Thought I should get something up on about Richard's week in Tokyo before my brain zaps the memories away forever. It's about a month ago and it's only the photos that are helping me remember anything.

Managed to get the week off work which was long overdue so met him out at Narita Airport and barely recognized him with an epic moustache and beard. I swear he wasn’t even shaving last time I saw him. Immediately took him to Yoshinoya for some Guadong beef bowl and then back to my place for an easy night in. Think we went to Donkey hote that night to get a fan(it’s sticking hot upstairs here) and look at all the dodgy Japanese toys.

Next day was Asakusa for the temple/shrine experience followed by Akihabara electric town, site of recent truck+knife rampage by un-sexed Japanese otaku. Checked out all the bb guns, knifes, manga and gundam. Tried to get into a maido café but it was packed and just didn’t really look like it would be that much fun in broken English. Missioned to the Imperial palace for a walkabout after and that was when the old man in me needed rest.

Went home and waited for Akane to come back from work before feasting at the best KoreanBBQ/Yaki Nikku(fried meat) in the area accompanied by some brews.

 

Shinjuku was next on the list the following morning. Went on lonelyPlanet 15min walk around before getting Richard aquainted with ichome/kabukicho. Not much going on in the late morning other than couples leaving robu hoteru so we played some jap spacies and gambring.

Harajuku was a few stops away and tends to be full of cosplay and other crazily dressed ppl. Had a perv, had a Lotteria(Korean mcds) gourmet burger and trekked up to Shibuya. When this Gourmet ‘zepplin’ chesseburger first came out it was mint. They could only serve 300 a day(to get ppl interested) but the beef, cheese and bread was delicious. Now that it is popular they get the dodgy beef/cheese and never seem to run out anymore. Seems to be the way things are around here. Bring out a premium/limited edition which is actually good quality, make people wait, queue up to buy it(the buzz spreads) and then once people are dropping the yen, dodge it up a bit and mass produce.

Walked around Shibuya for a bit(Richard wanted to see the massive crossing outside the station) and then found an Irish pub. Richard wanted to drink beer from a Large beaker but I was content with my guiness. Hung around there for a bit talking kusou. Sounds like I missed out on some good times drinking in London in coming to Japan. Wish I could’ve made it for a Aussie/Kiwi drinking session at the gutted out bar in the middle of a London suburb called I think ‘the shed’. Fine examples of Kiwi ingenuity were on display here such as sawdust to make cleaning up spilt drink and pride easier at 3pm closing time.(Opening time 11am).

Thursday was a train trip out to the Touristy area of Kamakura which was the capital at some point in time and is dotted with temples, shrines and beaches. We hired a couple of crusty bikes that most people ride around here and went missioning. On the way to a temple we spotted a sign that said “mountain pass(impassable)”. An impassable pass sounded like a challenge so we dropped our bikes into lowgear and conquered it with ease. Had a beer at the beach, got to the giant Buddha 5mins before closing time and made like Salarymen on the train and slept.

 

Akane got Friday off work and her parents car for a trip to Fuji and Fuji-Q highland funpark. We got to the funpark around 1pm and thankfully the queues were only 40-60mins so we got to do each major ride at least once. ‘Moon Raker’ was out of order(cleaning up vomit I suspect) but the rollercoasters were vomit inducing enough after eating the limited edition FujiQ MosBurger(Japanese mcdonalds). This burger was huge but honestly consisted of onion onion and more diced onion. They even give you a spoon to eat all the onion afterwards. Seriously … an entire onion diced in every god damned burger.

Saturday we hooked up with Kouji for some billiardo and drinking in Roppongi. Had a few beers at another Irish pub and then went to the local BigKumara, Gaspanic bar. Called GasPanic as at around 3am the room gets filled up with white gas of some sort. All the cool stuff happens at either 2am or 3am so you miss your last train home and have to stay there buying drinks all night. Ie. Bikini girls come out at 2am. Arseholes. There was a beerbong behind the Gaspanic bar that was gathering dust so Richard decided to do 1 or 5. Got the first morning train home and slept till dropping him off at Tokyo station for the train to the Airport.

Never got around to force feeding him sashimi or Uni but he still doesn’t eat peas of tomatoes so it would’ve been a fight I suspect.

 

Went to a bigass swimming pool an hour train+bus from our place. They had a wave pool(The exact one I posted a youtube link to last year), a couple of slides and one of those river pools where you sit in a tube and the current pushes you around. I managed to cut my forehead open on the bottom of the pool. I knew I fcked myself up but wasn’t sure if I was bleeding or not so when I came up I just looked at Akane with a smirk on my face waiting to see her expression. Yip … I’m bleeding .. from my Tom Cruise vain … It’s pissing blood. Got out and showed the pool attendant. She blew her whistle and yelled out across the pool. Blood was all down my chest at this stage and at least 1000 Japanese were steering at the white gaijin covered in blood. It was a long walk half way around the pool to the first aid station. They couldn’t give me butterfly stitches to stop it scarring so I had to go to the hospital and get an MRI for some god damned bandaids.

