powerisyours | (no subject)

How does that even work? I thought all you had to do was dial the number.

Well you can, but -- do you really not know how to work a cell phone?

I can usually make it dial the person I'm looking for, if that's what you mean.

I'm gonna have to teach you how to actually do things.

Hm . . . Hina had a similar response when I told her I didn't know how to use the computer.

That's because where we're from life kind of revolves around this stuff. I mean, you can pay for things with your cell phone in my world, like a debit card.

Really? I don't think we can do that sort of thing. Granted, my phone's . . . special. It doesn't work here, either, but that's beside the point. Takeru set me up with something else in case he needed to get in touch with me.

Mm. You can store payment information on them. You can survive for a week with just your phone, your ID and a little cash if you had to.

I think for the most part phones generally only work within Camp when they do work, anyway. I can get in touch with people here but nobody outside.

Hey, that's pretty neat! I didn't know they could do that sort of thing.

Mm, I've heard that much, but mine's meant for calling between dimensions. It's on a different wavelength or something than normal ones.

It's pretty convenient. I think you can even put your train pass information on it but I've never tried.

Ah, Camp's pretty good at trumping that stuff.

I'll have to ask Xia Tian if he was able to do that sort of thing with his. But if he wasn't, maybe it's a time difference thing? If your time back home was further in the future than mine, I mean.

2009?

2007.

Well that's going to be confusing to go home to from 2013.

Or later. I'll have to get used to the fact that some things just don't exist yet.

If it makes you feel any better one of my best friends is from the late 1400s or so, he has a lot to get used to.

Oh? I know a few of those, as well. I know a handful from the 1800's, and I think one or two earlier.

Mm, he's resourceful and one of the smartest people I know, but I can't help feeling like the culture shock must be crazy sometimes.

Mm, I think everyone has a bit of culture shock when they get here, regardless of where or when they come from. Particularly if you have a case like mine where there is literally one other person like yourself around. Or even no others.

No kidding. I was lucky, Tsukasa-kun was here before me. If I'd showed up by myself, I'd have been terrified. I wasn't a Rider when I got here, I couldn't do very much.

Thankfully more people are willing to help newcomers out than people who aren't.

Mm. Well, in your case, even if Tsukasa hadn't been here, there are other Japanese people with similar customs and such. Xia Tian and I are the only Chinese, to my knowledge. And we're certainly the only Yi Neng Xing Zhe.

Oh, I guess that's true ... I don't even think about that kind of thing anymore, since Camp translates everything and I've been here so long it's easy to forget.

It's not particularly important in a place like this, but it's a little jarring on occasion to be told the things you're doing or the way you're doing them are somehow "wrong", even if it's something that's considered perfectly acceptable back home.

"Wrong" isn't exactly the best way to put it, anyway.

Different, but not wrong. It takes some getting used to all around.