An Eternal Thought in the Mind of Godzilla

A Happy Present from the Earth

Stuck inside with the cold that killed could-have-been-fun weekend 200X. I made it as far as Ikebukuro for the Horror of a Malformed Man screening on Saturday before I said fuck it and made a Muji sick bed. My magazine and newspaper cash all used up now on thermals, fluffy comforters, and some packets of Pabron S Gold. Listening to Dylan Thomas and Joseph Campbell MP3s in the dark, playin’ them TV Games, wondering if it was the maids made me kaze or if it was last week’s bout of post-Loft couch surfing. Can someone tell me the mythical over the counter cough syrup they make here containing codeine? Might help elevate the boredoms and put me in touch with my cellular self.

Ah…the healing balm of music. Here’s some sweet Showa love courtesy of coffee shop titans Piko. The song is Adam to Eve mo.

Da Kaze

Her name is Momo. Nice girl. Funny. She’s 18 and just graduated from high school. She’s wearing a maid uniform, and floppy cloth cat ears. Her long straight black hair falls down between a pair of beautifully crafted black angels’ wings.

She is massaging my feet, her fingers weaving in between the toes. This will go on for twenty min. Then, she will go to work on my hands and arms until the time limit is up.

Welcome to “maid reflexology and massage,” Akihabara’s latest offering for all good otaku.

The conversation, naturally, revolves around anime and manga.

“Is it true that Satoshi’s name is Ash in the American version of Pokemon?” she asks.

“Umm, yeah, something like that” I mumble staring back at a nondescript mid-30s salaryman directly across from me. He’s getting worked over by a girl cosplaying as ‘Halloween,’ which means a black and orange dress, pumpkin antenna orbiting her head.

The place looks like a makeshift hospital. Thin gauze curtains separate the customers from each other. The antiseptic smell of lotions and sprays hangs in the air. The floor is cold white tile. You sit in a leather reclining chair while the girl kneels in front of you. The cleavage and panty shots you get from this elevated vantage point are part of the 2700-yen admittance fee.

To my left sits Watanabe Denki, a manga-ka with a strip currently running in Manga Action weekly. It was his idea to come here. He even wields a member’s card for the place. “After 10 visits, you get to take a picture with the staff.” His card is almost full.

I can see why Watanabe would want to come to a place like this. Every time his phone rings, he reaches inside his backpack and produces rough pencil layouts of next week’s comic. Much discussion ensues as the stress level clearly rises.

“My editor,” he explains.

Watanabe began his career as a manga artist as an assistant to the famed and beloved (beep), of who he says, “he was a monster. He could finish 200 pages in a single night. The thing is, I was his assistant for two years and I never once met him in person. Everything was done through the mail or on the phone.”

The maids too are stressed out,

“We hate Yodobashi-Akiba,” Momo says, speaking of the new family friendly electronics store that’s recently opened nearby. “They are the enemy. Those kinds of people don’t come here for business.”

Watanabe agrees. “Last year was the peak of Akihabara. Then they opened Tsukuba Express train line. Families and couples started coming in from Ibaraki and Chiba. They are not interested in the good old Akihabara.”

Who is?

“Sometimes, these huge groups of Korean and Chinese tourists come in here,” says Alice, who is Watanabe’s maid clad in Lewis Carroll refinery. “But they don’t speak Japanese, and there’s too many of them, so it doesn’t work out so good. Should I dye my hair blond and get blue contacts?”

Once time is up, we sit in the foyer drinking complimentary tea. Momo puts on a show. She’s a master of imitation and takes requests. One second, she’s a moonwalking Michael Jackson, the next, she’s doing Pink Lady’s UFO dance. Next is Spider-Man, and she gets the fingers on the web spray just right. Alice keeps asking her if she’s ok.

“Can you imitate a maid?” another customer, a young guy who looks more Shibuya than Akiba, says.

