im currently sitting in the lexus dealership waiting for my car to get serviced. ive been here since 10am and they told me that everything would be finished by 5-6pm. mother bitch!! good thing car dealerships are designed so homely where i have a computer all to myself, an abundance of food, and even a starbucks! since the stock market is closed today (martin luther king is the greatest!) its my only chance i had to fix my car. the annoying check engine light comes on automatically at 45K so even if your car is in impeccable shape, lexus wants you to spend $500 just to turn that stupid light off. so hell, might as well go all out and do the whole 50K service.

soooooo tokyo was awesome. it took a while for me to actually appreciate that place because usually when i get off the plane in another country, ie france or italy, im already feelin it. but japan took a little while...

day 1: the flight was comfy. i chose american airlines because my last experience on it going to heathrow was pleasant; full of leg room, good food, good movies. i sat next to this 23 year old UCLA graduate who is flying to seoul to work as an english teacher. he met a korean exchange student at school and flew back to live with her. how romantic. the rest of the flight, i breezed through half of my series 7 book and took no nap at all. yes i like to study. after 13 hours, i was in tokyo, 5:30pm on the 30th of december. as i went through customs, the officer asked where i was staying at. so i said "kabuki-cho". next thing he mumbles "Very dangerous" so i asked why and he didnt know how to say it in english. he pulled out a picture and pointed to a girl wearing lingerie. i thought ohhhhh keith chose the red light district. nice. besides the customs officer speaking a tad of english, 1 thing i noticed right away is no one else spoke a hint of english and now my friend is telling me to book a bus to shinjuku station. i am not good at taking the bus even in los angeles and now he is telling me to find my way to a station in an alien country without english? what i also noticed is that there was a "magna-doodle" right next to every service counter (and later finding out magna-doodles were everywhere in japan). a magna doodle is a board where you can write messages using a magnetic pen and erasing the board instantly. so i used the magnadoodle and wrote "shinjuku station". so she presented me with a price and the bus stop. after a 45 min ride on a bus with HID lights, i was at the world's busiest subway terminal. i was bumping into everyone during rush hour and immediately got lost in a sea of men in suits and girls in hooker boots. my next problem was trying to find keith. i made a call on the pay phone and just my luck i turn around a corner and bump into him. what luck.

from here on, i can let keith do the work. he can speak, read and write japanese and most importantly, hes white! we walked about 15 mintues to our hotel where we had seperate single rooms with a bathroom just a little bigger than a porto-potty. the bathroom also had a hi-tech toilet with a heated seat and a sprayer!! without wasting anymore time, keith and i went to explore the district of shinjuku. this place had it all, neon lights, food traffic, nightlife, male/female strip clubs, shopping, and restaurants. we decided to find a place to have dinner and although it may sound easy, finding a good place to eat is tough as i have noticed in my past travels. its just that you want to find a place with a good atmosphere in a good location and also with a good amount of people. believe it or not that combination is hard to find. after about an hour of walking in cirles, we found this place that had fried fish and tempura. meal 1 done. it was not big not small, but very good. by the time we finished, its already about11pm and since im on vacation, why not have a session at a bar? once again, we walked around and decided to finish the night at this scotch bar. it was decorated as if you were in a scottish bar with wooden accent and rows of different types of scotch. ive never had scotch before so i requested a scotch for the average guy. he prepared a shot of glenfiddich. as i watched him prepare the drink, it seemed like he was preparing it for the president. he put so much care into it where he made sure the glass was spotless, he measured the scotch exactly a shot, he used a perfectly spherical ice cube, and stirred the drink with a clean, glass rod. he then handed me the drink and said "arigato". shit, i didnt even pay him yet. scotch is a very unusual drink. it tastes like paint but that taste doesnt come about until 10 seconds after you swallow. its the fumes or soemthing that runs up your nose and makes you feel funny. i think its an acquired taste. next thing, i looked at my watch and its midnight. so im thinking shit, it would be 7am in los angeles and here im having scotch for breakfast!

