Stuff That Makes Me Smile

The first thing I came across that made me smile this week was this.

Seeing as I have two random junker PC's in my room, I want to try something like this.

The second thing that made me smile was this website.

The best way to surf this website (just like wikipedia) is to click on every term that you're unsure of, placing it in a new tab at the top of your browser.  When you're done reading the page, close it and move onto the next.  By the end of several hours, you'll have fifty pages yet to be read, and for every page you read you'll open up a couple of new pages.  If, however, you read in a niche with enclosed definitions, after a solid four or five hours reading you can become an internet expert in the given subject.

After doing this a few times you are ready to print out this certficate, and hang it on your wall.

On the TVTropes website, note the inherent sarcasm evident in a number of the posts.  An inherent sarcasm is what, I feel, Wikipedia is missing.  Also note the clever reimagining of old cliches in some of the Trope titles.  Diabolus ex Machina is one of my favourites.

On a lighter note; pictures will be uploaded during the next instalment.  I don't have time to do it this time around.

God Giveth, and he Most Certainly Taketh Away

So in general conversation today, my boss mentioned that she had two junked PC's in her room, and that I was welcome to have them, should I wish to try and fix them.

I got one up and running, (which I'm now writing this entry on) and I suspect a faulty power supply is the reason the other isn't working.  I'll go into work on Monday and try t source one from the school.

The PC's are both P4's, early generations to boot.

The one I'm using is a 1.7Ghz monstrosity, with half a gig of ram and an onboard graphics processor.  It's slow, but still faster than my laptop.

And so I mention my laptop.

I dropped it.

I snapped the attached USB stick.  The operating system was installed on that stick.

To get the PC running I installed a version of linux.  To do so I had to overwrite the SD card I used to install the original version of linux on my laptop.

Therefore, in totality, god gave me two extra PC's, one of which works, the other doesn't.

He then took away my laptop.

And then he took away half of the PC that IS working, because my linux install has corrupted.

Man, unlucky or what?

If You Don't Laugh, I'll Tell You

So I've been playing my  PS3 with no sound for a couple of weeks, and to understand why you need to delve into my understanding of HDCP.

It was my initial thought that HDCP was preventing my monitor from decoding the audio signal from my PS3.  This is because HDMI cables have several signals that are encoded, including video and audio signals, and should, for whatever reason, something not be working correctly, any one of those signals can be interrupted.

HDCP is ostensibly to prevent video pirates from copying movies using run of the mill Blu-ray copiers.  Should the receiving device not recognise the signal, it will simply refuse to play it.  This leads to occasions where you can see video, but can't hear anything, because the audio signal isn't being processed.

The reality is that these measures have been implemented to enforce region locking.  If you have an Asian TV and a European player, you may not be able to hear the audio, or see the video; or maybe nothing will work.

I assumed the reason I couldn't pick up an audio signal was because of this 'content protection,' and gave up trying shortly after I couldn't get it to work.  My plan was to purchase an extra cable, and run the audio through that, into a separate set of speakers.

As it turns out, the reason for there being no audio was much less sinister, and frankly more stupid than HDCP.

In Korea, a speaker 'mute,' symbol is the reverse of England.  A speaker that is crossed out means the speaker is, in fact, not muted.  A speaker that appears to be blaring out music, with the three curved lines, means mute is activated.

...

I honestly don't know what possessed me to try it out again, but I'm glad I did, as I learned a few important lessons.  Firstly, Sony isn't always as sinister as its' competitors.  Secondly, Asian logic is backwards.  Finally, always try for a few minutes to get something working, before you give up.

What A Day!

So the school bus leaves at exactly 8.23 every day.  On the button.

I woke up today at 8.26 and looked  at my clock.  I blinked and checked my computer, thinking my clock had stopped. Nope.  The alarm hadn't gone off.

For some reason I had slept with  socks on, which saved me a considerable amount of time  in dressing, (everyone knows socks are the hardest and most laborious part) and I was on the phone to get a taxi arranged.  I was pulling my trousers up as I headed out of the door, with no shoes on; my shirt had no buttons fastened.  By the time I reached the front door I had one shoe on.  By the time I had reached the end of the street, I had both shoes on - and was beginning on buttoning my shirt.

