With the trip fast approaching there are still a lot of things that Justin and I need to do to get ready, and as of the Monday I've added another item to my list of things to worry about in terms of going to Japan. My tattoos, which is honestly something I didn't think about until watching one of Anna Lee and Jesse's current Japan Vlogs where they mention that Jesse might have to cover up his tattoo to go somewhere.
So I started doing some research into tattoos in Japan and apparently in some places (Especially onsens, public pools and certain gyms) tattoos are frowned upon because of the association of tattoos with the yakuza.
Upon realizing this Justin and I started looking up the rules of various places we are visiting, such as the Shinjuku Robot Restaurant and Tokyo Disneyland, and they really do have rules on tattoos.
According to the Shinjuku Robot Restaurant's rules, which are apparently in place "to discourage trouble from yakuza and other organized crime gangs from entering the venue" the following things are not permitted...
Sunglasses
Tattoos (You must ensure that you cover them if you have any)
I need to do some more reading on the topic, so I'll let you all know how my research goes. If you have any first hand experience with tattoos and traveling to Japan I would love to know about what you dealt with and how your dealt with it. Or if you've ever had to cover up your tattoos what products you've used because I've never had to do it before.
In terms of tattoos in Hong Kong I haven't looked into that but we have a patron at the library who is from mainland China and she said that I have nothing to worry about especially since Hong Kong is such a "liberal" place. I trust her, but I'm still going to do some research.
As you may or may not know, depending on if you follow me on Instagram or not, last week I got a matching tattoo with my sister. And I just thought I'd share the little backstory behind it and some pictures with you guys.
So, for a good while my sister and I had talked about getting a "sister" tattoo. We joked around about having the words "Big" and "Little" tattooed on ourselves, as well as a number of other things. It wasn't until I came across this picture of two roses while on Pinterest one day the we actually decided that this would be a real thing that we'd do.
Even though we decided on the roses months ago, we just never made an appointment with our tattoo artist. About two weeks after my birthday my sister called me saying that she was itching to get a new tattoo and why not it be our "sister" tattoo? She also said she'd pay for it as my birthday present* which helped in the decision making process. So I texted our tattoo artist's wife, who happens to be my friend Eileen, and set up a date/time that was good for all of us.
So last Wednesday after work my sister and I went over to Eileen's got matching tattoos, had an amazing homemade dinner and got to spend time with their incredibly adorable daughter Addi.
So yeah, that's the story behind mine and my sister's matching tattoos.
As soon as they are totally healed I'll post a follow up picture.
*FUN FACT - My sister has paid for both of my tattoos as birthday presents to me.
1. Thank the person that gave you the award in a blog post & link back to their blog.
2. Pass the award on to 15 bloggers you follow.
3. Include 7 random things about yourself in your post.
4. Notify your nominees by leaving a comment on their blog.
SEVEN RANDOM FACTS ABOUT ME
1. I'm a Youth Services Librarian that hates kiddie songs.
2. I hope to one day open a coffee shop with Phil -- We have the name picked out & everything.
3. My sister & I are planning on getting matching tattoos of roses for our Abuela on our feet.
4. I've had my nosed pierced for the past seven years.
5. For some reason I'm always on vacation during my father's birthday (August 24th).
6. I feel really bad when I can't find what a patron is looking for.
7. My favorite comfort meal is buttered elbows with chunks of mozzarella.
The amazing Jake from Fresh To Death nominated me for a Liebster Award and obviously I accept, so here we go!
TO ACCEPT THIS FUN AWARD YOU MUST...
1. List eleven things about yourself.
2. Answer the eleven questions that the tagger asked.
3. Create eleven questions of your own for the people you nominate.
3. Choose up to eleven bloggers & link them to your post.
4. Go to their page and inform them of the nomination.
5. Absolutely NO tag backs.
6. ONLY tag bloggers with less than 200 followers. ELEVEN THINGS ABOUT ME
1. I am the youngest librarian on staff at my job.
2. I've been dating Justin for almost nine and a half years.
3. I hate going outside when it rains because I hate getting wet.
4. I love side-scrolling Mario games.
5. I was originally a psychology major in college.
6. I love cemeteries, haunted places and ghosts.
7. I sleep on top of my blankets instead of underneath.
8. My favorite comic is Batman: The Killing Joke by Alan Moore.
9. I have the Dewey Decimal number 027.6623 tattooed under a stack of books on my ankle.
10. I collect records and listen to them on my Crosley CR249 BK Keepsake USB Turntable.
11. I am constantly looking for a book stamped with the date March 4th, 1985 on it.
MY ANSWERS TO JAKE'S QUESTIONS
1. What is your favorite band?
Incubus. I'm actually going to see them for the 7th time next Wednesday night.
3. What is the first music video you ever remember seeing?
Hmm... Memories of "Baby Got Back" by Sir Mix-A-Lot pops into my mind but I don't think it was the first.
4. Do you sing?
I do. I was a dubbed a first soprano in high school with a decent range.
5. What is your least favorite musical genre?
Classical.
6. Do you play an instrument?
Nope. I tried learning how to play flute when I was in elementary school, but that didn't work out for me. Neither did learning how to play piano which sucks because my father teaches piano part-time. 7. What is your favorite song?
I don't have one favorite song. I have favorite songs by artists and bands. Here are my favorites from my favorite bands...
8. If you could go to any concert in the world, what would it be?
I'd love to go to one of those big European rock concerts.
9. If you could have one talent without putting forth any effort, what would it be?
I don't actually know... Is that bad?
10. Who is your biggest celebrity crush?
I love Jason Segal.
