相撲

Yesterday, the Osaka Sumo Tournament came to a close with an exciting sudden death match up for the title between Yokozuna, Asashoryu and Sekiwake, Hakuho, who was looking for his first championship ever. Unfortunately it wasn`t his day. Asashoryu was just too powerful and muscled Hakuho out to claim his 16th championship. I only saw this on tv, but 2 weeks ago I did manage to go to the opening day of the Osaka tournament and it was quite the experience.

We arrived pretty early and watched some of the early matches between the lower rank sumo. Maybe a future yokozuna in there,who knows? After watching some matches we went out to check out a bit of the city and get some food and drinks before coming back to watch the higher ranks.

In the second highest rank there is a European who goes by the name Baruto and he is a real up and comer. I wouldn`t be surprised if he`s going toe to toe with the big guys this time next year.

It was also great to see all of my favourites in person like Takamisakari, the fan favourite who while never a real contender, he always manages to maintain a good enough record to stay in the top division. When he won the crowd gave him the hugest pop of the day.

Kotoshuu is a beast. Not the bigest wrestler, but he`s so much taller and fairly muscular. I can`t remember if he won or lost, but he probably won.

Seeing Asashoryu live was also a great thrill. Some people don`t like him because they say he`s too cocky or arrogant, but he is by far the most focused and determined of all the wrestlers. Once he gets to ringside it`s game-time. You can see the passion in his eyes and his complete and udder attention on the matter at hand. I bet he doesn`t even hear anything that`s going on around him he`s that focused. He won as well in his standard impressive manner, no surprises there.

What was surprising was how good the seats were. We bought the second cheapest seats for $35 but we could clearly see everything and were close enough to actualy see the wrestler`s eyes. All and all it was a great day and I`m so gald that I had the opportunity to do something I`ve wanted to for years.

上京

Let me just start by saying that Tokyo is a crazy city. Pretty much everyone has seen pictures and has some kind of impression of what the city is like, but unless you've actually been you can never really know.

I should probably start by explaining how I ended up in Tokyo so suddenly to beign with. Andy's brother, Peter, was visiting him on his spring break and he had a JR Rail Pass which allows for free travel on any JR line suring the 2 week period his pass was valid for. He left a couple of days ago, but the pass was still good until the 16th. Andy couldn't use it because he has an intership at a construction company in Osaka so he gave it to me. With nothing really else to do I decided it would be a good a time as any to see Tokyo especially since I could take the bullet train which is normally a $120 ticket from Kyoto to Tokyo for free. So I packed a small bag with the basics and one day's change of clothes and left on the afternoon of the 15th.

A couple of hours later I arrived at Tokyo station. Not knowing where to really start I took a train to Shinjuku. In retrospect probably not the best place to start. Shinjuku is the busiest working area in Tokyo and I arrived right when the evening rush began. Needless to say the trians were packed. Granted I was travelling against the major flow, but it still was pretty tight.

Shinjuku






I didn't spend much time there because Christoph, another friend of mine was actually in Tokyo at the time working at a service industry exhibition for a friend of his named Oto (who I had met before in Kyoto) who has a food importing company. His friend offered to let me stay at his house in Yokohama which beat my idea of staying in a capsule hotel so I had to get to Yokohama station around 8 to meet up with them. The train ride to Yokohama was also really packed as well, but it didn't take as long as I had expected it to so that was at least pleasant.

I met up with Christoph and Oto and they grabbed some dinner while we waited for another of Christoph and Oto's friends, Mako, who I had also had the pleasure of meeting when she came to Kyoto and stayed with Christoph for a week. The four of us headed back to Oto's house which is the incredibly nice condominium complex modeled after some massive villa in Spain. For just one person his condo is really big, even by Toronto standards.

The next morning I started out by heading to Yoyogi, one station south of Shinjuku, and working my way south to Shibuya via the Meiji Shrine, and Harajuku. The Meiji Shrine has got to be the most un-Tokyoesque thing I saw while I was there. Not in the sense that it's not Japanese, but in that it's so quiet and green that it felt more like I was back in Kyoto.

