Hi friends and family. Thanks for tuning in to another episode of my life.

To be honest, nothing particularly exciting has been happening to me this month. February, I think, is the most boring month of the year. It’s cold and there’s nothing to look forward to. To be fair, the sky in Tokyo is absurdly blue and it’s almost always sunny, but I’ve been working 6-day weeks to make up for the massive Christmas holiday I took, and I am now rather worn out. My routine since self-isolation has basically been working, sleeping, being hungover, and then more working and sleeping again.

Since leaving the AirBnB, I have moved into my new studio apartment. It’s a four minute train to work and located on the very convenient Yamanote line, so yeah basically prime Tokyo real estate. I am also loving living alone. The simple pleasure of having no one else’s hair clogging the shower or dirty plates filling the sink is well worth the lack of company.

• 

• 

This time a year ago, I had my first and only visitor to Japan – my friend Kate. She arrived on the 14th and we spent Valentine’s Day at an art exhibition, then we went for ramen, ran around the streets of Tokyo and got nicely drunk. Back in February 2020, I was under the impression she would be the first of numerous friends and family to visit me in Tokyo and I was also under the impression that I wouldn’t still be in Japan by February the following year. Anyway, here I am still, in Japan, alone. I don’t really have any particular affiliation towards Valentine’s Day. Pre-covid, I thought I might be marking the end of my year in Japan by getting drunk in Thailand with my uni friends but that of course fell through. Then last month, I had a boyfriend for all of five minutes but that also fell through. So instead I reverted to doing what I always do: giving a dramatic middle finger to the consumerist scam of Valentine’s Day and instead masking my loneliness as a strong political standpoint. Such fun!

• 

• 

The day itself was off to a shaky start and I mean that quite literally. At eleven o’clock on Valentine’s Eve, Japan was hit by a 7.3 magnitude earthquake. Earthquakes are pretty common in Japan, so initially it was nothing to be afraid of. But when the slight shaking didn’t subside and instead it got stronger, the panic started to set in. I think you’re supposed to get under some kind of furniture (I should really know this given I live in a country that pretty much entirely runs along a tectonic plate) but the desk and the bed in my flat are flimsy-looking things, so I chose the bathroom. I sat in the bath and called Chash because I knew she would be at home hanging out with her dad and her cat so she would definitely pick up the phone (she was and she did), and also because she is a higher level IB geographer so I thought she’d know about the hiding place thing (she didn’t). I sat in the bath until the shaking stopped and then I watched some videos on Twitter of train platforms and cars on motorways shaking vigorously. Luckily there were no fatalities.

On Valentine’s Day I taught eight lessons in a row, one of my students gave me a box of chocolates (shout out Takashi), and then I ordered a pizza and drank a mini-bottle of chardonnay in bed (as pictured above). The next day I went out for Korean BBQ (as picture below). A pricey but delicious affair.

Nevertheless, some more fun activities I have done in February include: eating a lot of ramen, dying my hair using LUSH hair henna (a lengthy, messy process that has resulted in zero people noticing my new glossy locks), sushi in Asakusa and starting an online short story course (watch this space). The pictures of such are dotted around this blog post in no particular order.

• 

• 

As always, thanks for reading!