Roppongi night

It was officially my first night at Roppongi, Tokyo. My good-old Fukui friends Luke & Beata and other bunch new friends (met at the K's House) went out to night Roppongi.

Here is a pic of my friend Luke who is ecstatic about shooting at a game centre.

The Maple Leaf Sports Bar-Canadian bar

My friends were visiting Tokyo from Fukui prefecture. We went out to a Canadian bar called, The Maple Leaf Sports Bar, in Shibuya Tokyo. http://www.maplesportsbar.jp/

I was very excited to go to this Canadian bar, indeed. I wanted to feel like I were in Canada again. I was thrilled to eat Canadian food...Canadian food? What is Canadian food anyway?! Their menu had various "Canadian food" such as poutine (yes yes!!!), ice cream with maple syrupe & chocolate sauce, buffalo chicken, caesar salad...

okay...

...and ... meat pies, sandwiches, mixed nuts, popcorn (Canadian food?), french fries (Canadian food??), nachos (Canadian food???), vegitable sticks (Canadian food????), pizza of the day (Canadian food?????), hamburgers(Canadian food?????), hot dogs of regular, cheese, salsa--All hot dogs served with french fries (Canadian food?????????), burritos (Canadian food?????????????!!!!!!&%%$%&&%$%$##"!) ...

Someone please tell me what is Canadian food?????!!!!!! I'm confused.

Tokyo Comedy Store

I went to see a comedy show by Tokyo Comedy Store. They were performing at a bar Crocodile in Shibuya. For more info, see: http://www.tokyocomedy.com/

I saw stand-ups and improvised sketch comedy there. They performed in English. I've watched some TV comedy shows when I was in Canada, but not a live. So, it was my first time to see any live stand-ups. I was excited!!

During the impro show, I volunteered and did "arms" on stage!! In the picture, I'm sitting behind the blue T-shirt guy (in the middle) and doing his arms. The arms you see in the photo are my arms, you know?

"PS Rasyomon" TV job

I did an extra actor's work for the TV show called, "PS Rasyomon." I did a bank clerk's role and an office worker's role.

I saw Kano Kimura, Hiroshi Tachi, Shiro Ito, Leo Morimoto, Shiro Sano (in Japanese Kanji 木村佳乃, 舘ひろし, 森本レオ, 佐野史郎) who were known to be famous "Talento" (The word is similar to English word "Talent", but it doesn't necessary mean that they are talented actors. In Japanese, it means "TV personalities")

Again, it is very tiney roles I did though. In fact, I'm considering to quite this extra actor's job--it doesn't seem to take me anywhere. It was fun to see the behind the scenes for TV world for a while--for the novelty's sake. But I just couldn't help noticing that an actor's role was usually so insignificant and it was a kind of work that everyone could do it without any serious acting training & background.

Though I have to admit that a main actor Hiroshi Tachi was very good looking man...He was in his 50's, I think. He was unusually tall as a Japanese man and had unusually long legs (like, two-third of his body was legs indeed!!), and had such a wide shoulders... I was gaping at him and forgot about acting for a while.....(couldn't help it!!)

Ultraman TV job

I acted a housewife for the Ultraman TV job. There I met 2 male Japanese actors and 3 (including me) female actors (Again, it was a tiny role though).

We got 2 Obento (box lunch) for lunch & supper.

Canadian?

Pop quize!!

I met new friends Tracy & Garry at the K's House.

Do you have any idea which country they are from??

Jesus came to Tokyo! (I'm not kidding!!)

Who could imagine...Jesus to visit the K's House
in Tokyo?! But here you see
the evidence.

When he came to the K's House he had a ponytale
and introduced himself as Kevin (which is fairly
ordinary as an American). He was very casual and
wore an artsy T-shirt, just like any American guy
would wear. Without knowing he was actually Jesus,
me and other K's House guests went for a local bar
for a few drinks, too. He was well-disguised and
I had no doubt that he would be real Jesus. I just
thought he was a jolly American guy and that
was all.

But as the time went by, I began to realize that
he kinda look like Jesus...but I didn't have guts
to ask him for long time. Then, it was the morning
he was gonna leave for...so to call "America" (but
he actually meant the Heaven, I think) , I just
spotted him as Jesus.

