Genghis Kong vs. The Fly

Greetings Earthlings!

I had a thought earlier that struck me as somewhat interesting. Or at least it struck me as something vaguely akin to interesting.

I have a friend, and she is a Muslim. Now if I say Muslim woman, it's possible that some of you will think of something like this:


But actually you couldn't be further from the truth. She is an extremely liberated, left-wing, bisexual feminist, who drinks alcohol and uses drugs. But she won't eat pork, because she's a Muslim.

It just struck me as odd that she adheres so strictly to the avoidance of pork (she won't even eat something that's been cooked with or near pork), but somehow the prohibition of all narcotics doesn't seem to all that important. I'm no Islamic scholar, but as I understand it Muslims avoid pork because it is 'unclean', whereas alcohol and drugs are 'abominations'. So why is she avoiding the unclean in favour of the abominable?

Curious behaviour. It just goes to reinforce my general belief that people (on the whole) are crazy.

As an amusing sidenote, the word 'alcohol' actually comes from Arabic, despite its consumption being prohibited by Islam. The story goes that when the prophet Muhammad was decrying the evils of drinking, he just said the most loathsome, disgusting, abominable syllables that he could think of at the time, which happened to be 'Qohol'. 'Al' is Arabic for 'the', and the name stuck: 'al-qohol'.

I like to imagine how this might have ended up had Muhammad's first language been Modern English.

"Drink not of these wines and liquors - they cloud the brain, inflame lust and violent passions, and lead the heart away from the light of Allah. They are a false happiness, and their use can only lead you to the Devil. I shall call this wicked liquor... BLEURGH"

And for the rest of time the world would be calling alcohol "thebleurgh". In chemistry, alcohols would no longer take the suffix '-ol', but 'eurgh': ethaneurgh, methaneurgh, even mentheurgh to keep you minty fresh. People in support groups around the world would be introducing themselves thus: "Hi everyone, my name's Gary, and I'm a Thebleurghic."

I suppose, ultimately, it wouldn't actually make a material difference to anyone's life, but it amuses me nonetheless.

Now, I am not alone as I write this blog. In fact, I am accompanied by hundreds of tiny helpers. No - I haven't lost my mind or contacted the spirit realm, I just have a fruit fly infestation in my room. I have been battling these tiny bastards for about a week now, and let me say, they are one of the most persistent and irritating adversaries I have ever faced. The only real remedy for fruit flies, I think, is prolonged and rigorous cleanliness, but every time I think I've finally got my room completely clear of any food waste, there's something I've missed and then I'm back to square one. Last week I thought I had the bastards beat - I had done all my washing up, emptied all my bins, so food lying around, everything clean, and there were hardly any flies left. I noticed there were still a few buzzing around my bins, but assumed that they would die soon. But then I noticed that they weren't actually buzzing around the bins, they were buzzing around the rice cooker that is next to my bins. That's when I saw them crawling in and out of the steam vent in the top of the rice cooker. With trepidation I lifted the lid and a whole swarm of tiny black bastard fruit flies swarmed up to meet me. Fuck.

Again, today, I thought I had got rid of the flies. Then I opened my school bag to discover yesterday's lunchbox and a horde of evil little insects. Fuck.

I've bought something that claims to be a fly trap, but aside from the fact that it doesn't seem to have any means of actually trapping the flies, it doesn't even seem to be succesfully attracting them. The one place in my room where I can guarantee there are no flies is the damn fly trap. I keep burning mosquito coils too, and the mosquito coils at least seem to bother the flies a bit - I like to think I'm pissing them off - but it doesn't seem to bother them enough to make them leave or make them die, so it's ultimately not a very effective solution.

If anyone has any top tips for how to get rid of flies, they would be very much appreciated!

In other news of ineteresting or exciting things, on Friday I have been invited to speak at a drinks reception for University of Sheffield alumni at offices of the British Council in Tokyo - very exciting! I hope I can still remember how to hobnob with bigwigs in polite society... It's been a while since I had to make polite conversation with anyone. Hopefully this will be a good opportunity to make some contacts with people in prestigious companies and such - perhaps I'll be able to score myself some kind of internship or something! Or perhaps I'll get really nervous and accidentally drink too much and embarass myself. That would be fun too.

Now I just need to find myself a smart shirt. Dress code is lounge suits - which I understand to mean 'ordinary suits' - but I don't have a shirt that fits. I'm also wondering whether or not to wear my bright yellow rubber Casio watch. Should I go for smart and understated, or slightly wacky and multicoloured. If I paired the yellow watch with bright yellow socks, would that make it better?

