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| It's about damn time for an update I guess.
Just want to introduce some of the new cool Tokyo characters I've met so far, after been here for 1 yr and 4 months now.
SOLID crew.
I met them at their event at La Fabrique about 3 weeks into moving into Tokyo back in Nov 2007. They had Mark Grant as the guest DJ so I just had to go. I almost did not find the place, which would make my life so much less happier now that I know what I got into, but anyways. When I got there around midnight they place was already jumpin', and Kai was just slamming it, I was really impressed and insisted on introducing myself and buying him a drink. From there on I've never missed a single SOLID event, and I found fellow hopeless househeads much much faster than I thought I would, DJs Kai, Marshall, Megumi (Kai's gf), SOLID promoters/supporters Boogie, Teppei, Miyacchi, VJ Veem and the HOTHOUSE Boys crew (Raimon, Janga, etc man they can probably back-to-back it blindfolded with Kai, simply amazing), all fantastic people and we ended up going to Miami WMC together in March 2008 when they played several high quality gigs with mainly West Coast house DJs. I can say with absolute confidence that their DJ skills and sense are absolutely world class, even thought they're not famous even inside Tokyo
From them, I also had the pleasure of meeting other Tokyo based house DJs and organizers, among those I respect most would be Aron T (boy never thought I would hear gospel house in Tokyo), and DJ Kaori aka Lady Something Different (a cool recent mom AND an awesome DJ). With them I had the pleasure to experience and meet some of the most stellar DJs I would not discover by myself, David Harness, DJ Alfredo, Todd Omotani, Kasey Goto's sets still come to mind.... to name just a few. After all is said and done house is still a huge part of me that most people can't feel, and that's perfectly undestandable. But with them, it's 'OK' to like house THAT much, TOO much, and that's rare, and always appreciated. Of course them being awesome people in the first place, it's cool to hang out with them as well. This past weekend I met one or the other SOLID people Friday, Saturday, AND Sunday at various events, without even planning it. Saturday even Todd came out out of nowhere on his way to Singapore, and we hung out all night til the morning first at AIR, then for some ramen (BEST tantanmen I ate so far) and then hung out at Teppei's new pad til Todd had to catch his flight... at the end of it I arrived home at like 9 am, damn tired still even now but hey I think at least at this point in time it seems the best memories are still the ones formed with the people important to you at ungodly hours. Thinking back, if I hadn't found La Fabrique that night, I would absolutely hate myself if I knew I was going miss out on meeting these guys.
M&M
You know who you are haha. I met one of them first at a bro's birthday party at Feria/Midas, and then met the two of them at Tokyo Saloon I believe (sorry if I'm mistaken). Simply put it's kind of rare that you just meet people and just hit it off like that, but big up to them for being so cool like that. One is (unexpectedly) my sempai in more ways than one haha, and the other is the most fun Japanese girl I met, bar none. Both can see those things usually 'unseen' to us normal folks apparently, which is even cooler in my books haha. Everytime I hang out with them, it's like no matter what we do or how we chill or party it's always guaranteed fun and meaningful time, and always always always grateful for that.
JY
Unfortunately already flew away to France, as befitting her European fetish haha. But what can I say, another super cool character (ba-chan? haha) who is very full of (ever so slightly mischevious) confidence and passion for life. By her own admission quite smart and gets bored easily once she figured something out, and one of the few people that I know that will absolutely be loved and successful in many ways wherever she goes. I mean, it's really hard to imagine otherwise. Miss her lots, hope she's happy in France or wherever she'll end up eventually.
Co-workers
I guess there's three that I've been hanging out a lot with recently besides the people in my department, there's one guy who entered the company the same time with me, and is the loveable oobaka/class clown type, but in a very friendly, absolutely non-annoying way. Just hit the big 3-0 and recently married, but still can hang with the best of us hahah. With him around, I don't even need to do anything and it's always instant fun and laughs. To compound the laughter, there's the tsukomi to his boke among the four of us, and she always always says what she thinks to devastating effect when we're together, an absolute riot. Usually when we go out for drinks/eats after work, what was going to be a quick drink usually turns out to be a 4 hour farce haha. They're a big part of why work is so fun on and off work. The last one I consider a natural nakama, not sure exactly why but I think she's the type to get along extremely well with the likes of us who is not good at the whole tatemae stuff, and also it seems the type to get along better with boys as opposed to girls, even tho she looks very ladylike. As for me, I consider her a natural nakama simply because I think she is nice, honest, and is the type who will never ever double cross her friends.
