Ginza Party / Metal Event

On Friday after work, I headed to Tokyo again for the weekend. I rode up there with Emmet. on the way, we ran into 2 other JETs, Helen and Brooke. We rode the train with them as well. They had separate plans than us though. Both of them were going to be involved in a special fundraising event for the Tohoku Earthquake victims. Basically, a bunch of people would be walking around the permeter of the entire Yamanote line (the busiest train line in Tokyo). I think they had something like 8 hours or something to finish but I cant remember exactly. The Yamanote line just runs in a big circle that goes around most of central Tokyo. I never heard about this event prior to hearing about it from them. You had to be pre registered in order to attend. I think its pretty cool that they are doing this though. I hope the event raises a lot of money.

Emmet and I got off at Takadanobaba. I grabbed some quick BK and then we played games at Mikado for a while. Nothing really noteworthy to mention but I got some fun GG matches in. Oni was now unlocked as a playable character along with Evil Ryu in SSFIVAE, so Emmet played a few matches of that. I didnt get around to trying it out.

We left for Current sometime around 10:30 I think. From there, we headed to Current. It was pretty dead there tonight but at least Chris ended up showing up. We stayed for one beer and then decided to check out PSY. Unfortunately, PSY was also pretty dead. Chris has been trying to quit smoking but started again today. I kept bumming his cigarretes and finally he just gave me the whole pack before leaving. I hope he manages to quit. I have no nicotene dependancy and I want to keep it that way so I try to only smoke a few on occasion when im drinking.

Emmet and I decided that Shinjuku bars were looking pretty dead tonight so I agreed to go with him to Roppongi. We took a cab there. Emmet had some coupons to get into some place called Opera or something. Some club. The coupons were good for 2000 yen to get in with 2 drink tickets which is reasonable. We walked around trying to find the place for ages. I dont know Roppongi that well and all we had to go by was some crappy map on the back of the coupon. I asked a bunch of people and they all kept pointing us in different directions. Eventually we got to a point where peoples answers were pretty consistant as to where to go, but when we finally got to the street that they said it would be on, there was nothing there.

We got sick of walking around by this point, so we just decided to give up and go to 911, another club with free entry but over priced drinks. I made sure to bring in a hit flask of whiskey to make up for the over priced drinks. 911 was pretty boring but then again i dont really like clubs much to begin with. Emmet dumped some weird old awkward chick on me that started talking to him lol. I pretended I couldnt speak Japanese and told her I had a girlfriend in English. She still sorta just stood there expecting me to make conversation so I sorta just gradually got away hah. After a bit of time at 911 we decided to just go to Gas Panic even though I dont really like this place at all. However, its also free to get in here and I even got away without buying an over priced drink so whatever. It was already pretty late so I only had to kill like another hour and a half here until the trains started to run. I made a half ass effort to do a little dancing and killed time and it went by pretty quick. Emmet ended up leaving with some chick.

Once 5 rolled around I headed back to the station to go back to Shinjuku to sleep. Unfortunately, I fell asleep on the train and missed my stop and wound up all the way at the last stop on the line. As a result of falling asleep so much, I didnt get to the manga kissa in Shinjuku until like 7 something. Good thing I didnt have anything in particular I had to get up for the next day, so I slept till about 1:30 pm.

After I woke up Saturday afternoon (I was woken up by Emmet callling me), I waited to use the shower and went online for a bit. After showering, I met up with Emmet at Shinjuku Sportsland and then we got some quick food. After that, we headed to Mikado. Mikado was pretty dead at first so I was a little worried that there wouldnt be much comp today. As the day went on it improved slightly but never got crazy packed. Emmet had plans to go to another international party today. This time it was one of the ones in Ginza. He had plans to go with Jason, one of the guys who goes to Current who lives in the US and works for an airline, so he gets free flights and visits Japan once in a while. He would be around this weekend. He showed up at Mikado to meet up with Emmet and hung out for a bit while I kept playing GG. Emmet was trying to convince me to go as well. I was pretty much 50/50 on the fence about it. On one had, I felt like playing GG. On the other hand, Mikado wasnt too packed, Emmet had coupons to get us in for 2000 yen for all you can drink, and Jason was going too so I figured it might be fun. Also, they would donate 500 yen to the Tohoku Quake charity for every person that went, so it was even more incentive to maybe go. Jason showed up after a while and hung out while I played some GG. After playing GG for a few hours, 6:30 rolled around and Emmet said they had to leave and asked what my final decision was. I was in the middle of playing a match so I told him to just flip a coin cuz I was honestly 50/50 on if I wanted to go or not. After the coin flip, it ended up deciding that I would go to the party (I saw him flip it so I know it was legit). So, I won my last match and we headed out to go to Ginza.

We arrived there a little bit late. At first, Emmet couldnt remember where the venue was. Some random Australian dude came up to us asking if we were also going to the party and we said we were. Then, Emmet remembered the way. The Australian guy didnt believe him so he went to ask some random dude and we just kept walking. We arrived at the evavator to go inside and then the Australian guy comes up and Emmet said to him "Hey, we were just making fun of you, you should have trusted me". The guy didnt seem to mind. We got up there and the dude asked if we had the coupons to get in for 1000 yen. We had ones for 2000 yen but were surprised that a 1000 coupon existed. The guy said he gets a special rate for coming so often or something. The coupons are just email text messages you show from your cell phone, so he forwarded the message to Emmet while we stood in line to help us out and get us in for 1000 yen. Then, Emmet tried to forward it to me and Jason but it wasnt working for some reason due to size limitations. So, the Australian guy sent it to me as well. Then, I tried to send it to Jason but it wouldnt work for me either but by this time, Emmet was already inside so he just passed his phone over to Jason over the divider and we all got in for 1000 yen, lol! 2 and a half hours of all you can drink for 1000 yen is a great deal!

Since we got there late, the place was already really packed and it was difficult to even walk around. The biggest thing that sucked was that the line to get drinks was long as hell. It took on average about 15 minutes in line to get a drink for the first part of the party. I dont get how it was taking so long since they were only handing out cans of beer for the most part. I pretty much just got right back in line after getting my first drink to get another one fast. Much to our surprise, it turns out that fellow ALTs Bloodbath, Phil, Li, and Nick were there. I pretty much just spent most of the time talking to random people and drinking. I tried to wingman for my friends when I could since I wasnt there to pick any chicks up for myself. By the end of the party I got plenty to drink. I think I got at least like 7 or more beers which isnt bad for 1000 yen.

About 20 minutes before the party ended, a nice looking girl came up to me and struck up a conversation with me. I talked to her for a bit. Lets just call her Beer girl cuz she said she really likes drinking lol. She seemed like a nice girl so I invited her to come drinking with us at Current after we left the bar (since tonight was a metal event and we were all going back there for sure). She was actually at the international party all by herself which is a pretty rare thing since girls almost always come with friends. She was happy to come with us. If I was a single guy id be more than happy to try and get with her but im not, so I figured I could try and help out Jason since by the end of the party he didnt have any girls coming with him. Emmet brought a girl along as well. I guess all the other dudes we know who were there had their own plans.

