Separated At Birth?

Random Observation #7

Why is it that whenever they show replays of goals/fouls/shots on the football, they always show a much better view from the 'Reverse Angle'? If it's more clear, why don't we just always watch the match from this said 'Reverse Angle'?

NOVA Students Say The Stupidest Things #10

Discussing boring films:

Phil: So what movie have you fallen asleep in?
Student 1: Pokemon. I took my children.
Phil: Excellent, and what about you?
Student 2: Emmanuelle. It got past the good bit and so I was done.
Phil: I’m sorry?
Student 2: There were couples there, there and there. And me there.
Phil: You paid for it but fell asleep?
Student 2: I paid for it three times.

NOVA Students Say The Sweetest Things #5

In VOICE, discussing “what ifs”

Phil: If you were the opposite sex, what would you do?
Male Student: Take you out on a date.

Image Of The Week #8

Yasukuni-jinja torii (gate), in Kudanshita, is the largest in Japan - eight stories high and weighing 100 tons of high tension steel plates.

Come On England!! Japan Is Huge!!

Good luck tonight (it's on here at 1am; matches are 10pm, 1am and 4am!!). One of the girls downstairs is from Trinidad. How often is it that you meet someone from Trinidad AND England play them in the World Cup!? It's very tense, something about the loser swimming naked across the river. So England have to win.

Everyone was pretty disappointed here with the Japan-Australia match the other night, although the Japanese are all so high-spirited and good-natured that they say they don't mind. Still, I can see it in their eyes when we talk about it.

The nation is football crazy - 90% watched the match. One student has (and is planning to) watch every single match!! In fact, TV sales increased by 60% last month. They don't really have bars or pubs here in the same style as England, and coupled with the bad times the matches are on, everyone's watching at home.

Watching football here is strange - most TV's have bilingual buttons and many programmes can be dubbed in English, such as the News or movies. But the World Cup is purely in Japanese. It's funny, because in the middle of the incomprehensible commentary, you suddenly hear 'offside-o' or 'yellow-cardo'.

Monday night was crazy coming home. The trains are so busy that they usualy stagger the shift times. There are three evening rush hours (starting at 7, 9 and 11)- but no-one worked late that night so the 9pm rush hour to get home for the 10pm kick-off was ridiculous. I've never felt more like a sardine in my life.

The city is unbelievably overcrowded. It's the biggest in the world - with 30 million people.

To put it into a crazy perspective, there are 23 main areas/wards of Tokyo. Shibuya, one of them, has double the number of people living in Amsterdam, and Shinjuku has twice the population of Dublin. And there are 23 areas!!! HUGE!

Enjoy the match. And that mind-blowing statistic.

At Least Italy Won

My other team - come on!

Happy Birthday Elliot

We’ve been on the run, Driving in the sun
Looking out for #1

California, here we come
Right back where we started from

Hustlers grab your guns, Your shadow weighs a ton
Driving down the 101

California, here we come
Right back where we started from
California! Here we come!

On the stereo, Listen as we go
Nothing’s gonna stop me now

California, here we come
Right back where we started from

Pedal to the floor, Thinkin’ of the roar
Gotta get us to the show

California, here we come
Right back where we started from
California! Here we come!

Ultimate Disaster

The Japanese are so polite and reserved, no fouls, nothing. The Australians played dirty.

And Japan should've had a penalty.

The Whole City Roared

Half-time - 1-0!!!!!!!!

Go Nakamura

(I'm eating meat, and screaming at the TV. What's happening to me?! What's next?!)

It's A Big One

After the dull dull dull match the other day, I'm extremely excited.

I predict Japan will win 2-0.

And if not, I can change it and pretend I was right. Hindsight's a beautiful thing.

Wish us luck.

The Battle Of Hastings

Omen Day is over, but today is 10/6/6.

However, unlike the whipping we got back then,
GOOD LUCK ENGLAND!

(The times suck over here - tonight it starts at 10pm but that's the earliest time, most are 3am-ish)

Happy Birthday Oli

Oli it’s your birthday
And God bless you this day
He gave me the gift of a little brother
And I'm proud of you today

Oli it’s your birthday
Happy birthday Oli
Oli it’s your birthday
Happy birthday Oli

I wish you love and goodwill
I wish you praise and joy
I wish you better than your heart desire
And your first kiss from a... girl

Oli it’s your birthday
Happy birthday Oli
Oli it’s your birthday
Happy birthday Oli
Yeah!

NOVA Students Say The Sweetest Things #4

This is my most-favouritist thing I’ve ever heard in my life:

(Discussing family relations)

Student: My mum’s mum is my grandma.
Phil: Yep.
Student: So what’s her mum?
Phil: Ah! That’s your great-grandma.
Student: Really, thanks.
Phil: Can you guess what her mum is?
Student: Umm, no,
Phil: It sounds a bit silly but you can work it out.
(pause)
Student: Fantastic-grandma?

We both fell about laughing. Brilliant.

NOVA Students Say The Stupidest Things #9

Student: I bought a car.
Phil: How is it?
Student: Delicious.

Happy Omen Day!!

