Japan = SMAP

This is the only equation I know when the word Japan is mentioned.  I will not think of Japan without thinking of SMAP and most especially Kimura Takuya, my impossible dream.

So when SMAP announced their live tour this year, I did not hesitate to call my friend Vic and screamed "they have a concert!!!".  The year has been a hectic one and who cares if I will be doing a lot of twisting and turning to get myself over to Japan again.  As they say in Japan "Gambatte!".

So on Sept. 3, with just a limited amount of yen to my name (I just came back from China a week before), I flew to Tokyo.  The final destination is Osaka where Vic was waiting at our hotel.  Like I always said, Japan is the land of my soul and as soon as I got off the plane, it felt not like home but more like a familiar playground.  The first of my many train rides this trip was taking the Keisei line which will take me to central Tokyo in only 36 minutes!  I was met by Mayo, who I've known for 5 years and is my surrogate at the SMAP Fan Club.  She has warmly adopted me for the night at their Meguro ward home. 

As you see it's a fangirl's home.  Mayo loves Jerry the most. :D

On the morning of Sept 4, I went on my next train ride at the symbol of Japan's technology -> the Shinkansen or Bullet train!  It was my first time to ride the famous Nozomi-san.  As I sat on the train for the 2-hour ride, my excitement was so much that I thought I would break out in song  "you can take a little holiday in the sun, take it easy have some fun" hahaha!

I arrived at Osaka after a 2 1/2 hour ride.  As soon as I dumped my bags at Swissotel Nankai (http://www.swissotel.com/EN/Destinations/Japan/Swissotel%20Nankai/Hotel%20Home/Hotel%20Description), Vic and I immediately ran back out in the scorching sun and headed to our ultimate destination, the Osaka Kyocera Dome. We were awed as we approached the dome and realized its our 3rd dome concert (aside from Fukuoka Yahoo dome and Tokyo dome).  We excitedly went straight to the concert goods area and temporarily lost ourselves in the lines. 

The coveted concert goods stalls

 

The dome seats about 70,000 people

After a rather strict checking of our ticket source, we were escorted to the nose-bleed section equivalent to 7-storeys from the ground.  It was a comfortable section though as the seats were the special box seats during baseball games.  While waiting for everyone to get in, SMAP movie previews were being shown and their CMs.  Ahhhh!!!  Space Battleship Yamato!  Takuya's upcoming movie in December.  My early morning travel  caught up with me and I fell asleep.  I thought I was waking up to my alarm but realized the sound was a ticking clock on the screen.

The stage and arena.

When the dome was almost filled, a bunch of globe heads came out and mingled with the audience.  Some shook hands, did body bumps, hi-fives and hugs!  I've already read that SMAP was among these globe heads so it was so much more exciting for Vic and I to speculate who the members are.  And of course sour-graped that we were not the lucky ones that had this rare interaction.  This year, one of the nice touches to the concert was the CG effect on audience putting globe heads and faces of SMAP while we wait for the concert to start.  It kept us busy and laughing.

Who could that be?

Then an awesome video of SMAP as astronauts came out signalling the start of "We are SMAP Live 2010".  The opening song was This is Love, their newest single.  Followed by old favorites Shake, Gambarimashou, Dear Woman remixed in a Japanese guitar style.    I missed this!  An awesome production that is truly a manifestation of Japan's technology and attention to details.

The sea of blue and green lights left side of the dome.


 And the right...awesome!

I couldn't remember everything but another favorite is an arrangement of their old song Celery with an african tribal beat..oooh ganbatte iru yo yareru dake...  Tsuyoshi's solo followed then back to group number with Bang Bang Vacance flooding the arena with balloons.  And giving their Chinese fans more excitement with their upcoming Shanghai concerts, SMAP sang their biggest hit Sekai ni Hitotsu Dake no Hana in a chinese beat with matching costumes! 

The MC talk was funny too as the guys talked about many male fans this year.  Each member tried to call out the male audience who are their fans.  Next was Nakai's solo.  Vic and I were happy to see him back to his hip humping self doing his tribute Michael Jackson number.  We missed the energetic leader!  Goro's solo was cute because he had a lot of fan interaction with his virtual kisses on the big screen.  By the time Sotto Kyutto was being sung, I was again going back to lalaland. zzzzzz....

I was jerked awake by the beats of Dynamite that segued to Five Respect.  We missed that too!  We love the video playback of their old concert video clips.  Takuya at 18 was as charming as his now almost 38 year old self.  Then Shingo had his solo.  Vic and I had fits of laughter because we did not realize that the solo was in english!! hahaha!

