The Kyoto-Ho Japan Chronicles - Day 8

Day 8 - Sunday, June 3rd

We had a holy day of Temple Shrine Hopping. I didn't feel very holy though after those biatches made us pay to get in to see their shrines!

We did lots of walking and lots of getting lost along the way until we discovered that the easiest way to get around Kyoto is via their bus system and that it'd take you to whatever tourist spot you needed to see. I don't even take the bus in NYC, so the fact that Kyoto forced this upon me was criminal! But for 220 yen, we could pretty much tour Kyoto's major spots if we just stayed on the bus. And we did the day after but not because we wanted to but because we just had to make a roundabout as we got on the bus going in the direction opposite what we wanted.

Sadly, we never got to Nijo Castle. And the ninjas remained in hiding.

Not much more to say so just look at the pretty pictures!

This here is the Golden Pavillion. It's pretty golden, right?

Some Zen Garden Goodness

And please notice the duck, will you?

He argued with me the entire time I was there.

Asshole animals strike again!

I prefered the Ryoan-ji Zen Garden to the Golden Pavillion, even if I did get heckled by a duck. It's okay though, I paparrazi'd his ass.

But by far, the best temple we visted that day and perhaps for our entire journey, I felt (and not because it cost nothing to go to) was the one that was involved quick healing and safe travels. The atmosphere there was peaceful and felt special...



...ah yes, Goo Shrine. You cannot have anything but love and respect for a temple dedicated to pigs.

WTF Moment of the Day:

1. Seriously, 400 yen for the Golden Pavillion and 500 yen to see a tiny zen rock garden that lied to me in the pictures?! Those rocks were not as white as in the brochure!!!!

Things We Observed This Day:

1. The Japanese are trusting when it comes to the bus. I mean, if there's one thing you're taught in NY, it's that you should always have exact change for the bus. This is not needed on the Japanese bus. The bus actually has a machine to give you change! That's crazy.

Also, they do everything backwards and here's why they're 'trusting'. You get on the bus in the middle and you don't pay until you get off. They're insane.

The Day's Eats:

1. Pizza buns/bread

2. Green tea and vanilla Soft Serve Ice-Cream (which was fabulous)

3. Melon Cream Soda (which was a crime against nature)

4. "Regular" food - pasta, fries, baked pork with sweet sauce? Oh but was it good times.

5. Japanese Teriyaki pizza. (Gross. The chicken, the rice cakes, the mayo and corn. Ugh.)

The Tokyo-Ho to Kyoto-Ho Japan Chronicles - Day 7

Day 7 - Saturday, June 2nd

Well this was fairly exciting!

We traveled on the Shinkansen from Tokyo to Kyoto. The usual 8 hour trip by regular rail was only 2.5 hours on the Shinkansen.



The Shinkansen was not only super fast but also super quiet. It was quite amazing how smooth a ride it was. But while fast and impressive, that couldn't stop noisy little bastard children from invading our car. We would be the ones to get the noisiest children in Japan. There's nothing worse than a train riddled with brats, save the one bitchy fat assed baby who sat in his own chair and grimaced like nobody's business. Damned future Yakuza.

Misadventure number 1 of Kyoto was finding our Ryokan. We eventually found it by following a kind old lady who lead us to the place but not before accosting a plain clothed police officer? We're not sure what he was but he was awesome and his accent was awesome. He could have been from Osaka. He managed to help us some, even if all he did was direct us to an old lady after 15 minutes of listening to his prattling off about something. He wouldn't let us go for a while there.

The Ryokan was nice and was run by Yumiko, a woman we did not want to mess with.

Bad shot of our room -



And then came the communal bath which was quite sketchy. I tried to make a pact with Beetchie, who refused to shower the same time I wanted to until of course, she had to go clean her tattoo and begged me to come with her.

The WTF Moment of the Day:

For some reason the toilets were quite smelly. We later discovered that was due to mildew but man, was that nasty everytime we had to use the bathroom.

The Day's Eats:

1. Pork and rice for breakfast, salmon and rice for breakfast minus the natto this time.

2. Shrimp Fillet sandwiches laden with onions and potato salad sandwiches also laden with onions.

Why Haven't I Eaten This?!

Burger King Puts Spam on the Menu

By Jaymes Song, Associated Press

HONOLULU — For many Americans, spam is a four-letter word for unwanted e-mail. In Hawaii, Spam is a beloved comfort food, with cans of the pork bricks found in virtually every cupboard.

Hoping to cash in on Hawaii's love affair with the canned meat product, Burger King (BKC) last month began offering Spam for breakfast — going head-to-head with rival McDonald's (MCD), which has offered Spam in the islands for years.

Burger King is offering the Spam Platter — two slices of Spam with white rice and scrambled eggs. The fast-food giant also offers the Croissanwich or Biscuit Sandwich with Spam.

