Osaka Thailand Festival 2015

May is an awesome time of year to be in Japan, it is starting to get hot without being unbearably comfortable and there are a ton of international or cultural events taking place each weekend. In Osaka alone there are a few events and festivals happening every weekend! This weekend on the 23rd and 24th May, the 13th Annual Thai Festival comes to Osaka! If you are a big fan of thai food, I highly recommend it.

It takes place in the Osaka Castle grounds so its a good excuse to enjoy the local sights while also enjoying some foreign food. Unlike other events, there is no entry fee, you can come and go as you please and there is no problem with taking out your food an drinks. Which is a blessing considering that the available seating is ALWAYS full if you don't get there early. Near the event there were a ton of people sitting on the grass and walls happily enjoying a Singha while munching on some Pad Thai.

So you enter the area and are faced with this...!

The layout of the area seemed a bit...bare to be honest. Everything was laid out in a big semi circle with food stands on the right and centre, a stage and culture related goods in the middle, and general thai stores on the left. The remaining space was filled with lines, lines and more lines, like every festival event in Japan...the line for mango ice alone was roughly 60 people long!

There were a variety of drinks available, with 3 local beers and 2 local wines, with a variety of extra cocktails too, thankfully the booze bars had the shortest lines! So stock up on something to drink while you wait for food.

As you can see here the food was reasonably priced! Comparable to local prices for food at Japanese festivals, it doesn't break the bank. Normally international events like this charge WAY more, for example at Octoberfest, they were charging 1200+ for a small selection of sausages, whereas here I can get a big packet of pad thai for 500yen, good stuff! This combined with the open entry meant that this event felt a lot more 'free' than the others which often restrict you.

The food was pretty reasonable, it obviously doesn't compare to a decent thai restaurant but if you want your fix you can definitely get it here. I don't recommend the pad thai as the flavour was lacking but the noodle curry dish above was epic, really really good value for the price. The fried goods such as chicken and spicy pork were really good too. Most of the servers and cooks appeared to be Thai which was a nice bonus!

However, apart from the food and drink, there was a lot going on...events were few and far between with long lulls between performances. The cultural stores too were located too far away from everything else and too small to actually have an impact. The one thing I did get hyped about was the Thai Boxing ring but found out that I had sadly missed the time slot!

I did managed to catch a music performance as well as some Muay Thai fighters doing a traditional dance though.

Overall I would say that the Thai Festival is worth it but don't plan on spending the whole day there, especially if you don't get there early enough for seating. It is best enjoyed as a few hour detour on a day out, due to its location you can go and enjoy the castle grounds or hop on a train to Shinsaibashi or something with a belly full of Thai food and beer!

To find out more information you can visit the official website at http://www.thaifes.com/

Phallic Fertility Festival Fun at the Honen Matsuri / Penis Festival!

Lets face it, to many outsiders, Japan is a crazy country that does everything a little different, has futuristic technology, interesting food, adult cartoons and an abundance of weird fetishes. Whilst these are often exaggerated massively or are incredibly niche. Certain events or sights here can sometimes fit the stereotypes perfectly. Sex sells, we all know that so the 'fertility festival' is now often lovingly referred to as 'The Penis Festival'.
豊年祭り Honen Matsuri is a Japanese fertility festival that is held on March 15th every year in Nagoya prefecture at the Tagata Shrine in Komaki. Honen means 'Proposerous year' whereas 'Matsuri' means festival in Japanese. The aim is to celebrate  the blessings of bountiful harvest and prosperity and fertility. It sure as hell beats the can drives we used to have at school. Penis over canned corn any day!

Tagata Shrine

Early morning preparations

The festival starts with celebration and preparation at 10:00 a.m. at Tagata Jinja, where all sorts of foods and souvenirs (mostly phallus-shaped or related) are sold. You can see various carts full of charms and sake barrels being pulled by high spirited (literally) festival volunteers. They even had a big pushing war, blue vs red, just outside the gates which was fun to watch.
Inside the temple grounds you can find the usual festival variety of food stalls ranging from castella, to takoyaki, grilled meats and fish and so on. Accompanied by toy stalls and games etc for the kids. However since I was still feeling fragile from a night of St. Patricks day celebrations the night before I refrained from the treats...for now.

