Uncle Ed

Last Sunday I watched the fitting finale to the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics - Canada's victory against the USA in the men's ice hockey final. It was great to watch it with my uncle who's actually over from Canada at the moment. I'd been told he was coming over for a visit but had forgotten when, so it was a nice surprise when he called me up and asked me to hang out. After a rather dramatic and tense end we were both happy to see the Canadians win, and during the game my uncle was telling me all about Canada and how, although he's originally from Britain, he wants to stay over there long term 'cos it's such a great country, especially for bringing up kids. Chatting to him really got me thinking, and after doing a bit of research, I've found out that as a British citizen you can go over and work in Canada for up to a year, which could be something I could do in the future.

I've been getting into ice hockey quite a bit lately actually. Me and my mates went to see a Sheffield Steelers match for the first time the other week, and then my dad got hold of some free tickets, so I went again. It's a different atmosphere from a footy game, but it's a lot of fun, even if I don't understand all the rules yet.

Coach Trip

One of my mates is currently on Channel 4's reality TV show, Coach Trip. He's called Matt and we were in the same Japanese class in 1st year. He lives on the same road as me now, a couple of houses up, and I bumped into him sometime last year and he told me all about Coach Trip. Basically, it's a coach of British couples travelling to various tourist destinations throughout the world, but every day you have to vote for your least favourite couple, who are then replaced by another couple. It's not something I'd watch normally, but the recent episodes have been interesting. Episode 12 especially was pretty good.

It's on Channel 4 every day at the moment at 5pm, but you can catch all the episodes online at http://www.channel4.com/programmes/coach-trip/4od. Matt's managed to stay on since the start and rarely gets a vote cast against him, so I'm guessing he'll be on it for a while longer.

3 things that I love about Japan, #1

Things that I love #1

This one's a combination of things that's hard to give a name to. It'd probably be easier in Japanese, where you'd say something like 便利な日本 (convenient Japan) or 日本の便利さ (the convenience of Japan), as the word 便利/convenient has a broader meaning in Japanese. Basically, Japan is a very easy country to live in because everything is so... convenient.

Like I said, there are many reasons that contribute to this. A big one is that Japanese public transport is always on time, which is very important for a country which relies on trains so much. Japan is also very clean and pleasing to the eye for the most part - you'll rarely see litter in the streets. You're often never very far away from a convenience store, which is useful when you're hungry or thirsty, and you can also do things like pay all your bills or pay for concert or airplane tickets at convenience stores, which is genius. And convenience stores are EVERYWHERE. If you were to walk down any of the main roads on Port Island (where I used to live) you would literally see a Family Mart, Seven Eleven or Lawson every 5 minutes. The same is even truer for vending machines.

Another thing I was extremely impressed with, and used a lot during my time in Japan, was rehearsal studios. I had never had the need to use a rehearsal studio in the UK, as the bands I've been in have always found school rooms, or bedrooms to practise in. Plus, rehearsal studios are pretty expensive to rent over here. However, in Japan, there isn't space in the average house for a band to practise, and the houses are so close together with paper thin walls, so the whole neighbourhood would be able to hear you. Therefore just about every band uses rehearsal studios.

I joined a music society at Kobe Uni, and ended up in 4 different bands, so I used rehearsal studios a lot, and I was impressed with the quality of the equipment and the cheapness of the price. It would generally cost about 4,000 yen to rent a room for 2 hours, but when you split that between a 5 member band, it's only about 800 yen each, which is about £6, which is great value to say you're practising with top of the range equipment. You even get a points card, which you can use to claim back more studio time, or new guitar strings or drumsticks. And although I never tried this out myself, you can also record in these places for a relatively cheap price when compared to the UK.

There are also these things called manga cafes all over too, which are places you can go to and rent out a small cubicle with an internet-enabled PC, a big comfy chair and shelves and shelves of manga for you to read. You can also take showers here too, and the cheap hourly rate means that manga cafes make a cheap alternative to hotels if you're stuck in the city overnight.

If you stay in Japan for an extended period of time, you'll come to realise for yourself just how well organised Japan and it's people are. It's unlike anything you'll experience elsewhere. Everything just seems to work without any hitches or delays, and it makes living there very easy and comfortable.

And that concludes my series of the things I love and the things I hate about Japan. Who knows when I'll next write something on here. I'm super busy with uni right now, and have my dissertation coming up, so we'll see.

