Kitkowskiland!

This week I’m in Tokyo. Right now I’m actually sitting in the Japanese NetApp office using a coworker’s PC to make a quick update. I think in the next two days or so I’ll be able to upload more pics, but until then…

For the last two days I’ve been staying with my cousin Eikichi. I love hanging out with him, but his place is a total bachelor pad: EXTREMELY small, like “one room to live, eat and sleep in”, and the bathroom has all sorts of funk growing in it. I was thinking of cleaning it up for him as a present for letting me stay with him, but after doing a little, I became afraid and decided to buy him dinner instead.

Two days ago…. wait, today’s Wednesday, right? Yeah, ok, after the Kawagoe festival I went to meet some old friends in Tokyo. After hanging out with them for a bit, I went out to dinner at a place called “GOHAN” (”FOOD”) with Eikichi. Surprisingly good. I teased the waitress because she brought out these “Loooooong Crab-cream eggrolls”, and I told her that “These are long, but not Loooooong”. This sparked a humerous debate between me, Eikichi and her. She apologized humorously and gave us $10 of free drink coupons to make up for our experience with the Not-so-Long Long Crab-cream Eggrolls.

Yesterday I just slept in, lounged, read books and played PS2 games almost all day long. At night, I went to Shinjuku to meet my buddies Cam and Mike for some food and drinks at our favorite spot, Butto-Trick, …. but when we got there, it was closed! Like, we even used the elevator to go to the floor it was on, but when the doors opened there were just a bunch of boxes laying around in what looked like a warehouse. Funny thing was that I checked the place out online last week, and there was no mention of a closing. Maybe they either moved or are rennovating. THe Butto-Trick bar’s disappearance, being the coolest place in Tokyo, was a huge shock. Total suckage.

So we went to yakiniku (”meat grille”) and then Starbucks. At Starbucks we were accosted by a Koren dude who started talking to us in great English right away about Jack Kerowack and Hemmingway and Dostoyevsky, and how modern authors sell out, etc. Weird experience: I didn’t shoo him away, rather we listened to his equivalent of an art school student rant about selling out and being successful. Turns out that for a number of reasons he was stuck in Japan, wandering the streets selling books of poetry and writing. He handed us his $10 pamphlet of Haiku… which, honestly? Sucked. We kept talking to him, and I swear I felt like I was high or something because I was going through the motions of a conversation that I cared absolutely nothing about. It was surreal. Luckily, Starbucks was closing soon and we managed to escape that Dinner Show with our lives, though Mike broke down and bought his Haiku book. IMO, if he was so obsessed with authors being recognized when they were dead, I was about to tell him to die quickly so that he would become recognized for his great works (hopefully other than his aforementioned Haiku). Oh well.

Today, Eikichi called in sick, so we’re going to go on a wandering spree of Tokyo, from Harajuku and Ebisu to Akihabara and Shinjuku. Maybe hit up some public baths. Until next time, then…

Here are some pics, without specific explanation and untouched:
http://www.robo-christ.com/gallery/index.php?path=L0phcGFuIFRyaXAv&page=1

If the above doesn’t work, go to:
http://www.robo-christ.com/gallery/
and click on “Japan Trip”

Today we went to eat at a restaurant in Kiryu that specializes in Yuba, a specific kind of tofu curd: We went there to eat a 5-course meal that was almost entirely made from different kinds of tofu. Great stuff, more on that later (pics in the above link).

Tonight I went to our friend Shimizu’s place, which today hapened to have a festival- Interestingly enough, the last time I went to this festival was exactly ten years ago when I came to Japan in college. It’s the Kawagoe (city name) festival, and features two to three story tall movable shrines called “dashi”, each representing a district of Kawagoe, and they roll through town. I took pictures, above, and right when I was thinking, “Man, pictures alone just don’t give off the feel of the festival, I remembered that my camera can also take mini-movies. I took a few here:

http://www.robo-christ.com/movies

More later, including explanations of lots of the above.

So it looks like I’ll have access to a PC on Sunday with some power, so I can upload some of my pics then.

