Tag Archives: art

5th August 2020: Monforte de Lemos {Spain, summer 2020}

Posted on by

After so many curves, we deserved a calm day, which included some art in Monforte de Lemos . We started off at the river Cabe, crossing the bridge Ponte Vella and the newer iron one.

We had booked to visit the Christian Art Museum in the Clares’ convent Museo de Arte Sacro / Convento de las Clarisas, which features some interesting pieces of art, among them a dead Christ by Gregorio Fernández, and hundreds of reliquaries with supposed remains of Saints.

Then we moved to the Piarists School, the church, and their painting collection Colegiata de Nuestra Señora de la Antigua / Pinacoteca de los Escolapios . The school is built in a Renaissance Herrerian style and the guide constantly tried to one-up San Lorenzo del Escorial.

Then we found a good meat restaurant, Mesón JM for some local beef T-bone that we could prepare ourselves, although I get the nagging feeling they actually short-served us as they never showed us the meat piece. Please excuse the reddish tint of the pictures. It was the parasol and at the time I did not notice (≧▽≦).

After lunch and a break, we took a climb into the old castle keep Torre del Homenaje, and walked around for a little.

We ended the day at the tapas bar La Fábrica for some seafood.

And finished the day with some in-accomodation exploration at the Parador de Monforte de Lemos.

Walked distance: 9.03 km

30th July 2020: Vampires in Madrid (Spain)

Posted on by

The world is pretty much topsy-turvy these days, isn’t it? I’ve been literally staring at the computer screen for about an hour, wondering how to start, how to explain. I’ve erased the opening paragraph about four times too (≧▽≦). Thus, I will just spare you the introduction, explanations, justifications, and so. It took me a while to decide in favour of my little trip to Madrid.

Vampires, the Evolution of the Myth, or Vampiros, la Evolución del Mito (#VampirosCaixaForum) was scheduled before the whole COVID-19 debacle. Once things started opening up in Spain, the exhibition was rescheduled to run in Madrid for a couple of months through summer. And for a while I pondered whether it was… I’m not sure how to put it… worth the risk? For months we had been told to avoid public transport, which is my main mean of moving around, so in the end I decided what the fuck, if I was doing this, I was going to drive into the centre of Madrid – for the very first time in my life. For the record I don’t particularly enjoy driving, I much prefer being driven, and my sense of directions when driving is… not the best, so I borrowed a GPS, picked up my sister, and drove off.

After only getting the wrong exit once, we left the car in an underground parking lot and walked ten short minutes and we were in front of the Caixa Forum Madrid. Caixa Forum is a cultural space owned by a savings bank in search of tax deductions that organises shows and exhibitions. We had a compound ticket for 12:00, which included both exhibitions in the building, and a theme lunch. And so we went.

Vampiros: La Evolución del Mito, “Vampires, the Evolution of the Myth” is an exhibition originally organised by La Cinémathèque française, which is a French French non-profit film organisation that holds one of the collection of cinema-related objects and documents in the world. As they are specialised in films, the vampire exhibition focuses on the figure of the preternatural being throughout cinema.

The first room is focused on the book Dracula, and the Romantic interpretation of the myth – Romantic as the literary period, not the lovey-dovey stuff. Highlights include a facsimile of the first scene of the manuscript of Bram Stoker’s version of Dracula for theatre, aside from early editions of the novel and other vampire books such as John William Polidori’s The Vampyre and Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu’s Carmilla. There were also some surprising items – some of Francisco de Goya’s wood-prints. Goya was one of the most influential painters in Spain, also grounded in the Romantic movement. Good stuff.

The second room was dedicated to Nosferatu, one of the key films in the vampire genre, with some promotional material and film props – this was the ward with best and most important number of items.

The following room was dedicated to the romantic, erotic and sexual vampires. It had two main focuses – one was the Dracula portrayed by Bela Lugosi as the epitome of the elegant, seductive vampire, first in Broadway, then in the 1931 film by Universal Studios. The centrepiece of the room featured two pieces of the wardrobe in Coppola’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula worn by Gary Oldman and Winona Ryder, along with several designs for the wardrobe (which could not be photographed, but you can peek at in some of the pics). Finally, we got to see the suit worn Tom Cruise as Lestat and Kirsten Dunst as Claudia in the 1994 film Interview with the Vampire. I missed some more Christopher Lee, as there were barely some photographies of his performance in Dracula (1958) and its sequels.

On one side there was a small area dedicated to the vampire as a political metaphor. The final area was dedicated to the pop vampire, including magazines, comics and graphic novels, some Japanese manga, and so on – even Count Dracula from Sesame Street! Then again, he was on a screen. I would have killed to see the real puppet.

All in all I got the impression that the exhibit lacked ‘the real thing’ and abused the film montages. I was expecting a few more props and less bits of films which… after all I’ve seen most (≧▽≦). The truth is that the myth of the vampire starts much earlier than the “Medieval” vampire featured in the Romantic fantasies, and can be traced to early succubi or the Lamia myths in Ancient Greece if you think about Western Culture alone. The Romantic and Victorian writers just made the myth cool as it was once more popular due to a sort of “vampire hysteria” that crossed the Balkans the previous century – that’s probably the main reason why Bram Stoker chose the figure of a Transylvanian warlord to create his character. But in the end it was a good way to break the activity fast.

Then we moved on to the next exhibition, Cámara y ciudad. La vida urbana en la fotografía y el cine, “Camera and the city: urban life in photography and the cinema” which… was okay, I guess. I guess I’m not a photography / video kind of person (≧▽≦).

After perusing the shop for a while, we moved to the cafeteria, where a “theme menu” had been designed. Let me detail that for you:

  • El frenesí vampírico / Vampire frenzy: virgin – I think – Bloody Mary
  • Estacas de la muerte / Death stakes: aubergine tempura with sweet and sour sauce
  • Reencarnación / Reincarnation: Goat cheese, sweet beet and raspberries salad
  • Inmortalidad / Immortality: Macerated sea bass with lime, orange, coriander, salt and pepper, with a side of mango and tortilla chips
  • Embalsamamiento / Embalmment: Duck magret with a red wine sauce and mushrooms
  • Drácula / Dracula: Crème anglaise, jelly and raspberry mousse.

Let me tell you, this was amazing – and fortunately the portions were small so the final amount was more than adequate.

It was a little later than 15:15 when we left the CaixaForum centre and headed off the Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, the Thyssen-Bornemisza National Museum, a museum built from a noble family’s art collection which also hosts temporary exhibitions. The permanent exhibition is chronologically organised, and here are some of the pieces by famous artists: Rubens, Rembrandt, Van Gogh, Degas, El Greco, Tiziano… and hm… many very modern painters I… can’t understand.

Finally we decided to call it a day before people started coming out of work and leaving town so that we did not get into a traffic jam, and I am very proud of myself for taking the drive – which was my wee white whale for a while. I’ll see myself out now (≧▽≦)

Distance: Approx. 120 km driving; 6.08 km walking

Also, as an afterthought, I ordered the Vampire exhibition book online. I did not at first because I did not feel like carrying it around as it is thick. But they home-delivered and I actually saved 2.5 bucks?

PS: New logo! What do you think?

7th – 10th February 2020: Paris (France) for DIR EN GREY & BABYMETAL

Posted on by

I organised a weekend in Paris because two concerts conveniently aligned on Saturday and Sunday, and I had Friday free, as well as Monday morning. It was a great mental break that I needed badly. ETA: There were rumours about a flu from China, and some of the airport workers were wearing masks. We had no idea what was about to hit us…

7th February 2020: Through the Strikes

I had found quite a convenient flight that left at 9:00 on Friday for 35 €, which was a great deal. At first, I did not understand why it was so cheap. It turned out, the plane came from South America and it was on a Madrid stopover – so it was pretty much full already. It was a huge aircraft with on-board entertainment. That came in handy when the pilot informed us that we were going to have to wait something between one and two hours to be able to take off due to the air controllers’ strikes in France. But at least we were flying and I had films to watch.

We took off at about 10:00 and our big plane made the jump in just one hour, as opposed to the 2h10 minutes of estimated travel, which meant we were almost on time! Of course, this did not sit well with the strikers, who had us wait first for the parking spot, and then for the stairs to deplane. I finally managed to leave the airport and get onto the train so I reached downtown Paris around 13:00. I wanted to inspect the damage caused to the cathedral Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Paris by the 2019 fire. My first impression, looking at the main façade and towers, was optimistic, but as I walked round the building, I could see the real damage and reconstruction efforts. Furthermore, it still reeked of burnt wood, probably because they were still pulling out debris. My optimism did not linger long, I’m afraid.

Collage of Notre Dame showing the cranes and scaffoldings in the repairs

As it was sunny, I decided to walk to the Sainte-Chapelle (Holy Chapel) and see its windows in good weather. The Sainte-Chapelle is a small two-level chapel inside the Justice Palace Palais de Justice de Paris in the Île de la Cité, smack in the middle of Paris and not far from Notre Dame – actually, both of them belong to the same Unesco World Heritage Site, Paris, Banks of the Seine. The chapel has a lower early Gothic level, and an upper level with impressive stained-glass windows which I love. As the sun was shining outside, the views were stunning.

Collage. Sainte-Chapelle: outside showing the spire, inside with some colourful windows and pointed arches

Collage of the upper floor of the Sainte-Chapelle. It shows different angles of the long gothic windows, covered in colourful glass

The weather was great – especially considering February in Paris, which is always more to the north than I mentally place it. Unfortunately, the forecast for the following day was quite miserable, and thus I decided to just walk along from the Île de la Cité towards the Arc de Triomphe (some 5 km away). On my way, I walked by the Louvre, Les Tulleries, the Grand Palais, the Petit Palais, the Alexander III Bridge, and into the Avenue des Champs-Élysées – the Banks of the Seine that the Unesco declared World Heritage.

Collage with different landmarks of Paris - the river, neoclassic palaces, Luxor obelisk, Champs-Élysées.

Finally I reached the Arc de Triomphe, which honours the fallen in the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. It was commissioned by Emperor Napoleon in 1806, and completed in 1836, and you can actually climb it, which I might do some day. From there, I took a train towards Montmartre, where I had booked my hotel. I dropped off my luggage and walked up Square Louise Michel, a sort of urban park which leads up to the church Basilique du Sacré-Cœur (222 steps). There was a pretty carousel Carrousel de Saint-Pierre, and from the square, I could watch the Eiffel Tower Tour Eiffel against the sunset from the lookout Vue de Paris.

A view of the Sacre Coeur with a classical carousel in front of it

A profile of the Eiffel Tower in a blurry sunset in orange tones

I went back to the hotel for a while during twilight. On the way, I bought a snack in a nearby supermarket for dinner as I waited for the evening to get dark and the lights to come up. When it did, I took my last adventure for the day, and walked off to see the Moulin Rouge while I listened to KAMIJO’s song of the same name. It was a few minutes’ walk away from my hotel, and Moulin Rouge [ムーランルージュ] is one of my favourite songs of his. Since the man is obsessed with France, he has a few songs that fit my weekend. Truth be told, I did consider dinner and a show there, it is after all the most famous cabaret in the world. However, it was a bit expensive and I had read quite a few reviews about bad seats if you are alone. I did not want to waste money, and I did not know how tired I would be that evening in the end – and to be brutally honest,I really had not felt like packing fancy clothes for the evening.

The Moulin Rouge cabaret, all lit up in bright red for the night

8th February 2020: Louvre and DIR EN GREY

The weather forecast was accurate, and despite the lovely weather on Friday, Saturday dawned stormy and dark. I decided to go to the Louvre Museum Musée du Louvre, even if I had been there before. It is after all one of the greatest museums in the world.

The Louvre holds so many pieces (over 600,000) that it would be impossible to describe them all, but for me, its core is the Winged Victory of Samothrace, a Greek sculpture from the Hellenistic period, around the 2nd century BCE, and my favourite piece of art. The Louvre is a national art museum, which opened in the post-revolutionary France in 1793. It exhibits around 35,000 items – Egyptian antiquities, Sumer and Assyrian pieces, Greek, Etruscan and Roman items, Islamic art, neoclassical and Baroque sculptures, a collection of objets d’art (Decorative arts), paintings, prints, drawings… It is located in the former French Royal Palace of the same name.

