Re-contract with HIDEKI MATSUI possible ?

This is a common topic among MLB fans in Japan. Matsui stayed in Yankees for 7 years. He had good time and bad time during that long time. Fortunately or as he is expected, he got the MVP all through the World series.

Matsui proved the top player’s power and potentiality when he played in Japan, and nobody doubted his presence.  Everybody expected a home-run when he came up and he made adequate results to fans expectation in Japan.

In Yankees, he continued the good player status, but the environment around him is 180 degree different from Japanese baseball. All the players are powerful enough to be home-run batters and phisical ability of them is really high. Matsui stands out in Japanese players, however, among MLB players he always needs to compete with them not to be kicked out from the regular position.

He knew how it would be before crossing the ocean 7 years ago, but he chose the hard way.  He challenged.

Hideki Matui again proved his ability on baseball through world series, but he is exposed on the negotiation table for next season. In Japan he never experienced it.  What he needed to think in Japan was the salary for the season only.  Re-contract was truly natural matter for him.

Even with the high result of world series, he would be judged from 360 degree angle about his possibility by the directors of Yankees.  This may insult his pride if he has such a simple mind, but probably he is ready to accept any even before he became a member of Yankees. Otherwise, he never decided to cross the ocean.

About Hideki Matsui’s re-contract with Yankees,  fans in Japan are worried about it.

In my opinion, he doesn’t have to cling to one spot. He should search for somewhere his potentiality could be fully grown.  If he didn’t chose Tokyo Giants when he was in Japan for next year contract, it would be a big damage on his career.  He must keep the top star position all the time in Japan.  Not in MLB.

TAKOYAKI is especially popular in western part of Japan, recently it’s widely found anywhere in Japan though. TOKOYAKI is similar to OKONOMIYAKI but the biggest difference is the shape and the contents.

TAKOYAKI’s tako means octopus, and yaki means grill or fry in Japanese.  Direct translation is Fried Octopus.

Takoyaki’s shape is like a small ball. In each ball, there is a cut of Octopus.  Watered wheat flour covers octopus and when it’s fried on the round shaped pan, it would be fixed in the ball shape.

Some foreigners actually rejected takoyaki even though they tried in their mouth.  We Japanese probably like it very much, so we don’t know why they can’t eat. Taste is basically on Japanese sweet sauce and sometimes add mayonnaise, shaved and dried fish, seaweed, or leek.

Actually it’s fried, so maybe not so wired as Sashimi or Sushi for foreigners.

People in Osaka especially love takoyaki and there are many barrows in in the main shopping streets of Osaka, and most of them sell them in low price but the taste is really good.  In Osaka, we don’t miss having it. We just buy it at a barrow and eat it right away sitting on the street edge or while walking.  Of course, take away is possible.

Below video shows how to make Takoyaki well. It seems a very small street takoyaki shop but looks nice.

I found an American girl who speaks amazingly natural Japanese.  Her name is KYARORIN, she seems to live in Chicago now.

I happened to find her video on YouTube, and I got amazed !

She says she learns Japanese for herself and she’s never studied Japanese at school. To be honest, only a little bit English speaker’s accent could be recognized in her conversation, but it’s only a small thing and very hard to identify.  If we don’t know anything about her, we would think she had been born in Japan and at least she stayed for a while in Japan until she begins speaking some.  To sum up, she speaks almost naturally !

Also she talks to the lens ! She doesn’t look at any scripts, in addition, she uses dialect of western Japan very naturally.  Teenager’s spoken words are also coming from her mouth, which amazed me again.

She continued she enjoys OWARAI or Japanese comedian talks. It’s really unbelievable ! Japanese OWARAI talks is really fast and so much side meaning is hidden in the talks, so watchers of OWARAI need to catch up with the talks first and they have to find the hidden “laughable meaning” behind the rapidly spoken words right away. That’s more than a simultaneous understanding, it more like a person always living in Japanese life. Otherwise, it’s not possible to laugh at comedians talks.

She says she’s learned Japanese for 5 years.  I’ve rarely seen a foreigner who mastered up to this level in such a short time.

