STEP!

girls in flight...

break it down!

one of a handful of university girl dance teams shaking it in front of Kyoto City Hall Shiyakusho

I don't know who this fckng schlemiel is, but he's been McSlated to speak for all of us. 

Disclaimer: I don't watch much Japanese TV, so he could be a really famous gaitare foreign actor, and I wouldn't know...but I hope not.

--------STOP THE PRESSES!-------

UPDATE: he is apparently just some doofus dreamed up by McMad Men to make We the Gaijin seem less like pheromone concentrate to the local women...Hah! Good fcking Luck with that!

 This link has some insight on crackers more pissed off about this whole business than I (or is it me?)

The new McGaijin (This horrifying point-of-purchase cutout is life size and a bit rotund, for cardboard).

I got a hat not a visor--
I drink Budweiser--
the turntables
up on the drum riser

old skool beastie boys...from back in the dizzay

　Tony Soplano

nice 18% vigorish for you--and that's the advertised rate. a private money-lender. I'd be smiling, too.

those 500 yen coins represent your money flying away.  I have a Japanese friend who got behind at pachinko and the horse races keiba and essentially works full time for food, rent, smokes and these guys...at 24.4% interest. at his current rate of repayment, thinks he'll be in the clear--barring any unforeseen relapses--by mid 2011.

busted!

girl forced to remain professional as she hands out discount drink  coupons to her restaurant while being simultaneously idolized (by a schoolgirl) and ogled (by a me).

(note KIRIN beer flying dragon logo on her apron)

Gambatte sister!

...for the train in the rain...

File Under: Only Slightly Staged Irony

I was struck by this. Me on my way to lunch with my fatty salmon sashimi in the basket, pedaling past a group of young Japanese at the new American Burger shop. Based on the Sasebo Burger feeding Yanks at a US Military base in Sasebo, Kyushu (not far from Nagasaki, as fate would have it).

(It took me about 18 shots to get this 'candid', possibly ruining the Am-Burg experience for all of them.)

we met, we got married, she got pregnant...in no particular order.

in the experience of my acquaintances, when they've heard a Japanese person say this phrase, it's never been idiomatic & usually followed by some take on "marry me". 

the japanese speaker is most often a female (occasionally her father), some years older than the foreigner, in the 31-37 year range.

(JR train poster from the ongoing ECC Language Farm series on idioms, featuring Beat Takeshi.)

bright + cute = safe

Absinthe green froggy road construction barrier at the intersection of Sanjo & Kawaramachi in Kyoto.

"Let's get out of here...that dick w/ the camera is turning this into my American Nightmare."

a campaign highlighting earnestness in trying to persuade the Japanese to import and eat more hormone-stoked steroidal beef from the US of A. The local beef wagyu is very expensive and richly marbled...too fatty for many westerners. the real competition here is from the Aussie beef...which is in all stores and just like lean American beef.

(this photo is a closeup of a flyer hanging in my local SEIYU / WAL*MART)

I wanna just suck on all those teats

(KIRIN, brewing directly into color-coded beer mammaries right along the train tracks)

I thought this was a new banksy.

but it's a JR graphic, advising you to seek help from the train staff should you drop your bonnet from a simpler time on the tracks, etc.

 available more or less throughout Japan, wherever stuff is sold.

you know, Beat...I'm thinking most folks don't need that one.

Pink Alert!  Kyoto Station

yes, they knew each other.

don't have a beef with our Beef

young couple taking misty walk in the Kyoto Gosho. Figure in bright green (extreme left) is not a safety frog, but rather a raingear clad foreigner trundling northward to seek his fortune.

plastic food

Rive to Lide -- Lide to Rive!

Harley-Davidson Career Day 2009 storms Japan...See ya at Sturgis! (just don't let shacho* find out)

*company president, CEO, godhead.

real food. 

sushi trio (L-R: salmon sake/sah-mohn; young yellowtail hamachi; sea bream tai).

change: inspiration or desperation. choose one.

Safety Frogs:  Installation View

buy our American beef and we'll give you a Japanese Nintendo DS assembled in China.

pray

Student 1: Ahh Sensei! Harouuu!

Teacher 1: Hello. How are you today?

Student 1: OK desu!

Student 2: -------

Student 1: Good bye!

Student 2: -------

Teacher 1: Bye, girls...That's one lazy bithc, that fat one.

Teacher 2: Yeah. I have her, too.

not so much young as immature...

this droplet holds an ichiman (10,000) yen bill; once $90, now about $110...and climbing (thanks Fed!)

a mixed bag of japanese & foreigners show some grit in a dragonboat race on the mildly toxic Okawa River, Osaka City, as part of Tenjin Matsuri.

faitoh!  fight-oh!

BTW: if you have yet to see this style, the onsen towel headwrap is, in my opinion, one of the coolest tricks Japan has yet sprung on the world. great! useful! dashing! 

commonly spied: construction sites, restaurant kitchens, BBQs, kite festivals, bosozoku ohanami.

　Probably spoil it for me, too...for now I lead a triple life and I like it just fine. (it also helps that I'm a friendless skulking loner).  

How was Kyoto? Hope you had more fun than the next guy. Glad to be of some help; endeavor to be of more. Thanks for the mail.

T-shirt: getting requests, so ordered a small sample batch. See how they look and will post details soon.

*e.g., he references Page 19, I'm still working on Page 19, this is posted on Page 19.   Fresh as tomorrow!

you can keep your Pam Andersons and your Hollywood skanks w/ their ink & their herpes and your prom queens big & bland & blond.  these girls are, IMHO, nonpareil.  have a UNIQLOOK.

n.b.: all links in this box go to same spot; they're that good, these girls.

Student Sentence of the Week:

"All these huge unexpected expenses are killing us!"

Student: A high-strung older woman w/ 2 adult children. Private, weekly.

Context: Her hou$e had $uffered $ome uncovered damage in a recent typhoon. Her $on'$ new wife ju$t had a very premature baby who required a long $tay in the ho$pital. Recently, her retired hu$band wa$ pre$$uring her to learn to keep the hou$ehold book$ on the computer...$o money & accounting were in the forefront of her mind, $ee?.

Tech Talk: this was particularly impressive as it was a "novel utterance" (an original combination of ideas previously learned that she put together for herself, vs. just repeating some appropriate lesson point learned earlier).

Japanese Pro Wrestling.  Bring your game face, b!tch.

p

I don't take the escalator when there's an elevator.

I don't run when I can walk.

I don't walk when I can stand.

I don't stand when I can sit.

I don't sit when I can lie down.

(I paraphrase; we were both a bit sloshed when he told it to me, but think I got the bullet points).

Lived on the Inside.     Seen from the Outside.™

ｆellow readers: if you like this site please spread the word like human manure over an Edo Period rice field.  thanks.

posting a link to this site also much appreciated and good karma for you. 

you can't buy more bokeh than this...even if you wanted it.　

Japan now teaching women to read words (they can all read manga).

see? manga.

Humans...referenced & reflected in the same panasonic viera flat screen TV notice board in a JR train station.

Hope you all get where you're going safe & sane.