Holiday Hiatus

This blog has gone on holiday and will resume the first week of January.

Christmas Season

My holiday season started last week in Japan and will carry me through the next few weeks of my upcoming trip to America.

Last Thursday I kicked things off with a small party with my Hosono Class. I’ve been teaching these students every Thursday for just over two years, so I’ve gotten to know them very well, and they’re capacity to learn and retain English amazes me. Not to mention they’re all really, really sweet kids.


Hosono Class


The original plan was to teach English for an hour and then have a dinner party with games afterwards, but the kids were so excited it was impossible to have a normal class. We ended up just wrestling for about an hour before they wore me out and we all took a rest to eat.

Unfortunately, the youngest student of the group, a cute little girl named Reika, did not feel well and could not join the wrestling match, but she did try to make an appearance when the food was brought out. She ate a little bit, and then started crying and threw up. Not very pleasant.

Friday, my kiddy Christmas parties continued when I agreed to help my good friend Toshiko, a private English teacher in the neighboring town of Tsushima, with her students’ party.

I showed up a few minuets late, played a couple games with her students, taught them how to make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, which all the students thought was a weird combo, and then split for my very own Christmas party at my house.

While I was away, my buddy Will was helping get things started at my house. We had a little scare when he plugged in his fan heater and blew the fuses to half my house and couldn’t find the fuse box to turn things back on.

My landlady was nice enough to call an electrician, who lived close by, and he remedied the black out problem by spying a small fuse box hidden in the rafters near the entrance of my house.

From there on, the party turned out to be a success. It was a potluck style party, which is uncommon in Japan, but the turn out of people and food was great.

The most memorable of all had to be when Yuki, a young girl that works the front desk at my sports club, came by with her best friend, whose name I’ve forgotten but remember her well because she was really cute and tried to speak to me in Italian.


Yuki & her friend


Both girls were dressed as Santa’s Little Helpers and started rolling sushi and making tako-yaki (small battered pieces of octopus topped with mayonnaise and sweet brown sauce). It was a huge hit!


Santa's Little Sushi Helpers


Saturday I went to see the Acid Mothers Temple play they’re annual boninkai (end of the year party) in a bar called Tokuzo.

AMT is a psychedelic rock group from Nagoya, but they spend a majority of the year touring Europe. They’re only consistent Japanese tour date is this Tokuzo show.

No words can describe this show, so I’m not even gonna try. All I will say is that it was loud. It was awesome. Not to mention two punk rock chicks from Osaka called あふりらんぽ　(Afurirampo) joined them onstage. Both girls were topless and painted bright red like some kind of super hero in a body suite.

The show ended when Kawabata-san hung his guitar from the rafters, or possibly the lighting rack, in a fit of distortion. Then they came back out for a raucous encore of Na, Na, Na, Na, Hey, Hey, Hey, Good-bye!

Monday, in stark contrast, I continued my kiddy Christmas parties with my Shimomura Class. I started teaching these kids last September, and I’m just now starting to see them make some significant progress.


Shimomura Class


For this party, all I did was eat a nice meal prepared by the students mothers, and then go outside for a game of freeze tag. It was not your typical Christmas party, but it was good fun.

Hopefully I can keep this holiday spirit up over the next few days when I travel to Aspen, CO to meet my cousins and my ailing uncle for a week in the snow before traveling back to Gainesville, GA to see the rest of my family.

U.S.A here I come.

Let's Bring Em Home!

Let's Bring Em Home!

I just made a donation to help a soldier in Iraq buy a plane ticket home for Christmas.

If this is something that interests you, please donate here:

http://www.lbeh.org/


Happy Holidays!

Big Frog Over the Rainbow

This past weekend I traveled to Osaka to see Big Frog play in a small venue called Club Vijon. It was an absolutely incredible experience and one of my most memorable Big Frog experiences yet. They have major momentum right now and are getting better exponentially with each performance.

Thursday night (12/2) they played in Yokohama, just west of Tokyo, and drove through the night to my house in Heiwa-cho for a pit stop before Osaka.

They arrived mid morning Friday with friend Kento, the Tokyo Ale manager, just before I left to go to work in Tobishima. While I was working they all crashed out and got some rest.

