It all started in late September last year. My friend Dave and I travelled out to a random train station to check out the 'Sexy Football Club' (I'll leave that to your imaginations). As we were leaving, we came across what appeared to be a traffic safety promotion, featuring a giant cat:
They were also handing out little pots of flowers for free that day. If you look closely at my hand, you can see that I'm holding a bag with the pot of flowers in it. Somehow, those flowers made it back to my dorm room and were placed on my balcony.
It's a miracle that they're still alive. They have lived through a freezing winter and intermittent periods of dehydration (oops), coming to the verge of death more than once. Throughout all of this, all they have had to survive on is water, which slowly but steadily washes away their life-soil.
But today, when I went out to pull in my washing, I was greeted by a surprise. LIFE! (a.k.a. some flowers). I am not hesitating to call this the greatest achievement of my trip so far.
And finally, as a little treat, here's a photo of Mt. Fuji I snapped whilst on the way back from the SuperGT race at Fuji Speedway on Sunday:
Clubs are a big thing in Japanese universities, and especially at Waseda. To sum things up very briefly, and to avoid a huge rant, Japan is very much about belonging to a group. You are judged by what Uni you attend, what faculty you're in or what company you're working for. When introducing yourself, you say, for example: "早稲田大学の国際教養学部の三年のグリーリダニエルです" - "I'm Daniel Grilli, a third-year at the School of International Liberal Studies at Waseda University". Crucially, though, the word order in Japanese is in reverse, and your name always comes last.
Within the Universities themselves it is almost mandatory to join a club or their more casual equivalent, a circle. As I mentioned before, Waseda is full of them - rumour has it that there are more than 300 tennis circles alone! (Although the number of those that actually play tennis as opposed to having nomikai all the time is pretty low)
It all kicks off with a campus-wide fair at the beginning of the Spring semester where each club vies for your attention by handing out fliers. There's literally a club for anything, from music to sports (cricket!) to mountain climbing to sailing. I was very tempted to join a few, particularly the acapella circle, which counts the famous Gospellers as part of it's alumni, until I spied two guys in racing suits on a chance visit to the campus. Now this was what I was talking about!!
The Waseda University Automobile Club (早稲田大学自動車部 or WUAC) is no normal club. It's been around since the dawn of the Japanese automobile industry in the 30s and is part of the university proper. That means they have a garage on campus (a miracle considering we're in space-constricted Shinjuku) and recieve money every year.
They participate in a variety of events, from Gymkanas to Rally-style time attacks to the incredibly awesome six-hour, off-road, kei-car endurance race. The cars they use are quite varied: an older Civic with an Integra Type-R engine is used for their circuit work, whereas a tiny but potent Toyota Starlet GT Turbo gets called in for off-road duty. And did I mention that they can do almost anything to the car in their garage?
My experience with the club began at a welcome BBQ one Monday night. It was interesting to see the premises and hear from the members as to the activities - I was really excited. But the most exciting part was to come. (Parents please skip to next paragraph).
One guy who had befriended me, a third year named Shinichiro, asked me if I wanted to go for a drive with him after the BBQ was over. "The only thing is though", he said, "we'll be getting back at around 4 - 5 am". I was doubtful at first, but as he had a lovely white Skyline R33 GTS-T parked outside, I wasn't about to let an opportunity like this pass me by. We ended up driving for a couple of hours to a (relatively) quiet bit of road under a highway somewhere south of Haneda Airport, where we met up with members from the Keio University club, our arch-rival. It was all friendly tonight though, and we hung around and chatted while people took turns to practice their drifting/ handbreak-turning skills while there were no trucks moving past. I think that's all I shall mention of that night...
Needless to say I joined the club as soon as possible. I haven't been to another late-night outing since, but that's not because of a lack of opportunities - rather, I need my sleep!
