Back For Attempt Number 3!

Wow! I didn't expect this much hiatus from witting this blog. It certainly has been pretty busy for me recently. I know everyone is busy, so it really isn't an excuse but whatever. Anyway allow me to get up to date since May.

May was a very stressful month where i was just finishing up my work contract with AEON (ended in July) and i didn't have a job or eveer to n an apartment. If you cannot speak Japanese, it is so difficult to find an apartment. All of real estate agents cannot speak English at all, so obviously it can be rather difficult for a foreigner to find his/her own apartment. Luckily I was able to get help from my really good friend and manager. She sacrificed her Sundays to go with to the the real estate agencies. ( i say sacrificed because that was her only day off) So, I am extremely grateful for her help!

A note about apartments in Japan. If you are planning on renting your own apartment by yourself you will need a bit of cash. Depending on the size and the location expect to pay in the ballpark of 300,000yen (around $3000) in cash up front. Generally this cost is two months rent, agency fee, deposit, and key money (money equal to the rent of the apartment that you give to the landlord to say thanks for letting me rent this). This was the first time I paid for something with that much cash, so it was strange to have over 360,000yen in cash on me.

Location is also huge when looking for an apartment. Knowing where you want to live and what train station you want to live is very important. How far your apartment to the station is key as well. I really recommend no longer than a 15 minute walk. When the agency says the apartment is a 15 minute walk its really a 15 minute walk..if you walk fast.

Anyway, I was able to find a nice apartment that is only 2 minutes from 2 stations. I have easy access to east Saitama and north Tokyo like Ikebukuro. In terms of size of the apartment, the living area is bigger than my previous apartments, but the bathroom and kitchen is smaller. I don't mind this because i rarely cook a lot and you don't need a big bathroom!

In my next post I will talk about the fun adventures of Furniture shopping! Till Then!

Another Long delay. (pointless post)

Well I am back again, i have been really busy with job and apartment hunting..

As many of you know, i will be finishing my current job next month. Mid July to be a little more exact. So far i still do have anything, but I do know what i want to do and where I want to live. Next week i will have to rent an apartment. Which will be expensive initially like $2,000 up front, i have the money for that, but still it is a hit.

Since my current job is almost up its kind of sad that I am leaving. I will write a lot more about my job in the next post.

Recently, my co-worker and i decided to play basketball in Yoshikawa. Its a really cool court in a skateboard park! The competition there isn't the toughest, but its really fun because so many different kinds of people play there like wrestlers, bartenders, and international students. I wish I was better at the sport though..

Now i have a week off, from Tuesday to Friday, I will be spending my time apartment hunting, packing and other things like that. I promise I will write tomorrow!

X JAPAN CONCERT May 2nd

On May 2nd, I attended X Japan's world tour concert at Tokyo Dome. I was extremely excited to be able to attend it because X Japan has been my favourite Japanese bands for the longest time! (thanks jon) I was able to go to the concert thanks to Takayuki (Thank you so much!), a former student. He likes X, but dislikes Yoshiki (more on that later). Anyway the ticket for the show was 12,800 yen ($128) which is a lot for a concert.

The show started at 6:00 but before Takayuki and i wanted to buy some merch. Unfortunately in Japan buying band merch is painfully long and unnecessary. we got in line early at 2:30 and waited until 5:45 before we gave up. What a waste of time

Thankfully, after the show, they still had some overpriced merch left. I picked up 2 shirts and cell phone straps. So waiting in the sun for 3 hours was a bad idea!

Now, the show... The X JAPAN show was great... but no means amazing. I still think the best show i attended was LUNA SEA's one night Dejavu. That show was exciting for almost the entire show.

My main problem with X Japan's show was that they played a lot of slow songs that drag on for a long time. A lot of my favourite X songs were completely skipped. As a big X JAPAN fan, i love their early fast stuff mixed with their slower ballads. This concert was ballads and a few fast songs. Also, the played a lot of songs from the Dahlia album (their last album), which is my least favourite X Japan Album.

