Things What You Missed:
- It was Christmas Eve. We drank sake and reflected upon the oddness of Christmas spent away from home. Two New Zealanders, an Irishman, an American and a Singaporean gathered around a table and toasted multi-culturalism (and then walked into a bar, etc etc).
- It was Christmas.
- I ate ham, on Christmas, for the first time ever (how odd that this should occur in Japan, especially given the fact that my typical Christmas fare in New Zealand was, that most Japanese of staples, salmon. Having a vegetarian mother has shocking ramifications for one's pig intake).
- James, the most British person in Japan, brought Christmas cake and Christmas pudding. The Americans present prodded it suspiciously. James ate his portion with vigour. And chopsticks.
- I Skyped my family and enjoyed the spectacle of all festively adorned in the ridiculous clothing I had sent them. Father is particularly fetching in the luridly checkered yellow and orange hooded jacket which sang his name from the shelves of Senki ("Jo-ru! Jo-ru!"). Half of me came from this man:
I think this explains a LOT.
- I Skyped one Ally Garrett and enjoyed the spectacle of her festively adorned with ginger kittens. No finer accessory.
- One Diane White called me and wished the best of the seasons from the southern hemisphere where, amusingly, despite the purportedly summery climate, they had been forced to light a fire on Christmas Day, giving credence to my former private speculations that Taihape is, in fact, godforsaken.
- It was Boxing Day. I discovered that Americans do not call it Boxing Day. Imaginatively, they refer to the day after Christmas by the tag "the day after Christmas". ("But what do you call the Boxing Day Sales?" "..."the "after-Christmas sales"" "But that's so BORING!" "Maybe, but what does Boxing Day even MEAN?" "...*Googles*"). My request, put to an American family, that we should eat together on Boxing Day, was met by bemused sidelong glances, as if I had created some occasion upon which we all must don boxing gloves and shorts and meet in a ring to eat our gyoza. Which might have been festive.
- It was the 30th of December. Manfriend and I flew to Tokyo.
- Tokyo is big.
- I was reunited with one Elizabeth Love in a touching fashion (emotionally rather than figuratively) (a shame, really).
- I was reunited with one Abby Foy in an equally touching fashion (I apparently spent much of my holiday acting out episodes of Full House).
- I introduced my friends to their first nomitabehoudai. They got drunk. Very. There were some inappropriate maneuvers performed upon a nearby statue of Buddha (he felated a number of chopsticks, if you must know). We became overly excited by plates of bean sprouts.
- It was New Year's Day. The fact that I was not near-naked in a badly-pitched tent with a headache listening to New Zealand bands perform amongst grape vines grated oddly.
- We went to Harajuku. There were girls. And shops. And Nigerians flogging illegal things from dark corners. And may, many crepes. I discovered Forever 21, H&M and TopShop, all in a row, like very well-dressed and well-behaved English children. Acted like a Jew at the Wailing Wall. Worshipped. Worshipped vigorously, with my wallet. Liz rebelled by putting lots of weird things on her face.
- It was New Year's night. We went to Abby and Juliet's hotel room. I ripped my Karen Walker dress. Soothed self with plum wine.
- We tried to find Tim in the streets of Shinjuku. Many, many hours passed.
- We found Tim. Then we found dinner. In a restaurant glowing neon blue with the light of a thousand fish tanks, with the tag line "Experience the Great Barrier Reef". Can now tick that off my list of things to do in Japan. We were shut into a booth by long-suffering wait-staff. We ate nabe and very small pieces of cheese cake. We became merry. And overly excited by the possible contortions to be made with our tongues.
- We accidentally went into an arcade. Spent many, many dollars attempting to win small, plush Kitty's and alpacas. Amused by plethora of alpaca. Had not suspected them to be so popular an animal. Abby won two alpaca (alpacas? Had not suspected that correct grammatical rendering of plural alpaca(s) would be an issue I would ever face. Notable lack of foresight).
- We went to Big Echo for the countdown and for karaoke. Taylor Swift was there. So were the Backstreet Boys. And Queen. And The Killers. Abby was still bemusing composed.
I was not composed enough to take any more pictures that night.
- Suddenly, it was 7am. Instead of falling asleep like a normal person, I read a book (stolen from the hostel, soz) entitled American Wife, which I enjoyed until I realised, upon reading the end credits, that it was premised upon the life of one Laura Bush and her husband, one Bush Bush. Then, was struck by the immensity of my own denseness. Distressing commencement to the New Year.
- It was January 2nd. We went HERE.
Obviously, this is DISNEYLAND.
- Manfriend conceded to wear a hat:
- I myself located the most classy, tasteful pair of ears available for purchase:
- We went on Splash Mountain, where I was, inconceivably, splashed. My fringe was ruined. I was inconsolable. These guys remained perky:
- I became briefly homesick, prompted by Disney's charmingly accurate rendering of my homeland:
- More days passed. We did stuff.
- Liz came to Sapporo! It snowed a LOT.
- We went to the zoo in this weather. This proved to be rookie mistake. Too cold for photographs; too cold for animals.
- We went to a cat cafe. I spend too much time in cat cafes.
- We went to Round One. We rode arcade horses vigorously. We napped on massage chairs. We caught the 6am train home. I bought bran. I am a healthy, regular human being. We slept until 3am and then bought ridiculous quantities of McDonalds.
- We reverted to our 17 year old selves. This night resulted in Liz's last day in Japan being spent prone, on the couch, unable to move or eat. It is best documented photographically:
It is now 7.17am. An hour ago, I put Liz on a bus to the airport, the first leg in a trip back to NZ. We were sad.
See?
- I am exhausted. Even in bullet point format, and conceding much detail to the wonder of the photograph, I have clearly left it too long between blogs to accurately record all highjinks.
- New Year's Resolutions:
- Write more;
- Drink less;
- Write less about drinking.
Good.
This makes me miss you. And want to come to you in Japan. As long as you never take me to sacrilege that is any Disney apart from the one in Anaheim. When we skype you can tell me about F21 etc. xx
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