"Obey Consume Repeat!"

Dec 14, 2008
Taipei, Taiwan

We left Japan this morning and headed for Taipei. Home with my mom for the rest of the year. A much needed break and the unparalleled comfort only mom can provide.

Here are some of my overall impression of Japan:

1. Japan is one large mall/covered arcade. Every train station has a department store attached to it, all urban centers in Japan (Osaka, Tokyo, Kyoto) are all centered around places to shop (i.e multiple department stores within blocks of each other).

2. You could get lost in all major train stations and or live there for days.

3. My favorite things in Japan is the Shinkansen, and the best bargain you can have in Japan is the JR Pass.

4. Sushi is incredibly fresh in Japan, even the 20% off ones that you buy at the super market after 5pm.

5. Japan has a really interesting relationship with sex, marriage prostitution, evident in the multiple red-light districts that is a part of every city or how high school girls will sleep with men for easy money to pay for things such as their cell phone bills or a new outfit.

6. The Japanese are incredibly polite but the politeness is a facade.

7. The Japanese culture is for the good of the many and not for the will of the individual, obedience is highly valued, they don't even jay-walk.

OBEY CONSUME REPEAT feels like a good summary of my glimpse into the Japanese culture.

Japan certainly has many virtues, nearly a 99% literacy rate, and nearly 100% employment rate as well. It is extremely clean and modern, certainly a city of the future in many aspects. It is unparalleled in many of technological advances, such as a cell phone that can record and play TV shows, or with direct link to your credit card for you to make purchases simply by waving your phone at a censor. Yet the combination between advanced technology, obedience / lack of individual will, "strange" relationship with sex, pornography, marriage, rampant consumerism .... the combination only makes me think of movies such as Blade Runner or Novels such as The Handmaid's Tale. None of which depicts a future that I am excited for or eager to participate in.

I think I will skirt the modernized cities of the world for a little while. I think I prefer something with a little bit of rawness, something with a bit of an edge to it for the next destination.

Tsukiji, Muder and No More Tourists

Dec 12, 2008
Tokyo, Japan

I went back to Tsukiji one more time this morning for another round of photography before we depart Japan on the 14th. I keep on wanting to write a blog here to sum up an overall impression of the world's largest fish market. Yet, still, much as I was a bit lost for words two weeks ago during my first visit, I am still unable to find the words to fully describe what Tsukiji is like. I hope that there will be an image or two that I have caught on film that does in some ways describe the feeling of Tsukiji.

Here are some preliminary thoughts, first of all, I might be one of the last foreign tourists allowed to photograph the market for the rest of 2008, or ever maybe. Tsukiji will be closed to foreign tourists from Dec 15, 2008 - Jan 17, 2009. The workers complains that tourists disrupting their work flow, tourists are not aware of their surrounding and the electric flatbed carts that workers drive at top speed to transport the fish. Which are all fair complains, when you think about it, it is a place of work after all and not some sort of static museum made for observation. On top of it, there is a plan to move Tsukiji to a new facility that they are building. Whether the move will actually happen or not is still debate able, but there is an irony in that I photographed Fulton Fish Market (New York City) before it moved to its new shiny home up in the Bronx.

There is a contrast in the worker at the market, the older generation verse the young. The older generation moves at a slower speed, time is different for them. They walk around their stall with their hands folded behind their back, gently inspecting their goods, quietly awaits. While the younger generation drives the flatbed carts at top speed through the market delivering the fish to its next point of processing. The young pushes the froze tuna through the band saw, cutting it into smaller pieces while the older seasoned fisherman takes the meter long Oroshi hocho and meticulous decapitate the tuna into 4 large sections.

I was amazed to watch over half of a warehouse full of tuna be auction off and moved to their next location in less than 25 minutes. Or the careful silence the bidder takes in inspecting each tuna's belly with a flash light or how they cut off a bit of flesh from the tail section and rub it between their fingers to determine the fat content of that tuna. All of my thoughts are still a little scattered and some what random, but it will be intelligible soon, I hope.

