Andy's Glasses

My body is confused. I am confused. Because I’m in my third time zone in one week and it is indeed very confusing. On Monday we were in Japan time (GMT + 8), then we came back to British Summer time (Japan time… probably -8) and on Thursday morning we entered Lila Standard Time (GMT + 3/4). Because Lila is up at about 5. But really UP. And raring. And busy. And you just get swept along with the energy being expended in the house. But Thursday was fine because our Japan jet-lag meant we’d been awake since 3.30am and by the time Lila raised her head (well, raised her voice really) it felt like lunchtime. And it was easy and nice. So nice that we offered to have her again last night, so her very very pregnant mummy and (I feel your pain) daddy, might get a bit of much needed rest and we might get some more quality Lila-time. Because we’re stupid, obsessed and gluttons for punishment.

But this morning, when Lila called out at 5.03, my back was bothering me. Never mind, time and Lila wait for no man. And I felt like shit. Really tired, groggy, heavy-eyed. But heh, Lila’s here, let’s play. And then, at 8, off I went to my martial arts class, as usual. Still feeling rough.

When I returned, couple hours later, I’d had a large coffee and eaten and… still felt shitty and a bit achey and not great. Never mind; its tennis time!! So off I went, and on the way I reached a realisation. That possibly the great feelings of fatigue, coupled with the aches and pains and general lethargy (many adjectives can be levelled at me, most of then profane, half of them very insulting, the rest quite abusive; but ‘lethargic’ is not one of them), possibly I am ill? Like flu? Worse still, man flu??? In which case, tennis is always the best cure.

But it didn’t cure me. I feel like shit. Had lunch, going to bed.

To be continued.

Only send flowers if they’re certified free of bacteria. Whereas any chocolate is fine.

Happy poorly Saturday

A xxxx

I’ve been out of politics for some time now. Nearly 3 weeks. And if 24 hours is lifetime, this period is approaching ‘forever’. Although, alas, in many ways, nothing like long enough. I left the country specifically to give them all time to sort out Brexit, find a reason to get Farage on the plane with Julian Assange when he’s extradited and re-write a new constitution that allows the death penalty in certain very specific cases involving leaders of Opposition parties with beards. And what’s happened? Nothing! It’s the same shit. I was in Japan for 2 weeks and we had the first abdication of an Emperor for 300 years and the inauguration of a new one in just 2 days. But here, as they say in Tokyo: plus ca change, plus ca meme chose.

Which translates as ‘same shit, different day’. Because Theresa May is still trying to get the same deal, with the same terms, which everybody hated the first 3 times, through parliament again. She’s been in ‘discussions with Labour’ since before I left and both sides are still ‘deadlocked’. Mainly because as well as being diametrically opposed politically, they both moronic.

So now The Conservatives are insisting that the PM resigns. Which, although possibly offering no immediate solution to the problems, might freshen things up a bit. And as this is an assassination, rather than a ‘falling on her sword’, the first to jump in, like Brutus, with a dagger in his hand specifically designed for back-stabbing, is Boris Johnson. Obviously. The country’s greatest ‘bandwagon jumper’, who sees benefit in having fat blondes in charge of both sides of the Atlantic, can’t resist any chance of self-advancement. So was the first ‘name in the hat’.

And I really don’t like Boris. And trust him even less. But when I look at the others gathering round to join the battle to become leader of the Conservatives and thus, by default, the temporary at least Prime Minister, my first and really only consideration is who is most likely to keep Jeremy Corbyn out of number 10? And that trumps all else.

Furthermore, with the massively populist ‘Brexit Party’ of Farage steaming instantly ahead of all other parties in the polls, the Conservative vote will be more diluted still.

I’m not even a natural, comfortable Tory but quite literally THERE IS NO ALTERNATIVE.

And I cannot see voters falling over themselves to vote for Jeremy (fucking) Hunt, nor Sajid Javid, and as for Dominic Raab, I could barely pick him out of a line up of 3 people if the other two were women. Matthew Hancock? Who he??