So anyway, we get back to Current and it was pretty packed and what youd expect from a good quality metal event. Lots of regulars ended up showing up. I sat and talked with Beer girl for a bit at first but then later I went and takled to tons of other people I know. Emmet left at some point with the girl he brought but im not sure when. At around 3:30, I guess Jason ended up getting Beer girl to leave with him. So, I was glad that it seemed to have worked out. Im not exactly sure about any details about this though and hadnt seen her in a bit before they left. I dont think she saw me when they were leaving. I was busy talking to some other people.

Anyway, I stayed the rest of the time till the event ended and nerded it out drunkenly headbanging with all the metal event guys to good songs and stuff. After it was over, I headed to PSY and stayed until closing time. PSY was pretty good. It was someones birthday there today so a decent ammount of people came and lots of people from Current showed up as well.

The next morning I woke up to an email on my phone from Beer girl. She asked me if I wanted to go do hanami today sometime before 2 pm. It was probably something like 9 am when she mailed me and I was pretty damn tired so I went back to sleep and woke up again at like 1:30. I mailed her back telling her sorry that I just woke up and its probably too late now. She didnt reply back for a while. I mailed Emmet and Jason asking how their nights went. Emmet hooked up with that girl he left with. However, I was informed that Jason took Beer girl back to his hotel room but nothing happened between then and appearently Beer girl was just talking about ME the whole time... I guess she really must have liked me.

I took a shower, grabbed some food, and headed to Sportsland to play some GG for a while. Some Potemkin was there and he had like a 19 win streak. I beat him on my first try. He switched to Order Sol and I beat him again. Then we played a bunch more times vs his Order Sol. It was going back and forth and then he got like 5 in a row towards the end and I was getting a little annoyed. In any case, I was pretty tired and a bit hungover and sorta wanted to just go home early and seee Ryoko so I called her and she said she was free today.

So I left sometime around 4:00 to go home. On the way home on the train, Beer girl messaged me back saying sorry for taking so long to reply but she was unable to email me again till just now. I told her I was already going home. She said she was sorry to hear that but then she invited me to come to "play" at her house next weekend if I come back heh. If I was a single guy I would have been down, but Im not, so I just told her that I had a girlfriend and that I appreciate the offer but wouldnt be able to do that. She never replied after that. I suppose I should have mentioned I had a girlfriend to her at some point but it never came up and she never asked. I wasnt exactly trying to lead her on, but I was just trying to help out a friend and just invited her to come drinking with us at the bar. Nothing more. I feel kinda bad though cuz I didnt realize that she was that into me. So in the end I guess it sucks that things didnt work out with her and Jason but I at least tried to help out. Overall it was a pretty fun weekend though. Not sure whats going on next weekend yet.

Silent Hill (spring break 2011)

Originally, I had planned to go to Seoul for spring break with Emmet. However, after the quake, Emmet decided to go back to New Zealand instead. I honestly didn’t really want to go there all by myself so I decided to just cancel the trip. Luckily, Korean Airlines issued me a full refund (though the money wont return to my account for like 2 months but I will get it back in full eventually so its not a huge deal. Ryoko was originally going to come with us as well, but unfortunately her dog, Bill, has been very sick lately and had to go to the vet for a few days and the medical expenses were something like 50,000 yen. This is the money she planned to use for the vacation so she unfortunately couldn’t go.

However, now that the trip to South Korea was canceled, Ryoko and I decided to take a small vacation somewhere in Japan. This would cost less so she would be able to afford it. She didn’t want to travel very far away and we pretty much wanted to stay away from the Tohoku region near the quake stricken areas and where the Fukushima reactor radiation was much higher. We also wanted to go somewhere neither of us had been to before. So, we decided on going to Shizuoka prefecture. For those who don’t know, Shizuoka is located west of Kanagawa and South of Yamanashi. It is also the prefecture where Mt. Fuji is located.

Tuesday, March 29^th

Im not sure if I mentioned it before, but for the past year, right next to my old main school’s building, they have been building a brand new school. Well, it is now finished and for the past few week, all of the students and teachers have been manually carrying everything from the old school to the new school. This includes stuff like huge heavy furniture. Just about anything you could think of. By today, most of the work was finished, but we had some last minute stuff to do. I could have taken today and Monday off, but I decided to come in and help move the stuff from the staff room. Originally Ryoko and I were planning to leave for Shizuoka on a night bus (just like I had done so when I went to Kansai and when we went to Kyushu.) However, due to the quake, the highway bus schedule was reduced and we found out that there were no more night buses for the time being. I already told them I would come in to work today but when I found out about the lack of night buses, we had to change our plans to leave on an afternoon bus from 4:00 at Takasaki station. They were nice and said I could leave work early at 1:30 to catch my bus since most of the work we had to do was finished in the morning anyway. So I worked the morning and then met up with Ryoko and we got on the train to Takasaki. Ryoko’s sister, Reiko, was there as well. She had plans to go to Takasaki for unrelated reasons so she got a ride to the station with Ryoko and rode down to Takasaki with us.

From Takasaki, Ryoko and I got on the bus. At first there was only 1 other person on the bus, but a few more got picked up along the way (but it never got even half full.) It wasn’t as nice as some of the highway busses ive been on, but it was cheap and good enough. Also, the trip to Shizuoka was only like a 4 hour ride so it was no big deal.

I brought a bottle of whiskey on the bus as well as a few bottles of soda to mix with, so I enjoyed drinking the whole way. Ryoko would have drank with me, but unfortunately a few days before we left for the trip, she broke out into some sorta rash on her face. The doctor said its from stress (I would assume related to her dog being on his death bed, the whole thing with the quake, and some other family problems that have happened recently). The doctor told her that drinking would cause the rash to heal more slowly which was really bad timing cuz she loves to drink as well, especially when we go on trips. I told her that I wouldn’t drink but she insisted I do so.

We enjoyed playing some DS on the bus. Mostly Puyopuyo and a little Mario Kart. The bus ride went by quickly.

We arrived at Shizuoka station at around 8 pm. First, we found our hotel and checked in. Nothing fancy but a typical hotel and it was clean and nice and had all the basic stuff youd expect. It was only 5000 yen a night for both of us together as well, so it was a great deal.

There wasn’t really time to do any kind of sightseeing stuff today, so we decided to check out the area around the station. In particular, there was a place called Grow Stock that I found out about on the internet that I wanted to check out. It’s a bar/restaurant that serves all kinds of microbrews from around the world, and I never can get enough microbrews in Japan. The place was pretty packed and pretty nice. They did indeed have a very extensive beer menu with about maybe 10-15 beers on tap and probably like 30 or more in bottles. I got a really good IPA. Even though the doctor had advised Ryoko against drinking, she decided that she would at least have a few but keep it low. I think she ordered something there but I cant remember what it was. We also got a pretty good pizza that they made there.

After that, we walked around some more. The area had lots of bars and restaurants. We found a darts bar that looked pretty good so we went there to drink some more. I felt like smoking so I got a pack of smokes. I kept asking people for a light cuz I didn’t have one on me and eventually the bartender just gave me one for free lol. I just drank beers here (standard stuff) and Ryoko had a high ball or 2. We played several games of darts. This was her first time playing darts and she was surprised how much she enjoyed it! She beat me a few times but I won most of them. One of the games, I had a high score over 500 points and when the staff saw this, they came by and gave me a free set of 3 really good quality professional darts to keep. I think that’s probably the highest ive ever scored heh. Most of the people here playing were really hardcore and you can tell by watching them that they must practice a lot.