A collage with several Louvre pieces of art - Winged Victory, sitting scribe, the three graces, Diane washing her hair, Hermaphroditus sleeping, Psyche and Eros kissing, Liberty guiding the people, Venus de Milo

I wandered there for a few hours and I might have lost my way in the galleries a few times. In the end, I managed to (re)visit all the artefacts and artworks that I wanted. Because there are hundreds of thousands of items, but I must always see the Sitting Scribe, the Borghese Hermaphroditus, Canovas’ Eros and Psyche, and the remains of the Gates of Istar. I had a bit of a headache, so I eventually went back to the hotel to get some rest and prepare for the DIR EN GREY concert and VIP experience in the Élysée Montmartre live house. DIR EN GREY or “Diru” is a Japanese heavy metal band known for its dark themes and scenography that I thought I needed to check at least once (the final verdict was that I don’t need to repeat the experience, but it made for a nice mental break). The band has remained stable since its formation in 1997, and it is composed by Kyo [京] (lead vocals), Kaoru [薫] (rhythm guitar, backing vocals), Die (lead guitar, backing vocals), Shinya (drums) and Toshiya (bass, backing vocals).

A dark stage with a drum set. Letters projected on the screen behind the stage read Dir en Grey Tour 20 This Way to Self-Destruction

Setlist:

    1. 絶縁体 [Zetsuentai]
    2. 人間を被る [Ningen wo Kaburu]
    3. Rubbish Heap
    4. Devote My Life
    5. 軽蔑と始まり [Keibetsu to Hajimari]
    6. Celebrate Empty Howls
    7. 赫 [Aka]
    8. Merciless Cult
    9. Downfall
    10. Values of Madness
    11. 谿壑の欲 [Keigaku no Yoku]
    12. Ranunculus
    13. The World of Mercy
First encore:
    14. Followers
    15. THE DEEPER VILENESS
    16. 詩踏み [Utafumi]
Second encore:
    17. Sustain the untruth

Listing of all the concerts in the Dir en Grey 2020 tour

The concert was the final of DIRU’s 2020 European Tour TOUR20: This way to Self-Destruction. When I walked by the venue on Friday evening, around 18:00, there was a small number of people queueing already. I did not care enough to queue all day, and I had a VIP ticket with early entry, so I just headed to the line about 15:00. When the queues were separated and organised, around 16:30, I was VIP number 42. The weather was miserable, and I could have totally skipped the downpour while waiting, but I was lucky enough to be against the live house and not in the middle of the boulevard, where the General Admittance queue was. Doors opened at 19:30 for GA, and the VIP experience was held beforehand. The VIP queue started getting in around 17:30. As present we got a VIP pass and an “exclusive VIP only merchandise item” which turned out to be a scarf – very appropriate with the weather. The experience itself was a group photo with the band. There were five cushioned chairs for the fans, and the band stood behind. They did not say a word, nor interacted with fans in any way, not even acknowledging a hello or a thank you.

Afterwards, I headed for the hall, and I found an almost-barrier spot in the left area, on the second row. The people in front of me let me grab the barrier between them so I had something to hold on while I waited. The special guest was a DJ, who was more focused on getting recorded by his buddy on the phone than mixing music. The main show started a little after 20:30.

DIR EN GREY’s music is quite powerful, with a heavy focus on strings and drums. They also have a huge flare for theatricality and they enjoy the shock factor as part of the aesthetics. The singer, Kyo, donned a Joker-like make-up appearance, with a fake-suicidal attitude on stage, using the microphone to mimic stabbing his chest, or the wires to hang himself. It became a bit disturbing because it was repeated more than once. The act also felt rather distanced, there was very little interaction with the fans. At some point, a pick flew in my direction and the person behind me actually felt me up to try and find it in the folds of the coat I had tied around my waist. That was probably even creepier than the act.

The guitars and bass were tremendously powerful, and the drumming was amazing. The crowd was extremely loud, and the singer, Kyo, later confessed that he had been pretty exhausted and burnt out from the tour, which maybe explained why the concert felt so distanced. The encores were the probably best part of the concert, the part that felt more real and relaxed. After the concert was over, I headed off to the hotel to catch some sleep. Since I remembered that the area had felt a bit rough when I was there in 2014, this time over I wanted close accommodation so I could get back quickly without needing to use the underground.

9th February 2020: Destroy the Bastille!

Sunday morning was around 2 ºC, and it was windy. I lingered in bed for a while to recover from the previous evening, and then I headed out – I should have brought the merchandise-scarf with me! I saw the Place de la Bastille, where the revolutionary prison used to stand. In the middle of the square stands the “July column” Colonne de Juillet, which commemorates the Revolution of 1830 (which is not the “famous” French Revolution, which happened between 1789 and 1799). A few minutes away, in the Square Henri-Galli, I came across the base of the tower Tour de la Liberté (Freedom Tower), which was unearthed while building the first metro line. There are only a few stones remaining from the foundations, but I’ll take my fun wherever I can – so I stopped and used my music player to find another KAMIJO song, Bastille, just because I could.

Monument to the French Revolution

A few brick stones forming a circle, considered the last remains of the Bastille

It was too cold to wander, but I had a great plan. I headed off to the science museum Galerie de Paléontologie et d’Anatomie comparée (Palaeontology and Comparative Anatomy Gallery), which was a short walk away. I had read about it and was curious. To be honest, I’m still trying to decide whether it was amazing, or the materials nightmares are made of.

The museum was founded in the 19th century, and it keeps the atmosphere – and the charm – of the old exhibitions. There are stands and wooden cases, and the smell of dust and old paper. The first floor holds a “Cavalcade of Skeletons” – the whole floor is occupied by preserved skeletons of mammals and birds. In the glass cases along the walls, there are taxidermy specimens, preserved animals and dissected specimens. In the far corner, there is “gallery of monsters” with natural oddities. It was enchanting, but at the same time deeply disturbing – especially the male human figure displaying muscles and blood vessels, with a vine leaf on his groin.

The second floor hosts the dinosaurs and other fossils, including a very cool toothed whale, giant crocodiles, a Bernissart iguanodon, a diplodocus, shark teeth… Most of the fossils are either casts or reconstructions – I swear I’ve seen that Irish elk at least three times before. Also, the T-Rex skull was adorably flawed, as it was imagined to be in the 19th century.

The third floor is… ammonite-land. There were cases upon cases of ammonites in different shapes, colours, rocks and materials.

Shots of the museum. Skeletons of animals - fish, oxen, crocodiles, elephants, whale. Fossils: Dinosaurs, fish, toothed whale, shark teeth, snails

After I was done with the museum, I decided it was too cold to wander the neighbouring Botanical Garden. Instead, I headed off to yet another one, the Musée national des arts asiatiques Guimet – the National Museum of Eastern Arts or Museum Guimet, which holds pieces of art from Cambodia, India, China, Japan, Korea and so on. There was a gorgeous dancing Shiva sculpture, collections of religious artefacts, calligraphy, samurai armours, even modern art and clothes inspired by the Far East. It was a really cool museum I had recently found about and was happy to visit.

Different pieces in the museum: Dancing Shiva, sitting Buddha, Calligraphy in the shape of a dragon, elaborate kimono, samurai armour, Indian goddess

After leaving the museum, I walked towards Trocadero to take the underground. I made a small detour to have a look at the Eiffel Tower Tour Eiffel, and saw a bunch of peddlers playing shell games with tourists. Someone lost about 400 €, I really hope they were in on the game.

The Eiffel Tower in front of a cloudy sky

Since it was too cold to continue walking around to find something to eat, I decided to get take-out, and I headed back to the hotel to get ready for the BABYMETAL concert. I had never listened to them before, but they are a sensation, the basic ticket was not expensive, and two concerts in as many days seemed convenient. They actually played in the same venue as DIR EN GREY on Saturday, so I found out by sheer coincidence on the live house’s website. At that time, I thought “why the hell not?”. Afterwards, they added Madrid to their Europe tour, so if I had known that beforehand, I might have acted differently. BABYMETAL is one of those insanely-profitable Japanese marketing stunts involving cute girls that had never really been in my radar more than in passing.

Notice with the date of Babymetal's concert

BABYMETAL is a product of the “Japanese idol factory”. It was created artificially to fill a market gap. Three girls were chosen to form an act that would mix the idealised cute idea of girl idols with the heavy metal genre. When they debuted in 2010, the term “Kawaii Metal” was coined. One of the girls left in 2018, so there are two main members and and support dancer on rotation. The members are Nakamoto Suzuka, “Su-metal”, the main vocalist, and Kikuchi Moa aka “Moametal” on back-up vocals and screams. The supporting musicians are called the “Kami Band”.

BABYMETAL’s long-awaited European tour is officially called Metal Galaxy World Tour. The VIP tickets sold for around 170€, and did not even entail a M&G, so even if I had had the chance, I would have not even considered them. Despite that, they sold out, along with the show itself.

When I left the hotel at 9:00, the queue had started organising, and the tour buses were already there. I had no intention to queue or try for a barrier. I had decided to sit back and relax, so I reached the venue around 18:45 for the 19:30 concert. There were tons of people waiting to buy merchandise, but I was good. Thus, I just headed to the floor, and found a spot in the back. Since the venue has sort a bit of an arena and some upper stands, there was a wall I could lean against and it was not the end of the room.

The crowd was quite different from DIRU’s, ranging from good ol’ metalheads to families with little girls between five and ten years old with a bizarre range of in-between: people with fox masks, goth and loli dresses, explicit heavy-metal t-shirts (a bunch of those T-shirts were much less kid-friendly than the show… everything you could imagine. I… don’t think most parents knew what they were getting into, and a few of the kids ended up crying.

At 19:30 sharp, the support act started – a German band called SKYND. Their sound was really good, but their lyrics are based on true crime, which makes them a bit on the disturbing side (and very much not kid-friendly). The name of the songs are all serial killers or similar criminals.

Setlist:

    1. Richard Ramirez
    2. Elisa Lam
    3. Katherine Knight
    4. Jim Jones
    5. Tyler Hadley
    6. Gary Heidnik

At 20:30, the BABYMETAL show kicked off with the projection of the Future Metal video as an introduction of sorts. The musical act relied heavily on the Kami Band, and Su-metal carried the weight of the vocals. She spent the whole one-hour concert jumping and dancing while singing, and her voice did not break even once. If she is not lip-synching, she has the most impressive lungs ever. Both she and Moametal encouraged the crowd, making a lot of eye-contact. Su-metal addressed the audience a lot, even – I think – trying French. The concert was non-stop, and it ended up feeling a bit short, but much better than I had expected. The one annoying thing were the daddies putting their babes up on their shoulders in the middle of the floor, when the kids gave clear signs of not caring or were distressed. But it was fun. Not sure I would repeat unless I made it a thing with friends or something, but I enjoyed the act, and had a good time.

Setlist:

    1. DA DA DANCE
    2. Gimme Chocolate!!
    3. Shanti Shanti Shanti
    4. BxMxC
    5. Kagerou
    6. Oh! MAJINAI
    7. メギツネ [Megitsune]
    8. PA PA YA!!
    9. Distortion
    10. KARATE
    11. Headbangeeeeerrrrr!!!!!
    12. Road of Resistance

A group of girls dressed in black dancing in front of a logo that reads Babymetal

I was back at the hotel before 22:00. Thus, I got a good night’s sleep before I left, once again happy that I had taken nearby accommodation.

