Category: japan

Momiji Lightup

Momiji – 紅葉 – is the name of the Japanese maple tree, but it can also be read Kouyou, which is the color the leaves of trees take in autumn. Watching nature around this time of year is a huge event in Japan, almost as big as the cherry blossoms in spring.

So last Saturday I went to a park in the north of Tokyo to see a lightup, an event where they light up the best looking trees around the park at night so you can sit under them drinking 抹茶. The park was full of young couples, old women, and of course photo otakus with all their best gear on hand.

momiji lightup in komagome

If you want to go see it, the park is open every night until December 7th. It’s in the 六義園 close to Komagome station on the Yamanote. All the info is on this website.

Onsen nation

Next weekend is a 4-day weekend (well, it is if you take two days of since my company doesn’t care about official holidays). My girlfriend and I wanted to make a little trip, so we did what any japanese would do, buy a travel magazine, most of which selling you a one-night trip to an onsen.

Jalan - a travel magazine specialized in Onsen

You see, heaven for a japanese is a nice view, good food and a hot bath; and anyone who’s come to Japan and tried an onsen knows it ain’t a bad ideal. So all those magazines come out every month full of hundreds of onsen hotels where you can spend a night (rarely more, as prices are prohibitively high) soaking in your private bath watching the stars, eat traditional food (usually fish) and sleep in a nice futon.

It’ll be a first for me, sleeping at the onsen, so I’ll be sure to make a detailed report of my experience when I come back.

Wii Pre-orders

Wii comes out on December 3I just received an email this instant from Amazon. Here’s what it says:

『Wii』 予約受付日のお知らせ！

11/17（金）より、予約を開始いたします。購入ページへのリンクは、受付予定日（時間は未定です）にゲームストア にて表示されますので、ご確認ください。
注文数が確保できる商品数を上回った場合は、注文のキャンセルをさせていただく場合があります。その際はＥメールでご連絡いたします。

Which basically means that Amazon opens their pre-orders for the Wii tomorrow (no info about the exact time though). Now I’m torn between waiting in-line in the cold at BicCamera on the day of launch, Saturday December 2, or getting it on internet and running the risk of getting it one week late (I’ll probably be in China on a business trip the week just after launch and will not be able to receive the box from Pelican Delivery).

ああっ、どうしようかなぁっ！

New Ticket Machines

This weekend they changed the ticket vending machines in my station and it makes me feel a little bit closer to Tokyo when I buy my ticket every morning.

new tojo machines

On the left, the old busted early 80’s style machine with old-school orange monochrome screen. On the right, the new model they installed, exactly the same as any Tokyo Metro station (well, the older models they have there). Except we’re not on Tokyo Metro, we’re on the frickin’ Tobu Tojo line, 55 minutes away from Ikebukuro… I really need to move out of this hole…

1 year in Japan

1 year in JapanToday was my 1st anniversary of coming to Japan. It’s been a great year for me, I really feel like I’ve accomplished a lot of things and it makes me feel great. I met a lot of great people here, had a lot of fun and learned a lot.

One regret I have is that I haven’t had the time (and the financial resources) to travel around Japan as much as I would’ve liked. My “new year resolution” will be to correct that and visit the country outside of the Tokyo area. I’m already starting by planning a trip to the onsen in Izu with the girlfriend in the coming weeks. More about it will come soon…

So here’s to 1 year in Japan, hoping for a lot more to come.

Tokyo International Film Festival

19th tokyo film festival

This weekend is the start of the 19th Tokyo International Film Festival. They’ll show a lot of cool movies until next weekend at the Bunkamura in Shibuya and in Roppongi Hills. I’m going to try to catch Flags of our Fathers saturday, the American part of Clint Eastwood’s 2 movies about the Battle of Iwo Jima from each side’s point of view, and The World’s Fastest Indian on sunday.

That, or I might just go see some random foreign movie they’re showing if I can’t get seats for the ones I planned…

Something’s up in Japan’s sky

C17 VirginiaSomething’s going on in the sky over Saitama. Yesterday morning, in the bus to work, I saw a diamond formation of what looked like 5 C-17 flying very low. And today we heard jets screaming all day over our heads at work.