Momo promptly steps into the corner and bows her head. She flips her hair so it covers the right side of her face. The life momentarily leaves her and she looks like a display figure from the Tokyo Hobby Lobby. Then, without saying goodbye, she dashes behind a curtain marked 'staff only'. The last thing we hear on the way out is the sound of her breaking into laughter.

Hispanic + Japanese = Japanic

So Tim Burton walked into our favorite watering hole in Golden Gai the other night. Slasher had some drinks with him and said he was already sloshed when he showed up. I think I was home, hung over, and playing Fight Night 2. Not the biggest Burton fan following Vincent and Pee-Wee, but it would have been cool to have given him Kojiro Abe’s email so they could collaborate on crimes that would shock the puppet world. Sorry Abe, mebbe next time.

A long raunchy garage rock weekend looms ahead at Shimokitazawa Shelter for BACK FROM THE GRAVE PRESENTS 「HALLOWEEN BALL 2005」. The 5,6,7,8’s, Supersnazz, and Guitar Wolf headline, but I’m going for “the wild caveman stomp” of The Mighty Moguls. More music: doing a feature about new band The Feminine for Shojo Beat in order to try and answer the burning question, “What makes nice young Japanese girls fall for Chuck Berry and Gene Vincent?”

The Teruo Ishii film festival starts Saturday at Shin-Bungeiza in Ikebukuro with a screening of the late outlaw masters’ rarely shown and still-banned Rampo Edogawa - Horror of a Malformed Man. From there, a parade of sex and death and fart jokes unspools until 11/19.  Don’t know how many of them I’ll go and see, but the hallucinatory Porno Jidai Geki – Bouhachi Bushido is a must, and Ishii's 1957 debut King of the Ring (a boxing movie) sounds good too. There's also a Starman all-nighter that I'd like to come and visit, but I think he'd blow my mind.  Guests for the pre-and-post film talk shows include sub-kei stalwarts Lilly Frankie and LL Cool J-taro, whose manga we published way back in Tokyoscope.

Sunday is the Kawasaki Halloween Parade over in…well, Kawasaki actually. Instead of just playing the tourist and taking pictures like last time, I’m going in costume this time as “a monster,” which probably means a cheap rubber mask from Yuzawa. Remember, no drinking during the long walk itself, so booze in stealth-mode, please.

And here's another clue for you all...the theme song from Nikkatsu's old live-action Harenchi Gakuenn (Shameless School) movie.

Pages 28-29

［アキバ］オタク文化を具現化するバーチャルタウンの妖しい魅力／パトリック・マシアス

(No Subject)

But enough about me. Let's talk about Jack Wolfman, I mean Wolfman Jack.

Otaku Tokyo e yokoso

Here's the back page of today's morning edition of the Tokyo Shimbun.

The on-line version of the story is here.

Mecha Gojira no Gyakushu

ESPY HQ has just informed me that my interview with business magazine Sapio hits better bookstores and magazines kiosks across Japan tomorrow, Tues/25. In it, I spill the beans on the whole ball of wax known as the “American otaku.” Perhaps you know some.

Even better, my interview with the Tokyo Shimbun is also running that same day, complete with pictures of me holding a doll somewhere in Akihabara and not smiling. I guess this one is going to be more like a profile of me, along with some quotes from Machiyama about what an amazing kohai he has. Should be good for the folks back home, and hey, maybe help me get some beer money here as well.

Later that day, the hunt for a private tutor continues and I’ll be relaxing with the guys, ghouls, and groovy grannies  at Loft Plus One for Yamazaki-san’s Dark Side of Rock event. Helter Skelter, man.  

And where would we be without a song? Here's So Much in Love by McGough and McGear from the Acid Drops, Spacedust, & Flying Saucers comp. A bit large at 9.3 kb, but I'm a firm believer in big bit rates.