10th February 2020: No bells of Notre Dame

My plane boarded at 10:00 so I had to leave early for the airport. The weather was rainy again, so I took the underground to Gare du Nord, and then the train to Orly. As I was riding the train, I had a nice view of the Paris at dawn, but the bells of Notre Dame were not tolling, and my inner child was sad about that. Despite issues with the airport security staff, the stupidly-expensive food, and the general unpleasantness of early-morning public transportation, I made it to my plane without actual problems. As it was a big plane again, I settled down to watch Jurassic World during the flight, because I’m a nerd. Going straight into work from the airport was not fun, but it a small price to pay

I only had three days, but this trip was a very welcome getaway, and even if the weather did not help, I got to do a lot of stuff. I had to discard a few plans and improvise due to the weather. However, there is that film quote, “We’ll always have Paris”. After all, I’ll be coming back for the Saint Seiya Symphonic Adventure. ETA: Or so I thought, at the time of writing the article…

29th July 2019: Journey to the West: Osaka → Sakaiminato {Japan, summer 2019}

Posted on by

I was determined to cross as many things on my bucket list as I could in this trip as I could, and that involved some crazy travelling – in this case, two hundred eighty-something kilometres, four trains, and a bit over five hours. In order to make it work, I needed to leave Osaka around 7:00. From the hotel I took the Midosuji underground line from Doubutsuen-Mae Station to Shin-Osaka station, where I took the Tokaido-Sanyo Shinkansen to Okayama – the first 2.5 hours. There, I took the Yakumo Limited express to Yonago [米子市] (a bit over an hour). There, I had to change to, the JR Sakai Line which would finally take me to Sakaiminato [境港市] in Tottori prefecture – it took 45 minutes to travel the last 18 km.

Sakaiminato is “The City of Kitarō and Fish” – Fish is quite self-explanatory. Kitarō is the main character in the manga Ge Ge Ge no Kitarō [ゲゲゲの鬼太郎], often quoted as the reason why yōkai and other elements of Japanese folklore and mythology became popular in the 20th century. Yōkai [妖怪], literally “strange apparition”, are mythological creatures unique to the Japanese islands. They tend to represent nature or societal phenomena, some of them have animal features or are part-human part-animal, or anthropomorphised animals. Many others are rooted on the Japanese idea that inanimate objects have or can develop a spirit. Some yōkai are benevolent, others are evil.

The creator of the manga was Mizuki Shigeru [水木 しげる] (1922 – 2015). He was born in Osaka, but his family moved to Sakaiminato when he was young, and he grew up there. After being drafted to fight in World War II, he became interested in travelling and mythology. Back in Japan, he started the manga in the 1960s. Aside from writing and drawing Ge Ge Ge no Kitarō [ゲゲゲの鬼太郎] (Ge Ge Ge being an onomatopoeia of creepy grave yard noises), he was also a great connoisseur of Japanese folklore, especially monsters, ghosts, and yōkai.

Ge Ge Ge no Kitarō went through a few names and formats to its final form – and there have been anime adaptations as recent as 2018. Kitarō, the main character, is a young yōkai boy who lives between the worlds of humans and yōkai. His usual adventures involve protecting people from both evil yōkai and monsters of western origin. Other characters appear through the story, such as Medama-Oyaji, the “ghost” of Kitarō’s father, incarnated in his eyeball, the Rat-Man (Nezumi Otoko) or the Cat Girl (Neko-Musume).

Most of Kitarō’s adventures happen in or around Sakaiminato, and the town has decided to honour Mizuki’s yōkai legacy – or turn it into a tourist attraction. The inhabitants embraced its yōkai fictional legacy with glee… and stamps. Sakaiminato is all and everything about yōkai.

The magic started when I reached Yonago [米子市] Station: there, the platform is decorated with sculptures and statues, a prelude of what one finds when arriving in Sakaiminato. The train in the JR Sakai line [境港線] was also decorated with some of the characters of the manga. Furthermore, a lot of stops of the Sakai Line, aside from their actual name, are nicknamed after a yōkai.

Sign of Yonago station, featuring the character Nezumi Otoko from Ge Ge Ge no Kitaro.

Train to Sakaiminato, featuring the character Medama-Oyaji from Ge Ge Ge no Kitarō, taking a bath.

I finally reached the Sakaiminato station, Sakaiminato-eki [境港駅]. Upon exiting the train, the first thing I saw was a mural with all the recurrent characters in the manga. The second, that the street lights were shaped like Medama-Oyaji, Kitarō’s eyeball-shaped father.

Mural of Ge Ge Ge no Kitarō characters. The street lights in front of it are shaped like eyeballs, and the irises have different colours.

As I came out of the station, I was greeted by a bronze statue of Mizuki Shigeru writing among his characters, and a themed postbox. At the end of the block there was a mall-like building (actually, a cultural centre) which holds the Tourist Information Office. There, I got a copy of the yōkai booklet to carry out the Yōkai Stamp Rally [妖怪スタンプラリー]. The booklet was 120 ¥, of course I could not let it go – there are 35 stamps to collect, and if you get all the stamps of the main rally, you get a small certificate. There are extra stamps for day trips, too. I wish I had known beforehand, I would have planned two days out there to try and complete it.

In order to complete the stamp rally, you have to go down the main street and stop at the many shops which have a small stand out front with a stamp and an ink pad. It was stupidly fun to do, even if there were a few parents who thought nobody but their kids should get stamps and a certificate. Some of the stamps were “hidden” away from the main street and the documentation is in Japanese, so some effort is required – or just use the convenient interactive map.

Stamp Rally booklet

Booklet acquired, I could go forth and explore (and stamp). I backtracked towards the bronze statue of Mizuki Shigeru writing among his characters Mizuki Shigeru-sensei Shippitsu-chū no Zō [水木しげる先生執筆中の像], and the Kitaro postbox [鬼太郎ポスト].

Statue of a character writing with his mouth open. Two manga characters are looking at him, hearing his stories.

Kitaro sitting on top of a post box

And as you follow the road and turn the corner you directly go into Mizuki Shigeru Road. However, when have you read me going into something directly without getting distracted? First I had to see the Yōkai World Summit, Sekai Yōkai Kaigi [世界妖怪会議].

The bronze statues that comprise the Yokai World Summit.

Finally I got down to Mizuki Shigeru Road [水木しげるロード], which features dozens of small and not-so-small bronze statues representing yōkai as they appear in the manga, alongside the characters designed for the story itself. The Tourist Information claims that there are 177 statues in total. I honestly did not count. Shops line to the sides, and a bunch of them have the stamps that you ink on your booklet – and it was hard to get to them, it was so crowded!

I walked the right side to the end, then I decided to come back to check into the hotel, which was close to the station, and drop the luggage. Why didn’t I do that from the beginning? Either it was too early for check-in, or I was eager to get started with the stamps, or maybe both. I reached my hotel and it was gorgeous! It was actually the most expensive hotel in the whole trip, but it was amazing! Outside, it was just a brick building. Inside, it was full of wood and tatami, and so was the room. There was an onsen (artificial hot spring) on the uppermost floor, which I decided I would visit later.

I actually felt a bit bummed that I only had a night there, because I would have really stayed in that room for hours just lounging around – and there were more stamps to collect… But as soon as I thought about the stamps I realised I just had to go out again to continue my adventure. There were lots of things to see and do! Thus, I headed out again, and realised I needed to find myself some food as it was close to 15:00 and I had only had a coffee and a cracker at around 8:00. Then, I set off to walk the left side of the Mizuki Shigeru Road. Of course, every time I went up and down the street I took photographs…

Collage showing Japanese mythological characters as depicted in the Ge Ge Ge no Kitaro manga. They include a Medama-Oyaji, Betobetosan, a dragon, a nurikabe, a giant skeleton…

Of course, I also had to visit Yōkai Jinja [妖怪神社] on the way (the amount of time and times I had to wait till I was able to take a picture of this without anybody in it was ridiculous (≧▽≦)).

Japanese shrine entrance, depicting the torii as something ghostly. There is a sacred tree just behind the torii.

At the end of the road, I had seen the Mizuki Shigeru Museum, Mizuki Shigeru Kinen-kan [水木しげる記念館] and I knew that it was open (on a Monday!) until late (in Japan!). I actually had put Sakaiminato on the schedule like this so I could make the most out of the Monday. I decided to enter before I had finished the stamp rally, because I keep getting distracted by shiny new things. The Museum features some of the original manga strips, a replica of Mizuki’s office, some items of his mythology-artefact collection and personal library. You can peek at haunted house and see a lot of “domestic” yōkai that that may lurk in a traditional home. There are also replicas of different yōkai – big, moving, and trying to be creepy but only managing to be awfully cute: Nurikabe, Shirouneri, Otoroshi, Azukihakari, Betobetosan, Suiko, Akaname, Miagenyudou. There are also photo spots to compensate that more than a few items cannot be photographed. The museum also had a nice garden for the “wild” yōkai.

The Shigeru Mizuki Museum and garden

I still had a few stamps to go, so after I left the museum, I diverted towards the harbour to find them. That is how I ended up at Ominato Jinja [大港神社], a much more traditional shrine, not for tourist but actual practising.

Japanese Shrine. Pretty standard in comparison to Yokai Jinja.

It was time to look for the “hidden” stamp spots. The very last one I found was at the Sakaiminato Ekimae Police Box, Sakaiminato Ekimae Kōban [境港駅前交番]. I had completed the booklet in one afternoon! However, it was just around 18:00, so the tourist office was already closed. I saw something called “Kitarō Haunted House”, but I did not enter – it seemed to be for kids, and I did not want to brave too many hyper-protective fathers.

Open Yokai stamp booklet showing the stamped characters.

Instead, I went to the harbour to have a look at the setting sun. This was my first time in the west of Japan, so I thought I could see the sun going under the maritime horizon. I had not counted on the bay, but it was overall pretty.

Sunset at the harbour. It looks pastel.

As it was “after hours”, I went to look at the fountain Kappa no Izumi [河童の泉]. That day, the city employees had been cleaning it, and I did not want to take pictures with the workers in them, or disturb their work and power-washing. The fountain was still not running, but the city officials had left.

Dry fountain with Ge Ge Ge no Kitarō characters.

Afterwards, I tried to grab a bite to eat, but most places had either shut down or were not taking customers any more by 18:00. Thus, I found myself some conbini food, and headed back to the hotel. I had a nice traditional bedroom and a fantastic shower, but honestly, I ignored it in favour of the onsen. I went there to enjoy a long soak. As night falls and the shops close down, it looks like this small Japanese town would go quiet. Nothing further from reality! The Mizuki Shigeru Road displays a creepy illumination complete with sound effects. This is probably an incentive for people to stay overnight. I had read about it on the brochure, so of course I walked out again to see the town at night.

The whole Mizuki Shigeru Road had been completely overtaken by the wannabe creepy atmosphere – at least. There was music, and some of the shop windows had shadows. The Medama-Oyaji street lights flickered. Suddenly, as I was walking down the road, there was a thunderclap sound and all the lights went out at the same time. I jumped! They got me good! Well, me and everyone who was just experiencing it for the first time. Part of the fun became identifying when the lights would go out and watching out for people getting as startled as you had been. I plead guilty of doing it.

Mizuki Shigeru Road, with creepy lighting.

I went back to the hotel around 21:00. However, as part of the stay-in-town incentive, my hotel also offered a free bowl of ramen between 22:00 and 23:00. I wondered if it would be greedy to go and have it, but I decided to take full advantage of the offer. Thus, to finish the day, I got free ramen at the hotel for dinner! Indeed, I could have stayed in that hotel for days on end!

Bowl of free ramen with algae and bamboo sprouts.

I went to bed soon after. But remember, Sakaiminato is “The City of Kitarō and Fish”. I had done the Kitarō part. The following day, I needed to focus on the fish.

Walked distance: 13641 steps, 9.76 km in one afternoon/evening. It was bloody amazing and I had a blast!

28th July 2019: Wakayama {Japan, summer 2019}

Posted on by

Going to Wakayama [和歌山] was a spur-of-the-moment decision, so I did not prepare for it in advance – I should have. On the one hand, it was super hot, on the other hand, most of the stuff was not covered by my JR Pass and I had not budgeted 3,000 ¥ extra on trains for it. But when I came out of the train on the 27th saw that my platform was the Wakayama platform and thought “why not?” After all, they made HYDE their Tourist Ambassador this year…

First I found my way to the castle, Wakayama-jo [和歌山城] and the adjacent park.

