Faking It With The Nerd

I have mastered playing along. More often than not a phone call in the staffroom goes as follows: “Hello? Yes, yes. I got it. Is that right? Yes. Yes. Yes. I see. I understand. Yes. Yes. Please. Excuse me.” I have never, in the past year and a half, heard anyone go, “NO. YOU’RE OFF YOUR ROCKER. WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT? I’M LOOKING AT THE W.E.A.N.U.S (Weekly Estimated Annual Net Usage Statistics) AND I’M NOT HAPPY!!” And therefore, unfortunately, I don’t know how to say this.

So, as skillful as a peg leg’s parrot I have mastered more agreeable phrases. As long as my comprehension is not tested I can fake people out with the best of them. With overly garrulous people, they never have a clue that I have actually been playing the entire soundtrack of Alan Menkin’s genius “The Little Mermaid” in my head for the past thirty minutes as they have prattled on and on. Someone could be discussing the recent discoveries of nanotechnology or a new breed of lemur found somewhere in Asia, and they will think I, too, am well versed in the matter. “Yes. Yes. Oh is that right? Oh, I see.” Occasionally you can throw in a “Fantastic!!” to make them think you’re really enthralled by the topic of conversation.

Obviously, this can get you into trouble.

“Some of my closest friends and I are going to get naked and go sit in the onsen stewing in our own filth along with that of everyone else in that boiling cesspool for the next five hours.”
“Fantastic! Yes. Yes. I see.”
“So you want to come right?”
“Right, right. Yes, please!”

Being in Japan teaches you to be overly amiable and charming. It’s something that New York spent years eradicating in me.

I get into a taxi. For some reason taxi drivers appear to be some of the most talkative, friendly people that I’ve encountered in Japan. Perhaps it is because they can stare at you in their review mirrors without you noticing or perhaps it is simply because they spend something like fifteen hours a day in a hideously over-heated car daintily lined with white lace, BORED out of their minds from driving again and again to the same run-down, depressing, little train station.

This taxi driver is wearing a white, cotton face-mask to either prevent germs from escaping his mouth or to protect himself from his potentially diseased passengers. I always find it amusing when I see people driving alone in their cars wearing these masks, their eyes the only things visible above the mask, narrowed in intense concentration to prevent germs from invading their vehicles. Perhaps the four dozen Hello Kitties in varying costumes, sizes and colors lining their front and rear dash have yet to have their flu shots this year.

Immediately recognizing my friend and I as foreigners our driver seems eager to get us to our destinations. “The station, and then your apartment. Right. Got it!” He tosses in an English phrase with a grin, “No probrem!”

He chuckles to himself, pleased that he has successfully delivered the line.

After my friend successfully arrives at the station, I can feel the driver’s eyes concentrate on me in the mirror: “Hey, can I ask you something?” he enquires.

Like a trained, congenial parrot: “Yes, yes, please.” I begin what promises to be a long stretch of charlatan language fakery.

He blasts off in an explosion of Japanese, muffled slightly by his Neurotic Cold Mask. And I learn, what I never would have known unless he had spoke to me: He is a huge, HUGE nerd.

“So, I really, really want the English version of Microsoft Office. I don’t have it. I only have the Japanese version but, as you probably know, the Japanese version of office isn’t very good. No siree. It’s lacking isn’t it? Don’t you think so? I don’t really like using it. But you see I have problem, I don’t know where to get the English version. I can’t get it in Japan. But oh how I want it. All the programs here are in Japanese but in order for me to learn English properly and be MASTER OF ALL WORD PROCESSING PROGRAMS I MUST HAVE ENGLISH MICROSOFT OFFICE, YOU UNDERSTAND DON’T YOU?” Had he been typing the message it would have been peppered with LOLZ and various abbreviations for English words that make the vein in my forehead throb.

A legitimate and adorable computer geek, covetous of Bill Gate’s original English version of Office was hidden under that completely ineffectual mask. I am sympathetic with his plight, but wonder why he wants the English version of Word to type “no probrem” again and again, especially since I know that the Japanese version is equally capable of handling that. I flirt for a moment with introducing him to the joys of bit torrent, but decide against it. I end up giving him the names of three large electronics stores in the United States, that might, hypothetically send merchandise to Japan after charging a large mining cart full of gold bullion.

“Yes, yes I understand,” I say as he gives me receipt for my trip that I have absolutely no use for thinking that he is handing me his name and phone number should I stumble upon an unneeded copy of Microsoft Office in my house.
“Yes, yes I understand,” I say as he looks at me and says, “oh, you don’t need it do you?”
“Yes, yes I understand,” I say as he thanks me profusely for my assistance and I alight from the taxi, fairly sure that I have just met the nerdiest taxi driver ever, but only about thirty percent sure about the rest of the exchange.

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Published:
12.22.07 / 12pm
Category:
amusing incidents, what i call life, culture