I just honestly asked him if someone ever told
him that he looked like Jesus. Then I found
out he was actually real Jesus.

I mean, look at these pictures, it's obvious.

O-chan & tie-dye clothes.

Tuesday, July 11.

I forgot to mention about this, but I got my orange-yellow tie-dye top at the Earth Garden from Toshiyuki Ohashi (O-chan). He makes fantastic handmade colourful tie-dye clothes! (and the beautiful model makes it looks even better, right?)

French Hiphop Breakdance--Black Blanc Beur

Monday, July 10.

Kevin, Lauren, and me went to see the French Hiphop Breakdance show by Black Blanc Beur!! Dynamic and powerful work! (For more info http://www.arion-edo.org/home/ )

We could also see some of the art work by Yuken Teruya. (Title: Notice Forest) Very detailed paper work! http://www.asahibeer.co.jp/csr/philanthropy/ab-art/index.html

Japanese Drum in Kawasaki-city!

Sunday, July 9.

Me and my French friend Manu went to the Japanese drumming practice! (You see only a few kinds of drums on the pic, but there were various more drums there.)

The second pic shows my huge muscle! The pumped up muscle after the massive druming, you know?

Earth Garden pics #2.

Saturday, July 8th.

More pics from the Earch Garden Fest: Asian Market tents, dancing & African drumming people, and the stage for the live bands.

Earth Garden Fest at Yoyogi Park, in Shibuya Tokyo.

Saturday, July 8th.

My newly met French friend Manu, Megumi (Japanese friend at the K's House), and I went to the Earth Garden Fest.

At the Earth Garden Fest, there were Asian markets where bunch of artists sold their handmade goodies (i.e., handmade tie-dyed clothes, hemp hats & bags, organic Thai foods, magic mashroom-shaped ornaments [see the pic] and etc etc). There were also some live bands playing music, and street performers singing songs. There were also bunch of lovely hippies who had colourful clothes and did a dynamic drum circle with African drums and some other exotic instruments. Plus, there were dancers who were spinning colourful flags & nuctilucent objects... There were so many open-minded & free sprited people... Oh, this is pretty much what I was exposed while I was in Canada!! (Only a big joint was not there in this Japanese version) I talked to a Japanese guy who were selling his handmade hemp hats and he was familiar about some other hippy cultures such as, Rainbow Gathering and Nelson & Sunshine coast in British Columbia!! Oh Canada!!

I met Santus, a guy from Nepal (I don't have his pic here). His drumming was amazing! Massive & crazy drumming, very psychedelic! He said he was from the very country side where had no gas, electricity, tap water, watch, or cars!! People don't have a watch, but don't care about the exact time anyway--People see the sun and think "oh, this must be close to noon" or something like that. When people wanna get some fun, they go to a near by mountain and eat wild magic mashrooms, too (wooow).

Asagao Fest pic #3

Friday, July 7th.

More more pics from the Asagao Fest.

Asagao Fest pic #2

Friday, July 7th.

More pics from Asagao Fest.

Asagao Festival pic #1

Friday, July 7th.

There was a festival called, "Asagao Festival" (Asagao is a name of flower. According to my dictionary, it is a "morning glory" in English)

Somen (Japanese noodle) party

Friday, July 7th.

Tracy (at the very left) and Gerry (2nd from right) are from Calgary, Alberta Canada. I met them on the day they came into this K's House hostel. I quickly spotted their Canadian flag sewed on the backpack!! What's more, Gerry went to the same school (University of Calgary) I did, too.

We talked about "The Gauntlet" that was the University of Calgary's weekly student newspaper, covering the campus and the Calgary community. Includes news, entertainment, sports, etc... http://gauntlet.ucalgary.ca/

Garry said he used to be a photographer for the Gauntlet. So, I asked him if he took the pic for the "Puppetry of the Penis" show which appeared on the frontpage of the Gauntlet when I was still at the U of C. It was the show that this amazing 2 men folded & twisted their penis & balls and made "hamburgers" or "Eiffel Towers". (Did you hear me correctly?) Yes, with their own penis & balls!! This is their web: http://www.puppetryofthepenis.com/

Apperently, we were at the U of C around the same time. Maybe we might had our lunch at the school cafeteria one day sitting side by side without knowing each other!!