In the end, sha says the motive for Japanese lesson for her is that she saw Morning Musume, a Japanese idol girl group. OK, I understand the reason, but it’s really hard for me to see why she made such a progress.

I learned English because I wanted to know Beatles more.  Is it the same kind of reason as she has ?

Below are the Morning Musume’s video and Kyarorin.  She updates her blog in Japanese too.

GReeeeN is a vocal group of Japan who are all from dentist course of college in North part of Japan.  They used to go to Ohu University in Koriyama City, Fukushima Prefecture and met there to be a music group.

Their music was just an independent record, some people liked it and requested to media. Their music career started then and soon they went up to a popular vocal group of Japan.

Recently an entertainment magazine reported that they would soon break up and all of them seem to become dentist.  BUT, the news seems not true, or a lie.

A member of GReeeeN got heated up by the bad rumore made by the magazine and he showed “Fuck You Sign” in their website.  Now their web site is burnt up with the battle.

Maybe it’s not long before the battle is seased, but nobody knows where and who the romore came from.
This news is a little bit hot topic among teenage music fans in Japan.

World famous animation, Crayon Shinchan, continues to be published until March next year through Monthly MangaTown magazine, news reported today. The author Yoshito Usui suddenly died last year in the wood of Japan. Since then,  Crayon Shinchan’s fans in the world spent gloomy days. This could be a little good news for them although the new scripts will never be written by Yoshito Usui.

CRAYON SHINCHAN is basically an armature animator’s work if it’s checked by professional animators. But the stories and characters were supported beyond the technique of drawing. 

Although Yishito Usui seldom appeared in public, his character was easily understood by the world Crayon Shinchan fans.

In Japan, many were raised by Manga and Anime while they were children.  In some ways Crayon Shinchanwas provocative when the characters criticize the adult society or they use sexual words in spite that it was for kids.  In that sense, this manga animation caused attitude like children because they often imitated the narration of Shinchan.

Crayon Shinchan was hugely supported by kids, and it’s one of the social phenomena of Japan.

I don’t know how Crayon Shinchan was translated and exported to other countries, however, it’s true that Yoshito Usui had thrown a stimulative stone to the world of children then. In a sense, it was a stone which made them think what the real society is.

With all the close words and expression, in overall Crayon Shinchan was adored by fans. The laughter and wit of Shinchan always gave us oasis of hearts.  Shinchan could blow our stress away when we were down.

Shinchan left us something precious in memory.  Good bye, Mr. Yoshito Usui.

Chicken dish are found anywhere in the world. They are also in various way of cooking. In Japan there are some chicken cooking ways, YOKITORI is probably the most popular style of Chicken cooking in Japan.

Yakitori is cooked with sumibi grill or Charcoal grill, and while grilling, chicken is dipped into Teriyakisauce or seasoned with slight salt.  Yakitori has mainly 2 tastes like this, Teriyaki and Salt.

Usually Yakitori is the most standard pupu ( snack) at Izakaya or Japanese traditional tavern.  They drink beer or Japanese wine, Sake,  and taste Yakitori over booze.

You should try beer and Yakitori together if you come to Japan. The matching of the tastes is excellent ! One note is that Izakaya is often crowded with salaried workers after 5:00pm on week days. They are often flustrated with business and they drink beer for getting stress away !  Don’t get involved in their conversation ! It’s like a stress escaping time for them, so they often become crazy drinkers.

Video velow is an old Yakitori restaurant. An old chef is grilling Yakitori !

AYAKA’s best album, AYAKA’s history 2006-2009, made sales over 1 million copies only 1 and half months after the releasing date.  Last year, Namie Amuro made 1 million hit and this album followed it.

In 1980 to 1990′s, Japan had many million hit records by young generation’s demand to music software. On the contrary, the young generation don’t buy CDs because they use PC or Mobile phones for downloading music. Record companies are suffering from the shifting demand of young generation from CDs to downloading music.

This time,  the young generation or the teenager buy this best album of Ayaka.  They seem to be moved by her songs and life style as Ayaka is fighting illness of Grave’s disease.