The interlude for costume change were greetings of we are smap by Rain (yes the Korean star!), Lin Chiling (yes, Jerry Yan's ex!), Takeuchi Yuko and many more celebrities.  When they came out again, they were wearing what will be one of my favorite outfits they had in a concert - green trench coats.  They sang Lion Heart and OMG!  the mics stands were glowing orange! :D

When they sang Orenji on the second stage near us, I cried once again.  this song will always remind me that I made it again, that I was part of their music and I saw them live.  A nice new song called Love and Peace segued to Takuya's solo Kimi no ma made which was touching at the beginning and then became extremely sexy.  It's the white loose wifebeater I think.  That's the culprit!  And the toned upper arm muscles! LOL.

My body was hanging on the railings totally forgetting we were 7-storeys up!

There were many more special moments of the concert.  It was almost 4 hours long! There are Korean artists that I love but I don't know if they can do something like this and do it for almost 20 years!  While the superb technology of the finale was winding down, the 2 tops moment of Nakai and Takuya during Aoi Inazuma still lingered in my mind.  And as the final bows were being made, Takuya's silent "thank you" gave Vic and I the resolve to come back for the next ones until the finale of their singing lives.

Mata ne!

Otsukaresama deshita SMAP no minna-san!  It was a great show.  It was all worth it.

Note:
Photos were taken by my Blackberry 8900 declared useless for its original purpose while in Japan but was very, very handy up there in the nosebleed section where no one was watching to throw me out of the dome for taking photos.  The rest of the photos will be posted in my facebook page. :D

My New SMAP Concert DVD!!

I was sooo happy to see Mr. EMS (Express Mail Service y'all) a couple of weeks back. He came bearing the package I have been waiting for - SMAP's concert dvd!

Last Sept. 30, 2008 was the memorable day that I went to Tokyo to watch this concert that is now immortalized in a dvd. I can now re-live the fun, the excitement of seeing SMAP live again.

I picked the red SMAP shop version instead of the original concert theme of black, white and grey because I wanted to remember the SMAP shop which has opened during the Christmas holiday season in Asakusa, Tokyo. It is opened only on limited time and I've always wanted to go to one but unless I ditch my Kamp (I would be disowned by my siblings!), I won't be able to.


I have always been thankful that I am a fangirl. I've invested so much on it for pure escapism but the therapy works and I remain a happy girl.

And this will not happen if not for the generosity of my japanese friends Mayo and Minori. They braved the cold winter to line up at the store and make a trip to the post office just to make a girl thousands of miles away really, really happy.

Mayo to Minori, hontou ni arigato gozaimashita. Futari ga saikou desu!

The Purple World Has Expanded Again...

Hah! You guys think that because I was busy with my fangirl pursuits, I wouldn't have time to further enlarge my purple world? Wrong! While I was watching, screaming and buying fangirl souvenir items, I also did some purple shopping.



A trip to Japan will not be complete if I don't indulge in a few pens from Muji (http://www.mujionline.co.uk/index.asp?). In fact, it was my first purchase together with SMAP's latest album from Tobu Shopping Mall. I horde up on Muji pens wherever I find myself near one. I found more pens in this nice store along Ginza called Toy Park. I loved their shopping bag so I kept it for obviously purplish reasons.

The purple sweatshirt from Uniqlo (http://www.uniqlo.com/jp/) is just one of the few purple pieces that I got. Thanks to my travel buddy Vic, I was introduced (to the dismay of my debit card..) to this wonderful store called Uniqlo (read Yunikuro) which is everywhere in Tokyo and Yokohama. Their prices are totally reasonable even for Philippine standards. And yey, they have sizes for relatively (hehe..) big girls like me.

Now those nice Tombow pencils were a gift from Vic. I was actually mulling whether to buy them or not when she beat me to the cash register. Thank you and I love you Vic! Hahaha!

The purple Pringles (Tomato Mozarella) is new to our eyes so we were munching on this variation during the trip.



The craziest purchase I made was this gorgeous toy camera I found in Roponggi Hills. The Holga 120N Medium format plastic camera (http://www.freestylephoto.biz/holgawood_camera_formally_known_as_holga.php) is something that I could not resist. It was impulsive and crazy to buy something which will probably just earn a nice place in my shelves. But I absolutely love it and will play with it with my nephews and nieces. Hope I get the film installed right because I can't remember the last time I used one!

The goodies with the camera were not my purchases but wow did it expand the purple world some more! Thanks to my new friend who goes by the online name of Jasmine, I will never know that stuff like Grape Chocolate existed in this world.

