What do do with ourselves after the musical is over...

At a lack for things to do on the weekend now that there are no longer rehearsals for the musical, we were desperate for plans.

Together Louise and Chris Pickles dreamed up "Cockney-oke." It is Karaoke done with a Cockney accent (Think Dick Van Dyke from Marry Poppins) and Cockney costumes. We started off strong at Cassanovas (where our horrifying singing scared away a few customers), then ventured off to Bar Bitch. There after a few drinks and a few songs, the owner said "Ok last song..." Which we thought to meant he was closing, but as it turns out he just wanted us to stop singing. @.@ From Bar Bitch we went to Ingrid's where we noisily interrupted a quiet night at her bar, and sang a few loud songs. After a little while longer there, we wanted cheeseburgers. Root Down, the bar Louise and I vowed never to return to again was open for its very last weekend since the bar owner was going on to become a priest or something ridiculous like that. We got there at 3am and he would not serve us burgers. We were so furious. We decided then to get snacks at Turibilly Bops since we had not been there in ages. The bartender was surprised to see us, but I think his joy soon dissipated as we were rowdy and in general not good company. I blame the alcohol. But after what was a great theme for a night, we all went home, having pissed off at least 4, maybe 5 bartenders.

Waking up the next morning, feeling rough, we discover on Louise's camera that we had taken several interesting pictures of us dancing and making faces at James' house before bed. There was even a picture of "I hate Norm" written on a sticky pad and stuck to my underwear... No recollection. To be fair, we were mad that he wouldn't give us cheeseburgers.

Thirsty! Thirsty like never before. We all threw our coins at Louise and sent her to the vending machine with a bag to get as many juices as she could buy. She came back with quite the selection, boasting that she spent the money very efficiently and that there was only 10yen left over. We headed off to Mos Burger for breakfast. I was famished from not meeting my delicious burger requirement the night before so I hastily ordered 4 burgers for breakfast. When they were brought out to me, the waitress looked horrified that they were just for me, and said rather hesitantly "Please enjoy them slowly..." I could only painfully finish three and a half. What to do today. We had no plans and it was a beautiful day. Louise wanted to go to the park and squirt water guns. This later turned into going to the zoo, and ended in James' apartment playing video games.

We finally gather enough energy up to leave the house, and get directions to the zoo from Andrew. Living in Japan has done something to me. When asking for directions I now only listen to the first sentence of what someone says, and then tune out. Even if it is in English. So I had no clue where the zoo was. We drove and drove in the direction I THINK Andrew sent me in. Then finally we had to stop and ask for directions again. I pulled the same trick and only listened to half. James was convinced that zoo's close early. I told him zoo's aren't ever closed until dusk. I don't know why I think that... It just seems right. We drive and drive, and get to a park that we thought was the zoo. The park was closing and the traffic getting out of the park took a while. It was there we decided that we probably wouldn't make it to the zoo. Instead we were not going to go home until we took a picture of 3 animals; it didn't even matter what kind. As we were driving, on an overpass James sees a couple walking a dog. One woman riding a bike, and her husband/boyfriend/brother/friend walking with the dog beside her. The bicycle was blocking the picture of the dog so James shouts out the window, "Move bitch..." As they look up he proceeds to hold the camera out the window and try to get a picture of the dog. Brilliant tact, I must say. Finally there's a sign for the zoo. We make some wrong turns again and eventually make it there.

The zoo closes at 4:30. Its 4:45. There goes our day. On the way back I nearly kill everyone in the car by stopping in the middle of the street to grab a picture of a tubby cat laying on the sidewalk. Then we decide to stop at an interesting looking shrine we caught a glimpse of. The area smelled like sewer and the shrine wasn't all that fantastic. There were strange fox statues all over it. We decided to go to the movies. At the movies, we discovered that nothing was playing. The new Disney Movie was playing but only in Japanese language, and everything else either had been seen or wouldn't have been understood. Strike two is this? I've lost count. We eat at an Italian place instead where the Japanese waiter is very eager to see us and tell us his very fake Italian name. Fuel up and out.

Somewhere along the line we title this day "The Day that Never Ceases to Fail." based on an earlier slip up I said, trying to combine "never fails to please," and "never ceases to amaze." We decided to rent movies and eat snacks at James' house. At the movie rental place we pick up Duck Tails, and Spongebob the Movie. We then grab wine, cheese, olives, chips, salsa, and sweets at the supermarket. The movies were an enjoyable end to an interestingly disappointing day.

The next morning we were up early and headed to McDonald's for breakfast. James has never had a hash brown in Scotland so we have been tallying up his hash brown intake since coming to Japan. He's up to 4!!! We are going to do the zoo today! Yesterday was a flop so today we will do it!! But.. its raining. :-/ We go anyway. We each made a list of animals we expected to see at the zoo and entered. We were surprised at the number of animals there in our very town zoo... But because we weren't expecting much from it, the animals we chose were strange, and they didn't have many of the ones on our lists. It was a great time all the same.

From birds to rodents to apes to African greats... I had to throw some pebbles at the red panda and the otters to get them to come out of hiding so we could take a picture. I didn't strike THEM, just near them... And it worked (even tho the otters looked pissed off). When we got to the ape cage there was a chimpanzee pulling on the locked handle of the door in his cage. He probably saw the zoo keeper going out through there and he wanted to as well. What was interesting was, unlike a human, who would have given up, he tried and tried for 10 minutes at least. This intrigued Louise and she started to talk to it. It found a bucket and started hitting it lightly against the floor. Aww its making music. Then its pounding grew and grew until it was beating it against the floor, raising it over his head, and sending it crashing down again. Such a fury arose until finally it was winged into the air, smashed against the viewing class and back through the air. Immediately following that crash, the chip threw himself against the glass, pounding on it. It was terrifying and we thought it was time to leave. He was either having a bad day, or he did not like us one bit. Either way, we did not want to be around crazy ape anymore.

So many animals. We even ran into bird that spoke Japanese. It would not learn English curses despite Louise's valiant attempts. Some lovely tiny monkeys who let you touch them and a sort of petting zoo (closed in the rain). Finished with all the animals we could see we decided to go to the theme park next to the zoo. As it was raining so no one was there. We decided to forgo the all-ride pass because it didn't look like anything was running. We got on the Ferris Wheel, and then the pirate ship. Since we were the only ones in the park we had not only the ride to ourselves but also all of the theme park attendants running that one ride/seating us/ drying the rain off the seats. They did everything short of hold umbrellas over us while on the ride. The ultimate was when we went on the train. At the start of the ride the train goes up a slight incline. Our train couldn't make it, despite there being only 3 people on board. Boy did we feel fat... Eventually a man came and pushed the train up the hill while we just sat there. Finally we went to the arcade played some really bad games and took a purikura from a machine that was made centuries ago and the quality and selection was bad. I got a balloon and we went back to the car to grab our picnic. We ate in the zoo on a bench; lovely sandwiches, fruit, sparkling lemonade, and crackers. Yum.

Finally got to the zoo! And weekend over.

PICTURES!!!
Never Ceases to Fail
Tokushima Zoo
a video of the talking bird

posted by Living and Teaching in Tokushima @ 10:16 AM Comments: 0