A really good Japanese-Latin band!! 

BBQ!! Need I say more? 

Before entering the festival 

Palm Trees and Latin Beats

I came the closest I have come in a long while to visiting a tropical island this past weekend. I had been to this place once before, but in October instead of August. My, what a difference 2 months can make!! I went with a group of friends to attend a salsa festival at a camp site on a small island off the Fukuoka coast called Nokonoshima. My first trip last year was full of flowers blooming and grassy fields high atop the bluffs in the middle of the island. This time I stuck to the beaches....sandy beaches with palm trees, a shanty like bar and lots of vendors making everything from traditional Japanese food to tacos and jerk chicken! Oh and to wash things down, an assortment of brightly colored fruity concoctions both of the alcoholic and non-alcoholic variety, you know the ones with the little paper umbrella's sticking out of them? Oh yes and Mexican beer!! Mmmm.

Right and then there was the whole reason for going: the music. I don't know the exact number, but I would say 15 to 20 different dance groups and bands from all over the world performed. Of course hearing trumpets screaming out over the driving latin rythm's re-awakened old feelings to pick up my horn and show them who's really boss...but unfortunately they were definitely in charge! I don't play as much as I should anymore. It shows. But I really enjoyed the music!! Then there was the bbq with friends, a group of 10-15, we grilled beef Japanese style, along with yaki-onigiri (grilled rice balls) and veggies. After a late dinner we talked until our food had digested and headed for the surprisingly warm and surprisingly OILY water. There was a floating dock with a diving tower, rope swings, and a slide that made for 2 hours of fun in the water!! I haven't had so much fun swimming since high school. We slept in a massive cabin that had no furnishings, but luckily I brought along 2 airbeds and laid sideways we managed to get about 6 people a bit of back support.

It was a full weekend, beginning for me on Friday after a business meeting and not arriving back home until late Sunday night. It was well worth the sleepy Monday though, I have not had such a unique weekend in quite a while. Something about swimming off the coast of a small Japanese island, while listening to a latin band from South America play...that well although not a normal match, put me quite at ease! No street fights, no men hitting on me early in the morning, no large bundles of cloth pulled up my rear, no exchange disasters....although those all were experiences that also made my time here memorable, it was nice to replace controversy with palm trees and pleasant music for once!

*Note this picture is a re-enactment. No Matt's were harmed in the making of this weblog. Thank you. 

Street fights and Sexual Harrassment - My Friday night

I thought I would wait to make another post until I had something noteworthy to share. Well, I think last night qualifies.

The evening started off innocently enough. I went into the city after work with a new ALT to go guitar shopping, get some dinner, and possibly check out the night life. After finding and buying a guitar (a nice yamaha acoustic) we ate some delicious pasta at Pietro's in Tenjin. Later, we met some Japanese friends of mine at an izakaya for snacks and drinks. We decided that the 6 of us would meet up with 4 or 5 other Japanese friends and go dancing since it was the first time so many in the group did not have to work on Saturday morning.

We went to our usual dancing spot first and had quite a good time dancing the night away. The clock hits 4am and as the club is closing down we decide to walk up the street to another club that opens at 4am and goes till 7 or 8am to finish off the night before we catch our first trains and buses home. We step outside, meet a really nice guy (although rather raunchy) who was on vacation from some tropical local, complete with dreadlocks that were about 2 feet long. He spoke no Japanese and gladly joined us as we took off for the next club. So with the night seemingly almost complete, things are looking quite good for our merry little group.

As we are making our way down the main street in the area, I see a fight up ahead. Keeping a safe distance I strain to see who is involved. Two Japanese guys were holding a white guy down while a third was kneeing him in the head. "NOT GOOD" I think to myself. After a few shots they let go and start walking away...the American stands up and I realize that he looks familiar. He is from a different prefecture, but a teacher I know and have hung out with before. He was intoxicated and angry that 3 guys had tried to take him at once...so he was going after them. Enter myself and a bunch of other people who try to stop this from turning into a brawl.