Anyhow, Tracy and Garry got free dried-somen noodles at the Tokyo station. We cooked and shared them with other K's House friends.

Yoko acted for TV

Wednesday, July 5 2006.

I did my first TV work this evening!! Yay!!

...well, just as an extra, but I got to act an office worker who ordered a soba noodle at a soba restaurant "Tanaka-ya" in Akasaka, Tokyo. Later a guy came in, sat down at the next table, and he ordered the same noodle as me, but he got his food served faster than me. So, me--as an office worker--acted she was in a pout.

Maybe it will be just a moment of short scene, but it will be a national network broadcast in Japan! The TV program is called, "Trivia no Izumi." For more info on the program, go to:

http://www.fujitv.co.jp/b_hp/trivia/

(The image is taken from their website)

African Dance & Drums in Ueno

Sunday, July 2nd 2006.

OMG!!! That was an amazing night!!! Massive African drumming and dancing aaaaaaaall night!!! Crazy crazy!!

Like, I wasn't planning to go to this drum workshop at all... I only wanted to practice my drumming at the Yoyogi Park near Harajuku & Shibuya area.

Like, I took a subway for about an hour and finally got off at the Shibuya station. I was waiting for the traffic light to change and there was a Japanese guy asking me about my drum. So, I unwrap the fabric and showed my drum to the guy. He examined my drum and said that the skin of my drum would need more tension.

He also asked me if I was gonna play the drum at the bar called, Pink Pig (or something like that). Since I was still new to Tokyo, I had no idea what he was talking about. Well, he explained me that the bar would hold a drum circle once a month.

I told him that I really was new to Tokyo and didn't know anything about Pink Pig and I only bought my drum a month ago and still not good at it yet at all...

Then he said, "oh, that's even perfect!! You'd better go to Ueno and join the drum workshop that my friends are holding tonight. Well, it's already started, but I'll call them and let them know you will be coming!" He didn't even give me a moment to think, but just phoned his friend right away.

So, I couldn't say "no" anymore and went back to the subway station. As I was walking back, I was thinking like, "This is crazy!!! It took me for an hour to get Shibuya, but I didn't even had a chance to go to the Yoyogi Park. Now I'm heading back to Ueno just because this total stranger insisted me to go!! I'll be wasting my time and the subway money if this drum workshop sucks!!"

Well, I arrived the bar Kirack in Ueno and holly cr*p!!! This was an amaaaaaaaaaazing drum workshop!!! About 4 drummers (I'm not sure if they were professional musicians, but they were far from amateur!!!) were holding the workshop to about 10 drummers (but these 1o drummers were pretty good at drumming, too). Oh man, I never had sucha great drum jam before! We were so together and the drum sounds we made was just soooo powerful and energetic.

Later, 4 pro-like drummers performed. Oh, I couldn't just stand still and listen to their drumming, it was too great!!! My body started to move and there I was African dancing crazy. Eventually, everyone in the bar joined dancing and it was just soooo amazing!!! Oh I love Tokyo and the massive creative energy here.

A sign for "forbiding to sleep"

My friend Hana-chan came from Fukui prefecture and we met at the Asakusa. We had yummy Monja-yaki (a kind of pancake in Tokyo) and beer.

Later, we walked around Asakusa and I was shocked to find this sign...the original sign underneath says, "forbiding to leave your bike here," but the 2nd sign on the top says, "forbiding to sleep here"...yes, it is the sign for bums who sleep on street...

Sushi Party #2 at the K's House

Monday, July 3rd 2006.

Nadja and Anders from Denmark wanted to learn how to roll a sushi and I decided to hold another Sushi party at the K's House.

Look at the beautiful sushi we made!! Nick made a Sushiman (a snowman-like figure made by sushi) that you can see at the right bottom corner.

From left: Yoko, Nadja, Nick, ?, ?, Anders, Kevin, and Sean.