Denise Yamauchi, Burger King managing director in Hawaii, says sales have been "very good and very promising."

Putting Spam on the menu, alongside Burger King's traditional items, such as the Whopper, has been in the works about a year, and corporate headquarters finally signed off on the idea.

"It's something that was a little unique and a little different for them, so it was a bit of a hard sell to bring to Hawaii," Yamauchi said. "But they finally realized it is a unique flavor and something the locals really like."

At a Burger King near downtown Honolulu, where a poster in the window proudly advertises "Spam in the A.M.," the Spam Platter was selling for $3.49. The nearly identical Spam, Eggs and Rice plate across the street at McDonald's was $3.39.

Melanie Okazaki, marketing manager for McDonald's Restaurants of Hawaii, said Spam has been offered at the chain's 75 island restaurants since 2002.

"In Hawaii, it is a very popular menu item, and we will continue to offer it to our customers," she said.

Burger King's latest offering runs counter to the chain's push to offer healthier fare, including salads and the meatless BK Veggie Burger. But no one can deny Hawaii's appetite for Spam.

Despite being one of the least-populated states, Hawaii leads the nation in consumption of the Hormel Foods (HRL) product. It's been a hit since World War II. Island residents consume more than 5 million pounds of Spam a year, an average of about six cans for every man, woman and child.

Spam "musubi" — a slice of Spam atop a block of rice, wrapped in seaweed — is a favorite at nearly every convenience store, including 7-Eleven. And Spam fried rice is a local classic.

There are more varieties of Spam sold in Hawaii than anywhere else. There's Spam Garlic, Spam Bacon, Spam with Cheese, Spam with Tabasco, Spam Turkey and Spam Lite, which features less sodium and less fat.

"We're pleased to see more and more restaurants adding it to their menu, providing Hawaiians additional opportunities to experience the savory, salty-sweet taste they love," said Dan Goldman, Spam's product manager.

Are you a Spam fan? What's your favorite Spam recipe?

Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Why haven't I had Spam Bacon?! You people saw that right? Spam. Bacon. Oh the awesomeness that must be.

Let's go to Hawaii!

The Tokyo-Ho Japan Chronicles - Day 6

Day 6 - Friday, June 1st.

We left the security of the Oakhotel Inn for our new digs in Akihabara. Ah yes, the Capsule Hotel. We got lost over there trying to find it and had the dude at the front desk run out to come get us. Luckily, we were close by so he didn't have to leave his post for long. We were only allowed to drop our bags off at that time so more on the Capsule sleeping situation later.

This day found us at Harajuku. Yes, MC and TD5, this shit is bananas. Yes. The one and same. And the girls were out in their sometimes ridiculous outfits. That place was crowded. Not much to say about Harajuku - Snoopy Town's over there, lots of clothing stores but oh, it was awful because you've got the punks on one street then the Japanese Hipsters on the other! Stupid hipsters... stupid no matter what the country.

We were accosted by some punks in Harajuku who were interested in Beetchie's Green Day shirt and we were shown pictures of Green Day themselves visiting that particular store we were in. Lots of musicians and such were there apparently. That was kind of cool. We tried to tell them to listen to Mindless Self Indulgence if they were looking for new music so we'll see if MSI catches on in Japan. You know, we have to do our part to rid of them of that awful J-Pop, much like I try every day to rid the U.S. of pop over here.

Beetchie also got a tattoo! Yep, a little wispy Japanese fart cloud. Uh, I mean regular cloud. It's pretty cool and caused her much paranoia and grief for a few days after but we think it's going to heal just fine. It's pretty cute.

We then headed over to Shinjuku where Beetchie attempted to find the gay district and a lesbian bar.

It was there I had a breakdown. And it's not that I was very sad but you know how when you start tearing, you just can't stop tearing if someone tries to ask you what's wrong? Well that happens to me. At this point in the trip, I felt that I had been in Tokyo forever. I missed home and I even missed my little boobey-head. So I broke down in a lesbian bar and what's worse, it was very tiny so of course, now all the lesbians in that bar probably think that Beetchie was breaking up with me.

But you guys saw my true plan right? I wasn't really sad. I was just trying to ensure that Beetchie didn't leave me stranded in Shinjuku by going off on a late night rendevouz with a Japanese lady she found!

Ah, yes. Crying. One of the best thwarting tactics around.

But H1's right, it wasn't fair because as she pointed out, if I had seen my man Matt or my Clown Hooligan boy Alex T. in Japan, I probably would have bailed on Beetchie. Heh. Well in my defense, I knew Alex was not going to be in Japan until August and Matt's currently preparing for Wembley Stadium!

We rushed to catch a train back to Aki. (the trains stop running after midnight) for our stay at the Capsule Hotel. Those things are sweet. It's not coffin-like because they're quite spacious. It's got a tv in there. My only complaint was that it's kind of hot and well, 'communal' showers suck. But the sleeping space itself is pretty awesome.



