New Year at Roppongi

My December 31st had me lounging around at home with Mori for most of the daytime. I hooked up the PS3 to the common room's 3D television, and it was nice to just kick back and relax in the spacious sun-filled room. Julian was out working, picking up dog shit or whatever, so the day was pretty quiet and otherwise uneventful until he arrived home and we kicked off our New Year's Eve celebrating. Mori, who works at events throughout town, couldn't join us for the night.

You can see Tokyo Tower in the back!

We met up with two of Julian's friends, Kaz and Yasu, in Roppongi.
Most adult Japanese people tend to avoid this part of town. It's known for its concentration of foreign embassies, and therefore, of young gaijins who just want to go clubbing all night every night. The streets are bustling with girls who want to hook up with tall white guys. There's no shortage of those in Montreal (both the former and the latter,) so I can't say I'm too fond of Roppongi in general, but this is where things were mostly happening in Tokyo on New Year's Eve, so this is where we went.
You can see Tokyo Tower from here! It's a giant rip-off of the Eiffel Tower, serving as a broadcast antenna.

I think this was Yasu's default face for the night.

The cover fees to get into the bars and clubs on New Year's Eve was pretty ridiculous, ranging from 25$ to fuckin' 63$. We went into a bar that charged the cheaper end of those fees, called Motown House, and, to our dismay, it catered mostly to middle-aged south-east Asians, with only a few exceptions here and there. I can not blame Fumi for not coming when I tried to invite her. Well, you get what you pay for. It was fun none-the-less, and we had our countdown here.
Yasu parted with us shortly after, having drank a drop too much.





We then headed out to a karaoke place. Kaz and I tried inviting some girls to join us (Julian being too shy to try!) But we weren't tall or white enough, so that didn't work. Curse you, Roppongi. But we ended up going in anyway. The room was way too big for a group of three, but we had a nice view on Tokyo Tower, so hey, why the hell not.
Aaaaand that about sums up my New Year's!




Oh, and a special thanks to Marianne for contributing the banner up top! Geez, she was the only one. You would've thought I graduated from Economics instead of Illustration & Design. You guys are lazy bastards (but I still love you. Please don't flood the comment box or my facebook wall with excuses!)
Also, a "special" special thanks to Self (not myself,  but the guy named Self) for making me a banner featuring me being sodomized by Godzilla while Nicholas Cage watches. You need help, but I love you too.

Kaz & Yasu

Yesterday night got me acquainted with two of Julian's friends, Kaz and Yasu.

Yasu on the left and Kaz on the right.

Kaz (Kazuyuki) works at an American military base in Yokohama as a firefighter, so his English is quite good. He enjoys metal music. Kaz also is good example of visible Japanese longevity. You'd never guess he's 35 years old.

Yasu (real name unknown) is a friend of Kaz's. He's trying hard to improve his English. As many Japanese do, Yasu loves drinking when he's not working. He's just a fun guy in general.

I Moved! (again)

For the last time in a while, hopefully, I've moved.
 And this new place is quite nice! The guesthouse is located in Okachimachi, in-between Ueno (museum district) and Akihabara (geek district). It's within walking distance to both, which makes me quite happy. Additionally, rent is quite low, since I moved in with Julian, just as I did last time.
 Yeah, I know, our room ain't much to look at right now, and especially not from that angle. But get a load of the common room.

Interior balcony, exterior balcony, piano, and 60-inch 3D television! I think I'll be settling here for a few months, until a few paychecks roll in and I can settle into an actual apartment.
 To top it all off, Mori lives here, too, so that's pretty cool. And in comparison to the prices of the other places, our current rent is approximately 480$, whereas our guesthouse in Minami-Senju was 560$ and New Koyo was 800$. A real steal.

Julian is Sad

This is Julian's sad face.
Julian is paid 10$ an hour to walk dogs and clean a guesthouse. However easy that may seem, all is not perfect beneath the hermetic-looking exterior.
Today, as Julian was doing his daily routine, his canine friend decided to take a dump. And so, holding himself responsible to do what every dog owner (temporary or not) should do, Julian bagged the stool and went on his merry way, leash in hand.
However, my dog shit story ends not here!
For, you see, the dog had defecated in front of someone's lawn!

