For while I destroyed his hopes, I did not satisfy my own desires. They were for ever ardent and craving; still I desired love and fellowship, and I was still spurned. Was there no injustice in this? Am I to be thought the only criminal, when all humankind sinned against me? Why do you not hate Felix, who drove his friend from his door with contumely? Why do you not execrate the rustic who sought to destroy the saviour of his child? Nay, these are virtuous and immaculate beings! I, the miserable and the abandoned, am an abortion, to be spurned at, and kicked, and trampled on. Even now my blood boils at the recollection of this injustice.

Mary Shelley, “Frankenstein”

Aliases for my roommates in my new share house:

• Chris, 25, a German engineer and gym rat with short hair, Dahmer glasses, and an intense passion for lifting weights and watching anime.
• Alejandro, 32, an Italian set designer and party animal with curly bangs, a sharp face, and an intense passion for earthly delights.

4 November 2023

• 10:05-10:30 Kencho-mae to Oya history museum bus number 45
• Oya history museum (1h)
• Oya temple (30m)
• 13:30-13:50 Oya Kannon mae bus stop to Tobu station bus number 1
• Writing inside Utsunomiya station
• 17:00-18:40 Utsunomiya station to Shinjuku station local train (Shonan Shinjuku line)

Oya History Museum

I woke with pain in my left elbow and right foot. The former probably from dragging my luggage, the latter from my sleeping position.

My first order of business after checking out was buying a one-day pass to Oya history museum, Oya temple, and the bus ride there from Utsunomiya. While available for purchase in two stations, closest to me was a hotel selling it. They also offered to store my luggage for the day.

I walked to the castle ruins first, though, to check out the gyoza festival that was happening this weekend.

Musical performances, endless lines at 9:30 to buy gyoza for absurdly cheap – yet every gyoza included meat in it.

So I left and returned to the hotel to take the bus.

While Utsunomiya was known as Japan’s gyoza and cocktails capital, Oya, an area of northwestern Utsunomiya, was known for its singular soft yet durable volcanic stone.

The museum started with a small exhibition room displaying archaeological artifacts. Then I descended to a 1,400 years old former stone quarry.

Cold temperature and 30 meters tall ceilings. This underground mine had a capacity of 300,000 square meters, equivalent to an entire baseball stadium. Built using ten million stones shipped from all over Japan, it was dug manually until 1959, so hand marks on some walls still remained.

Year round, the temperature averaged on 7 degrees, ranging from 2 to 13. As such, it was still being used as a storage for rice, vegetables, fruit, and wine.

In the past, it was also employed as an army base and an airframe factory. Some sections featured specific cutouts in the ceiling to determine the corresponding location overground.

There were a lot of sculptures with dramatic lightning. A dark, humanoid figure, with light shining from their chest.

There was a creepy underwater pond with steel columns sticking out like a swampy death trap, with a tiny opening of light in the ceiling.

There was a small laser projection on the walls, reflected on a black pond.

I wandered around the quarry in awe. Eerie, cold, dramatic, almost militant and religious. I could imagine a horror movie set here. A ladder was creating shadows against a wall. Like a civilization that came and went, and left all this behind.

This atmosphere captivated me so much, that I wanted to summer here. Underground cities had always struck my fancy, and this one seemed like a nice retreat from society.

Knowing I’d be back to Tokyo tonight only deepened this desire.

In early September, I hadn’t known where to spend my nights. I’d sent couch-surfing requests to thirty hosts who, apart from one, had all neglected to reply. I’d been hosted for a few nights here and there, but overall, most days I was anxious about finding accommodation and being able to afford it.

People hadn’t owed me anything – yet even friends I’d tried to hang out with hadn’t texted me back. My then-workplace had stopped giving me new work, ignoring my messages as well. I’d cleared my schedule specifically for that job. 

So I’d dragged my luggage all over Tokyo almost on a daily basis, not knowing what to do. Would I need to work an hour from now? Would a friend like to hang out? With too many locals and tourists around, the public Wi-Fi had never worked. No train station had included a seating area, no street had offered benches. I couldn’t find a spot to sit down for a moment, rest, find an accommodation, text people, and plan my next steps. Charging my phone was nigh impossible, even when going to a café in search of a socket.