3 things that I love about Japan, #2

Things that I love #2 - Karaoke

Although a lot of people don't know it, karaoke was invented by the Japanese. However, Japanese karaoke is quite different to the kind of thing you'll find in a typical British pub on a Saturday night, and much more enjoyable.

It's the most popular evening entertainment in Japan, comparable to going clubbing at the end of a night in Britain. If you've been out for a meal or been out drinking in Japan, it's highly likely that the night will end in karaoke. You usually go with a group of 7 or 8 friends, but it's not uncommon for couples to go by themselves either. In urban areas there are karaoke venues absolutely all over the place, but you'll also find at least one in small towns and villages too. There are the big karaoke chains, which provide higher quality machines, and nicer karaoke rooms, and there are also the smaller karaoke places, which are a bit more out of the way and dirty, but you can often barter with the staff to get a cheaper deal.

Once you've decided upon your karaoke venue for the evening, you battle your way through groups of drunk businessmen and their partners and head over to the front desk. The staff will ask how many people is in your group, and how long you want to sing for, although you can often extend this time if you decide you want to sing some more later on. You then have the option of whether to include nomihoudai (all-you-can-drink) or not. This means that your overall price will be a bit higher, but you can order as many drinks as you want while you're singing. You're then given a room number, and you take the stairs or lift up through the countless floors of karaoke boxes to find yours.

When you arrive, you'll find a dark, smallish room with a sofa running all the way round the outside, a big table in the middle and a TV in the corner. There is also usually some kind of crazy disco light on the ceiling flashing away. You can then pick up the touch screen and mic, and start choosing songs and singing them. At first it can be quite daunting, singing in front of a bunch of people, even if they are all your friends, but I found even the most shy in our group enjoyed karaoke once they got used to the idea.

I also found that the way Japanese people do karaoke and the way foreigners do karaoke is quite different. Japanese people tend to pick a song and then sing that song on their own while everyone listens. Foreigners tend to pick songs and then everyone will sing along if they know it, either passing the 2 mics around the room during the song, or singing along without one.

I really grew to like karaoke when I was in Japan. As one of my friends once put it, "It's not often in life you get a chance to just sing". It's quite cathartic, and can end up being a lot of fun, especially when you have certain songs you always sing. Songs me and my mates would often sing included Man In The Mirror by Michael Jackson, Under The Sea from The Little Mermaid and I Want It That Way by Backstreet Boys. By the end of my year in Japan, we had become experts at certain songs like these, and had even incorporated harmonies and added our own little extra words and chants.

In each room there's a telephone attached to the wall, and you use this telephone to order drinks, or tambourines to play along to the music with, which are then brought to your room by the staff. You also always get a call on the telephone 10 minutes before your time is up, asking whether you want to extend your session.

When you're done, you head down to the front desk again and pay. Karaoke is a fairly cheap night out, a 2 hour nomihoudai session usually costing you no more than 10 pounds. It's even cheaper if you go in the daytime too, and we would often do this on Sunday afternoons.

Much like the public baths, if you're in Japan, karaoke is something I would definitely recommend. It seems this style of karaoke is spreading to other countries as well, as I hear there's a Japanese-style karaoke place open in Sheffield now.

3 things that I love about Japan, #3

Following on from my last post, here is #3 of the 3 things I loved about Japan.

Things that I love #3 - Public baths

This is something in Japan that you tend to either love or hate, but I would definitely recommend trying it out at least once if you're over there. Just to explain the idea of public baths, it is basically a place where people from the local neighbourhood all go and bathe together, fully naked, and that's the part that puts a lot of people off. For someone from outside of Japan it can be a strange concept at first, and I also know Japanese people who feel uneasy about the idea too, but if you're willing to get over your fear of bathing naked with other people, it can be a really enjoyable experience.

Now, the wearing no clothes with lots of other males isn't the reason why I enjoy the public baths so much, although being naked in public like this does add a certain feeling of liberation and complete cleanliness to the experience. And I don't enjoy the public baths because you get to see members of the opposite sex naked, as just about all public baths are divided into male and female sections (if you're lucky, you might be able to find one of the combined baths though). I think the reason I enjoy the public baths is because it's such a relaxing experience, and you feel so clean and relaxed afterwards.