I have a nephew named Riku, about two years old. He kicks me in the nuts with his cuteness daily. He knows how to speak very little, most of his words are babble even to his mom, but he knows “doozo” (”here you go”, which he says as he finds things around the room to hand to you), Kaka (mommy), Toto (daddy), “Bye Bye”, “Go! Go! Go!” (which he says to me ALL THE TIME), and today he learned my name after Orie told him just once (”Anny”- Close enough). “Anny Bye Bye!” “Anny Go! Go! Go!”. I took lots of pics of him, which I’ll post when I can.

His father is Ko, my brother in law who is my age. He was really proud to have an “international family”, so with his wife they decided to name their boy Riku, as it sounds a little like “Rick”. I of course promised Orie not to tell them that Riku also sounds like when Japanese people say “Lick” in English.

So tonight I was putting some plans together for next week, talking to some friends on the phone in English, when Riku’s pet demonic evil-looking beetle thing suddenly overturned and stopped moving. I think it’s dead. I undoubtedly killed the beetle with my careless use of English inside the home. We’re going to see if he’s Just Sleeping tonight, and take appropriate actions tomorrow.

Last night I think I had my Jet Lag Fit: When I got home at like 5:30, I literally could not think straight, and while I totally wanted to rise up and do some things (shop for manga, etc) I just couldn’t move at all. I only had enough energy to go to the bathroom and make my immediate sleep area a little better. And watch a little bizarre TV.

Today I woke up and decided to go to Tokyo to get some shopping done before next week: Next week I’ll be spending most of my time with friends and the like, and won’t want to make extra time to go out of my way to do some shopping, so I did all my “Akihabara shopping” today. Akihabara, being the electronics and otaku (collectibles, games, hobby stuff) district of Japan I picked up a PS2 game or two and a handful of books. For dinner we had some expensive Autumn Foods (matsutake mushrooms, baked kuri seeds etc) with relatives.

Tomorrow is a day of relative rest and relaxation, and trying to contact the few friends I haven’t been able to yet. Maybe getting in some ramen and heading to a Japanese tavern (izakaya).

Time for some sleep. But first, more bizarre TV. Actually, right now it’s not too weird, pretty normal: High school girls and boys are talking about personal problems in a group counselling environment. Nice and light, no host or visible audience, not like the Oprahs/Doctor Phils. I’m hoping that the comedy team London Boots is on TV later tonight, because I could really go for some weird comedy; like the show where they take 5 girl-friends and turn them against each other for laughs. And then spray them with a fire extinguisher.

Man, I really need to find a PC to upload some pics. This Sony Viao is decent once it’s up for typing and the like, but man… Opening a new browser takes about a full minute.

Yesterday we wandered around Isesaki and Maebashi. Picked up some books, watched some TV, ate at Orie’s favorite Indian restaurant in Maebashi. One thing that we noticed about bathrooms in Indian restaurants: They’re always festive somehow. Like, it could be a hole-in-the-wall Indian restaurant in some corner somewhere, but the toilet will be gorgeous and clean, with all sorts of Hindu folklore treasures scattered all over the walls, sink, etc. One I went into had an almost 2-meter tall gold-looking Siva on the way to the bathroom. I don’t know if this is a “Japanese-Indian thing” or an “Indian family thing” that just didn’t come over to US restaurants…

Last night on TV I watched a man in Village-People style sharp black leather SM gear (complete with police hat) cross a narrow lit beam covered in banana peels that was suspended 10m above Tokyo Bay. Now there’s a CM on about a monkey in a suit who visits a drugstore (Matsumoto Kiyoshi). Oddly enough, this must be the third CM I saw in 3 days that featured a chimpanzee in a suit.

