Apartment life in Japan isn’t necessarily something I would recommend. Having a single, small space in which to do all your eating, sleeping, reading, dressing (and undressing) is an experience which I can most charitably describe as instructional.
It’s not all bad. On the plus side, you learn how to get creative with your living quarters and the various items contained therein (Is it a futon? Is it a sofa? It’s both!) and it is at all times strongly in your interests to be tidy – that stray wrapper or empty tin of beer will make for a fiendish blight on your domestic landscape if it isn’t chucked in a bin post-haste. The cabin fever gives you strong impetus to go outside and enrich your life with activities. Also, it makes for a great time-saver as tidying up the place takes all of about 10 minutes.
On the negative side, it very often feels like you’re living in some sort of Kafka-esque experiment in social deprivation, or maybe a Terry Gilliam movie. My apartment is one block in a small cluster of about 30 or so, all neatly stacked on top of each other like Lego. In physical terms, I’m so close to my neighbours that we could probably chat with each other by tapping on the walls in morse code, but at the time of writing I’ve yet to meet any of them. I’m told there’s another English teacher in my block but we haven’t crossed paths once. I haven’t even had the chance to bid my co-habitants a courteous nod on the stairs. I don’t know or recognise a single face in my block; we all seem to be anonymous salary drones who scuttle home after dark and lock ourselves in before scurrying back out the door once the sun reaches a certain height in the sky.
Compounding the issue is the fact that for as long as I can remember, I have always lived with people, whether it was family or friends. I know some folks who love living by themselves and thrive on the independence of being a solo act, walking around naked, playing whatever music they like and bringing whoever they want back to have sex with them. I don’t feel like I’m wired that way, not yet anyways. I really miss having housemates. I miss finding people in the kitchen at 1am, raiding the fridge while you’ve just got in after an okay-ish night out. I miss people who play their music around the house, music you don’t always like but you’re glad to hear it anyway because it’s proof that there’s someone else under the same roof as you, someone who you can talk to and be around. I miss people who share a bottle of wine with you after a shitty day at work while you watch movies together in the living room. I miss people who make you laugh when they’re drunk, people you can cook for and chat and be ridiculous with. I miss all of that very badly.
Sometimes living by myself is fun. For one thing, there’s no queue for the bathroom. Also, I can do meditation whenever I want without fear of interruption. I can watch porn with the volume up or sing along to The Smiths at the top of my voice while I do the dishes. I can burp and fart and scratch my balls to my heart’s content. I also find myself talking to myself on the odd occasion but I feel like that’s par for the course when you’re all by yourself. It actually feels quite liberating.
It strikes me as odd that I never hear my neighbours making any noise, bar the occasional muffled thunk here and there as doors open and close or someone trips over something. I’m pretty sure I’m the noisiest person in the whole apartment block; if I’m not chatting loudly with my mum via Skype then I am cranking Spotify or swearing vociferously while reading something upsetting on BBC News. I keep expecting a leaflet through my door asking me, in very polite broken English, to kindly shut the fuck up.
It’s an experience that I’ve yet to become comfortable with. One of the things that fed into my ennui a few weeks ago was that after surviving the working day, I would simply come home to a small, empty space. I’m not sure if my current mode of existence is something I’ll want to continue with once my contract is up in the Spring. But there’s also a nice by-product to all of this. Less people means less distraction, and so it’s a lot easier to hone in on the things on your life that you’re grateful for. I’m living alone in the physical sense, but at the same time I’m always deeply aware of the huge circle of love from the people I’m close to, which keeps me psychically propped up at all times, even when I feel at my lowest.
Living by myself was one of the things I’d always silently dreaded for years, and I always had a feeling that one day I would have to confront it head on. Like a lot of other things in my life at the moment, I’m learning as I go. But like those things, I have a feeling that it is very temporary. If anything, I want to make the most of all the ball-scratching and Morrissey impersonations. I won’t be able to indulge in them forever.
GO BACK TO THE VERY FIRST CONFESSION
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