Nice Guy!

It's written in my name.

Guy is

Gai- is

Gai-jin is 'Alien Person', to move from English, twice through Japanese roman phonetics ('romaji') and back to English again. I don't belong here and sometimes when I start mulling over it all, it feels like I don't even belong in my name.

Then there are all the little lies you tell. Could they be called 'white lies'? They are calculated and abundant. I've told them to a lot of Japanese people I've met. It's practically a verbal handshake, except, I suppose, they're not lying back. Or they're really good at it.

It's just easier. It's easier in the classroom, if you lie a little and package yourself a little tighter and more manageably. I like football and I support Arsenal. I follow their progress quite closely, but I've only ever been to one game and just recently got an Arsenal shirt. If I ever told the first XI football team guys from my school days of my allegiance, they'd probably tell me where to get off the bandwagon I leapt on.

But to the kids here, football is my thing. I live it breathe it.

So I'm constantly living this fraudulent-me, whether it's a dressing up or down of anything to do with me. It's like working undercover in yourself. It gets a bit tangled when you start living by the fraudulent you. You're held accountable to that fraudulent-you, and you can't always live a little lie with conviction.

Unless, of course, the fraudulent-you grows and grows in you and on you, and you start to become a little less like you were originally. You buy a football shirt. You play football more. Or is that just part of, you know, natural, personal maturing?

You get me?