You know how it is- you get a budget air ticket for a distant location on Expedia or whatever and the non-stops will be the most expensive. My first few years in Japan, the cheapest tickets were on Korean and Asiana, so from Tokyo I’d have to start in the opposite direction, spend a night in Seoul, then take a non-stop to Seattle (or SFO or LAX in between). Then the Korean airlines got more expensive and the best deals were trips that routed through Hong Kong, then Taipei, and for the past few years the best Tokyo-Seattle deal has been on Hawaiian, routing you through Honolulu, but unfortunately most of the connecting flights leave somewhere between 1 1/2 and 5 hours after you land, so not really enough time to go through all the airport hassles and get out to Waikiki Beach for a swim. On one trip to Seattle with Kenny, we got lucky and found a 9-hour layover so we took a Lift to Waikiki and had a good time walking around, swimming and having lunch and sleeping under a huge banyan tree in the park. On this trip, I got lucky again and found a 23-hour layover at no extra charge. But first a couple pics from my last day in Japan.
I was a bit sad to leave wife, kids, and old friends, both gaijin and nipponjin. Ten days was much too short. Somehow maybe I’ll achieve my dream of living half the year here in Montana and half the year in Japan.
Of the four gaijin old friends I met up with, one is vaxxed and three are purebloods. Usually, when back in Japan, I contact my tin-foil-brigade Japanese friends and we meet for a feast and discuss the deep state and such. None of them are vaxxed and they did their best to buck the system during the plandemic. The number of my foreign friends (gaijin) decreased during the pandemic, and the number of Japanese friends increased. On the gaijin side, this is because almost all of them except for my inner-circle friends fell for the plandemic fraud. This issue is an elephant in the room, of course. And on the Japanese side, my increase in friends is because through my work with kla during the plandemic, I met many fellow rebels.
Here’s the bullet train arriving in Hamamatsu. The Japanese have adopted many Western customs over the past 100 years, but they still have yet to learn to dress slovenly in public.
Photo below: Ueno station main gate. The gates with the green panel are for people who breeze through with the chip in their phone, card or apple watch. The black panel gates are for resisters like me who still put coins in the ticket machine and use a paper ticket to get through the gate. It wasn’t too long ago that the whole row of automatic ticket gates would take the paper ticket, and the machines are fast; they can suck in your ticket and spit it out two steps ahead as fast as you can run through the stall, whether you put your ticket in face up or face down, backwards or forwards. They work very well so the all-digital option is for control more than convenience. I’m wondering which will come first, the end of the paper ticket option or the beginning of the chipped hand option 666- much easier to restrict entry based on social credit score with the chipped hand, mind you.
As dictator I will mandate acceptance of paper currency and paper ticket options everywhere. Yes, libertarians, I’ll be restricting the freedom of governments and corporations to monitor your every move, but guess what- restriction on the freedom of tyrants means preservation and expansion of freedoms for you!
In Tokyo I met up with two substackers, one who is a veteran and I’ve interviewed, and another who is brand new to writing here, but has worked with kla.tv. Both meetings were a pleasure as it’s always good to share a beer or coffee with fellow rebels in the resistance.
After a late lunch with Kitsune I had about two hours to get from Ueno to Haneda airport. Instead of taking the local train in the direction of Tokyo station, I decided to hoof it. The crowded back streets of Ueno look much like they did 27 years ago, when I first came to Japan.
The famous mostly open-air shopping area just south of Ueno station is Ameya-Yokocho. The Ame part means either ‘sweets’ or it’s short for America. Post war, when the area was rebuilding after all was burned up in the Tokyo firebombings, sugar was hard to come by and various stores here sold sweets. Either that or the Ame is for the stores that sold American Army surplus goods.
There are tons of cheap restaurants and shops selling everything here. I wonder how the electronics and camera stores make a profit in the era of Amazon.
Here’s a seafood shopfront:
Here are the fishermen drying out sakura shrimp:
Dig those light utility trucks with the sides and tail that fold down. I used to have a 5-speed Daihatsu and man was it easy on the gas. Those trucks would sell like hotcakes here in the US, even if Cap’n Warpspeed put a 30% tariff on them!
You can buy right out on the street, or go inside the merchandise-packed, cramped shops:
The Ameya Yokocho shopping area is a bit gaudy and run-down in parts, but I like it. So many retail areas in Japan seem like they were rebuilt or remodeled yesterday, and the Japanese generally like their shopping areas clean and neat and new. This area seems like it’s saying, “Heck with it, leave everything as is. It was grungy in ‘73, and it’s grungy today,” and the tourists and locals seem to like it that way.
Here’s the same place in summer, taken by a decent photographer:
At this yakiniku place (cook your meat on your table’s grill) a platter of カルビ, delicious boneless short ribs for 680Y, only $4.41, and a draft beer for 190Y, $1.23!!)
I left the small streets and emerged at the main thoroughfare of Akihabara, the famous electronics zone.
OK, I expected to get to Hawaii quicker than that. I’m going to have to put it off for the next post.
Wait, first this:
That is Kochi castle, on Shikoku island, the smallest of the main four Japanese islands. The reason I include this is because I visited a church in Hawaii which was built as a replica of this castle. See you in Hawaii.
Addendum: BBR update- this week I’ve been working on the Morning Commute show. On Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday I sat down with a different 2-person panel and we went over the news of the day. It went well- now I have to figure out how to get it up fast on the webpage. Some days I’ll just post audio on the BBR website, and other days I’ll also put up the video on the BBR Rumble site. Larry came in last week to help me get the site going, and it’s running now, but with limited content as I’m learning how to schedule programs throughout the week. You can see the basic, beta version now and click the play button to hear the stream, which has limited content in the trial mode.
photo credits:
Wpcpey - Own work
Ueno Ameya-Yokocho shops under track
· CC BY-SA 4.0
· File:Ueno Ameya-Yokocho shops under track 2015.jpg
4510waza
A view of drying Sakura Shrimps in Fuji River Mouth, Shizuoka Prefecture, Japan.
· CC BY-SA 2.0
· File:Drying Sakura Shrimps in Japan (2425372520).jpg
Kamasakizaki - Own work
Fresh Seafood at Ameyayokocho
· CC BY-SA 3.0
· File:Ameyayokocho Seafood Stand.JPG
Nice pics! Send a newsflash my way when you're in Tokyo again.
Had a good chat last summer with NJ Election Advisor who makes a yearly return as well.
He might be a good candidate for an anonymous interview.
As Dictator, you've got your work cut out.
Your first act should be to put together a clear definition of "obscenity", which I'm confident you can produce. In the event you don't have more success than Potter Stewart, call me. I'll help you muddle through it. Oh, and get rid of those silly face diapers. Don't you know that people everywhere just want to breathe free?
I'm not sure about this, but in the photo taken by the more professional photographer, it looks like the woman at the far right is wearing "sweats". Or is she the waitress and in uniform? Or am I seeing things which aren't there?