Fourteen Minutes and Thirty Seven Seconds Left...

This morning this was a banging on my door like no other. I heard someone screaming "Maiku! Maiku! MAIKU! OKITE!" Which means "Mike! Mike! MIKE! WAKE UP!!" She then told me she saw me on a commercial on TV for a TV show that was about to start. This is what was shown across Japan (luckily at 7:30 before most people woke up, I think)

The link!

I made Japan TV!!!

http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=1963114789

The Fifteen Minutes Might Be Up

So while I was in Tokyo we went to this place called Akihabara. It's kind of a geek-out place with tons of electronics and anime stuff. I liked the electronics, but we didn't have much time to walk around. One our way to the train we came across some people with TV cameras and this really hip looking Japanese guy ran over to our group and asked if we would like to be on a TV News Show. We were pretty scared because we aren't great at Japanese, but figured we could get through with it. The said the girls would go first, then they'd interview the guys. The girls talked about a lot of stuff and were pretty rockin with the Japanese. After they finished they called us guys over. Mike E. is good at Japanese so all of my answers were pretty much based off of his because I could only understand chunks of what the news lady was asking us. But it was ok, and good practice for speaking Japanese. She was basically just asking us what we like to do in Japan, whta we think of it, things like that. My said he liked doing Karaoke and she asked what songs we sang. I said "A lot of American 80s songs..." she wasn't impressed (Even though I do a mean cover of "It's Raining Men" "What a Fool Believes" and "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go"...seriously, they would all leave you in tears.) She asked if we knew any Japanese songs. I remembered back to my Sophomore-In-High-School days where we translated "Ue Wo Muite Aruko" (Also known as Sukiyaki) by Kyuu Sakamoto. She then said "Sing it!" I said "Well..." looked around at the slowly gathering crowd of weird forgieners and Japanese people. "GIMME THAT FUCKIN MICORPHONE, LADY!!" (I thought in my head) "Sure!" (I've recently stopped caring about what people think of me in this country because I already stand out, have run (naked) into old ladies, bathed with old men and unfortunately little girls, eaten fish sperm, sang bad 80s songs in karaoke (seriously, you'd CRY they're so good, and I also frequently drop food/my chopsticks, and bang my head). So I decided "why not do it" it's only some local news show. All the people laughed and pointed at me which I expected and was funny, the attractive news lady even laughed and clapped and told me good job. I'm pretty sure I got a lot of the words wrong. Anyway, after that they told me a bunch of jokes to say and made me redo some random stuff. It was fun! They gave me a fancy pen that is actually 4 pens in one (one blue, one black, one red and a white out pen) that had the TV show info on it. I showed it to my mom when I got home and she totally freaked because it's a national news/variety show that's on every saturday morning. It may not make it onto the news, they said they'd call us if makes it on, but lets just say, I'm in for one embarrassing trip if it DOES make it on! I can't wait.


(Talkin...)



(Singin...)

The Tokyo Syndrome

Tokyo has got to be the strangest city I've ever been to. It's like New York, California, Chicago, old-Japan-town, and small-European-town rolled into one. It's got massive buildings, old temples and shrines, crazy new technology, small windy roads with little bakeries, an ocean...and a lot of people.

When I left my family kinda was just like "yeah yeah, bye bye. See you later." and they all went out to work at night and I left by myself. I wasn't looking for a big "goodbye" but I mean, I was going to Tokyo for the first time EVER. Everyone elses mom made them food for the bus and gave them other goodies. But that's ok!. I took a night bus there. As far as money goes...that was a great idea. 6800 Yen (About $65.00) round trip. The bullet train costs, at the cheapest, about $140.00. We left Nagoya at 10:30 at night and arrived in Tokyo an hour early...at 5:15 in the morning. It was dark out, freezing cold, and nothing was opened. We walked aorund for a while looking for food. Eventually made it to the Hostel 4 hours early, dropped our bags off and walked around our area. We were 1 block away from here...



which lead to here..



I went clubbing for the first time in my life only to learn that Japanese people are worse at dancing than me. This is a great feeling because I looked like a dance machine sent from the future to teach Japan how to move and how to groove to the techno rhythms they seem to love soooooo much. We left, went home, chatted with our Irish and English roommates and then crashed. The next morning we woke up, walked around Asakusa (our area in Tokyo) and then we just wen all over pretty much... in a very loose order we went to the following places...

Ueno Park - we watched lots of great performers perform music, doing circus acts, sing songs. We went a beautiful old art museum that you could spend a week in and still not see all of it.

Shibuya - The most crowde city I've ever been in. It was a constant sea of people, lots of bright flashy lights and giant monitors on buildings. We got delicious cake and dinner food and looked in all of these weird stores. My favorite went from selling garden hoses to sex toys and everything in between.

