TheLeong.com

I saw this a while back in the hobby shop in Yodobashi Camera, but forgot to post it. It’s modeled to look like a Cactuar from Final Fantasy. I don’t know jack about ukuleles or really any musical instrument, but something tells me the arms and legs would get in the way of trying to actually play this thing.

Then again, it would be pretty sweet (yet very nerdy).

Click the thumbnail to see the full thing.

You know how sometimes you have a dream that feels very real, and other times you have a real-life experience that seems very much like a dream? I had one of the latter today, at least I’m about 90% sure it actually happened. Either way it was pretty odd.

I was teaching classes in the evening down in Ichihara, which means I have to ride the trains about an hour and a half from Shinjuku back towards Chiba, then down south from there. Luckily if I time it right I can catch an express train from Tokyo station, meaning I don’t have to change trains mid-way. The train is usually fairly crowded, but after about 20 minutes a lot of people usually get off, yielding me around a 45-minute nap after grabbing a newly-vacated seat.

I wake up after around a half-hour and notice there’s a bit of a commotion going on in the train car. We had just left Soga station and I couldn’t imagine what was causing the usually lifeless train passengers to scoot around in such a still-silent panic. I sit up a bit and notice to my left that 3 pigeons are walking around. Yes, inside the moving train. They weren’t causing any problems, just walking and making that pigeon noise. Coo, maybe? Nonetheless, tons of people were freaking out as the pigeons just strutted about the floor, minding their business. Now, Japanese people do a lot of things that make no sense to me, but this next part really confused me. Instead of just letting the pigeons walk around and waiting until the next stop (less than 10 minutes), this one genius Japanese guy decides it would be a good idea to hit the ground near the pigeons with his umbrella.

ID. I. OT.

So of course the pigeons go flying, trying to avoid being hit with an umbrella. They head towards the windows, which of course are closed and have people sitting in front of them. The birds hit the windows and land on people, then jump around again as people try to swat at them or shake them off. The situation has just become much much worse because Mr. Wizard thought his magic umbrella would cause the 3 pigeons to vanish in a puff of smoke. So the panic level continues to rise as now you have people all over the long train car getting up and running to either the corners or to the next car. The pigeons are getting more excited now, just trying to figure out how to get off this train while avoiding getting hit by Moron of the Month’s umbrella. Then 1 or 2 more idiots start using their umbrellas (the situation might not have been as bad if it weren’t raining earlier today) to “protect themselves” from the pigeons, creating a vicious cycle or retardedness. I stand up, still slightly asleep having woken up less than a minute ago, and see one of my former co-workers running towards me. I think this was when I started to think I was still in a dream, because what in the world was she doing on this train?*

She jumps into action like she’d been specially trained to deal with pigeons on a train car, opening up a nearby window then running to catch one of the pigeons. She does, checks to make sure there are no trees or electrical poles next to the tracks, and releases pigeon #1 back outside. I get the message and run to open up the other windows on the train, while every other person on the train either 1) sits there as if nothing was going on, 2) quietly runs to the next train car to escape or 3) stare at me or my co-worker out of confusion, as if we were playing catch with a midget covered in peanut butter. Not a single person helped, opened a window, or even said anything. Japanese people love to act like nothing is going on around them. I’m pretty sure that if Godzilla really did attack this country, the reaction of the general public would be to continue walking as if nothing was happening. Or maybe they would try throwing their umbrellas.

So once she got the other 2 pigeons cleared off the train with her bare hands, we closed the windows, wiped our hands, and had a brief chat as the train pulled off at my stop. Needless to say I was pretty impressed. I definitely wouldn’t have done that myself. So that was probably the most exciting 5 minutes I’ve ever had immediately upon waking up. I’m pretty sure this actually happened.

*She was going to Goi to work, obviously.

I started writing this post on the 5th, as it’s labeled. I actually finished it late at night on Tuesday the 17th.

Last Monday, May 26th, we went from Dalian (well, Wafangdian station) to Tangshan via train. Living in Japan for so long, trains are nothing new to me. I ride trains everyday, and occasionally take the long-distance bullet trains. But the train we took this time was nothing like what I’ve experienced before. This was a 9-hour ride from hell on a train half-filled with hobos. I’m not exaggerating either when I say that; the Orient Express this was not. To illustrate my point, there was a hobo right near us that had a crazy burnt-out (probably a cataract) eye and a crazy laugh, and his buddy was a younger hobo who enjoyed a meal consisting of a handful of raw vegetables and a long chicken’s foot. He munched on this food with his blackened hands and gray teeth during the last leg of the ride.

