Visiting Tokyo's Underground Scene with Old Man Poo

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People keep telling me that its the small things that you remember about your trips abroad. The colour of the phone in the hotel room. The smell of grilled squid in the alley beside the hostel. The ring of the mobile phone two seats back on a bus to another temple.

Well, I thought that was a bit sad. I wanted to have a full day in Tokyo that I would never forget. Everywhere has neon. Everywhere has tall buildings and girls dressed as Mary Hadalittlelamb. I wanted something just plain old weird. A day of nonsensical nonsensry. Fortunately for me, so did our good friend Will. So we put our combined brain powers to use and produced a plan. We weren't sure if some of these places exsited. We'd heard stories, we'd read books, but sometimes the things you're looking for just aren't that well publicised.

This is a bit of a selfish blog because its about one morning in my life when my wife was still in bed and I was out doing weird things with weird people. Its fair to put in a disclaimer that in no way do the following events/stories reflect Viks experiences. This is a Bob blog if ever there was one...

5am.
Tsukiji Fish Market
This is one hell of a lotta fish in one hell of a big place being hacked into hellishly tasty portions right infront of your tired touristy eyes. Vik had decided that a 4:45am start was a little on the early side, so Will, me, a girl that worked at our hostel and another bloke headed there alone. (Well as alone as four people who aren't really alone can be - I mean, if you are with three other people you're not really alone as such are you? Question: can four people be alone together?). Anyway, having posed with the carcasses of numerous large sea creatures gathered from every fishing ground on the planet (Canada, Morocco etc.), and having seen live creatures sliced with some of the finest specimens of stainless steel blades I've had the wow's to set my peepers on; we left in a pickled silence, wondering inwardly if Morrocan fish could understand what a Canadian fish was saying. At least that's what I assume everyone else was thinking. Maybe it was just me.

7am.
Breakfast - Squid Ink Ice-Cream
I don't need to expand too much on this little episode. You might think we found this at the fish market. That would make sense. But this was nowhere near said market. It was just a random stall by the side of a major road that happened to be open at 7am. We all chipped in with some silver and gave that cone a good licking - but... it tasted a bit poohy so we gave it all to bloke (the fourth member of our Musketeers group) and he duely spilt it on his white trouser-chino-cargo pant thingies. Squid ink on yer keks. Not what you want now.

7:30am.
Giant Beer Vending Machine
These crazy Japanese love their vending machines. I'm going to come back here with a giant ball of wool and a crazy needle shaped car and show these wacky people just what a stupendiously ridiculous idea having so many vending machines is by driving round them all in my car with my ball of wool. Japan will be a well wrapped woolly sausage. I'll knit them a lesson so they may learn the error of their ways. Its just bonkers the number of the things. Anyway, we found one - outside a blinkin' junior high school that sold 3 (THREE) litre cans of lager! Not only that my word hungry guzzlemonkey friends - they sold Whiskey in little stumpy cans! To anyone! ANYBODY! Arrrgh! Has the world gone mad? You can't sell whiskey in cans! Maybe they misheard when the director of Suntory Whiskey said "Eureka! We'll sell whiskey in Cannes!". I blame this Eureka person. Damn them to Suntory Hell. By the way... for all you Lost in Translation / Scarlet "Are My Lips Real?" Johannsen fans out there... I have yet to do "a-ring-ading-ding" but we have been to see the Park Hyatt - it was disappointing but they did sell Suntory and I will be going back in a tux.

9:30am.
The Gas Museum
You read it right the first time. Our first bizarre stop of the day. The Gas Museum. By this point we'd lost our blokey friend and it was me, Will and... lovely Japanese girl from the hostel - just useless with names (not her, me... ). Did that last bit make sense? I meant that I always forget names. Maybe she does too. We didn't really go into that much. If I see her again I'll be sure to test her.We had stumbled upon the gas museum quite by accident, but the whole weirdness of the place was like a magnet to three crazy aluminum grasshoppers with nothing to do but rust in the Tokyo sun. (I'd like to thank Mrs McGibbon (4th yr English) for teaching me all there is to know about word-smithry and the power of a well constructed metaphor thingy.) Inside said building, which was, to be fair, one of the finest museum buildings my retinas have ever scanned, we did such activities as:
- standing in a fridge
- feeling a cows udder
- stroking a hot baguette
...and of course...
- lying in a dry paddling pool
Oh. And no trip to a gas museum would be complete without putting on a workmans helmet and crawling through a short black pipe.

11:30am.
Breakfast with a Baseball Team
Random dockland area park. Randomsville, Tokyo. We stop to munch on some plasticy wacky-snacks and next thing we're being eaten by a baseball team. Actually - the arrival of the baseball team and the mosquito hordes was probably incidental - but to me those junior high bat-boys brought the plagues of Egypt.