On one of the corners of the park I found Wakayama-ken Gogoku Jinja [和歌山県護国神社].

And then I visited the Wakayama Rekishi-kan [わかやま歴史館], Wakayma History Museum, since the ticket was included in the Castle visit.

Then I missed the train to Kimiidera [紀三井寺], so I had to wait an extra half-hour… that I would later be thankful for because… stairs. Lots of them.

There were a couple of other shrines that I wanted to visit, but it felt like 45ºC and it was just too hot to walk to them – besides the stairs left me exhausted. So I headed back to the station. I did not manage to make a seat reservation, so I had to stand the 90 minutes back to Osaka [大阪]. That was not fun. Once I was in Osaka I took a stroll in Tennoji shopping centre because I wanted a long summer-jacket, preferably in black lace. I was not lucky.

I had dinner and a shower at the hotel, and then I walked past Shinsekai [新世界] and Tsūtenkaku [通天閣] to see Shitennoji [四天王寺] at night. I was closely observed by some cats which roamed the altars and were very offended I was not bringing them any food.

Walked distance: 22995 steps, 16.4 km

18th & 19th May 2019: Madrid (Spain) for Jupiter (and fesFE[M]!)

Posted on by

The weekend started extremely early on Saturday, when I took the first bus out to Madrid, and I think I was there around 7:30 to meet my friend C*****. She had been having a rough time and she had asked me to “keep her head off things”. Up until a couple of days before, we did not even know whether she would be able to come to the concert, so I had a whole plan up my sleeve. Unfortunately, a couple of steps backfired slightly. The main event – which we had been planned since the previous December – was Jupiter’s concert for the ZEUS Europe Tour on Sunday the 19th, but we made a whole weekend out of it. I was not actively following Jupiter at the time of the announcement, but C***** and I decided to attend because Madrid is easy and convenient, well-communicated and an opportunity to spend a weekend decompressing somewhere. As the time drew near and we could access more material, the excitement built up – I also managed to find the album they were promoting and it sounded really well, actually.

Her bus arrived earlier on Saturday than mine, and when we met, we decided to have breakfast at the coach station, to catch up and to give shops and so on the time to open up. When it was a reasonable time, we took the underground to drop our luggage at the hotel – the lovely EXE Moncloa. I had selected it because it was near the concert venue, and I hoped that we could hang out the terrace and the swimming pool, which unfortunately did not open until June. After getting rid of the luggage, we rode the underground towards the neighbourhood of Chueca, where I had looked up a bunch of Goth apparel shop which were right up her alley and… did not open at 10:00 as the internet said, but at 12:00.

Fortunately, other shops were already open and we were able to pass the time amicably. We were actually close to the Telefonica building, so I suggested we headed up there for the TeamLab exhibit, which I had already seen, and I thought she might like the digital art.

Teamlab logo and digital art: Waves, butterflies in red and green, and a dripping circle as if it were painted with a brush. All of them are light or bright colours on black.

Afterwards, we moved onto Callao Gourmet Experience for a snack. I wanted to introduce C***** to the Niji Mochi shop, and we also shared a chocolate ice-cream shake.

Mochi and coffee with whipped cream

Afterwards, we were shopping for a little longer before we moved on to have lunch. I had a surprise for her. While I care little to nothing about Korean food, she is a fan of everything Korean. Thus, we hit one of the best Korean restaurants in Madrid, called Seoul. I gave her free reign to order for both of us and we shared, though being honest, the only thing I enjoyed was the green tea at the end.

Lunch: fried dumplings, roasted meat, rice with vegetables, and green tea.

After lunch, we went on and found an underground station. We rode towards the Museo Arqueológico Nacional, National Archaeological Museum, although we had not realised that it was museum day so instead of a quiet exhibition I was used to, we had to deal with a ton of families! On the bright side, it was free, though. The museum, which shares a building with the national library Biblioteca Nacional, was founded in 1867, at a time when creating national museums had become popular among European governments. It was the start of the development of archaeology in Spain. I remembered it from the time I was a kid, dark and with wooden floors, but it was recently renovated with wide spaces and modern interiors.

Exhibits at the archaeological museum: bones from a mastodon, boar statue, lady statue, Neanderthal skull, Roman mosaic of an octopus, Horus statue, Iberian stelae, primitive animal that looks like a boar or a bull carved out of stone, Grecian vase

C***** was tired from spending all night in the bus, so we left the museum and headed back to the hotel to finish our check in process and then catch a break. On the way, we stopped and bought a few snacks for the following day because you always have to be ready for a post-concert low.

We had to look for a place to have dinner, and I found a few interesting places. There were not one, but three Japanese restaurants in the area where we were staying. One of them required queueing and sounded quite self-important, so we were left with two options. We decided to try one in the evening and the next for lunch the following day. Thus, I booked a table at the nearby Naniwa. We had some decent sushi, chicken, and takoyaki… then ordered takoyaki seconds because we had a discount (and I was hungry because I barely picked on lunch).

Dinner: sushi, fried chicken, octopus balls, chicken skewers

The next morning, we headed to the venue Sala Copérnico door around 9:00 and upon seeing nobody queueing yet, we went to have breakfast at a nearby café. Then, we walked around the Moncloa park area, mostly chatting, until we went back to the venue – no queue. And later went back to the venue – no queue. And afterwards, we went back to the venue again, just to find there were still no people in the queue.

Coffee and bread breakfast

In the end we ran into the supporting bands went to have lunch to the second Japanese restaurant in the block, Morikaen. It was around 13:30 as we were heading there, and I said something along the lines of “I feel sorry that they’ll arrive and there’s nobody here to greet them”, and as we turned the corner we almost literally ran into the whole crew coming out of the bus. Talk about timing. They looked tired so we just walked by, but we were rather sure that we had been noticed. On our way to the restaurant, we walked past a family all clad in “Sunday church clothes”, and their small girl wearing aaaall white just stared at us – in rock-goth black clothing – with pure envy in her eyes. Here’s to you, little one. You’ll get there too.

Lunch was all right – tuna tataki, tonkatsu, takoyaki. A bit more expensive than the previous day’s dinner, but we also ordered higher-class ingredients and more complicated dishes.

Lunch. Tuna tataki, rice and chicken, breaded pork, octopus dumplings

Jupiter is a Japanese band who define themselves as “melodic metal band”. It could be said that it is a visual kei symphonic power metal, which means they combine a very particular image (or a bunch of images, the most iconic being Hizaki’s Baroque-inspired dresses) with a subgenre of metal that combines hard drumming, metal guitars, and elements of classical music. On the 22th November 2018, Jupiter announced their new album, a Japanese Tour, and a European Tour, ZEUS Europe Tour. Bassist Rucy left between the announcement and the album release due to creative differences, and I really thought they would cancel the tours, but luckily everything went ahead. The remaining members – guitars Hizaki and Teru, current vocal Kuze, and drummer Daisuke were joined by support bassist Shoyo.

Schedule for the tour

There were two promoters involved for this concert. The local promoter, which in Spain was Madness Live, sold general admission tickets – they have a clean and neat webpage and buying from them is easy; I got ours on the 12th of December. The other, Editions Hikari, was in charge of coordination of the European tour, general information, and ticket upgrades. I think they are one of the worst organisers I have ever come across.

Hikari announced those upgrades in January. There would be VIP experiences, on sale on the 14th of February. Besides that there would be two kinds of upgrades, there was no real information about them until a few days before the sale. The best tickets were called “Venus Premium” (40€ face value + 5€ reservation costs) included autographs + handshake + backstage access before or after the show or soundcheck access (if possible) + photo with 1 member taken by a professional photographer (sent by e-mail later after the tour) + priority access to the merchandise, and there were five per show. The “Venus” upgrade (25€ VIP + 3€ reservation costs) comprised autographs + handshake + priority to the merchandise, there were 20 available per show. Getting the tickets was chaotic, but in the end, C***** managed to buy the two Venus Premium tickets we wanted – luckily. A lot of people did not even find out about the option to upgrade. In the end, the backstage pass / soundcheck was not available for any concert in the tour, and the priority access to the merchandise was impossible in Madrid due to the two independent promoters. Either of the VIP upgrades granted the option to buy an “Instax” (Polarid) photograph with the whole band at extra cost.

Hikari’s Facebook instructions were that Venus and Venus Premium ticket holders had to go to the merch booth – to which they supposedly had priority access – at the beginning of the concert. However, as the access to the actual venue was controlled by the local promoter ticket, there was no way they would access the merch booth with any kind of priority unless the managed to somehow skip the queue. Any kind of communication with Hikari was impossible as “they could not check emails, Facebook messaging, nor reply to comments.” However, they still made posts, and that is how we found that the CDs which Jupiter brought to sell at the merchandise booth were confiscated by customs’ officers before the first concert!

On the 10th of May, we received an email form the local promoter, Madness Live, informing us that the door timing had been changed and they were nice enough to send us the following schedule: Doors at 19:00, VII ARC (German support band) at 19:15; fesFE[M] (Japanese support group) at 20:20; Jupiter at 21:30. There was no information on the upgrades, because they had no clue about those, as Hikari was in charge. The day of the concert thus arrived and we had no actual about that, except for rumours and comments of what had happened in previous concerts. That was why, even if there was no queue, we had decided to stick around Sala Copérnico instead of heading into the city centre.

Eventually, after lunch, I decided that I was too tired to keep going up and down the streets, so around 16:00 we settled at the venue doors until they opened so we could get into the chaos that was the concert. At 16:30, other people arrived, so we got talking – that was how we found out that many people had never even heard about the upgrades. Doors opened around 19:00 – without any kind of priority access to the merchandise, nor separating VIPs and GA. C***** and I decided to divide and conquer – she went to secure a spot on the first row, while myself checked in at the merch booth to get the Instax tickets with the whole band.

That is when I saw the lousy, half sheet of paper taped there saying “Venus and Venus Premium ticket holders, gather at the merchandise booth at 20:00”. That placed the “Venus experience” in the middle of the support act, which meant either having very good friends who saved you the first row spot, or sacrificing it. We decided to give the place up and find somewhere more convenient so we could move about. Without holding spots for the VIPs, this was totally unacceptable in my opinion, especially since there had been no early entry, or priority merchandise. A bunch of people who did not want to buy anything missed out on what they had paid for.

The first support band was VII ARC. They were okay, a bit of stereotypical German heavy metal. I can see how they might appeal to the general metalhead crowd, but it feels that they were chosen because “they dress up sometimes”, and Hikari thought they would fit. It is formed by Kay (vocals), Fū (lead guitar), Bena (guitar, screaming), Grazel (Bass) and Z’ev (drums), and they could probably fit a bit on the “visual” style, but they did not bring any distinctive gear.

VII Arc playing in Madrid

At 20:00, as fesFE[M] prepared to take the stage, the Venus Premium and Venus ticket holders gathered around the merch booth and we were ushered past a barrier, towards the bar. There, we had to wait for about 10 minutes while the second support act started. A Japanese staff lady with little to no English came to “check” the Premium tickets and “sort of explain” to us the whole thing. First the Venus Premium would be shown backstage one by one for the one-on-one photograph – there were four of us, we never knew if the fifth was never sold, they did not come, or they missed the whole experience. Afterwards, we would come out again and joined the regular Venus for the autographs and handshake, then the Polaroid would be taken for the ones who had bought it. We were ushered past a curtain and the backstage door towards the mess room where the remains of the lunch buffet were.

As I entered, I caught sight of Shoyo, the support bassist, who was sitting down on a low mattress in a room to the left, looking bored. I greeted him in Japanese, and he greeted back. C***** turned to see whom I was talking to and her eyes were wide. I asked Shoyo if he felt lonely, he said a little. Another attendee who also spoke Japanese asked for a picture (beating me to it, actually) but he said he was not allowed.