Anyway - I'm going to sign off for now. The smell of the mosquito coil is making me feel decidedly unwell, so I'm going to go somewhere for some fresh air. Maybe I'll go get a coffee and read my book. Incidentally, I am currently reading a book called Silk by a man called Alessandro Barrico, and I would like to recommend it in the highest possible term to all and sundry. It's very short, and written in a very simple, plain style, but it manages to be absolutely enchanting in its simplicity. It's also set in Japan, so it manages to encompass virtually everything I look for in a novel - short, not originally in English, and relating to Japan.

(That's me practicing for polite conversation, by the way. How did I do?)

Farewell my darlings!

and R.I.P Michael Jackson!



love
Genghis xx

Genghis Kong vs. Rikkyo University

The more astute among you may have noticed that haven't blogged for a while. I would cite the usual excuses, but I think we can probably skip that part and move on, okay?

It is June already - a fact which has taken me very much by surprise. I think by the time June has come around no one can pretend it's late Spring any more; it is most emphatically Summer now. In England, of course, Summer and June are synonymous with sunshine, barbecues, afternoons in beer gardens, bumblebees in the garden and all such idyllic scenes of British summer. Not so in Tokyo, I'm afraid, where Summer is a by-word for sweltering heat and humidity and June signals not the start of the barbecue season, but of the rainy season.

No, Summer is not Tokyo's finest season. The weather in Spring was extremely fine, but it's more-or-less downhill from here until September now. Nothing but rain, steam and heatstroke to look forward too for the next 8 weeks.

That's right, in only 8 weeks (actually, slightly less than 8 weeks) I shall be returned to England and celebrating a Birthday in the garden/park/pub/gutter (probably in that order). It seems extraordinarily soon now, although I must admit my feelings about that are mixed. I shan't deny that I am extremely keen to get home - I miss my family, my friends, my home and just being with my own people. My own sarcastic, cynical, bitter, alcohol-dependent countrymen with whom I have so much in common.

But despite my desire to be back on Her Majesty's soil, I can't help but feel that I have not yet achieved all that I set to in Japan. Indeed, I have achieved virtually nothing that I set out to, and i can't shake the feeling that my return home to England will be tinged with regret at having (as I see it) wasted a year of my life, not to mention a great opportunity to improve myself (and, of course, my Japanese). I don't quite know where it all went awry... When I first got to Japan I spent a lot of time with Japanese people - you may remember the IFL from earlier blog posts - but rapidly came to the conclusion that I didn't like them, so I basically stopped socialising with any Japanese people. Now, I'm not saying that I don't like any Japanese people, just that I don't much like the IFLs and I failed to find any better Japanese with which to replace them.

And so I came to socialise almost exclusively with Americans, which really does defeat the purpose of spending a year in Japan.

I went to Yokohama National University last weekend to drink with my mate James, and there I got a glimpse of what could have been. My university, Rikkyo, is an elite Tokyo private university with a very small student body. It owns an elementary school, a middle school and a high school which feed directly into it, and creates a student populace of incredibly sheltered, unworldly, small-minded, posh, rich Tokyoites with whom I can't find any common ground. They have such a sheltered, simplistic view of the world that conversing with them is really more akin to talking to children than university students, and in general I just find them infantile, shallow and uninteresting. Clearly, there are a few who are aberrations in this society of wide-eyed but tiny-minded children, and as far as possible I try to hang out with them, but overall my attempts to socialise with Rikkyo students have been largely unsuccessful.

Yokohama National University, by contrast, is a large state-funded university - neither elite nor Tokyo-based - and as far as I can tell is populated by a throng of rowdy drunkards, musicians, dance crews, bums and (presumably) a few serious students. In short, roughly what a student body ought to be. I can't help but feel that had I gone to Yoko Uni instead, I might have made more of myself this year. But there's nothing to be done about it now, and no sense in regretting a decision which was almost entirely out of my control. Besides, if I had gone to Yokohama I know for ceratin that I would have had no money and would have been living in the grottiest dormitories imaginable.

This is a picture of Yokohama University. Those signs say 'Tequila'. I think these men were associated with the Rock Music Society or something, and that's why they were selling me tequila. Or something. Either way, they were selling tequila with no shirts on.

You see what I mean? This university is clearly made for me! Alcohol and shirtless men? It's perfect!

Aside from my trip to Yokohama, my life has taken on a fairly mundane rhythm. It involves mostly going to school, going to the gym and going to karaoke. And eating. That's pretty much it. However, I have replaced variety of activities in my life with sheer quantity of the only four things I do. Except school - I still just do the bare minimum of school. But I go to the gym 2-3 hours a day, 6 days a week, I go to karaoke 2-3 times a week, for 5-7 hours at a time, and I aim to eat between 5 and 7 meals a day. By the time I get back to England I am going to be weirdly muscular and incredibly good at singing karaoke. I'm a little bit concerned about my rapid musculation - I find the idea of me being all ripped and muscley and what-not to be really quite disturbing. Check out my muscular back:


Sorry about the weird angle - taking a photo of your own back is rather tricky.

