The Expiry Date

This is my first day of real actual, god fearin' work. I thought I was going to freak out, but you know what? I had a REALLY GOOD first day!

Today I also wanted to get my gaijin card, national health care - Ko kumin Hoken, AND my mobile phone. I thought I could do this in three hours. Maybe at home this would be not too hard to ask, but in Japan I don't think so.

First I did the alien card and NHI. This was a little bit of a struggle. Of course the lack of Japanese was always going to be a pain in the behind. I think I did everything ok. I am happy to know that if something DOES happen, my parents will not have to sell the house to "fix" me should I feel not so well.

Ok, next was the mobile phone. The salesperson at Softbank didn't speak any english (what IS it with that? I'm in Japan. Everyone should speak english!), so from the start this was not going to be an easy ask. He was using a web yahoo translation service to explain what everything was.

Unfortunately I had to purchase a phone in order to get onto a phone plan. I chose a Samsung 707SCII because on a 24 month plan it is free. Even if I cancel after 12 months, I'll only have to pay 11,760 yen so no big deal. I signed up for the 980 yen white plan which is REALLY cheap. There was about a AUS $28 new subscription fee.

The really good news is that their SIM card works perfectly in my K800i from Australia, so I have a backup phone and I can use my trusty Sony Ericcson. Good pictures here we go!

I don't know what it is today but as the title of this post states, a few things decided it was time to check out. My sunglasses screw came off and i can't find it. My mobile phone case broke as well. I thought this was going to be a bad omen for my day, but as it turns out. Everything was sweet.

It would have been nice if I had more than 5 minutes before I started work though. The Pocky kept me going.