So the Lost Travel Buddy Made This:

So Naree, the Australian council sponsored companion with whom I shared a few excursions had to document her travels with a video camera.  I asked her to show me the evidence of her documentation, and she produced these:


harajuku from Naree Vachananda on Vimeo.

This is our trip to harujuku. I haven't had the chance to watch this all the way through yet, but the production quality is pretty good; and the content is pretty interesting too.

I'm still not sure why the Australian council let her have money for doing this because, frankly, it all seems like too much fun to be serious work.


ueno park from Naree Vachananda on Vimeo.

So the soundbyte at the beginning is pretty stupid, and I sound dumb but hey, they were a really fun couple of days.

She's also got a website full of these kinds of videos, check them out if you like psychadelic artsy contemporary dance stuff.

As Naree might say, 'far out...'

The Zoo!

Well I ended up heading out with a friend to the zoo. Unfortunately it was raining, but in this case it was definitely a cloud edged silver lining, because there were virtually no people there. We wandered round, nary seeing a soul the whole time. We also got front row seats to animals being fed, the otters for example, that we otherwise wouldn't have been able to see for the massive throng of people that usually attend these kinds of places. Sometimes I can't really see why Tokyo has the jam-packed reputation it does, and in other instances, like the shop window I'm looking out of right now, I can absolutely see why this is the most populous place on the planet.

If I get the job I'm interviewing for I'll do a bit on average apartment sizes and amenities here. I know exactly what they're like, but some people may well be dismayed at seeing them... I can feel my parents shock at seeing the tiny spaces and cramped conditions I might land in.

So the zoo was really fun, but we ended up walking around for absolutely ages, walking around the entire place, up and down the plentiful number of stairs that exist in this city, and generally becoming very tired...

So we stopped and had lunch in a western style pasta place, they're abound in pasta here, I think it's because of their obsession with noodles. Pasta and noodles are similar, so let's just modernise our diet by pretending to eat western food, but still secretly eat noodles by any other name! This is alright for me, I love pasta, noodles, rice and all the noodle soups, but I could see it being a serious struggle for others.

I would also recommend eating western style in a proportion of about 1/3 versus Japanese style here, because you never really eat western. The pasta places for example, serve either a timid pasta that's kind of tasteless, (without sauce often!!!) with a few bits of indescribable meat on top, or a noodle/pasta crossover that presumably started life as pasta. These places are really cheap, around 4 pounds for a lunch. (Free water provided in most places, served at your table, and even if it's not free it's like 100 yen for each cup) Then you have your 'proper' restaurants that are more expensive, but still have some bizarre Japanese twist to them that's better experienced than described.

After this we played some drums, the game I love but still haven't taken pictures or videos of... Damnit!

Onto the pictures!

So I know it's kind of random to go to the zoo, but being out and about in the rain is no fun.  Especially considering it rained all day.  It's not a torrential kind of rain, it's just persistent.  Like it's trying to be annoying.

Another similarity to England then!

So about the animals, this zoo specialised in cute fluffy things.

And birds.  Lots and lots of birds.  But unlike fish, they don't seem to eat that many.

My companion was even surprised when I mentioned that we eat pheasant, (a few were displayed in one of the bird sections, and I commented, in Japanese, that they are delicious.  The look on her face was one of disbelief in me speaking Japanese, and pain in the thought of eating them.)

So this is literally the best picture of the lions I could get.

If I had a better camera...

But yeah they were pretty wet.  Even hiding under the tree they ended up becoming bedraggled.  It was also funny to see the group weakling sit out in the rain, while the rest were under the tree.  Space is tight even for the animals in Japan!

So the rain rather spoiled this particular shot.  They had quite an interesting setup for the otters; they fed them in this tank that had a little platform for them to sit on, and it was connected to their main habitat by an otter sized pipe, housing a completely independent water system that then fed their main pool via a waterfall.  All in all, it was an immensely complicated system that provided for an amazing close up view of the animals eating.  Typically Japanese, extremely complicated and intricate, but it seemed to work quite well.