So I’m left with the horrendous acceptance that for the good of the nation (ie: no fucking Corbyn), for the good of the only party fit to lead it, and for my own sanity (always questionable anyway), B…B…B… (I’m struggling to put it down) B… Boris must lead the Conservatives.

Holy shit.

Happy Friday

A xxxx

She wore a brand New Jersey, if you’re interested. It was a song. Decades ago, that ‘cleverly’ used the name of all of America’s 50 states. It was pathetic. But, as a kid, I learned the names of lots of states that I’d never have otherwise known. Which was pretty much all of them except New York, California and Chicago. Yeah, I know, just emphasising a point.

But of all the states, its always the same ones that cause all the problems. Down in the South East quadrant. Mississippi, Tennessee, Georgia and Alabama. And by ‘all the trouble’, I’m going back to pre-civil war times as these were, along with the Carolinas, the tobacco states and consequently the slave states. The Souyath. Deep Souyath. The states where that slavery was so entrenched, so culturally normalised, that 10 generations later, they are still inherently racist, separationist and pretty vile. And they’re the mainstay of the gun lobby.

Mississippi Burning was a true story. The KKK are alive and well ‘down there’. The Scopes trial was in Tennessee in 1925 where a teacher was prosecuted for teaching evolutionary theory. Because nothing must ever contradict the Bible. The book no-one down there ever questions nor asks for any proof.

And now, yesterday in Alabama, they changed the abortion laws. Basically removed them really, in their entirety. A woman won’t be prosecuted for seeking or having an abortion but the person doing it will get up to 99 years in jail. Even in cases of rape or incest.

And that, I feel, (in my wonderfully caricatured, stereotyping imagination) is the problem. That if you terminated all the babies resulting from incest, there’d be a catastrophic decline in population ‘down there’. Because its only some of the Bible that God really meant, not all of it.

The fact is that this vote by the State Senate is a massive challenge to the Supreme Court, which is Federal. And its always a big problem in American legislation, the battle between a state and The States. Local vs Government. And when the ‘local’ in question has no interest in either women’s rights nor the right of any single woman, a bunch of bible-bashing, right-wing Christian, Republican men decided that they, and not the women, should be in total control of any choices those women may have to make about their bodies, their lives and those of any child they may be carrying.

Ironically, their arguments always centre on ‘the number of children lost to abortion’ since the famous ‘Roe vs Wade’ case when abortion was pretty much legalised across America, in 1973. Yet I can’t help but wonder how many people, including the kids, have been killed in gun crimes over the same period. Which they’re not in any way concerned about.

Sickening bunch of inbred tossers. I make no generalisations.

Happy Thursday

A xxxx

When I’m away I read the Times online. And it takes me about 3.6 minutes. I glance at the sort of things that pass for headlines in the online world, then read the sport. It’s just not how I want/need/like to read a paper. I know, I could go to a news site and see much more current stuff, but that ain’t me neither. So the third incredible pleasure of ‘the return’, as the paper dropped through the letterbox, had arrived. The first two were picking up a screaming (with joy), shrieking, jumping Lila up from school yesterday (ok, its nursery, but she’s so clever I’m tempted just to call it ‘university’ and be done), and sleeping in our own bed.

And its the little articles that I generally miss when I read online. Like yesterday, I had ‘read’ ‘the paper’, but then picked up a free proper copy at Heathrow and learned that due to Manchester City’s financial dodgy dealings they may miss out on Champions League football next year. As long as that doesn’t get Arsenal involved then JUSTICE MUST BE DONE. As that would, as well as being fair and just and the undoubtedly the right thing to happen, would be a wonderful for everyone else as it would be terrible for Manchester City.

