@@keep in mynd i have no ambition to change the tenses to make this make sense to you know... so just pretend you are reading this earlier in the week and that i have just come back from TOkyo.@@
TOKYO IS FREAKIN: INSANE! Seriously. It is insanely wickedly wildly kickin in so many ways! The weekend was filled with people watching, eating ice cream and smoking Marlboros, taking the subway (it:s sooo easy! Cam and I are old pros at it now. Tokyo, I laugh in the face of your 14 subway lines!), sleeping on cardboard, and eating (of course).
I have a huge happiness hangover today, I want to go back! Thank Twigg it’s a 4 day work week or I: be hurting. Speaking of hurting Cam and I were majorly out of commission yesterday. Maybe it was the 2 hours of sleep we got. Maybe it was from sleeping on a cardboard box. Or maybe we were just floored and still in shock from the coolness of Tokyo. Sorry to say but we were the two coolest people I know, going to Tokyo for the weekend. Who does that? Oh, I:m not doing anything this weekend, I think I:ll just pop over to Tokyo and kick it.
Like I don:t even know where to begin… yesterday we took the subway to a different part of Tokyo- Harajuku. I don:t know if you:ve ever seen pictures of the punks in Harajuku but that:s completely how it is. It:s like walking into a cartoon. We walked down Takeshita street for nearly 3 hours taking it in. Takeshita is like W. Queen St. on acid. I’ve never seen anything like it. Mad punks, Goths, hippies… and everyone looks like they are straight off a magazine cover. And the guys! {drools} why didn’t my parents raise me here? It could have increased my chances with one of these babes- at least I could speak to them! The extent of our conversations with common people was sumimasen, and hello! And ok… sorry for sleeping on your stoop, we’ll leave now! So I did some MAD shopping on Takeshita, and now I feel more Japanese. Or, as we like to say, “’nesey”. Its all about the layered look here and it feels so good to have on 3 er 4 different layers, and with the weather how it is, you really need that option of stripping er bundling up. This conservative nonsense that i thought i would have to rock here just isn:t working for me. it doesn:t feel like ME. Cam and I bought matching shirts cuz, ya know, we’re 15 and want to have the exact same shirt and wear it on the same day. Mine’s white with black writing and hers is navy with yellow writing. There’s a big guitar on it and on the front and back it says: Various Distortion. The life of the human being with comfortableness. The stimulus of piercing acrown of the head.
Ummm.... WHAT?
Last night Michelle, who came on Tuesday, and we went to a really famous Italian restaurant To The Herb for dinner to celebrate my and Cam’s ONE MONTH ANNIVERSARY of being in Japan. Saying something about time flying here would be too cliché and too much of an understatement. I started to have a bit of culture shock in TTH- eating Italian is Japan. It was just weird. plus I was soon to part from Cam and that made me really upset. She’s for sheesy my best friend in Japan. I think I was just like… feeling that whole stomach churning ‘we be parting soon’ feeling I felt on the day my training group parted from Okayama. The same feeling I had back in gr. 1… ooh the memories of heartache! Well, not really heartache but you dig what I’m saying. We had mad fun this weekend and after spending a week with her a month ago I feel like she’s family. She’s someone familiar in the land of the mochi..
anyways, enough of this emotional ramble. Ramble… rambling… rambaldini! Mouffie you would have LOVED takeshita. I swear you couldn’t say “this is so sick” enough times to really get yr point across. The punks were just so... punk! and it:s funny because any look here is exactly that, just a look and nothing else. The people, I just adore the people in Tokyo, everyone looks like they just walked off a ‘zine cover, completely put together and dolled up. Everyone!! There was at least 18 different styles we identified this weekend.
Monday when Cam and I arrived we had lunch around Tokyo station and then headed to the Shibuya area of Tokyo. And people watched. We just love people watching and could do it all day, and in fact we did. Ya ya shrines and museums, and cultural expeditions... but this was our first time there! And we were trippin with giddiness and awestruck…ness...?! actually we did one sight seeing thing^ the Imperial Palace in TOkyo and i would just like to say for the record after we saw it we wanted a refund on TOkyo. i guess we came on a day it was closed but it was not what we were hoping for. so like I was saying about the people. You had the kimonoed women, the drags, the bling, the barbies, the Snoop dogs, the Esses, the business suits (i swear around Tokyo Station is did not see any other colour besides black, beige, and gray), the punks, the 80s rockers, the hippies, more bling, the sk8rs, the sophisticated, the subdued, the traditional, the sporty, the DragonballZ guys, and guys wearing pink and purple and carrying Vuitton man purses with not a second thought. What I loved the most is that there’s SO many different styles yet everyone is so individual in their own. It’s all about how you choose to put it together. I felt like I did when I first moved to Toronto, like I could dress however I wanted to and it was totally ok. speaking of which, the whole scene wanted to make me crawl into my big khakis and rave out to some sick ‘nesey beats- which is actually on my agenda the next trip to Tokyo. We are definitely going to Harajuku and picking up gear! So Cam and I sat outside the train station and people watched, went for crepes many times, walked about, went shopping in the 10s of dept stores, checked out tower records and basically just chilled out. Oh! And who could forget our fix on the sticker photo booth obsession! We also bought albums and decorated each other’s to keep for all the SPB we will visit throughout Japan.