We later meet up with a friend, a film editor who is currently working in Tokyo, on a film called "Map of the Sounds of Tokyo" which is about an employee of a fish market who also doubles as a contract killer....

I feel all things are starting to converge together....

Food Costs in Japan

Dec 4, 2008
Kyoto, Japan

The impression of Japan is that it is an expensive country to live and travel in. I certainly am feeling like I am burning through money a bit here. Although I do think that a trip through Europe or US would be just as expensive, if not more so.

As I have traveled, I have always found ways to cut down on costs and be some what thrifty, but I am having a rather hard time here practicing some tried and true money saving methods. For one thing, none of the budget places, hostels or ryokans actually have a kitchen for the guests to use that includes a stove. Which means that not much cooking is really possible. When a bowl of ramen costs 650Yen and up (current exchange is 95.4Yen = 1USD and with banks fees factored in, its more like 93Yen = 1USD), which means that the simplest meal you can have will cost you nearly $8. If some amount of cooking was possible, it sure would help with the budget travel.

Here are some of the sample food costs here in Japan:
A single apple = 88 Yen - 180 Yen (88Yen was on the smaller side, the larger ones are the size of an infant's head)
Bread = 188 Yen ( there was a special at the market that day where the price for 3 slices, 4 slices, 5 slices or 6 slices are bread all costs the same)
6 eggs = 298 Yen
Cream Cheese, 6 small single serving = 460 Yen
Pork Cutlet Sandwich = 360 Yen
Lunch Bowl sold at Train Stations = 840 Yen
7 piece of sushi outside of Tsujiki Market = 3500 Yen
Coffee = 200 Yen - 529 Yen (all simple drip coffee, nothing fancy, the cost of coffee is certainly killing me a bit here)
Pastry = 180 Yen and up
Water = FREE! The tap water is of such great quality there that you at least don't have to buy water, and it tastes great!

So, thank god for free and clean water, but maybe I should think about cutting back on the need for fresh fruit and coffee.

Girls here come in pairs, at minimum

Dec 3, 2008
Kyoto, Japan

Our friend Brian explained the Japanese mentality as an desire for not stick out. Individuality is ok but only when expressed along side of another. So if your friends are practicing the same kind of individual expression as you, then all is well.

With that in mind, I have been observant and I see that the girls come in pairs, at least. When you spot two girls together, on the train, out and about, they are coordinated, if not matching. They are sporting the same style and have made themselves (clothing, make up, accessories and etc) all to be of the same. Its like they are a matching pair.

This can quickly become a fun game to play - sit somewhere and see if you can spot the matching friend in the crowd.



Then, there are the school girls who are in uniforms. You would think that once they are in uniforms they all would look the same. Not so much. There is always little modifiers that are added on to the uniform to express that sense of individuality, except the group all share the same identify. For instance, there is this group of school girls all in uniforms but all of the girls all of converse style sneakers on, only that all of them are of different colors and patterns. Then, there was another group which all had "kicks" on by either nike or puma, same style but different color and patterns.

Is individuality is individuality when it is conformed within the will of the group? Can we all still be the unique snowflake that we are when we are all look the same?

Geisha spotting in Gion, or is it wild life hunting?

Dec 2, 2008
Kyoto, Japan

I think one of the must do thing for all of those who travel through Japan is at least an attempt to walk through the Gion district and have a sighing or two of Geishas as the culture and practice has captured the imagination of the West.

But as there are less than 100 geishas and 80 maiko left in Kyoto, less than 1000 of geishas and maiko in all of Japan, standing on the streets of Gion district in hopes to spot one of them begins to feel like a wild animal sighting of sorts. This feeling only deepens as double decker tour buses pulls through the narrow alley way full of tourists, Japanese and foreign.

