Tokyo Day 5

What do you thinkI did this morning?

Yep, went to Shinjuku and Ochanomizu to look at guitars.

Didn't see anything that I loved, but at least I saw and tried some new potential candidates. The first place I went was in Shin-Okubo, and the basement was like a vintage guitar museum. The amount of nearly priceless (judging by the prices) vintage American guitars in Tokyo is mind-boggling.

Remember, I used to look at guitars in Nashville.

Tokyo is unbelievable for seeing huge collections of rare and fantastic American musical instruments.

I saw this poster outside an arcade while I waited for the 11 o'clock opening of the store:

We all know I love mahjong, but this is even better:

The first rule of Mahjong Fight Club is you don't talk about Mahjong Fight Club. At 2pm I met Mr. Higashi and we had lunch with two of his coworkers, who were women. They work on the company's web page. They seemed very nice, but I didn't ask about how they felt working for an AV company. They didn't seem to mind, and we were eating lunch.

Well, they were eating. I was involved in exhausting negotiations between my bad back and my worse knees and the wooden floor I was expected to sit on. I was very uncomfortable, and I realize my tendons would need a lot of stretching if I lived here.

That's not a euphemism, in case you were wondering. But then Mr. Higashi told me Nana had blogged about dinner, and I felt a lot better.

After lunch, we walked the short distance to the Soft On Demand offices.

I noticed in the subway station that they were listed on the Area Map that the stations always have; point of local pride, I guess.

This is the company that produces the AVs Nana used to be in. They still produce AV. Actually, they produce a LOT of AV.

500 a month.

One problem, I was told, is that while the demand for new AV grows, and while approximately 2,000 women apply to be AV stars every month, the number of actors (i.e. men) remains static. These guys are working three times a day.

Which, on the surface, sounds like fun.

But day in and day out ( or  in and out all day), that's got to be a grind. And as Mr. Higashi pointed out, an actress who's having an off day can fake it. The guy can't.

There's no Penis Double in AV. Verisimilitude carries more weight than you know, especially in Japan.

I must say that I learned a lot about the business of producing pornography, about Japanese AV philosophy, and by extension Japanese attitudes about sexuality. I'm dead serious when I say I am overwhelmingly grateful to Mr. Higashi and everyone at SOD because I got to find out about something I never could have otherwise, and they'd have been well within their rights to tell me to go away. They didn't, and I'm lucky.

I got to meet the president of the company. He's 33 and a former director. God bless him. He's got to be an exceedingly rich man, but he was as down-to-earth as anyone and answered a lot more questions than I ever should have asked. I learned just how much of a business it is, and how they do a lot of market research and they all work hard and strive to do well.

Of course, it was also a magnificently weird afternoon, and for that I am eternally grateful.

Imagine an office full of people bustling about doing office work. Now imagine the office is decorated like an adult video store. Posters, shelves of DVDs, autographed life-size flats of actresses (in bikinis). No one who works there can really say the decor is dull.

We actually watched excerpts of videos from a 'digest' the company produces (and I need a copy, because some of the scenes are absolutely hilarious). I've never watched porn on a 60" TV.

I've never watchedanything on a 60" TV.

But we were looking specifically at things that were admittedly either experiments on the companies part or pandering to niche markets. My absolute favorite involved what might have to be called "Bungee F#$%ing."

Picture a couple  on a Plexiglas (so you can film 'through' it) platform suspended 200' off the ground by a crane, and half a dozen other cranes with cameramen dangling off of them in baskets. The couple both have on bungee harnesses.

Apparently, this was a competition for the actors, since a fear of heights would certainly impede one's ability to 'rise' to the occasion.

Anyone can get it up, but not just anyone can get it 200' up.

We watched a truncated version of events, the basic premise of which is that the couple would engage in sexual activity until the man climaxed, frequently away from the woman. This was apparently to highlight the visibility and veracity that he had indeed discharged his responsibilities, so to speak.

Then, he would jump off the platform.

But here's the best part, and the first time it took me by surprise. As he approached the nadir of his fall, an explosive charge was set off on the ground, making a huge cloud of dust that looked immense, usually enveloping the man.

Then the woman jumped off. She didn't get an(other) explosion, but it was still very funny.

One of my favorite parts was that as they fell, quickly and in such a manner that there was no prurient visual aspect, there was a large mosaic over their entire midsection so you wouldn't see their naughty bits

As they bungee jumped off a platform they had just f#$%ed on.