12:30pm
The Sewerage Museum
Despite being a busy time of year in Japan, this place was remarkably quiet. Shame too, because it is a hotbed of waste system information. If you want to know about the Tokyo Underground scene then this is the place you, comrade. Located next to the main processing plant in Odaiba, the Museum is actually on the fifth floor (and not well sign posted), built above a fresh water jobbie remover thing that supplies the leisure centre on floors 2 and 3 with water for the pool. Let me tell you from the outset that I thought this place was cool. We had a three screen cinema (capacity approx 150) for 3 people showing (in English) exactly how waste in Tokyo is processed. Needless to say I was surprised to learn that Tokyo uses a mainly separate waste water and overflow system where other cities in Japan opt for the more usual combined system. Did you know that there are 15,000km of sewers in Tokyo? How's that fact sitting in your noggin'? Concentrating on work aint so easy when you know that the sewerage system in Tokyo could reach to Australia and back. When I met Vikki later I wanted to take her back here so she could share the experience, but oddly the following interactive exhibits didn't appeal:
- a floor lit, computer generated facto-blast from Old Man Poo (the places mascot)
- a large laser cannon that when fired at a giant map of Tokyo reads out the address of the nearest Water Treatment Plant
- a bottle of untreated sewerage that says it isn't actually poo but chocolate cake. (Yeah right. I saw the movie remember).
- an exhibition of sewerage piping through the ages - from brick to polymer with Old Man Poo.

1:30pm
60 Witches Doing Aerobics
As we left the Sewerage Museum, ladden with leaflets and brochures about Sludge processing, we found that the square immediately infornt of the main entrance area was packed with kids and adults dressed as witches doing an aerbobics workout. There was a Pumpkin style Mr Motivator jumping around on a stage and the witches were following. I swear - I hadn't taken anything and my blood pressure was normal.

The day went on in this vein for quite a bit. I can't go into it all, but none of it really topped the above for sheer weirdness. I could go on for ages typing about poo. Its an endlessly funny subject offering more gags than the Sewerage Movie (which I pray to God they release on DVD).

Anyway, I'd like to thank Will for helping make such a memorable day possible. Without him I'd have done something like go to the Imperial Palace (which incidentally - we never saw before we left). Since Will left Tokyo without completing our day of madness, I'd like to dedicate an outing to him. In November we will be returning to Tokyo, and when we do... Will, just for you - I'm going to the Luggage Museum.

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Photos

Shibuya District
We went to a Jazz Club here with Will and some Japanese friends. Shinichiro (a friend we met in Moscow) still seems bitter that he was beaten in the game of ten-pin bowling we had afterwards. Sorry Shinichiro.

Neon and more neon...
As noisy as it is bright.

Who said Tokyo subway was busy?
Try it at 5am. Its distinctly quieter than most other times of the day.

You could eat your dinner off that floor.
Everything in Japan is clean. The stations are immaculate. There is no litter problem. There is no graffiti. There is no vandalism.

Big Chunks of Sashimi
Carving up Tuna is a serious art...

Japan: not a place to be a fish
The tank of water contains the fishes friends. This fellow has just been plucked from the tank and had his gills sliced.

Who knew Tuna was that big...?
I was on the lookout for John West, but the stuff here would never fit in his tins. Cutting through a Tuna looks like hard work.

Me and Will in a fridge!?
This exhibit in the Gas Museum was to demonstrate that a fridge could lower your temperature (!?) - and sure enough, it did just that!

CONTAMINATION
This exhibit in the Sewerage Museum shows what will happen if you have a duff sewerage system. Your water will become contaminated and your vegetables will mutate. Makes perfect sense really. Look what happened to the Turtles when they went into the sewers. Scientific evidence that Raging Mutant vegetables is a realistic possibility.

If it all hits the fan...
This is the Emergency Situation room. If something bad happens in the sewers of Tokyo, these guys leap into action. Its a bit like Tracey Island - but with less strings... less International Rescue and more clearing up poo.

Sewers through the ages...
This may look like there was a bright spotlight above me but really its coming from my head. At night I dazzle drivers.

Who would have thought that Tokyo has a beach?
Obviously its fake and the residents laugh at you if you mention swimming, but they had some active beach volleyballers volleyballing and plenty of other beach related stuff...

Bob in Space
Going into space has been an ambition of mine since Seven of Nine joined the Star Trek Voyager crew in episode 4-13. Having told Vikki this, she spotted me for the nerd I am and quickly had me jettisoned into space for her sake and mine.

Earth from Space
During my time in the capsule, I took this photograph of earth. I wanted to get a good shot of Scotland but it was covered by cloud. Question: has anyone every actually been able to see Scotland from space?

Posers
These little guys were at a wedding in a temple we visitied in Harajuku district of Tokyo. Their parents took great pleasure in pushing them to the top of the steps and letting all the tourists photograph them. At first they hated it but by the end they didn't want to leave.

Wishing I Was Lucky...
At most temples you get the opportunity to spend money on a piece of wood that you then write your wishes on and hang from a special wish making place. I guess this is Tottenhams only real hope.

This guy isn't wishing...
... he's Preying.

Making Washi (Japanese Paper)
When Vikki said she wanted to make Washi, I thought she'd lost the power of rational speech and was trying to comment on my personal hygene. Turns out she just wanted to make some paper.

Wrapped up in what I'm doing?
I was great at this paper making malarky. I didn't even need to concentrate that much. The only time I had trouble was when I had to count to 30. It was embarrasing. I thought I'd show off and do it in Japanese but lost track and then forgot how to blinkin do it in English.

Bananas
Why we need this picture here I don't know. Sorry. I just like all the brightly coloured bananas.

Comments

[Bernie]

Can you bring Will home for christmas!!! lol . Love you loads , Tokoyo looks amazing! xxxxxxxxx