I ran up to the taxi, threw my bag in, and dived head first, pulling the door closed with my feet.  Okay that last part didn't happen, but that's the urgency I showed.  I arrived at school, having not showered, brushed my teeth or eaten, and cursing my crappy travel alarm clock.  Everyone else seemed rather nonplussed by my comedy entrance into the office, and I was there well before time.

Germany いきましょ！

I think the title of this post means, 'Let's go to Germany!'  Germany, by the way, is: ドイツ。I think....

So I'm (hopefully) heading towards the land of litre-beer and sausages soon, in order to gain some insight into what makes the single largest portion of the EU economy tick.

Ok enough joking, I'm just going there to have a nose around, check out some museums, and eat some sausages.  Hopefully I'll be able to take some good pictures too; but there's no real guarantee about that.  Come to think of it, maybe that's what separates a good photographer from me - the knowledge that at any given moment a good picture will be taken, no matter the circumstances or situation.

What things are there to see in Berlin?  It's only a short stay of a few days, so I guess we can't duck and dive through the undergrowth, hoping to come across something good, a planned approach is necessary.

Any ideas, internet?

And here, without further ado, is stalking cat 2: Hi-Def.

P.S  This is the first hi-def youtube video that's actually worthy of the title of 'hi-def.'  I'm reliably informed that this is due to reasons of a source nature, that is to say; while many cameras will shoot at a higher resolution, they sacrifice picture quality to do so.  Being Japanese, the camera this guy is using is probably a few years from market here, so this is the future!  Revel in its' glory.

End of Year Tops

So far I've resisted the temptation to draw up a top 'X' list of what's passed; but now have succumbed due to the brainwashing power of television.  I watched a 'top 100' list of youtube videos on the gogglebox.

They got it all wrong of course, showing a few of the good videos, but misplacing importance and, therefore, numerical rankings.

So, here is my Top 'X' (the final number is subject to change.)

Although no numbers will be assigned, the last video will be the absolute, no questions asked, best youtube video of the moment.

Due to the transient nature of the youtube 'scene,' it will only be the best at the time of publishing, not a second after.  Get used to it, the internet changes quickly!

First up, we have:



Jeremy Clarkson beatbox.  'Swedemason,' secretary of the Swedish chapter of our very own freemasons, presumably, has taken a vast number of clips and soundbytes, and spliced them together with an attention to detail that screams: 'Obsessive compulsive disorder.'  However - to create something that can even be considered music, and I do consider it so, from the inane ramblings of Mr. Clarkson, is a feat of patience and genius.  Good job.

Considering this is a family-friendly top 'X' I am sticking with the cutesy videos.  In that vein, there is this:



It was a close call between the video above, and this: Link.  I chose the one above because it's a genuine youtube, and therefore internet, breakthrough; whereas I suspect the linked clip to be taken from a 'you've been framed' style show.

Another cat that does deserve a mention however is this Japanese one.  From the land of ninjas I present to you:



I think this cats' name is Daruma.  A daruma is this.  You paint one eye before the new year, and then the other on new year for good luck... Or something like that anyway.  I can't remember the dates and whatnot.

Anyway; ninja cat.  Awesome.  Enough with cats now!

This next clip isn't; it's a genre.  The genre in question is the overexploited category of 'crazy Japanese gameshows.'  Producers and writers in the West are notorious for their chronic cranial malady, and this produces a lack of creativity, inspiration, energy, drama and so on.  This leads to the pathetic televisual experience we now have.

The very few things that are worth watching, however, can be traced directly from the above genre.  And now the videos.  In order to demonstrate the genre to its' best, a few different videos are required.  Remember, this is merely the tip of the iceberg.  (I realise these clips may or may not be thought up in the land of the rising (I've genuinely no idea whether they were) but I have an affinity for that area, so let's pretend they were.  Plus the Japanese have a reputation for this kind of thing, and one must earn any reputation.)



The precursor to our own 'hole in the wall.'  No adlib dubbing from Craig Charles is necessary.

For the next clip, they're wearing binoculars...



This.  Is.  Genius.  This is, literally, wet your pants funny.  And I think everyone will agree.  It's not often you get to watch something this funny, and the whole family can watch, appreciate, and enjoy the humour in it.