After the darts bar, we decided to just go back to the hotel because we wanted to get up sorta early to do stuff tomorrow. I had been drinking since like 3 pm so I had no trouble sleeping.

Wednesday, March 30^th

After getting up and getting ready, we left the hotel and headed to Shizuoka station. Before getting on the train, we wanted to grab some food. There were several restaurants in the station so we had a lot to choose from. Shizuoka is most famous for its good seafood seeing as how its right next to the ocean. We ended up going to a nice seafood place and got this really good Sashimi Donburi (raw fish with some vegetables over a bed of rice with wasabi and soysauce). It was really delicious and Ryoko especially loved it.

Today’s plan was to go to a western part of Shizuoka called Hamamatsu. The train ride down there was about an hour, so its about as far from Shizuoka City as Takasaki is from my town. We played a little more DS on the way, this time some Bomberman. Ryoko always kicks my ass at Bomberman.

When we arrived, our first plan was to go to a historical museum of musical instruments from around the world. I wasn’t sure how cool it would be but I was surprised how many fascinating instruments there were! I took like a zillion pictures in here so you can see them when they are posted on my pictures page. They had all kinds of crazy stuff like big horns shaped like dragons and drums bigger than my whole body. A lot of the stuff had very intricate details and carvings and truly were visual works of art in addition to being musical instruments. Next to many of the instruments were video and listening station with headphones where you could watch a sample performance of the instruments being played so that you could get an idea of what they sound like. There were 2 whole floors of things to see. Also on the top floor was this little room with various instruments that people were free to try for themselves so we messed around on some of those for a bit as well. When we finally got down to the bottom floor, we realized that we were already low on time if we wanted to go to the next place on our list of places to go, so we sorta had to rush the bottom floor unfortunately, but it was still cool to see.

Our next destination was Hamamatsu Castle, one of the various famous castles of Japan. On our way there, we passed this huge German beer hall that looked good as hell. We decided we would return there later for dinner.

It was already about 3:30 and we were worried the castle would close at 4 but when we arrived, we were glad to find they were opened until 4:30, so we had plenty of time to go in and look around. The inside of the castle had a huge map of Japan that showed the locations and pictures of all of the famous castles around the country, There were also a lot of displays showing some full body armor and other relics. The view from the top was really nice as well.

After exiting the castle we walked around the surrounding Hamamatsu Park. The sakura was already starting to bloom nicely and a few people were sitting down enjoying hanami. The area around the park was nice, and there was a large bronze statue of the shogun, Tokugawa Ieyasu.

After walking around for a bit, we headed back to the German beer hall. The place was called Mein Schloss. We got there slightly early and it wouldn’t open for another few more minutes so we walked around in some shops near there. There was a free art gallery with some really nice photos so we looked at those for a bit. Also, there was a little shop selling souvenirs and some German themed things. They had some pretty hard to find food in Japan, like sauerkraut! Being half Polish, naturally I love sauerkraut but pretty much never have the chance to eat it except for when I visit home. So, I was happy to buy a large jar of it to take home.

Once the restaurant opened up, we headed in. The place was HUGE! It was well decorated too look authentic. Aside from us, there were only like 2 other tables of people. By the time we finished our meal there were a few more customers though. They had an extensive menu of authentic German food. They also had about 6 different beers that they brewed right there in the beer hall. You could see the brewing equipment through a large glass window near the seating area. I tried their ale and their bock and Ryoko tried the ale as well. Both were very good! For food, I got the wiener schnitzel and Ryoko got a plate of assorted German sausages. We shared a bit of each other’s food and everything was really good. My only small complaint was that the sauerkraut wasn’t very good. It tasted too acidic or something. (Note: upon writing this I have tried the sauerkraut that I purchased at the store and it thankfully tastes much better than what was served at the beer hall).

Overall it was a great place and im glad we randomly found it.

After finishing up at the beer hall, we decided to head back to Shizuoka City. Ryoko fell asleep on the train for a bit. I enjoyed another beer. I had been drinking since we first left Shizuoka city originally so I was feeling really good by now.

When we got back, we decided to just walk around the area from last night with all the bars. We couldn’t really find anything overly interesting but we found another bar and went there for a few more drinks. We also found this burger join called Boss Burger. The place was going out of business and it was their last day. I got a burger and it was pretty good. Not sure why they were going out of business. They also gave me this random little toy milkshake lol. A bit after that we decided to head back to the hotel.

Thursday, March 31^st

Today, our plan was to head to the small town of Fuji, which I would imagine is named as such due to the fact that it is located not far from Mt. Fuji. We decided to just wait till we got to Fuji to eat this time. Unfortunately, near the station there wasn’t very many good options so we just opted to eat some Subway. I don’t really mind though cuz I don’t often eat Subway here and its pretty good.

While Fuji does have a nice view of the mountain, we had no plans to try to climb it or anything. Ryoko and I are both too lazy for that shit lol. Maybe someday id be willing to try it with the right people at the right time but we didn’t really feel like it at the moment, plus it was a bit cold for that right now. So actually, our main reason for coming to Fuji today was to go to the Safari Park! There are only 2 Safari Parks in Japan, and the other one is actually in Gunma, where I live. However, I have never been there and Ryoko says that the one in Shizuoka is much bigger and better. We had to take a bus from the station to the Safari park but it didn’t take all that long. Much like yesterday, I continued to enjoy drinking as we walked around.

When we arrived at the park, we went to go buy our tickets. They said that it would be about an hour wait till we could get on our bus so we had time to walk around. Fortunately, there were plenty of animals to see separate from the bus tour. We saw some interesting stuff like kangaroos which we could feed and pet, wallabies, meerkats, wild boars, monkeys, and other various animals. It was sorta like a zoo except for some of the tamer animals you could pet and feed them. The biggest bummer was that my camera battery was dead and I didnt realize it beforehand. It must have turned on while in my pocket. Ryoko had her iphone though, so we took some pictures with that.

Eventually it was time, and we were able to board our bus. There were several different busses and each one looked like a different kind of animal. Ours ended up being the white rhino bus. The bus had seats going from the center with a row facing each side of the bus. The sides of the bus were open but separated by double cages. Each passenger was given some food in order to feed the animals that we would encounter on the way.

First we went to the bear area. They had several black bears and grizzly bears. We fed them carrots through the bars of the bus using a long metal tool to hold it out to them. Ton of bears came to the bus right away once we stopped and surrounded us, waiting for their food. They even came up and stood on their hind legs putting their front paws up against the bus cage. It was pretty sweet.

After that we saw the lions. Just like with the bears, they surrounded the bus for their food. This time we fed them raw meat. The lions were much more aggressive than the bears. The dominant lions would roar at other lions who came close to getting their food. Many other lions just lazily lounged about behind them watching. It was pretty awesome but im glad that those bars were there cuz I have no doubt in my mind that they would have been happy to eat every last one of us on the bus lol.

Up next were the tigers. We didn’t get to feed them anything but we could see several of them around the bus as we drove by slowly.

