Rain & tests

Tsuyu (the rainy season) has well and truly kicked in it seems, so the weather at the moment is usually rainy and humid. Although very occasionally it's not rainy but still humid. Goddamnit I love aircon.

Once again I haven't been up to much, but yesterday evening I braved the rain to take myself to go see some music at a club in Nagoya called the Tokuzo, which bills itself as "good booze, cheap foods and hip music". Cool place, quite intimate (about 150-200 people capacity). I went because Nakayamafutaba (a sweet Osakan girl who plays twee songs by herself on a half-size guitar), Jojo Hiroshige (longtime lynchpin of the Japanese underground) and Keiji Haino (another longtime lynchpin of the Japanese underground) were playing and I like all three of them very much. Hiroshige and Haino's music is hard to describe but is usually experimental and noisy. I won't bore you with a review but Haino in particular was in fine form, and I had a great evening.

What also struck me was how reserved the audience (consisting mostly of Japanese hipsters; I think I was the only gaijin there) was. There was no cheering, no real movement (not that this was really music you could dance to) - just polite applause.

Anyway I have a couple of tests tomorrow so back to the books...sadly one of them is a conversation test, which I always dread...hey ho.

Oh yes, I am also now the proud owner of a "witty" trash can. Seriously, the 100-yen shops here are real Engrish goldmines.