At the beginning of each of my classes today, I started off with a little 6/6/6 conversation. This is the result of one such attempt:

Phil: So, who knows why today is special?
(Students umm and err)
Phil: It helps if you're a horror movie fan.
(long pause)
Phil: And it's unlucky.
Student: Ooh, I know, it's Friday the 13th!
Phil: Except for it being Tuesday, right?
Student: Hmm...

Anyway, stay safe and keep away from young boys*.

*So tempted to make a Michael Jackson joke, but it's too easy.

Dancing To My Own Tune?

A few weekends ago, I went off to the largest club in Japan, for a rave that was being talked about on Radio 1. I’m not into trance music so thought I’d get bored after about ten minutes. I packed iPhil full of tunes so that if I really got desperate I could bounce along and pretend I was loving it.

AgeHa was based in Odaiba, so automatically I was impressed. The only problem, it’s quite a trek there and the 6 am journey home sounded depressing. However, there were free buses from Shibuya so that was perfect.

I went with a few people from work and got to the actual club just before midnight. The place itself was incredible; it had its own gift shop and food arena! The main area was packed and had cool light effects all night. However, the best place was the outside bar with a swimming pool in the middle. A few drunken people ended up in there over the course of the evening, and morning. The pool area overlooked a beach and lake. Check out the AgeHa website and click on facilities to see pictures and a layout of the place.

I thought watching the sun come up would be amazing but I ended up inside because Paul Van Dyk (a supposedly hugely famously international DJ, with a rather unfortunate surname) DJ’ed. Actually, I got really into it and the time flew by. If I’m really honest I have no idea why the DJ was famous; to me he didn’t do anything different compared to the guy before him. After all, it’s not their songs, they just press ‘play’ and ‘next’. Or am I being very naïve?

It was only when we left the club at 5:30 that I went outside for the first time since it was dark. It was bright and had that smell of morning. I wasn’t actually that tired but instead just rode on the free bus back to Shibuya, and spent the rest of the day chilling in Tsunashima Park playing cards with friends.

Sadly, it caught up with me the next day at work.

Oh, Odaiba

Odaiba is an artificially-created Island on the bay of Tokyo. Although it began life as a waste-disposal area, the reclaimed land* was seen by the then-Mayor as a gold-mine. Work began in 1985 but by 1991 funds were low, Tokyo-ites unenthusiastic and the Mayor kicked out. However, in 1996 Fuji rezoned its headquarters here and since then it has flourished.

I fell in love with this area, which is reached by Shimbashi (future-world) by a monorail over the Rainbow Bridge, and if I decide to move after six months for a change of location I’d request here.

Some of the highlights include:

Venus Fort – an Venice-themed shopping mall with an ever-changing ceiling depending on the time of day.



Toyota Showroom – the largest in the world, with games, simulators, test-runs and, this lovely model. The car, not me.


The concert piazza – it just happened to be Hawaii week.


The beach – artificial, and you can hire a dog to walk along the beach.

Joypolis – a cool 3-floor Sega theme-park. Loads of awesome rides but my favourite was ‘Room of the Living Dolls’, aka ‘The Scariest Experience of my Life’. You sit around a table in a room with dolls placed the whole way around you and a human-sized doll to the left. Headphones are given to you and the lights go off. In the pitch black, you hear a creepy woman tell you a story. Of course, I couldn’t understand much apart from ‘You will die, you will die’. The headphones were incredible as it sounded like people were walking around you. Wind blew from behind to cause the sensation even further. A girl starts singing and the woman goes crazy, then a shotgun is fired and it’s freaky. The room lights up and the dolls eyes are bleeding and, through strobe lighting, the big doll jerks. It was terrifying, but I loved it.

Here are some shots of the view to Tokyo. Sadly, my batteries died before evening so I’ll go back and get some night-shots.



Such an awesome place. Sitting across the bay at sunset watching the sun go down and eating a burger, I can’t describe why but it was the first place I felt that I’d really accomplished something in coming to Japan. Another one of the top places I’d show someone if they came.

*I was kind of expecting a place like Springfield in The Simpsons episode with the garbage disposal and the golf course is all bumpy with rubbish bursting at the seams. But alas, it was fine.

100th Post - Woo!!!!!!!

Thanks for sticking it out with me! Sometimes I can write a lot, other weeks I get writer's block. But either way, it's been fun.

I guess this is a good place to tell you all my really big news. Some may have heard through the international grape-vine. But here it is, it's official:

I'm no longer a vegetarian.

It became too hard here and most things were served with meat. The more I ate, the easier it became. But strangely, it was never a question of digestion (ooh, that rhymes) as it never upset my stomach, but I felt guilty because for 11 years I'd been fussy and here I was being lazy. So thank you to everyone who's had to go out of their way preparing special food for me.

I eat meat usually every day now, and I'm starting to like it more and more. At first, I was craving it, like Brad Pitt in Interview With The Vampire. Like what I did there - comparing myself to Brad Pitt!

I miss veggie food and will eat it back home. Along with a nice Steak.

Happy eating, and happy reading. See you at the 200th! x

Happy Birthday Barbara

(taken in Yokohama, June 1st)