Flying In

The flight was uneventful (except for the turbulence that always appeared when I tried to go to the bathroom), long, and boring. I didn’t bring anything to do on the flight, so it was all about SkyMall. Seriously the best magazine ever made.

Upon landing, it was go-go-go, and I didn’t get to film much until I got into Shibuya (more on that a little later). I went downstairs and exchanged my JR Pass, which lets you ride all JR trains (that’s a lot of trains plus it includes the bullet train) for free (well, not free, but I only had to pay $700-ish dollars one time. Will pay for itself really quickly). After getting the JR Pass, I got my ticket for the train into Shibuya (because I knew there were some capsule hotels there, and you guys wanted Capsule Hotels), and it turned out it was leaving really soon. I ran down to the train, got in, and proceeded to use almost all 50mb of my phone data in one fell swoop. Whoops (Don’t worry, I upgraded to 200mb… I can’t use my phone so much).

Shibuya, The Man, And The Capsule Hotel

After arriving in Shibuya, I immediately started walking in the wrong direction, thinking I was walking in the right direction, and got lost in the Shibuya ghetto (if that’s even possible). While walking around, I met this older dude who wanted to know more about my camera set up. Turns out he didn’t have much to do, so he walked around with me to show me where Shibuya actually was, then show me some interesting things in Shibuya. For TofuguTV, I’m much more interested in the stuff that’s not in Tokyo, but I can show you here.

Me and the guy I met

We went around and saw a lot (and he wanted to see my capsule hotel, creepy, I know) – two things of interest include Hachiko, the ever faithful dog that waited for his master to come home (there was an American movie made about this).

…and a restaurant that specializes in Whale meat. You know, all in the name of science, or something. (P.S. if you don’t want to eat whale meat, you should probably avoid くじら).

That whale in the bottom right looks totally happy!

After he showed me around for a while, we went searching for a Capsule Hotel that also happened to be on the way home from this guy’s home (We’ll call him “Ta-san” because I only remember that his name starts with a “Ta”). It was a pretty sweet setup, actually. You get bathing facilities, a big locker, some sleepy clothes, a couple towels, and a nice coffin sized capsule to sleep in. I kept finding dead bugs in mine. I appreciate that they weren’t alive.

I’m planning on staying at another capsule hotel in Kyoto (which is totally awesome, from what I’ve read / seen), so I’ll do more on capsule hotels then, but this particular one wasn’t a bad experience. I’ll post more when I start putting up episodes of TofuguTV. One more good memory… there was a guy in one of the other capsules in my area that had a snore (or something) that was exactly like a dog barking. Maybe he had a dog. Either way, it kept waking me up, and it was really, really, weird. Seriously. Dog barking snore? Maybe he has something stuck in his throat… Other than that, it was a fairly good stay. Definitely recommend it for the experience, at least!

The Search For Wifi

The next morning (i.e. this morning, for me) was early. 4am to be exact. I pretty much just walked around in the dark and rain hoping that something would open. I ended up going to McDonalds because it was one of the only things open, and I thought they might have wifi. I was wrong.

This began an entire morning searching for wifi. Finally, I found a cafe called “Wired Cafe” in Shibuya. The internet there was pretty shoddy, but it got the job done. I think I was at the edge of the wifi signal. I’d have to move my computer to my left by about 3 feet in order to get things to load. I probably looked like a weirdo.

While I was there, I met the CEO of “Qoopedia” which is like Groupon (you get deals on things). He wants to make an English version for foreigners in Japan – you’ll probably hear about it here when that happens, too. We talked shop for a while (you know, business, startups, entrepreneurship, blah blah blah) and I headed out, eventually, because I needed a lighter long-sleeved jacket. I know a few of you called it. It’s way to warm here. My fleece jacket was unnecessary (but, I fixed that).

Hanging Out At Flutterscape HQ

Flutterscape CEO working hard on something

Luckily, today I had planned to go hand out at Flutterscape HQ (you buy Japanese things and get them shipped to you, it’s pretty awesome, and there’s free upgrades to express shipping going on right now, I think). Awesome to finally meet the folks I’ve been talking with a lot lately. I’ve bought a few products through Flutterscape and it’s always a great experience. The really convenient thing is that they ship things from Japan to America. I happened to have a problem where I packed too much and my backpack was too heavy. To solve this problem, I’m putting my stuff I don’t need in a box, and they’re shipping it back to my home in Portland, OR, so I don’t have to carry / throw it away. It’s a lot of stuff, too, and it’s (surprisingly) only going to cost around 2000 yen ($25-ish dollars). Not bad for international, considering how much box I’m sending back. Seriously, @hirrro who’s helping me do that is awesome. You help me say thanks to Flutterscape by tweeting this (click on the Twitter button below).

Oh, and I also got to use their wifi, so I could catch up on some email and write this post up.

Next Up? You Decide.