Then we went to a section with various other types of animals such as hippos, giraffes, elephants, deer, yaks, and other herbivorous animals. The last group of animals we encountered were camels. We got to feed them as well, but this time we just threw these brown pellets into a sorta receptacles that was able to be pushed out threw the bars so that the camels could eat out of it. Just like with the lions and bears, they surrounded the whole bus.

The whole tour lasted about an hour or so. It was pretty cool and is easily the closest ive ever been to just about all of those animals. I had a lot of fun.

After that, we had a bit of time until our next bus would come to take us back to the train station, so we decided to go to the house of cats. Its pretty much just like youd expect; a house full of various breeds of cats from around the world that you could just go pet and stuff. Unfortunately, most of the cats weren’t very friendly aside from a few. Most of them just ran away when you went near them. It also smelled really funny in there.

After that, we went to the gift shop to look around at the various things they were selling. I think all I bought was more beer though lol. They even had some microbrews there that ive never seen before but unfortunately they only came in packs of 3 bottles and were unrefrigerated and I don’t like drinking warm beer so I passed up on that for some regular refrigerated Asahi.

After a bit more, our bus came and we got on and headed back to Fuji station. On our way to and from the Safari Park, we saw yet ANOTHER great looking huge restaurant specializing in microbrew beers! We decided to go there to eat dinner. Another bus went directly to there from the station so we boarded it and arrived.

Just like the German beer hall, this place was fucking huge! However, unlike the German beer hall, it was packed full of people. There were Spanish flags all over hanging from the ceiling, though the food seemed to be from all sorts of different cultures. This place also brewed their own beers in house and had about 6 to choose from. I tried 2 different ones; the dunkel and the seasonal honey wheat ale. They were both delicious. I ordered a slab or BBQ ribs and it rocked pretty hard. Once again, Ryoko decided to order a big sausage platter except this time it was in a huge spiral shape that took up the whole plate. She also got a beer. At this one table, someone had ordered a HUGE tall long cylinder of beer. I forgot how bit it was but it had its own tap on the bottom. I took a picture of it. (The people at the table told me it was perfectly fine, I didn’t just ninja that shit). Overall this was another great place that I would certainly recommend to anyone. Im pretty sure this was the Fujiyama beer company, though I could be wrong. I dont quite remember.

After that, we went back in front of this hotel that was across from the restaurant because that’s where the bus was supposed to come that we could take back to the station. We waited inside for a bit in the lobby. Im not sure why, but for some reason there were huge, life size statues of the Aliens from the “Alien” movie series. Random, but pretty cool. However, when the bus didn’t come when it was supposed to, Ryoko went and asked the hotel desk why the bus wasn’t there and they said that there were no more buses coming tonight. Ryoko was starting to panic because now it meant taking a cab back was our only chance. It seems we weren’t the only ones who thought there was supposed to be a bus, because there was a man who was saying goodbye to what seemed to be some relatives staying at the hotel and asked us about the bus as well. When we told him it wasn’t coming he offered to split a cab with us. We agreed. We chatted with the guy about various things on the ride back and he seemed like a nice guy. When we got to the station, the cabbie told us the final fare. It was something like 2500 yen I think. The guy handed the cabbie 2000 yen and told us thanks for helping him out and just took off before I could even argue with him about it. So Ryoko and I only had to pay like 500 yen. Pretty nice guy, but I felt a little bad. But I guess it was his choice so we got lucky there.

After the whole bus thing, Ryoko was in a bit of a bad mood and we had a little argument about trip planning and what not. Ill be the first to admit that I don’t plan things so great all the time when it comes to going somewhere brand new. She did a lot of the planning herself so she felt a bit stressed out. I wanted to help plan more things but it’s a little more difficult for me to do so since navigating and finding a lot of Japanese tourist websites is a lot more difficult for me and English ones are a bit limited compared to some of the information you can find on Japanese ones. I felt bad. We ended up falling asleep sorta early.

Friday, April 1^st

We woke up early. I got ready pretty fast and Ryoko took a while. While she was getting ready, we talked more and made up, so from then on everything was cool. Today we had to check out of the hotel because we didn’t have a reservation for tomorrow night. Originally our plan was to go back to Gunma tonight on an overnight bus, but as I mentioned before, there were no more overnight busses. However, there was supposed to be a huge festival today in Shizuoka so we figured we would just enjoy the festival and stay up all night drinking and then just get on our bus in the morning.

We checked out of the hotel and headed out to the station where we found a locker to put our stuff in for the day. After that, we went looking for another good restaurant in the station. We found a new part of the station we hadn’t looked at yet that had even more places. While looking, we stumbled upon a great little grocery store with all kinds of imported stuff. They had a TON of great imported beers and micro brews! We wanted to eat first so we said we would go back to this place after we found a good restaurant.

We ended up going to this one Lion beer restaurant. I ordered the Ox tongue with a really great sauce and some veggies, pasta, and rice on the side. The best part was they had a kind of Yebisu beer called Creamy Top Stout which I had never seen before. I got one of those and it was fucking great! Ryoko got some Korean bibinba (this place had a random menu with all kinds of shit), and she enjoyed it.

After that, we went back to that store we found. I got a cold can of Aooni IPA (it means Blue Demon). Ive had this before but its so good and Ive only seen it at like one or 2 places ever. Its brewed in Nagano but Ive only seen it at ONE place in Shin Okubo and one place in Sapporo. Ryoko got this little blueberry cocktail thing that shes never seen before. I tried a sip and it wasn’t bad.

Next, we got on the train and headed to a station a few stops away called Shimizu. From there, we got on a bus and went to this really big shopping mall called S-pulse Dream Plaza. Ryoko wanted to go there because it had this store/exhibit dedicated to an old famous Japanese anime character called Chibi Maruko-chan. I didn’t really have any interest in it but she wanted to see it so I didn’t mind. There were also some other cool stores there. We went in a pet store and looked at some dogs. We also found that this place ALSO had a super market inside with MORE great micro brews! This time I got a frosty can of Yona Yona Ale and later went back for the Tokyo Black Porter. These are also made by the same company in Nagano. Ive had these beers before as well but just like with the Aooni IPA they are hard to find so im happy to drink them when I have a good chance. They are also not expensive either which is the best part. Also, in this supermarket there was this giant fake sushi mountain display and it had faces of all the major world leaders surrounding it with a giant fish on top. It was pretty impressive so I took a picture.

Also in this mall, they had a food court with Dippin Dots. This is the only time ive seen it in Japan. Ryoko tried it when we went to Six Flags Great America together when we visited Chicago 2 years ago, so she wanted some.

We found an arcade inside. I was down to play some fighting games but unfortunately the only fighting games this crappy arcade had was the newest Virtua Fighter, and an out of order Blazblue cab, so I didn’t end up playing anything there.

Also, outside the mall there were play areas for kids. They had this giant bubble that kids could go into while floating on a pool of water and run around. They also had a one of those big inflatable bouncy castle things that kids go inside and bounce around in, except this one was shaped like a giant Mario instead! It was pretty awesome looking. I told Ryoko that the inside was probably full of mushrooms. There was a Sasebo burger outside there too but it was closed. We were surprised to see it cuz I didn’t know they had them outside the Kyushu area. Also, there was a huge Ferris wheel. This mall was right next to the ocean in a harbor with tons of ships and stuff, so we decided to ride it to get a nice view of the area. It was pretty cool.