And finally I got a Crocs Prima in grape (naturally) because I've always wanted to buy one and surprise of all surprises it was a couple of hundred pesos cheaper in Tokyo than Manila. Did not realize I don't have a pic but here's what it looks like - http://www.shoebuy.com/crocs-prima/190623/473396?cm_mmc=yahoo-feed-_-none-_-none-_-none.

Needless to say, the purple world is once again happy, happy, joy, joy!!

The Longest Hangover..

One month since I flew out of Manila and 24 days since I came back, my soul is still back there..in Japan. My longest travel hangover ever!!

Maybe because I had the ultimate fangirl experience of watching both SMAP and F4 in one trip..or that I've met fantastic people..or that I just love Japan period. It does not help that I now go to my Nihonggo classes every Saturday and study everyday. I would still catch myself staring into space and remembering everything.

After a busy couple of weeks, I finally downloaded photos I took with my mobile phone (which incidentally died on me yesterday). I can still remember the excitement I felt as we neared Tokyo Dome last September 30th. It was my first time to attend a Tokyo Dome concert and despite the rain, I was so happy to look around. I even wanted to ride the roller coaster if the weather was good (though it did not stop many folks. The coaster kept on operating despite the rain) but I chickened out. Next time...

I braved the rains and did my concert souvenir shopping. I was a good girl and did not bring my camera. I did not want to go through the hassle of leaving them and claiming later. It was a good decision because with 80,000 people trying to leave the dome at the same time after a concert, claiming something might take me forever.

I was overwhelmed with happiness after the SMAP concert that I forgot to take a quick photo with the stage behind me. Thank God I did not forget to snap a shot of me with my concert buddies - Minori, Minori's oneechan (sister) and Vic, whose face almost did not make it to the frame. Gomenasai Vic.

And of course my F4 concert experiences in Yokohama and Tokyo. Both times I was pretty much sitting by myself. I can still remember my excitement to find the arena. It was my first time in Yokohama and I did not get lost. And I cannot forget my 1st night arena seat which gave me a great view of everything especially the boys.

So obviously I can still blabber non-stop about the experience. I am definitely getting the SMAP concert dvd when it comes out on Dec. 17. I am hoping and hoping aloud (paging the folks who produced F4's Japan Tour!!!) that F4 will also come out with their own concert dvd.

Watching the concert dvds and reminiscing about my special trip will probably shut me up...or not?! =)

So many men...so little time

17 days after I got back from Japan, I have to admit that my soul is still back there. And while browsing through the tons of photos I have, I was amused at how many men sightings are in my photo folders.

Not only was I busy spotting Kimura Takuya or watching concerts of SMAP and F4, I was also diligent in spotting many other Japanese actors/idols who I have some sort of liking to. Gomenasai Takuya. Gomenasai Zaizai. Gomenasai Vanness. Gomenasai Jerry. Gomenasai Ken. Please forgive my wandering eyes.

For the rest of the men sighted by mopworld, please head on out to this site: http://gigidm.multiply.com/photos/album/47/So_many_men_so_little_time..._

Kimura Takuya..on my mind

For the past 4 years, Kimura Takuya has been tattooed in my mind. So it's no wonder that when I was back in Japan, all I was pre-occupied with when walking all over Tokyo.

This one I spotted Sept. 30th while walking in the Shinjuku area. It was raining but I did not care, Vic just had to take my pic in the rain!

This next pic was taken in between buildings! We were walking through Harajuku St. last Oct 1 when I spotted this big billboard. I had to click the camera just at the right time because it was a busy street and cars zipped back and forth. Success!!
And on our walk back, I was happy that we were taking that road. So with quick fingers, travel sister Vic had to take this shot. LOL!
We spotted this Fujitsu shop across the street in the Ginza walk. Again, it took all effort to take a clean shot!

And then we spotted this "mojakura" billboard towards the subway exit to Roponggi Hills. I loved this shot of me taken by none other than Vic, my travel sister.

And would I have insisted to my host family that I would like to see the Sankaku-hashi bridge if not for Takuya's 2004 drama Pride? Of course not! But no self-respecting member of Takuya's harem will miss being on this bridge if they find themselves in Yokohama.

And who would have thought of going to the Parliament building and have their photo taken in the middle of the street if not for the memorable scene in Takuya's latest drama CHANGE?

And I couldn't go home without seeing Odaiba and Fuji TV. It was a no brainer choice between Fuji TV and Tokyo Tower. Hahahaha!! Fuji TV is the home studio of Takuya and his group SMAP and their long-running variety show SMAPXSMAP.

For 2 years, I have envied Ochie for her pic in this mini-set of SMAPXSMAP's Bistro. So when I sat down and had my pic taken by Rachel, I felt such satisfaction that when we left Fuji TV, I said to myself "I am ready to come home".