Of course, I don’t really know what I’m going to do from day to day, but I have some ideas for tomorrow. I’m going to start heading north (gotta get to Cat Island, eventually… so many people are requesting it). I’ll have a cameraman for a few days as well (Japanese friend from College), so it should be pretty good. Tomorrow is when the real show begins, I think.

I think there are three options. I’m going to lay them out here. For the first one, make sure you’re following on Twitter or Facebook to find / get the poll, going out soon. I’ll probably try to see a couple of these, at least, but I’d love to know what ones you want to see the most.

Option 1: “Western Village.” This amusement park is “American Western” themed, which means there will be cowboys and stuff. I’m really hoping it’ll be full of really ridiculous depictions of America, or be something like “America Town” from that episode of The Simpsons. Either way, it should be full of interesting hijinks, weird culture translations, and (hopefully) Japanese cowboys saying “putto uppu yoru handzu.”

Option 2: “Sex Robot Museum.” I have no idea what’s actually here, just that there are sex robots, or robots doing the dirty thing, or maybe a little bit of both. Who knew that there was a need to have a museum like this?

Option 3: “Sex God Museum.” Once again, not 100% sure what’s here, but it should be interesting. It’s all a matter of whether you want Robots or Gods. Up to you, really.

Option 4: “See Some Monkeys.” My camera man says he knows how to find monkeys around here. There’ll also be another opportunity near Nagano to see some monkeys, too, so keep that in mind. Not sure what these monkeys do, but monkeys are monkeys, and monkeys are pretty awesome.

There you have it. To vote on what you want to see the most, head on over to Twitter or Facebook to find the link to vote. While you’re there, you should make sure you’re subscribed to both of them… I won’t always tell you where to look, you know!

Okay, I don’t have much time. I’m in the Portland International Airport, and my flight is boarding in about 20 minutes. I also need food. Hungry. But, before I go, I need to tell you how to vote for what you want to see on TofuguTV. I’ll be sending out emails, tweets, Facebook updates, etc., and anyone following Tofugu on those things (or all of those things, especially) will receive their God given right to vote for what they watch on YouTube… or something like that. Anyways, here are your options.

Ways To Vote

There are three ways to vote… and I won’t necessarily send voting thingies out to all three things at once, meaning I might only send things to Twitter or only send something out to the people subscribed to the newsletter. That means you should sign up for all three. That’s right, you’re held hostage (maybe). Don’t worry, they’ll be awesome.

Facebook: You can vote on Facebook by following Tofugu. Watch out for the status updates!

Twitter: You can vote on Twitter by following Tofugu. Watch out for the status updates!

Email: You can vote if you receive the Tofugu Newsletter. It’s been a while since I’ve sent one out, but surely there’ll be a few over the next few weeks.

So, there you have it. If you follow all three of them, you’ll get every single opportunity to vote. If you don’t, well, you’ll just get some of the opportunities, which is cool too.

But What Are You Voting For?

While I’m in Japan filming TofuguTV, there will be times and opportunities where I’ll be like “huh, I don’t know where to go.” This might be some time where I don’t have any preference, and I’ll ask “which direction?” or it might be a time where it’s something specific, like “do you want to see this, or this?” Based on what you vote, and what you want, I’ll do those things for you. All you need to do is vote. The power is in your hands, my friends.

Also, keep watching the blog. I’ll try to update as much as possible while on the road with pictures, short videos, and things like that. After I get back, I’ll start working on the big footage. First episode should come out first week of January! So soon! Gotta love the web :)

Thanks everyone for your support, hopefully this’ll be amazing.

P.S. Want to follow TofuguTV related posts? Use the TofuguTV Tag, and subscribe to the tag feed!

P.S. Want to get status updates as they happen? Follow Tofugu on Twitter. I’ll be tweeting as much as my overly expensive AT&T data plan and wallet lets me.

Still, someone kindly nominated us and we made it into the fray over at WhatJapanThinks. They are doing a “Best Japanese (culture) Blogs of the Year” poll, and we think it’d be great if you headed on over and voted. We really don’t care who you vote for; in fact, we’d love it if you took a look at the other nominees in our category. Our competition is definitely made up of cool froods who know where their towel’s at.

Best Humorous Blogs on Japan (nominees):

• An Englishman in Osaka
• Gaijin Tonic
• TV in Japan
• Claytonian@Youtube

So what are you waiting for? Get on over to WhatJapanThinks and vote for your favorite blogs! I hope you make some discoveries of your own while you’re at it.

Update 1: On another note, we’ve made a big update to the design. It’s only about half done, but I decided to put it up because I need some help. What can we do to improve on it? What can we do to make your viewing experience more pleasant? Please comment and let us know. We actually listen (gasp?)

Update 2: Sorry for the big delay between posts. We were all in finals, but now it’s all over. Expect us to tease you with more posts than normal, only to take it away from you when we all go back to school. Ha!

Update 3: Vote or die!