Harajuku - This places, on weekends, has a bunch of teenagers who dress up in whacky costumes and face paint and hair and stuff. Some are anime characters, some are "ganguro" or "Yamanba", come have signs that say "Free Hugs." There's also people who go there to protest this and say it negatively reflects Japanese culture. this is Ganguro/Yamanda...



Afterwards we went to a Kaitenzushi (the place where the sushi is on the rotating belt thing and you eat all you can.) If there isn't a piece of Sushi on belt that's on the menu you just ask a chef to make it for you and he'll do so. There was one on the menu called Shirakogunkan. Gunkan is a kind of sushi, for instance the ones with the orange salmon eggs..that's gunkan. Now take out the orange eggs and put in a whitish brain looking thing. That's Shirako. My friend Masako dared me to get one so I ordered it and threw it back in one bite. Neither of us had any idea what it REALLY was. i immediately felt like vomiting and faught my gag reflex with all my pride. I settled on moving it to the side of my mouth and slowly swallowed parts of it for about 2 minutes until it was gone. It wasn't bad tasting really, the consitancy was just digusting. It was cold and kind of mushy. Shira means "white" and "ko" means "child" or "children" anotehr Japanese person told me she thought it was part of the female reproductive system. Current research tells me, it's a type of fish Sperm. I ate fish sperm. I want to make sure you all get this. I ate fish sperm sushi. In one bite.

Capsule Hotel... we landed in Akihabara at 9 at night. We had our bags and everything. Walked into the Capsule hotel and immediately realized there was no way in hell we'd be sleeping there. It was dirty and scary and I expected to see a bloody capsule. I didn't, but I thought it might be fitting. We turned around, called our hostel and they let us back in with welcoming arms. I was really scared of the capsule hotel. REALLY scared. Maybe I'll give a second try when I know for sure that it's safe.

Finally, I got home to Toyotashi and walked in. My mom immediately started apologizing to me. Apparently what happened was she thought I was going out with my friends that night and the next morning when I wasn't home, she thought I'd missed the last train home. She called me but I didn't get the message til I got back to Toyotashi. She gave me $50.00 and said "I was going to give this to you for spending money! I'm SO sorry!!!!" then she gave me Chocolate filled with whisky and another kind of Chocolate for Valentines Day. Yeaaaaaaaah.

I'll write more about Tokyo speficics later...

The Dullest Akaike

I find myself in awkward situations a lot.

I was riding the train one afternoon with my friend Matt, frequently people will say random things to us in English or Japanese. This doesn't usually happen with anyone else on our trip, but people really seem to enjoy talking to us for some reason. On this particular day and old lady and an old man were staring directly at us with giant ear to ear smiles on their faces. The old lady says "Are you from America?" "Yes. I'm from Louisianna, Mike is from Chicago" (Matt said that.) We had a short conversation about why we were here, what we were doing, what our hobbies were and stuff. Matt said he lives right off of the "Akaike" stop. Coincedene: So do the old people! They told us that the old man was a Noh theater actor. (Noh theater is a pretty strange style of theater... you can wikipedia it if you want to learn more.) And apparently this couple has a Noh theater inside their house. Or so they claim. Anyway, they eventually asked us for our phone numbers and told us we had to go to their house one day. This is where I got nervous...

At our orientation they continuously said "Japan is NOT safe." "Do NOT give your phone numbers out to strangers" "Do NOT tell strangers where you live, or your full name." "Many people think Japan is safe but Japan is NOT safe."

Not to mention the years and years of "Don't talk to strangers." that is drilled into our skulls from the time of birth. or "Don't get into a strangers car." "Don't go anywhere with someone you don't know."

We gave them our numbers...
I couldn't help but think we'd show up at their home one day and there'd be 25 buff men who would torture us. OR they'd brand obscene Japanese words on our faces. Maybe they'd brainwash us to the point where we became sweater-vest-wearing A+ students who says things like "That's swell." or "Aw shucks." I also imagined them saying "Go into that room!" and we'd walk into a room full of American students where we'd be locked into a zoo like room where people would come to watch us walk around a small room that is decorated like an American home so we'd be in our "Natural environment." My family would definitely never hear from me ever again.

Well Matt got off at the Akaike stop and they insisted he get a ride home from them. Matt hopped into their Mercedes and drove off. I still had 8 more stops to go so I kept to the train. The next weekend we decided to call them and see if we could go to their house. How much damage could an old couple do? They never answered, their phone just rang and rang and rang. About two weeks went by and we never saw them. One night at about 7 or 8 during rush hour when the trains were packed Matt and I were riding home and I noticed a familiar face. What are the chances? The old lady and man were sitting in the jam-packed train. I see her wave me over and she said "Can you come over right NOW?" "No. How about tuesday?" "Tuesday at 10 am?" "Perfect." I was nervous, but I also thought, these were just sweet old people.

At school the next day we told people what happened and that we were going over and they all said. "You guys are gonna get killed." or "You guys are dumb." Matt wasn't scared, but to be honest, I was starting to get a little bit nervous...