The conversation died out when it was time to go into the private band area for my picture with one of the members. As I walked in, there was Kuze to my left, Daisuke to my right and Teru and Hizaki in front of me, Teru dead centre and Hizaki a little to the right. I was asked whom I wanted my picture with and chose Teru, as I had long ago decided that I would if I could. He smiled and posed with me, then he shook my hand. I have got to learn to look into Japanese musician’s eyes when I talk to them.

We said good-bye to Shoyo on the way out, and almost left, but it was now time for autographs, handshakes and Instax. I pulled out the CDs I had brought for C***** and myself, and I got to shake hands with all four of them and receive the band’s autographs. Since the CDs the band brought had been seized, we might have very well been the only ones in the whole country that produced some official material for signing. Then, we took the Instax and the staff would ask with a thumbs up sign “okay?” to check the picture was good, before we left.

CDs signed by Jupiter members

All in all, the band was very friendly and amazing, but the timing and organisation was horrid. We lost out first row – despite having “priority access”, and we missed half of the fesFE[M] concert. As Copérnico has two levels though, we found a nice spot at the stairs that connect both, and I could lean against the handrail to watch the rest of the act.

fesFE[M] is a relatively new visual kei band where all the members take up “doll” personas. Their career in 2017 and released their first mini-album in May 2019, just in time to come over to Europe for Jupiter’s tour. For each album / season, the band dons a doll theme, and they were currently on the “horror genre” dolls. The members and their doll types are: Lion [リオン], vocal, Distress Coppelia doll (from the namesake ballet, dressed as a bloody bride); Aito [アイト], guitar, Apathetic Prince doll; Zeno P [ゼノP], guitar, Bloodthirsty Child Killer doll; Toru [徹], bass, Emotional Princess doll; Rensa [蓮沙], drums, Psycho Butler doll; and Jun, keyboards, Scalded Dollmaster doll (dressed as a nun because… reasons?).

The first time I heard a song by fesFE[M], I was not extremely impressed – the PV was a bit too creepy. However, they are really good in person, even with the bad sound quality and reverberation in the venue – and the fact that we missed about half of their act. They were really engaging. The whole visual part was amazing, and the coordination was great! Their music was much more powerful live. The band played some songs from their mini-album enseMble autoMata: Doll in blueberry jam [Doll in ブルーベリィジャム], Arachne ni haitoku wo [アラクネに背徳を], Psychological stolen heart, and Freiya [フレイヤ].

Fesfem live in Madrid

The Jupiter concert was as expected, very energetic and fun – it actually went beyond expectations. Our spot was really good in he end, a bit raised, without getting pushed, and we actually watched the concert next to fesFe[M]’s bass Toru. Sometimes he smiled and waved at us, and we waved back without fail.

Kuze, Jupiter’s vocalist held his ground better than I thought he would be able to. I was kind of impressed when I listened to the Jupiter single Theory of Evolution and later to the album Zeus: Legends never die. While we were expecting the guitar and metal power, Kuze’s voice range in the recording was rather wild, and I did not think that he would be able to keep it up live, especially on a final concert after touring both Japan and Europe. He proved me wring, and he held all his notes and his vocal range, just like the recording. He had practised his English a lot and learnt the MCs, but he switched to Japanese quite often, and he spoke too fast for me to get! He did a great job even with songs that had been released in the previous vocalist’s time.

Daisuke was pretty much hidden by his own drums from where we were, but we did see him bounce a couple of times. Hizaki was on the other side of the stage from us, and he looked divine in his Baroque dress. I don’t understand how he can even move in those clothes, much less play guitar or crouch, which he did so a few times in order to interact to first-row fans. A couple of times I did fear for his safety as someone grabbed either him or the guitar. Most of the songs that were played were his. It’s fun to imagine what he would be thinking when writing “die, die, die, go fuck yourself”, when he presents as such a beautiful and innocent lady, but it surely was fun to yell.

And finally, Teru had a blast. He kept twirling around as he played, his stud-leather coat swirling around him. He played with a huge smile on his face all the time and he gave off the vibes that he was having a lot of fun. He also interacted with fans a lot.

Jupiter Live in Madrid

Setlist:

  1. Arcadia
  2. Last Moment
  3. Angel’s wings
  4. Drastic Night
  5. Bring me out
  6. Show Must Go On
  7. No cry no more
  8. The spirit within me
  9. Tears Of The Sun
  10. Memories of you
  11. B.L.A.S.T
  12. Blessing of the Future
  13. Zeus: I. Legends Never Die / II. Conversations with God
  14. Symmetry Breaking [Encore 1]
  15. Theory of Evolution [Encore 2]

While the concerts were a lot of fun, the whole event was stressful due to the abysmal organisation. I actually feel a bit ripped off, because they did not deliver a lot of what they had sold in the upgrades. At least C***** and I are lucky enough that we managed to get our pictures, autographs, and saw the concert from a relatively good place. All in all, Jupiter are amazing, they were super nice, and so were the guys from fesFE[M]. The concert was great, and we don’t regret going for a second.

After the event, waved at Toru for what we thought was the last time. When lights went on, we also saw Rensa, who stopped for us when we told him he had done a good job. C***** and I decided to pool our money together to buy the CDs fesFe[M] had brought – and not got seized. Apparently, it is typical that the entry-level bands hang around merchandise booths after concerts, and we were lucky enough that they agreed to sign the CDs and take a photo with us. Lion was extremely surprised and nice – or acted so. He complimented me on my poor attempt of Japanese and complied with what we requested.

CD signed by Fesfem members

Finally, C***** and I headed back to the hotel, and we went home the next day – fortunately we left from the same bus station so we could maximise our time together.

Hikari took a few days to send out the VIP pictures, but they eventually arrived on the 1st of June. Getting them was also hard, and amateurish – they wanted to put them in a Google Drive link and post that on Facebook. At least we got them to send them via email, citing European Data protection laws at them… I really, really hope to avoid this promoter in the future, but if I do, I’ll be on the lookout in order not to miss anything.

4th May 2019: Museo Naval & TeamLab in Madrid (Spain)

Posted on by

There were a couple of exhibitions in Madrid that I wanted to see, and my mother decided to tag along. We took a train and walked to the Museo Naval, the Navy museum, which was being renovated – so the permanent connection was not being shown. In the end, that turned out to be awesomely lucky because it allowed us to see the marble staircase and stained glass of the classical building, which is very rarely shown.

The exhibition that I wanted to see was related to the trips to Asia, mostly China, Japan and Philippines, and it was interesting for 3€. one of these days I would like to come back to see the whole museum when the renovations are over. It’s on the bucket list, I swear. One of these… I’m not sure, months, because I’d been saying I want to go to the Museo Naval for years.

After seeing the “Asia in the Naval Museum” exhibit and the ceiling, we walked towards the Telefónica Building. There, there was an Exhibition by TeamLab, the museum of virtual art from Tokyo! I really want to see it.

There were three exhibits:

  • Flutter of Butterflies, Born from Hands (2019), a magical wall where you can rest your hands for butterflies to come up.

  • Black Waves: Lost, Immersed and Reborn (2016), an amazing scenery of breaking waves.

  • Enso – Cold Light (2017), a self-tracing enso (perfect circle traced with one stroke in calligraphy).

I was very happy to see this, and then we walked around the “Evolution of phones” exhibition- however, I apparently have not taken pictures of that one. I think it was too nostalgic, because god did it make me feel old (≧▽≦).

Before we returned home, we had lunch at a De María restaurant – an Argentinean meat-grill where we got a glass of rose champagne to go. Another place I want to return! However, this time I did not take pictures because the atmosphere did not feel adequate to do so.

2nd January 2019: Jurassic and 19th Century Madrid (Spain)

Posted on by

I was in the middle of winter holidays and a couple of family members asked me if I had plans – I said I was getting tickets for a dinosaur exhibit in Madrid, and they jumped in. We made arrangements to head over there on the 2nd of January and spend the day in Madrid. I don’t think they really realised what it meant to be around me and the “terrible lizards” (≧▽≦). But off we went.

General entry ticket for 2nd January 2019

The Jurassic World: Exhibition was held in Madrid. The whole thing is organised in-verse, as if you actually visited the island.

Jurassic World the Exhibition logo and title

After you walk in, there is first a small introduction on the “boat” as you travel towards Isla Nublar. There you are given the instructions (mainly, keep your hands to yourself), the boat makes dock and you are let into the Park. Keeping in touch with the spirit of the films (not the book though *giggles*) there’s a Brachiosaurus there to greet you, just like the first animal you see in Isla Nublar (and later the last).

Pretencious gate with two columns on the side, reading Jurassic World. A brontosaurus head peers down at you

You also catch a glimpse of a Parasaurolophus.

The head of an herbivore dinosaur (parasaurolophus) peering through the bushes

Then you get to the “stables” where you get to see a Triceratops mama with her baby.

Mom and baby Triceratops behind a fence that reads Gentle giants petting zoo

Afterwards, there is a small room that represents the laboratory where the dinosaurs are made – I could have made it out with a critter but there were only baby Iguanodon.

Fake amber pieces and DNA extactor along with an incubator with eggs and baby dinosaurs

Next, you walk into a tiny museum with some fossil reproductions and actual scientific information…

Reproduction of carnivore dinosaurs skull and bones, along with the drawing of a huge T-rex fooot print drawn on the ground to compare it to a human one

… right before everything goes to hell and back when you’re shown a hologram of Owen Grady talking to his velociraptor Blue and you get a… guy in a velociraptor costume prancing around (≧▽≦).

Person disguised as a verlociraptor

The next room shows the Tyrannosaurus rex cage (by the way #TeamTRex here, in case you did not know) behind her cage, menacing and staring.

T-rex animatronic, showing the huge head behind a fence

The final room is another garden in which you get to see a Stegosaurus being stalked by the made-up Indominus rex.

Stegosaurus

Head of the Indominus rex, looking like it's stalking prey

And at the end of the exhibition, after the shop even, you find the velociraptors, which have apparently escaped and are ready to attack!

Jurassic world velociraptors on a wrecked crate

All in all, being the dinosaur geek I am, I had a blast. I’m not sure that my poor family members that had wanted to tag along with me knew what they were bargaining for (≧▽≦).

However, they were still willing to put up with my for a little longer, and together we drove off to the centre of Madrid, and somehow ended up at the Museo Cerralbo. They asked if there was something I wanted to see, and the Cerralbo Museum was running a couple of Japan-related specials I was curious about. The museum stands in the Palace of the same name, and it holds the collection of the late Marquis Cerralbo.

The museum is… crammed and chaotic, but interesting in its own way. It holds thousands of pieces, from worthless-looking mementos to priceless paintings by masters such as El Greco. Art experts say that the Cerralbo collection was the most valuable of its time.

Collage of cerralbo museum. A room with two samurai armous. A centrepiece made with swords. A long table, set, with chairs along and an ellaborate lamp hanging from the ceiling. The hall of the museum, with a staircase with an ellaborate balaustrade and a glass lamp hanging from the ceiling.

The museum was holding a designated route focused on the Japanese pieces it has, including samurai armours.

Collage of Asian and Japanese pieces of the museum: hars, a samurai armour, and an hexagonal carey box

Furthermore, there was an origami exhibition on the lower floor.

Origami pieces: a phoenix, a snake, an orca, corals, and a life-sized hippo

After the museum we sat down for lunch at a fusion Asian-Japanese restaurant, because the family members “wanted to try” – although they were rather scared of the food. Eventually they managed to enjoy it too, and even have seconds – however I needed to make a run to get my tablet serviced.

Lunch. Sushi, chicken skewers, rice dish and noodles dish

Once it was up and running, and family had come to find me, we walked towards the shopping centre in Principe Pío for dessert – yoghurt ice cream with berries and smarties. A great way to end the day!