There are more photos of billboard sightings which just goes to show what sort of "superstar" Kimura Takuya is in Japan - huge! For the rest of the photos, please click the link below.
http://gigidm.multiply.com/photos/album/46/Kimura_Takuya..Tattoed_on_my_Mind

SMAP Concert..Yume Janai (It's Not a Dream)

I was not so happy to arrive in Tokyo yesterday (Sept. 29). Aside from the rains, the traffic from the airport to our hotel killed me. We wanted to try and get tickets to the Sept. 29 concert of SMAP but after checking-in at our hotel at around 5:30pm, tired and have not eaten since 9am, all we can do was drop our bags at the hotel and find something to eat in the Ikebukuro area.

After successfully finding a McDonald's (hahaha!), we decided to just get to HMV to get our copy of SMAP's latest cd Super Modern Artistic Performance. Once back in the hotel, I surfed local tv and much to my delight, there was a replay of an old Pussma (Kusanagi Tsuyoshi's show) episode with Kimura Takuya guesting. I set about preparing from the next day and promptly fell asleep.

Tuesday was another rainy and gloomy day. Plus temperatures suddenly dropped to 16 degrees (61 degrees) which for Filipinos like me is already collllddd! Vic, my SMAP buddy and I are so excited to get to Tokyo Dome but we had to content ourselves going to Shinjuku unti it was time to get to the Dome.

We knew we had good tickets but we did not realize just how good!!! The saying that good things come to those who wait is true in this instance. C-17 is an arena seat right in front of the right hanamichi (stage). 10 meters away from any of the SMAP member who would come to that part of the stage. 5 rows from the railing. What can a fangirl do but scream and jump when we were ushered to our seat! I mean sugoii! Wow!

The show started at exactly 6pm and lasted for a wonderful 4 hours!!! Talk about value for money, even if we had to fly to Japan to watch it. It was really great value. I have only been to Sample Bang in person but have watch all of SMAP's concert on dvd and I must say that they have exceeded themselves in terms of concept for this show.

I liked their horizontal walk on harness during the opening number. I loved the vampire concept which they've taken to the sequence break clips. The songs were spaced out well to give the boys the time to breath and allow them to dance beautifully. And most of all, I loved the arrangements of old songs..like the jazzy Tomadachie, Say What You Will. I closed my eyes amidst 55,000 people in the Dome and just enjoyed the music. Also the lullaby rendition of Sekai ni Hitotsu Dake no Hana in the sequence clip..

Now the main reason that I was there is this member called Kimura Takuya. With a stage so big, my eyes were literally glued to Takuya. Since we are in front of the right stage, were always excited to see him sexily sashay (there's no other word for it, believe me!) down the catwalk to our area. We saw every bit of facial expression, stared him down from head to toe. I especially remember the time he just popped out in front of us during Keep On. He was just gorgeous. Of course, I couldn't stop screaming when Takuya did his solo Style..he was wearing a lilac T-shirt with his green pants! Again, a purple person can only take so much! The description during the individual intro was soooo apt - sexy, wild and hotstuff!! He is the only Japanese who looks gorgeous in an American Indian outfit with a feather on his hair. I just don't know how he does it.

But then I also get to enjoy the other members. Especially since they insist on coming to our side of the stage. One member I enjoyed in this concert is Tsuyoshi Kusanagi who is actually my least favorite. I love his Sou Desu number. It has a catchy tune and dance moves that were so easy to follow. Plus other SMAP members were backing up. All the time in this song Takuya was in our side (sorry can't help but remember again..hehe) asking everyone to do the dance with him.

Aside from songs from the new album, I was happy to sing old songs like Sekai Hitotsu Dake no Hana, Yozora no Mukuo, Sonomama, Aoi Inazuma and many others. When I heard them sing Orenji, I couldn't help the tears from flowing. It is one of my favorite songs. I was just so overwhelmingly happy. I can only tell my Japanese friend Minori in halting words..ureshii..san nen..mattemashita. I waited 3 years to see them again and the difficulties and challenges that I had to overcome flashed before me.

I was back to singing along and dancing when another favorite was sung - Original Smile. I thought the show was finished after Arigato but then there was a second encore. This time, Takuya rode the crane on top of us. Suddenly he dropped his drinking bottle!!! My heart stopped beating for a second..could it be? Unfortunately it dropped directly behind us.

It took us 30 mins to get out of the Dome and into the train. And in the rain! I did not care about getting wet but I just had to take off my cardigan and put it over my bag of concert goods. As I take pictures of my loot, all I can say is that IT IS NOT A DREAM!! I came, I bought and I watched.

And it won't hurt to dream again...