Nande mo nai

My head, blown off, my ears, blown in, by The Femminine, an all-girl garage band in Hatagaya tonight. They look like china dolls, and play like Chuck Berry with his ass on fire. I don’t know what legally deaf is in Japan, but I’m it. Hajimemashte, motherfuckers.

Makes posting more music here kind of a strange proposition, since I can’t hear a goddamn thing, but this one goes out to King Carl Gustav, who knows good peanut butter rock and roll when he hears it.

It’s an Outrageous Cherry track I just stumbled across today. It’s from the Detroit Ghetto Blaster Vol. 1 compilation. The song is called The Realm of Nothing Happening (wow, there's a right-on title for you) and it’s about 4.7kb.

Enjoys.

博徒外人部隊

If you are joining us here just now, courtesy of Jean Snow or something like that, we are nearing the middle of the second act of the Goka Jyu-pun Senso, starring Youna Dai Teppo and Pedro Edogawa. Here is the story so far:

Patrick Macias is deeply paranoid, drinks too much, and looks like a Turkish woman. He speaks regularly to the spirit of Kafu Nagai via a Rider-Waite tarot deck, thinks anime and manga are real (notice he didn't say "real good"), and wears a fall wardrobe furnished exclusively by Rotten Cotton of Antioch, California.

He lives in Tokyo and is going to be in some magazines and newspapers here next week. Haw haw haw. Then there’s a book that’s coming out from a Japanese publisher…like, hopefully in time for Xmas (it was originally supposed to come out today).

He also has some old books that he wrote for sale. So buy his old books until the new ones come out. The books are actually kind of useful if you are interested in Japan, Tokyo, and pop culture in general, whereas this blog has carefully been designed to just be confusing and weird.

Since life is kind of confusing and weird as well, this seemed like the most natural and honest way to go about things. Nothing personal.

Anyway, here's a song by Yokohama Ginbae that seems to sum it all up a lot more artfully than some tired third-person bullshit (warning: may make you want to dress up like Fonzie, do the twist in Yoyogi Park, and then sniff a bunch of paint thinner).

Aruite?

A few quick pics from last night's Shinonomekai Vol. 19 Crazy Bloody Halloween Massacre at Loft Plus One.

Your host...slasherさん.

澤水月さん...mistress of the dark

MAD Kさん& unidentifeid corpse.

As you can see, it was all very wholesome.

Eat Meat, Drink Beer

I don’t think I’ll be walking anywhere anytime soon. I got the joke. One foot in front of the other. Marching songs from obscure Japanese superhero shows that you base your whole life on humming in the back of the head.

That’s because I just walked all the way from Akihabara to Shinjuku. And here I am at the Southern Century Tower having a margarita and the EL Torito “Macho Combo” with you good people.

It takes about 2 ? hours by foot (10 min by train) and is exhausting, especially if you don’t have any money so you can rest in a caf? or buy something to drink. But more about that later.

I’m getting the “die” vibe from a table of very strange Americans over to my left. I don’t think they like my Unibomber T-shirt, the tap-tap-tap of the keyboard, or the Rotten Cotton bumper sticker on my laptop (Man shooting himself in the head: “The #1 Underground T-shirt syndicate on the fucking planet!”)

Meanwhile, they are a haggard middle age white woman who looks like Peter, Paul, *and* Mary all trying to inhabit the same body at the same time, a young Mulatto girl, and what’s maybe her mom, who says “Onegaishimasu” to get the staff’s attention instead of ‘Sumimasen,’ who then go about ignoring her.

This place is some sort of way station for hen na gaijin and rich women sitting by themselves, picking at chips and salsa, faces buried in paperback books. Sit and eat. Sounds like a good plan. Tokyo is either me, alone like this, or trapped in a room with a bunch of nutjobs for 12 hours straight with nothing but beer to drink.

I went to Akihabara for a photo shoot with the Tokyo Shimbun. They snapped me inside of Tora no Ana ogling Moe-kei figures, walking past Ali-Baba on Chuo-dori, and doing a Busby Berkeley-style dance number backed up by animatronic maids on the escalators of the Seikai no Radio Kaikan trying to be as quotable as possible the whole time (memo to Alt-Japan: we tried to snap a bit inside the Gashapon Kaikan, but the media blackout continues).

