Places I can't take pictures in.

On days when I don't run around town heading to all kinds of museums I can take photographs in, it's hard for me to write these entries. I just purchased a back pack to lighten up the load on my shoulders and that has also contributed to the total lack of picture taking I have been up to. I'm too afraid to put the camera in the front pouch and none of the clothing I own (so far) has pockets. Tomorrow is supposed to be the start of massive sale time, all through next week, so I hope to pick up some overalls. That should make things better.

On June 1st I headed to the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography. You aren't allowed to take pictures in that museum, but I really enjoyed the works on display. I had to pay a bit extra to see the current exhibition. It was worth it. I think that it is very important while I am in Japan for me to be exposed to Japanese artists. So many of these Japanese museums are focused on Western artwork. Especially the museums that cater to the western audience. I saw the work of Seiichi Furuya in the special exhibition at the museum, which was something I had never been exposed to. His photographic works were very stunning. They mainly surrounded his wife and his memories regarding her life before she passed away. You can see some of the pieces from the exhibition here. I don't want to steal them.
On the main exhibit floor was "The Samurai & I". This exhibit started with early photographic works in Japan and discussed the history of photography in Japan, mainly portraiture. It was really interesting to see some of the very early photography of real samurai. I was really moved by the concept of what occurs to an individual when they understand that their place in society may be at risk, that their lives may be at risk so they reach out to a foreign technology to preserve themselves. The photographs were pieces of these people's lives, although now we only sometimes know who they actually were.


That museum happens to be in the Ebisu beer plaza area. So I headed to the Yebisu Beer Museum.

The history of the beer is pretty remarkable. It started when foreigners essentially started making beer in Japan. These guys in particular imported absolutely everything from Germany so they could call their beer a German style beer. It was a super luxury for everyone to buy beer. But then in World War II all the beer makers were taken over and they could only make all the same crappy beer. In the 50s Yebisu came back and slowly helped Japan drink beer that wasn't a luxury item. That was the only thing I found interesting about this museum. Obviously I did not get a drink there.

I keep hopping between museums. It gets a little mundane to write about 'cause there really isn't anything remarkable about them... when I get home. When I'm there I'm really into it, but you know, you leave and you have some time to think about it and it's not as cool. I got lost and spent about three hours trying to find the Parasite Museum. This poor doctor was treating all these really poor people in post-war Japan. He became really good and finding and identifying different kind of parasites. His office discovered four new to the world parasites just in their patients. They are most know for the 8 meter long intestinal worm they also uncovered. Horrifying. The website says that this is a fantastic place to not be afraid of parasites but to learn about them, but I can't say I've ever been so terrified at a museum in my life. You can learn more about it at the website here I didn't bother to look at the website before I left, just tried to use my guidebook. Needless to say, looking at the building before you go definitely helps you find it.

One thing in particular I was really excited to see was the Aleksandr Rochenko and Varvara Stepanova exhibit at the Teien Art Museum which happened to be down the street from the Parasite Museum and easily identifiable.

It sounded like a really cool thing. The museum was this Prince's house who had some complicated lineage and lived there with his wife. They had this art deco architect design the place, and it really shows. More information can be found on their website here.
The exhibition of this work was a partnership with Russia to bring these works to Japan for the first time. I was expecting (not knowing much about their work) many posters and graphic design work. The show encompassed all of the duo as artists and more. It was fascinating in that way. I didn't know they did lots of abstract painting, abstract photography and designs for plays, but they did. It wasn't as interesting to me from what I was anticipating seeing. The Japanese in there really ate it up though. There was a line of older people coming out of the gift shop into the hall. They all really wanted the book from the exhibit, which I wouldn't have dreamed of purchasing. I am really interested in the way the Japanese have taken Western culture and purchased it as a commodity. The reappropriate it as they see fit. They take it home and put it on their coffee tables. I guess we do the same thing with European culture for lack of our own American culture. I think this might be my theme for the year, but we'll see how things work out.

The gardens were beautiful. I hung out there for awhile 'cause it seemed to be the thing to do. There was a Japanese garden with it's obligatory pond and koi.

There was another section that was the Western section.

I hung out in these gardens for awhile before I headed back to the ranch. A suitable day, I'd say.

Ka-zooooo!

