So after hanging out in Tokyo with MikeyG, I rushed back to Okazaki for work and to meet up with Guillaume!!
He arrived on August 2, and for my day early birthday present, he agreed to join me to a visual kei festival, even though he was super jet-lagged, and it was ABSOLUTELY AMAZING!!!! I originally wanted to go because I felt like I NEEDED to see Ayabie before leaving Japan, but really almost all of the bands were amazing!
Or Guild in romaji, these guys were absolutely AMAZING! They did fun Nana chan poses, and it was super adorable - something they could only get away with doing in Nagoya. (It was actually at during the song in the video that they did the nana chan poses, but given that this video was taken in shibuya, they're not there). (watch until at least the second minute for music!!)
For those of you who don't know who Nana-chan is, you can see her in the above picture. She's basically a huge doll thing that hangs out right in front of the Meitetsu Station in Nagoya, and she's regularly dressed up in lots of different outfits - in the featured picture, she's dressed up as Naruto.
Anyway, Guild was definitely my favorite band of the night that I didn't previously know.
The lights were super flashy and all over the place, so every time I tried to look at the stage to watch them, I started getting a headache. Thus, they were super hard to watch.
They're on the heavier side of visual kei compared to what I normally like, but they were still pretty good. Much better than I was expecting.
They vocalist apparently had a throat cold and thus wasn't there. Which was. . .weird. In the beginning they were all just jumping around and having fun, and it looked like they weren't even trying to play their instruments. And then they had the singer's voice coming over a recording. It was just, as I said, weird.
Despite the weirdness, the music was totally awesome, and the bassist was maybe the cutest thing I've ever seen (but unfortunately, he seemed to know it). I've been listening to more of them since, and I'm totally into it!
I'd be interested to see them live again when they actually have a singer.
Another band on the heavier side of visual kei, they were MUCH better than what I was expecting. I'd even told Guillaume that when they came on, we could take a break, but in the end, that didn't happen. They were super fun - a little bit hard, but I totally got into it. I often judge bands by just one song, and this is totally a case of "I shouldn't have done that."
Of course, this was the best concert of all time (I remind people to beware of my tendency to exaggerate). I absolutely LOVE OVER ADORE them, but the show was even better than I ever could have possibly imagined. They played most of my favorite songs, and Yumehito, the singer, with the best voice of all time, was super cute with his explanations of songs and dances (and really expensive fans).
The only sad thing was that they just didn't play long enough (well that and that their t-shirt was really ugly, so I didn't want to buy it). And even though they're on tour now, I won't get to see them again before I leave Japan, because the day they play in Nagoya I will be in Tokyo seeing An Cafe.
Fingers crossed for a North American tour!
Stylized Gotcha6a.
YAY!!!! On the ticket, it said there would be a secret band playing, and I don't know why, but I kind of thought it would be Gotcharocka, and they were!!!! HAPPINESS!!!! They were playing as ハイパー (Hyper), but it was still totally them doing their songs, and it was wonderful!
Their songs were just as amazing live, and I'm so happy all those dudes decided to get together to form a group! Pure awesomeness.
I don't LOVE Kra (which I learned this night is actually pronounced kera), but I do like them quite a lot. And that is EXACTLY how I felt about their live as well. I didn't love love LOVE it, but I did like it quite a lot.
The singer has this amazing voice that seems like it can do pretty much anything, go pretty much anywhere. And a lot of their music is really pretty.
Maybe I would have been able to enjoy them more if Ayabie and Gotcharocka hadn't played just right before them
Anyhow, it was an AMAZING concert (during which Guillaume might have fallen asleep), and I'm SO happy that I got to go!!!! It's so sad for me to think that soon it's no longer going to be so easy for me to just hope over to Nagoya to see visual kei bands whenever I want.
YAY VISUAL KEI!!!! YAY PUNK!!!! (And as I write that, I am listening to kanjani8. Awesome)
Today, I went to see るろうに剣心 (Rurouni Kenshin) with 佐藤健 (Takeru Satou), a movie based on a manga about a swordsman that takes place somewhere right at the end of the Edo Jidai, beginning of the Meiji Jidai.