Joining the club itself is, as I said on Facebook, rather similar to joining the military. I need to pass a health check and cardiogram, pass a test to reach the first rank and always be respectful to my superiors (for those of you that don't know, Japanese has various forms depending on whether you are speaking casually to friends or to a superior in a company etc. I really dislike using the polite, honorific form because it's wordy and, I feel, creates divisions between people of different ranks).
We start off each club session with a gathering where everyone stands in file according to rank with the leader at the head. Next is steering practice. Each person picks up a wheel and practices left and right turns whilst holding the wheel up in the air and trying to keep it as centred as possible. It's a good idea as you want that sort of thing to be instinctual when you're trying to do a handbreak-turn at speed!
What follows then largely depends on what events are approaching. There's always car maintenance/ modifications to do, as well as study for the test (car readiness checklist). Things usually wrap up at around 10pm, which is no problem for me as I live only five minutes away.
Anyway, this post is getting rather long, so I'll get to the part with the photos in it!
Last week the club held the 'New-Members' Gymkhana' in a carpark in the mountains four hours or so north of Tokyo. Us newly inducted members were given an old EK Civic (with EK plates in photo) and were either taught to drive if we didn't know how or taught to handbreak turn if we did. A handbreak turn isn't easy, especially when someone's trying to explain the theory of applying centrifugal forces in Japanese! I think I kind of got the hang of it in the end, though.
Other things we could do were to ride alongside the full members in their cars as they practiced on a gymkhana course. Let me tell you that even a 660cc Suzuki Alto feels fast in a small carpark!
But enough talk - here are the photos!
I'm sure there'll be much more fun to come!
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Spring is in the air, and for Japan, that means one thing: sakura, or cherry blossoms.
For centuries they have been admired, in both painting and poem, for their outstanding, fragile, beauty. You see, the blossoms only last for two weeks or so, and as such they are often used as a metaphor for life: beautiful, but ever so short.
I won't go into the philosophising (brain not working well enough for that), but what I will do is share you some photos I took whilst on my homestay in Kagoshima Prefecture, down on the southern island of Kyushu. The trees at this time weren't quite fully blossomed - but close enough I think. Enjoy!
Finally, I'd like to leave you with a song. It seems that every Japanese singer has their own version on the theme of sakura, but this particular one is from one of my favourite bands, Monkey Majik. I first heard it at their concert a month ago. Enjoy!
PS: The spring (???) vacation is finally at an end - I'm back to Uni on Tuesday. It's been a blast though, and there's certainly more fun to come!
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This little story began one chilly night in early January. I had just gotten back to Tokyo from a rest-break in Adelaide, I was feeling better than I had been for months and months, and I felt like going out for once.
"Let's go to Shibuya!" I said to my friend Dave, and so, after making dinner and getting dressed up in clothes completely inappropriate for the weather (a shirt and a light jacket) we took the 10-minute train ride there.
For those of you that don't know, Shibuya is one of the 'coolest' places in Tokyo. Most of you will know it for the massive pedestrian crossing (pictured) they have right outside of the station, and there's a good reason it's so busy. Packed with shops of all kinds, restaurants, bars, clubs, love hotels and karaoke parlours, Shibuya is a haven for young people. It's only a short walk from cool fashion central Harajuku as well.
As my friend and I were waiting to cross the above intersection, we were approached by two young men. Now, my friend Dave is an Australian of Chinese descent, so he is easily mistaken for a Japanese, as these men did:
"Ask your friend if he would like to be a model for our magazine" (in Japanese of course).
What! Poor Dave (sorry man)...
Anyway, after talking to these guys a while and giving them my contact details, we headed off to walk around...but my mind was abuzz. Sure, I'd heard of people being scouted for being models in Tokyo, and in fact I have a model friend, but me? I'm no イケメン!
The photoshoot was to be on a Friday, on which I had class. I was at first reluctant to skip my class (I'm too good of a student >.>), but then I decided that this opportunity was too good to pass up. So, on January the 22nd, I arrived in Shibuya again, fresh and early in the morning.
