Now With 100% More Purikura!

[blodeuedd]

Today was packed, to make up for my Saturday of Doing Nothing.

First, I headed out to my old 'hood, i.e. Asakusa, to get in my yearly plum blossom picture fix. If I'd gone last week, I would have gotten more of the five-petal white blossoms I love so much, the ones with the strongest fragrance, but then I wouldn't have had the shocking brightness of that one tree that flowers deep magenta. Next week the pale pink ones will be at their peak.

Next, I went back to the Shrine of Literature, only to find that most of the blossoms were done, save for a few later-flowering trees. There were people selling plum bonsais, and you're sorely mistaken if you think I was not very, very tempted to buy one for myself. Only the thought that I'd have to carry it around Tokyo all day stopped me; if I'd been coming directly home, one of those trees would have made the journey with me.

I met with Jill and Erynn in Shibuya (for real this time, and there was no crazy running around like in my dream). While I was waiting for them at Hachiko, and old guy with a cigarette shuffled up to a spot a couple of metres away from me, mumbling to himself. I ignored him, and he wasn't really looking at me anyway, but then he started to do these weird movement like he was trying to dance and it was very strange. Everyone around was staring at him but not staring, you know, the way Tokyo people do. XD

We had Chinese food for lunch, which is why I still smell of Chinese food*, and afterwards went down to Mandarake to look for porn highbrow literature, and ended up squealing over adorable Jirou, Ohtori and Shishido books. We also saw the most bizarre spelling ever for Jirou: Jirrow. O_O

I didn't have a ticket to Altar Boyz, but Jill suggested I tag along in case they were having a lottery, and am I ever glad I did! I stood in the toujitsuken line and was given number 70, and I'm fairly certain they didn't go past 75, because once I finally made it up to the ticket table, I got one of the last standing-room tickets, and there only looked to be two or three seated ones left. I was standing at the very back (because Japan is not only the land of assigned seating, it is the land of assigned STANDING! :D), but still had a good view of the stage, and it's not as though the room was very big anyway.

And the show, oh the show! So damn funny. I didn't get all the jokes (especially what was going on when the guys were reading out some of the confessions from the box, mostly because they were laughing so hard and it wasn't scripted, so it was harder to follow), but there were some points where I was cracking up at things that went over Japanese audience's heads.

dilettantka already wrote a far better review than I ever could (and that review was the final push, after having Jill bug me about it for a week, that convinced me to go, so thank you! ^_^), but here are some of my favourite bits, and our Close Encounter of the Altar Boy Kind:

- Sooooooooooooru sensaaaaaaaaa DX 12! *does little finger wiggle*
- Jesus makes Masa's cell phone vibrate. Masa enjoys this.
- Masa singing about things being put into him. Also, Masa being extremely gay. And coming out as Catholic. XD
- A Japanese guy yelling, "BREAK ME OFF A PIECE OF THAT MIRACLE FUNK!" = the best thing ever, or the best thing ever?
- That poor girl who was brought up on stage was thisclose to passing out; I felt kind of bad for her, because she kept hiding her face and flinching away from Matthew and Mark.
- Every time the big cross was lit up blue, I couldn't help but think of Mont Royal. Or the cross on top of the Co-Cathédrale St-Joseph in Hull. XD

The venue is up in a building that has a game centre on the ground floor, so Erynn suggested we do purikura to commemorate this most memorable of evenings.




We left by the back exit, and as we stepped out onto the street, we noticed that there seemed to be a lot of girls and women hanging around. Almost like...

"They're waiting for demachi, aren't they?!"

We thought we might as well hang around, and it turned out that we'd inadvertantly lined up for an autograph from Tanaka Rouma (who plays Luke). We must have been speaking pretty loudly because he suddenly leaned back and looked down the line at us (we were the last in the queue), and everyone else in line did the same! As we neared the front, we saw him sign one woman's cell phone, and another's ipod. Erynn started wondering whether we should ask him to sign our boobs.

"Let's get Adele to do it!"
"But there's barely anything for him to sign!" I protested.
Pause.
From Jill: "You know he's totally listening to everything we're saying."

Because he speaks English, you see. But just looking at him, it's obvious he's spent a good while outside of Japan; Japanese men just don't have muscles like his.

When it was finally our turn, we got him to sign his black and white photo in our pamphlets, and he very carefully avoided writing on his nipples. XD He wanted to know how we'd found out about the show, and Erynn was quick to mention that Jill is in Masa's fanclub.

Over a supper of Indian curry, we had fun imagining their afterparty. Obviously, Rouma would be telling the other guys, "Yeah, these three foreign girls were there and they almost made me sign their boobs. Hey Masa, one of them's IN YOUR FANCLUB! >:D"

Speaking of Masa, Jill and I must maintain our stance that Masa doesn't really exist: he's just a figment of our imagination, a collective fantasy made flesh.


If you missed the show, they're coming back in the autumn of 2010! That was their big surprise senshuuraku announcement.

* The only drawback I can think of to eating at a Chinese restaurant is that the smell goes home with you.