Talking to Frances in the park near my apartment. It's not really a park, just a slab of concrete they haven't built anything on yet. There's not even any grass here.
This is the slowest horse-thing I have ever ridden. I think it's time to send this horse off into greener pastures. I got bored, so I started to mess around with the spring underneath. To my surprise, I found that you can actually pull it out of the ground if you try hard enough.
On a totally unrelated note, some hooligan has been going around defacing playgrounds in this area.
Ugh, I knew this day would come sooner or later. The money I brought with me finally ran out today and I had to make a withdrawl of about $1,000. It was painful, but I need the money for tomorrow.
I'm moving into my Alcatraz-style cell tomorrow (looks like I'm getting mine for pulling up all those spring-horses), and I have to pay the rent up front. On top of that, my train pass expires tomorrow also, so I have to buy another one. Above all, I desperately needed a hair cut. So, there you go.
One good thing about living in Japan is that you have to deal in yen. One Canadian dollar is worth about 75 Japanese yen, as a result, I am very happy when I look at my bank book. The balance is always 75 times what I expect it to be. Click on the photo to open my passbook.
Look at this hair. Why can't I get a proper crew cut? I don't understand it. I did everything possible this time to get them to give me the haircut I wanted. Brought a photo, did the charade thing and even went to the trouble of looking up the word for "soldier" to indicate that I wanted hair like a military officer. But nope. I have a round head once again. Argh.
There are two reasons I can think of for this. First, Japan technically does not have an army. See, after WW2, the Japanese were forced to accept a constitution that stated that they were neither to have an army nor any weapons of mass destruction. So what did they do? They created the SDF (Self Defense Force). The SDF is a non-offensive band of militants who will fight to the death if someone attacks Japan, but they cannot launch attacks themselves. I don't know who wrote that constitution, but that's a mighty big loop hole, wouldn't you say? As far as I know, Japan has an army second only to the US. They may not call it as much, but you don't want to mess with them. As such, there are no "soldiers" in Japan, so the hairdresser probably had no idea what I was talking about when I asked him for a soldier's haircut.
The second, and more likely, reason is as follows. Remember the Transformers? On Earth, there were cars, trucks, planes, tape recorders, what have you. But the moment they set foot on Cybertron, they transformed into these weird looking vehicles (what did Soundwave turn into on Cybertron?). And I suppose that is what is happening to me. At home, I have my normal form, but in Japan, I look different in order to blend into the population. I am more than meets the eye; a robot in disguise.
I can almost hear that metallic voice singing the theme song over a cheesey midi file they called music in the 80's.
Sam wanted to go out to see a live band today. So here we are in Akaska-something (I forget the name of the station) on the Ginza line, at a bar called Graffiti.
Good job of positioning the camera, Sam. For all of you who don't know, Sam studied photography for 4 years in university. I am guessing that she spent more time at the pub than at the studio (just kidding, Sam).
In the background, you can see the drummer's mother. She flew all the way over from Chicago to see her son play. This is truly a Kodak moment. Bill Cosby would be so proud.
Ok, onto the introductions. Starting from the left: Ooo La La, Emiko, Me, Sam and Leslie. We're all affiliated with Nova one way or another. Ooo La La is a part of the Japanese staff at a Nova branch, Emiko is a Nova student and the rest of us are Nova teachers.
We're not really supposed to socialize with the students, but the story I am sticking by is that we all just bumped into Emiko here...her and the other 20 students that showed up as well.
It's not like Nova will really do anything, it's only if they catch you dating a student that you will get in trouble. And even then, it's probably nothing more than relocating you to another school.
This is the band we saw. They're called Better than Sex. Three of the five members are, or once were, Nova teachers. The drummer, the bassist and the guy playing second guitar.
Here, she just looks like a smudge, but the lead singer is gorgeous. I wanted to get shot of her for you, but she never really stood still, not even for one second.
The lead singer is Japanese, but she sang in perfect English. They did some original material and the rest were covers.
To be honest, I was a little hesitant at first when Sam suggested that we go see this group. I mean, how good could a couple of Nova teachers be? I stand corrected.
This is the bassist Tom, singing Laid, by james. He actually hit the high note, which was quite impressive.
Here he is singing High and Dry, by Radiohead.