Fortunately, there was to be one other model for that shoot, so I would not have to brave the dangers of an off-the-street modelling request alone! He American and also a first-time model, and, to jump ahead a bit, after that day we became good friends.
After waiting a few minutes, we were told to get into a nondescript, apparently rental white van. Uhh.... I suppose it was a good sign that the van was white. All the bad stuff happens in black vans, right?
We drove around for a while, leaving Shibuya and heading into the suburbs, stopping only to pick up a short Japanese woman (random) and the clothes (that explains the van). Before long we had arrived at the studio where the shooting was to take place!
Everyone was really nice, even if they didn't really tell us what we had to do. "Come here", "Wear this" and "Look serious" were about the extent of their instructions. Thankfully, because I was not alone, I was able to share nervous giggles and uncomprehending shrugs with my new-found friend.
I could write more, but I think all you really want to see are the pictures. The magazine came out last month and has just been replaced by a new issue. The magazine title, "Choki Choki", is the Japanese onomatopoeia for the sound that scissors make, and as such it's a young men's hairstyle/fashion magazine. Also, apparently, a magazine that almost never uses foreign models (which are otherwise all the rage here).
Enjoy, and try not to laugh too much (the clothes they made us wear are pretty weird).
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I know I'm not a good blogger. It's been nearly two months since my last blog post - that's unexcusable! And I have no excuses, in any case.
Oh well, I guess I'll just have to make up for it from now on. Since too much has happened since I last wrote a blog, however, this post will just cover some random points from the last couple of months of my time in Japan, focusing on the Spring Vacation, which I am currently in the middle of.
First, I think I have finally decided that Spring is may favourite season of the year. That first warm, sunny day, with a slight smell of pollen on the air, lifts my spirits so much after the long, cold winter. In my mind, I've come to associate Japan with cold and winter because it seems like that's the only season I've experienced in this country (forgetting the hot, humid weather when I first arrived...).
Spring is also the season of flowers (yay!). First come the 梅(ume; plum blossoms), whose small, fragrant flowers so contrast the dead winter wear of the trees around them that they have captured my heart. I want to plant one in the garden at home when I get back! (if it will grow...) After that are the 桜(sakura; cherry blossoms), that haven't bloomed quite yet but which I am looking forward to with great anticipation.
Spring makes me feel so alive!
Two weeks ago, I left the Kanto area for the first time on a trip with my American friends Mike and Brett. Typical for an all-guy trip, only the bare essentials were organised (not even the entire trip) and very little advance research was done. Research such as, say, where exactly the bus departed from. Needless to say, we did not make it to a single bus with any meaningful amount of time to spare; rather, we gave ourselves some good morning exercise each time by running a block or so, five minutes before departure time, in frantic search for our buses. Departing on time with no hassles would be boring, I think!
During our trip, we headed to the West (South?) side of Japan, starting from Nagoya. In Nagoya, we met up with my friend Yuri, who had come to Adelaide in 2008/2009 for an exchange. She showed us around several interesting places, such as the castle (unfortunately a replica as the original one was, um, burnt down in WWII) and the Toyota Automobile Museum - the latter of which we arrived in Yuri's mother's pink Yaris (wooo!) and departed in a cool mag-lev train.
Having left Tokyo, we had begun to notice various changes - the trains departed less often, the people looked a little different, there was less Louis Vuitton around (only one in three people had an item now, instead of one in two), and, having less foreigners around, we attracted more stares (usually welcome ones from pretty girls). In fact, on one occasion, my friend was able to get a girl's phone number simply by smiling at her through the window of a pub - something that probably wouldn't have happened in Tokyo. But did happen again in Osaka. Um, I probably shouldn't be writing about these things in my blog...
