Low Content Mode

Hey guys, sorry to say but it looks like I'll be entering low content mode for the foreseeable future. The combination of upcoming work regarding Christmas an insane amount of work to do at school and my invalid girlfriend who needs nursing this week (not quite, she just had a wisdom tooth out) means that I likely won&t have any proper posts up until after Christmas.

I'll try to have stuff up but don't expect anything major.

And on that note I leave you with the following fine example of Engrish I've been saving for just such an occasion.

Akihabara

Hello everyone, apologies incidentally for the lack of a post on Tuesday. I'm going to try and make up for it with extra posts this weekend. Today however I'm continuing my series of articles catching up on mine and Fran's brief exploits in Tokyo. Today's topic, that Mecca of geekdom; Akihabara.

P.S. Mum, if you're reading this I recommend you stop right now. No seriously, stop. Dad if you're reading this don't tell Mum.

Akihabara is renowned throughout Japan as being Otaku-central or nerd-city if you will. In fact it’s pretty renowned outside of Japan for the same reasons. This is the heart of anime culture. This is where the cos-players throng, where the amateur manga is drawn and published, where computer games tournaments are held. A dozen of the things that typically draw the western eye to Japan all originate in Akihabara or have their spiritual home here. Akihabara is the home from home for all Otaku.

However Otaku has a very different meaning in Japan than its equivalent English word geek does in Britain and America. Some of the meanings are shared, the fascination with pop-culture, the obsessive fandom, the interest in non-mainstream fiction and hobbies. Indeed some of the more negative meanings are shared too, the social awkwardness, poor personal hygiene, etc. But in Japan the negative meanings are far, far worse. In Japan social awkwardness is not something that’s a shame but is forgiven. It’s not a joke, it’s the ultimate in taboo’s. To choose not to partake in the dominant cultural and social norms is to declare yourself to not be Japanese. The culture here is all about harmony and group dynamics, to opt out of the group is to become the ultimate outsider. So Otaku, far from being a fairly affectionate term for someone with slightly odd interests is an insult that suggests that you are odd, cannot function in society, are a disgrace to Japan and your family, are disgusting personally and likely are a sexual pervert.

Okay that is a bit harsh but really geek is at best affectionate and at the worst a humorous term. Otaku ranges from the humorous to outright fear and hate. At a speaking contest held in my adopted home city of Kobe one group of girls did a presentation on Otaku and "mania." Although the presentation was sympathetic to Otaku a survey of their classmates revealed that something like 80% of them "hated" Otaku.

Oh and apparently one of the girls presenting was a comic "mania"* because she owned 70 manga digests. I wonder what her friends would make of my comic collection of more than 1000 comics.

furthermore the sexual pervert thing, alas, is truer than I would like it to be. All the areas of “geek” or “Otaku” culture in Japan are linked inextricably with a sleazy pornographic culture. Den Den Town in Osaka freely mixes computer and toy shops with pornographic posters of underaged anime girls and Akihabara is home to the original maid cafes. Where sad lonely otaku pay for the privilege of having a woman dressed as an anime character flirt with him whilst he eats his food.

But, says I, is all this sex culture merely pornographic? Is there not a vibrant sexual underground in Japan? A breaking open of centuries held moral and social practices all in the service of better and more thrilling sex? Surely my girlfriend and I could explore this brave new world whilst we are in Tokyo?

No? Alright I’ll own up. The nerdy stuff was all shut so we wandered into the only place open (a 6 story sex shop) to pass the time giggling at willies.

As you can imagine, with 6 stories available there was quite a selection in there. Adult costumes, some extraordinarily hardcore pornography, marital aids of all shapes and sizes, flavours and colours and this:



This my friends is the Hello Kitty Vibrator.

