Weekends Don’t Count Unless You Spend Them Doing Something Completely Pointless

I made a big decision a little while ago.
I don't remember what it was, which prob'ly goes to show
That many times a simple choice can prove to be essential
Even though it often might appear inconsequential.
- Watterson

So another fun weekend has passed, and once again, I get to brag bout the wild and crazy events that took place! And then since it’s three weeks today that I arrived in Japan, I shall update with my thoughts and impressions.

Ok, onto Osaka Adventure Vol 2!!!!! And there was much rejoicing.

Saturday morning started exactly the same as last Saturday morning… well, besides meeting Uncle Masa… I met Anton in Nara at 10 in the morning and we both went down to Osaka. At Kyobashi Station, we ran into a slight snag in our plans; We had arranged to meet Keith, Boon-hau, and Tongxin here at 11, but failed to realize the size of the station. Me and Anton split up, and Keith managed to find me, and fortunately when Anton returned we spotted the other two as well.

Tongxin wanted a camera, so we decided to go to Nipponbashi quick before we had to meet Vincent. Wandered around in the stores there, and since I was wearing a red shirt in front of a red Vodafone booth with a red phone, I may as well advertise for them.



Off to Osaka station, a little late at this time, and a little lost too. After taking the wrong train, we arrived 40 minutes late. Luckily Vincent was still waiting for us (Sorry bout that Vincent), so finally we were all together. Now for the adventure to start! If only we had a plan…

Everyone was very hungry, so we decided to find somewhere to eat. We found a food court type place, and looked at all the restaurants. There was what appeared to be an All You Can Eat Desserts restaurant… 90 minutes to consume all the sugar you can… I must take note of this. We went to a smaller place where you sit at a counter to eat… we all got the same thing ><. So we got some stares and laughs from the other customers, but it was all good. Went for dessert at a café a few doors down (sadly not the all you can eat place), got some cake, and Keith, well, the cake came with a plastic wrapping around it…

Anton took a picture of the girl that worked there. He seems to take pictures of everything, which means he’s slow at processing and uploading everything, which means it takes me longer to steal his pictures!!! Dang him!!! Nah, I’m very grateful that he’s letting me borrow them for my blog.

We explored the nearby mall. And then I heard what I had been waiting for since the first week in Japan… they were playing Funkytown o.O. Craaazy… Then we started heading back to Nipponbashi (Tongxin still needed her camera), but we got distracted by arcades. Keith and Boon-hau battled to the virtual death at Dragonball, and Keith won… before he was challenged by a Japanese Highschooler!! Boon-hau took over for Keith, and was beaten, but it was a close match. Though the student may have just been playing with Boon-hau o.O.

We took some pictures in the picture booth and then spent a good five minutes decorating them all… unfortunately they turned out very very small when they printed. Vincent played some Initial D racing, and Tongxin and Vincent played the drum game. Vincent’s a madman, he’s very good. It was around 5:30 around this time, so it was time to head to the big event.
Anton and I saw a band called Kaede playing near Osaka station last week (I may have blogged about it), and they were playing again this weekend! So we decided to check it out. In classic Link and Anton style, all we had to go by was the name of the place they were playing, Esaka Muse, and the time (Anton forgot the map). So we headed to Esaka station and asked one of the workers for assistance. Took the guy 5 minutes to find the place on the map, but was eventually able to help us.

Esaka Muse was basically the fifth floor of some sort of store maybe? We get up there, looks pretty small, there’s a dozen young Japanese guys hanging around. And we’re a gang of six gaijin… we got some looks yes. We go up to the counter, and I’m not sure exactly what the conversation was, but apparently it was more expensive than we thought, 30 bucks a ticket since we didn’t have reservations. But fortunately, the guitarist from Kaede, Atsushi, recognized me and Anton, so we got a reservation and 5 bucks off the ticket price.

Now, we weren’t sure what we were getting into exactly, we weren’t really expecting a concert to be held on the fifth floor of a store… Anton and I were up for anything as usual, but we would have felt bad if this was not a concert, and the others paid for nothing. Buuut…

We go inside, there’s a small stage (good sign), about 5 small tables, and a counter around the back corner with a bar. There’s probably 15 or so people inside, me and Anton were (of course) the only white guys. And we were pretty fly… or something. Anton proposed a toast for being the first white people to set foot there… which may or may not be true, but this was an extremely out of the way place, not a tourist attraction whatsoever. It was a place for indie bands to start out, basically, so most people in the audience were either very big fans, or friends of the band.

The first band were quite good. Their name was Re:ing (which doesn’t make sense to me either)… and according to their sticker, they advertise themselves as "Non Genre Pop" (I always thought pop was a genre, but what do I know). The band was made up of three guys, guitarist, bassist, and drummer, and they were quite good. Keith bought their CD.



Nobody was super close to the stage at this point… except for one brave soul. He was getting his groove on pretty good, dancing close to the stage with some very good moves! I was jealous of his mad skillz. Oh, perhaps I should mention, he was about 5 feet tall, and about 65 years old. The bands and the fans were very nice to him! Anton got a photo of him while he was taking a break… Some of the younger guys were copying his dancing moves too.



The second group (don’t remember the name) was decent, but waaay too American influenced… Every song the girl singer would shout "What! What! What!…". Very dumb, that’s what, but I guess to be expected. American music is everywhere in Japan, and not necessarily the good music either. Third band was better than the first two, they were called Wedding… (Yes, I use a lot of … when I type, but that’s actually part of their band name). The lead singer, female, had a very good voice. Anton and Boon-hau each got one of their singles CDs.

Yay! Kaede is next! By far the crowd favorite, people were standing right next to the stage, and kinda punching the air while cheering, guess that’s the thing to do here. And three guys were getting a little… rambunctious? But that’s the thing to do at rock concerts everywhere. Anyway, Kaede played really well, even coming out for an Ankoru (encore)!







When we left the concert Chii was in the lobby area. She remembered us from last week, and thanked us for coming, and we got a group picture!




This is getting very long… like Anton’s blog long almost, and I’ve only wrote about Saturday, so I’ll speed through the next part. We went for dinner at a Ramen place, and the only eventful thing was while we were waiting to be seated. A nice looking Japanese girl was leaving the restaurant, and just as she passed us, Anton said, mostly to himself, "She’s cute!"… The girl turns around, smiles, and thanks him!

Anyway, Boon-hau and Tongxin left to go to their dorms, and we headed back to Anton’s place in Nara. Got to the stop 2 stations from Anton’s and the trains had stopped, so we had to cab it home.

I shall return with installment two shortly, perhaps later tonight, so stay tuned!

Mmm Japanese Jolly Ranchers.