"It's a beautiful day in the neighbourhood.
A beautiful day in the neighbour -
Would you be mine?
Could you be mine?
Won't you be... my neighbour?"
Hello boys and girls. Today Mister Joseph is going to introduce you to his trials and tribulations over the arrival of some new next-door neighbours. You see, after yesterday's episode where Mister Joseph thought the neighbour's apartment was on fire, his old neighbours decided that living next door to the local gaijin (foreigner) wasn't worth the hassle that happened two weeks ago. You can read all about that adventure here: FIREME.
Like the song above says, it was a beautiful day in the neighbourhood of downtown Ohtawara-shi, Tochigi-ken, Japan. the sun was shining, the sky was blue, none of my goldfish had tried to kill themselves by jumping onto my still wet carpet after the fireman paid me a visit.
I ambled over to the bathroom that morning to put in my contact lenses. While doing so, I heard a tremendous amount of merriment outside my front door... so I crept quietly up to the peephole, squatted down, and peeped out.
There, moving into the apartment opposite mine was a small blurry Japanese family - a redundant statement as all Japanese families are small, though only about half are blurry. There were three of them. An oto-san (father), oka-san (mother) and a tiny, widdle baby screeching at the top of his fully-developed lungs.
mom, realized the potential negative affect the screaming could have on her new neighbours allowed the child to continue.
Oh well. I tried to ignore the rabble rousing by shaving. But, after the onset of a headache - perhaps caused by the new blood loss from my jagged nerves shaking my hand as I sliced my face - I must admit I thought about ending it all. Oh for crying out loud... not my life. The kid's!
Why didn't the mother quiet it? Or smother it? I then realized why tigers eat their young.
Two hours later, I had finally finished shaving. The family was still moving in and the child from Hell was still rending the air. I wanted to leave my apato (katakana Japanese for apartment) to go shopping for more razors, but I knew that if I tried to leave my place with them still out there, I'd have to say konichiwa (hello or good afternoon).
Amazingly, after two years I still had not learned the Japanese words for: "Welcome to the neighbourhood. I'm your local gaijin."
So... instead of being neighbourly, I waited. Behind the peephole. Waiting for them to either finish moving in or for my psychic attempts to kill the still screaming kid to work. Redrum! Redrum!
Finally, quiet erupted like muted peals of thunder.
I peered through the peephole... first down, and then outward. Nothing. I carefully opened up the door and stepped through. I stupidly turned to lock the door.
That's when THEY flung opened their door, stared at me, took a step back and screamed in unison: "Hora! Gaijin-da! (Look! It's a foreigner/outsider!)"
Can you say that, boys and girls? I knew that you could.
I guess they must have heard me mumbling "Urashai (shut-up)" at the top of my lungs from behind the door for those past few hours, and had simply waited for me to make my move first.
They weren't so bad. They introduced themselves and talked to me for 10 minutes. I have absolutely no idea what they said - they are either from New Zealand or someplace in Japan.
I, as per my norm, answered loudly in the affirmatives to anything that sounded like a question, in the hopes that one of their questions might actually be: "Are you busy now?"
I guess they finally though I was a complete idiot or a complete gaijin (redundant), as they both exclaimed in unison: "Sumimasen (Excuse me)" - or perhaps they finally asked me the correct question!
The father reached behind him into his apartment and pulled out a package and handed it to me. I stammered some incomprehensible Japanese, bowed gracelessly and banged my head on their gift before crawling back into my apartment to shave again as it had been about... well, 12 minutes.
The baby began to cry - so he must have stopped and I just didn't notice.
Anyways, boys and girls, Mister Joseph's upstairs and downstairs neighbours are now experiencing an increase in volume in the level of music he likes to listen to, which now includes anything loud. Can you say Megadeath? Nice try.
That's all for today, kiddies. Mister Joseph is expecting Mister Postman to deliver a package from Colombia.
Somewhere playing with Mister Trolley,
Andrew Joseph
Today's title is by War. You can listen to that great song at THISCLICAKABLEPOINT.
PS: In case you couldn't figure it out, there were more than a few references to the kiddie program, Mister Rogers' Neighborhood - you hear the opening song HERE. The American's spell neighbour differently from Canadians et al.
