changing my name in Japan

As I've recently mentioned, I feel the time has come to change the katakana spelling of my last name.

Today I went to the ward office and in a surprisingly brief session managed to get the katakana spelling of my name changed on my alien registration card. Doing so invalidates my officially-recognized name-stamp, so I have to get a new one made. Once the new one's made, I'll have to bring it back to the ward office to have them notarize it.

So a journey of what I suspect will be a thousand miles had begun with this single step.