Ueno and Declaring Our Independence

*EDIT* The video is now fixed. No more stuttery slideshows!

But first, a tour of our apartment...


Aaron + Michael: Apartment Tour from Joe Smith on Vimeo.

Today was a late, late start due to the editing we did. I mean, we saw the morning news come on when we went to bed. So yeah, we woke up around 1:00pm. It took us long enough to get ready, so by the time we got out the door, it was maybe 1:45. We decided to go to the store and get some stuff we needed for the apartment and general living. That was, in as much as we bought more delicious Japanese drinks.

About that time, we decided it was time to get out and about. Ueno was an obvious choice due to the free park it offered and that it was free. We got on the train, rode for forty-five minutes.

While at the train station, Aaron and I split up because he was hungry and I had to use the bathroom. (I used the squatty toilet, just so know. Fun experience.) After Aaron bought his food, he sat down next to a homeless guy and started eating. From across the station, he saw two policemen eyeing him hard and fast, which is odd because Japanese people don’t seem to eye us ever (especially in the eyes). They came over and bowed slightly, then just kept staring. Aaron stared back, then ate some more of his rice ball. They spewed a long string of Japanese. Aaron just looked at them. “I…don’t know Japanese,” he said. “Rice…okay?” They asked. Aaron nodded. “Okay,” he said. There was a nice long silence. “What country?” they asked. “United States,” Aaron said. “Okay,” they said and walked away. A few seconds later, the homeless guy burst into talk. He talked and blabbed and yammered in Japanese while Aaron just sat there in silence. He offered Aaron a flask of whiskey. “No, no. Arigato,” said Aaron. The homeless guy left and about that time I came back.

We arrived Ueno park around dusk. It was nice and very peaceful. Aaron and I barely said anything to each other just because it was so serene. We saw a temple, a fountain, and some unsanitary bathrooms. The coolest thing I saw though, was a little halfpipe on the side of the street. It was cool because in every Tony Hawk game there’s little halfpipes on the side of walls and streets, and every time I see that, I think, “No city in the world has random halfpipes in its architecture.” Well, Japan, you amaze me yet again.

It was getting dark and the park was about closed, so Aaron and I headed to what I call the “Flashy Alley District.” I don’t really know what it’s called, but it was a series of alleyways with a lot of flashing signs and pachinko parlors. We walked and walked and walked. Aaron has video of it, which should be up eventually. We ended up eating in a cool little eatery, where I had Japanese fried chicken of some kind. Never had it before, but it was good.

When we got bored of Ueno, we gave Will a call and met him and Jesse in Sengendai. It being July 4th and all, we decided to celebrate our hatred for Great Britain by shooting off convenience store fireworks. It was pretty fun. We had spinners, rope spinners, flying bugs, sparklers, and bottle rockets. The bottle rockets were my favorite mostly because they’re illegal in North Carolina and I haven’t been able to play with them since I was ten. I was about to set off three bottle rockets at once when a homeless guy told us he was trying to sleep. Too bad. My firework fantasy must be saved for another day.

The rest of the night was watching Will play Metal Gear Solid 4 on his PS3. To you non-gamers, that may sound boring, but the MGS series is incredibly fun to watch someone play. Also, we played GTA IV, which I had wanted to get my hands on for quite some time.

On the way home, we saw some skater kids, the first I have seen in Japan, skating in a parking lot. We watched them skate and taped them a little before running to catch the last train home. While buying our tickers, we passed many drunk people, one who invited us to go drinking with him. We declined and said we needed to sleep. “Don’t think so,” he said. “You need drink, drunk, get ----ed up.” We declined again and left. The train home was packed at 1:00am, mostly with drunk people. The whole car smelled of alcohol. Getting off at Kasukabe, it was funny to see everyone stumbling out of the station. It was like being surrounded by zombies, except they wanted to sleep more than eat your brains.

So tiredy descends on my eyes, as it is quite late. I have to get up early because the two other K-SEP kids join us tomorrow. See you then.

-Michael