Keio Line Madness

So today on the Keio was a suicide. Where somebody jumped off the tracks into a passing train. Not really too uncommon but it's really rare to happen on the Keio line and it happened once last week. Last week it happened when I was going home and we had to wait about 10 minutes at a station. And we passed by the station where it happened and you could see all the police and the blue tarps covering the bodies. It was two people I think last week. Something kind of interesting is that their shoes were taken off and placed at the edge of the platform before they jumped. Much like the Japanese custom is to take off your shoes before you enter a house. Something about ritualistic purity. Kind of shows how suicide is still revered as a sacred and pure thing. A lot different than the traditional "straight to hell" western judeo-christian thought.

Anyway, so today it actually happened at the station I was at while I was there. A quick explanation about the trains: there are several types of trains that run on the same line, express, special express, local, rapid etc. So depending on the train you get on, some of the stations are skipped. I was on a local this morning so we were waiting at a station for the "special express" train to pass. And I saw the train go past the platform but then it stopped all of a sudden. Kind of wierd I thought. But then I finally figured out what happened. So strange....

Unspeakable

So a quick update about my little speech contest thingy. The topic is very vague. It's basically supposed to be about something you like. And since I am partly a dork and like "Rent", I thought I would talk about Rent. And since Rent has a lot of heavy issues like AIDS, Homelessness and drug abuse all wrapped up in catchy lyrics, I thought I could use it as a way to do a little rant about how Japan ignores these kind of problems. I thought that since I was going to lose, I might as well lose in...glory (cue "one song glory". Yeah, I wasn't kidding about being a dork). So I gave my speech group a little preview of this speech in my horrible Japanese. And surprise surprise, they basically said "we don't talk about these kind of things in Japan". Coming from a country who didn't have an official policy on AIDS until 2000...I really shouldn't be too shocked. But, oh well. So I have to make another attempt in horrible Japanese about something more "appropriate" for a speech contest. At least I know I'm constant. I'm not only offensive at Baylor, but also at Hosei. Hoorah.

Other than the speech contest, nothing too much has been going on. I substituted at my old job last Saturday. The kids really liked me and were sad to learn I wouldn't teach them the next week. That's about it for this update.

Oh, This is my page on Youtube.com where I put some videos up. Look there everynow and then.