It’s healed now but there’s still a visible vertical scar about 2cm smackbang in the middle of my forehead. Just looks like I got savaged by an elbow though so all good :D

Went to a big fireworks display in Asakusa again decked out in the traditional attire. After it was all over and we were walking to the station with thousands of other people we happened across 2 guys sitting down with a girl(clearly corned in the doorway) and they were obviously taking advantage of her. She was saying stopu in Japanese and English but everyone just walked past without doing anything. This was on the main road so at least 400 people would walk past in 10minutes. There weren’t any cops around so I asked if she was alright and the guys just said daijobu. My jap is lacking and Akane didn’t want to get involved so what more could I do.

Ordered my new Bike last week. It’s a black 2008 Yamaha yzf R6 but get this … The Canadian model has to be imported into Japan. Something to do with emission standards here which mean all the fast bikes are actually overseas models and have to be re-imported. Looking forward to the day I can avoid the trains everyday.

BBQ at our place this Saturday before the big Koenji festival.

My ears are still ringing slightly 1 week later. Picking a spot next to the main speakers up front wasn't the smartest thing to do but was one of the better vantage points in Club Quattro. I held out for Propagandhi to come on before getting all dirty in the mosh. If the previous bands(FC Five, comback kid) were anything to go by this was gonna be rockn. It's all about the circle pit here which looked rad from the outside but was actually pretty tame once you got into the thick of it. Still looking forward to my first wall of death!

Got a few pics and a bunch of 100M+ vids from Akane who chose to stay on the sidelines although she could've handled the mosh easy. Crazy stage diving from 3-high stacked speakers and cannonballs from the stage were the hazards to watch out for. There wasn't much pushing up the front of the pit and it was dead easy to get front row views. Todd was a total nutball thrashing around the stage in his boardshorts and dripping in sweat by the end of song1. They pulled out speculative Fiction to kick it off followed by all the meaner songs from LessTalkmoreRock through to Potemkin city limits. I concentrated on the crowd surfers most of the time giving them an extra boost. I think by the end I probably just looked like a giant foreign dooche throwing Japanese around with both arms :) All good!







There were 200 odd people there so not sure why they don't tour to NZ or Aus. We could easily pack that many into ex-Indigo. There were a couple of Aussie dudes there who flew from Aussie just for this show and got a cameo up on stage with salty Todd. It's been a while since going to a show and was good to get a pit work out. Looking forward to some more jcore and intenational shows soon.




I was suitably smelly by the end so got a  tshirt for the train home. Fully worth the $30 ticket!
I'll try upload the 4gigs worth of AVI to my box back home if anyone wants to see me bobbing up and down like a munter.

Man, this blog's starting to feel more and more like a chore same as everything else ... training, commuting to work, eating, showering. I wanna go bush for a while :(

Trip to UK/Europe was an eye opener. I've grown accustomed to everything Japanese and by the end of my 2/3 weeks away I couldn't wait to get back home to Koenji. I'm stealing some of the below from an email I sent a while ago cause I just poured a whiskey and can't be arsed :)

== snip ==
Once I get past the depth of History of London/UK there isn't really a lot to be impressed about other than being a good base of Operations into Europe. Bunked up with my bro Brendan in a South-London Hostel for the majority of the stay. He was working during the week so I did all the touristy stuff and met back with him for dinner on weeknights and we went to Rome for a weekend.

Rome is dirty as hell and Italian restaurateurs are pinheads. Had to stay overnight at Stanstead airport as no trains earler enought for the 8am flight so tired most of the Saturday. Did bus tour as soon as we got there and went to a pizza place at about 2pm for some eats. Ordered a pizza and big bottle of beer between us for about 20Euros and the guy kept trying to sell us other shit. Bit of Lasagne about the size of a bit of toast for 8 Euros. Frig that, just the pizza and bear thanks. pinhead:'mutters under breath in Italian'. me: What was that? pinhead:nothing. me:I thought you said something? Guy walks up and starts mouthing off about why should he turn on his oven for 2 people sharing a pizza. The bottle of beer was open at this stage and we hadn't paid so got up and left. Guy was super pissed when I did the 'foo fukula' thing that Ryan does where you gesture with flick your fingers out from under your Chin. Don't think it's italian but he knew what I meant. He came out on the street, clenched his fist and rubbed his bicep as there were customers out front. We b-lined for another shop closeby incase he got his boys onto us. Similar storey in London but at a curry place with an indian mullet, 30min wait and still no curry. bailed.

