Thursday, September 20, 2007

My Trip to Shibuya


Yesterday on my day off I decided to take a trip. I only brought myself and a camera along to a part of Tokyo called SHIBUYA:

Shibuya is one of the twenty-three city wards of Tokyo, but often refers to just the popular shopping and entertainment area around Shibuya Station.

Shibuya is one of Tokyo's most colorful and busy districts and birthplace to many of Japan's fashion and entertainment trends.

A prominent landmark of Shibuya is the large intersection in front of the station (Hachiko Exit), which is heavily decorated by neon advertisements and giant video screens and gets crossed by amazingly large crowds of pedestrians each time the traffic light turns green.


I had a fantastic time. I started the afternoon just walking around and going to shops. Then I had lunch at a SUBWAY I found...that I was all too excited for me. Then I got myself lost for about an hour. I knew I should've started asking for directions when I was in residential areas with no signs of a real city in sight. After asking people, "SHIBUYA doko desu ka?" Where is SHUBYA? I found my way back and walked some more this time it has gotten dark. I decided to find a movie theatre. After asking like 4 people I met a guy at a store who spoke perfect English and he pointed me towards the right direction. At the theatres they were showing 4 movies and 2 of them were in Japanese and one I had already seen. The only one left to choose was "Miss Potter" which I wasn't really excited about. It has Renee Zellweger and Ewan McGegor in it....I had heard nothing about it. It looked like a period piece and not terribly exciting. But my feet were hurting from walking so much and it was the only movie in English that I haven't seen...the other English speaking movie being Transformers. I thought about it for a while....especially because the tickets are like $18. It insanely expensive to watch a movie in Japan. I decide to go. I thought if anything I could get a good nap out of it. Would you believe that I loved it....OF COURSE. All I could see around me were single Japanese woman sitting by themselves. I couldn't help but to laugh at myself. The movie was surprisingly good and I was glad I went. After the movies I decided I needed some dinner so I went walking around and came to A TGI Friday's. I was SOOO EXITED! I don't know if you can tell but I miss AMERICAN FOOD. So I went in got a table for one and had my favorite Jack Daniel's chicken strips and then chased it with a NY style cheesecake covered with mixed berries for dessert. I was in heaven. I left the restaurant with a huge smile on my face only to find this woman outside the restaurant, practically on the street, throwing up in a bag. She was thrown on the floor with her friends huddled around her making sure she was OK. I thought she was dead until she started throwing up again. I started to laugh and en suite took a PICTURE like any tourist would do. Then I made my way back to the train station and headed home finishing my night around 11pm.

The whole day was exciting. Even though I was alone and wish I had some friends with me....I had a good time. I had time to explore and get a real glimpse of Japan. The movie also made me really think. If you haven't seen it, GO! I started to think of my life and what is coming of it. I know there is much to expect and alot to do but I have done alot and I am sooo blessed of what I have accomplished but I think what matters most to me is that there is a constant showering of love and devotion to and from those things that matter most to me. For me it mostly consists of my friends, family, GOD and one day a beautiful wife. I am happy with those things.

I didn't mean to go there. It kinda just came out. Anyway, I am gonna go back to watching episodes of Prison Break. Have a great day everyone. Love you all!

Tony

Wednesday, September 12, 2007

I'm HERE!


I just got my Internet connected today. YAH! Life has not been the same without it. It has been a whole week and a half with out the WWW. But now I'm complete!

Life has been crazy from the flight over here till last night even. On my flight here we had an emergency landing in Anchorage, Alaska because one of our flight attendants hit her head on something and was going in and out of consciousness. Our trip to Alaska was quick. We dropped of the injured attendant, re-fueled and then we went back on our way to Tokyo. Needless to say it added a couple of hours to an already long flight.


This is a picture outside my window seat from inside the plane of the attendant going into the ambulance.

When I got to the airport there was a Japanese woman with my name and another guy's name on a card. She welcomed us to Tokyo and got us on our way to our apartment called E-Village. On the way there I got to know David from Texas who is a drummer in my show who actually have been here before and is on his 2nd contract doing MOM(Minnie Oh Minnie). He has been a big help to me teaching me alot about life here in Japan and at Disney.