Since then, I’d spent a largely successful two months up north. I’d met people who had proven to me that not everyone was apathetic. Now, I didn’t know where I’d stay for the next 10-14 days in Tokyo, and didn’t feel like I could count on the friends I’d made there, apart from one.

A creepy, cold mine attracted me more than humanity’s cold shoulder. A return to Tokyo tonight gave me the image of a car reversing to a swamp.

Oya Kannon Temple

I alighted to the hot and sunny stone park and walked for a few minutes to the nearby Oya Kannon temple, carved into a cliff. It featured a giant, thousand-arm Kannon carved into a stone wall, which spoke to me more than the usual, shimmering-golden statues of Buddhas. There was also a hill with a statue and a fantastic view of Oya park’s cliffs. I wasn’t sure why there was a large sculpture of a snake at the garden, though.

Finally, there was a gallery featuring the remains of an 11,000 year old skeleton.

Tokyo

After a two-hour local train ride, I returned to Tokyo.

The first thing I did back in Japan’s monstrous capital was get lost inside Shinjuku station.

I had not missed Tokyo.

An entire month of seeing kouyou on a daily basis, from October 3 at my birthday ryokan, had come to a close. I’d also seen Sakura every single day for a whole month, from late March to late April. My next time seeing kouyou would probably be in two weeks from now.

Not knowing where I’d spend the night, my first order of business was to drag my luggage to Shinjuku san-chome station, in search of a coin locker. (Storing your luggage inside Shinjuku station equalled never finding it again.)

This being Saturday night, I went out to ni-chome, and stumbled across a cheap ne-café right by my usual bars.

The night progressed so badly, that in the coming days, it hit me that I’d experienced a form of sexual assault.

Today’s highlights: the atmosphere inside Oya history museum; Oya park.

5 November 2023

• Japanese language café at a church in Takadanobaba
• Another language café in Takadanobaba

Shin Okubo

I woke at Shinjuku exhausted after a disappointing night of little sleep. The plan for today was a free lunch at a Japanese language café in Takadanobaba, a 45 minutes’ walk north. So I walked for twenty minutes to Shin Okubo first.

Pajeon, kimchijeon, and cheese tteokbokki at Seoul Market, followed by a return to the sizzling-hot honey hotteok stand from September. The Korean auntie recognized me as the Israeli guy from September.

Tokyo’s Koreatown was essentially one street, practically uncrossable on Sunday morning, yet I loved it so much, that I already resolved to return here.

Things Go Awry in Takadanobaba

Next, I walked for twenty minutes to the church in Takadanobaba, a Chinese area. The guy who’d approached me on September 12 outside the station had been eager for me to come, texting me every few weeks and offering advice regarding my visa situation.

The last time a Japanese person had randomly approached me, offered to do things together, and kept sending me messages, it didn’t end well. I suspected his intentions, but went nonetheless.

Every Sunday, following the sermon (which I didn’t attend), a small church offered a free lunch and a Japanese language café. The basement room was teeming with foreigners living in Tokyo, working or studying at a Japanese language school. Most of them twenty-something Chinese guys. All invited in the same way: approached by a member of the church outside a station.

I felt like a sardine. There wasn’t enough room for everyone invited. People were struggling to find a chair, while more and more diners arrived.

“My first time here, I thought I was about to join a cult,” a regular guy told me.

The staff members already knew my nationality and name.

The vibe was a bit awkward at first, with no small talk. The Chinese guys around me were chatting in Chinese. I struck up a conversation with them after a while and ate a little. The kitchen piled so much food on the tables – a lot of it Korean, for some reason, such as kimchijeon and tofu stew – that it was like a Hogwarts feast. Inside a crammed church basement.

After lunch, it was time for the language café. Beginner level Japanese and gospel songs playing in the background. I didn’t really connect with anyone. The conversation was forced and the awkward silences were many. Plus, I could not stop yawning, after last night.

We finished at 16:30. The staff gave me a doggy bag with handmade onigiri, instant Korean noodles, kimchijeon, and fried rice with vegetables. Why they were being so nice to me, I couldn’t tell. But none seemed to have an ulterior motive.