*sigh* this weekend was too mind bending for words. I can’t even get it across. Maybe I’ll talk about it bit by bit throughout the week. It’s a lot more interesting that regurgitating my work week, which today included my new student Chisato picking her nose and WIPING IT ON MY ARM. I wanted to rage- how GROSS is that?? Suddenly I envisioned thousands of bacteria strands radically multiplying all over my arm. I couldn’t get out of class fast enough and wash my hands and arms. Of course, this whole event was heeeelarious to her. I did the whole sucking-air-through-my-teeth-‘no no sweetie we don’t do that here! that’s really gross! ewww gross and yucky!-let’s-put-it-in-the-garbage-can-instead’-while-scrinching-my-nose thing. Inwardly I wanted to barf and run around the room screaming get it off! Get it off! Aaaaahhhhhhh germs!!! Actually I was trying hard not to bust up cuz that whole scene was in fact playing in my head. ahhh, children! I love them in all their grodyness. I’m sure I did some sick things when I was younger. I know I definitely picked my nose and ate it. Whodidn’t? they are lying if they tell you otherwise! Liars!!!
Tokyo never sleeps. Cam and I pulled up a step at the subway station at 3am to catch some shut eye and the city was still moving. People everywhere… we crashed there for an hour and then decided it was too loud of a place to be homeless. We were being way too picky as homeless people! So off we went, walking down the street. Off in the distance on the side of the road I saw a glimmering... was it?.... Could it be?.... We got closer.... What ho! Two beautiful pieces of cardboard folded up on the side of the road! *gasps* garbage??!! No! This glowing gift from the heavens was our future bed! That’s right, we slept on cardboard boxes in the middle of the city. And it was FUN. And obscenely comfortable. Although my back HATED me the next day. I like sleeping on completely flat surfaces. Of course, it was comfy for an hour until we got booted from our bed. No matter, we just packed up the cardboard like it ain’t no thang, and relocated. Actually we ended up freshening up in the neighbourhood am/pm corner store and facing the day with a warm beef bowl at Yoshinoya. I’ve always wanted to be homeless for a night. Just for the experience. We could have stayed in a hotel, but wouldn’t you rather spend your money on a strawberry ice cream and peach slices crepe or a green tea frappacino or a ridiculously cheap Dickie’s shirt? I know I sure would!
Preconceptions and Commonly Held Beliefs held Abroad that were Shattered this Weekend
Japanese and sticks thin and short. FALSE. Sure they have a smaller stature and sure there are some sticks but for the most part they have normal sized bodies. And we saw some really tall people, esp the girl teenagers. And honestly they look just like North Americans in proportions, except shorter.
Group Mentality. FALSE. This weekend all I saw was individuality at its finest. You might look like one of the other magazine covers walking about but it’s all about how you put it together.
There are no homeless people in Japan. FALSE. I’ll write later about the tarp city we landed in, and the steps on the subway station. We saw hundreds of millions of people sleeping in boxes. ok, not realy. but we did see quite a few!
Things to Write About in the Future
- the barbies and the bling
- sushi restaurant experience
- Japanese punk music
- The hot guys! I’ve never wanted so many guys in my life. I don’t know if it’s the sideburns or the pudding hair that gets me more…
- Things that reminded me of home.. of Will, of Joel, of Lindsay
- Toques. What’s the deal? It’s 20C out… but I like it! I like it a lot!
- The gaijin
- Crepes, coffee jello
- Starbucks workers that never sleep
- The transformation of Tokyo at night
- Tarp city and man with coffee table
- The punk concert on the bridge and cam’s FH
Hmmm ok I gotta go churn out some lesson plans for this week. And regroup. Danielle is still splattered all over. She’s half in her head, half in la la land, and half in Tokyo. 3 halves, now that’s mangled! lesson plans and a nice lotus flower meditation will set me straight.