Tuesday comes, I wake up at 8 am because it takes me a while to get to Akaike. I meet Matt at the train station. The old couple decided to not show up. After 45 minutes of waiting for them and multiple calling attempts, they never showed up. I got stood up by an 80-something year old couple. What the hell? How is that for anticlimactic? I bet they were sitting around the corner in their car watching us and throwing their heads back in laughter. The just LOVE to stand up American college students because we easily just walk into traps. Either that or their torture equiptment was malfunctioning that morning so they called it off. Damnit, I got stood up by two old people. What the hell?

Next Post: Finally, Tokyo.

Secret Part III...

My job is to distribute the miso soup at dinner time. I secretly give myself more miso soup than everyone else because I like it more.

Setsubun

This past saturday a bunch of the Japanese students at my school arranged a little trip to a place called Osu Kanon. It's a place with a bunch of cool little shops and what not but during Setsubun (I'll get to it in a second) they have a big fun festival. Setsubun is a kind of ritual for the start of a new Season. It's kind of like the New Years Eve of season changings. Basically people throw these roasted beans to get rid of evil spirits and to bring in the good luck. Some people do this in their home but if you go out to a temple there's usually a big gathering. At Osu Kanon, they have a big big temple and this big stage type thing where people throw beans for hours. People gather underneath them with bags to try and catch these beans. You're supposed to catch and eat however many years old you are plus one. (Since I'm 20, I had to catch and eat 21.) I totally made bank with the beans caught about 8. It's basically a giant rough mosh-pit of old people. It was way rougher than I had imagined it would. It was a blast. Old ladies were grabbing my tush like nobodies business. It was, by far, the most action I'll get in Japan for sure. After doing this for an hour or so, we broke off into groups and walked around the shopping area looking at stores and finding cheap delicious food. In Japan, I am hungry all the time. Japan is the king of snack food so I frequently go to the convenient stores and get very delicious food like chocolate waffles filled with ice cream and strawberries, giant cream puffs, chocolate melon bread, or these mean sandwich things. Luckily I do enough walking that I haven't gotten fat...YET. (If I can break 140 pounds while I'm here, I'll be extremely proud of myself.) We later did a set of Karaoke and then moved to the highlight of the evening. Tabehodai (All you can eat) and Nomihodai (all you can drink). This was at a yakiniku (cook your own meat). For an hour and a half (for about 26 dollars) you basically can order where kind of delicious meat you want and any alcoholic beverage you want. It was delicious. I sat at a table with one friend who knew english, then a non-english speaking Japanese student and a guy from China who is in the same level Japanese as me and knows no english. Let's just say I tore up Japanese without even knowing it. I was pretty proud of myself. Knowing I had to get on a train and ride for an hour by myself, I was careful with my alcohol...some people weren't so lucky. I ate so much I wanted to vomit (again... see an early essay on a giant lunch I had). As soon as we left, though, I wanted a cake or something from a convenient store so I got one on my way home. I finished and realized it was a bad idea immediately. I walked in the door of my house and my host mom had saved me HUGE sushi rolls she made and very special miso soup. My host mom and dad watched until I finished it all. Then I drank a cup of tea, two cups of water and ate a starburst I found in my backpack. I lay down to get to bed and was pretty sure i was going to vomit within seconds. Using a very effective technique called "Michaelmalarkeyhatesvomiting" I prevented it and survived the night. I think this story is kind of boring. But I had such an awesome time last night.

Lessons Learned

How do you top the Onsen story? You can't. Anyone who has read it will probably be utterly dissatisfied with any other message I write...

So I keep missing random parts of my homework here. Not because I don't like it and don't want to, but because I can't read my homework-schedule-sheet because it's in a confusing writing called "Japanese." So today I finally piped up and told the teacher. He told me to "never come back to Nanzan University until I know how to read." He told me this by saying "Haha, here let me explain..." I will, now and always, do my homework.

I don't have a lot of great stories to tell today since this week has been pretty quiet so I will give you a small bit of knowledge about Japanese Culture incase any of you decide to make the trek over here...

Since space in Japan isn't too abundant and 96-98% of Japanese are buddhist, when people die they are almost all cremated. After an extremely extremely elaborate funeral, the casket is brought to be burned. After it's burned the family sifts through the remaining ashes with chopsticks to take out any remaining bones. They pass the bones to one anothers chopsticks, and places them into an urn. Because of this, it's VERY "taboo" to pass any food during a meal from chopstick to chopstick. Always take it, place it on a plate, and then pass it. Or just move the serving place to that person.

ALSO, they often place a bowl of rice out for the deceased with a pair of chopsticks stuck into the rice. Because of THIS, you shouldn't ever stick your chopsticks into your rice when you aren't using them. Instead, lay them across your bowl or plate.

I'll be heading to Tokyo for 4 or 5 days next week and I can't wait. I've got my fingers crossed for spending a night in a capsule hotel!