The Pain of Change

Facebook post on June 17, 2023

Oh boy, the reality of relocation far exceeds my imagination. If I were to compare it to childbirth, it's like being in the midst of labor pains. There's no going back, but I can't rush things either, so I find myself panting in the middle.

In my case, it wasn't just a regular move. Due to the inability to trace my life history, obtaining a residency registration was quite challenging (although I managed to get it now). Born in Canada, raised in Nagasaki, registered in Yokohama, and disappeared from the record by having lived in Canada for 23 years, I made a direct move from Canada to the Goto Islands where I have no personal connection. The staff at the Goto City Hall were flustered by this extraordinary situation.

The problem is, without an address, I can't get a phone contract. Without a phone, unconventional address changes like mine become impossible. I have to borrow someone else's phone and inform them, "If you need to contact me, please call this person." And when a call comes in, the owner of that phone relays a message, saying, "Mari-san, someone called. Please come here and return the call." I drove about 6 or 7 minutes just to make a 30-second phone call, and if I have to wait for a response, I wait right there in front of the phone. It feels like a telephone game from the early Showa period.

Amidst the back-and-forth about missing documents and changing laws, it took me five days to finally obtain the residency registration. I am now officially a resident of Fukue Island in the Goto Islands, Nagasaki Prefecture.

Once I had the residency registration, I had to go through the procedures for national health insurance and national pension. I left Japan when I was 27 years old and worked for a major trading company, so all these public matters were taken care of by the company, and I knew nothing about them. It was quite overwhelming.

And finally, the mobile phone I had to visit the mobile phone store three times. They told me to make an appointment and come, but I couldn't make an appointment because I didn't have a phone to call with. When I explained this, they gave me a puzzled look and said, "What do you mean?" They asked me to bring the required documents, so I brought my passport as identification, but that was also rejected. Apparently, a passport doesn't count as identification. Even though I have the world's strongest Japanese passport, it's not useful in Japan.

And when I asked about buying a data-only SIM card, they said they've never heard of it. But wait, you can buy them at the airport. How come the mighty Docomo can't handle that?

Everything seems to be going wrong, and I was on the verge of giving up.

Just when I was feeling that way, a small miracle happened.

One word: "Mari-san, you're a pioneer. Pioneers are at the forefront, experimenting and trying things out for those who come after you, so that you can teach them. You're currently undergoing training for that."

Pioneer, it has a nice ring to it, and it made me think,

"Okay, I can do this."

That's how my day went today.