Welcome to my pad

This next set of pics is a tour of my home. The first pic shows my door, complete with CDN sticker added by me. While my door opens smoothly, and given that it's made of metal, fairly lightly, my co-ALT upstairs has a door that she needs to slam into to open.

The door opens into my genkan, or threshold/reception area. The cubby to the left contains a few of my shoes. Just visible is my bath room (notice the separation in this normally compound word), opposite of which is my toilet, in a small room the size of a broom closet. In the small space between these small rooms is my bathroom sink, obviously made for post-war undernourished Japanese people. I'm not a tall person, but even I find it just low enough to be a pain.

For those who are interested (and/or coming to visit me), a few notes on bathing protocol. Japanese baths are small but deep. Imagine taking your own bath, dividing it in half and stacking the halves. This is a Japanese bath. The traditional way is to sit on a little plastic stool and lather up using a small plastic washbowl. I am lucky enough to have a ineffectual showerhead, which expedites my washing. The water is cold from the water supply, but heated via a gas water heater. Both the shower and the bath are heated by this water heater, but the shower, even at its highest setting, is only just hot, and the bath, which is traditionally left filled, takes about 20 minutes to heat. The bath, however, can become scaldingly hot, and the combination of depth and heat make it welcome after a long day.

Currently, my apartment is living it pink and Kitty-chan (Hello Kitty to you North American folk). It will remain so until next payday.