Karaoke Spotting

Sorry, another short one today.  This is the view from Kama Sutra, (formerly) one of our favorite bars in Osaka.  It's generally known as a gaijin bar, meaning it's typically frequented by foreigners and those who enjoy hanging out with foreigners and/or singing songs in English.  Kama Sutra is about the size of a standard American SUV (or, say, one and a half times the size of our apartment), which makes it nice and cozy.  It's here that we spotted this gentleman, a real-life Drunken Japanese Man Belting ZZ Top Songs Incomprehensibly, in the wild.  Enjoy this uncensored, brutally honest look at the Osaka nightlife fauna:

Before, after, and during his song, this guy claimed to be a music producer. As far as I know, he's still there, hogging the mike for all time.

This is Only a Test

Sorry, folks, no blog to speak of now.  There are plenty of issues going down (nothing quite as substantive as the last few posts), but at the moment we at Gaijin HQ are driving ourselves crazy preparing for the JLPT.  In short, the JLPT is the Japanese Language Proficiency Test.

...In slightly less short: Jenn and I are taking the JLPT Level 3 test for the second time this December.  Basically, this is the test that gets you a piece of paper that says you can speak (and read) Japanese.  While the uses of this piece of paper beyond Japan may be obscure and unforeseen, one of our goals in coming to Japan was to actually learn Japanese, something that goes a bit quicker with some motivation.

For those of you out there who aren't abreast with the minutiae of our language acquisition, our Japanese has finally, after many, many months of study, progressed from "basically nonexistant" to "bad."  We have Japanese friends, we can make some conversation, we can make a few jokes (ask Jenn, hers are pretty awesome), we can order in most restaurants and even order pizza over the phone...but amazing as all that may seem sometimes, my vocabulary is still routinely dwarfed by 4-year-olds.  It's not an easy language, is what I'm trying to say.

To this end, we enrolled to take the JLPT last July to give ourselves a concrete goal and a way of measuring our progress.  After flailing through a smattering of Japanese textbooks, we finally procured the services of a really awesome tutor, whom Jenn sees three times a week and I see once a week (the life of a kindergarten teacher is a busy one).  She's an awesome foreign language teacher, and this is coming from someone who sees a lot of really sucky foreign language teachers, someone who knows that it's considerably harder to teach English than it is to speak English.  After a good hard 5 months of drilling vocabulary and grammar and a million such things, we went in and soundly failed the test.

With another few months' work of preparation behind us, we are going into the test again on December 4th.  Which is why I have so much studying to do, which is why I don't have time to write...a...blog.

Hm.

Well, as long as I'm here, how about a couple pictures?

A sign posted above the toilet in a restaurant/bar that we frequent.  Translated: "Rather than speed, control."  An important message for us all (well, all us men, anyway).

AAAAAAH!  THE DEAD HAVE RISEN!  This is probably one of the more fun crafts we've had in Free School.  Happy Day of the Dead, everyone!  You'll hear from us again sometime after the JLPT, probably!

They [We] Live!

Yes, rumors of our death and all that. Anyway: we're back from a long hiatus of not doing anything particularly interesting! It's really remarkable how after two short years of living here, what once seemed bizarre and blog-worthy now seems...well, humdrum. Ho-hum, giant spiders, wacky Engrish T-shirts, pizza with corn on it, yes yes, nothing new there, everyday stuff. However, we've crammed two entire vacations into the last week, so full blog coverage is upcoming shortly! Here's a teaser:



What do these pictures have to do with each other? Or...anything else, for that matter? Tune in this week to find out!

Happy Blogiversary!

I'm sure you don't need us to point this out considering how closely you've been following these matters, but this is actually the 100th post on "Amazing Tales of the Gaijin Patrol!" And to think that only a year and a half ago this blog was little more than a glint in our collective desire for attention. Wow.

In tried-and-true blogditions, according to the Blogmandments that inform our blogposition, without which the blog blog bloggity blog. Or is it? Anyway, please enjoy this best-of compilation of some of our greatest moments of the past 18-odd months. Think of this as the clip show of blogs (and remember, clip shows are already the olive loaf of television).

Remember that time we came to Japan and it was really weird? (doodley-doo, doodley-doo, doodley-doo)

Or how about that other thing? Ha ha, that was great.

And let's not forget this. Now that's what I call a sticky situation!

And of course, mummies in the basement.

Can you believe it's only been six hundred and five days? Just look at all the progress we've made since being embarrassed to go to a restaurant or throw away our garbage in the proper receptacles! Maids are still f¥¥¥ed up, of course.

Here's to another hundred posts!

To Paraphrase a T-Rex: "I Want to Plug My Band. Please Allow Me."

Sorry it's been so quiet 'round these parts lately...I promise, it's not because we've all been turned into Godzillas or superheroes over here. Things have been groovy enough, in fact, that a funky-ass concert is just about to break out:


I do, in fact, have plenty to say about many topics of interest. So, as a preview for the upcoming weeks of "Amazing Tales of the Gaijin Patrol," be sure to look forward to hearing about...

• * A trip to Beppu, the Las Vegas of Japan! Except instead of a desert, it's boiling pits of molten sulfur, and instead of gambling, it's taking baths!

