Posts Tagged jiyugaoka

December 31, 2003 – New Year’s Karaoke

Posted by Barniferous in Drinking, Karaoke, Life in Japan, Tokyo on December 31, 2013

Bob Sapp vs. Akebono, NYE 2003

Happy New Year!!

New Year’s Eve was a lot of fun. I was worried because most of my tentative New Year`s plans fell apart at the last minute. Fortunately I was able to join a group of Hello House people and friends on their way to O’Carolan’s Pub in Jiyugaoka. We got to the pub just in time for the big Bob Sapp vs. Akebono fight. I have written about Bob Sapp before, but Akebono was a retired sumo champion who had a little trouble with the transition to MMA. Sapp won quickly and then challenged Mike Tyson to a fight. We had beer and did the big New Year’s countdown, but it just wasn’t the same away from home.

After O’Carolan’s we went to a karaoke place in Musashi-Kosugi. Our group got a private karaoke room that rated your singing at the end of each song. My “Daydream Believer” got a whopping 78 points, which left me in first place until Katsuragi racked up just over 80 points on the last song of the night. Stupid Katsuragi!

Overall it was a fun New Year and I ended up getting home around 3:30am. 

(small updates from original post)

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December 8, 2003 – High pressure sales in Shibuya

Posted by Barniferous in Life in Japan, Tokyo on December 8, 2013

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I went wandering around in Jiyugaoka and Shibuya today, doing some sightseeing and early Christmas shopping. The area around Jiyugaoka station is full of classy, stores and restaurants. Shibuya is simply crowded and insanely busy.

While wandering around Shibuya, I was approached by a friendly African guy who spoke English. He literally dragged me into his nearby hip hop clothing store. Being the only customer in a store while the owner is watching over you hoping to make a sale is pretty awkward. He was prepared to offer me a 30% discount “just for me”, but I had no money and the clothes just weren’t my thing. He actually looked pretty sad when I left.

Shibuya is a confusing maze. It took me over 30 minutes to find my way back to the station again, where I got the pleasure of riding the most crowded train in the world, and then transferring to the most crowded train in the history of existence. Not a fun shopping trip.

(partial rewrite of original post)

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