|
Post by caucasoididiot on Mar 7, 2010 21:09:19 GMT -5
I thought it might be worth posting some pictures of where I lived in Japan, though I'm afraid the photos I can find aren't that great. Interior shots are especially lacking, but maybe you can get some idea. The town was called Kami-fukuoka when I moved there, a name which villages on that site apparently have had for centuries. However, a local politician smarting at "do-nothing" charges changed it to Fujimino-shi. This means "The city from which you can see Fuji," and if the day is very clear and you're on top of a rather tall bldg, you can. But the train station is still called Kami-fukuoka and the next one down the line is Fujimino, which just goes to prove that politics is poopadoodle in any language. Kami-fukuoka is some 40 minutes from Tokyo on the train. Like all Japanese towns it's pretty dense with narrow streets. At first my wife and I had an apartment, but after Yuuto was born we moved back in with her mother. Here are fore and aft views of her house. It's a pretty typical one for Japan, nice in that it's a corner lot. Aside from the building's own footprint and a driveway (which is in front, that blue car in the back view is a neighbor's) there's about a meter all the way around to the property line. It's small but comfortable. The first floor has a wash(i)tsu room with tatami, the kitchen, toilet and bathroom. Note that only the smallest Japanese apartments put the toilet in the same room as the bath; they find that quite yucky. The bathroom works similarly to the onsen I described earlier, in that you wash with a shower hose and basin before getting into the tub to soak. The tub is quite deep and comes up to your neck. The window was usually open, so in winter you tend to wash quickly! Everyone soaks in the same water, and so there's an established order based on family precedence that's usually adhered to. One exception to this is when there's a baby in the family, who goes last. Should you ever need it, the Japanese for, "Oh no! He pooped!" is Ara! Unchi deta! 「あら!うんち出た!」 Upstairs were two bedrooms and a very small storage area. My mother-in-law slept in the downstairs wash(i)tsu, my brother-in-law in one upstairs room and Yuuto et al in the other. We had the one with the balcony, but that was actually just big enough for a clothesline (as few Japanese have dryers, and those that do don't like using them). There is no central heat or air. Typically one room will have a heat/airco unit and the others will have fans and space heaters. By the way, that's why the electrically heated seats some Japanese toilets have are not as silly as they initially sound. Most homes also have a kotatsu, the low table with a heater on the underside for winter use. In cold weather it has a skirt that you put your legs under and is quite toasty. As an aside, a student in Ogawa once invited me to lunch at his 200 year old farmhouse. His was still the traditional style where the kotatsu was over an actual fire-pit, but as it was summer we weren't using that. What a shame. Later we bought a house nearby, and here the front and back views of it: It's the middle beige one in the back view, and this also shows you the lovely view of a parking lot which it commands. Again, the parking spaces are literally two meters from the back door, and that car in the front view is the neighbor's. Japan is not a country for claustrophobes. Here's the view of or neighbor's balcony from my widow: The layout is essentially similar to the first house, though this one has three upstairs rooms and a second bath there. Downstairs it has both a living room with a heated floor and a wash(i)tsu. The tub even has an LCD TV screen in front of it, which struck me as heinous. Unlike the older house the kitchen was designed with all the gas tubing and such under smooth and easily cleaned surfaces, but that didn't stop my wife from covering all of these with dangerously flammable saran wrap. ( /-_-) Tatami is interesting stuff. It's green and highly fragrant when new, but ages to a golden color. Heh heh, if you stack stuff in a corner and later move it you get green "footprints." One nifty aspect of it is illustrated by the photo above: at that stage Yuuto didn't have enough strength to lift up and crawl but he could "swim" across the tatami quite easily. Heh heh . . . my wife would still kill me if she saw that picture. Ours was not a fancy toilet. I've seen ones whose control banks put Captain Kirk's chair to shame (and there's story there, but another time). My boss had one that sensed your approach and opened automatically. It even had onboard logic that decided wether to lift the seat or not. But one clever feature that you can sort of see in ours is the hand-washing station atop the tank. It's very efficient, once you get over the sense that you're washing in soon-to-be toilet water. Note also the paper dispensers. There's no over/under debate in Japan due to the little dust-cover. Also note the neatly folded ends on the auxiliary roll. And lastly -- after a nice after dinner drink -- my cat hanging with a kappa. Goodnight and have a pleasant tomorrow.
