Last week we had a meeting for the start of IES SIG groups, basically little clubs for various interests like sports, Japanese language, culture, etc. Clubs so the IES kids and Japanese students can hang out. I joined the biggest one, Movies, and became leader of it. Then, I didn’t realize that the leaders of each of the SIGs were automatically candidates for IES Student Council President. Well, that was the case, and I am now the President. Haha, funny funny.

On Monday, we were off for 老人の日 (Roujin no Hi), or “Be nice to old people day.” So what did I do? Went to the movies. Japanese movies are ridiculously expensive. 1 ticket is 1800 yen, or around $16. Student Discount is a little bit less. Me, Seth, and Bryan went to see Naruto the Movie. Mii showed up a little late, so we stubbed her in. She didn’t know this at first. I guess Japanese kids aren’t big on sneaking into movies. After that, we decided that we paid so much money, we wanted to see more than 1 movie. Luckily, when we bought our tickets, they give you a schedule of the movies playing that week. Makes it easy to figure out which movie to sneak into next. So, I watched about 20 minutes of Biohazard 2 (Resident Evil 2), then moved to watch the Dekaranger/Kamen Rider Blade double feature. Good times. Went to Outback for dinner.

Tuesday was just classes as usual, no biggie.

Wednesday, went to Harajuku to buy a man-purse, since every guy in this country has one. It’s actually just a black canvas bag with Kishidan on it. Then, me and Ari went to a restaurant that had for 1000 yen all you can eat pasta, pizza, pancakes, and hip hop. When I ever get around to putting up pictures, I will have to show the sign from this place. Then, we went to Ebisu to see the Sapporo Beer Museum. Horrible museum really, it’s just an excuse for people to try (after paying for) different kinds of Sapporo and Yebisu beer.

At night, went with Ari, Ahn-tuan, Dan, and Adam to Shinjuku. Went to 2 huge music stores, then walked around Kabukicho (the shady yakuza/triad-run area). Before we finally made it to Kabukicho, however, thanks to my awesome map-reading skills, we found where the Shinjuku gay district is. Definitely some weird stuff going on there. And also a gay park, where I guess the gay folk do their business. We were out of there as soon as we realized where we had gone.

Randomness for the rest of the night, primarily walking around aimlessly in Shibuya. Met up with Dave Heston from high school, and his friend from Germany. We walked around a lot, finally ended up in Roppongi at the famous Gas Panic (the locals call it GasPa) club. Let me make this short and sweet: ROPPONGI SUCKS. It is the dirtiest area I have seen in Japan, hilighted by the hordes of refugees/immigrants from Europe, Africa and the really poor parts of Asia. They are either in Roppongi to be hookers, to pick up Japanese guys who don’t know any better, and/or to go to dirty, crowded clubs like Gas Panic. Ah well, at least I know not to go back to Roppongi. Also note that since we were in Roppongi so late, I couldn’t even leave until 5AM. So I was trapped there for hours longer than I would have liked.