While it absolutely looked like an amazing movie, I'll admit that my main reason for wanting to see it was Satou Takeru - I totally love him!
I'm so glad he was playing Rurouni, though, because the movie was absolutely AMAZING! It was action-packed but heart-warming, and I laughed, cried, and cringed the whole way through. If this movie ever makes it to America (or Canada or Europe or wherever) - highly recommended!
Now, let's go back in time a little bit to before I hung out with MikeyG in Tokyo. Two days before I left, I hopped on a train and met up with Rachael in Ichinomiya for the Ichinomiya Tanabata Matsuri.
Basically, it's a star festival celebrating the stars Vega and Altair - star-crossed lovers separated by the milky way, doomed to only meet once a year (on the seventh day of the seventh month).
The man and woman on each side were constantly turning but never looking at each other - I can't help but wonder if they did eventually meet, but we didn't stay long enough to check it out.
I'd been wanting to check out a Tanabata Matsuri since arriving in Japan but had just somehow never found the time. I heard the Ichinomiya one was one of the biggest in the area, so I really wanted to go. But what really drove us there was that alfabeto was playing the matsuri.
I've written quite a bit about alfabeto in the past, as at this point I've seen them more times than I can count. They of course put on an absolutely amazing show that totally made the festival worth it. They were up on a real stage, they seemed totally together, and they absolutely rock!
While we were there, we saw Darth Vader!
We also talked quite a bit to alfabeto's manager guy, who suggested that, if I like punk, I would like another band that he manages called the Zutazutaz.
They just so happened to be playing a free concert the next day at another festival, so I headed over to check them out.
Manager dude was right, and I absolutely LOVED them. I feel somewhat disloyal saying this, but I actually preferred them to alfabeto.
The singer was absolutely nutso, jumping and falling around like a crazy person. He even had a bag of beer that he passed out to everyone (and for a moment I thought he was even going to give some to the children) so that we could all kanpai (cheers) together.
When it was over, I couldn't help myself, and I asked if he was drunk, but apparently, he's just crazy. Totally loved it!
After the concert, I met up with some friends to go see Eito Rangers, the new Kanjani8 hero movie, about a future world where your whole life is decided by a test you have to take at the age of 6.
Needless to say, I LOVED it! Possibly the best hero movie I've ever seen! :-) The pseudo dystopian future was, in my mind, AMAZINGLY well played. And they totally played up the members (of kanjani8) strengths and weaknesses perfectly. Love!
I don't get to go to movies a lot here in japan, as they are ridiculously expensive, but I'm happy to say that I feel like I've picked well.
So, at the end of July/beginning of August, Mikey G made a quick stopover in Japan on his tour of Asia, so I headed up there to hang out with him for an AMAZING two days!! I wish it could have been longer, but alas - work.
Anyhow, since I have SO much blogging to catch up on, Mikey G has graciously allowed me to just use the e-mail he sent about our time togehter - with pictures added in by me, along with commentary in italics.
Tokyo with Audrey
As I had mentioned, the first two days in Tokyo were spent with Audrey, and we had am absolute blast. I met up with her on Monday morning, and we had a whirlwind tour of a few parts of Tokyo. The first thing we did was head to Shinjuku, where we went to get me a bus ticket. There's an amusement park in Japan that I've always wanted to go to
(called Fuji Q Highlands, and me, too, I SO want to go. Unfortunately, I am a broke person and was even more of a broke person then)
, and apparently there are "cheap"
bus+entrance combo tickets (cheap being about 100 USD, which is apparently half of what I'd pay if I took trains there), so we went to look for them. And damn, I was lucky that Audrey came along with me because nobody who doesn't speak Japanese would have ever been able to do this alone. We found the bus station, but we didn't see anywhere to buy tickets. Audrey
asked someone, and we had to find staircase 8 and then booth 50. We ended up going up staircase 6, and then she saw a place that sold tickets, but there was no 50 there. When we walked in, she was told that they only sell same-day tickets there, and the advance ticket office was around the corner, through a random warehouse-looking door, up an unmarked flight of stairs, and in a random room where the people didn't speak a word of English. That's one thing that's different from the rest of the trip: Southeast Asia relies so much on tourism that most people speak English on the tourist paths, but Japan doesn't rely on it as much, so very few people speak English. It's an interesting dynamic. Anyway. everything worked out, I got my ticket, and we went to grab some lunch.
