A while ago I said I was thinking of moving into a guesthouse, the (often) really shit dorm style housing that foreigners often find themselves in when they first come to Japan. Obviously that could be viewed as a step backwards, but certainly it's cheap and fairly hassle-free. Anyway, the only guesthouses I could find were in the middle of nowhere, or tiny, or ludicrously overpriced.
I like living fairly central. In London, all the dizzying heights of Oxford street were thirty minutes away by bus, or less if I took the Tube. And I wanted the same set-up here. I spend a lot of time in Shibuya and Shinjuku. So,when a friend told me she was leaving and asked if I would like her room, I said yes.
The house (HOUSE, not apartment, thank goodness) is in Shimokitazawa. That's only four minutes away from Shibuya by train. Lovely!
Shimokitazawa is a bit like Camden, before they high-streeted it up and ruined everything. Or maybe Portobello. There are no tall buildings, which is in itself a miracle. "It's popular with young people," my students say dubiously, and I don't know if that's good or bad in their eyes. But it's nice to see all the little African inspired shops and things, and people-watching is great there. Before, in places like Otsuka or Mizonokuchi (my old towns), all you could see were the salarymen in their stupid cheap suits. It was really depressing really, as you saw them you knew more or less exactly what they were doing, where they were going, what their routine was like. Their stupid wives were probably cooking their stupid dinners in their stupid little apartments, after a stupid day at the stupid office. So seeing people dressed in actual colours, or a young ponytailed man sitting writing in what looks like a journal at the table next to you as you sit with a coffee, is quite a nice change. Tattooed men appear on posters outside record shops, and the picture is a picture to be admired, not sneered at with disdain. Shimokitazawa has an air of hope and aspiration about it - people seem artistically inclined or imaginative. Places like Shinjuku or Mizonokuchi, in contrast, reek of despair.
I've been developing a bit of OCD about my new room's cleanliness. Everyday I'm dusting and cleaning the tatami before work. Everything is binned, washed, wiped, Febreezed or folded immediately. As soon as I wake up, I turn around and straighten the bed covers. That's a bit mental, maybe. When I was a student, I was a filthy pig. I only tidied up when it got to the point where I was picking my way through the debris to reach the door, and it's a miracle the sheets got changed at all. Did I change them? I don't remember. But call it old age, or new house excitement, or whatever else, I'm enjoying it. I never made any effort with my last place - it looked like a bomb had hit it and the floor became an extra shelf. Also, you couldn't swing a cockroach in that tiny space. And there WERE cockroaches.
It brings back my student days again...
THE CURIOUS INCIDENT OF THE MAGGOTS
In my shared house, I looked at the kitchen sink. Someone had poured rice into it and left it there. I looked closer. It wasn't rice.
Monday 27 September 2010
Saturday 11 September 2010
If I owned Eastenders
I really miss Eastenders. I really miss all British telly. Recently I've started going mad from it - searching for crusty clips on Youtube of Sharon snogging her fake brother from several years ago, until before I know it it's 3am and I'm still needing a dose of fake cockney injected into my bloodstream.
I must confess that the reason for my recent mania is the fact that I heard that Kat and Alfie are coming back - the tart with a heart and the cheeky chappy himself. In fact, they were the only reason I watched Eastenders for the most part. But then they went away and it all went wrong. All these blonde clones called Mitchell started appearing, some red-headed father and son were fighting over a slapper, some children appeared and nobody seemed to remember who they belonged to, etc. And I lost interest.
But as of next week, my favourite couple are back and I'm stuck over here, eating rice balls and MISSING IT. So if someone finds a way to record it, send it to me, despite my lack of a VHS recorder, then I'll be over the Alfie Moon. But until then I'll just keep imagining my own episodes in my head. So here is my take on things -
If I were in charge of Eastenders I would:
Kill off everyone in a freak accident. Sod burning the Vic, if I had it my way there would be a nasty case of bubonic plague, starting with the Mitchells. The signs would be small at first – Phil coughs up phlegm with every line (well, more than he usually does). Janine will find even more unsightly lumps under her armpits. Pat's earlobes would drop off, partly because of the plague and partly due to her bulbous earrings. Then entire families would disappear overnight, never to be seen again.
The only survivors would be Kat and Alfie, who would be holed up in the Vic’s burned out shell. Once all the corpses are cleared away, the pair would reign supreme and entire episodes would be dedicated to watching them loot the houses of the dead. Perhaps, for some light relief, Dot would remain in the launderette to keep the happy couple’s sheets nice and clean and quote bible passages when it seems all morals are lost.
