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The big plan for today was to: 1. buy some gas for my "mini-condo", which is Japanese for "small camping stove", and 2. go to Tokyo Critical Mass.
I woke up early and left Teresa's place. Stopped by some stores and finally hit the one in Odaiba to get the gas. By the time I got to Kyoko's place, and chilled for a little while, I was already running late to get to Critical Mass. Meanwhile, Kyoko's plans were to go to one of the parks in Odaiba and have a BBQ with some old high school friends. She and Kei prepared some things, and headed over there, with me trailing a few minutes later, on my bike.
Well, my plan was to say "what's up" to the friends, then take the Yurikamome line, with my bike, over the waters to Shimbashi, and from there ride over to Yoyogi park, which is where the CM people meets. I was halfway through buying my ticket, when a gentleman there stopped me and asked about my bike. Instead of feigning "stupid foreigner", I actually tried, in Japanese, to explain to him what I was doing. I tried to get sympathy for the Odaiba Catch 22:
You see, in Japan you can't take your bike on the train, unless it is a folding bike, or you have a bike bag for it. A bike bag is basically a bag that you can fit the bike in after you take off some pieces, like the wheels. Unfortunately, they cost about $80. So this guy was trying to ask me if I have a bike bag, and so I told him that I don't, but I'm on my way to Shimbashi to buy one. Odaiba doesn't have any bike shops, so since I can't buy one here, I have to take my bike on the train to get one. Atleast that's the story I told him.
Unfortuantely it just didn't work out, he didn't let me on. Because the only other ways off of Odaiba are either by taking the slow ferry, or by using a bridge on the other side of the island, either way I figured I'd be too late to join my fellow cyclists. (As it turns out, I ended up riding in the next months critical mass... you can read about it on the May 25th journal entry)
Fortunately, today was still super fun, because missing CM meant I got to go to Kyoko's BBQ. Although everyone there was mostly speaking Japanese, it was still very fun. In fact, I enjoyed it because I got to practice my language skills (or lack thereof) so much. We even tossed a frisbee around for a bit, and the food definately rocked. I have to say that as far as food goes, the American BBQ could learn alot from its Japanese counterpart.
Afterwards, Kyoko and her friends went back to her place, where we chilled for a while. The friends left, and later in the evening Kyoko and I went to meet 2 more old friends of hers. We went to 2 bars, and just hung out and talked. Since I had originally postponed the bike trip for a few days, specifically so I could go to Tokyo Critical Mass, I got a bit depressed earlier in the day. However, by the end of the evening I was feeling pretty good with my Japanese, so now I eagerly look forward to the trip.
For more information on Critical Mass, try critical-mass.org or the Critical Mass Hub.
If you are in Tokyo, they meet on the last Saturday of every month at 3 or 4pm, I believe. If you can read Japanese (since they never updated their English portion of the site), check out the Tokyo Critical Mass site. They provide a Yahoo! map on their website.
If you are in San Francisco, just show up at Embarcadero plaza at 6pm on the last Friday of the month. Maybe I'll see you there.
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Content last modified 27 June 2002