THE CASE OF THE COFFEE CAN AND THE VENDING MACHINE

Well as I sit here sipping my can of 0% alcohol beer*, on my electric carpet**, listening to Damian Marley, life is good.

As good as it can be when you have lost faith in your own, once discerning, set of taste buds, and are beginning to think you left part of your memory on a beach somewhere in the midst of a youthful drunken stupor. Involving sub-par, sub-legal women, Holden Gemenis (Gemenii?) and Midori served in test tubes. 

But I digress.

The past 3 weeks have been a great introduction to Japan. We've enjoyed all sorts of lovely food and quality time with Emma's family, and all in all we've spent the sort of quality time together that results in us wearing matching parachute pants *** and quality australian woollen jumpers that had their fashion nadir in the mid 90's east coast hip hop scene.

I've also had the chance to go fishing a couple of times with Emma's brother, Jerremy. He's a, ahem, 'keen fisherman'. Otherwise known as a knot tying ninja who has the ability to stand on slippery rocks, waves'a'crashing, flick a cast out, 70 metres away into a stiff breeze, targetting a fish he can see 10 metres below the surface, while you're busy trying a) not to slip over and drown, and b) to get the hook out of your now-bleeding hand that you somehow managed to entangle while getting the rod out of the car. That aside, it has been super to see how he goes at it, and also to show that not only can I fish for hours in Australia and not catch anything, not even a nibble, but I can also do it in Japan.

Anyway, during one of these dawn missions, that he calls 'fishing', and I call 'surviving' (at least so far), we chanced upon a vending machine. Which in Japan is akin to chancing upon a strip bar in King St. So I bought a coffee from the machine. Which was steaming hot, and delicious. Which in Japan, is common and miraculous, respectively. For a country that has the utmost respect for flavours and food, they hate on coffee like Ali did Smokin' Joe. (Hazelnut coffee y'all????).

Anywho, it is now over a week later, I can't find the bloody same brand coffee anywhere, as there are millions and they all look similar, and the ones that I have found that I thought were it have tasted ordinary. So either a) the coffee was never that good in the first place, it was more a 'time and place' type situation or b) my memory is letting me down as to what it looks like and I will never find out whether it was delicious or ordinary. Or I could just hunt down that original vending machine and sample every drink from it. Which in Japan, is the equivalent of finding an All Blacks supporter that doesn't claim to have a cousin who once played for the All Black Under 21s.

Deflating, huh.

But I did find a machine that sold mello yello, so I was pretty chuffed with that and took a photo for your viewing pleasure.

PRODUCT OF THE WEEK

In the land where new problems are quickly invented in order to keep the population employed solving them, this is an extremely tight contest. 

*From delicious tasting 0% alcohol beers, invented and widely sold so that the outgoing Japanese can have a few cans before driving home under the legal limit of 0.00, to **electric carpets that you can lie down on to warm up after a few cans of zero, there has been much here that has taken my fancy so far. 

But I'll return to my first second Japanese love (er, sorry honey), the humble Electric Toilet. Or Washlet, whatever it wants to be called. I'm indebted to this mighty invention for both getting my nether regions to a level of cleanliness once only dreamed of by men as hairy as myself, and inadvertently giving me a refreshing full body cold shower during a sweaty number two session in a Tokyo KFC. While difficult to manage at times, (see bit about KFC), mainly due to the use of Japanese kanji and confusing icons, the services provided by these toilets include, in order of use;

• Automatic lid and seat lifter. No touching of the seat here. That is for cretins.
• Pre-heated seat. This is individual preference, sure, but I can advise it only takes one week of a Japanese winter to anticipate, and then look forward to a warm seat.
• Music, so that you can keep the beat while you get down to business, and to disguise those tell tale sounds that are inevitably produced when least appropriate
• A water stream of variable temperature and force to help the primates amongst us revisit the cleanliness only experienced as young child
• A hair dryer, for post-water cleansing
• Steriliser involving de-ionised air spray
• Automatic flush

The set-up (note that the lid had not lifted up when I took the photo, as the proximity sensor had not been triggered. For the blokes, the button on the control panel, top left, activates the seat lift)

The control panel. The workings of this is somewhat of a mystery, still, but in mystery lies intrigue. And surprise jets of water.

JAPANESE EXTREME COURTESY OF THE WEEK

Also a competitive category. From the endless bowing to complementary hot towels in every restaurant, the level of sophistication in thoughtfulness knows no bounds. 

For this week, we'll leave out the many lovely things that people have done for us since arriving, the apology I received from an old lady after I almost killed her while longboarding down her street, and the stories I've heard about some neighbours who had an ongoing kindness fight, which started with a simple gift of some excess produce from the vege garden and escalated up from there, with each trying to outdo the other. 

We'll also leave out the bit where I am officially registered as an 'alien' here, as that sort of doesn't fit the theme. (I have a card to prove it though)

We'll settle for the Japanese custom of sending out a NY greeting card to all and sundry. No 'reply all' on the email here to 'save the environment'. A real card, sent by mail, each year. There are 15 sent for every man, woman and child. Thats 1.9 billion cards sent. Yep, by mail. So while Australia Post is busy delivering last minute gifts bought for your mother in law from ebay or some utterly shit coupon site (overriding thought when purchasing inevitably being "that'll do"), the Japanese post are quietly (and courteously) delivering 1.9 billion bits of card. Not all of it personalised, no, but a reminder that even the most technology obsessed society still thinks a card is better than a soon to be deleted email.

 A small selection is shown below.

And finally, we go to my favourite category under the broad guise of 'education'

WORDS OF THE WEEK

Alliteration and onomatopoeic phrases, like myself, is a big thing over here. And I love it. 

The term (I think) is 'giongo', and used to describe repeated words such as 'shabu shabu', which describes a dish involving bits of meat or fish quickly dipped and swirled in hot soup. The shabu shabu bit is derived from the sound that said pieces of meat are believed to make when swished through the soup. So an entire dish is described by the sound of cooking it. We have nothing that I know of in english that is similar to this phenomenon, except perhaps things like 'miaowing'. 

This brings us to most awesome phrase of the week: shaka shaka pantsu. Which are so named because of the sound the material makes when the legs, er, rub together. Which are parachute pants, in English, and otherwise known as Gold Coast Chinos. 

Anyway, we bought some from Uniqlo. Thats right, we. My wife and I wear matching shaka shaka pantsu. From Uniqlo.

#winning.

SPORTING MOMENT OF THE WEEK

Michael Clarke? The Teebow meltdown? The NBA back on? 

Nope. The sporting pinnacle was reached this week by a kick of the sherrin in the park with a few local kids. 

'why is it so good?' Emma asked as we played kick to kick. 

Couldn't tell ya, but if it feels right, then it is right. Sometimes when it feels wrong it still is right.

But I digress......