I decided to go to the Tama Zoo yesterday (because once again, it's admission was included in my Grutt pass!). It's a hike, about a two hour or so commute if you have a tendency to think that the Express train is more express than the Semi Special Express train (which I have now learned not to be true). There's some transferring involved and getting a bit lost within those two hours, but somehow I made it to the zoo train.

It's a train just for the zoo! Can you believe it?

I couldn't. But I enjoyed all the signs even if they were a little sun damaged.
The park is huge. They took over this giant piece of land and left many of the trees and stuff on it. It's really beautiful, even the entrance!

The inside of the zoo is HUGE. It's really hilly. There is also quite a bit of walking to get from place to place. I got a good exercise in.
I won't bore you with all the photos of animals I took, but here are some highlights!

Quail!

Hungry hungry giraffes!

Lazy kangaroos!

Snow leopard, upside down!

A tree of red panda!

Attack Yak!

The Human interaction with Peacock special exhibit

Majestic Tiger.

An Actual pack of Wolves

Pile of Snakes in a Tree.

This zoo has two really special things that make it amazing. The Tama Zoo has an extremely fantastic Insectarium. Their collection of insects is amazing. They also have an entire mega-room where you can hang out with butterflies and plants, much like the one at the Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum in Chicago.

Huge!



The rest of the facility was dedicated to other kinds of insects most of which were really scary. And extremely difficult to photograph.


The absolute best part of the entire zoo was the Lion Bus. The Lion Bus travels through the Lion Park, which is this giant hole in the ground where the lions hang out.

To make things interesting, the park officials put a bunch of pieces of meat on the side of the bus. For many waiting hungry lioness

Many of the lions were just stretched out. They are actually really cats, you know.

They also go meow-wow.

It was a fun bus-ride, the only one I've taken so far. I enjoy seeing lions in their semi-natural habitat, but as with most zoos, some of them were pretty mangy. I felt really bad for one of the elephants who was just stuck out in the sun all day with really no water and a whole bunch of giant chains that were a little too reminiscent of circus side shows to me. He didn't seem to mind too much, but then again, my elephant is a little rusty.

A lonely morning.

I left Tokyo Decadance really shocked that it was light outside. I know the rest of you all-nighter experts wouldn't be too surprised by sunlight after a night of no sleep. I found it shocking. Here's a street full of people who shared my experience of staying up all night, only they were at a club down the street.

This is Meiji-Dori between Harajuku and Shibuya


I snapped some photos of Harajuku at 5:45 in the morning after Tokyo Decadance. It's really amazing to see an area usually PACKED with people so empty.

Notice there is no one outside of Laforet! wow! They knocked down the Gap in case you hadn't noticed.

Takeshita Dori just packed with no one.

I didn't really do much else, other than sleep.

tokyo decaDANCE!

Somehow I will make it through this month.

Yesterday I spent most of the day wandering around Shinjuku trying to find the Closet Child (used reseller of Gothic and Lolita clothing) from memory. Not really an effective strategy as I had never been there before. I was trying to find a shirt to match my 3000Y used skirt to wear to Tokyo Decadance that night. Clearly I was not very successful.
I did find the Marui One weirdo building that only has weirdo brands in it (like Angelic Pretty etc.)
For some reason they were also having this extremely compact Evangelion art exhibition and t-shirt sale.


In my wandering I also passed these giant costumed guys. It sucks to be alone at times like these because I would've loved a picture with them but there was no one to take one.

I finally just gave up and went to the Harajuku Closet Child where I had seen this one shirt that matched but I didn't necessarily want to buy it. I caved and purchased it, and it matched perfectly with my outfit. Of course I don't have any photos.
I accidentally walked to Shinjuku instead of Shibuya. I asked the police officers where the place I was going was and they were like, uhhh. This map, it says Shibuya right there in English, right? I was really embarassed so I quickly ran to the train station. It was already after midnight and if I got lucky I might catch the last train. Well, I was lucky, and I barely made the LAST Yamanote line bound for Shibuya. I got off the train and got a bit turned around, but made it to the right intersection.