Yesterday I went past a game center, which these days are not in good shape: it’s simply easier to play PS2 these days, and aside from UFO Catchers and the like it’s hard to find innovation in game center games, save for the latest fighter, the latest driving game, etc. However, they put together this bizarre game about the Chinese Three Kingdoms era that’s like a strategy game where, in front of you on this board, you move around various cards and use a roller-ball to control your armies, and above you see your armies fight others, either locally or online. If you do really well and rac up a lot of points, when the game is over it may spit out an extra card or two: These cards can be like “Guan Yu” or “Zhuge Liang” or other famous generals in that army. You can use these the next time you play. So, it’s like a cross between a video game and a collectible card game. Pretty cool idea- Maybe more of this kind of thing will revitalize game centers…

Today I’m heading to Tokyo very briefly to pick up a huge wad of books and other assorted presents for friends so that I can get it over with now- And spend the rest of my time here just relaxing and all.

This morning I climbed a mountain, had two plates of soba noodles for lunch, and just came back from some hot springs after dinner. Man, what a day. Tomorrow will be shopping and relaxing. I’ll dump some pics online when I get to a PC with a USB port…

The allergy thing cleared up- It turns out to probably have been something I ate. The doctor pilled me up with steroids, and the swelling went away. Aside from one case of Roid Rage where I flipped over a city transit bus, everything’s been pretty relaxed.

24 hour trip starting at 6:30AM on Monday morning, and I got to Japan at 5:00 Tuesday evening. United totally overbooked the flight so it was totally full. I was trapped in the middle, two people on each side, and am currently cramped up, but getting over it. Orie saw to my left, and to her left was this bizarre dude, a corporate of some kind, who had this getup of huge ear plus, eyemask, inflatable cushion, inflatable backrest, and joked loudly about how “we only get to go past him two times” (because of all the work it takes to get out of his getup to let us go to the bathroom). Aside from wanting to break his face, and constantly being fed decent but buttery food, and having Fantastic Four playing three times in front of me, it was all good. Got a lot of reading in.

Anyway, tonight we’re building plans for tomorrow and the next day: Probably some mountain climbing and soba/sushi eating tomorrow, and generally hanging about Maebashi. FOr those of you with Google Earth, type in MAEBASHI JAPAN to see that area.

Went to the local bookstore tongiht to start building a buy list of PS2 games, books, manga and the like: Man, it’s worse than I thought, there’s a lot of decent looking games out, and it’s going to be hard to decide between them. Manga is more like like finding the latest 2-4 volumes of manga that I’ve been reading, plus polling friends for the latest and greatest.

Well, it’s almost 12 and time to go to sleep. Before that I gotta climb into the Japanese tub over here (I literally have been looking forward to the bath for like over a year)… currently watching TV, which is a trip. Watching this comedy team show “ways to pick up girls”. “How to pick up a girl while drinking a beer/eating a hamburger/doing a crossword puzzle/eating raw eggs”. The hamburger one was funny: The guy takes a bite out of a juicy burger, and wipes the juice of the side of his mouth with a wad of basically $100 bills. Most of the rest of TV can be broken down into Dramas, Quiz Shows and Trivia/Knowledge shows. Man, I wish I could get this back in the US.

Anyway, heading out for a few days. I probably won’t have this kind of time to blog regularly, as the only PC I have easy access to is this Sony Vaio here with microscopic keys, a 10 minute boot time with Win2K, and a power supply so weak that the PC immediately dies when the AC plug is pulled, and the S key is kinda sticky/broken…

So, Friday night, two plus days before I’m heading out to Japan, looking forward to this trip since my last trip some two years ago. Since I came home tonight, I’ve developed itchy splotches ALL OVER MY BODY. They’re getting bigger, and itchier.

Allergic reaction, undoubtedly, but to what? If it was the new allergy medicine I started taking last night, how come it didn’t start last night? Was it something I ate at work? Was it something in the new kind of ramen I ate?

In any case, I leave Monday morning. It’s Friday night. Odds of finding an open Dr’s office on Saturday: Pretty close to zero. Man, why does crap always happen to me on Friday nights???

Update A: Found out my Dr’s office has limited Sat hours. Rock, I’m a comin! Excellent!

Update B: I think that if it turns out that I’m allergic to allergy medicine, that would be all sorts of ironic….