Catching some Zzzz's in the Capsule 809-



Now get me the fudge out of nyo!



WTF Moments of the Day:

1. Studio Cafe Strawberry.



It's one of many Maid Cafes in Akihabara and I couldn't take pictures or see the real thing in action but ugh.

Apparently for 500 yen we could dress up in a selection of ridiculous outfits and play games with the maids in three different settings. This particular cafe had the "School Classroom", the "Children's Playroom" and the "Doctor's Office".

Perverted? Thankfully we left right before a troop of guys came in. I wasn't sure if I was alright watching those little maids, complete in French Maid Outfits get on their knees to ask their 'masters' if they wanted anything off the menu. Ugh. So damned dirty. I feel so incredibly dirty typing that out.

Just like the dirty men going down the shady little staircase to the cafe:



2. Japanese and Hip-Hop do not mix. I don't know what their deal is but it's troubling.

Things We Observed This Day - Volume VI

1. Another toilet incident. This time, we went to use the tattoo parlour's bathroom, flushed the toilet and couldn't find the sink to wash our hands. But no! Trickery! Because as you flush the toilet, it triggers water to come out from the faucet attached to the top of the toilet! You'd think I'd be highly appalled but I was actually very fascinated by it. Beetchie on the other hand was disgusted.



The Incident of the Day:

1. The Failed Pachinko Experiment.

One of the main things Beetchie wanted to do was play Pachinko. That night we met Hattori Hanzo and the band of Japanese business men, one of them who was quite the avid player of Pachinko we gathered, had said to us that as a minimum we should put down 30,000 yen at a machine. We...were confused and informed him that 300 USD was quite a bit and our cap was maybe 1000 yen or 10 USD.

That Friday in Aki., we discovered what the hell the man was talking about. For 1000 yen, we got two balls. Two. Two silver balls in that slot machine is about as valuable as a baconless hamburger.

Now let us never speak about it again.

The Day's Eats:

1. Tonkatsu Sandwich; Turkey/Cheese Sandwich from our good, close friend in Japan - Lawsons, which is like a Seven Eleven.

2. Chocolate bagel with white chocolate chips; Soy & Edamame Bagel

3. Pizza Bao

4. Banana, Vanilla Ice-Cream, Whipped Cream and Chocolate Sauce Crepe

5. Cheese Bacon Bread which tasted like a cheese paste sandwich and this is my reminder to ask H1 to make me some cheese paste with bacon in it.

6. Chicken Hot Dog

7. Some kind of honey drizzled dessert that I can't quite recall right now. And some sort of refreshing beverage from the same maid cafe... lemonade? grapefruit drink? I don't remember.

The Tokyo-Ho Japan Chronicles - Day 5

Day 5 - Thursday, May 31st

We set out to the Tokyo Sea Life Park. I was expecting more sharks but otherwise, it was pretty decent. The space itself was nice and the displays were alright. I guess the big deal was the tuna exhibit, which I suppose was rather impressive. Those things are huge and scary. I've decided if I need to get a true Aquarium experience, I'd have to have H1 take me to see Marvin at The Shed Aquarium. Also, I can visit the Sunshine Aquarium on the next trip to Japan.

Anyways, look at them mean ass tuna!



After a billion photos taken at the aquarium, we headed over to Akihabara - Anime, Video Game and Manga Central.

We were quite happy to see this here building in true anime/gamers nerdy fashion:



However, after waiting all our short little anime lives (which really isn't that short - what's it going on for you now, Beetchie? 12 years?) to hit up this place/Electric Town, we found it to be kind of sad. We didn't find goods that we really wanted from our various anime series and what's worse, all the cool toys that we would have wanted all had release dates pegged after our trip to Japan, ie on Tuesday the 12th of June or September!

They rob me of the new anime love of my life, L! Those rat bastards.

So now I'm off on a mission to find the mini 5 piece chibi "L" figure collection that I want badly (and isn't out yet but already sold out over there), the new Bleach Soundtracks which come out in a few weeks, and my "Knights of the Round" Final Fantasy VII figure set.

Am I a nerd? Yes. Do I care what Frass has to say about it? No. I care about nothing Frass has to say and no Frass, no matter what you think, I am not Rosie O' Donnell and it is not a coincidence that she went off The View the same time I was out of the U.S. You insult me, and yet I still get you presents from Japan. But as I discussed with MC, your present is not one of meaning unlike his. Anyway, I'll give it to you when I see you next.

The UFO Catchers pretty much kicked our asses that day save the Kon and Ryuk plushies we acquired but oh was Beetchie angry by that L plush that escaped her. No worries though, she owned it the day after.

Things We Observed in Japan - Volume V.

1. Tokyo's one noisy place. Everytime you enter a store, every worker will greet you and bid you farewell when you're leaving. The constant babbling makes me wonder if they feel incredibly tired and have dry throats by the end of the day.