Marketed officially as a neck massager the Hello Kitty Vibe has been well known as a sex toy since the early 90’s**. Sanrio gave the license to produce Hello Kitty products to Genyo who produced the first “neck massager” and began raking in money hand over fist when the thing became a bit of a cult object amongst certain sub-cultures in America and Europe. When Sanrio got wind of this they promptly yanked the thing from the market and revoked Genyo’s license (eventually, initially they had no egal standing but in the end shady business deals by Genyo gave them a pretext), citing moral outrage.

Of course as of last year Sanrio has re-released the neck massagers to the market, in a variety of colours no less. Evidently it was more greed than moral outrage that motivated Sanrio’s decision.

I knew of the Hello Kitty vibe long before I ever decided to come to Japan and I couldn’t believe I was being faced with such a legendary object. Something that seemed to so perfectly sum up the insane materialism of this country, and only for a 1000yen!

Alas I didn’t buy it, girlfriend didn’t want it and I had no use for it so we put it back and moved on.



Our next stop in Akihabara was a café called “Neko Ja La La”. This was the original “cat café.”

Now when I tell my Japanese friends that I went to a cat café in Akihabara they assume that I went to a Maid Café where the maids dress as cats. Nope, I want to a café filled with actual real life cats.

And aren’t they just adorable.

Neko Ja La La charges per the hour and also charges for drinks. Whilst there you can play with any of about 30 cats and the room is filled with cat toys, baskets and other luxuries to make the cats happy. It was all very, very twee and ridiculously cute but come on; I’m not made of stone. Wook at the kitty, wook ad duh kiddy!



The idea behind the café is to exploit the stress relieving effects of cats. Most Tokyoites live in tiny apartments where pets are banned. So places like these allow stressed urbanites the chance to play with and pet cute kittens and generally chill out. In my opinion it’s a fantastic idea although it does potentially veer into the realm of animal exploitation. However, considering the cats are basically pampered all day long I think it steers clear of it. There are numerous rules in place to protect the cats too (everything is very sanitised) so overall I wouldn't be at all disappointed to see more cat cafés spread over Japan.



The cats seemed particularly interested in Fran’s feet. This puzzled us for quite some time until we twigged that we had spent the morning walking though a fish market and our feet probably smelled delicious to the cats. Needless to say we also found this to be sooooooooooooo cuuuude.



And on that final fishy feet fact I bid farewell.



* Yes, i know it should be "maniac" but Engrish has appalling grammar.

** Most of the information in this section comes courtesy of Hello Kitty Hell.

Hiroshima Dreamination

A final thought from Hiroshima from my recent two day trip.

With two days to spend in Hiroshima my girlfriend and I used one day on Miyajima and the other visiting the A-bomb museum and the various memorials in Peace Park. All of which I have written about before.



The night of our second day we wandered down Peace Boulevard to look at the “Dreamination”. Basically Christmas Lights.



I don’t know about other countries but in Britain we have a big tradition of municipal Christmas lights. Every December cities up and down the U.K. tart themselves up in illuminations and then hold a fairly naff ceremony with a local celebrity to switch them on. Thus done the cities are transformed into a festive winter wonderland. Well not quite, but it would take a scrooge of epic proportions to object to Christmas Lights. For one month of the year the same old streets and tired shop fronts transform into something a little bit more interesting and fun to look at. The whole experience of just being in a city is subtly altered for the better.



I have fond memories as kid of being driven around the city centre with my Mum, Dad and two brothers with Christmas music playing on the radio looking at all the lights and pointing out all the strange shapes they were in. Snowmen, stockings, wreaths, presents, bears, Santas, candy canes and most memorably in Leeds the Santa parachuting down the side of an office building.



The “Dreamination” reminded me a lot of Christmas lights except that

a) They had nothing overtly to do with Christmas
b) They were up in November
c) They were confined to one (admittedly rather long) street
d) They were on a pedestrian level and pedestrians could interact with them rather than merely looking at them.

a) Can’t be helped considering Japan doesn’t officially celebrate Christmas, b) is a sad indictment of our consumer capitalist society but c) I am prepared to forgive because d) more than makes up for it.



