AltJapan

One Word: Plastics

It is websites like this one that make me realize how pathetic my own model-building skills are. (Above, a "Trad 11" from the 1982 anime series Xabungle. The same modeler's custom ping pong ball Death Star II is a classic.) 

Sparked by the success of Bandai's "Gun-Pla" (Gundam plastic models), a craze for building and customizing super-realistic sci-fi model kits swept Japan in the early Eighties. (The hysteria put even Pokemon to shame: in one famous incident, several kids were injured in a riot to get their hands on the latest Gundam kits in a department store.) I myself spent many an hour drooling over the hyper-customized specimens that graced the pages of magazines like Hobby Japan. Glad to see more than a few old-timers have kept at it.

A totally random collection of some other amazing kitbuilders' sites:

Nostalgia

Revenge of the Nostalgic Kits

Maschinen and Panzer Kampf Wagen

Altengerace

Plamo Seisaku Nikki

Powered Armor Competition (Thanks, Ray!)

Kichijoji Cryptid

I'd never heard the term "UMA" (pronounced "you-mah") until it came up in a meeting with illustrator Morino-san during the making of Yokai Attack. Outside of Japan, these "unidentified mysterious animals" are usually referred to as "cryptids."  Whatever the case, I have news. Big news. I found one of my very own!

 Hiroko and I were walking in Kichijoji's Inokashira Park two days ago when I noticed this strange carcass behind some bushes. How many pedestrians simply walked past this with their green tea lattes, never realizing the mysteries unfolding in the shrubbery around them? 

Warning. The following pictures are graphic. Parental discretion is advised.

Neo-Tokyo After Dark

I'm no William Fitzpatrick, but the following is based on a description I sent to a friend in 2003. Trust me, things probably haven't changed in the years since. Then again, maybe they've gotten worse...?

So you wanna know what it's like in a hostess club? Here's the deal. Tokyo's famed "entertainment district" of Roppongi is crawling with financial-industry expats and hustlers and god knows what else on Friday nights. Being Mr. Quiet Married Japanese Aficionado, I tend to avoid the place like the plague. But a friend insisted that I had to see a hostess club if I really wanted to see Japan. And more to the point, he offered to pick up the tab. Heigh-ho...

Excuse me!?

"Every house should have one! Super relaxing! Matt is a sloth! 1680 yen."

"Words fail us! What a face! Orangutan Matt! 1680 yen."

This is what I get for having a name that's indistinguishable from a bath "mat" in Japanese.

Samurai Shodown

Last Samurai? Ha! There are still samurai stalking the streets of Tokyo. Hiroko and I know, because we met them, thanks to a surprise invitation from H.I.S. Experience Japan to try a "Samurai Sword Action" course in Tokyo last Sunday.

Normally, I avoid touristy stuff like the plague. I have never been to the famed ninja restaurant in Akasaka, nor the jail-themed bar in Shibuya. But the Samurai Sword Action course is on a different level altogether. It is run by an actual tateshi: a professional swordfight choreographer. In addition to dozens of Japanese films, Tetsuro Shimaguchi's resumé includes supervising the fight scenes in "Kill Bill." 

Shimaguchi and his partner Takuro Munekata are the real thing: pro swordsmen and superb instructors. They made everything incredibly easy to understand, even for total novices like us. After a brief lesson in grip, stances, parries, and a series of striking exercises, Shimaguchi (at left in the photo below) choreographed a short scene of the sort used in jidai-geki films, with the long-suffering Munekata-san (far right) playing the fall guy who gets cut down by each and every student.

It was an amazing window into a world in which foreigners  rarely get to enter. For those without Japanese skills, H.I.S. provides an interpreter as part of the package, and both Shimaguchi and his partner speak basic English. It was an absolutely incredible experience. I would wholeheartedly recommend it even if I hadn't gotten the chance to do it for free. And where else but Tokyo are you going to get the chance to spend an afternoon with a man who has the distinction of getting impaled on Uma Thurmond's sword?

 

Hell in a Cell

Translation: "Let me out, oh God please, please let me out, I promise to be good...."

Just kidding. It's a "do not enter" sign. Intentional or not, putting it BEHIND the fence was a nice touch. Cute portrayals of helmeted workers are a common sight on signs placed around construction sites in Japan. Why pay a guy to stand around when you can have a "working character" do it with even better effect?

No Dumping

I get the question nearly every time a pal visits me here: "Hey! I heard people in Japan put out brand-new TVs and stereos out with their trash! What day is that...?" I almost hate to dispel the visions of free Blu-ray players dancing in their heads.

In spite of what you may have read about garbage day in Japan ("How to Get Free Electronic Goods in Japan," BoingBoing, February 17th), the streets of Tokyo are not lined with mint-condition electronic gear ripe for the taking. The binge-and-purge cycle of constantly upgrading one's appliances is a relic of the "bubble era." It went out of style in the mid-90s, shortly after Japan went into recession. These days, people tend to make the most of what they have. Nobody dumps electronics on the street to impress the neighbors. Quite the opposite. They do it because they're too lazy and cheap to pay for it to get hauled away. Anything with actual value gets sold to a local recycling shop. The stuff left sitting on the curb is inevitably junk.

This being Japan, if you have a societal problem, you have super-kawaii signs reminding people not to do it. The pictures above, taken within walking distance of my home, represent just a tiny fraction of the "no dumping" signs posted throughout the country. It's a major problem here.

Obama Maki

First we had the Obama action figure, then Obama pachinko, and now, finally, inevitably, Obama maki-zushi. In triplicate, no less. There isn't much info as to what it actually contains (I assume the red and white stripes are maguro and ika, respectively) but there are more photos on the Tokyo Sushi Academy website. Thanks to the one and only Aceface for the tip. (Yes sir, we specialize in hard-hittin' Japan commentary here.)

White Eyes

Here's looking at you: a mejiro perches from the branches of a kanzakura (winter cherry) tree in Mitaka. Photo by Hiroko.

Maid in the USA

For Anime Fans: Maids for a Day (Washington Post)

Coverage of a temporary Akiba-style maid café set up at Katsucon, an anime convention held just outside of Washington DC. Is it just me, or does the whole maid phenomenon get even creepier when removed from its Japanese milieu? The "racial cosplay" element of the participants taking Japanese names is intriguing, as are the lengths the author goes to to assure readers that this isn't a front for some kind of S&M scene.

In Japan the conventional wisdom is that maid cafés are hostess clubs for the otaku crowd, but stripped of that specific contextual anchor in America, they must seem like the frontier of a vast and unexplored psychosexual terrain.