When I got back home around 5pm, they all woke up and went to a local sento (public bath) while I went to the supermarket to buy the fixings for a nabe (hot vegetable stew).


CobaKen serving up the nabe


Ton & Richard

We hung out watching a new DVD by a Japanese psychedelic group called ROVO and ate dinner, while Kento worked on his laptop, a small Powebook, using my wireless network and placed beer orders for me. So cool.

Then Richard showed up full of giddiness and put on the Live Aid concert from 1985 which drew laughter with all the old school 80's fashion. Bono's bad hair mullet and knee high black boots and Freddy Mercury's flamboyancy almost eclipsed their generous accomplishments.

Afterwards, as people were slowly fading out, I put on Tenacious D: The Complete Master Works which drew even more laughs until everyone finally went to bed.

Saturday morning was slow and easy until we hopped in the car to make the drive to Osaka.

All the band members traveled in their large white nondescript van (license plate: 4 20) while Richard drove me and my friend Shaka in his English Pointer wagon.


English Pointer following the 4 20

Richard was a very adamant about staying right on the Frog's tail because we didn't know the way and he didn't want to get lost in the rain.

It worked out well for the most part except when we went through toll gates and couldn't follow the Frog through the ETC (automatic gates). Once, Richard was so worried we'd fallen behind after a toll gate that he raced and leap-frogged cars until we were actually a few kilometers ahead of the gang.

We eventually worked out the confusion, but only after we were almost crushed by a trailer truck when Richard refused to yield as the truck started coming into our lane. He actually revved the engine, then slammed on the brakes; nearly causing us to skid into the median railing and jostling all the luggage across the back of the wagon.

Things got really hectic once we hit rush hour traffic in Osaka and Big Frog was running late for their soundcheck. They were changing lanes often, trying to make a hole in the traffic, and Richard refused to let anyone come between their bumper and ours.

I think we weaved in and out of traffic in downtown Osaka for almost an hour before we finally found Club Vijon.



Once inside things started to get exciting. While Big Frog was doing their soundcheck, Kento, Shaka, and I were setting up the merchandise table for the band and Tokyo Ale. Richard walked around and snapped some great photos of the event.


Kento getting ready


Shaka lending a hand

Afterwards, the band went across the street to have an interview for Balance Magazine in a kushi-katsu restaraunt, so Shaka and I went to an Indian Curry Shop just next door.


Big Frog interview with Rie-chan for Balance Magazine

We crammed ourselves with curry and nan bread before going back to the club to check out the opening band, Aqua Bomb.

Aqua Bomb was a funky power trio whose lead singer came onstage in a wife-beater t-shirt and a pink & black leopard skin shag cowboy hat.

He often addressed the crowd as "Strawberry People" and informed us, "Za messegii wa... massagii," which translates to, "The message is massage." All the while doing a choreographed dance with his hands making waves and then a kind of wax on... wax off movement. Not to mention, at the end of every song he congratulated the crowd on a, "Naisu Kyachii." In other words, nice catch! Too funny.

Next up was DJ QuietStorm. He rocked the house with a unique blend of rock, hip-hop, and jazz. He got things started with a sliced up version of King Curtis' Memphis Soul Stew and kept the momentum up with mix of Led Zepplin's Whole Lotta Love opening guitar riff and some hip-hop tracks I didn't recognize.


DJ QuietStorm

QuietStorm eventually segued perfectly into Big Frog's set; scratching and cutting up break beats on time with Ton's drum kit to the opening song.


Ton

QuietStorm stuck around and played with the Frog for the first few songs until finally disappearing into the audience.


High Octane Silent Maccos

As Big Frog came out of the shoot firing on all cylinders and I started dancing, my mind drifted towards my family and some bleak news I received last week concerning my Uncle Ned's up hill battle with brain cancer.


Shimi

I determined that if I danced hard enough to the thermonuclear power Big Frog was churning out, I could somehow create enough energy to radiate a rising sun over my uncle and give him a glimmer of hope from afar.