Strolling through the lights is a much different experience to driving past them looking up. Strolling arm in arm with your long time girlfriend in weather that is cold but not too cold and looking at and playing with lights is another experience altogether and a very fine one at that.

Most of the lights were still there to be gazed at, obviously but a few of them provided an opportunity to get inside the lights and pose for photos.



Most notably this carousel.



And this train which I dubbed the Galaxy Express 999.



One day I need to see that anime, if only because at karaoke with my fellow teachers one of my JTE’s sang it once.



My favourite of the lights was this awesome looking phoenix. Not very Christmassy but very cool.



Incidentally Kobe also has it’s own Christmas lights-esque festival. The Luminare. I wrote about it last year. The Luminare has its appeal but frankly I’m much more a fan of the idiosyncratic but varied lights of the Dreamination than the beautiful but repetitive lights of the Luminare.

Miyajima Momijidani

I apologise but this post gets a wee bit poetic and flowery in the middle.

Momijidani is one of Japan’s two famous “viewing” seasons, the other being hanami in Spring. Momijidani means to go view the beautiful maple leaves that turn Japan’s forests into beautiful vistas of red and gold every autumn.



One of the most famous sights for Momijidani is Miyajima Island near Hiroshima. The island is covered in a wide variety of maples and even has a park dedicated to maple trees.



My girlfriend being wiser and more sensible than I rightly thought that it would be a great place to spend a long weekend. And she was right.



I don’t really have a lot to add about Miyajima since the last time I wrote about it. The floating torii is still a truly amazing sight. The view from the top of the mountain still offers a stunning panoramic vista of the surrounding area and the dramatic, moody mountains that burst from the sea like monsters rising from the depths. The climbed down is still pleasant and calm and takes you through beautiful primeval forest. There are still monkeys, deer and monkeys and deer together. The town of Miyajima is still charming and old fashioned and a delight to stroll through. It is, basically, still my favourite spot in Japan.

The main changes this time were to the climate and the amount of people in attendance.



Obviously it was autumn and as I said we had gone there to admire the autumn leaves. And they are definitely worthy of admiration. Autumn has always been my favourite season in Britain for the combination of the nicest temperatures of the year (September is warm but not so warm that you sweat from walking), the confluence of several festivals such as bonfire night and Halloween (which obviously isn’t a big thing in Britain but is to a horror movie buff like me) the beautiful crisp quality to the air and the glorious colours of the trees.



Japanese Autumn lacks the festivals and is still so wet that it jumps from hot to cold almost immediately but it more than makes up for it in the quality of its leaves.



I mean, wow! Words fail me.



The amount of forest in Japan helps this effect too. Japanese cities are largely devoid of trees (although Hiroshima is an exception) but just beyond every Japanese city is a dominating mountain range covered top to bottom in ancient forest. These forests are mostly a lustrous dark green but they are dotted here and there with bright apple reds, fiery oranges and sunflower yellows. In autumn every view in Japan gains a breathtaking multi-coloured backdrop.



Chief and most important of the autumn trees are the maples, the momiji which the season gets its name from. Not only do these trees effect the most dramatic change and most exciting of colours (just look at some of those reds and let your jaw hang loose in wonder) but the shape of the leaves further enhances their beauty. Symmetrical, angular, intricate, eye catching the classic maple leaf shape is the perfect canvas on which to display these autumnal compositions.



Autumn also grants the surrounding view a wonderful mist. From the top of the mountain the surrounding islands which rise so magnificently from the waters are draped in a mysterious fog. Thin enough that it doesn’t obscure the view but just thick enough to lend the islands an air of mystery and a vague ethereal quality.



Put basically Miyajima looks really pretty in autumn.



However, unfortunately, the Japanese people are well aware of this and they flock, in their thousands, to come see it.

