Note: This entry is in multple parts, as finding time to write the whole thing in one go is becoming difficult…

So…. Part One
As I had said, the rest of the week went “as work does” until we hit Friday night. Seiko had mailed me earlier in the day to say we should go to Shinjuku Nichome (the gay area of Tokyo). Naturally, I wasn’t so keen on this, but she was going there with a friend already - so it did seem like that would be that.

It was therefore at about 9pm or so when I walked out of Shinjuku station and headed to the nearby police box corner to meet Seiko. She had been drinking for quite some time now, so was in very good spirits. She explained that her friend had decided she now liked girls as well as boys, so they had been trawling around the various gay bars for the last few hours - so her friend could “test the water” as it were.

So first stop was a quite swish bar in the basement of a building, decorated with really tasteful decor. There was a bit of a commotion getting in the door, due to me waiting to let a guy out, and him waiting to let me in. After a few minutes of bowing at each other, I was finally ushered in by the barmaid who had come out to see what was going on
Inside, there were no actual customers except for us three - so all wasn’t too bad. The bar maids were very chatty (but only in Japanese) - so I just watched “Romeo Must Die” on the tv (which had subtitles :)). Not really much more to tell here, we stayed until about 12:30, when we had to go and catch last train.

Leaving Yuko at Shinjuku station to catch her train home, Seiko and I transferred to the Yamanote line to go somewhere different (staying in Shinjuku wasn’t going to be an option) and “Ebisu” was decided upon. We could have chosen Shibuya, but it seemed like a good idea to actually go somewhere new. So, on the last train of the night (literally) we sped past Shibuya and got off at the station that was Ebisu…. and then instantly regretted it when there was absolutely nothing there!! Well, this is of course a slight exageration, but what was there that looked good - all closed at 2am or so….

After walking around for about 30 minutes, the only sensible option was clear (though we of course wished we had thought of it earlier) - get a taxi back to Shibuya —- doh!

Of course this only took a few minutes (it was litterally just up the road), though set us back a cool 1000 yen (£5) - however at least we were back where some of the action was We knew we didn’t want to club it, though were quite happy to head to a bar, so it was quite lucky when we were stopped in the street by a guy offering “nomihodai” (i love that word!) for 1500 yen… hurrah!

It actually turned out that this was the same place we had gone on New Years, but that was cool. We just wanted somewhere warm to sit and get alcohol. The all you can drink lasted 2 hours, after which, it was decided just to head back as there was nothing else particularly fun to do (and we were kinda running low on funds) - to the taxi stop!
Saturday I had planned to get up nice and early to go and do some sightseeing, but on waking at 11am and finding the weather awful, bed seemed a good enough place to stay… and stay all day I did, just taking some time out to get up, microwave some food, and change the DVD on the computer
Come Saturday night, I had (miraculously??) managed to tire myself out (by doing nothing) and I got to bed at 12:30, hoping for a nice long sleep so the Sunday wouldn’t be so unbearable… ahh… sleep…..

* BANG BANG BANG *

Eh?

* BANG BANG BANG *

Ah yes, of course, common sense prevails and the man next door decides to start banging on the wall at 1:30am. What for, I just don’t know, but he decided to keep it going until 6:30!?!? Leaving me just 2 hours of sleep before I had to be up and alert to go to work. As you can imagine, I wasn’t at my brightest (for all the day… haha) and had to make frequent trips to the coffee machine to give me my much needed energy juice.

Come the end of the day, I just wanted to go home - however this was the new staffs “joining party” night, which meant 1) I had to go out, but even worse 2) I finished work at the 5pm shift, yet the party was at the end of the 7pm shift… no time to go home, so I just stayed at work doing admin jobs… (why i don’t know, but it seemed more fun that just sitting around doing nothing…)

The chosen venue for the party was the same izakaya that we had gone for Vanessa’s leaving do (so you can just look at the same photoset I guess) - and believe it or not, the same food was ordered… so like a complete copy of the previous night. I was trying my best to get involved in the conversation, but in reality I just wanted to go to bed. So it was begrudgingly that a few hours later, when Karaoke was suggested and everyone got up to go sing, I made my excuses and left …. bed bed bed!!
Aparently they only stayed for a few hours so everyone could get last train home, so perhaps I should have gone along - however, I saved some money, so I guess it wasn’t all bad.

Monday night was again a “bed early” due to Helen coming the next day, however sleep was kinda hard as I was quite excited I think I finally got off at about 2am or so All was not over though, as then the phone calls started… over and over someone kept calling from England with seemingly their phone in their pocket. The normal thing in this case of course would have been to just turn the phone off, BUT, I couldn’t incase Helen rang. The other option would have been to put it on silent, but again, due to the fact Helen might ring, this wasn’t an option.

So I got to bed at about 4am
However, all was not quite so bad (for me at least) as I received a call at about 8am or so from Helen telling me they had forgotten to put her luggage on the plane, so she would need to wait for the next one to arrive…. 3 hours later… hurrah! This meant I could go back to sleep and meet her at a much more respectable 12′o’clock at Shinjuku station… hehe…

So it’s now Tuesday and Helen is (by all accounts) here —> to Shinjuku station!

Well back I am here in the wonderful city that is Tokyo. Do you detect some sarcasm in my voice? No, I don’t think so - though being back in London has made me think how much a better place it is
First I should write the obligatory - OH HOW I MISS EVERYONE - which I really do mean. It was so nice to catch up with everyone again, be able to sit in a bar and make jokes without having to explain them in precise detail, sit at home on a SOFA!! (like OMG!!! ;)) and spend time with Mum + Dad.

I was thinking in the shower earlier, it doesn’t matter what people say - you can have a great a place as you could ever imagine, but without your good friends there, it will never be perfect. On the flip side, you can take an awful place, but as long as your good friends are there - you will always be happy.

I was reflecting on the last few years and uni. I didn’t really go in, so didn’t get the chance to meet the hundreds of people that is usual for a uni adventure, but i was very lucky in the fact that the few people i did meet are really great people… i guess i was lucky - and that was my point - how can a place where you have to study be any good? but add in a few great people and suddenly everything is ok
Ah the memories, going to uni (well almost, over the road) and just sitting in Ruks room (after climbing in through the window when she is changing of course) - guys, I would like to send out a bit “w000000t!” to (in alphabetical! :p) alex, greg, judge, nat & ruks plus of course the amazing Mr Fish (Lawrence) who joined in with the uni antics as best he could (when he could get there on time that is!) - without you lot, uni would have just been “something to pass the time”, but you lot made it a happy experience… to friendship forever, hurrah!
So, the mushy stuff done, what’s been happening to me.

Well, I’ve been back almost 2 weeks now so what great things have I done.

First biggest news I guess is that I have left Japanese school! Why you may ask?! Well, I was fed up of not ever having any money / not being able to go out with the work people due to school the next day - and really wanted to do something about it.

My new motto is: Stop existing and START LIVING!

So this is what I have done, in the last week, my daily funds have jumped from £7 a day to a more reasonable £15 - and I have been out about 3 or 4 times with the work crew. I know, it sounds trivial, but I hadn’t been able to do it before - so this was quite a big thing.

Don’t worry though, I don’t intend to give up on Jap, Seiko has agreed to teach me (well it was actually her idea) plus I have been hot on the websites looking for language exchange students. At the moment, finding someone who is a low level English student is quite difficult (most are high level) as I need someone low so that there is no danger of flicking into English….. My aim is to have found maybe 2 or 3 by the end of the Month, I’ve got a load of replies already - just need to get around to mailing them back!

What else, hmmm… last weekend was quite amusing actually. Due to the time off I took, I have been having to work each Sunday (so this one too) - which meant I have just Friday nights to go out. Last Friday then I was to meet Seiko in Roppongi after she had had a meal with some friends, to go drinking. I got all ready, and from about 11pm started the labourious journey to Roppongi. When within one station of it (after 3 trains worth of changing) - I get an email “I feel really sick, can we go home!” - hehe - so basically, I walked out the station, and into a cab which took us back home!!! hahaha…. Not really wanting to waste the whole night though, I decided to go and meet up with Shimpei in Shimokitazawa, so told the driver to wait until we got Seiko in the house, before jumping back in to meet up with Shimpei at a very nice izakaya (the joys of having some money!!!) - the izakaya itself was actually pretty cool, with a load of shelves all around the bar with various nicknacks on them, including a large collection of puzzle games (the type where metal shapes are joined together and you have to split them up) - we ate and drank, then proudly left at about 3am with all the puzzles unlocked and strewn over the bar…! hurrah!

Ah I know, I haven’t mentioned the room change. Well this has been completed now, so I now am in Seiko’s old room. I should take some more photos when I get the chance. So it’s all happy sailing now…. actually, not really - but i think i’m just going to have to live with it… hehe… i can imagine the grief i would get if i said something now!

Firstly, there is no day light in the room, so even now, its really sunny outside, yet I am sitting here with the light on!! Problem is then that I never wake up! I wake, see it’s still dark so go back to sleep… I can’t see the time on my clock (it’s not flouresent) - and don’t want to put the light on, just in case it is really early, and i then won’t be able to sleep again…. hehe… so thats problem one.

Problem two relates back to noise again (though it isn’t as bad as before) - because I am now on the inner side of the apartment, it means all the corridoors are just outside my room. And, I don’t know how they managed to soundproof this place so badly, but it means if someone puts a key in their lock and turns it, the whole noise travels down the corridoor and wakes me up?!!? Insane sounding I know, but true…. same thing with people talking and going to work etc…. but like I said, no way I can complain now after all the fuss I made before!

So on Thursday I went with some of the work guys to one of their leaving dos. It was at a bar just around the corner from work called “dot” - actually a pretty nice place, a proper shoes off affair (with little slippers in the toilet) but best of all, “nomihodai” (all you can drink) for 980yen (about £5) for 2 and a half hours!! As you can imagine, this was being seriously abused by the gaijin in there (ordering like 5 beers at a time) - at which I was actually quite embarresed. You can picture the scene, a traditional Japanese bar, filled with loud and annoying foreigners…. I HATE GAIJIN!! haha…

Anyway, I tried to sit away from the loudest of them in the hopes people would think I wasn’t with them, but I don’t think it worked (it was pretty obvious, we had taken over the whole of the upstairs!!!) - this finished at about 12′o’clock or so and it was time to wander home.