An old station from iron architecture epoch repurposed into shopping centre

Frozen yoghurt with berries sauce and smarties

15th August 2018: Hikone is small and at noon it turns into a pumpkin? Hikone → Kyoto {Japan, summer 2018}

Posted on by

As I had learnt the way to the castle entrance the previous day, first thing in the morning I headed off to Hikone Castle. The walk to the castle is flanked by the Irohamatsu [いろは松], which is a row of special pine trees that were planted there as their roots grow downwards but not sideways.

Hikone castle, Hikone-jō [彦根城], is one of the twelve castles that retain the original keep and one of the five to be a national treasure. The ticket included the castle, the museum, and the Gardens. I was there when they opened so the affluence of people was not to big yet.

Being one of the important ones made two things happen – one, that you have to take your shoes off, and two, that the stairs are crazy. Good thing I was not carrying my backpack – I had left it at the hotel but they told me they could only keep it till noon for whatever reason, so it was a good thing that Hikone is not as big of a town as others. The interior structure of the castle is naked wood, and it feels quite severe.

After the castle I went to the Hikone-jō Hakubutsukan [彦根城博物館], the Castle Museum, as it started drizzling. Normally the castles have the museum inside, but this one was in a nearby tower next to the main gate.

My next destination were the Genkyuen [玄宮園], a traditional garden from where you can spot the castle.

Also within castle grounds was the Kaikoku kinen-kan [開国記念館] (officially translated as Hikone City Museum of History, but it is more as “Memorial Hall”) – unfortunately pics were not allowed except for this Lego Castle.

Finally I checked out Shigakengokoku Jinja [滋賀縣護國神社] under daylight.

I walked back to the hotel through the main street, where I saw many stone statue shops displaying their work　- including the city mascot, Hikonyan [ひこにゃん].

Finally, after picking up my luggage from the hotel I stopped by the Ii Naomasa Ritsuzō [井伊直政立像], the Statue / Monument to Ii Naomasa, who was the original builder of the castle.

I jumped on the Hikone Rapid Express, which was packed, and headed off to my next destination, Kyoto [京都]. As I was earlier than expected, I got a jump-start on sightseeing. This would later proof to be not too much of a good idea – originally I only wanted to do one temple so I did not put my luggage into a coin locker. Looking back, I should have.

I went to To-ji [東寺], a Buddhist temple whose pagoda had drawn my attention every time I had been in Kyoto before.

Then, as it was quite close, I decided to check out the aquarium, Kyoto Suizokukan [京都水族館].

Finally, I went to Daishōgun Shōten Machi Ichi-jō Yōkai Street [大将軍商店街 一条妖怪ストリート], a shopping area with a lot of yokai and yokai-like mascots. Unfortunately, most everything was closed due to the Obon festivities, which in the end made for an unrewarded extra effort. Here I was trying to pace myself and not doing a good job out of it.

On my way to Yokai street and back I saw Jinja Kitano-Jinja Otabisho [北野神社 御旅所],

Jizo-in [地蔵院 ],

and finally Daishogun Hachi Jinja [大将軍八神社].

Finally I backtracked to the station and headed off to the hotel for some rest. I made a mental list of things that were incredibly close to the hotel and I could do the following day.

14th August 2018: On the road… I mean railway again! Tokyo → Nagahama → Hikone {Japan, summer 2018}

Posted on by

One of the things I did on Saturday in Shinjuku [新宿] before the J concert was activating my JR Pass, and I had a week of travelling in store, so there I went. After getting to Shinagawa and being told that there were no seats to be reserved, I travelled to Maibara on a seat in a very-empty unreserved car (keep in mind, this was the end of the Obon festivals, and lots of people travel around these dates).

In Maibara I left the Shinkansen and jumped onto the local line that headed off to Nagahama [長浜] in Shiga Prefecture. This trip was mostly organised around my need to be in Kyoto on the 16th of August, so when I looked up things to do, Nagahama popped up for having a castle at the shore of Biwa-ko [琵琶湖], Lake Biwa, which is the largest freshwater lake in Japan.

Nagahama Tourist Office at the station provided me with a very handy map that featured a walking route to see the most important areas of the town, which I set to almost immediately.

First, of course I head to the castle, Nagahama-jō [長浜城]. Between the station and the castle there was a cage with monkeys. I did not realise that until one of them popped up staring at my lunch.

Then I walked around the surrounding park and got to the lake front. Biwa-ko is big enough to have waves.

Then I continued on the proposed route to the Nagahama Railway Square, Nagahama Tetsudo Square [長浜鉄道スクエア], and the Railway Museum.

In front of that there was the Keiunkan [慶雲館], a beautiful traditional house and garden.

Then, after deciding to modify the walking route to fit my interests, I headed out to the town centre to find Nagahama Betsuin Daitsū-ji [大通寺], the biggest temple in town (with confusing indications). To get here I passed by the central commercial streets.

Afterwards I decided to go to Hokoku Jinja [豊国神社].

And before heading to the station, the Kaiyodo Figure Museum [海洋堂フィギュアミュージアム] had really caught my attention so I decided to come in.

On my way back to the station I saw the Hideyoshi to Mitsunari deai no zō [秀吉と佐吉 出会いの像], the Statue of (Toyotomi) Hideyoshi and (Ishida), important historical figures in the area.

Finally there was the Aqua Tree before I took the train to go to my next destination, Hikone [彦根].

Hikone is twenty minutes by train using via Maibara, so I basically backtracked to Maibara and continued in the opposite direction. At Maibara our train joined another one so it became twice as long in a very interesting process.

Once I arrived in Hikone, I found my hotel and I checked in. However, having heard that sunset at Biwa-ko was really beautiful, I decided to sprint for 35 minutes, and headed off to the lake, racing the sun. I managed to see a beautiful dusk indeed, even if coming back to the hotel was a bit lonely once the lights were out. I had no idea. Yet.

Then I diverted towards Hikone-jō, Hikone-jō [彦根城] to try and catch a glimpse of it at night. Everything was locked down, so this is the best I got, and that’s a lot of zoom.

Finally, just before turning in I walked by Shigakengokoku Jinja [滋賀縣護國神社] and the Mitama Matsuri it was holding.

28th July – 3rd ‎August ‎2018: The Spanish “Levante”

Posted on by

My parents sometimes vacation in this tourist-like complex in a little town called San Juan de Alicante in the east of Spain (the “Levante”). My father uses it as a base for diving trips, and sometimes I tag along to keep my mother company. When we arrived this year we found out that there was a new resident family in the garden – a family of squirrels that had apparently shown up travelling in trees that were going to be planted. The complex management decided to make squirrel-nurturing the local sport. Guests were encouraged to watch out for them, and leave them nuts. Also, there were educational signs about what was safe or unsafe to feed the little critters. I caught sight of them at some point or another.

One of the selling points of the complex – aside, of course, from the swimming pool and the great room service – are the big gardens, with lots of trees and plants, and the rescue bunnies. Now the squirrels came over to complete the scene.

Collage. A hotel room. Red flowers. A garden. A tiny rabbit. A tree and a close-up of that tree focusing on the squirrel on one of the branches.

31st July 2018: Chocolate & Lobster. Not together.

A meagre 20-minute-drive away from this little town stands the village of Villajoyosa, which translates into something akin to “The joyous village”. If you’ve never heard of it, I’ll just have you known that it has a chocolate factory, the Fábrica de Chocolates Valor, and the chocolate museum (and of course the shop). As it is a working factory, the visit is of course guided. We were told that there was usually a long queue, so we were there before 9:30 for the 10:00 visit, and we were quite literally the first to arrive. Once inside, you get to see what they call the museum, with a short video about how they used to and still make the chocolate, and you visit some of the old equipment. Then, there is a short trip around the factory using some hanging planks – when we were there, the production was halted due to pre-Christmas-campaign holidays. So FYI Christmas chocolate is made in August. The visit was done in one hour, and then we splurged in the shop.

Chocolate factory from outside

Inside the chocolate factory shop. A painting on the wall says we heart chocolate, another, in the backfround of several chocolate bars packaged as presents, it says All you need is chocolate, with the word love scratched out

After the visit we went back to the complex, where we had booked a made-to-order lobster “paella” (traditional rice dish) for lunch, and boy was it awesome. I totally sinned with the apple pie afterwards, too.

Collage. Rice pan with lobster pieces, and a piece of apple pie

1st August 2018: Alicante

The day started awesomely with coffee and pancakes, and that alone worked to make me happy.

Pancakes with chocolate syprup, a glass of milk, and a cup of coffee

Besides, twenty minutes in the opposite direction from Villajoyosa we had Alicante. And we could also be lazy and not take the car out, we could just take the bus. We wanted to see the archaeological museum, Museo Arqueológico Provincial MARQ de Alicante, and that was out first stop. However, for some reason a bunch of pictures got lost – and I can only show you this of the library, where pictures were not allowed anyway. It was a… photography accident.

A former chapel, with gothic windows. A glass lamp hangs from the ceiling and there are dark shelves full of books in the foreground

After the museum, we walked around the base of Monte Benacantil, the mount in the middle of Alicante – again, literally – until we were exactly on the opposite side to find the entrance to the Castillo de Santa Bárbara, Santa Bárbara’s castle. The castle is of Arab origin, it may have been built the 8th century. However, there are archaeological remains in the mount dating from prehistoric times. The castle gave the city of Alicante a vantage point towards any kind of threat, whether it originated on land or the ocean. The castle was reconstructed in the 16th century, and later, in the 18th century, it played a part in the war against the French.

Castle ruins and views of the sea underneath. It looks hot.

After this we walked over to have lunch at a restaurant we had read over in the tourist complex magazine, a prime Japanese restaurant called Nigo, which has the best sushi I’ve ever tried outside Japan.

Lunch - Japanese salad, fried chicken, sushi and tuna tartar

After that we headed back to the complex and planned our next move.

2nd August 2018: Valencia Diversion

My father was unable to go on his two planned diving outings, so we decided to head home early. However, he was feeling a little disappointed over the cancellation, and I suggested that maybe we could take a detour somewhere else instead. In the end, we decided to book a hotel in Valencia and use the time to visit the Oceanogràfic over there. This is a large aquarium complex. We also reserved a table at the “Submarine Restaurant” and had lunch there.

The aquarium opened in 2003 as part of a big project called “the city of art and science” in Valencia. It has a double layout, over- and underground. The underground area is the big aquariums are built, while the upper enclosures hold most the mammals and the birds.

An empty restaurant surrounded by an aquarium where fish swim

Collage of different marine animals: octopus, sea urchin, anemone, clownfish, surgeon fish, rockfish, seal, jellyfish, seastar, sea dragon, turtle, reef shark

Collage of different animals, and general view of the park. Penguins, crocodiles, seal, pelicans, snipes, ibises, tortoises, carps, crane

Once we were done, we said goodbye to the sharks and hi to the nice sunset. Next morning we drove back home.

Sunset above an unremarkable city skyline

21st & 22nd July 2018: Swan Lake in Madrid (Spain)

Posted on by

21st July: The housefront

This Saturday/Sunday getaway was a birthday present, and I have to admit that I was super excited about it – the main part of the present was a hotel night in Madrid and tickets to watch the (British) Royal Ballet in the Spanish Royal theatre, the Teatro Real. And I mean stall tickets, I was over the moon.

The day started at the Museo de la Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando, where there was an exhibition about yokai, the Yumoto Koichi Collection (Miyoshi, Hiroshima). It was called Yokai: Iconografía de lo Fantástico (Iconography of the fantastical), and it was rather interesting. It holds a collection of different items related to mythological creatures of Japan, yokai [妖怪] – there are scrolls, woodprints, games, pottery, even clothes and accessories. This was an interesting exhibition, and having seen it would later save me a trip to Miyoshi, allowing me to discover Takehara instead.

Rolls of paper, kimojo jacket and blookwood painting, showing different scenes and beings from Japanese mythology

After the exhibition, we went to the Green Tea Sushi Bar & Cocktail Room, which turned out to have the most overpriced mediocre sushi ever. The place was ridiculously expensive but fortunately we had booked with a special 50% discount, which made it bearable. However, fair is fair, and the tataki was delicious, and the chocolate coulant turned out to be amazing.