But anyway, if I keep working out at this rate for the next 2 months, there's a definite risk that I'll be getting rather buff by the time I come home. I don't think I'm mentally prepared for that.

Here's a picture of my 2 most stalwart karaoke companions. We've got some seriously deep three-part harmonies going on. You've never heard Kiss From a Rose or Can You Feel the Love Tonight sound so good.


Ummm... No homo, okay?

And here's a photo of my balls in a dude's face. Again, no homo.


And essentially that is what I've been doing recently.

Hope you all are well.
Write soon,
love

Genghis Kong xx.

Genghis Kong vs. X-Box Live

Okay, so to quickly finish off the episode of my family coming to visit in as short a time as possible: We had a really cool time in Tokyo, then Oli went back to England. Mum and Dad and I then went off on another jaunt round central and western Honshu following a similar, although slightly different, general itinerary to mine and Oli's trip - Kyoto first, then Nara, Himeji and finally Hiroshima. Even though I had just been around most of those places with Oli, we stayed in different areas and went to see different sights so I still had a really interesting time. Of course, travelling with the parents meant that I was also eating extremely well and staying in relative luxury, which was wonderful (especially in comparison to the rather small and damp apartment/bedroom/hovel I live in in Tokyo).

3 Highlights of my trip with Mum and Dad:

1. The Dattan Matsuri festival in Nara.
By pure coincidence we arrived in Nara on the last day of a 2-week long festival, which ends with a dramatic closing ceremony. We were, unfortunately, clueless to this fact and very nearly missed the whole thing, except that when we asked the Ryokan staff to serve us our dinner at 7pm they turned to one another and muttered something about "They're not going to the festival? Are you sure? They're really not going up to the temple?". Eventually we discovered that there was this event going so we rescheduled dinner for earlier and after eating we all but ran the 2 miles or so uphill through the park to try and catch the festival. Even so, we arrived just as it was ending, and only caught the last few moments of what must have been a spectacular sight.

The ceremony consists of the monks lighting on fire several enormous 8-metre long torches and then running circuits around the temple veranda with them while crowd of pilgrims/tourists (the line between these two categories is extremely blurred) is gathered below. It is a festival for the protection of children, I think, but anyway it is considered lucky if the falling cinders land on your child's head, so the onlooking worshippers actively try to catch falling fire using their children's faces.

I'm afraid I didn't get any good photos of it myself, but here's a stock photo from the internet to give you an idea of what it looked like:
The next day we went back up to the temple and collected little bits of burnt cedar from the torches for luck - I've got one attached to my phone!

2. Himeji Castle.
As I think I mentioned in my last post, Himeji is just an awesome sight. Really, truly beautiful and magnificent and breathtaking. What really makes the visit though is the volunteer guides that show you around. Without them it would be impressive, and a great photo opportunity, but the guides show you the intricacies of the design and the ingenious strategic devices built into the castle layout to deter intruders, and all kinds of extra little background information. That said, I noticed that the two different guides I had gave us entirely different tours filled with entirely different little nuggets of wisdom and tidbits of information, some of which directly contradicted each other or even directly contradicted the information plaques around the castle!

So a fascinating tour, but not neccessarily a strictly factual one.

Incidentally, anyone hoping to visit Himeji in the near future: do it this summer, because after this year it is undergoing massive restoration work to the main keep and will be closed and under scaffolding for 5 years. You have been warned.

3. Hiroshima
Hiroshima was pretty amazing, but for completely different reasons. Despite all the hilariously tasteless jokes I might make about the bombs (I was going to change my name on facebook to Hereward 'A-Bomb' Feldwick before I went, ho ho), actually visiting Hiroshima was a deeply affecting and sobering experience. We actually spoke to some A-Bomb survivors about their experiences which was rather grim and harrowing, and it is shoking to think how recent and how utterly devastating it was. Seeing the A-Bomb dome and feeling first-hand the blast marks where the heat waves from the bomb had caused gravestones to shatter really brought it home and made it seem much more real.

Top bit in Hiroshima? Seeing groups of smiling American tourists posing for photos in front of the Cenotaph - the mass grave for all the unrecorded victims of the Hiroshima bombing. Something about that scene just struck me as remarkably tasteless. I mean, in their defense I think it was their Japanese friend actually taking the picture for them, so it seems to be a collective obliviousness to possible deeper layers of meaning shared by Japanese and Americans alike. I think to most people it's just another tourist spot to tick off the list and get the photo.