I'll try and paint a picture of what visiting a public baths is like and what you do there. The actual building is generally quite small, and you get the feeling most public baths are family businesses. The first thing you do when you enter the building is remove your shoes and place them in a locker. You take your locker key, and go through to the lobby area where there is generally a few sofas with people who've just come out of the baths relaxing there. There's also a fridge full of cold drinks for you to buy, a TV, and usually a massage chair. You pay your money to the person on the front desk, and walk through a curtain to your changing room. Here you put your all belongings and clothes, (apart from a flannel, shampoo and shower gel) in another locker, and proceed to the warm, steamy bathing area, which is separated from the changing rooms by a sliding glass door. When you enter you'll see people either washing themselves over at the shower area or relaxing and chatting in groups in one of the pools. First you grab one of the plastic bowls and put your locker key, flannel, shampoo and shower gel in here, then proceed to the shower area. Before entering the pools you must wash yourself, so you grab a small plastic chair and sit down in front of one of the showers which are at about head height when you're sat down. There's also a mirror right in front of you so you can watch yourself while you shower. After you're clean, you can head over to one of the pools on the other side of the room. Each public baths has a different combination of pools, which could include a jacuzzi pool, a pool with carbon gas, a really hot pool and even sometimes a pool with electricity in the water, which is meant to be good for your muscles or something. I've also seen radon pools as well, which I never went in, as bathing in a radioactive substance isn't something I wanted to do. There are people who do though.

You don't have to go in all the pools, but you can if you want. You generally spend 10-20 minutes relaxing here. Then there's usually a steam room, which is fun to try out. You might not wanna stay in there too long though, as they are so hot you start to feel faint and light-headed, and instinctively want to leave. There's also a pool of freezing cold water to clean off all the sweat from the steam room, and if you want to go back into one of the other pools to relax, you should wash yourself with the cold water first. When you're done you head back to the changing rooms and get dressed again, then head out to the lobby to relax.

I've never felt so clean as when I went to the public baths, and you're soaking in warmth and warm water for so long that you can't help feeling relaxed. You might feel a bit dehydrated after all that heat though, so it's a good idea to grab and drink. After a few minutes in the lobby you'll want to say "arigatou" to the person at the desk, then wrap up tightly before you head back outside to make sure you don't catch a cold.

If you go to Japan you can also visit an onsen, which is similar to a normal public baths, except that the hot water occurs naturally from a spring, and it's bit more up-market and expensive. I only had one experience with an onsen, and that was getting thrown out for my tattoo. The vast majority of people with tattoos in Japan are gangsters called yakuza, and so there's generally a ban on tattoos at onsens. I never had any trouble at the public baths though. In fact, I once saw a yakuza with tattoos covering most of his body at one of the public baths.

Look out for #2 coming next.

3 things that I love and 3 things that I hate about Japan

So as you probably know, I went to Japan last year to study there, and I came back to the UK last month. Here are 3 things that I love about Japan and 3 that I hate. Let's start with the things I hate, so we can end this post on a positive note.

Things that I hate #3 - Work culture

Now this is something I didn't encounter directly, as I was a university student for my time in Japan, and in Japan university is undoubtedly the easiest stage of the school/university/work progression. However, I did come to understand a lot about the Japanese attitude to work and business, and it's something that really puts me off wanting to work there.

I'm making some generalisations here, but a lot of people work in office jobs in Japan, and the hours they work are extremely hard and extremely long. When I was returning home from karaoke on the train around 11 or 12 at night there would often still be businessmen and women returning home after just finishing at the office. You see, it's expected in Japan that everyone work overtime - it's just a normal part of the job, and basically everyone does it. And the emphasis for a worker in a Japanese business is not usually on results, but simply on time worked. So an employee could work extremely efficiently for 8 hours in a day and get all their work done and more, but it would be preferred that the employee works more hours, even if it means they get less work done.

From what I gather, Japan is moving away from their unique business practices, and towards a more Western way of working, but this kind of thing is still very prevalent in Japan, and results in things like death from overwork, which was a fairly big problem a few years ago.

It also creates a mindset where people become too focused on their work at the exclusion of all else, which means they barely have any time to see their family or spend as leisure time, which is very unhealthy. It can also contribute to creating a very homogenous society, which Japan definitely is, where there are few individuals, and just one massive workforce.