Sato wailin' away

Maybe it was wishful thinking, but I rocked out as hard as I possibly could. The more blood sweat & tears I discharged, the more power I received from the band. I kept feeding off their octane rock until their alloted time was up and they left the stage.



I was so exhausted I had to take a seat on the floor of the club and catch my breath.


Me & Shaka taking a rest

Next thing I knew, everyone was packed up and ready to go. We lingered outside the club in the cool air for a few minuets before hopping back into Richard's car, this time with Q-san as an added passenger/driver.


Mota & Q-san


The Bleshing

Q-san brought his iPod and was able to connect it to Richard's stereo through the radio waves, something I'd never seen before, so we listened to Phish most of the ride back to Nagoya.

As we headed east listening to Phish's infamous '94 Tweezer set from the Bomb Factory, the sun started breaking through the on coming horizon and put on an awe-inspiring light show as it climbed higher and higher in the sky. It made me ponder that my positive energy output possibly did something good.

We dropped Q-san off at Nagoya Station, so he could catch an early train toward Tokyo, but Richard, Shaka, and I continued on to Heiwa-cho, and were blessed by an even more miraculous surprise.

Driving into Heiwa, much to my dismay, there was a wondrous full length rainbow arching directly over the top of my house. Once again my thoughts drifted towards my family, and I wished they, especially my uncle and cousins, could share such serenity.

What a beautiful morning!




My thanks goes out to Big Frog, Richard, Shaka, and the rest of the Bleshing Crew for making this such an astonishing weekend.

I will never forget it.

Windowlicker

I wish I had some great adventure to write about, but the truth of the matter is that I've done absolutely nothing the past few weeks except import music into my iTunes and iPod.

These toys are a blessing and a curse. It's made listening to music around my house much easier due to the convenience of having my entire musical library a few mouse clicks away. Hell, it's even made my drive to and from work downright enjoyable because I've got all my music at my fingertips.

The major drawback is that I've spent every spare moment of the day trying to put more and more music into the thing, and it's turned me into an even more anal retentive person because everything has to be labelled exactly right and fit into a proper genre, so I can find it easily. That might sound simple enough, but when you're dealing with a few hundred albums and a few thousand songs it's a pretty daunting task.

More adventures are on the horizon...

Happy

The past couple weeks have gone by too fast. I've spent countless hours importing music into my computer and iPod and have neglected updating this blog, so I'm just gonna breeze over the highlights of the past couple weeks for posterity's sake.

Last Friday (11/12) I went to Yokkaichi with my friends Toku, Miho, and Shaka to see Kei, the local improvisational guitarist who played at my Halloween party. Kei was playing with a special guest from Argentina named Fernando Kabusacki.


Kei


Fernando Kabusacki with red shoes

They played in a really interesting log cabin cafe called Galliver with tables made from sliced tree trunks and the menus were made from old vinyl record sleeves. I think our menu was made from Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon.

The show itself is impossible to describe, but it was really amazing with heavily distorted guitars, computer effects, and even snippits of the O' Brother soundtrack thrown in for good measure.

That Monday (11/15) I went to Anjo, on the eastern side of Nagoya, to see my friends Big Frog from Tokyo play to a packed house of over 300 people, while Richard J snapped some amazing photos of the event.


Big Frog


Smile

This was a full on rock n roll party that saw Big Frog light the club on fire with enough high octane rock to make the members of Led Zepplin scowl. They left me, my friends, and the large rowdy group of Japanese aliens from the 4th dimension partying behind us, in tatters.


Shimi & Sato


Maccos in the driver's seat

As an encore, they brought out members A-Funk Syndicate, a local Southern rock band, to play a cover of the Band's The Weight.


A-Funk Syndicate sitting in

One of the highlights for me was actually when the show ended and the after show music was Pat Boone singing a Sinatra style version of Crazy Train. Classic.

This past Friday (11/19) I went into Nagoya with my friend Shaka because there was a free trance party in the middle of downtown Nagoya.


Trance Party

Trance is not really my thing, but the location in the middle of the city made for a great setting and atmosphere. It always amazes me the type of people that show up at these kind of parties. I met one really short, old Japanese guy who spoke Spanish to me because he'd traveled in South America at some point in time.

