See You, Space Cowboy~!

Shinkansen

noreply@blogger.com (Daniel) — Wed, 09 Feb 2011 06:16:00 +0000

The bullet trains, or Shinkansen, are one of the things that everyone associates with Japan. Anyone who travels there will inevitably ride one many times during their stay, which is why it may seem rather strange that the first and only time I went on one was in July last year, a couple of weeks before I was due to leave Japan.
I have a good reason though - they are very expensive to ride. A return trip (of about 2 hours each way) to Osaka costs something like $400! Now, all of the tourists coming to Japan are eligible for a Japan Rail pass that for a set fee (around $700 last time I heard) gives unlimited use of any of Japan's trains for 2 weeks, but I, being on a student visa, was not eligible.
Still, by July I had some money spare and so I thought I should take the chance to ride on these iconic trains! I had loved Kyoto when I visited earlier in the year, so off I went again. Luckily for me my one-night trip coincided with both the famous Gion Festival in Kyoto and a friend's birthday in nearby Osaka, so even though it was a short trip, it was jam-packed with things to do.
The following photos are from Tokyo Station, somewhere in the mountains, Kyoto, and the nearby historic town of Uji.

PS: You can tell that I like portrait shots, can't you?

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Exploring

noreply@blogger.com (Daniel) — Mon, 13 Dec 2010 08:21:00 +0000

Exploring. It's something I love to do, no matter where I am. In Tokyo, I'd often go for a walk after dinner to explore a random side street or other, with my feet often leading me to some very interesting destinations.
When I stayed for two weeks on a small farm in the hills of the southern island Kyushu, how could I resist the opportunity to go for a walk with my camera one sunny Spring afternoon?

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日本での最後の冒険 (My Last Adventure in Japan)

noreply@blogger.com (Daniel) — Mon, 22 Nov 2010 09:39:00 +0000

Today I handed up my last assignment for the semester and thus the year. What that means is that I can now relax and get around to doing some of the things I've been meaning to do for a while, such as giving this blog a much-needed update.
I don't know how many people still check this or check their emails, but I thought that there was one last adventure that people might like to hear about. Actually, if you're Facebook addicts you probably already know about this, but I don't think you've heard the whole story. Well, here goes!

It all began about a month before I was due to leave Japan. We had quickly worked out that, on the day we left, we would be returned our deposit money that we had laid down on our dormitory room almost a year earlier. This was no insignificant amount of money - it amounted to about half of a month's rent. What on earth were we to do with this money? My friend suggested I take it to the airport and get myself a new wallet at Burberry, which I kind of liked the idea of but thought that it would be a little excessive to spend all that money on such a small thing. I was going to resign myself to just keeping the money for when I got back to Australia when I had a flash of inspiration - there was still one goal of mine that I hadn't yet fulfilled...

In case you haven't picked it, this was my thought:

"What if I used the money to hire a Nissan GT-R?"

A Nissan GT-R press shot. For those of you that don't know, this is the successor to the wildly famous Skyline series and is famed for eating supercars like Ferraris and Porsche 911 Turbos for breakfast. It is known as 'Godzilla' for a very good reason.

The more I thought about it, the more I was convinced. It *had* been one of my goals before I came to Japan, one that I had publicly acknowledged. It was a goal firmly seated in the impossible category but as they always say it is these goals that are often the most surprising when they are realised.
So, what were the things holding me back? First was the cost. How much would it cost to hire a car like that? Secondly, would they let me, a 20 year old foreigner, hire one?
A quick use of google came up with some answers (this is what I learned Japanese for!). Nissan operates their own rent-a-car business in Japan, and surprise surprise, they were offering the GT-R for rent. What's more, the rental fee for a day was exactly the amount of money that I would be getting back as my dorm deposit. Syncronicity much?
When I looked closer, however, my fears were confirmed - they would only let someone that's 35 years or older hire one. You'd expect me to get a little down at this point - for if Nissan weren't letting young people hire one, what were the chances that someone else would? I did not let these discouraging thoughts dissuade me and hopped straight back into google, this time coming up with a private company. They were renting out GT-Rs, albeit for a slightly higher price, and nowhere did I see mention of a minimum age. Just in case, however, I sent them a quick email on the matter. To my delight, there were only two requirements: that you had held your licence for a minimum of a year (which to be honest is a lot of trust on their part but I guess money speaks louder than common sense), and that you had an international driving permit. I satisfied both criteria, luckily. It was only on a whim that I picked up the permit before I left for Japan...

Once the date had been settled, there was only one thing left to worry about - actually driving the thing. I had never driven in another country before! Thankfully I with my wonderful foresight had been taking part in pro-level driver training for just this very purpose!
Before I knew it the fateful day had arrived. I had decided to invite several friends along, two of who didn't turn up because they were sick / hung over. In the end it was just an American friend of mine who loved cars and my Japanese mate from the car club who owned an older-model Skyline. As the car was my doing, however, I went alone to pick it up. Let me tell you, it sure was daunting sitting in a showroom filled (literally) with a 911 Turbo, a SL63 AMG and a Rolls-Royce Phantom, all in white. Somehow my documents were accepted and before I knew it the man had handed me the keys and was ushering me out onto the busy road. What on earth was he thinking?

The hire car showroom.

The car was in auto mode to start with. Set like this, gear changes were smooth and unnoticeable and I could almost convince myself that this was just an ordinary car. I quickly figured out how to put the car in manual mode (what would be the point if I hired it just to leave it in auto?) but didn't really get a chance to stretch its legs for quite a while. In fact, I was caught in a traffic jam! Still, it gave me time to fiddle around with the many knobs and buttons in the car, as well as the touchscreen navigation/entertainment system.
Eventually, though, I made it to the dorm where I picked up my friends. I had pulled a sneaky one and not told my Japanese friend what car I was hiring - needless to say, he was surprised.

Outside the dorm.

Our destination for the day was to be a beach - any beach. We decided in the end on Atami, a seaside town that was quite famous for its hot springs but also featuring a lovely little bay. It would take a couple of hours to get there, along the highways and across some hills, which sounded just perfect.

It was with a sigh of relief and great anticipation that we finally reached the highway. Here was finally a chance to let the car stretch its legs! And let me tell you, stretch it could. With a quick glance to make sure that there were no cameras or policemen nearby, I put my foot down as I was merging into the traffic. HOLY COW that thing was fast! With a roar of fury from the engine in front of us and exhaust behind us we were thrust back into our seats by the sheer force of the acceleration. In no time at all the revs had hit the limiter and the car quickly and brutally changed up into second gear, seemingly without any loss in acceleration. By the time I looked down at the speedo, we were doing 130km/h and I decided that was probably a good point to back off. Now, the speed limit on Japanese highways was nominally 80, but my friend had informed me that the cameras don't catch you unless you go something around 140 or 150 (which is an excellent system in my opinion). He also kindly informed me that they often have speed cameras set up in tunnels, after I had already wound down my windows and sampled the sound from the four large exhausts. Thankfully there was no camera in that tunnel...

Anyway, here are some photos of our drive and time at the beach:

Who needs to respect parking conventions when you have a GT-R?

The beach at Atami.

I think the question we need to ask ourselves here is 'Why not?'.

A beautiful old castle overlooked the bay.

The seaside roads we drove along were simply stunning.

My friend swears to me that this Subaru was driven by an extremely attractive young woman.

Unfortunately, the promised hill-roads were at best a let down and at worst downright dangerous. The former was the case on a stretch of roads that was beautifully smooth, wide and cambered where we were STUCK behind a van that was doing the exact speed limit.
The terrifying part came when I decided to let one of my friends drive. It was his first time a) driving in Japan, b) driving right-hand-drive and c) driving on the left side of the road, but none of these had any bearing on what was to happen. I had pulled off a lovely coastal road onto a side-street to let him drive for a little. It was a narrow road and we couldn't do a u-turn right there, so I suggested he drive up the road a little. As we drove, the road rapidly became narrower and narrower and rock walls sprung up on both sides. My friend was starting to get a little nervous, but when our worst fears were realised and a car appeared in front of us he began to freak out. The road was too narrow for them to get by easily so we decided to back it up a little - only for a taxi to appear behind us. Yikes! We were on a tiny street, hemmed in on both sides by rock walls and at the front and back by cars. My friend did the sensible thing and just stayed still, letting the other cars (obviously locals) squeeze past and miraculously we made it through without a scratch. Unfortunately I only took one photo at the time...

...and then a car was spied coming in the other direction.

