Archive for 2007

A Guide to Englishism

Sunday, December 9th, 2007


As an English person living in North America, one thing that never fails to amaze me is the fascination Yanks and Canucks have with my accent. When I first moved here, the attention it garnered (not to mention the play from the fellas) was quite flattering. But now, it’s just annoying. Every time I open my mouth, people want to know my life story. I might just have to run to the store for some milk but if people catch even a hint of my accent, they want to engage me in a 10-minute conversation.

 

I appreciate the interest, but sometimes, I have places to go and things to do, so can’t indulge you in the lengthy ‘ask a British person’ interview you had prepared.

 

And so here, I have put together a helpful guide for North Americans of things you should steer clear of doing/saying when you meet an English rose such as myself. (What can I say? I’m a giver)

 

1. It’s fine to ask where I’m from, but when you get the answer, must you tell me that your second cousin twice removed’s husband’s next door neighbor’s babysitter went there two years ago? Seriously, people actually do this. What is my response supposed to be? I’m smiling on the outside, but completely baffled on the inside.

 

2. Never ever ask if we’re Australian. The two accents sound completely different. The key difference is that when Australians talk, everything sounds like a question.

 

3. I’m sorry to be the one to break this news but no, we don’t all eat cucumber sandwiches.

 

4. We’re not tourist information. We don’t all have an infinite knowledge of our country. I’m a city chick. Telling me you’re going to the Cotswolds on your next vacation means pretty much nothing to me. That’s like you telling me you’re from New York and me saying I once went camping in the back woods of Mississippi. Where’s the relevance?

 

5. Please do not try to use the word ‘bloody’. It’s a very British thing. We appreciate the effort but you never use it in the right context and it’s kind of cringe worthy.

 

6. The same goes for ‘wanker’ and ‘bollocks’. You have your curse words. We have ours. Let it go. I’ve lost track of the number of times I’ve tried to explain ‘bollocks’ to people only to get completely lost while pointing out that if something is ‘the dog’s bollocks’ it’s good whereas if something is just ‘bollocks’ it’s nonsense. Why would a dog’s testicles be considered a good thing? I don’t know! It’s just an expression OK?

 

7. Not everything stops at four o’clock for tea. We drink it all the time, not to a set schedule.

 

8. With reference to the above; if you’re trying to have this conversation with us while we’re buying milk, that usually means we have the kettle on and are dying for a cuppa. You should know better than to disturb a British person at a time like that.

 

9. Please don’t call our accent ‘cute.’ Puppies are cute. Accents? Not so much.

 

10. Please do not mimic our accents. It’s embarrassing. And you sound nothing like us. We don’t all sound like the Queen.

 

So there you have it. Now when you meet an English person, you can bypass all that bollocks you were going to waste 20-minutes talking about and get down to the more important issues of the day like where to go for a cuppa and what the hell happened on that camping trip in the back woods of Mississippi.

Tags: ,
Posted in life | 5 Comments »

An Open Letter to Mariah Carey

Friday, December 7th, 2007


Dear Mariah,

 

I understand that ‘Hooker Chic’ has been your look of choice for quite some time now, but have you ever thought it might be time for a change?

 

It’s clear that you’re in a deep, deep state of denial and are surrounded by enablers who indulge your princess fantasies, so perhaps no one has pointed this out to you but, you’re in your late 30s.

 

It’s bad enough that you continue to make music (if we can even call it that at this point), but if you must be seen, at least be seen in something a little more age appropriate than cut off shorts and a low cut tank top.

 

I’ve seen you in clear heels more times than I care to remember. Unless your record company pays you in dollar bills, this is not a look you should be going for. Mini skirts and midriff bearing tops are also out.

 

How about giving a knee length skirt a try? Or jeans (maybe even wide leg ones), that aren’t two sizes too small for you? Sometimes, leaving a little something to the imagination is good. In your case, all the time would be better.

 

What pains me Mariah is that you’re filthy stinking rich. You don’t even need to go shopping yourself, you can hire someone to do that for you. If you already have a stylist, fire her pronto. Seriously, give her a good bitch slap (then drop kick her in the face and put her in a choke hold, just so she gets the message).

 

This routine of you parading around with your tits, belly, ass and legs hanging out is getting really old, as are you. You’re like that embarrassing aunt, attempting to flirt with your niece’s boyfriend at the family barbeque.

 

So why not do what all the crazy kids your age are doing these days; adopt a child from Africa and become a UNICEF ambassador. That shit you like to call clothing won’t make the grade as ‘humanitarian wear’. Give all your clothes back to the 12 year old you stole them from, throw out the clear heels and go buy yourself something pretty. But remember the golden rule; Thou Shalt Not Shop At Forever 21. Please, at least try, to grow old gracefully.

 

Sincerely,
From one Carey to another.