I walked ten minutes toward Takadanobaba station with everyone, where I revisited the English language café the Polish girl from Osaka had volunteered in. I’d spoke to the nice and young owner in early May about volunteering here in the future. The Mexican guy from my hostel in Busan had volunteered here in July per my recommendation.

The owner remembered both volunteers. The café was full of Japanese locals and international travellers making lively conversation. Normally, volunteers ought to apply three months in advance for a minimum of one month. In my case, however, the owner offered me to sleep there starting tonight, and volunteer for as long as I needed.

Yet another stranger more considerate toward me than my friends.

I sat outside the café’s building in Takadanobaba wondering what to do. I might be able to spend a few nights at friends’ – not a complete fortnight, per my plan for Tokyo, but maybe close to a week. Four hours of English conversations five days a week was more than double the time I’d dedicated to cleaning a hostel, where I hadn’t just slept at a dormitory, but also received free rice and instant noodles. If I’d come to Tokyo for three or four weeks, I’d have said yes on the spot.

Throughout the day, I’d been texting my friends in Tokyo, starting with Saki. The last time we’d spoken was an hour before the beginning of the war. He’d known I was supposed to fly back to Israel on October 30, since I’d left my trolley for safekeeping in his apartment.

“How are you?” I asked.

“Busy with work and private life,” he replied.

I mentioned returning to Tokyo. He said he might have time later this week. That was it.

How had we gone from me crashing at his place like a friend and him divulging to me secrets he’d never shared with anyone, to him not even asking about my well-being?

The other friends in Tokyo didn’t even reply.

“It’s ironic how I have more friends in Tokyo than anywhere else in Japan,” I told my Ukrainian friend.

“I feel like it’s the truth of big cities,” she said. “You can disappear in them. In both good and bad ways. Nobody cares what you’re doing (you can do whatever you want and be whoever you want), but also nobody cares what you’re doing (people are mostly concerned with their own life and mind their business, without really caring about you much).”

I spent the evening outside the language café, sending couch-surfing requests I figured would go unanswered. The atmosphere at the Busan hostel came to mind: cool, fun, light, cosmopolitan. Everyone was friendly and talkative, down to hang out and go out. I’d been keen to recreate that routine ever since leaving Busan.

It hit me that I’d be better off saying yes to the café and befriending its volunteers instead of relying on anyone for accommodation. The location was perfect: Shinjuku was within walking distance. The hours were long, but I’d spend them chatting, rather than cleaning. Most of all, I wouldn’t have to drag my luggage all over Tokyo on a daily basis, develop perpetual arm pain, and worry where I’d spend the night (and how I’d pay for it).

People always disappointed me. I needed to be self-reliant.

I picked up my luggage from a coin locker inside Shinjuku San-Chome station and waited outside Seibu Shinjuku station for the Chinese guy who’d hosted me on my last night in Tokyo, in September.

“This is probably where my future lies,” I thought, as I watched a crossing busy with tourists and street performances. Then I noticed a rat nibbling at trash on the floor.

I spent the night at the Chinese’s apartment. Living right next to the recently opened Harry Potter Studio Tour, we passed the building and posters on the way, watched a comedy film, and ate my doggy bag for dinner. He’d been texting me every now and then since the war had begun, asking for my well-being and offering me to crash at his place. Thank god people like him existed.

Today’s highlights: a delicious return to Koreatown; free food from a generous church.

6 November 2023

• A futile visit to the Israeli embassy
• Checking into the English café

The Embassy of Israel in Tokyo

I left the Chinese guy’s apartment and headed straight to the Israeli embassy, which opened on weekdays for three hours only, between 10:00-13:00. Toshimaen station had been painted a Hogwarts-like red, and Harry Potter music was playing on the platform.

A text message came from Cowboy, after I’d told him of the events of yesterday.

“People you’ve encountered during this trip, they might’ve helped you once, but that doesn’t mean you’re friends for life,” he said. “Just acquaintances. It’s very dangerous to count on anyone, me included. Sorry for the harsh words, but I just thought you’d knew better as you’re the one constantly saying goodbye to people during this trip.”

I didn’t find his words harsh. The more I thought about it, the less I wanted to rely on anyone.