11. If you could trade lives with anyone in the world, who would it be?
I wouldn't want to trade lives with anyone permanently, but I'd like to see what it would be like to Lady Gaga or Nicki Minaj for a day. MY ELEVEN QUESTIONS FOR MY BLOGGERS
1. What do you want to be when you grow up?
2. What is the last book you read?
3. If you could change anything about yourself would you? What would you change?
4. Who is your favorite superhero?
5. It's midnight and you want a snack, what do you grab to eat?
6. Celebrity "Marry, Fuck, Kill" go!
7. What is your favorite accessory?
8. Do you collect anything? If so what?
9. What is the last thing you watched on TV?
10. Do you owe anything library fines?
11. Did you have an imaginary friend as a child? ELEVEN BLOGGERS I'M TAGGING
1. Emily from Tea Tree Vintage
2. Jessica from Living The LA Life
3. Jessie from Young Georgia Love
4. Elise from The Jersey Flower
5. Lou from Foxy Whiskers
6. Cait Emma from Linen & Leaves
7. Maggie from Finding Myself
8. Lenni from Imprimatur/At The Quill's Mercy
9. Meghan from Adventures In Mediocrity
10. Leila from Confection
11. Bibliotecher from Confessions From The Information Desk
Apparently my Director did care about my tattoo, he just didn't say anything to me. He said to "Leslie" that he couldn't believe I got a tattoo without asking -- I typically ask him if I can do things (i.e. - Dying my hair, getting my nose pierced when I was a Page, etc), but because he and some of the others made such a big deal out of the staff's tattoos I said screw it. I did apologize for not being "courteous" and mentioning it to him. Jokingly he said the punishment was death for getting the tattoo -- He jokes around a lot and can be hard to read at times, so I really can't tell what is going on in that brain of his.
But honestly I don't feel anyone on the staff has any right to say anything to me because there is nothing in our contract about tattoos and there is no policy on the matter, he just verbalized to people that he wanted a committee to gather whenever someone wanted a tattoo to deem if it was appropriate or not. I don't think it is right to tell people what they can or cannot do with their bodies. And I mean, I understand he is trying to prevent the staff from getting "offensive" tattoos but really? I don't even know how one would even begin to enforce this garbage.
FYI: There are three librarians on staff that have two tattoos or more, there are several Clerks with tattoos and even our payroll lady has a tattoo. His tattoo thing started when "Leslie" and Lenni got Dewey numbers tattoos on their arms -- The pretty little fancy fonted numbers reminded him of concentration camp tattoos.
That all being said I have reached out to the librarians of Twitter and asked everyone that follows me if they could send me a picture or two of their tattoos and lemme know what state they are in so I can compile pictures and data to show him that he is being kind of ridiculous. Here are some of their pictures. Thank you all!!
Twitter Librarians with Tattoos Not in any order, but you should follow them!
Today was weird. We had a crazy program registration, a person coming in about their stalker and there were talks of handless dead bodies. The first of these things to happen was the stalker portion, I had a woman come up to me talking about a stalker and them leaving books by their house, I called the Director and had him deal with it.
Later on at the beginning of the program registration I had a mother come in who told us she left work early so that she could sign her children up for library programs. Apparently she wasn't supposed to be the one to do this, her husband was but he ended up having a flat tire and he father was supposed to take their children but he got a phone call yesterday that there was an odd smell coming from one of the apartments he owned. And he found his tenant dead, according to the coroner the body was there for at least two months and apparently the guys hands fell off when they moved the body -- True story.
In addition to those things "Emily" and I had to deal with the craziest program registration in a long time -- Our Department Head called in sick yet again and we got stuck doing it. We had tons of people and a lot of programs to sign them up for. It was exhausting.
Also Lenni and "Leslie" blew up my spot and forced me to show & tell our Director about my tattoo. He looked at it, laughed and walked away. After all of the bull people in the building were talking about having a tattoo comminty and getting them approved, the Director didn't care. It was an odd addition to my weird day.
The other day "Favorite Page #1" texts me that she did something, I ask her what she did and she texts me back that she got her nose pierced and a tattoo -- If you knew "Favorite Page #1" well you'd know this was shocking news. I couldn't believe that she did it and I told her that when the rest of the staff at the library found out that they would blame me. She told me I was silly, but what did the staff do when they found out? Blamed me. Everyone blames me for everything.
Here is the tattoo I'm getting sometime before my 26th birthday. My friend said her husband would do it for me for $250, which is awesome. I have to book an appointment with him and I will be able to cross #22 off of my "No Regrets" list.
If you can guess what the DDC number is you get a prize. Not really...
Yesterday I started off my day by going to a mock Newbery Award meeting where a bunch of librarians sat around drinking coffee, defending eight selected titles, having group discussions and then voting on their favorite titles. It was super boring. I hate mock award meeting and I unfortunately have to go to another one on Wednesday.
After the meeting and a lunch break I headed back to the library for a couple of hours of work, which were relatively dull. With the exception of a tween telling our security that she was going to stab him in the head.
When I was free from the library is when all of the fun happened last night. I started off by having dinner at a diner with Phil and Erin. Then the three of us accompanied Maria to get two tattoos (I know getting a tattoo is on my "No Regrets" list but I'm working on that happening at the end of the month) on each of her wrists -- One is a Gemini symbol and the other I can unfortunately not tell you, but it's a Chinese character.
After watching her getting tatted up we drove to go get some Red Mango®. On the way there we saw a little dog without an owner, so we flipped around to go save it. We picked it up to take it somewhere safe and as we were a woman ran up to us saying it was her dog and thanking us. We proceed to get some Red Mango® and then we ended up driving around aimlessly for hours talking and carrying on. It was an excellent evening that I should be having a repeat of on Wednesday when the four of us head on our next adventure.
