talk and tales of takoyaki

First of all, I have uploaded some new photos to Flickr - the link is to the right, over there on that side bar thing. I took some photos while I was in the studio on the weekend and while I was driving. On top of that, I took a few photos from the Japan Festival that we went to on Sunday, though those aren't up yet. Maybe they will be by the time you read this. Maybe. I have also added a Top 10 weekly artists from my last.fm account (thanks polarkun) - it grabs info from itunes and automatically updates.. Amazing eh?

Ben, Yoko and I watched the FA Cup final on saturday night from the comfort of our lounge room. We had planned to go to a pub, but as the night got on, we got lazy. The match started at midnight here you see. So we got a slab, cooked some dinner, and watched the game (after all but finishing our season in the La Liga on Winning Eleven 2007). And what a boring shiteful game of football that was. I dont have much more to say about it other than Drogba's goal wasn't bad, but that doesnt cancel out the fact that he's a diving bastard.

As I mentioned, I went to the Japan Fastival on sunday with Brad, Yoko, Ben and Yoko's flatmate Shiori. We also took a DV camera, and made a video. You may or may not see that in the future. Time will tell. It was OK, but nothing special. Worth going just to get takoyaki - something that I love and something that is not easy to find in Melbourne (well easy to find, but not easy to find good takoyaki - most of the Japanese restaurants in Melbourne are run by Chinese or Honkeys, so good, real Japanese food can be hard to find). There were girls in Kimono, and displays of Koto, Taiko and a Japanese born Australian blues singer named George Kanakawa. I have seen this guy play before on the streets of Melbourne, and he is awesome.

There is a strange phenomenon in Melbourne, and I'm sure elsewhere, of young Chinese and particularly people from Hong Kong pretending to be Japanese. They dress like Japanese, wear anime t-shirts or bathing ape, go to things like the Japan Festival with their PSP in hand, all the while trying so hard to look like a hipster they fail miserably. My Japanese friends are also aware of this, and have a laugh about it. I'm not sure where it comes from - especially considering the history of the two countries and their current relationship. Anyway, it was fun, though really crowded - I guess adding to the "authentic feel". Ha!

Yesterday was spent doing anything BUT what I should have been doing - uni assignments. It's amazing how dusting the television becomes an attractive alternative. I Played squash against Brad last night. He killed me, but it was exercise. We went for a quick swim after that, then came home and made dinner. We are both trying as best we can right now, to eat out as little as possible - both for health and financial reasons. Mind you, I think it's cheaper to eat out sometimes, than cook.