It’s about time the ‘financial fair play’ farce actually showed some teeth to a club who abuse all the regulations and think by throwing even more money around they can get away with it. The case continues, the plot thickens…

And I learned today a sadder thing. That the movie company EuropaCorp is in receivership. Who?? What?? I was not that familiar with them either. But I learned that it was set up in 1999 by Luc Besson (all bow). Who, after making possibly the three best films of all time: La Femme Nikita, Leon and The Fifth Element, set up the company to make European-made Hollywood-style blockbusters, like Fifth Element, to challenge the American dominance. Alas, like all blessed with the Midas Touch, as he appeared to be after those 3 amazing films, he and the studio then produced a whole load of duds. And the difference between making art-house Euro-flicks like Nikita (which was then made again in English by the Yanks which told the exact same story but without any style or class), and ‘blockbusters’, is usually about $200million. So you can’t afford too many failures. Yet that’s what they’ve had. Which is such a shame.

Leon was not only ground-breaking, almost proto-Tarantino in its approach, but also introduced the exquisite then-child Natalie Portman to the world. And the Fifth Element was so odd, bizarre and stupid that it went full circle and became brilliant. In my mind anyway.

What a shame.

Back to work

Happy Wednesday

A xxxx

The over-riding message you take from all of Japan is one of food. There are restaurants, cafes, diners, quite literally everywhere. In rows. You never ever find just one, always 17. Most selling the same thing, sometimes they offer variety. In the spaces between the eateries you find food shops. Not just ‘yer basics’ kind’a shops, you have those too. But sweets, biscuits, cakes, desserts. And all these places are busy and everyone walks down the streets with either bags of food or eating on the move. They are also a nation who love to drink. As in ‘drink’. Beer, wine, sake, whisky, anything, the more the better, whatever helps with the high notes on Unchained Merody.

Yet you don’t see fat people here. (Currently pigging out in the lounge at Haneda airport and by the time you read this ‘here’ will be ‘there’, so there may be ambiguity), Well, you do but they speak with American or Australian accents. Ok, a few British. And not just ‘not fat’ but the default position here is ‘painfully skinny’.

And thus we should be investigating the genetic make up of oriental people to discover, isolate and clone ‘the gene’ for thinness and offer implant services outside every branch of KFC, McDonalds, Dennys, every fish’n’chip shop, pie-n-masheree and pub in every… everywhere Westerners eat, except the Japanese restaurants, obvs.

Because the answer must be diet. Yes, they are ‘pre-disposed’ to thinness but obesity levels are generally a reflection of fat/sugar/carb consumption within a society which is cultural and to a degree socio-economic in that ‘the poor’ can eat hi-fat shit much more cheaply than they can eat ‘well’. They don’t sell pizzas at Nobu.

It’s what they eat though that is rather spectacularly healthy. 796 ways to eat fish. Some of them even cooked. A few you wouldn’t even want to ask. But loads that are just wonderful. If ya like fish, obvs. And Japan is a series of fairly narrow islands, so everywhere is coastal. (Fish generally live on the coast, FYI). Plain boiled rice. Yeuch. But you get used to it and can drown it in anything to give it taste. They grow it here. Many in their own gardens. They DON’T use heavy sauces here, like your British chicken-tikka-massala or ‘chinese’ take-out. And they’re big on tofu (no, me neither, horrible stuff) vegetables, lots and lots of good stuff. And they’re big on breakfast. Which pretty much looks like every other meal; fish, rice, tofu, miso soup, but is more… breakfasty than the same thing served later on. Because…

So I suppose what I’m really saying is: YOU EAT TOO MUCH YOU GREAT FAT WESTERN FUCK!! LIGHTEN UP, IN EVERY SENSE. And then, like me, your inner yin will outweigh your outer yang and you’ll either become slim and waif-like or you’ll vanish up your own kimono. But something in the diet here is seriously, profoundly, outrageously, non-obesely, type-2-diabetes-preventively wonderful and good for you. Turning Japanese, I want to turn you Japanese, I really think so.