• * A look back at a year of teaching kindergarten and having meetings.

• * An unflinching look at how information flows in the Internet Age and how it affects popular perceptions. With...video game jokes, probably.

• * Kit Kats!

• * And more!

See you at the show on Saturday! Like the man said, "Free concerts and your ass will follow." Or something.

Robo-Boogie

It is the distant future: the year 2011. There are times where having the opportunity to write about life in Japan is a precious gift. This is absolutely one of those times.

The other day, Osaka hosted the world's first bipedal robot marathon. I'll just repeat that: Osaka was home to the first-ever 26.2 mile race of bipedal robots. If your reaction to this is anything like mine, you are expecting news of the successful launch of Skynet any day now.

The proud winner of this year's marathon. Look at that charming smile!

So yeah, it's pretty much "I for one welcome our cruel robot overlords" time. Except, of course, for the fact that these robots are adorably tiny. Please enjoy these highlights from the race.

It's even better if you imagine "Yakkity Sax" playing from 0:17.

The blog post containing actual information about this race is here. A chilling vision of what could one day come to pass is here. Please write your congressman today and demand that robo-American relations are represented in the government.

Snow Day

Sorry, no blog this week. In case you haven't heard, Osaka has been stricken by the white-hot vengeance of the season. Snow demons, what hath thou wrought?



The school buses stopped running, the city buses were about half an hour late, there was utter chaos. Teachers (not me) threw snowballs at other teachers (also not me). It got so bad that even a well-meaning gaijin couldn't take out the garbage from Activity Kids without getting thoroughly dusted.

Happy Valentine's Day, snow demons. And a hearty fuck you to you, too.

Not Since the Deliveryman Called me Harry Bellafonte...

Yes, yes, the concert last Saturday went well. Lots of fun, even if it was a little tense because about half of our audience (5 of 11 people) were musicians, meaning they probably could catch it when I screwed up. Still, one guy was enthusiastic enough to ask for three encores, and we had a nice little session time after the show where the audience came up to play a few numbers. And we played one more, too.

Before the show, we had a rather interesting encounter with a Japanese man whose name escapes me (not an uncommon phenomenon) who seemed keen on America to the point of...well, oddity. A few of his points (as best I could understand them) are here enumerated (and no, I really didn't make any of these up):

1. Japanese people are all very short compared to foreigners.

2. Japan has way more homeless people than America does.
2a. Furthermore, Japanese homeless people are ugly and smell bad.
2b. By contrast, American homeless people are certainly all attractive.

3. Japanese people cannot grow facial hair well.
3a. Foreigners, who can grow excellent facial hair, all look like Charles Bronson.

It's really refreshing, especially after some recent nastiness, to confirm that even the people who really like America still have no idea what foreigners are actually like.

Today in Shameless Plugs

Just a last-minute plea for attention from anyone who might be in Osaka tomorrow (that would be Saturday, October 23rd): Jenn and I will be performing two sets of live jazz and blues at our home away from home away from America, Raku Cafe. Please enjoy this copy-pasted advertisement, free of charge!

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Yes, once again, Jenn, Harry, and Yutaka-san will be performing jazz and blues at New Raku Cafe in Shin-Imamiya! We've been some days in preparation; a splendid time is guaranteed for all! Bring your friends!

Yutaka-san - Guitar
Jenn - Vocals and Cello
Harry - Ukulele

From Shin-Imamiya Nankai: Take the North exit (near the Festival Gate exit), turn right and walk with the train tracks on your right and the large construction site on your left. Turn left at the end of the construction site and go straight to the first intersection (about 30 seconds). Raku is on the corner.

From Dobutsuenmae: Take Exit 1 or 2 and turn left to cross under the train tracks. Turn right, walking with the tracks on your left. Turn right on the first street after crossing the tram tracks (seriously, it's about a minute if that). Go straight to the first intersection (about 30 seconds). Raku is on the corner.

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Hope to see you there, true believers! Being on another continent is no valid excuse!

A is for Awwwww

Just a short image for you while I'm working on a longer post:

Despite all the complaining that goes on around here, we both really do like Japan quite a lot. Our new apartment is awesome, Osaka is a cool city, and Japanese culture really is interesting. I kinda just have a problem with that fine line between "incisive observational humor" and "bitching." I especially like the job at the kindergarten. It's got long hours, but really, having the laughter of children being a part of your work day is a considerably better perk than free copies or a communal coffee machine.

Case in point, today I was walking past Panda class and Shogo, one of the most enthusiastic if error-prone students (he regularly stops me on the playground, points to my shirt, and says "It's red!", regardless of the actual color), stepped out and yelled "Hello!" to me. I was on my way to get lunch, but I greeted him right back and gave him a high-five. By the time we managed that, another dozen or so students ran out to meet me, squealing and demanding high-fives. I laughed and tried to oblige them all as three or four started hugging my legs. One of them, then most of them, started saying in their adorable little voices, "Harry Daisuki!" Basically, "We love Harry!"

Pretty much an average day at the kindergarten. I'm pretty sure my best day ever at Sakishima was the time I took a long lunch and snuck out early.