Tags: ,
Posted in fashion | 2 Comments »

Boarding All Flights to Your Last Nerve

Thursday, December 6th, 2007

I make it through a crazy long check in line at JFK and move on to security where I’m chastised by a guard for not having my hair serum, deodorant and moisturizer in a clear bag. “Really,” she tells me “I should confiscate these right now.” “Why?” I ask. “What am I gonna do? Makeover a stewardess to death?” She lets me past, but not before taking my brand new Victoria’s Secret body spray and throwing it in the trash in front of me. There’s $12 I’ll never see again.

 

I walked (what felt like miles) to a packed boarding lounge. It was teaming with people. I found a seat, pulled out my book and started to kill the 30 minutes before my flight. 15 minutes passed and they still hadn’t made any announcements, so I got up to look at the board. Apparently, my 5.25pm flight had been pushed back to 9.30pm. In fact, everything on the board had been either cancelled or delayed. This basically meant that I was in a room full of very pissed off people. And I couldn’t escape. Everyone wanted to share their personal travel tale of woe.
“I’ve been waiting since 8am.”
“Well, I’ve been on the go since yesterday.”
“Well, I left my house in ’98 and still haven’t reached my destination.”

 

I resigned myself to the fact that I’d have to listen to variations of the same tale for the next 4 hours.

 

Every once in a while, I’d look up at the board and a few more flights would have the dreaded red letters that read ‘cancelled’ next to them. My flight had been pushed back to 10pm. At 9.30 I checked again and it had been pushed back to 10.45. I started to get that sinking feeling. Sure enough, not long after that, the red letters showed up next to my flight.

 

I mosey on over to the cancellation desk where a riot is on the verge of breaking out. People crowded the desk, shouting at the staff and pounding on the counters. I waited patiently in line, remaining calm, deciding I would use the ‘kill ‘em with kindness’ approach when I got to the desk, that way, they wouldn’t be able to resist putting me on the midnight flight to Toronto.

 

I make it to the desk. ‘Hi! How are you?’ I chirp at the Delta rep. He snarled and stuck out his hand. I gave him my ticket and he typed away in silence for 5 minutes.

 

“We have a 6am flight to Cincinnati,” he says.
“That’s nice. Why are you telling me?”
“You can connect to Toronto from there.”
“What about the midnight flight?”
“Cancelled, “ he said as he handed me my new ticket.
“Um, OK, so I take it you’ll be arranging a hotel for me?”
“No, the delay is due to weather conditions, which isn’t Delta’s fault.”

 

Delta’s customer service never fails to amaze me. The only reason I was even flying with these fools was because I had written several complaint letters after a particularly shitty flight from Japan and they gave me a $100 credit.

 

So, it was now 11pm and I had no choice but to bunker down in Terminal 3. Around 11.40pm, they started calling the midnight Toronto flight to board. But wait a minute – hadn’t that little Delta runt told me that flight was cancelled? I grabbed my LeSportsac, put on my game face and marched over to the gate. I explained my predicament to a staff member and she got on the computer to figure it out. There were five other people surrounding her all vying for the last remaining seat. I had two American dollars in my purse and was prepared to use them to bribe her. After much typing and murmuring into walkie-talkies, she tells me the flight is full.

 

Ten minutes later, a Chinese man who was also trying to get on that flight and whom I’d been watching become more and more irate all night, came over to me. He told me a woman who was behind me in the line for that standby seat, got on. He was ready to take it to the streets. I just shrugged. More power to her – at this point, I would’ve jumped the line with a blatant disregard for everybody else too.

 

The Chinese man got on his cell phone and was cussing people out in Mandarin, kicking chairs, walls and trashcans and repeatedly throwing his bag on the floor. I guess I should have felt bad for the guy, but it was actually pretty comical. The next flight outta there was at 6am and no amount of chair kicking would change that. Still, the Chinese dude wanted to start a revolution. He found an ally in an equally pissed off Italian guy who couldn’t speak any English. They had an intense discussion in their native tongues. When they realized they couldn’t understand a word the other way saying, the Chinese man tried to find an Italian interpreter. The best he could get was a Romanian woman who spoke Spanish. So, the Chinese man complains to the Romanian woman, who in turn relates this in Spanish to the Italian man, who incidentally didn’t speak a word of Spanish. I felt like I was on Candid Camera. I left the Terminal 3 United Nations at it and tried to take a nap.

 

Airport floors (well, floors in general) are not comfortable. Particularly when it’s freezing and you’re trying to ensconce yourself in what appears to be a Delta Airlines baby blanket. The noise of Larry Birkhead on Larry King talking about the joys of fatherhood was competing with, what seemed to be, All-Maroon 5-All-The-Time FM and they were drowning each other out. So, as I always do in times of turmoil, I whipped out my iPod and threw on some Jigga. Hell, he’s from Marcy y’all. He knows there ‘ain’t nuttin’ nice’. I felt he could identify with my Delta/Terminal 3 airport woes. And just like a lullaby, Hova rocked me to sleep.

 

I awoke at 4am, slightly rested, with sever back pain. I finally figured out that the guy sitting opposite me had kind of a Robert Downey Jr thing going on (I’d been trying to place the face all night).