*2. Exactly how things might look if we were to use an Eastern Style Toilet...



The Day's Eats:

1. Japanese black curry with beef. Yuck. Yuck. Yuck. If there's one thing the Japanese do not know about, it's curry. Ugh.

2. Hamburg Steak with rice and fries. The Hamburg tasted like frozen meatballs. Bleck.

3. Sukiyaki, a chain restaurant provided us with more bad Japanese curry. It was pork this time but not black but that really didn't matter.

4. This day began the string of Takoyaki eating that Beetchie set out to do. Those little octopus filled flour batter balls made her happy. They were good but I was never really hungry when she ate them despite her theory that I hate them.

Obligatory Photo Post of Ugly Fish For Beetchie:



*To protect our identities, since we do have enemies floating about on the internet, I will be inserting wacom-drawn bao heads where I deem appropriate. They are not loads of poop with stink lines. They are pork bao with steam lines. Please do not judge my drawings.

remember, b-a-o-s.

a like so:

The Tokyo-Ho Japan Chronicles - Day 4

Day 4 - Wednesday, May 30

I waited up or tried to until 12.55 AM to catch Death Note as it aired. I watched a few minutes and gathered that Near was freakin' out for some reason. That was cool for all of 5 minutes until I fell asleep. I so need to play catch up in that series. It's almost done and I'm three episodes behind! ::sigh:: That also reminds me, I can't wait to eat my L Death Note Chocolate Cake.

The Day of Cheap

This was the day I discovered that my ATM was not going to be working in Japan and all I had for money was the 1000USD I converted for food, travel and whatever else. Oh the love of the credit card until I see my bill.

And this was the day we were traumatized and it's something we'd rather not remember, yet I still took video footage...

We call it, "Sanrio Puro Land".



There was a boat ride, a ton of children, a kiddie show and pink. Lots and lots of pink and of course, Hello Kitty. Everywhere. We went to her house. That cat's living the good life and apparently loves to watch Britney Spears videos in her den. Odd. We also took pictures with the cat herself. She held my hand. I am still very confused and feel slightly sullied and unusual.

Here are some pictures and yes, a video of the boat ride (which shames me to admit was one of our finer Tokyo moments - alright, don't judge me!) so you guys can join in that madness we experienced not that you could ever understand.

No Sanrio related blog of mine would be complete without Badtz Maru!



Why didn't you guys ever tell me about that male kitty that Hello likes to hang out with? He's fantastic! And um, trapped in a cage. Ahahahahahahahaha. Whatever, he's still awesome.



And I thought this was a kids' show! This villain is the stuff of nightmares. Though, the entire Sanrio Puro Land is the stuff of nightmares really.



And the boat ride footage. Okay. It's 2.45 minutes long and not even the entire thing, so you don't have to watch it all. In fact, I can guarantee not many of you will sit through this thing. But as I said before, I actually liked this. It was confusing and cracked us the hell up:



Gen and Battler, I went for you guys and came out with some stuff for you and that's all that matters.

It was raining lots when we got out, so after Sanrio, we just walked about and visited another arcade. It wasn't Sega Joyopolis but it was a Sega Arcade World. We did the usual but then we also did some of the things all the girls are into over there - those damned picture poses with your friends. It was fun times but ridiculous.

We then hit up a department store in that area in search of a bag for the pigghies and found a grocery. There we got some fugu sake. It's gross. It has a little piece of fugu floating in it. It's Clownie's present and he can drink it at his own risk.

The WTF Moment of the Day:

1. On the Virtual Adventure Trip we had to Digimon Digital World ('cause you know, I love those Digimon to this day), why did we get sprayed with mysterious puffs of smoke?! It reminds me of that Bidet incident I need to blog about in a future post...

Things We Observed That Day - Volume IV:

1. If you ever need assistance at a ticket machine in the subway, it's the funniest thing. You hit the assistance button and out of no where, from the wall pops open this little trap door and a little Japanese guy will pop up and start talking to you. And then he'll prattle off something crazily, slide the trap door shut and come out from the magical room behind the ticket machines, invisible and unknown to all.

2. The Japanese love them a clear umbrella. For the love of crap, why couldn't I get one that'd fit in my suitcase?! I'm so sad.

The Day's Eats:

1. Onigiri - bacon, salmon, pickles, tuna roe.

2. Street Pork Bao. Mmm.

3. Wendy's - The worst chicken nuggets ever. I'm not even sure it was chicken at this point.

4. Beetchie had a blue flavoured popsicle, which she swears is the best flavour ever.

5. Mister Donut - it was unimpressive and kind of dry actually.

6. Gyoza chips and peach & orange wine coolers in a can.

The Obligatory Photo of the Day (I mean, I really couldn't just post about Sanrio Puro Land and not post a picture of the betch herself, right? Here she is with my boy):

The Tokyo-Ho Japan Chronicles - Day 3

Day 3 - Tuesday, May 29th



We'll call this day the Great Yokohama Piggyh Adventure.