After riding it, we checked the bus times and the next bus back was coming pretty much any second so we rushed back to the bus stop and got on just in time.

We headed back to Shimizu station and decided that next we would go check out an aquarium they had there. Next to it was a dinosaur museum and they had a special rate where you could go into both of them for a really cheap price. However, it was getting late and we were having a hard time finding which bus we needed to take. Ryoko was stressing out about it a little cuz she didn’t know where to get on the bus, so I asked a random bus driver and he told us we were at the bus stop on the wrong side of the station and that there were more busses on the other side. We thanked him and then made our way over and got on the right bus.

When we arrived at the aquarium, there was only like an hour left. Ryoko doesn’t particularly care about dinosaurs so we went to the aquarium. I personally think dinosaurs are pretty awesome but that’s ok. Sharks and stuff are pretty cool, too.

When we walked in there was like this little open tank area with live starfish that you could pick up and a bunch of kids were playing near it. Then we went to this science area that had all kinds of stuff that talked about the physics of ocean currents and water pressure and things like that with various exhibits. They also had robots that showed up certain sea creatures move such as crabs and lobsters. You could control them with a remote. There was also a full size, huge whale skeleton hanging from the ceiling.

Then, we headed to the area with all the actual animals. They had many kinds of exotic fish, jellyfish, an octopus, some sharks, eels, coruscations, and various other cool stuff. As the place was just about to close, we managed to see the very last of everything there. Unfortunately there was no time to see the dinosaur museum next door but that’s alright. Ryoko enjoyed the aquarium.

After that, we rode the bus back. There was some weird chick who probably had some mental illness or something who kept talking to herself out loud and shouting random stuff.

After we got back to Shimizu station, we then rode the train back to Shizuoka station. Upon arriving, we were disappointed to find out that due to the earthquake, the festival had been cancelled. That pretty much killed our plans for the night.

We ended up going to another good local restaurant near the station. Ryoko got the unagi (eel) donburi, and I got a shrimp tempura donburi with a beer. Everything was really good. We stayed there for a while and talked and Ryoko enjoyed some tea.

A little after leaving there, Ryoko got a really bad headache suddenly. We walked around a new area of Shizuoka that we had not yet been to, trying to find some drugstores to buy headache medicine. We found a few stores but they ALL were closed. I don’t know why, but I guess after like 9 pm, nowhere at all seemed to sell headache medicine, so Ryoko was forced to just tough it out. I felt bad for her but there was nothing I could really do.

We walked around a bit more and found a pretty decent looking arcade. Ryoko wanted to sit down for a while so she told me I should just go play some fighting games while she relaxed. I had no problem with this. This arcade unfortunately didn’t have GG, but it did have SSFIVAE, and there were some guys there playing so I got some casuals in. At first there was a Dan player and I beat him. Then a Ryu player I beat 3 times in a row. Then he beat me once and I beat him 3 more times. Then I beat a Juri player and finally I got beat by a really good Makoto. I figured I had been playing for a while so then I went to check on Ryoko. She was feeling slightly better but not fully better yet.

We left the arcade and figured that there was no way we were gonna bother pulling an all nighter and we had no hotel to stay at, so we began to look for a manga kissa. After walking for a while, we found a few and decided on the best one that had a good rate. Now that we knew where we were gonna stay, we got our stuff back from our lockers and then decided to go to one more izakaya for some more food and beers. We stayed for a couple hours and she was starting to feel a little bit better.

Eventually we left and checked into the manga kissa. We got a double flat room to share. This was Ryoko’s first time to stay in a manga kissa. Unlike most manga kissas I stayed at, this one wasn’t a major chain brand, and instead of having like a soft mat on the floor, it was just some tatami mats with a few cushions scattered around.

Saturday, Apirl 2^nd

I ended up sleeping pretty well but felt hungover as hell when Ryoko woke me up. She said we had to get going soon and that if I wanted to shower id have to do it now. It took me a good 5 minutes to think about it but in the end I decided to just man up and take a shower. After the shower I felt a bit better. Ryoko said she only slept for like 3 hours so she was still tired, but her head felt better.

We checked out and went back to the station and ate at this begal sandwich place that had a lot of really good flavors and ingredients to choose from. It was pretty decent. After that, we shortly got on our bus and took the 4 hour ride back to Takasaki. Both of us were pretty much asleep the whole time.

Shizuoka was pretty cool. If for nothing else, it certainly has a lot of good fucking beer.

After arriving at Takasaki we both felt better. We had time to kill till the next train so we went to a bakery in the station and ate some good bread.

We eventually made it back home on the train. The rest of the days plan was to go to Ryoko’s friend’s new house. Her name is Remi. Her Husband Tomo and her just got a new house so they were having a small dinner party. They also have a 2 year old daughter named Aone. We brought over a case of Yebisu and some snacks. Ryoko’s friend Eri was there as well as 2 other dudes that Tomo knows. We mostly just talked and ate a lot of food and drank a lot of beers and had fun playing with Aone. Shes really cute and seemed to take a liking to me. Im glad she didn’t think I was scary. Im the first foreigner she ever met.

That pretty much sums up my spring break. I had a few more days off but no real plans so I spent the next few days being super lazy around the house playing video games and watching shit online. There was also another enkai to welcome the new teachers to my school. Now, im back at work and the next weekend already starts tomorrow! Sweet.

Return to the Capital

The following takes place on Saturday, March 26th and Sunday, March 27th...

So I havnt had a chance to write my blog for a while but on this weekend, I finally went back to Tokyo for the first time since the quake. On Friday, March 25th, we had an enkai for work because it was the last day of the school year before spring break.

On Saturday, I woke up and headed out to Tokyo at around noon. I got there a little after 3 pm. Despite the quake, things seemed more or less the same. I didnt notice any noteworthy physical damage to roads or buildings. Trains seemed to still be running frequently enough if not just slightly reduced. The main difference I did notice were that in most places the lights were much dimmer and less lights were being used in order to save electricity. The other main difference I noticed was that bottled water was pretty much sold out everywhere. Every conbini I went to had zero water bottles and also just about every vending machine was sold out of water. This didnt really affect me at all since I brought a bit bottle with me from home in my backpack and otherwise I mostly just drank sports drinks and alcohol.

Of course, the first place I went when I got to Tokyo was Mikado. I was itching to play some GG since it had been several weeks since I last played. At first it was pretty much dead as hell with just 2 guys playing who looked like they were either just fucking around or didnt really know how to play well. I didnt really wanna play against them and be stuck playing the computer if they didnt rematch me so I decided to play a little SSFIVAE since there were more people playing it. I was a bit rusty at this game and got beat up by a T Hawk but then I rematched him and won. I also beat someone else but I forgot who. Eventually I lost to the T Hawk again and noticed a few GG players were watching for whatever reason. I think they wanted to play GG but no one else was playing so they were hesitant to play or something like that.

I was getting hungry so I got some Burger King. When I came back, there were a few more people playing GG so finally started playing that. Gradually as the day went on, more and more GG player showed up and in the end it got fairly packed. Kunihiro came and I talked with him and played him for a bit. Also, Ryan (Letbloodrun) is back in Japan currently and came to play 3S. There was a 3S tournament going on earlier actually when I arrived but he said he had stuff to do in the morning so he missed it. He came to play casuals though. We talked a bit. He asked where Emmet was and I told him he went back to New Zealand after the quake hit. I played a ton of GG casuals and had a lot of fun.