Friday night was (once again) my only weekend night out (due to the working on Sunday situation) so this was an important occasion. This time, I decided I *actually wanted* to go to Roppongi (shock horror!) so arranged to meet up with Seiko at about midnight at “Hub”. I got there before her (she was enroute in a Taxi) so got some drinks in. About 20 minutes later, Seiko arrived, and my earlier show of kindness looked like it was going to be unrequired as already she was completely battered She had also brought along a friend with her, a 51 year old chap called Nobu, who works for a web company and had very little English. (which was good….)

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We stayed in Hub for about an hour or 2 (with me and Nobu propping Seiko up) - talking about various computer like topics and various other things until it came to the subject of music. Nobu is a great fan of older rock music and was talking about old bands he liked - I then started to tell him about dad and his love for music too. This conversation got quite involved, until Nobu suggested we go to his friends rock bar down the road which had loads of memorobelia and things he wanted to show me.

So we carried Seiko up the stairs and into a taxi ….

Arriving at the bar (called Heaven) - I was greeted with a fantastic site.. a really cool looking place, decorated with posters and news clippings all over the wall and guitars and amps strewn about the place. A really, really nice place - I think you would have loved it dad, it was just your scene Inside there were only about 6 people (all who were friends) so the atmosphere was also very good “funiki ga yokata desu-yo!” - so we went over to a little table, and the orders were taken….

I wanted a Matador (tequila, pineapple juice and a dash of lemon) - but there was not tequila or pineapple juice. Not to worry though, as the barmaid went off to the 7/11 to get it for me!!! Talk about service. Then, the hunger started, but alas the chef was ill… no worries, again, the barmaid went off to the 7/11 to return with a selection of food (as she wasn’t sure what i liked!!!) - so i had sandwiches, pasta and some crisps
Anyway, back to the rock - so over the wall was all this rock memorobilia, a load which i recognised from dad showing me (though i can’t now remember what it was) - so again i started to tell all of them about dad, and his adventures and the such like. They were all very impressed, and I have to say, listening to myself saying all the stuff dad did, I was pretty proud of him too It would seem that if you look past the pineapple head, there’s a pretty cool bloke there NICE ONE DAD!!!
I think we were talking for about 2 hours, by which time Seiko had fallen asleep, so it was time again to go back to the Taxi and get back home …. z00m z00m!

Saturday was the day I had set aside to get Dad’s cds, so at about 5pm (hehe) I got out the house and went off to Shinjuku - not before stopping off at the temple to wish for some good luck for the day I really like this whole Shinto religion thing, it’s nice to be able to go somewhere, ring a bell and say your bit to “someone”. No, I haven’t gone full on religious freak, but just saying hello to whoever or whatever made everything in the first place….. it’s a really nice place, especially in the evening as it looks really traditional with lanterns hanging about lighting the place up. I’ve been trying to go each day as it’s en-route to work, so on the way home I try and stop by.

So anyway, on to Shinjuku, where I first needed to go to the bank. Now for those of you who don’t know, Shinjuku station is absolutely massive and has so many exits. Unfortunately, I had forgotten which one led to Starbucks (which has the only ATM in Shinjuku I can use) - so it took me about 30 minutes to actually get some money out!!! Grrr…. Then it was a quick stop off at the electronics centre (go Sofmap!) to buy a new memory card for my iPAQ.

I’ve been fed up of listening to the same tracks day after day on my 128MB card, that I wanted to go for something somewhat bigger. After pondering for a good 20 minutes, I finally plumped for a 4GB compact flash card (I would have prefered SD but they didn’t have any) - which I got for about £80…. a good deal, yes, at the time, though I could have possibly grabbed it on ebay for a big cheaper…. ahh well, at least now I’ve got hours and hours of tunes for the 30 minute walk to work haha….

So that done, it was off to find the CD shop. I had a map, so it wasn’t too tricky, however after going in, the cd couldn’t be found. Therefore began a comedy sketch between me and the shop assistant on trying to obtain where a copy might be…. after logging on the net, and a translation site, he was able to inform me that the cd wasn’t made anymore, and they had no second hand copies in stock. I therefore asked if he could reserve one for me, at which he told me (after about 5 minutes of looking it up) that I needed to go to the “prog rock” branch over the road ….

…. so over the road I went ….

Simplest thing to do when I got in was just ask for the cd again, so I did, and was then handed a copy!?! Slightly confused I asked if they had anymore, at which point I was given another…. ?!!? EH?!? Thanking the girl, I then headed back to the original shop to show the guy. “Ah!” he goes, I am so sorry, I thought you wanted the “Import” … erm, no, but thanks anyway
Due to the ungodly hour I had to wake on Sunday (8:30!?!? does that time even really exist) - I aimed to hit the sack at around midnight. This got extended slightly as I rang Gowry first, but did manage to get to bed at around 1:30. All was good, I was nicely snuggled and fell asleep within 20 minutes or so. Then….

Bzzzzzzzzz, bzzzzzzzzzz, bzzzzzzzzzz - my phone started ringing, I tried to ignore it, but it rang and rang for absolutely ages…. before finally, it stopped…. so I started to drift off again, before, bzzzzzzzz, bbzzzzzzzzzz, yup, it started again.. this time i couldn’t ignore it, so got up and switched it off. However, the damage was done, I was now wide awake, and would stay so until about 5:30 which is the last time I remember on the clock before sleep.

This of course meant Sunday was one of the hardest days EVER, with me even starting to feel dizzy in some classes and just wanting to get onto the floor and just SLEEP!! hehe…. I got home at about 6pm or so and then got a text from Seiko saying she would cook tonite, so I bashed back saying cool and that we should watch a movie together, which was met with a “cool”.

The movie we chose to watch was “Howl’s Moving Castle”, an anime movie about a wizard called Howl who has a castle that it totally mechanical and can walk! HERE!. It was a really cool film and even better, in Japanese with English subtitles. This meant I was able to both listen to Japanese, but have the translation below if I wasn’t sure of the word (I must admit, most of the time was spent reading the subtitles, but hey!) - next we are going to watch Totoro, which features the same dialog format… this is part of my new school of Seiko
Monday I had an earlier shift again, so was going to finish at 7:30 - therefore I arranged to meet Seiko and Shiho after work to take them to “dot” (the izakaya of the other day). When we got there, there were no tables, only bar stools, which neither of us wanted, so after a little negotiation, we were moved into the “lovers room”! - basically a private room with a sofa, heaters and loads of hearts everywhere We were also opposite where the staff stood, so everytime we wanted a drink, all we needed do was poke our heads outside the curtain and ask!!!

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[IMG=516]

Well, 2 and a half hours later (and a blinding 12 drinks later! I was going to make the most of it this time) - we decided it was time to head somewhere else, so we gave Shimpei a call and told him to meet us at a nearby bar, after which we would go to Karaoke.

The bar we chose was “Heaven’s Door”, a pretty cool second floor joint, which sold about average priced drinks.

It was here, where suddenly everything started to go wrong …..

No one can be truely sure what caused it, though we suspect it may have been the now 14 drinks she had consumed, but when Seiko didn’t return from the toilet for 20 minutes, we were slightly bemused…. The wall was really thin though, so we could shout to her through it and she said she was ok….. not wanting to push the issue, we let her be, though by now a gentleman by the name of Henry wanted to use the facilities….

Remembering previous nights out usually ended in Seiko falling asleep, it seemed the best thing to do would be to just drag her out…. but alas, the door was locked, and then had a seperate slide lock on the inside (so we couldn’t open from the outside) - by now we weren’t sure what was going on, but Seiko kept banging on the door…… and shouting something….

Suddenly (and without warning) the door comes crashing open and Seiko goes flying across the room!!! Running back to pick her up, she seemed a bit confused and couldn’t understand why she couldn’t get out ….. we pointed the inside lock out to her ….. “AHHHH” she says, “I didn’t notice that!?!??” - a true “Helen” moment GO SEIKO!

It was pretty obvious now, Karaoke was no longer on the cards, so we decided to take the 30 minute walk home… no mean feat when you are taking a completely totalled girl with you, who is ademant she can walk on her own!! (no chance!!) We got about 10 minutes down the road, before it was obvious we weren’t going to get anywhere fast like this, so doing the only thing that seemed sensible at the time, I took it upon myself to start carrying her home!
Not that she was heavy, but I doubt I would have been to carry her very far, so when a taxi popped into view, the decision was (very quickly) taken to get in it :). I don’t know what the driver could have thought, he pulls over the brow of a hill and suddenly there is this gaijin carrying a (good as) passed out j chick with her mates all waving frantically…. SUGOI!!
A fun night had by all Which of course Seiko couldn’t remember in the morning…. haha….

So the plans for this weekend? Well it’s Seiko’s birthday on Thursday next, so this weekend is her party weekend. The plan is to first head to the newly opened ice bar in Roppongi (HERE) - basically, the whole place is made of ice! You have to wear a special cape and gloves in there, and can stay a maximum of 45 minutes!!! Should be pretty cool, I will be sure to get many photos!

There are a few extra things going on, but not really fit for here, but apart from that, the outlook is ok….

So apologies again for the late late updates, but now I am all settled again, regular posting should be resumed. One thing I will say though, I’m now at the point where I will stop posting just for the sake of it… if all I did one day was go to work, then home, don’t expect an update.

However, the amount of things I am trying to do now, this should (hopefully) not be a regularity
Onwards and upwards …. HURRAH!

Another week passed, another “fill in entry” - a bit more to discuss this week, though not neccessarily more to type… this will make sense when i get to it.

Anyway, on with the show:

Saturday 3rd September

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Saturday night was going to either be Ageha with Kaori (which I must admit, I didn’t really want to do anymore) or out with Seiko. Things were looking unsure however when I was woken up to the news that one of Shiho’s friends had died, so Seiko and Shiho had to go to the hospital (though I wasn’t at this point sure why…)

Later on (this entry is going to be short, i can’t remember too much - funny, i keep saying that… maybe Japan induces memory loss?) I received a mail from Kaori to say she would be working late, so maybe to leave Ageha until another day? This seemed like a good “get out”, so i mailed back to say it would probably be a good idea, what with the Seiko situation and all.

My consience (sp) was clear at this point, as it meant i was out of the situation in a nice way and i really was staying at home, so needn’t feel guilty I had gone out with her (Kaori).

Of course, my life is never that simple, and at about 10 o clock or so, Seiko called to say she had finished at the hospital and did I want to meet her in Shibuya with her friend Mika? After turning it over a few times in my head, I figured I might as well as I still wanted to meet up with more of Seiko’s friends, so threw on a T Shirt and headed out into the night.