I found the address of the place I was looking for, but it turns out you have to enter through the back. Fortunately for me I ran into some pretty awesome looking Trump themed people (since that was the theme of the party although not my theme) and they helped me find the entrance.
I was afraid to take any pictures because there were signs all over the place saying not to photograph someone unless you've asked them. It was really loud and I was afraid I wouldn't be heard so I didn't ask. But there were a lot of photographers (most of them really nice, some of them really creepy) so I'm sure out there somewhere are pictures.
There were so many foreigners at Tokyo Decadance. None of them had even bothered to dress up. I guess they just figured they were going to this really big stupid party but in actuality it was this really tiny awesome tiny dance floor playing electronic and industrial music. I chatted with this one fellow who was in the Air Force stationed in Japan. He told me he wasn't really into this techno stuff. I really wondered why Tokyo Decadance was the party all these people decided to come to. I mean, really, no effort was put into their attire. The air force fellow tried repeatedly to get me to dance with him, and I rejected him repeatedly until he finally gave up. The foreigners were the worst too. I'm sure the Japanese felt the same about me, but at least I wasn't trying to feel up their ladies. I just went to dance, but these guys were really hell bent on grabbing and groping which the Japanese girls were really not up for. It was really unfortunate.
There was a stage in front of the DJ booth where at first all these kinda homely sad people were sitting.

That was right in front of the dance floor, so it was extremely unfortunate.

This fellow in this strange outfit got up there and did all these para-para moves which was really fun to watch.
There was an Alice and Wonderland kinda striptease thing.

It was really bizarre.
There was also a tap-dancing clown and this really awesome violin player.

After that was this really really sad magic show, and I don't drink so I wasn't drunk enough as everyone else who appreciated it much more than I did.

I have some really bizarre blurry pictures of people from that night.
The club was really awesome though.




Those guys were really the only people industrial-dancing to Sisen's set other than me, although I'm crazy so I don't think I count. When I asked to take a picture of them, they were like, uhhh, freak? sure?


Lights on! They're kicking us out at 5:30AM.

All in all, a good night had. I really enjoy DJ Sisen's music although I did not necessarily appreciate all the bizarre staging. It was also fun to dance with some awesome folks but not so fun to have to fight off creepy english speaking guys trying to get action. I didn't come to meet any guys, I wanted to make Japanese alternative culture kind of friends, but that didn't happen. I wonder if all these other American and European tourists hadn't caused suspicion for all of us based on the way they were acting.

There is some serious baby-mama drama going on in my hallway between the British guy and his wife. The British guy stays here so he can work while she lives out in the 'burbs with their daughter. Although she just said "my daughter"
And now piano playing while the baby-mama complains about how unclean everything is.
This place is so bizarre.

Next up, early morning Harajuku! I didn't take any pictures today, I'm no good.

a beautiful day!

I don't quite know why but every time I sit down to write these entries, I open my window and I hear this very faint marching band music. It's really strange and it has been happening every day now.. I thought it might have been the Laos festival (or something?) in Yoyogi Park. But then I couldn't find anything. Although I also haven't really found Yoyogi Park. Somewhere out there a marching band is practicing and I know it.

I finally went to Tokyo Sea Life Park yesterday! I love aquariums. This one did not disappoint and fortunately there were not 40,000 people visiting the animals (like the Shedd is constantly full) so I was able to enjoy myself.

There was a couple school groups of really small children there, but I was able to distance myself from them (man were they loud!) Seeing how the animals kinda would've lived in their kinda natural habitats is a lot of fun. I do feel bad for them sometimes when their areas aren't clean and (in this case) they are essentially food for the other fish and there is no way for them to get away. This Sea Life Park was not a nasty horrifying aquarium. Needless to say that I now have an entire folder of pictures of fish, which I will not bore you with, but instead here's the Park's most notable exhibit, their school of Tuna.

They had alot of smaller tuna but four really massive (must've been 400lb-ers) tuna. You can see in that picture their size versus the poor guy in charge of cleaning their tank. I'd actually be afraid of them, they are almost entirely muscle (as I was just eating the other day... nom nom nom).

There was also an outdoor penguin exhibit, which I thought was really cool. I mean, these guys are just chilling out, outside with their own private pool. There were at least fifteen penguins too. The children loved them.


Suction-guys under a starfish attached to the glass.

Obligatory cuttlefish. There were two cuttlefish in the tank, evidently male and female, because after I snapped this photo they decided to mate. I have some really dark pictures of them mouth to mouth exchanging their fishy-fluids. I don't know how often you all see cuttlefish mating, but I was a little confused at first.
After that I wandered over through the beautiful outdoor section into their freshwater pond. There were frogs.