Towards the end when it was starting to get late, Ryan had to go soon so he couldnt come out drinking but wanted to have a beer with me so I drank with him for a bit while playing GG. He eventually left. I stayed a bit longer and played a little buzzed GG as I continued to sip on a little whiskey. Eventually it got pretty late so I decided to go hit up Current. Before going to Current I grabbed a kebab for the road.

Current was actually busier than I would have thought it would be and nothing seemed to have changed. As soon as I walked in, lots of people were glad to see me saying how they were wondering if I was ok and stuff. I assured them I was and quickly ordered a beer and sat at the bar. I talked with a few regulars and the staff. Eventually Sawa mailed me saying she wanted to meet up with Heidi and drink with us tonight. Heidi said she was at PSY so we said we would join her there later. Sawa didnt remember the way to PSY so I told her to come to Current and id go there with her later. She eventually showed up and we just kept getting beers at Current cuz we were having a good time there.

I dont remember exactly but probably sometime around 4 pm we headed to PSY. I dont remember much there honestly lol. From what I do remember it was a pretty typical night at PSY and I stayed passed 6 am. Manga kissa was the same as usual.

The next day I got a haircut and then I bought a new PS3 arcade stick at Yamada Denki in Shinjuku. The left direction cherry switch on my stick at home is broken and I dont have the tools to fix it here with me in Japan and im too lazy to bother finding new parts and tools here so I just decided to buy a new stick. Nothing fancy, just a 5000 yen Hori, but it does the job. After that, I went home a bit earlier to spend the rest of the evening with Ryoko at home.

Pretty typical weekend but it was good to finally go back to Tokyo after so long.

Johnny-o Cup tournament put on hold

Well, for those of you who were looking forward to the Johnny-o cup vids, unfortunately it has been delayed until an undetermined date. In all honesty, I am glad it was because I doubt I would be able to go there anyway seeing as how the regular JR trains are still not running in my town. The constant black outs in Tokyo would also make it difficult to run the event. Mikado is currently open for business but the event is being put on hold.

This weekend will be a 3 day weekend. Theres not really anything I can do. I need to conserve my gas supply and trains are not running, so I pretty much am going to sit on my couch for the next 3 days with a few bottles of whiskey and will be checking the news constantly for updates on the Fukushima reactor situation. As of now, radiation levels in Gunma are not dangerous. Many foreign embassies are advising citizens to evacuate Japan. I am going to stay until things end up extremely bad. If need be, I can drive to the Shinkansen station in about 15 minutes and flee to Osaka with Ryoko. I honestly hope it doesnt come down to that but for now they SEEM to be keeping the problem under control. I will be watching things carefully in the next few days. I hope everyone who was affected by this bullshit is doing ok and wish them the best of luck.

Quake

As I'm sure everyone already knows, Japan was hit with the largest earthquake in its recorded history on Friday, March 11th at about 2:30 pm. When it happened, I was in the staff room at work at my desk. The epicenter of the quake was in Miyagi prefecture, which is far enough away from where I live (Gunma) to where the damage in my area wasnt severe, but close enough to where I could certainly feel the quake. It was about a 5 or so on the scale where I live. When it was happening, I had no idea how powerful and devistating it was. I went outside the staff room with some other teachers and we waited for about 2 whole minutes until the quake finally stopped. Smaller quakes and after shocks continued throughout the day. Train services were suspended and high ways were shut down. As you can probably imagine, I just ended up staying home all weekend drinking with Ryoko. Currently gasoline supplies are pretty much completely out around here. Hopefully they will get more soon. I am also quite worried about the nuclear reactor in Fukushima that is having a melt down... Fukushima isnt all that far from where I live, but I live far enough so that at the moment I am not in any immediate danger.

I just figured I should type something on here to let people know that I am ok. I just hope that the people that I know who live in north eastern Japan are ok...

The Tokyo 23

Friday after work I headed down to Tokyo with Emmet. I was feeling slightly stressed due to some work stuff that theres no point in getting into so I had a little extra beer than usual on the train. When we got to Tokyo, I still wanted to play fighting games for a bit but didnt really feel like going to Mikado cuz I was a bit drunk, so we went to Shinjuku Sportsland. I wasnt playing at the top of my game but still won a few GG matches but lost some that I shouldnt have. I also played some SSFIV and beat some Akuma player once who rematched me and beat me by a hair.

We didnt stay very long and decided to just go knock back some drinks outside and then hit up Current a little before 10 pm. For a Friday, I guess it wasnt decent but still not very packed. A group of people in the back consisting of Johan and some other people he knows were sitting at a table. We joined them for like an hour or 2. Some girl that Emmet met last weekend came to drink as well. Eventually they wanted to go to karaoke so we decided to join them.

We grabbed some whiskey to sneak in and got the 2 hour package. It was a pretty standard karaoke session and for some reason the songs I was requesting took forever to show up. I think people were just going nuts with requesting songs. Either way, I got pretty smashed and I think I fell asleep for just a little bit towards the end but woke up and sang more. It ended at around 4 and by this point I was already pretty smashed and tired so I just decided to go to the manga kissa and sleep so that I could get a lot of rest for tomorrows tournament.

So I woke up Saturday at around noon or something, grabbed some quick food and headed to Mikado. I got there pretty early with plenty of time to get some practice in. I was doing so-so in casuals. Today would be the very final Johnny-o cup singles ranbat to qualify for the 23 on 23 Tokyo team at Mikado. Going into the tournament, I had the highest amount of points among allt he Faust players who were trying out for the Tokyo team, so basically, even if I didnt place at all, I would still make the team as long as another Faust didnt win first place today, which would have allowed him to take the lead by one point. The only noteworthy Faust player who entered today was Nage, so as long as he didnt win first place I would be on the team.

I checked the brackets after they posted them and unfortunately my first match was against my old team mate, Gaku, the Robo-Ky player. I asked him if he checked the bracket yet and he said no. He went to go look and then after seeing it he turned around and gave me this WTF kinda laugh sorta face palm combo thingy cuz we didnt want to have to fight eachother since were friends. I just told him to do his best and wished him luck. Gaku usually beats me a bit more than I beat him in casuals. It could go either way but I didnt have a good feeling about.

So eventually they called our match and we battled it out. Gaku ended up winning. It wasnt increadibly one sided or anything but I made some stupid mistakes. I wasnt really upset or anything though. At this point, all I could do was just wait and watching, hoping that Nage wouldnt clinch the win.

Nage ended up winning his first match. I cant remember who it was against cuz I didnt see it, but I looked on the bracket and he had advanced. His 2nd match was against Satou's Johnny (the guy who fucked me up at the last qual and ended up getting 1st place). Now, I am pretty sure that Nage and Satou are friends and sometimes I get the impression that Satou might not like me very much, so I was a bit nervous that Satou might throw the match and let Nage win since Satou already has lots of points. The match ended up being really close and went down to the 3rd round. Satou was dropping some stuff and just didnt seem like he was on point with his game a little bit. In the final round, Nage had a big lead but then Satou made this really crazy comeback and won with a sick combo, eliminating Nage from the tournament. With that, I had officially qualified for the Tokyo 23 on 23 team! I am unsure exactly who else is on the final team at this time. They have a list on the Johnny-o cup website but it isnt updated yet to reflect the results of this current weekend's results. In any case, some really good players like FAB, Mitrurugi, Satou and others will be on the team, so its cool that I get to team with those guys.