Look forward to a shrinking Things To Write About list and more on my weekend soon!
TOKYO IS FREAKIN: INSANE! Seriously. It is insanely wickedly wildly kickin in so many ways! The weekend was filled with people watching, eating ice cream and smoking Marlboros, taking the subway (it:s sooo easy! Cam and I are old pros at it now. Tokyo, I laugh in the face of your 14 subway lines!), sleeping on cardboard, and eating (of course).
I have a huge happiness hangover today, I want to go back! Thank Twigg it’s a 4 day work week or I: be hurting. Speaking of hurting Cam and I were majorly out of commission yesterday. Maybe it was the 2 hours of sleep we got. Maybe it was from sleeping on a cardboard box. Or maybe we were just floored and still in shock from the coolness of Tokyo. Sorry to say but we were the two coolest people I know, going to Tokyo for the weekend. Who does that? Oh, I:m not doing anything this weekend, I think I:ll just pop over to Tokyo and kick it.
Like I don:t even know where to begin… yesterday we took the subway to a different part of Tokyo- Harajuku. I don:t know if you:ve ever seen pictures of the punks in Harajuku but that:s completely how it is. It:s like walking into a cartoon. We walked down Takeshita street for nearly 3 hours taking it in. Takeshita is like W. Queen St. on acid. I’ve never seen anything like it. Mad punks, Goths, hippies… and everyone looks like they are straight off a magazine cover. And the guys! {drools} why didn’t my parents raise me here? It could have increased my chances with one of these babes- at least I could speak to them! The extent of our conversations with common people was sumimasen, and hello! And ok… sorry for sleeping on your stoop, we’ll leave now! So I did some MAD shopping on Takeshita, and now I feel more Japanese. Or, as we like to say, “’nesey”. Its all about the layered look here and it feels so good to have on 3 er 4 different layers, and with the weather how it is, you really need that option of stripping er bundling up. This conservative nonsense that i thought i would have to rock here just isn:t working for me. it doesn:t feel like ME. Cam and I bought matching shirts cuz, ya know, we’re 15 and want to have the exact same shirt and wear it on the same day. Mine’s white with black writing and hers is navy with yellow writing. There’s a big guitar on it and on the front and back it says: Various Distortion. The life of the human being with comfortableness. The stimulus of piercing acrown of the head.
Ummm.... WHAT?
Last night Michelle, who came on Tuesday, and we went to a really famous Italian restaurant To The Herb for dinner to celebrate my and Cam’s ONE MONTH ANNIVERSARY of being in Japan. Saying something about time flying here would be too cliché and too much of an understatement. I started to have a bit of culture shock in TTH- eating Italian is Japan. It was just weird. plus I was soon to part from Cam and that made me really upset. She’s for sheesy my best friend in Japan. I think I was just like… feeling that whole stomach churning ‘we be parting soon’ feeling I felt on the day my training group parted from Okayama. The same feeling I had back in gr. 1… ooh the memories of heartache! Well, not really heartache but you dig what I’m saying. We had mad fun this weekend and after spending a week with her a month ago I feel like she’s family. She’s someone familiar in the land of the mochi..
anyways, enough of this emotional ramble. Ramble… rambling… rambaldini! Mouffie you would have LOVED takeshita. I swear you couldn’t say “this is so sick” enough times to really get yr point across. The punks were just so... punk! and it:s funny because any look here is exactly that, just a look and nothing else. The people, I just adore the people in Tokyo, everyone looks like they just walked off a ‘zine cover, completely put together and dolled up. Everyone!! There was at least 18 different styles we identified this weekend.
Monday when Cam and I arrived we had lunch around Tokyo station and then headed to the Shibuya area of Tokyo. And people watched. We just love people watching and could do it all day, and in fact we did. Ya ya shrines and museums, and cultural expeditions... but this was our first time there! And we were trippin with giddiness and awestruck…ness...?! actually we did one sight seeing thing^ the Imperial Palace in TOkyo and i would just like to say for the record after we saw it we wanted a refund on TOkyo. i guess we came on a day it was closed but it was not what we were hoping for. so like I was saying about the people. You had the kimonoed women, the drags, the bling, the barbies, the Snoop dogs, the Esses, the business suits (i swear around Tokyo Station is did not see any other colour besides black, beige, and gray), the punks, the 80s rockers, the hippies, more bling, the sk8rs, the sophisticated, the subdued, the traditional, the sporty, the DragonballZ guys, and guys wearing pink and purple and carrying Vuitton man purses with not a second thought. What I loved the most is that there’s SO many different styles yet everyone is so individual in their own. It’s all about how you choose to put it together. I felt like I did when I first moved to Toronto, like I could dress however I wanted to and it was totally ok. speaking of which, the whole scene wanted to make me crawl into my big khakis and rave out to some sick ‘nesey beats- which is actually on my agenda the next trip to Tokyo. We are definitely going to Harajuku and picking up gear! So Cam and I sat outside the train station and people watched, went for crepes many times, walked about, went shopping in the 10s of dept stores, checked out tower records and basically just chilled out. Oh! And who could forget our fix on the sticker photo booth obsession! We also bought albums and decorated each other’s to keep for all the SPB we will visit throughout Japan.