Arriving at Roppongi station, I was mobbed by the usual army of promoters trying to get me into their club (who don’t even take “i am waiting for someone” as a reason not to enter… “you can call and tell them where you have gone…”) - Seiko turned up about 10 minutes later with gifts of alcohol from the Convenience Store - so we started the night off with a streetside drinkathon (I wonder how much I look like a nuisance tourist….)

I then felt the pangs of hunger hit, so we nipped across the road to the 7/11 to get some grub… however, something caught my eye (or nose…) - it was another roasted chicken place…..

Now remembering the nightmare chicken of the night before, i was kinda uneasy about buying another one, but as Seiko pointed out, the people standing eating it looked happy, and it was the start of the night, so might be worth a try…. I therefore duley purchased a 1/4 of chicken with the obligatory roast potatoes…..

All went silent as the chopsticks grasped at the first piece of chicken and it was slowly raised to my lips…..

….

….

IT’S GOOD! Ahah! Finally, the great tiki god has blessed me with some proper wholesome food. This chicken tasted wonderful (though perhaps the greatness was accentuated by the fact i have been eating miserable food for the last 3 weeks) prompting me to do a little jig in the street, much to the amusement of a group of passing girls - and aquiring me some strange looks from the bar owner who was touting for business opposite.

Now the night was set, all we needed was somewhere cheap (I only had 3000 yen - pretty desperate) so it was off to meet Seiko’s friend.

Entry to the club was 1000 yen, which wasn’t a good start, though we did get one drink. I was about to try and barter this down when seiko just paid and went straight in… doh!

Inside was playing your typical R/B hip hop that i have come to love since i moved here (oh yeah, and i live in a penthouse apartment in Ginza doncha know? :p) - however it wasn’t as rammed as everywhere else, so we were able to get a seat/half booth.

I was then introduced to Mika and her boyfriend (I’m not sure of his name, but for the sake of getting confused later, I will call him Bob) along with Bob’s brother Mike* (* of course his name wasn’t really Mike….)

Straight away Bob bought a round of drinks, despite my protest that i couldn’t afford to buy one back, followed by Mike doing the same. Mike seemed quite friendly and wanting to practise his English so kept asking me different questions and generally being quite pleasant.

It seemed obvious however as the conversation went on that he wasn’t entirely kean on the black race (I’m sure referencing them as “Niggers” isn’t PC anymore..) which was confirmed when he showed me a scar on his face, proclaiming the “Gipsies did it when I was a member of the Neo Nazis!!” - this struck me as kind of odd, seeing as he was Japanese (I thought you had to be white to join them, obviously not) - but also kinda left me a bit lost for words…

He then went on to explain he’s not like that anymore and can put up with other races, just would prefer it if they weren’t here…. riiiiiiiight…!??

Another round of drinks from Bob later and he sensed that I wasn’t having the best time, so suggested we move onto another club/bar called “Wall Street” which would play some better dance style music - this suggestion was met favourably, so we “bust a groove” and got outta there
Wall Street must be the narrowest bar I have ever been to. Whilst it was very long, the walkway could fit about 3 people down it at a squash. The DJ was playing an interesting style of music (half dance, mixed with hip hop…) - however the vibe was good, and thanks to Bob, the drinks were flowing, making it not very hard to get into the whole party spirit.

Even if I had written this entry the next day, I still can’t tell you what went on there, as I really can’t remember, but I left the place with more money than when i went in, 2 unopened packets of cigarettes (i dont smoke) and some very bizarre photos on my phone…… a good night then

Sunday 4th September

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Aha! This is an easy entry to write… slept most of the day, then started to write the last entry.

The idea had been to order pizza at about 10:30, as i had eaten quite a lot of scrambled eggs at about 5pm, so got on the phone to Gowry and Zak for a few hours until that point. However come 10:30, Seiko had gotten quite ill and was lying sick in bed.

As I had to be up early for my first day at school, I hit the sack about midnight… back to school tomorrow…. wow

Monday 5th September

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Alarm goes off at 8:15 - argh.. off damn thing, comes back on at 8:30….

Why am I up at such an ungodly hour? Yup, today is my first day of school (woopee!) and i have to get in a little bit earlier to hand in my enrolment forms and actually sign into the place.

So it’s a quick jump into the shower, muffins in the grill, clothes on, muffins buttered and out the house by 9:00. Quite impressive I think
As I walk out into the street to begin my walk to the station I feel somewhat enlightened. It’s a nice morning, I feel quite awake and am already looking forward to learning something
By the time I had finished the 5 minute walk to the station, my earlier optismism had someone decreased and i was fighting the urge to go back home to bed The clock on the station showed 9:05 (I remember this as the train was just leaving … doh!) - however it wasn’t long until the next one showed up (and pretty crammed it was too) so I was able to start my communiting journey.

Now you always read that Japanese trains always run on time, etc etc… stickler for time, run military time etc… Well maybe most do, but certainly the train from Setagaya to Shibuya doesn’t always being a few minutes late (which i guess is still good, just when you are a little late - is quite infuriating).

I got to Ometo-Sando at about 9:25, and as I had not known the correct fare, had to queue at the fare adjustment machine to pay the difference. Of course, this meant I arrived at college a little late (9:40 or so) - much to the amusement of everyone there, but after quickly going through all the forms, i was ready to be sent to class…..

My class is very small (4 people: Bob, Jean, erm an indian woman and ME :)) which I think should be good for learning. The way they teach is vai repetition (so teacher says something, then we go around class repeating), so if the class is big this can take ages.

One annoyance though is the Indian woman who asks so many questions…. The idea is that no English is spoken in class, so we just have to work everything out. Except this woman keeps stopping to ask in English… ho hum….

I can’t even remember what we learnt (more on this later) - however it seemed we got through quite a bit and I think this will be quite a beneficial course.

At leaving time (which couldn’t come too soon) - the heavens had decided to open (due to the typhoons going on in Kyshu) so I nipped next door to get an umbrella, before braving the cold and heading to Shibuya for some lunch.

I had wanted to try a Yoshinoya, however with them all being full up, Subway seemed like the next best bet… so subway it was I decided to eat out as inside seemed quite hot, but couldn’t seem to cool down outside (despite the rain) and now rather worryingly, the hearing in my right ear had got decidedly dodgy.

Now this has happened before and usually means I am getting a cold, so it seemed the best thing to do would be to head home, not before making a quick stop at Citibank to remove my UK money and then nip down the road to the Shinsei bank to deposit it all.

Back home i was feeling decidedly worse so hit the bath computer to run me a nice hot bath (39 degrees…) and 10 minutes later or so it was ready. Not having been in a bath this deep for a while, it was great to be able to get my head right under the water - however on coming up for the umteenth time, my hearing suddenly didn’t return, regardless of how much i tried to prod it (** notice ** never try and do this) - plus the heat was now making me feel rather sick.

Tonite was Arnauds last night and he wanted to go out, so although i wasn’t feeling the best, i did want to say goodbye, so went off to the bus stop to get to Shinjuku (the train is starting to cost so much) - by now we were in torrential rain and on finding out the bus would be 30 minutes, a trek back to the station was in order and the many changes that came with getting to Shinjuku.

Arnaud had been going to a particular restaurant everynight and he really wanted to show me it, however first stop was an ATM so I could get some money out.

Houston, we have a problem.

Now I really cannot understand why a country so technologically advanced as Japan can’t get something as simple as a cross bank ATM system working… comprende?

No, well it’s simple. Out here, you can use your ATM card at your own bank. And that’s it… possibly a 7/11 if it supports your bank (there are quite a few banks, and ATMS can choose who they like) - why they can’t be like the UK and let you use one bank card anyway, I just don’t know.

To top it off, you actually have to pay for withdrawals too if outside a certain time (?!?) - though not with the Shinsei bank (which is why I chosen them).

So anyway, of course, none of the bank machines will accept my card, nor will Citibank let me use my UK account due to me withdrawing the maximum earlier (to put in the Shinsei bank). After about 30 minutes we finally find a Shinsei bank (inside a Starbucks!) and I can withdraw my sacred 3,000 yen.

Grr… just thinking about this annoys me. If I had gone somewhere with no Shinsei bank, I would have been completely stuffed - I wonder why this system is used…. hmmm….

/rant over

So we go to this restaurant of Arnauds. It’s a pretty cool looking place, you sit up at the bar/table area and they give you what looks like a pottery kiln. On top of this is a grill and as you order the food, they give it to you on a silver platter (raw) and you get to cook it yourself.

No, whilst this is all well and good fun, these type of restaurants always strike me as just money making schemes, why? Well it’s simple.

They generally cost a bit more than a normal restaurant because of their “uniqueness”, ok, but then if *I* am cooking the food and not a chef, surely the prices should be cheaper? All the staff are doing is getting some meat out of a fridge… In fact, come to think of it, why didn’t I just stay at home and save myself £15?!?!

I must admit, it was quite nice… but in the back of my mind, all i could think was we were paying too much… Especially funny was when Arnauds piece of pork (we had bought pork and chicken) dropped through the gaps in the grill top and ignited, causing quite a large flame to shoot out the top of the “cooker” haha…

After the meal, we spend a pleasant hour or so browsing the local arcades, trying to win various toys, whilst also conconting a cunning plan to defeat the sex club owners who kept trying to get us in their bars.

Basically the way it works, they come up to you trying to be all friendly and everything, then trying to direct you into their establishment. This can get so annoying when all you really want to do is get across the street, but as soon as they know you speak english they are onto you. Last year, I tried to get the better of this situation by talking in French, however being from Nigeria, a lot of them spoke this too.

So this year required something special, we shall call it the “Akbar Language Deception Technique”

Akbar Language Deception Technique - A very simple technique that allows you to walk freely around the street without being jumped apon by various dodgy touts. This method requires a like minded friend and works as follows:

Whenever you are in an open area and likely to be targetted, simply strike up an animated conversation with your designated friend in a completely made up language. For further effect, talk very loudly and laugh extremely crazily along with making wild hand guestures. Believe me, no one will come near you
Finally, it was time to go back (as my health had seemed to deteriorate again) so we headed back to the station where we said our good byes (*sniff* lol) and made our seperate ways home.

Tuesday 6th September

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Getting up seemed a lot easier today as I had gone to bed on time the night before, so I had time to check my emails before I set off. 20 minutes later, I realised that of course I didn’t have time at all so had to rush for the 9:05 train.

