This quote—by Ghandi, if I’m not mistaken—describes the basic purpose of this website in a nutshell. TheJINX is essentially a way for me to share my experiences with family and friends without sending out numerous mass emails which, let’s face it, are bad for the environment.

Now some of you, at this point, have probably begun to realize that I wasn’t just trying to get attention when I said that I was leaving the country for two years. Others of you have most likely found my detailed instructions and are currently building an exact replica of me—my doppelganger if you will. To those dedicated few, I say, sorry you had to buy all those meat patties but you can stop now; I have created a website, and in this cyber day and age that’s about as good as having the real person right in front of you…and twice as good as any meat patty replica, I’d imagine (again, sorry).

For others of you who stumbled upon this site while researching for a "college paper" (suuure you were) I say welcome to you too.

The original title of this essay was “My Life in Japan…in 3 words,” but my editor felt that “So fucking bored.” was not a sufficient journal entry. So, today we start out with an entry succinctly subtitled “The past six months of my life since I left America to live in Japan while working on the JET Programme, in less than 500 words.”

So, let’s get to it. In July 2004, after a five month application process, I was accepted into the JET Programme, an educational exchange that brings college graduates from English-speaking countries around the world to Japan. The program relocates the participant to the center of a rice field [Note: purportedly, some JETs live in cities, but I have rarely seen such so called “cities” in Japan], sets the participant up with about 12 hours of work a week and an embarrassing salary (embarrassing because we don’t have to work for it… hah!), and then retreats into the fog of Japanese bureaucracy before the participant has time to wonder where the forks are.

Let’s examine Valentine’s Day in respect to non-platonic relationships. As the dictionary describes the word “platonic” as being synonymous with “idealistic, utopian, and intellectual;” we are, of course, talking about something not possessing these qualities, i.e. intimate relationships. Intimate relationships are rarely what you’d call “utopian,” buuuuut you get to have sex once in a while, soooo…you know…who wants utopia anyway? When I was in a relationship, I tried to never take it for granted, knowing that skinny, intellectual types with high standards rarely suffer a profusion of romantic prospects in their life. Therefore, we would go out to dinner often, and I would buy flowers time to time…you know, to create an atmosphere of romance. (Plus neither of us liked to cook, and the flowers were only, like, five bucks. …Statements like these may be why my ex-girlfriend refuses to agree with my declaration that I am a romantically inclined person). Then Valentine’s Day rolls around, and all the sudden flowers and dinner aren’t good enough. “Flowers and dinner? Again!? We do that every week. You are SO unromantic!” she thinks/exclaims/carves into your chest.

Next will come a new Media section and Guestbook. All in “good time.” And by good time I mean “a long ass time from now.”

Rock on.

The disturbing part of it all is not that I actually ate heart, nor that it was frying in the collective juices of intestine and stomach (not a joke), but rather that I unintentionally ate it thinking it was a large slab of liver…and that this seemed perfectly normal to me.

Many foreigners with an interest in Japan feel that they know what Japanese cuisine consists of previous to coming to Japan. Food is, after all, the second most important aspect of any culture (the first being facial hair). Those interested in Japan and the Japanese diet go from the initial stage of cultural ignorance: (i)“So, they all eat rice in China, right?…oops, I mean Japan;” to the culturally aware stage: (ii)“Ugh, fish?!;” to the culturally tolerant: (iii)“Eww, RAW fish?!;” to the cultural assimilation stage: (iv)“Yeah, I LOVE sushi (California Rolls);” to finally actually living in Japan: (v)“What the [expletive deleted]! You sick mother[expletive deleted]!.”

Girlfriend: "OMIGOD!"

Me: "I know, I haven’t had Earl Grey in a while either."

Girlfriend: "We should get under your bed, or in the closet!"

Me: [Look at bed, notice that there is about 4 inches of space from the floor to the box spring; mentally assess size of own skull…decide impossible. Visualize contents of closet shelves; mentally assess hardness of own skull…decide impossible; say:] "…impossible."

And then we discussed Hume and the nature of moral attitudes. It was THAT long.

Fun facts about beavers (ending with exclamation points!):

— They poo in water and give people giardiasis. (Note: I did not get my bout of beaver fever from beavers but instead from the poo of humans! Joy! Well, that or contaminated water…contaminated by the poo of humans!)

— Adult Beavers weigh anywhere from 35 to 100 lbs. making them the biggest rodents in North America! The biggest beaver ever in North America was Jerry Mathers!

In any case, I hope to have some pictures up relatively soon so you can get a small sense of the splendor that is Angkor Wat. Unfortunately, given the gigormity and magnacity of the temples of Angkor, very little can be adequately captured on film. Perhaps I’ll save description of the temples until a later date when you can get an idea from the pictures themselves.

I will tell you that Cambodia should be a top priority for anyone who fancies themselves a traveler of…places. Siem Reap, the hometown of Angkor, offers resort hotels, affordable guesthouses (ours cost $25 per night), and swanky bar/café/restaurants. Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia, though not as tourist friendly as Siem Reap, has some nice places to sit and have a beer on the river, some great markets, and British tourists that make me want to quietly distribute parasites into their belongings as they raise

Anyway, I haven’t posted anything in a little while. This is mainly due to the fact that I have been dwelling in the arid pits of extreme boredom where, if thoughts flow like water, even the air around me seems to be a diuretic causing me to urinate inspiration out of my system before it ever has a chance to reach my brain, leaving me a parched shell of a man with hardly enough brain power to metaphorically drool on my chin. If you’ve ever watched C-SPAN you’ll know what I’m talking about.

Today, however, I was reminded of why it is that I sometimes hate my job: I had to “team teach.” This is what I do about nine classes a week and consists of me reading words from a textbook as young independent minds are crippled and twisted until they can perform simple binary functions as a collective. The beginning of each of these classes always starts the exact same way. First comes the standard “Good morning everyone. How are you?” which always elicits the much rehearsed “I’mfinethankyouandyou?” response. This isn’t really a big deal except that it becomes an ingrained reflex response.