Seriously, though, I don't know how even Japanese people manage to find their way to this ticket counter, with how convoluted, confusing, and unmarked it was. Kristen and Shawn said the same thing about the lack of people in Japan speaking English, as did Guillaume. It's true that it's so much easier to have an awesome time in Japan if you speak a bit of Japanese.
We went to a restaurant where there's a machine full of buttons with pictures of food and prices, and you push the button of what you want, pay at the machine, and give your receipt to the waiter.
I've always wanted to eat in one but never been able to because they never have anything vegan.
They then bring out your food. It was somewhat amusing, but what was even more amusing was that Audrey and I were the only people there who weren't businessmen. Not even businesswomen. We walked past several more push button restaurants, and we never saw anyone inside other than businessmen. Perhaps because it's a fast place and they're short on time? Who knows?
We actually talked to Martin about this somewhat, and somehow, he NEVER noticed that there are never any women in these places.
After that we went to the Harajuku area and walked down Takeshita street, which is a popular shopping area for teenagers and 20-somethings. We went into an AKB48 store, which was interesting. Apparently AKB48 is this popular girl band group that has something like 98 members that are all teenage girls (more like fifteen years old as opposed to nineteen), and apparently people vote on who gets to be in the music videos (since not all 98 can be featured). But not just anyone votes - there's a minimum age to
do so, and it's apparently quite high, so it's mostly 40- and 50-something year old men voting on which fifteen year old girls they like the most. It's really creepy, but equally amusing.
It's incredibly depressing, but the more I see them and hear them, the more I find myself liking them. And I even watched one of their graduations (they graduate from the band when they leave, which I assume is when they get too old) on TV the other day, and it made me cry. I might actually buy their new album, and I'm feeling somewhat horrified about this.
We also went into a store that's full of those machines that you put quarters in and get little trinkets out,
They're called capsule machines or gachapon
only these were a bit more expensive (a few bucks each). There were a lot of bubble machines, and Audrey got a keychain of the group ViViD, which is one of the visual kei (just Google it) bands that's tied for her third favorite visual keiband (SuG and Ayabie are also tied, with LM.C taking second place and An Cafe taking first). Not that you need to know her favorite bands, but it was super fun seeing this random bit of culture and how much she likes it. Audrey has absolutely fallen in love with Japan over the past two years, which is sad because she's moving to Montreal soon. But I think she'll be back someday :-)
After that we went to Meiji Jingu, which is a shrine, and wandered around a nearby park and got lost. I've seen so many temples that while it was amusing to see what a shrine was like, I didn't really have much of a desire to go inside or really take a tour. We also saw a group of Japanese people dressed up in some sort of traditional-looking outfits and doing a dance.
They had these big antler like things, and they were playing the drums, and it was seriously one of the coolest things I've ever seen!
It was amusing because they were interviewing the people, and Audrey told me that one of the older men was asked how the experience was,
and he responded that he was hot and tired and ready for it to be over :-p
After wandering around and getting lost in the park, we went down a nearby street (Omote Sando)to find the Snoopy Store, and I was excited to find that they had Snoopy chopsticks. I've been wanting some chopsticks for home, and I wanted something from the Snoopy store that was definitively Japanese, so they were perfect!
Then we went to store featuring D-Boys, which is a group of guys who are actors with the same agency, some of whom Audrey is, of course, in love with. And as we were walking, we ran into a few girls who were dressed up as though they were Anime characters (cosplay), which was cool, but unfortunately I didn't get any pictures.
The guy on the left is Jinnai Sho, and he's my favorite D-Boy. He's in a move about to come out called Pole Dancing Boys that for some reason I can't wait to see!