Another shot of the otter.  It's mate came and nabbed a few fish, but beat a hasty retreat, barely staying in the feeding box for more than thirty seconds.  This guy ended up just lazing around on the platform rolling around and playing to the audience.

They didn't seem to mind us intruding upon their meal but they were aware of us as they kept watching us move around.

Look at those hands!  Their feet look like their hands too... Weird.

Again, if I had a better camera...

He looked entirely comfortably just sitting there like that; I'm amazed at how quickly they move though.  As soon as he became uncomfortable he was across the enclosure in a few easy bounds.

Ok so this is the tiger.  No zoo is complete without a tiger.  Whether through luck or judgement they placed the dry spot in his cage right next to the window, so easy pictures abound!

There's no way of avoiding the reflection though, I tried taking this photograph from about fifty different angles.

One of the gorrillas in the enclosure, assuming what must be a really uncomfortable pose.

They used to have panda called ling ling here, but it died last year.  Such was the draw of the panda that they had signs up everywhere saying, essentially, 'we no longer have the panda,' and immense numbers of panda merchandise all over the place.

I'm amazed the chinese gave them one in the first place, but damn them for not giving them another one!

The most sorry looking polar bear I have ever seen.

It's almost enough to forgive them for all the baby seals they've torn apart and eaten.

They were in a special misted zone to keep them cool, and I therefore think they spend their entire lives wet.

On a side note, some of the enclosure designs were quite interesting...

I don't really think these things are cute, but my zoo partner did.  Maybe it's a Japanese thing.

All their cartoon characters here are round and fat, and this thing is pretty much devoid of sharp edges and is definitely well fed, so maybe it just fits that aesthetic.

I include this for the name alone.

In something of an editorial oversight I managed to take terrible pictures of the jackasses themselves.

If you notice in this picture, the autofocus on my camera has somehow managed to focus upon the fishing line they've put over the enclosure to stop other birds interferring.

How did it focus on that?  Really now?  That's just unbelievable.

Stupid camera...

Oh, and that penguin is a jackass.

Spot the chameleon!  How good is that camouflage.

I think it was a little cold for the lizards, even here where the lowest temperature I've experienced so far has been 20 degrees.

He still did the crazy eye moving in different directions thing.  That freaks me out every time I see it, but it's the kind of fascinating event that you just have to watch.

He  didn't change colour though... Is it chameleons that do that?

Isn't this just the ugliest thing you've ever seen?  I don't even know if it has eyes!

It's the largest amphibian on earth, and I've a feeling it's native to Japan, although that's another unverifiable fact.

The Japanese word for salamander is upalupa/うぱーるーぱ(I'm not sure if that's the correct spelling) and it really tickled my funny bone to hear the parents going around telling their really small children, in really silly voices the names of these things.  It sounds like oompa loompa, I think that's why I liked it so much...

Strange... yeah I am.

BOO!!!  So they had a random crocodile in the tank to the right after you walk through into the main building.  I don't remember seeing any warnings, so seeing it there came as a bit of a shock.

For some reason it also took offence to me being there, because after a bit of gormless staring on my part, he came right up to the glass, ala this picture, and did some menacing staring of his own.

Whatever I had done wrong, it enabled me to get some good pictures.

This is a long shot of its' body.

Those scratches are teeth and presumably claw marks; not from the guests I can assure you.  No one bar me was within three feet of the tank for fear of a Godzilla-esque breakout I think.

How ugly  is this turtle!

I can't remember the name of it, but it's certainly the ugliest thing in this part of the zoo.

Its' entire body is shaped to make it look like bits  of rock and seaweed; personally speaking I'm not sure how convincing the illusion is, but as long as it's happy that's all that matters.

This looked like some kind of river alligator, but I wasn't about to jump in there and try the water to find out.

Also, for some reason, this thing didn't have English labels.

Maybe it dropped out of high school early and didn't take the mandatory English classes.

Stay in school kids.

This is my favourite thing in the zoo.

It's a Galapagos tortoise, the kind Darwin tried to bring four of back home to England, before him and his crew became hungry enough to eat them.

