telophase | (no subject)

At a late-night internet cafe with half the eltters rubbed off the keyboard so my typing will be even worse than usual.

A bit more detail on the past couple of days.

First, the train to Tokyo took, as I said earlier, 2.5 hours. Rachel assures me this is atypical. It was due to an "accident" that we are told usually means a suicide.

On the walk from the Minami^Senju station to the hotel, we saw a doorway - no idea whether it was a house, bar, whtever - with what looked like salt in twolittle dishes on either side of the door, and a man walked up to it, bent and took a pinch of salt from one, and then we didn't see what else he id because his back was turned, bt he went into the doorway.

Random aside: iced tea is served with sugar syrup here. And is often expensive: cafes tend to combat people who order one drink and stay for hoursby simply charging $5 for one drink. I've spent a lot of money on iced tea already.

That night we saw the Japanese police actually doing something: three showed up to clear a drunk man away who was hassling poeple trying to get into the hotel. They did it without laying hands on him - just surrounded him and stared until he got up and walked away with them. Rachel assures me this is atypical.

Yesterday I was migrainey and a bitch. Rachel bore it well. We went to a nearby department store so I could see the amazing food and free samples in the basement. There was no food in the basement. Rachel assures me this is atypical. (he also thinks we got lost and didn:t find the right part of the basement).

We went out for okonomiyaki with

m00nface, her boyfriend, and a couple they knew. In SHinjuku. And then went to this place that Phil, one of the couple, described as "a cake place in Tokyo". We found it nevertheless, in Shibuya. And had shaved ice with peach syrup and peach pieces - very good. Especially in this heat.

BTW, Japan is hotter than hell and twice as humid. August is not the time to be traveling ehre.

This morning, I found a breakfast place nearby on a printout the hotel had, and figured that food early on would prevent a meltdown later. We walked right to it, after a glance at the map. Rachel assures me this is atypical. We sat next to a Japanese couple in yukata who were very elegant and made me feel underdressed.

We took the train to Asakusa, a section of Tokyo built to be traditional, with shops and temples and an amusement park. Very Old Tokyo Theme Park. We shopped about a bit and ate at a place where I had sliced vegetables served on ice, and fried squid. Rachel had tuna sashimi.

But more to the point, we accidentally stumbled across a samba festival. Most of the participants in the parade were Japanese- who knew so many Japnese were into samba? Took pictures, will post when I return from Japan. There was a giant tiger float with a girl on top on a swing, but my camera was put away by then so you'll have to imagine it.

And then, the most exciting bit of that day that will take over my comments section while you all ignore the rest of the post.

We were meeting

m00nface in Shinjuku for dinner, so took the subway from Asakusa to Ueno Station, then transferred to the train for Shinjuku. It was crowded, and Rachel grabbed a seat while I stood in front of her, hanging on to a strap. We traveled for a while, and I was idly observing the people nearby. I saw the man next to Rachel, who seemed like an ordinary sort of fellow, youngish, with a bag form a camera store, a bit geeky, but otehrwise unremarkable, furtively look about, tilt back the hat on his head, then lean forward and rest his forehead on the pole next to him.

And then he kissed it. Three times. I thought this a wee bit odd. I watched him. A few minutes later, he leaned forward again, and engaged the pole in a longer kiss.

About this time, while I was trying to figure out how to tell Rachel this without alerting him that he had been spotted, she oulled out her notebook and a pencil to record the Engrish on the shirt of the girl standing next to me. When she was done, I took them from her, and wrote "The guy next to you keeps kissing the pole." Rachel read it, and did her best to keep from bursting into laughter. We could not look at each other for fear of falling about for a good long time.

The man didn:t do anything for a while, and Rachel tells me she thought I was misinterpreting something. The pole was steel and cold, the car washot, and she thought he was just pressing his head to it to coool off.

He looked around furtively again. Then leaned forward and kissed the pole. Rachel saw it this time. The man then got up and went to stand next to a pole near the door. We kept watching. He looked around furtively, and leaned forward and planted on on that pole. We sniggered madly behind our hands. Two Japanese schoolgirls nearby saw him also, and started sniggering.

He then pulled a piece of Kleenex or white cloth or something out of his pocket, and carefully, tenderly, wiped doen the pole where he:d kissed it. All four of us observers were watching him openly by this point.

The train stopped in Shinjuku, which disappointed us because we wanted to keep waching the drama. But then he kissed it one last time, and swept out the door of the train, leaivng Rachel, I, and the wo Japanese schoolgirls looking at each other, rolling our eyes, and sniggering in a moment of cross-cultural togetherness.

Rachel assures me this behavior is atypical.

After thar\t we met

m00nface and Phil, and went to an izakaya where we had what Rachel assures me is an atypical experience, but there:s no point in talking about it ebcause you:re no longer paying attention after Train Man.

