Haikyo #1: Pachinko Parlor

*Warning: entering abandoned areas can be dangerous. Please be wary of squatters, unstable structures, and hazardous materials. ALWAYS have your phone, and if you are alone, make sure someone knows what area you are in*

A favorite hobby of mine, ever since childhood, has been exploring abandoned places. Something about going through forgotten places has always filled me with a sense of curiosity and wonder. I think it is because I know that I am walking through a discarded piece of the past, a slice of history simply left to rot.

The biggest thing that still strikes me, even after doing this dozens of times, is what people decide to leave behind. Sometimes there's barely anything, the place is merely a shell, but other times, I quite honestly cannot believe what was forgotten. From simple things like clothes and toys, to things that I would never think to leave, like negatives from your wedding day.

Every time that I enter an abandoned place, which in Japan is called a Haikyo (廃墟), I find myself wondering what happened here? What lead this place to becoming forgotten? Because of this, my favorite part of exploring these ruins is trying to find clues as to who the people behind it were and what happened, and I hope that through my photos and stories, I can distill that feeling in a few of you as well. 

So without further ado, here is my first of hopefully many haikyo entries.

For my first entry I am going to start with a small exploration, a closed pachinko parlor. 

I noticed this particular place during my routine drives down Rt 49 from Iwaki to Koriyama, every time I drove by, I wanted to check it out, but every time it somehow happened to be raining. 
  
This place consists of 3 buildings, the pachinko parlor, managers house and a combo kitchen / apartment. 

The pachinko parlor

 

The kitchen/workshop and apartment

I began my exploration by, fittingly enough, walking through the houses front door.

The indoor shoes were still waiting patiently for their owners to return and use them again.

The house appeared to be a pretty nice home, but completely empty of important belongings. So I quickly moved onwards to the connecting pachinko lounge.

Believe it or not, I have lived in Japan for 2.5 years, but this was my first time stepping into one of these places...

Everything seemed pretty run of the mill when it comes to haikyos, until I came to the other side of the gaming center and was confronted with a scene I was not too happy to see. A squatter had been here.

And he likes Hello Kitty

I checked the piles of cans lying around, and everything was long expired, so I figured I was safe, but sped up my time in this building just to be safe. You never know what kind of person could be in one of these places, and it is something I try to never discover firsthand.

The last thing that really struck me while going through the parlor was the many dead birds, I spent a long time searching for any opening to help keep it from happening again, but to no avail.

In the next building, I found that this location had also been home to a small restaurant.

It became clear very quickly that whomever had been doing their laundry in the parlor, had been sleeping next door in the bar area. Again though, after checking the dates on the magazines beside the bed, it appeared that whomever this person was, they had moved on a long time ago.

The documents I found lying around both the parlor and bar suggest that this place closed back around 1997/98, and from the stack of unpaid bills that were in the office, I'd say it was because the owners went bankrupt. A true shame.

Please, let me know what you thought of this entry, if there's something it is lacking or if there are too many / too few photos. Any advice and tips are quite welcome.

Moving On

I have been quite terrible at keeping this blog running, and really only have myself to blame for that, but felt the need to comment about the life changes that are about to happen for me.
In a little over a week, my job as a kindergarten teacher will come to an end, it breaks my heart to leave these kids, because they've really become my kids over the last 12 months, but I must. The next chapter of my life is waiting to begin, and that chapter is looking to be amazing.

You see, after this I will finally have enough money saved up to volunteer full time in Japan and to also travel the world a little bit. So while I have to leave my children behind, I will finally give the disaster animals the time they deserve and the look at the world I've been dreaming of.


I promise that this blog will be becoming far more active as this new chapter starts.

Change of Plans

This weekend I had been torn between finally taking a vacation and helping out at the shelter. After a lot of talking, David and I decided that we deserved a trip to Disneyland to clear our minds and just have a good time, but once again, fate had other plans.
We've had a kitten trap set up outside our house for a few weeks now to try and catch the litter that lives here and to socialize them, then adopt them out (or at least do vaccines and TNR), and we have never had any luck with it, so of course luck decided the weekend we were finally going to go on an adventure would be when a kitten would wander in before I could take down the trap.