He kept the shells though, what an inspirational naturalist.

To really get the correct sense of scale I took a photo with my friend standing in front of the enclosure, it

looks something like this.

I can see why the crew in the Darwin expedition were riding them all round the island.  I can't imagine them going very far on them though, in the entire time we watched it; it didn't even twitch its' legs, let alone try to move.

And instead of moving towards food that was too far away it strained and strained to make itself longer.  How lazy!  What a life!

But yeah he was awesome.

And that was my trip to Ueno Zoo.

Ueno Park, The Second Outing!

So this is the chronicle of Ueno, day two.  On this day I went with Pascal and Naree again; it was the last such time that we went out together, I think.  To be honest I should have written this earlier, because I've forgotten a lot of things that happened!

We essentially had a nose around the park ala my first day in Ueno, (yesterday in chronological blog order).  It's always more fun to go around with good people though, so it was another good day.

Onto the pictures!


Or at least there would be pictures here, but the internet in this hostel is so bad that I can't upload any!  D'oh!

Ok so I hear the cries of, 'what the bloody hell is going on here then?!?!'  I don't know.  Prior to this she contorted  herself into the small blue bag behind her, and re-appeared with a couple of velcro eyes on her, that she proceeded to move around her body, inevitably ending up on her ass.  She then did a merry jig with this.

Everyone was so awed by her performance that all that could be heard was the occasional cough.

Still, a large number of people were gathered so maybe it's the Japanese way of showing appreciation, rapt attention with no sound might be the ultimate applause here...

Ok so this guy actually had demonstrable skill, unlike the prior 'entertainer.'  He plays the kind of music that you might here in a Chinese restaurant, the soft melody that's so relaxing.

It really is amazing how quickly he can move his hands around, and how deftly he moves around the board.

Ok so this is a random train that appeared before us in the park.

It turns out that the park has a mini railway around the edges for children and, bizarrely, couples.  Lots of couples.  Weird.

Anyway, not wanting to do anything by halves, they've stuck a big old steam loco out front.  The determination to stick out here is quite impressive.

This is another shot of the same train, this time vertically.  I don't know why I included two, I just felt like it I guess.

Ok so now for the serious portion of my blog.

There are lots of homeless here.  I don't know, statistically speaking, whether there are more here than in London, but one thing is certain; they're more visible.

We were walking around the park and noticed that there were fewer people heading over here, so we came and checked it out.

All the people in line are queing for food, donated by a christian charity.  Charity doesn't exist in Japan; this event is extremely rare.  The mindset of the Japanese isn't one that allows for donation normally, if someone is homeless it must be through a fault of their own.  This attitude is changing however, and it's surprising to see a christian organisation actually doing something helpful, rather than just trying to hold the world back, or abusing children.

Having said that the Japanese are, frankly, harsh, they do other things extremely well.

All their trains and train stations have lifts for disabled people, and all their doors have special notches that wheelchair ramps can connect to, so when a wheelchair user gets onto the train, a conductor (quickly and efficiently) slots a ramp onto the train, and he can quickly get on and off.  The whole process takes less than thirty seconds.

It seems to me that they frown upon those who have had opportunity and failed, but cater, discreetly, for those who were born with disabilities.  I don't know enough about their tax systems and social welfare systems to see how far this goes, but to have every bus be low floor, and every train be accessible for everyone without the need to modify anything, (i.e. these considerations were built into the fabric of the system) would seem to make them quite conscientious of everyone.

It's also worth noting that unlike England, where homeless people are harassed every hour of every day, told to move on and not stop anywhere, the police do nothing of the sort here.  They don't move people or arrest them for loitering, they just let them be.

This does create areas where native Japanese don't go, because they think it's dirty or unsafe, but coming from London, I'd trust these people with my children, they're that harmless.

The difference in these areas is almost complete, between England and Japan.

The English would rather not see the homeless, despite knowing they're all about the place; out of sight out of mind.

The Japanese would rather leave them be and not go to those areas.