Catching that on time, but then missing the next one meant I arrived at college at 9.40 - ah well…

Today was the first reading/writing lesson and would introduce us (well not me, but everyone else) to the wonderful art of scripting that is Hiragana and Katakana (not Kanji, that comes after we have learnt the first two).

Basically the two ‘Kana’ languages are the way of phonetically making any Japanese word (If you think of Kanji as being the picture way, the Kana allow you to make the same sound) and have about 90 characters each. The first lesson involves learning the first 30 of each (nice and easy start to the session then) and was basically the teacher drawing one on the board, and us copying it down. Every 5 characters, we would stop and have a miny test, making words from what we had just learnt.

Whilst normally this wouldn’t have been too bad a lesson, i was feeling decidedly worse than yesterday and now properly had complete hearing loss in the damn right ear. Everytime there was a break, I wanted to get up and leave, but I must admit i was too scared
So after enduring 3 hours of pain, it was finally time to go (and go and sort my ear out) - however i really wasn’t sure what i was supposed to do. First stop was to ask the teacher, who then redirected me to another student named Greg who had been here for 10 months so knew the score.

Basically it seems you have two choices: 1) go to a hospital or 2) find a local clinic.

Luckily he knew one near by in Harajuku and was walking that way so offered to show me the route. This he told me, was a good clinic as they all spoke English and that is much more reassuring, especially when they are working on something as delicate as your ear…

The place seemed good enough, however we soon hit a snag… insurance… of which if of course had none.

We get it so easy in the UK. You are ill, you go to the doctor. Simple.

Here, you are ill, you try and grin and bear it until you can no longer, then you PAY to go to the doctor.

To keep the costs down, every Japanese citizen is expected to take out medical insurance (which is based on your previous years salary) which then takes the costs down by 70%, however as I had only just got here, I wasn’t yet enrolled on a plan.

The cost to see me … £150!!!

EEK! Not having that sort of money (and even if i did, not wanting to part with it) - i politely declined treatment and staggered back dazed and confused into the street
Catching the train back, I wasn’t quite sure what i should do, but it seemed like a good idea to ring Shimpei to ask. This I did and he explained he knew a clinic near that should be a lot cheaper, but he couldn’t pick me up until 4, would this be ok? Fine.

Getting home and with the pain still not letting up, I decided the internet was my friend and I would ask it what i could do. A quick Google returned a few pages that suggested “Garlic Oil” put in the ear should do the trick.

Well, I still had some garlic left over and a new bottle of Olive Oil, so this was worth a try. We don’t have a garlic masher, so I used a fork to try and squash it up as best I could, before filling the glass up with olive oil, then putting it on the stove. When it was all melted, I used a spoon (we have no dropper) to pour it in my ear (plugging it with a clove of garlic for good measure) before tilting the laptop on it’s side and settling down on the bed - my head swimming with oil.

After about 2 hours of this and feeling no different, Shimpei came around, so i emptyed my e in the sink and went outside to meet him. First stop was the local ward office to see if i could actually get on the government health insurance scheme (and thus save myself a load of cash) - so 10 minutes later we were sitting at a desk answering all sorts of questions.

Luckily it seemed, I *could* join, but my premium would dependant on a few things.

How much did I earn last year? Nothing
How much do I earn now? Nothing
What is my job? Fulltime Student (and I had my card to prove it)

I dont think the woman fully believed me, as she went off for quite some time, however on her return she jotted a load of numbers down and finally informed me my premium would be ……

800 yen (£4) a month!!

I think perhaps luck must have been on my side, as the average cost is £70 a month…. Shimpei was also a bit put out I think (”you are SO lucky!! it’s unfair!”) as he pays quite a bit more hehe… but it seems it was due to my no earnings last year…. w00t!

So now armed with insurance, it’s time to go to the local “ear doctor” - arriving at the place doesn’t look promising, everything is turned off, however the doctor wakes up (!) when we enter and hits the various switches flooding the place with light.

I kinda wish he hadn’t - this must be the most dodgy surgery ever seen. I wouldn’t even let Beavis come here for a checkup. It wasn’t even clean and just seemed so dark ages. The doctor didn’t even have one of those cool ear looking in devices, but had to rely on a bright light and one of those circular mirror headbands…!! Could have been the scene from an old horror movie…. (Or that Cypress Hill music video, I can’t remember which…)

Anyway, after about 20 minutes of looking around and applying various things to the inside of my ear, he was finished. I had an allergic reaction to the air conditioning which had caused something in my head to swell; this then caused the air pressure in my ear to be thrown out, making it feel like my ear was blocked. Finally, me poking around in my ear trying to stop this feeling had caused me to get an ear infection (which was causing the pain).

So i was given a batch of tablets to take (antibiotics - we think… they have no writing on them) and some drops for my nose. On telling this to Seiko back home, aparently the doctor is not allowed to do this and I should have received a prescription…. hmm….

Come dinner time I was still not hungry and having received a mail from seiko telling me she wouldn’t be home, best thing to do seemed to be to go to sleep.

Wednesday 7th September

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Even I can’t make today sound interesting:

In bed all day feeling awful, watching movies on the computer (yes, ALL day!)
Oh no wait, except for when I got hungry and due to the stupid ATM situation, had to make a 45 minute round trip to get some money out from Shibuya……

Thursday 8th September

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Already knew I wasn’t going to go in to college today, so had turned off the alarm. Woke up to no pain, but still not full hearing and Seiko and Shiho watching TV in the front room.

I got up to say hello and get some water, when, POP - my hearing cleared! Everything seemed so loud Hurrah! Dr Frankenstein DID know what he was talking about!

Today is still a boring story, in bed on the net and watching movies, but I should be well enough to make college tomorrow… i just hope I haven’t missed too much.

Now…. i realise this entry definatelly hasn’t been the best, but i have been feeling groggy all day, but really couldn’t miss writing any more or i would be much too far behind.

I think from now, entries will be shorter as I am settling into a “same same” routine, with maybe a bit more to say on the weekends (which hopefully won’t be same same….)

Anyway, anything else… hmm… ah yes!! Fruit…

Crazy Fruits - the name of a popular 5p arcade machine (remember that Nan? Always played it at the Burstin (sp) and Brighton) but also rather a good name for the fruit situation here.

You want an apple? Sure, no problem, £1.50 please. £1.50 for a single apple!!! Yes they are quite big and individually wrapped in a nice packet, but seriously…. Oranges are a bit cheaper at 80p, with Lemons cheaper again at 60p… but sorry mum + dad, if you want me to eat more fruit, you’ll have to transfer some money over…

Rather more astonishingly, I have found a shop that sells 470g of chicken for £1.25!! I think it’s chicken breast (I can’t confirm this) but even if not, it tastes quite good and is cheap as chips So will bring the price of my pasta and chicken down… hurrah!

So there you go people, finally an up to date blog…. tomorrow if i feel ok, I’m going to Club Pure with Chizue and her friends which should be good, just wish Arnaud was still here to come too…

Good news!! Well, at least I think it is… or maybe it’s a cause to feel guilty.. hmm… my rent has miraculously decreased to Nana-Man Yen (70,000 yen or £350) a month. I don’t know if this is because it was originally worked out wrong, or the girls feel sorry for me as I keep complaining about the cost of everything… lol… but I guess I shouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth, so I’ll accept it graciously…

Ok so where was I, ah yes i was just on my way to Shibuya to post the start of this up. You know, I really feel I must apologise again for the rubbishness of the look, but at this moment I really can’t do much about it, anyway, I digress….

It’s really strange, I have only been here for four days, but already I feel this area is like home. I must admit, I still like it that I’m the only foreign person here (whenever I see another westerner in Shibuya / Shinjuku - I kinda get a bit jealous… weird I know.. but I haven’t seen any other blondes yet…. yatta!) - the walk from the apartment to the station now I’m used to it is quite nice, all the houses are so different, quite unlike back in the UK where a street is normally quite uniform in look.

I’m going to jump around a bit with topics now, as I keep remembering things in differnt orders, so prepare for a slightly confusing post.

Background: As I think I mentioned, and you can see from the photos, my bedroom door(s) is/are made from glass and keep out 0% of light. We are still working on this problem, and my brilliant plan involving many sheets of A3 paper (and an hour and a half to do one pane) came to nothing. The next idea is wallpaper which will be attempted tomorrow.

Anyway, because of this, first thing in the morning, the whole room is lit up by the sun (the curtains in the front room are some rubbish 2000yen (£10) things we got from Donki) which invariably wakes me up at about 6/7am. I do manage to get back to sleep however until about 9am when the builders arrive….

Smack opposite the balcony (and you can see it from the photos, it’s like another high rise) is the university halls of residence. For some unknown reason (ie it looks fine to me) - the good people at the council / uni / whoever have decided they need to knock down the perimeter wall. If this was a wooden wall, then no problem. However it is steel re-inforced concrete, which requires a jackhammer and about a billion work men to knock down. Oh my god it’s so droning, and combine it with the b4stard flying squaking things, makes sleep impossible. So then I lay they cursing them until 11 when they go for tea, so I can get back to sleep….. not a good way to sort a sleeping pattern.

I was watching out the window today shaking my fist at them (more for a laugh than anything) when one of the chaps looked up, saw me and got all his chums to start waving back… hahaha… he better watch it, they sell air guns at the local toyshop ….. mwahaha!!

You know one thing that puzzles me, it’s how the japanese guys keep their hair so perfect. I assumed it was some sort of gel, but it seems to be waterproof. After I came out of Manboo (the internet / comic store where I uploaded this) - it was bucketing down with rain. But NO ONE’S HAIR WAS GETTING MESSED UP. I’m so jealous, it takes me ages of careful flicking here and there to be confident enough with my hair to go out, but only seconds to trash it in the rain, yet these guys don’t have this problem.

To try and solve this mystery, I thought I would ask one of them, which of course was easier said than done. As expected, I didn’t really get very far and just ended up telling him his hair was “sugoi!” (cool) - way to go ben! erm yes, quite….