There were other young people there dressed in very outlandish and colorful outfits that seem to break the mold of conservative Japan.


SpiderMan


Fire Dancing

Sunday (11/21) I met Crazy Will in Nagoya and went shopping. He wanted to buy an iPod, so we pooted around a computer store for a bit, and he came away with a 40GB device that I'm sure he's gonna love.

Later in the afternoon we went to Kiso San Sen Koen (Three Rivers Park) and met a group of tri-athlon members from my gym. They ran a marathon relay race that morning and were celebrating with a BBQ party by the river.

We had a great time chowing down on lots of food and playing baseball and a knock-down drag out game of dodgeball with everyone. All the kids (big & small) joined the fun.


SunGarden BBQ

Later that night Will called some American friends living in Ichinomiya to come to my house to hang out.

Steve, Jim, and Cordelia came by about 8pm and brought a few bottles of sake with them. We heated it up, drank, listened to music, and chatted about everything from life in Japan to American politics. Eventually more friends came by to share in the fun and we had a full on party happening.


Party People

Will had a blast DJing off my iTunes and eventually started wresting with Jim in my living room. Things got a bit unruly when the spilled wine on my beige bean bag chair and knocked my paper doors off the sliding track, but it was all in good fun and nothing was seriously damaged.

Late in the night we decided to walk down the street to a large abandoned Pachinko/Bowling center that's completely bombed out and looks like it belongs in Baghdad rather than Peace Town.


Bombed-Out Pachinko Parlor


Steve by candle light

Steve, Jim, and I took a flashlight and a few candles and went exploring with two young Japanese that were scared out of their minds. The girls were so petrified that it kind of hindered us boys having fun, but in the girls defense the place is very creepy.


Bombed Out


Baghdad Bowling

After that it was very late and everyone was pretty exhausted, so we called it a night. I'm not sure if anyone had any nightmares, but I know I slept really well.

Frozen Wooly Mammoth Arrives in Japan

My Way News



http://apnews.myway.com//article/20041119/D86F8BG86.html

TOKYO (AP) - World fairs have typically focused on the wonders of the future, highlighting new technologies from glass and steel construction in the 19th century to satellites and computers today. But next year's fair is different.

The Japanese organizers of the 2005 world's fair have shipped a 18,000-year-old frozen woolly mammoth from Siberia to become the centerpiece attraction.

Kyoto is up

It took me more than a week to post my Kyoto trip, but it's finally up. Please scroll down to read/see the entry or just click this link:

http://heyheygig.blogspot.com/2004/11/kyoto.html#comments

Basically the arrival of a new computer, trying to learn a new operating system which drastically changes how to make entries to this blog, and spending way too much time loading music into my new iPod are what slowed the Kyoto entry down.

I haven't figured out how to run spell/grammar checks on this thing yet, so if you see something shocking please forgive me. I'm just glad I finally got the thing posted.

Now I gotta get caught up with everything else.

MoveOn.org: Investigate the Vote

MoveOn.org:
Investigate the Vote: "Questions are swirling around whether the election was conducted honestly or not. We need to know -- was it or wasn't it?

If people were wrongly prevented from voting, or if legitimate votes were mis-counted or not counted at all, we need to know so the wrongdoers can be held accountable, and to help prevent this from happening again. "

Please sign this petition:
http://www.moveon.org/investigatethevote/

If you're not convinced there is probable cause to investigate the election please read the following articles.

States with electronic voting machines gave Bush mysterious 5% advantage
http://www.newstarget.com/002076.html

Exit polls data: accurate except in counties using electronic voting machines
http://img103.exs.cx/img103/4526/exit_poll.gif

Ohio officials block public from observing vote count
http://www.enquirer.com/editions/2004/11/05/loc_warrenvote05.html

Machine Error Gives Bush Extra Ohio Votes
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20041105/ap_on_el_pr/voting_problems

Voting machines in Florida count backward
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/politics/content/news/epaper/2004/11/05/a29a_BROWVOTE_1105.html

Did Kerry concede too soon?
http://www.freepress.org/columns/display/3/2004/981

Kyoto

For the past week the weather has been absolutetly perfect. I had a long weekend, so I decided to join my friends Jason and Haruka on a pilgramage to Kyoto.