The Japanese guy's friends were trying to pull him back, and it took 3 or 4 of us to hold our guy back. It looked like both guys were walking opposite directions when they both turned and ran for eachother again. This happened several times. Out of the 10-15 foreigners there only myself and one other guy spoke any level of Japanese at all, so I was trying to talk it out with the Japanese guy and smooth things over. After 20 minutes of tension and chaos we were walking away when the Japanese guy came back AGAIN. He said he was coming for his sunglasses which he had dropped...but our guy didn't know/buy this excuse and threw his cigarette at the Japaense guy. ROUND 4 begins. This time they push and shove and really start going at it. Punches are being thrown, and the group of Japanese guys has grown from 4 to about 30 or 40.

At this point I am really afraid for not just the guy I know who is fighting, but for the other people in the area who were trying to help. So I run into a shop and had the clerk call the police. Before the police arrive somehow the 2 main guys involved have started talking again. In eachother's faces, but no longer throwing punches. The Japanese guy is screaming he just wanted to get his glasses....and something about how "I am a samurai, I do it samurai style" over and over again. He of course has tattoos up and down both arms (not common in Japan outside of rockstars and criminals), earings in both ears and a shaved head. Of course while he is ranting about himself being a samurai I am debating asking him whether he really knows anything about Zen Buddhism, Bushido, or Japanese culture at all. But figure I already have gotten on his good side by trying to talk things out with him, so I should try not to aggitate him more than he already is... At this point the police arrive, and now 20-30 Japanese guys who don't really know what happened are yelling at the police, and 10-15 foreigners who also didn't see what happened from the beginning are trying to talk to the police.

Since I was one of the few who spoke any level of Japanese at all, regardless of how much I saw, the police wanted to talk to me. Although I had talked things out with the main 4-5 Japanese guys involved the fact that I was speaking to the police in Japanese about the incident was really making some of the other Japanese guys angry. They were yelling "Hey be carefull what you tell the police, don't lie about us!" This made me feel very much at ease. So after explaining what I saw, and that I didn't see it from the beginning, the Police send most of the fringe group of foreigners off. Myself and some of the friends of the guy who was in the fight were asked to get into a police car as they thought it wasn't safe for them/myself to stay in the area after many of the 30-40 shady types had slinked back into the shadows of the city.

The police station was rather uneventful. After 20 minutes of jibber-jab I think the police finally realized my Japanese really wasn't all that good, and after talking things out with the 2 guys involved (as far as I know they both agreed not to press any charges against eachother, so everything was dropped), we were all free to leave. My Japanese friend had also come along to say what he had seen (in Japanese thankfully) and of course to help me out. So together we walked back to the club where we were intially planning on going to and where we told our friends to wait for us until we came back.

I step into the club feeling a mix of emotions, relief, disgust, anger, frustration, happiness......and my throat is sore from a combination of breathing in too much smoke at the first club and yelling things like "STOP this, it is stupid" in English and Japanese for 30 minutes non-stop just a few hours prior. After greeting my friends and assuring them that I was fine, I head to the bar to get me a NON-alcoholic drink to wet my whistle. As I am waiting at the bar the guy to the right of me smiles and nods....he was Japanese and looked to be between 55-65 years old. I nod back and he then asks in Japanese "Where are you from?" I say: "America" he says: "Ooh I love America!" He begins to firmly shake my hand and I say: "thanks" he says: "I love Bush, do you love President Bush?" I say: "well no I wouldn't say that I 'love' President Bush right now" he says: "Ooh then you love Kerry, Kerry is great!!!" I say:"well no, I am not too impressed with Kerry either at the moment." He says: "Oooh okay, well I really like Americans" I say "thanks, that's nice" he looks frustrated and while continuing to firmly shake my hand he says:"I said I LIKE Americans!!" I say "Oooh right, and I like Japanese!!" He then says no no, "I.....REALLY like AMERICANS"...and then pulls my hand towards his crotch. At this point I yank my hand away and go running back to my friends table crying and seeking protection.

I realize I am a miserable failure at properly using coma's and parenthesis in wrtten dialogue, but I am tired and this is a weblog. In looking back on last night, I have come to several conclusions. 1. I probably won't be going clubbing again for a while. 2. Those who wear sungalsses late at night either have extremely hyper-sensitive eyes, or they are bad news 3. Don't argue with thugs, even if they aren't really mafia. 4. Avoid idle chit-chat with strange looking 60 year-old men in Japanese dance clubs at 6am. 5. Yamaha produces good quaility musical instruments ranging from expert to beginner at an affordable price.