Old journal posts july 2004 contd...

July 15th 2004 I fought city hall- and won!!! I have been meaning to post about this for a while but just haven`t the chance! Warning it is LONG!!!!A couple of weeks ago I got a bill from city hall for my citizen`s tax. We all get them and I know we all have to pay them. Thing is, it says on the bill that you are billed by the city on January 1st 2004. If you move to another town after that, say on January 10th 2004, (smaller towns usually have cheaper citizens` tax), you still have to pay Kagoshima city this year and then you pay your town`s tax next year. I was annoyed that I got a bill for two reasons:1) They sent it to my old address which means that although I went through all the proper immigration processes to cancel my gaijin (alien registration) card in August, the news that I had left the country and come back to a completely different address on a different visa didn`t appear to have reached city hall in the 10 months that had passed between me leaving and this bill being sent. Remind me again why they bother with gaijin cards and all this registration rigmarole if they don`t actually use it!?!?!2) I wasn`t in Japan on January 1st. Granted I moved back on January 10th but according to the rules, I shouldn`t have to pay the tax for the city this year...So I took the bit of paper to city hall and sat down with the woman there. I explained that as I had left Japan in august, cancelled my visa etc.. I didn`t see why I had to pay citizen`s tax for the whole year when I wasn`t here for most of it. I also pointed out that the rule for Japanese people was that if they were living in the city on January 1st, they had to pay.I was not a registered resident on Jan 1st so why did I have to pay??? At this point, I discovered that my useless idiot of an ex-supervisor had told city hall (they called him to find out why he had returned the form to them) that I had left the country but that I "had been intending to come back". This therefore meant that city hall qualified my time at home as "just returning for a bit" but I was still technically a resident of Kagoshima city. Now, I don`t get angry very often but my mental response was peppered with several swear words and my actual response what "What on earth are you talking about? that is ridiculous!!" (In a very squeaky loud voice which seemed alien to me, but then I remembered it was because I haven`t really ever gotten angry in Japanese before!!! )I had to sit down with this woman and basically explain my whole life story. How when I returned home in August I was not 100% sure if Daisuke would come to live in the UK in the spring or if I would come back to kagoshima etc.... (which is entirely true) I also pointed out that I had cancelled my visa and although I was back in Japan at the beginning of January, I wasn`t registered in the city until the end of January and according to the rules they use for Japanese people, this meant I didn`t have to pay the city tax. If I had moved to a different town in Japan, I wouldn`t have to pay Kagoshima city tax so why did I have to pay it just because I was a foreigner and out of the country?!I know this may have all seemed terribly petty but I have been feeling very bitter towards city hall recently because of the registration (or rather lack of it) I suffered when i got married. I was upset because they were trying to make me pay taxes for services that I will never get to use (holding elections etc..) because I am "just a gaijin" (for those of you not in Japan, gaijin in another word for foreigner with not 100% nice connotations, it basically means outsider) However, more than anything, I don`t see how they can charge me tax when I am not actually registered on Daisuke`s residency documents. (Stupid Japanese system!) According to them, he lives alone. Therefore I don`t exist.. (one of the many anomalies faced by long-term foreign residents)unless it comes to charging me tax, it would appear!!! Anyway, I ranted all this at the woman at city hall and managed not to cry at her (which I am very proud of because I AlWAYS cry when i try and argue with people, this is why i would have made a terrible lawyer!!) and she said she would re-assess the situation and let me know if I needed to pay or not. I felt kind of sorry for her being faced with this crazy ranting foreigner so I apologised and said that obviously, I would pay if I had to, but just wanted to make her aware of the problem and the unfairness of it all!! She called me at the beginning of the week- looks like I don`t have to pay the tax this year because I wasn`t in the country and although I was planning to come back by then, she