 

Around 5.30am, they started check in for the morning flights. I see people at the check in desk who had slept there all night and were now being turned away from the flights they had been booked on the night before. I really didn’t have the energy for this.

 

When I get to the desk, the girl tells me my flight is boarding now. I didn’t second-guess her; I took that to mean I was actually on the flight. She tells me I need to hurry but she just needs to print my boarding pass. Her long acrylic nails, complete with florescent green paisley design, are slowing down this process no end. She’ll type for 30 seconds and then spend 30 seconds hitting ‘backspace’. Finally it’s done and I make it onto the Cincinnati flight.

 

I had no idea where Cincinnati was. Strange things were afoot when I boarded the plane and saw a white Sikh family. First time for everything I guess. When I arrived at Cincinnati airport, the place was swamped with people wearing fanny packs, ill-fitting jeans and visors. My God – I was in Middle America. Three hours of bad fashion and intense boredom later and I was boarding my connecting flight to Toronto.

 

I land in T Dot, the home stretch. At this point, the 18 hours of delays and no sleep was catching up with me. I had just enough energy to stumble into a cab. But not before customs decides to pull me aside and root through my bag. He pulls out all my Victoria’s Secret garb for the whole world to see. Nothing so secret about it anymore. A couple of bras and panties and this guy’s acting like I’m the biggest smuggler of the 21st century. My friend in New York had given me three pairs of shoes. I was trying to explain to him that they were a gift, hence I don’t have receipts or know how much they cost. He threatened, quite seriously, to cease them. But when he saw a single tear threaten to roll down my cheek, he let me go with a slap on the wrist. Men will never understand the intimate relationship between a woman and her shoes – especially ones she got for free.

 

And so finally me, my Secrets and my shoes walked wearily out of the airport and got home only a mere 20 hours after I was supposed to.

Tags: , , , ,
Posted in life | 5 Comments »

My Most Embarrassing Moment

Wednesday, December 5th, 2007


And there’ve been many, but I outdid myself with this one.

 

Back in England, fresh from living in New York, I’d been catching up on all the girly gossip with my friend, B. She told me that a good friend of hers, E, who we’d gone to sixth form with, was pregnant. Or at least, that’s what I thought she’d told me.

 

A couple of days later, I was at my friend Sim Simma’s surprise birthday party. My best friend was there, along with my newly born godson. I was holding the lil’ fella while everyone in sight cooed over him. B’s friend E was also at the party and came over to greet the newborn.

 

She was there with her boyfriend and looked about seven months pregnant. As I only know E in passing, I have very little to talk to her about. So, (very stupidly, on reflection) I decided to kick off a convo with the information B had given me.

 

“Hey, congrats, B told me you were pregnant,” I say, nodding towards her protruding belly.

 

“No I’m not,” she said smiling.

 

I laughed, thinking she was joking, as it was so obvious she was with child. No one else at the table said anything. E stood there, shaking her head. Was it meant to be a secret or something? As what seemed like minutes of painfully awkward silence passed, I realized she really wasn’t pregnant. She’d just put on a load of weight.

 

Oh Jesus.

 

Eventually, someone broke the silence and struck up a conversation with E to distract her from my hugely offensive comment.

 

I sat there for a few minutes, cradling the baby, mentally kicking myself for that biggest of faux pas. I couldn’t wait to get out of there.

 

I handed the baby back to my best friend and signaled to my Mum that it was time to go. We walked down the stairs in silence and out the door. I checked behind us to make sure no one was there.

 

“Oh God. Oh God. Oh God. Oh God. Oh my GOD!” I muttered burying my face in my hands.

 

“It’s alright,” Mama said, giving me a pat on the back.

 

“Was that as bad as it sounded?”
“Yes.”
“Thanks.”
“No problem. Get in the car.”

 

As soon as we drove away from the scene of the crime, my cell phone rang. It was B.

 

‘I never told you E was pregnant!” She screeched.

 

“You did, I swear you did! Why would I say that if you didn’t tell me that?!”

 

“No – I didn’t say she’s pregnant, I said she’s getting married!”

 

I paused for a moment.

 

“Is she getting married because she’s pregnant? Because she looks pretty damn pregnant.”

 

The moral of the story is: never ask someone if they’re up the duff unless you actually see them crowning.

Tags: , ,
Posted in life | 1 Comment »

The Secret's Out

Tuesday, December 4th, 2007


Earlier this year when there was all that hype over ‘The Secret’, I had to see what all the fuss was about.

 

I got my hands on a copy and flipped through the pages excitedly. Even the cover art made it seem as though I had stumbled upon some ancient treasure. Several pages in and they were still building the suspense. I was starting to get bored. Then it finally told me the Secret; Thoughts Become Things. Hmm. That’s it? Thoughts become things?

