School Festival, Smash Tourney, Elementary School Performance

So the school had their big festival, the Matsuragawa Matsuri, last weekend (the weekend after Halloween). It was from Thursday till Saturday, with no school on Thurs / Fri. Basically it was a bunch of food booths at the Akahiro (red quad) and a big stage with a bunch of performances. The majority of performances were ensou (musical performances), all done by the students. There were also a few comedy shows that were actually pretty funny...and there were the comedy shows that all us gaijin thought was completely unfunny, but had the Japanese roaring. There were also a lot of sporting events, with competitions taking place between each year (e.g. Freshman vs Sophomore) and between schools.

A really funny skit...heavy on slapstick, as is most Japanese comedy

Oh! A sword fight!

Then they bust out the guns, which happen to be bubble makers. They do a really funny Matrix-like thing...it worked really well with the bubble makers. I thoroughly enjoyed it :)

The bands that performed were all pretty good...though, there was one time that I thought the band sounded just like the Japanese original song (whatever it may be), then someone told me they were singing in English...so, the music's pretty good, but their singing in English could still use work ^_<>And if you've got a good eye, you can see where the singer is looking to get his lyrics. (Yes...he is reading them off his cellphone...such is the Japanese dependency on their keitai [cellphones]).

A look from the back. You can see a few of the booths...it's not too big of an area. I'll be taking some more pictures of the campus when it's a clear day and no one's around to wonder why the gaijin is taking pictures (I'd rather not stand out more than I already do ^^).

Directly behind me from the last picture was this kawaisou (an endearing "how pathetic" hyougen (expression) in Japanese) flea market. I ended up buying a copy of Finding Nemo in Japanese here for 1200 yen, which is about $10. A VERY good deal - most Japanese DVDs tend to range in the ~$25-$35 department

Inside one of the main buildings they had smaller performances. Here a mandolin group was playing various popular songs. It was really amazing to hear their rendition of YUI's CHE.R.RY.

Here's the girls soccer team doing a para para dance (where you do flashy hand movements) to LOVE & JOY by Yuki Kimura (J-pop).

I went to my friend's apartment for dinner that night. Hey look, Lost is on TV! She hadn't seen the show before, but when she saw it she instantly cried out "mitai!" (He looks like you!). So, I guess it's no only my parents who think I look like Jack from Lost :)
PS: Yes, it was all in Japanese. Despite American dubbing usually being horrendous, when the Japanese dub American shows, it usually turns out pretty good (though that's probably because I'm used to the Japanese voices).

So on Friday night I went to Tokyo. Saturday was the day of the Smash tournament, and I decided to go to that instead of the soccer tournament, since it would be the only one I'd be able to go to and I'd be going to a different soccer tournament later on (this coming weekend). Hey...what's that sign say off in the distance?

"Su-pa- Ekisaiteingu Pabu UCLA" = "Super Exciting Pub UCLA". It just so happened I had my UCLA shirt on at that time, too. I really wanted to go check it out, but I think there was an entrance fee. I plan on going back with the other UCLA ryuugakusei to go see what's inside...there's no way I can't :)

That night I stayed in a Manga Kissaten. They're amazing. For ~$10 you get 5 hours. During those 5 hours you can check out any of the hundreds of manga books they have, rent any of the dozen DVDs they have (everything's in Japanese, of course), and get as many refills of your choice of caffeinated poison (soda / slushee / coffee / tea) as you like. On the right is the drink machine, and on the left are the cubicles (pictured is the walkway). They also have showers that you can use.

Here's my room. It's pretty small, but pretty nice too. You get a computer (with Internet access, of course), a TV, headphones (so as not to disturb people sleeping), and a big chair/bed thing with a footrest. It wasn't the most comfortable place to sleep, but it was conveniently located, and I did get to watch Ice Age 2 in Japanese.

This is inside a McDonald's. Why there's a random giant poster of Captain America, I don't know...I've learned that the answer to most questions you'll have is: "This is Japan. It just is."

Here's the Shinkansen (Bullet Train) I took to Aichi-ken, Nagoya-shi. I was hoping it'd be super cool...but it wasn't. Just kinda like any other train, but a bit nicer. Slept most of the time. Cost me $85 or so, but at least I can say I rode it, right?
When I got to the train station in Kariya (a train ride away from Nagoya) I saw two Japanese guys standing off to the side. I pulled out my Gamecube controller from my backpack, and they smiled and walked over towards me. Ping pong, (a Japanese way of saying "correct") these were the guys I was supposed to meet. I had known the second I saw them that they were gamers...don't ask me how. It's just a skill I have that I'm none too proud of...blame my dad for exposing me to them at an early age. It doesn't matter if their American or Japanese, they all carry themselves in a similar manner...the way they wear their clothes, the distinguishable laugh, that unmistakable stench...yup, they were gamers =) And I'm glad I have that ability, too, otherwise I might have never found them (well that and my Gamecube controller never hurts ^_<).

I really had to use the bathroom at the train station, but then I saw this...you know, for all the hi-tech toilets that most Japanese people have in their homes, you'd think they'd get rid of their Japanese style toilets. They're nothing but shitholes in the ground (quite literally). I still am unsure exactly how to use it, so I just gamanshita (dealt with it) till I got to the venue, which was about a 10 min walk from the station.

It was held in some big building that had a lot of sub rooms that could be rented. About the tournament: There were about 30 people, with me and a guy I met on the internet (Israel's best player, who wasn't actually that good) as the only (surprise) gaijin. The rules were different, but not different enough that I'd bore you all with the "what stages were banned / allowed" details. The level of the players was surprisingly low, and it seemed like they had never really watched a high-level match. If the Nor Cal players had played against these guys, the Japanese would have been completely blown away. I did alright, winning a decent amount of matches, but eventually lost to a few of the actual real good players there. All in all it was a lot of fun, and I'm glad I went.

Here's a group shot of all of us...good times, new friends, and a new group of Smashers to play with when the next game in the series, Super Smash Bros. Brawl for the Nintendo Wii, comes out Februrary 4th next year.

Last Thursday (the 8th) my class of elementary school kids were performing at a performance hall at the top of Tsuru Bunka Daigaku. I woke up early to go watch. Pictured above is the 4th graders, who did a rendition from a song from the Playstation 2 videogame Final Fantasy XII. It was pretty cool to see that the Japanese were completely fine to do performances from videogame and anime music, without it seeming geeky or out of the ordinary.

They were really good, especially for 4th graders. It wasn't as impressive as the awe-inspiring professional-quality performance that the Junior High schoolers put on a while back, but it was still pretty damn impressive.

There's my kids! (3rd graders + another 3rd grade class) They did a song from popular Miyazaki anime film "Princess Mononoke" on their little recorders. It was really good, I got some video footage of it that I'll put up later (unfortunately I didn't have enough space to record the entire thing v_v). They also sang a song afterwards...very impressive.