All in all, it was an amazing experience and definitely the best possible use I could have made with my deposit money. What was even more amazing was that my parents didn't kill me when I told them about it ;)

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Homecoming

noreply@blogger.com (Daniel) — Wed, 04 Aug 2010 03:26:00 +0000

As I write this, I am back in Adelaide and have been for over a week. It's hard to believe that my exchange year in Japan passed so quickly - it seems like only yesterday when I was excitedly receiving my certificate of acceptance from Waseda in the mail.
At the same time, though, the time I spent in Japan is quite a long period and one that divides the old, pre-Japan me and the me that is writing this blog post now. In my time in Japan, I made a whole new network of friends, both Japanese and international. I grew familiar with the area around my dorm and the university to an extent that I began to think of it as 'home' - something that I felt when returning to Tokyo from time spent in other parts of Japan or in Korea. I also gained increasing confidence in my Japanese abilities, remarking to one (Japanese) friend how our conversations started in English in September last year and were one hundred percent Japanese by the time we said our goodbyes.
All of these things contributed to Japan becoming a large part of me and my life, whether that is immediately obvoious now or not. I know that the things I have learned and the people I have met during my time abroad will continue to have lasting influences on my life - for the better, I hope.

I am sorry that there are no photos to accompany this post but I promise that there will be some photos to look at in the near future. At the moment I have rough plans for two more posts - one regarding the things that I miss and don't miss from Japan, and one regarding a certain adventure I undertook a couple of days before I left Tokyo...

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Goals! : A Retrospective

noreply@blogger.com (Daniel) — Fri, 02 Jul 2010 13:59:00 +0000

Somehow, it's July already. Time sure has flown - it really does seem like yesterday when I arrived here in Tokyo, eyes open in wonder at the big city sights and brain in confusion with the millions of things I had to adjust to.

And adjust I have. Tokyo is like a home to me now, and I can honestly say that I'll miss this small, ten-metre-squared room when I head back to Adelaide (what will I do when there's empty space on all sides of my bed?).

I haven't been living a merely adjusted life though - in the meantime, I've been having a lot of fun! Most of that you will have read about in this blog or seen through photos on Facebook already, but I thought it'd be best if I quantify this fun. Put it up to some scrutiny. What better to do this with than my original list of goals I posted almost ten months ago to the day?

Let's see how I stacked up:

Become ペラペラ in Japanese. (if you don't know what that means, look it up!)

Well, I may not be fluent, but I can hold a conversation just fine. I understand most of what is said to me too - but when Japanese talk between themselves, I still struggle.

Attend a Tohoshinki concert, preferably at Tokyo Dome, with Jaejoong Sweat Seats!

I had a ticket to attend the fan event, but due to certain unfortunate circumstances it was cancelled. This meant that the Tokyo Dome event could not happen either. :(
HOWEVER I did manage to see a movie of the 2009 Tokyo Dome Concert!

Visit my friends in Japan, particularly those outside of Tokyo (Yuri in Nagoya and Izumi and Pei in Osaka)

I ended up in both places over the Spring Break. Saw Yuri in Nagoya and Pei on our ski trip too~

Visit the super-awesome life-sized Gundam.

Sadly, I think it was taken down before I got to Tokyo...

Stumble upon an unassumingly awesome bar behind a non-descript, heavy door.

Well, I did visit one bar! It was very nice, and I had a drink with a large spherical piece of ice in it.
Speaking of bars, I intend to visit a particularly nice one to celebrate the end of my trip.

Attend the Tokyo Game Show.

Done!

Attend the Tokyo Motor Show.

Sadly did not happen due to my feeling unwell. But I got to see a whole lot of interesting historical cars at the Mille Miglia instead!

Go skiing (perhaps!).

Yessiree! Here's a photo that I haven't shown you before:

Have a photo taken with those crazy Harajuku-types.

Sadly not. But I think two pretty girls in kimono are nice substitutes.

Stumble upon a street-racing scene or Touge event.

Does being driven to said event by someone count as 'stumbling upon'?

Learn to cook and clean for myself.

I mean, I cooked on average once a week, and cleaned somewhat less, but I wouldn't count that as learning to do either thing. Certainly not enough to do either when I get home. *cough cough*.

Update this blog once a week (yikes!)

Sorry about that guys.

And the super-challenge goals:

Get some Tohoshinki signatures at a fan-signing event.

May have been possible if I actually went to said event.

Somehow appear on Japanese television.

This one didn't occur, even though there was a chance I could have. Instead, I did something even better, and got immortalised in a magazine!

Convince someone to let me drive a GT-R (this is definitely in the 'impossible' category!)

Sadly not. However, my friend had an R33-GTS-T which he drove me around in (and not just normal driving, let me tell you). Said friend has also just sold the car and bought another one with a GTR bodykit and extra power... I wonder if he will let me drive?

I won't bother giving myself a score, actually. A qualitative analysis was more fun. And I qualitatively conclude that I've had an awesome trip so far!

As for those remaining goals, well, I don't think I'll be achieving any more than I have already in the short time that I have left here. That doesn't mean I won't be doing anything interesting though - next week is certainly shaping up to be interesting...

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Nine Months

noreply@blogger.com (Daniel) — Sun, 13 Jun 2010 08:52:00 +0000

Some of you may remember, if you cast your minds back, to the video I uploaded showing my room here in Tokyo. Well, I thought that since it's been the better part of a year since then, it might be a good idea to show you what my room looks like now!

I've obviously personalised it a lot and made it feel much more like a home. Indeed, I feel that I'll come to miss it when I leave - sleeping in the middle of a big room with space all around me may be rather unsettling!

And, as before, a video tour!

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Radio Gymnastics

noreply@blogger.com (Daniel) — Tue, 08 Jun 2010 02:50:00 +0000

Every Monday evening, right before we start our club activities (but after the compulsory gathering), we undertake something known as 「ラジオ体操」or, in English, Radio Gymnastics.

This tradition, which I have no idea when it originated but strongly suspect it was sometime in the post-war 50s, begins with removing the tiny, battery-powered mono cassette (!) player from the storage room. This task is, of course, relegated to a first year student. After the device has been removed and placed in a suitable position, we spread out in a large circe in the garage or, if as in the above photo we are outside, in rows according to year-level. The play button is pushed, and the gymnastics begin.

What follows is something that conjures up in my mind a mix of Play School, 1984 and 50s socialism (which, believe you me, Japan was). The piano starts playing and a man with a kind and all-too-happy voice begins counting sets of eight while briefly explaining the exercises. Of course, right away I am reminded of the piano man in Play School, who I remember being excited at seeing whenever they rarely showed him ("So that's where the music came from!"). This Play School connection is futher enhanced by the fact that some of the things we do strongly resemble a piano-accompanied activity that I often partook in whilst watching the show - 'Heads, Shoulders, Knees and Toes', anyone?

Needless to say, I was struggling to contain a grin the first time I partook in this activity. The Korean student to my right, however, was not so successful, and burst out with laughter. None of this fazed the Japanese students though. They have apparently been doing this exact same exercise since they were little children in primary school and as such all knew the moves by heart. Not one of them batted an eyelid when they found out that we had to continue those same activities as university students!

The longer I stay in Japan, the more I realise just how fundamentally different our cultures are. It goes all the way down to our ways of thinking - distilled down to a very basic level, it's individualism vs. what's best for the group. But I won't go into such a discussion in this post, as it only has one photo, and I'll probably kill people with boredom.

(PS: The above photo was taken at the recent trip out to the University's practice grounds in Niigata Prefecture. I snuck in this photo while no-one was looking - it turned out pretty well, I think!)

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Korea

noreply@blogger.com (Daniel) — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 17:33:00 +0000

I find it a little weird to be writing a blog about something that happened half a month ago. I really should have written this post earlier, but it seems a combination of busyness and laziness has meant that I kept putting it off. If I were to make my contribution to the social problem of blaming someone else for everything, I would say that it's just a lot easier for me to quickly upload photos on Facebook and tell people about my experiences that way. But I won't say that...

...anyway, back on topic: two or so weeks ago I flew over to Korea with three friends of mine. I needn't mention that it was the South that we went to - although I'm just dying (hah) for a visit to Pyongyang. We spent the entirety of the four days that we were there in Seoul, which was only a two-hour plane trip from Tokyo. To put that in perspective, travelling to another country took about the same time as flying from Adelaide to Sydney - and cost about the same too!

Japanese Countryside

Contrary to what I had thought, Korea was a very different country to Japan in almost every respect. Sure, the languages share the same grammatical structure and the two peoples look similar (at a first glance) - but that is where the similarities end, and the latter isn't even really the case.
In fact, I'll begin my description of how Korea and Japan are different by talking about the differences in appearance of the people (of course all of the following is just my own somewhat exaggerated opinion and shouldn't be taken too seriously).
Let's start with the guys. Korean guys are in general taller and more well-built than Japanese guys. This latter fact is in no doubt helped by the two years of compulsory military service that they have to undergo. As a result, the fashion is also more 'manly', with less of the crazy fashions that you'll see in Japan (not that that's a bad thing!).
On to the women. Where a Japanese woman could be described as petit and cute, a Korean woman could be generalised as... well, more 'well-bult' shall we say. They also have a reputation for being more sassy.

The atmosphere of Seoul is also very different from that of Tokyo. Tokyo is what all modern cities should aspire to be. It has an amazing, punctual transportation system of trains, subways, buses and highways that covers pretty much everywhere you need to go. If you don't live in the centre of Tokyo (few people do), you live near a train that will get you there within an hour. As a result, the streets are surprisingly empty and calm at any time of the day. Calm, that is, except for the maniacal cyclists, who seem to have no regard at all for road laws, riding all over the footpaths and roads in any manner they please. I've had many near misses, and I don't think it will be long before there's an accidental (or otherwise) collision.
Seoul, on the other hand, is what most other major cities in the world actually are. That is, the streets are packed with cars, each competing with each other for right of way and resulting in no-one really getting anywhere. Cars aren't afraid to use their horns, and the cyclists stay well away for fear of their lives.

Korean food is also very different to Japanese. For starters, there are two stereotypes about Korean food - once is that it's spicy, and the second is that it comprises entirely of meat grilled on a hotplate on the table in front of you. Often it's both.

In reality, those stereotypes aren't too far off. Compared to Japan, whose cuisine can best be described as 'rice with condiments', Korean food has an abundance of both meat and vegetables. And it's cheap! On one night, we stuffed ourselves with delicious grilled beef at a local eatery that our Korean contact had taken us to, eating easily a three-person portion each. That, combined with drinks, amounted to less than $20 - something that would be impossible in Japan, especially considering how much meat we ate.

But perhaps the most interesting and unique food we ate in Korea was of chicken, not beef. In a large traditional style Korean house which had been converted into a restaurant and was a favourite of the old President, we savoured on the delicacy of chicken soup. But not just any chicken soup - this one had a whole chicken in it (each), stuffed with rice and cure-all ginseng. Oh, and did I mention that the chicken was black?

Very fiddly to eat with nothing but chopsticks, but oh so satisfying. My mouth is still salivating at the thought...

The final difference that I'd like to mention about Korea reflects not the country itself but my personal abilities. Whereas in my time in Japan I've come to be able to read and understand and even speak enough to live a daily life, going to Korea was my first experience in going to a country where I could understand nothing. Even the writing system was foreign to me. (Korea used to use Chinese characters (漢字) like China and Japan, but changed after WWII to distance themselves from their old-time rulers. Instead, they have hangul (한글), which is a phonetic alphabet invented by a Korean king some hundreds of years ago and supposedly mimics the way the mouth moves when words are pronounced.)
Still, we were luckily enough to have a guide who showed us around to all of the best eateries and tourist attractions. And since all Koreans spend seven years learning English in high school, there were not really any problems with speaking to the, uh, local population either... ;)

In any case, I think you'd all like to see some more photos. Here they are!

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We have LIFE!

noreply@blogger.com (Daniel) — Thu, 06 May 2010 03:08:00 +0000

It all started in late September last year. My friend Dave and I travelled out to a random train station to check out the 'Sexy Football Club' (I'll leave that to your imaginations). As we were leaving, we came across what appeared to be a traffic safety promotion, featuring a giant cat:

They were also handing out little pots of flowers for free that day. If you look closely at my hand, you can see that I'm holding a bag with the pot of flowers in it. Somehow, those flowers made it back to my dorm room and were placed on my balcony.

It's a miracle that they're still alive. They have lived through a freezing winter and intermittent periods of dehydration (oops), coming to the verge of death more than once. Throughout all of this, all they have had to survive on is water, which slowly but steadily washes away their life-soil.

But today, when I went out to pull in my washing, I was greeted by a surprise. LIFE! (a.k.a. some flowers). I am not hesitating to call this the greatest achievement of my trip so far.

And finally, as a little treat, here's a photo of Mt. Fuji I snapped whilst on the way back from the SuperGT race at Fuji Speedway on Sunday:

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Waseda University Automobile Club

noreply@blogger.com (Daniel) — Wed, 05 May 2010 03:20:00 +0000

Clubs are a big thing in Japanese universities, and especially at Waseda. To sum things up very briefly, and to avoid a huge rant, Japan is very much about belonging to a group. You are judged by what Uni you attend, what faculty you're in or what company you're working for. When introducing yourself, you say, for example: "早稲田大学の国際教養学部の三年のグリーリダニエルです" - "I'm Daniel Grilli, a third-year at the School of International Liberal Studies at Waseda University". Crucially, though, the word order in Japanese is in reverse, and your name always comes last.

Within the Universities themselves it is almost mandatory to join a club or their more casual equivalent, a circle. As I mentioned before, Waseda is full of them - rumour has it that there are more than 300 tennis circles alone! (Although the number of those that actually play tennis as opposed to having nomikai all the time is pretty low)

It all kicks off with a campus-wide fair at the beginning of the Spring semester where each club vies for your attention by handing out fliers. There's literally a club for anything, from music to sports (cricket!) to mountain climbing to sailing. I was very tempted to join a few, particularly the acapella circle, which counts the famous Gospellers as part of it's alumni, until I spied two guys in racing suits on a chance visit to the campus. Now this was what I was talking about!!

The Waseda University Automobile Club (早稲田大学自動車部 or WUAC) is no normal club. It's been around since the dawn of the Japanese automobile industry in the 30s and is part of the university proper. That means they have a garage on campus (a miracle considering we're in space-constricted Shinjuku) and recieve money every year.

They participate in a variety of events, from Gymkanas to Rally-style time attacks to the incredibly awesome six-hour, off-road, kei-car endurance race. The cars they use are quite varied: an older Civic with an Integra Type-R engine is used for their circuit work, whereas a tiny but potent Toyota Starlet GT Turbo gets called in for off-road duty. And did I mention that they can do almost anything to the car in their garage?

My experience with the club began at a welcome BBQ one Monday night. It was interesting to see the premises and hear from the members as to the activities - I was really excited. But the most exciting part was to come. (Parents please skip to next paragraph).

One guy who had befriended me, a third year named Shinichiro, asked me if I wanted to go for a drive with him after the BBQ was over. "The only thing is though", he said, "we'll be getting back at around 4 - 5 am". I was doubtful at first, but as he had a lovely white Skyline R33 GTS-T parked outside, I wasn't about to let an opportunity like this pass me by. We ended up driving for a couple of hours to a (relatively) quiet bit of road under a highway somewhere south of Haneda Airport, where we met up with members from the Keio University club, our arch-rival. It was all friendly tonight though, and we hung around and chatted while people took turns to practice their drifting/ handbreak-turning skills while there were no trucks moving past. I think that's all I shall mention of that night...

Needless to say I joined the club as soon as possible. I haven't been to another late-night outing since, but that's not because of a lack of opportunities - rather, I need my sleep!

Joining the club itself is, as I said on Facebook, rather similar to joining the military. I need to pass a health check and cardiogram, pass a test to reach the first rank and always be respectful to my superiors (for those of you that don't know, Japanese has various forms depending on whether you are speaking casually to friends or to a superior in a company etc. I really dislike using the polite, honorific form because it's wordy and, I feel, creates divisions between people of different ranks).

We start off each club session with a gathering where everyone stands in file according to rank with the leader at the head. Next is steering practice. Each person picks up a wheel and practices left and right turns whilst holding the wheel up in the air and trying to keep it as centred as possible. It's a good idea as you want that sort of thing to be instinctual when you're trying to do a handbreak-turn at speed!

What follows then largely depends on what events are approaching. There's always car maintenance/ modifications to do, as well as study for the test (car readiness checklist). Things usually wrap up at around 10pm, which is no problem for me as I live only five minutes away.

Anyway, this post is getting rather long, so I'll get to the part with the photos in it!

Last week the club held the 'New-Members' Gymkhana' in a carpark in the mountains four hours or so north of Tokyo. Us newly inducted members were given an old EK Civic (with EK plates in photo) and were either taught to drive if we didn't know how or taught to handbreak turn if we did. A handbreak turn isn't easy, especially when someone's trying to explain the theory of applying centrifugal forces in Japanese! I think I kind of got the hang of it in the end, though.

Other things we could do were to ride alongside the full members in their cars as they practiced on a gymkhana course. Let me tell you that even a 660cc Suzuki Alto feels fast in a small carpark!

But enough talk - here are the photos!

I'm sure there'll be much more fun to come!

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桜 Sakura

noreply@blogger.com (Daniel) — Sun, 04 Apr 2010 07:38:00 +0000

Spring is in the air, and for Japan, that means one thing: sakura, or cherry blossoms.
For centuries they have been admired, in both painting and poem, for their outstanding, fragile, beauty. You see, the blossoms only last for two weeks or so, and as such they are often used as a metaphor for life: beautiful, but ever so short.

I won't go into the philosophising (brain not working well enough for that), but what I will do is share you some photos I took whilst on my homestay in Kagoshima Prefecture, down on the southern island of Kyushu. The trees at this time weren't quite fully blossomed - but close enough I think. Enjoy!

Finally, I'd like to leave you with a song. It seems that every Japanese singer has their own version on the theme of sakura, but this particular one is from one of my favourite bands, Monkey Majik. I first heard it at their concert a month ago. Enjoy!

PS: The spring (???) vacation is finally at an end - I'm back to Uni on Tuesday. It's been a blast though, and there's certainly more fun to come!

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Choki Choki

noreply@blogger.com (Daniel) — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 03:39:00 +0000

This little story began one chilly night in early January. I had just gotten back to Tokyo from a rest-break in Adelaide, I was feeling better than I had been for months and months, and I felt like going out for once.
"Let's go to Shibuya!" I said to my friend Dave, and so, after making dinner and getting dressed up in clothes completely inappropriate for the weather (a shirt and a light jacket) we took the 10-minute train ride there.
For those of you that don't know, Shibuya is one of the 'coolest' places in Tokyo. Most of you will know it for the massive pedestrian crossing (pictured) they have right outside of the station, and there's a good reason it's so busy. Packed with shops of all kinds, restaurants, bars, clubs, love hotels and karaoke parlours, Shibuya is a haven for young people. It's only a short walk from cool fashion central Harajuku as well.

As my friend and I were waiting to cross the above intersection, we were approached by two young men. Now, my friend Dave is an Australian of Chinese descent, so he is easily mistaken for a Japanese, as these men did:
"Ask your friend if he would like to be a model for our magazine" (in Japanese of course).
What! Poor Dave (sorry man)...
Anyway, after talking to these guys a while and giving them my contact details, we headed off to walk around...but my mind was abuzz. Sure, I'd heard of people being scouted for being models in Tokyo, and in fact I have a model friend, but me? I'm no イケメン!

The photoshoot was to be on a Friday, on which I had class. I was at first reluctant to skip my class (I'm too good of a student >.>), but then I decided that this opportunity was too good to pass up. So, on January the 22nd, I arrived in Shibuya again, fresh and early in the morning.
Fortunately, there was to be one other model for that shoot, so I would not have to brave the dangers of an off-the-street modelling request alone! He American and also a first-time model, and, to jump ahead a bit, after that day we became good friends.
After waiting a few minutes, we were told to get into a nondescript, apparently rental white van. Uhh.... I suppose it was a good sign that the van was white. All the bad stuff happens in black vans, right?
We drove around for a while, leaving Shibuya and heading into the suburbs, stopping only to pick up a short Japanese woman (random) and the clothes (that explains the van). Before long we had arrived at the studio where the shooting was to take place!
Everyone was really nice, even if they didn't really tell us what we had to do. "Come here", "Wear this" and "Look serious" were about the extent of their instructions. Thankfully, because I was not alone, I was able to share nervous giggles and uncomprehending shrugs with my new-found friend.

I could write more, but I think all you really want to see are the pictures. The magazine came out last month and has just been replaced by a new issue. The magazine title, "Choki Choki", is the Japanese onomatopoeia for the sound that scissors make, and as such it's a young men's hairstyle/fashion magazine. Also, apparently, a magazine that almost never uses foreign models (which are otherwise all the rage here).
Enjoy, and try not to laugh too much (the clothes they made us wear are pretty weird).

It was only a one-off job so I'm not really a model now - but it was a great experience and a priceless souvenir of my time in Japan!

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春休み (Spring Break)

noreply@blogger.com (Daniel) — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 09:50:00 +0000

I know I'm not a good blogger. It's been nearly two months since my last blog post - that's unexcusable! And I have no excuses, in any case.

Oh well, I guess I'll just have to make up for it from now on. Since too much has happened since I last wrote a blog, however, this post will just cover some random points from the last couple of months of my time in Japan, focusing on the Spring Vacation, which I am currently in the middle of.

First, I think I have finally decided that Spring is may favourite season of the year. That first warm, sunny day, with a slight smell of pollen on the air, lifts my spirits so much after the long, cold winter. In my mind, I've come to associate Japan with cold and winter because it seems like that's the only season I've experienced in this country (forgetting the hot, humid weather when I first arrived...).
Spring is also the season of flowers (yay!). First come the 梅(ume; plum blossoms), whose small, fragrant flowers so contrast the dead winter wear of the trees around them that they have captured my heart. I want to plant one in the garden at home when I get back! (if it will grow...) After that are the 桜(sakura; cherry blossoms), that haven't bloomed quite yet but which I am looking forward to with great anticipation.
Spring makes me feel so alive!

Two weeks ago, I left the Kanto area for the first time on a trip with my American friends Mike and Brett. Typical for an all-guy trip, only the bare essentials were organised (not even the entire trip) and very little advance research was done. Research such as, say, where exactly the bus departed from. Needless to say, we did not make it to a single bus with any meaningful amount of time to spare; rather, we gave ourselves some good morning exercise each time by running a block or so, five minutes before departure time, in frantic search for our buses. Departing on time with no hassles would be boring, I think!

During our trip, we headed to the West (South?) side of Japan, starting from Nagoya. In Nagoya, we met up with my friend Yuri, who had come to Adelaide in 2008/2009 for an exchange. She showed us around several interesting places, such as the castle (unfortunately a replica as the original one was, um, burnt down in WWII) and the Toyota Automobile Museum - the latter of which we arrived in Yuri's mother's pink Yaris (wooo!) and departed in a cool mag-lev train.
Having left Tokyo, we had begun to notice various changes - the trains departed less often, the people looked a little different, there was less Louis Vuitton around (only one in three people had an item now, instead of one in two), and, having less foreigners around, we attracted more stares (usually welcome ones from pretty girls). In fact, on one occasion, my friend was able to get a girl's phone number simply by smiling at her through the window of a pub - something that probably wouldn't have happened in Tokyo. But did happen again in Osaka. Um, I probably shouldn't be writing about these things in my blog...

...anyway, the next stop was the Kansai region, were the people were famed for being friendlier than the cold-hearted busybodies of Tokyo. First up was Kyoto, the old Imperial capital of Japan, and a sightseeing heaven. Unlike Tokyo, which had been built straight up from the winding, narrow streets of old Edo, Kyoto was built from the start (over a thousand years ago) in a grid pattern, much like our beloved Adelaide. The star attractions of Kyoto are its Buddhist temples, many of which were almost as old as the city itself, and Gion, the old Geisha district which retains to this day much of its old-Japan feel.
Like I had mentioned earlier, my friends and I had no plan, so, and I say this with the utmost regret, we were not able to partake in a day long temple-crawl with a bunch of other camera-happy tourists. Instead, we just followed our feet, a few scant recommendations and our instincts ("let's climb to a temple on a mountain!!") and still managed to see many beautiful things. I for one quite enjoy looking at a rudimentary map, finding a temple on the edge, way apart from anything else, and spending an a couple of hours trying to find a way to get there (no, I am not being sarcastic here).
My only regret of our time in Kyoto was that we didn't go to the Ninja restaurant with a built-in underground labyrinth. I guess that will have to wait for next time...

Our second stop in the Kansai area was Osaka, the second largest city in Japan, and, in 2009 at least, the second-most expensive city to live in in the world. Of course, Tokyo was number one. Yay!
There's not much I can really say about our time here, as, being the weekend, we took the time to go out on Friday and Saturday nights. Going to the all-night all-you-can-drink club sounded like a good idea until we realised that such a place would attract a particular crowd which we didn't really want to be a part of...
Some Osaka interesting experiences:

Walking past a public car-park in the 'night life' area of Osaka and seeing four Lamborghinis parked next to each other. A closer inspection revealed an F430 Spider a little further inside the building. I wonder who could own them...
Finding an Australian pub and ordering a Pure Blonde for $10. The taste was so light and sweet (and I do not say those two things in a good way) compared to the Japanese beer I have been drinking, of which Asahi is only the start.
One of my friends coming home from a night out with a red cowboy hat. Of course I remember where we got it from (a random Japanese dude), but still very amusing nonetheless.
Being treated to a free live event at the hostel we were staying at. It was Tate Takako, an apparently famous Japanese singer, who in any rate had a very beautiful voice.
The beautiful plum-blossom orchard at the Osaka Castle (see photos).
Realising all too late that the bus station was actually several blocks away from the train station. Yay!

After Osaka we had only one more destination: Hiroshima. Most of you will know this place as the first city in the world to have felt the destruction of an atomic bomb - but surprisingly, very little in the city today gives a hint of the terrible events that happened many years ago. Indeed, Hiroshima is quite a bustling city! It even had a substantial dodgy night-life area, which by now my friends and I had taken to use as a trademark of a Japanese city - every one we visited had one! (Tokyo has many). Not that we entered any of the establishments - it was amusing enough to just walk and observe from the street.
We spent most of our time there out visiting some of the various islands nearby, including the incredibly beautiful Miyajima. For those of you that don't know, Miyajima is a world heritage site, and for a very good reason - it's a forested paradise complete with deer roaming the streets, monkeys climbing the buildings and incredible temples and shrines. In particularly, the 鳥居 (tori-i; literally bird's nest or the gates you see in front of a Shinto shrine) of the main shrine is famous for the fact that it is partially submerged at high tide. Just have a look at the photo and you'll understand!

On Miyajima we were finally able to realise our wish of climbing to the top of a mountain to a shrine. Not only that, but this shrine housed the eternal flame of peace! Too bad I did not think to take a photo...
The other item of interest in Hiroshima was, of course, the various memorials they had to the atomic bombing event. Most famous is the 原爆ドーム, or Atomic Bomb Dome, which stands, in ruins, as a monument to the bombing. Nearby is the peace park with various statues and monuments, as well as the confronting museum. I won't go into detail about what is inside - you have to see it for yourself - but suffice to say that I really hope people don't use atomic weapons again in the future. Especially considering that modern technology means that the bombs of today can be over 3,000 times as powerful as the one dropped on Hiroshima....

But enough of that sad story. I think I have made it to last week, when I returned back to Tokyo. After a hurried few loads of washing, attending a Monkey Majik concert (long story short: awesome) and battling a cold, I was back on the road again - this time to Fukushima for skiing!
Despite my reservations, it was very fun, if a little painful. I was able to get down an intermediate-level slope more or less in control and with only a few falls by the end of it - I can't wait to go again!
One thing that makes skiing in Japan quite unique (apart from perhaps Iceland or Scandanavia), however, is that after abusing your body in the cold during the day, you can retire to a hot spring in the night for a much needed rest. Once I had overcome my initial embarrassment (as long as no-one looks down, it's all ok), I found myself really enjoying the whole concept of a hot spring. In particular, the 露天風呂 (Rotenburo; open-air bath), which allowed you to enjoy both the warm water with your body and the cold snow falling on your head at the same time was just magical. Of course I have no photos, though...

I think that's enough writing for one blog post. I'll just leave you all with a small teaser of what's to come in my next post....

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Waseda El Dorado

noreply@blogger.com (Daniel) — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 07:48:00 +0000

I love walking around my local area. There's no end to what you can find on a lazy afternoon or evening stroll: vast parks that transport you out of the hustle-and-bustle, shrines and temples for every occasion, tiny shops selling specialty goods (taiyaki!), secret research labs and, occasionally, really cool buildings.
This post is about one of the latter. I was walking around the far side of Waseda University, an area I hadn't really been to before, while waiting for a friend one day. Just as I was about to head back, to my great surprise I stumbled across an amazing building right next to the campus!
As the sign above shows, it was called "Waseda El Dorado". It was, apparently, the creation of an ex-Waseda student, and is 'gaudy Gaudiesque".
Whatever the critics may say of it, I absolutely loved it. It's like a fantasy book come to life in a building. The bottom floor is occupied by several shops - an antiques store and a hair salon I think it was - while the rest is apartments. There is a small entrance-corridor/lobby that can be freely entered as well, which allows one to have a good look at the amazing detail which has gone into this building. Everything, and I mean everything, has been looked after, which reminds me of the similar level of detail found in the Ghibli museum (You'll have to visit to see that one though - no photos allowed!).
I could go on and attempt to describe the building some more, but I think that pictures will speak more than any of my words could. Enjoy!

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成人式 (Coming of Age Ceremony)

noreply@blogger.com (Daniel) — Sat, 16 Jan 2010 11:54:00 +0000

As I mentioned in my last blog post, this Monday I attended the coming-of-age ceremony. Every year, the second Monday of January is 'Coming-of-Age-Day' - the time when, as the name suggests, you graduate from childhood and become an adult!

In Japan, being 20 is the equivalent of being 18 in Australia. You can drink (legally, anyway...), you can vote, and I guess that for all legal purposes and whatnot you are now an adult. As to whether this is matched by personal feeling (who of you readers really felt like you were an adult when you were 18?), well, that is another matter. People seem to be young for much longer these days!

In any case, this story begins towards the end of last year. One day I opened my mailbox, and, after throwing away the usual stack of junk mail, was surprised to find myself with an invite to the seijin shiki (Coming of age ceremony) of Shinjuku, the ward (more like city!) in which I live. I am a foreigner, so I had no idea that I would be invited to an event like this - but I am not one to complain! Luckily, I knew some other people who were to be going as well, so just after lunch on Monday we took the train to Shinjuku.

The event was held at the Keio Plaza Hotel, one of the nicer hotels on the West side of Shinjuku. Now, Shinjuku is a very interesting city. It's reason for existence is one of the world's biggest and busiest train stations that lies smack-bang in the centre of the city (when I say city here, you must remember that it's really just, well, a suburb of Tokyo, but it's certainly bigger than most city-centres in Australia!). This station neatly divides Shinjuku into two parts: East and West. East Shinjuku is probably what most people think of when they picture Tokyo - neon lights, shops everywhere, alleyways, a huge red-light district- in other words, a lively, bustling place.

West Shinjuku, on the other hand, is much more modern and reminds me somewhat of Singapore. Lots of tall towers, hotels, government buildings and wide, tree-lined streets. It seems like another world when compared to the bustling activity of the East.

Now, I seem to have gotten a little distracted... where was I... oh yes, the seijin shiki. As we had approached the hotel, we had begun seeing girls dressed in magnificently coloured and patterned, long-sleeved kimono with white, fur stoles on their shoulders. 'They must be going where we are!', we all thought. And we were right - upon arriving in the hotel, we were greeted to a whole ball-room full of people celebrating their coming-of-age. The girls were, as mentioned before, almost all attired in their kimono, and while some of the guys were wearing traditional hakama costume, most wore western-style suits.
I thought it a little bit strange that this was the case - why had the men moved on to suits while the girls remained in traditional costume? Was it because they would soon become suit-wearing sarariman? In any case, I wasn't going to complain- the kimono were beautiful:

Of course, as is the case with any event, some of the girls were waaaay overdone with fake tans, too much make-up and bee-hives of hair. Most of them had remembered discretion, however, and it was interesting to compare the different colours and patterns on the kimono. One girl, I was amused to notice, had managed to convey her gothic fashion sense into how she dressed in a kimono! (Unfortunately I did not manage to take a photo)

There wasn't really all that much to do at the event itself. It was mainly just a wander-around-and-chat-with-your-friends affair. As this was an event that you attended in your local area, most of the people there would be friends that you had gone to school with, and as such the event was also a huge reunion of sorts. Being foreigners and thus not having grown up with the people in the area we didn't really have much to do at all, so we just spent our time walking around, chatting and comparing kimono.
There were snack foods and drinks provided as well, which I did not touch except for having a few very sour pieces of fruit. I must say, though, that it was quite amusing to see some of the girls, all dressed prettily in kimono and make-up, stuffing themselves with food!

Finally, just before we left, my friend and I also managed to meet some nice girls who let us have our photo taken with them. This, and the others, will serve to remind me of a day when I was allowed to participate in the traditional event of another country - a once-in-a-lifetime experience!

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Sorry!

noreply@blogger.com (Daniel) — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 08:14:00 +0000

I feel very bad that this blog has been let go for so long. It must be, what, at least a month since my last post?
Anyway, in the meantime, I returned to Adelaide for Christmas and New Year's (as most of you know) during my 'winter vacation' for a much-needed break. I spent my days reading fantasy books (how I love them - dangerously so. More addictive than the internet!) and playing games. Assassin's Creed 2 is great, and I heartily recommend it to anyone, especially if you're Italian and you love history. I just love hearing the cries of 'Hey, you stronzo!' in the comical, but completely natural, English-Italian mix.

Even though I'd been in Japan for three months already, it was still good to return to Adelaide. The pace of life there is just a lot more relaxed, and there's more room to do everything. It helps to be with friends and family too.
However, there was one thing that I found myself missing - while walking from Chinatown to Rundle Mall, I was thirsty, and wanted a drink. 'No worries', I thought, 'I'll just pick something up from a vending machine....'
...
...
...
And then I realised there were no vending machines to be found. I had to go into a shop and pay three dollars for a bottle of water? What is this place! Where is the convenience?!
In case you couldn't read the sarcasm, I wasn't really that upset, but I did miss the convenience of the ever-present vending machines in Japan. Here's a photo of one to tide you all over until I write my next blog post!

Speaking of which, I promise I'll write another blog post very soon. I have a bit of work to do this week, but I should have time to do it before the weekend is over. It's going to be about the 'coming-of-age-ceremony' that I attended yesterday - so look forward to photos of pretty kimono!

How to Party: Japanese Style

noreply@blogger.com (Daniel) — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 07:09:00 +0000

1: Find a suitable reason for throwing a party. Perhaps you’re welcoming new international students as they’ve just arrived, or maybe the week after that, or even the week after that too. Perhaps you’re celebrating the end of a successful year, or perhaps you’re just celebrating the passing of another month! It can be anything- as with most cultures, the Japanese don’t need a big occasion to party.

2: Meet at the designated meeting place, usually in front of a station. In Japan, or Tokyo at least, the area around a station is where all the action is. You’ll find department stores, restaurants, cafes, bakeries, CD shops, pachinko parlours, izakaya (Japanese-style pubs), more Western-style pubs, bars, clubs, supermarkets…. If you’re looking for something, chances are it will be near a station!
Most stations have a space in front of them, like a round-about, where it is very convenient for people to gather. Meet all of your fellow party-goers here!

3: The first party. This is usually a nomihoudai (all-you-can-drink) at an izakaya. Basically, it’s a medium-sized room with lots of low, traditional Japanese tables, and cushions for seats. The tables are laden with platters of food (yay!) and, inevitably, sake (alcohol). There are apparently two drinks of choice at a nomikai – beer (Asahi) and sawaa, which comes served in jugs and is basically what we’d call an alcopop, although less sweet. There’s also some tea for a refresher as well.
Once everyone has entered the room and found a seat, a small speech is made, glasses are filled, and then a cry of ‘kampai!’ is made by all. It’s time to start!
A nomihoudai is, like I mentioned, an all-you-can-drink affair – for two hours. The price is fairly reasonable, if you’re a first year or an international student – usually something like 2,500 yen, or about $~32 AUD. If you’re a sempai, or older student, you will be paying more...but being a sempai has it’s advantages! If it so pleases you, at any time during the night you can single out your favourite younger student (the word escapes me…) and command them ‘nome!’- drink!

4: The two hours have by now gone by, quickly or otherwise, and it’s time to leave if you can. Put your shoes back on, descend the many flights of stairs, and make your way back to everyone’s favourite meeting place – the roundabout! Once here, to celebrate the end of the party, gather with all of your friends in a circle, thank the organisers, and clap once all together. This is the end of the formal proceedings...

5: ...but not the night! Look at your watch. What? It’s only 10pm? (Remember, the first party was for two hours only, and included dinner, so it didn’t start all that late). Who wants to go to the nijikai (second party)?
The nijikai could be at another izakaya or it could be at a pub (English style). Not everyone from the first party attends, but there’s usually a sizable crowd. This time, however, the proceedings are rather slower as everyone’s rather, you could say, ‘well-greased’.

6: The second party’s over, and it’s back again to the roundabout! By this time, it’s nearly 12, and that means the time for the last train is rapidly approaching. You know you should get going soon, but hey, it’s not that late really, and you just want to talk to that friend a little longer…

7: Oh noes! You’ve missed the last train! Whatever can you do? Why, go to an all-night karaoke of course – that’s the third party! It’s good value, too – you can sing/chat/sleep your way through the hours until the first train the next morning (5:30 or so) for a set price.

Wasn’t that a fun night?

**DISCLAIMER** This does not reflect my own experiences, but rather observations I have made from my limited experiences of going to parties during my time here. For those of you that doubt me in this disclaimer, let it be known that my dorm is in walking distance from the station and hence there is no ‘last train’ for me. :P

Sorry it's been so long...

noreply@blogger.com (Daniel) — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 07:50:00 +0000

First of all, I'd like to apologise for failing to write a blog for so long. My neglect has partly to do with the fact that I haven't done anything especially interesting of late, and a lot to do with the fact that I've been on-and-off unwell - curse you glandular fever!

However, it does me no good to dwell on negatives like this, so, at the behest of my friends back in Adelaide, I will once again write a blog! But what to write about?
In the first few weeks that I was here, it was always easy to find a subject to write on, for everything was new and exciting. As I have become more accustomed to life in Japan, though, things that were once new and wacky are now simply part of my every-day life; but that's not to say that things aren't exciting. Far from it - I'm having a great time here!

One of the things I am enjoying the most is gradually being able to understand (and to a lesser extent speak) Japanese. The multitude of Kanji (Chinese characters), of which were once all but incomprehensible to me, are now revealing their secrets, and I can gradually grasp the meaning of Tohoshinki's ballads. Indeed, it seems that sometimes there are things that can be better expressed in Japanese than English - or at least they come to my mind in Japanese first. I am taking that as a good sign that I am learning!

Japanese is particularly interesting because of the great subtlety of meaning that it can convey. Often, tone is conveyed not through the tone of a speaker's voice, but by their choice of words. There is polite speech and there is casual speech, there is masculine speech and feminine speech, and so on. In contrast to English, where one's type of speech (formal vs casual) is largely dictated by choice of words, Japanese uses the same words but with different conjugations - for example, 'to go' is ikimasu in polite/semi-polite form, but merely iku when speaking casually. Not only that, but because the Japanese love to shorten EVERYTHING (to give a familiar example, 'Pocket Monsters' becomes 'PokeMon' ), listening to casual speech is like listening to another language entirely! And I haven't even mentioned keigo, the super-polite way of speaking, because I get annoyed when all of the shopkeepers etc speak it to me and I cannot understand them. Oh well, it's quite the challenge, but I guess as I've always found understanding things to be satisfying, I am enjoying it.

Another part of the language that doesn't really translate into English is that many words have the same pronunciation but different meanings. This can be interesting in two ways - firstly to create such confusing sentences as:

橋の端で箸で食べた。
Hashi no hashi de hashi de tabeta.

I ate with chopsticks on the edge of the bridge.

Of course, there are subtle pronunciational differences between all of the above hashi, but I can't pick them up in everyday speech. That's why I found Chinese so hard ~_~".
The other is in creating multiple meanings in things like poems. As my Japanese is nowhere near good enough to create a poem (or to find a suitable example), I'll just give you one example of where it's similar to English:

松＝ matsu = pine (tree)
待つ = matsu = to wait

It's not hard to see how you could do a similar play on words in English with the word 'pine'. This is just the tip of the iceberg, however, and you can see why it'd be hard to translate a poem from Japanese into English if it contained things like this.

Well, it seems like I have run out of steam for writing this blog post - I hope I didn't bore you to death with my ranting on language! To make up for it somewhat, I suppose I'll post up some pictures of food to torment, er, show you what my life is like in Japan!

Great, now I've made myself hungry...

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Sou-Kei Sen

noreply@blogger.com (Daniel) — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 08:12:00 +0000

As many of you may know, I'm not the world's biggest sports fan. I usually leave the room when the AFL comes onto the TV, pay no attention to the latest tennis celebrity and only watch the football (you know which type!) every four years. And baseball? Does such a sport even exist outside of faint rumours from American soaps and movies?
How, then, did I find myself waking up at 6:30 am on a Saturday morning to attend a baseball game in the middle of Tokyo?

The reason behind this apparent lunacy of mine is that this was no ordinary game of baseball - it was the 早慶戦　Sou-Kei Sen, or the bi-annual Waseda University vs. Keio University baseball game. To put it simply, Waseda University (for the forgetful among you, that's where I am studying now) and Keio are long-time rivals. How long? Try over a hundred years - the first game was apparently played in 1903. How could I miss out on such a historic event as this?

The game was due to start at 1pm, but in order to secure ourselves some decent seats and to properly enjoy the pre-match celebrations, we all met up at a station near the Jingu Stadium at the wonderful time of 8am. There, we were met by members of WIC (Waseda International Circle), basically a group of friendly Japanese students who organise events and things for us international students. After hanging around for a while, we moved slowly to the stadium, eventually getting in at 10am or so.

Why we were required to get in so early became apparent shortly after we had sat down - there were to be many pre-match events to keep us occupied. You know, cheerleaders, singing university songs, giving respect to the other university, raising the flag, raising our fists, cheering for the other university....wait, what?

To begin with, let me explain a little about the cheerleaders. Of course there were the obligatory short-skirted and pom-pommed female kind, but they were only secondary to the male cheerleaders, who seemed to be running the show. These guys were dressed in a traditional Japanese black school uniform (just think of what you've seen in manga or anime) with a Waseda armband. Their 'cheerleading' seemed to consist of leading the singing, shouting at the tops of their voices and performing strange arm-movements and dances. Rather odd, but you get used to it after a while.

What I did not really get used to was the nature of the rivalry between the universities. For something that has been going on for over one hundred years, I would have expected it to have been crazy: rabid fans hurling insults at each other, brass bands competing with each other to fill the stadium with noise and cheerleading squads attempting to outdo each other in the splendor of their routines. However, I could not have been more wrong.
Of course, I should have expected this, being in Japan where tradition and respect is still, well, respected. Instead of shouting rabidly at the other side of the stadium, we each took our turns at singing our university anthems (all three verses, which made me realise just how laid back us Aussies are - when was the last time you sang the second verse of Advance Australia Fair?), removing our hats/Waseda flags/etc as Keio did so. We each gave a cheer for each other before the game. We even exchanged cheerleaders! That's right, a detachment of Keio University cheerleaders was sent over to our stage before the game, at the same time as we sent ours to them, to perform a small routine - and no-one thought anything of it! Amazing.(N.B. I thought Waseda's cheerleaders had the better routine in the end, but those of Keio were somewhat prettier overall. ;) )

Another aspect of the proceedings that interested me was how, as one of my American friends put it, they were so reminiscent of 1930s Germany. We had the military-style brass band, we had the numerous patriotic songs, we had the cheerleaders in Prussian-style uniform - we even had the fist raising! It was an amazing experience, and something that was so different to what I ever could have imagined.