The English give out charitable donations, to ease their guilt over being in a better position than the homeless; thereby helping those with less than them.

The Japanese don't have that same guilt.

The people wearing the blue shirts belong to the christian church giving out the food.

They also had a band playing, which was the initial draw for me, music of any kind is worth investigating and has led me to many interesting encounters!

I don't know how much food they had, or if it was enough to feed everyone, but there were thousands of people to be fed, and the queue, as you can see from the photos above, went beyond the depth of field of my camera.  It was massive.

I wonder what the average Japanese would think of this scene?  Or what the average English person would think of this happening in hyde park or trafalgar square?  Because Ueno is essentially comparable to those places in terms of tourist importance.

Ok so back to the lighthearted stuff.

If you've seen my videos section, (on the right hand side, it says youtube!) you will have seen TIM (the incredible machine) here!

It's amazing.  To see the amazing thing in action watch the video.  The movement makes this much more incredible to watch in full flow.

This giant pizza oven is some kind of shrine to some kind of god.  The pizza deity he shall now be known as.











More to come soon!

Ok, let's do this thang!

Check out my youtube videos for this guys crazy one man band contraption thing.  He made all the equipment himself, and custo designed it to fit into the bags on his bike.  He essentially travels around (thanks to his sponsor, seen on his bike and shirt etc) raising money for charity.  He goes all around the world, and he listed the countries he's been to; most of which I can't now remember.

He was the only performer who made an attempt to communicate with the big scary foreigners in English, which makes him a favourite of ours!

So we crashed on a bench looking over this lake, (the park is massive, so we needed a rest).  We just ended up sitting here, making fun of the people in the boats, (really big fat men sitting next to small women made the boats lean and end up going round in circles) and generally chatting.  We did this for two hours somehow...



Before

So this bird went around fishing the waters, having an amazing success rate.  It was walking around being terrorised by the carp in the lake, as well as us for a long time before getting bored and flying off, straight into one of the boats.

Click on the image to see the little tiny fish it caught, and I managed to catch it catching!  There was a lot of catching apparently.

This is one of the most time consuming photographs I've ever taken.  It took about 20 attempts, using a huge number of different settings.

I don't know if I even like it :/

Anyway, for those who are interested:
Night time settings, 1 second exposure, resting on a fence around the lake!

So when it got dark we headed to this crazy loud noise, that turned out to be a free concert!  Amazing!

Unfortunately we only arrived for the last few acts, but these guys to the left here were definitely my favourites.

They have a man playing an electric ghost instrument on the left there, that's just awesome.  Check out my youtube videos for the video of their performance.

This is a better photo, and is another case of being extremely annoyed by the process of trying to take it.  So much effort went into this...

We liked this band for two reasons.  Firstly, and most importantly, the guy in the pink A: had the stones to wear a pink shell suit and B: He did a rock out thing at the end of their first song, where he stood  at the front of the stage pretending he was metallica or something.  Awesome.

Secondly and least importantly, the guy in  white had a pretty good voice.

It's a dark picture, but they're still posing like the cool dudes they are.  The guy in black was the bass guitarist, and seems to be fulfilling the bass guitarist stereotypes here.

And has become customary in my posts, we end today with a comedy picture.

Suntory is a beverage/snacks company here in Japan, and they make everything from beer to packed lunches.

Their best product however, is this; BOSS coffee.  It has an old 50's style american dad with a pipe, and the face they put to this?  The sidekick to will smith in 'men in black.'  Tommy Lee Jones himself.  Wearing the men in black suit and everything...  Epic.

Ueno Park, the First Visit!

Ok so today I visited Ueno park to scout out the surroundings.  There are a large number of museums and things of that ilk to see, so I went to check it all out.  What I wasn't expecting was all the crazy street performances and a random zoo!  The whole park is also raised about 100 feet above ground level, and there are shops and train stations underneath it.  Tokyo always amazes me as to how much vertical space everything takes up.