I also had my huge shopping list to do, which (apart from the paper) had the very important items of lighting devices on it. Now, maybe I’ve just been spoiled by Dad’s low prices, but to me 2000 yen (£10) for a budget lamp ISN’T a good deal. Ceiling lights are even worse, with the cheapest light shade I could find coming in at 3500 yen (£17.50) - so as of yet I still have no lighting…. maybe i should just bite the bullet and get one…

So we’re now at dinner time and after meeting up with S+S they said we should go for Hamburgu. After questioning whether they meant hamburgER and being told “no”, i was looking forward to this new delicacy. Of course, all a Hamburgu is, is a hamburger without the bun, but aparently because of this it is seen in a new light… I duly had the Hamburgu with Frankfurter, Pork Bits, Sweetcorn and Chicken, which I must admit was very nice (and it was also good that the girls picked it, so I can’t be accused of not eating the local food .. ;))

After dinner, they wanted to go off to one of the many book shops in Tokyo, not to buy anything mind, just to sit in there and read!!! Reminds me of the Starbucks in Borders in Kingston, where you can get a coffee and read through all the books!!! Something I beleive Judge used to do during exam revision time so he had access to more material… (I of course did the more sensible thing of buying the book, reading it really carefully and returning it after the exam……)

I had decided now that I wanted to start on the creation of my wall masterpiece, so headed off home. All full of enthusiasm, I got in, hooked the laptop up to the TV (better speakers) , put on the Muse album and began sticking. I suppose I should have realised that the album finishing and me still on pane one of glass meant I wasn’t doing too well, but I kept on going and put on Green Day to fill the silence. By the end of that, and after catching A3 paper as it fell off the wall WAY to many times, I came to the conclusion that:

1) This was going to take longer than an evening to complete.
2) I wish I had bought A2 paper

But worst of all, after going round the other side:

3) It looks completely crap anyway
It was at this moment that the girls got home, so I took the opportunity to have a tantrum and start shouting at the wall until they made me a cup of tea. (ok the tea bit isn’t true, we don’t have a kettle, but they did come to see what was wrong :)) - we decided that perhaps going to the fabic shop in Shinjuku tomorrow (today) would be a better idea, so the paper was shelved (literally … it’s on it’s own shelf in my special cupboard. When I feel particually evil, I tear some apart, sheet by sheet shouting “ha! you bastard, take that!!!”)

Oh I missed a bit, dammit, ok well earlier we went looking for mobile phones. There are so many to choose from, but you have to decide what you basically want (sort of same as UK) - but you then limit yourself to which network…. it’s not stupid features like colour screen, many ring tones etc, but important stuff….

To cut a long story short, I’ve whittled it down to Vodafone, but now have a dillema. I can either get the 3G model, which allows (amoungst other things) SMS to and from the UK and free picture emails (so i can take a photo, then mail it to you guys) and have global roaming (though I guess not so important) - however the signal coverage is not so good outside major cities… OR go with one of their V6 models which will allow me to listen to FM radio, use the video functions, but best of all…. WATCH TV!! I tried it in the shop and it’s so cool… Of course, I don’t have a clue what’s going on, but it could be useful once I actually learn Japanese…..

Let’s jump a day forward now (temporarily) - but after sitting up with Shiho last night for about 2 hours working out what each brocure said, then enduring a very painful english/japanese conversation with the woman at the vodafone stand in Shinjuku (just before reading the catalogue and finding out there is an English speaking shop in Shibuya… doh!) - I’ve decided to go with the 3G model, as it will be nice to be able to send and receive texts and the photo email facility will be cool (I’ll eventually link it up with here, so I can post directly to the site…)

Well this morning was jackhammer morning, but I did get to witness a load of them kick at the wall until it fell down (which looked pretty cool!) - so perhaps all was not *quite* so bad.

I got up and dressed around lunch time and as Seiko had eaten, decided to walk to the convenience store to pick up some lunch (and a few bottles of water, but to write that would just be boring… oh no, wait…. lol) - of course, the convenience store is “Justin Heaven” as it’s full of various cold fish dish type things. I of course aren’t at all impressed by this, so hunted for some meat. Now I can tell the difference between fish and meat pretty well (i’m sure most of you can) - but now when it’s all wrapped in breadcrumbs as most of the dishes are. Not to fall for the same trap as last time when instead of obtaining a nice chicken burger, i was hit with a mackaral sandwich (YADDA!!!) - I played it safe and went with the only english written packet in the hot food section - Spicy Chicken Cutlet Burger.

After a bit of hand waving, I managed to get the woman behind the counter to understand I wanted it heated up, so she popped it in the microwave for me for 15 seconds. Now I don’t know what wattage these things are, but after these short moments of time, the thing was piping hot!! I swear I could see it glowing as she put it in the bag, but I’m not completely sure…..

Anyway, deciding it would be rude to eat walking down the street (well ok, i just didnt have enough hands free) - i took it home to eat. Settling down on the floor (lol), I opened it up and took a bite… but something was wrong… there was no cutlet in it. I was just about to throw it in disgust over the balcony at the builders (who had now resumed their ‘jackhammering’) which I noticed something small and brown… could it be…? Opening up the buns confirmed it, the smallest chicken cutlet known to man had fallen into one of the airpockets in the bread and was barely visible to the naked eye…. now I know the Japanese are small, but to make a burger this size is unthinkable. Think coke can diameter and you have my lunch….

There wasn’t time to grumble too much though, as I had to go with Seiko to Shinjuku and look for fabric (to try and sort the wall out) - so took the now familiar walk back to the station….

Hmm, I wonder how long I will keep up writing absolutely *everything* I do, each entry has been a few hours so far… let’s take bets…

[BONZAI INTERLUDE]

Question: How long will it be until Ben-san starts writing very brief entries / no entries at all…??

(HAI!) A: 1-4 days
(HAI!) B: 5-10 days
(HAI!) C: 10-14 days
(HAI!) D: 14 days or more..

PLACE YOUR BETS…… tick tock, tick tock, don’t be afraid of the ticking clock….

[/BONZAI INTERLUDE]

Sorry, lol… so Shinjuku and the cloth shop. We must of spent about an hour or two trying random cloths with the “torch test”

Torch Test Shine torch on back of cloth and see how much light comes through the front.

And as we got more desperate (as all of them let the light through) - and figuring unless I was VERY unlucky, the sun wouldn’t rise smack next to my window anyway (in which case I’d be dead and not care anyway - at least it would stop the damn jackhammers) - we resorted to the “head test”

Head Test Make “tent” shape from cloth and put head in gap to judge light levels. This method of course obtained us many a funny look, however it was a lot more accurate and conclusive than the torch test…

Unfortunately though, none of the fabric (or at least the fabric within the £3 a square metre range - I need 8 square metres) passed, so we decided to go get some more food instead after meeting up with Shiho.

After dinner Shiho was off to the bookstore, but we agreed to meet after an hour to go check out mobile phones (but I’ve already told you that…) - so I had an hour to find an internet cafe, or, more accurately the one I was at the other day.

It took me about 20 minutes to eventually find it (all i knew was it was underground near the red light district) - after being offered sex about 30 times by various blokes (who i assume were a front for women, at least, i hope so… ) i finally found it, so settled down in the comfy sofa avec foot stall to log on… (i’ll take a photo of one of the booths, they are amazing - pc, tv, ps2, dvd player, video phone etc etc… you can rent one for an hour or two just to watch movies, or as some people do, go to sleep!!)

So yes, apologies to you mum, but my time ran out before I got to your email
Then comes the phone store bit, which you’ve already read… before heading back via bus with Shiho to home. (our place does actually have a posh name, but i’ve forgotten it, so i’ll update another time) - where… guess what…. I COOKED!!!
Now I bet you’re all dying to know what…. but then, I think with a few guesses you would probably get it…. no…? Spaghetti with Garlic Fried Chicken and lots of Olive Oil A Ben and Gowry speciality, no? Ate this while sitting watching a comedy sketch show with Shiho, which despite being in another language (funny that…) - I managed to work out what was going on and it was quite funny. It must of actually been ever better if you knew what they were talking about, at least I assume so by the fact Shiho was rolling around on the floor every 2 minutes =)

Almost done, don’t worry…. we then had another look at the whole glass door situation and tried to work out a new rememedy. Well, the next plan is wallpaper Cut very straight, I reckon it will be possible to make a perfect looking door (to the outside) - then put a (cheap) cloth over the whole of the inside. Of course, the A3 paper plan was also a masterpiece of an idea, so this could go horribly wrong too, however I have faith!

Which brings us up to now, 1am on a erm (I dont even know the day, let me check my ultra cool watch…) Wednesday evening (or Thursday morning if you want to be really precise) - heck, almost the end of week 1… i only have a week to go until i must start school… which reminds me, I need to enrol…. eek! And I’m sitting my pillow (I’ve learned from the sore bum incident the other day) listening to very loud music on my headphones
Shiho is down at the payphone talking to her boyfriend as her mobile has stopped working, and Seiko should be home very soon (her work finished at 11…. hmm… which means she should actually be home by now….)

I’m hopefully going to be able to get to sleep earlier tonite, not the 3/4am it has been, but this is looking doubtful at the moment. If I had a light in my room, I could sit in there reading… but as of yet, my cheapskateness self hasn’t got the lighting ability
Seiko reckons she makes do (very well) with about £500 a month (excluding rent and bills) - so even the lowest paid Nova job should be ok. (however I will need to use all my savings for school…) - I also don’t know how much she goes out, but I do know that I’ll save a fortune in internet cafe bills once it finally gets put in haha!

Skype is setup now too, so I can annoy you all at work by ringing at 5pm my time and laughing at you lot just starting your day The timezone is a bit annoying though, as it means I can only properly ring at the weekend… grrrr…

So before I leave, tomorrow - Alien Register (something every “alien” to the country has to do if they are staying more than 90 days) - which will then allow me to open a bank account at the Shinsei Bank, which in turn will allow me to purchase my phone (Toshiba/Vodafone 902t for anyone interested - http://www.vodafone.co.jp/english) and then be able to text you guys
To you my friends… OYASUMI!

Hmmm… Justin never filled in Monday, and we are back home now But hey, I will try and write the rest so we don’t forget what happened. Excuse me if i miss a bit, but it was 3 (now 4!) weeks ago!

Right, Monday the 12th was our big trip to Ueno, the supposedly largest shoe shopping district in Tokyo. As you can imagine, J was pretty excited about this as all he had been going on about all holiday was how great the shoes are and how he was going to buy so many.

We got there quite early (I believe I was awoken at 7:45 or something) and the day was really nice and sunny. Stepping out the station and all looked really nice. Flip, memory very bad… I think there was a big hill just behind the shops opposite the station, and some large (but clean) skyscraper buildings leading down the highstreet.