Of course, being the only cast to speak of and therefore having no one else to talk to as an outlet, Alfie and Kat would gradually start to go mad. They will be sick of the sight of each other and begin to resent each others’ presence. The tension would build and build until someone snaps. So in a hilarious contrast to Alfie’s one-man midnight ‘condom caper’ episode a few years ago, there will be a harrowing episode consisting of nothing more than Kat running around the ghost town that was once Albert Square. Chased by an always unseen Alfie, wielding the metal bust of Queen Victoria.
In a further twist, Pauline would come back from the dead. Not as gripping as the Den Watts storyline but certainly worth it as Eastenders isn't Eastenders without a nagging matriarch.
Ratings would skyrocket!
In addition, one thing that's really torturing me at the moment is the fact that right now, probably right this minute, I'm missing This Is England '86, the TV spin-off continuation of Shane Meadows's film. This is a terrible state of affairs. I remember when I first watched the film I was distraught by the end, not because of the white-power, colour-hating subject matter, but because the jovial leader of the rapscallion skins, Woody, disappears half-way into the film. I was enraged! How dare they create a loveable, chirpy character then just push him off to the sidelines. But this is all fixed, as Woody's back, in several glorious episodes. Except, for now, I don't get to see it.
Bless England and its top telly. I'll save my rantings about Japanese TV for another time. I'm busy on Youtube right now.
I must confess that the reason for my recent mania is the fact that I heard that Kat and Alfie are coming back - the tart with a heart and the cheeky chappy himself. In fact, they were the only reason I watched Eastenders for the most part. But then they went away and it all went wrong. All these blonde clones called Mitchell started appearing, some red-headed father and son were fighting over a slapper, some children appeared and nobody seemed to remember who they belonged to, etc. And I lost interest.
But as of next week, my favourite couple are back and I'm stuck over here, eating rice balls and MISSING IT. So if someone finds a way to record it, send it to me, despite my lack of a VHS recorder, then I'll be over the Alfie Moon. But until then I'll just keep imagining my own episodes in my head. So here is my take on things -
If I were in charge of Eastenders I would:
Kill off everyone in a freak accident. Sod burning the Vic, if I had it my way there would be a nasty case of bubonic plague, starting with the Mitchells. The signs would be small at first – Phil coughs up phlegm with every line (well, more than he usually does). Janine will find even more unsightly lumps under her armpits. Pat's earlobes would drop off, partly because of the plague and partly due to her bulbous earrings. Then entire families would disappear overnight, never to be seen again.
The only survivors would be Kat and Alfie, who would be holed up in the Vic’s burned out shell. Once all the corpses are cleared away, the pair would reign supreme and entire episodes would be dedicated to watching them loot the houses of the dead. Perhaps, for some light relief, Dot would remain in the launderette to keep the happy couple’s sheets nice and clean and quote bible passages when it seems all morals are lost.
Of course, being the only cast to speak of and therefore having no one else to talk to as an outlet, Alfie and Kat would gradually start to go mad. They will be sick of the sight of each other and begin to resent each others’ presence. The tension would build and build until someone snaps. So in a hilarious contrast to Alfie’s one-man midnight ‘condom caper’ episode a few years ago, there will be a harrowing episode consisting of nothing more than Kat running around the ghost town that was once Albert Square. Chased by an always unseen Alfie, wielding the metal bust of Queen Victoria.
In a further twist, Pauline would come back from the dead. Not as gripping as the Den Watts storyline but certainly worth it as Eastenders isn't Eastenders without a nagging matriarch.
Ratings would skyrocket!
In addition, one thing that's really torturing me at the moment is the fact that right now, probably right this minute, I'm missing This Is England '86, the TV spin-off continuation of Shane Meadows's film. This is a terrible state of affairs. I remember when I first watched the film I was distraught by the end, not because of the white-power, colour-hating subject matter, but because the jovial leader of the rapscallion skins, Woody, disappears half-way into the film. I was enraged! How dare they create a loveable, chirpy character then just push him off to the sidelines. But this is all fixed, as Woody's back, in several glorious episodes. Except, for now, I don't get to see it.
Bless England and its top telly. I'll save my rantings about Japanese TV for another time. I'm busy on Youtube right now.
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