I don’t know if they raised the state of alertness since North Korea announced they were taking the UN sanctions as a declaration of war, but it sure looks like it.

If this whole situations turns bad (and it’s bound to happen with that crazy midget in Pyongyang), I hope it’ll at least get me a pay raise. A little risk allowance is always welcome…

New Google Maps

Apparently, it’s it’s been live for 2 weeks now, but it’s the first time I notice it: Google Maps has been updated for Japan! It’s now much more readable with full-width characters, building elevation, 2 more zoom levels, brighter colors and at last hybrid view.

new map for shibuya crossing

And the best part, we can now see the underground parts of train stations in light red with the exit numbers. Here is for exemple Shibuya crossing.

Fun Fact: I never noticed, but the sheer number of MacDonalds in Shibuya is scary…

Train Otaku festival

This weekend we had perfect weather in Tokyo, thanks to the typhoon that just passed. It’s impressive how it can pour with crazy wind friday night and be 8°C more with a perfect blue sky on saturday morning. So we thought it’d be nice to go for a big walk around Hibiya/Yurakucho/Ginza in the afternoon and here is what we stumbled upon in 日比谷公園:

13th railway festival

It was the biggest concentration of otakus I ever witnessed, largely trumping a sunday afternoon in Akihabara. They were all coming to see the latest Shinkansen locomotive, buy a Yamanote station’s chief costume or original parts from Chuo-line wagons…

On the way, I saw the perfect look-alike of Densha-Otoko‘s friend. I imagine most of these guys come back home and transform into this:

screenshot from Densha Otoko

Disney Sea

Je suis alle a Tokyo Disney Sea ce samedi. C’etait vraiment sympa, vachement mieux que mes souvenirs de Euro Disney / Disneyland Paris / Disneyland Resorts Paris, enfin je sais pas quel est le nom officiel en ce moment, ca change tout les 2 ans.

la place d'Agrabah (Aladdin)

Ma copine avait trop peur de faire les attractions marrantes (ie. ジェットコースター comme on dit ici) donc je me suis venge en faisant le camera maniac. D’ailleurs avec Kurisu, nos copines respectives nous appelent le “camera club” maintenant…

Au final:

  • Attraction preferee: Indiana Jones
  • Pire attraction: 20.000 miles under the sea, la manette qui commandait le spotlight etait petee et c’est tout simplement chiant
  • Plus longue queue: Tower of Terror, d’ailleurs c’est pour ca qu’on l’a pas fait
  • Truc marrant: les gaijins qui jouent les characters des films de Disney

temple of the crystal skull

Et puis une petite vue de nuit du temple d’Indiana Jones pour la route.

@#!§様

Hier soir je devais recevoir les batteries de remplacement pour mon Powerbook suite au rappel de batteries d’Apple. Comme d’habitude, j’avais demandé au livreur de passer à 20h et il est passé à 19h30 alors que j’étais toujours dans le bus rentrant du boulot.

Donc j’arrive chez moi et voila l’avis de passage que je trouve dans ma boîte aux lettres.

avis de passage

L’appli de remplacement de batterie recupere mon nom depuis mon Apple ID et j’avais mis la cédille et l’accent à l’inscription. Les japonais doivent se dire qu’ils ont vraiment des noms bizarres ces gaijins…

Surf à l’eau

Le weekend dernier un typhon est passé sur le sud du Japon avant d’aller se perdre au nord d’Hokkaido en passant par la 日本海, vu avez dû le voir dans les news, 9 morts. Au passage, il a amené avec lui une masse d’air des tropiques et a nettoyé le ciel de tout ses nuages laissant un grand ciel bleu et un petit 30°C sur ma bonne chere plaine du Kanto.

Donc, inspirés par ce temps superbe on s’est dit avec des amis du boulot qu’une petite virée surf vers Chiba ou Shonan s’imposait ce weekend…

Typhoon number 14

Manque de bol voilà les prévisions pour ce weekend. C’est sympa l’automne au Japon.