That's all for now.... hopefully can stay here for a long time and meet more cool people as I go and tell you guys about it.... I can't help but wonder sometimes how long this is going to last.... cos nothing lasts forever unfortunately, especially the good times. I guess that's also part of the reason why I go out like crazy during the weeeknds.... don't know if I can even maintain this super messy but damn fun kind of life when I hit the 30s y'kno haha
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| From J-List's website
"School Days is an extremely popular anime based on a dating-sim game
about a love triangle between Makoto, his girlfriend Kotonoha and his
friend Sekai, which combines beautiful characters and an incredible
complex (and fairly violent) story. The day before the last episode was
to air, a girl killed her father with an axe, and fearing that the act
might have been inspired by the show, replaced the last episode with
classical music and images of a boat."
.......a BOAT? LOL.
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| Wouldn't the Japanese learn English faster if they would ban katakana altogether and write and pronounce English as it is supposed to be written and spoken? Instead of going through katakana as an intermediary?
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| Just came back from 9 day trip of Inner Monglia via Beijing, some observations. I've never been much the tourist, my MO has always been to visit places where I have friends/bros that would gladly welcome me (at least I hope so haha). That way I can save on hotel fees (Miami was a notable exception) and have a local who knows the lay of the land to guide me. In the case of Inner Mongolia it was more crucial than I first thought. But first off Beijing.
First night there on a layover to Chifeng, Inner Mongolia I didn't get to see anything because I arrived pretty late (10 pm) and was already pooped when I reached the Beijing University dorm where I crashed at Hooters' (thanks bro). On the taxi ride to Beijing University though, the city felt too much like Jakarta, which probably means I won't set foot there again unless on business or visiting good people. The second time around on the way back to Tokyo I had more time to go out (with the bros and Alice, god I feel old hanging out with Class of 2010) and barhopping/clubbing in Beijing is pretty chaotic but sweet, I would recommend all the places that we visited (Obi-Wan, Song, Bar Blu, Song being my personal fav), and I also wholeheartedly thank Hooters, Carebear and Alice who hung out and took really good care of me. My gripe tho, is that most people there need to learn some damn manners. I already heard something along these lines from people who visited Beijing, but experiencing it myself and for somebody who has gotten used to mostly impeccable service in Japan, it was especially shocking. There were some people that I seriously wanted to slap across the room ranging from the kid who was pushing a middle aged lady to get in front while disembarking from the plane to the person who put his backpack on the seat beside me on the bus without asking for permission (I seriously wouldn't mind if he had asked if it was OK, I gave him a very dirty look, which he ignored, I would've just pushed his backpack to the floor to give him a stronger hint of my absolute displeasure if it wasn't for the fact that it would have probably started a mob riot in the bus against me). Today on Japanese TV news I also saw the sight of Chinese police trying to direct the subway crowds to move in an orderly manner to exit and enter the subway (since they restricted the use of cars in recent days in Beijing due to the Olympics, the subway is severely overcrowded). It didn't surprise me anymore that they failed to keep order sometimes because the crowds would just ignore them and break through the police line anyways. The Western media in recent days has been intensifying the coverage on the lingering pollution in Beijing, but in my view the athletes and visitors from all around the world will probably more shocked by the behaviour of the laymen and laywomen in Beijing if they get to encounter them. This also reinforces my view that no matter how 'advanced' a country might be terms of economic or infrastructure growth, it doesn't mean jack shit if the hearts and minds of the people is still back in the middle ages, esp countries like China (and Indonesia also imho) who has had explosive growth in the last decade and has admirably reshaped her cities into international powerhouses. It doesn't even have anything to do with being 'Westernized' or whatnot, I think the notion that you have to be Westernized to be advanced is also not entirely correct either. It's simply about having some common decency, damint. As for Inner Mongolia, I had a very good experience most of the time thanks to my friend He Chang and our guide Uncle Fu, but I also have some mixed feelings and side notes about the things that I saw there. The scenery was absolutely beutiful no doubt. You would think that after seeing a range of hills you've seen them all but I was quite wrong, depending on the time of day and the weather the endlessly rolling hills change before your eyes, from the greenest of greens to a gradation of green to blue, every corner and moment was pleasantly different. It