Of course this kind of system has its benefits. Japan are currently (although probably not for much longer) the 2nd largest economy in the world, and the Japanese population is very affluent, but it's something which I can't go along with myself, and would prevent me from wanting to work there.

Things that I hate #2 - Summer weather

The weather in Japan is really great for half of the year, namely spring and autumn. Both of these seasons are warm, with little rain, and could be compared to the British summer to be honest. And winter isn't all that bad. However, summer in Japan is horrible in every way. First the whole thing kicks off with a rainy season where you get torrential downpours and the possibility of typhoons. While I was in Japan the rainy season was apparently nowhere near as bad as usual, but it still wasn't enjoyable. Then it starts to get hot, really hot. Now being from the UK, you think I'd be happy of any kind of warm weather to come my way, but this isn't the kind of hot weather where you can get a suntan. This is the kind of heat that makes you sweat just sat in your room, meaning you have to have the air conditioner on full blast to make sure you don't end up in a melted puddle on the floor. The heat is so oppressive and muggy, that as soon as you walk outside you'll start to sweat, and about 30 minutes later be covered in sweat from head to toe. This climate was made ten times worse for me by the fact that my university was half-way up a massive mountain range, which meant I had to climb a huge hill every day to get to classes. One of my friends would take an extra change of clothes for when he reached uni because of the amount of sweat he would expend making the journey there. When you're in Japan you spend a lot of time on crowded trains too, which isn't fun in such weather.

You don't even get light nights in the summer in Japan, as it goes dark at the same time every night for the whole year. So it's safe to say I was relieved to come back to the UK and escape even just the tail-end of the Japanese summer. As soon as I got off the plane in England I noticed a difference, and the air felt so clean and cool. So while Japanese weather is quite nice most of the time, it's nearly unbearable in the summer.

Things that I hate #1 - Getting along with Japanese people

OK, that heading looks kinda bad, but let me explain. It's not that I hate Japanese people at all, but the biggest problem that I, and many of my foreign friends encountered in Japan, was getting along with Japanese people. Although I was warned about it before I went, and in a way even experienced it with some Japanese people I met before going to Japan, it took me a while to adjust to and understand the situation.

Now one of the big reasons I wanted to go to Japan was because it seemed so different to any other nation in the world. I once heard someone say something along the lines of "Japan is the most unique nation in the world, and is unlike any other", and after being there for a year I can agree with that. Even some of my Korean and Chinese friends who are from countries that are culturally close to Japan had a hard time getting along with Japanese people.

I don't like to make judgements on why a certain nationality of people behave in a certain way, but if I was to explain why I found it so hard to make good friends, I would say there are a couple of big reasons. First, Japanese people socialise in a different way compared to Western countries. It is common in Japan for your circle of friends to basically be the people in your class, or your office, and spontaneously making friends as we do in the West seems to happen much less. On top of that, many Japanese people have a mindset towards foreigners which means they view them as something very different and separate from Japan. Now every country in the world has this kind of view to some extent, but I believe Japan has it more-so than most other countries.

Also, I believe the concept of friendship in Japan is different to that in the West. For me, I can consider someone a friend if we get along well after just a few minutes, but in Japan it takes a long time to become good friends with someone. But even then, the method of becoming friends is different, and doesn't necessarily mean you have to spend much time with the person. It's a complicated process, and one I understand only a little of, which meant I didn't feel like I connected with a lot of Japanese people during my time there. Now don't get me wrong, I made some very good Japanese friends while I was there, but the number was very small compared to the amount I make back home in a year, for example.

This is a big over-simplification, but I think much of this problem comes from differences in personalities between me and the Japanese people, and it's a shame, because this is something else which puts me off living there long term. If I did, I know I'd need to have foreign friends there to hang out with.

OK, this got long, so we're gonna end on a downer :( I'll make the 'Things that I love about Japan' post next time.

The end?

I've been writing this blog for two years now, and after thinking about it for a while I've decided I'm going to take a break for a bit.

One of the main purposes of this blog has been to keep a diary of sorts for myself, but recently I've been wanting to write something a bit more in-depth and personal. So I think I'm gonna switch over to a writing an actual journal, Doug Funnie style, and see how that goes.

I know people might want to keep up to date with how I'm doing over in Japan, but my hope is that we'll still keep in touch via other means. And although there's not much there at the moment, I'm going to try and take lots of photos and upload them to my Flickr account while I'm over there.