accepted that my supervisor`s claim that I had been intending to come back was not reason enough to charge me!!! I kicked butt!! Now all I have to do is go down to my old office and bitch-slap my old- supervisor for telling her my life story when really, it had nothing to do with him!Next step.. get my name on Daisuke`s residency papers.. (just in the notes section but something is better than nothing!!) I have a feeling that won`t be as easy though... However, if we don`t try, we never know do we!?!? July 15th 2004 The Long weekend starts today!! YAY!!!!!!!! I am sooo excited! Mikey is coming to visit today!!! (For those of you who have no idea who Mikey is, we studied Japanese together at Durham and he lives in Tokyo..) It is his first trip to Kagoshima and also the first time he will meet Daisuke! We don`t have any set plans as yet because it all depends on the weather but we are planning to go to Sakurajima at some point to visit Furosato onsen- a hot spring which is built on the site of a shrine. It is mixed but you wear robes to go in the water. (there are some pictures on one of my picture pages!) We might also hit the beach as it is definitely hot enough!!! I just hope the rain holds off while he is here!! July 19th 2004 Back to work... Well not quite because I cancelled my classes during the day today so I don`t have to teach until this evening. However I do have to take Mikey to the airport as he flies back to Tokyo today. Although it was a long weekend, it went FAR too quickly! I guess that is probably because we did so much! On Friday I met up with Mikey and Daisuke after work and we headed to a restaurant which specialises in "Kurobuta shabu shabu" (Kagoshima speciality) but there was a HUGE queue so we headed to a different restaurant and ate a HUGE amount of food! On Saturday we took things easy and went for lunch with James and Doug, two of my friends who are going home soon. I haven`t seen either of them for so long, it was good to catch up and also made me regret not making more of an effort to see them sooner. Saturday evening was fun- we went to a place called Ozizo, the food was great and it was all so reasonable- Nomi-tabe-hodai (all you can drink and eat) for 4000 yen for 2 hours. Unsurprisingly, we ended up eating and drinking ALOT!!! On sunday we went to the beach. We were supposed to leave early in the morning but none of us woke up so we ended up leaving at lunchtime!!! After a few detours (we got lost in the middle of the mountains at one point) we arrived at Marukihama beach in Bonotsu (south west Kagoshima prefecture) There were ALOT of people there and the water wasn`t nearly as clear as we had hoped but we managed to swim anyway. On the way back, we stopped at a viewpoint to take pictures so there are lots of new additions to my picture page!!! After the beach, we headed to Ibusuki to visit the "Suna mushi" (natural sand bath). This is definitely highly recommended as you feel so good afterwards!!! Sunday night dinner was "Yaki niku" (Indoor BBQ basically but it is soo good!) We went to a place called Shirakawa which is famous in Kagoshima for the quality of its meat. We had to wait for about 45 minutes to get a table but it was definitely worth it!! Monday was another day off. Again, we were supposed to wake up early and yet again, we failed miserably!!! We headed to Sakurajima with Miyasako-senpai. We wandered along the lava road before heading to Furusato onsen. (Another highly recommended hot spring!) The view from the lava road was one of the most beautiful I have seen in all the times I have been there. The sun was shining and there were very few clouds in the sky so it was possible to see all the way across the bay to Ibusuki and Kaimon dake. Sometimes I wonder if living in a bigger city would be better for us but then I see views like the one yesterday, feel the breeze in my hair and realise that I am definitely in the right place. Kagoshima may be old-fashioned and it may be horribly behind the times in some areas of daily life but it makes up for it with its good food and beautiful scenery! For anyone interested in checking out details about the tourist sites mentioned, this is the link to the English page for Kagoshima prefecture. http://www.pref.kagoshima.jp/home/english/index.html JULY 26th 2004: Kanoya Summer Festival Last weekend we went to Kanoya to visit Daisuke`s Mum and to hang out at the summer festival in Kanoya. I really love festivals in Japan and try to go to as many as possible!!! I love watching the dancing and eating all the food and seeing everyone dressed up in their Yukata. I have uploaded pictures in my album in case anyone is interested...