 

I decided to give it a chance and kept reading. I started to feel empowered. I can create my own reality through my thoughts. The Laws of Attraction. Like attracts like. It all seemed so simple. Just put the positive vibes out there and it all falls into place. The universe aligns and you can get anything you want. It even goes so far as to say that the universe is ‘an inexhaustible storehouse of goodies from which you can command whatever you desire from the comfort of your own living room by following three simple steps; Ask, Believe, Receive.’ Wow. I better put my orders in ASAP.

 

Empowered by all the positive thinking, I threw that boomerang of good vibes out there and waited for it to come gliding back to me. When it finally came back, it clobbered me over the head as my boyfriend dumped me and I was laid off my job. Hmm, I’m pretty sure that’s not how that whole ‘like attracts like’ thing was meant to work. Someone, somewhere fucked with my good vibrations!

 

I referred back to the book and according to all the ‘philosophers’ in there, I asked for this. They say if I just keep sending my positive thoughts out into the universe, they’ll come back to me in due time. Well, can the universe hurry the hell up? My rent’s due!

 

I can appreciate the concept of The Secret, but have a couple of gripes. First off, considering how many copies the book sold, it’s not a ‘secret’ anymore. I don’t feel like I’m part of a privileged inner circle and when my girlfriends told me secrets in the playground, they were a damn site more exciting than “The vibrations of mental forces are the finest and consequently the most powerful in existence’. So many people have read this book that the number of shiny, happy, eternally optimistic people walking around is bound to get really annoying. And if like truly attracts like, then that must apply to everything, right? So, the victims of rape, displacement and genocide in Darfur, are they asking for that? I think not.

 

Well, here’s my ‘Secret’; sometimes the universe wants to take a dump and it’s just your turn to be the toilet. C’est la vie. Life is full of hills and valleys. Sometimes we’ll be optimistic; sometimes we’ll lose faith and be pessimists. And no matter how many positive vibes I put out there, Brad will probably never leave Angelina for me. So, while I wait in vain for the Jolie-Pitts to as least consider a trial separation, I think I’ll just take the rough with the smooth as usual. My mother always told me it’s not good to keep secrets anyway.

Tags: , , ,
Posted in life | 4 Comments »

Things Which Must Stop

Monday, December 3rd, 2007



 

Bluetooth technology – more specifically, the assholes who use it.

 

If you are a responsible driver who uses your Bluetooth headset to take a call while driving to ensure you don’t lose control and cause a multi-car pile-up, keep on keepin’ on.

 

If you’re the person who has the headset on while driving, never receives a call, gets out of the car and walks around all day with the headset on to give the impression that you’re waiting on an important call – you need to get a life.

 

Do you think that your refusal to take that hunk of plastic out of your ear will make me respect you more? It’ll make me think you’re important? Sorry to burst the bubble, but it pretty much just makes me think you’re a wanker. It’s like the 2007 equivalent of your tie being thrown over your shoulder and you’re just too busy to put it back in the right place.

 

What’s more annoying is when you try to communicate with non-Bluetooth-using members of society. You can’t even take it out while you order your skinny soy moccacino latte because any second now that important call might come in. The person who makes your coffee isn’t important enough for you to show them just an ounce of respect by taking that shit out of your ear and actually engaging with them, on a real level, for the 10 seconds it takes to place your pompous order. Your over-inflated sense of self- importance is almost as bad as that of….

 

Blackberry users


Like an eight year old with a Game Boy, you just can’t leave that shit alone. All ability to engage in a normal conversation is lost to the unstoppable desire to give yourself Repetitive Strain Injury using that scrolly thing on the side. Never mind that you might be sitting in front of an actual computer; you’d rather type 40 mistaken words a minute as your fat fingers attempt to navigate the miniature QWERTY keyboard on your Blackberry.

 

You’ll find any excuse to use it (checking your calendar, scrolling through your address book, googling the name of that tribe that lives in the Amazon rainforest) just so you can pull it out in front of people, in the hope that they’ll think you’re as important as you do.

 

If you’re a director of a very busy international business, I can let you off for using one of these things. If you’re in high school and you have one, you need to go home and beg your parents to use the belt on you. Being pretentious at any age is wrong, but being pretentious at 16? You’re begging for a beat down.

 

And people think it’s cute to call it their ‘Crackberry”. Remember the expression ‘crack kills’? Death by Blackberry is not the way you wanna go out. But there is a distinct possibility you could get mowed over by….

 

People who drive Hummers


If you drive a Hummer, we already know you’re an asshole – you don’t need to paint it bright yellow and throw some Ds on it for us to get the point.

 

Outside of a war zone, these vehicles are wholly unnecessary. Or do you find you need it to maneuver around the notoriously rough terrain of mid-town Manhattan?

 

Who cares that you’re driving the least fuel-efficient car on the road? You keep up your powerful contribution to global warming. 12 miles to the gallon and the honor of looking like a complete prick is way more important to you.

 

And since it’s usually men who drive these things – we all know that men who drive big cars are compensating for smaller things. Do us all a favor – get surgery and keep that tank off the road.

