Author Archives: mdw

Manglish

English is widely used in Japan. It is in Korea too, but not to anywhere near the same extent. It’s in business names, book titles, and other places that don’t seem to be aimed at foreigners. French also shows up more than I expected, and French bakeries are de rigueur. There’s even some occasional Italian. But mostly it’s English.

In both Korea and Japan I’ve seen a lot of shirts purporting to be from places in the US, usually done in a collegiate style. And you don’t have to travel abroad to get them.

Almost all of them are from places in the US, but they can be from other places too, as long as you have that look.

A shirt might look authentic until you read it.

But Japan also has bizarre sayings, something I did not see in Korea. As I was going through passport control in Fukuoka, I saw a Japanese girl with a shirt that said, “Sweet Holic the Most.” I’ve seen plenty of others since then.

Some are semi-understandable.

Some are not.

Some have a simple message.

Some have mustaches.

And some take things to another level entirely.

Harajuku

Yesterday I went to Harajuku, which is a combination of a really crowded upscale shopping street (Omote-sando)…

…and a really crowded shopping street for hip kids who want to have a party on Mt. Fuji or something (Takeshita-dori).

Many of these stores employ people to stand out front and greet you and tell you of all the marvels that they offer in their store. On Omote-sando, they’re Japanese people who greet you in a low-key manner and don’t bug you. On Takeshita-dori, they sound more like carnival barkers. And about half of them were African, for some reason. Their Japanese accents sounded really strange.

At Akihabara, they’re all Japanese girls in French maid outfits. It doesn’t seem to matter what they’re trying to sell—DVDs, manga, food—they all dress that way.

These two were advertising (over a PA system) a maid cafe, wherein your waitress acts like your personal servant and treats you like you’re lord of the castle. Which would personally drive me nuts, so I didn’t go in. They would have had a problem with my camera anyway. They didn’t even really seem to like me taking pictures from the street.

UPDATE: The maid costumes were indeed all for maid cafes. But the maids in question are not necessarily positioned next to their associated cafes, hence my confusion. Most of the people rounding up customers in Akihabara are dressed in the more conventional style that I like to think of as “marketing huckster,” though there were also some dressed as anime characters.

This blog regrets the error.

Sleepwalking Through Shinjuku

Early morning. I have a cold. I took some Japanese decongestant and I’m undercaffeinated. My feet hurt. It’s starting to rain. What should I do today?

How about wander through the alleys of Shinjuku in the morning drizzle?

A triple latte made me a little less groggy, so I didn’t even get lost all that much.

The Golden Gai in Shinjuku looks like this. It had a definite Nasty Vomit Sauce vibe, but everything’s closed in the morning, so there’s no way to check.

Next I went to Akihabara. I had a hankering for Freshness Burger* and figured I could have lunch and check camera prices in the duty-free shops.

Akihabara is “Electric Town”. It grew out of the black market in surplus military electronics that went on under the train tracks after World War 2. That portion is still there—although it’s legit now—and sells all sorts of electronic components and related items as the trains rumble overhead.

If you’re more than about 5′ 10″ you’ll bump your head. There’s even a second story in there.

The rest of the area is a more standard jumble of computer/camera/stereo/DVD/you-name-it businesses.

The cameras I looked at all had the same prices as on Amazon. I would have saved on taxes and shipping, but that’s it.

And there’s no Freshness Burger there, so I went back to Shinjuku. I knew I’d seen one there. I had lunch and listened to two Japanese girls speak French to each other, then went back to the hotel to take a nap.

* Mos Burger is pretty good, but Freshness Burger is better.

Beware of Preversions

I Have No Idea

Moa

Found another one. Apparently they’re not just indigenous to New Zealand.

The Danger of Trains

There are those who say that this blog focuses on trains too much, that it’s insufficiently dramatic and fails to live up to the high—even stellar—standards that this blog has set in the past.

To those people I say: You do not realize the danger of stepping onto a train in Tokyo. On any day, at any moment, something like this could happen.

He always goes after the trains. Not to mention the risk from Rodan flying over, or Ghidrah’s lightning breath, or Gamera shooting fire from his leg holes. Granted, Gamera is with a different film company, so he wouldn’t attack in conjunction with those other monsters, but any one of them would be sufficient, is what I’m saying.

But this blog giggles in the face of danger. That’s our commitment to you, our several readers.

You’re welcome.

Nasty Vomit Sauce

About 20 years ago, a friend visited Tokyo and told me of something called “nasty vomit sauce” at some dive down an alley in Shinjuku. I tried to find it today while I was stranded in Shinjuku.

“Sumimasen,” I said to passersby. “Nasuchivomitososuno restauranwa doko desuka?”

But they just bowed and acted embarrassed and rushed away.

“Iidesuyone!” I called after them, but I guess they all had a train to catch or something.

I’ll try again tomorrow. Somebody must know.

Conurbationary Megalopoli

Imagine greater Los Angeles. At 4850 square miles, it has about 13,000,000 people. Now increase the size slightly, to 5240 square miles. Then nearly triple the population, to 36,000,000. Make most of the roads too narrow to drive on and put a giant, confusing train system in the middle of it. Add vast amounts of neon signs and video screens and one emperor.

Now try to find your way around.

I couldn’t find a place to stay in Tokyo proper, at least not for a reasonable price, so I’m staying in Saitama, a little north of Tokyo. Getting here is straightforward. You just take the Saikyo line to Todakoen station. You have to make sure you get on a local or a rapid express, not a super rapid express, because that one bypasses Todakoen. Otherwise, no problem.

But if you’re going the other direction, the line stops at Shinjuku. If you’re foolish enough to stay on the train, thinking it will continue to Shibuya, well…it won’t. It now goes in the other direction, back toward Todakoen. To continue toward Shibuya, you have to get off and take a train on the Rinkai line, which is the same exact line. It’s just called something else in this direction.

So that was a good chunk of my afternoon.

I finally got to Shibuya, but all I did was get a triple latte at the Starbucks that overlooks Shibuya crossing and watch the people go back and forth across the street. A fair percentage of them were just crossing the street to try to get pictures of everyone else crossing the street.

At the starting gate, just as the light turns…

Tonight I’m just going to stay in and read a William Gibson novel.

XK Red 27 Technique