japan in general is quite an interesting country. it systematically mixes old conformist proud tradition with new innovative chaos. People create more work than necessary for themselves (people who shout and announce things near the countless number of drug and convienience stores, quite unnecessary) yet those people still feel great pride and joy in their useless job. The best is the middle man in the street cars of hiroshima, who passes up and down calling things on the radio and pushing buttons that emit sound to somewhat meaningless result. Whether or not he was there doing what he was so proud of doing, would not make a difference at all.
Otherwise the best way of conceptualizing japan is its intense sensual information. As you walk down busy streets you hear 50 different types of music (each little store has its own little boom box emiting music), the sound of people and plenty of neon lights. Lights of all kinds, advertising what the shop sold, advertising store names, advertising specific brands held in the store. As far as visual and audio marketing its like american times 1000. A lot of shops have video game sounding recordings playing on the store house speakers above, little 10 inch tv’s embedded in the shelves with a looping add for certain products and some guy on a megaphone announcing deals and special offers. Of course all of this sensual information with the added bonus of not understanding the words heard or being able to read the signs of both advertisement and product information it creates a chaotic jumble that is difficult to sort out.
Its just a lot of things all at once. The first few days we walked around tokyo we would feel drained after about 5 hours, usually cutting out our busily planned days in half due to the overload of sensual stimuli and its draining on the attention and energy levels. After sometime you get used to it and do what the japanese people do and ignore it.
However one thing hard to ignore is the way they go overboard on christmas. As david mentioned to me today, its almost as if they are trying to fit in with the rest of the world, doing it because they are supposed to od it because everyone is doing it. From a billion different versions of Christmas carols that literally haunt you the entire day (theres no way of escaping it wherever you are) or the brilliant excessive lights that expose more neon brightness to the eyes. I mean it adds christmas spirit in the conventional sense but i dont believe it affects anyone here in the way it was initially intended, or means the same. It seems to be purely on the superficial level.
Other than that japan is really good. Like any unfamiliar culture theres so much that confuses on the surface but you realy need to understand them below the surface before the top layer makes sense. I havnt really begun that process but its quite interesting nonetheless. People are generally extremely humble and polite but i get the feeling they keep their own true thoughts to themselves.
Friday night we went to Karaoke. That was one really fun night. It is something we have always heard the japanese and generally the east asians are obssessed about. I remember two years ago when I went to singapoore I bumped into a few karaoke bars where the locals were going nuts singing emotionally fused chinese songs. well here was gonna be my first japanese experience. We went with this local guy called hiro, some of his friends and us, all in all there was about 8. We picked up a few drinks first (we needed something to sooth the hesitation and add a dash of careless confidence before we could properly let loose. it was really cool because in japan the way they do it is they allow you to have a private room for a few hours, so for 4 hours 8 of us were in this special room. It was equipped with two microphones, a few song books (in english) and drinks upon order. the first few songs took a while to come out, we were all a bit nervous about singing in our horrible voices infront of others. But in my opinion the bubble burst when our generation’s legendary teenage classic “Oasis – wonderwall” came on at that moment every one in the room sang at the top of their lungs. It was at that moment that I felt (and i believe everyone else felt) I can do this, i can sing infront of these people, who cares, i know the words. From then on it went in a circular rotation, bam bam one song after another, some duets, some solos. all our classics came up. Aerosmith – dont wanna miss a thing, Coolio – Gangsta’s paradise, Backstreet Boys – I Want It That Way, Marilyn Manson – Sweet Dreams, Green Day – Basketcase, the list went on and on and on. It was freakin fantastic. The more we sang, the more we drank, the easier things became.
A very very good japanese night. It was especially un because i got to connect strongly with david, something that hadnt been done in quite a while. Always good. Saturday night jack made some awesome Nabe, which was delicious. we played the card game “500” till the wee hours of the morning.
Other Highlights of Tokyo include sunday’s trip to Harajuku. It was a pretty awesome day, a visitation of rebelious culture. One that I find so amazing especially within the strict, no one steps out of bounds, japanese moral ethic. Here are these extreme teenagers that go all wacko. However i must say, sadly a bunch of it has been built up soo much in the international community, im sure the majority of the girls who dress up know about it and parade around knowing tourists from around the world come and seek them out for photos and stories. Street performers however always amuse me with their antics. With their creative spirit.
My favorite part was going into Yoyogi park where it was a lot more low key but a lot more realistic feeling of the spreading of creative arts. there was a band playing in one corner, a guy walking his many dogs in another, people practicing marshal arts, another group of school kids hanging about, some people playing instruments and practicing magic tricks in others. It was a very free spirited arena, something which got me very excited about the culture as it usually does. I dont know what it is but creative free spirit of humans attracts me greatly. The idea that people can break away from the blandness of everyday life and invent this alternate world, alternative lifestyle where they can make arts and pure entertainment mainly for themselves and for the few that will take the time out of their busy lives to listen to what they have to say/do/feel/make. I think this is especially representative in music, which is probably one of the reasons i like it so much.
But anyway this park was awesome. Not only was the creative spirits that roamed around but the trees, the leaves, the water and general atmosphere was so warm yet so foreign and different. So beautiful in its own right, nothing was overly systematic or generic. It was definitely a pleasant experience walking through that area.
on monday had made plans to take the shinkansen to Hiroshima where more adventures would be pursued. hiroshima to kyoto to nara to nagano. i shall report more from the road.
heliographic messages of worldly adventures 