day 2 (new years eve): we woke up at around 930am and hopped on the computer to plan out our daily agenda. the first stop was at the electronics district. many folks come to japan to get their first hand on the latest technology. we went to this store if i remember correctly had about 9 distinct floors. cameras, computers, tvs, radios, cell phones, gaming systems, toys, appliances etc... like keith said, it was fry's electronics on crack. after that, we took the subway to harajuku, a district that highlighted japanese pop culture. coincidentally snoopy town was also there so i did a little shopping and got my sister souvenirs, who is a huge peanuts fan. harajuku is basically an alley way with each side lining up with japan's j-rock fashion stores. the younger japanese typically sported a heavy-metal type of style at the moment but not for long because japan is always in the most updated fashion sense. just imagine asian bret michaels walking everywhere. tight jeans, boots and heavy jackets all in black. after that mind blowing experience, we took the tube to ginza, a district that resembled new york's prestigious 5th ave shopping. although i like to shop, im not here to shop for something where i can find at the beverly center. so instead, we walked around and settled down at the first starbucks of japan. with a plaque, its engraved with pride that you are actually stepping foot in japan's first starbucks. after ginza, we hopped on the subway for a short trip to roppongi hills. replace "roppongi" with "beverly" and you get the idea. its japan's residential area for the socially inclined. with plush malls and luxurious lofts, and my first time ever seeing 2 bodyguards pushing a shopping cart for their master. thats what you call mega-baller.

it was new years eve and we went back to get ready for nic fanciulli. it was going to be held at WOMB, which is the top 10 club in the world. we got off the station at shibuya, the famous area that is always shown on tv where you see masses of people crossing on the crosswalk. it dawned on me that it was smaller in person. i guess people are really tinier in japan contrasting its actual size. we arrived in womb after passing through small alley ways and places called "love hotels" where you can rent a room for half hour blocks. nice! it costed us 5000yen for nic fanciulli which equals to about $40 US dollars. it wasnt packed at first but when 1130 came around, it was absolutely insane where everyone was pushing each other and every part of your body is touching every body else's sweat. countdown was over...oout we go. didnt even get to enjoy the musik.

day 3: today we planned to take a bus to mount fuji, but that wasnt until 4pm. so all the time before, we decided to explore shibuya more after the buzz kill that ruined our new years eve. we stopped at NHK studios which was japan's tv network. there i was happy to discover domo-kun. it was a the mascot of NHK TV that looked like a brown monster with spiky teeth. i decided to buy a doll-sized version for my bed at home.

4 o'clock came and i slept through the 2-hour bus ride. it was already night once we got to the town of shikouza which was on the foothills of mt fuji. we checked into this extremely neat private hostel where the room was designed traditionally like a japanese dojo. there werent any seats, so you had cushions and kneeled next to a foot high table. the door was a sliding rice-paper door and the floor were made of straw bounded tightly together. as for our beds, we had rollout matresses on the floor and had to prepare it each night. for dinner we went up the street and ate at a place called "skylark". it was japan's version of dennys but with a touch of japanese style such as enoki mushrooms on steak, miso soup and breaded fish etc... i ate like a king!

day 4: we woke up to an amazing site. in front of us was this towering mountain that was shaped so perfectly like a cone with the top half snowcapped. the day was beautiful with clear skies and sunshine which made mt fuji stand out more. the streets were lined with snow after a 2 day storm last week. i was in a winter wonderland. we walked 15 min down the street to the foot of the tram stop. this tram took us to a peak where we can take in the whole view of mt fuji and the 5 lakes that are surrounding it. after taking numerous pics with domo-kun, we took a $40 taxi ride 2 miles up the street to the caves. these caves were actually lava tubes that vented mt fuji as it erupted in the past, so im thinking since mt fuji is still active, lava can run through these caves at any moment. even if it did, i wouldnt feel much. i read on the guide that the caves pretty much keep a constant temperature 365 days a year. therefore, icicles in the cave are always kept frozen. by night fall, we took the bus back to tokyo and off we go on a bullet train to osaka......