Again, my photography around Hiroshima wasn't really up to much, so here is someone else's photo of the A-Bomb Dome for you to consider:


So anyway, after a few more days in Tokyo my parents went back home to England and I was left to get on with the ordinary humdrum everyday business of living in Tokyo. You know: wake up, wash, eat, go to the gym, eat, look at facebook, eat, have some beers, watch the Daily Show, eat, sleep and repeat ad nauseam. The most exciting developments in my life over the last couple of weeks have been my first tentative steps into horticulture and my purchase of a Super Nintendo.

I'm growing some tomato and chili plants from seed. It's all terribly exciting. They're living in eggboxes on my windowsill at the moment, soaking up as much sun as their little tiny leaves are able. I'm optimistic that I might start getting actual fruits from them before I have to go back to England, which will be a great thrill! Okay, this may not sound exciting to most of you, but considering I've been middle aged since the age of about 13 the idea of growing my own vegetables is honestly the very peak of excitement for me. Once I've got my own house and garden I'm going to grow all manner of vegetables and I'm going to keep half a dozen ducks for eggs and meat. I've already got it all planned out: house, wife, 4 kids, vegetable patch, ducks, lots of cats, maybe even a dog.

I also bought a Super Nintendo, and it is honestly the very finest purchase I have made for a very long time. In my opinion, it is immeasurably more fun than any of the new hi-tech machines that everyone raves about these days. I mean, so what if you've got the most advanced first-person shooter or the most realistic driving simulator in the world - I've got Super Metroid and F-Zero, and they're awesome! You can take your X-Box Live and shove it up your arse.

Right - I'd better go to bed. Once again I didn't manage to write what i had been planning to. What I had meant to write about was the enormous penis festival I went to today, but I got all caught up recapping events up to that moment. I have my placement test for Semester 2 tomorrow morning and I don't want to stay up too late writing, so that tale will have to wait for another time - hopefully not long.

Here's a little teaser for you:



So I'll leave you with that.

Wish me luck on my exam!

*Special Preview* Genghis Kong vs. Snow, Gravity, Mountains and all things slidey

*SPECIAL PREVIEW*

*NEVER-BEFORE-SEEN PHOTOGRAPHS*

*ONLY AT HTTP://GENGHISKONGVS.BLOGSPOT.COM*

Dear fans,

After a long hiatus (almost a whole month!), Genghis Kong will be returning with the long-awaited next installment of his best-selling blog/philosophical memoir, Genghis Kong Vs. MegaTokyo.

The next thrilling episode will chart Genghis' progress through the gruelling ordeal of final exams at an elite Tokyo university, his subsequent adventures as a free-operating cool young thing in the world's coolest city and finally his epic ascent of the imposing Mt. Hishigaoka in Japan's remote Niigata Highlands.

You can look forward to:

• Thrilling Suspense!
• Incredible Extreme Sports Action!
• Pseudo-Romance!
• Unfathomable Gluttony!
• Inadvisable Alcohol Consumption!
• Health, Beauty and Weight-Loss Tips!

All this and more is waiting for you in the upcoming edition of Genghis Kong Vs. MegaTokyo (release date TBC).

And if all that isn't enough to entice you, here are some brand-new, never-before-seen EXPLICIT photographs of Genghis Kong on his adventures to whet your appetite even more! Read Genghis Kong vs. MegaTokyo to find out the REAL story behind these SHOCKING images!



Is Genghis about to be out-eaten by this mysterious fur-coated challenger?




A dancing drunkard and his pet bronze dog, but is this unlikely duo an ally to our hero, or a dangerous new menace?




Strange markings appear on his leg. Is this a message from some higher being? A tattoo of St. George's Cross gone horribly, horribly wrong? An extremely unusual pattern of bruising?

Find the answers to these and many more mysteries ONLY in Genghis Kong Vs. MegaTokyo.

COMING SOON!

[Editor's Note:

Hullo chums,

I just got back from Snowboarding this evening. I currently experiencing a very high level of physical pain in most parts of my body, but I don't seems to have come to any significant lasting harm. Within a few days the aching will have worn off and I'll be fit as a fiddle again - have no fear!

I have much to write about, but the hour grows late and I am weary from long days' travel and travail so I shall leave the bulk of my update until the morning. I just thought I would leave this little teaser-trailer up here to (hopefully) keep you all amused until then and maybe encourage you to come back and have a little look again tomorrow.

In brief: all is well, but I am tired. More on those stories tomorrow.

