I understand that some of my relatives, following the blog, wanted to see more pictures of overweight males wearing little. So today’s entry is for them. 😉

It is at moments like those shown in the above photograph that you are glad you don’t have a first row seat. There isn’t much space outside the ring before the Sumo wrestlers fall into the spectators below. With hundreds of bouts in a day, several people end up with hundreds of pounds of flesh falling into their laps. I’d be surprised if there haven’t been some injuries.

Today’s pictures are from the September tournament. The November tournament is now underway in Fukuoka. The above photo is of the Ryogoku Kokugikan (両国国技館) in Tokyo.

As mentioned in a prior entry, the above yokozuna, Hakuho (白鵬), was defeated on this night. Hakuho has been the best sumo wrestler of late, winning 10 of the prior 15 tournaments. This photo captures his last happy moment of day 6 in the tournament. Hakuho went on to win the rest of his bouts, including one over the other yokozuna, Asashoryu. Unfortunately for him, Hakuho’s loss on day 6 of the tournament meant that he would have to beat Asashoryu twice to win the tournament. Asashoryu doesn’t lose twice in a row often and he didn’t on day 15 of the tournament either. Asashoryu won the September tournament with a record of 15-1, including the playoff victory, for only his fourth tournament victory in the past 16 tournaments.

I can hardly wait for January to come around as the tournament will return to Tokyo. I have tickets to the final day. Stay tuned.

Posted on November 21st, 2009 under Japan. Tags: buildings, clouds, hakuho, people, sumo. Comments: 4

Continuing the series on Waseda University, I went for a Sunday morning walk on campus earlier this week. The trees were changing colors so I decided to head to high ground in Building 11 for an interesting angle on the fall colors that I will show you in a future blog entry.

I was surprised to see Mt. Fuji out the west-facing windows as well. This was my first sighting of Mt. Fuji before dusk from Tokyo.

If you make this image larger (by clicking on it), you can see a McDonald’s to the left–the same one as shown here.

Above is Building 11, where I teach two classes a week. Building 11 is home to the School of Commerce, Graduate School of Commerce, Graduate School of Accountancy, Institute of Research in Business Administration, and School of International Liberal Studies (SILS).

The weekend before I took a shot from the top of Building 11 looking down on the Waseda Festival (Wasedasai or 早稲田祭). Unfortunately, I didn’t notice my camera settings were messed up, and the photo did not come out well. Students were doing a performance in front of the Okuma Auditorium. Thousands were in attendance. It was crazy walking through the crowds down below.

Posted on November 20th, 2009 under Japan. Tags: mt. fuji, night photography, waseda university. Comments Off on Waseda University – Part 3

In looking through my Hakuba pictures just now, for the first time in a few weeks, I realized that this is going to be about a 20- or 30-part series. I hope you don’t mind.

Our lodgings in Hakuba were wonderful. We booked them through a travel agent in Tokyo. After doing so we got an email saying that the owners of Mountainside Hakuba Jodel were going to throw in a free breakfast for us each morning as well. That’s not something that usually happens AFTER you book a place, but it was the first of countless bonuses the fabulous owners imparted to us.

When we arrived at Jodel (マウントサイド白馬ヨーデル) we were surprised to find no one there–no guests, no employees, no owners, nobody. We soon came to find that the Jodel wasn’t alone. Much of Hakuba had an abandoned feel to it, a most welcome contrast to Tokyo. A few minutes after we settled ourselves in the lobby the owners arrived. From the instant we met them I loved them. They were so kind. I think their names were Mr. and Mrs. Uozaki, but Mr. Uozaki asked us to just call him Uo (魚) for short.

Mrs. Uo cut the largest nashi (梨) I have ever seen and gave it to us. They came from her daughter, who lives in Kyushu, that morning. Mr. Uo showed us to our rooms. The above is an unaltered image of my first look out our room’s window. I could have cropped it, or shown you a better picture that I took later, but I like this one for a memory of the initial impression.

Mr. Uo then offered to drive us around town or pick us up (should we call) from any point in town whenever we went out. How is that for service? They fired up the hotel’s bath for us, even though we were the only ones staying there and could have just bathed in our rooms’ baths. The hotel could hold probably 200 or more people, and the bath can handle at least 10 or 15 people at a time, so we felt a bit bad that they should have everything running just for us.

We were served a breakfast of about a dozen courses each morning, freshly cooked by Mrs. Uo. The views were amazing and Mrs. Uo even decorated our table in fall colors in case we didn’t get enough from looking out the window. Did I mention that we didn’t even order or pay for breakfast?

