I go back to the office and have the stuff I want to take home "signed out" by Oe, as if they were top-secret, but the whole day has been a farce anyway, so what's one more charade? In reality the documents are just things I did to try to help Kanaflex (like my Excel calculators, see Quality of Life), but even though I'm leaving copies here too I know they won't ever get used - after all, they were done by a foreigner.
I have brought a camera along, and Oe humours me by organising photos of the QC team. First, I MUST have a photo of them all by themselves ("Nikku ga kurumae"), then I MUST have a photos of them with me in the middle ("Nikku ga kita"), then I MUST have a photo with the same team but me to one side ("Nikku ha yaku tatanai ne!"), then I MUST take a photo of me "using" every machine in the office (even though I was never actually given such responsibility). As I said, endings are very important. The one photo I take by choice is of the Waapuro, because I know that no one will believe that there is a place in the first world where people still use this kind of machine.
Nishi and Sakata have come to collect me from the office. They spend 20 minutes thanking Oe, individually, then do a few rounds in chorus. Oe says that we MUST catch the 6.15 bus (1 hour, 1100Y) to Kyoto, so we MUST leave the dormitory at 6.03 exactly. Why? The buses come every 90 minutes or so, surely we don't need to keep to such a tight schedule. I say that the buses are often late anyway (they are, sometimes by over 20 minutes), but don't argue too much. I just think as soon as we are out of his presence we can change our plans.
Fat chance. Oe "generously" offers to accompany us to my dormitory. Why? I can pack my stuff on my own, surely.
No, apparently I can't even pack my stuff at all, because Nishi and Sakata have already done it. Do the words "invasion of privacy" mean anything to these people? Thank god I packed some more personal (ahem) items in another suitcase already. They have heaped everything they could find into my other bag, and stocked a big garbage bag with stuff from the fridge and kitchen cupboard. Lucky I check, because they have only packed the authentically Japanese stuff of the guy who was here before me (which as you might guess is kind of past its prime), but left all of my "foreign muck" (e.g. Barilla pasta, vegemite, my mother's christmas cake) behind. Thanks guys. In between offering unnecessary advice on the packing, Oe "casually" inspects every detail of the dorm, including, as expected, the toilet, the cleanliness of which, he has explained to me many times, is the true indication of a person's level of discipline. An invisible force-field stops him in the doorway, though - I have hidden the special toilet slippers (HA HA, petty, but funny).