Much love,
Genghis Kong x]

Genghis Kong vs. Arianna Huffington

Dear World,

I have just watched today's edition of The Daily Show with John Stewart (if you don't already watch this programme religiously - or at least cultishly - you really, really ought to. It's the only source of American political news I trust.) On today's edition (December the 3rd; actually yesterday thanks to the 15 hour time difference between me and New York) a lovely lady called Arianna Huffington appeared to promote her new book about blogging. She told me that the key to blogging is spontaneity and not thinking too much about what you write, so here I am, spontaneously not thinking about what I'm writing. Apparently blogging is supposed to be like an intimate conversation, without any of the intimacy (it's so convenient having someone tell me exactly how I'm supposed to act and think - it was getting confusing having to work it out on my own.) So I'm going to try a semi-spontaneous off-the-cuff post, currently having little idea what the actual content of this is going to be.

Because that, apparently, is blogging.

Also, spontaneous stream-of-consciousness blogging rather precludes self-censorship, so if anything unsavoury comes up: sorry, parents.

I have recently been amused by the merry spin Japan puts on alcoholism. Firstly, alcohol is advertised widely, proudly and without 'drink responsibly' tags attached to all the ads. As far as I can tell there are no real regulations to alcohol advertising, and on my way to school I pass many 30-foot-wide billboards extolling the virtues of Japan's many fine beers. Which can, when I am trying not to drink (a frequent struggle) be more than slightly troublesome, although I have to say I feel it more keenly on my way home from school in the evening than on my way to school at 8.30 in the morning (I'm not THAT bad... yet...)

Secondly, there are the wonderful, uplifting messages printed on Japanese beer cans which make the whole idea of getting drunk seems so much more appealing. Asahi Clear have clearly paid someone who can actually speak English to write theirs:
Clear Asahi is brewed with select barley malt, hops and grains by using our pure cultured yeast. Its unique brewing process creates a distinctively bold, clear and smooth taste.

Now that sounds pretty damn tempting, and not at all retarded.

Kirin, thankfully, has no such compunction about asking a genuine English speaker to tell them whether their beer slogans sound retarded or not.
Kirin Tanrei:
Sheer refreshment! Open up the good taste that goes perfectly with good times.
Kirin Green Label:
Green label brings you a comfortable time. The refreshing taste cheers your mind.
Kirin Nodogoshi Nama (their cheapest beer-flavoured brew):
Kirin's brewing technology elaborates the Nodogoshi!
And my personal favourite, on Kirin Strong Seven (that's their tramp-flavoured 7% ABV beer-flavoured beverage):
This hard and clear taste brings you the great feeling. (No messing. No apologies. Hard. Clear. By 'great feeling' I presume they mean 'numb to the outside world')

I honestly didn't think anyone could make super lager sound appealing, but somehow these tricksy Japs have achieved it (nom nom nom).

To continue my discussion of how GOD DAMNED CRAZY these people are, allow me to tell you of the fabulous drink known as 'a Hoppy'.

No doubt you are all familiar with the concept of an alcohol-free beer. They are those mysteriously overpriced, sad-looking bottles of misery that live in the fridges of many nightclubs and are never bought by anyone. They are the social outcasts of the beverages world. Even amongst the alcohol-free clique of drinks, they are shunned. I mean, J2O may be alcohol-free, but compared to low-alcohol lager it's the coolest girl at the party. To offer a badly-thought-out American-high-school analogy, J2O is known to be a geek and a loser, but someone caught low-alcohol lager masturbating in the school toilets 2 years ago, and no-one has spoken to him since. That's how low low-alcohol lager is in the grand hierarchy of drinks.

And yet in Japan there is an alcohol-free beer known as 'Hoppy' which is widely popular. Many bars hang banners outside their premises advertising that they sell Hoppy. Let me tell you now that Japan is not a nation of teetotallers. Their drinking culture differs from ours in many significant ways, but no one could accuse the Japs of not liking a wee drink or two every now and then/every night of the week.

You see, the thing is, 'Hoppy' is an alcohol-free beer, but 'a Hoppy' from a bar is something rather different.

'A Hoppy' (I shit you not) is a chilled bottle of Hoppy alcohol-free beer, served in a chilled glass tankard, with a large chilled measure of Shochu (liquor) stirred into it. Shochu is Japan's rough liquor - it is diatilled from grain or potatoes and fills the role of Vodka in Japanese society. It's only 25%(ish) but has no significant flavouor and is cheap as dirt.

So basically, what I'm getting at is: alcohol-free beer + alcohol = commercial success in Japan.

...??!!///...?...........

B... Wha...?

Utterly baffling. What can I say.

Right - school tomorrow, so I shall start signing off.

I shall firstly bring to all of your attentions the 'Get Journey's "Don't Stop Believing" to be Christmas number one!' campaign, which is a serious issue in which I believe very strongly. I urge all of you who read to this join the Facebook group, invite all of your Facebook friends to join the group, and then to actually buy the single (wait until after December 15th otherwise it won't count for Christmas no. 1).

Honestly, I adore this song more than almost any other and I would be utterly beside myself with joy if it were Christmas number 1 this year. I'm not sure if they're actually re-releasing it as a single, but the charts include download sales these days, so if everyone just downloads it from iTunes then it could make it.