We trekked to the outer shrine, which is up a steep hill beyond the train tracks. At the top is a small temple, Shinmai sha, and beside it was the star of the show, a 280 kg (620 pound), 2.5 meter (96 inch)-long wooden phallus. If its your dream to take a selfie with a gargantuan dick like the girls below, here is your best chance. This phallus is later used for the 'climax' of the ceremony, as it is later carried down the hill to Tagata Shrine, but at that point it is swarmed by crowds. Here it was nice and quiet and people took turns to have their photo taken. There was a wall of photographers snapping away, especially so whenever a foreigner walked up!

Before the parade you can take photos at the smaller shrine with the main penis

 I also found this awesome flag nearby, by far my happiest photo of the day!

My favourite photo of the day, to scale.

AvidyaJP having a stroke with Taurinensis

 Speaking of foreigners, outside of places like Roppongi in Tokyo or Amemura in Osaka, this was by far the largest concentration of non Japanese that I have encountered in Japan. Far outweighing the national percentage, obviously attracted by the unusual chance to celebrate the D. While most were pleasant and respectful there is sadly a recognizable percentage that give a bad reputation for everyone who are loud, drunk, rowdy or just saying really ignorant comments. Plenty of exceptions though, so if you go, please respect the local customs, especially around the temple areas.

The queue to buy these banana and marshmallow dicks was, ahem, massive.

 Past noon I was feeling a little better so with another blog friend Taurinensis of Identity Gaming and his wife we queued up to get some バナチン Banachin, Bana as in bana and chin as in penis. In case you are wondering, the marshmallows act as balls. I wish I had taken a photo of the line for this because it was huge! The popularity of this stall far outweighed the neighboring food stalls that I almost felt sorry for them. For 400 yen you can obtain your very own banana penis which comes in 4 different flavours. We opted for the black chocolate ones as they looked the most authentic and 'dickesque'!

4 flavours available, including snowbitten blue dicks.

Wildly popular バナチン banana dick!

 It was pretty amusing to be walking around and seeing men, women, boys and girls alike nibbling, sucking and eating on various penis shaped bananas, candies and desserts. We couldn't resist taking a few photos ourselves although it is pretty embarrassing to do whilst a crowd of onlookers is staring at you!

Taurinensis and AvidyaJp enjoying the D

Taurinensis and AvidyaJP REALLY enjoying the D

Even I couldn't resist a sexy selfie

At 2 p.m. the parade to the Tagata Shrine started, the giant wooden penis is carried by volunteers followed by a chanting tengu and lead by chanting priests. Beautiful maidens also carry 60cm long wooden phalluses and were proving to be incredibly popular, sadly I missed my chance to take some photos for myself! Musicians were also playing tradition gaguku music. Festival volunteers also hand out various snacks and free sake to the crowd. As the phallus reaches the shrine, things get a bit crazy as the penis is span and paraded around wildly, much to the crowds pleasure! See the video below to watch the penis spinning in action!

After the penis is set down everyone gathers in the square outside Tagata Jinja and waits for the mochi nage, where rice cakes are thrown down from raised platforms by shrine officials, if you catch one it is meant to give you good luck. Sadly this is where some of the rowdy foreigners raised their heads. Often there is only enough for around 1 person out of 4 to collect a rice cake, whilst most Japanese would stand still and try to catch the cakes, some foreigners would sadly push and shove each other to get one. Later you could see some foreigners clutching 4-7 cakes for themselves and shoving them into bags, so again, if you go to the dick festival, don't be a dick yourself, there are enough on show already! The festival concludes at about 4:30 p.m.

Overall it was a nice experience, although to be honest I felt that it was a little overhyped considering how far away it is from Central Nagoya. I was expecting phalluses to be everywhere with an abundance of stalls selling related goods. In reality however there are only two small sites that display the festival items and only a couple of stalls actually selling penis shaped goods. So it was a little underwhelming initially.
But you can deny that seeing a unique festival like this is really cool, especially when you see the impressive wood carvings up close and is a great excuse to enjoy the festival spirit. If you have a chance I highly recommend it, you don't get an opportunity like this often!

The 'climax' of the Matsuri sees the penis being carried and spun.

Nobunaga Concerto Drama First Impressions

Nobunaga Concerto : First Episode Impressions

While channel hopping last night, keeping track of where Typhoon 19 was heading, a random new drama popped on screen. Turns out it was the first episode! I soon found myself getting sucked in because 1) I'm an Oguri Shun fan and 2) It is set around the Sengoku Jidai, and I'm a giant Sengoku nerd. Therefore my interest peaked as soon as I saw the intro. Sengoku Jidai is the era where various samurai clans under the rule of powerful generals fought against each other to unite Japan.

