La cucaracha!

[Elgin]

Is it normal to have some cockroaches in a Japanese house? I`ve got a bunch in my host families house, I just wanna know if it’s a normal thing Japanese don`t worry about since it`s been 2 weeks stait I tell my host parents that I see some around the kitchen and toilet and they just continue watching tv or laught.

[Uncle Frank]

Way back when I was in Fukuoka, I used to see them in many resturants! Between them & lots of rats around,
it didn't seem to sanitary? No one seemed to get upset about it there, just part of the everyday landscape. I used to think of them as Godzilla's babies running around!
Your posts are not making Japan sound like the heaven you thought it was going to be?? Hope you're having some good times!

Frank

:D

[Elgin]

humm I dunno I kinda had low expectations, but I must say I didn’t think my host house would be that much of a dump. Like when it rains the water gets in the house so the ceiling is rotting away so it smells like and old rotten French toast.

So cockroach is common, just treat them as room mates?

[Blue 3]

I guess it depends on how old the place is. I been living in my apartment in Fukuoka for about 2 years now and I've seen one or two. I try to keep it fairly clean. In the summer the bugs start coming.

Does your host family live in an apartment or a house?

My girlfiriend used to live in an old Japanese style house and it had tons of cockroachers. There were so many places they could creep in, i guess. It's just the way it was made.

[Foxtrot Uniform]

Well, it does get wet in the summer and thats when the cockroaches usually come out the most, but I've never seen a house where the people just let them walk around, I killed a cockroach just the other day but I have always just seen one that happened to come into my house. Its pretty rare too and it usually happens mostly during the rainy season. Personally, I hate the little buggers and I love to kill them. Hey Luc, maybe the host family just thinks of them as really big silent crickets or something. Very weird...

[Jean-Francois]

They are like 12 times bigger than the ones in Canada (this is not an exaggeration). And some of them even know how to fly. One time when we were having dim-sum at a restaurant, this gigantic roach, coming out from nowhere, flied around in the air for about 20 seconds and finally decided to land on my friend’s face. She ended like screaming and jumping around in front of fifty people. And we were like yelling, running and laughing at the same time.

By the way, I find your experience in Japan rather unusual. It is always refreshing to hear different stories from different people. I know a few acquaintances who’re sent by IBM to work in the Tokyo branch and all they talk about are how cool Roponggi is and how many Japanese girlfriends they have made during their stay.

Really … I don’t recall any of these people has a workable knowledge of the Japanese language and from my impression none of them bothers to learn…dunno why they got recruited to Japan in the first place… it is not like Japan doesn’t have enough system analysts (I am not sure about this though ‘cause I am not familiar with their trade). Anyway, the only common these people share is – all of them used to be top graduates of some prestigious American universities in the IT field.

But before I forget, there is one anecdote to this. One of those guys who got hired by Big Blue was a distant relative of mine. And his girlfriend who was in her last year at York University actually quitted school and flied to Japan just to “watch” him. Hee hee, a lot of women like to control men, eh… but very few succeed. According to her mom, this twenty-four-year-old still hasn’t earned her bachelor degree, but she is teaching English right now. Don’t know how she got the job though. Maybe it’s the power of love? Or maybe it’s easier for Canadians?

Obviously, her mission is to keep an eye on the guy, not really to teach Japanese folks English. A working visa only serves the purpose to allow her to stay in Japan and thus checks on him legally. Her parents are still sending her a monthly allowance so that she can work minimum hours and spend time with her boyfriend whenever he’s not working. It’s been like that for two years and she is not tired of it yet. Tokyo, in any case, is such an amusing place to hang around!

Sounds comical? Well, different people have different goals in life…
Luc, from what I have read so far, you have a pretty productive schedule. Lucky you (although you may not agree), have the opportunity to receive some vigorous trainings of a third language. ^_^ At least you are learning something.

Bonne chance! :cool:

[chiquiliquis]

La cucaracha
la cucaracha
Ya no puede caminar
Por que no tiene
por que no tiene
Marijuana pa' fumar...

:music2:

Yeah, they are part of life here... although, I have never seen them in my apt here in Ymanashi (I get centipedes and geji-geji instead). My dad used to tell me horror stories right before I went to bed, about all the huge *** poisonous and ugly bugs he was affected by growing up in the Colombian countryside... It wasn't so much that he wanted me to have nightmares as it was that he wanted me to be thankful (growing up in Seattle) for what we had, and what we didn't have.

[Ewok85]

I wouldnt worry about it, they do get in and there was a thread somewhere about japanese housing not too long back... I think they need to teach them how to install insulation in the walls and about making homes that last for many a years. :D

[Lina Inverse]

Just now, I remembered a movie about a guy who lived in an appartment (in the US!) that was really chock full of cokcroaches. The cockroaches wanted the appartment for themselves, so they tried all possible stuff to get him out. He also wanted to have the appartment for himself, and tried all possible stuff to get them out. Neither really succeeded, and they ended up living side-by-side :D

[mdchachi]

Disgusting. Sounds like your host family has hygiene problems. I think most Japanese people try to keep their homes cockroach free and at least kill the ones that appear in the house.

[Ewok85]

Where in Japan are you?

[Mandylion]

Just be glad cockroaches can't kill you or cost you a finger like some centipedes can. I seem to be able to handle small doses of venom as I have been woken up by the darn things twice now chewing on my arm. Stings like you wouldn't believe for about 15 minutes... A friend of mine had to get an anti-venom shot when his finger swelled up after a bite. And I killed a centipede that was about as thick as my middle finger outside last year by running over it many times on my bike and finishing it off with a brick.

So far the score is Mandylion 2, centipedes 1.

You can try and try all the sprays, chemical and traps out on the market, but as some stage there are just too many of them critters. Perhaps this is how your host family views things.

PS: Bleach and mildew cleaners also kills centipedes really well, clorox kitchen cleaner doesn't.

[Glenn]

Jeez, that sounds like centipedes from the Amazon! You had to run it over with your bike and then finish it off with a brick?! Heh, and I thought that our mosquitoes were bad. :relief:

[Mandylion]

The thing wouldn't die!

Anyway, here is a picture of a smaller cousin of my epic monster. Don't let the cute face fool you, it is a killer. That and it is obviously dead. Centipedes don't pose for pictures on the floor of your living room like that.

[Glenn]

Eck, that's nasty looking! I don't think I've seen anything like that in my life! This does remind me, though, of the instance that my friend and I found a huge bug in my brother's apartment and rolled over it with a shopping cart that had some books or something in it, and the thing started to walk away! I was amazed! But I never thought that a centipede could be so tough. :shock: