Coffee and TV

Posted on 10/06/2014 by Luke

Today, the weather is a delightful 28°C, clear with occasional sun showers. I meet Andy at breakfast for a cup of coffee before we bid our final farewells. I then decide to walk to Ueno. It’s really quiet here so I keep walking and arrive in Akihabara. Here I go to the top of Akihabara UDX, a huge building full of restaurants. I go to the 4th floor to check out the Tokyo Anime Centre but the sign on the door says, “Today has become a closed day.” After a wasted journey I get the feeling that today will be somewhat uneventful.

Back in Ueno I stumble across Ameya-Yokocho, translated to Candy Shop Alley; it is an outdoor market of about 200 shops next to Ueno Station. Here I see loads of shoes and clothes shops mixed with pachinko parlours and restaurants. I see a section of the market closed off and about ten firefighters standing around looking very bored, presumably there was a fire here. Every store seems to have employed a person to stand outside to shout at passers-by, trying to encourage them to check out their wares. I wander the market aimlessly for about an hour, before getting bored and grabbing a coffee and a sandwich from Family Mart. For no obvious reason the sandwich doesn’t have a crust.

Back at the hostel all but one person in my room has gone. Six beds are empty. I can’t really be bothered to head back out into the humid streets just yet, so I decide to do a little job hunting. I sign up for a student teacher matching website. I set my fee at an overpriced ¥5000 per hour for coffee shop conversational lessons. I ask Daisuke why my sandwich had no crust, and he just laughs and says something about how biting into crust is bad and that soft is better.

Back at my room I meet the one person who is still here. A Brazilian named Marcos. We chat for a while about Japan and traveling in general and he tells me that he is a published author. He shows me his travel book, it looks very professional. Unfortunately for me, I can’t read Portuguese.

I head out for my third visit to my new favourite restaurant, Mizuguchi. As I take my seat I am given a small bowl of octopus sashimi in seaweed as an appetiser. I then order deep fried breaded salmon; it is served with a salad garnish and homemade potato salad, fresh Wasabi, and a selection of pickles. I also order a bowl of rice and a beer. It’s a lot of food but a long day of walking around has made me very hungry. The total cost is a bargain ¥1350.

Back at the hostel I bump into Gomez, the manager. He tells me about a television event happening on Thursday morning. I enthusiastically sign up, not wanting to miss an opportunity. I am not to say anything else on the subject for now.

My earlier instinct of an uneventful day was correct. I finish the night with a couple of beers in the English bar, bid farewell to Matt and Kaes who leave tomorrow, and head back to the hostel to take a much needed early night. I am also now convinced there is a ghost in the elevator.

Street Festivals, Buddhist Temples, Ninjas, and Rubik’s Cubes

Posted on 09/06/2014 by Luke

I am listening to Clint Mansell’s soundtrack for the film The Fountain as I drink a Yakult based watery yoghurt thing; I don’t really know what it is, except that it is disgusting. I am a little sad this morning, more people I have become friends with are leaving today. I check my messages, I have one from Satoko reminding me about the Oko Ceremony, saying that she hopes to see me there. I receive some good news too in the form of messages from both Grant and Edwina; they are back in Asakusa in a few days time and we will hang out again.

I leave the hostel and walk over the Sumida River to the Hongyoji Temple. Inside, I am seated and given a prayer book and prayer beads, there are about 450 people here. At exactly eleven we start to chant for ten minutes straight; the Temple is so very warm and my mouth is so very dry from the constant chanting. Next, the first prayer is read out and four silent prayers then follow. There is then another ten minutes of straight chanting before the Chief Priest Marakami-san comes out to deliver his sermon.

After the sermon has finished, a woman takes to the podium and reads something in Japanese, it moves her to tears. Next a man does the same. A brief chant concludes the 90 minute Ceremony. I am given a handwritten account of the Chief Priests sermon translated during the Ceremony by Satoko. I am asked by Yoko to please come and visit again, I say that I will. Outside the Temple the rain has finally stopped after a constant 72 hours of downpour. I feel thirsty and exhausted, but also pleased about the overall experience.

I start walking down the road to my hostel, after about 10 minutes on a random street corner I find a festival. I see a man named Kazuma, an artist from Shiburoko playing the guitar and singing very upbeat songs about being happy. I am handed a flyer in Japanese, it reads, ‘Asakusa spirit! Confused Street Live!’ There is also a schedule for the rest of today’s festivities, but it is written entirely in Japanese.

At the hostel I use the Internet to help translate the flyer. It reveals that at 4 p.m. a group called Yunlong Taiko will be playing a Japanese drum show. I bump into Heather, one of two English women I met last night, and we head out for the drum show. After the drumming stops, Heather and I take a walk up to the Sumida River, where we randomly see a man dressed in a full ninja outfit. I say to him, “Ninja!” He pulls his forefinger up to his lips and makes a ‘shhhh’ sound, before casually strolling off.

Back at the street festival the Hero Show is starting. This is a superhero-action-comedy starring Gun Caliber, famous for his live action features. I would explain the story but it genuinely made no sense to me at all. There was a scene where a woman dressed like the Pink Power Ranger came from nowhere and revived the defeated alligator/snake man with a large bag of biscuits. It was all very strange.

At the hostel Andy is still here. He couldn’t get a bus today so will stay in Asakusa at a different hostel for another night. We join Heather and Steffi, and the four of us head out to find a bar twenty minutes walk away that Andy has recommended. We stop off at a Lawson Stores for snacks, and I buy for ¥108 an egg sandwich that says: Making the everyday better. We arrive at Bar Nui and it looks impressive. It is a public bar on the ground floor of a hostel. ‘Bar opening times: 18:00 – 26:00’ boasts a sign outside. Inside, I order the ‘big beer’ and am handed a massive 1 litre jug of Asahi, and a bill for ¥1000. Eventually I switch to The Macallan 12 year old at ¥700 a time.

Heading back to the hostel I realise that I had left my umbrella at the Lawson Stores on the way to the bar, so we stop off there; I am pleased to find that my umbrella is still intact. Andy and I buy cans of beer at Lawson Stores, just so we can walk down the street drinking alcohol in open containers, no outdoor drinking laws here! We pass two trouserless businessmen with ties around their heads. They insist on high-fiving us as they pass.

My night ends in the hostel listening to an in-depth and incredibly nerdy conversation between Andy and James about the algorithms and patterns used in solving the Rubik’s Cube. Andy claims that he can solve one in under 1 minute and has his Dayan Speed Cube in his bag at the other hostel. I am very disappointed that this has only come up in conversation on his final night.

No More Dream

Posted on 08/06/2014 by Luke

At breakfast I have an amazing caffeine free chai tea with free range ‘happy’ eggs. Andy sits across from me, for his breakfast he has a hangover. Incense is lit and a hangover cure is delivered in the form of a tiny bottle. One drop before and one drop after is all you need, or so the bottle states. From his initial reaction it doesn’t look good.

After breakfast Andy checks the time, it is quarter to eleven. He suggests going for beer. Hangover cure confirmed to work. We take the train to Odaiba, and head for the Gundam. We arrive and there is a huge crowd of people, they are here for more than just a robot. At the Gundam there are about one thousand girls, each with an umbrella. A man with a megaphone makes an announcement in Japanese and the girls begin to scream with excitement.

Members of a Korean hip-hop boy band are shown on a large television screen, there are seven of them in total. Jungkook being the youngest member at 16, Jin and Suga are the oldest at 21. The best named member is Rap Monster. The band are called Bangtan Boys, often abbreviated to BTS. The name of the band literally translates to Bulletproof Boy Scouts.

BTS play their debut release, No More Dream, much to the delight of the one thousand screaming fans. The band then talk on the microphones for about twenty minutes before jumping into their second song, Rise of Bangtan. It features a heavy backing track and some lyrics in English. “Cuz we got fire fire fire, Get higher higher higher.” Andy and I stay for about half an hour. The Gundam is underwhelming in comparison to the music.

Back in Asakusa, Matt joins us for a bit of English teaching and free beer. Kaes, a Canadian friend of Andy’s, joins us, and eventually, two English women we met earlier at the hostel, Steffi and Heather join us too. After last orders, we head out to a late-night bar for some food.

At the restaurant we have to take our shoes off before entering the seating area. At the table I eat ¥450 seared mackerel sashimi, ¥450 fried fish cutlet bites served with a delicious but unrecognisable dip, and a nice big ¥481 beer. Probably one of my favourite meals I’ve had on this trip.

After the meal it’s back to the hostel for some card games via a Seven Eleven. I pay for my goods, totalling ¥212, with a ten-thousand Yen note, the equivalent would be paying with a £60 note in England. It goes unquestioned and I receive my ¥9788 change without any fuss. Paying for things with a £10 note in England is sometimes met with a frown or sarcastic comment.

At the hostel, the English women have sake with them—three bottles, to be precise. I’ve tried hot sake on my trip, but I didn’t really enjoy it. This will be my first time trying it cold. Once again, I find it somewhat unsatisfactory. Finally, I’ve discovered something in Japan that I don’t like.

Cat Cafe, Cats and Dogs, Square Enix

Posted on 07/06/2014 by Luke

I wake up at 9 a.m. to the sound of rain. It is very loud. I head downstairs, I drink two cans of Boss Coffee Sweetened Rainbow Blend and write for a few hours, until I am finally ready to venture out into the monsoon that is the streets of Japan. I buy an umbrella, pleasantly, before taking the Tokyo Metro Ginza Line to Shibuya.

In Shibuya, vans drive around all day advertising new albums from random Japanese artists. There are three AKB48 vans that circle around, blazing out pop classic, Labrador Retriever. I wander the Dogenzaka district in the pouring rain until at last I find the sign I am looking for; it reads Neko, the Japanese word for cat.

Hapineko is a cat cafe. For ¥1180, I order peppermint tea with sweets and spend 30 minutes with the cats. Inside, there are literally tens of cats. Most of them are hiding or sleeping. I spend some time taking photographs until eventually I find a cat that sits with me and allows me to stroke her. It’s an odd concept, really, and how it came about, I really don’t know. As I leave, I playfully change the Japanese word for ‘thank you’ by one letter, “Aricatou gozaimasu!” The staff member gives me a puzzled look.

I hop on the Yamanote Line and 4 minutes later I hop off in Shinjuku. If Tokyo is the capital of Japan, I would say Shinjuku is the capital of Tokyo. It is massive and boasts the worlds largest train station. An average of 3.64 million passengers per day pass through the station, which has over 200 different exits. After an hour of searching, and a trip to a Metro Station to ‘borrow’ some free Internet, I manage to get directions and find that I am only eleven minutes away from where I need to be.

Eleven minutes later I arrive at Artnia, the official restaurant of Square Enix. I order two desserts from a Final Fantasy themed menu; the first I order is the Strawberry Pancakes, served with ice cream, strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, and a Cactuar. After finishing my huge portion of pancakes, I instantly regret ordering two desserts.

The second dessert is a parfait. It is in the shape of Cloud Strife from Final Fantasy VII and contains an edible chocolate Buster Sword. It also features chocolate panna cotta, with coffee jelly and vanilla ice cream, all topped with a layer of whipped cream, bananas, and chocolate sauce. The total cost for both is a pricey ¥1910.

The restaurant also sells a selection of Square Enix official goods. They include games, stuffed toys, trading cards, necklaces, perfumes, and models of popular characters. Here are Tidus and Yuna from Final Fantasy X:

After the restaurant I head back to the hostel where I meet up with Andy, an Australian I had first met at the karaoke night, and Matt, the guy I went to the izakaya with a few nights ago. We decide to go to the English speaking bar across the road. Because of the rain, the bar is quiet and there are only two other customers. A Japanese man here says I look like a famous person, and after five minutes of searching on his phone he reveals that I look like a young Barry Manilow, I strongly disagree.

After last orders are called, Andy, Matt, and I head to another bar with the owner of the English bar and the Japanese man. Here we drink more and more beer and snack on Japanese omelette and smoked salmon served with Daikon. The Japanese man eventually leaves, but not before paying the whole bill. It turns out the three of us haven’t paid for a thing all evening. Thank you very much, Saito-san.

Bach No Senritsu Wo Yoru Ni Kiita Sei Desu

Posted on 06/06/2014 by Luke

I sign up through Craigslist for an event in March 2015. Bach’s 330th birthday celebration. All day and all night the music of Bach will be played in subways and public spaces. The website specifically states that, ‘Solos, ensembles, flash mobs and Bach marathons are all encouraged.’

Outside, rainy season has started. The unexpected heat wave during my first week here has now stepped aside and the rain has taken over. It will not stop raining now until mid-July. I take a ‘free’ umbrella from the hostel and walk to the boat terminal. Here I take a ¥1580 boat ride down the Sumida River to Odaiba; an artificial island. The journey takes about forty minutes.

I see The Goddess of Liberty, a to-scale model of the Statue of Liberty. There is a giant Ferris wheel with no riders and a huge arcade with no customers. It is nearly lunch time and there is nobody else here. A Toyota theme park showcases new vehicles and offers driving lessons and ‘games’. A Shell museum offers not seashells but the history of petrol pumps and petroleum. I am very disappointed.

Japan are preparing for the 2020 Olympic games, and Odaiba, with its large areas of open space, is one of the venues that has been selected. I walk long distances in the rain trying to find the giant 1/1 scale statue of a Gundam robot. I never find it and there is nobody around to ask. I eventually give up and take the train back to Tokyo.

For lunch it’s another Cheese Mushi Cake. This one is from Family Mart and is sadly not as good as the one from Seven Eleven. I also have a natto wrap and a bag of the ‘best crisps’, or so I am told by a member of staff at the hostel.

Natto is fermented soy beans. It is a traditional food of Japan and is usually eaten for breakfast. I once read that most people in Japan eat natto but don’t like it, and that they only eat it for its excellent health benefits. My natto is wrapped in rice and seaweed. The smell is overpowering, and the taste is disappointing.

I spend the next hour or so in the hostel until I am in the right place at the right time. The hostel manager approaches me. He says a film crew for TV Tokyo are making a documentary, and are looking to film someone that is staying here for a while. I immediately agree and wait anxiously until the film crew are ready.

The director cannot speak any English but she has brought with her a language interpreter. I am asked to go to the reception so they can film the hostel staff recommending a strange place for me to visit. I already know that we are going to a bird cafe, so I have to pretend I don’t know where I am going; it is all very odd. The crew film me talking to Daisuke at reception. He recommends that I visit Asakusa’s Owl & Parakeet Cafe, before making me laugh with his chicken noises. We film the same scene again, without the chicken noises, and he marks the cafe on my map.

The film crew then follow me through Asakusa. I rely only on the instructions from the hostel; I am not allowed to ask the film crew for help. Daisuke’s directions are pretty good though, and I find the bird cafe with relative ease. Once inside I am asked to stroke the birds, play with the birds, feed the birds, and get bitten by the birds. They ask me some really random questions. I am not sure whether to direct my answers at the interpreter or the director, and I’m never really sure which parts they are filming.

Once we finish the interview, we head back to the hostel. Overall the experience was rather enjoyable and I am pleased to have been given the opportunity to be on television. I have no idea which footage they will use for their program, only that it will air at the end of the month.

At the hostel I meet with a few of the nice people that I have spent time with over the last few days; almost all of them will be leaving in the morning and I will once again be alone. A few hours of whisky and beer later and the Thursday night Jazz Club is in full swing. Five of us decide to head out through the soaking and somewhat flooded streets of Asakusa to get some food. Tempura again for the third time this week; I don’t think I’ll ever get bored of it though.

After food it’s back to the hostel to catch the end of the Jazz Club washed down with a few cans of Suntory Strong Zero 9%.

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