In this next clip let me forewarn you:  They all run like uncoordinated fools.  And that is how the average Japanese person actually runs, I've witnessed 'the platform run,' several times!



Ok, so this next one doesn't really need introducing, but I will anyway.  Japanese gameshows have their own subgenres, such is the volume, they need subdividing and classifying.

This falls into the ever popular - 'laugh and get a forfeit, don't laugh and get cake,' sub-genre.  The forfeit is usually extremely painful, and, depending on the time the show is aired, may or may not result in groin based pain.



This next video.  Still on the Japanese gameshow theme.  Think a light-hearted version of the Johnny Knoxville classic.  Chicken or the egg?



This next clip.  Yeah...  It's brilliant, but I'm not going to introduce it; self-titling removes the need for any introduction.



It's when he arm swings straight through and only clips them.  That's got to hurt.  That's got to hurt like nothing else in the world.

The next clip demonstrates why Japan so desperately needs English teachers.



Why didn't they hit the guy who screwed up?  Oh that's right, it's ok to screw up, but don't laugh at him!

One of the many similarities between our countries:  Men dress up as women a lot on television, yet no one asks why.


Ok.  Moving further down (or up, depending on whether you live in the southern hemisphere) the list; the two chinese students, who, bored one day; mimed the backstreet boys.  They gained infamy in china, and commercial success, with adverts and sponsorship.  Considering the extremely tight communist control in that country it's amazing.  Chinese people can't even watch youtube!  It's restricted from within the mainland!  How did these guys get so famous?  Probably a youtube style ripoff hosted within the borders.  Anyway; the guy in the background is playing counterstrike, (version 1.6 (oldschool)) and was implemented to create a 'living background,' instead of just a static background.  In the outtakes, in case you can't read chinese, someone knocks on the door asking for a towel or something, one of them misses his cues, and something else happens.  I forgot what though.



They do a rendition of a popular chinese song, where the leading lady is dying from a terminal illness.  In the original video she has a nosebleed that is faithfully recreated using ketchup.  The out-takes are something else entirely for that video.

I was going to finish this today, but it's late and I want to head to bed, so I'll upload the absolute, unquestionable number one at a later date.

Some Interesting Foodstuffs.

Ok so I'm finally getting round to putting up some of the pictures I took before the storm, randomly around Yokohama.

This first batch are interesting food items I've seen about the place, and with no further ado, here they are!

Ok so at this stage the foodstuffs in this box are still alive.

They just come outside and whack it on the head essentially.

I don't really know what the one swimming around is, but it was tiny; not much of a meal to be had with that guy there.  Maybe a sandwich.

Then again, eating bread here is taking your life into your own hands, so you've got to contend with the bread and the poisonous fish.  I don't really like those odds!

There are assorted shellfish here.  I know it's not a very good picture, but they were being aerated so...

This also presumably means they're alive, or maybe it's to keep them fresh; who knows.

They didn't look particularly delicious though, so only those who really like slimy shellfish should probably eat these things.

Ok at this point I feel I should stop and say:  This was actually outside a chinese restaurant, not Japanese.  I know they eat disgusting things over here in Japan, but china and the chinese have the monopoly on that particular plaudit.  As the saying goes, the chinese will eat anything, and so far this appears to be true.

If the English saying, 'you are what you eat' is also true, this makes an awful lot of chinese people, and those who frequent chinese restaurants here, quite disgusting and rather slimy.

So this is a close-up of the two dimensional fish at the bottom of the box.  They're still alive too.

People in England are always looking to obtain the freshest food possible; yet they baulk at the idea of having a live fish swimming around in front of them.  This is the ultimate freshness, either go for the most fresh produce in everything, or put up with frozen food!  Put up or shut up!

I like this sign because it's a perfect example of Japlish, or Engrish, whichever you'd prefer.

Deep 2 Deep is the shop name, with a random 'import' thrown in for good measure.

It also says 'sweet heart beat,' in the bottom left, and in the middle of the actual heart itself, '...beat...'  Very interesting design going on here, I think you'll agree.  The philosophy seems to be, throw as many English words together as possible.

Ok so I include this basically because I really liked it.  The incessant rain we had during this time also makes it look much nicer in the twilight of whatever hour this was taken.

