God Bless President's Choice

My name in Kanji
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Today was the most glorious day ever to have been lived by any person in the history of the world!  My bank card worked!  I realized that I have been a complete idiot!!  I thought that my President's Choice card wouldn't work because the card was incompatible with the network (because it doesn't say Cirrus or Maestro on the back).  Well, today I went to try three new PINs for my Bank of Montreal account (like I do everyday) and I thought that while I was there I might as well try my PC one again.  Nothing to lose and maybe the system was down the day I tried or something.  So I tried it and it didn't work.  But I noticed that it didn't ask me which account:  chequing or savings.  And then I remembered that last summer when I was in the UK it didn't ask me either and just automatically took the money out of my chequing account.  Last summer I had money in my chequing account.  This time I did not.  So it wasn't that the card was incompatible with the system.  It was that my chequing account had no money in it!  So i ran to the library to use the internet to transfer some money into my chequing account and then ran back to the post office bank machine to try my card.  As I walked up to the sliding glass door I almost wanted to turn around and cling to the surviving hope that there may be a way for me to eat today.  I knew that if this didn't work I would break down and cry right there in the ATM vestibule.  But as I waiting to see the green screen that indicates a failed transaction appear, I heard the sound of money being mechanically counted inside the ATM.  It sounded like a symphony of the most majestic sort!  And I celebrated by buying some delicious (and vegan) Japanese sweets (pictures to follow).  Ok so that mellodrama over with I can move on to the joy of living daily life again.

Japanese beers
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Byron is loving going outside here.  I was very nervous at first because of all the tiny alleys and places she could hide, get lost, be attacked, be stolen, or be run over but she has been doing very well so far.  Today I let her out at around 9am.  When I get to her at 10am she wouldn't come.  I spent over 1/2 hour wandering the streets calling her name and shaking her ball with a bell in it and she didn't come.  I had to leave to go write a Japanese placement test (more on that in a minute) so I left her outside.  At around 3pm I came home for lunch (after running from bank machine to library to bank machine and home) and she was waiting at the front door for me.  This was a good sign as it means that she knows her way around all ready and she can obviously hold her own with the local hoodlum cats.  This was a bad thing as I am not allowed to have a cat and the sight of one wearing a bright yellow tag with my address on it sitting on my doorstep is probably not a great way to conceal the fact that I have one.  I posted some pictures on the picture site in the album "Chasing Byron" so that you all can get a better sense of how difficult it is to catch her when she doesn't want to be caught!

Today was the most glorious day ever to have been lived by any person in the history of the world! My bank card worked!

Byron averting capture in a mossy alley
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Ayami and Junko made up a Kanji for my name.  My name is pronounced ke-ru-shi in Japanese.  Every kanji has several different pronounciations; some derive from Chinese and others from Japanese language.  There are also several different kanji with entirely different meanings that are all pronounced the same.  For example, for the sound "beh," one could choose a kanji that means soldier, bottle, room, separate, door, double, or jury just to name a few.  The particular characters that they chose for my name are pronounced ke-ru-shi and mean "flower" "keep" "poem".  We decided that this would refer to an ancient Japanese custom of lovers tying a flower to their love letters before they sent them.  Ayami said that there are certain kanji that are normally used for girls names and others that are used for boys names.  She said that my name looks like a girl's name and uses female kanji.

Beautiful, cold, hard cash
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We also tried some Japanese beers.  Dad, I have included this picture just for you.  I didn't ever like Asahi when I tried it in Australia (maybe my palate was tainted from all the Aussie swill) but I really liked it here!  Sapporo was ok.  Very fruity though and tasted more like a combination of white wine and beer.

Emily, I will write more about the Japanese sweets once I have posted the pictures for reference.

As for the Japanese placement test.  It is written entirely in Japanese.  I'm not sure why my telling the woman in charge "I don't know any Japanese.  I am an absolute beginner" didn't mean anything.  I have been waiting for almost a week to write this test at this particular time and when I got there she told me that if I couldn't read Japanese and understand it I should probably just not take the test and start in the introduction level.  Thanks.  I never would have figured that out myself!!  She also told me that I have to wait until October 10 to start the new semester.  So it looks like I will be confined to my lonely, English bubble of isolation for at least another 3 weeks.  It's a good thing Byron is here or I would have no one to talk to.  She also had to ask my boss for permission but he told me that if I was sure I wanted to study 20 hours a week and work 41 he wouldn't say no.  I told him that I was sure.  I'm not sure.  But I will see how it goes.  I always tend to take on a lot and seem to happier when I am very busy and have no time for myself at all.  Maybe it's because when I do have time for myself I think I should be doing something productive like exercising or reading and I inevitably end up watching TV or sleeping instead and the guilt is unbearable.  Who knows?

I think that is all I have to say for now.  I am going to go home and eat some more sweets.  It's kind of ironic that I got sweets from a shop that accepts mastercard to celebrate my new found cash.  I paid with cash though...