Thursday, 15 October 2009

• Our Okinawan Home: Settling In

  For some reason, I kept myself going through my road trip thinking, "Okay, when we get to Japan...the chaos will be over, we can finally REST, settle in and get used to routines again..." but when we arrived in Japan, it was anything but. We woke up the next morning freaking out about all the things we needed to get done. My husband had to check into his unit at some point, we needed cars, we needed to find a home...we had no idea if we could still live off base because of a new rules the military threw out there about nobody being allowed to live off base. The reason was because nobody stationed in Okinawa really wants to live in the base housing here, which is often rumored to be old and full of mold. I've seen it. The housing isn't really all that bad if you don't mind concrete, sterile, box-like structures...but compared to what you can get out in town, it isn't all that great, either.
  
  Of course, number one on my list was just to get OUT of the hotel room...so we decided to take a walk. Nothing on earth can prepare you for the humidity of Okinawa. I thought the Ohio river valley was bad, with it's swampy river valley heat. Hell, I thought southern Florida was brutal...but nothing prepared me for how humid it is here with air so thick you feel like you're swallowing it. I was fine at first...but then my husband said, "We could walk to the furniture store...It's right down the street..." and I was more than happy to avoid going back to sitting in a hotel room.

  It became apparent to me that my husband's definition of 'right down the street' is much different than MY version of 'right down the street'. All the makeup melted off my face. I was sweating buckets...but we finally made it to the furniture store. While there, in a moment of desperation, we decided to buy strollers and attract the attention of the whole store by assembling them IN the store.  The kids were even tired of walking through the heat and we had been carrying them for most of our walk. We started making the trek back UP the hill when I became sick. I couldn't walk. My legs just stopped working and I had to plop down on the ground.
  
  The whole time, my husband is yelling at me. I had water and was gulping it down like a fish, but it wasn't doing me any good. My body was saying, "Screw you!"

  We kept trying to walk...I would make it about twenty feet and I'd have to sit down again. I was hoping I wouldn't pass out. Meanwhile, I was noticing a base phenomenon: The Newbie-Fascination Factor. People were so rude as to slow down, STARE at us, realize that I was in trouble...and just keep driving. It's obvious on base who is a newbie...they are the ones walking around in 100° heat because they can't bear to be stuffed up in the West Pac Lodge, anymore. All the sane people are in cars. I am still angered that not one person even stopped to say, "Are you all right?" I was cursing at my husband to get a cab, which he should have done before his wife died of heat stroke, but it didn't seem to concern him. I'm not one of his Marines. I'm a woman with a history of heat-sickness, damnit, and somewhere, he forgot this. Eventually, we made it to the top of the hill and into a Taco Bell where I sat for an hour, air-conditioner hungry and drinking everything I could get my hands on. I will never forget this and my husband will never get off my shit list because of it.
  
  Before we left for Japan, I had to be inspected by a military dentist to make sure my teeth were in good shape. I had to have my complete medical history relinquished to the military. I didn't like this idea. I had to admit that I'd just had a major panic attack within the last 6 months. So much for your right to privacy about your medical records. When your husband gets orders and if you want to have a snowball's chance in hell of seeing him, you have to drop down your guard and hand all that stuff over. What was shocking to me is that a surprisingly large number of people get rejected to go with their spouse.  I was afraid they would reject me because of my stupid panic attack and I'd spend months explaining that it really wasn't because I was crazy while people gave me the "yeah, right" look.
  
  There is a whole list of things that can get you disqualified: Mental disorders chief among those. They wouldn't even send some people over because they were on or had been on anti-depressants. Basically any medical condition that requires a specialist will be turned down. This has caused a lot of grief for some spouses I know. They couldn't get orders to go over, but guess who still had to? Luckily, the unaccompanied tours were shortened to one year instead of three...but still, one year away from your family in someplace with a reputation for hookers? It's enough to end many marriages or cause them severe distress.
  