Sure we did other things than this but this was by far the most memorable thing that happened to us that day.

And so the story goes...

We went out to Yokohama and before entering Chinatown there was this Arcade. It was the first real one we had seen, so we went in after 9 AM to hit up some Taiko Drum Master (which is my new favourite game and at least, the one that was most fun at the arcades) and to test our hands at some UFO Catchers.

For 100 yen, we managed to grab one pig from the second row of white and black piggies and out came tumbling that pig dragging 6 others with him! It was hilarious. There were pigs all over the ground! My head hurt from laughing so hard and we made our escape from the Arcade, with two bags of pigs, a previously obtained gloomy bear, and a monkey, with the girls working at the arcade watching us slink off like dirty criminals! But hey, Beetchie won those pigs fairly. Ah, they must have hated having to re-arrange that UFO Catcher Machine.

We then headed to the Doll Museum. It was cool yet scary as expected from a Doll Museum.



::shudder::

Also, I now have questions as to who "Licca" is (not that crazed scary betch in the picture above) as she seems to be the Barbie of Japan.

Our next destination was Chinatown. The problem with this Chinatown was that while it was the dirtiest part of Japan that we had seen and would see for the entire trip (yes, even the fish market was cleaner), it was still not at the level of NYC Chinatown dirt, taking away a vital feeling of what makes Chinatown what it is.

The other thing missing was the people on the street trying to sell you CD/DVD or Louis vitton on the sly.

As far as we could tell, there were no Chinese people in Chinatown but if they were, they were all speaking Japanese. It was very odd.

Also, the Chinatown in Japan has seen it fit to bastardize pandas. They've been exploited by trying to make them marketable. Save the Pandas! By buying some useless panda junk!

Here's that damned monkey in a panda suit:



But like our Chinatown, there's a tiny section in Chinatown that some Europeans have called home. It's not Italians but Ukkers. Ah, Ukkers. I was happy to see them.

Our last stop to that day took us to a residential area not far from a busy train station where we scared some kids and made them nervous as they hurried off to their parents. We were actually a little bit lost trying to find the Ramuen Museum.

Ah, Ramuen Town. It was shady and a re-creation of a dirty little ramen-serving town with multiple ramen shops. It was small but cool and quirky. Beetchie loved it plenty.



The WTF Moment(s) of the Day:

1. I don't know what's up with that Hokkaido Mascot and its relation to Ramuen but yeah. That thing was obscene.

2. WTF's up with the 'u' in 'ramuen'? I need to wiki that.

The Casualty Count:

1. The little sumo guy I bought Beetchie fell off her bag and almost lost to Yokohama. Fortunately, due to his large ass in red sumo undies, I managed to spot him on the grey ground but he, ::sniff:: sadly lost an arm.

2. Beetchie's virtual puppy that she could not walk and later was attacked by a larger dog. Let us all have a moment of silence...



Things We Observed This Day - Volume III

1. Those goddamned Japanese bicyclists are crazy! Many times did my life flash before my eyes.

2. Licca, unlike Barbie, has had many man whores. Ken's got nothing on her.

3. I can't slurp ramen. 10+ years of ramen eating habits could not be broken in 2 weeks, no matter how polite in Japan it is to slurp.

The Day's Eats:

1. That weird breakfast with a not fully cooked egg, kielbasa sausage, salad, seaweed, miso soup, and rice. The even weirder breakfast that Beetchie had. It's not the fact that she had grilled salmon for breakfast with rice, it was the natto that made it not so good. She has now deemed herself Nattofan. It was god awful but she says that activating it was fun.

Let us all be revolted by the following picture:



2. Pork ramen from Ramuen Town. Oh that was greatness.

3. Dim sum in Chinatown. It was not the same as dim sum here because there are no carts zipping around but there are set meals that have lots of dumplings, gyoza and shumai. I was not too impressed by those dumplings because I have to say curry should never be in a dumpling. At least they were nice to look at. Stupids! I'd rather have a happily filled stomach than happy eyes when it comes to food!

4. Shumai on a stick. Mmmm. Street shumai.

5. Absinthe and a 'cranberry'/vodka combination that actually turned out to be a 'grapefruit' juice/vodka combination. Much like the T-shirt and tie combination, it wasn't that impressive. I probably should have thrown a hissy fit but they were so sweet, how could I?

Currently listening to (as I revise the draft): Man of Mystery by MUSE.

The Tokyo-Ho Japan Chronicles - Day 2

Day 2 - Monday, 5/28

We awoke at 5 AM to go to one of the largest and best Fish Markets in the world -  the Tsujiki Fish Market. It was a bit underwhelming at first but we weren't exactly sure we had run across it. The streets are filled with little shops selling packaged goods from seasoning to dried fish.

