The kidz

There's nothing that makes you feel quite so old as when you are surrounded by lots of people who weren't born when you were. This is completely natural. If it wasn't, then something would be wrong with the system, and we all know how difficult those are to fix.

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The reason I've been (more) absent (than usual) is three-fold. One is that I'm a lazy mo-fo, but that should be painfully obvious to all parties involved ny now. The second one is that I've been having yet another adventure in bureaucrazy, as I call witlessly call it.

I got my current passport three-and-a-bit years ago. It now has four full-page visas in it. I say this, of course, with a certain measure of pride. Not at some vain belief that I've "seen the world" or whatever, but rather that I've managed to get four visas at all. It seems to me that the entire process is really just a test to see how many hoops you can get a potential visitor to jump through in order to enter your country just to weed out the ones who don't care enough to compete.

The most nerve-rattling one was probably the Chinese one. Some of you may already know of my Adventures in Communism from last year, so I'll spare you the details. However, even Japanese ones can be quite taxing. Documents from four (4!) different sources, all signed and sealed? Yeah.

The tragic thing is, I don't think they really care. The embassy which tells you to do all these things just weighs your envelope and judges you worthy or not worthy of a visa to their country purely by the weight of the papers you've sent them. They then proceed to do something for a while, and send you your passport back to you with what is - in all ways that count - just a big sticker covering a full frikkin page.

But this time, I am actually indebted to them. Without me asking for it, they gave me a longer visa than I should have gotten, as well as an upgrade which may prove useful in the future. Maybe they liked my penmanship. More like they wanted to get me to stop calling every thirty minutes to see if I'd gotten my visa yet.

Yotsuya, here I come. Be prepared. June 28th is the big day. Not that that's any of Yotsuya's concern.

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The reader will no doubt be aware that I quoted three reasons for the tardiness of this post and have thus far only given you the first two. You will no doubt be expecting me to let you off without mentioning the third and final one. Fear not! I shall write more words which will make even less sense!

Trust me on this one.

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I went to a "festival". It was not "the festival of lights", since I'm in no way Jewish, nor was it "the monster truck festival of New Zeeland 2007" simply because I doubt such an atrocity exists in this world of ours. Also, to my admitteldly limited knowledge, it's not 2007 in New Zeeland yet. No, this is what the kidz call a "rock" festival. Three whole days, generally speaking.

The first time I went there was in 2002, I think. I remember getting a text message with the reaction from one of my friends that this was "unlike me". There was no malice in that statement, nor is there resentment in me mentioning it here. It's just plain statement of fact, and it's as true then as it is now. I don't belong there, reasons being among others that I'm not 16 years old, nor am I insanely drunk right now. Nor had I REALLY listened to an entire album non-stop that I'd bought and paid for myself before going there that first time. But I'm very glad I did.

This time was more unlike me than every before, really. I didn't plan everything carefully in advance. Hell, I didn't even know which bands were playing until the day before departure. Nor did I know how I was going to get home, since my friends ride was full. That's where not-planning-ahead comes up and bites you in the... groin. But, I managed to get back in one piece, in large part due to friends of friends who drove there in a van. I say this with reverence. A real, honest-to-God tree-killing American Chevy van. Naturally, starting the trip home, it wouldn't start. Battery dead. Luckily, they had a spare, and the knowledge to change the dead one for the new one. Unluckily, this one, too, was dead. But in the end, we got going. Until we stopped, and spent half an hour trying to get help starting it once more. And then solemnly vowed never to turn that engine off again. Global warming? Yes, that would be my fault. Entirely.

The moral of this story? Growing up, I've been surrounded by people who instead of preying on what makes me me have allowed me to "belong" without the added pressure of "conforming" just for the sake of said conforming. They have all allowed me to be a bit strange around the edges and thus not be like them in some ways, though none of those ways actually matter when it comes down to it. For this, I am eternally grateful. Chances are, if you're reading this, you're one of those people. So thank you.

In less than a week, I will be on my way to start another new life in Tokyo. I hope you will be with me.

The sunset

You'd have to search far and wide before you'd find a person who's more patriotic than an expat who's either wilingly or forcibly accepted living in a country for more than a couple of months, other than that in which he was born and raised . This is not strange, or perhaps even blog-worthy. He who lives shall see.

Today is the National Day of Sweden. The reason for this? Some politicians decided it that way a couple of years ago. Before that, it was the "Day of the Swedish Flag", which just doesn't have the same ring to it. Why give an entire day of the year over to a piece of designer cloth, when you could give the same day to an entire country, be it a small and relatively cold one with lots of people going on and on about the weather and ... pizza? On this day in history in 1523, we crowned a real badass king. And on the same day in 1809, no doubt influenced by said badass regent, the then-new constitution was ratified. It was repealed some 170 years later, when it was the second oldest one in the world still in use. But in grand blog-tradition, that's not the point of all this.

Like I've covered before, we're not a terribly nationalistic people. We have what one writer claimed to be an inferiority complex towards Norway since they celebrate the living daylights (triple word score to the first one who spots the 80's Norwegian pop-reference!) out of their national holiday, whereas we, traditionally, haven't. Now this year is the first when this day is a public holiday which actually means something. Last year, it ended up on some loser weekendian day like Saturday or Sunday. Sadly, we lack the Japanese backup system of making the following weekday a holiday in case that particular disaster should rear it's ugly head at us. And scream. Possibly "Ha-HA", for all I know. So this year is the "first". And according to polls (who dreamt up this one I do not know), two thirds of the people are not planning to celebrate it. Shocking.

I say, much like that writer (why have an opinion of your own when it's just so much easier to take somebody else's? It's what most people do, anyway. And most people in my surroundings seem to be doing pretty well, what with being alive and all), screw it. Celebrate it in your own way. You get a day off work (or for me, a day off from being off) to do with as you may. Reflect on your fine country, play videogames till your eyes bleed, or go consume something. I really don't care. I spent my day reading a biography of H.R.H. the King, who's one daughter I've taught a thing or two. Believe it or not.

Ok, so the reason for that reading bit has nothing to do with it being 060606 today (ooh, number of the beast, watch as I quake in fear at the disappearance of the three zeros holding today together), but rather a distinct lack of will to unpack crap sitting in the garage. But still.

That, however, is not my way of celebrating. That would be reflecting on a fact that managed to squeak by in last night's news. Ever since a couple of years before TV was invented, they've shown this little movie on the TV news every spring, maybe once a week or so. "The sun film" is it's official name. And it's gorgeous, to use someone else's word. It tells you when the sun rises and sets, and how many minutes of daylight have been gained since last week, in three parts of the country. Yesterday, instead of "+36 minutes", it said "over the horizon". And that, my friend(s?), is the definition of gorgeousness.

Having not been back here to sample a Swedish summer for three years, I'd almost forgotten what it's like to be alive in a place where there's still light outside at 10. At night! If I were a slightly more sleepy person, or if I lived a bit more to the north, I would never see darkness. (Until winter came, but I'd be in Acapulco sipping Shirley Temples by then, surely). It kicks the ass in the most invigorating way possible. It's also a bit scary when you think it's five in the afternoon and it's past the kids' bedtime by hours. Not that I have any kids. But yeah.

So, having been an expat for a few summers in a row, I've spent my National Day contemplating the grandness of light. This in light of the news that I will once again set sail in some sort of motorized aero-thing for my adopted homeland, Japan, in a matter of days or possibly weeks, instead of months or possibly years. I shall make every effort to bring this gorgeous light with me.