shiro240

I'm using Vodafone (Soft Bank) prepaid now. It's not the cheapest, nor does it have the best coverage, but most (if not all) of their phones have the ability to switch to English menus. Unless many of you looking to buy a phone are fairly Japanese literate and have a good grasp of the kanji alphabet, you should make sure the phone you're getting has the same feature.

Akihabara--are there any tuner shops there? It seems like a lot of the ones I've seen in Tokyo are fairly scattered about. More or less, you'll just be walking down a busy street and you'll see a smaller tuner shop with a bunch of tuner cars in front. In terms of finding everything in one place, Autobacs is good but Super Autobacs is even better. I think there are a fair number of them in the Tokyo area, although I don't know the exact locations--try their website or the internet. Otherwise, a good thing I've always done in the past, especially if you're looking for parts for a certain car, is to go to a specialist tuner shop so they'll know exactly what you're looking for. I've found a lot of these places are listed in the Hyper Rev magazines that come out periodically for certain types of vehicles (they should have tons of issues for the Skyline). Good luck!

Makuhari, although in the Tokyo metro area, is kind of out in the "sticks", so I'd bet you'd have a pretty good chance scoring with a local girl rather than some chick in Tokyo. Then again, I hear a lot of the girls in Roppongi aren't exactly nuns either. Ganbatte!

No offense, but... If you're white, in Japan, and you can't get laid for free, you might as well just stick with your right hand or turn gay. There are no excuses.

Speaking of Tokyo... I was just thinking that because of all the motorheads in the Tokyo Metro area for the show, surely there must be some sort of after-party/cruise going on during the weekend. Anyone heard about anything--maybe at Daikokufuto?

Not to open a can of worms, but... The Chevy Z06 is a massive amount of car for the money. Something like $60,000 for a car that compete with cars costing twice as much. Even though it's GM, will likely fall apart in about 5 years, and every douchebag down the street will own one, they're still a force to be reckoned with. It should be interesting to see how these two cars match up--Best Motoring or Top Gear, are you listening?

The grass is always greener on the other side. I'm sure many of you probably found it cool how, at first, people would stare at you all the time because you're a hakujin, but I think that wears off after awhile and you just want to blend in with everyone else. Maybe I'm wrong, but so far that's probably the biggest thing I miss about being back home.

LOL @ pic! Speaking of bikes... What's the deal with all this? They cost an effin arm and a leg, weigh about 90lbs, and look like they were made in some ex-Soviet Republic. On top of that, they get stolen about as frequently as your garbage gets picked up by the city. I have a feeling that this is some Yakuza-like racket, with all these people buying and selling stolen bikes to pay for their flash, new VIP body kits for their Cedrics or Celsiors. Can anyone confirm this? Rezz?

In Nishi-Funabashi now, but moving near Yachiyo, Chiba-ken this week.

If Friday is press only, any chance someone could blag me a press pass?

Promotion has been building up for the GP this weekend as I've seen adverts all over the rail cars I ride to work. This past weekend in Tokyo, I noticed both a Williams Cosworth and a Toyota Panasonic car on display at different major locations in the city. The latter, stationed at Harajuku, was at a KDDI store which was converted in to a Toyota F1 GP headquarters with some sort of Suzuka race simulator, free Toyota F1 gear, and the chance to sit inside a real grand prix car. Knowing I'll probably never have this chance again, I had to try it out. Besides the fact the seat felt like it was molded for Cristiano de Matta, I think it actually fit me quite well. Back on subject... For anyone in the Tokyo area not going to the race this weekend, are there any suggestions about where to watch in a bar or pub? I am still lacking a TV and I may have to work part of Sunday.

I'm just curious... Why are clock radios--the ones that have an FM tuner, alarm, and digital clock--so freaking expensive in Japan? I just got back from Akihabara with the girlfriend to go and pick up some different electronics. I figured a clock radio, like the kind we get in the States, would cost around 1000 yen at the most for something fairly basic. However, when I actually arrived, most large stores (eg Yodobashi, Ishimaru, etc) either didn't carry them or the ones they did seemed to range anywhere from 4000 to 9000 yen! How could this be? These are like the most basic electronics ever made and, yet, they sell for 10 times more for the same model than they would in the US?? If anyone has any ideas as to why, I'd be glad to hear them! PS- We finally found an off-brand clock radio for 2000 yen, but only after searching around for a couple of hours!