Like I had mentioned earlier, my friends and I had no plan, so, and I say this with the utmost regret, we were not able to partake in a day long temple-crawl with a bunch of other camera-happy tourists. Instead, we just followed our feet, a few scant recommendations and our instincts ("let's climb to a temple on a mountain!!") and still managed to see many beautiful things. I for one quite enjoy looking at a rudimentary map, finding a temple on the edge, way apart from anything else, and spending an a couple of hours trying to find a way to get there (no, I am not being sarcastic here).
My only regret of our time in Kyoto was that we didn't go to the Ninja restaurant with a built-in underground labyrinth. I guess that will have to wait for next time...
Our second stop in the Kansai area was Osaka, the second largest city in Japan, and, in 2009 at least, the second-most expensive city to live in in the world. Of course, Tokyo was number one. Yay!
There's not much I can really say about our time here, as, being the weekend, we took the time to go out on Friday and Saturday nights. Going to the all-night all-you-can-drink club sounded like a good idea until we realised that such a place would attract a particular crowd which we didn't really want to be a part of...
Some Osaka interesting experiences:
- Walking past a public car-park in the 'night life' area of Osaka and seeing four Lamborghinis parked next to each other. A closer inspection revealed an F430 Spider a little further inside the building. I wonder who could own them...
- Finding an Australian pub and ordering a Pure Blonde for $10. The taste was so light and sweet (and I do not say those two things in a good way) compared to the Japanese beer I have been drinking, of which Asahi is only the start.
- One of my friends coming home from a night out with a red cowboy hat. Of course I remember where we got it from (a random Japanese dude), but still very amusing nonetheless.
- Being treated to a free live event at the hostel we were staying at. It was Tate Takako, an apparently famous Japanese singer, who in any rate had a very beautiful voice.
- The beautiful plum-blossom orchard at the Osaka Castle (see photos).
- Realising all too late that the bus station was actually several blocks away from the train station. Yay!
We spent most of our time there out visiting some of the various islands nearby, including the incredibly beautiful Miyajima. For those of you that don't know, Miyajima is a world heritage site, and for a very good reason - it's a forested paradise complete with deer roaming the streets, monkeys climbing the buildings and incredible temples and shrines. In particularly, the 鳥居 (tori-i; literally bird's nest or the gates you see in front of a Shinto shrine) of the main shrine is famous for the fact that it is partially submerged at high tide. Just have a look at the photo and you'll understand!
On Miyajima we were finally able to realise our wish of climbing to the top of a mountain to a shrine. Not only that, but this shrine housed the eternal flame of peace! Too bad I did not think to take a photo...
The other item of interest in Hiroshima was, of course, the various memorials they had to the atomic bombing event. Most famous is the 原爆ドーム, or Atomic Bomb Dome, which stands, in ruins, as a monument to the bombing. Nearby is the peace park with various statues and monuments, as well as the confronting museum. I won't go into detail about what is inside - you have to see it for yourself - but suffice to say that I really hope people don't use atomic weapons again in the future. Especially considering that modern technology means that the bombs of today can be over 3,000 times as powerful as the one dropped on Hiroshima....
But enough of that sad story. I think I have made it to last week, when I returned back to Tokyo. After a hurried few loads of washing, attending a Monkey Majik concert (long story short: awesome) and battling a cold, I was back on the road again - this time to Fukushima for skiing!
Despite my reservations, it was very fun, if a little painful. I was able to get down an intermediate-level slope more or less in control and with only a few falls by the end of it - I can't wait to go again!
One thing that makes skiing in Japan quite unique (apart from perhaps Iceland or Scandanavia), however, is that after abusing your body in the cold during the day, you can retire to a hot spring in the night for a much needed rest. Once I had overcome my initial embarrassment (as long as no-one looks down, it's all ok), I found myself really enjoying the whole concept of a hot spring. In particular, the 露天風呂 (Rotenburo; open-air bath), which allowed you to enjoy both the warm water with your body and the cold snow falling on your head at the same time was just magical. Of course I have no photos, though...
I think that's enough writing for one blog post. I'll just leave you all with a small teaser of what's to come in my next post....
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