"But Sean," you may ask, "In front of the lawn? Not on the lawn?"
"Correct!" I would earnestly respond. "On the street in front of the lawn which is in front of the house!"
No big deal, one would assume, especially since Julian picked up the shit. But one would assume wrongly! For, you see, the man who owned that house was watching! And, after said man made a quick inspection of the spot the shit was, and found it not clean enough to his liking, the man furiously dialed the number of Julian's boss, and complained, threatening to call the police if such a thing were to happen again! And the boss came down upon Julian with the fury of a thousand suns.
Long story short, Julian got scolded for not picking shit properly enough. This is why Japan is clean.

Jackpot Dice

Mr Bobby's turn.

Eh, today I was at New Koyo's and the tenants and I got bored together. So we played Jackpot dice.
 The rules to the game are simple; one at a time, each player attempts to roll every number from 1 to 9, using two dice. For example, if you roll 3 and 4, this can count as either 3, 4 or 7. Easy enough, right?
 The players were Mr Bobby, Kimura-san, and myself, playing on behalf of my brother, who watched on the side.
 Each player put in 100Y (1.25$) as an initial ante, and 10Y (0.12$) as an additional bet every time it was their turn.

My Brother Miyamoto laughs at Mr Bobby's poor luck.

I came pretty close to winning the pot, but in the end Kimura-san took the winnings. I apologized to my brother for not having better luck. He didn't hold it against me, but I brought him a doughnut later in the evening anyway.
 I also informed him that I was moving out of the area later in the month.

The conversation went something like this.
Me: "I'll be moving to Ueno by the end of the week."
Brother (laughing): "Oh. You'll be living under [something] probably."
Me: What's that? I didn't understand that word.
Mr Bobby: "He's saying you'll be living under a bridge."
Damn it, have faith in me, brother.

Brief Note: Happy Holidays

Happy Holidays to all you folks, from Tokyo. It's not a very celebrated thing here in Japan (although New Year's is,) so I didn't do much asides from eat cake and play video games. In case you were wondering.
I'll be moving into a cheaper, bigger guesthouse closer to the center of Tokyo within the next few days (I know, right? Best of all worlds.) More news on that later.

Night Out at Stella

Julian and I were invited today to go out with Mr Bobby and Kimura-san to a small bar in Asakusa named Stella. Seeing as we never got the chance to really hang out with them despite knowing them for a couple of months, we couldn't pass up on the chance, and so the four of us took bikes from New Koyo and rode out to Asakusa, which isn't too far away from our neighborhood, and a short 10 minute ride in the night air took us straight there.

I was surprised to find the place mostly attracted a younger age group of hip-hop oriented people than I had originally expected by accompanying Mr Bobby and Kimura-san. Stella isn't anywhere close to being as big as Womb or Unit, but it does have a dance floor. 

Alas, tragedy struck that night; the saddest thing perhaps that had happened to me since coming here.

As I was sipping from my Red Bull (in case you were wondering what a non-drinker orders at a bar) while talking to Mr Bobby, the young lady in green (pictured on the right) sat down next to me and tried to engage in conversation!

It went something like this; note that the text in italic is all spoken in Japanese.

Girl in Green: Hey!

Me: Oh hey, good evening.

GiG (smiling): [something something] dancing. [something something something.]

Me: Oh, err, I'm unfortunately Canadian. My Japanese sucks.

GiG (surprised): Oh? Really? You're Canadian?

Me: Yeah. My Japanese is terrible. Do you speak English?

GiG: Nope, not at all...

Me: Ah, that's too bad.

GiG (smiling, gesturing towards the dance floor): [Something something something] there. [Something something] yeah?

Me: Err, yeah! It's fun!

(She gets up and goes to the dance floor.)

I assumed she was asking how I liked it. I'll try not to torture myself by wondering what else she might have meant, but, damn it, I have to learn more Japanese.