Sidetrip to Nagoya - Part 3

It was right after we got sick eating nothing but grapes when we, that is I with my roommate, fled far from the violet beads to nearby Nagoya. He, to buy himself a new pair of shoes. I, to help him buy a new pair of shoes. And both of us to drop in to one of the biggest cosplay events on this little planet - the World Cosplay Summit 2008 (note to myself: add link when done). But first things first - this post will contain just a few photos from another short trip to Nagoya; nevertheless I find them quite interesting and hope that I'm not the only one. ^^

As we got off somewhere near Sakae Station, we found a group of Japanese Elvises hopping around near a large fountain. Imagine a bunch of Japanese weirdos, every one of them looks exactly the same, with old school hairdos in black leather shoes, black leather pants, black (leather?) undershirts and black leather jackets, besides being over 37°C and 95% humidity, flying back and forth or even writhing on the glowing ground along with blaring Elvis Presley's hits without a single stop and you have the image. Those are not human. Never were. Never will be.
I, actually, knew that there are such funny individuals somewhere in Japan, and later met a similarly bizzare group in Ueno, Tokyo, but this was my first encounter and it have left a hilarious impression on my shattered soul.

We were following a LONG alley stretching far from the TV Tower filled with numerous statues, memorials, fountains, cafés, exhibition grounds, odd monuments and even stranger pieces of wicked art. There was a fancy Lamborghini parked in front of some stands and still empty seats awaiting some event, and they gave me a Pikachu fan. The hell does Pikachu have to do with all this stuff and fancy Lambo!? Well, at least they haven't made a Pikaghini just like with this poor Toyota. Though it would have been an instant hit...

I won't burden you much further with tons of text, since all that followed can be simply summarized as "shopping, taking weird photos of almost anything like a proper gaijin and going to see some cosplayers".
An ordinary summer Japanese day...


Photos:

Rock 'n' roll baby!

Nagoya TV Tower in background

The same place, the other side

Pikaghini (to be)

Even racing Lambo has GPS... In Japan, no car is complete without it.

Pika pi...

Pika~~~chu!!

Siesta...

What's this? A tomb?

The steel boat was quite interesting... Though it's weird, as always.

...

... x_x

Such a beautiful eye you have... Too bad, I have bigger! ＼(◎o◎)／

Taiko band in the Ōsu district

Shame on you!

That's my pet lion

Beer! Sake! Beer!!

The same group again o_O

My friend liked wolves too much...
(Actually a mascot of some clothes shop).

"Niku" means "meat" in Japanese... Too bad no one here would understand what's on this amazing T-shirt.

Videos:

Elvis still lives in Japan!!

A taiko band performing in the Ōsu district in Nagoya

Tuesday, February 24, 2009

JLPT Passed ― やった～～～！！

Yesterday, there was an exceptionally gloomy and pesky weather. And it wouldn't be me not to have to creep out from the warmth of my den, even though I have a week off, to this unbearably annoying scenery in drowsy streets of Prague filled with chilled tourists and occassional lumps of snowbroth.
Just as I was waiting for the slow home elevator to finally reach the ground floor, I recalled that my JLPT (Japanese Language Proficiency Test - 日本語能力試験) results should arrive soon but not now - sometime in the beginning of March, as I had read on the official website the day before. And then, some 5 seconds later, I open my mailbox to see a strange large brown envelope with "Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin" stamp on it. Which means the letter concerning JLPT has arrived!
My mother was all excited about it and hurried me to open the envelope though I just said I failed and didn't actually want to open it so quickly to see the disappointing fail notice. However, as I peered into the slit, an ornamented number 2 on decorative light-pink paper struck my eyes - something was definitely wrong. I put out the paper, with two official Japanese square stamps in red ink standing out on the bottom, and, in temporary confusion, glanced over the English text to make out what the hell was this all about.

The first line goes like this:
"This is to certify that the person named above has passed (...)"
.
.
.
"Has passed"?
"Passed"?

Then I finally realised that it really is the certificate and I have really passed the goddamned (or should I rather say godblessed?) JLPT exam! I was 99% sure I had failed. Hard. No positive expectations, no nothing, just the embarrassing thought that I will have to take the same exam again this year in December. So this really came to me as a surprise and I just felt I want to write about it. ^^

I know I still have very, VERY, VERY long and curvy, and perhaps even thorny, kanji-filled road ahead of me. (Man, I often don't even really get what are they talking about in the news in terebi or, worse, in cursed rajio). And anyway, JLPT doesn't have much to do with being actually fluent in Japanese; it has its notable flows. But at least I now have yet another goal to reach and overcome - the mighty gaijin-killer JLPT 1-kyū - the ultimate regular shiken. May the kanji-, keigo-, tamego-, dokuzetsu- and all the other weirdo gods bless me.





EDIT: I just read that the results of the examinees in Japan were mailed to them on February, Friday 13th. Not that I believe in any of this stuff but nice... Very nice... ^^

Just some random posts from the Internet:

"Thanks for the cultural sensitivity Japan!!!"

"they shipped 'em friday the 13th lmao.
i pray for everyone's pass!! :D"

"Hey, inspite of Fri 13th, i got the results today and i passed...
passed with a score of 350.
cheers and wishes to all."

To you, too.