The Jodel’s owners were so cute. They came out of the kitchen to take pictures with us and of the breakfast. She said she had never made a western breakfast before so she wanted to capture it with photos. Apparently most of their guests are Japanese and the few foreigners they get are from Australia (coming to Hakuba to ski), not the USA or Europe.

Here are Ellie and Ryan in the lobby of the Jodel. The place isn’t fancy or new, but for hospitality there is no better place on the planet. The price is extremely reasonable, and if you aren’t planning on staying on a Saturday night during the peak of the ski season you will likely have lots of elbow room.

Posted on November 19th, 2009 under Japan. Tags: drainspotting, ellie, food, hakuba, ryan, 紅葉. Comments Off on Hakuba – Part 5

As I mentioned last time, O-EAST in the Shibuya area of Tokyo is an excellent venue. Nestled between about a dozen love hotels, don’t be surprised if you see Japanese business men (サラリーマン) in full suits and ties show up at weeknight shows. I saw several on this evening. They hadn’t even loosened their ties or taken off their suit coats to see Opeth. Perhaps Opeth shows should become completely formal in the future.

Getting to Shibuya was, by far, my shortest commute to see Opeth. It took me about 10 minutes on the train, followed by a 5 minute walk from the Hachiko Exit to O-EAST. Normally I have to drive all day to see Opeth. If you count the miles from my home base of Ashland, Oregon, rather than my current home in Tokyo, I have traveled over 21,400 miles to see Opeth. Of course I was already in Denmark when I went to Metaltown in Sweden, but even so, for the four Opeth shows I’ve gone to in the states, all included an overnight stay and, combined, logged more than 2,000 miles on my car.

I took one video which you can view below. It begins with Mikael talking and messing around with the crowd for the first minute and a half. The song Opeth then dives into is “Leper Affinity” off of Blackwater Park, perhaps their best CD. I apologize for the shakes during the first half of the video. The floor was vibrating. I adjusted my feet for a better foundation during the second half of the video so it looks much better. My TZ7 seems to take much better video (and pictures) when it is zoomed to the max.

If you do not like heavy music, but still want to take a peek, then I suggest jumping in at the 5:10 mark. When it gets too heavy jump ahead to 8:50 to see the end.

Enjoy!

Posted on November 18th, 2009 under Japan. Tags: metal, opeth, reviews, Tokyo, tz7 zs3, video. Comments Off on An evening in Shibuya with Opeth (オーペス)

Opeth was set to hit the stage at Shibuya O-EAST at 7 p.m. Doors opened at 6 p.m., and there was no opening band. Rain had been falling hard all day and didn’t let up before, or after, the show. I arrived at 6 to find that they were letting people in based on a number printed on the ticket. It turns out I was number 189. I don’t know if this is the case at all small venues in Japan, but it is good to know. If you aren’t in the first 50 numbers, who grab up the best spots, you may as well show up 10 minutes before the show so you don’t have to stand and wait for an hour.

Most people in the audience had an umbrella with them throughout the show, myself included. Afterwards I thought I should have opened my umbrella when Mikael mentioned “Watershed,” but maybe the mostly non-English speaking audience wouldn’t have made the connection.

O-EAST is a fantastic venue. The stage is large for the size of the place, and everyone in the audience is within about 40 feet of the stage. The sound was incredible. I think this was the best quality sound I have ever experienced at a concert. Maybe my earplugs were just in perfectly, or something, but the music was crystal clear. There wasn’t the normal distortion of music bouncing around like there usually is at indoor shows. I wasn’t even standing near the mixing board; nor was I dead center. Even so, the mix from my position in the crowd was perfect; every instrument, and the vocals, sounded just right.

Even though I saw Opeth on this same tour back in the states this past summer, the set list was extremely different on this evening in Tokyo. Only two songs were the same. “Windowpane” was probably the last song in the world I was expecting them to begin with. “Burden,” kicking off the encore, was also a shock. Personally, I’d rather hear “Demon of the Fall” and “Baying of the Hounds” instead, but surprises are good too.

Setlist:
Windowpane
Ghost of Perdition
The Lotus Eater
White Cluster
The Leper Affinity
Reverie/Harlequin Forest
April Ethereal
Hex Omega
Burden
Rudolf Schenker impersonation
Guitar Solo
Deliverance

I have a pretty decent video of “The Leper Affinity” coming here soon.

Posted on November 17th, 2009 under Japan. Tags: metal, opeth. Comments: 4