  I can't imagine Blaine being over here alone. The guys stationed here talk about cheap hookers non-stop. They talk about it with the nonchalance one would use talking about going to McDonald's for lunch...and the quality of the hookers is probably about the same - cheap, greasy, bad for your health...and instead of Happy Meal toys, you get crabs or Syphilis. No woman in her right mind wants to leave her husband in a place where all they have to do is walk down a certain alley and women will hang their heads out the window and whisper, "Hey, G.I....over here!" and I don't care how much you trust your husband. The thought always goes through your head. It's one of those military stigmas that lives on in infamy...and disgusts virtually everyone.

  We were informed, that evening, that we both had a housing brief and a mandatory newcomer's brief that we had to attend that week. This was a first for me. The military has never told me I had to attend a mandatory meeting before...Okay, besides that one our housing people said we must attend because of the psycho women on our street.  They later cancelled that and only made the troublemakers attend.  The only mandatory thing I'd had to do previously was submit all those medical records.  I had never been told I had to attend anything, so I was actually looking forward to this. I was hoping to get some more insight into the place we'd been sent to. I don't know what I was hoping for honestly...

  Before we attended the newcomer's brief, we had to attend the housing brief to tell us all about the housing available to us, all about the loaner military furniture, etc. Our sponsor picked us up and took us to the brief and kept our kids for a few hours. The only thing we wanted to know was if we were going to get to live off base. The answer to that was: "You have until August 1st..." That was two weeks away...so my husband and I high-fived each other and immediately started making plans to live off base. Someone else told us they wouldn't be searching for places so fast...they said command might lay down the law earlier. We decided to risk it, but at the same time try to get a message to his command asking if it was okay. His unit was in Australia for training, at the time.
  
  We signed up to have housing agencies contact us at the main housing office. We had not even left the office yet...and all of a sudden, we were getting phone calls. Massive amounts of phone calls. Literally, my husband's phone was ringing constantly with some over-eager housing agent dying to show us a house. My husband eventually started asking, "Does it have an ocean view? At least three bedrooms? Well, then we're not interested, right now...but if you have anything like that, please call me back."
  
  After that, we had appointment after appointment lined up. One already for that day. Three for the next day. The first place we went, we looked at a place that overlooked the greenest river you've ever seen...and also overlooked some large, Japanese tombs that kind of freaked me out. It was also up this steep, tiny windy road that would have given me a panic attack just to maneuver, but we liked it...and we went to sleep that night thinking it might be the place if tomorrow didn't bring anything better.
  
  The next morning, another housing agent picked us up. I immediately wanted the first place he showed us. It was 3 bedrooms, marble floors, ceiling fans, but I could have cared less...it was the view you immediately saw when you stepped in the door. Looking down the hallway, you saw a wall of windows framing the most perfect view of the ocean....No obstructions whatsoever, just pure aqua, blue-green water. I was hypnotized by the view and rushed through looking at the other bedrooms just so I could go step out onto that balcony and see this view. Of course, I let my sensible side get the best of me and started calculating exactly why we could not live here, but it was already set in my mind. This was the place I wanted. We went and saw another 3 bedroom place that I just didn't like as much...same layout as the other place...view wasn't so nice and it was near a sewage drain and smelled. We saw another place with a similar layout...but with four bedrooms. That was the place Blaine wanted. You could see the ocean from this place, too...but again, nothing like the view from the other place.
  
  We looked at a really huge concrete house that was so hot I thought my face would melt off. The room sizes were absolutely enormous and all I could think was that the place would be HELL to cool. We went back to the hotel room that night, exhausted...and all I could think of was that first apartment. My husband was still talking about the four-bedroom apartment. I sighed and confessed that I was in love with the first.
  
  "Well, you want it then? Let's just get it...that's fine with me!" he picked up the phone and called and my heart sank as I heard him say, "Oh, really? Well, what about the four bedroom place? Are you kidding? That one's gone too? Okay, well...thank you."
  