was something else too to stay at the campsite there (as commercialized as it was) and wake up to the sound of the cow's moo instead of the engine of a car in the highway. Having nice traveling companions helped too I would say. I ate more lamb meat than I maybe I had over this lifetime but the first dinner in Chifeng was probably the best still, the spiced roast lamb and some-sort-of-green-flower dip was delicious in the way that incudes deep thought. I also probably drank enough bai jiu (white Chinese hard liquor, probably nastier than 151 in taste), milk wine, Chifeng produced Yanjing beer and what have you to turn blind. The first night out in the grasslands was the first time in a long time that I had a hangover, trying to keep up with four of the hosts (in fact most of the time I had to keep up with 3-4 hosts at different places/time). Except for the man with a voice of a broken megaphone spouting Chairman Mao's quotes like we were still back in the Cultural Revolution and spitting saliva like it was hurricane Katrina, all the hosts' company I thoroughly enjoyed. Thank god for my Lambda training. Overall I felt very welcome all the way by the people of Inner Mongolia. Back to the main title of the blog tho, the trip to Inner Mongolia reinforced the importance of connections to me (also interesting but not entirely unsurprising how people assumed connection = corruption there, but I digress). Our guide Uncle Fu (who supposedly descended from the last Chinese emperor's family) has arranged for everything for our trip by contacting his old military buddies, and in every locale that we visited we were taken care of by the local strongmen, ranging from the head of the local police to the local businessmen, military officials and site supervisors. Thanks to that our trip proceeded briskly from one spot to the next with nary a trouble. For that I am truly grateful. The only slight trouble we ran into though, kind of highlights the problems probably any developing country would facing. During the tail end of the trip Uncle Fu decided to take to cross over to Hebei province side before going back to our home base Chifeng in Inner Mongolia since it would be closer. Near the border we were stopped by a gate guarded by several young men in official looking uniforms and ties trying to collect money for us to enter the so called parksite. To me it seemed very legit at first sight, since there was also a sign both in English and Chinese proclaiming the area we were about to enter as Hebei provicial park or something like that. Uncle Fu though proceeded to get into a heated argument with the guards there claiming we were on our way home and this was a public road anyways, and therefore we shouldn't be charged to pass. At first I was worried because there were 4-5 of the guards who looked slightly thuggish and on top of that a police patrol car with 2 policemen got involved as well. In the end after a tense standoff Uncle Fu won out. It turns out according to my friend's explanation later Uncle Fu (whose parents live in the Hebei province side) knew all along the gate and the signs were a hoax and they had no official license to operate a park and collect passage fees in the first place, and he drove that point relentlessly during the confrontation, and that's why the 'park' guards and police backed down very reluctantly after Uncle Fu demanded to see official papers/licenses. My friend surmised that the gate was probably erected by some people who were close to the local provincial officials. One of the other sites inside the 'park' also had a few ladies selling admission tickets and organic cucumbers, which is fine except for the fact that they waived our admission tickets because we bought some cucumbers, which led me to guess that they were not supposed to collect money for admission in the first place. This whole money at all costs mentality was in display in a smaller scale in Beijing as well, when the public phone card saleslady was pushing to sell me the 100 yuan phonecard first, before I asked for the cheapest version (30 yuan). Anyways, we also got to another site where the infrasctucture for tourists were still under construction, which is again fine except the fact that one of the things they are building is a mini rollercoaster(!?) which is totally nonsensical and distasteful in my opinion. Just one of those developments without thought or style I guess. This particular poor example of tourist site development combined with the super salesmanship mentality (whether lawful or otherwise) saddens me. Anyhow, after a bit more in a week in China, I definitly found a newfound appreciation for things here in Tokyo/Japan, as imperfect as it is. I don't know if the hearts and minds of people in Beijing/China will change for the better soon (heck, Indonesia has been stuck for 50 years+ in the same corruption infested mentality), but one can only hope I guess. | | |
| Excerpt from the WSJ regarding the Bear Stearns deal: "Mr. Black's role was pivotal. He was a longtime associate of J.P. Morgan Chief Executive James Dimon. And Mr. Black had a long relationship with Bear's CEO, Mr. Schwartz, dating back to the 1970s, when the two were fraternity brothers at Duke University." In the end, what matters is personal connection, really. | | |
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