On the walk home to the hotel we saw a group of older teens or young adults standing outside the subway station. The girls were weaing Mickey Mouse ears with tiaras, and one of the guys was wearing fuzzy pink kitty ears. I felt like I wasn:t missing AnimeFest after all.

We also, on the way to this itnernet cafe less than a hundred yards from the hotel, got lost and saw a Japanese police car pull a van over and search the interior, which is an atypical experience although Rachel assures me getting lost is entirely typical.

Tomorrow we geek out in Akihabara.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Maybe Densha Otoko was trying to boost his immune system by exposing himself to as much filth as possible. The viral population of an urban train pole has to be huge like xbox.

Patrick Macias assures me that Akihabara is "so over". Still, it's worth a look. Let us know what you see there.

"I felt like I wasn:t missing AnimeFest after all." LOL

I was hoping that the person on the other side of Rachel would get up first because I didn't want to sit down and have to touch that pole. XD Luckily, that's the way it happened.

Train dude was weird, but ZOMG SHAVED ICE. I love shaved ice. TwT

Me too. Ice with the hair still on it is gross.

Best thing EVAR in this weather. XD

Dammit, that was me. I WAS LOGGED IN, HONEST.

I still want to know about the izakaya, even after the pole fetishist. Goodness.

:) Well, as

m00nface said, none of us had ever picked up an izakaya on the street before, so it's not like we should *expect* a really traditional experience. :)

There were people with menus wandering around Shinjuku trolling for people to come to their restaurants, and we talked to a couple, and this one seemed good. So we followed him to it. It was on the 5th floor of a building, and we got to sit in a small booth with a curtain in front of it. We ordered shochu and plum wine and eventually sake, and a vareity of food - black pork (ie pork from black pigs, not *black* pork. I forgot the Japanese name), what was fish but inexplicably turned out to look like a piece of ribbed plastic. We put it on the little grill they brought to cook the pork, and it cooked and got really brown in parts. We had to rip it apart with our fingers to eat, but it turned out really good - sweet with a hint of fish. We still have no idea what it was.

And we got fish cooked on a leaf of some ilk with miso, cooked at the table on a thing with a pre-set amount of Sterno so when it burned out, it was perfectly cooked. And some fried chicken, and some french fry type things.

I have no idea what was atypical about the experience, as I've never been to an izakaya before. The wait staff didn't seem to know anythin about the alcohol, which I think I was told was the most atypical thing, since it's supposed to be mostly a drinking place.

The waitstaff here, and in several places we've been, have PDA-type things to write the orders on, which seem to be connected to a main computer, so any server can serve any table.

I think the black pigs are called "kurobuta" (kuroi = black, and buta = pig). Was it good?

Yes, that's it! It was good indeed. :)

'Atypical' huh? Sounds like a good (if oddly interesting) time anyway. :)

more info on Samba festival or Old Tokyo region/theme park please ^^. I wish you more energising, non-migrainey weather.

Samba festival: mostly the parades. There were three different places we saw the samba dancers and musicians, and we found the staging area where the floats were between parades. I forget the name of the temple this was centered around. The theme park type area was mostly shops built in a sort of old style. Not sure what else to say - keep watching

rachelmanija's journal and I'm sure she'll post about it and mention stuff I forgot. :)

There were some people who looked like they might be Brazilian in the parades and the samba crews (what are samba groups named? I'm used to Mardi Gras krewes), but most looked Japanese.

Thanks, I will ^^.

Hahaha. Wow...that's just...wow. Good laugh there.

-~-

...W-wow, Train Guy. That's bizarre and kind of hilarious. XD You're having a pretty atypical time so far, it sounds like, but I hope you're having fun!

I keep wondering if I'll ever have a totally typical Japanese experience. But I suspect an atypical experience is really typical. XD

I've found a translation for that plastic fish, by the way - "stingray fillet"

AH-HA!!!!

Atypical or not, seems like you're having a really interesting time at least. XD Oh god, I can't stop laughing at that guy on the train (Densha Otoko indeed!). How has navigating around been, language-wise? Just curious. :)

I love the bonding with the schoolgirls, but really the samba festival tickled me the most.

I know, i'm weird.

leaivng Rachel, I, and the wo Japanese schoolgirls looking at each other, rolling our eyes, and sniggering in a moment of cross-cultural togetherness.

There's nothing like a good WTF moment to help you bond with strangers.

LOL about Train Guy! I'm certainly glad he wiped the pole off afterward. I think I won't be complaining about Metro for a while ... .

Gee, Tokyo weather sounds just like home to me. Of course that's part of the reason why cherry blossoms are so nice here too ... the climates are very similar.

I think the samba "krewes" in Brazil are usually just called schools - one of the lovely "Children Just Like Me" photo picture books I got my daughter when she was much younger featured a young girl who was a member of a samba school (see also linky here).

:)
The theme of Telophase's stay in Japan:

"Rachel assures me this is atypical"

wow... train guy really loves cold metal poles, huh? ^^; but still, i guess it was nice (?) of him to wipe it off after he was done... ._.;