Lunch. Sushi boat, sald, tuna tataki, edamame, and an ice cream scoop

The hotel was in the right smack of Madrid, a short walk away from the “royal theatre” Teatro Real and we had tickets for 17:00 – to watch Swan Lake performed by British The Royal Ballet. Before sitting down we took a small exploration walk through the different rooms, including the ball room. I really loved the whole building and in particular the blue room and the ball room.

Royal theatre snippets - the main hall, the stage, the stands. Most curtains are a rich burgundy colour.

Swan Lake happens to be my favourite ballet – I love Tchaikovsky in general, though the stars have always aligned against me watching Sleeping Beauty. In Swan Lake, the evil sorcerer Rothbart turns maidens into a swan during the day, and they turn back to women at night as long as they are near the enchanted lake. The ballet officially opens with Prince Siegfried celebrating his birthday. He receives a crossbow as present, and he is later told by his mother that he needs to choose a bride the next night. As he becomes upset his friend suggest going hunting. In the forest, Siegfried becomes separated from the group and meets Odette, one of the swans. She explains of her predicament, and they eventually fall in love, and Siegfried invites her to the ball in which he needs to choose his bride. The next night, however, Rothbart sends Odette’s magical doppelgänger, to whom Siegfried swears love. Witnessing this in swan-form breaks Odette’s heart. As he realises his mistake, Siegfried makes it back to the lake.

The ending of the ballet changes. Sometimes it is a happy one when the spell is broken. The original ending has both Siegfried and Odette dying together to break the spell. Another alternative is that only Odette dies, but Siegfried manages to kill Rothbart and break the spell – this was the one that the Royal ballet played, and it managed to make me a puddle of happy goo. As Siegfried raises Odette’s inert body over his head, I shuddered all over. It was magnificent.

Snapshot of the credits, Showing Akane Takada as Odette and Odile, William Bracewell as Prince Siegfried, and Thomas Whitehead as Rothbart

The cast after the play taking their bows.

After the performance was over, we had dinner in the Plaza Mayor and then walked towards Puerta del Sol, then back went to the hotel to catch some sleep.

Square Plaza del Sol lit by night

22nd July: The backhouse

On Sunday we went back to the Teatro Real because we had booked one of the visits they offer, the technical one. During this visit you walk through the inner areas of the theatre, and even more interestingly, the upper area.

We saw the main hall, and afterwards we went first onto the backstage, then the backstage, and finally onto the stage where the Swan Lake props still stood, so that was really cool. The visit finished climbing up to the upper area of the theatre to see the views and the theatrical rigging system.

Empty royal theatre, showing the stalls from the stage, the backstage, and the view of the cathedral and the royal palace from the upper windows.

Finally, we had a bite to eat and we headed home for the weekend, and I have to say, I was happy as a skunk.

23rd & 24th June 2018: London Express (England, Great Britain)

Posted on by

I took some family members over to London for the weekend, and they asked me to organise something so they could see a lot of things. We took the red-eye flight so we were downtown London something around 8:30. Our first visit had tickets for 10:00, so first spot was a Costa Coffee for breakfast! (≧▽≦)

Afterwards we saw the Tower Bridge over the Thames.

Then, at the right time, we walked into the Tower of London, where we wandered around visiting all the areas, including the White Tower, the dungeons, the Crown Jewels vault and the raven nests.

Once we were done, we took the underground to the British Museum for a quick visit through the most important collections, along with a few of the less known but interesting things – in the end we saw the Babylonian, Grecian, Egyptian collections, and had a glimpse at a few of the Chinese artefacts and the Hoa Hakananai’a from Easter Island.

We had lunch in-between and then went to the hotel to drop our things off. After that, we took off again and, via underground, we reached Trafalgar Square. We walked towards Piccadilly and on the way we stopped at Legoland and M&Ms shop. Then had dinner in an Angus steakhouse in Leicester square, and to end the day, we had a look at the lit Piccadilly Circus.

We got back to the hotel, and honestly, I had not realised how close to the centre we actually were until I looked out of the window.

The next morning we woke up early and headed off to have breakfast on the go – actually the weather was super nice so we got ourselves some Nero coffee and sandwiches and ate them in front of Westminster’s Abby. As it was Sunday we could not visit the Abby, but we saw the scaffolded Big-Ben, and walked around the Houses of Parliament.

We went to visit the Monument to Emmeline Pankhurst because the youngest person in the group needed to be told about a period in history in which she would not have been as free as she is today.

After that, we crossed over the Thames, then moved on to the London Eye. Half of the group wanting to go up, the other half being not fans of heights, we divided and conquered – two of us went to the London Aquarium while the other three enjoyed their VIP ride in the London Eye. I know you are not surprised I picked the side with the sharks instead of going up.

This guy judged us, very hard:

After our riverbank separation, we regrouped and headed off towards the Natural History Museum where we first saw the Butterfly carp that was installed outside it – they were extremely pretty and beyond friendly, because we were landed on quite often.

When we had finished the walk, we stepped into the Natural History Museum itself to wander through the dinosaur area for a bit, and then around the animal collection.

We decided to head out to the restaurant to have a bite to eat, and as we were walking through the marine invertebrate area (the room with all the crabs and so on), there was a nice lady showing items. And that’s how I ended up holding a megalodon tooth and fanbying like there was no tomorrow. Don’t judge me. Or do so, I don’t care ☆⌒(ゝ。∂)

As they walked into the insect / general creepy-crawler gallery, I walked around the gallery that held “less impressive” fossils, including the ones discovered by Anne Manning. We had lunch in the NHM, then moved on.

A short underground ride later, we were at St James’s Park, where we took a bit of a walk towards Buckingham Palace. As the weather was nice, we got to see a lot of the local fauna, even the local swans.

We hung around for a while as we saw Buckingham Palace, then headed off back towards the airport. Although we had a couple-of-hours delay, we made it home without further complication.

9th & 10th June 2018: Wicked London (England, Great Britain)

Posted on by

This will be the last work-trip, at least for a while. I might change my mind later, but for now I’m done with them (although there’s an upcoming family trip rather soon…). Again, we flew in early Saturday morning, and we went to walk around the Tower of London and the Tower Bridge.

Then we went to the British Museum. I left them for a couple of hours there and I went to visit some of the lesser-seen galleries.

We had booked tickets for the musical “Wicked” in the Apollo Victoria Theatre at 14:30, so we headed over there. Wicked is a parallel story to “The Wizard of Oz”, focusing on the story of the Wicked Witch of the West, who becomes a social outcast due to her tendency to speak her mind and the strength of her magic. I had really wanted to watch this for a long time, so I used this chance and convinced the group to get there. I absolutely loved it ♥.

After the show, we dropped our things at the hotel. The group wanted to get some rest, so we stayed there for a while, then got out again. We took the underground towards London central and we were in Trafalgar Square for a while.

Then, we went to Chinatown for dinner.

Later, we walked around Piccadilly Circus, checking out some shops and so. We even stopped for cake.

On Sunday morning we went to Saint James’s Park, where we got to meet the local fauna, especially a very adventurous squirrel.

Then we dropped by Buckingham Palace. Although we did not watch the Guard Change, we did see one of the relief marches.

We walked from there to Westminster, saw the Houses of Parliament and the Big Ben, along the outside of Westminster Abby.

We visited the Monument to Emmeline Pankhurst and stayed for a while in the Victoria Tower Gardens.

As a final visit, we went to the Natural History Museum.

Finally, we headed off to the airport, and the icing of the cake was that we got caught in a controllers’ strike, so we had like a three-hour delay on our flight and it took forever to get home (;¬_¬). All in all, this was a very… strange trip, and without a doubt the highlight was going to see Wicked, which is something I had wanted to do for a long time, and gave me a couple of hours of enjoyment to myself.

21st & 22nd April 2018: MIYAVI & London (England, Great Britain)

Posted on by

On Saturday the 21st I caught a red-eye flight and I landed in London Stansted around 7:00. After clearing security (aka a security guard very interested on WHY I was there and WHOSE was the concert again?) I got myself on the train and headed off directly towards ULU London to attend MIYAVI’s “DAY 2” World Tour in Europe 2018. I spent the whole day at the queue / venue, so I tell you much of what I did, except that I was an idiot and did not really eat much solid food, if at all. A cookie, I seem to remember, and a cereal bar, which in the end caused a bad stomachache. Lesson learnt. Also! Heatwave in London. How do I manage to always catch the heatwaves in London?

MIYAVI is a Japanese guitarists I’ve listened on and off for a while. I lost a bit of track of him when he got married and had a baby, but every excuse is good for a little getaway. And I have to say that he blew my mind.

I set off at around 4am on Saturday and arrived in the queue around 10 am. The line was incredibly well organised, and the venue staff was super-friendly and efficient (which is a welcome change from most). Often, when an artist comes in, you can hope for a wave, maybe an autograph or sneak up a picture – not with this man, who goes out of the way to shake your hand and thank you for coming.

Well, I did have a VIP ticket that included a handshake and a picture, so I got two handshakes out of him! The concert itself was fantastic, fast-paced and MIYAVI is a guitar master. He was supported by a number of musicians and singers and they all were bustling with energy.

MIYAVI's instagram story reading well done London you guys were hot tonight

Before heading to the airport, the following morning I headed off to the British Museum, which was halfway between the venue and the hotel. I spent a couple of hours there, mostly in the Korea and China areas. There I fell in love with the Bodhisattva Guanyin.

Collage. British museum façcade and some exhibit from the Asia ward - Shiva, Buddha, a green-faced priest, dragon, a Korean dress... The main piece is Guanyin, sitting with a knee up, their hand resting on the knee, the other leg hanging down

From the British Museum I directly went to the airport, and I grabbed some food at Itsu, which is not my favourite Japanese brand due to the price, but my stomach was acting up (my own fault though (≧▽≦)) and I needed something to appease it. So sushi, miso soup and Coke it was.

Sushi and miso soup

11th & 12th June 2017: Highlights of London (England, Great Britain)

Posted on by

As part of my day job, I took a group of customers on a trip to London. Not the best decision in my life, but one that I would repeat a couple of times before I had enough. This was a short getaway – we took off on a red-eye flight on Saturday and we came back on Sunday evening.

Our first stop was The Tower of London, officially called “Her Majesty’s Royal Palace and Fortress of the Tower of London”. The main Tower, “White Tower”, was built in the 11th century, and additions to it were made up to the 1400s. It was designated Unesco World Heritage Site in 1998. The Tower holds an armoury, some treasure, documentation offices, a few shops and the Crown Jewels of England. And, according to the legend, quite a few ghosts.

After the Tower, we took a moment to see the Tower Bridge.

We had a hotel basically at the end of the world, and we decided to go to drop our things off before we continued on the visit. We saw the Wellington Arc in Hyde Park on the way to the royal palace.

Then we fooled around Buckingham Palace.

Finally we went to Chinatown to have dinner…

… and rounded up the day at Piccadilly Circus.

The next morning we headed off to the British Museum. We had breakfast outside because of course it was one of those times when it’s all warm in London. Waffles = ♥

The British Museum was established in 1753, and opened to the public, in its current location, in 1759. It focuses on human history and art, having branched the natural history items to the Museum of Natural History and all the documentation to the British Library. The museum holds the awe-inducing number of 150 million of artefacts from dozens of cultures of the world, both ancient and modern, with amazing Grecian and Egyptian collections (albeit having disputed ownership…)

Inside the British Museum we separated. I left them to have a walk around the most important areas and I walked into my favourite spots (although the Japanese galleries were still closed. I also got a ticket to see the Hokusai – beyond the Great Wave exhibition, which presents a number of Hokusai’s works organised in series or topics. One is waves, and it shows how Hokusai experimented with textures, shapes, swirls and foam until he found the “perfect” wave – his most famous work, the Great Wave. There is a series on people, another one on mythology, and another one on himself and his family.