Most of the 'sculptures,' using the term loosely, that exist here in the street are extremely abstract, and generally fall under the category of, 'we had too much money and too many artists, so we needed to keep them fed.'  There are one or two good ones though, and knowing these kinds of things are entirely subjective I guess it's merely statistics that dictate there should be at least a few I like.  This just happens to be one of the ones I do.

I'll take some photos of a horrendous example at a later date.

This was on the side of a supermarket.

What can I say.

They have *almost* got it right, but not quite.

I want to give the person who penned these lines a hug and a gold star for effort.



Ok so I'll get round to doing the typhoon in  a minute.

So English Language Maps in Japan Then...

Ok so today I had to rely on these godforsaken English language tourist maps, twice.  I got lost exactly three times.

As I've noted before the maps here are designed by small children with decidedly blunt crayons, bent on making pretty pictures rather than informative guides.  It is roughly 400 metres from my hostel to the train station with exactly five intersections between me and the station.  The map shows three.  This is how I got lost the first time.  Upon reaching the station (after a lengthy circular detour) I found that I had gone to the wrong one, because the name was mislabelled.  This is crazy, the only reason I knew it was misspelt in English was because the kanji (hieroglyphs used by the Chinese and Japanese) did not match up!  This is insanity.  In case you were wondering, some areas are called north and south xxxx, and the station I wanted was north, but I was directed to the south.

So I then headed to the correct station, only to be thwarted by another Japanese map making anomaly.  The map does not have a set scale.  At this point most logical minds would just explode.  This seriously does not compute.  A road that is five miles long can, and is, the exact same length as a road that is fifty metres long.  Come on now, the joker who designed this map is probably the same guy that designed the millenium bridge.

So I got lost again while walking along this infinitely long road.  Yokohama is the primary port town in Japan, and I was heading towards the ocean all the time thinking, by a logical process, looking at how far I travelled before, my feet, probably even up to my waist, should be wet by now.

At this point I feel I must stop and say, yes I have exclusively used tourist maps.  This is because road maps provide useful things like road names, but on a scale that could easily include Korea, China and Japan, with some of America on one A4 page.  The tourist maps don't provide road names, and then only some landmarks that the comedy map maker has deemed worthy of inclusion.  This means great swathes of the map will have nothing in them, including the roads, their names, their relative sizes/lengths or even the area, (called -cho) and some areas will have such useful things as, supermarkets that are no longer supermarkets, and apparently haven't been for five years or more, and 'sights of interest,' including fountains... that are on top of sixty storey skyscrapers that no one can see unless they happen to be on the 60th floor...

So I eventually found the venue, I met my friend, I enjoyed the day, and I promptly got lost on the way back to the hostel.

I managed to walk three full train stops past my intended destination, into an area the map thankfully did not cover (formally known as the, 'here be dragons' zone) and ended up getting the train back.  Whew, what an amazing day!

This is the first time crappy maps have really annoyed me, normally getting lost is fun and part of the adventure, I've found some really nice places while being 'lost.'  However, when I'm thirty minutes late meeting someone it really grates, and it's not fair on the person waiting, so it makes me stressed and annoyed, and probably reflects in my demeanour, at least until I calm down again.  Therefore the top tip, while in Japan, when you're going to meet someone is this, a trip that should take ten minutes will take an hour, and if you're just ambling around, chuck the map in the bin, write the name of your street and hostel down somewhere and just ask the people.  They're really rather helpful.

So I updated my ueno day 1 post, it's not finished yet but I have some downtime planned tomorrow, I'll do it then.  I might be able to get day 2 done as well.

Update:  Ueno park day 1 is finished!  Sorry for the delay...

The Trip from Minamisenju to Yokohama

So this particular post covers the night before I left minamisenju, to the day after I arrived in Yokohama.

It's worth noting that drawing money out here is really difficult!  If you have a visa card it's fine, but if you have a debit card like mine, it's nigh on impossible.  I have to go to the big post offices and draw money from their machines because the banks don't accept my card, and none of the normal atm's here do either.

Also, they only use cash here.  Unless you're buying a  car or some expensive tech, they use  cash.  Essentially drawing money out at atm's is important here, and I can't do it easily!  It's quite the pain in the backside.