Oguri Shun plays the role of Saburo, a high school student who is poor at studying and pretty unsuccessful with the ladies. In the opening, Saburo finds himself being rejected by a girl at a Sengoku Matsuri, a festival celebrating the famous samurai of the past. While sulking he slips down a hill and smashes his head. Unknowingly slipping through time and arriving in the Sengoku period of 1549. Almost immediately he meets Nobunaga Oda who is the spitting image of himself. Nobunaga is one of the most famous warlords in Japanese history and in this period is the son of a warlord and magistrate of the lower Owari Province. Nobunaga is physically sick and asks Saburo to live his life in his place, under the name Nobunaga Oda.I'm not going to lie, the premise for the series is pretty stupid, and the introduction sequence is full of over the top acting that Japanese dramas are known for. At first I took it for a simple carefree comedy drama, but while it does have many comedic moments it also has a serious side too. At first Saburo treats the world as a joke, thinking that he is still at the festival in modern times. He is still dressed in modern clothing yet has no phone signal, and treats the world as one big stage, much to the embarrassment of his very real retainers. 

Look how stupid he looks!

This is amplified throughout as despite changing into more traditional samurai garb he is still sporting his sneakers and occasionally his hoody. This light hearted tone often made me laugh out loud during some of the more slapstick scenes. Especially when he tries to woo his future wife for the first time, showing clear inexperience!

 However, soon battle breaks out involving Nobunaga's clan, Saburo still assumes that it is a re-enactment and cheerfully walks into battle, almost causing his premature death. It isn't until he is directly attacked, slashed and seeing people die before his eyes that he panics and realises that perhaps the world is real after all! His realisation scene was a powerful moment, however due to drama budget constraints, the battle was very small scale and some of the blood effects were too fake. Ruining the effect. Perhaps I have been spoiled by the recent Kenshin movies.

Another complaint about this drama depiction of the era is that everything is too clean, from the armour to the village. It looks like a set, not a real village and while I realise this is a prime time drama, I felt that it would have had more emotional impact if they tried to make us believe in the world more.

Without revealing the plot of the first episode, several key events occur that push Saburo into power as the leader of his region as well as bringing on the troubles that come with that responsibility. The last thirty minutes of the episode are quite tragic due to the horrors of war and the duty of samurai involved. Saburo grows a lot during a single episode but he still has a way to go! I don't want to say any more for fear of ruining the story but I found myself respecting the drama more and more as the story developed. Becoming less of a slapstick comedy and more of a character development piece.

Having watched the episode with no previous knowledge of it whatsoever it turns out that it is based off a popular manga and anime series of the same title. Needless to say I already have the next episode set to record and am excited to see how Saburo's tale unfolds!

Check out the trailer here!

Summer Sonic 2014!

This Sunday during summer vacation I made the spontaneous decision to buy a 1 day ticket for Summer Sonic Osaka!! Summer Sonic is an annual music festival that is held during Summer Vacation, with alternating line-ups in Tokyo and Osaka.

I definitely don't regret this decision, I was going there with one mission, to see BABYMETAL. I was gutted to have missed their London show so this was a good way to make up for it!

It was a scorching hot day but despite this I spent most of my day walking around the outside stages checking out as many rock/metal artists as I could with the odd surprise in-between.

Artist impressions:

BABYMETAL

Lets start with my main highlight, BABYMETAL. Whether you love or hate them, you have to admit that the girls and their backing band have made huge progress in spreading their unique form of music worldwide, with upcoming shows in New York and London too! I'm personally a big fan and love the blend of cutesy pop vocals with hard metal backing music, the dancing and general image is great too. 

The setlist begin with an amusing star wars-esque intro video highlighting their  journey so far and showing the support they had gained from prominent figures in industry such as Metallica, Slayer and so on.
They then jumped straight into their set..

1. BABYMETAL DEATH

2. Give Me Choco!!

3. Kami Band Performance

4. Catch me if you can

5. Megitsune

6. Headbanger!!

7. Doki Doki☆Morning

8. Ijime, Dame, Zettai.

One thing that impressed me was the sheer number of fans who turned up to see them perform, with roughly 3 times the number of any fans on that stage that day and was comparable to Avenged Sevenfold's turnout - and they were headliners!

Highlights for me were definitely Catch me if you can, Megitsune, Headbanger!! and Ijime, Dame, Zettai.

The entire crowd was jumping, singing and having a great time, there was almost a continuous small circle pit but everyone was respectful of each others space. During an interlude video before Ijime, Dame, Zettai three words flashed on screen. WALL. OF. DEATH. The crowd immediately spread out and you can see my POV in the video below.

