Getting a Cellphone

The view from our apartment, with the train station on the right. 

I was woken up this morning by a now familiar sound of the siren which marks the start of the trains. One disadvantage to living directly beside the train station is that we hear two of these sirens a day, one in the early morning and one around midnight. This is in addition to a small radio attached to the wall of our living room, which plays music at 7am, noon, and 5pm. 

We went out in the morning to try and buy groceries, but discovered that the store doesn’t open until 9:30am, so we walked back home. Around 9:30, O-san came by to pick up his phone, which he has been leaving overnight in case of emergencies. He informed me that I had free time this morning until N-san came to pick us up at noon to go to Tottori city to get cellphones. He also told me that a typhoon is coming this weekend! 

After O-san left, we went back to the grocery store, since it was open now. We got back, ate a bit of lunch, and then N-san and Y-san (another person from the BOE, not really sure what he does exactly) picked us up from our apartment and drove us into the city. Y-san dropped the four of us off at Tottori station, where we were supposed to meet Mayumi, the PA. We were a bit early, but even after waiting Mayumi hadn’t shown up. It had also started raining (a sign of the typhoon to come). Finally, after N-san called her, Mayumi arrived. Justin, Yana, and I got in Mayumi’s car and went to pick up another JET who was getting a phone, S. N-san and Y-san drove ahead to Softbank and waited there for us. However, when we arrived at Tottori BOE, Mayumi was informed that S had been out to eat with her teachers and they were having so much fun that they hadn’t finished, so S would meet us there. So we drove on to Softbank, and Mayumi and I had just sat down to start the procedure, when I realized I hadn’t brought my bankbook, which is necessary for paying the monthly bill. I felt really awful about it, because it ended up that Y-san drove all the way back to Chizu to look for it in our apartment and then had to drive back. Since that took about an hour, we let S get her phone first (she had arrived just after the fiasco started), and then we went with Mayumi and S went to a nearby department store to do some shopping for the apartment. We had just gotten started when Mayumi got a call that Y-san had returned, so we hurried back to Softbank and finally were able to to get the contracts finished. 

After getting our phones, Y-san and N-san took us back to the department store to do some more shopping, but by that time it was late, we were hungry and tired, so we ended up just getting a few more things, going grocery shopping (getting enough food for a few days in case power goes out), and then driving home. However, this meant that we completely forgot to get a few important things, oops. 

Interesting things:

I got my bank account at Tottori Bank, and the mascots are Tom and Jerry. Literally, they are on my bank book and for setting up an account I got a box of Tom and Jerry tissues.

There is EVERYTHING Frozen here. Seriously, everything. Yana picked out a Frozen water bottle at the department store, and there were also bento boxes, cups, chopsticks, water jugs, etc.