The Bank Account Post

I don't think I posted about this, but I wanted to get this all down before I forget about it. Our first month of rent is due on the 27th, and for some reason, it can only be paid at a conbini (convenience store). We actually tried to pay it at a yuubinkyouku (post office/bank), but we were told it HAS to be paid at a conbini. That wasn't a complete waste of time, though, because I now know there is a yuubinkyouku much closer to my dorms than either of the train stations (it's at the Pikoku). It's good to know I can drop off letters there or deposit/withdraw from the bank. Anyway, after the first month's rent is paid, the remaining months will be automagically deducted from our bank accounts, so we had to get bank accounts. Really, if it weren't for this and the fact that internet came out from our accounts, I probably wouldn't have got one. Every time I change money from USD to Yen, I lose money.

We had sort of put off opening our bank accounts because we had to have our alien registration cards first, and there was a delay on when we could do that. Once done, we attempted to find the yuubinkyouku at Minami-senri station, only to find that 1) they were ridiculously busy and 2) they were closing in ten minutes. We decided to try for another day. Then things were busy with orientations and classes, but finally we were able to make it to the bank early enough to open our accounts. I am sure we were a pain in the ass to them - three gaijin showing up at the same time, with no clue how to open a bank account or even fill out the appropriate paperwork. It's worth noting that the yuubinkyouku is REALLY tiny. It's probably 1/8th the size (if not smaller) than a small-town post office. In fact, I'll try to snap a pic of it next time I'm there so you can see just how itty-bitty it really is. There are four clerks (if I recall correctly), three of which handle banking and one which handles post.

They split us into two groups, K on her lonesome with one clerk, M and myself taken off to the side by another clerk. Things like this are stressful, because you spend the whole time trying to figure out what's expected of you. We hit a roadblock when they wanted us to put our address down - in KANJI - which neither Meaghan nor I are tremendously confident at. Kathryn, however, was able to do hers just fine. There's a reason she's our fearless leader, y'know... Anyway, the guy that was helping us put our addresses in for us. We filled out the form as best we could and signed them, with instructions that our signature on each form should look exactly the same (keep in mind that Japanese people use hankos for their signatures, and a hanko always looks the same because it's a stamp).

We were then instructed to wait, and after about 10 minutes they came back out with our "bank books" which is a ledger for keeping track of expenses. It's not a checkbook though, because I guess no one uses checks here. I had no money to deposit at the time (was waiting for my money to transfer from ING to my credit union), so I was pretty much done. M was in the same boat, but Kathryn wanted to make a deposit. Then I realized that I had to pay for one of my health insuranceseses (because I have like fourteen of them now - well, okay, maybe just four, whatever), so I got that taken care of at the bank. They are also mailing us a bank card which is a debit card, as I understand it.

So now I have my bank book, and the other day I deposited 40,000 Yen into the account (about $480 USD, we are seriously getting screwed on the exchange) because any day now the cable company will try to withdraw to set up my internets, and I seriously don't know what happens if you bounce a check in Japan.

I don't want to get deported or anything.