PekoPeko

Melon-pan (Melon Bread) is one of the best things in Japan! Its soft bread buns coated in sugar and shaped to resemble melons. Take a lookski HERE Yummmm! I can’t get enough.

Anyways - Helloo! I’m giving up with the apologies now because every post is always late by a month so I’m just gonna try to update this as much as possible and if it doesnt get updated for a few days - then I’m just being a lazy get!

Kanazawa is getting very hot (around 20/21 degrees at night!) and very humid too! It’s something that I’m really struggling to get used to. When was the last time you ever heard someone in england say “Ohhh cor blimey, tis rather humid today isn’t in old chap?” Probably NEVER! Here you only need to take two steps outside and you begin sweating! How lovely! Also much unlike good ol’ Britain, Japan has a rainy season every year and Kanazawa has just entered it’s rainy season. This means I will get to enjoy pretty much constant rain for about a month. I know as an englishman that I should nothing but resent towards rain but in all honesty I’m pretty glad for it’s arrival! It is really nice to walk outside being warm but having a cool shower at the same time!

Tomorrow my band has a gig! Shock! I’m in a band?! Yep!
We’re called 裸・牛・牛乳　or Naked Cow Milk. Strange name indeed. I owe it all to Laurence who I lived with in my First and Second year. He took a Japanese dictionary from my desk near the start of my first year and disappeared for a few hours. When he reappeared he said those three words and I thought it was quite possibly the best thing I have ever heard said in Japanese! So that is the story of my band name! I’m the lead vocalist and bassist and we do *mainly* covers of various songs in Japanese and English but we have a couple of original songs too! I don’t mind the singing but it’s pretty scary getting up in front of a crowd of Japanese people and singing to them in their language, believe me! Apparently the gig will be recorded and filmed so once the photos make their way back to me - i’ll post them here straight away!

That’s it for today - it’s late and got to get snacks in for the Spain-Italy Euro match! Yeah I’m watching football :O Even more shock! I always get like this when big tournaments start like the World Cup or Euro championships. I usually have very little interest in football but at times like these I get really sucked into it all! Oh well!

Smoke me a kipper - I’ll be back for breakfast!

Wow I am terrible!

I keep making promises to update this blog and I follow it up. If I am allowed to make another excuse it would be the Year Abroad Project that I’m working on at the moment. 20th May is the deadline but it has to be posted from Japan so I need to have it finished at least a week before hand. I’m currently very busy with that and work with Kanazawa Uni to even think about doing anything else but still I manage to procrastinate. Luckily for all those who are reading this and can understand Japanese - I have a couple of drafts for my Japanese Blog so when that goes live (Next few days) then I’ll let you know right here.

Random picture of the day:

Howdy to anyone that may still be checking this hoping for any kind of new content!

Yes, I once again have been neglecting my blog (especially the Japanese one - what Japanese one you ask? I don’t even have one post on there yet!) and I have so much back tracking to do that a lot of what I want to say will be skipped over! Please bear with me over the next day or two whilst I review what I’ve been up to over the last 2 months! There will be a sudden burst of posts soon so hang on to your hat because its going to be a bumpy virtual ride.

Quick summary however to tickle your pickles:

Went to Okinawa
BEACHES and DOLPHINS
Went to Tokyo
HELEN came to Japan! Woooo
Disneyland!
Shinkansen surfing! (Bullet Train)
Kanazawa and endless Gyoza
Go to Tokyo
Byebye Helen
Come back to Kanazawa
Go to Tokyo again!
Party hardy with lovely Alice
Forming of the greatest fatty food tribute band ever
Recording of the greatest fatty food tribute E.P ever
Back to Kanazawa
Classes and return of Kanji!
Fishing?!

Keep those potatoes peeled!

Good evening from Osaka!

I’m here in a lovely little hostel called Sumo Backpackers! It’s only got 10 person capacity but its right in the middle of Osaka and costs 10 quid a night! Wowza!

I’m here with 2 other people but they are busy sorting out their travel plans so I haven’t talked to them yet! It’s been such a long day of travelling for me! Whilst not moving all that much, I had to stand still on a crowded train for 3 hours which did no good for my back or knees! A chair next to me became free about halfway through the trip but being the good ol’ english gentleman I am - I let someone else sit there and just gaman’ed! Guess that is my good deed for the day?

I had a little trouble finding the hostel despite being 1 minute walk from the station so I thought I’d put my high tech mobile to the test and pulled up the GPS sat nav! I entered where I wanted to go and it gave me my current location along with the fastest route there walking! I was only around the corner but man I love my mobile!

I’m flying to Okinawa pretty early tomorrow so I have to wake up at stupid o clock (7am) just to get to the airport. Okay it isn’t really stupid o clock but for anyone that knows me, getting up before the afternoon is a challenge worthy of the crystal maze!