|
|
|
Post by afriendlychicken on Mar 8, 2010 19:32:54 GMT -5
Great explanation on the Paris Hilton video. I was wondering what snack he gave to her. I would have eaten that since I love nori treats. I guess they thought an American tourist would only like sweet stuff. Did you notice the music playing? They played 'Do You Think I'm Sexy' in the beginning. The guys in the other videos would be considered rude anywhere. What jerks. We have a word for that type in Hawai'i. We call them lolo. Nice toilet. What happens if the electricity goes off? Everything is fit in tightly, even the streets. The one thing I noticed is how clean everything is. I don't see rubbish in any of the outdoor shots. Or indoors, for that matter.
|
|
|
Post by caucasoididiot on Mar 8, 2010 20:16:27 GMT -5
Yeah, I suspect those guys were just yahoos pure and simple. I reserve a little judgment, just because there are days when unfamiliarity and frustration can really weigh you down, but I still feel an urge to slap 'em silly. I also tried to remember guys like that when Japanese strangers sometimes seemed uncomfortable on my arrival; unfortunately their misgivings aren't totally unwarranted.
"Lolo?" What's it's literal meaning?
Indeed, Japanese who've been to America all comment on how much more sugary the sweets are here. That said, Japanese women do love their sweets. My first day there I did run into one exception, delicately colored little balls that were gorgeous but felt like popping four sugar cubes into your mouth. I found later that they were for the tea ceremony. The tea made for that is very strong and bitter, and the two sort of take the edges off each other.
Glad you liked the Paris Hilton annotation, by the way. I was a bit worried that my own grasp of the details was too weak to make it worthwhile. The show it comes from, "SMAPxSMAP," would sometimes do really visual humor that would port well. When I was there they used to do some drop dead funny take-offs of Golgo 13.
I remember another where Kimtaku (Kimura's universal nickname) was doing a sort of Sesame Street bit with a muppet being worked by another member in one of those black bunraku puppeteer "invisibility" suits. He keeps asking the muppet what 4 - 1 is, and beating the bejeezus out of it when it can't answer. Later in the show they did a totally straight tear-jerker scene of a father telling his wife and two kids that he must turn himself in to the police, and as he mopes off and they sob Kimtaku and the muppet burst in: "OK, once more, four minus one is . . ."
On compactness, the Japanese are masters of it. It's fun to go through their home and gadget stores and see all the incredibly clever foldaway stuff they have. I especially remember the dishwashers (a rarity in Japanese kitchens), they were about the size of a bread-box. My shorthand explanation of my first reaction to Japan was that it was like a model railroad, everything's perfect but just a tad too small and close together.
Cleanliness is a big and fascinating issue, and one on which the Japanese place a lot of emphasis. Traveling around Japan it seemed like everything was either spotless or filthy. There are occasional spots that I gather no one is responsible for and they can get downright squalid. There was this one toilet in Ikebukuro station that still gives me the heebie-jeebies to think about.
American and Japanese ideas of cleanliness don't always completely jibe, either. It became an issue in the house that I washed dishes in hot water, which they considered wasteful.
PS: Actually a power failure isn't a problem with flushing the toilet, but all your nifty auxiliary gadgets would go down. No warm air jet! Oh the barbarity! (^_^)
|
|
|
Post by caucasoididiot on Mar 9, 2010 11:47:51 GMT -5
I've been thinking of doing a listing of Hollywood movies about Japan and my thoughts on them. I may yet, but for the most part they would boil down to: "Guys, this is so not Illinois."
There are some that do bother to go film there, and they're much more satisfying. As much as I was knocking Sayounara elsewhere it was actually very good on that score. Lost in Translation was a more recent success in that way, though Japan was really only a backdrop for it. The only true Japan moment I had watching that movie was the scene in the hospital waiting room when the old lady started trying to talk to Mill Murray's character.
But last night I re-watched the only Hollywood movie I know of that really gets Japan, and gets being gaijin in Japan: Mr. Baseball. It's a 1992 film starring Tom Selleck and Takakura Ken. Selleck plays Jack Elliot, a major-leaguer who feels himself cresting the hill. His club agrees and trades him to a team in Japan managed by Takakura. Roger Ebert noted that the film was formulaic in many ways but had a style that redeemed that. Among gaijin though, I never heard of one who didn't love it.