Upon my arriving, I had orientation for 2 days and then jumped right in to vocal rehearsals. Being extremely Jet lagged had to be the worst part of my first week. All my rehearsals are done with a translator. She is really cool. She is actually Japanese but lived in MEXICO most of her life and went to college in English. She has been so great to me and my only outlet of communication besides the occasional hand jester and panamine that goes a long way here. It is a weird experience though cause simple explanations take a long time to get across due to language barrier and even music terminology that the translator has trouble understanding. But it has been pretty smooth. They are very anal about everything. From on how I hit a note to how I walk to a certain spot in the choreography. But it has been a blessing to be able to speak Spanish and to know how to dance. I have been picking up the choreography really quick and moving fast giving me alot of time to go over and over it.

Since I have been here. I have had 2 days off. I had my first Sunday and yesterday off. Sunday I made my way to church. It was an English ward that is about an hour way on the subway that met at 9 am. It is also meets in the same lot as the Temple. I met one girl there that works for Disney also but she leaves in a month. But there is another LDS guy that got here a couple of days ago from BYU. So we should be able to go to church together for the next two Sundays I have off then I will have to work on Sunday, which sucks. I tried to get it off but it was impossible. I do get Monday's and Tuesdays off. I'm still going to try to work something out once I get my schedule. I should be able to hit the first hour of church or something. I did get invited to dinner by this older missionary couple after church. It was really nice of them. They also gave me some advice and maybe my first really good meal in TOKYO.


The Chapel


The Tokyo Temple right next to the chapel

Other then that. I have been in rehearsals and have been trying to meet new people. I did get to meet some Aussie girls that live on my floor. They are all princesses and gorgeous. I actually went out with 2 of them along with David and another drummer named Louis that is in our cast to GINZA last night, the fashion area of Tokyo. We went to dinner and then a Latin club. I danced the night away with Lauren who found a new love of Latin dancing. We had a really good time. I also got to go to COSTCO yesterday before I left for GINZA with Josh who went to BYU and was in Crazy For You with me. He has also been a good help when I got here. He took me shopping my first night and showed me the way. I got the essentials at COSTCO; laundry detergent, a towel and CHIPS AND SALSA! I felt like a kid in a candy store. I never knew I would be so excited to see a COSTCO.


Josh and I eating COSTCO food after a long shopping hour for American food!

My apartment is awesome. I love living in my own place. I also got to decorate it Little with somethings I found in the DOZO pile which is a designated area in the lobby of E-Village where people who are leaving dumped stuff off they don't want to take with them. Dozo is Japanese meaning "go ahead." The stuff in the pile is free for the taking. So instead of wasting money on stuff that I would just give away after my contract I just found everything in the DOZO pile. Needless, to say everything is kinda random.


This is me in a pose(for one of my numbers in my show) in my apartment.


My Bathroom. Got most of this stuff at the Japanese equivalent $1 store called the 100 yen store.


View from the outside of my front door of my apartment. Down the street is the Tokyo Bay where I would like to go for my morning jogs.


Before I retire this blog there are a couple of things that are different that I have to get used:

People wait at crosswalks here until the green light designates to walk. Which is very different from NYC

There is Absolutley no picture taking in Disney....so it will be hard to get pics of me in costume and stuff but I bet with time that will change :) I'm a rebel!

At escalators people wait on the left side leaving room for others to walk up on the right which is opposite of what we do in America. It could be the fact that they also drive on the opposite side of the road...which also makes crossing the street interesting when you don't know which way the cars are coming from :)

The food is very interesting. So far I noticed that most everything is fishy. I learned how to say chicken in Japanese really quick. I have been eating alot at WENDY'S and KFC which are both right down the street from where I live. Now, that I have been grocery shopping I have been eating better. Just had a quesadilla with guacamole and salsa earlier :)


I found these lovely dead creatures at my local grocery store. YUM :/

That's it for know. I'll talk to ya'll later.