On Sunday, I bumped another car. The bump was not bad; we didn't even need to call the police or anyone. I was turning a blind corner and managed to stop before hitting the car passing. Looking in my rear view mirror, I thought I saw another car coming up and instinctively took my foot off the brake a little and bumped the car in front that hadn't moved. The driver in front got out to look at the damage. Mind you this was on a tiny road and we were blocking both ways of traffic. I got out and knowing it was my fault, though not so bad, began to apologize. The old man who had been driving in front of my then began to yell at me for not following the Japanese rules of the road and expressed his disbelief that I even had a license. His wife suggested that we go to the police, which I was more than happy to do. Since their car was barely scratched, he said no and drove away with not so much as asking my name or insurance information. My car isn't badly damaged either, but I will need to take it to the shop. I pulled over out of the way of other cars after the old man left and pulled my self together after the verbal abuse. I've really not had a lot of experience with angry old men in Japan. I've seen them on TV and sort of believed that it was a little over the top, but after Sunday's events, I know that they do exist. And I'm sure that as a foreigner he was even ruder to me than we would have been to someone else. It wasn't just the old man, his wife just stood there and scowled at me. It was kind of scary. I know from experience what being on the receiving end of that kind of accident is like, and my car at the time was much worse off. I don't remember even raising me voice when I got out of the car and confronted the woman who hit me.
My boyfriend and I had an interesting conversation about it Sunday night coming home from a small event his band played in. It went something like this, but in Japanese.
'If you're tired, I'd be happy to drive part of the way,' I said. It was nearing eleven o'clock.
'After what happened today, you don't really want to drive, do you?' he asked.
'No, I'm fine to drive... I just don't want to meet any mean old men.'
'That's a good way to look at it. We have a saying in Japanese that means a half lesson (sorry, I can't remember the exact words... I'll ask later and update). It means that we see a person or something like that and try to be the opposite. We learn what not to do from this kind of experience.'
I think what he said was really a good lesson to think about. So, from that bad experience, I can take away two lessons: be more careful at blind corners and if crashed into by accident, be nice to the person doing the crashing. Being mean won't make anyone feel better or fix your car faster.
On a happier note, the event that night was fun. It was at a restaurant/event space. I was essentially alone when my boyfriend was on stage (it's more like a recessed floor than a stage though), so I sat with some of our friends who have another band though weren't playing that night. The thing I like best about the restaurant though it that they have a couple of Mexican food dishes. Nagano Prefecture is not a good place to find Mexican food at all. But the enchilada I had was really good. Instead of a corn tortilla, it was made with a wheat flour tortilla and covered with a refried bean sauce and cheese. No one I was sitting with had ever heard of or seen an enchilada before, so they were all very interested to see what it was. The other Mexican food items on the menu were; fajitas, tacos and taco salad. The rest of the menu is supposed to be American style food, so they had burgers and even spam. There was also a variety of locomoco dishes... I'm not really sure what a locomoco dish is though. The owners lived in California for three years, so is that a California thing?
My boyfriend and I had an interesting conversation about it Sunday night coming home from a small event his band played in. It went something like this, but in Japanese.
'If you're tired, I'd be happy to drive part of the way,' I said. It was nearing eleven o'clock.
'After what happened today, you don't really want to drive, do you?' he asked.
'No, I'm fine to drive... I just don't want to meet any mean old men.'
'That's a good way to look at it. We have a saying in Japanese that means a half lesson (sorry, I can't remember the exact words... I'll ask later and update). It means that we see a person or something like that and try to be the opposite. We learn what not to do from this kind of experience.'
I think what he said was really a good lesson to think about. So, from that bad experience, I can take away two lessons: be more careful at blind corners and if crashed into by accident, be nice to the person doing the crashing. Being mean won't make anyone feel better or fix your car faster.
On a happier note, the event that night was fun. It was at a restaurant/event space. I was essentially alone when my boyfriend was on stage (it's more like a recessed floor than a stage though), so I sat with some of our friends who have another band though weren't playing that night. The thing I like best about the restaurant though it that they have a couple of Mexican food dishes. Nagano Prefecture is not a good place to find Mexican food at all. But the enchilada I had was really good. Instead of a corn tortilla, it was made with a wheat flour tortilla and covered with a refried bean sauce and cheese. No one I was sitting with had ever heard of or seen an enchilada before, so they were all very interested to see what it was. The other Mexican food items on the menu were; fajitas, tacos and taco salad. The rest of the menu is supposed to be American style food, so they had burgers and even spam. There was also a variety of locomoco dishes... I'm not really sure what a locomoco dish is though. The owners lived in California for three years, so is that a California thing?
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