OSAKA

Apparently Osaka is the setting for Blade Runner and there's a famous square that's used in the movie. I've been here about 5 times now and I've never seen it. Not that that means anything.

Through the middle of Osaka run several miles of coverd malls - long long covered walkways, full of stores. To me, they're the defining feature of the city. Albert played at Club Quattro - I haven't been there since maybe 1996 (?). It hasn't changed. It's really clean and well-maintained everywhere except for the dressing room which has been covered by graffiti by (mainly) Birtish bands, or rather, road crews. Most of it is dull and vulgar with the very occasional pearl scratched in there. But mostly it just made me think what a dull bunch of twats road-crews are when they get to Japan...



These guys were hanging out at Osaka Station. Just a comfy place to sit? I think this scene has sinister connotations to it too, or have I been living in America too long? (Btw, did anyone see the movie Little Children? What's with the sex offender who just commits any sort of sexual crime? Like, at first he's a paedo, then he goes on that date and abuses that woman...it's like he's the bogey man or something. I'm surprised he wasn't out raping corpses too, as once you've commited one kind of sex-crime you might as well have committed all of them, right? .....and then, and this is the bit that pissed me off, at the end of the move (SPOILER ALERT!) he castrates himself....? wtf?! That's convenient! Handy that he chooses to do that. Saves the writer / director the dilemma of how to resolve his story line without upsetting all the middle class sensibilities of the main cast. At least they didn't have to get their hands dirty with him or take a position....that was such a cop out. So very very middle class. Really undermined the whole movie for me). Anyway, here's a cute photo of some old men sitting on a plastic panda. Yeah, really fucking cute.

Today is an angry day, I think.




The bullet train runs exactly on time. I love that about Japan. None of that unpunctual American and British crap. (Don't you love it on flights when they announce they've arrived on time? BFD! You're supposed too! What? You want extra points for delivering your half of the bargain...? Wow. By that logic, we should all get a round of applause when the ticket money's charged successfully to our credit cards...). I think that one of the best things about Japan is the ability to make things work very well. Sometimes, I think this meticulousness can get overbearing. My dinner date one night told me she found it a little stifling after having lived in the west - there is much red-tape-overbombing in Japan. But on the plus side - high suicide rate notwithstanding - isn't it great the trains run on time?

Oh, and I had a dinner date too. And it wasn't anyone from the tour. That's even better.



And apparently there's a big gambling problem on Japanese trains. So much so that they had to put signs up telling people not to throw their unlucky dice into the toilet when they lose.



And finally, how cute are these? Individually wrapped toothpicks....such a waste of resources. Someone's got too much time on their hands. And I'm so common I was tempted to steal them all to take them home. You can take the boy out of Coventry...