At last, I see one! Dressed in full make up, hair and kimono, hustling down the street in small quick steps, my instinct is to pull out the camera and attempt a shot, but as all the other wild animal enthusiasts who have gathered near by flashes away, I quickly see that the Geishas do not really enjoy being photographed.

Out of respect (and also I rather suck as a paparazzi and I was not geared properly for wild life photography) I put my camera away after one lousy shot and started to take photos (albeit random and crappy) images of the gawkers instead. I think I really just wanted to annoy them in attempts to make them understand why the gawking and flashing cameras without any regard for the Geishas might just be a bit rude. I can't say if I was successful at annoying them and making my point know but I did get a few confused and dirty looks.

Plastic Food Models and Fake Foods

December 1, 2008
Kyoto, Japan

There are plastic food models outside of many Japanese restaurants to show you what the restaurant offers and what the costs are. Some of these food models looks amazingly realistic and delicious. Which got me thinking about a culture where much of your visual sensory experience relating to your meal is "fake" or "simulated." What effect does that has on the national psyche? the collective unconsciousness?

Then I got to wonder about the traveling sales men who goes from restaurant to restaurants to sell the owners updated or new models of the plastic foods. Where is the factory where they make these plastic foods? What about the factory workers who have to make the models and assemble them? Do you think the sales men has a big glossy catalog of plastic food options to choose from? Or do you think that the models are custom made to order for each restaurant? After all, I have seen quiet a bit of diversity in the arrangement of each models, even if the restaurants are all selling similar foods. Or do you think its a do it yourself kit that you can order? You get as many parts as you needs along with a large bottle of lacquer and you can arrange for the portions and presentation of the plastic foods as you see fit for your restaurant and when you are done, you pour the lacquer over it and wait for it to dry.


Then there are these miniature plush food replicas. Is it merely decorative? Or is it some sort of luck and prosperity kinda of talisman?

I am rather fascinated by all of these fake foods and if effect it has on the unconsciousness.

Tsukiji and First Impressions

Nov 29, 2008
Tokyo, Japan

First full day here in Tokyo and of course the first order of the day is to Tsukiji,the world largest fish market. I have been wanting to see this market ever since "Wok the Dog" became the project that it currently is. So naturally there is a lot of anticipation and a lot of expectation riding on today. After being some what disappointed in the markets that I found in Argentina, I was trying not get my hopes up, trying not to have any expectation.

We got off the subway and I smelled fish! My heart quickened and I was immediately excited by what could be waiting for me. Lets just say that I will be spending every available day shooting at Tsukiji for all the mornings that we will be here in Tokyo. It lived up to any expectation that I might have had.


After about 2 hours at the market, we wondered around for some coffee, shared a bowl of noodles for breakfast number 1 and proceeded to wait in line for a spot at a tiny sushi restaurant just outside of Tsukiji for some of the freshest sushi in the world! We waited 2.5 hours for a seat! Yes, it was amazing! As we waited in line, I had a silly thought, "What if they ran out of fish?"

We are in one of the most technologically advanced cities in the world and yet we have had nothing but tech troubles here. Our blackberries do not work since Japan is on their own cell network, I can't get money out of the ATM because Bank of America is stupid. So I am having a bit of crackberry withdrawl here. It seems rather ironic that I can get money out of the ATM in the boarder town on Laos without needing to inform BofA of my travel plans and yet here in Japan, they wish to hold my money hostage as a means to protect me. Blackberry was happily delivering me emails at the base camp of Mt Everest but not here in Tokyo. Ironies of ironies.

First impression of Tokyo is that its a lot like Taipei, Taiwan. With the only difference being that I can only understand about a third of what is going on and have virtually no ability to converse with anyone. I have wanted to see Japan ever since I was a child, how strange is it to find that it is a lot like HOME?

Well...that is the first impression at any rate. There will be more concert thoughts on Tsukiji and everything else later, after a little recovery from the jet lag and crackberry withdrawal.