Stabby stab stab:


Crazy guy in Rome


It was either travelling alone or the Hostel that left me with a more negative view of London. It was full of Aussies and kiwis. Most of them in early 20s and suckered in by the Hostel marketing. Party hard, sleep easy. Selling tshirts with stuff like 'im drunk, you'll do' 'my liver is naughty and must be punished'. Every night the same alcoholic slob would bust into everyones room and try to drag them out on a pubcrawl. Kinda lame that I didnt go at least once but meh .. I'm a total dad now anyway. Should have bought a pair of jandals .. The showers and now my toes covered with vomit, urine and STDs. Managed to catch something called the Norovirus just before my weekend in Bath which killed me for a day.

Feeling Unwell?


Trains from London to bath(well, anywhere really) were pathetic. Should've taken 1.5 hours but took 4. 2 trains broke down and multiple delays. Subways were surprisingly shitty too. Carriages were way too small, entrance gates were balls and the whole backend IT systems crashed at least twice while I was there shutting down entire stations. Was the first system in the world I suppose but frig me ... it's time to do some upgrading in collaboration with the Japs!
==snip==
LEGO:



Netcafes
UK: Mouse, keyboard, screen, 1 pound for 20minutes of slow/locked down net
JP: Leather chair/couch, gaming rig, ps2/dvd/comics and drink bar for equivalent of 3NZD/hour

Service
UK: money <-> goods. me feeling like I should be tipping cause they look pissed off.
JP: Whole store in unisen: Welcome, come in! 400Y plz. domo arigato gozaimasu! slight bow.

Got put up in Four Seasons hotel for 3 nights as I went to our London office for a few days. Way too posh for me. I think if I'm ever lucky enough to make buttloads of money, I'll be one of those guys that dies with it all sitting in a bank account. If spending it means I have to hang out with wankers, I'll just stash it under my bed thanks.

The trip home wasn't as bad as people made it out to be when I mentioned I was flying Russia's Aeroflot. Transferring at Moscow, I felt right at home once I was on the connecting flight full of Japanese people I couldn't understand. Fell asleep on the express train from Narita Airport to Shinjuku and woke up a couple of stops past where I should have got off. I was awake close to 40 hours so was in the midst of deep deep sleep when the train dudez woke up the snoring foreigner. Stepped outside on the platform and it was a real shock. The rest of the way home I felt like I had just touched down in Japan again for the first time. Compared to UK, completly different approach to urban planning/design although a lot of it is probably historical. Streets here so nallow and buildings so small.

Akane had decide to do some redecorating while I was gone so I got home to a Bedroom decked out in Pink.

Last couple of months:
Went to Akane's uncle's wedding at Four Seasons hotel which was okish
Akane has been taking pole-dancing lessons and her class does little shows every now and then. First was at a big all night rave last year and the second was a few weeks ago in Tokyo harbour on a floating bar with crazy neons. Looking forward to the next one :D

It's starting to get warmer now and the Cheery Blossoms have made an appearance for a around 2 weeks. Met up with Akane's parents and did a big walk around near where we watched the K1 MAX last year. It was only 4 hours walking around but we were toast and had to skip shopping at the mall after. I'm getting old.



Okasan, Ottosan and Oshima-san


Got a new gaming rig for super cheap in Akiba. Couldn't be arsed buying everything separately again so bought a close to high-end prebuilt rig from one of the DIY stores for equivalent of $1200NZD minus the screen. Wasting all my 1337 cpu cycles on CS source.

Got hax R4 card for my Nintendo DS Lite too so I can 'backup' my 1000s of legally purchased NDS games on the Internet. Got a wix Jap-English dictionary for it and haven't been able to stop playing Contra4. Akane has been owning MarioKart and I reckon she could give Tom a run for his money.

Thinking of renting a car this weekend and mishing out to Fuji-ko theme park for the weekend. http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&VideoID=2663680

Ballz to the wall

Take this!

Right, time for an update. How to summarise 2 months without looking like a shopping list ...

Christmas isn't officially celebrated over here so I ended up working with all the other SalaryMen Christmas day. However, somewhere in the past Colnol Saunders convinced 123 million Japanese people that xmas = KFC. I'm serious ... There are 30min queues outside  around xmas and if you want to impress  your GF you make a reservation at KFried. Illuminations are also big over here with most of the big railway stations, malls, Offices etc having huge lighting displays. Akane bought us both a ticket on a French dinner Cruise around Tokyo bay on the 23rd of Dec which was quite nice if a little on the posh side. Shakeys all you could eat pizza in Shibuya the next night was a contrast and a half. They sat us between two tables composed of gossiping teenage girls and a sports team of 13 year old girls high on drink bar and lols.