Happy landings

A xxxx

I was standing on the platform this morning at Odawara station, getting the bullet train back to Tokyo. So this is what you do. You find the platform, it ain’t hard. Then along the platform are the numbers of the actual carriages on the train, once it arrives. So you go to the ‘4’ number and you know that is precisely, exactly, unwaveringly where the door to carriage 4 will arrive. So they paint lines to queue behind it and, being Japan, everyone politely, courteously, quietly, stands in a neat little line. They all know the rules.

I was standing in the wrong place. Mel pointed it out. So I modified my favourite football song for the good citizens of Odawara (all Japanese are good citizens, they don’t have burglars, muggers, homeless, smelly or Chelsea fans). “I’ll stand where I want; I’ll stand where I wa-ant: I’m a fuckin’ foreigner, I’ll stand where I want”.

Because wonderful and amazing and dependable that Japan is, there are lots of rules for someone like me who naturally just kind’a likes to circumvent, question, argue with or just ignore. Like waiting for a little green man to give you permission to cross the road. I’ve crossed roads since I was 5 without any green men, why do I need ‘em now? In London its an irrelevance, but here, you just… its just HOW IT IS DONE! And in the interests of harmonious international accord, I stood waiting with everyone else. Gritting my teeth and shuffling my feet.

But then Manchester City won the league and it all became a bit irrelevant. Spurs finished 4th, which was obvious after last week but in the interests of statistical possibility (Arsenal winning by 8 goals and us losing), we weren’t allowed to actually claim it. Though we were allowed ‘pre-statistical gloating and arrogance’ as per Premier League Rule 736-17, ch.4, pt.7.

And in fact Spurs could have finished 3rd, as Chelsea drew, but obviously we didn’t because at this end of the season, generally, we just don’t. They HAVE to make it hard on the fans, there has to be something of a collapse.

And because we have bigger fish to fry coming up. The biggest fish in the footballing pond, in fact. The final of the European Champions League on June 1st. In case you missed that. Liverpool are to be the haddock. Chelsea are the chips and Arsenal become a pickled onion in this over-stressed metaphor.

I’m getting on a very early plane tomorrow morning. We are returning to Lila. And the very soon to be ‘plus 1’. I’ve loved every minute of it here. Just amazing and totally excellent.

Sayonara

A xxxx

You arrive at the Ryokan and the first thing that happens is that you take your shoes off. That’s a big thing in Japan anyway, but in the ‘old Japan’ ethos of a Ryokan, its a red line. At the door, off they come and they lend you some sandals. You get to choose. Small, medium or large. Cool. Then they take you to your room, which is basically made for someone with no legs. The table is 6 inches off the floor, the chairs have no legs either, the bed’s on the floor. And its spartan. But nice. In a very Japanese way. A massive suite with nothing in it (nothing with legs, anyway) and an outside bath.

Then you have to wear a kimono thing, as you can see. And if you laugh I will kill you. Because its in the rules. Ok, you don’t have to wear it all the time but I need to get in character.

We’re in a place called Hakoni which is in the national park by Mount Fuji. Which is actually a ‘Volc’ rather than a ‘mount’. So the whole area is one pit of seismic activity. Which is very interesting if you’re studying geography or geology, rather more worrying if you’re just cruising round. But it also means… hot springs! And we love hot springs. And our Ryokan has its own. Lots of them. And the idea is that you use them to boil your testicles. And when they’re cooked you get out and collapse because of the outrageous temperature your body has reached. It’s great fun.

In fact our ‘outside bath’ is our own mini hot tub, natural spring, in a gorgeous little secluded courtyard. Which is wonderful. Everything here’s wonderful; its fucking Japan, innit?

And then they bring you dinner. At 6. No negotiation. Rules. And its in your room. And you have your own ‘person’ in her own kimono, who brings you course after course of the most amazing looking, tasting wonderful things. Most of which, if you have eaten before, you don’t recognise. The rest you’ve just walked past in the forest, fish pond or Japanese supermarket with no English translations. And the level of intricacy with every tiny little side-dish, every minuscule decoration, is an art. Much better than those art installations I saw the other day. And a lot tastier. Amazing experience. Even if you look a bit of a twat doing it.

