Tokyo: The Rest of Thursday Night

After 'Thanksgiving' at the Teppanyaki place, the party moved to Shibuya.  Stephen got into town late, so we had to go down to Shibuya station to pick him up.  Less Ganguros than before (doh!)  but still a few here and there.

鉄板焼後、皆さん渋谷へ行った。Stephen君は空港から電車で直接来た、駅で待って行った。。。

 It was just great to see this part of town again...

a bit blurry, but you know what I'm trying to show...

We were supposed to meet Stephen at the station, but instead someone met me:

Stephen君見つけていたけど、他の人を僕を見つけました！すごい！

Since dinner time we had been discussing whether or not to go to this big music event i had found out about online called " Connect '07" - it was being held at the Ryogoku Kokugikan, which is the big Sumo stadium in Tokyo.  I was interested because the headliners included ' Hifana', one of my favorite Japanese music groups. (right after Ketsumeishi and Southern All-stars). :-P

Connect'07のイベント参加したかった、国技館で有りました。色色なバンドとDJいました、例えば：ヒファナ。すごい！大好き！遅いけど、まだ行った：

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But by the time we got there it was already quite late,  we weren't sure if we could even get in, since they said it was probably going to sell out... but luckily our friend's friend Mai, who's a DJ, was able to get us passes.　舞ちゃんはDJから、ホーク・アプがありました、それからVIPパースを貰った。すごい！

The place was pretty full... had to be like 5,000-10,000+ people in there between the main floor, the seating area, the hallways and the outside areas.  Since it was the middle of the night, a lot of people were partied out and had passed out on the floor (pretty much anywhere they could lay down w/o getting stepped on.  Totally 'Night of the Living Dead'!:-P

人とても一杯！多分一万人上！

We spent about 30 minutes wandering through the halls trying to find a place to put Swang's suitcase, since he came directly from the airport.  we ended up leaving it in what I think was Hifana's dressing room down in the basement and then FINALLY got into the main arena:

The Dance floor was the main floor of the sumo competition area (where they normally set up the sumo ring, which is a giant pile of compacted sand)... they had a cool set up of Japanese lanterns, which had blue LED lights inside that were computer controlled as part of the VJ show.　提灯すごい！

The stands in a sumo arena is not seats, its actually open carpeting flooring with a low railing, normally people sit on cushions and watch the sumo competitions (which take all day).  In this case there were no cushions, just lots and lots of people passed out or at least sitting down and chilling.　相撲スタンドなか人も一杯、たくさん酔っ払い人寝ていました。

Here's a video I put together panning around the arena:　ビデオを撮った、見て！

Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sUjjvc5PJsk

We eventually made our way to the main floor and snuck some pictures:

Me and [Akira](/?akoieyama)

The beautiful Mai with Me and Swang.

The problem came when some of our group tried to find something to drink and we found out that they were out of beer! (shocking, considering the main sponsor for this event was... a beer company!)　　

楽しそう？でも大問題有りました！ビールを売り切れた！本当！ビール会社のスポンサーありましたけど、売り切れた！What the hell!?

So eventually we decided to regroup and relocate to a cool but extremely well hidden underground club in Aoyama.  It was fun but we stayed out WAY too late. :-P