A Birthday in Tokyo

2008, for me, will be the year that I celebrated my birthday half-way across the world - in one of my most favorite cities: TOKYO. I turned 23 on the night bus to Tokyo - not one of the most comfortable ways to turn 23, but it was cheap.

For my birthday I really wanted to go to Springroove 2008. It was a hip hop "festival," with headliners like Kayne West, Rihanna, Sean Kingston and Ne-yo. 4 of my friends came along for the fun and I had a blast!





WHAT DO WE DO AT 5:30am IN TOKYO?!
The pisser of taking the nightbus strikes again. We didn't know what to do. Check-in for our hotel wasn't until 3pm - but we decided to head over to the hotel's neighborhood anyway.

Denny's For Breakfast - Ate at Denny's to kill time and fill our stomachs. Denny's in Japan is a lot different from its American counterpart. For one, it's A LOT cleaner and secondly, the food on the menu is 34312343141324x better...for me at least.

I hate traditional breakfast food, but Denny's in Japan offered more choices for me to choose from (i.e. more 和食　Japanese food). I settled on a very delicious vegetable soup and some of the best bread I've eaten in Japan.

I think the one thing that Denny's-Japan has in common with Denny's-U.S. is that it's the ultimate place to eat after you've had a long night of partying. In the booth next to us sat two Japanese girls with bleached hair, heavy make-up, pumps and thigh high stockings (shiver). They had obviously had a long night... and their hair overly done hair entertained us for a good 10 minutes.




IT'S ONLY 8am, NOW WHAT DO WE DO?
Go to SpaceCreate of course! So with a lot more time to kill we decide to head on over to SpaceCreate which is a place where you can play darts, go on the internet, watch movies, read manga, have unlimited beverages, etc... We rented a family room for 3 hours and watched Saw 3 of all movies. But in our defense, we didn't have much of a selection!

It gave us a chance to just rest up a bit since the nightbus failed to provide a good sleeping environment. Afterwards we freshened up at the hotel. They kindly let us check into one of our rooms early. That felt a lot better and off to Chiba we went!

MEAT.

SPRINGROOVE 2008
...was sooooooooooooooooo FUN!

Springroove is a Hip Hop Festival that features both U.S. and Japanese artists. The line-up this year was really great:

• Sean Kingston - 2nd favorite set of the night. It was short - but it was just so fun. But there was an odd part at the end where he asked everyone to put their keitais in the air because the next song was dedicated to his mother who is incarcerated.
  

....WAIT A MINUTE?! Did he just say incarcerated!? haha - what?! I'm sure most of the crowd didn't even know what that word meant.

• Kreva - Better than the Teriyaki Boyz. Unlike many Japanese rappers - he's one the few that sound the closest to what we're used to hearing.
  
  
• Afra something-something - This is who we walked in on first. They were a Japanese group and the guys were so entertaining! Sure we didn't understand what they were saying - but they really did know how to work the crowd!
  
  
  
• Rihanna - I was excited to see her perform, but was kind of disappointed. She had a long set, but the middle portion of it was all slow songs - boringgggggggggg.
  
  You get a bit hypnotized by her when she's on stage; she just has that kind of presence and she can dance! But in terms of crowd interaction - eh... just mediocre.
  
  I really wish she hadn't sung that Unfaithful song. My friend and I really wanted to hear the Umbrella song, which of course she didn't do until the end. We stayed long enough to hear it - but left halfway through.
  
  
• Kanye West - My FAVORITE performance of the night. The crowd was packed - I couldn't see most of the time. Every now and then I'd get a glimpse and then some giant would stand in front of me. The crowd loved every song and it was just very enjoyable.
  
  But I must say this, Kanye West is such a little princess. He KNOWS he's big in Japan. At the end of his performance - he just left. No "thanks" or "thank you for coming out!"
  
  Who doesn't thank their fans? Seriously. I was so turned off by that. It's a shame to think that someone is so full of themselves - but man, he does makes good songs!
  
  
  

• Keyshia Cole - Didn't get to see her and I'm not entirely sure why...
  
  
• Ne-yo - Last performance of the night - drew a big crowd.
  
  
• N.E.R.D. - Very, very loud performance. This was the only performance where I got really pushed around. My body was in one area but my arm was in another!
  

  Where's my arm!?

  That was a bit scary and we immediately went to the back.
  
  
  
  

There were bunch of other people, including DJ Kaori on the 1's an 2's - she did a good job of making sure the crowd's energy stayed high.

I thought it was well-worth the trip and the price. Anything to get a dose of what I'm used to back home.

A Few Notes on Japanese Crowds

• Definitely not as violent as the American crowds
  
  
• Always, always, always face the stage and DJ
  
  
• Not as eccentric w/their dance moves
  
  
• They don't "get into it" as much as the Americans do
  
  
• There are still those group of girls who shriek when the artist come on stage. I think there's a difference between cheering and being overly shriek-y. Oh my ears!
  
  
• Even though they don't understand what the American artists are saying - they are still very into the performance. Whereas many Americans would be turned off by the Japanese artists... hmmm... I don't think that's very nice. Give it a chance!
  
  
• Most Japanese people are still taller than me (-_-). I should start bringing a stool to step on at concerts
  
  
• The Hip Hop scene in Japan is very "pop-like," in terms of the way that people dress. It seems costume-y. It's kind of like that in the U.S., but it seems just a tad mimic-y here. But at the same token, there are different scenes in Hip Hop and I tend to not like the pop-scene.

But with all that said - I still had an awesome time and I don't really care about the differences, as long as we're all having fun then there's no point in ruining the party!





LAWN-LOUNGING AT THE IMPERIAL PALACE
The next day we went to the Imperial Palace and decided to lounge on the lawn. It was very clear and sunny day so we found a clearing of grass and laid down - WITHOUT a blanket (haha, Mom don't kill me!).


We were surrounded by cherry blossoms and I have to say that at that moment, I really did feel like a がいじん (foreigner) in Japan - but not in any negative connotations. It was like... wow, here we are, living in Japan, and enjoying a day at the park in Tokyo.




I LOVE YOU BULLET TRAIN
Ever since I took my first bullet train, and I've only taken 2 to date, I don't ever want to step on another nightbus. I have officially been exposed to the beauty of the shinkansen. Sure it's a bit more expensive, but it's infinitely better.

It's fast, and I think they are cute. They remind me of dolphins:

THANK YOU
TO EVERYONE FOR WISHING ME A HAPPY BIRTHDAY, SPENDING IT WITH ME, SENDING ME CARDS, PRESENTS AND LOVE!