Okinawa here I come!

Good evening folks!

Today I’m off to Osaka for the evening so that I can catch my early flight to Okinawa on Monday morning! I’m off to visit my lovely friend Alice who is studying at Ryuukyuu University this year.
By some crazy coincidence that isn’t a coicidence really, I’m going at the same time as my other lovely friend Lizzy. The three of us will be living together in Sheffield next year and Monday will be the first time we have seen each other together since coming to Japan so I’m very excited!

Yep, from tomorrow I’m going to be away from Kanzawa for the best part of a month but I will be keeping the blog updated as much as possible. I’ve got a very busy few weeks coming up so be sure to check back often!

Oh and Nagai-sensei… A japanese post will be appearing very shortly! I have some stuff written but I fear for its lack of quality! Ack!

Howdy!

Well the concert is over and went very well but guess who forgot to put a memory card in their camera and so couldn’t take any photos?

You guessed it!

I was all ready with my camera to take photos of people and when I start clicking, my camera starts beeping at me - I look down and its screaming at me “WHERE AM I MEANT TO SAVE THESE PICTURES FOOL?!” Oh well! Apologies for the lack of photos but hopefully I can nab some from the other people in the society that might have taken some.

Anyhoooooooo - the Jazz Big Band Concert went very well! It was in the middle of a big department store called Atrio in the City Centre and so we had all the shoppers from all the levels peering down at us but everyone seemed to enjoy it! There was one little old lady who was so into it that she was clapping along… out of time. Nice!

We played the the set twice, at 1 and again at 3 and both times we had a decent crowd of people bobbing along and enjoying it! There were a few technical difficulties however (to be expected!). We all got up on the stage ready at 1pm but then the department store clock started chiming away so we had to wait for it to finish. Little did we know it just keeps on chiming for 10 minutes! Small mechanical puppets came out of the clock and an organ descend from behind it to give us all a seemingly everlasting serenade. Then my bass amp started making high pitched whistling noises and the volume kept dropping in the sound check. It turned out to be the cable so we managed to get that fixed in time.

During the second set, the piano lost all its volume - right at the start of a song which has a piano solo. What great timing! All of a sudden, the other pianists in the society dove onto the stage attempting to fix it. I’m pretty sure they broke the light speed barrier because I didnt seem them go from where they were standing on to the stage.

Depsite all of that, it went down very well and I got to celebrate by going to a chinese all you can eat restaurant and stuff myself full of nikuman and spring rolls! yummmm yummm yummmm

Due the the high demand to see my new suit (Thank you Alice) I present you with…

I look sleepy because I had 2 hours sleep the night before this was taken!

I’m back! Two posts in the same day? Wow you folks are lucky!

I mentioned in the last post that I have a Jazz concert tomorrow and thought I should probably let you in on that whole thingymabobba (Yes, thingymabobba IS a word).

Back at the start of December last year, I was without a band to play my oh so lovely bass with! The rock band that I had joined had to be disbanded because the drummer was got pretty seriously ill and couldn’t make any of the practices. So I was left wondering what I should do and I thought I would just pop along to the Modern Jazz Society (MJS for those in the know) and see what it was all about!

I got there and got speaking to a few people and they said I would be more than welcome to join! The only thing is that I am the only foreigner in this society of about 60 people so I was pretty scared that my Japanese wouldn’t be good enough to function properly in the society. After that I started going to all their practices… of which there are A LOT! MJS practice throughout the week but have the Big Band practices where everyone attends 3 times a week. Every Tuesday and Thursday from 18:00 until 21:30ish and then Saturday at 13:30 until 16:30. But that isn’t all. Each section of the society have an extra practice away from the Big Band and my group (Piano, Drums, Bass and Guitar) practice on Saturdays from 9:00. NINE IN THE MORNING! So that means I have practice every Saturday from 9 until 4.30 in the afternoon! It is pretty gruelling but it is a lot of fun!

Each member in the society is assigned a song or two they will play with the big band, depending how many members there are that play that instrument. There are a fair few bassists in the society so we all got given just one song each. Can anyone guess what song I was assigned?

Oh yes. Glenn Miller - In the mood!

I’m very happy about that because I already knew the song back to front and it is such a great song to play! So yeah, Having 3 (essentially 4) practices a week places me in direct contact with Japanese people very often and it has been great for my speaking and listening skills! At first I found it very hard to follow what was going on or what people were saying to me. When playing in a band, specific vocabulary is used when giving critisism but in all honestly at first, I had no idea what people were trying to say to me! I would just stood there looking blank and hope that I would play it better on the next run through!