It succeeds very well in covering all the bases, and does so with only the slightest exaggeration for comic effect. Some things that might seem implausible (like some secrets kept until late in the film) are far less so in Japan than you'd likely think. The script is quite clever in making Jack an unwilling visitor. I don't think anyone who goes there hasn't had a day where he thinks, "God, I hate this country." At first that's every day for him, and at this stage it makes him the classic hairy barbarian the Japanese dread. I find it hard to put into words my reaction to these sequences. They're drop dead funny even while making me cringe, but Selleck brings a sense of self-embarrassment to them that keeps me sympathetic. Been there, been there.
Heh heh . . . I also have to admit that there have been times where it would have been really cathartic to snap a bat in front of a Japanese boss. (^_^)
All the supporting characters ring true. His fellow gaijin player quickly becomes a buddy but gets increasingly irked with him, while his Japanese interpreter tries to keep everything on an even keel through creative translation. The relationship with team manager Uchiyama (Takakura) and the team also feels right (though actual baseball players might spot inaccuracies I don't). There's a romance of course, but his girlfriend is a smart businesswoman about as far from the geisha stereotype as you can get.
I'm afraid I don't know squat about baseball, but I've seen comments from others that the film is a good baseball movie as well as Japan movie. It's no spoiler that Jack eventually unbends. Once convinced that he must show respect before he can earn it he is able to finally connect. By the end wisdom is going both ways, and there are places in this part of the film where I actually tear up a bit.
This actually reminds me of something else re actual gaijin celebrities. A lot of US athletes and actors come to Japan, and when there you're always hoping they'll come off well. I've seen Tom Cruise interviewed there a couple of times . . . don't get me started. But I remember Sammy Sosa being someone I was proud to see representing the US. I gather there's been scandal since, which is a shame.
But there was another gentlemen whose name I can't recollect, an American baseball coach who was hired by one of the Japanese teams. I should take a moment to explain the "gaijin bubble." This term describes the phenomenon of foreigners who live and work in Japan but seal themselves off from it. They stick to gaijin clubs, Western restaurants, English language media and so forth. There's enough English in Japan these days to make this possible, especially for a celeb with an assigned interpreter. A big part of the movie is Jack making the effort to break out of his.
Anyway, I saw this coach being interviewed on TV once. Not only was he humble and personable, but you could tell he was following the questions before his interpreter translated them. Partway through he began answering in Japanese. It was a bit halting and not terribly skillful, probably even slightly under my own level (not that I could even begin to speak it on TV). But it was heartfelt and appropriate, and you could tell that the Japanese host and audience felt truly honored by it.
Here's a decent clip from the movie that avoids spoilers. That's a tea field they're standing in, by the way:
They did cut this clip a little short, her last line there is, "You're out of here (when we get the shot, Jack)." This leads to a nicely done culture clash.
|
|
|
Post by afriendlychicken on Mar 9, 2010 18:12:56 GMT -5
"Lolo?" What's it's literal meaning? Like most Hawaiian words, it has more then one meaning. Lolo can mean stupid, dumb, nutty, goofy or crazy. As a joke, it's used when someone is forgetful, "Wat? u lolo? no can remember stuffs?" Usually though, it's used as a negative. If I was saying it about the guys in the video, it would be, "Those bugga's stay lolo!" I should start a thread on Hawai'i's pidgin' English. Someone can give me a line and I'll show how it's spoken in pidgin'. I'm hungry, let's eat = minahs, we go eat. I just saw Mr. Baseball on TCM not too long ago. It was better then I thought it was going to be. Since I played and watch baseball, I can tell you it's a pretty accurate portrayal. Could the manager you can't remember maybe be Bobby Valentine? I love reading your blog and I hope my remarks aren't intrusive. I keep feeling like a saboteur.
|
|
|
Post by caucasoididiot on Mar 10, 2010 10:10:33 GMT -5
Could the manager you can't remember maybe be Bobby Valentine? Pipon! Pipon! Pipon! I do believe we have a winner! Thanks, it bugged me that I couldn't recollect his name. Not at all! Sometimes I wonder if it's all too scattershot and incomplete to make sense to anyone but myself, and it's nice to see that it's coming across. A lot of the time your comments also remind me of other interesting points. I'd love a blog like you describe. Language fascinates me, especially pidgins. I'm going to have to talk some more about "Japlish" one of these days. When you saw Mr. Baseball, did it have a scene between Selleck and Takakura in a cemetery? My copy is the Japanese release, and I've heard that that scene was cut from the US version. A shame if true, it's one of their best scenes together. I watched the commentary track for Tora! Tora! Tora! last night. I might write that one up, but I could go in so many directions from it might just be an exercise in inchoateness.