After finding a bank that would change sterling (most seem to only take US Dollar) we were ready to hit the market, or at least J was, i was happy to go back to sleep… hahah… This basically began J’s most dissapointing day…

You won’t believe how many shoe places there were, with every possible shoe you can imagine. Aparently there were all these great styles you dont get in the uk… I dont know about that as shoes don’t really bother me, but J was very happy…. until it came to trying to buy any.

Yes dear friends, the old ’shoe size’ problem soon cropped up. No matter where we went, no one seemed to sell shoes larger than a size 9 (perhaps a 9.5) - and with Justin being an 11, this was not good news. So desperate was J to get some, he was talking about just wearing them and dealing with the pain!?!?! Crazy!

Special mention should be made to the guy with the suitcase selling the (fake?) LV wallets, we’re not sure of the price, but I reckon it wasn’t as high as the £200 the real LV shop wanted around the corner, I know which one i would have bought

Not sure what time we got back to Yoyogi, but we were going to meet Seiko in Shibuya for her to take us to a traditional restaurant, the Lockup.

I suppose we should have guessed from the name it wasn’t going to be normal, and the haunted house entrance kinda made a few things seem odd, even when the waitress handcuffed J to lead us to our table, I still didn’t twig… LOL… we were led to a jail cell (complete with iron bars and everything) where we had to take our shoes off and sit on the floor nice one! You were then served by jailers or fellow inmates, lol. It was actually really nice, and the food was really good (though J didn’t approve, not sure why, it was japanese and was fish). We stayed too late to have pudding (it shut at 12) but was still great all the same.

Afterwards, trying to find something to do let us to the Starbucks (the one that overlooks the ‘famous’ crossing) we were sat for a bit drinking my frozen vanilla shake and mucking about with the blinds. We were then pretty undecided on what we should do, so we caught a cab back to Yoyogi, to sleep early ready for the next day….

Tuesday the 13th -

Pretty sure that never happened, I’m looking at the photos for reference. Seems we just went later on to Shijuku, where we did go and explore a bit, found all the dodgy pr0n shops and found a real shanty town style supermarket Were gonna go to a strip show (£25 for 3 hours) but didn’t bother… went on the arcades instead.. .lol.. i do know we had to be home early though as Seiko was going to take us out.

Wednesday the 14th -

We were up at a reasonable hour however on the run to meet Seiko at Harajuku station, we managed to become seperated, so were late as usual (Actually, i was still on time, i found a shortcut, but poor mr J went back looking for me… lol) where Seiko took us to 4Lab one of the best Tattoo parlours in Tokyo. Why I hear you ask? Well, ever since I had been thinking of Japan, I had decided I wanted a Kanji (japanese characters) tat of the year of the monkey. (which was actually why i started back at the gym, to try and build my uppers arms up!! it also HAD to be done in Japan btw, otherwise i didn’t want it) I know a lot of people dont think Kanji on your arm is so cool anymore, but i dont care, i wanted it cause i like it … simple However, after spending some time in Japan and developing such a love for the place, i decided ‘Monkey’ didn’t really symbolise anything ’special’ to me and that i wanted something that would always make me remember Japan, for this reason, I changed my mind to ‘Never Forget’ (which translated directly into Kanji as ‘Forever’). The artist loaded it up on his computer and printed out some samples which i held on my arm to see if it looked ok… they did so after getting the price (£60) we asked when we could book for… the artist said ‘now’ would be ok (i was expecting a wait) and did i want to do it………. bit nervous now, but said ‘yeah’ … eek!

The artist took the print out, then traced it onto some (best example i can give) carbon paper. He then cleaned my arm, put on some gunky stuff and applied the transfer. I now had a purple outline of the design i was about to get put on me, this was the last chance to change my mind… lets do it!

I was asked to lay back on a little bed/table like thing, get comfy, then he began… Now i had been expecting pain (as thats all you ever hear about) - but to my suprise, there was none! More a scratching sensation, cool! So i’m laying there .. and after 5 minutes “hmm… wow! this is gonna be there forever (ironic really)… hmm…” then after about 10 minutes “god, i really hope i like kanji symbols forever…” haha… after 20 minutes i was just bored, so started to drift off to sleep… then finally after about 45 minutes it was over..

Getting up and looking in the mirror, there was now an addition to my body…. and it looked great However i couldn’t keep it out in the open (as the guy explained, its basically an open wound! yuk) so it had to be covered in antisceptic, then wrapped in clingfilm, before being covered in tape…!

No matter what anyone says, about how i might get fed up of it, or regret it, i know this wont be true. I’ve got it because it means a lot to me, and always will… how can i ever regret that???

After that was finished, we were ready to catch the train to the Tokyo Dome where we were going to watch the Giants vs the Dragons in a first for me… Baseball!! We had been pretty excited about this, and made sure we bought some baseball tops to wear to the game. Seiko also bought some mini bats to hit, which i adopted part way through…

However, realistically, baseball has to be the most boring sport in the world!!! No one seems to be able to hit it, whether that means the pitchers are really good or the batters are crap, i just dont know. But to watch a game for almost 4 hours which the score only being 4-3 was quite a, whats the word, not sure… but you get my drift!!! Was worth it to say we’ve been though and it did only cost £8.
Afterwards, we went across the road to what can only be described as an outdoor mall/theme park. There were all shops and restaurants around the enge of a pond thing, with a log flume that falls directly into it, and overhead a massive rollercoaster with a huge ferris wheel! Even better, there was a ‘Moomin Cafe’ which I got quite a few photos of, make mum happy

We didn’t eat here though, and went to a ‘Jonathans’ Family Restaurant (pretty much the same as Denny’s) and Seikos favourite. The desert menu was too good and really hard to pick something, i think it did a good job though

Thursday the 15th - Asakusa

Seiko had again planned to take us out today, this time to visit Asakusa, where there was a massive market. Supposed to meet Seiko at Yoyogi station at 3, but J swore blind it was 2. This meant i had woken up late (i was planning for 3) so had to go pick her up instead of doing my washing. Went to station, waited half an hour then finally rang her. She was indeed meeting at 3, so i had to run back home to start doing my clothes. They didn’t finish in time, so J went and picked her up at 3 (hmm, or 3:30), we finally got out the house at 4:30!!!

Asakusa is a mix of old and new, it had a large temple and massive market which sold loads of great and wonderful things. Unfortunately I had *NO* money so couldn’t buy anything. Looking back, this was a fatal error on my behalf, as try as i might, i couldn’t find that stuff anywhere else

From the walk from the station to the market, we kept getting mobbed by guys with carts offering to run us ‘downtown’ for ‘great discount’ and ‘amazing experience’, this was actually really funny as that was all they would shout… much better would have been ‘downtown, monster, dragons, very cheap’ which kept us amused for ages.

Pushing through all this and walking to the end of the market brought us to a massive temple with many shrines. One of these things had a ‘luck stick’, where you shake a vase type thing to reveal a stick with a symbol on it. You match this up with the draws in this building and it tells you your fortune.

The first one I got was ‘Worst Luck’ stick, which basically meant everything in my life would go wrong. I was pretty upset about this and took another one… suprise suprise this one (UPDATE LINK) came up… which made me feel a lot better

After spending a good few hours in the market it was time for food, and time for justin to get his wish of a sushi bar. One was nearby and aparently very well priced… its crazy, just a massive conveyor belt that snakes around the restaurant with a load of different coloured dishes on it. Each colour is a different price, from 50p or so up to £5. YOu just sit at your table and pick off the plates that you want to eat!

Justin was in heaven (as you can see from the amount of plates he stacks up), I however wasn’t quite so happy as it was all fish My problem was soon solved when a plate of strawberries and a pineapple came around… hahaha… Don’t worry, i did try some fish too Prawns, Friend Squid and some batter prawns (though still with their shells on so they were quite crunchy!!)

After this, we headed to the 100yen store (yes I kid you not, 50p!!) where you wouldn’t believe what you could get for your money! I should have taken more photos inside, but some of the stuff back here would have cost a couple of quid!

We had to be back at Yoyogi station by about 10pm to meet chiakiy, so back we went. We had made (well Justin had, well done son!) a decision to not go out tonite (Cause everyone was so tired) so we bought a load of drink and went for an on the roof drinking session. We even made ourselves a lot more comfortable by dragging a few matresses out which was good for about 2 hours or so, when everyone was really tired and it was freezing cold… lol… Seiko as usual got completely plastered, and rather unfortunately managed to kick my camera across the roof giving a good dose of scratches and causing the memory card to fail (but dont worry, i wasn’t gonna let that stay like that!) - even funnier was trying to get to sleep with her rolling around drunkenly moaning… hahahahaha

Friday the 16th -

Justin and Seiko got up early to go (you guessed it) shopping leaving me and Chiakiy to lie in for a bit. We got up a bit later on, rang Sakura House to change the checkout time from 12 till 4, and went around the shops in Harajuku, before meeting up with Justin and Seiko (and her sister) at the station a bit later on. I still didn#t have any money, so we had to go to Shinjuku first to visit the only place that could change money after 4pm. We then went to the local Sofmap store to change my camera but were told it had to be done in the original store!! grrrr.

Me and Chiakiy then headed off to Akihabara planning to meet Justin and Seiko there later on.

Taking the camera back seemed to be a bit of a chore, as you can’t do it in store, you need to go to a ’service centre’ first where they check something actually is wrong with the items. Was a bit worried about this as the camerea error was intermitant and it was really the scratches i wanted sorted. However everything went without a hitch, even having the woman run down the road to the local Sofmap (And back) to get me my new camera,… HURRAH!

Can’t remember if I mentioned the no smoking policy, well if not, here it is again - Akihabara is a no smoking in the street district. To allow for the addicts (lol), they have built a ’smoking room’ which is basically like a shop with just bar style chairs where you go to smoke!!! hahahahah… pathetic

We had planned this night to go to Club Atom (in Shibuya) for a trance night, 3 floors of hard house and trance, so i was pretty excited. Firstly though, we had to eat and figured we should go to a traditional Japanese restuarant. We picked a IZAKAYA which is basically a bar/restaurant open until about 5am where business people go after work purely for the purpose of getting drunk! It was really nice inside and very traditional looking (no shoes allowed, slippers provided!) and after putting our shoes inside a locker, we were let to out little table/compartment type thing.