I managed to land work oncall over New Years but still got out to Akane's parents in warabi for a few nights. Seafood was eaten 3 meals a day and we played a lot of wii. Went to the local temple and shrine new years eve which had food stalls and some fair-like games. Choco-bananas and sausage for the win.



In the new year we headed to Nagano Happo skified(site of the 98 winter olympics) on a spur of the moment trip and it turned out to be the best boardign conditions of my life hands down. Deep base on no ice! Bonus points to Ronald for Cheeseburgers at the top of the Gondola. I'm amazed they haven't got makudonarudo on Mt Fuji yet. We stuck to the beginners course most of the time as it was Akane's 2nd or 3rd time snowboarding but you'd never know. She picked it up pretty quick so I started encouraging her to go quicker here and there. The beginners course weaves down the mountain cutting through the Olympic slalom course 3/4 times. Akane picked up a bit of speed as we were approaching the Olympic cutover point and she tried to slow down a lil bit by weaving left ... everything was going left except the board. She ended up headfirst down a black run and slide about 5metres on her tummy before somehow coming to a stop. I honestly thought she was going to keep going and wrap herself around a tree at the bottom. Made it home in one piece with a 4 hour sleep on the train home. Went up by myself the next weekend and hit some of the higher runs Love it! Going to get my own gear for next season and go every other weekend.

Laundry list:
1) Went to Disneyland for the entire day. Waited 30minutes for curry popcorn. Highlights .. illumination show insync to music. Best ride of the day was the classic revolving teacup. Screw the main attraction rollercoasters. This teacup ride had a wheel in the middle that you could pull on to spin the cup on it's centre axis. So as well as the machine spinning you around 2 ways you could control the speed of the 3rd way. Man I got us going quick. Akane got a photo mid ride on her camera which I'll have to pull out sometime.
2) Has snowed in Tokyo twice now which was a nice surprise to wake up to. Only stays a day though.
3) Heaps of Earthquakes too. One 2 days ago at 4am woke me up and went on for at least 1 minute. I'm worried about how this house I'm living in could handle a bigger one. When the people next door run down the stairs the house wobbles slightly. Good or bad ... who knows.
4) Hit local onsen with Kouji. Played some snooker and darts with a lil gamring on the side.
5) Finding motivation to train Muay Thai here is hard, even with the new gloves Akane got me for xmas. Think I need to schedule a fight to force me to train.
6) Finally found milk here that doesn't taste like pooz. Majority of milk here is nuked at 130degreesc for 2 seconds. The good stuff is 66degreesc for 30mins. Good things take time. Been overdosing on Milo and cereal since.

Heading to England this coming Friday for 2 weeks to catch up with my bro and scope the place out for potential future living. Will get some pics up after. Going back to an English speaking country is going to be a mindf*ck and a half.

After the very Japanese meals me and Kouji had up in Hokkaido I felt pretty confident about keeping my food down when I took Akane's family to a swanky Sushi/Sashimi restaurant in Ebisu afew weeks back. They took me in
like a son for 2 months while I was looking for work and a place to live, so thought I'd show some more appreciation via their taste buds.



The raw fish was a breeze, salmon and tuna were tasty but I struggled with the prawns head again prefering to avoid the dozen or so crunchy legs this time. The grande finale was Sea Urchin or Uni to the Japanese. All I knew of these nasty little
balls of death before tonight was that are not pleasant to stand on, I've always tiptoed around the ocean floor when swimming in the sea after hearing about my Aunty standing on one as a kid and having to get the spikes cut out of her foot in hospital.
I had no idea people ate the inards of them. Well, the gonads to be precise. It had a subtle smell so I thought nothing of it although the thought of beer and copious amounts of
raw fish all over the table did enter my mind .. I bit the bullet and did it in one go anyways. The taste was nothing short of 1000 times the smell. Take the most rotten seaweed infested rockpool at the most rank seacove and you can get
a rough idea of the taste. I wasn't embarrassed about the teary eyed involuntary refluxes at the time but felt a little embarrassed afterwards. Everyone laughed it off so I don't think I depply offended anyone :(

I did my u@most to avoid any repeat of some childhood pumpkin eating memories I have. Me and my brothers always dreaded pumpkin in any form and one particular time we were out of juice so we all decided to chase our Roast pumpkin with
cold milk. I think at least 2 of us brought up a mix of pumpkin and milk onto our plates so yeah. Words of Wisdom for the day, never chase with cold milk.