ただいまー！

みなさんこんにちはー！

ε＝(ﾉﾟдﾟ)ﾉﾀﾀﾞｲﾏｰ

I've been in Japan officially a week today. It feels so good to be back. (* ^^ *) My flight was rather smooth, I managed to make use of my German language since the Airline I used was German. I made a stop over in Frankfurt too, although I didn't really plan to spend much time looking around, actually; Germany airport was hard to navigate and customs was INCREDIBLY slow? I had just come off your airline, why the hell did I need ANOTHER bag search? People went through one by one, literally and if it beeped, you had to wait until they had completed a pat down. UGGH annoying, it was by far worse than China.. I kinda have to add, the passengers in front of me were incredibly rude, even the Japanese sat beside me kept sighing. Basically they remained silent during German announcement - then incredibly fucking loud during English and Japanese announcements. Anyway I kind of ranted like hell then, but I probably not use this Airline again.. but I had no problems really, just I wasn't fond of them and the food was gross. Okay stop.


I arrived at Narita supposedly at 8:30am however we reached around 9:00 and horribly luggage was delayed by another hour or so?! (T__T) So I did panic and try to connect my phone to tell my Boyfriend I was late. I pretty much flew through customs after I filled out ANOTHER sheet (I was given a Japanese customs pass, logic.) Once I was through the gates I started to panic again because I was so late, but I spotted my Boyfriend and it was such a relief I wanted to scream. (T 3 T) He explained later he was late because of traffic, which sums up his parking ticket being so small this time haha!

We got stuck in traffic coming back, but we decided to play a game: 勉強GO!GO! basically I was pointing out kanji for him to translate.. since I can read some hiragana and katakana I was easily reading the back of trucks. Well it easily passed time and kept me awake. One word I learned that day: 引越のサカイ  it was on the back of a moving truck with a cute Panda, although I haven't memorised the kanji.

It's really nice here, the temperature rarely dips below 10 degree, which is nice since England isn't even reaching close to 10! I will slowly update once I've finished the housework. I'm home alone today and I feel very poorly. (.___. ) Not fun.


I'm pretty sure my readers are like: eh? she's in Japan again? But of course. Where else would I be?

☢ 281 ANTI-NUKE ☢

 Japanese Street Art

Whenever I visit Japan I always end up photographing such weird things, anything from the floor to local graffiti, or "Street Art". I absolutely find it fascinating, especially in Japan. Sure you get the 'I LOVE ____' graffiti scrawled up the side of vending machines, chain link fences and such, but you also get amazing pieces of art! Some pieces are very mind boggling, where as others, promotional tags.
I wouldn't consider the tags part of a 'terrortory' not like here where I come from, you see 'NG15' around a lot, because apparently we have a representative 'gang' in our area, nice...



After the Tsunami disaster in 2011, it sparked many people's concern with health, especially after the meltdown of Fukushima power plant. The threat and worry of radiation became a nationwide epidemic, and a lot of unanswered questions, skillfully dodged and skirted around.
Nearly a year ago after then, I was in Japan, and a year after the Tsunami; so obviously the disaster was to be remembered, charity and fundraising made streets swell, because; after all despite all the help previously Japan was still suffering with worry and dread of this unspoken radiation!
If you looked beyond the fundraisers that day you will see (yes see) a silent voice - and even today you will still see the silent voice of "281 Anti-nuke", a graffiti tag artist who believes in anti-nuclear power.

 

'I HATE ☢ RAIN' 

This little girl is all over Tokyo - mainly Shibuya is where I spotted her the most. Her anorak comes in a variety of colour, but the message is always the same. 281 Anti-nuke also created a new tag for the Summer.  So the fear is still out there, however who really will take these small voices into consideration?

Image credit: SNUPPED

281 not only focuses his views on anti-nuclear, but also anti-tepco, (Tokyo electric power company). Many of 281's work for anti-tepco involve Children's characters such as Hello Kitty and even Seseme Street characters.

281 has been known now as the Japanese version of Banksy, where you can see the similarities and especially since no one knows the true person behind 281.

There are so many other pieces - between Shibuya and Harajuku you see a vast vast variety and it is indeed beautiful that many local people just breeze by them without a second glance. I on the other hand, always stop and take photographs. Though I do this in the UK so I am no different and I love Art like this. By the way, not all pieces of street art are scary demonic sounding threats and/or warnings. Some are purely innocent, creative and cute. As long as the work isn't tacky or discriminative, I see no reason as to why graffiti should be hidden from society. 

Disclaimer: all images are © to me unless otherwise noted beneath the image!