This is a constant problem for the traveller in Japan. There are just a lot of Japanese people. And lots of these Japanese people want to do the same things as you. The Japanese are very good at enjoying their own country, much better than Brits are, and they love to travel and see the sights in Japan.

So you can be sure that at any major festival or any scenic spot that is particularly associated with a season there will be other people there in their thousands getting in your way and spoiling the view and the quiet.



Frankly I’m used to this by now and having to struggle through enormous crowds of people no longer bothers me quite so much as it did but it can still rankle sometimes, especially when we had to wait more than an hour for the cable car to the top of the mountain. Nor did I have the island entirely to myself last time either but whilst last time on my climb down the mountain last time I saw 3, maybe 4 people in total this time around I passed a group of 3 every 10 seconds.

The food is still awesome too. I introduced Fran to the delights of barbequed oysters. She didn’t like them and so I got to eat hers as well. She has no idea what she’s missing, they were tasty and juicy and perfect and meltingly delicious. I want some more just thinking about it.

And momiji-manju, basically tai-yaki but in the shape of momiji leaves, is still the finest invention in the entire history of Japan.

Chotto Matte Kudasai

Hey guys. New post tomorrow for sure. I just came back from a visit to Hiroshima and I have lots of amazing photos to share. Right now though I'm absolutely knackered so just a quick filler.




birds fling delightly


Seen on a cup in our Hotel.


(topic title means "one moment please")

Tokyo At Last

Hey guys. So as promised I'm finally going to get around to posting the write up for the rest of my Tokyo-trip.

Because it's now been so long since I went there though I'm not going to be doing full day diaries like i usually do but rather short write ups for the various attractions and places we visited.

With any luck Tokyo should all be done and dusted by Christmas.

So lets start it off with one of the experiences that will stick with me the most from Tokyo.

Tsukiji Fish Market



Our trip to Tsukiji began at the shockingly early time of 5:30 This wasn’t so bad for me as I’m used to rising at 6:00 for work but my girlfriend, who works nights, was paralysed by early morning sickness. Eventually with some persuasion I got her out of bed and dressed and we headed bleary eyed into the dawn in search of fish. However, and this may surprise you, our 5:30 awakening was actually a bit late.




You see Tsukiji is the world’s biggest and busiest fish market and one of the biggest open air markets in the world. A significant proportion of ALL the fish eaten on the main island of Japan, and certainly all the fish around Tokyo, passes through this one market. Serious money moves through this place. Japan eats a lot of fish everyday and Tokyo, with a population of about 8 million, not factoring in it’s enormous suburbs like saitama and Chiba, is a huge consumer of fish all on its own. It would be the equivalent of every meal eaten in London every day passing through one market and it is just as noisy, busy and loud as that image would suggest. In fact the market itself makes about 5 BILLION dollars annually.

Famously it’s also where the really expensive tuna gets bought. Early in the morning just as the catch comes in auctions begin where top quality restaurants bid for the largest, freshest most perfect specimens of tuna available. Prices here can easily get into the silly money territory. The record for one tuna being $55,700. Our 5:30 start might seem like an early beginning to the day but actually all the auctions were already finished half an hour before we woke up. Not that this mattered to us as due to the interference of tourists the auctions are now closed to the public.



It is, as you can imagine, for such a large and busy market, chaos. However it’s a kind of organised chaos. Everyone there knows where they are going and what they are doing, after all they do this everyday. It’s just we poor tourists who haven’t a clue as to what’s happening. From the inside it’s a well oiled machine, everybody has a role and a function and busies themselves with some small task with their uttermost focus. From the outside it is as chaotic as a hive of bees, impossible random movement in all directions with no seeming logical reason or pattern behind it. The result being that we spent most of the morning avoiding being run over by tiny little trucks called “mighty cars”. Basically a flat bed and then a tiny circular cab where the driver stands. About the size of a motorbike and moving at that speed but with unlimited access to every part of the market and some kind of gaijin eliminating screen that allows the driver to completely ignore the screams of helpless foreign tourists as he plows them down.