It also amazes me how similar England and Japan are in desiring green spaces.  Everyone has potted plants here, and there are about five large parks in Tokyo.  Maybe it's that dull grey feeling you get when you spend weeks on end looking at concrete that sparks a sudden desire for greenery; a syndrome that must be particularly acute considering the dearth of gardens or allotments here.

The park is also full of couples.  They make me sick with their covorting and whatnot.  That should be made illegal.

Onto the pictures!

This is another example of random history dotted within the city.  This shrine could be five years old, or five hundred, but finding these adds so much to the feeling of Tokyo.  Paris has coffee bars and long lunches, London has the queen and lots of rain; Tokyo has more people than seems possible, and shrines wedged improbably between buildings.

A lot of the statues are also given clothes.  This fox has been given a bib, which I think is something to do with children.  Each shrine has its' own speciality, some are for health, some are for fertility etc.

And helpfully the modern shrines have English descriptions of what they actually do.  It would be nice if they included a little more information thought, like what appeasing this God will do... (My Shinto is a little hazy, but I think people can be deified and housed in shrines like this, so presumably by worshipping here you're actually worshipping the author mentioned, but it doesn't say what happens if you do pray here.)  Do you, for example, become able to touch-type if you pray here?  Or maybe  they still adhere to the traditional religious school of thought, whereby not praying here will mean you lose the ability to read?

Let's wedge as many buildings and people into the smallest area possible!

This is a typical view of the interior walls of a small religious area.  Sometimes the flags are even advertising the Japanese bid for the 2016 olympics!  I want to see a local church fly banners for the next rugby world cup, please.

And this is the view to the right.  (above is left)  These statues are everywhere and initially look the same, yet there are extremely subtle differences between them.  Some have extremely puffed out chests, some have short legs, big teeth, are laying down etc.  I would assume they're bespoke to the shrine that ordered them, and they do all give off slightly different vibes.  The large chested ones look quite prideful, whereas this one is all about guarding the main shrine.  The ones that are lying down look like they're supposed to be doing something, but are just thinking, 'meh, someone else will do it.'

Ok so the couple of shrines I bumped into during the walk to Ueno were a side-story to the main event.  I didn't realise looking at the map just how massive Ueno is.  No building is below 200 metres tall, and even this picture is taken 30 metres in the air, over an enormous walkway.  The park itself is raised above the train station, a road and a ton of shops!  Rather than show you how high it is with a side on comparative shot, you'll see the shot looking down from the park later.  The building philosophy here is astounding.  There's plenty of space in the air afterall.





More posts to follow!

So this is a typical Tokyo side-street.  Notice the signs, they all light up at night.  Also notice the pachinko sign.

Pachinko is a Japanese phenomenon; I will have to write an investigative piece all on its own at a later date investigating pachinko, because their parlours are everywhere.  Literally everywhere.  If you look at the other photos I've taken of Tokyo streets you'll see those signs all over the place; usually in English too.

I don't think this guy is a recognised character like rirakuma, the relaxing bear that was in akihabara; but he's just so ridiculous that I had to take a picture.  I wonder if the hole in his head is for the guy inside to breathe?  Or maybe his character is a dolphin/turtle hybrid born in a lab somewhere.  Who knows.  I certainly don't.

I've been around Tokyo and seen singers and street performers, but unlike the buskers in London they never asked directly for money-in-a-hat - instead they peddled  cd's and merchandise promoting their dance troupe, band or whatever.  In Ueno they do it the european way, and ask for money at the end of their performances.

This woman was some kind of clown/magician/mime artist conglomeration.  My favourite trick of hers was actually 'hat manipulation,' for want of a better term.  She rolled it down her arms, flicked it onto her feet and generally larked around in a very skilful way, with her hat!   Pretty awesome stuff if I'm honest.

So I remember this guy from a book I read, he may well have been the author.  He's dead (sic) famous anyway, enough that there were never fewer than five people taking pictures at his feet.  Being a foot taller than anyone I was able to snap this without including too many tourists.  This was a fact that did not go unnoticed, as several people approached me asking for a foreigners eye view of the statue.

So basically I can't really remember what he's famous for, but he is famous for something.