On the plus side it means I don't tend to keep drawing money  out, and I think this helps me keep track of my finances.  I'll draw a certain amount out and say to myself, ok this has to last x number of days.  Quite handy in that respect I suppose.

So I arrived here desperately needing to pay for the rent in my new hostel, and it took me two hours to find an atm that accepted my card!  Really annoying.

So having found the atm I went and ate dinner with my university language exchange buddy, who came to hull for a month between her normal degree study, and her masters.  She's a biologist studying seaweed and algae and wahtnot.  It's all very clever stuff.

Ok so the pictures start with the night before I left minamisenju, and me and the girl who works behind the Aizuya bar in minamisenju went to eat some dinner, that took about four hours...  Taking your time is important to me apparently, I never realised this before.

Ok so we had 'western' foods tonight.  Pizza, pasta, that kind of thing.  I remarked that even the pizza is tiny and cute, then couldn't resist making a little face out of it.

Don't play with your food children!

Yeah we got some strange looks from the staff...

Then we added a nose...

I don't know why...


But it's fun I guess?

Ok so this is the Aizuya bar.  The woman working behind the bar also works in the adjoining hairdressers.

The people that work here are the best I've met so far on my trip; amazing and friendly!

I'm pretty sure the bar makes no money, it's just something to do for fun, and it shows with the way the staff talk to customers, and how easy it is to strike up a conversation with them.

Really nice people.

The woman on the right owns the hostel/bar with her husband, and they have the cutest baby ever.  It's this devious and cunning little blob thing that already knows how to break things and spend peoples money, in the coin machines they have around the place.

It's a shame about the picture really, but the lighting didn't allow for a very good photo.  If only I had a good camera!

Ok so I forced her to do the bunny rabbit ear/peace/v sign thing.  She works behind the counter in the new koyo hostel and is an amazing help.  She showed me how to get all around the place, and is just generally awesome.

She also bought me lunch!  Thank you very much!

I'll definitely head back to that hostel on the way back to the airport.

Ok so now we're in Yokohama.  My bags weighed too much to take photographs while travelling, but there really wasn't much to see anyway.

This tall, cool looking tower is on the coast of Yokohama overlooking the sea.  The cool thing is that this isn't particularly tall, there are buildings nearing 100 storeys that have obsvervation towers at the top, but this is probably only fifty or so, if that.

So many unbelievably tall buildings in Tokyo and Yokohama.

So I like this picture, even though it doesn't really have a story behind it.  All the birds are facing the same way, because the wind is blowing directly in the faces and when they want to take off, they simply hop off the edge and use the headwind to fly off.  Literally zero effort required!

Another view of the same boat.  Nothing more to say here really...

Moped modification...

You know you've taken it too far when you put a massive fin on the back of a moped to make it look like some kind of shark...

Big bikes are few and far between here, even on the motorways you'll see more harleys than sportsbikes, which again makes no sense.  Harleys work on american roads, but Japanese road are like English ones.

There are side-streets that have turns a harley would literally not fit around.  Bizarre.

Speak of the devil...

I've seen a few R1's parked around the place, and a few more 600cc bikes about the place, always parked.  Never ridden.

This cool looking structure is a hotel/apartment building overlooking the bay area.  It's gargantuan in all dimensions.  Most tall buildings are quite slender, but this thing is broad as much as tall, so you recognise it all over yokohama.

The distinctive curve reminds me of the gherkin, only this building is pleasing to the eye.

I really struggled  to get a good photo of this wheel.  It's substantially smaller than the London eye, but it's still a skyline dominating lightshow.  It's called the clock, and each spoke lights up like a second hand.  It also has a digital display in the middle showing the current 24hr time.  It's impressive.

Inside there's a log flume, as you do, and running around the area is a small roller coaster.  No I didn't go on any of them, my companion is quite timid.

Ok so now we're going to play a little game.

Guess what this shop is...

A little more will be revealed in the next picture...

Ok so there's no name yet, but the little figurines should give it away...

That's right!  It's a pokemon shop!

It's actually styled to look like a shop in the game, and has places to meet other pokemon players and trade junk!

It's a whole shop dedicated to a game franchise, frankly that's incredible and well worthy of a few pictures!


That's everything for this portion of the blog!

So I met this person at breakfast...