The menu had all manners of interesting sounding things on it (and some that looked really good, but when you got them translated suddenly you didn’t want them anymore!!!) so everyone picked a load of different things (to my embaressment i must admit i ordered a pizza!!) - with the starter being raw squid (See photo), its unclear quite how much J didn’t like it, but he tried his best to look manly. Me and Chiakiy thought better of this and let Seiko (Who again didn’t look so happy about it) finish it off

I’ll tell you what is great though, COW TONGUE. Yes my dear friends, roasted cow tongue on a stick is just soooo nice. Its like a really nice kebab, but without being all greasy and yuck! I highly recommend it to anyone who has the opportunity of trying it. Also another weird dish… chicken bone. Yes, yup, uh-huh, thats right, the bit we throw away, the japanese boil until soft(ish) and then eat. The most pointless dish ever (though I guess it saves them quite a bit of money).

Ater leaving, it was a quick hop across the road and onto the JR for the 60p ride to Shibuya Seiko had a rough idea of where it was, so we followed her (Forever!!) up the hill to find Atom. Decided to stop on the way at the local Lawsons to get some drink (might as well get a bit merry first) where you can buy Smirnoff Ices for just 90p (NOT FAIR!!) so we found a little standing area where we were able to get the drinks down. (well tried, as they were very fizzy and Justin remember can’t burp… oddball! ;))

The road to Atom was off the main road and down the hill a bit, which led us through the ‘love hotel’ district of Shibuya. What is a love hotel? Let me explain. In Japan the houses are usually very small, with thin walls (or even sharing bedrooms) so its quite difficult for couples to get any ‘quality time’ if they live with their families. For this reason, the love hotels were built. Charging anything from about £15 up to £70/80 (i kid you not!) you can hire a room for 3 hours or so (in Tokyo you are limited to 3, or book whole night, other cities you can pay per hour as you wish)… You generally go in and there are pictures of all the rooms with buttons next to them, pick a room you want, press the button and pay the person behind reception (the button turns off the light to show room is no longer available), you then have your time to ‘get it on’ … due to the nature of the places, the rooms are usually very, very nice, and contain *everything* you need (this includes a sound system with multi channel music, lighting for every possible light controlled with dj mixer style faders and multiple heat control switches… cool!

What was quite amusing is they are all in the large club district… no prizes for guessing why.. when the clubs shut, suddenly the hotels fill…….

Anyway, we walked up and down this street until we finally found Atom (it was about 1am) we went to go in, but OH NO! We told it *closed* at 1… what is it with the japanese??? all the decent music clubs shut early…. not fair not fair… Justin was up for going to Club Asia next door, but i was determined to have some trance in Japan (my dream for godsake) and refused to budge on the issue.

Seiko claimed to know somewhere in (suprise, suprise) Roppongi that played trance, so we jumped in the £12 cab to get there… i sense the mood in the cab wasnt the greatest, as everyone was worried this was going to muck up again…

Got to the club, all ready to go in, read the sign on the wall…. Hip Hop Night?!?! NOOOOOOO… wtf was this… Seiko felt pretty bad, Justin seemed just pissed off, and i could see my dream just slipping away. To try and rectify though Seiko said she would go to an internet cafe around the corner somewhere to find out where we could go. Leaving me, J and Chiakiy to sit around (for quite a long time, J was getting quite annoyed :)) - however she finally returned claiming she had found somewhere, it did play all types of music but was the biggest club in Roppongi (though everyone seemed to claim that), its name, Club Vanilla… so we set off on the short walk to find it…

5 minutes down the road, down a little backstreet and finally, there it was. From the outside, it looked quite upmarket, had its own car park next door, and a really nice entrance hall. We had a problem though, males had to be 23 to get in… goddamit! However, we played it cool, and made it inside (”yatta!”) - £15 but you did get two free drink vouchers (shame we had forgotten to take our own) …. so we went in….

Ok, now we understood why this place had a good reputation… it was, not amazing (wrong word), but definately something special. It was like a really trendy place, but without the unconfortableness that usually comes with that style of joint. Lit with dim red lighting, all the furniture and walls where white and it just looked… WOW!

Downstairs as we entered we were greeted with the sound of R&B (woo bloody hoo :() and the lockers to put our coats in (not sure if i’ve talked about them before, but lockers are all the rage here… so much better than a cloakroom…) - the r&b room had white sofas all around the edge, with some tables and chairs dotted around, with the dancefloor in the middle and the bar and dj booths in the far end. Everyone seemed to be having a really good time, and the vibe was just wonderful…

A set of stairs led up to the next floor, so we decided to explore the next level. This brought us up to a smaller room, with a little bar and people doing massage and the like (i think, memory hazy) and also the toilets… it seemed like the ‘chill out’ room as people where standing around talking…

There were some more steps (5 or so) which led up to the next level and a corridoor which also had bar height tables and chairs on it, and the sound of house music coming from the far end. Down here we walked until we came into the main dancefloor. It was alot bigger than downstairs, the main floor being in front of us, with poddiums and higher levels dotterd around with various females dancing about, then behind that was a fake wall which had the bar behind that (i guess to block some of the sound so the bar guys could hear what you were ordering!). To the left of the dancefloor you had the seating area, huge it spaned almost the same size again and just had loads of high seats with loads of people sitting around chatting. At the back of this was the bar area. I’d like to point out again that this was all really nice looking, with the plants adding a really nice ambience to it all.

We all sat down on one of the chairs nearest the floor and went to get some drinks. The music was plodding along house, which no one seemed to like that much, but as we were all together, we decided to stay for a bit longer. Then something started to happen… as i listened, each song ’seemed’ to get a bit harder… then next one would drop back, but next would go one step forwards.. i commented to justin ‘it seems to be getting harder’, which he grinned but said wasn’t going to happen…

then finally, after a good 20 minutes of teasing… it happened… the dj started to play some decent music!!! my dream was being lived!! i ran out onto the dance floor and started to go for it! Justin and Seiko couldn’t stand it, so left for downstairs, but i persuaded Chiakiy to stay up with me and tried to get her into the music… even the introduction of some more crazy clubbers didn’t help, with her looking totally lost - yup, she left also to go downstairs

I used this time to get another drink, so headed up to the bar, gave my drink token and waiting for my drink. The barman was a bit distracted and giving me my drink, put the bar tokens he had in his hand down on the bar…. thank you very much! yatta!

Back on the dancefloor on my own was OK, but wasn’t quite as good as it could have been, so noticing some mad girls on the stage, decided it would be more fun to go dance with them… Lol, they were so drunk, but loads of fun, shouting ‘Agay (Aki?)’ repeatedly in time with the song. I don’t know what it meant, but it was fun, so i just joined in.. haha.. met up with a crazy (but cool looking) japanese guy (in the photos with the sunglasses) so we partied on down together - until i got up on the stage with the girls, then got dragged off by the bouncers… aparently only girls allowed up… grrr… had to leave, so went back down the corridoor where i bumped into Seiko and Justin who were heading back downstairs…

Chiakiy was happy to see me, but the music was, argh! nasty… however i did my best to try and dance, and must admit after getting used to the crapness of it all (hahaha) did have quite a good time, helped along by the very nice japanese guy who was giving us his (*very* strong) drink - too much though, and we had to sit down… lol…

Blimey, this is a long night report, but theres more!!! I couldn’t deal with much more r&b and seeing as there was only an hour or so left, i left the crew to go back upstairs to the dance room, where i hooked up with my new jap pals making sure not to jump on the stage again (though ironically, the girl got so pissed, she was carried off by the bouncer in a fireman style carry outside, only to escape and run back in!!! :))

A mention has to be made to my final drink, half an hour before the end, and realising i had a ticket left, i went up to order a vodka and orange. Now i dont really drink much here in the UK, so i dont know if its the same, but when he was pouring it, he does both liquids at the same time, then stops the vodka after glass about half full to fill rest with orange juice… except he didn’t he stopped both, looked at me, said ‘ah fuck it’ - then filled the remaining half glass with vodka!!?!? nice one!!!

That was what it needed to tip me past tipsy onto all out pissed, hurrah! I hit the dancefloor with gusto and had the best hour of the night - sadly it ended, and i had to say goodbye to my new friends (i can’t remember the names, sorry!) and go find the rest of TeamTokyo who were waiting downstairs by the lockers, ready to begin our final saturday …. the fish market…

Saturday the 17th -

As knackered as we were, Justin was determined to see the fish market, and to be honest, i did think it would be kinda stupid to miss it as it was such a big attraction. Luckily, the train went straight there from Roppongi, so it was just a case of waiting at the subway station before the lovely clean train arrived!!!

Getting out at the other end, the fish market was easy to find, a massive ‘warehouse’ style place, surrounded by a huge car park, filled with lorries, and guys driving around on the most manipulative fish carrying truck things (the driver and the engine are mounted at the front in a full 360 turning circle part, allowing change of direction and monouverability second to none… also means you have to look out as they fly around *everywhere*!)

After just making it across the carpark with our lives (and dignity) we entered the main warehouse where all the selling took place. It was so busy and full, with just enough room for one of the trucks to drive down a path and little else. Everywhere were boxes and boxes off fish, many of them still alive and flicking water at anyone who walked past… Justin was off with his camera again, photoing anything and everything…

We stopped by one guy who was having particular trouble with a fish, he was holding it up with it flapping away, so he punched it! Then, not content with giving it a black eye (:)) he proceeded to stick a metal hook down into its body via its mouth and pull out its insides!!!?! yikes!

Now for the main plan, Mr J wanted to eat here, so we headed off to find a fish bar (still in the market complex) where you could actually be served the fresh fish from the market. For this reason, it was quite expensive, and as I was really tired, i declined the offer, instead sleeping on the bar for a few precious minutes Everyone else tucked into their food, with justin thoroughly enjoying his ‘fish brains’…. until he found out what they were lol….

By now, everyone was really tired, and seeing as we had to be up quite early, decided it was time to go home… finding the station was a mission and a half though, and i was now hungry, so Chiakiy and I hopped into the nearest Lawson to get some Spaghetti Bolognese (no, really!) - however on coming out, Justin and Seiko had disappeared - we spent the next 30 minutes looking for them, but unfortunately to no avail… then finally caught the train home (the station was a mission to find too, we were wrecked and really just wanted to be back in bed), making it back home at maybe 8:30 (darnit! really can’t remember that…), but at least we were back! yatta! now we could sleep until about 2 or so, ready to clear our room by 4 ….

KNOCK KNOCK!

Bleugh… sleepy… sleep sleep…

KNOCK KNOCK!