Thanks to everyone who's read and commented on here, and don't forget about this blog/me completely. I've moved the blog homepage, but I'm keeping the feeds in the same locations, so stay subscribed, and I might be back at some point.

Rage Against the Machine at Leeds Festival

So yesterday I went to the 2nd day of Leeds Festival 2008. I'd been looking forward to this ever since I bought my ticket 3 months ago, mainly because because I would be seeing Rage Against the Machine!

We started off the day by catching a coach from Sheffield to Leeds at around 10am, passing the Tinsley cooling towers which would be knocked down at 3am the next morning. We arrived at the bus station in Leeds about an hour later and then caught a shuttle bus to the festival site, where we showed our tickets and got our wristbands before heading towards the main festival area. We had to get rid of all our drinks before we went in though, which sucked because water was £2.20 a bottle(!) and I got abnormally thirsty later on.

As we made our way over to the main stage I was surprised by the sheer scale of this event. There were so many people everywhere, but we managed to locate some of our other friends who were there all weekend while Get Cape. Wear Cape. Fly was playing. Not my kinda thing really, but he was OK actually. Next up was Taking Back Sunday who I wanted to see, so we moved nearer to the stage. They were good, playing some of my favourite songs of theirs. After that was Dizzee Rascal, and the main stage suddenly got really busy. We didn't want to watch him though, so we moved back toward the food stands and made our plans for achieving the best possible position to watch Rage. After much debating we decided to go down to the front of the main stage fairly early on, but not before we'd had a bit of a wander. As I mentioned in my last post, I wanted to see Goldfinger and Tiger Army who were both playing on the punk stage, but we couldn't actually figure out where that was. So after grabbing some (very expensive) vegan fast food we headed back over towards the main stage just as Serj Tankian was finishing up. His music is even more ethnically-inspired than System of a Down, and it sounded kinda freaky to my ears, but cool nonetheless.

As Serj finished we made use of the temporary movement of the crowd, and followed a slipstream to the front of the stage. I was pretty pleased with how easy that had been, but now we had to stand through 4 bands we didn't necessarily want to see without needing to use the toilet or eat/drink.

But Biffy Clyro were good actually, even though I only knew one song. Next was The Enemy who were OK, but after that it was The Fratellis who weren't very good at all and I only knew one of their songs too - that one that goes "da, da da da, da da da, da da da da da da da". Apparently that was the last time they'll ever play that one live as well - they probably got tired of people only wanting to see them for that one song. But they didn't look very interested throughout their set, and neither did the crowd. In fact, I was surprised by the lack of crowd interaction from all the bands we saw, even Rage Against the Machine. It always makes things a bit more interesting and involving when bands say something in between songs.

Next up were Queens of the Stone Age, and up until this point it seemed like people had been moving in and out of the crowd just to see one band, but by now it was getting dark and the crowd was pretty much packed in, to the point where you couldn't really enter or leave.

There had been pits and crowd surfing up until now, but nothing too bad. But when QotSA came on they started with No One Knows and we all went crazy. But it's so weird when there are thousands of people in one area all trying to move or dance. The crowd swayed in waves, and you had no choice but to sway along, although at times it felt like you were about to fall over and get crushed by everyone. I'd been at shows in clubs where this had happened, but nothing quite on the scale of this before. Fortunately just about everyone managed to stay on their feet, although some people began to push their way out as it just got a bit too much.

To be honest, the rest of the QotSA's set bored me. I know they're meant to be stoner rock or whatever, but I didn't realise how monotonous they could be. And being crushed to the point of not being able to breath properly, as well as having endured the heat, being really thirsty and feeling kinda tired from standing up for hours on end sent me into a zoned-out state where I stopped paying attention. I think I might have concentrated and enjoyed it more if I'd been in a club and had some space and a drink in my hand.

Eventually QotSA finished and Rage were the next band up - we'd made it! As we waited for them to come on we moved back from the front a bit so that we'd have a more stable place to stand, and this proved to be a good idea.

Rage were scheduled to come on at 9:30, but they were about 20 minutes late coming out in the end. Everyone forgot that though as Tom Morello started with the opening riff to Testify, and when the drums kicked in everyone just went wild. After that was Bulls On Parade, and everyone was still going crazy. I'd personally been building up to this show for a while, and all the previous bands that day had been building up to this too - it was a really great feeling being part of this show.

