So they rules, or guidelines if you like, were to line up at 11 am, at 12 noon they let everyone in line pick a number out of a box, and the people with numbers 1-350 got a chance to watch. Okay, an hour isn’t so bad, right? Well, of course, being the OCD person that I am, I show up at like 10:30, but there’s already a line, so whatever, right. Freezing my butt off. Freezing my butt off. Freezing my butt off. And we hit 12. Still nothing. Two young men dressed in snazzy black jackets and scarves (one who was the spitting image of Lee Jun Ki but with deep blue, almost imperceptible streaks in his hair), come down the line with one of those clicker counter things, and looking behind me is a line of probably 900 people in all. (So 1 in 3 get to go, right?) Anyways. These two young men spend another 40 freaking minutes sporadically telling us to scrunch up, or move back, or move over out of the way (since we’re on the sidewalk). Also, from time to time they come by to explain the rules, though in the most polite Japanese there is, so I don’t understand a word. And I’m freezing my butt off. Freezing my butt off. A lane of traffic beside us is cordoned off and then a very strange procession makes its way down the street: a few dudes dressed as ghosts howling, a few people waving flags that I’m only guessing had to do with graduation (it’s that time of year), and others with megaphones making some fervent speech about something I couldn’t catch. It was all quite strange. And I’m freezing my butt off. And I’m freezing my butt off. Freezing… Finally a girl comes up with a makeshift box with a hole in the top and I’m told to pull out a number. I look down at it and it has #197 written on it, a time (16:45) and a bunch of rules in Kanji I can’t read. So, I’m assuming they have the winning 350 numbers up somewhere (at this point I thought it was just a regular luck-of-the-draw lotto you see. So I go up to the Ameba front window (it faces onto the street), but instead of numbers, there are only polaroids signed by celebrities. I notice how everyone else has broken off and are going all ways, so I go home to wait it out til 4.
Come 4:30 It’s now even colder. I go, expecting a line or at least people checking some sort of board with numbers on it and still I find nothing. I walk around until the allotted 4:45 and notice a huge line of about 350 people that somehow I’d missed before. It still has not dawned on me that people who drew numbers under 351 were good to go, so I went up to a girl managing the line who worked there, showed her my ticket and asked where the crap I was supposed to go. Evidentally we were lining up in order, and after a few tries, I found my place. And we waited and it got dark and it got colder and I’m freezing my butt off again. Freezing my butt off. Freezing my butt off. It’s 5:15, the show starts at 5:30 and nothing’s happening and I’m freezing my butt off. Why aren’t we going in? Freezing, freezing, freezing, 5:30, freezing, freezing, 5:35, what-ho we’re moving. But… Alas… We’re not going inside. Now previous to this last 2 + hours of standing, I had wondered to myself just where they were going to fit 350 people in such a small looking building. Oh where indeed. I was in for a bit of a disappointment. Rather than getting to go in somewhere, sit down and watch the entire 45 min. performance, they were cutting us into groups and moving us in front of the window for 5 min. spans of time. Oh yes. 4+ hours of waiting for 5 min. I was slightly saddened at this discover. My toes were numb, my cheeks chapped, my hands now red with cold and I was freezing my butt off. It was dark by now and colder than it had been and I could have sworn I felt miniscule raindrops. Was this really worth it? Was it indeed. I was leaning towards no. And then, my turn came and we got to up to the window and there sat Tora (ever cool, with his
shades on), Hiroto and Shou, all smiles and laughter, as close as if we were sitting on opposite couches. By the way yes, I AM a lunatic/dork/insert-word-here. Of course they were answering questions fans had sent in, and while Hiroto went on about his spoilt Pomeranian (which admittedly made me love him a little more), Shou spent his time looking at the crowd, each and every one, and being the overall sweetheart that I find him to be, even taking time out to get up in the window and read some letter a girl had plastered up there for him to see. What was really so cool about it was, first of all getting to see them upclose (and yes, they do look just as good as they do in the pictures), but also to actually interact with them, making eye contact, waving to each other, etc., which you don't get to do really at lives.So anways, there was lots of fun chit-chat and laughter and then, when our 5 min. were up, we were all ushered out of the cordoned off space, the fans (myself included) waving goodbye and the guys all waving back. And that was it. Yes, that was all. All that time in the blustery, wintery weather for a brief 5 min. But yes, it was totally worth it. I tell you now, it was worth it. That being said, it was the most fan-girly thing I’ve ever done and I probably won’t do it again, but still… I’m glad I did. Granted, by the time I got back to my apartment, I literally couldn’t feel my toes, but a piping hot bath and two cans of warm coffee took care of that easily enough.
On quite another note (and sorry, this post is turning out long), you remember my last post about old KimuTaku? (If not, refer below). Well, I’ve broken down and decided to watch one of his more famous dramas to see if it furthers or retards my liking of him. In fact, I’ve taken up two (Gift and Beautiful Life), but have decided to start with the latter, as, from the description of Gift, I’m afraid it would sully my already shaky impression of him (you see, I watched Million Stars Fall From The Sky, and that just wasn’t alright). But, much to my chagrin, Beautiful Life is a terminal illness storyline (you just knew it would be). At least it has the decency though, to tell you right at the beginning, basically, “I’m/you’re dead now, let’s reflect on our past relationship” rather than moving things along and then boom, hitting you with the low blow of surprise cancer/leukemia/insert-terminal-illness-here. (I didn’t mean that to sound harsh). So I’m probably setting myself up for a fall, but I tried Pride once before and since I don’t like hockey, I couldn’t get into it. Well, getting back to what I’d originally wanted to say, in the description of Beautiful Life, on top of saying she’s in a wheelchair, he’s not, they like each other and try to cope (which is the premise from the get-go), it says they’re drawn closer together by a terrible car accident. Well that’s just great! So I’m now halfway through episode 6 and for the first time, they’re in the car TOGETHER, and of course it’s raining and they’re fighting and I just know it’s about to happen and I’m finding it difficult to push through. I suppose I’ll find a way to muscle through it, but I really just don’t want to. Well, we’ll see what progress I make. Anywho… tomorrow my host brother and his girlfriend are taking me to what they call an Izakaya (which basically is a place where you go after work to drink and have appetizers, sorta like a bar but classier), called The Lockup, though from what I’ve heard about The Lockup, it’s not so much (or at all really) an Izakaya as it is a themed restaurant. I’m not so sure about this place. But they want to go so hey, if they’re willing to take me, why protest? Anyway, I’ll blog about that later. Above is a picture from the taping (which I nabbed from a person called mandramoddle, so thanks to her for that). Well, talk to you cats later!
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