To make things even more exciting, I had just stepped out of the house to buy some things for tomorrow's trip, so while out shopping, I got a call from David saying "hey, there's a kitten in our bathroom. What should I do?" Well, I quickly went and bought all the supplies we needed, came home and was met with a tiny wet ball of cuteness hiding behind our toilet.

Poor little thing was quite scared and we could hear it's siblings outside the bathroom window crying to him, and while it was sad to see, we knew we couldn't just release him again, because street cats in this country are often killed, so we know this is his best shot at life.

While setting up the new cage, our new little friend found a strange place to hide, which was nice for us because it made transporting him to the cage quite easy. 

they'll never find me here!

well this is new

Needless to say, now we have no clue when Disneyland will be happening, as we are going to try and socialize this cutie and hopefully capture it's litter mates as well.

Bye bye vacation. Hello cute new roommate.

*Better pictures to follow as soon as he settles in*

New arrival

I am still in no mood to write, but the days keep passing by, and things need to be recorded.

heading out to feed

local dog enjoying a treat

On July 1^st I went with JCN into Namie again, and while there we filled 34 feeding bins with food, which took an entire van filled with bags to manage, and also made some side stops to check on local animals that owners don’t want taken out, but still need some good food and love.

We also added a new bin that was created by a wonderful volunteer

We had just gotten a phone call that morning about one of the locals JCN helps, saying his dog had had puppies and we wanted to make sure they were alright and once again try and convince him to get his dogs fixed. Instead, it turned out to just be a rumor, which I personally think he started to get us to come visit him since he had a huge amount of prepared home cooked food and treats from Sendai already waiting when we arrived… if that is true, I certainly cannot blame him, he lives alone in an otherwise empty town, with no one to talk to besides his dogs, it must be a very lonely life. After a 2 hour long chat with him, and me getting tricked into eating fish, my least favorite food, we finally headed out around 8pm, which was great since it was still a 90min trip back to the shelter and then another 2 hours home and I had work in the morning, but fate had other plans for us that night. Instead of heading straight back, we stopped to feed a tiny kitten alongside the road, it became clear very quickly that she was not feral, so we trapped her. She turned out to be incredibly friendly, and not a kitten at all, but instead a recent mother. We have no idea where she had been living though, because where she was found there were no houses or feeding bins in the area. She currently has no name, but all of my students have suggested Yuki (snow).

I also got to check on the cat I trapped last month, who I named Kocha (tea) after myself and because he has a big "T" on his forehead. It's still unclear if he's going to be friendly, but Kocha at least seems to be settling in and fattening up a bit.

 The following week I stopped by for just a day to say goodbye to Kuma, who was leaving for his new foster home in Iwate. I will miss that dog dearly, he is just one of the kindest souls imaginable.

 

Abuse

It has taken me a week to decide whether I should talk about this or not, but as it has been a week and it is still bothering me, here goes.

David and I went to the shelter last weekend to volunteer and gather some supplies for a fundraiser we will be doing later in Iwaki, while we were there, I spotted a man kicking his dog. At first I simply assumed that it was my eyes playing tricks on me, as it had already been a long weekend, and who in their right mind would abuse an animal across the street from a shelter? But that's when it happened... this man threw his dog as hard as he could into the ground, in front of his 2 small children.

Without even thinking I just ran over and began shouting at him, I do not know a lot of Japanese so it was mostly English with a bit of me calling him a monster. I scooped up the small poodle to check it for injuries while the man shouted obscenities in Japanese at me and told his children not to worry as I was just a moronic foreigner.
David and a Japanese volunteer came over to talk with him, but he spent his entire time denying it and saying that I had tried to steal his dog and attacked him, our Japanese volunteer even apologized to him for my actions, while I just sobbed.

We were told later that while it was sad, we could do nothing to stop this man since there were no visible wounds on the animal and since I had "attacked" him. In Japan, the foreigner always looses against the native.
 I spent much of the rest of my time that day closed up with some of ours animals, crying.

