Slurpees in Japan

What one? Location: Tokyo, Asakusa, 7/11, right in front of the temple gates.

Beetle bodies

Check out these beetles I found outside my apartment. They're pretty huge and valuable. The males can be sold upwards of $100 in Tokyo. If only I knew a seller...

brandon - part 2 of 2

In part two of the series, we complete the second 'half' of our journey.  To be honest with you, it's not really the second half.  Part one covers the first day and a half while part two covers the next four or five days.  Shooting video gets tiring and eventually, I want to relax and have fun as well.  The last two days Brandon was here have no video footage at all.  I have no video of him where I live.

After that day in Tokyo, we went north and stayed at my place.  The next day we played video games.  The day after, we went back to Tokyo and hung out, all night, until the next day.  There is a lot missing.  

There are also some stories I want to tell about the trip but didn't mention.  At one point, Brandon lost his iPad.  He didn't realize it until about an hour after it was lost.  We had to back track our steps and we found it in the same place it was left.  That story I will save for later.

Generally speaking, this is why many of the travel videos I make are more segment like and less story like.  In order to create a story, your camera always needs to be on.  If you're going to do a segment, you can be more selective.  Anyway, that's all I've got.

Brandon in Shibuya

My Rural Farmer Accent… Sort of.

At least thats what I feel like calling it. You see, throughout Japan different regions have different dialects of Japanese or different accents. Since Tokyo is the hub, it would be considered the most standard form of Japanese. Compare it to 'American Standard'. That accent is what most people speak in America. It's how most news casters speak. More or less, it's the standard. Japan is the same but also just like America, there are different accents and dialects throughout Japan.

It's a difficult concept to explain to anyone who doesn't speak Japanese so I will attempt my best. I will use one of the most well known dialects 'Osaka-ben' which comes from, Kansai region.

Essentially what occurs is parts of words or actually word uses are changed completely. To relate this anywhere to English a word like American English verse British English.

American British

=======================

French Fries Chips

Chips Crisps

Vest Waistcoat

Tank top Vest

Ice sickle Ice lolly

Or to compare it to something to American English, you can use Ebonics as an example. It's much more of dialect than anything else. Pronunciation and abbreviation of words is completely more common. This to me, seems to more closely resemble what happens in Japan.

So for example the word 'can' is 'deki' in Japanese. If you were to say 'can't', you would tag 'nai' at the end of it, creating 'dekinai'. In Osaka they use 'hen' instead. Your word would now be 'dekihen' or 'can't in Osaka-ben. This sounds simple but becomes problematic because 'hen' in normal Japanese generally means 'weird'. In Osaka, you would be ok to say that but if you said it outside of the Kansai region, you're saying 'can crazy' or maybe some other word. There are a lot of other words that modify or change words in Osaka ben but I won't get into it because I can hardly understand it.

Where the concept of regional dialects applies to me is where I live, Tochigi. And just like other areas of Japan, it also has a dialect known as 'Tochigi-ben'. A lot of Japanese see it as a dialect farmers use. Mainly because this is a farmer area. Though it's dying off a little, it's still used within Tochigi. I might unknowingly learn a word form a Japanese person in this region which is Tochigi-ben. With all honesty, I have learned just a little Tochigi-ben and have caught myself using it when trying to talk with my students. This might not seem overly interesting to someone who doesn't speak Japanese but try and imagine meeting a Japanese who speaks English with a Southern Drawl. That's more or less how I try and view it.

Wouldn't you love to hear and Asian speak like Shop Dog Sam?

DV cable, Virgin Ledges of Tokyo...

Having troubles finding my DV cable... Might have to go get a new one. :(

Since I can't find it and really get to work on anything, I will post this...



While during my stay in Japan, I had the chance to walk around a bunch. Most of my walking and adventure seeking was in Sapporo, a snow filled, 'Hoth' like city. Architecture of nearly every form was covered with snow.

When I headed down to Tokyo, I got to take in the architecture a little bit more. During this, I noticed that ledges, hand rails, and everything that makes a skater here in the States drool, was untouched. Only on a few occasions did I notice anything that was slightly damaged.

I mean, Tokyo is a city of Eight Million or so people! You would think that there would be a handful of skaters out there breakin' the law. My only conclusion is that the Japanese have much respect and reverence for other peoples property.