Like that day in April, the Israeli embassy didn’t let me enter. A reservation was required. They didn’t even let me make an appointment there, telling me to leave and call their phone instead.

“I’ll say yes to the English café,” I texted Cowboy. “I hate relying on people because they always disappoint me.”

“They helped you once, they don’t owe you anything,” he said. “It’s just life, it’s just people.”

Even an embassy didn’t owe its citizens any form of aid.

“I keep learning this again and again because I keep forgetting,” I texted Cowboy. “But that’s what people are.”

“Because you’re desperate right now, you wish someone could save you.”

Things Go Awry Even More in Takadanobaba

I took the train back north and entered the English café in Takadanobaba when it opened at 13:00. I didn’t want anyone to save me.

The owner gave me my weekly schedule. Three days off; a double shift on one day. Seemed good to me.

We walked for fifteen minutes south to the share house. An old, cramped, dirty apartment building, with a male and female floor. My floor was full of dirt, dust, fit, shirtless guys from America and Europe, discarded items like laptops, dumbbells, and blankets, and a pile of stale dishes in the sink no one deigned to wash.

So basically, a frat house.

The first thing I did was text Cowboy.

“I just checked into the English café,” I said, and then echoed his words. “It’s true. You can’t count on people.”

I added another message: “I do feel like I can trust you, though.”

His response was the last thing I expected to hear.

“Well, I might fall in love with someone next week, next month, or even tomorrow. Maybe I won’t reply to your messages, either, if you come back to Sapporo.”

I sat outside my floor on a narrow, rusty staircase, in a dark street, cramped with old apartments, and felt my heart sink.

Ever since our last day together, he’d been repeating that I’d left him. I’d looked for a job in Sapporo, and even considered taking the Lake Akan position and working night shifts at a ski resort, in order to gain a work visa and spend my weekends with him.

For the last two months, he’d been my rock. So caring and nurturing to me; so thoughtful. Constant communication, support, flirting. I liked him so much, that I’d asked him out last week.

Now, all my thoughts and feeling from Tokyo in early September gushed up.

I couldn’t rely on anyone. I couldn’t trust anyone. Back to the way things were.

“Why would you say this?” I texted Cowboy, completely befuddled. “Because I left Sapporo?”

“No,” he said, “it’s just a fact.”

As if no rose had been blooming in the past two months.

I couldn’t figure out what had caused his sudden change of attitude. Especially after I’d told him how close I’d felt to him, and we’d discussed the possibility of meeting again at the end of the month.

And to think I’d been researching language schools in Sapporo, and that he’d walked to his to ask them to accept me, without me even telling him to.

I walked straight all the way from the share house, five minutes south, and came face to face with the Korean restaurant I liked in Shin-Okubo.

The location was perfect. Absolutely perfect.

One minute walk from 7/11 and a public park; walking distance from Donki, McDonald’s, and Shinjuku. I could reach ni-chome without public transportation, and party as much as I liked.  

I felt good about this move. Location and self-reliance. No need to count on anyone.

But Then Shin-Okubo Always Makes Things Right

I met the Toshimaen guy for a late lunch at the Korean restaurant. A tofu stew so spicy that my eyes were tearing up. Our lunch was a sombre affair at first, with me visibly downcast due to feelings of abandonment. So many people in Tokyo, in Japan, yet barely anyone to count on.

A honey hotteok for dessert from my regular stand acted as a compensation. At Seoul Market, I bought frozen cheese hotteok and vegetable dumplings, plus my favourite Korean snack, the HBAF honey butter almonds. It was remarkable how food could improve my food.

I returned to my share house. My room was probably the worst of the four in my floor, with four bunk beds and a sun roof. Inside was Alejandro, a 32 years old Italian guy from Rome who’d arrived today as well.

A skinny figure, curly bangs, dark circles, and a thick accent, he was a set designer in the film industry living in a share house with an Israeli roommate. We talked about Israeli food and Italian movies.

“Netanyahu ben zona,” he said (“Netanyahu is a son of a bitch” in Hebrew).

Alejandro had almost flown to Israel last month for a visit to attend the music festival where the massacre of October 7 had occurred. At the last minute, he’d picked Japan instead.

Still thinking about Cowboy’s message, I went outside, sat on the staircase, and called my mom.

