Today is Halloween

Today is the last day of October, and I realised I already wrapped up this month in my last post. To be honest, I’ve never participated in Halloween before. Twice, I accidentally went to Universal Studios Japan during their Halloween theme period, though not on Halloween day itself – I didn’t like it at all! Zombies would come at you and try to scare you. I worked in Shibuya, Tokyo, for six years and never once joined the Shibuya Halloween events, nor did I ever want to.

Today, I considered going bouldering near my place since they had a special Halloween-themed event. In the end, I didn’t go; I told my friend I wasn’t feeling well, but the truth is, I don’t like seeing people in weird costumes, and I felt uneasy about joining them. Plus, I didn’t want to dress up at all.

Eventually, I decided to stay home and cooked something nice for myself. Today is also Diwali, and I could hear fireworks around my place. My friend sent photos from the bouldering event, and I thought it looked really cool. But if I were there, I wouldn’t know what to do.

Am I an extrovert? I’ve been questioning it a lot recently. I feel like I dislike socialising more and more, avoiding unnecessary interactions with people. I don’t think it’s a good sign, but I don’t know how to change it.

The last day of the month made me feel like the last weekday of the week. I got my payslip earlier today, but my salary hadn’t arrived yet. I was worried the company would delay the payment again and checked my bank account every five minutes until 2 p.m. this afternoon. I finally received my salary and split it between my daily and savings accounts, which has become a payday routine.

Yesterday, I lent quite a lot of money to a friend. She asked me to send her Japanese currency to pay her mother’s medical treatment, saying she’d pay me back in GBP. I didn’t hesitate much, as she’s older and wealthier than me; I thought this amount would be nothing for her. After I paid her, though, she started talking about something else and didn’t mention paying me back. I felt really anxious and asked her to confirm when she’d pay me back. Only then did she tell me she doesn’t have enough GBP at the moment and would pay me back slowly. I felt betrayed; it wasn’t what I expected. Although she didn’t explicitly say she’d pay immediately, her tone made me feel like she would. She even asked how much I still have in my Japanese account. I feel naive in situations like this. I never want to get into arguments about money; I always repay immediately when someone helps me, and I expect the same in return. The amount I lent was the largest since I first graduated.

These posts have slowly become more like a diary, a record of my life. I hope that when I look back, I’ll find something meaningful in them. I’m going to edit the podcast I plan to update tomorrow. See you next month.