Good-bye to the staff then. See you in the funny papers next week. Time to go back to Shinjuku, find a caf?, and finish that article on Ninja High School for Figure Oh before Tomo comes back to Japan just to stomp a mud hole in my ass.

But I don’t have any cash. And I left my ATM card back at Draft One. In other words: Hen na gaijin wa totemo fucked desu. The only card I have that will get me those cool millions only works at Citibank. So no problem. Find a branch, like the ones in Shinjuku and indeed Kichijoji, buy a bottle of pop, and take the A-train.

I can now personally attest that there are NO Citibanks in Akihabara. Places that sell human-sized pillows with female game characters on them, yes. Stun guns disguised as cell phones. Check. Blank Beta tapes for fuck’s sake. Double check. But no ATMs that will “do the gaijin.”

But no big deal. There’s bound to be a City Stank on Yasukuni-dori. After all, it’s one of the main boulevards that runs through the thrilling city (tm) of Tokyo.

I can now personally attest to the fact that there are no Shitty Banks on Yasukuni dori, at least, not until Shinjuku.

The pressure of a pressing deadline, and total lack of physical comforts, it’s still a pretty epic and stunning walk. I thought about going to the Hi-Ho offices when I passed through Jimbocho, where I could beg Ginty for train fare, but figured I might as well put on a diaper, fall in the street and scream “I want my ba-ba!” And besides, What Would Nagai Kafu Do? Definitely take the stroll from the Shitamachi to the Yamanote, lamenting the loss of Edo all the while, taking note of the fact that the route follows that of the daily voyage the city’s sewage used to make during them days (yes, Shinjuku really *is* Tokyo’s toilet).

Before leaving Akihabara, there was half a temptation to trade in the new iPod Nano for train money and some used Curricular Machine DVD. But I’m glad I didn’t because I got a chance to test walk my new “Bari! Bari!” playlist, a collection of Cools, Rats & Star, Yokohama Ginbae, The Mack Show, and The Colts that would probably sound better on a motorcycle, but only hoofing it was an option.

With the imperial palace erupting out of my left side, the colossal tori arch of Yasukuni Temple popped into view. I figured the offering box there must be full of 100 yen coins, but international relations are shit enough without some guy who looks like a Turkish woman starting problems.

Observation: for every neat-o cool place in Tokyo, there are approximately 300 boring coffee shops and soba-yas. And that’s mainly all you get to eyeball from Ichigaya on. By this point, I gave up on even looking for a Pussy Stank and resigned myself to the Frankenstein shuffle, however long it was going to take. The only respite from increasing tedium was the sex offender hum emanating from the Unibomber shirt whenever I walked by a post office. I finally had to smother his mouth with my Porter designer handbag when I came to a crossing and had to ask a cop which way the fork in the road led to Shinjuku.

“You me, by walking,” he said with a strange grin, like he knew I was in for something rough. A half hour more of Tully’s Coffee, Origin Bento, and Mizuho banks (Nagai would have capped himself by now) and suddenly I was looking at a Denny’s. Not just any Denny’s, but the one billed by Yoshiki as the “the most fucked-up Denny’s in the world.” Every day around 5 am, a rouge’s gallery of gangsters, trannies, hookers, and pimps spill out of Ni-chome and Kabuki-cho and wind up there for cocoa and honey butter toast.

Yokohama Ginbae officially welcomes me back to Shinjuku. The sun is going down, but I still get to stand in the shadow of the site of the former Japan Self Defense HQ, where Yukio Mishima played hardball for the last time. Then there’s the building where the idol jumped off, the papers running pix of her brains all over the pavement the next day.

