Bikan in Japan

He lives to hurt,

It's evil Bert!

Hello there mellayella fellas,

Another week, another grimfaced stride into the perverted underbelly of the Japanese public school system. Ready? Yes? Picture of a marsupial copulating at hand? I thought you said you were ready...

As the school year judders to an end (ending at the rear end of March, just before Gridzer presents her credentials) my kids are getting a bit more relaxed than usual. Something that I would usually welcome as they usually look like they're trying to carry around a piece of white hot burning Magnesium between their bumcheeks such are their anxiety wrought faces. But with the applications to High School in, the load is well and trully off and they have as one creature decided to tell me about their privates.

Usually this includes some, more or even more utterances of "Big Pen-iss!"

Some highlights have included:

"I want to swim in the sea...to see cougars(the Japanese word for which being Jukujo)"

"I want to go to Hawaii... to see big pen-iss"

"Mark-sensei... Peniss Japanese size or Irish size?"

"Mark sensei girlfriend, big?(chestal gestures)"

"Mark sensei, do you have AIDS?... I have AIDS"

"Big thighs? Big Pen-iss."

And so forth.

For some reason that I have not researched but that necessitated a bankholiday (on a pissing Saturday) Meg had a long weekend, even longer as she took the Friday off with one of her Victorian style swooning illnesses. The Consumption. The Quinsey. The Lurgy. The 4 day weekend. Treacherous killers all.

Anyway, on the back of this we scheduled a trip to the mainland city of Okayama in order to see whatever it is Joe Okayaman gets up to in his busy day. Much as with any mid-sized Japanese city we did the standard shlep to the castle, early lunch, plod down the covered shopping street, try to find a decent glass of something. Nap.

The only things that point out Okayama as a city of note is an antique shop on the main street with a 94 year old proprietor that beat like a government mule any museum/gallery/castle I've seen here for sheer density of amazing Japanese historical and artistic items. The auld lad himself was a thunderously nice chap too and he gave us his business card which I believe indicates he also has wee shops in Tokyo, Kyoto and London. An enterprising one so he was.

Further to this is the legend of the "Peach Boy" (or Momo-Taro) or some baby that was found in a peach and then killed a demon with his animal commando squad of a dog, monkey and a pheasant. Sounds like a cracking read I know... But on the upside, aka the creepy side there are anatomically correct statues of the nude peach boy all over the city, with his wangdangdoodle braving the scourging gales of the February cold. And his ass hanging out like a fatty wino.

He could eat a peach for hours

We hit the Okayama bar scene at about 8 only to find it was closed. There was one miserable ex-pat bar that was the El Grande Bratwurst of sausagefests. I swear to God they tried to erect a small shrine to Meg when she came in, so starved were they of female contact. Then we tried a small cantina we spotted in the day, only to find it closed forever. You win again Japan.

The next day we ended up in the Japanese Colonial Williamsburg type attraction of Bikan, an old Japanese style set of streets with few cars (apart from ours storming up the main potentially pedestrianised street) and few reasons to bother ones hoop about going into any of the yee olde shops. Except that I found a bottle of White Chocolate Beer, I'll keep you posted on that one.

Meg very much felt she earned her 4 day weekend with her trip to the hospital to get something for her strep throat. I had been in days previous to get a few anti-bios for an arm cut that got a mite infected and had mentioned in passing how 2 weeks previous I had had a touch of flu. This was all the green light they needed to administer "The Test."

This involved ramming extra long cotton buds up both her nostrils to the point that her tears and snot flowed freely as one salty stinging stream. An American-Japanese pharmacist who was acting as interpreter answered her nasal shrieks with,  "I know, archaic isn't it?"

Frankly I'd take the day of work and the evening time self-administered whiskey-IV over that in a hot minute. 

In other news it may be that Megs soft drink of choice, "Mello Yello" has gone out of production in Japan. It had been re-introduced here after a 27 year hiatus, and the nuclear piss yellow drink has been putting a sugary spring in Megs step ever since. Especially as her quaff of choice (Diet Coke) is not available here. Prompting the slightly hysterical quote:

"Japan takes away everything that I love!"

Word is starting to filter around to certain teachers that Mark-sensei is outta here with a bongo-cherry on top. And bells on. I'm leaving. I explained to one teacher (that I've worked closely with for a year and a half mind) that I wanted to study some more and her rote response was "I hope your dreams come true."

"Um, yeah... cheers."

Another fantasy football drubbing has left my haggard array of overpaid nags swerving violently onto my shit list. If one more week goes by without one of my strikers making some effort on goal I'll I'LL.... continue to stew in impotent rage.

I've an event coming into my sights called the "Naked Man Festival" next weekend that I will be attempting to attend.

<rubs hands gleefully>

Let's naked Japanese men!

Bikan in Japan