Jason & Haruka

We met Sunday morning just off the highway, not far from my house, around 8am. I left my car in a parking lot and got in the back seat of Jason and Haruka's station wagon. Jason drove while Haruka navigated and I played DJ from the back seat.

We arrived in Kyoto about 11am and went straight to a sprawling complex of temples known as Tofukuji.


Sub-temple in Tofukuji

Inside this complex there were various sub-temples with beautiful rock gardens made by Mirie Shigemori, a famous garden builder from the 1930s who sought to express the simplicity of Zen through modern art.


Rock Garden

The largest temple in the Tofukuji complex we visited was Hojo (Abbot's Hall). It consisted of four rock gardens, one on each side of the temple, made by Shigemori.

My two favorites was the southern garden which represented islands (jagged rocks) amongst rough seas with mossy moutains (boulders) at the far side and the northern garden with square stones and moss in a checkered pattern.


Northern Garden Checkers


Southern Garden Islands


Southern Garden Mossy Mountains


Southern Garden

We also visited another sub-temple which is normally not open to the public and saw an intense rock garden made to represent a dragon flying in and out of the clouds. Unfornuately, cameras were not allowed.

After Tofukuji we walked down the road to a funky little restaraunt with red walls and ate Kamo (wild goose), chicken balls with vegetables, miso soup, and Yuba (a strange by product of tofu).

Haruka wanted to go off alone and do some shopping, so Jason and I drove through town, with me navigating this time, to another temple on the northern side of town called Tanuki Dani Fudo-in.

To reach this temple, we had to climb a myriad of steps. Upon arriving at the bottom of the steps, there were several Tanuki statues. A tanuki is a Japanese badger known for his unusually large scrotem and promiscuous behavior.


Tanuki



About halfway up the steps there was a mysterious, shadowy statue of a monk.


Mysterious Monk


Mysterious Monk

At the top of the steps was a large wooden temple on stilts with barrells of sake underneath.


Tanuki Dani Fudo-in

Around the main temple were several shirnes depicting various scenes, like a Buddha with babies crawling on him, and another Buddha behind bars. Jason and I presumed these were places people came to pray for infants or relatives in prison.

Unbeknownest to me, on the deck of the main temple the two most prominent pillars were covered in small wooden tags. It took me a minuet to read the signs in Japanese, but I finally figured out it was in prayer for people suffering from cancer.


Gan (cancer)

I immediatly went and bought a tag in honor of my uncle Ned, who is battling brain caner.


Cousin Harris, Uncle Ned, & Cousin Stuart

I incribed his name and age on the tag and circled the appropriate body parts afflicted by the cancer.


Wooden tags of prayer

Then, I went inside the temple doors, made a small offering and said a long, deep, emotional prayer.

Walking back down the steps, I needed some comic relief, so Jason and I stopped and started taking ridiculous pictures of some of the statues along side the steps.


Face

We met back up with Haruka at a pension in Higashiyama and then walked down a side street for dinner in a small Jazz cafe. The restaraunt, located next to a canal, had a nice atmosphere with Ella Fitzgerald-esqu jazz playing softly in the background, but they sat us at a table that was too small, so we had to eat fast in order to make room for the next dish.

After dinner we walked around the corner to Shoren-Nin Temple.


Shoren-Nin

This temple, with sevaral enormous trees along the ouside wall, was spectacularly lit with flood lights all around the temple grounds.


Shoren-Nin

We entered the temple and passed by a large kanji (Chinese) character that meant dream. Then we went through a large tatami (straw) mat room and casually bumped into one of the temple's monks. He, in very good English, suggested we try and have our fortune read.

In the tatami room was a small alter with instructions to kneel down, repeat a saying in Japanese three times, then shake a cylindrical box until a numbered chopstick comes out a small hole in the box.

Out of maybe a hundred or so chopsticks, mine was number one. Ichi-ban!

I carried it with me while we were checking out the temple, a very large multi-roomed place where the emperor of Japan used to stay while visiting Kyoto.

