Vacuum cleaner nightmares, on Monday nights.

Perhaps I should stop apologizing for my inconsistency. I'm torn. On the one hand, my apologies and half-assed reasons explaining what has led to yet anotherspell of bad blogging gives me a gimmick. A way to start every entry-- maybe it's endearing.

As I was going through it, though, I've noticed how often I actually do start with "sorry" or something other, and do I really mean it? If I did, I'd probably be more consistent. Right?

So, I apologize for not being sorry enough. I am working on it.

I am going to let you all in on a little secret, since I'm apparently being introspective and thinking on this sticky Monday night.[Have I mentioned Japan has suddenly become hot as BALLS?] I have this bad habit. It's small, I suppose, and I'm not entirely sure how to explain it. But I'll try. I actually check my blog quite often, and the comments from last entry were really quite moving. And I intended to write an entry quite a while ago but I kept avoiding it, putting it off, thinking of doing Japanese homework that I would eventually leave undone. And this snowballs, somehow, hours become days, my "I'll write an entry tomorrow"s slip from my mind. And before I realize, a month has passed.

The same thing happens with eMails, actually. Someone will send me an eMail-- my teachers, my advisors, even my mom and I'll go through the same motions of delay. First a half-hour, then a few hours, and while I've been too busy assing around playing Hearts or reading the Economist time will crawl by until it's some obscene hour. And when it gets too late, I always feel as if it's too late to write an eMail, as if my fingers stop working properly after 11 P.M., and so it'd be best to leave it to tomorrow. Rinse and repeat. Magically, a week has gone by and my advisor is now messaging my classmates to relay information because I've been too unfeeling to respond to an eMail asking if I was in good health after my trip to China. As melodramatic as it sounds, I really fear getting eMails.

So, now we've all become closer.

I'm unsure of what this entry should be about. Perhaps race.

There's no way I could seriously discuss all of my feelings about race in Japan in one entry. But one recent development is worth talking about, namely what seems to be the white guilt of some of my classmates and my recent ineptness in tackling racism and prejudice.

For the past month or so, it's become apparent to everyone in the dorm that I am a "heavy drinker", since I'm hungover for half of the week most of the time. This has led to me being invited to the drunk brigade with two of my Tufts classmates-- one is short, sort of pudgy-ish, black hair, typical NJ-but-spends-time-in-NY kind of suburban type. The other is tall, bald, in his thirties, Californian joker type, I guess. And so we usually go out drinking every Thursday, sometimes with another boy, who's from California.

On one such night, as we were chugging cheap Japanese beers, getting ready to go to a nomi-houdai[all you can drink, essentially], I was asked: "So, since we're close now, I can make Black jokes, right?"

As I held my beer can to my lips, I raised my eyebrows. I didn't even dignify it with an answer. Just, "huh?"

"Well, I mean, now that we're good friends and stuff, you know that I wouldn't mean any jokes offensively, right? You can make Jewish jokes and stuff too; it's totally cool."

Or something to that effect.

I just looked. And laughed. And looked some more. I think I gave something akin to a "yeah, sure" because, as I'll get to later, I have become incredibly lazy and, as mentioned above, inept with dealing with racial issues.

I don't recall what exactly was said. Some comments about Hypnotiq being a "Black drink"[though they've all had it more often than I have, apparently] and some other nonsense. This has all been snowballing, and I made the mistake of making a statement the other night that I think will only add to the enabling. The conversation went something like the following:

Me:"Yeah, my high school was pretty expensive too, about 25K a year."
M: "Wow, yours was expensive too?"
Me: "For no reason. I mean, there was nothing extraordinary about, I guess it was because I got to go to school with you guys."

M., the guy I was talking to, is Jewish. What I meant by "you guys" was people with money, and from context, it sort of makes sense. But what I'm pretty sure it was taken as was a Jewish joke, which was not what I meant. We were interrupted by some other people coming to our little "Beer garden" party and so I never was able to clarify myself. Plus, I was pretty drunk at this point. I'm just pretty sure that this came off as me agreeing to that little, "you can make Jewish jokes, too" permission that I was given. Which was not my intent.

I'm pretty sure I'm enabling.

Anyway, I suppose I don't laugh enough when one of them compares me to Jero[have I talked about him? If not, then that deserves its own entry. He's a Black singer in Japan] or when a joke is made about Kanye West or Flavor Flav. And so, at least in the past two weeks, two of the four have felt the need to give me apologies about it, about, once again, how they don't mean to be offensive and hope I am not taking the jokes in that way.

I, of course, feel some kind of way about it. But as when Jefferson[a Nigerian] used the n-word in China, or when another Latino friend of mine used it, or as when someone else made a racial faux pas that made me uncomfortable over the past year, I have preferred to ignore it instead of explaining why that sort of behavior makes me uncomfortable.

There's a lot more to say[like, say, my actual opinion, I guess] but it's almost ten o'clock and I'd rather pretend to do my homework. Maybe I'll make a part two to this entry.

Anyway, yesterday, a friend here took a picture of the front of a Japanese record store here in Kanazawa and I am going to steal that now and post it. Credit to him, of course.[Whatever, I'm not a real blogger; I can plagiarize...right?]




This led to us "talking about" a series of issues-- and by talking about, I mean, him asking me questions about racism and me responding. This is unfortunately my general impression of racial dialogue with white or passable "liberals"-- them asking questions and the other responding with their complaints and grievances. But I shall leave that topic for another entry. Either way, he asked me a series of questions-- "Which country do you feel is more racist, China or Japan?", "What types of racism did you deal with in America?", etc. And part of me was reluctant to answer-- here this goes again, if and when I fail to adequately represent Black grievances to a potential ally in the struggle for Black Power!!![yes, the exclamations are necessary], I will have to deal with the disappointment, with my sudden ineptness in explaining why a lot of Black people are still mad.

And instead of talking about the jail system, or how race relations in the 1960s and beforehand in the US has had major effects on class and gender issues in the Black community today, or the public schooling system, or health issues, or WHATEVER, I wound up saying getting chased by cops.

And I always feel as if, as silly as it might be, that despite their oh-so-bleeding hearts, and the compassion that they wear on their sleeves and facebook profiles, that many of these white liberals have a quota, a limit to how many times they can ask a Black person about racism. So. What if I'm the last person they can fit in the quota? And if I, the rare sagelike Black kid who's almost done with a relatively good college, cannot answer these questions appropriately-- who will?

And this is all what runs through the mind of a petty Juggernaut like me when I get asked these questions.

It's hot as balls. I have homework but I want to write a poem. And I've been thinking of that comic that I wanted to write, again.

I imagine this entry is possibly offensive, and I'd apologize, but...do I mean it?

Hopefully this entry was a good exercise in honesty, a faculty I've forgotten how to use properly. I'll come in and do clean up later, if necessary.

Much love. There's so much more to say-- I think I might actually write another entry tomorrow but with me, that's probably as likely as leeches raining from the sky.

Fin.