Who ya gonna call?
Because today was uneventful other than suffering through seven and a half hours of classes after four and a half hours of sleep, I will instead blog about the awesomeness that was yesterday (even if it was six hours of reading and other homework that prevented me from doing so at the time).

The conclusion of the festival job only confirmed that it was truly the best job EVER. The weather was half a ton of suck but what did we care? We had on our day-glo orange "Shibuya Staff" jackets!

To start the day off, we greeted city officials for the opening ceremonies at Shibuya station. This involved handing welcome gifts and commemorative programs to arriving suits, bowing, some aisatsu, etc. I was personally asked to deliver a program to the mayor of Shibuya who seemed very happy to meet me and inquired of my host father's co-worker who I was. I was even asked to hold an umbrella for him while he spoke but alas, it ceased to rain while he was talking.

It did occur to me, after realizing we were the only foreigners working at the festival and meeting/socializing with all the "important" people that we did, Shibuya will probably call on the four of us if they ever need "decorative gaijin" again. That's all we were. We were paid to stand around, practice Japanese, meet people (and occasionally give directions) and eat free food all day long.

After we completed the opening ceremony-- during which we viewed the unveiling of a new Shibuya landmark, a statue featuring gleeful, naked babies-- we were treated to an hour of festival sightseeing with my host father and the Shibuya interpreter. We took tea ceremony at the traditional tea booth and were filmed by NHK television as we drank our O-cha. I wouldn't say an orange blazer would have been my uniform of choice had I known we were to be broadcast, but I missed the program since I was working anyway. After tea ceremony, we looked at some local Ikebana arrangements and walked to a nearby building to view Hachiko's dead stuffed carcass.

In case you don't know the famous story, Hachiko is the loyal dog of a Japanese man who waited faithfully for his master outside Shibuya station every day and continued to wait long after the man had passed away. After Hachiko himself passed, nearly 11 years later, he was stuffed and mounted. Apparently he normally resides in Shibuya but has been on display elsewhere for some time. This festival commemorated his return "home." Seeing Hachiko was both subtly nostalgic and bizarrely amusing. He is a pretty dog.

After we were treated to sightseeing we went back to "work." I don't think I even had a chance to become bored because I spent all day chatting with some person or another. We again saw the sad cigarette man, this time accompanied by a beer can man. In a nearby booth, we talked to a Myna bird named Yosef that could say "konnichiwa," "ohayo," "ahoy" and laugh like an evil overlord on crack. The laugh was the best part.

During our break, we wandered over to the soccer field and saw REAL JAPANESE POWER RANGERS ON STAGE!!!!!!!!1111 Erin was so giddy she could scacely contain herself. Despite that the J-Power Rangers really laid on the cheese, their coreography was actually remarkably good. I believe we saw them practicing the day before yesterday out of costume while we escorted the ambassadors to their seats before Saturday's opening ceremonies.

Not only were we released because of the rain before four o'clock, we went home with bags stuffed full of gifts totalling at least half a day's paycheck in additional value. The festival staff seemed to delight in handing out gift bags at every opportunity to special guests and "ticket holders" as well as city officials and diplomats. We recieved one of each of these gifts because apparently we were novel enough to be considered important. My host father also let us keep our day-glo orange blazers and we have decided that it is MANDATORY for the four of us to go out drinking some time in Shibuya while wearing them.

In case you're curious (and so I remember in the future), here's a list of the loot I went home with:

-Shibuya-ku* kaitai strap
-Shibuya-ku lapel pin
-Set of Shibuya-ku placemats ( ?? sounds trite but apparently they're very nice)
-Shibuya-ku ballpoint pen
-Shibuya-ku pencil case
-Set of "expensive" (as we were told) Pilot mechanical pencil and pen
-Commemorative postcards of the gleeful naked baby statue
-T-shirt from the myna bird people (they decided to give it to me because I "took a picture of the bird." I'm confused as to why this merits giving me free stuff because I felt like an idiot for toying with their animal for so long just to take video.)
-Rad orange jacket
-Stuffed p-chan (!!!!!) and scary other stuffed pig (technically these weren't free but they cost Y50 after the bazaar lady bartered p-chan down from Y100 and threw in the scary other thing for free. I didn't even say anything, just looked at it... everyone was fighting over p-chan)
-Sakura Wars mecha keychain (a pink robot!)
-Spiffy super-thin, glow-in-the-dark (why?) pocket mirror

*all "Shibuya-ku" merchandise is emblazoned with the city's logo, a pretty and tasteful flower.

To top it all off, we were fed all day. Free bento, apples, oranges delicious beyond belief (just now in season), zushi, chocolate, cookies, sweet potato, three kinds of tea and even the hand-made-on-site mochi/anko combo pack that everyone in the faire queued for for hours. We were quite literally pampered.

When I came home soaking wet, I found out my host mother had bought me at least two week's worth of bento foods and other snacks and stashed them in our new downstairs refrigerator next to my room. After I came up for dinner, she and my host sister seemed prepared to listen sympathetically to me talk about how stressful and confusing my first "baito" (part time job) was. Instead, all I could say was "Jitsu wa, totemo tanoshikata desu yo." ("The truth is, is was really fun!")

I'm bragging, I know. I also know it was totally, completely ridiculous of them to even pay us. We had so much fun I would have done it for free. It wasn't even WORK. I don't know what to say to my host father to express the indebtedness of us all. We needed work and he managed to get the city of Shibuya to hire us in return for... what? Our simple presence at the fair? I can only hope we made a good impression. I can't express enough how grateful we are all. At the end of yesterday we left the fair convinced that it was by far the best day we had experienced since we came to Japan. Despite the obscene amount of rain and that none of us had umbrellas, we were all laughing about the silliness of it all.

Today my cynical, disenfranchised viewpoint has returned to me. After not sleeping, I imagine it's impossible to escape. However, I will always be able to look back on yesterday with fondness. I've asked everyone to contribute $5 so that I can buy a thank you note and decent bottle of red wine for my host father in thanks. It could never be enough, but I think he'll get the point.