The last annoying part of the show was Yoshiki. Dont get me wrong he is extremely talented. Probably the best in the world. What was really annoying was the fact that he kept crying.. I can understand crying to one song, like the last slow song they play, but he cried on every slow song.. very uncalled for.

I know I wrote a lot of negative things about the show.. It was a good show, but with their catalogue
it could have been so much better... Oh well..

Trying it again!

Sorry for the delay...its been forever since i updated this thing. I decided to start again!

From now I promise to update this thing at the very least weekly. I just got to figure out what to Write about..

I guess we shall see!

Thanks Mr. Nash! (TYSON NASH that is)

So I have been trying to go to hockey games in Japan and i finally went to my 2nd one. (I was retarded not knowing that i lived two stations from the Arena.) This time I watched the Seibu Prince Rabbits vs. Nippon Paper Cranes. The Seibu team has one former NHL player Joel Pripic while the Paper Cranes have Jamie Mclennan and Tyson Nash!

The game was very entertaining to watch, seeing Nash and Mclennan close was absolutely amazing! During the game there was a pretty big fight where punches were thrown. (Apparently in Japan, fights arent allowed because the fans complain the next day after a fight) So there was massive penalties. For some strange reason The Seibu team had a 3 consecutive power plays in a row after the fight and Tyson Nash got ejected.. Bummer..

As the game continued i started talking to a Japanese fan beside me. He was a really cool guy and he spoke fantastic English. As turns out he use to work at the arena and he gave myself and my friend 2 free tickets for any game in the season (SWEET). So far great day..

The game concluded with Seibu winning 4 -1 because they got 4 power play goals. My friend i went to the local hockey store to check prices. So in Japan hockey sticks aren't that much more expensive. Most of the sticks cost like 20000 yen which is less than 200 CDN. So after the hockey store we decided to head back into the city. Once we go on the train platform i thought i recognized one of people who was surrounded by 3 Japanese men. It was TYSON NASH and he was going to take the train with us!

At first i didn't want to say anything because he was ejected from the game and you never how players will respond because we all hear about players egos and what not. So i sheepish asked him 'are you Tyson Nash?' and he responded 'yes'. He turned out to be one of the nicest guys i have met in Japan. My friend and I were luckly to talk with him for a solid 45 minutes as we made our way back to Shinjuku. We talked about everything from my Home team (Toronto Maple Leafs), players in the NHL (looking at you Emery!) to his experience in Japan. I was an amazing experience to talk to someone who played in the NHL and who was a really good player. I will never forget the conversation and I really hope he gets back into the NHL because he is a really awesome guy and i would love to see him do another run in the league. So thank you Tyson Nash! Best of luck! I hope to watch you again!

I've Just Pricked My Heart...I'm the Trigger!

Luna Sea and Siam Shade coming back for one night only! two of my all time favourite bands are going to play while i am in Japan! I MUST GET TICKETS!!! I MUST! WISH ME LUCK!

Quick Super Fast Update

So work has been long and tiring, my room is getting dirtier and dirtier everyday. The weather is still damn hot. 30 C everyday with humidity which is terrible when you go to work with a suit. Oh well may

So i went to Tokyo Game Show last week and i must say it was very awesome! So many games and so many people! The major problem with TGS is that lines to play some games where way too long.. Metal Gear Solid Online was 2 hours!! Also, the cosplayers were FANTASTIC clearly the best costumes i have ever seen. Take that Toronto! My pictures of this will be up soon

I also decided to buy a Japanese 360. I got it to play games like Halo, Bioshock and etc. So far its not bad, i still like my Wii the best at the moment

More news.. My 60gb ipod broke... yeah its dead... for good. So i was force to buy a new one. So I bought the 160gb classic edition. My biggest problem right now is getting back the albums i use to have. I have most of them on my computer in Canada but i want them now. I am missing bands like Straightener, Maximum Hormone, Luna Sea, X-Japan, Sambomaster etc. If anyone has any of this please send! PLEEEEEASE! or i will be forced to get a TSUTAYA account.... sign..

Anyways i will update tomorrow for sure.