People were also taking a lot of picture of him from behind; maybe he has a famous ass or something...  Maybe they were just too short to get good photos from  the front?  This is mere speculation of course.

Ok the internet is breaking at the moment, so I'll finish this later.

Ok so this gargantuan department store is called 'yodobashi camera,' ヨドバシカメラ.  I think.  It has the camera I will buy if I get a job, it's fricking amazing.  Anyway, this is the premier shop for all electronics purchasing, not just cameras, and contains some cool stuff.

I've not yet visited don quixote, which is an 'everything under one roof,' kind of store; and is cutely abbreviated to 'donkey,' but I will try and get there in my travels!

So this is the view from the top of the park, looking down on Ueno.  It's really as high as this picture makes it feel, and the city is at least this crowded all the time.  Everywhere I've been  there are this many people, and this many things happening all the time, I'm beginning to see why this is the most populous city in the world.  There are maybe a couple of places that are like this in London, but there are literally dozens that follow this pattern in Tokyo.

The bagpipe playing Japanese man walks into the bar and says...

Yeah this is really a Japanese guy playing the bagpipes.  And then he does some awesome stuff with some diablo too, what's that all about?

Ok so this is the same guy that does the awesome juggling  and diablo in my youtube videos.  Frankly speaking, he has to be gay.  No straight man has the crazy moves he does.

I include this picture because the thought occurred to me, while he was performing this trick, that he must have nads of iron, or have lost them some time ago, possibly performing this trick...

So this is a shrine inside Ueno park.  They are literally everywhere in Japan, and are vital to the sense of being Japanese, even if they average person doesn't really visit them often, or think about it that much.  I'm currently looking at a survey that says 40+% of Japanese think these heritage sites are what defines Japan.  Having these spaces everywhere, housing gods, spirits and all manner of things between this world and the next is quintessentially Japanese.

The concrete lanterns for example, are Chinese, yet they're incorporated into most shrines here, and are considered to be Japanese.  They steal things and claim them as their own... Sound familiar?  The difference is their heritage is celebrated, for better or for worse, rather than admonishing their past like in England.  It also causes a lot of problems, the fact that things like nanjing are buried and not well known within these shores definitely contributes to the 'Japan is the America of Asia,' mentality most Asians have.  'Good' and 'Bad' aside though, all these different curiosities come together to make Japan what it is.

The giant pagoda are quite common here too, although not as common as the shrines themselves.

I couldn't get closer to this one unforunately, and the artsy kind of 'through the leaves' photo doesn't work because the growth is too damn dense!

So these designs are all over the giant chinese lanters.  They're pretty cool, and I've lots of pictures of them; don't worry, I'll only show you this one.

This site appeared to be really old, unlike most places here that have to be rebuilt every so often.  The bell was all rusted and mangled, and I don't think it's still used.

Even the rope looked old in this place.

They also keep a flame from the atomic bombings, just to the right in this picture.  Like the olympic torch, only a lot more morbid.

I was going for an artsy shot of the chinese shrines next to the Japanese style water-sould purification system that I've described previously.

It didn't work, but the other pictures I took were also quite poor, (I put the camera in sports mode so they're really grainy) so I'll put this one up.

This is the atomic flame.  It's been on quite a  journey, but the most interesting part for me was the description of why the first person kept the flame; it wasn't positive.

The first man kept this flame to show his resentment of the dropping of the bombs, yet over time this thing has come to symbolise the desire for peace.  How did that happen?

So yeah I was basically trying not to look american when I was looking at this.

Another view from Ueno park.  It's amazing the variety of things that are contained within this one, albeit large, area.  It's certainly an efficient use of space.

A view of Ueno by night.  It's taken me so long to figure out how to take night photographs!  You wouldn't believe how many of these are blurred...

And finally, the Hello Kitty bus!!!  Cute rules here, and Hello Kittty is the cutest of them all...

Still though, and entire bus?  Really now?  Incredible...


So that's it for Ueno day 1!!!  It's taken me nearly a week to get this single post up and finished, I thank the internet for its' patience in these matter.

Ciao for now!