After that, I pretty much just played some various casuals. I got some fun games in with Roy and Basara and beat his Testament. Had some other good matches with this one really good I-no and some good fights vs Melon's SL and ED. At some point, Johnny-o came by while I was in between matches and asked to confirm if I could make it for the Final 23 on 23 tournament on the weekend of the 19th. I told him I would be there so he checked me off the list.

I stayed and played for a bit longer but I had other plans for the rest of tonight. Normally I dont care too much about going to international parties unless I have a good reason and today was one of those days. Today, Phil, Bloodbath, and 2 other guys I know would be coming down from Gunma to go to the same international party with Emmet so I said I would go to hang out with everyone as well. The only problem was this one was at Tokyo Loose. I didnt really wanna go back there cuz I dont like the place but since the international parties are completely different than what its like normally, and I felt like drinking, I decided to go.

I grabbed a quick kebab for the road and then headed to Shinjuku. I met up with those dudes in front of Tokyo Loose and soon we went inside. We were some of the first to arrive but the place filled up pretty fast. I was the very first one to order a drink at the bar once they started serving a few minutes after we entered, lol. Normally Tokyo Loose is full of skanks and shady people blasting crappy top 40s club music but this time they kept the music lower and the people there seemed pretty cool generally. We talked to several girls (for me its just for fun), and I also ended up talking to a few pretty cool dudes there. This one guy was a pretty big metal head so we had a good chat about bands and live shows and shit.

The people at the party were cool but the thing that sucked about it was that the drink line was WAYYYYY to fucking long! First of all, they wernt serving beer for free (you had to pay 500 yen), but since they had full open bar of spirits, I didnt mind, and mostly just drank tequila cokes. The thing that sucked though was that the cups were really fucking tiny. They only had ONE guy mixing drinks at once, so the line would que up like 20 fucking people and the guy took forever to mix drinks, and it ended up being like a 15 minute wait in line every time you wanted a drink. This doesnt sound that bad but when the drink only takes like 10-15 minutes to finish when you are sipping it slowly it makes it a pain in the ass. The other thing that sucked is they didnt have all you can eat... just a few random plates of some crappy chips and stuff, but I knew this before hand (which is why I ate the kebab) so it wasnt really a big deal for me.

There was this one girl in particular who really seemed to take a liking to me. She was pretty hot, too. At the end of the night she wanted to exchange numbers with me to maybe drink somewhere else with us later (she was working as a voulenteer at the check in desk by the door for like the last hour of the party and had to stay and clean up so she couldnt leave with us). She seemed like a nice girl, and while I had no intention of actually trying to sleep with her or anything, I figured there was no harm in exchanging cellphone email.

After exchanging info I headed outside in front where a bunch of people were gathering. Emmet was with these 2 girls that wanted to go with us to Current. We were still waiting on a few other people to come out. Some of them were getting some last minute phone numbers and it was taking a while. Emmet and the girls were getting a bit impatient so I told them to just go on ahead without me and that I would wait up for Phil and whoever else wanted to come with us. Bloodbath and the other guys we were chilling with ended up going somewhere else with different girls. Eventually Phil came out and suddenly like this big crew of like 10 people (a mix of Japanese girls and some guys) decided to all go with me to Current so I lead the way and took everyone there.

Current ended up getting pretty packed, espessially with all the people we brought in. I talked with this one girl I know there named Chiho for a bit at the bar and then just mingled with various people who came with us from the party. Chris and Sachiko came later as well and I drank with them for a bit, too. We drank for several hours like this but over time, the people we all came with all eventually cleared out and left before the last train. The girl that Emmet was trying to get with had to get up early but otherwise would have stayed out.

Once it got dead, we decided to just go head to Shibuya and go to Camelot since the trains were still running and Current wasnt looking very promising. On the way to the station, we met up with Bloodbath and Li (one of the other guys we came with), as well as this one Japanese dude who was at the party. They had no girls with them saying all the girls had to go home.

When we got to Shibuya, I asked one of the staff if trains were still running when we got there since it was pretty late and some of the guys didnt believe they still were. He told me it was. Then I went to buy a ticket and went through the gates but the other guys were already like way ahead of me (they just didnt bother waiting I guess). I ran up the steps to the train and the doors were just about to close. I didnt see any of them but assumed they got on the train so I just piled in the packed train right in the knick of time.

I contacted Emmet soon after and he said they were all on the train so I told him Id just meet them outside the Hachiko exit.

I got out first and no one was around. I waited for a few minutes and then eventually a few of them came out. I asked where the rest of them were and they said that Bloodbath was like in this mode where he just decided to start hitting on like every good looking girl he passed by right ont he station platform just cuz he was drunk and didnt give a fuck lol. He eventually came outside but unfortunately his plan didnt work for the moment. From there, we all headed to Camelot. We stopped at Family Mart first to grab some whiskey to sneak in though.

We got inside and I put my stuff in a locker and split it with Bloodbath. Not long after, we all sorta get split up a bit but some of us ran into one another periodically through the night. I was with Emmet most of the time. We also ran into our friend Leo there. He rocks up to us with a 700 ml bottle of whiskey in his hand! He said that when he ordered his last drink, when the bartender wasnt looking, he just stole the whole fucking bottle from the bar counter! LOL!!! That takes some fucking BALLS! For a while we were chilling by a small table near the bar with no seats and Leo was sorta holding the bottle slightly under the table. Eventually he got a little sloppy and a staff member came by and saw the bottle. He got questioned about it but just lied and said he found it here on the table and he just gave it to the staff guy. The guy actually believed him (or at least decided not to do anything about), took the bottle, and just left us alone, lol! He got lucky as fuck, but it was still hilarious. Emmet and I were a bit smarter about our snuck in whiskey and we knocked it back in the bathroom without notice.

I also ran into that Italian chick who used to go to Current with Fracheska all the time, too. I guess she comes here all the time now. Also, Phil and Bloodbath decided to leave a bit early so I had to get his stuff out of the locker.

Other than that it was just a standard night at a club with crappy music and me dancing badly but not caring cuz I was pretty drunk. I guess overall I had fun, but I wish Current was as consistantly good as it was back in the day. Lately its just been kinda dull. My biggest regret actually was that Heidi mailed me at some point during the night asking if I was coming to PSY cuz it was Natsume's (the owners) birthday party tonight! I didnt know about it or else I would have much rather went there but I was already stuck in Shibuya so oh well.

At the point when I left the club, I had no idea where anyone I was with went so I just left alone and slept at the manga kissa. They were out of flat rooms but they had a double room with a couch that they said I could have for the same regular price so I got to sleep on a couch lol. It was fine.

The next morning I woke up at around 12:30, grabbed some quick Sbarro pizza for the ride home, and got on the train. I told Ryoko I would spend the rest of the day with her. There was no reason to go to the Saitama team qual since I had already made the Tokyo team.