|
|
|
Post by caucasoididiot on Mar 10, 2010 14:51:38 GMT -5
It occurred to me that the song my avatar references might be on YouTube. I haven't found it, but there are some songs from the same kids' show, a popular one called Ponkikiizu. I've taken a stab at translating one about bath time below. There are a good half-dozen words that appear in none of my dictionaries, of course. A few words about all the subtitling might be in order. You see this in a lot of shows, and part of the reason is because of all the homonyms I mentioned previously. There's a long-running show called Sazae-san that frequently uses this humorously. A typical situation is to have one character listening to another, with thought and word balloons respectively over their heads. A key mis-interpreted word will have the kanji highlighted. Later, when the person realizes the mistake, the balloon will reappear and the kanji will flip like a tile on a game-show board. Those subtitles are a godsend to me with my dodgy comprehension, as I can come at things both phonetically and by the kanji (though kanji lookup can also be tedious). But this song is from a kids' show and therefore writes everything out phonetically. This makes it easier to follow and be certain I'm hearing correctly but sometimes harder to interpret. There was apparently some talk after the war of abandoning kanji for purely phonetic writing (as in Korea), but I gather this is what stopped that. As an aside, conversation is easier than watching a clip. You can ask people to slow down a little or repeat something and for explanations of unfamiliar words. My last time in Japan I was relieved to find that I was still pretty functional in that regime. There are actually two phonetic character sets in Japanese. They date back to the Heian era and are simplified versions of selected Chinese characters. The hiragana form is most common and is used to show inflections, grammatical particles and to spell out many words. Katakana is generally reserved for foreign words and onomatopoeia, but may also be used to give some parsing clues or even just because. They're visually quite distinctive as hiragana 「ひらがな」was developed by women and is flowing and curvy, while katakana 「カタカナ」was developed by men and is sharp and angular. Anyway . . . MOVIE SIIIIIGN!: おふろのかぞえうたNote: I see some ascii creeping in. Oh well, sometimes that happens. 「おふろのかぞえうた」 " Ofuro no kazoe uta" "The bath time counting song" ひちつとせ Hitotsu to seFirst point ひとり おふろに はいるときゃ Hitori ofuro ni hairu tokyaBefore getting in the tub alone ゆかげん ママに みてもらおう Yu kagen mama ni mitemoraouCheck the water temperature. ふたつとせ Futatsu to seSecond point ふくを ぬぐときゃ カゴの なか Fuku wo nugu tokya kago no nakaThe clothes you put in the basket キチンと ひとりで たたもうぜ Kichin to hitori de tatamou zeYou should fold neatly yourself. イェイェイェイェ ワワワワ Yeye, yeye, wa wa wa waみっちのせ Mittsu no seThird point みみを おさえて もぐったら Mimi o osaete moguttaraIf you dive to submerge your ears おしりが プカリと せんすいかん Oshiri ga pukari to sensuikanYour hinder is "pukari" and a submarine. (Unfortunately "pukari" is a mystery to me). よっつのせ Yottsu no seFourth point よごれた ドロンコ ひざこぞう Yogoreta doronko hiza kozouKids with dirty morasses on their knees (I'm guessing this would mean "scab" in context). ちょっぴり すりきず ゆに しみる Choppiri surikizu yu ni shimiruShould put the injury in the water carefully. イェイェイェイェ ワワワワ Yeye, yeye, wa wa wa waいつつとせ Itutu to seFifth point いつも ゆぶねで オナラすりゃ Itsumo yubune de onara surya(See below.) おゆが プクリと はなちょうちん Oyu ga pukuri to hana chouchin(OK, several words here do not appear in my dictionaries, but between the visuals and what I can get this seems to be: "When sharing the tub with others don't float an air-biscuit." The literal translation is "nose lantern"). むっつのせ Muttsu no seSixth point ムンムン ゆげの ガラスまど Mun-mun yuge no garasumadoOn glass windows fogged by the steam にがおえ かけば うちゅうじん Ni ga oe kakeba uchuujinYou might draw an alien. イェイェイェイェ ワワワワ Yeye, yeye, wa wa wa waななつのせ Nanatsu no seSeventh point なないろシャンプーで あらったら Nana-iro shampoo de arattaraIf you wash with colorful shampoo あわぶくゴリラの できあがり Awabuku gorira no dekiagariYou'll end up a foamy gorilla. やっつとせ Yattsu to seEighth point パパと いっしょに はいったら Papa to isshou ni haittaraIf you get in with Papa おゆが ザンブリ だいこうずい Oyu ga zanburi daikouzuiThe water will make a "zanburi" great flood. ("Slanderously" is possible). イェイェイェイェ ワワワワ Yeye, yeye, wa wa wa waここのつとせ Kokonotsu no seNinth point キュウッと タオルを しぼったら Kyuutto taoru o shibattaraIf you firmly wring out your towel おへそも ニッコリ わらってる Oheso mo nikkori waratteruYour bellybutton is sunnily laughing. とおとせ ToutoseTenth point とうとう きれいに ピッカピカ Toutou kirei ni pikka-pikaAt last you become sparklingly clean パジャマきたなら pajama o kita naraThen if you're wearing your pajamas バイバイバイバイ・・・・・・ Baibaibaibai . . .ねてしまお NeteshimaoAt last to sleep.