Yesterday when we approached Hakone on the bullet train, Mel said: ‘oh look, there’s Mount Fuji’. Because it was. Magnificent in the sunshine with just the merest halo of cloud around its very tip. And we watched it for 10 minutes thinking; we’ll see that tomorrow. Alas, tomorrow became today and we didn’t see it at all. Because it was cloudy. And we learned that to see the mountain at all is rare as fucking hen’s teeth. Rare as an Arsenal Champions League match.

Back to Tokyo tomorrow, then home Tuesday morning. Gonna miss it here.

Happy Sunday; now for the footy

A xxxx

When in Rome, as the saying goes, do like the Romans. But what do they mean? Eat an unborn baby? Shag a little boy? Fight a lion, kill a Christian or just eat pizza?

And how does that help me when I’m in Hakone, which is where I’m headed. To Mount Fuji. To stay in the national park. In a Ryokan. Which is a traditional Japanese Inn, where you sleep on a futon, wear something like a kimono, and drink tea that tastes like shit? It has to be done. And I presume you have to eat with chopsticks.

Which is the ‘when in Tokyo’ bit. When you’re here, you eat with chopsticks. Except Mel. Who is genetically challenged in that department. I say ‘genetically’ not with any scientific validation but merely because it may cause insult to her (genetically identical) twin sister. Who, I believe, has no such issues, but still. I personally like eating with those things, its fun. Mel always gets a spoon. Unlike the chap next to me at breakfast yesterday who had 2 fried eggs with his meal. Which was otherwise a traditional Japanese one. So I looked at his eggs and his chopsticks and thought: I wanna see this. I expected him to just pick the entire thing up and shove it in his mouth, with yolk dripping all over the place. But he didn’t. He cheated. He cut a lump off with his sticks and shoved it into his little bowl. I don’t know what else was in that bowl, but it all got thrown in together. I was so fascinated I went and ordered him a 12 ounce t-bone, cooked rare. Sort that out with yer fucking chopsticks, mate.

Then we went to Miyajima. A little island just a 10-minute ferry ride from a station that’s a 25-minute train ride from Hiroshima. Possibly the most lovely place on Earth. You climb to the top of the mountain there and what you see is breath-taking. But for so long you actually pass out and need oxygen and paramedics. Ok and breathe…

You go to Miyajima because you have to. It’s in your tourist contract. And there’s only 2 things to do there. Firstly you see the famous (round here) Torii gate, the ‘floating’ one. These are the gates at the shrines. So you know where to pray. And you see the shrine, which in Japan are not like a little Buddha with a candle and an incense stick, not here matey. Here, a Shinto shrine is fucking massive buildings, loads of them, statues, alters, the whole 9 yen. So you see the gate and you go ‘ooooohhhhh’ and tick the box in your guidebook. Though it is lovely and the setting its in is divine. And you head off to the other thing. The mountain. Because from the top of that is visions of heaven.

And then you come back. But we didn’t. Because Miyajima is one of those places that, particularly in the gorgeous sunshine, you just don’t want to leave. Why would you? There’s loads to eat, loads to drink, deer walking the streets, and it feels just wonderful. So we stayed all afternoon and got a late ferry back.

Another day, another bullet train. And that’s the beauty of Japan, the real magic. It works. Perfectly. All of it. All the time. There’s an effortless efficiency about absolutely everything here. So every time you wonder: ‘now where is *****?’ a sign will just appear and tell you precisely. Or something will take you there. Maybe all those prayers in all those shrines pay off?

Happy Penultimate Day of the Premier League Season

A xxxx

What is art? Iss pitchers. Innit. Maybe skullptcha. Drawins. Nice. Pretty. Don’t’cha reckon?

Well you’d be wrong. You Neanderthal, philistine, anachronistic know-nuffink. Renoir? Tosser. Picasso? Wanker. Beethoven? Nob. Ok, musician, but sort of arty.