Wtf?!? Who’s knocking on our door, its only 12… fuck off!

KNOCK KNOCK - scratching …. door opens, people come in, apologise and walk out!?!?

Neither Justin or myself were paying any attention (true!) so didn’t know what was going on, but Chiakiy who did see them said it was the same Korean people who had looked at the room before…

Confused… I’ll say… when suddenly - KNOCK KNOCK! “Phone for you, its Sakura House” - ah goddamit, so i got up and went upstairs to see what they wanted…

“Sorry to bother you, and I know you were moving out at 4, but can you do it sooner instead??!?” - was very annoyed, as the whole point of the later check out was so we could sleep in! Not for them to call us and wake us up anyway!!! Went back downstairs and explained it all, can’t remember if we went back to sleep, (too long ago.. sorry!) - however when we did start to pack, we realised maybe we hadn’t given ourselves long enough!! whoops!

The guy from Sakura house also turned up early (we were worried we would get in trouble for Chiakiy staying over, but he seemed cool / didn’t know / let us off whatever!) and helped us out a bit… We even got out of washing the bed sheets and hoovering as there wasn’t time result!! What we were left with the problem of though was trying to quickly get all of our stuff into our suitcases… not so much a problem for me as i had bought very little, however Mr J had, well lets just say… TONNEESSS!!! After putting everything in his case, it was at least 4 times as high as it should have been lol… serv him right for having too much money to buy things…

We had been given our deposit money back now, and although we felt bad, Chiakiy and me left for Harajuku for Kiddieland, leaving Mr J with a very puzzled expression on his face as to how he was going to pack everything …

Me and Chiakiy spent a happy afternoon (though perhaps a bit stressful) trying to find gifts for everyone (which was a lot harder than it seemed) and then realising that everything i wanted to get was in Asakusa… dilema… was there time to go there… unfortunately no, but i hoped that Shibuya might have everything.. we were to go there when we met up with Justin (about 20 mins or so…)

Except time dragged on, and on… we were waiting at Harajuku station, but Mr J had gone AWOL in kiddieland again… Seiko was telling us “he’s buying everything!!”, which was mad seeing the state of his suitcase to start with… however, we got some food and we sat on a wall, so not too miffed… (too tired to worry too much!)

When he finally turned up with a billion or so more bags, we just kept quiet …

So it was now off to Shibuya to look for some lucky cats for presents and anything else that might be needed. I’m not too sure of the details now, but I think at this point we split up, Justin to buy his records and myself to find lucky cats.

Chiakiy and I did however find the greatest food stand in the world (just outside the station also! unless you count the cream puff shop also at shibuya station, but thats more a shop :)) - the Grilled Cow Tongue on a Stick Stand… £2 per skewer, but worth every penny (or Yen :)), in a special sauce and tasting absolutely perfect… they were wonderful, mmm….

Anyway, I digress… So we were off to the Penguin Supermarket (* ASK CHIAKIY NAME *) to find the lucky cats… except you can’t get them… heck.. nor did they have anything else worth buying for presents… this was pretty awful for me as I had put a lot of faith in the good old penguin… alas…

Met up with TT at the station, not quite happy everything was complete… “PORN!” - nuts, had forgotten Haroons present… it was either disappoint a friend, or make the effort… Never to dissapoint, we left the others at Yoyogi station and stayed on the train to Shinjuku (me + C) to find the perfect gift….

Now this was funny… if you imagine again the shops mentioned before, but this time really busy, me taking a very embarrassed girl into them, asking her to translate and point things out… hahaha… especially funny was when we went to the ‘underground’ shops, full of businessmen and *very* hardcore porn, for them all to look and stare at Chiakiy as she walked around (covering her eyes for most of the time!! lol)

After about 30 minutes, finally found something (just about) worthy as a gift (it seems all the Japanese Gals that do HC are quite minging, the nice ones stick to the SC stuff… ah well…) , so that was it… back to the apartment to get ready for clubbing at ‘Womb’.

However after returning, it was apparent we weren’t going clubbing that night as Mr J was still trying to pack his case!! Lol… repacked my case with everything we had bought into it, so all was perfect ready for the flight. It weighed in perfectly, which was good, but also rather upsetting, as there was so much i had wanted to buy, but just cou;dnt bring back due to the weight… ah well, Chiakiy said she would send what was needed, or i could get the rest next year… (a plan!)

Not wanting to spend the whole night in, me + C left to go back to Shibuya… long story, lots of walking, get some money out at Citibank (god bless you!) ……

We ended off with some food at the really nice curry house, Justin me and Seiko had gone to before, staying there until the trains started and we could make the journey back to Yoyogi. We had wanted to stay out longer, but Mr J was very defiant that we get to the airport early, so go back we did….

Sunday the 18th -

Got back to our apartment (although I guess you can’t call it ours anymore!! :() at around 6 to find Mr J still trying to pack his case! Aparently it had been going on all night and required lots of throwing away of clothes. I wont go into too much, as i think J is writng about it, but you can see from the photos the fun that was had trying to fit everything in. I had quick shower (very quick, as there wasn’t much time, so no soap or the like, just a quick wash) and i was (very proud of myself also) ready on time… yatta!

Needless to say, when we actually got around to leaving, we were late… lol, this was a bit worrying as we wanted to get the bulkhead seats on the plane (after seeing the legroom on the way out, there was no way we were going to sit in a normal seat!!!) so we now had to rush. This was fine until we went to leave the building, or more to the point, Justin tried to lift his suitcase With all the additional items, it certainly wasn’t light, and slowed us down a heck of a lot more.

This was the only point when i was glad i hadn’t bought loads of stuff, as it meant i had a relatively light case to carry, or wheel to use the words correctly…. the trip to Yoyogi was pretty uneventful, and we managed to buy our tickets and get on the train without a problem hahaha… Nippori station was a bit of a different story, as there were a whole lot of steps and 2 heavy suitcases, but after taking a few deep breathes we managed to get up them, where we had to buy the tickets for the remaining part of the journey to Narita.

Here Chiakiy and Seiko were going to leave us, but we couldn’t have that, so a bit of gentle persuation and they joined us on our last train journey of Japan…. (well for this year at least)

As when we had arrived, we had come straight out into arrivals, we hadn’t really seen much of the airport before, so this was a new ‘adventure’ in itself. Unfortunately we didn’t have much time, so it was more a rush through, however one thing that should be mentioned are the escalators.

Now in england, if you want to take your baggage trolley up a floor, how do you do it… a lift (Elevator ;)) right…. well, a major flaw with that is time and you can only get a few people in it at once.. In japan (being the greatest country in the world and all), they’ve got a much better solution. Why not adapt the trolleys so they can go on the escalators?? Ingenious, they have a pivotted set of wheels (Which lock) so you just wheel it on, the front lifts up, then takes the back wheels on a few stairs down… AMAZING but such a simple idea..

Now was check in. Entering the main checkin hall we were greeted with hundreds of people waiting, Great! we thought, however luck was on our side as the desk for Alitalia had only just opened and there was pretty much no queue, I went through the baggage checks no problem, but suddenly… WAIT…

The canister of ‘Gun Power’ that Ming had requested Justin brought back (that he assured him would be ok) had flagged up on the X-Ray and J was told he would have to open his suitcase and take it out… now, baring in mind how long he had taken to get it shut, this was going to be funny….. 10 minutes later, and after fruitless arguements, we weren’t allowed to take it on, but could check in

This went without a hitch, and *BONUS* we still got our bulkhead seats! Yatta!

Then began the painful task of saying goodbye, it was now that realisation kicked in that we were going home. I’m not sure about J, but I really wanted to stay, there was so much we had missed and not done, 3 weeks just wasn’t long enough! Alas, we had a plane to catch, and we needed to get going…. a lot of hugs and goodbyes later, we were finally through security, wondering what all the ‘time delay’ fuss was as had a good 20 minutes to spare (note: the stamp on our ticket made it very clear the gate would *CLOSE* in 20 minutes) - we headed down the stairs, to walk into the largest queue we had seen all day. Apparently we had just been through security, now we had hit immigration?!?! fuck fuck fuck, this was worrying as although it was moving, it wasn’t moving very fast…. luckily, we made it through then made the dash for the plane, getting there with minutes to spare (ok, maybe not, but it sounds a lot more dramatic ;))

Our return seats weren’t like before as in right next to the door, but were the last row before business class started. It meant we didn’t have quite as much leg room (and didn’t have our ‘walk’ area) but was still a lot better than all the other suckers on the plane, as we could stretch our legs out and rest them on the wall in front if we wanted. The plan here was to try and beat jetlag, we’d stayed up all night before. Go to sleep on the plane for about 5/6 hours, then stay awake until we got home to go sleep again… and guess what… we did it! 1 point to us

Worth a mention are the awful air stewardess’s (well maybe they’re not awful, but their response time was) - I didn’t have any headphones, so asked for some… none came… i put on the ‘assistance light’ - 30 minutes later, still no headphones so i fell asleep. 5 hours later, i wake up and *still* no headphones. So call again, they say ok… then forget, finally about 45 minutes later i received my headphones… grrr…

Of course, being as stupid as we are, we had once again forgotten to change any euros for Malpensa airport (Doh!) but this wasn’t too bad as we were only there for 45 minutes this time - greeted with torrential rain… justin commented this was probably what england would be like, i was a bit more optimistic, but it was a far cry from the hot sun of japan….

And indeed, arriving back in England was bleak… a real come down from a great holiday, J was happy to be back, I however would have loved to stay a bit longer, didn’t really get done all the things i wanted to (Especially the mountain with the monkeys!), the massive rollercoasters and to actually go to the sea! (back in PC world, I had a photo on my desk showing a beautiful beach… i want to find it one day….)

This holiday has really been a life changing experience for me, not only has it let me get to know Justin a lot better (and i hope we are better friends because of it, despite all our argueing… lol) it has made me realise how happy it is possible for me to be. I love Japan and everything it symbolises, its such an interesting, fascinating place - the only downside being the lack of decent music clubs (although I’m told frantic do a night out there, just have to find it) and the food (noodle bar food, the rest is ok :)) and all the arcades, just cool! (if you live there, i’m sure there’s a part of you that never grows up…)

We made some good friends, some of whom will be returning to england in the summer, so we can meet up again and some who we will only see if we return, which i will do next year, i just can’t stay away from the place

So thanks Justin for the great idea, cheers for being a good friend and hope to see you around soon!

YATTA!