From the desk of JC

This year is the umpteenth time I won't be making the long, tedious and not to mention expensive trip back to, what the racists call, "my country". It's a little hard on the soul not spending Christmas with the family, especially since I am not getting the yuletide vibe at all in Tokyo this year. Some richer areas are all lit like a magical wonderland and have Christmas muzak everywhere, but the area where my office is located remains a vomit-stained pisshole with as much seasonal cheer as a jihad. What makes it worse is the fact I'll be spending the 25th at work, chained to my desk. Monday the 24th is a national holiday to celebrate the emperor's birthday, which is at least a day dedicated to a non-fictional character, but it would have been nice to spend Christmas Day on the sofa getting drunk and Boxing Day recovering. No such luck.

I will however be enjoying the usual New Year down-time that is traditional in Japan. The last working day of the year will be spent cleaning the office. This is a big Japanese tradition where everybody mucks in and makes the whole office spick and spam to be enjoyed for the first week back in work, after which it'll be the same old dirt again. But as I always keep my desk as clean as possible I'll be done in five minutes, pretend to help clean up the communal areas and divide the rest of the time between smoking and doing "research" on the company consoles. Though I'd prefer a holiday, a wasted day will suffice.

Then there will be a holiday for the first week of January. Though I am far from religious (the complete opposite in fact), I do enjoy going to the local temple on January 1st to drink a watery home-made rice porridge next to burning logs in a metal barrel, buy a new enma featuring next year's zodiac animal (boar?), an arrow sans point and pretend to pray to the gods.

So while you're unwrapping your presents, getting drunk, hooting at the Queen's speech and overeating, please remember little old me, gnashing my teeth at some entirely avoidable problem I am invariably asked to fix and cursing at Maya somehow crashing more often since Autodesk got their fingers on it.

Merry seasonal holiday, readers, whichever it is you celebrate.