A line of bikers zips by at the Chuo-dori crossing. B-boys sniff out some baggy threads near 0101 Men’s. The hos begin price wars with a twist of their hips and a turn of their blessed boot heels. And young couples overlook the galaxy rail lines near South Exit, put their cell phones down for a bit and finally touch tongues. Ee, ne?

For me, a long limp home around 6:30 am, and legs like someone who’s been hit by a bus is all I can hope for tomorrow. But I guess it still beats writing about Ninja High School.

---------------------------------------
Japanese Street Fashion Corner:

Gustav Horn, I know you are always the first to try and out yourself as an otaku, but until you get some real shitty black New Balance shoes and wear them non-stop for a year straight, then you are walking on thin ice that used to be black rain. Glasses help, of course, but it’s really the sneakers that make the otaku.

Warate

Café One Million, inside the My City dimensional-shopping mall in Shinjuku. Where the monsters come to come up with new ways to harass the superheroes.

“When your book comes out, we’ll introduce you to a gaijin talent agency.”

“A hen na gaijin agency? For people like (this years' Ewok) Bobby?”

“Yes, but they are good. They are not stingy or anything like that.”

“Ok, I guess I should get a private tutor and really work on my conversation.”

“Yes, you should get a tutor, but you only really need to learn how to follow direction well. Maybe it will be better for you if you can’t speak so good.”

Background. Over the shoulder of the generous editor: a retarded woman eats cake like a crazy animal and plays with her enormous plastic visor while the staff giggles at her behind her back.

Sitting in my lala waiting for my ya-ya

Now it can be sold. I’m interviewed on-camera for a short documentary about Mamoru Oshii included with the new Japanese R2 DVD of Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence (this is the “International Version,” for those of you keeping score). My hair is kind of fucked up and I was fresh off the boat from my move to Tokyo when they filmed it…. but I’m surprisingly coherent and sound much less like Porky Pig than I usually do.

Here’s a sample sound byte: “The ESPY wars were fundamentally the result of  a handful of Military Occult Complex agents who were unwilling to face up to the challenges of navigating ESPACE by themselves. Had simple training and research been undertaken, instead of opting for experimental surgery on children that frankly boarded on butchery, then the Espionage Rejects and Counter-ESPY never would have dragged us all into the psychic equivalent of street fighting. If the attempt to reverse the Earth’s polarity had set the stratosphere on fire, as many suspected it would, then there would be no one left to blame. They succeeded of course, and billions benefited, but someone should still be made to answer for the thousands of lives lost during the Battle of Greenhaven. The question now…is who? Future generations, and not just voices on the fringe, will now have to consider that notion that history has been vilifying the wrong people all along. And in that sense, perhaps the deafening silence of the Espionage Rejects will stand as their greatest act of heroism. But who could ever hope to call what they did heroic?”

If you like what you've read, pick it up today and make an old man happy.

ukon no chikara

More hot nasty action up on Twitch soon after a grind session at the Fireman’s Café and a meeting with (bleep) about a planned DVD collection of (bleep) for (bleep). This weekend: a write-up of recent sub-cult sessions at Loft Plus One for Japattack.

Some pix.

Here is Eiga Hi-Ho superstar / stuntman Ginty Kobayashi dressed in the original Japanese Spider-Man costume from the 1978 Toei TV series. Talk about a brush with greatness...

Here is director Sogo Ishii (Angel Dust, Burst City, Gojoe), who did a live sound mix of his masterpiece Crazy Thunder Road at the Tokyo Fantastic Film Festival…meaning it was loud as fuck, and at 5am, no less.

Here is the song Little Darling by legendary '70s grease rockers The Cools (they were the bad boys in the old Toei movie Violent Classroom). They used to ride out on stage on Harleys before bursting out in full Sha-Na-Na shenanigans. I want the Henshin Pimp boys to make a video ASAP, with Wes-chan in the wig and mud mask for the opening. The track comes from their amazingly titled best-of Everything We Said Was Cool.