After I was done and we had met up again, I helped them found some stuff that they had not seen but still wanted to. Then, we headed off to the Westminster area to see the Big Ben, and although there was some scaffolding already visible, we managed to see the whole thing.

Finally, we headed off to the airport to get back home.

6th & 7th May 2017: Cuenca (Spain)

Posted on by

If I ever go missing, especially with my car, don’t go around looking for me in Cuenca . I would have a nervous breakdown trying to drive through the streets and slopes. I’m not sure what time we arrived, maybe mid-morning. We had a reservation to have lunch at the Parador. However, to get there we had to drive up a horrible, horrible hill with a terrible paving and park too close to the cliff so #no.

Cuenca is considered a World Heritage City. It has a classical, mostly Medieval area, and a normal / standard area surrounding that. The inner cluster is virtually carless as the streets are narrow and steep. It is perched on the Huécar Gorge and as you can see, a vertical rock wall.

We had some time before we had to go for lunch, so the first thing we did was go have a look at the Casas Colgadas, the hanging houses that overlook the Huécar Gorge. Inside there is a contemporary art museum that I visited once already so there was no incentive to look again – you know, the kind of abstract art that showcases a plus-symbol and you’re supposed to interpret.

We had lunch at the Parador de Cuenca. A Parador is a high-end state-owned hotel usually with a good restaurant. More often than not, a Parador is located in a renovated historical building. This one is a former monastery, and the restaurant is located, if I remember correctly, where the original dining room would have been.

Main dishes were forgettable (and not photogenic) but the curd or “cuajada” for dessert was to die for – and it came with a lot of extra goodies.

In order to get to the town centre you have to cross the scary, scary bridge aka the Puente de San Pablo, St Paul’s Bridge, over the gorge, but I survived – without a freak-out (≧▽≦) and you might be aware that I am not a fan of heights.

We had lunch, then moved (over the scary scary bridge) on to see the Museo de las Ciencias de Castilla la Mancha, the Science Museum of Castilla La Mancha – unfortunately the dinosaur area was closed, so we “only” got to see the super steampunk clock and the energy wards, and the tornado simulator, along to some kind of reproduction of the International Space Station.

After the museum we walked a little around the town. We went to the cathedral, Catedral de Santa María y San Julián de Cuenca, but it was closed due to some religious service or another. I mean… that’s its main purpose I guess? (≧▽≦)

Then we found the Torre de Mangana, Mangana Tower, a clock tower dating from the Sixteenth Century. From underneath the tower there is quite an impressive sight of the area surrounding the city.

We went back to the car and we had a drive around the city. Cuenca is located in the middle of a karst area. Karst is a type of landscape formed by the dissolution of soluble rocks e.g. limestone or gypsum. You can see how the rock seems to be “molten” among all the pines.

We reached the Castillo and Murallas (castle and walls) on the other side of town but we had to drive back due to the streets being cut for the same religious event we had run into before.

Thus, on our way back, we drove at the bottom of the Huécar Gorge and headed back to the hotel.

This was about six or seven in the evening, and we did not go out again because we were way outside town. We had dinner in the hotel and called it a day eventually. I ordered the kids’ menu because everything else was too fancy and abundant.

The next morning we woke up early to visit the Ciudad Encantada / Enchanted City. This is another karst topography which has somehow become very famous. Some of the rocks have interesting forms, and have been given names. It is a sort of geological park formed by rain falling on the rocks and dissolving them for millions of years. The original rocks were a mix of of limestone and dolomite in different proportions, which ended up dissolving in different shapes.

After walking around for a couple of hours we went on our return trip.

16th September 2016: Some Madrid (Spain) Museums

Posted on by

I woke up one morning, a silly weekday that I did not have to work for some reason and I decided to wander off and take a day trip to Madrid to see some museums, just because I could.

My first stop was the Museo Nacional de Ciencias Naturales, the museum of natural science. The museum is divided into several buildings. The first building holds the “Biodiversity” collection. This includes preserved specimens – in better or worse shape, mostly stuffed, and some skeletons.

Then I walked over to the palaeontology and mineral museum, where at the moment most of the collection is composed of replica, sometimes it feels that you see the same diplodocus or arsinoitherium (two-horned rhino) skull everywhere. Of course, however, I hunted down every megalodon tooth on site and sight.

After this, I walked around the mineral collection and walked down Castellana Avenue until Colón Square, where I had lunch somewhere before I walked around to see the Museo Arqueológico Nacional – National Archaeological Museum. There were a few things that interested me there.

My first goal was to study the Iberian stelæ . Nobody really knows what they are or what their meaning is, but it is thought that they were funerary monuments, maybe of fallen warriors.

An interesting thing to see in this museum is the sculpture of La Dama de Elche, the Lady of Elche, the limestone bust of an Iberian lady dated back to the 4th century BC. It is supposed to be a woman who belonged to the aristocracy that was later revered as a goddess, or maybe a reinterpretation of the Goddess Tanit of Cathage. The back part has an opening, which suggests that it could have been a funerary urn. It was originally polychromated, but it has lost its colours. I really like her expression, and probably due to the Hellenistic influence. I have a thing for Greek sculpture, after all.

A second “lady”, the Dama de Baza (Lady of Baza), stands next to the first. This one still keeps some of its colours. This one is full-body, also carved out of limestone, and it traces back to the fourth century too. This lady seems to have been designed in pure Iberian style, without Hellenistic influences.

The last key pieces of Iberian sculpture in this museum are the verracos – sort-of headless boars, pigs or bulls (depending on the interpretation), but it is commonly accepted that they are symbols of protection of cattle routes. Most of them are… visibly male.

Once I had seen what I really wanted to see I wandered over the rest of the museum, stumbling upon the currency exhibition, which was strangely interesting.

I walked past the Medieval rooms and then I found the Egyptian area, which is humble, but has some interesting things like the X-rays of a mummified falcon. Finally, I checked out the classical Greek area before calling it a day and making it back home.

28th July 2016: Ueno + VAMPS Replay {Japan, summer 2016}

Posted on by

As the time to leave drew near, I felt a bit sad this morning (T^T). However, I did not let myself be dragged by it, so I forced myself out of the apartment to do things, and these things involved Ueno Kōen [野公園].

First I headed off to Ueno Tōshō-gū [上野東照宮], which I had not found open last year when I was there, because there was a matsuri, or something, I don’t really remember. Then I found out about the two dragons, the ascending dragon and the descending dragon, who come to drink at the pond at night. It is a very nice imaginary. Also, the shrine is really cool. It has a bit of a Chinese style, and is decorated with a gold layer. The inner fence shows animals of the sea and the wind, making it a unique shrine. I really liked it a lot.

The main building of a Shinto shrine, sparkling golden with a dark ceiling

Wooden painted carving of dragons, one going up, one going down

Then I found the Ueno Daibutsu [上野大仏], the Great Buddha Pagoda, which I had missed before – one of the things I love about Ueno is that whenever I go I find something new, yay. Most of the Ueno Daibutsu was melted for metal during WWII.

A giant Buddha face made of metal in a ceremonial pagoda

Gojoten Jinja [五條天神社] is really cool too, but I decided to leave getting its seal for another time. Next time.

A row of torii gates

I walked by Shinobazu no Ike [不忍池], the Pond in Ueno.

A pond covered in water lilly leaves, with some high rises in the background

Finally, I went to the museum of Shitamachi of Customs, Shitamachi Fūzoku Shiryōkan [下町風俗資料館], where they keep some old houses from the years after the great Kanto Earthquake. A bunch (hundreds) of houses were built there to make sure that the population was housed. The museum shows how life was those few first years, and how people lived and organised themselves. There are a few items, houses, photographies and so. The second floor is hands-on, with games and pastimes and so. There was a very nice guide there and she explained a lot of things to me.

Reproduction of pre-industrial wooden houses in Tokyo

Later I went to class (I found another Gyoza Franchise on my way back to the station) and then I skidded out because I had to get to Yoyogi National Stadium, Kokuritsu Yoyogi Kyogijo [国立 代々木 競技場], in Yoyogi [代々木]. I was attending the Sukkiri Superlive in order to see VAMPS one more time before heading off back home. All in all, a very complete day that ended up with a bang – when I should have been studying Japanese to be honest ^^;;

The Yoyogi national stadium, and a screen reading Sukkuri 10th Anniversary Super Live

9th July 2016: Rainy season is rainy {Japan, summer 2016}

Posted on by

Because yes, we’re in rainy season, and in rainy season, it rains, lots. Especially when I want to go to certain places. I hoped that the rain would not be too much, and headed off to Kawasaki [川崎] (yes, like the motorbikes) to check out a temple called Kawasaki Daishi (川崎大師) or Heiken-ji (平間寺, Heiken-ji)

It was wet. There was some kind of child ceremony because there were a bunch of parents with very young babies braving the storm rain, while the kids (and occasionally their siblings) looked unimpressed or plain zonked out.

The only other thing for me to check out in Kawasaki were the Chinese gardens, but I decided that it was raining too much for that, so I came back to Tokyo [東京], and headed off to a shrine called Hie Jinja [日枝神社], in Chūō [中央], which I wanted to check out.

One of the most interesting thing of Hie Jinja is the way the torii is designed, with a sort of triangle on its top. It might be to deter wayward otoroshii, a creature from the Japanese mythology. Yes, this is important. As it was that it was raining. To get to Hie Jinja you have to climb a hill, as it could not be otherwise. In the rain, with my broken umbrella – because my awesome umbrella decided to stop being overdone and break, thankfully it was fixable, but not before I got home.

There was a marriage photo shoot in the shrine, and I was torn for the poor bride, having to walk in those clothes through the rain. I tried to be out of their way as much as I could, too. But kudos to the photographer for bringing a traditional umbrella which made the couple look awesome.

Tired of being wet, I decided to head out to a museum. I had two exhibitions I wanted to see, one of them in the Edo-Tokyo Museum, and the other one in the Museum of History and Science. I decided that I really wanted to se the former, just because I was feeling like it. It was an exhibition called ‘From Eerie to Endearing: Yokai in the Arts of Japan’ [大妖怪展　土偶から妖怪ウォッチまで], held in the Edo-Tokyo Hakubutsukan [江戸東京博物館], the Edo-Tokyo Museum, in Ryōgoku [両国]

This was the scenery of the first almost panic attack I caused. If you’re a visible foreigner in Japan, some people don’t want you around and they don’t want to speak to you, especially because you may require them to speak in English. This is a bit on the ridiculous side in the tourist industry, where you can be met with actual hostility at times. Japan, sorry to tell you this but you’re not ready for 2020. Point and case, the lady selling tickets in the Edo-Tokyo museum. She was literally paralysed for a moment, then she pulled back. Keep in mind, my Japanese is not the best thing in the world, but I said a grand total of six words, five if you count ‘onegaishimasu’ (please) as one “special exhibition, one ticket, please”. Straight forward. She was so much in a panic that she did not even hear me at first, it took her half a minute to realise I had asked in Japanese. When she asked me to repeat I just gave her the “yokai, one” and showed her one finger (to count!). She was so freaked out that I did not even get a brochure.

The exhibition has three main parts. The first one runs through the historical representation of yokai as supernatural beings, explaining old questions that humanity had (for example, what is the echo) or forming part of legends. It exhibits part of the Parade of the One Hundred Demons classic paints and scrolls, and a bunch of key ukyo-e in mythology, which I was very excited to see. Apparently, an huge bunch of Japanese people had decided that the museum was a perfect place to spend a rainy afternoon, too, and the exhibition was packed.

The second part dealt with the representation of the different worlds, especially the Buddhist ideas of heaven and hell, and the concept of ‘spirit’ or ghost (yurei) as opposed to a yokai. Out of these, my favourites were the umibozu and the Peony Lantern representations.

The final part was dedicated to ‘Yokai watch’, a contemporary anime series that explores the concept of cute yokai causing mischief in present days.

On my way back I dropped by Shinjuku [新宿] and the Book Off there. The number of acquired items was slowly climbing up, and I was still on budget!

Then I did my homework because I might fail at Japanese all my life but I will still try not to.