Actually her songs have power of life and very positive message. Young generation is especially  in lack of this type of music now. Most of the idol groups are non-message music singers with non-sense songs. Record companies may feel relieved with this result because it’s a good reconfirmation for them that music with life message is still needed among the young generation.

As everyone knows, downloading music is not a treasure. But when we buy CDs, it means we more or less want to preserve them for a long time as our memory, or sometimes they are treasures of our life.

CD marketing is hard now.  Basically listeners are still in want of good music.  The most important thing is not analyzing the market but producing the good quality music.

GACKT keeps something about him under secret. Age is one of the secrets. He recently said that he would be 37 years old next year ! Then finally we got his age.

GACKT often jokes, and sometimes gets serious. If we don’t get used to his talks, we would be at a loss about which is his real way.  This time, it seems serious, so he will be 37, actually.

As my impression, he is quite aged for the image. I thought he was at most 30 years old or so.  To be honest, from male eyes, it’s impossible to judge age about him because he makes up his face. Also, he talks very unusual way, which makes it hard to understand his age. As we grow up, the topic we chose is also grown up. But his conversation is like up and down, right and left, and clear and vague. Anytime we feel like he is just enjoying it.

Probably it’s his charm, and it attracts women.

After his age is decided, I don’t know how the fans of him feel.  At least I’m sure that fans will keep on the same because fans seem not to mind his age at all. GACKT lives in virtual dream land. That is fan’s psychology.

GACKT CALENDERS are also available through online mart

KAZUSHI KIMURA announced he would come back to YOKOHAMA MARINOS as the director (manager) of the team in the website he himself runs.

KAZUSHI KIMURA was a splendid forward player in Japanese football history. Without his play, Japan never succeeded to set up professional soccer football league.  At the time of NISSAN Football team, Kazushi Kimura became the first professional football player in Japan before the professional league starts in Japan. Although the salary for professional status was not high enough, he tried the way for himself and future of Japanese soccer.

He was respected by many players around him, and when he quit the player, many missed him.

I personally think he should work in the uniform, not in suite. His charisma and his passion to soccer is extraordinary. Also his memory is still alive in fan’s mind, so Kazushi’s existence in the field will bring mental concentration to both players and present people in the stadium.

Professional director is a really hard job. If no good result, it simply means no contract next year. Each year is the battle of mind.

I believe he can overcome that hardship because I’ve seen many difficult scenes while he played in All Japan Team, and anytime he faced the problem, he was always there to solve it.

When I first heard this song, Come Back to ME, I thought HIKARU UCHIDA grew up in some ways.  Hikaru Uchida suddenly opened the door of Japanese POP music when she was just 16 or so.  HikaruUchida’s first hit song, AUTOMATIC, was a real shock to Japanese music industry because her song had something new we’ve never had. Melody has black contemporary influenced feeling and the words she makes is what we native Japanese can’t use in songs as the timing of the words on melody is not Japanese song’s style.

She speaks Japanese but her songs were not Japanese songs although the words and the singer were Japanese.

Probably the fans at the time felt like listening to American songs through Hikaru Uchida’s music. Moreover they could enjoy them as exotic feeling music with Japanese words. The best matching atmosphere on her songs led Japanese fans into her original world.

From American people, this story sounds like she just imitated American music.  I think it’s true more or less. Actually she grew up in America with her famous mother, Keiko Fuji. From my point of view, her songs were just natural for her. She was raised by American Music and she also speak Japanese among her family. What she made was just the way she lives.

And her way of life ends up tp the extremely comfortable exotic sound for us with Japanese language filter. Consequently, her 1st album in Japan was a mega hit, which sold more than 8 million copies. Of course it’s a Japanese best selling record ever.

COME BACK TO ME set me a little different feeling. I felt she got out of Japanese market and she’s back in woman of American blood. She’ not teenager here in this video any more and she is released from Japanese music category. She is doing what she wants to. She looks like a flying bird in the sky out of the cage.

When she sang Automatic for Japanese market, she was decollated by Japanese music industry with big expectation. Now she is free from it and CAME BACK TO HERSELF.