My Japan - Outside 1996
"Beyond Expectations"

Wednesday 5th June - This morning our first stop was Ikebukuro, another district within Tokyo. After the sightseeing and looking around we made our way to the Budokan again, arriving about 1500hrs. Dave and I got our tickets the same way as the day before and this time were seated on the left hand side of the stage slightly higher. Dave also bought a ticket for his sister Rachael, who was meeting us at the venue a bit later. She works as a teacher in Tokyo and had been over in Japan for about three years. Steve bought a ticket from a tout for ¥10,000 (approx £62.50 / $95) and his seat was on the balcony at the back but in the centre opposite the stage. Rachael met up with us and we went inside and took our places.

The set was slightly different tonight with songs from the night before being omitted, namely 'Oxford Town' and 'Teenage Wildlife' (these two songs infact were not performed at any further Japanese shows). The show itself was the same other than that with one other surprise for the first encore: 'My Death', the first verse of which David sang acapella. It was fantastic, the audience were in total silence during his solo and cheered enthusiastically when the band cut in afterwards. This show was slightly shorter than last night but another excellent one. Rachael was amazed at how well I knew the set, seemingly which song was coming next and singing along to it. I told her that I'd been to 30+ previous shows on this tour so far so that was probably why!

After the show we arranged to meet up with Rachael again the following evening for a meal, she said she would take us to a traditional Japanese restaurant. We then made our way back to our guest house, cleaned up and hit the sack.

Thursday 6th June - Some Japanese girls that we spoke to at the Budokan told us which hotel the band were staying in so we decided to pay it a visit in the hope of maybe winning a prized autograph. We didn't want to be intrusive and were discreet in our objective, sitting patiently in the lobby for about 90 minutes. There was no sign of any activity and we were thinking of leaving when we caught sight of some crew members. We hung around a little longer and saw the crew and the band all depart in fleets of cars but there was no sign of David. Oh well, never mind. We made our way into Shibuya by underground and were just walking out of the station when we bumped into Zac walking in. He stopped to chat with us for a few minutes, a little surprised to see us English fans in Japan. He told us that the show scheduled for St Petersburg in Russia had been cancelled as it would clash with elections. Apparently the government didn't want a potential 250,000 people crowded into the city at such a time. He asked us our names and we said we'd see him in Nagoya, our next destination and the third concert. He said "bye" and made his way into the station and we continued on our way into Shibuya where we had a bite to eat and visited HMV and Tower Records.

Shopping Arcade in Asakusa, Tokyo

The Shopping Arcade of Asakusa

 Our next journey was to Asakusa which was our meeting point with Rachael. We had a look round the bright and colourful shopping arcade, full of souvenir items and gifts, a real Aladdin's cave of cornucopia. I found some postcards so bought nine, I hadn't seen them anywhere else. Rachael got some little crackers for us all from one of the stalls which were served with a soy sauce dip and because she asked for them in Japanese the vendor let her have them for nothing.

Kaminarimon Gate, Asakusa

Kaminarimon Gate - Asakusa

Cooking our 'Yakatori'

Myself (right) & Rachael 'Cooking Dinner'

 She then took us to a restaurant where we would eat in traditional Japanese fashion, kneeling on the floor over a hot-plate. Each table was secluded in as much as it was separated by a screen from the next one, so you and your party almost had a private section. We took our shoes off and crouched down on the cushions provided and Rachael then began to translate the menu. Our servings consisted of a bowl of vegetables, fish or meat, in my case tuna, with a raw egg cracked over the top. The waitress showed us how to prepare the food ready to eat. She lit the hot-plate then took a bowl and mixed the ingredients together, sprayed some oil onto the hot-plate and poured out the egg mixture. It was then cooked basically like an omelette. The oil was at the end of the table along with some spices to garnish and flavour the food once cooked.

For drinks we had a weak version of sake which came in various flavours, I had lemon. Very tangy. Some people on the next table to us kindly took a couple of photos for us with our cameras so we had a momento of this fascinating Japanese custom.

We got back to The Apple House around 2230hrs, showered and went to bed. Had to be up early in the morning to catch the shinkansen to Nagoya.
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