As you can see it is tamer than your average metal moshpit but I consider that a good thing, everyone has giant grins on their faces! 

I really recommend you check out BABYMETAL live, even if you are skeptical I feel that you would fall for their charm and get soaked up in the atmosphere! I bought a BABYMETAL towel and definitely intend to see them again!

Avenged Sevenfold

Avenged Sevenfold were the headline band for the Mountain stage this year, I must admit I haven't really listened to any of their newer material but I was a fan of their earlier releases. Was always curious to see them so I checked them out, plus I don't like the Arctic Monkeys who were on the main stage!

I was impressed, M. Shadows lead vocals were really strong, as if he was on the CD. The guitar solos flowed well and rhythmic riffs that Sevenfold are known for really packed a punch. Hearing 'Bat Country' made me incredibly nostalgic and I felt like a teenager again.
Midway through the set M. Shadows paid tribute to their late drummer and dedicated 'So Far Away' to him and all others that are not with us today. He yelled to the crowd to raise their hands, and they did so, for the entire song. It was a touching moment and he thanked everyone afterwards. Their set and backing videos had a very 'Nightmare Before Christmas' feel to it. Go check them out!

Coldrain

Coldrain are a metalcore band from the city where I studied abroad, Nagoya. Their singer is half American and I mistakenly thought he was non-Japanese who was really fluent haha. So easy to misjudge from appearances. I had never heard these guys but after hearing the muffled into to one of their songs from another field I immediately went to see who was producing such an awesome sound. Despite being one of the earlier performers these guys had a lot of energy. The crowd responded well to their half english vocals with a lot of people headbanging around me. Highlights included 'War is on' and 'Six Feet Under'. Will keep an eye on these guys!

TOKIO

This was a total surprise to me. Was not what I expected at all. I had always seen these guys separately on a variety of TV shows as all Johnny's groups are. However what I didn't know was that they are an actual band, not just boy group. Whenever I hear the word 'Johnny's' I get the image of young squeaky clean singing and dancing boy bands. However these are a group of guys in their late 40s and 50s and they play their own instruments. Instantly earnt my respect. They play a blend of pop rock music and interacted really well with the crowd. I'm sure endless TV appearances really gives them an edge with public speaking skills!
While it was not my usual kind of music I think I will listen to a few of their albums. Their live show may have created a new fan...!

I watched numerous other artists before but those 4 were the ones that stuck out for me.

Festival Impressions:

This was my first music festival experience in Japan although I have been to numerous festivals in the UK and there were some areas that really struck me as different when compared to festivals that I have been too...

The cleanliness:I don't know about other countries but in the UK the festival sites become increasingly disgusting and smelly at a rapid rate. Overflowing trash cans, toxic toilets and general waste all across the festival site. Whereas at Summer Sonic, the venues were in relatively good shape! Sure there was some trash but for the most part, there were numerous recycling bins, well enforced and followed, they were also changed regularly. Toilets were for the most part clean and the general SMELL of the festival was better, only in the super muddy areas did I notice a stench. In the UK you can smell the toilets from the other side of the field....ugh.

The fans:There were none of the noticeable drunks/people high off their face that I am used to seeing in the UK, sure there were drunk people but they seemed perfectly capable of looking after themselves! In the moshpits and crowds everyone was respectful of each-others space and no forced shoving, the atmosphere was really happy and positive. There were A LOT of BABYMETAL fans walking around, saw t shirts and towels everywhere, or maybe that's because I'm biased...! Despite the FIERCE heat, everyone was in high spirits.
M. Shadows made a good point during Avenged Sevenfold's set when he said 'I always love coming to Japan, everyones so nice, very polite, thank you always.'

Safety:During the sets with bigger crowds there were consistent requests to space out and to notify staff if anyone felt sick because of the heat. The day was scorching hot, I received crazy sunburn and am currently typing with glowing red hands! Since the fans were not acting wrecklessly there were no warnings about setting fire to gas canisters etc that are common at festivals in the UK. Went through the entire day without seeing any incidents, which is great!

Final Thoughts:I really recommend that you go to Summer Sonic 2015! In hindsight I wish I had also gone on Saturday to see some other great artists too. It was well fun, the food and drinks were reasonably priced and everyone was so damn nice! Definitely take care in the summer heat though, I'm in agony now due to getting stupidly sunburnt, so stay hydrated and whack that sunscreen on! Tickets are widely available from all convenience stores and there is a convenient shuttle bus to and from the closest train station.

I aim to go to more live concerts in the future so keep an eye out for more music updates!