It's Not Where Your From, It's Where Your At

You know what's interesting about Japan? Its amazing how the streets are so clean, yet it takes a one hour man hunt to find a trash can (￣^￣)

 2011年03月18日

After I ran out of all my mixtapes I figured it was time to let out the geek in me and hit the Otaku shop next door. The place I went to was huge. 5 floors of Otaku madness. There were even hot chicks geeking out to the figures, mangas, and anime. There was a whole floor dedicated to trading cards and pong. I know what your thinking. WTF pong!? I havnt seen that since 4th grade yet apparently it was still a hot thing to collect and battle with. The very top floor was a mecca for cosplays. They had a whole wall lined up with wigs and their were all kinds of outfits for something such as Anime Boston (#^.^#) I bought a few gifts and decided to head back to the hostel.

When I returned, the guy at the reception desk informed me that Ayako had checked out. Another thing about this place that made me uneasy was the fact that I leave my room keys whenever I step out but when I pick it up, all I say is the room number and they hand it to me. No ID or anything. If it was always the same guy at the reception desk, I would give him the benefit of the doubt that he has phenomenal memory of people walking in and out but nope. It was almost always a different person from when I left and returned. I guess it's no different than staying at a shared dorm with people you don't know.

When I got to my room, Ayako had left me a message saying she is sorry and had to go back. She ended up leaving me some green tea (^○^) and a bunch of hokkairo. Thank you Ayako. I didnt feel like she needed to apologize to me cause her leaving just brought me back to plan A: solo dolo. Although I didn't appreciate the cold shoulder I got earlier (♯｀∧´) I decided for my next adventure I was to head out and explore the neighborhood. I still had about 5 hours before I was going to meet with the Akira and there was a direction in my neighborhood I had not gone to and wanted to go so... I'm going ε=ε=ε=┌(￣◇￣)┘

I go to get lost by taking a path that seems like a tunnel walkway and when I emerge on the other side I come to find another shoutengai. This place was huge and had the look of once being a very lively beautiful shopping district. It looked like it had been run down by the recession of the 90s and hadn't had a makeover in over 20 years. There were a lot of closed down shops that must have thrived at one point. There were still plenty of people hanging around but it wasn't like the feel I got in Shinsaibashi, where you know people are there to shop and indulge. Rather I got the feeling that these were people that lived around here and hung out at this shoutengai. The day had suddenly become cloudy and it just made the scenery look even more sad. On my walk I actually noticed an arcade for the first time. Funny cause on my last trip I couldn't help but to find them everywhere and now I see one and dont even have the desire to go in. I'm not a gamer like I used to be (T_T) I continued my walk through shadier areas and found a rundown looking movie theater that looked like a place to watch porn on the big screen. As I continued my twist and turns through the district I caught sight of an enormous tower. It turned out to be the Tsutenkaku Tower, modeling after the Eiffel Tower, and was in the heart of Shin-sekai (that's my neighborhood). As I approached the building more closely, I wondered if I could go to the top? Soon as I reached it I felt that going to the top of that tower was not made for a lonely traveller so I just kept it moving (｡-_-｡)

I decided to take a turn and walk along this highway bridge. At this point it started to get really dark out and not as populated. I randomly happen to run right into the city's zoo. Of course it was closed but the place had a few homeless Japanese that seemed to call this place home. The area seemed so vacant and rundown but it had a path that seemed to be a scenic route. Let's go me (^○^), myself ♪（ｖ＾＿＾）, and I (^_-)

The path I took seemed to take me to what seemed like a museum. The area I was in seemed like a great place for riding bike or taking someone on a date. I continue the path that was fenced around by the zoo. I wonder if during operation hours, do you see animals out and about as you walk this path? The path eventually took me back to the city lights and a train station. I decided to warm up with some ramen and headed to Umeda to eat at the same place I was yesterday with the KK crew. Soon as I got there I felt cold and exhausted. I ate and jetted home to catch some sleep before tonights clubbing event.

I gotta say my phone service in Osaka with Softbank was on the off and on and if I ever get a new phone next time it will be with Docomo. I napped using Ayako's hokkairo to keep me warm for about 3 hours until Akira hit me up. He said he be late a half hour so that just gave me more time for sleep (~_~) I almost didn't feel like going on how tired I suddenly felt but I eventually got up off my ass, put on the T-qualizer and headed down to Namba to meet Akira.

Time for a challenge, this was gonna be my first real hang out with Japanese people who didn't understand english and I didn't have Ayako as the translator this time around. Trying to meet up and discuss our location over the phone was dam near impossible. When we finally met, talking in person was much smoother and it felt like we had been friends for years. We headed to a McDonalds as our meeting spot until Coney and Kodama showed up. There seemed to be a lot of people dolled up in different styles for what the night life had to bring. Akira and I talked music and dancing. He even showed me a new move called the 'Reebok'. I'll be doing that tonight（＾Ｏ＾☆♪

Coney eventually came through and showed me footage of their practices. Watching each one of them I randomly gave a nickname to each style. Akira: water, Kodama: a gorilla, and Coney: I couldn't quite narrow his down but he wanted me to give him one so the closet thing I can think of for his semi robotic style was a gundam. It was past 12, Kodama still hadnt showed, and I began to think that the club plans were done after learning that they close at 1. Coney reassured me that those clubs are the ones in Amerika-Mura and we were headed to all nighter clubs in Shinsaibashi. やった！Kodama finally came through (he is known for being the late one, I can relate @(・●・)@) Kodama busted out a street hair style magazine called "Woofin Heads" which him and his wild style haircut are featured in! Awesome, I will be taking that as a souvenir back home. As we sat there before making up our minds on which club to go to in Shinsaibashi, I looked at there attire and mine and realized they looked more street Hiphop than me and I looked more Japanese than them. My how our cultures make an influence on one another.

"All you see is all my flights, Well all I see is all my falls

All you see is all my rights, All I see is all my wrongs" - Lupe Fiasco

Keep it 元気