*sigh* this weekend was too mind bending for words. I can’t even get it across. Maybe I’ll talk about it bit by bit throughout the week. It’s a lot more interesting that regurgitating my work week, which today included my new student Chisato picking her nose and WIPING IT ON MY ARM. I wanted to rage- how GROSS is that?? Suddenly I envisioned thousands of bacteria strands radically multiplying all over my arm. I couldn’t get out of class fast enough and wash my hands and arms. Of course, this whole event was heeeelarious to her. I did the whole sucking-air-through-my-teeth-‘no no sweetie we don’t do that here! that’s really gross! ewww gross and yucky!-let’s-put-it-in-the-garbage-can-instead’-while-scrinching-my-nose thing. Inwardly I wanted to barf and run around the room screaming get it off! Get it off! Aaaaahhhhhhh germs!!! Actually I was trying hard not to bust up cuz that whole scene was in fact playing in my head. ahhh, children! I love them in all their grodyness. I’m sure I did some sick things when I was younger. I know I definitely picked my nose and ate it. Whodidn’t? they are lying if they tell you otherwise! Liars!!!
Tokyo never sleeps. Cam and I pulled up a step at the subway station at 3am to catch some shut eye and the city was still moving. People everywhere… we crashed there for an hour and then decided it was too loud of a place to be homeless. We were being way too picky as homeless people! So off we went, walking down the street. Off in the distance on the side of the road I saw a glimmering... was it?.... Could it be?.... We got closer.... What ho! Two beautiful pieces of cardboard folded up on the side of the road! *gasps* garbage??!! No! This glowing gift from the heavens was our future bed! That’s right, we slept on cardboard boxes in the middle of the city. And it was FUN. And obscenely comfortable. Although my back HATED me the next day. I like sleeping on completely flat surfaces. Of course, it was comfy for an hour until we got booted from our bed. No matter, we just packed up the cardboard like it ain’t no thang, and relocated. Actually we ended up freshening up in the neighbourhood am/pm corner store and facing the day with a warm beef bowl at Yoshinoya. I’ve always wanted to be homeless for a night. Just for the experience. We could have stayed in a hotel, but wouldn’t you rather spend your money on a strawberry ice cream and peach slices crepe or a green tea frappacino or a ridiculously cheap Dickie’s shirt? I know I sure would!
Preconceptions and Commonly Held Beliefs held Abroad that were Shattered this Weekend
Japanese and sticks thin and short. FALSE. Sure they have a smaller stature and sure there are some sticks but for the most part they have normal sized bodies. And we saw some really tall people, esp the girl teenagers. And honestly they look just like North Americans in proportions, except shorter.
Group Mentality. FALSE. This weekend all I saw was individuality at its finest. You might look like one of the other magazine covers walking about but it’s all about how you put it together.
There are no homeless people in Japan. FALSE. I’ll write later about the tarp city we landed in, and the steps on the subway station. We saw hundreds of millions of people sleeping in boxes. ok, not realy. but we did see quite a few!
Things to Write About in the Future
- the barbies and the bling
- sushi restaurant experience
- Japanese punk music
- The hot guys! I’ve never wanted so many guys in my life. I don’t know if it’s the sideburns or the pudding hair that gets me more…
- Things that reminded me of home.. of Will, of Joel, of Lindsay
- Toques. What’s the deal? It’s 20C out… but I like it! I like it a lot!
- The gaijin
- Crepes, coffee jello
- Starbucks workers that never sleep
- The transformation of Tokyo at night
- Tarp city and man with coffee table
- The punk concert on the bridge and cam’s FH
Hmmm ok I gotta go churn out some lesson plans for this week. And regroup. Danielle is still splattered all over. She’s half in her head, half in la la land, and half in Tokyo. 3 halves, now that’s mangled! lesson plans and a nice lotus flower meditation will set me straight.
Look forward to a shrinking Things To Write About list and more on my weekend soon!
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home