After People Of The Sun things calmed down a bit, but then something weird happened. Halfway through Bombtrack the drums stopped, then someone came on stage and told the rest of the band to stop. Apparently things were looking kinda dangerous down at the front and Zach asked everyone to move back so that people weren't gonna get crushed. This was good to see and a lot of people applauded. The band then finished off Bombtrack though and played through the rest of their set - all classics. Again, it would have been nice to have a bit more crowd interaction, and every song was played at the same or slower speed than the recorded versions, which is odd for a live show, but nothing could spoil seeing this band live. It's just something I thought would never happen, but it did, and it was awesome. And that's all there is to it. They finished with Killing In The Name, applauded the crowd, linked arms and left the stage. Amazing.

The fun wasn't over yet though. Everybody started to leave the main stage, and I took out my phone to text people to find out where we were meeting (we'd lost each other in the crowd). However, halfway through writing the text message my phone ran out of battery! Now I had no way of getting in touch with everyone (although I probably should have used my head and looked for the massive flag we'd been waving all day). Anyway, I made my way back toward the shuttle buses hoping to catch the guys in that area, but after not finding them I decided to take the bus on my own rather than risk being stuck at the site overnight. After that I managed to get the last coach home to from the bus station and then get a taxi, arriving home at 2:45am.

It turns out the guys were all still waiting for me in front of the stage wondering what had happened to me. They managed to catch the last shuttle bus back, but there were no coaches from Leeds to Sheffield until about 5am. I felt pretty bad for them when I found out today, but it's good to know they were concerned over where I was!

So in the end I didn't get to see all the bands I wanted to, but seeing Rage Against the Machine was mind-blowing and something I'll always remember.

Here's the full setlist and an article about the Rage show from the NME website, and I've uploaded some photos I managed to take to Facebook.

Leeds Festival! Wooo!

I'm going to Leeds Festival on Saturday and it's gonna be awesome. I wanna see Goldfinger, Taking Back Sunday, Anti-Flag, Tiger Army and most importantly, Rage Against The Machine. I also wanna see Less Than Jake, but I think they're gonna be on at the same time as RATM. Can't wait though! I'll try and get some photos too.

One night in Manchester

Last night was pretty fun - me and my mate went to Manchester to see Big D and the Kids Table, Sonic Boom Six and Random Hand at the Manchester Academy.

We caught the train from Sheffield at around 6pm and arrived in Manchester about an hour later. I didn't realise until I arrived, but I'd never actually been to Manchester before, which is kinda strange considering how big a city it is and how close it is to Sheffield. I'd also forgotten that the Champions League final was on, and Manchester United were playing in it.

We left the train station and kinda just guessed our way towards the Academy. It took about half an hour to get there, and the streets were pretty busy because of the football.

Manchester is quite a nice place, or at least the parts we went through, and everything's bigger than Sheffield.

The academy was inside the Manchester University students' union, and it felt a bit odd being in another university's union, but again, it was a nice place. We found the room where the gig was and met up with a couple of friends who go to Manchester uni.

I'd seen all the bands before, but it was a good show. Random Hand were really energetic and fun, and Sonic Boom Six were pretty lively as well, but Big D were the best band of the night for me. They didn't play some of my favourite songs though, sticking to their more recent stuff.

While we were inside we discovered Manchester United had actually won the match, which we were glad about, and as we left the gig the roads were full of people driving along, beeping their horns and waving flags.

On the way to the gig someone had handed us a flyer for an after-party, and our friends and the bands were going so we decided to go too and catch a later train. It was like a pop punk night and the drinks were cheap, so we ended up having a good time.

Just as we were leaving we had a quick chat with the bassist and drummer from Big D. I told them to play some of their older stuff at shows, and that they should come to Sheffield next time, but the bassist said they had got in a fight or something last time they did. I also asked where the band name had originally come from, as I'd heard one theory before, but wasn't sure how true it was.

If I remember right, the bassist said that one of the singer's friends had suggested it as a name after hearing the phrase on a TV advert (although the bassist wasn't sure how true that was). Then when the band formed and couldn't think of another name, they went with Big D and the Kids Table. So now you know!

After that we walked back to the train station, but had an hour to wait before our 3:30 train, so we went and got some food at a nearby chip shop that was still open. There were some drunk Man Utd fans there who had obviously had a sauce fight, as they and the walls were covered in brown sauce and ketchup, and the owner got quite annoyed and tried to throw them out. It was pretty funny.