So thats about it. In 2 weeks from now is the Johnny-o cup final tournament. It will be a 3 day event since its a 3 day weekend in Japan with that Monday being a national holiday. There will be a 23 on 23 just like in the past at other G3 events with one team each representing Saitama, Kanagawa, Chiba, and Tokyo. I will be the Faust player for the Tokyo team. Hopefully I can get some good wins in for my team! Im looking foward to it. There will also be a 2 on 2 which I didnt qualify for. Also, there will be other events which anyone can enter the day of the event without having to qualify for, so I will enter those as well. And of course, Mikado will be packed with all of the best players in East Japan, so there will be plenty of awsome casuals to be played on Mikados 12 GG cabs (and they probably will even have more for the event setup).

As far as next weekend goes, I have no particular plans and will probably just lay low around Gunma and try to save some money. I doubt whatever happens next weekend will be interesting enough to warrent a blog write-up, so the next one will probably be in 2 weeks. Peace.

End of Final Roundbats 2010-11

I stayed home on Friday night and just chilled and drank with Ryoko.

Saturday I woke up and headed out to Tokyo and Emmet got on the same train. He had plans to go to another international party and I was going to the last Final Roundbats tournament so we parted ways upon arival in Tokyo.

I got off at Shingawa and headed to the skylounge. This would be the last Final Roundbats since Final round will be coming up very soon. Tokido already had enough points even before this tournament to where it didnt matter so he will be going and getting a fully paid flight to Atlanta. I mainly just went to hang out and drink and I also wanted to play some MvC3.

When I arrived it was pretty early and Abelity and Bull410 were chilling in the lobby. Soon after, they got the key and I headed up to the sky lounge to open the door while Abelity went to help Scott Popular unload his car and Bull410 got some stuff from his apartment.

Soon after people started coming. Lots of regular guys were there. Tokido showed up but he had to leave early so he didnt even enter the SSFIV tournament. As I said, it wouldnt matter anyway for him.

I was doing well in casuals and went undefeated aside from one loss until the tournament started. I think my first match was against a Juri player and I won. My 2nd match was against a Ryu player and I won that as well. There was a low turnout for SSFIV players (lots of people showed up but didnt bother entering SSFIV cuz I guess they just wanted to play Marvel. I was the same but I figured I might as well enter SSFIV anyway). My next match was already the finals. I had to go against Abelity's Abel. We played something like 4 times before the tournament and I won every match. The finals were 2/3 matches, 3/5 rounds. I won the first match 3 straight rounds. Then he answered by winning the next match 3 straight. The final match went down to each of us having 2 rounds and in the 5th round he pulled ahead and won. I guess it would have been cool to win but I wouldnt have actually gotten anything and I didnt even really care about that tournament so whatever. It was fun though I guess.

After SSFIV was over, they busted out the Marvel. At first they were talking about running a tournament for that game as well just for fun but in the end they just opted to run casuals all night. I got lots of games in against various people. My team last time I played was Lei Lei/MODOK/Ammy but I dropped MODOK cuz hes just too awkward to control right now and id rather just learn the game and have fun. I picked up Dante for the time being so I ran the team Lei Lei/Dante/Ammy. I will probably eventually replace Dante with someone else but hes fun enough for now and not too difficult to use on a basic level. I won every single match I played except for 2 matches I played against this one dude who had Phoenix on his team and killed me in the end with Dark Phoenix both times in close matches.

Of course, I was drinking the whole time (I started drinking on the train ride to Tokyo and never really stopped, lol) so I was good and buzzed and had a fun time. I ate a good ammount of pizza too.

Since this was the last Final Roundbats of the season, they will be taking a break for a couple of months and reboot it sometime in maybe May or June. They might have some other events during that gap but im not sure. Scott was talking about trying to get a drunken flag football game going in Yoyogi park. While im not too much into playing sports, if I have nothing else to do on that day I might go just to hang out and get drunk and get a little excersize for once, but its too early to say cuz I might have more important things to do whenever they run it (like GG tournaments or something).

The party lasted until 10. Jude, the Claw player, decided to go drinking with me. We headed to Current where we met up with Emmet who rolled in with a group of people from the international party. One was a girl he was trying to get with and then there were like 2 other guys or something who sorta just tagged along to come drinking I guess. A few regulars were there, too. After not too long, some other random girl who was at the same international party that Emmet and them were at came and sat with us... except she didnt even go with them. We figured she must have followed them there like some sorta weird stalker but she claims that she has been to Current before and that it was just a coincidence (though I have never seen her there before and I am there almost every weekend). We sat for a bit at the tables in the back and chilled but then Emmet's crew all left after like an hour or 2. The strange stalker girl stayed. We still had time before the trains stopped and Emmet had some discount coupons to get into Camelot in Shibuy for 2000 yen with 2 drinks, which isnt a bad deal, so we decided to go there.

When we got to Shinjuku station and were waiting on the train platform, Emmet, Jude, and I were doing most of the talking and the stalker girl just wasnt really trying to make an effort to be part of the conversation, even though I remember some of us at least saying something to her here and there to try and include her. Suddenly she just starts crying and says shes going home and just leaves. It was random as hell. Soon after, the train came and we headed to Shibuya.

I went to Camelot once a long time ago with some other people and it was pretty nice for a club. Im not much of a club guy but Current wasnt that booming and I dont mind a change of atmosphere sometimes. So Emmet, Jude, and I just drank at Camelot all night. We talked with some random girls and all that and got good and drunk cuz Emmet and I snuck in some small whiskey bottles that we slammed in the bathroom. Emmet was talking with some girl for a really long time and eventually we didnt know where they went. Im still unsure if he went home with her or just got lost somewhere else in the club. When 5 rolled around, the place closed so Jude and I just headed out. He went back home and I crashed at the manga kissa in Shibuya.

The next morning I woke up and headed to this one nice book store in Shinjuku. I wanted to buy a new Japanese study book cuz I have been a little lazy and unmotivated with studying ever since I took the JLPT N2 (which I failed as expected, btw). I found a book that looks pretty decent which is designed to help study for the JLPT N2. I havnt used it yet cuz I was pretty busy at work yesterday and today but I will start using it either after im done typing this or tomorrow. Hopefully it ends up being decent, but it wasnt very expensive so whatever. Hopefully it will motivate me and help me study for the next time I try to take the JLPT.

Anyway, after buying the book, I went to Shinjuku Sportsland to kill a little time playing GG. I decided I wanted to just go home early today and chill with Ryoko cuz there wasnt really anything special going on. I played there for about an hour while I waited for the next convenient train time. I went undefeated the hour I was there playing. It was mostly some Chipp player who kept playing me but there were a couple other guys like some Sol, a Johnny, a Testament, and a Dizzy.

After I left Sportsland, I just got on the train and headed up and spent the rest of the evening with Ryoko.

So, next weekend is the final singles ranbats for the Johnny-o cup tournament series. If I place high enough theres a decent chance I may actually be able to play in the final even but im just gonna show up and play and see what happens and have fun and maybe something cool will come of it. (At the time of writing this blog they still havnt updated the Johnny-o cup sight from last week where I got 4th but hopefully they will do it soon.)