Basic Space

Part 2.

I've been attending a gym for the last month and half. I don't want you all expecting an amazingly bodied Kris upon my return (well, not any more than usual HAHAHAHAHA...) but as the weather gets colder and as I want to feel less guilty about stuffing my facial region with various food and/or food alternatives - then it makes sense.

There are two gyms in my area. One is just up the road and the other is about a 10 minute drive away. Seemingly against logic I went with the latter of the two for these reasons; price, size and people. Whatever. Not important. Decision made.

(Positive attitude y'all!)

Signing up to the gym is not such a difficult process if one has a basic grasp of Japanese. This is mainly due to the fact that if one can't speak Japanese well enough then one is not allowed to join. It's actually in the contract. Discriminatory but reasonable clauses aside, the process was quite smooth if not a little drawn out. The choices of plan include a day plan (from 11:30am - 2:30pm), a night plan (8:30pm - 10:30pm), a weekend plan or the MASTER PLAN (anytime). I went with the MASTER PLAN as ideally I'd like to be able to go straight after school but if I'm forced to hang around home until 8:30 I will probably crash/burn/die and not be bothered to go etc. It is a liiiiiittle bit pricey but so far I've been going quite frequently so I think it's pretty worth it.

Joining a gym in Japan doesn't lock you into a death grip of 6 year plans with painful canceling fee's that will probably render you homeless and poor. Which is nice. The whole feeling is nice! I don't feel intimated to walk inside by people twice my size nor do I feel self conscious. In fact as far as the people who go are concerned I'm quite happily in the middle range. The middle range involves no pressure, expectations or obligation. Exactly my style. Like this man!

(Go possibly Russian man! Exceed no expectations!)

So usually I enter the gym from the strange side parking and take off my outside shoes. Oh yes, don't think that gyms are excluded from the inside and outside shoe policy. I put my shit into the lockers and after weighing myself I start stretching. About 5 minutes later I begin running or some kind of cycling, then machines and then cool down. Sometimes I do a class (there's a psuedo-kick boxing class on Mondays) but generally it's the above schedule followed by the shower/bath in Japanese style... that is to say, naked.

One of my favourite machines is the treadmill. Instead of being totally boron and just sticking to calories and crap, it has a picture to show what I have burnt off so far. It starts with a candy and progresses upwards. The first few are perhaps encouragingly pessimistic and feature things such as a banana or some tuna sushi or something like that. I, personally, would prefer the machine to tell me how many beer related calories I have blasted off my petite frame but the machine wasn't made in Australia, now was it. Beer however does pop up in the pictures and is followed by things like hamburgers, baked cheesecake, short cake and ramen etc. It's a little gratifying but more often than not, it's depressing.

(This is all you've burned off. You suck. LOLOLOL)

If I don't want my self esteem challenged by watching such pitiful amounts of calorie burning action then I can watch the installed TVs on each machine. TVs for each machine is not a new phenomenon but as I can't watch TV at home (due to mine being broken due possibly to fitness DVDs) then it is a chance for me to catch up on inane variety shows, cultural/nature shows and other gems such as 'Telepathy Girl Ran' or Sumo wrestling. This allows me to gain a 100% accurate view of Japanese life. This is just interesting enough to fill in the vacuous black hole in my head space of TV-related information and comedy quotes.

(quality)

The gym has been a lot of fun to go to so far. I can't tell you if there's been a noticeable change in how I feel but any sort of change for the better is a good thing I would think. Here's hoping anyway.