There are also an enormous amount of huge, dangerous looking saws. As a man I got an enormous thrill out of seeing circular saws about 4ft in diameter destroying chunks of ice and enormous fish bodies. I don’t know why, but something about huge dangerous bits of metal speaks to something primal in me.



However something about disgusting fish smells, enormous blades constantly spinning and trucks speeding about in pedestrian areas had set Fran’s nerves on edge a wee bit.



The signature fish here is tuna. Man sized fish that require years of training to properly prepare for the sushi plate. Tuna is to fishing what rice growing is to farming in Japan. Who wants to be the guy growing potatoes or cucumbers? Everybody wants to farm rice. Rice is the signature food of Japan, it is the food that the Japanese value above all others and to grow it is to be a “proper” farmer. So tuna is to fishing. You can catch sea snails all day and make a living but tuna is what people think of when they think Japanese fisherman. Indeed, as with all things in Japan, a tradition and a set “way” of preparing tuna has evolved over the centuries. The Japanese love a fixed set of rules for how something should be done. It gives them an immense feeling of ease to know that there is a set way to do something and an immense pride to master this way. From what I could observe the way of tuna seemed to involve wielding absolutely enormous blades and pretending to be a samurai. Honestly these blades are absolutely huge, more like spears than knives. The entire knife, handle included, was about 6ft long but the blade itself accounted for more than half of that.



The next stage seems to be to chuck fish heads into the gutter and in the general direction of poor gaijin trying to take photos.



Honestly, this man threw a fish head at me. I don’t think he knew I was there but he still chucked a fish head at me.



Tuna is the signature food but pretty much every thing that has ever lived under the sea is available for sale, either to restaurants or direct to the consumer. Among the weird and wonderful sea creatures on offer we saw.

Tentacles from what must have been a huge octopus.



Sea snails in their shells.



Tiny fishies.



Quite…phallic looking shellfish.



Live, and terrifying, spider crabs.



Anemones?



All this raw fish, plus a lack of breakfast was starting to turn Fran’s stomach so we set out to fulfil an ambition of mine. A sushi breakfast in Tsukiji. As one of my friends put it, we were being “more Japanese than the Japanese.”




Wandering out of the main market (god knows how we found our way out but we somehow managed it) we eschewed any attempts to find a specific restaurant and settled on picking at random any of the hundreds of small eateries adjoining the market. We had been warned that the queues for good sushi in the morning can be up to an hour and half long but at our smaller place we only had to wait for about 20 minutes.

The sushi was absolutely amazing. Hands down the finest fish I have ever eaten. I had no idea sushi could actually be this good. It had a stronger flavour than sushi usually does but a range of subtler more delicate flavours to it as well. It just was more complex and more delicious than any sushi I have ever eaten. And the restaurant itself was enormously entertaining. At the counter was a sempai (senior) chef and his kohai (apprentice) a relationship that defines Japanese culture. The sempai prepared our sushi with enormous knives and good humour. Cracking jokes in decent English and singing to himself as he did so. He carved fish into elaborate shapes and sliced with confidence and skill. Beside him his kohai nervously fumbled to make the rolls (which had waaaaaay too much wasabi), too junior to be allowed to touch the fish yet and merely allowed to observe his master at work. Throughout the entire process the kohai would make mistakes and be berated for it in jocular terms by his master. In the backroom an old bloke could be occasionally glimpsed obviously preparing the stock and berating both of them. It had the perfect makings of a sitcom. Old bloke, middle aged bloke and young bloke in a sushi restaurant together and the fun that occurs. At least one episode would be about the apprentice incorrectly preparing fugu I reckon.

So Tsukiji, in summary, busy, smelly, fishy, delicious.

Bizarre Biscuits (that would be cookies for our American readers)

A quick follow up to Tuesday’s Ninja post today I am going to discuss.




NINJA BISCUITS!!!!

