Legal Alien

Went to get my visa the other day, not a problem after getting Megumi to help me with the forms yesterday, did have to wait around most of the day until my ticket came up though. Only problem was I'd pulled ticket number 61 today even worse than yesterdays 41, the machine showed that there were 45 people in front of me.

Anyway had a bit of time to kill so thought i would go for a wander round town as it looked like It would be about 3 in the afternoon before it was my turn, and it was only 10,30 in the morning when i drew lucky number 61.
On walking round town checked out a few supermarkets, food all looked pretty good, and it looks like you can get pretty much anything, i was surprised at the prices as it wasn't as expensive as i thought it would be. Sushi's a big thing over here and i don't that any self respecting supermarket over here doesn't have a Sushi section, a lot of it looked real good even though I'm not a big fan. Cakes and pastries also seem to be a big thing over here which is a good thing because I've got a bit of a sweet tooth, so may

come back a bit bigger than i went.

Did the supermarket thing, all this looking at food had made me feel a bit hungry so of i go to see what Utsunomiya had to offer, looking round it had a lot ranging from literally thousands of small Japanese restaurants that would be packed with ten people in them, these were mostly in the side and back streets off the main drag, almost all of them though looked like it would be good to go in. The usual suspects were all here as well MacDonald's, KFC and other local burger chains.

Italian restaurants seem really popular here if i passed one i must of passed a dozen and just in the little area i was walking around. Finally settled on a sort of Japanese noodle fast food place, went in sat at the counter for a couple of minuets until a guy pointed at a sort of slot machine thing in the corner.

Had seen a few people around it but just figured it was some form of one armed bandit type of thing. Felt like a bit of a plonker as it turned out to be where you got a ticket for your meal, how could a Englishman know that i ask you.

luckily it had pictures on it and i could just feed it in money push a button and get a ticket, take it to the counter give it to the waiter and literally about two minutes later i had my meal. It was all a hell of a novelty and pretty strange be but it was such an efficient system i was quite impressed. Didn't really know what i had got but the picture looked OK and i had sort of vetted it for squid and the like before i put my money in and got my ticket, don't know what it was, but it was good and I'd have it again if i could remember the picture and which button i pressed.

Fancied a beer after this but after searching around for a while could not find any where open, getting the feeling that the Japanese don't drink in the afternoon but surly that can't be true can it? Was getting to be around 2-15pm by this time so gave up looking for an open bar and off i go again to the immigration office to get my visa, got there around 2.30, still about 10 people before me, decided to wait anyway as i didn't want to go to the back of the queue or even to the next day if my turn came up and i wasn't there. Finally got to the counter at about 3.30 tried in my fluent Japanese to explain what i wanted, luckily there was a guy there who spoke a bit of English as well, finally got my visa about half an hour later.

After this went to get my alien registration card sorted, once I get it guess I’ll be a legal alien, as in the words of the song by Sting “I’m A Legal Alien” this time in Japan though and not New York. You need an alien registration card in Japan if you're going to be there more than 90 days, needed to go to another building to get this which was another ticket machine type of deal but luckily i was the first in the queue or should i say it was getting late and they closed at five. Had to get some photos taken for the card so off i go to the photo booth in the building basement, got my money out and went in just like the ones we have in the UK, or so i thought. Sat down put in my 600 Yen, composed myself waited and waited some more absolutely nothing, it had a touch screen on it pressed everything i could see not looking at the instruction as i was in a hurry, not a sausage. There was a lot more instructions then the ones i had been in in the UK and at first glance though they were all in Japanese, well they were until i discover the instruction in English button, great big blue one right in front of me. Oh forgot to mention it was about 95F inside the booth while all this was going on and to say i was sweating would be an understatement, starting to think that when i finally did get it sorted it and took a photo it would look like I'd just been in the shower.

Success finally found out how to get the instructions in English, press the big blue button dummy, there was a lot more things to go though before you actually got to press the button to take the photo.

Finally got there and managed to mop up the sweat before the photo was taken, they weren't the most flattering photos I've ever had but beggars can't be chooser. Off i run upstairs with the photos as it was nearly closing time and i didn't want to come back the next day this made me sweat even more, got back to the desk dripping wet think the lady wondered what the heck had been going on and why it had took me so long, anyway to cut a long story short should get my card the first week in July.