 

What binds you all together is your deluded belief that these material goods boost your social status somehow. These are troubled times my friends. How about you accessorize with some respect for others and take the Bluetooth out/put the Blackberry down when someone’s trying to talk to you? Or at least pretend test drive a hybrid?

 

But you should probably just start by taking your head out of your ass. Believe it or not, other people function just fine answering their phone the regular way when it rings and don’t feel the need to constantly press buttons for no reason on a pocket PC or enjoy cars that you don’t need a ladder to get into.

 

Come back to the real world and enjoy.

Tags: , , ,
Posted in life | 9 Comments »

I Can't Get No Sleep

Friday, November 30th, 2007

Insomnia is a motherbitch.

Most of this year, I’ve been surviving on roughly two hours of sleep a night.

 

In July, my parents and brother arrived for a vacation. We were staying at my grandmother’s house. I already couldn’t sleep in the comfy queen size I’d been lounging in, but soon as the fam arrived, I got relegated to the shitty bed (a perk of being the baby of the family).

 

It was called a ‘fold away cot’ and I felt as soon as I sat on it that I might fold away in it. It was, hands down, the most uncomfortable thing to ever be passed off as a bed. It was also, approximately 12 inches wide. If I tried to turn over, to the right, I crashed into the wall, to the left, I fell off the damn thing.

 

And I’m a sprawler when I sleep. I need space. After a few nights of repeated elbow dislocation from trying to turn over, I could take no more.

 

I took my blankets and set up camp in the living room. But the sofa couldn’t accommodate a good sprawling either. I took the sofa cushions and set them up on the floor. That was my bed for the next three weeks.

 

Then I subletted a place for a month while waiting to move into my apartment. I could never get comfortable in the sublet, living out of suitcases etc.

 

Towards the end of the month, people moved into the apartment downstairs. They were students (strike one). They were crazy noisy (strike two). They had terrible taste in music (strike three).

 

I don’t mind a bit of noise. It’s to be expected when you’re living in close quarters. But if you’re going to be ridiculously loud, you should at least have been blessed with the ability to distinguish between music which brings joy to the soul and music which frikkin’ sucks.

 

One night (I’d had my wisdom tooth taken out that day and was moving house the next morning, so could have used some rest), the students decided to have a party.

 

I don’t object to a good shindig. I do, however, object to ‘Wannabe’ by the Spice Girls being played on repeat till 5AM.

 

I pretty much never feel the need to ‘zig-a-zig-ahhhh’ (especially not in the dead of night), but I did want to zig-a-zig-kick someone’s ass.

 

I didn’t even want to tell them to turn it down. I just wanted them to get some taste. I would’ve happily DJ’d the party for them. My iPod kicks some serious behind.

 

I lay awake all night listening to the muffled sounds of Mel B and Co tell me if I wanna be their lover, I gotta get with their friends. Oh piss off.

 

Needless to say, moving day was a sweet relief.

 

So, I finally get into my new place and thought this would be the end of my sleeping woes. But alas, no.

 

One Friday, as I got home from work around 7pm, I noticed the guys across the street (students, grrr) were having a party. They were all hammered and acting retarded, but at 7pm, I didn’t really care.

 

By 10pm, they were outside butchering my favorite karaoke tune (Don’t Stop Believing by Journey – I mean, if you’re gonna do it, do it right, damnit) and I was starting to get a little pissed.

 

The later it got, the more people came to the party and the more determined they became to have it outside. (I wouldn’t have cared if I didn’t have to work at 9.30am the next day).

 

Then finally, at 1.30am, came the straw that broke the camels back.

 

Some fool at the party broke out the bagpipes. Fucking bagpipes. And treated partygoers to a rousing version of an indistinguishable tune in the middle of the street.

 

I let the slaughtering of Journey slide, but this? Bagpipes? Hell to the no. Bagpipes are like the musical equivalent of nails on a blackboard. There’s a reason they’re usually played on the Scottish highlands with no one around for a couple of hundred miles.

 

I look out the window and see the Pied Frikkin’ Piper and his band of Merry Men (and women) all doing some ridiculous drunken jig. Damn, I was so ashamed of my people. White people can’t dance at the best of times, but throw alcohol and some bagpipes in there and it’s a complete clusterfuck.

 

About 20 seconds pass and I’m convinced I can feel my eardrums starting to bleed. Then, I transformed into a middle-aged woman and called the police. I couldn’t believe I was actually calling the Po Po to make a noise complaint, but everyone’s got their limit, Bagpipes are mine.

 

“Would you like to speak to the officer when he arrives?” the operator asked.

 

“No. I would, however, like you to create legislation whereby the ownership and usage of bagpipes is illegal and arrest his ass.”

 

Apparently, they couldn’t do that, but they would shut down the party. Good enough.

 

As I sat at the window, watching them, waiting for the 5-0 to arrive, I got more and more pissed off that, with all the people at this party, not one of them had taken the initiative and beaten this guy up. What the hell kind of people were at this party anyway?

