Today is the last day of a month from hell. Bad thing is the hellish days are spilling over into next month, but on the 10th of September things should be back to normal for me (for the most part). I went out to celebrate the fact that I would get some money back from the hospital. I was planning on going after school but those plans dissolved quicker than Alka Sletzer in a glass of Coke. I find that working as an ALT makes it pretty much impossible to get anything useful done in my own life. By the time I get off work half of the places I need to go to are closed. The City Hall closes at like 5pm I get off work at like 4:25pm if I am lucky, or run fast so nobody ask me to do some dumb shit at the last possible second. And I am not sure about like paying bills and stuff but that stuff probably closes early too. So I somehow managed to get to the City Hall before it closed on Thursday, I was expecting to walk out of there with about 50,000円. When my number was called the guy at window 3 told gave me some forms and told me I had to go to the hospital to get their はんこ (stamp) of approval. Great! Problem is I had no idea how to get to the hospital. No worries iPhone to the rescue! I used google maps to plot a course from the City Hall to the zip code on the letter from the hospital. When I arrived at my destination it was just some shady ass alley I didn't see anything anywhere in the vicinity that even looked like a hospital, frustrated I gave up and returned home. The next day while running at the gym I decided to text Christal and she if she knew were it was. She did! Score!
Armed with a new address I set out on my search again. This time I actually found the hospital and I proudly walked in to where I would be receiving the money. The desk was closed! Just my luck right? So I had to try again the next day. The next day I figured I would try a different route to the hospital that should have been a shortcut. It ended up being a long cut as I got lost for like 30 minutes, I was just about to give up, when I found something that looked familiar and success I made it there. This time the desk was open, I gave the lady my form she gave me a shady look. Asked the guy next to her some questions then told me to sit down, then she went in the back and started looking through a bunch of forms, I was starting to think she was going to give me a hard time. I was about to say "look lady this money isn't coming out of your pocket now fork that shit over!" It was almost as if she knew that all this time I never paid my share of Japanese pension or healthcare, I dodge that shit like the Matrix. At first I didn't pay into the pension or health care because I am a freaking foreigner, and I am not spending my hard earned money to support old Japanese people who fall down and go to the hospital or something like that. Plus I never thought I would use a Japanese hospital. But then after I went to the Japanese hospital I got completely fucked over, so they should be paying me!
She called me back up 15 minutes later and put he stamp on my forms and I held out my hand for the cash and started thinking of what I was going to buy to eat after leaving. She put some papers in my hand and I am not talking about money, she just gave me more forms to take to the City Hall! WTF. By this time the City Hall was closed, so I had to wait until the following day.
The following day came and it was raining outside but I didn't care I needed money. I rode my bike through the rain got completely soaked walked into the City Hall and it was closed so that it could be vacuumed! What!?! Couldn't they still be open or vacuum at night! I mean it's not like I can come there whenever I want to I got to work all damn day! In fact I think the City Hall made my contract just so I couldn't ever come there and talk with the people there, it's a conspiracy I tell you! They are trying to prevent me from doing anything in my own personal life. So I came back the next day and luckily no one was there so I didn't have to wait. I walked right up to a window with my forms, the guy took one look at me then walked me over to the ticket machine and made me take a number, then he told me to sit down and wait for my number to be called. There was NO ONE THERE but regardless I sat patiently for about 10 minutes and watched the guy sit at his desk staring at me from behind the window with his hand over the button that changed the sign to the next number. I kept looking at him and then the number sign wonder WTF he was thinking. Finally he pushed the button and my number was called I took all my papers up to him and then he said I would get the money on September 18th. Noooooooooooooooooo! It won't even matter then as I get paid on the 10th.
I was happy that I had at least gotten something done and it only took like a week! Except I wasn't done. Today at school the City Hall called me and told me they needed my はんこ. I wondered why they didn't tell me that when I turned my papers in because I could have easily stamped those papers. The lady asked on the phone asked me when I would come in, and I told her I had to work because the City Hall made my hours inconveniently long. She told me "がんばって" (good luck) and then hung up the phone. Wanting this all to be over with as soon as I hung up the phone I bolted for the City Hall I didn't have another week to spend fooling around with this I wanted this done NOW! So that is what I have been spending most of last week doing. And I have nothing to show for it. At least not now. . .
Oh well just another day in the life of a Kenny.
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