The Cherry Tomato That Broke the Camel's Back

(A detailed description of Bullet Point #1 from the last blog post)

It's been a while, and I apologize for my absence, but rest assured, I have a good reason for my disappearance as of late. By the title of this blog, you will see that I took the initiative to leave my English teaching job in Japan. Unfortunately, that cuts short some of the articles that I planned on writing about the different age groups, however, I have some of those on backlog and will publish them once I finish doing some much needed tweaking.

You're probably asking why I decided to walk away from my wonderful job. Well, to be honest, there were a ton of reasons, but the main reason was health related. Also, there were some conflicts of interest that were beginning to wear on me day in and day out.

In order to clarify what this means, allow me to revisit a running theme that surrounds Japanese business culture as well as many other businesses all over the world. The pressure and stresses one faces at work are real. These stresses can cause the more "vulnerable" of souls to sacrifice their moral integrity in order to reach goals and keep clients. This can also manifest itself through the treatment of one's workers. Unfortunately, there were things that I was asked to do that I wouldn't do in any country, and that is where the conflict of interest arose. Either way, I don't want to focus on that. As you could see in my posts, I enjoyed working with my students and they enjoyed my lessons. And fortunately, I was able to take advantage of the many requests for English lessons that were solicited by members of my congregation as well as some folks in the community . . . so that's been pretty awesome.

My decision to leave may seem abrupt, but it definitely wasn't. It took months and months of deliberation and consultation from friends and family. But in the end, what it all really came down to was a tomato. Yes, you read right . . . a cherry tomato.

Well, let me just get to the story. I was having some *ahem* traffic problems and uh, well to put things into perspective here . . .

Let's just say I was having a hard time. I can see some folks getting uncomfortable reading this. (Sorry big sis! But you should read this book, apparently everybody does it - except me, in this particular instance.) So unbeknownst to me, constipation is a big problem that people face when they are overseas and getting used to a new diet and let's face it . . . stressed out. I was all of those things. Unfortunately, I'd been dealing with my digestion problem since Mt. Fuji. However, it took me 3 months of drinking tons of water and eating tons of raw vegetables and some weight gain to finally get the nerve up to go to the doctor again. So after a last phone call to my mother, I walked over to the hospital in order to see what was ailing me.

Embarrassed and confused, I didn't know how to explain my problem except by pointing to my stomach and showing the doctor words such as "bulged" and "hard" on my iPad. After about 10 minutes of pantomiming, the doctor wanted to speak to someone fluent in the Japanese language. He called one of the Japanese teachers that I worked with and she sped down to the hospital as soon as possible. "Why didn't you tell me you wanted to go to the doctor?!" she asked, obviously upset and a little worried.

After an introduction, the Japanese teacher answered her own question and began a 20 minute dialogue with my doctor that went into depth about all of the reasons why my stomach was big and disgusting looking. Occasionally, the doctor would scribble words on a notepad. He drew a picture of a digestion track and some squiggly lines inside, I guess that represented the uh, *ahem* the excretion. He then wrote words on the pad like, "colonoscopy" and "pregnant," and "gynecology disease." I sat and pondered ways that I could kill myself using his pen. Occasionally, I asked her what they were talking about and she would respond with brief answers like, "He's just telling me what you told him earlier." Finally, the doctor and my coworker decided that I should get a blood test and an MRI. They did a secret Japanese handshake and lead me to the changing room down the hall.

After the MRI, I walked back to the doctor's office and he told me that despite the fact that I could use more iron, my blood came up just fine. As far as the MRI goes, he said that I was not digesting food properly because of stress and he gave me some laxatives and told me to return for a refill when the problem comes back.

I took a deep breath of relief and thanked God that a human being actually uttered these words in front of my coworker. "Stress."

(For the record, my American coworkers and I have been accused of "easy lifestyles" in comparison to our Japanese counterparts. Unfortunately, many Japanese people can be consumed by their jobs, some to the point of committing suicide so the idea that a "lazy" American could be stressed out, is often met with incredulous eye-rolls.)

Regardless, I was now a part of this culture and I was stressed. Everyday I came home with a migraine. I was always tired and I didn't have more than 30 minutes to myself at any given moment during the day. I spent 9 hours of my day in a closed environment, surrounded by people who did not understand or (to be honest) even like me. I was stressed. And now, I would return to work and my manager would have to understand that I was "stressed" and maybe life would be a little easier at work. Maybe she would discipline my particularly brutal students a little more or I wouldn't have to do my student's homework for them, or she wouldn't ask me to do impromptu English lessons on my 10 minute breaks. Just maybe.

So I begged my Japanese coworker not to utter a word of my digestive issues, of which she promised she wouldn't. As soon as she steps over the threshold, she tells my manager everything and the office is a-buzz with my "stomach problems." They watched quietly as I sat down and took my lunch. That particular day, my lunch was a piece of bread, some water and some fruit jello (which is sometimes a quick snack for me on days when I am not hungry but need some kind of nourishment.) It was then that my manager begins to ask me questions.

"So, BG . . . do you eat vegetables?"

Me: Uh, yeah. I eat them all the time.

Manager: How often do you eat them?

Me: Well, uh, probably everyday. I like to eat them for dinner when I get off of work-

Manager: (interrupts, ignoring me) Yeah, because you should eat vegetables.

Me: (Steve Carrell voice) Yeah.

Manager: What kind of vegetables do you eat?

Me: I eat broccoli and uh, spinach. I eat a lot of spinach. And let's see, I like . . .

Manager: Do you eat tomatoes?

Me: Why uh, ye-

Manager: Here! (pushes a small carton of cherry tomatoes toward me) This is called a cherry tomato. Please try it.

(Watches me as I put it in my mouth)

Me: Thank you.

Manager: How is it?

Me: It's good, thank you!

Manager: They are very good for you. Have you ever eaten a cherry tomato before?

Me: Yeah, I -

Manager: I used to not cook or drink water either. When I went to Canada I didn't cook because I only want to eat meat and fast food. So that is all I ate until my friend, he told me to eat a vegetable.

(At this moment, my mind fades out. I felt like this woman was patronizing me, not listening to a thing that I said and judging me according to "American stereotypes." I'd been eating nothing but vegetables for 3 straight months. I worked hard, sometimes staying up as late as 2am in the morning cooking soups and stews to aid my digestion, ate nuts and berries as snacks and drank nothing but water and vegetable juice. Since I'd been to Japan, I could count on one hand how many times I'd eaten fast food. As my friend K would put it, I could feel "the anger" becoming more prevalent. I decide to be patient and force my teeth to stop grinding together so I can listen to her simpleton advice.)

Manager: (cont'd) . . . so I eat a vegetable and I feel better. Oh, and drink water. When you wake up, don't drink soda. You should drink a water.

Me: (rather my patient side) Okay! Thank you manager. I will try all of those things. (smile and rise from the table to dump my trash)

Tada! Take that Buddha. That's what I call "pulling a Jesus" - and turning the other cheek, baby!

And then, my manager pulled a "Confucious."

Manager: You can't live with me.

Me: Excuse me?

Manager: I can't take care of you. You have to learn to live on your own. You have to learn to take care of yourself.

And so, a month later I pulled an Alanis Morisette "Isn't THIS ironic?" and quit. (I'll save the actual "quitting" story for the book version of this blog. *cough, cough* Hello Random House Publishing *cough, cough*). Within two days of my leaving, the headaches went away and my digestion went back to normal.

And it was all because of a "cherry tomato."

THE END