Come on people: we can do this!!!

Also, if anyone wants christmas prezzies please give me a shout what Jappy stuff you fancy - if it's cheap enough you might just get your wish! (seriously, this country is DAMN expensive and I'm running out of cash fast, so keep 'em small if you want any chance of getting your wish.)

So there you are. That's it. All that remains is to say that I wrote this post while drunk with absolutely no forethought, and I feel it's possibly one of my better ones, so please COMMENT and give me feedback about how you feel about it.

Also...

wait a minute...

I've forgotten what I was about to write,

but don't worry,

it'll come back to me in a moment, I'm sure...

...

...

Oh yeah, I remember!

Don't stop believing,
Hold on to that feeeling,
Streetlights, people,
Ah a-ah a-ah a-ah



Love, love, love,
Wood, wood, wood,
X, x, x

PS. Journey at number 1 would be the best Christmas present ever. Don't forget it.

PPS. I'll try to do a more 'newsy' post soon, to let you all know what I'm actually doing with myself. a bit. if any of you actually cares *sob sob*

Genghis Kong vs. Bodhidharma

I went to Sensouji temple in Asakusa the other day (classes haven't started yet so I've got quite a bit of free time for sightseeing/drinking). Sensouji is one of the oldest temples in Tokyo (it's probably not actually old - everthing old in Tokyo was destroyed during the War - but it's a recontruction of a very old temple) and it is famous for the long avenue leading up to it which is lined on both sides by small stalls and vendors selling tat to tourists and idiots.

This is actually very traditional. We all know the Japanese love being tourists and love buying tat, and apparently this has been the case for centuries and there has always been a market for selling naff little souvenirs to happy Jappy tourists.

So I bought myself a Daruma doll. <history lesson> Daruma is the Japanese name for Bodhidharma, the Bodhisattva who founded the school of Zen. He is often (falsely) credited with introducing tea to China. Daruma dolls are popular lucky charms in Japan to help people achieve targets, goals or wishes. </history lesson>
Here he is, looking all grumpy on my shelf, staring at me disapprovingly.



The more astute among you will observe that he has only one eye. This is how Daruma dolls work - when you buy them their eyes are white. When you make a wish/set yourself a target, you colour in one eye and when you achiece that target you colour in the other. Mine is a boring wish - that of learning 1325 Kanji by February (63 Kanji a week!) - but I like his silly face so I decided to show him to you all anyway.

While at Sensouji temple I decided, upon further reflection, that in fact my phone was not nearly gay enough at all, so I decided to invest in some small dangly things to hang from the back of it (this is what japanese school girls do, I believe).



From left to right you have a large red lantern, a small pink thunder god and a small blue wind god (these three guard the Tenmon Thunder Gate at Sensouji Temple), followed by a glass of beer and some yakitori (chicken on a stick). If you look closely, you can also see a can of Asahi reflected in the shiny shiny pink of my shiny gay phone.

In terms of what I've actually been up to since I got here, there's been a lot of orientation meetings, registration meetings, filling out of forms, applications for insurance and other fun things. These have, of course, been interspersed with the violent outbursts of drunken rage and uncensored eroticism for which I have become so famous (and loved).

I've decided that most of the internationals aren't actually that bad (a couple of them really are that bad), but I think I definitely need to go and find myself some Japs to hang out with. This weekend I'm planning to go down to Yokohama to visit my friend Lora who I met when I was in Japan 2 years ago, and hopefully there'll be lots of friendly Japs down there for me to befriend/intimidate/interfere with.

Classes start on Monday, which I'm actually quite looking forward to, but until then I've got most of the week off. I don't quite know what I'm going to do with myself for a week. I can't get drunk (all the Internationals frown on excessive drinking outside of the weekend, so I've no one to get drunk with), so i might have to do some sightseeing or something. Or maybe even studying, although that doesn't seem likely.

Actually this brings me on to another point, and an opportunity to get some audience participation into the blog: I now have a pretty good idea of my timetable for the next 5 months, and it features 9am lectures 5 days a week, but not a lot of other lessons. This means I'm going to be awake with nothing much to do a lot of the time so I'd like to open up the floor to suggestions of good hobbies i could take up. Some suggestions I have come up with so far:

• Become a really bad otaku (Japanese for geek - it involves reading a lot of manga, watching a lot of anime, watching a lot of hentai, socialising very little etc.)
• Become an intensely self-destructive alcoholic
• Become a pachinko addict (pachinko is very confusing Japanese gambling game-thing, a little like pinball crossed with slot machines crossed with epilepsy)
• Take up a sport (PAH!)

Any further suggestions would be welcome, as I'm not convinced I like the sound of any of these.

