License to Kill!!

Er...or at least...licensed to drive in Japan! Woo! I now have my Japanese driver's license or should I say untenshu mekyoushyou. I am pleased. I passed my driver's test on the first go! But let's start from the beginning.

Last month, during the beginning of September, I had to go in and take this dumb interview at the driving center. I had to take a translated copy of my license (which is why I couldn't go ahead and get a new one while I was in America) to the driving center in Matsue and sit through an almost pointless interview. During said interview, they asked me about every piece of information on my driver's license (including what the peaches were and why they were on my Georgia license!). Go ahead, look at your license. See if you can say what every last bit on information (front and back!) means. Honestly, there are some things that I lied about because I had no idea what it was for. After I explained my license, I then got asked about my experience driving. I got asked normal questions like "when did you take your test?", "did you take a class in school?" , and "how long have you been driving" and stupid questons like, "how much did it cost for your test?", "was the written test a true/false test or multiple choice?", and "how long did the test take?" There were some tough things to explain because, of course, Hiawassee is so small and backwater that we don't have a permanent DMV. It comes through town once a month and that's when people take their tests. I had a tough time explaining that one! But, Mihara-san was there so she helped translate everything.

Anyways, so that was then. Today, I actually went in to take my tests. The first thing I had to do was wait until 1:00. We got there at 12:55 and went to the window and they fussed at us and made us wait until 1:00. Stupid. At 1:00 *rolls eyes* they told us we had to go to another window to buy a form or something. Bah. DMVs! They are all the same. After that, I had to wait another 10 or 15 minutes before I was called into a room to take the written test.

Now...I know most of you know that I am a very smart person. Genius some say. However, I have a lot of problems with the evil True or False tests. I overthink them and pysch myself out. This test, of course, was a true or false test. Egads! Not only that, but the questions were translated really really poorly. Like REALLY bad. They also didn't make much sense. To make matters even more tense, there was this grumpy looking old guy watching me take the test (he was turning the pages because apparently I am too inept to do it myself). Now, I agonize over the answers of True/False tests because I always feel like the world is trying to trick me. So today's test was no different. I fussed with each answer; grumpy guy looking on the entire time. After I went through the test twice, I gave up and handed the grumpy guy my answer sheet. He nodded and showed me the door. I was a little depressed because I really though I failed the test. Mihara-san was with me and she just looked sympathetic. No one fails the written exam! I would have been the first. Now the cruel part comes in. I had to wait 40 minutes! 5 other people had to take the test, too. Even though it was just a 10 question test and the guy could grade it as I wrote...I still had to wait for everyone to finish. I was almost sick with nerves by this time.

Finally, after 40 minutes, grumpy guy comes out and announced that everyone passed. Hooray! The mexican guy, me, the 2 brazillians, and the one chinese dude all passed! Nice. Then, grumpy guy hands out the sheet with the layout of the course we have to drive and barks at us to go to the observation deck and study the sheet. Way to make me nervous, grumpy dude! So Mihara-san and I make our way to the observation deck. It's now 2:00 (we left my apartment at 12:00 to give you an indication of time). This is important! You see, it was a dark and dreary day. It was raining on and off but the sun was out, too. So when we looked out on the driving course, there was a BEAUTIFUL rainbow arching across the entire course. I pointed it out to Mihara-san and she smiled. She said that it was going to be lucky because 'rainbow' in Japanese is niji and 2:00 in Japanese is also niji. So it meant I was going to be lucky.

Around 2:15, the grumpy guy comes back holding a huge folder. He calls our names and puts us in order of driving. I was number 3 of 5 (which is really the best place to be, I got to see two people do it but I didn't have to wait and really make myself nervous). He gives us instructions and made sure we understood them because they are very important. Some of the instructions were: you get a practice loop to get used to the car, you can go 50 kph in a certain zone, if you touch a pole you automatically fail, and if you go into the ditch, if you back up to right before you went in the ditch, you can try again. This is important because if you remember, Chris failed his driving test the first time because he went into the ditch (the ditch is only like 2 inches deep, btw). No one bothered to mention that you could back up and try again and you wouldn't fail because if you didn't back up and try again, you automatically failed.

So I watched as person number 1 went (a Brazillian). His driving didn't look so bad. When it was number 2's turn, I got to ride in the backseat to observe the course from there (very helpful!). Unfortunately, this guy wasn't a good driver and was making me even more nervous. I don't think he drove very much prior to the test. He was really jerky and nauseating. Then...it was my turn! Dun dun duuuuuuuuun.

I started off fine. I was going a little quickly, but I have been driving awhile and I felt comfortable not going at a snail's pace. I went around the saw horses like a pro and just killed at the stoplight (I'm a very good stopper...you know...ever since I ran that stop sign during my first driving test in America and failed miserably!). Then it got to the tricky part. A narrow 's' curve (really narrow). I blew through that. I went really fast around it...but I've been driving in the mountains and dirt roads of North Georgia. Curves won't stop me now! Then came the crank turn. Now, the crank turn are turns at 90 degree angles (one to the left and one to the right). This is tricky but I did it no problemo! Or so I thought...but you see, the crank turn is a little tricky because you THINK that it's only 2 90 degree angles but it's really four. You have to do a crank turn into the section, and one back out. The one into the turn isn't so bad. The one out of...well...that's where Chris went into the ditch. He got over-confident after doign the cranks so well that he didn't pay attention and went into the ditch. That's why he failed his first test (well that and the fact that he didn't know that you could back up and do it again).

And...I did the exact same thing. I wanted to swear. But instead, I calmly backed up until the tester (did I mention that it was grumpy guy?) told me I was ok. And man did I back up perfectly. I didn't go back into the ditch to back out, I just smoothly backed into the area...I'm a terrible backer...it came as a surprise to me, too. Anyways, I went back out and relaxed. You see, I figured I had failed the test. Even though they said we could back up, I knew Chris failed and others for doing the same mistake so I just calmed down because I figured the rest of the test didn't matter. I didn't make anymore mistakes. In fact, my grumpy tester even chatted a bit about the signs!

So by the time my test was over, it was about 3:00. I then had to wait for the rest of the people to finish their tests. It took FOREVER. I was so nervous but I kept telling myself to chill out because I failed and it wasn't a big deal. So we waiting until about 3:20 and then they took us back to where we took the written test and had us wait (poor Mihara-san...she was so bored and kept dozing off). And we waited and waited and waited. At 3:50 they finally called each person to the window to discuss the test. The first person...failed. The second person...failed hard. The third and most beautiful person...passed! "Holy crap!" was the first thing I said (but in Japanese so it was more like "honto!?" which isn't really Holy Crap but close enough). How exciting!!! I was really happy. So he told me I should use my blinkers earlier but everything else was fine since I backed up and corrected my mistake. The other 2 people passed as well.

Then...MORE WAITING (this story is quite facinating, isn't it?). At 4:30...I finally walked out of the DMV $40 lighter and with a shiny new license! I would post a picture but since it has all my personal information that seems like a dumb idea. We got home around 5:50. What a long and boring task. At least I got a license out of it.

And so...that's how you get a driver's license in Japan.

in case you are wondering, I wasn't driving illegally on an American license, per se, it was just a better idea to get a Japanese license...just in case...