Oh yes!

There were a huge variety of different brands of ninja biscuit available in Iga, all basically the same thing. An incredibly, astoundingly hard biscuit covered in either ginger or seaweed (Japan has different ideas about what constitutes savoury).

How hard are they I hear you cry. So hard my friends that they come packaged with a tiny hammer.



A tiny hammer which incidentally is bloody useless for breaking the damn things.

Ostensibly these biscuits are really hard to prevent them from going stale and so a ninja can keep a stash of them to feed himself on dangerous missions.

Considering neither museum once mentioned these biscuits I’m going to treat this claim as, um, shall we say dubious. Nonetheless stick the word ninja in front of something and it automatically makes it 1000 times better in my world. I was powerless to resist the allure of ninja biscuits.

That said, they’re not very nice. Oh sure they taste nice, even with the inclusion of sweet seaweed, but it’s difficult to get too excited about eating something that could make passable tank armour. Honestly you have never eaten anything this hard. You may be thinking “oh ho Adam, I’ve eaten some pretty tough toffees in my time,” well not as hard as these biscuits you haven’t. I’m sure if pushed to it I could kill a man with one of these. Actually come to think of it maybe that’s why the ninja carried it around. Food and weaponry in one handy package; it’s dwarf bread from the Discworld books. Available for consumption in Japan, the land of no food taboos whatsoever.



In the world of more palatable confectionary we have two new offerings from Kit-Kat this week. Well newish.

The first is a Muscat of Alexandria Kit-Kat from the premier line. The premier line consists of incredibly pretentious packaging, within which are 2, single finger kit-kats which are slightly larger than the standard size and have very unusual flavours.

The Muscat of Alexandria is a white grape flavour rendered in slightly pale green chocolate. It smells, very, very strongly of grapes but also faintly of milkshakes. I’m not sure why it smells of milkshakes, possibly a shared gelatinous component but I do know that such an odour provides a torment for me. I gave up eating at fast food places about 5 years ago and milkshakes are the thing I miss more than anything.

The first taste of the Muscat kit-kat is surprisingly bland. It doesn’t really taste of anything other than vaguely waxy. After a few chews though the grape flavour is really, really strong. Much stronger than I’ve come to expect from these kit-kats. Obviously it lacks the sourness of a proper grape and I think without that it’s way too sickly sweet. It probably needs some salt (like the watermelon) to just cut the sugar down a bit and make it a nicer overall experience.



Next up we have…. Untranslateable flavour. I’m pretty sure the hiragana says kooji (pronounced ko-O-jee) but I can’t even hazard a guess at the kanji. The picture on the packet seems to indicate English (or if you prefer Black) tea but the Japanese for that is koocha.

A quick taste check confirms that this is indeed English tea. This is not a new flavour for kit-kat. I had an English tea kit-kat last year as part of the premier line (which was very strong and unmistakeably a cuppa). These are part of the kit-kat mini line, apparently meant to be eaten alongside a cup of Japanese tea. Japanese tea is notoriously bitter and it customary to eat really very sweet cakes and biscuits with it to counteract some of the bitterness. Consequently the tea flavour is a bit weaker but the product is much sweeter. It isn’t nearly as sweet as the Muscat though. In fact I really quite like these. They taste like what a kit-kat tastes like after it’s been dipped in tea (but with a still crisp texture). However, for the life of me I cannot figure out what the market for these is? Surely they can’t complement a cup of green tea, because, well, they taste like black tea. And eating them with black tea would just be redundant. They’re too small to be eaten on their own so I ask you Nestle Japan, what are they for?

Oh and before you ask, yes, Japan does produce matcha and green tea flavoured kit-kats too. In fact I’ve eaten them and I do intend to get around to reviewing them on this site eventually.

Well that’s all for now. Next week I’ll probably get some of my Tokyo trip photos posted (finally) and we’re all going to learn about Japanese politics. Don’t miss out.