Valentine's day, 2004.

That's going to be a very special day for me. Because it's the last day I'll be paying rent on two apartments at the same time.

You may be wondering how that works.

In a nutshell: Nova knows their employees aren't going to be up for paying their first month's rent the day they step off the plane. So instead you pay your rent in arrears. Your October rent gets taken out of your October paycheck. Which you receive on November 15th. Kind of a drag, but I don't see any other way Nova could set it up.

So let's say you're me. On November 26, you lay out a nice, quarter-of-a-million-yen bribe on your new place. You subsequently give your one-month's "I'm moving out" notice to Nova. You set your new apartment move-in date as December 16, the day after you'll be receiving your next paycheck. So that's cool, right? Only ten days' overlap. Enough time to move all your stuff via daily train trips, one backpack at a time. Should be all over by Xmas, right?

Right. Except here's how it actually breaks down.

• November 26, blow the entirety of my savings to help pave the way for my own place.


• December 15, receive my paycheck from Nova. My November paycheck, you understand. Rent on my Nova apartment is deducted automatically.


• December 16, hand over two-thirds of that paycheck to my new landlord to pay for my partial December rent and remaining bribery.


• December 25, celebrate my first Xmas alone. It's not a holiday for Nova; I'll be at work until nine.


• January 1, pay the January rent on my new apartment. Except I only have a third of a paycheck left, remember? Actually, significantly less, since I'll have spent that money on food. (Oops. I actually neglected to factor this in when made the original deal. I'll need to close out my remaining U.S. savings to account for the oversight. My bad.)


• January 15, receive my paycheck for the month of December, minus 26 days' rent.


• February 1, pay the rent on my new apartment with what remains of my paycheck.


• February 14, celebrate my tenth consecutive Valentine's Day alone.


• February 15, receive my first paycheck that doesn't have Nova rent deducted from it.


• February 16, maybe buy some furniture or something.

Yeah, I hear ya. No one's making me do it. Is it worth going through all this just so I don't have to share a bathroom?

I'll let you know.