....or "Fresh Off the Boat" as we used to call them back in the States. My girlfriend and I arrived at Narita yesterday afternoon and are now at our temporary apartment in Funabashi. Although this is now my third trip here, I have just as many questions as I did the first time I arrived! Anyway, hopefully once I have once I get a better internet connection (as I'm currently stealing off someone's bandwidth), I'll try to contribute more on the board! PS - I found that Makuhari Messe is only a few stops from me--has anyone been there lately? Are people still doing drift? If so, what day/time do they usually come out there? Cheers guys!

This will be the last F1 race at Suzuka and is also meaningful, as the driver's championship has yet to be won thus far. Is anyone on this board planning to go? If so, how much were tickets and where did you go to get them? Thanks!

Rezz - LOL That last story is hilarious!

"DoCoMo" is just a dual-meaning for the real use of the word "anywhere" right? I have to admit, that is so Japanese of you guys to buy that stuff just because everyone else does! Don't you know that since you're a "kakkoo ii hakujin" that you can just buy whatever you want and instantly set trends??? Actually, you got me thinking...it's about time those old Motorola brick phones came back in style!

That's funny...it reminds me more of a child molestor's car, but I guess to each his own!

For years I have wondered... What if a Cicada.... and a 1998 Ford Taurus... ...had some sort of bastard, love-child? What would it look like? I think I can safely say that this dream has become a reality!

Very good info--thanks! I'm considering AU because they have some sort of 300 yen monthly fee whereby you can talk to another AU user unlimited. Sounds like a good deal to me, although I hear that other companies might have something similar.

Even if you hate it, I still think you have to give Honda a lot of credit for coming out with such a different design. They seem to be real good at producing edgy, yet refined, designs and I think in about 10 years time, this car may be looked at as one of the better car designs of the "nouveau-box" trend we're in right now.

Just curious... I've noticed that most people overwhelmingly use DoCoMo over just about any service, but are they the best? What company did you pick and why? Also, who has the best service and cheapest plans? Thanks! PS - I did a search in the archive and nothing came up.

Can anyone read that kanji on the side? Does that say "fujiwara tofu"?? Funky- I'll be sure and check the older posts--do you remember the title?

I was just reading an article in the newspaper today about how my local sheriff's office are now using modified Dodge Chargers for "reckless or agressive" driving. So that got me thinking... What are Tokyo, Osaka, or Nagoya police using these days for the same purpose? I recall seeing pictures of R34 GTRs, GTOs, and FD3S RX7s painted up in police colors awhile back. Anyone know?

I'd have to agree in fact that if Honda does do WRC, it'd be because they've dropped their F1 program (which I highly doubt considering they only recently took ownership of BAR's F1 stock). For many reasons, I think that WRC isn't quite as glamorous a choice as it once was back in the 80's. One of these is the lack of involvement by major constructors. As of now, I think there are only two companies with factory based teams this year: Ford and Subaru. While that number will grow next year, there's still the problem with TV exposure. Rallies run over three days, involves tons of cameras, and the owner of WRC (David Richards) charges a ton for the TV rights. Infact, although it had a strong cult following in the US, the motorsport channel we have decided not to renew for this season! Compared all of this to F1 where there's more competition, better brand exposure, more prestige, more revenue, etc, and I think it's really a no-brainer that a lot of companies decide to pack up shop with their WRC program and move over to F1 (a la Toyota 5 years ago). BTW- The Toyota F1 and WRC teams were/are both run by a group called TTE (Team Toyota Europe). I believe they also brought over a lot of staff from the WRC team during the early stages of the F1 team, most notably former rally driver Ove Anderssen (sic) as their first F1 team boss.