Just before exiting the temple and entering the temple's garden, we traded in our chopsticks for our fortune. Haruka had to translate for us, but basically Jason's was not so good; Haruka's was okay, and mine shot over the moon. Best fortune ever.

Feeling self assured, we walked through the lit up garden and through a small bamboo forest behind the temple.


Bamboo Forest

The last part of the garden we visted was the most wonderful. Inside a small room, with the doorway roped off, was a portrait of the 'God of Light'. We were instructed to make a wish in front of the portrait, then turn around and face the garden.


God of Light

In the garden, there were several lights on 10sec timers going off and on at different intervals. In the center of the lights was a projection of a sanskrit symbol. We were instructed to say the symbol, pronounced BOH-ROH-N, when it appreared amongst the other lights. Very cool experience.

Last but not least, next to the garden exit, was the grand bell of Shoren-Nin Temple. To my knowledge, this is the only temple in Kyoto that let's tourist ring the bell.

To grab the thick rope holding a suspended tree, swing it into a giant brass bell, and stand there as it reverberates all around you with a wah-wah-wah effect; all the while the lights are going off and on around you, was a truely mystical experience.

After that we were ready for bed.

The next morning we woke up, had breakfast at the pension, and went back to Shoren-Nin to see what it looked like in the morning sun.

It was a completely different atmosphere in the morning, just as cool, but totally different. We walked around very slowly and checked everything out for a second time, occasionally relaxing on the tatami or just sitting and taking in the garden.


Haruka relaxing

Next, we walked just up the road a bit to the San Mon (Third Gate) of Chio-in Temple. Most of the year this gate is off limits for tourists' entry, but we got lucky and were able to climb the steep steps and enter the sacred room on the top of the gate.


Chio-in San Mon

In all the time I've lived in Japan, I've never seen Japanese archticture quite like the inside of this gate. In sharp contrast to the brown and white exterior, inside it was brightly colored with dragons and winged angels all over the walls, pillars, and ceiling. There was a giant gold buddha seated on a throne in the middle of the room, and he was flanked on both sides by devilish deities.

We listened to a short explanation about the gate from a staff member who told us we could now enter Nirvana because we have seen the winged angel on the ceiling, and then we were escorted back down the steps.

We walked back to the pension and got in the car for a short drive to the northwestern part of town to Myoshin-ji, another sprawling of complex cobble stone streets and short white walls serparating the several different temples.

Before entering Myoshin-ji, we ate a nice light lunch across the street at an organic food restaraunt.

Inside Myoshin-ji, we first went to Dai Hou In where we ate a small Japanese sweet and drank green tea.

Next we went to Taizo-In, which was very nice, but at this point it was kind of the same, same, but different. Plus there was a large group of elder Japanese people being herded around by a tour guide that kind of ruined the atmosphere.

Lastly we went to Hatto (Sermon Hall). It was a place where rituals were performed and sermons given, but it's most famous for the gargantuan dragon, painted by Kano Tanyu, on the ceiling. The dragon is the guardian of Buddhism in Myoshin-ji.


Haruka & I waiting for the dragon

The dragon was painted so that it's eye always follows visiters around the room, but depending on where you are in the room the dragon looks like it's acending or decending.

After leaving Myoshin-ji we took a short drive up into the hills to Kurama Onsen (hotspring) for a hot bath and dinner in the hotel. We all had a very tasty tempura set.

Before leaving we decided to make one last stop at Kodaiji Temple to see it under the night lights. This was a very impressive temple, but it was also very crowded with tourists and bow-legged Japanese girls walking on high heels along pebbley paths.


Kodaiji Temple


Mirror Lake

It was also strange that there was an abstract art display in the main court yard garden and in some of the tatami rooms inside.


Kodaiji's abstract exhibit


Abstract Art

I thought the art work was very intersting, but it seemed a bit out of place in an ancient temple. Maybe it was just me.

Afterwards, we were all very tired, so we packed it in and drove home. It was a pleasant drive until we started listening to Don Caballero and Jason lost the highway ticket to pay the toll.

Anyway, we made it home safe and sound.

Until our next adventure...