After that we went to Shibuya and saw the famous intersection where millions and millions of people cross each day. Then we went into Shibuya 109, which is a very Japanese clothing/department store, and had a blast wandering around. The fashion was just amazing, which was one of my favorite parts of Tokyo. The teenagers and 20-somethings definitely have their own culture, with several subcultures, and it's just fascinating to people watch. It was amusing because Shibuya 109 is separated into men's and women's stores, but there were a lot of really feminine guys covered in make-up shopping in the women's store, and even the men's store had a lot of feminine-looking fashion.
Fashion is also totally one of my favorite things about Tokyo! I wish I could get away with wearing some of the things they were. . . but somehow because I am taller than most of them, I feel like I would just look awkward and gawky instead of cute. Totally love people watching, though, and trying to stop myself from buying clothes.
Afterward we met Audrey's friend Martin and went to Asakusa for dinner. Audrey pointed out the giant golden poo, which is supposed to resemble the foam on the top of a glass of beer, but it just...doesn't. We also saw the Tokyo Skytree, which is a new tower that was built solely to be an observation deck. It's kinda sad because it has no other use, and so it was a huge waste of money. Anyway, we grabbed dinner and then went back to our hostels to bed (I'm tired just writing about the busy day)!
It also seems like a huge waste of money to me, but it seems to be doing extremely well. It's still booked out for the next couple months, and for the time being, it actually seems to be earning a lot of money. Something I will never understand. . .
Then Kate joined us on Tuesday morning for a bit of sightseeing. We went back to Asakusa (with the giant golden poo), but this time we went to another part which is really the old part of Tokyo. We got to see how the shops used to be, and we went past a cool pagoda.
Afterward we went to Akihabara, which is the electronics district. We saw women dressed as maids advertising maid cafes (where you are waited on by women dressed as maids, who call you "master" and treat you really nice and whatnot), and then we went to the coolest store in the world, Super Potato! It's a store that focuses on old video games, like the Famicon, which is the original Japanese version of the original Nintendo. They have old games and systems, but also stuffed animals, lamps, and loads of other types of old video game paraphernalia. I wanted to buy everything, but I'm running out of money, so I abstained. I also don't need more *stuff*. But it was all such a part of my childhood that I'm a bit disappointed that I didn't get anything. Next time, I suppose.
Me, too!!!! I want to buy everything every time I go into Super Potato. Unfortunately, money = issue. :-( I also noticed last time I went in there that the sign on Mario that Mikey G and I are blocking by touching him says さわちゃダメ, which means don't touch. heehee! oops!
After that we went to a convenience store because that's where the sell baseball tickets, and Kate and I wanted to see a baseball game here. And it was another situation where we were lucky to have Audrey with us because a foreigner would have never, ever been able to purchase them without knowing Japanese. So we get to the machine and see that there's no English mode. So Audrey goes in and hits about three buttons to get to the Baseball section (they sell tickets to other things, including other sporting events, Tokyo Disney, and loads of other things). So when we finally got to baseball and picked the correct date, there were four different options for tickets that even Audrey had trouble distinguishing. The first one we tried was for family tickets and only let you purchase a set of 3 tickets, but then we found the right option. But we still had to pick where we wanted to sit, and the first few we tried said that there weren't two seats together (but in Japanese, so Kate and I would have never known). Then we were finally able to find a section with seats together, purchase them, and print them out. It was such an ordeal, and very few people here speak English, so it would have been otherwise impossible to get tickets.
An ordeal, yes, but one that I for some reason super enjoyed. Anyhow, MikeyG enjoyed his baseball game so much that I will defo be heading to one myself before I leave!!
After getting tickets we got lunch, and after taking a while looking at restaurants, we found one that featured omlets with rice inside of them, appropriately named Omrice. We were pleasantly surprised at how delicious they were. After that, Kate split off to do her own thing and Audrey and I went to the Parasite Museum, which was small but very amusing. There was a guy and a girl there together, and Audrey pulled me aside and said that she didn't hear their full conversation, but the bit she did hear was the guy saying, "This brings back memories" or something of that sort. It was seriously hilarious - she said it so excitedly while pointing to one of the parasites in the glass. I'm pretty sure it was her and not him.They also had an 8 meter long tapeworm, accompanied by an equally long ribbon that you could play with to see how long the tapeworm really was. I had Audrey wrap it around her and model it for a small photoshoot, which is the sort of ridiculous fun she and I always have when we hang out :-) Yay! Super fun times! I can't wait to visit MikeyG in California!