The game itself was quite interesting as well, as far as sports go. If I have the chance, I would like to go to see a game in the U.S. sometime, just to compare things. I'm sure that would be another enlightening experience!
The result, though, was not something to be too happy about:

Oh, yes, I should mention one other thing: October 31st was also significant for another reason: it was Halloween! Having never celebrated this custom before, my Australian friend Dave and I decided we may as well make the most of having two important events on the one day:

We wore those costumes for the whole day. I don't know if it was because we were foreigners, because we were Pikachu, or because we were two Pikachu's together, but we attracted attention wherever we went. Quite unusually for Japanese, people were outright staring at us, and there were constant cries of 'Pikachu da!' (It's Pikachu!) as we travelled between our dorm and the stadium. All of this was very entertaining to Dave and I, who had worn sunglasses to a) disguise ourselves and b) hide our tired eyes (had been out to a birthday party the night before). Perhaps the most memorable thing that happened was when a group of high-school girls, who I had overheard talking about us for quite a while, coming up to us, giggling, and asking if they could pull our Pika-tails (don't take that out of context, please :P).

All in all, it was a day memories are made out of - so much fun!

P.S. To those of you who are interested, I have also secured myself tickets to the Tohoshinki concert movie (this weekend) and 4th Official Fanclub Event (end of January) - the latter of which will have the guys themselves there. My goals are being achieved! ^_____^

Soba Making in Chichibu

noreply@blogger.com (Daniel) — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 03:51:00 +0000

The university is constantly organising various outings and events for all the exchange students, which I think is a fabulous idea. In fact, I am very happy with the support that Waseda is giving us - there's always something to do!

One such event was a day trip to Chichibu, right in the mountains of Saitama prefecture, about an hour and a half by bus northwest of Tokyo.

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I signed up at the last minute, wanting to see a part of Japan *outside* of Tokyo, and was lucky enough to be picked as one of the forty-or-so students to attend.

We set off early in the morning (8am... not good) and took a bus directly from the university itself, and it wasn't all that long before we reached our destination- a rather large farm which grew, somewhat peculiarly, grapes. I was very confused and surprised when I first noticed this, because I was unaware that grapes were even grown in Japan! The way the grapes were grown, too, intrigued me...

For whatever reason, the individual bunches were wrapped in perforated plastic bags - rather odd, I thought. I was told it has something to do with the humid climate they are grown in, but I think it might also be due to the peculiar Japanese custom of wrapping everything. Seriously, in a supermarket the peaches are individually wrapped in foam and they give you a bag for everything! Even in a 100-yen shop, the staff lady took care to individually wrap my 100-yen glasses (for reference, 100 yen is about $1.30). I know this is side-tracking a little, but those 100 yen glasses were actually decent! Made in Japan (not made in China? What is this?) and certainly superior to anything you could buy for a similar price back home.

Anyway, where was I... oh yes, soba making! Once at the farm we were divided into groups and given the task of creating soba from scratch! I should briefly explain what soba is - it's a type of noodle made from buckwheat flour and shaped much like spaghetti, except somewhat more square (look at the picture above for a non-perfect example -_-;; ). It can be eaten either hot or cold, and is traditionally served plain (as above) with a bowl of broth on the side which you dip the noodles in before eating.

We were given a little help while making the soba, but no matter how hard we tried, my groups' still ended up looking like they were cut by a child with a pair of toy scissors. Still, they were edible, and we enjoyed a lunch of our own hand-made soba!

While it was incredibly tasty, I thought the meal was somewhat lacking. While wholesome buckwheat soba, a light soy broth and a few slices of spring onion may be the stuff that sustains remote mountain hermits to live for decades, I, a growing (I can hope) young man, needed something a little more meaty and as such spent the rest of the day hungry. Luckily there were plenty of things to distract myself with!

After lunch we had some time to walk up the hill behind the farm and admire the views and rest in the hammocks:

Our day did not end with soba-making, though. After an hour of free time, we boarded the bus again and headed to a nearby river. Here, were were treated to the experience of riding on a boat down a river with scenery that had made the place a 'national beauty spot'! Needless to say, it was a magical experience - and oh so different from the neon lights of Shinjuku and Shibuya. There were waterfalls, rapids, 100-year-old railway bridges (still in use!) and even what looked like filming for a TV drama. Fantastic!

What made the trip interesting in another way was that the area is also known as the 'birthplace of Japanese geology', presumably for the impressive rocks to be found there. Much to the horror of one of my Japanese friends, I took a small piece of this rock with me, and it's now sitting on my desk.
I also returned to Saitama on the weekend, but that is a tale for another blog post... (unless something more interesting occurs in the meantime!)

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Random Night Strolls

noreply@blogger.com (Daniel) — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 15:07:00 +0000

It's a Friday night, you've just had a delicious bowl of tonkotsu ramen at Ippudo, and the night is still young. What do you do?
Walk among the side-streets of course!
Although I am in Shinjuku ward, and hence the centre of Tokyo, the wonderful thing about the area that I live in (and much to Tokyo) is that the streets have retained their tiny, narrow, winding quality from ages past. Even when the city was fire-bombed in the final stages of WWII (remember the houses were pretty much all wood and paper back then), they rebuilt it in almost exactly the same way.
What this means is that it is very easy to have a night of adventure simply by getting lost among the alleyways.

I could go into so much detail about what I saw, but I shall keep it brief so as not to overload you all:

A tiny, crazy-looking Mazda sportscar with gullwing doors. Saw the owner and had a small chat with him too - he was also a student at Waseda! Dave took a photo with his phone, but I do not have it...
Numerous interesting looking bars and restaurants. More often than not these were absolutely tiny, seating no more than 5 or 6 people, but looked like perfect places to go on a quiet night out (or date, I suppose...;) )
The Tokyo Academy of Bread, offering two year bachelor degrees in bread and cake making.
A huge, apparently Edo-era mansion. I have no idea how we can just stumble across these things in the middle of Tokyo, where the land price is so high.
Lots of little parks.
Cats!

The other thing I love about walking at night here is that it's so safe. I never feel like I should hurry home - there's just no fear of being robbed, attacked, or whatever. Even when I stumbled across these tiny parks with only one entrance and filled with several homeless people sleeping, I still felt totally at ease.

Also, earlier today I came across an ex-rental CD sale right near the station. The CDs were in very good condition, and at such great prices that I couldn't help myself when I found two of Monkey Majik's earlier albums....

Asakusa

noreply@blogger.com (Daniel) — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 05:00:00 +0000

Last Thursday was what I like to call "台風曜日" (Taifuu youbi - Typhoon day in my own special form of Japanese). All week we had been watching the approach of Typhoon Melor with great anticipation. Coming from Adelaide, where nothing interesting really happens (apart from bushfires, which are dangerous but no fun), I was particularly looking forward to experiencing a typhoon first-hand, especially since it was to be the first typhoon to strike Japan in two years!
Unfortunately, and to cut a long story short, I missed the typhoon experience. It struck Tokyo at around 2:30am on Thursday morning, and while I was told it made quite the racket, I must have slept soundly through it. When I woke up, in fact, it was a beautiful day with nary a cloud to be seen.
Something must have happened, though, because the other news I awoke to was that the entire day's class had been cancelled. "Excellent", I thought to myself, "Now I can go and see another part of Tokyo...".

We (Dave, Anthony and I) decided to go to Asakusa, because it was part of 'downtown' Tokyo that I was yet to see (where I live, Shinjuku, is part of the 'up-town'). It wasn't too long of a train and subway ride before we arrived at our destination, Asakusa.
Asakusa is known firstly and foremostly for it's temple, Senso-ji, which has been in the same position more or less since the seventh century AD. Coming to Asakusa for the first time, it was a must-see for us:

At the temple itself we were able to, for a small fee, recieve a fortune - which, fortunately (hah) was written in English as well. I was blessed with "Good Fortune in Future", but Dave was not so lucky, and somehow recieved double ill-fortune. (This would manifest itself later when every single game store that we visited was sold out of the game he wanted. To this day we have not found it.)

After we had a quick look around the temple, we thought it would be best to lose ourselves in the side-streets of Asakusa, which we promptly did. It did not take long to find ourselves in a world of tiny izakaya (kind of like a Japanese pub), hidden bathouses (supposedly frequented by the yakuza), old amusement parks and, of course, numerous pachinko parlours (which also are supposedly run by yakuza). For me, who had only experienced the likes of futuristic Shinjuku and Shibuya, this little adventure was refreshing. I finally felt like I had arrived in the real Japan!