“You’re the only person I can count on,” I said. “You will never walk out on me.”

It wasn’t blood. My dad had stopped raising me at the age of 11, following my parents’ divorce. My brother and I weren’t speaking. My sister had been criticizing me more than supporting. My family hadn’t approved of my trip, my career path, my life choices. This was the first time in my life when my mom said, “I’ll help you no matter what.”

My second roommate returned. Chris, a German engineer with a trimmed beard and short hair, small eyes, Jeffrey Dahmer glasses, and a muscular build. He would leave the café in a few days to move to a share house in Ikebukuro, and so, started packing his suitcase while I was unpacking mine.

Our long chat revealed the following details.

• He journaled every day about his trip.
• He kept a German copy of the Bible on his bed stand.
• He had got into Japanese culture two years ago and already furnished his apartment with tatami, a sliding door, a katana, calligraphy, etc.
• He preferred walking to taking trains, even if for more than an hour. He would stumble upon new things this way.
• He had recently hiked Fuji-San with two other flatmates. It had taken him three hours to run up the steepest trail all the way to the snowy crater. He had worn a t-shirt and a hoodie.
• He maintained a gigantic Excel spreadsheet with a ranking of hundreds of anime he’d watched, plus twenty or so judging criteria to give then an accurate score.

“You’re crazy,” I said in the best way possible. I loved meeting people as wild as him.

Our floor featured no living room, so the only place to sit down was the small kitchen table. The shower, in the kitchen, was separated by a sliding partition that didn’t close all the way. I showered while some of the guys were eating and chatting.

Before going to bed, I texted Cowboy.

“I have to say your words hurt me, because I told you that I feel like no one’s there for me, you’re the only one I can trust, and instead of helping me in this tough time and supporting me like you have since day one, you basically said that you’re not there for me, either.

“This was the least supportive response I could’ve gotten from you, and I wonder if you’re just telling me your worldview or doing this on purpose, because you’re angry at me for leaving Sapporo.”

He was working day and night at his hotel this week, too busy to go back home, let alone sleep for more than a couple of hours, and so, didn’t reply.

Today’s highlights: the location, independence, and cosmopolitan atmosphere of my new volunteering gig; tofu stew and hotteok for lunch.

7 November 2023

• A futile visit to the immigration office
• A successful visit to Beit Chabad

More Tough Lessons about the Callous Nature of People

I ate the frozen cheese hotteok I’d bought in Seoul Market for breakfast (a plastic-y disappointment) and spent the morning sending couchsurfing and volunteering requests, plus contacting language schools.

“I don’t know what you are expecting from me,” a text from Cowboy came. “Are you saying that I should wait for you in Sapporo?”

“I don’t expect you to wait,” I said, “I just don’t understand the change in your attitude, especially when I reach out to you in a bad moment. So far you’ve given me the impression that you want me to come back to Sapporo, and now you’re saying that you might ignore me even if I do find a way to do this.”

He replied that he was working 35-hour shifts, and dropped the subject.

While this was unfolding, a text came from an Israeli woman I’d contacted. She’d moved to Tokyo decades ago, written a book about her experience as a foreigner in Japan, and was now running a tourist company.

“There isn’t any work right now due to the war,” she said, “but if you’re still in Tokyo in mid-March, I might be able to hire you.”

For lunch, I went to a vegan burger restaurant in Takadanobaba the Toshimaen guy was working at. He treated me to burger and fries, a delicious meal I hadn’t had in over a year, and lend me his phone to call the Israeli embassy.

Not only did they refuse to let me schedule an appointment, they offered not one piece of guidance or advice.

“We don’t help Israeli tourists in Japan, not even in time of war,” they said. “I can’t help you with visa or job hunting. You should talk to the immigration office.”

No one would help me, I thought. Yet again. I’d been forgetting this small feature of the human race. Some would even push someone away and hurt them, just to avoid the possibility of getting hurt.

If this was what people were like, I didn’t want their aid.

I took the train to Shinagawa station for an hour and transferred to bus 99 from bus stop number 8 (Konan exit). The immigration office told me that I couldn’t apply to the Difficulty in Returning to Home Country visa, nor to any other.

“You should talk to the Israeli embassy,” they said.

Great.