Believe it.

Haukjin ja nai

Hot ass interview with director Ryuhei Kitamura (Versus, Godzilla Final Wars) over at Twitch written by me, me, and me. Here’s a pic of him (r) and Tomo (l)  from the other night. Afterwards, we all made love on Monster Island.

 

Jealousy, You Gotta Hold on Me

This man, on many drugs,  with wave-motion gun.

Congratulate me already. I have successfully diverted funds from the Counter-ESPY “Istanbul Affair” fund to finance the all-new, all-different “Yoshinobu Nishizaki Museum.” It will be opening in 200X in Mitaka-ku, right across the street in fact from the much better known Ghibli Museum, AKA The Miyazaki Museum.

The main attraction will be a 1/1 scale model of the prison cell that Nishizaki, the co-creator of Space Cruiser Yamato, spent seven years in for sitting on a Scarface-sized cache of guns and drugs.

On the first day, the museum will be firing it’s own personal wave-motion gun at the establishment across the street. You see, the original airing of Yamato on Japanese TV bombed because most people were watching Miyazaki’s Heidi of the Alps instead on another channel. So there are some serious debts to be settled here.

But really, what would Heidi do if radiation bombs were raining down upon the Earth? Suck up food and eat. Some people - Nishizaki-samma for example - are willing sacrifice their lives for the love of all mankind. But what would Heidi if we were Up Against It? Make cheese?

We anticipate that the Nishizaki museum may be destroyed in a retaliatory attack by Cambodian fans of Princess Mononoke. But that’s cool. We’ve designed it so the museum will magically reappear the next day totally intact. In fact, it is impossible to destroy, much like the original Space Battleship Yamato itself.

The only thing is, Toei Doga has forbidden us to use any images, or indeed any mention, of Uchu Senkan Yamato within the Nishizaki Museum itself. So it’s going to be devoted mostly to Blue Noah and Photon Ship Odin. BUT we managed to get permission from Columbia  to use the song
"Have a Nice Dream, Bitches" from the Final Yamato BGM, so it will be playing on a loop whenever you pass by, hell or high water.

We hope you will come and enjoy the weird purple wine we serve as drinks in the bar. Your hostesses’ name there is Emi. She goes to Tokyo University and has a fat ass brain, but her English needs some work.

ura video

Only now just coming out of the Shinjuku Coma, induced by the Tokyo Fantastic Film Festival. Had french fries with Ryuhei Kitamura, said hello to Sogo Ishii, met the director of Battlefield Baseball, sat on my ass for 12 hours watching the Toei logo, and saw the original Spiderman costume from the old TV superhero series up close. Will do coverage of all damn things over at Twitch in the next day or two.

In the meantime, for all true finger poppers out there, here’s Jealousy by Bomp recording artists The Poppies from the Lost Treasures CD out on Japan’s High Calorie Treats label. Last time I went to Tower Records in Minami Shinjuku, the listening kiosks were all abuzz with it.

New mission from ESPY intel: Who are the people here who buy this stuff and where do they hang out?

(Early feeds from the remote viewers seem to indicate select members of the Strange Kigurumi Army leaning back in their Muppet-skin suits and saying, "dat sound like da Beatles.")

See the Eastern ladies

If you listen to the song Chinatown by The Move while sitting in a café in Shimokitazawa, you may just piss yourself laughing for no particular reason.

In other news, it looks like they closed down the Anna Miller’s in Kichijoji. Score one for total bullshit, man. Must have been the stink of paint thinner and PVC bodies from the creepy Volks doll shop next door.

Oooh. Tomo is in town now. Dual interview with the Tokyo Shimbun on Saturday. And then 48 hours of Eiga Hi-Ho hell...

Montaku

The girl is on all fours and naked, except for a pair of blue-gray knee socks. Seconds ago, she was dressed like a schoolgirl, but that was before her clothes disappeared. Behind her is The Illusionist in a black frock coat and a white ruffled shirt. So far, he’s done a series of rope tricks, made a fake dove appear in his palm, and generally run through basic cheeseball magic 109 before bringing out his female assistant. Now, he’s holding a Coca-Cola bottle.

