Good Old Days in the share house

I still live in the share house I wrote about in Save Point Update.

Everyone I mentioned in that post has since moved out. The French guy went home, and the American spent a while in Kyoto before going home, too. The German guy later moved to a share house in Saitama.

A few days ago, the German guy came back with someone from Indonesia who used to live here.

His working holiday visa had run out, and he hadn't managed to switch to a work visa. Before leaving Japan, he wanted to see the place he'd called home for six months once more.

He still missed this place after moving to Saitama and had come back a few times. He said it really was dirtier and older here, but this was where he'd built a routine he loved: working out in the run-down gym, going out to box, taking walks in the afternoon, then coming back to the common room at night to watch the French guy and the other residents make a racket.

From what the German and Indonesian former residents told me, the house was at its liveliest around last winter. By the time I moved in that April, everyone was getting ready to go their separate ways. At least I caught the last of its glory days.

There was also a French woman doing a carpentry internship, a handsome older guy from Spain who worked remotely, and a British DJ who taught English.

The French woman's English wasn't very good, and she didn't speak Japanese, but she was always excited to tell everyone about her day, what she'd bought, or where she'd been. The Spanish guy once made me authentic croquetas. Before he left, he even gave me some of the small furniture he'd bought.

The British DJ is still in Tokyo, and I'm going to see him again this week. We once talked about small talk. He said that when he asked how someone was doing, he genuinely wanted to know; he wasn't just waiting to hear “All good.” Writing this reminds me that he and the Spanish guy took me to Torikizoku for my birthday this year.

Around the time they all left, I was about to start at my previous company. The share house became very quiet. For a while, a group of Indian residents would gather together, but after the person at the center of the group left Japan for Dubai, the group drifted apart.

I've mostly been talking about people from Europe and America, but most of the residents are Japanese. A retired Japanese woman and a Japanese man were the two who interacted with everyone most. When I first moved in, she took me to a Chinese restaurant nearby. Whenever we met in the common room, she'd ask how I was doing and say she hoped I could stay in Japan. This month, she moved back in with her son.

I think the Japanese man is still here. He seems to have lived here for years. His accent is strong, so I don't always understand him, but he's kind and helps the other residents even when they don't share a language.

As for Taiwanese residents, there was one before I moved in, and three more have arrived recently. The one who's been here longer works from home and keeps a remarkably steady schedule: he always eats at 1 p.m. and 7 p.m. When I want to speak Chinese, I time my meals so I can catch him in the common room. I also ask him about things I don't understand. I only struck up a conversation with another Taiwanese resident in the hallway yesterday. He's here on a working holiday and is still unsure whether he wants to stay in Japan afterward.

These days, the people I still run into include a Nepali woman who's often in the smoking room, an Indonesian animator, the Taiwanese resident with the steady routine, and the Japanese man who's been here for years. We still chat now and then, but the common room isn't as lively as it used to be.

That's what a share house is like. People come and go; staying for a long time is the unusual part.

As of today, I've been here for six months. I'd originally planned to move out around now, but things haven't gone to plan. I'll wait until I have a new job lined up before moving. I hope it'll happen early next year. Then I'll be one of the people who left this place, too.

Maybe some periods of our lives stay beautiful because they end while they're still good. Afterward, we get to linger over the feeling they left behind.

I still look back on my working holidays in Australia and at the ski resort. But if I'd stayed longer, or if I went back now, I doubt those places would feel as wonderful as they do in my memory.

I want to live well in the present. The ordinary days I'm living now might become my good old days someday, too.