During the nearly 3 years that I worked with the SPCA back in the US, I saw lots of animals come through that had been badly abused, some had terrible physical scars, others only had mental ones, but all of them had been noticeably effected. I just kept thinking of my time with those cowering animals and how much it had pained me to know they had been hurt by some heartless bastard, and how utterly wrong it was that this man got to walk away with an animal that he will most likely abuse for the rest of its life, or until he gets sick of it and throws it away, like so many other animals in this nation. This incident especially struck me, because while I have worked with abused animals for a long time, I had actually somehow never seen it happen first hand, so seeing someone do it so calmly, and right across the street from our shelter no less, shook me to the core.


Anyways, it still replays through my head over and over again, and I find myself praying for that poor small dog. Now, enough sadness, here is a picture of Chachamaru, who was found over a year into the disaster, covered in parasites, very underweight, with dislocated legs, and a big smile. Animals like him are what keep us going.

Fun fact: We personally spend around $200/month in travel costs to volunteer and rescue.

Sheltered life

This weekend I got to take a fellow Iwakian to visit the shelter with me, I met her by mentioning JCN in a facebook group for locals to try and grab some new people. So far I’ve nabbed Wesley (the vet tech from 2 weeks ago) and now Kimberly. Oh, the wonders of the internet.

First we got to meet the new puppies that just came in from the 30km area, Kim fully admitted to not being a dog person, but really, no one can deny the cuteness of tiny puppies; even ones that seem to manage to have poop on themselves at all times. The white girl was my favorite, but she seemed to be a bit of a bully to the others. Either way, all of them were quite adorable and surprisingly patient when it came time to clean their fur, these guys seem like they will be very easy to train in the coming weeks.

Later in the day, Takumi took us to see the kittens that are in a local foster home. No matter how many times I work with babies of any species, it still amazes me how fast they grow, just two weeks ago one of these cuties would fit in the palm of my hand, now it takes 2 hands. We also learned some great news from Takumi, not only have all 3 caught up in their weight, but there are now potential adopters for all of them! The foster parents want the orange and gray tabbies, and an international volunteer wants the black one, which is just superb.

so shiny

Upon coming back to the shelter, which has Club Lohas as its bottom floor, we were shocked to see 3 shiny guests, a 1984 Lotus, 1973 Lotus and a 2010 Alfa Romeo! For whatever reason the Japanese men who drove them requested that Kim and I pose with their cars, but I won’t complain since it meant I got to admire the cars for awhile longer. These guys stuck around for a long time, and were pretty entertaining guests.

For dinner, I made chili for everyone, and Maaya joined us. Sweet little Maaya was found in some debris over a year after the disaster, and she had gotten so used to eating trash to survive that she still often prefers human food and plastic over cat food. While finishing dinner, Yuuko, who runs Club Lohas, invited all of us out to karaoke in town. Was a superb way to end the day, just relaxing with everyone (Kim, Howard, Yuuko, Takumi and Aki), also got to learn that Takumi is an incredible singer and that Cobra Starship is available on machines out in the boonies. 

Maaya sleeping

love you too Joni

Susan, who is the founder of Japan Cat Network, is away in Shiga at the moment handling things at the main shelter with her husband, so I slept in her bed and discovered just how starved for attention the cats in that room have been without Susan there. Around 5am Joni and Dylan woke me up by biting and suckling the blanket I was under, and then Joni decided to sit on my face to make sure I was alive. 

Sunday:

After walking the dogs for the morning (Kim’s first time walking a dog by the way!), we took a trip over to Comya, the coffee shop across the street to get some breakfast. Both their baked goods and drinks were divine, and we made the startling discovery that this small town coffee shop was the origin of all things hipster. Seriously, all things. 

also, they have Gremlins on record.

look at that face!

Once the coffee kicked in, Kim and I took Michitaro, who is quite regal until he gets excited, on a nice trip to a local park. A lot of children proclaimed that he was scary, but there were a few brave little ones that came over to give him love, which was also nice because it gave us a chance to tell people about the shelter. It is really a shame how few people in the area know about our existence, so it’s very helpful to take the animals on trips like this to get them some much needed exposure and hopefully get more adopters coming in, because all of them really deserve a forever home, not just a shelter.