|
|
|
Post by spackle on Mar 10, 2010 20:01:24 GMT -5
^ I don't know why, but "nose lantern" gives me the giggles. What if one floats a nose lantern in their poopie suit? Does something light up? No I have not been drinking.
|
|
|
Post by afriendlychicken on Mar 10, 2010 21:59:26 GMT -5
^^^dang it, Spackle! Now you've given me the giggles!
'Air-biscuit'. That's an image that will be forever burned in my mind.
Oh, I found out what pukari means. It means floating. So their butts were floating like submarines.
|
|
|
Post by caucasoididiot on Mar 11, 2010 0:01:01 GMT -5
Ah, thanks on "pukari." Yeah, that would make the line something like: "If you submerge your ears your hinder becomes a floating submarine." One of the tricky things about Japanese is that you really can't equate their grammatical particles to English very well. " To" is initially taught as a correlative conjunction, and when attached to a noun it usually is. But then you find that sometimes it also functions adverbially. 'Course, adverbs are kind of the "miscellaneous" of the grammar world . . . ^ I don't know why, but "nose lantern" gives me the giggles. What if one floats a nose lantern in their poopie suit? Does something light up? No I have not been drinking. Heh heh . . . the result is probably about like the scene in Tha Andromeda Strain where the Phantom pilot's gear begins dissolving. I'd link to it, but no one seems to have posted it in vacuo. Are you not getting your RDA of alcohol? We all have to go to an izakaya sometime to drink umeboshi sours and eat squid! (^_^) PS: This reminds me of one of Japan's popular soft drinks that gaijin tend to find unsettling:
|
|
|
Post by afriendlychicken on Mar 11, 2010 5:19:00 GMT -5
^^^Ummmm, yea, I think I can see why. I'm not positive, but it could just possibly be, maybe, the drink name. I'm not 100% sure now, it's just a feeling I have.
"What are you drinking?" "Oh, it's the best. It's called Pokari Sweat!"
|
|
|
Post by spackle on Mar 11, 2010 8:24:33 GMT -5
I think I remember that scene from Andromeda Strain. Important lesson: take Beano before donning your poopie suit.
I'm usually pretty adventurous when it comes to food, but I've always had trouble with things with suction cups.
I don't suppose "pocari" and "pukari" have anything to do with each other? Floating Sweat? My favorite!
|
|
|
Post by caucasoididiot on Mar 11, 2010 10:47:43 GMT -5
From what I understand, "pocari" is just a made-up word. I find the stuff pretty intimidating; it's colorless and the flavor screams "electrolytes." It's a way too appropriate name, and I get Ren & Stimpy flashbacks whenever I taste it.
But squid is quite good. Some people have texture issues with the raw kind, but a side-dish you can get in any izakaya is grilled squid. It comes sliced into calamari sized "o-rings" that you dip in mayonnaise. It has a nice, firm texture and a delicate flavor that goes well with drinks.
The strangest thing I ever ate was inago, which are glazed crickets. On a weekend trip with my wife I saw them in a roadside gift shop. She was saying that even among Japanese it's usually only older folks who eat them. I found that they weren't bad, the flavor being similar to a glazed shrimp. With the bigger ones you could really discern the hind legs as you chewed, and that did take some getting used to.
I took them in to work. This was when I was working in a big Tokyo school with a lot of staff, both foreign and native. About 50% could nerve themselves to try it, and that wasn't just a foreign/native split. On seeing them one of the staff shrieked, "Iyaaa! Gokiburi mitai!" ("Ewwww! They look like cockroaches!"). I remember our one Western woman eating one calmly, saying, "Y'know, that isn't bad, really," and a moment later doing a little dance and saying, "I don't BELIEVE I just ate a bug!"