Now this is a story of stupidity, if ever there was one.  I met someone at breakfast this morning, and we spent the whole day walking around the Imperial Palace grounds.  Upon the completion of the day, she bought me dinner, to which I vowed to repay her with a drink or two.  She was australian, and although she was a dancer and therefore quite keen on health, her natural heritage kicked in and a *possible* drink later today was arranged.  However, this was an extremely tentative arrangement.  So I took her name, saying 'I'll add you to facebook, and I'll send you the pictures from today over,' (she forgot her camera.)  So I wrote her extremely complicated name down on my phone and we parted ways.  Now, upon my return to the hostel, I find that my phone has not saved her name, and it has in fact deleted all the notes I've placed onto it...  This is really frigging annoying...

So it's also worth noting that the imperial palace itself is only open to tour groups once every fortnight, with extremely limited availability, and during the emperors birthday, so you can only walk around the grounds themselves.  We knew this, but were amazed at how heavily guarded  the actual palace is!  You can't even see it, because of all the trees.  That was a bit disappointing.

So after that, this unnamed girl wanted to shop for some things, to take back home I believe.  So we had a quick look through some stores, oh I forgot to mention, THIS IS AFTER SHE BOUGHT ME DINNER, shit I feel like an ass now...  So yeah I have some funny pictures of products that are, apparently, normal over here...

Let's go pictures let's go!

The style of blockwork here is prevalent throughout, and isn't supported by cement or any kind of fixing.  The walls range from sitting height, up to about 30 metres high, overlooking the moats that surround the place.  Most medieval castle and surrounds back home are quite cramped, with room enough for a few peasants and a bit of  land, but this particular place stretches forever.  I doubt any peons were allowed inside during its' heyday, but there is a lot of room inside now, it's like a park.

You'll notice that most of these pictures have the old style about them, but then a socking great skyscraper in the background.  That is pretty much Tokyo in a nutshell, it has about five large park areas, kind of like London, that are then surrounded by immense city structures.

This was the old guard barracks.  Interestingly the whole place was built around the 1600's, so by most standards that's not particularly old.  Then again, Tokyo wasn't the capital until recently, so maybe this has something to do with it?  Maybe the old palace grounds were in Kyoto.

This is the head honcho of the royal guards' abode.  These stylised 'life size' bonsai are everywhere, and must take a long time, even now, to train and upkeep.

This is one of only three original guard houses within the grounds.  They were strategically placed around the grounds, on the walls overlooking the interior grounds.  What you can't see from this photo is the fifty foot drop on the ledge this thing is overlooking, into the moat.  Although there were around 18 or 19 of these placed around the perimeter, that leaves a huge amount of space beetween each.  Regular patrols and, presumably, fast horses would have been necessary for constant surveilance.  What you can't see from these pictures is the constant elevation change, throughout the grounds.  It's a giant basin, basically, with sheer drops on the outside.  I seriously doubt this was naturally a basin in the middle of Tokyo, so there must have been a gargantuan amount of effort in digging this into shape at some stage.

Another shot of the guardhouse.

This structure on the left has an interesting story.  They built this base, and then on top, built some kind of pagoda.  It took thirty years to build, and got burned down within twenty.  How annoying is that!

Another thing I noticed about their wall buildind technique, is that the corner pieces always lean down.  Look at the white block on the left.  That block is essentially leaning into the rest of the wall, lending the corner, which is already the strongest point of the wall, extra solidity.  The exterior walls are constructed in much the same way.  The blocks in the middle of the wall, comprising most of the surface would then presumably be forced together by the weight of the massive corner blocks, as well as from those above.  They don't slope in any manner, which is worth noting, considering these walls can be 20 feet thick on the exterior, and substantially more at the base.  They all slope inwards, as you look upwards, like a dam.  Basically you would need a meteorite to knock these down; I can't see any kind of catapult breaking these walls.

These particular stones were all scratched in this way, in a very regular pattern.  I can't see them having used  machine cutting tools of any kind 400 years ago, but I also can't see why they'd have scratch marks on them like this.  Then again, the Chinese had movable print thousands of years ago, so maybe the Japanese  stole JCB digger technology from them during one of their crusades.

A close-up of the rocks.  They look kind of haphazard, but it works.  Wabi-sabi at its finest!

This is at the top of the structure that got burned down, looking out to  the city beyond.