Since the first practice I’ve been getting used to the vocabulary used and I’m much better at understanding where I’m going wrong and what’s being said to me! There have even been a few occasions where I’ve given my advice to the band in how to improve the song!

Fast forward to now, and I have my first concert with the society tomorrow afternoon! I was all prepared on the music side but at the very end of the last practice, I was told that I have to wear a suit to the concert! I think that Helen would agree that any excuse to wear a suit then I am there! So I went down to the city centre and found myself an amazing dark blue and white pinstriped suit! It was a little expensive but so so worth it! But it doesnt even end there! I thought that I just have to go all out if I’m going to buying a suit so I went along to a second hand clothes store (which sells more new clothes than it does second hand!) and got myself a nice white shirt annnnnnnnnnd a very incredible grey waistcoat! Oh man I am so happy with it! I’m dying to get to the concert already just so I can wear it again!

Anyways, seeing as I have to be up in about 6 hours time - I should get some sleep! I will be taking plenty of photos at the concert so check back tomorrow for some photos of me rocking (jazzing?) out!

Will I ever start a post without having to say sorry?

I am alive! Just bearly after everything that has happened between the last post and now! I’ve got an awful lot to write about and it will all start appearing in little bite size chunks after this post!

Quick update for now though because I have to go to the city centre and buy myself a very lush black suit for tomorrow! Why? Because I have my first Jazz Big Band concert and they all wear suits on the stage! Yep I joined a Jazz Big Band here at Kanazawa! More on that one soon!

, I have finished all my end of semester exams now and I did pretty darn well on them too so I am very happy! It’s now the spring vacation for all the universities across Japan which means I get about 2 months off to do whatever I want! Woooooo! My classes dont start again until 2nd week of April!

During the holidays I have a wee bit planned but I really need to get a bit organise what I am going to do pretty soon!

Ahhhh have to dash because the bus will be here soon! Pop back soon for 100%-guarenteed-cross-my-heart-and-hope-to-be-poked-with-a-rather-large-wooden-spoon-if-it-doesnt-get-done post a bit later today! Woooo how exciting!

Tomorrow. 2 mid-semester exams. A whole lot of kanji, vocab and grammar. Blog can wait.

My head.

So where was I? Oh yes…
I met with some really good friends of mine – Chris and Lizzy (coursemates from Sheffield) and Saori (who spent 6 months studying in Sheffield) at Ikebukero station and we all for a very tasty Indian curry! Yummmmmmm freshly made naan bread! Do you remember me saying how much I loved Round one – the sports entertainment stadium? Well guess where we went after the meal? Oh yes!!! We spent 3 hours at Round One in Tokyo messing around in the arcade, playing random sports and falling asleep in massage chairs. Well, I couldn’t fall asleep in my chair because I think I had it set to “Massaged by Godzilla wearing iron gloves” mode so it actually kind of hurt. I couldn’t figure out the controls to the chair, so I just bashed some random buttons and all of a sudden my legs were being squeezed, my shoulders were being prodded and my back steamrolled. Better luck next time I guess.

The next day I went straight to Akihabara, the electric district of Tokyo famed for its incredible amount of Electronic, Video game, Comic and generally geeky stores. If any knows me even in the slightest, they would know that this place might has well have been made for me! I loved it! there were so many random but amazing gadgets, video games and VERY cheap electronics! Most people tend to buy new MP3 players there but I bought a hamburger instead. Electronic? No. Tasty. Oh yes yes yes!

The reason I didn’t equip myself with so many electronics that you could call me Robocop was because I was saving my money for a brand new bass guitar! Before I came to Japan, I said to myself that I will get a new bass guitar and join a local band. I can thankfully say that this mission has been accomplished. On the day I was leaving, I went to Ochanomizu with my course mate Ryan, who luckily has to go every day on the way to Meiji University, to buy a bass. Ochanomizu is pretty well known throughout Japan as THE place to go to buy good, cheap guitars. Stepping out of the train station, I was hit with a long road where 90% of the shops were musical instrument shops. In my excitement, we ended up going into almost every shop looking and playing the instruments there. There was really no need to because in the first shop I went into, I saw the bass of my dreams. It’s a Fender Japan Aerodyne Jazz Bazz 66 Black that is just so damn sexy I want to run away and have little half human/half bass freak children with it. I even told Ryan to phone Helen and tell her that I’m cheating on her with a Bass guitar. Don’t believe how nice this guitar is? Take a lookski…

The pictures don’t really do it enough justice. The black body is actually a kind of matt black, and around the rim of the body is a thin cream line. Note the black headstock too! Anyway,with you drooling over the keyboards, I shall leave you there until tomorrow (Tomorrow? Maybe I will keep my promise this time) when the last of Jason’s Tokyo Adventures will be told. Prepare yourself for tales of Karaoke, Beer and FISH! Until then.