  Then, he turned to me scratching his head, "They're gone. All three apartments that guy showed us are already leased now."
  
  I wanted to cry. I had come that close to having a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to live by the ocean? I was pissed.  My husband tried reassuring me by saying, "Hey, we don't even know if my command is going to approve living off base anyway..."
  
  The next few days, we searched for another place to call home. Nothing. Everything paled in comparison.  We were kicking ourselves for not saying, immediately, "We want it!" I went out with a housing agent, one day. A young guy who spoke perfect English and had a lot of fun discussing American culture versus Japanese culture with him. He was a great guy...but the places he showed us just weren't big enough. When I came back from house-hunting my husband gestured to a quiche on the table. The Master Gun's wife had brought it by along with a salad and some fruit. I told him that was very nice of her and reminded him to get me her phone number so I could call and say thank you. Unfortunately, he would forget and I would forget in the whirlwind of stuff we had going on.
  
  We saw another place with another housing agent that we really liked...that is, we liked the housing agent. Not really the house so much. She was an Okinawan girl who married a military guy and moved to America with him.  Eventually, she had come back home. Her name was Mina and we told her to call us if she found anyplace else...but we didn't expect to hear anything. I was running out of hope and the phone had stopped ringing.  About the same time, my husband's command got back to those left behind in his unit.  They told my husband that the command's reply was, "We don't give a shit where the Staff Sergeant lives"...literally.  Well, there was one question answered.
  
  We went to our newcomer's brief and the whole time, I was sitting there and wondering if anyone had tried to call us about the perfect place...and we'd missed it because we were sitting in this boring brief. Where I thought we'd get more discussion about the island, culture, and basically how not to piss anyone off...Instead, we got to sit and listen to eight hours of talks about equal-opportunity, sexual harassment, what's going to happen to you if you commit an offense on the island, etc.  I didn't come here to rob, pillage, or rape...I just wanted to know the basics of getting by.
  
  It was interesting to see the variety of people in the newcomer's brief.  I had this weird lieutenant that had to have been no older than twenty-two looking me up and down in this, "I'm better than you" look. He wasn't checking me out. I know that look. This was a look of pure condescension:  A fresh Lieutenant with a chip on his shoulder. He had a wife who was probably even younger than he was. She looked like a preteen Victoria Beckham with a baby. I was once again struck by how young some of these guys are...and how bizarre and stupid it is that my husband ultimately would have to answer to this 22 year-old snooty Lieu-Lieu and Vicky Beckham Jr. would expect me to be her suboordinate.

  My husband says there are good officers and bad ones. The bad ones don't respect experience. The good ones respect it and learn to use it to their advantage. I'm not talking THEIR experience, because they really don't have any, but the experience of Enlisted guys who will be under their direction. My husband loves the new Lieutenants that realize the way the system works...and hates the ones who enter into the Great USMC with a power trip on Day One. Unfortunately, there are wives that also adopt these attitudes, which are pretty baseless when you don't have a rank to your name (aka. the old wench from our neighborhood...the "I don't speak to 10-year gunnys" lady. Her husband got promoted to 1st Sergeant and she quit talking to all of us all together, of course) so when you get a group of wives in mixed company, the observations are always interesting.
  
  Here, you had a room full of all ranks...and all people. Middle-aged wives who looked like they couldn't wait until all this was over, 30-somethings excited to get away from wherever they were last, 20-somethings ready to settle down and set up house, late teenage wives with white knuckles on pens scribbling down notes and terrified...You couldn't really tell who was an officer's wife and who wasn't if their husbands weren't next to them in uniform. You start realizing that these people are really from all walks of life. An officer can marry a girl who lived in a trailer park all her life and never attended a day of college. An Enlisted guy can have a whip-smart laywer wife. You never really know...but we were all nearly nodding off the rest of the day...and didn't learn much other than to stay out of trouble.  We were all united in one glorious moment....of total boredom.
  