Because if you want ‘contemporary art’, you need ‘installations’. Tracey Emin does ‘em. Loads of people do them. And on the gorgeous little Japanese island of Naoshima, they love art installations like nowhere else. They take a whole house, an abandoned one, I presume as I didn’t see anyone in the middle of the installations, like making tea or watching Match of the Day, and they… they instal! And they’re brilliant. If you really like installations.

My favourite was the house that was a tribute to emptiness. Because you didn’t know if the house had been installed with emptiness or was waiting for it. Because you don’t know if a toilet is a toilet or a valuable and essential statement on existential nihilism.

But it is powerful. The over-riding emotion is ‘WHAT THE FUCK????’ but that’s just because, like you, I have preconceptions that looking at art should be easy, simply the admiring of an image or object, or a dislike of it. Not here matey. Here you have to work out what you’re looking at and whether its art or a brick wall behind that art. You have to understand the difference between… well, anything and anything else.

One house was in absolute pitch blackness. And you sat there, having felt your way around the walls to find the seats, and you dark-adapt. And that’s it. You can see nothing, then you can see almost something, and they let you go. Enlightened (very intentional pun) and blinded by the darkness.

How’s that fucking ART????

Then we reached a wonderful house that was made entirely from bits of old boats and it was spectacular. And brilliant. And wonderful. And fun. And I thought maybe… just maybe… art installations can be cool. But that was our 6th. And the other five were so obscure as to be totally impenetrable. Although some felt nice to be in, like the one pictured. A rock in a garden. You can’t get more inspired than that.

Well, Lucas Moura can, but I can’t. Still stunned, still amazed. Hiroshima never felt so good.

Happy Friday

A xxxx

I wrote today’s blog last night. Due to Mel insisting that we sort of ‘catch trains’ and ‘eat dinner’ and ‘see things’, at all sorts of inconvenient times, you have to make hay whilst the rising sun. And its about art. I left a little space at the bottom just to put something like: shame about Spurs, great to have got so far, blah, blah, sadness, sorrow, few tears, not meant to be, injury-plagued, small squad, price’a wheat, better than Arse, blah, blah, blaaaaah.

Then we went out for a fab dinner (its so random here because you never really know what you’ve ordered or what its gonna look like until its on your fork, no matter how many plastic fucking models you see outside) and returned only mildly drunk for bed. At about 11. What you call ‘3 in the afternoon’. By kick off time I was in the fast asleep world of 4am.

There are ways to follow football. I’ve tried them all. Firstly you can go. Some say this is the best way, but they don’t run a fast train from Takamatsu to Amsterdam, I checked. Lila’s dad was there though. The first link. Next is ‘watching in a bar’, which is fun and shouty and wonderful, depending on the bar. Rachie found a bar in Berlin to do this and went there with a Dutch friend, an Ajax fan. Brave. Then there’s tv. But they don’t have such channels here. Although Lila’s mum was watching in London. Lila went to bed. Eventually. And the fourth way to really ‘soak up the atmosphere’, to really maximise the thrill and excitement of what was, along with Tuesday night’s Liverpool game, probably the most incredible match ever played, is to relive it retrospectively via our message group. Benny there live, Rachie in Berlin, Nat in London, Lila in bed, us in Japan (though my own contribution was obviously rather minimal).

So when nature called me (I think my bladder is linked to the Spurs website) it was just after 6am. 10pm in the Uk, 11 in Amsterdam, game just finished. I picked up my phone as I walked bathroomwards, to see the ‘bad news’ and standing there, I ‘followed the game’. It went like this:

(Nothing for virtually the entire first half because we weren’t very good, they were and scored two more effin goals)

And so is Dad.

But by then I was awake. And running round the bathroom screaming so Mel wouldn’t miss out on this profound and wonderful moment in our lives.

I’ll send the other blog tomorrow. It’s important. They’re all important. But this just couldn’t wait.

CHAMPIONS LEAGUE FINAL!!!! AAAAGGGGGHHHHHH

Happy Thursday

A xxxx