I'll have to write up izakaya sometime. They're another great Japanese institution.
|
|
|
Post by caucasoididiot on Mar 12, 2010 18:39:18 GMT -5
Well, on learning a third will get its US release this year, last night I re-viewed Tsukamoto Shinya's Tetsuo movies. I'll tried to keep these remarks spoiler light. I consider these movies disturbingly nightmarish classics. They are highly surreal and designed to shock, but from the first I've felt that Tsukamoto did have an aim beyond that. There are clear themes of dehumanization and a tragic sense of being destined to destroy the things you most love. Mishima Yukio once said something about viewing the Japanese soul as constantly struggling to reconcile a sense of elegance with a sense of brutality. Tsukamoto seems to be probing similar ground, indeed the subtitle on the Body Hammer DVD translates as: "Too beautiful, destruction," (「美しすぎる、破壊」 utsukushi sugiru, hakai). There is some suggestion that this destruction clears a way for rebirth, but also that that in turn will lead to further destructive cycles. The first film is called Tetsuo: The Iron Man in English. It's Japanese title, 「鉄男」, is a common man's name with both that pronunciation and literal meaning. It is not the name of any character however. The significant male characters are "the man" 「男」 and "the guy" 「やつ」 (played by Tsukamoto himself). In the second movie, Tetsuo II: Body Hammer, the man is given the name Taniguchi Tomou (a slight rearrangement of actor Taguchi Tomorou's own name). Tsukamoto apparently never made any bones about the first film being inspired by Eraserhead. It's in B&W and has a lot of similarly disconcerting imagery. My two favorite sequences are an early chase in a train station and later when the guy presents "New World," a bizarre mechanistic alternative to nature. Both movies have pounding soundtracks that complement the visuals well. It's hard to pigeonhole Body Hammer. It's neither quite a sequel nor a remake. Some ideas are fleshed out more and a back-story is elaborated, though whether these can be taken to apply to the first film as well is unclear. In Body Hammer the man is now married, and the crucial part his wife plays in it dilutes the misogynistic aura of the first. While shot in color, Tsukamoto tends to make his scenes bichromatic (black & blue, black & orange, etc), which makes them very moody. Tsukamoto clearly had far more resources, but at points it seems to have a little less spark than its forerunner. I've never quite decided which film I think is stronger. I'm not sure what to expect of a third film. I rented some of Tsukamoto's later films in Japan but was severely limited by a lack of subtitles. He continues to like shocking imagery, but I'm not sure if the films develop scenarios that make this rise beyond a sort of pandering. Unlike Lynch, I'm not really sure if Tsukamoto has grown enough to avoid self-parody. I do find the concept of a more recent project called Vital intriguing, involving a medical student mourning his dead lover by dissecting her and carefully drawing every step. So far I'm deliberately avoiding reading much about Tetsuo: The Bullet Man, though I've heard it doesn't include Taguchi. That seems hard to picture. Anyway, the complete first movie seems to be on YouTube. If you're OK with the first five minutes you're probably OK with the rest, but unless you're a fan of Lynch I probably wouldn't recommend it: Tetsuo- part 1There's a trailer up for Body Hammer, but the sequences aren't matched up with the music nearly as well as in the actual film, and most of the subtitles are wayyy off: Tetsuo II: Body HammerHeh heh . . . next time I promise something less twisted. Shouldn't be too hard . . .
|
|
|
Post by afriendlychicken on Mar 13, 2010 17:24:19 GMT -5
I was waiting for the first video you posted to finish downloading when I read this: "but unless you're a fan of Lynch I probably wouldn't recommend it." Uh oh, no wonder the first 3 minutes bothered me. Gruesome for the sake of being gruesome...yep, sounds like Lynch to me.
Too answer something I forgot you asked about earlier, I believe there was the scene in the cemetery in the version of Mr. Baseball that I saw, although I wouldn't swear on it.
The show with Ishizaka Koji; I only know who he is because he was one of the stars of Ichikawa's The Makioka Sisters; was like the Gaijan in Ryokan clip. It showed short news clips, alternating between serious and funny, and they had a panel that would comment on the clip. I remember that he had a lady co-host.
Great details huh? It's like when I used to work in music stores and the customer couldn't remember the name of the song or the chorus, only meaningless lyrics, like "I love You". Yea, that narrows it down to a few million songs.
What I'm trying to say is, sorry. Wish I could remember more details.
|
|