Random thoughts, comments, observations and general fluff from a random bint who left London at the end of September 2004 to embark on a new life and new adventures in Tokyo, land of the cute.... and is leaving mid-June 2010 - and counting!

Wednesday, July 25, 2007

I'm all smug

Cyclists in Tokyo often drive me nuts. Cycling on the wrong side of the road or pavement. Not looking where they are going (into another cyclist often). Blocking a wide pavement so you cannot get passed, and so on.

Wednesday I often cycle to work as there is proper free bike parking, as opposed to my normal bung-it-down-anywhere-and-hope-it-doesn't-get-hauled-away policy. Today I got there a couple of hours after it would have opened up and it was, of course, full. BUT, I spotted someone about to take their bike out.

I got ready to pounce. I smiled sweetly and said hello to the old men looking after the bikes. I rushed. I waited. A few seconds after I spotted the space and started to rush for it and wait for it to be emptied, another women did the same, persued by her kid on a second bike. I beat her. I waited. She got ready to hedge in. I 'sumimasen'd' her and glared. The old men came up. She looked perplexed and didn't seem to be able to get her head around the fact I'd got there first and I WAS taking the spot. Or else. She REALLY didn't get it. It wasn't rocket science. It was first come first served. And she'd lost. The old men told her I was taking it. She admitted defeat.

I stopped my smug grinning after about five minutes.

The small victories are always the best!

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Yesterday a whiteboard fell off the wall in my classroom. A few times. Scary. Luckily nobody was hurt.

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Later I managed to, yet again, knock over a small row of bikes. A schoolboy rushed to pick them up. Now, can you imagine THAT happening in the U.K.?

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Also yesterday, I went to the 100-yen shop and bought a 500-yen coin tin / moneybox thing. The idea is that as it can ONLY be opened with a tin-opener, thereby allowing you to save and not dip into it whenever you feel like it. It can hold 200 500-yen coins. That's about £400. If the exchange rate ever takes a turn, it could be a lot more. That's my winter vacation (Cambodia/Laos)'s spending money. If I'm good :D

2 Comments:

Blogger sexinthedesert said...

well it just goes to show (hopefully) that she who beats the bitch to the final remaining bike park laughs lastest!

12:51 am

 
Blogger Sigsy said...

Go for it with the 500 yens. I raided mine yesterday because I realized I had no mular. But it was Ok, because it was a recycled tim that I had already opened.

What a beautiful day it is today!

10:27 am

 

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