He is going to make it vanish up her ass.

It is Sunday night in Shinjuku, Kabuki-cho. We are in the mammoth Club Heights, a Showa-era nightclub with horseshoe style booths and seating. The circular walls are done up in mirrors at 360 degrees. It’s like a club from an old Nikkatsu Action film and sure enough many yakuza movies have been lensed here.

The place is gorgeous. So is the clientele. The cream of the riding crop from Tokyo’s Goth, Fetish, and S&M scene.  Impossible 18th century French hairstyles resting on black feathers, based on Frankenstein boots. Supermodel shimmering top and white-rimmed sunglasses. A pair of transvestites walk around the U, one in Monroe’s Seven Year Itch dress, the other looking like a battered Tina Louise. Much black, a whole lot of black. I feel like a fool for only coming in my Maniac Rotten Cotton T-shirt. They sell them now at Hot Topic, so I thought I’d go for irony. Most everyone else here spent hours playing dress up.

As we arrive at our booth, a pair of matching female musicians stand on stage under a colossal crystal chandelier. One is playing concerto-class violin, the other with accordion. They are wearing matching white pinafore dresses, topped by black conical hats. The music is strange caterwaul: a mix of chanson, soaring opera scales, and plain Japanese bug-fuck.

The second after their set is over, a waiter drops a dozen wine glasses on the floor, shattering them. Aside from Slasher, me, and Sato-san, there’s not a lot of aluminum cans being consumed in here tonight.

Next is Goth Magic. I don’t know what to think about Goth Magic. I guess illusionists were big in 30’s Berlin and vampires might like them too, so it’s not totally incongruous. But you have to draw the line somewhere. Elegant decadence and garden variety cheese locked in eternal combat. The battleground is the naked assistant’s body.

Ni-chome at 6am. Some gay coffee shop with disco music blaring and videos of pride parades. It was the only place we could fine that was open with food. Slasher orders a steak. Rare. The one he gets isn’t as bloody as he was hoping for. Still, we are mightily impressed as he wolfs it down. A Satanic breakfast, washed down with a draft beer. Amazingly, he orders another slab of early morning meat. The waiter is astonished. “Another one?” “Yeah, another one, and make it really rare.”

Violent Onsen Geisha asks me what’s big in the USA. Bukkake and Karaoke: new additions to the American lexicon of important Japanese words. There’s got to be some business in Bukkake, Violent Onsen Geisha figures, and god knows I need the money.

The word means “splash,” so we figure if Americans like Bukkake so much, you could design a new kind of Splash Mountain for Tokyo Disney Sea. Take back a picture of the whole family covered the damned stuff.

Instant Bukkake, like Tang. Just add water. Designed for astronauts and tested by Noguchi on the space shuttle just last summer. While everyone else was sending messages home, he was in the bathroom with a picture of Goto Maki, advancing the Japanese march into space. Zero gravity Bukkake. Thin white needles orbiting your face to a shit J-pop soundtrack. It looks like bullet time. You can dodge them and send them shooting back to their place of origin with a wave of your hand.

Shibuya. 109. We have to see the fall collections. Huge ad for the new Lil Kim album out from, kitty corner of the bronze statue of the retarded schoolgirl. Exposure to the elements has made it black.

The camouflage pedal pushers of summer have become designer army parkas with fur-line collars. The girls are now going to dress like military otaku from Ameyoko-cho. One olive green jacket is held together by tarnished silver buttons with the chrysanthemum seal on them: the Imperial sign.

Also big is the grandma look: heavy drab double knit sweaters, unflattering floral tops, and strands of fake pearls. In a building dominated by hip-hop flash and Barbie doll trash, this is as subversive as it gets: a total denial of youth. The only problem is the price. Still, you could go to Sugamo, a kind of Harajuku for old-timers, and fake it.