This is 180 degrees to the other picture.

This is one of those bonsai style fully grown trees that has found purchased on this plateau, and is currently trying to escape over the edge.  I don't know whether it's looked over there, but it's a helluva long way down...

Toodays unknown travel buddy said these particular stones looked evil, because of the black streaks running through them.  I think this evil thing might be true... Afterall the building on top of here did burn down soon after it was built!

Notice how the ends slope down towards the middle section.  And also notice the bonsai style tree gamely escaping the top!

Guess this plant!  The grounds had all the plant names written on little sticks in the ground, but they were in latin and Japanese only, so I didn't know any of them.  They were also too small to photograph because the focal length of my camera is measured in timezones, not mm.

Look at the width of that moat!  I don't know how deep it is either, but this place is essentially impenetrable.  The walls are finished to a nicety, so only spiderman, and that french climber who calls himself spiderman would be able to climb it.  Then stick a couple of swords, a shield and some armour on them, and laugh as they get very wet.









This is the first half, the second half will probably happen tonight or tomorrow, depending on when I fall asleep.

This is one of the entrances to the grounds, built upon the giant wall that surrounds the city.


These photos all kind of look the same I guess... There's a ton of green in the garden at the moment, but not so many flowers.  I think we were a bit late for that kind of thing.

The views along the straight lines created by the walls are tailor made for this city, with its' massive skyscrapers and metropolitan skyline.  Unfortunately I don't think any camera in the world is able to capture that.

There were some nice palm tree type things around the place, which struck me as odd but I guess it shouldn't have; considering anywhere this hot is probably capable of growing anything they might want to, up to and including cactii.  It might need an umbrella though...

This is my attempt at an artsy fartsy photo.  These cool little secluded places were all over the place.  I went for the light sky, versus dark building.  I don't know why.

This sums up Tokyo.  Park+gravity defying skyscrapers = a strange combination.  Whether it's good or bad, works or doesn't is up to you.

Another shot of the hidden/not so hidden building.  I captured it from all four sides, but one of them got away so you'll only see it from three on here.

This is probably one of my favourite shots of this particular building.  It's like this from almost every angle when you actually see it up close, but capturing the ease with which it sits in the landscape on camera is exceptionally difficult.  They always make things tricky over here.

This is looking down upon the park.  The foreground is a little rampant and someone snuck a tree into the middle of the photo when I wasn't looking, but overall it looks nice.

This is just a little further along.  This spring feeds into the main lake area.  I can't see it being natural due to the nature of the site, and its location within Tokyo, but I couldn't hear a pump or any kind of mechanisation so the illusion is flawless.  They do the running water thing really well over here.

The water isn't very clear but the fish in here have wings.  I think I might have snapped one of them.

Make your own red bull jokes.  They move like normal carp though, so despite the aeronautical design these things will only fly onto dishes across the nation.

Bamboo forest.  No pandas allowed.

The demon fish.

Someone asked me if people dress like this normally, in every day life.  The answer is here, at four pm on a random station with no scheduled costume party thing going on...  Yes they are all completely nuts.

Onto the funny photos.  I do not know what the balls are for in the blusher...  Anyone out there know?

The MOST amazing toast holder ever.  I was laughing for a long time after seeing this.  There's this whole gothic obsession over here at the moment, that is either presumably five years behind us, or five years ahead; thinking cyclically.

This is like bath salts, advertised for women with a practically naked woman in a suggestive pose on the front?  Isn't that the wrong way round?  This also made me laugh.

Ok so this is tipex or correction fluid, BUT IT HAS A TOOTHBRUSH AND TOOTHPASTE ON THE FRONT.  I want to see the advert where a small child puts this stuff on his toothpaste and realises it's not toothpaste.

This picture is amazing.  Firstly the description of the item.  I'm going to use marketing speak, to try and sell this product to you.

Tired of the boring, tiring commute from the office to your house?  Then try our new pino, for those who work too hard and tooo long to bother with trains.  Simply take our product from the convenient carry case, slide one or both arms into the comfortable rests, AND SLEEP AT YOUR DESK!  Arrive to work before even your boss does with the new pino!

 Holy sweet jesus.  This product actually exists.  I am now not surprised by the number of suicides there are here every year.


Updated!  Done!