 

I’m telling you right now, any party I go to, if someone pulled out bagpipes, that dude would get the most brutal beat down of his life (not necessarily by me, ‘cause I’m a lover, not a fighter – but I hang with people with great taste and big muscles).

 

Who even owns bagpipes? Then pulls them out at a party and actually plays them?

 

Anyway, the Po Po came and shut it down a half hour later – by which time I was wide awake. So I turn on the TV, watch it till I doze off at 5am and start yet another day on 2 hours sleep.

Tags: , ,
Posted in life | 4 Comments »

The Onsen

Thursday, November 29th, 2007

When I was in Japan and heard about Onsens, I immediately wanted to go. Outdoor hot springs just sound so relaxing. Then my students told me you had to go nude. This threw me off somewhat. It seems very un-Japanese to get butt naked and frolic around in water. But whatever – I was down to nude it up.

 

So, on our day off, me and my roommate, Nads, decided to venture to an Onsen. Our new roomie had just moved in, so we invited her along because we thought nudity would make that whole ‘getting to know you’ thing easier.

 

We caught a train to Hakone, which is a couple of hours outside Tokyo. Once there, we found out the Onsen was up in the mountains so we had to catch a bus. We were told to wait in the middle of this bridge and the bus would be along in about 10 minutes. As none of us had planned on ending our lives that day, the ‘middle of the bridge’ instruction lacked appeal. But we walked there and waited. Cars whizzed past us as we huddled at the edge of the road (of course, there was no sidewalk). We started to think this was a cruel joke the Hakone natives played on foreigners.

 

Soon enough, the bus came. As if waiting for the bus wasn’t hazardous enough, the driver had a death wish and drove like Mel Gibson on a bad night up the steep, narrow, winding streets.

 

Ten minutes later, we arrived and got off the bus, a bit shaky from the wild ride we’d been treated to.

 

It was the equivalent of $5 for a whole day at the Onsen. On the way to the changing rooms, they gave us towels and robes. We stripped down, donned the robes and began to walk outside. An employee stopped us and started babbling. She was an older Japanese woman and we couldn’t understand a word she was saying. We looked at each other and shrugged, then realized she was speaking Portuguese. Great. As if the English/Japanese language barrier wasn’t enough to burst your brain. Yet the more she talked, the less the words mattered. It became clear she was trying to tell us we couldn’t wear the robes outside – we had to parade out there in the buff.

 

This woman became a kind of ‘house mother’ to us due to our complete and very obvious lack of knowledge of Onsen etiquette.

 

So, slowly we disrobed and readied ourselves for our nude debut.

 

Now, I’m not body conscious, but letting all my alabaster skinned goodness hang out in front of a bunch of Japanese women, who are bones with a little skin wrapped around them, was a little daunting. Nads and I (who are normal sized people, I might add) thought we’d look like a couple of heifers. (The new roomie was Asian, so her tiny frame would blend right in).

 

The towels they gave us were no bigger than dishrags. You could cover one nipple at a time, your groin or half a butt cheek.

 

Brave Nads led the troops to the great outdoors. Once outside, we were greeted with the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. It was nothing short of breathtaking. [Cue harp music] We were up in the mountains, pools of hot springs dotted about, trees and flowers everywhere to shade you, steam rising from the water and rays of sunshine peeking through the trees – it was like something out of a fairy tale.

 

After taking a moment to absorb all that, we got in one of the hot springs to relax. But then, something became increasingly hard to ignore – Japanese women have never heard of bikini waxing or a good ol’ Trim ‘n’ Shape.

 

‘Holy Jesus! What is going on with the pubes?’ I say to Nads.
‘I know!’ She says while averting her eyes from some woman’s offending jungle. We then hatch a plan to import Trim ‘n’ Shapes, become traveling saleswomen and sell them at Onsens.

 

We laze around at the Onsen for a few hours and then decide to take the bus back down to the town and have a look around. We explored and did a little souvenir shopping then got on a train that’d take us on a tour up in the mountains.

 

The train didn’t seem to go anywhere. It just zigzagged up and down the mountain. People were getting off at the stops as if this was their regular route. Every time someone got off, we debated; ‘what are they doing? Who the hell lives here? There’s nothing but hill and trees damnit.’ We put this down as another conspiracy theory to confuse the hell out of foreigners.

 

People neglected to tell us that Onsens make you very lethargic, so when we were on the mountain train to nowhere, it was all we could do to keep our eyes open. The higher we got, the more intense my headache. Since we didn’t know where the hell we’d end up, we thought we should get off at the next stop, cross the platform and go back down.

 

On the descent, there were a bunch of schoolgirls in the next carriage over. (Where the hell was this mountain school?) The girls saw us and started giggling and waving in true Japanese schoolgirl fashion. We waved back. Then they started rummaging around in their bags. A couple of minutes later, they had written a note and held it up against the window between the carriages.

 

“You are cute,” it said.

