Girls Day Out

So shortly after I told my parents to 'get the f*ck out - and stay out!', another two friends from Sunny Melbourne swung past Kumamoto to check out the Japanasian lifestyle. I met Miya and Alex at the station on a sunny Saturday afternoon, then it was a quick taxi ride back to mine to get base camp established. The girls were pretty tuckered out from spending most of the day travelling here from Osaka, so we decided to spend the rest of the day in a leisurely stroll up to the castle.
Once we checked the castle off the list, we headed back to my place, only after spending about twenty minutes at the local konbini (convenience store, but they're heaps better than the ones back home) buying everything from groceries to premixed cocktails to make up. Despite Miya being on enough medication to disqualify her from Beijing 2008, and my own weak protests that I didn't really want to get drunk again, the first cans of Calpis Sour (an intriguingly tasty ready to drink cocktail which goes down very, very easily) were cracked at approximately quarter past five. Nice. Energy levels weren't at an all time high so we headed into town for a quick Izakaya dinner, followed by a whirlwind tour of the local bar scene, and then it was home (via the konbini of course to collect some post drinking drinkies) for a nightcap, then bed by a reasonable hour. During the night I introduced Alex to Umay Shu, the local plum wine, and can safely add another convert to the list. If you can get a hold of some, try it, if you like sweet drinks then you'll love this stuff.

Sunday morning bought with it a world of possibilities. After laying out a range of options to the guests of honour (climb a local volcano, drive to the beach, check out an ancient Japanese park) the activity of choice was a favourite of women all across the globe: shopping. Being a little tired tired from spending the last week being the owner operator of 'Maxi's Family Tours', I was happy to oblige. So we hit the bricks again and headed into Shimotori, Kumamoto's main shopping strip where the locals flock every weekend to spend their hard earned yen. After some time was spent shopping, doing coffee, shopping, and checking out make up, it was decided that this day just wouldn't be complete unless a decent massage parlour (of the legitimate kind!) was found. Luckily enough I had a vague idea of where one might be, and being kind of curious having never experienced a professional massage before, it was off to the massage joint. $40 bucks, some excellent back kneading and one hour later it was a super relaxed trio that walked out of Rakuya Massages. Thinking along the lines of 'if you can't beat 'em, join 'em' I suggested the next stop in our Girls Day Out should be cocktails in the swanky hotel lounge close by. Ten minutes later it was cosmopolitans all round for a post massage analysis.
I had some dude work on me, and he did such a good job that at some points I found myself in a semi-dozing state thinking about one of the girls at work who I'd recently had a bit of a thing with. Talk about conflicted: here I am thinking romantically about a japanese hottie while an old japanese man gives me a massage. Hhmmm, maybe that's the kind of thing that I should be keeping to myself...but then again this is 'uncut'. In a similar vain to the previous 'I'm so dangerous' segment, perhaps I should start a new list:

I'm so heterosexual...

• I'm so heterosexual, I think about girls when men touch me.
• I'm so heterosexual, I collect hello kitty figurines not only because they're cute, but also because the late night line of 'hey, wanna come back to mine and check out my hello kitty collection' is proving to be surprisingly effective.

Ok that's all I got at the moment, but as always suggestions welcome.

Cosmopolitanites:

During the course of the day I strongly encouraged Alex and Miya to get into the swing of things and dress like the locals: by putting on pop socks (knee high socks) high heels and micro skirts. I thought I had a pretty impressive argument: 'when in rome...'; but unfortunatley they wouldn't come to the party. Maybe next time huh girls? Actually here's a culture difference bizarro-world fact - most 'normal' girls over here look like complete tarts by dressing in the style described above, although they often replace stupidly tall high heels with knee length boots. This is in comparison with the real 'ladies of the night' who get around in floor length evening dresses while they stand on the main streets trying to attract customers. Cool.

Cosmopolitans drained we then headed to one of the best restaurants in town, Jang Jang, for some excellent chinese cuisine in a very decent setting.


This was followed up by after dinner drinks at the swanky (albeit pricey) Hachi. Being a Sunday night there wasn't much going on in town and seeing the girls had an early start because of travel the next day we called it a night.

At the risk of sounding totally gay (although maybe it's too late for that?), Girls Day Out was TOTALLY AWESOME. It was pretty fun just chilling out and doing whatever, I can safely say a good time was had by all. Good times, good times.

Immature Office Banter of the Week:
Me: Hey, any of you guys want to get some dinner after work?
Tony: Only if your mum's on the menu.
Bystanders: Whhooooaaaa, burn!

Tune of the Post:
Five-O, James.

Link of the Post:
Facebook Get on it.

Alrighty kids, keep me posted on the news back home. Upcoming posts include Kitty Land Magic and Senmei's Going Away.
Peace!