I came back down to Tokyo from Tohoku for a quick meeting. Done with my day, I head back up to Tohoku to continue my work at Rikuzentakata City Hall. I'm in Tokyo Station. Return ticket bought, I walk around the station for a few minutes looking for this famous bento store (boxed meal). This is the only place in Tokyo that sells the most amazing sushi box and I have high hopes they'll have a box left. I take my ticket out of the back pocket of my wallet, go through the gate and proceed towards the store. I find it, make my way through the swarms (why is this place to packed??) and do not find my sushi box. Undeterred and convinced I just can't find it, I ask one of the staff members where it would be. He checks.
"We're out."
Crap. I decide to settle and pick what has to be the next best box of goodness and reluctantly proceed towards the cashier. At which point I begin 24 hours of major hassle.
My wallet is gone. It's really gone. I dig through my bag. I move things around, take things out. It's not here. I had it five minutes ago when I took the ticket out. Someone I bumped into in the last five minutes grabbed everything I need to operate fully in Japan and walked off with it. It's not panic I feel. It's the five-stages-of-pickpocket-angst that hits me in 15 seconds. Disbelief, shock, rage, "oh, this is so not cool" and then reality. I have no cash, no cards, no paperwork. My passport is in another little bag in my purse. Is it there? Yes. Relief. I must find a cop and report this. And so it began.
I make calls. Alpha Male first.
"What do I do? I've not ever been robbed in Japan."
"Go find a station employee and ask where the nearest police box is."
I look around.
"I can't find a station person."
"Relax. Keep looking. They're there."
I keep looking and still can't find anyone in station uniform. Where have they all gone?
"I can't find anyone!"
"Where are you? Specifically. Which exit did you come through. Go back there. Someone will be at the gate you walked through." Of course he's calm.
"I see them."
"Good. Go. Call me again when you're at the police station."
"Okay."
I call another friend, a cop, and leave a message. I call a friend and say I'll need to borrow some money, completely forgetting she's on a date. I call someone up north and say I won't be coming back up, until at the very least I have a new driver's license. Really? Do I have to go through that whole process again? The last time I went to the two police stations in Tokyo that issue licenses to foreigners, I left having had words.
I find the police station and tell them what happened. So began three hours of paperwork.
Here is where Japanese language comes in. The cops, two of them in full uniform (what are all those gadgets for?) are polite but unsympathetic. I tell my story, and they make me repeat it. I do. And again.
Several times in the three hours I filed my report, the younger one taking my statement said, "When you lost your wallet" and I politely corrected him by saying, "When my wallet was stolen." Semantics, I know, but "lost" is when I put a credit card on my desk piled up high with things, and then can't find it in that pile whereas "stolen" is having something taken from me by someone who shouldn't have it. The cop, evidently not accustomed to being corrected, does. Correct himself, that is.
"Right. Stolen. Not lost."
"Yes. Stolen."
I head back to my apartment. With no cash, I'm grateful for the fact the pickpocket did not get my train pass. It has enough money on it for me to ride the train.
The next day I start the process of going to all the right offices and banks filing more paperwork, explaining again what happened the night before. At the immigration office (foreigners in Japan have to carry an ID card) I sit with other foreigners all speaking different languages. When my new card is issued, I'm handed it with a warning. "This is a very important document. Don't lose it again."
It's the nuance of the word "lost" here again that rattles me. I didn't lose my card. I didn't misplace it. It was stolen. I decide not to correct the official who is surely tired of dealing with opinionated foreigners but am not happy with the insinuation. Fine. Whatever. Since when has the Japanese language gotten this passive-aggressive?
On the way home, I receive a call on my cell phone. I don't recognize the number but decide today to take the call. It'll be fine. I usually let calls from unknown numbers go to voicemail but today I'm feeling risky.
It's one of the grandmothers from temporary housing in Minami-Soma whom I've worked with. She introduces herself in thickly accented Japanese, her Fukushima dialect coming through loud and strong.
"Oh, hello!" I say. It goes downhill from there. I do not understand what she's saying. In person, I can figure out what's being said. When she's in front of me, I can keep up. On the phone, however, I'm guessing, assuming, hoping I'm getting the nuances of what she's trying to tell me.
I'm pretty sure she's telling me they've made something new, this group of grandmothers in temporary housing who in the past have made beautiful origami kusudama balls.
"Oh, really?"
And, here I think she's trying to explain to me what these are. If I'm wrong, my answer will mean nothing--be completely out of context, so I think fast about how to respond safely, not giving away the fact I have no idea what she's saying. I decide to go with "I see." It seemed to work.
Next I think I'm being invited up. I'm pretty comfortable with this assumption.
"I won't be able to make it until some time in late February" I say, and she replies with something, oh please help me, but I'm lost. Say what to this?? Think, woman.
"Uh huh." Now there's silence. Crap. Did that not make sense? Not giving her a chance to think through my incorrect (?) answer further, I decide to butt in.
"Is it okay that I can't come until late February?" She's excited, rattling fast and I'm so lost.
In the end, I believe I agreed to go down for a visit sometime in the spring to see something they've made, but I honestly can't be sure.
Having spoken Japanese since I was a child, I'm not accustomed to having to correct, stand down, defend myself, explain, listen hard, and hope I'm making sense. Between the pickpocket incident and having to make sure my Japanese is clear to cops and government officials, conveying exactly what I'm putting out there, I'm exhausted. Twenty-four hours of drama, indeed.
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