Earthquake !!!

My first one ! Just 10 mins ago !
Everything started to move, my desk, my chair, the walls, all furnitures...
It felt really strange, you are supposed to be on a steady ground and yet, it moved and shaked around.
It lasted few seconds and faded away. Its strength was around 3, from what a co-worker says.
Also, I feel a bit dizzy right now. Really a strange feeling, definitely not like being on a train or on a plane about to take off.

Well well, back to work now.

Toilet paper

I ran out of toilet paper, lucky that I noticed it before something "urgent" came up if you know what I mean.
So I went to the drug store near here and to my surprise, they didn't have toilet paper. What the hell ? No toilet paper in a drug store ? I'm not kidding, I searched through all the store, nothing to be found. Then I resigned to ask a salesperson when he lead me outside, where the toilet papers are stored. THEY HAVE TOILET PAPER STORED OUTSIDE !! And tons of it. The funny part is that you have to get one pack and go back in to pay. If it is an emergency and you don't have 200 yens to spend for it, you could also run away, I bet no one would notice.

Japanese cinema

As I said earlier, I went to watch Superman Returns.
Honestly, it is a great film but I can understand why some critics went all the other way about it.
But it's Superman so, who cares ? :D
Just go watch it, 'nuff said.

Now I will talk about cinema in Japan. I will compare it with cinemas in France, since I don't know about cinemas elsewhere in the world.

The cinema I went to is the MOVIX, near my home
It's located on the 3nd floor (3rd in Japan, 2nd in France) of a mall, called Ario.
First of all, the ticket. Before coming, I already checked about the whether the movie was showing in English or not. Hopefully, it was. So, as a 外人 (gaijin) and totally assuming it, I bought the ticket all in English, that way there would be no mistake if she would have ever sold me a ticket for the Japanese version. She then showed me a map of the room, because you are assigned a specific seat when you buy the ticket, compared to France where you have to fight your way in for the best ones. I chose a seat in the middle, when she told me that the best seats are behind.
Anyway, I sticked to my choice, bought a coke (200 yens, pretty cheap compared to what you see in France...) and headed for the entrance.
There, I showed my ticket to the staff and as I headed to the room 5 for the movie, I saw people getting blankets (you read well) and cushions, which were available for anyone to take. If you are afraid of getting cold during the movie or if you want to do things with your boy/girlfriend without being seen, go for it.
Then you spot your seat, thank God or whatever you trust in for not having listened to the girl because your place couldn't be more perfect, get on it and wait for the movie to start. They show trailers, along with a small serie called "Rabbit's minute" or something like that. It's just a very short CGed movie, featuring 2 rabbits and their so-wonderful life near a public trash where living carrots prevent them from taking a disposed but good-looking and working piano (if you don't understand, nevermind).
Finally, when you think that the movie is about to start, a staff comes in, stands in front of the screen and says stuff like "welcome to movix" "you are about to watch superman returns" "please turn off your phone and don't smoke" "enjoy blabla". Besides what I enumerated, it's pretty much the same in France.

Planning this week end

There are many interesting things to do this week end. Things like :
- attend the location test for the new Guilty Gear at Akiba
- go watch Superman Returns
- play VF5

Yeah all those cost money.
Otherwise I could stay at home in front of the computer.
If you have any suggestions, post them in the comments.

Failure

I hoped the computer/internet would help me keeping away from VF5 and game centers.
It doesn't. With the computer, I can now download and watch VF5 videos, which means going to the game center later to try the new stuff I learnt.
Fortunately, I'm starting to win some matches now. The count is like, 25 wins for 150 losses (don't laugh, you don't know what it means to play against Japanese people...)
Maybe one day I will be like those 1337 players who, with just one coin, manage to play the whole afternoon.

PS : For those who don't now, 1337 == leet

Back to nolife !

I have the net at home now ! Hurray !
It means that I will have more time for blogging and that I will probably spend less time/money in Virtua Fighter 5 (or not...).

Speaking about VF5, I said I would blog about this. So let's start.
It's incredible to see how much this game is played here.
It even has its own dedicated FLOOR (yes, an entire floor) in some game centers, the Sega Game Center at Akiba for example. The whole basement floor is dedicated to this one game, with 20+ versus city cabs (making it 40+ players).
I am playing Eileen, a new character introduced with VF5.
I won't go into details and you probably don't give a f*ck about it but it's the kind of technical character, quite hard to play and you just lose if you keep smashing buttons (like I do...).
I have like 17 wins for 120 losses. This is stored, along with your character customization, name and stuff in a card you buy for 500 yens (400 with a small discount from the Okachimachi game center, near the JR station !).
There are 5 other co-workers playing VF5 too. Characters are El Blaze (a new character also introduced with VF5), Pai, Vanessa, Brad and Goh. For more information about those, just check Virtua Fighter 5 Website.
Thanks to them, I got addicted and spent my money like I never did. We usually go twice or three times a week. Each time, I can't help spending at least 1000 yens (up to 2000 once...). Just count, even if this is rather cheap for a single play (100 yens), when you are addicted it runs quickly out of control.

Anyway, I hope that with the net at home now, I will spend less money on week ends...

Hail !

So many things to say and yet no time for it....but fear not ! For the time is near ! The time when I will finally have a computer at home !

Anyway, I attended the Comicket this week-end with 2 co-workers. It was kinda fun, will post pictures later. If you have watched Genshiken, just know that it is exactly the same...

French culture in Japan

Today, I had a small talk with co-workers. We were talking about differences in our culture when it came, inevitably, to manga and comics (I use the word comics because Japanese people seem to use it more often than "manga", at least in our conversations).

When they asked me about famous French comics, I was stupefied to learn that they didn't know (or had barely heard of) Tintin, Asterix or Lucky Luke.
Tintin seems to be known, at least when they see the pictures. As for Asterix, never heard of him. Same for Lucky Luke.
Honestly, I thought that they were quite known and I was proud to refer to them.
I mean, who doesn't know Tintin or Asterix ??? That's like completely unbelievable.
And now I feel to start nostalgic about it, for I have read all Tintin and dozens of Lucky Luke/Asterix when I was a kid.
Next time, when I get the opportunity to drop by a library or when I'll go back to France, I'll be sure not to miss my chance.

Alive this blog is

Indeed, even though I hardly have time to update it, and having tons of stuff to say.
Last week I intended to update about the week-end before but there were too much to say. I have to learn to keep it to the essential. If you want a small summary (the week end 2 weeks ago) here it is :

• went out

• spent too much money (bought stuff, played too much VF5 - I'll make a special post about it....someday, played too much UFO catchers and so on)

• train problems, had to walk home
• witnessed an accident (a car bumped into a cyclist)

Anyway, I also have few pictures I'd like to share. Will post them once I have some time.