After eating we went and waited at the train station. Our train came, and I tried to get some sleep on the way back, but this other passenger was being noisy and kept waking me up. The seats were really uncomfortable too.

There was a bit of a delay at one of the stops, and so we got back to Sheffield at about 5am and walked home.

All in all, although at times kinda odd, it was a really fun night. I'd probably go back to Manchester too - I really like the place.

Stop the War demo

Yesterday I went to London for the Stop the War demonstration after one of my mates asked me to go. I'd never been to anything like it before and I enjoyed it.

There were loads of short speeches in Trafalgar Square, including one from Tony Benn, before everyone marched around London in support of the removal of foreign troops from Iraq and Afghanistan and the prevention of an attack on Iran. We had to leave London at around 4pm though to get on our coach, and I think I would have liked to stay longer, not just for the demo, but because London is quite an interesting place. I used to live down South when I was younger, and we'd often visit the capital for a day out, and up until yesterday I hadn't been in years, so it was nice to go back.

Also, I got to stand behind C-list celebrity, Nell McAndrew in a queue at a service station we stopped at on the way home.

It's the Easter holidays for me now, so I have three weeks off from uni. Should be good.

Here are a couple of pictures that my mate took at the demo (I really should buy my own camera soon):

Thursday and the weekend

Thursday was a pretty good night. There was hardly anyone in the room at the time of my friend's set, but it was good to hear some chiptunes blasting out of some pretty large speakers. I travelled to and from Nottingham by train. The train was full on the way there but the return journey was OK. I got back in time for lectures and then attended band practice. I'm really enjoying writing some new songs with the band and look forward to the shows we'll be playing soon.

On Saturday I got to play the Wii for the first time. There were 2 Wii (I'm guessing that's the plural) at Meadowhall for people to try out - I played the tennis game from Wii Sports with my brother. After observing others whilst waiting in line I found the motion control really easy to pick up and I look forward to playing more when I get one for Christmas.

Football and nightclubs

I went to watch a football game for the first time in a while last night. Football isn't as important to me as it used to be, but I wasn't doing much and my dad and brother were already going. It turned out our team won 3-1, and it was pretty enjoyable. Also, the stadium is located in the area of the city where I was born and grew up, so I always enjoy going back there for nostalgic reasons. I usually enjoy anything that reminds me of being a small kid.

A listener to the video game music podcast which I present is playing a DJ set at a club in Nottingham tomorrow. I'm going along and it'll be cool to hear the kind of music we play on the podcast coming out of the speakers in a club. I generally don't attend clubs unless for gigs, but for something this cool I'm going to make an exception.

Summer III

All this week I've been attending a course on the music business. The course was advertised in a local newspaper and when I saw the article I phoned up, not expecting to find any places left on the course. I did manage to reserve a place though and the first class was on Monday.

As the course was being held in a training centre on the other side of the city I've had to commute by train. I've also had to get up early which is not what I've been doing so far this summer.

I'd never really had to catch trains by myself before, but after figuring out how trains work I've enjoyed travelling in this way. The seats are comfortable and trains seem to pass through interesting, scenic places which makes it fun to look out the window during the journey. I've also stocked up on podcasts to make the travelling more bearable.

Once I had arrived at my destination on Monday I had to find the training centre. I asked in a shop then an information centre and after walking around a town I didn't know managed to locate the training centre. By this time I had realised that the course might not be as hi-tech as I first thought, as it looked like we would be learning everything in a room which had only some tables and a flipchart at the front. I sat down and waited for the other attendees to arrive, there only being two. The teacher arrived and the course began.

Basically, the course consists of listening to the teacher's many anecdotes, gained from his experience in the music industry, and watching movies such as The Filth and the Fury. And I've enjoyed the past few days, as we often end up talking about music and bands which I am quite interested in. Hopefully I will look back and feel I have learned something too.

On Saturday I'll be leaving for Nerja, Spain. The family took our holiday in Nerja last year, and I was quite surprised as I enjoyed our stay. Or at least I think I did. Holiday memories sometimes seem more fun than the actual holiday - I often spend all holiday waiting to return home. There's an internet café on the beach front which I frequented last year. I did think about attempting to leave the internet alone for a week, but I couldn't and ended up checking my emails most days. The same will probably happen this year.