  The next morning, we had Mina, the housing agent we really liked, give us a call. She said that one of the apartments had opened up in one of the buildings we had told her about that we liked.  Someone's lease had fallen through. She gave us the name of the building and I told Blaine, "I don't think that was the one we wanted, though...but still...let's go see it, look at it again and then we can just sign the paperwork."
  
  She asked us if we could be ready in five minutes. We flew to get ready, excited...Would it be the one with the wall of beautiful ocean view? Would it be the one with the partial ocean view that was nice, but kind of smelled like the sewage drain? Maybe we could remedy that...or would it be the four-bedroom...could I have my own exercise room? We were so excited we could hardly stand it. When we got to the building, I started shrieking at poor Mina, "Oh my GOD!!! This is the one we wanted!!!" It was. We drove into the parking garage, parked, and ran upstairs only to see...a line out the door of the apartment.
  
  Literally, there was a LINE of families waiting to see the apartment! Families that we recognized from our housing brief and the newcomer's brief. My heart fell for the second time. "This was IT!" I told her, sighing...All these other people had turned to look at us and they were laughing nervously about all of us wanting to see this apartment. And then, Blaine had an idea at the same time I had it. "Mina?" he whispered, "We've already seen it. We want it...We don't have to tour it again...Can you make a phone call before one of the other agents and see if we can still get it?" Mina's eyes lit up and and she started dialing. I felt wrong. I felt like a snake...I wasn't sure about the ethical principles of snagging the apartment while people were still touring it...but for once, I decided I'm too damn nice and it was time to shut up.
  
  Mina made the call and snapped her phone shut, "Come on, guys...It's done..."
  
  I didn't believe her...and then I just turned, grinned at her and told her she was the most awesome housing agent ever. Thank God for small victories. I was bummed about not getting to see the place again...and I also wasn't 100% sure we had DEFINITELY gotten the place. She had just called someone in her office...who had to call the leasing agent who was in charge of renting the place out. If someone else called first, they could still get it...and I wasn't prepared for that kind of heartache again. Blaine went home to get a check for her and I went back to our hotel to wait in disbelief that didn't fade until the day we moved into our Okinawa dream apartment.
  
  Meanwhile, we were still living at the West Pac Lodge and we needed cars. We found a few - a guy and his family were leaving the island and had not one but two cars they needed to sell - a van and a Toyota Celica that was, unfortunately for me, a stick. Blaine swore he would teach me and I swore to learn because it was only $2500 for both cars. Of course, driving on the island would prove more difficult than I would have thought. They drive on the right side of the car here...on the left side of the road. Three months and I still haven't driven except for on base...as for driving that stick? Ah, forget it! I can't imagine driving a stick with my left hand, let alone my right. I think we're going to have to sell that one and get another automatic.
  
  To drive here, you have to take a driver's test...which means studying a traffic manual and learning all the Japanese road signs. Everyone passed the test in my class and we all got these SOFA (Status of Forces Agreement) driver's licenses.
  
  It's funny, the day you graduate from the West Pac is the day you feel like your life in Okinawa really begins. We got to move our suitcases out of the West Pac and into our new apartment. The furniture and household goods all showed up and we had fun unpacking everything and seeing familiar items again. The kids were thrilled to see their bikes and toys again. It was like Christmas for us. I immediately wanted to unpack everything and make it seem like home...but with kids, it doesn't always work that way so it's kind of been a one-day-at-a-time thing. I unpack a box every week...We're now down to only a few scattered boxes. We're also running out of storage space because our Okinawan home isn't quite as big as the large place we had in the states.
  
  But with the view....Who can complain?

  
  Taken from our balcony

  
  Our room at the West Pac Lodge

  
  Crazy Japanese TV - hysterical

  
  Our Okinawa home

  
  
  

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