Nala <3

 Update on Nala, our FIV+ girl: she is still nearly a skeleton, but she has been gaining weight and is becoming a lot more interested in cuddling. My current fear about her is that I think she may be losing her fur, but that has not seemed to stop her from enjoying being stroked and brushed all day. Nala is just the sweetest thing, and I seriously wish there was a forever home for her so that she could get the full devotion she deserves.

Dylan loving life

Ah, I nearly forgot! The catillion that Caroline had started for the cats 2 weeks ago has now been finished and everyone just adores the chance to get fresh air. There is no way I can properly thank Caroline for dreaming up and creating this great spot, it’s fantastic. 

I will close this entry out with with one more photo of some of the guys waiting for dinner 

Does not compute

People often ask me why I tend to choose animal companionship over other humans, and today here in Iwaki I was given a good example of just why that is.

There is a colony of cats near one of the preschools I teach English at, so every Monday they get a visit, along with lots of food and attention. This week, while they were all running over to get some food, one of the cats appearances made my jaw simply drop...

not Photoshopped

Someone took one of the cats and painted them! At first I thought he maybe just landed in some wet paint somewhere, but then I noticed this guy also had new injuries since last week, and even though he had been the most friendly before, today he was very timid.
It simply boggles my mind why anyone would want to do this to an animal. Any animal.

the colony last week

My goal is to save up some money and trap these guys so they can get fixed and vaccinated, plus a few of them have eye gunk that I want to treat with lysine, and if I can get them trusting people enough, it'd be awesome to treat them to a grooming session.

JCN Fukushima shelter

My writing skills are terrible, but I suppose that something is better than nothing at all, so here is my first attempt at doing volunteer notes about this last weekend at the Inawashiro shelter.

First, let me give everyone a quick overview of the general structure of a day:

Morning routine begins at 8am, this includes feeding all the animals, cleaning all the rooms, walking the dogs and giving our sick tenants their medications (whether they want it or not)

If there is only one person there, the routine takes from 8am till around lunch.

If there are 2+ people, it is typically over by 10:30am.

After the morning routines are finished with, and if it is not a zone day, volunteers are free to do whatever they please. Be it cleaning, organizing, cuddling animals, sightseeing or simply taking a nap. I personally tend to take the route of keeping busy with cleaning and petting the cuties, but to each their own.

Evening routine begins at 5pm and consists of feeding everyone, cleaning the cages again, walking the dogs and then putting them in their kennels for the night (there are foxes, tanuki and bears in the area, so our boys aren’t allowed to have nights outside), and ensuring everyone has had their medications.

Again, if there is only one person, this takes forever, and depending on how willing the special needs babies are with taking their meds, it can also sometimes end with a few tears.

With 2+ people, it feels like a breeze since you have good conversations and helping hands to burrito kitties and trick animals into swallowing pills.

On a zone day, we typically load up the van with food, cages and emergency equipment the night before and head out around 10am, and return whenever things are done, be that 5pm, or 2am.

While out there, duties consist of refilling feeding stations, scouting for animals, checking on our feral colonies (JCN does TNR as well), talking with locals, and inevitably getting stopped by the police a million times to check our papers. It is immensely hard work and sometimes can be utterly heartbreaking, but every animal out there that is still in need makes it more than worth it.

Anyways, that is a basic run down of the daily happenings at the Japan Cat Network Fukushima shelter, now on to what specifically happened this particular weekend.

Nala <3

Nala, who was quite recently diagnosed with FIV (Feline AIDS), was being a lot friendlier then the last time I got to visit 2 weeks ago. Last time Nala would try to struggle and do her pathetic growls during medicine time, this trip she actually cuddled with Caroline and I on several occasions. She is still practically a walking skeleton and it pains me every time I see this poor little one in such a state, but with the IV drips, high calorie foods and diligent care by our volunteers, she has an infinitely higher chance then she did a month ago when she was still in the 30km. There’s no doubt in my mind that if JCN had not found her, Nala would not be alive today.

Wesley weighing Sam

This weekend was quite busy medically speaking, JCN got a great new volunteer vet tech for the weekend named Wesley, and she gave every cat eye drops several times a day to help them with the cold that spread through C room. Wesley also gave deworming and parasite treatments to all of our dogs, and managed to weigh even our huge Sam on a small bathroom scale. Caroline, who was visiting from Australia, got many cuts from the not so happy cats while helping with the treatments, but she was quite a trooper and just laughed off the scratches and moved on to the next task. She is an amazing woman. 

visiting his deity relatives

Caroline and I also took our newest dog, Chachamaru, on a great adventure in between morning and evening routines. This poor boy was just craving love after a year alone and Caroline wanted to see the area, so we took him to the beach at Lake Inawashiro, a local park and even Aizu castle to run and get loved by lots of excited children. He ate up every minute of it. He even temporarily got renamed 蝶蝶 (butterfly) because he was so happy.

Caroline also showed off her creative side by designing and beginning to build an outside catilion so that the cats can get some fresh air now that the weather is getting nicer. 

Lastly, I finally got to meet the tiny bundles of joy that one of our local supporters are fostering, these 3 are really active and their foster is seriously their mama. 

ball of cute

Right before I had to leave Sunday, all of us enjoyed a dinner at Club Lohas, which is the restaurant right underneath the shelter. The amazing owner, Yuuko, made me the best ice coco ever.

If you would like to help Japan Cat Network continue their work of helping the animals of the Fukushima exclusion zone, please go here: http://japancatnet.com/donate/
Every amount counts, as it costs 5,000Y in tolls alone just to make a single trip to all of the areas JCN helps.

さようなら 富士山

Two weeks ago, David and I moved from Minami Alps, Yamanashi to Iwaki, Fukushima to get a pay raise and be closer to volunteering at Japan Cat Network.

Things have certainly not gone as expected since arriving.
David's job fell through last minute, so he went from having his dream job to working part time as a preschool teacher, I discovered my job was not what was originally described to me (still seems fun, but rather bummed), and we have so far not been able to volunteer much.
The worst part though is how much I am missing my students. It feels like there is a big void in my heart without them. I miss teaching them, making lesson plans, seeing Fuji from the classroom window, getting harassed during my down time, and I deeply miss being called 紅茶 先生

Ni-Nensei after closing ceremonies

Thank God I thought about giving the kids my e-mail address before leaving, it really makes the day seem infinitely brighter when a message from them pops into the inbox. Especially when they write in broken English or talk about how sad it is to not have me as their teacher. For a year, I called them "my kids," but I didn't realize how true that was until I had to leave them behind.


P.S. on the plus side, we are fostering cats named Ham and Egg. They're pretty awesome, and sound like cars when they get excited.  

oh and Egg sleeps in a TV

Some days I really can't picture myself anywhere but right here

Down with the Sickness

I have been rather ill for the last few days, at first I thought it was just because it is so incredibly cold in my school (they do not allow any heaters on unless it is less then 10C outside), but then it continued at home. I would get chills so bad that being under a mountain of blankets just a few inches from a heater felt like being out on the tundra, followed closely with heat waves so bad that even without any blankets on me I was drenching my bed in sweat. 

This was uncomfortable, but still tolerable. Then came the horrible waves of pain, I convulsed pathetically even while lying in bed and spent most of my time lying around moaning while David looked on helplessly, he tried to comfort me, but it is hard to make someone feel better when they feel as if their organs are trying to explode through their body (all I could think of when writing that was the stomach scene from Aliens).

Then come this morning, I am faced with the decision of if I should go to school or not. I did actually start to get ready, but then doubled over in pain and thought this might not be the best decision. I called my company and the Board of Education, they both told me that that was quite sad but to try and feel better as quickly as possible, which is fine, that’s what you would expect from an employer. Disappointment in the situation, but understanding that you cannot change the current circumstances.

Then, I get a call from my school, telling me I should come in anyways. I explained that I have a fever, am in pain, and that blood is literally coming out of multiple orifices (lovely, huh?), they followed this up with, “so are you sure you can’t come in and teach?”

I bit my toungue, said yes it is a rest day for me, and hung up. This was closely followed with a call from someone at my company, asking me the same damn thing, “so are you sure you can’t come in and teach?”

Did these people miss the part where I said the words fever and blood?