I was half expecting fresh fish strewn about in these stalls but found nothing at first. As we walked further we realized we were exactly where we needed to be. I found my fresh fish eventually including a bunch of other strange things I'd never seen before and can still not properly identify.



I guess for 200 yen you really can buy nothing but bullsheet.  Just kidding of course.  Man, if someone were to prepare this for me, I'd be all over it.

I managed to not be killed on those busy streets but I did not escape my foot being caught on a plastic thing on a shady corner and taking a really bad spill that had my knees badly bruised and hurting for a few days. I also twisted my foot which seemingly cleared up after 2 days but I must have busted it up something fierce because it started to hurt again 3 days ago. I'm in pain as I write this. Weak. We can catagorize that as the 1st incident/misadventure for the day.

Next we went to Asakusa for the giant temple there, known as the Sensoji Shrine.

Sensoji is crowded, has tons of tourist stalls selling all manners of trinkets to traditional clothing and of course, street eats leading to the giant shrine, pagoda and gardens.

At the entrance of the actual temple is this massive lantern that could kill a small village if it fell on it. On either side, are the Japanese gods of Wind and Thunder. It's a great spot and here are some pics for you guys to see. I'll send the entire set when I upload them to shutterfly sometime this week.

How I can just kill a man...or tiny village, or two little girls from NYC.

Various shops when you get inside!

All part of the temple grounds.

Incident number 2 involved Beetchie drinking the shrine water when really all you are supposed to do was intake, spit and not swallow. You'd think that swallowing the germs of millions of people would deter anyone but anyway....

We then went to Ginza to catch a Kabuki show but a wrong turn took us not to the Kabuki theatre but a high class theatre featuring Japanese Traditional Dance. We went, and were amongst of sea of upper class Japanese elite all decked out in suits and many of the women were wearing kimonos. And in we bounced, two kids from NY looking like two hot messes. Yeah, we were stared at but that's okay because our yen paid for our seats...up in the balcony...off to the side but whatever!

The show was decent. Beetchie's convinced it was a slow version of the L-Word.

Our day ended on a high note. We ate at this little place in the area near our Oakhotel Inn.

Quote of the Day:

"The Holy Water, it burns!" - Beetchie

Things We Observed This Day - Volume II:

1. Those Japanese wrap everything up. Everything! They enjoy present wrapping, I guess. And it's so easy to be conned by two little old people when they're so sweet. Curses on them!

2. The Subway is on time. Always. Though I mean, I did see a minute late train. Shameful! Transfers are rough though and costly. It costs you to transfer subway lines. Ugh.

3. You may not be able to smoke and walk but you sure can smoke and bicycle. Those bullshitters.

4. 230 dollar pair of chopsticks that I really wanted but could not justify spending that money on them. Oh but how that pure silver sparkled...

The Day's Eats:

1. Sushi donburi breakfast at 6.30 AM from the Tsujiki Fish Market. Yes, X. Fresh fish from one of the best fish markets in Japan that early in the morning = good times.

2. Sweet potato soft serve ice-cream and tofu soft serve ice cream

3. Street eats of fresh red bean soft cookies

4. I finally ate manju on a stick! and hated it. The coating of that weird bean powder really didn't sit well.

5. Beetchie had a No. 6 which was a Teriyaki McDondalds Burger which turned out to be a weird sausage patty and anything but beef. I had a No. 2 which was an Fillet o' Ebi. I'd have to say I got the better eats this time around.

6. Flan from the high class cafe in Ginza.

7. Awesome food from the man we now fondly refer to as Hattori Hanzo. He fed us grilled mackerel, various meats on sticks and some bad assed fish balls - yum, and for some reason scalloped potatoes with pasta sauce?

The For No Reason Picture(s):

1. Here, have a ninja on a rooftop!



2. And this thing!

Within the vicinity of a Temple, no less. For shame.

The Shooed Away Count:

2 times -

1. At the Fish Market.

We ended up in an area we were not supposed to be at which was closer to the warehouses for arrival of the fish and shipments. Yeah. I knew it was too busy for us to be there! Beetchie made us get shooed away not to mention almost killed.

2. Our trip to try Pachinko in our neighbourhood.

The place was closed and we barged in there, wondering why it was so hard to get in. Beetchie insisted we push our way through the giant curtains and my ass almost tripped again.

The Tokyo-Ho Japan Chronicles - Day 1.5

Yes. Tokyo-Ho has returned.

Let the slew of blogs begin!

Day 1.5 - Saturday May 26 (New York Time)/Sunday May 27 (Tokyo Time)

We will start with the incident at the airport while waiting for our departing flight to Japan. Before I continue, it should be noted that you all should expect many 'incidents' because as you all know by now, when Beetchie and I are together, we have some mini and some not so mini-misadventures.