We found some paper and wrote back. “So are you.” This was greeted with fits of giggles and bows from the girls.

“Where are you from?” They wrote.
“England, Canada and Australia”

“Do you like Japanese food?”

 

This conversation went on for an age. We were scribbling on random scraps of paper (they were much more organized with a seemingly endless notebook specifically reserved for meeting random foreigners on mountain trains).

 

At one point, the whole of our carriage seemed to be involved in our note passing. There was a group of Chinese tourists sitting near us. As I was writing and my pen seemed to be running out, new roomie, who can speak Cantonese said ‘This guy says he’s got a pen you can borrow if you need one.’ Go team!

 

The never-ending train ride finally came to a halt and the schoolgirls took some pictures with us on their cell phones.

 

We boarded the train back to Tokyo, refreshed but exhausted. We hit Tokyo just in time for rush hour. Ahh, how we’d hate to miss that. While on the subway squished between an armpit and a briefcase, I fantasized about my new life as a Trim ‘n’ Shape saleswoman. I’d bring pubic jungle freedom to all and be hailed as a Japanese national hero.

Tags: , , , , ,
Posted in life | 2 Comments »

Citric Nightmare

Wednesday, November 28th, 2007


I am anti-citrus.

I hate it when I go to a bar, order my Diet Pepsi and some jumped up bar keep hurls a lemon or lime wedge in there with abandon. How about you ask me before you taint, what would have been, a thirst quenching, refreshing beverage with a chunk of sour, lip-pursing citric acid?

 

But my least favorite of the citrus family? The orange.

 

This is not a socially friendly food. People who eat them in public make me sick. I hate oranges in any form; as is, as a garnish, or as a juice. If I even see the words ‘orange juice with pulp’ on a juice carton, I have a full body dry heave. (In fact, just typing the word ‘pulp’ made me throw up in my mouth a little).

 

I had never eaten an orange. The smell alone is enough to make me gag. If someone is eating one near me, I have to move. I would never even touch one; forget putting one in my mouth.

 

But all that changed in the spring of ’07.

 

Ahh, what a spring it was. Jobless, broke and in desperate need of a trip to New York, I needed to make money fast. I weighed up my options, ruled out drug dealing, car jacking and prostitution and went to the obvious fourth choice; a medical research trial.

 

I got on to the study, which involved me staying over at this facility three weekends in a row, taking a couple of pills and having almost every last drop of blood in my body drawn out of me.

 

I arrive on a Saturday evening and get acquainted with the 50 other people on the study.

 

Sunday morning, I get ready for breakfast. Each person has a number and has to eat at a specific time. I wait for my number to be called and go into the dining room.

 

As I walk in, I’m told I have to eat100% of what’s on the tray.

 

I sit down and the tray is placed in front of me. A bowl of cornflakes, some apple juice and…an orange. I zone in on the orange and the psycho music plays in my head.

 

I grab the clinic staff. “Can I get something else? I can’t eat oranges.”
“No.”
“Please? Any other fruit?”
“No, You have to eat that. You have 25 minutes to finish everything.”

 

Great. Now I’m against the clock.

 

I try not to think about it while I munch on the cornflakes and gulp down the juice. That’s done in 5 minutes. I have 20 minutes to tackle the citric nightmare.

 

I grab hold of it and my heart starts racing, hands shaking. Even peeling it was making my stomach flip. I was discreetly asking people at my table if they would eat it for me. But if we got caught, we’d all be off the study and I needed to go to New York damnit!

 

I finally get through peeling the thing and someone says: “watch out for the seeds.”

 

Oranges have seeds?! Jesus. What does the orange think it is? I have to peel it, get all that stringy white shit off it, break it up into pieces AND contend with seeds?

 

My eyes started to well up. I threw the first piece of orange into my mouth and my gag reflex had a party. I put my hand over my mouth, chewed and forced myself to swallow. I choked back the tears. This was embarrassing enough without me crying. I didn’t want to be known as ‘the crazy orange girl’ but it was pretty much too late for that now anyway.

 

My whole body was shaking as I forced down wedge after God forsaken wedge.

 

Now people were noticing how hard this was for me and were giving me words of encouragement. “You can do it! You’re almost there!”

 

It was like one of those weird Japanese TV shows where they force you to eat and drink till you throw up, then you have to do an assault course or something.

 

The clinic assistant stood over me with her hairnet, white coat and a stopwatch saying; “You have four minutes left. You’re doing a great job.”

 

She’s lucky I had a mouthful, or the tirade that would’ve come out of my mouth would have got me kicked off for sure.

 

I finally finished the last piece with about 45 seconds to spare. I sat with a napkin over my mouth for a couple of minutes hoping I wouldn’t ‘refund’ (as George Costanza puts it).

 

They don’t let you go to the bathroom afterwards (which was probably good idea in my case and there would have been refunds, exchanges, gift vouchers and credit notes), but I needed to wash my hands. If I had the smell of oranges on my mitts all day, my stomach would definitely not cooperate with the program.

