[Day 100] Pokemon, New Year's Eve, Breakdancing

Here is a playlist put together by our good friend Todd who is in this post as well as the last post, he ıs a filmmaker living in LA, trying to get a feature film made, traveling as much as he can. When hes not working on film stuff you can catch hım at local music spots. If you want to check out any more of hıs musical likings check out hıs myspace http://myspace.com/polymotion or any of hıs film work check out his webpage >http://myspace.com/polymotion . He is a super-talented guy with an amazıng ear for music!!!


Hey world! We're ın south Tukey at the ruıns of Mt. Olympos. People hıke, chıll on the beach, sleep ın tree houses, and drınk. There are 3 bars and a nıghtclub at our place; we're sharıng our tree house wıth 2 awesome kıds from Sydney... they've spent the last 5 months ın many of the countrıes we're about to see, and they're en route to Asıa, so we spent last nıght belly-laughıng swappıng storıes, advice, and booze. Tonıght we're goıng to see thıs crazy mountaın that has small flames dwındlıng outta lıttle holes on ıt's summıt.

Here's what went down on New Years Eve..................................

Day before NYE, Jen invites us all to stay with her host family. 45 minute train arrive in her part of town, Kokbunji, a university area, and we the exit bustling station into a wintery afternoon. Walk down oil-weathered sidestreet—see a convenience store selling adult-size, full-body pajamas... 1-piece, hooded, Pokemon costumes. We buy Pikachu.

Continue pass uniform'd students (many wear a surgical mask) and strange cars, people on funny bikes fly by (many wear a surgical mask). Turn pleasant road where lining houses resemble those in Ocean Beach—compact 2-story places with the top floor converted into spearate loft. Jen's house has a beautiful Japanese garden of small hedges and flowers. She greets us seeing the Pikachu cotume, says “I can't believe you guys bought that.”
“YA YA! ridiculous right? We're wearing it tomorrow night for New Years!”
“(chuckling) Dude, you guys don't understand how much people love animation here. Some girls get off to that shit.”
“FUZZIES?” we don't believe her—plan to test next night—decide Brado wears it en route to preparty at kareoke, then I sing in it, then Todd wears it at the club, and Matt wears it back home, because he can breakdance best, and not just anyone can breakdance in a subway station dressed as Pikachu.

Next night Todd, Kelly, and Matt leave early for food, agreeing to meet us at the kareoke. Jen, Bradon, and I lag behind, then hit up golden arches for McPorks because a ricebowl topped with something bland, like steamed spinach, runs about 4 bucks. There, Bradon steps into the yellow Pokemon costume, and not 1 local notices, not even when he busts out a celebratory Roger Rabbit. Now on the subway, Jen cracks open the vodka and we go swig for swig. Walking down the street with the courage of Kenny Rogers, he goes wild running up stairs and down alleyways. Suddenly we hear “PIKA!” and he takes off—3 girls are chasing after him arms outstretched.



See the gang as well as a few of Jen's comrads, waiting at the kareoke building. After some high-adrenaline hugs, we pay for a private room. I hurry on the suit and 9 of us spend an hour trashing the place singing White Snake, Haddaway, and 2LiveCrew.





4 vodka flasks laid to rest, Todd gets on the get-up and bolts into the Tokyo night—vanishing. The remaining 8 of us stumble the sidewalk glowing, still singing, toward the reving-up clubs of Shibuya, arm-in-arm scanning for Todd to pop out and scare us or something. We turn a corner and he's 6-stepping surrounded by girls, who are saying things like “OH YA PIKA!” What the hell.


Arrive Shibuya. Coincidentally, I'm trotting beside Todd and the bouncers love him. Redrope unlatches and the 2 of us take a lift to 3rd floor nightclub. A gauntlet of cheering people part a path for Todd, virtually everygirl goes ape-shit jumping on him, screaming for him, kissing him, buying him drinks, all while last year's popular rap music gets hurrah'd.

The night carries on like this for a while and we never see the group. An hour passes by, then another, still nothing so we leave and WOW the streets are jamming!

We walk around looking for 'em all, nothing, and randomly go into Starbucks... there they are. Bradon explains that Matt started falling asleep in line, so they brought him to Starbucks (open 24hrs), and he passed out in a chair... they'd been there the whole time babysitting! But, Matt slurred out a promise to make it up to them. Kelly, a marathon runner, demanded cake buffet—in Japan they have buffet-style dessert restaraunts, cake-buffets. They also have all-you-can-drink pubs, which charge by-the-hour.

We convince the slumbering giant to take 3 espresso shots, and he perks right up and hops into Pikachu just as promised...
7-11 munchies