On the way back, we even stumbled across a restaurant selling fugu, a Japanese delicacy that I do not think I will be sampling during my stay here...

Tokyo Mille Miglia

noreply@blogger.com (Daniel) — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 06:52:00 +0000

When I was in Harajuku last week, I caught a glimpse of a poster advertising the Mille Miglia Japan, which was to be kicked off at Harajuku on the 13th of October. I thought there was only one Mille Miglia in the world?
Apparently, Japan begs to differ, and with sponsors ranging from Alfa Romeo to Alitalia (how do they have money to sponsor things?), this event was every inch the real deal.

I wandered over to Harajuku with my friend Tatsuki (he was the guy who bought a DSi along with Dave and I). Fortunately for us, the event was very easy to find, as it was located at the entrance to the Meiji-jingu shrine, right next to the train station. It was about 10:30 at the time, and the event did not kick off until 12, so we spent the in-between time holding ourselves a prime viewing position right next to the fence and taking some photos of the cars lined up at the gateway.

One thing that intrigued me greatly as I stood watching were the nature of the drivers. Even though they were almost without exception Japanese, they all looked like the sort of people that drive classic cars. There was a distinguished air about them: the way they dressed, the way they talked, the way they all seemed to know each other - in my mind, it was not all that different from the Classic Adelaide, except perhaps more... distinguished (and Japanese). Take, for example, the driver of the Alfa Romeo 8C (if there is a more beautiful car anywhere I have not seen it yet), who, upon entering his car to shelter from the light rain, proceeded to smoke casually away on his cigarette-in-a-cigarette holder. How eccentric, and yet how so typical of an owner of such a rare machine!

The cars in the event were many and varied, ranging in age from a 1925 Bugatti Brescia T22/13R to a '65 Alfa Romeo Giulia. Surprisingly, there was only a single Ferrari in the entire event - a 1950 Ferrari 195 Inter - but this was more than made up for by the many (nowadays) unheard of makes like Stanguellini, Morassutti and Bandini. The Maserati 150S was also very impressive. It was a wonder to see these pieces of history in action, driven by men smoking extended cigarrettes and wearing leather helmets and racing goggles, and I couldn't help but feel nostalgic for the 'good ol' days'. Which is funny, because a classic car from my 'good ol' days' would probably be something like a '92 NSX or something.

I took many photos on the day, but most of them were rubbish, so I have selected only a couple to show you here on the blog:

After a quick and unsatisfying lunch in Harajuku, I said goodbye to Tatsuki and met up with Mr and Mrs Kinoshita, relatives of friends of my parents. They were an extremely lovely couple who lived in Setagaya-ku, slightly west of Shibuya. The area they lived in was simply stunning - large houses, abundant greenery, impressive cars (I saw a pearl-white GTR) and even a large Dominican school. I did not have the opportunity to take any photos at the time, but imagine this area as something like the inner-eastern suburbs of Adelaide.
I spent some time at the Kinoshita's house, eating the delicious food they had prepared for me, and the time passed very quickly (no doubt aided by the Asahi and sake they kept pouring). It was soon dinner time, and to my surprise I was invited to go along with the Kinoshita's for dinner at a local Jazz bar.
On the way, we stopped at a pachinko parlour because I mentioned that I had never played pachinko before. After this brief experience, I can safely say that I do not want to play again. To explain it briefly, pachinko is like pokies, except a whole lot more pointless. You pay money for a certain amount of ball bearings, which you then insert in a machine and hope they come out again. I had no idea how the people sitting next to me managed to accumulate whole piles of the things while mine dissappeared in seconds - and nor did I really want to dwell on it. Those ball-bearings could not really be exchanged for anything of worth (like, say, money), and I left the parlour at a loss as to why people would waste their money, time and eardrums (it was incredibly noisy inside) on pachinko when they could instead play something like DDR ;)

Dinner was delicious yakitori skewers accompanied by an American blues band. I could describe it all, but instead I will leave you with this video - definitely a day I will not forget!

PS: If any of you would like to have a different take on the Waseda/Japan experience, Alicia has a great blog and even better photography - something for this blog to aspire to, I suppose :P

Harajuku, Omotesando and Shibuya

noreply@blogger.com (Daniel) — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 12:46:00 +0000

"We're in the middle of a financial crisis", they say. "Japan's economy has been stagnating since the late 1980s", they say. "China is where all the money is these days", they say.
Well, the very important thing that these hypothetical people are forgetting is that Japan is still very much the second largest economy in the world. To put that in other words - there is a LOT of money floating around here, and nowhere have I noticed it more so far than my trip to Harajuku and the Omotesando on Sunday.

Ever since I'd stumbled across Toyo Ito's work on the Tod's Omotesando building in my Year 12 design class I have wanted to go to visit it. The glass and concrete building, built to resemble the trees on the street in which it resides, was a great inspiration to me in my work.
When I woke up on Sunday to find it a mild, sunny, day, I knew that I could not waste it by staying in my room and doing homework. So, after a quick lunch at Yoshinoya (fairly cheap chain restaurant, which I think tastes pretty good), I took the Yamanote line to Harajuku. (For those of you that don't know, the Yamanote line is a circular train route that goes around various parts of central Tokyo. Well, to be specific, it goes around the uptown areas - the word literally means 'hands of the mountains')

Harajuku itself is a very interesting place. To foreigners, it is the home of the famed 'Harajuku Girls' (google it and you'll see what I mean), and to the Japanese, it's a place for cheap (girls) clothes and sweet crepes (yeah, I don't know... check out the photo below). In fact, it seems like an area catered to girls in general - there were numerous shops selling male idol merchandise. I ventured into one in search of Tohoshinki goods and was rewarded by a Jaejoong keychain from a 200yen vending machine. As I was the only guy in the shop, though, I did feel sort of weird...

After I had walked down the main Takeshita-dori pedestrian street, I turned to the Omotesando - where the real shopping happens. If there is a well-known fashion brand that you like, chances are they have a store here. Prada, Bulgari, Lois Vuitton, Ralph Loren - to name but a few - all have amazing buildings here. The level of self-presentation of the people walking on the street was very high (as it is in most places I've been so far in Japan), apart from the tourists (of which there were many), and on the street itself many, many, many nice and incredibly expensive cars could be seen.
To give you an example, this man in, oh, you know, a red F430 Scuderia (looked and sounded SO NICE) just pulled over in the middle of the road while his wife stepped into the Louis Vuitton shop.

This Diablo broke down (?)

To be honest, not all people were allowed to flout the law so. I did see a silver SLR McLaren Mercedes recieving a parking ticket sometime later.

Not all of the cars were what one would call 'luxury', but they were certainly interesting:

I was out to find the Tod's store, but before I set off, I quickly watched the first lap of the Japanese GP on my phone. How convenient. While sitting down, I saw my first 'Harajuku Girls', who were, strangely, not Japanese:

I ended up walking up and down the street several times before finding it, including a rest stop at a cafe that served Lavazza coffee. The cappucino and muffin I had cost me more than my lunch (about $8 all up), but was worth it for the chance to have Italian coffee and to sit down a while.

Here are some of the buildings that I saw along the way, including, at last, the Tod's building:

In the end, I think my favourite was the Prada building (first photo there). Very cool.
Anyway, afterwards I decided to walk along to Shibuya in search of the massive intersection that you see in so many movies. Along the way, I even saw what appeared to be an Australian fashion building!

It goes without saying that I was distracted on my way to Shibuya station and my way home. In one CD shop, they had a very large section dedicated to Tohoshinki. They had everything - all the CDs, the singles, the DVDs and the photobooks. I had to walk out of there in a hurry lest I bought something - the keyring would have to satisfy me for now.
The big intersection wasn't all that hard to find in the end - it was right by the entrance to the station!

One day, I will return to the Omotesando to shop! *adds to self-goals list*

PS: I said I would write shorter posts, didn't I? Sorry...

A New Toy

noreply@blogger.com (Daniel) — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 14:26:00 +0000

I shouldn't be spending money, really. Well, not on such superflous things like a new Nintendo DSi and game. Especially when I should be spending it on things like food and textbooks...
Hrm, well, I guess the game *is* completely in Japanese, so in actual fact what I have bought is merely another learning tool! That's what I shall tell myself in those restless times at night when I am filled with regret and self-doubt. Indeed....

Why are there three DSis? Well, today, I went with my friends Dave (also Aussie), Mike (from Arizona) and Tatsuki (Japanese guy - very awesome) and three of us bought a DS and that particular game, Dragon Quest IX. Mine is the red one~ although I think the metallic blue colour is also very cool. Now, to start learning, slowly, how to play...

In other news, I recieved Epik High's [e] album in the mail today as well. I love their music to no end - and this two-cd wonder is no exception.

Ooh, yeah, and also, I was talking to some other people at the dorm today, and they are keen on going to a Tohoshinki concert sometime too! I really should sign up to BigEast soon...