In 1993, as I was finishing at university, I had absolutely no job prospects. I didn't go to any of the job fairs and was moping around San Diego after breaking up with my girlfriend of three years. I was thinking about going to graduate school- for lack of a job, and because I hadn't defaulted on my Alaska Student Loans (yet).

I went to the San Diego State University campus to check out class schedules- I had ideas about maybe entering the foreign service after a graduate degree. My Spanish was pretty good- maybe somewhere in South America. I saw a little flyer "Teach English in Japan Seminar" on one of the bulletin boards there - and it just happened to be starting in the next 10 minutes. I sat in a classroom with 30 other recent graduates and listened to an attractive corporate lady talk about life in Japan. I asked a few questions from the back, which must have got her attention- because I got a "call back" and after a few weeks, received a contract and a round trip ticket to Osaka to work at "Trend Language Academy" teaching English to primary school kids.

My contract was for 1 year, but I wound up staying in Osaka for 3. When my Japanese was good enough- I got a job managing one of the first internet cafes in Osaka. This was in 1995. IE 2.0 Netscape 2.0. Mainly it meant keeping the 20 or so Macs and PCs from crashing- and helping drunk salary men find the porn sites.

Japan has a strict no pubic hair rule for pornography. The bookstores that stock Penthouse and playboy, all had magazines with the pubic area scratched out by old ladies in the customs office, using a little aluminum scratcher tool that they wore on one finger. (why do I know that? I can't remember) anyway, the Internet world of porn with pubic hair was a revelation to these sake soaked sadsacks.

In my spare time, I learned HTML, some Perl and Photoshop.

I had a very small apartment right in the middle of the entertainment district of Osaka - and a motorcycle - even though I was walking distance to my job. I slept in everyday until after noon and came alive when the sun went down and the neon lights came out. I felt like I was living in a William Gibson novel.



All good things come to an end. The economy started to crash in Japan- it looked like the internet cafe was closing down. My motorcycle was stolen- and I got married. 3 bad things, 1 good one. We left Japan, and have only been back once for a short stop, until this trip.

Now we're coming to the end of a 2-week reminiscence tour and I'm tempted to generalize and make comments on how Japan has changed - it has - but I feel like we've only skimmed the surface. We caught up with old friends- ate a lot of sensational food and rode too many trains.

We're considering maybe doing another stint in Japan. Living here for a few years- enough to get the kids nice and bilingual. I don't think I could go back to teaching English though. I'm too old and cranky these days. I'd just yell at the kids- probably scare them to death.