I've gotto buy that DVD!!! It's like an X-rated version of those Japanese game shows.

With mosaic.

It was the most magnificently hilarious thing I have seen since Elvis Tsui's heyday.

After a couple hours of being closer to the world of AV than I ever thought possible (with my pants still on), I bid Mr. Higashi adieu. I thanked him again and asked him to thank Nana for me.

I'd rather have done it myself, but you can't always get what you want. And after yesterday, I have no right to ask anyone for anything.

I got on the train and went to Shinjuku.

To look for guitars.

But I had a good reason, sort of.

It was 4:30.

The trains were about to be used for human density experimentation. I wanted no part of it.

Oh, and I forgot to mention that I was grateful to watch AV for a medical reason.

It was so cold today that I thought I froze my b@lls off.

I like the cold, but I had guessed wrongly (again) for my wardrobe. Still, it was better than being a sweaty pig.

So I walked around Shinjuku, my cheeks rosy from the wind (and recollections of Bungee F#$%ers Vol. 8). I seem to have gotten a grasp of the place, at least based on finding the same guitar stores I went to yesterday. I mean from a different direction. I located Shimamura Music, which I couldn't find yesterday, and went back to Ishibashi and Rock In. I didn't expect much, and in fact realized I had confused the Ishibashi in Shibuya with the one in Shinjuku.

But that doesn't mean all Japanese music stores look the same. It just means I can be stupid.

I'm glad I went back, because I lucked into an irresistible situation that led to having a curvaceous body reclining on my bed.

It's not what you think. What you think is what I hoped, but never mind...

Where was I? Oh, yes. So I go into Rock In, because I had seen a marginally interesting guitar there recently, an Edwards (which is a branch of ESP) Les Paul in Tobacco Sunburst, relic version:

Now, as you know, I don't care for relic-ing. It's cheating, I think. But after doing research and hands-on inspection, I had to admit that the guitars are extremely well-made, sound great, and are a great value for the $.

Still, I was hoping for something that wasa relic, not something that had beenrelic'ed. Here's a picture of the same model in different colors:

These guitars, being new, are actually fairly common in Tokyo, and I had seen quite a few, ranging in price from about Y120,000 to Y82,000, which was the lowest I had seen, and that was at Rock In.

They had the tobacco sunburst as well as the Cherry Sunburst and the Vintage Honey Burst. These guitars are not very glossy, because they are finished in nitrocellulose as opposed to polyurethane. 'Nitro' is thinner and supposedly sounds better. I just like it because you're not paranoid about scratching a dull finish like you are with a shiny one.

Today's lesson: Dull finish is good for guitars, but bad for AV.

I have always preferred the Tobacco Sunburst. Not sure why. But as I looked at the rest of the guitars, away from the 'Edwards section,' I noticed a Cherry Sunburst Edwards in another part of the store.

I looked at it for a long time. I stared at it. Because it wasn't Y82,000. It was Y59,000. I asked to try it out. I looked it over, played it, and looked it over some more. The sales guy didn't speak English, but through an hilarious display of miming, etc., I managed to make him understand that I wondered why this one was so much cheaper than the others that were the same thing.

One of the valuable lessons I have learned here is that I will be much more careful from now on when I speak English to people who don't speak much of it. Because this guy just spoke Japanese to me no matter how hard I shrugged or shook my head. God bless him. He was trying to communicate, and for that I respect him.

He looked at me and said "crack," and held up the guitar.

Pawned by a crackhead? Really?

Supposedly, near the knobs on the face, there was a crack. I couldn't see it. We turned it in the light. I saw an incredibly small and shallow scratch about an inch long. I pointed to it. He smiled and said "Yes!" Then his face got grave, and he said very seriously "and fingerprints."

So this thing was Y23,000 less because of a tiny scratch and some fingerprints.

This is the area of the guitar in question:

Let me try to help you:

Do you see it?

Neither do I!!!

But I saw a great deal staring me in the face that probably wasn't going to be around long, so I bought it. Now I don't have to sleep alone:

Your curves are so voluptuous, your neck so smooth and slim,

and your knobs so smooth when I twist them... It wasn't exactly the thing I was looking for, but its exactlythe kind of deal that must be seized and not drooled on.

I just don't know what I'm going to do with my time from now on.

Probably look at more guitars.

And chuckle to myself about a certain someone who told the internet a certain something. I need to make up a t-shirt:

夏目ナナは私が巨大であることを主張する