Yoyogi and the Meiji Shrine




Shibuya is definitely one of those places that can't be experienced any other way than in person. Lots of crazy buildings (the Disney store building for example, see picture below) and people everywhere. I doubt that there is a time of day aside from maybe 3-5 a.m. when this place isn't packed. I didn't really spend to much time in any one place looking around, but when I go back to Tokyo this area is certainly up near the top of places to explore more indepth.

Shibuya










After Shibuya I headed over to the east end of the city to check out Akihabara, the sumo arena and Ginza. Final Fantasy 12 was released on Thursday when I was doing all of this so my trip to Akihabara was motivated by the potential chance to get my hands on a machine that had it loaded up and ready to play. Unfortunately this was not the case. I must have checked about 15 stores and came up empty handed. They all had massive FF12 displays and promotions going on, but not a single one with a playable version hooked up to test out. Defeated, I headed a bit further east to check out the massive sumo arena. It was pretty impressive from the outside and I'm sure it's massive on the inside. Muich bigger than the Osaka gym where the current tournament is being held.

An Akihabara alley, the sumo arena, and Sumida River






The final area I checked out before heading back was Ginza. It wasn't night time yet so it wasn't as alive as I sure it gets, but it was still pretty busy with a lot of suits and fancily dressed people shopping around for their luxury goods. In front of some of the clubs you could see the host boys getting ready for the night's work but overall it was still pretty quiet. Ginza is a place that you really should see at like 11 at night to get full experience. By this time it had started to rain and my feet were killing me so I decided to call it a day and head back. All and all a wonderful time in Tokyo, but saying this I'm very glad I live in Kyoto. I don't think I could handle all the people and the hustle and bustle of Tokyo life for any extended period of time.

Ginza

突然に

Going to Tokyo. Be back tomorrow night.

まだ生きている

First off, apologies for not having written anything in so long. A combination of being alternately busy and lazy is the main reason for no updates in the past couple of weeks.

A couple weeks ago I started doing a lot of hiking around the nearby mountains. They have these symbols carved into several of the mountains around for a festival that takes place in August. From these symbols you can get great views of the city. There's one very close to my house (about a 30 minute hike) and I took some pictures from up there. These are from the north of the city facing south.







A couple of days after I climbed the close by mountain I went up Daimonji, the mountain with the most famous symbol, a massive "big" kanji. You can see where it is in the third picture. The cut out area of the mountain in the middle of the picture. It's a lot higher than the one by my house, but it faces west so when I went up in the afternoon you're taking pictures into the sun. They didn't really turn out too great.









I ended up getting sick a couple days after this which took me out of play for a few days, but it allowed me to watch a lot of the Arrested Development that I had downloaded. Fantastic show, FOX would be idiots to cancel this gem.

Last week I got a message from Kitai asking if I wanted to go with him to a nearby club for their "80's night". I ended up going as well as Andy, Sebastian, Christoph and his friend who was visting. It wasn't very busy and a large percentage of the crowd was male foreigners. When I go to a place filled with foreigners in Japan I'm often thinking "what the hell, why are there so many foreigners" at the same time forgetting that I'm a foreigner as well. I'm sure many of these other people are thinking the same thing probably. I also find that it's also really easy to tell the difference between foreigners who love here, and those who are just visiting, but thinking about it, it's not that hard to do in Canada either.

Anyway, the club night was turning out to be kinda dull when all of the sudden this lady (Japanese) approaches me and we get to talking. She asked me if I would be willing to teach her English on her days off. She works for an architectural company in Shiga, Kyoto's neighbouring prefecture. This past Thursday I met up with her at Kyoto Station for lesson number one. Her English isn't that good, but she seems like she really wants to learn so I think she'll be able to make some good progress. Next week I'm going to her hometown for lesson 2. Should be interesting. I've never been to Shiga, and the town she lives in has a very famous castle that still exists in its original form.

I'm still not quite to sure if her interest in me goes beyond English though, but I must say she is a very attractive lady both looks and personality, although I do think she thinks I'm older than I am. I don't know her age, but I'd guess it's close to 30 and she doesn't know mine, but she does know I am a university student. Either way, it's nice to have a little side job.

The Osaka sumo tournament starts tomorrow and I've got my ticket! Sumo was on my top 5 list of things to experience first-hand in Japan so naturally I'm pumped. I'm Going with Andy, his brother who is visiting, his girlfriend, and Sebastian. Should be a great day. Expect lots of pics and a detailed report in the near future.