I guess i ought to show you some pictures of Tokyo, rather than boring pictures of crap in my bedroom so here you are:

Sensouji Temple (and the boulevard of Tourist Tat leading up to it)







My School



Some views of Tokyo at night (Shinjuku and Ikebukuro East)










There you are: photos. I hope you're happy now.

I've also been practicing for karaoke a lot. Somehow I've managed to be in Japan for pretty much a whole week and I still haven't done any karaoke. I need to sort that out. But anyway, I decided it would be a good idea to learn some Japanese songs for karaoke in Japan. The first is a very old Japanese song, and the only Japanese language song to make it to number 1 in America. The second is some recent J-pop tosh, but out of all the recent J-pop tosh i could be bothered to listen to, this was among the best. It's dead hard to sing though.





Unfortunately I'm not really allowed to sing in my room because the walls are so thin and someone might be trying to sleep next door, so I've been practicing karaoke-whispering. We'll have to see how it goes down when i try it out at full volume.

Right. I'm getting bored of writing, and no doubt you're getting bored of reading, so i'll call it a night.

Many thanks to Jimmy here for finding me a seriously awesome theme tune to sign off with:

Dsching-, Dsching-, Dschinghis Khan
He Reiter - Ho Reiter - He Reiter - Immer weiter!
Dsching-, Dsching-, Dschinghis Khan
Auf Brüder! - Sauft Brüder! - Rauft Brüder! - Immer wieder!

(Geng-, Geng-, Genghis Khan
Hey rider - Ho rider - Hey rider - ever further!
Geng-, Geng-, Genghis Khan
On brothers! - Drink brothers! - Fight brothers! - Again and again!)



Love and love,
Genghis

Genghis Kong vs. Rob da Bank's Underwater Army

I have just got back from my weekend at Bestival on the Isle of Wight. I have come home a day early for a number of reasons, first among which is that I need to sort my life out before I go to Japan. Also, by coming home a day early I get out of having to clean out, put down and pack up the tent. Ha.

Bestival
Festival: 9/10
Weather: 2.5/10
Overall: 7/10

As you can see, the weather was a significant factor in reducing my enjoyment of the weekend. Having said that, I really ought to be grateful that it wasn't raining when we were putting up the tent, and also that our new massive 8-man behemoth tent was really pretty good, and I managed to keep my bed dry-ish. It really did piss it down though, for at least the first couple of days.

We got there on Thursday after a pretty long bit of travelling (longer for the Liverpool and Sheffield contingents than for me) at a moment when it wasn't raining, and just as they opened the new campsite right next to the festival entrance, so our timing was perfect and we managed to get a spot at the top of the hill and get our tent up before any rain fell. The first night, as far as I can tell, was spent mostly having a bit of a drinky drunky game, although I don't remember it too well. We definitely went off to the Big Top for a bit of a dance, until we realised that there weren't any acts on and we were just dancing to a CD which was repeating itself every 8 tracks or so.

After a pretty damn soggy start, Friday was my real grand evening of excess and wild abandon (for which I suffered dearly the following day) and we went to see Layo and Bushwacka! (I'm pretty sure the exclamation mark is officially part of his name, and not just added by me out of enthusiasm) and Erol Alkan. Layo and Bushwacka! played some really good deep, deep rolling techno and Erol was pretty good but didn't particularly blow my mind. Later there was an extended after-party at our tent because it's massive. (This is the main downside of having a massive, sturdy, dry tent - everyone uses it as a lounge, bar, emergency bunker, meeting place, refuge and general flophouse, so within a day the endless stream of drunkards and wreck-heads had turned the communal area at the centre into the most depressing array of muddy beer cans, muddy clothing, muddy wellies, muddy footprints and mud.) I got chatting to this really cool girl and we spent hours lying in my bed just giggling, chatting and shouting at my friends. No sexy times went on, I can assure you; just shit-chatting and laughing, but it was cool.