Earlier in the day, we had finished up things with our client in Dalian at lunch with the bugs and other unmentionable food. On the way back from the restaurant to the client’s office, he pulled over about a block away from the office and started talking to these 2 shabby looking guys. I of course have no idea what they said, but minutes later when we arrived at the office to pack up our luggage, those guys were there with their motorized cart to help us out. They helped haul our ridiculous amount of suitcases and boxes of lab equipment all the way to the train station. Their help didn’t end there. These two guys were pretty old, I’d say at least in their fifties, but since they were (assumingly) hired by our client, it was their duty to haul our stuff all the way. The one guy took our 2 huge cardboard boxes, tied a thick rope around them, and hauled them on his back. The other guy got it easy with two heavy rolling suitcases. They not only hauled the stuff into the station, but after waiting with us for the train to come, they went through the gates and hauled them all the way down the long platform with us. I felt bad for the guy with the boxes, because he was struggling and sweating up a storm. Check him out:

Before I go any further, I should describe Wafangdian station. Like many places in these smaller towns in China, I felt like I was in the 1920’s or 30’s. The station felt like an empty warehouse, with tall ceilings, lots of sunlight, very little electronic presence, no air conditioning, and hordes of poor-looking people. There were no electronic ticket gates or signs. They had these big signboards showing the train number and location, swapping out panels for different trains. The gate was just a metal bar with a guard/attendant standing near it, who would open the gates when it was time to board the train. It reminded me of some kind of cattle ranch, with steer waiting to move from one area to the next. So yeah, not a very favorable image of the station.

Pretty much that entire day I felt like I had time warped back about 70 years.

Now to the train ride itself. After having our two slaves load our stuff onto the train, off we were for Tangshan. Except the train didn’t really speed along. Ever. In fact I’m pretty sure if you would take a bouncy rubber ball and kick it along the tracks, you would be going faster than the train. It never felt like we were moving fast, which probably helps explain why the ride took 9 excruciating hours. Unfortunately Tangshan has no airport so we were told that train was the best way to go. However we also found out later that there are faster trains we could have taken, instead of suffering for 9 hours on the Hobo Express. Of course our guide person never told us about these options, and we were stuck with the value travel plan. Each ticket only cost 94RMB, which is like $13 USD. This low price also probably attributed to the many hobos and other poor-looking and sour-smelling passengers.

The first half hour or so wasn’t that bad I guess. We were able to somehow fit our many suitcases on the overhead racks, and sat down. Again, I felt like I was in the Great Depression era. Then our guide was nice enough to tell us that we’d have to stand up at the 4th station, because we don”t have reserved seats. Yeah. A 9-hour train ride and our guide didn’t have the foresight to pay the extra few bucks to get us seats. So once we hit that station, people got on the train and claimed their seats, beginning our 8 hours of standing on a train that was going at the speed of Jell-O.

It’s tough to write about this train ride now, because honestly I think my mind has blocked out most of this traumatizing day. The area between the cars had a little bathroom, a sink area, and standing room for people to smoke. I don’t know if this is really what the area was designed for, but that’s sure how it was used. There was constantly a crowd of about 20 people on either end of the train car smoking, ensuring that the entire train would be filled with smoke at all times. Oh, and the bathroom? My god. Not only was it the Asian-style squat toilet, but there was an added bonus with this one. It was literally a hole, going outside of the train, onto the tracks. Talk about primitive.

At some point in the last few hours of the ride, our guide ended up getting us involved with the people sitting around our standing area. It was a real mixed bag, with the 2 hobos I mentioned earlier, some middle-aged guys, and 2 people about my age. Of course me and my dad can’t speak Mandarin, and the guide is only interpreting maybe one in every ten sentences for us. Not enough to understand what’s going on. The people were nice though, letting us sit down for a bit, still in awe that not only were we not from Beijing, but we were all the way from America, which to some of these poor local people, might as well be Mars. More than a few people at first just thought we were from southern China, which I don’t know is because of the way we look (family roots are there) or because we just didn’t fit in with everyone else.

Of those 2 people my age, one was a girl who could actually speak some English. I was pretty tired of faking conversation with these people, especially when I don’t speak the language at all, and I was getting a headache from standing up on a slow-moving train for an entire day. I made some small talk with her though, since she was the only other passenger who could communicate with us. It was funny when at one point she looks at me and says, in English, “You’ve got a big ass.” What!? I look at my dad sitting across the aisle to see if he heard what I think I did. “I think she said you’ve got a big ass.” I was totally stunned, wondering how in the world to respond, when she starts pointing at her face. “Yes, you’ve got a big ass” she repeated, pointing at her eyes. Ooooooooh! She was saying I’ve got big eyes. Haha. Thank….you…?

And that was pretty much the only moment of entertainment on the entire 9-hour train ride.

After the big ass incident I had about an hour or two left on the train. I spent most of it either napping or fake-napping (Ari no jutsu) so I wouldn’t have to act friendl
y anymore.

It’s finally time for me to get around to documenting the past few weeks. A big highlight was the unusually high number of visitors. It seems like everyone and their mother decided to come visit right around the same time. Actually Blanchard’s mom did come to Japan, but they were in Kyoto. But at least the “everyone and their mother” line kind of works. But I digress. Luckily, I had a lot of free time to hang out with people, show them around, go to sightseeing-type places, and all that stuff. I got to play tour guide and went to more places in Tokyo than I think I have the rest of the year combined.