After the museum I wanted to go somewhere to just relax (as my feet were killing me from all the walking), and so Audrey picked a park area called Yebisu Garden Place because it's supposed to be nice and because it was featured in a Japanese television show (Hana Yori Dango!!!!) she watches, and she had never been. We went to the place where Domyouji and Haruka (who is actually called Makino - I totally screwed up her name when telling Mike)
met up for their first date and then later got married. It was funny because there were loads of people taking pictures in that spot, and we were wondering if the others were also super into the show or if there was some other reason. After that we met up with Audrey's friend Karl and his girlfriend and hung out at a cafe (but only after eating a delicious dinner at Little Heaven - mieum!!).
I was SO excited! I've been trying to remember to go there every time I go to Tokyo, but I just keep forgetting. While we were there, Mike and I also found a pharmacy in which we took our blood pressures. For some reason, this ended up being one of the highlights of my day. Good times, good times!
The next morning we grabbed breakfast, and then Audrey had to head back home. Sadface!
Sadface!, indeed! I had a great time hanging out with MikeyG in Tokyo, and I wish I could have spent more time with him!
One thing I wish I could have shown him while he was here, that I think I've posted in the blog before:
So, I just got back from a 3 week vacation around southern Japan, and I have a LOT of catching up to do. So, if things go as planned, expect a bombardment of blog posts in the very near future!
In the meantime, let's go back in time.
A long time ago, I woke up one morning, and Chieko asked me if there was anywhere I wanted to go in Okazaki where I hadn't been because I needed a car.
After much thinking, I realized there really wasn't, so after a brief internet search for waterfalls (私、滝好きだもん) in the Okazaki area, we hopped in the car and headed to Kuragari Keikoku (keikoku = canyon).
I was extremely happy with my choice.
Even though it was super hot outside, there was a nice breeze comfortable shadows from the trees, so the weather felt lovely.
And the scenery was absolutely AMAZING!
I am a hardcore fan of lush, green areas, especially when they involve bamboo and trees covered with soft, green moss.
There were times when I really felt like I was in a Miyazaki film.
I find it really sad that all of the green space in Japan is slowly, steadily being destroyed. Somehow, the forest areas of Japan feel more majestic, more magical to me than in a lot of the other places I've been.
I was especially happy with my choice because there were literally waterfalls EVERYWHERE along the hike!
There were ones that were quite a lot larger than this one, but for some reason, I just found this one exceptionally gorgeous.
Other than hiking, I've also been doing a lot of farming since arriving in my homestay.
Me with two of the biggest zucchinis I've ever seen!
Chieko's parents live on a farm, and they seem to grow every type of everything you could possibly imagine.
Chieko's mom taking a break after potato picking.
We even went digging up potatoes one day, and it was SUPER hot and SUPER exhausting, but also inexplicably fun!
But let me just say - the smell of rotting potatoes is one of the most REPULSIVE, RANCID things I have ever smelled in all of my life of smelling.
We would be having a lovely, pleasant time digging (with me, of course, far too regularluy accidently plunging the pitchfork shovel thing INTO the potato instead of the dirt) when suddenly we would be accosted by a smell so awful that I almost threw up on several occasions.
Then we woul inevitably come across a potato so rotten that it had literally turned into this whitish brown oozy slimy goop dripping out of a rotting skin.
So gross.
Other than that, and the inevitable heat headaches, the farming has been super fun. I hope I get to go again at least a couple times.
I'm an ex-mathematician vegan who just moved to Montreal after living in Japan. I love to bake, I love live music, and I loved living in Japan. I used to live in France. Oh, and I LOVE to read and listen to punk rock and visual kei!