The rest is a blur of designer shirts, Burger Queen skirts, and jewel encrusted accessories. There’s still some room for amazement. Some of the girls are abandoning the pithy little ear bud headphones that their MP3 players come with. At least two are have enormous 20th century audiophile cans covering their ears. I am duly impressed.

The girls of the world spin around in the 109 centrifuge, noses in the air, the thought bubbles above their heads reading: “we are so cute and pretty.” Some of them actually are. It’s a great place to be an invisible man. On the way down, we see one lone middle-aged guy by himself taking the ride and digging the scenery with a hint of desperation on his plain face. He’s the last man on Earth and I don’t want to spoil the illusion for him.

“Maybe he’s looking for a date. Some of these girls would go out with him for money. They need to buy the big brand names.”

Or maybe he’s just researching a book.

When we get to Akihabara, the spirit of the age is dancing in the shadow of the NTT IT building. He is an adult Japanese male dressed like an anime schoolgirl, pink wig and all. He looks like this:

His movements are frenzied, passionate, and totally insane. Expression of total bliss. It clearly all means something very deep to him. A crowd stands around snapping pictures of him and getting some chuckles out of it. Soon, it starts to drizzle down rain, but the fully mad otaku still dances on, commanding the elements maybe. It’s his world now. And you are just lucky enough to live in it.

Hayaku, baby

At the end of jet lag, the trance state dissipates. Three days in Akihabara helped, sniffing out the NTT building and the new Yodobashi Akiba monster-store: Disney-fied Akiba-kei for the whole rotten family. Much more about it later…

In the meantime:

Met with the staff of Kategaiho International Magazine. Going to write a feature about Akihabara and the ubiquitous gashapon capsule for their winter issue. Should be out…well, when it’s colder and the earth is farther away from the sun, I guess.

Waltzed over to the Shogakukan building to be interviewed by Sapio magazine about the “Soft Power” of Japan, meaning “why are Americans going bananas over Japanese stuff?” I opened up by telling them the story of one Guy Mariner Tucker, the first US tokusatsu fan who made the trip and met his Japanese SF fan contemporaries. This was back in 1980. All they wanted to talk about was Superman the Movie, which kind of bummed him out. Where are they all now, I wonder?

Sapio bills itself as the “international intelligence machine.” Although, as some who should probably remain anonymous says Sapio is thought of more as a"rightwing, patriotic, fanatic magazine for ultra nationalist” so hopefully this means I’m upwardly mobile. The issue will street here on October 25th.

Also in the pipeline, a feature for Wired magazine about a subject very dear to all of out hearts. I’ll say no more for now. Carl Gustav Horn (“who is this man with a name like a Swedish king?” Tomo once wrote) is contributing also to Wired now, so it’s kind of like Pulp magazine now, only without the funnies and better advertising.

Editor Tomo called up and said my next book OTAKU IN USA is being delayed yet again so I can increase the page count and the publisher can raise the price. This really feels like the Neverending Story Part 2, but at least I can always have something to worry about in the back of my mind. Paranoids need that sort of thing…

I haven’t thought too much about experimental Tokyo SF novel since I got back here last week. Pedro Edogawa has sort of taken over and all I want to do is imagine how weird and sexy the Meiji and Taisho eras must have been. I can’t imagine anyone really being able to romanticize the Heisei, i.e. right now, too much.

Downtime is taken up by Fight Night Round Two for the PS2. Boxing bliss. You can even set “Yes Yes Y’all” by the Geto Boys as your entrance music, so this one was clearly made for me. Best bit: being able to play as Jake LaMotta, the Raging Bull. Worst bit: he doesn’t say, “did you fuck my wife?” no matter how hard you mash the buttons. 

Next week: Tokyo Fantastic Film Festival and the 10th anniversary of Eiga Hiho magazine.