Sneaky frogs.
As I was leaving the park I ran into this bird. He was trying to be sneaky too, but it wasn't working.

I have a bunch of pictures of him sneaking around. The park around the Sea Life park is noted for it's bird watching goodness, but this was the only bird I saw in my whole wandering around the park.

I did get to sit on the sea shore across form Disneyland. I accidentally got off at the Disneyland stop because nothing had signs on it. I thought for about two seconds that maybe this means that I should go to Tokyo Disneyland. No. No it doesn't. Not with the ticket price of 4500Y. Maybe someday. Maaaaybe.
The tide must've been high because of the weird rain the previous day but now it had just left all kind of weirdo beach debris and some dead fish. I have a bunch of pictures of dead fish because I was really shocked at how big they were. They were not your tiny dead fish, they were really large. I thought someone was fishing and had just gotten bored with them and left them, but no, it was definitely from the tides. Poor fish. I won't... amuse you... with pictures.

There was also a small field of poppies for people like me who take really close up pictures of flowers. After that I figured I should probably leave and head back to the ranch but I flipped through my Grutt pass book and noticed that one train stop away there was the Yumenoshima Tropical Greenhouse Dome. Given that I have easily already gotten 2000Y worth of my Grutt pass book and admission to this Greenhouse was essentially free, I decided to go check it out.

It was really beautiful inside, with your usual assortment of tropical plants. They had highlighted the different plants they had that were fruit producing, like pineapple and mango, although most of them did not have any fruit at the time.

These pineapples were working on it.

There was an entire room of Pitcher Plants. I don't think I've been happier in a greenhouse. Pitcher plants are my favorite, hands down, of all carnivorous plants and really just any bog plants. I do much prefer bog plants to most others. I'm not really a tree or a palm person. The door at the entrance was broken but I pried it open anyways to enjoy this entire room of carnivorous plants. The colors found in these guys are just so lovely. I also enjoyed the way they hung them in fairly tiny planters from the ceiling. I'm sure my roommate would freak out, but it really would be a fantastic insect kill in the summer.

Here they are outside. So cool!
There was even an herb garden. I was so happy to smell the calming oils from the Lavender plants.

There was also a huge area of thyme so I stole some for thyme-y potato breakfast this morning. Yum.
As if this place could get any better...

THEY HAD CHICKENS! Just chilling out!


and they were silky chickens at that! Oh, so cute.
I tried to get closer to them, but the rooster was like "WHAT."
So I think they might've had chicks. D'aww chickens so cute.

I headed back to the train and happened upon a REAL supermarket! I bought a large variety of mushrooms because they were on sale and a variety of other food because I need food. I headed back to my dorm and decided to empty out my mail box. It was stuffed FULL of menus. I decided to make collages out of them. I'll post them in the future when I finish all of them. I think I might make them into some kind of print. They really fuse this weird concept of cultural appropriation that I find really fascinating about being a foreigner in Japan. I took all these really bizarre Italian food menus and cut out the pizzas. What does it mean to patch together these sort of cultural re-appropriations? I don't quite know, but I find these things really visually and texturally interesting. It's sort of my own boro, of the modern day. Taking what is cheap and readily available to me and making some kind of patch work with it. I'll just have to reapply that in fabric in this screen printing class and see what it comes out like. I'm into these weird visceral reds and yellows these days. I think it was Barb that got me hooked with her crazy awesome photography of my hands.

Last night, as some of you who also read my livejournal or check my facebook status are aware, was another ridiculous party thrown by the very rude person who lives next door to me. I am still very angry about this party because it did not consist of people who live in this section at all. And I'm sure other people who actually live in this section were very angry about this, as the girl next door to me must've been because she was blasting r&b until she must've fallen asleep or something. I wrote another letter to Sakura H-dawg that they will hopefully respond to, although I guess when it comes down to it, I don't really care either way. This place is a bit too much of a craphole, but in a fairly nice area. After the washing machine fiasco of prior and the complete inability of the holding company to do anything about this noise issue (it seems I'm not the only one complaining), I'm certain that if I end up here in Tokyo again, I'll ...try to figure out a better situation?
Stuck between a rock and a hard place.

In the mean time though, tonight is a Tokyo Decadance party at Trunp Room. I don't have an outfit prepared at all, but I'll figure something out before then, hopefully.