 

I asked to use the bathroom and was denied. They offered me wet wipes.

 

“Wet wipes won’t do it! I need soap!” I screeched, a little more emotional than I’d intended. Everyone looked at me as though I might lash out at any minute and a clinic assistant slowly unlocked the bathroom door.

 

I got in there, washed my hands like I had OCD and spent the rest of the day feeling nauseous.

 

Week two was even worse than week one and by week three my every waking moment was consumed with the thought of having to eat that orange. I only had to get through one more, then I’d get a nice fat cheque and be on the next plane to New York, but I just didn’t think I could do it.

 

I was trying meditation, breathing exercises, crosswords to keep my mind off it, nothing worked.

 

Then my dad suggested I try hypnosis. So I went for a consultation. This guy spent half an hour explaining the process and how it’ll work for me. Then he told me it was $100 a session and I’d need at least five for it to work. I think the price quote cured me.

 

I said to myself ‘suck it up and deal with it bitch’.

 

By the time I got to the clinic that weekend, I had my game face on. I ate the orange in a record 18 minutes and only felt like I was going to hurl for four hours after that. That’s what I call results.

 

The trip to New York was awesome.

I’ll never go near another orange as long as I live.

Tags: ,
Posted in life | 1 Comment »

Stomping Grounds

Monday, November 26th, 2007

I wear heels most of the time. I wear them because I look good in them and I can strut like a champion. My mama and grandmother are constantly on at me to wear more comfortable shoes, to which my response is; I’ll worry about being comfortable when I’m middle aged. Right now, I’m young, I’m hot and I’m wearing heels – deal with it.

 

My footwear of choice is usually a good pointy toe, with just the right amount of toe cleavage, a three and a half to four inch heel, which gives me that lift to accentuate my derriere a little more, that slight arch of my lower back and make my already long legs look killer. Yes, there’s an art to wearing heels and when I see high heel abuse, it irks me so.

 

There are several things to consider before you throw on a pair of heels. Terrain is the most important factor. Cobbles, hills, grates, certain escalators, a narrow stairway, will there be grass involved? Or a pebbled driveway? All of these can throw off a perfectly good strut.

 

Cobbles and grates are particularly hazardous and can lead to the dreaded ‘lunge’. Ladies, you know what I’m talking about. You’re strutting along like a diva, when all of a sudden, your heel gets stuck and as you stride forward, your back heel stays put, forcing you to lunge it out like you’re in a bad ‘80s workout video.

 

The ultimate purveyors of heel abuse are Japanese girls. They all do a kind of pigeon-toed-shuffle, which, when coupled with high heels, makes for some major shoe damage. And it’s not like we’re talking about some cheapy Steve Maddens – they’re wearing very high-end designer shoes and stomping them to death. They have enough trouble walking in regular heels, but they seem to like to challenge themselves with mules and slingbacks. Although the results are comical for me, I imagine there’s an epidemic of broken ankles in Tokyo.

 

I once saw a girl walking down a flight of stairs at Shibuya subway station. She stumbled, managed to regain her balance. Stumbled again, but grabbed the railing just in time, only to stumble a third time. The final time she fell flat on her ass and one of her shoes flew off. I would have pulled her aside and said ‘bitch, take the shoes off, walk to the nearest Footlocker and buy yourself some sneakers’ but with my limited Japanese ability, I could only ask where the bathroom was. When heels become so troublesome you can’t make it down a regular flight of stairs, with the aid of a railing – admit defeat and invest in some hush puppies or something.

 

Another girl, another train station, another dead shoe. She was coming to the top of the escalator and rather than take a step, she did the Japanese girl pigeon-toed-shuffle which resulted in her heel getting caught in the top of the escalator and her doing quite a mighty lunge. She stepped all the way out of her shoe. I shook my head and watched as she spent a few minutes squatting down trying to yank the shoe out. All the sex appeal of heels is lost when you watch someone do that.

 

The one thing worse than a Japanese girl in heels is a Japanese girl in heels, wearing sunglasses, in a nightclub.

 

Look at all the hazards:

 

- Japanese girls in heels (see above examples)
- Sunglasses worn in an already dark nightclub (quick side bar; if you are someone who wears sunglasses in a nightclub, stop it. You look an absolute wanker).
- Complete and utter lack of rhythm.
- Complete and utter inability to dance
- Alcohol
- Possibly a strobe light

 

Combine all those factors and you better take cover (or do as I did; pull up a chair and wait for hilarity to ensue). Hang around long enough and you’ll see plenty of chicks falling down stairs, tripping over themselves and if you’re lucky, walking into walls.

 

My point is this: the entire reason for the existence of heels is sex appeal. If, when you wear heels, you shuffle, limp, drag, stomp or wobble – then they’re just not for you. It doesn’t make you less of a woman, it just means you can get a head start on bringing the sexy to orthopedic shoes. Good luck with that.

Tags: , ,
Posted in fashion | 3 Comments »