in America, in a nice frame, a monument to the shit I had to do to get here. Well, that's not exactly true anymore, it's probably in an envelope speeding its way across the ocean soon to arrive at my door, but that's beside the point. I had my dad scan it and send me a high res copy, which I printed out this evening. Not exactly official, but at least they'll see that one exists, theoretically. I called Greg when I discovered this, and he told me he didn't have his either when he went in for his interview, and that it didn't turn out to be such a problem. But, there will be a few more people at mine, and the circumstances are different, and I'm afraid they're using it as red-tape filtering. Oh well, too late to worry about that now.

So I focused my energy practicing my stuff, and it's come together pretty nicely, basically it's exactly 5 minutes, and could be pretty fun, if all goes well. The rest of the interview I'm not really worried about so much, it's the standard stuff, which I'm pretty good at. Question and answer section, grammar test, informational speech, etc. Not that I'm not thinking about it, but, there's only so much one can prepare for those things, and at least with that part, I've got experience under my belt to help me out.

It was kind of fun, cutting out little flashcards and downloading stuff, and printing stuff out while preparing my presentation. It was I think the first time that the stress turned into something enjoyable. While I was cutting, and printing, and hacking through mistakes, I never felt nervous, I felt excited. My confidence built, and to be honest I'm not worried about it at all right now. That'll probably change tomorrow morning when I go into controlled panic mode, but, at least for now it's good to be this close to something important and not worried that my sitting here writing in my blog is taking away from my preparedness. More on that when I get home tomorrow, I'm sure.

Also, I start work with zombie neo-Nova on Tuesday in Kanamachi. I got the call from Cerie when I was plastered with Greg up in Moriya on Friday. I think I managed to maintain pretty well, but who knows. Oh well. I'm happy that I have something right now, some kind of promise of future pay while I wait around for the government to pick up the rest of my back paychecks. Money's gonna start getting reallllly tight pretty soon here, but for now I'm going to enjoy this time for what it is. Heh, today was the last day of my month long vacation from work.

In other, other news, Saki came over last night and she was just the cutest thing. It's strange, I'm starting to understand a lot more about how the Japanese, and some other Asian cultures, work regarding public vs. private selves. Saki is a very cool, relaxed, chill girl when we're out and about, she's witty, sarcastic at times, etc etc she's great. But then at home, when we're alone, she's different, but still her. She's a lot cuter, she tells me more about her feelings, the real cutesy shit comes out, and I like that too, but what I'm coming to understand is that that's how things work out here. Not that it hasn't been said a million times over, but there really is a public and private reality here.

This is what I think really confuses foreigners, namely Westerners, when they come here and get into relationships with the locals. They meet someone who seems very put together, or fun, or non-possessive, or loves their music, and that's all very well true, for their public persona. But when they become comfortable enough to show their private side, invariable it's things that those foreigners don't like. And then boom, the relationship crashes, and all you hear are stories about how this Japanese chick was cool for a while, and then as soon as things settled or got serious, "they just completely changed overnight into someone I couldn't stand to be around."

Funny that this country breeds people to split their personalities, even though it's ok here because that's what's expected, and thinks that's not going to cause relationship problems. Or maybe, it doesn't so much because the guys here all know it's coming. But that would also explain why old people here are so completely different from young ones, because their personalities have melded again, and they've stopped giving a shit about putting on appearances and just hate gaijin openly, or whatever. It's an interesting system, and I'll have to spend some more time considering the ramifications. See what other questions and observations that clears up.

Kk, time for me to rehearse once or twice more, and then get some good rest so I can just crush my interview tomorrow.