The incident involved Beetchie kicking a Japanese flight attendant, too polite to cry out in pain but could only utter a muffled "ya ta ta" while hopping on one foot. We're not sure though if Amy Winehouse the Flight Attendant lost that tooth due to meth. use or after she was kicked.

Japan Airlines, I must say, has crap in-flight entertainment (and not just because I almost destroyed my in-flight entertainment remote control by getting it stuck on the side and later on destroying my fingers trying to get it out). Being affiliated with American Airlines will probably do that to you though. And here's hoping that Virgin Atlantic does not screw me over come Thursday (after I boasted about it for months).

The food sucked and was questionable, and we're convinced gave me the belly heebie jeebies. Ugh, it was not good times.

As you can well imagine, getting off the near 14 hour gruelling flight of bad food, bad entertainment and broken sleep, with a heebie jeebie belly was not fun. And then to discover that the nearest bathrooms were Eastern style,



was also not fun.

We needed to find that Oakhotel Inn quickly while navigating the Subway system but thanks to a Subway Smart NYC kid Beetchie, we were able to get our bearings and find our way to the Oakhotel without much trouble.

Oakhotel Inn was cute. We now value the greatness of private bath so much more but we were still naive to that reality being that we had no idea how much that place spoilt us until Day 5 of the trip. More to come in that future blog post...

Quote of that Day:

"I'll get used to it..." - Or 2, everytime a train on the other track passed the limited express from Narita Airport. I'm not sure if I got used to the sound of another train 'hitting' our train as it passed by but if you heard that sound that came out of no where, you'd be unnerved as well.

Things We Observed in Japan - Volume I:

1. The multi-coloured roof tops of Japanese houses on the way from Narita Airport to Tokyo Central was very awesome. There's nothing wrong with a blue-roof.

2. The Japanese and their subway order. They have arrows pointing to what side you should be on when walking through the subway platforms. For instance, if you're going up the stairs, you should stay on the left. We of course, walked through people instead of with them and confused those poor Japanese greatly. "Stupid Americans!" is what I'm sure they were thinking.

3. The Japanese's insistence on staring at me because I'm brown. Beetchie thinks I may have confused them some with my asian features yet big, wavy hair. I especially didn't like that one little child who get staring at me. So he knew no better but still.  It was unnerving.

4. The toilets. The toilets had incredible flushing power which is always a concern for me. But not only that, they all have two settings for flushing! To the left for a big flush and to the right for smaller business. I always flushed to the left because of my fear of clogged toilets, even if my business was small.

5. Another toilet observation - the toilet paper's perforations are singled out at either 2 squares or 4 squares and never 1.

6. Beetchie smells like an Asian pear, which surprisingly smells just like watermelon jolly ranchers.

The Day's Eats:

We got our food ticket and paid for the meal out of a vending machine. Those things are quite popular and luckily for us they all had pictures on it so we had a fair idea of what we were in for.

I had fried pork cutlet and shrimp tempura with limitless access to rice, and miso soup.

Clowns and Our New Found Love Of Them.

Well, those clowns anyway...

Tokyo-Ho has returned ...

and she is sleeeeeeping.

Mom says to keep it down.

-H1

Eeeehhh??!!

コイイカソクニイチミシニチスイニミまちせちみル

コスニリリニチミカル

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Oh Green Day, Why?

Yeah. I don't know what the hell was up with that 2 hour crap fest American Idol had going tonight but Mama HOchie watches, so it was on.

What really disturbed me though, was the fact that I came downstairs at one point, looked at the television and saw Green Day performing on AI's stage.

What?

I'm still confused but I guess Billy Joe was as well because at the end of the performance, he looked around at the audience who were applauding and had the cutest look of 'wtf. These people don't even truly KNOW us. Ah well. Freaks.'

The bottomline really though was that Mike Dirnt looked great to me, as per usual.

- Or 2, crushing on every member of Green Day beginning 1994, starting with Tre then Billy and now Mike.

The End of Greatness

Those stupid assholes at CW have ruined things for us.

While we do not want to truly discuss it because it'll just really angry up the blood, this here is our tribute to one of the greatest shows in recent history.

3 years of the greatness that is Veronica Mars comes to an end.

Fantastic characters, interaction and development; detailed and cleverly written plots; wit; Logan and Veronica; Keith and Veronica - all things that made this show amazing and as expected, overlooked and tragically underrated.

::sob::

And so Veronica Mars has paid the price for being too clever a show and has drowned within the sea of television nonsense.





We bid thee farewell with frowns, crest fallen faces and teary hearts as we watch Veronica walk off in a chilly drizzle to the tune of "It Never Rains in Southern California", her future unknown but we can only hope it will be to a successful career with the FBI; Keith's fate uncertain but grim; Logan being Logan with his boyish grin and his confirmed love for the girl; and everyone else living their lives in Neptune, for now, blissfully ignorant to all the creepiness that certain citizens of Neptune are capable of executing.