It had been exactly one month since the war had broken out, yet in the Japanese government’s opinion, it was still too soon to grant Israelis the same rights as Ukrainians.

The Business and Employment Inspection Department at least told me that, if I found a job, they’d convert my tourist visa to a work visa (which was impossible in regular cases). Now I just needed to find one.

Tokyo’s Beit Chabad

On the way back north, I visited Tokyo’s Beit Chabad. The Rabbi, a middle-aged man who’d moved to Tokyo 24 years ago yet didn’t speak Japanese, practically ran the Jewish community in Japan. He knew everyone, whether English teachers and managers of tourist companies.

“Did you talk to [the Israeli woman from this morning]?” he asked out of nowhere, without explaining who she was.

“Yes,” I answered.

He went on to divulge legal information no one had deigned to share with me.

“It’s not as hard to get a work visa as you think,” he said. “I employ Jews from all over the world, I give them a visa all the time. Simply hire a lawyer who would apply to a specific kind of a work visa on your behalf.”

Apparently, there were tons of kinds, with different requirements. One didn’t need a company to bestow a visa on their behalf. I could do it by myself.

Our conversation ended with him informing me of a couple of Israeli tourism companies in Kyoto. I left surprised that a synagogue had helped me more than an embassy or an immigration office.

Toyama Park

Back in Shin-Okubo, I grabbed some takeout. Cheese tteokbokki and pajeon again, plus steamed broccoli and tofu noodles from a tiny, heinously cheap, Chinese bento shop right by my favourite restaurant. Chris had informed me of its existence. Open 24/7, it was half the price of a convenience store.

I devoured all this at the park next to the share house and passed the evening chatting to an American tourist from El Paso. Soon enough, the temperature dropped; today was the last day of summer. By this weekend, Tokyo would go from 26 degrees to 11.  

At 22:00, after chatting for longer than expected while failing to make sufficient progress with my to do list, I returned to the share house. It was eerily dark and quiet. Where were all the guys?

I hung out with a Japanese guy who lived on a nearby street. At midnight, I returned and found Chris in the kitchen. We noticed a couple of jars from Roma Alejandro had offered to share with us: an organic chocolate spread, more nutty than sugary, and an organic, orange-flavoured honey.

We eyed them with ravenous eyes.

“Should we go get some bread from 7/11?” I said.

Five minutes later, we were spreading chocolate and honey on soft, Danish bread.

We both relished every bite, chatting about Japanese and life in Japan. I had such a good time with him, that this went on until 2:30. Busan-hostel vibes.

As I lay in bed, it hit me that I’d recreated my life in Busan in more ways than one. Not just volunteering, staying long-term at a dorm, and hanging out with international travellers until the dead of night.

My month in Busan had created a lot of friendships, and unearthed the burial of the now-erstwhile. I’d helped countless tourists who had turned to me in need, and then broken their promise to return the favour or stay in touch. I’d learned for the umpteenth time how humans, social creatures on the surface, cared about themselves deep inside.

I’d paused my fast travel, resided in a city centre, quit convenience stores, and resolved to go clubbing every weekend. I’d grown jealous of the cishet and attractive volunteers around me, suffering rejection and sinking into loneliness. Most days were uneventful, with the occasional taste of a special food providing my sole, daily highlight. Instead of sightseeing, I found myself busy with errands, shifts, and anxious preparations for the future. Finally, a romantic interest who had promised to be there for me had disappeared altogether.

Nothing had changed, then, least of all the lack of stability in my life.

I’d been walking the line for nine months, leaning on people rare enough to offer their shoulder. At some point, they’d turned their back. And I’d learned about humanity the hard way.

Maybe I was by their side for a short while – but I would still be there for them, even thousands of miles apart.

These days, as much as I wanted to, I couldn’t maintain stability. I couldn’t be enough. Yet I wouldn’t leave someone close to me high and dry. Whether a friend or more than that. As long as they were in my life, it would be a betrayal to do otherwise. I would never gamble with their heart.

So, back in Tokyo, I’d reached a dead end. Back to square one.

Today’s highlights: vegan burger and fries; finding aid in a Rabbi; Shin-Okubo takeout for dinner; organic spreads for a 1 AM snack.