First group of visitors was Nick “NR7000” Roberts and his so-called Sidekick. They came up from Ono to Tokyo for a few days during the last week of March, and I met up with them on the 26th. We had planned on meeting up in Akihabara, after which I thought we’d be going around to other places in Tokyo. We ended up spending the entire day there though, which gave us an in-depth look into the strangest and creepiest part of Tokyo.

Most of the day involved us going around to arcades, shops, etc. There wasn’t really anything that I wanted to pick up, but Nick was able to do some shopping and also found those giant foam Hulk Hands that came out about 6 years ago. He was wearing those all around the karaoke booth at night. Sidekick was looking for a mousepad or a poster and some other stuff for some weird jerk-off anime that I don’t know about, and I don’t think he found it. Either way, one highlight (if you can call it that) of the day was the maid cafes, which Sidekick had never been to, and of which Nick and I had only been to once, last year during Golden Week. While in principal I am not interested in these places, in some small part it was interesting. However, we went to more than one maid cafe, which is more than you ever need to go.

The first one we went to was called a ツンデレカフェ (Tsundere Cafe), which is a kind of special maid cafe where the waitresses are supposed to act like your little sister but also be all pissy and mad at you and stuff. Due partially to the fact that we were foreigners and they probably didn’t want to confuse us, there was very little difference between this cafe and a regular cafe. There was one time when Nick tried to call the waitress over and it took a few tries (she was only 3 feet away). This could have been her being pissy, or maybe she was just a bad waitress. Or deaf. Also they spoke very casually, rather than the usual formal Japanese that all people in the service industry have to use for fear of being speared in the temple with a katana. Overall I was not impressed, and being there was just uncomfortable. The place of course had creepy dudes by themselves, and there were two guys who were hanging out eating a 4000 yen giant waffle sundae. Yeah. There was another maid cafe where Nick totally got into the weird maids (see right), mostly the super fat one (not pictured) who could kind of speak English. I don’t think I need to go to anymore maid cafes the rest of my life.

I put up some other pics from this day here, and there is also a quality YouTube video of Nick and his Sidekick doing some anime dance and being creepily synchronized for this being the “first time” they did said dance. I’m pretty sure they’ve done it before.

The following Sunday we had a Hanami Party at Chiba Castle, which was sweet before it started raining about 2 hours in. We ended up going to this American-style bar on the west side of Parco afterwards, which was pretty cool and is apparently open 24 hours. That night, Steve arrived in Japan and we went to Kim-chan for dinner before he headed to his hotel in Asakusa. The next day we met up in Tokyo with Macie, who was also visiting Japan. So yeah, the first stop with Steve and Macie was Akihabara, making it the second time for me to go to Geek Land in less than a week. That’s embarrassing. But with them, we did more arcades and hit up Super Potato, not doing much shopping. We didn’t really stay there that long. Macie was going to Kyoto that night, so after I took her to Tokyo to get on the Shinkansen, I met back up with Steve and we explored more of the city. We hit up Shimbashi, Ginza, etc on that side of town.

In Ginza we went to this amazing sushi place called 乾山 (Kenzan), which was the ritziest eating experience I’ve had in a while. From the moment we stepped into the door, we had a bunch of waitresses in kimono taking our coats, bags, etc as we got seated at the counter with our own personal sushi chef. Everything was absolutely fresh and made to order, including the anago, which was also grilled and cut to order. Of course great service and great food comes with a price. I didn’t know the damage until we actually asked for the final bill, which was scary since I noticed early on that there were no prices anywhere, and we were getting the otoshi and dessert without saying a word. Also they gave us a new shibori (wet towel) with almost every course. So yeah, the head waitress lady came over with the price written in pencil on a piece of paper and I almost gasped. It was indeed a pricey meal, but the best sushi I’ve ever had and a good experience. Can’t say Steve didn’t get a fancy Japanese meal that night!

The rest of the week was a balance between me going to job interviews, working, and meeting up with Steve in Tokyo. We went to the Ghibli Museum, Ueno Park for sakura, etc. Blanchard’s dad was also in town, so I went out with those guys one night. Seriously, everyone decided to come to Japan at once. There are some other pictures here. Part 2 of this big wrap up is coming soon, with the first Y’s of 2008, Penis Festival, and Namja Town.

I saw this Engrish in Shimbashi station last week, just as I was exiting the ticket gate…

Direct and straight to the point, right?
I wonder if they have their employees wear this logo on a shirt.

I forgot to post this before, but it’s from my visit to LA in October. I was driving around with Joey and Kyle, maybe near Beverly Hills, and we saw this dude walking on the sidewalk. Judging by his gear, he may very well be the King of All Hobos. But he’s dressed like a normal guy. It’s this contradiction that makes it all the more ridiculous.

Click on the image below to see the full picture.

I’ll bet you weren’t expecting that. I know I wasn’t.