It's Been A Week

And we're still re-living the goo'd times we had at Arctic Monkeys. This time last week, we were anxiously awaiting our boys to take the stage.

I'm not writing this to torture TD5. I'm actually just writing this because I forgot to say a few things.

1. Frass, you should consider yourself priviledged to be at that show! Apparently it sold out in 45 seconds. Again, not our fault you weren't prepared.

2. I had a surreal moment at the concert that I failed to mention the last time. Near the end of the set, Alex was fiddling with his guitar and looked up in my general direction. Then he did a double-take as if he had recognized me. He stared for a while. It was weird.
So I can think of only a few things,

a. He didn't want me taking footage?
b. I reminded him of that relationship he had to break off and writes about.
c. I'm Suga'Face and he realized it.

I'm really hoping for option c. because umm, b. is not the look I'm going for...

FINALLY!

Yeah, the end of this god awful season is here.

S6 24 HC Ends but I still have to sit through 2 hours of this bullsheet.

4 AM to 5 AM:

Look how awesome it is - Chloe and Jack the BFFs scheming together again. It's fantastic. Everything else is lame in this show but Chloe and Jack = awesome.

I enjoy how hardcore these pansy Russians are acting. It's almost as if they made them extra stupic for 3 seasons only to show that you just don't f' with the russians. Is that true in real history? Umm. Maybe not. Gotta love the Russians. They've given us the best drink eva' - Vodka. No ill should be spoken against them!

oo! Oo! It's Bill! The only other person who's good on this show. If those betches try to kill any of the good 3 off tonight, I'm done!

H1: Horlicks slapped that Kitty into a corner and said, "shut up!" Wrong.
Milo's Brother looks even more hardcore than Milo did.

That sucks! How could they do Horlicks dirty like that? They blinded his ass!

NOOOOO. Cheap! Just letting my Chloe pass out like that! That's just wrong.

Head Count: 0 but should I add the eye kill count for Horlicks?

5 AM to 6 AM:

Okay, so the best thing just happened. Chloe's pregnant! Just think! Another betch in the world! Yay!

Okay, so Josh Bauer? Awesome. Come now, so much more useful than Kim. Josh shot his grandfather in the chest! Yeah. If Jack ever dies, Josh could take over. Another Bauer in the making to save the world.

And the rest of the episode was boring soooo, that's that. Oh, except how the Chinese threatened CTU at the end. Now that's that.

Note: Though, does this mean they've written Bill, Karen and Chloe out of the show without killing them? Or will we fast forward 5 years into the future next season?

Best line of the show: "Don't forget, I can disappear. And if you try to send someone after us, I'll kill him. I'm very good at THAT too." - Jack

Head Count: 10

Babies and the Paparazzi

Saturday: May 19th 2007

Every attempt was made by Baby B. to hide a cup incident and with the Paparazzi floating about, things got ugly.



Saturday's altercation is being followed by a law suit, with the Paparazzo seeking monetary compensation in the amount of $710.00 for a dirty camera, as well as compensation for pain and suffering.

Ugh.

MUSE has annoyed me some today.

WTF is up with their having mcr support them at Wembley Stadium?! mcr?!
...

They're so un-deserving of that gig. I cannot even begin to express my disgust.

Anyway, those suckers at the Sunday show can suffer through that bullshit.

H1 and I will be seeing The Streets.

And while those other assholes sort out what they're doing over there in London, I'm going to sort out H1 and try to fanagle a trip to Malahide Castle to see our boys, Arctic Monkeys in Ireland.

It's May 19th!!!!

Happy Birthday to X!!!!

and

Happy Birthday to Lou!!!!

The HOchieS are lucky to have seen another year with you guys, sharing goo'd time laughs and such. More importantly, you guys are lucky to have us with our false promises of tea and presents! Heh Heh Heh.

Aren't you happy you get to look forward to another year of assholery?

Kidding!

We'll do tea sometime this year, X!

Notice though, how I've said nothing about your receiving presents?

Fortune Cookie AssHattery Continues

The fortune for tonight -

"The Fortune You Seek Is In Another Cookie".

W.

T.

F.

I Guess I Forgot To Do It

Post last Monday's S6 24 HC Entry.

Heh.

Well, since I really don't remember now. Um.

3 AM to 4 AM:

That Josh is kind of smart. I don't remember why now but I just felt the need to say that. I'm sure there was a reason but it escapes me right now.

Head Count: 7 + 6? I missed the first 5 minutes and apparently the entire Chinese squad got taken down, including the Chinese Ryan Reynolds. Sad. Sad.

Alright.

Remember that plan I came up with a few months ago? The one that involved flying to Ireland after Muse @ Wembley Stadium on 06/16/07 to go see Arctic Monkeys on 06/17/07?

Who's in?!




...




Okay, can we at least go see them when they come back to NY? H1 and I have decided that we are already there.