The next morning my misery began in earnest. I was feeling really unwell for some reason and was totally unable to sleep so I just lay awake for hours, watching the ceiling of my tent bow and shake in the wind, listening to the rain lashing against the canopy. It eventually dawned on me that I really, really needed a poo in the most urgent terms. I must have lain there for at least an hour just going over and over the horror of it all in my head.
"I need a poo. This requires me to:
get up
put on my horrible muddy trousers
climb over my muddy friend
find loo roll
get to the door of the tent without muddying my feet in the endless sea of filth, mess and mud
find a matching pair of wellies (my own wellies had been borrowed for the night, so I was without)
put on said wellies
find a rain poncho
go out into the rain
squelch my way amidst the guy-ropes in the dark down to the toilet
lock myself in a tiny plastic cubicle which is filled with other people's shit and doesn't even keep the rain out
squeeze out a sad, uncomfortable slug of poo into the stained plastic bowl of a chemical toilet
walk back
take off wellies (without getting feet muddy)
cross tent (without getting feet muddy)
get into bed (without getting bed muddy)
take off muddy trousers (without getting bed muddy)
lie in bed, unable to sleep, shivering with despair whilst watching the ceiling of my tent bow and shake with the wind, listening to the rain lashing against the canopy.
Oh, woe upon woe! Oh, tragedy upon tragedy! Surely no person's misery has ever been more complete."
I might also point out that I was equal parts very drunk, very hungover and very tired, which makes none of the above tasks any easier. I ended up going through this process 4 times that day. Woe upon woe indeed, and even tragedy upon tragedy. My sorrow could not be described with words, nor even reckoned by the acre, so complete was my misery.

Thus Friday brightened into a Saturday which was marked by my discomfort and sadness. On Saturday it rained a lot, and I felt very ill. I didn't get to sleep until 3.30 Saturday afternoon.

Before I managed to sleep though, I did manage to drag myself down to the Big Top to watch the Human League They were awesome, but I was so tired, sad and unwell that I could scarcely force myself to sing along with 'Don't You Want Me Baby', so my enjoyment was severely hindered by my depleted mental state. Not to worry, says I, they are playing a another, longer set later on, so I must just make sure I am well enough for that.

And thus I went to bed, and successfully slept until the Human League played again later that evening. Fortunately, this time round I was able to fully appreciate the fact that they are seriously good and I really did enjoy them. Many thanks to Jonny and Kirsty for dragging me out of the tent for that. Under my own power I fear I would have probably just spent the next 48 hours in bed complaining about my poo.

Then DJ Yoda and Shlomo did a short set which was pretty cool, but I still don't quite see the point of turntablism or beatboxing. I mean, they're both pretty impressive, but even when it's done really well the end product isn't really music at all. Some interesting noises, certainly, and I couldn't do it any better, but it's still not really real music, y'know what I mean?

Hot Chip followed the Yoda/Shlomo duet and were extremely good, as ever. They also all came out in fancy dress, which I liked, and covered Sinead O'Connor at the end of their set which I also liked. However, the sound on the main stage just wasn't loud enough, so none of these shows was quite enough to blow me away. It was good though. We then went to see Hercules And Love Affair who made me question myself (the lead singer is a really really sexy tranny. Seriously, I totally would. Really good band too), but I could not be bothered at all with Aphex Twin, who played a really boring set of nerdy techtronica which didn't go anywhere or build up to anything at all. He did have 2 professional gurners on stage pulling ugly faces at the crowd though, which is nice. Aphex Twin was boring, so I got drunk and went to bed while everyone stayed around and partied.

Sunday. Got up early. Not raining. Bought coffee. Saw comedy (Phil Jupitus, Marcus Brigstocke and 2 other guys doing"The Early Edition" ie. reading the newspapers and making me laugh about it). Ate hog roast. Built Titanic. Watched Sebastian Tellier. Went Home. Had a poo (best poo ever). Done.

The official fancy dress parade was actually on Saturday (the theme was 30,000 freaks under the sea), but we were held back by the weather and everyone's general grumpiness on Saturday, so we finally put our costume together on Sunday. Our Titanic consisted of 7 people wearing wire and fabric sections of the Titanic with tall cardboard funnel hats on. It didn't quite have all the bells and whistles we had discussed/planned (including lights on the inside, built-in beer holders, drowning lego men) but I think the overall effect when it was fully assembled was pretty impressive - several people stopped us to take photos so I reckon we must have looked pretty amazing. I didn't take my camera to Bestival with me, but I believe there will be photos at some stage so I will keep you posted.

Best Act: The Human League
Worst Act: Aphex Twin
Wish-I'd-Seen: The Specials played a surprise set on Saturday. They were listed as "Special Guests", and someone told me the Specials were gonna be there but i didn't believe them, so I missed it.
Quote of the Weekend: Tough to call, but I like "Look, we're all talking shit, but our shit shits all over your shit!"
Would Go Again?: Yes. The weather can't really be helped, but the Festival was really well run and had a great atmosphere as well as some awesome music.

So that was Bestival for me. All my friends are still there having a massive last-night-of-tour blowout party without me, but I felt I ought to get home to make sure everything's in place for going to Japan.

2 days to go now until I fly, so very soon my blog about my trip to Japan will actually start to feature my trip to Japan in it! Yay!

I know you're all going to miss me dearly as I galavant around the concrete jungle of Tokyo, so if you find your self pining for some hot Woody lovin', just remember this:

We'll always be together,
how ever far it seems.
We'll always be together,
together in electric dreams.



Kisses,
Genghis

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