I know quite well that here in Japan, most people still go to school or work while ill, they just simply “tough it out” and wear a mask, which has always been something that angers me, but I try to ignore it since it is their culture and it is not my place to pass judgment on how they run their nation. It annoys me whenever a teacher comes in quite obviously under the weather, sometimes they have even gone to the hospital and then come in to teach now that they have medicine to get them through the day, but that is not me. That is NOT how we do things in America. If you are sick, you do not pass it on to an entire school filled with children, you fucking stay home.  You do not allow yourself pass out in the middle in the middle of class from sickness. And you do not, ever, tell a person who is sick to “suck it up.”

If they want to do that, that is their prerogative, but there is no way in Hell you are going to get me to suffer through a day of work and possibly get 700 people sick.

I apologize in advance if this entry is not entire logical or sounds overly angry, still feeling ill and emotions/logic are a tad bit out of whack.

Example: cried like a baby earlier cause the cats knocked over a glass of tea. Fully know that that is not the normal reaction, but currently my brain seems to be saying “fuck logic.”

Summer Vacation – Tokyo

The day after finally getting a car of our own, it was time for our first road trip, destination: Tokyo.

Another BoderLink worker named Michelle was kind enough to offer her loft as a free place to sleep during our trip, which was doubly fantastic since the cheapest hostel that I had ever seen looking around was 2,500Y a night, and there is no guarantee that your roommates there will be good company.

Michelle unfortunately had some meetings during the first day, so Debu and I headed to Ueno on our own to see visit an Edo period museum that I had heard about.

For just 300Y, this museum was a great treat. It was filled with antiques that the surrounding community had donated to help recreate an entire Edo period neighborhood, and everything is touchable. There was a fantastic English tour guide as well, who spent an equal amount of time explaining the museum and having friendly chit chat with us about life in Japan, he even showed off his skills at the Edo period toys that were set up and cracked a few jokes along the way. This museum was well worth the price and every worker was simply lovely to us.

WWII poster about the blackouts

recreated Edo candy shop

common, only 50,000 for a freaking bear!

The museum was directly across from the Ueno pond, which luckily was in full bloom and breathtaking, add to this luck that there was also a flea market that day, and it makes this pond just about the best place for me to be, as I am a bit crazy for flea markets. This one was exceptionally interesting because most vendors had quite eclectic wears for sale, from scrolls that were over 150 years old, to WWII helmets, to an actual bear! I spent at least an hour just wandering around gawking at everything and forcing myself to not buy anything.

mmm pineapple

Probably did not entirely purify me

To help combat the heat of Tokyo, we went down into one of the side alleys and bought some frozen pineapple on a stick, and then wandered into a local shrine to purify our souls and get some shade.

The next stop on our trip was the Tokyo University Historical Museum, which a friend had told us had a torture section in it, but after walking the 90mins to get there from Ueno and arriving with no time to spare, it came to our attention that that area is now Edo crafts and that the torture artifacts have been long gone. To quell the sadness in my heart from not getting to see an Iron Maiden, I wandered Akihabara until I found something cute and fluffy to hug. 

Yes, that will do.

With day one coming to a close, Debu and I headed back to Michelle’s to relax and prepare for the next journey: Tokyo Pokecenter.

So, every website that I had read said that the Pokecenter was right beside Tokyo Tower. Awesome. Go see the tower and then run in and see Pokemon, sounds like an easy day. 

Except things got very complicated, very quickly.

For starters, after meeting up with friends, we continued to get lost on the way to the tower a few times, and after a lot of wasted time, finally visited Tokyo Tower, to find it isn’t all that impressive a sight.  Afterwards we asked for directions, because the Pokecenter was nowhere to be seen, we came to discover that it is a few kilometers away from our location. So… walk a few kilometers, the whole while thinking “well maybe that was the closest train station, and that’s why the sites say that.” Nope. There is a train stop just a few blocks from the center, and the center ended up being not nearly as amazing as all the reviews had made it out to be. I mean, it was still neat and fantastically dorky, but was it worth the heinous trip? Hell no.

f you Pikachu!

To make matters more depressing, all our efforts in finding the place had basically wasted our entire day away, resulting in the rest of our plans becoming scrapped for going back to the apartment and moping instead.  

On the plus side, finally found an Women Only train car