Japan loves Kit Kats, and exotic flavored drinks, and happily enough so do you and me, so let’s get down to some serious snack deconstruction: I’ve blogged Kit Kats before, as well as snack/drink combo Pepsi Blue Hawaii + Brazilian Pudding Pocky and others. This time we have a faux Kit Kat (Choco Wafers) and a Boysenberry Sparkling Soda combo:
Please do it at the beach
Recently this ad has been cropping up in train stations all round Tokyo: I’m glad as it’s about time- the number of people I’ve seen hemi-sliced like bacon rashers by those executioner-style train doors is more than I care to think about. Shlump! His upper body rolls around messily inside the carriage. Everybody politely ignores it, as they do if a drunk person has a food escape or a homeless person comes on and emanates. So, it’s certainly about time. Of course they could just de-sharpen and de-fang the train doors so people weren’t forever getting hemi-sliced, but then what …
Kugenuma Beach Hole-Diggers
I’m something of a life-long addict when it comes to digging holes at the beach. I’ve been digging holes since I was a kid alongside my Dad, fending off the sea, arming sea-shell soldiers along a sand-fort battlement, willing the walls to hold and the moat to stay fast. These days however I forsake the battlements and soldiers and just go for the biggest, widest, and deepest kid-swallowing hole I can dig:
Coppertone Bikini Girls
Coppertone have gone nuts recently in Shibuya station, plastering at least the Yamanote line north-bound platform with pictures of bikini-clad women (and little girls) with a dog biting their butts. When I first saw this I did a double-take, turned the other way, saw a similar ad where a little girl was getting her butt bit, and started to wonder if the whole thing wasn’t just a bit too weird for its own good. Odd.
Dinning Bar
I found the DINNING BAR in ultra-hip Shimo-Kitazawa a few weeks ago, and ever since have been scouring the net for what it could possibly be. My first thought was that it MUST be connected with the word ‘din’ as in “Lordy Mike’s making a din on that Double Bass!” or “Where’s that Godawful din coming from, is he on the Double Bass again?” But I wasn’t sure if the noun ‘din’ could be made into a verbal noun (AKA- gerund) so I went to the font of all knowledge, my old friends Merriam-Webster:
The ‘other’ Colonel Sanders
His name is Koichi Sanders. He and the Colonel were divided at birth, despite not sharing a common mother nor being born in the same country or year. After that tragic separation, they never saw each other again, but for in the distant redness of Red land. They live in Red land, which is why the space behind them is always red. Their uniquely black and white faces cause them endless shame, as everywhere they go they are mistaken for each other. This is a big problem, since they do not even speak the same language! Koichi Sanders considers the …
Scott and Makiko’s Wedding, Niigata
2 weeks ago my good friend Scott and his long-time girlfriend Makiko had a traditional Japanese wedding ceremony, in a hotel up in Niigata. I say ‘had a ceremony’ rather than ‘got married’ because of course- as things are done here in Japan- you get married first in secret at a local ward office, just by signing some papers. Then, when its too late for the parents to protest, you notify them that they’ll need to pay for the ceremony. Hay-ah! How do you like that, parents? I went up with some friends on the Shinkansen to attend. I’m on …
Push Pops
Push Pops! When I was a kid in England we had these. To have a Push Pop was a total status symbol. Adults may have walked around with ivory gilt gold-headed canes and peacock feathers in their caps, but for kids the only thing that mattered was the Push Pop.
Youtei Yusui Political Water
Lots of things get politicized in life. Rock has been political for a long time- Band Aid, Live Aid, U2 are heavy into politics. Food got political with Freedom Fries vs. French Fries for a while. Environmental concerns politicize a lot of regular products, as they switch their packaging and production methods to more eco-friendly ones. This is the first time I’ve seen water politicized though, especially for such a short term duration. This water is from Mt. Youtei in Hokkaido, where the 2008 eco-summit will be held for 3 days next week.
Arakawa Cyclo-Campers
The Arakawa river stretches up out of Tokyo Bay and into the Saitama mountains, passing straight through the bulk of the city, picking up stray cyclists looking for a place to go as it meanders above and below ground. Some of the cyclists that accrete to its bike-pathed banks come prepped with tents and gear to camp out, BBQ, and generally make merry. That was us.