Japanese TV

Most Japanese TV that we see in the UK is on late-night “how strange is ‘foreign’ TV” programmes, hosted by someone such as Chris Tarrant. Generally we see practical jokes played on people when they’re on the toilet, or shot, naked down ski slopes on chairs with rockets attached (honestly). There is a Japanese comedian called Yanagihara Kanako (柳原可奈子) who is really very funny. She’s not really a joke-telling comedian, but a parody of people you see in Japan.

In this video, you can see her poking fun at shop assistants for their attitude, and the ever present call of “irasshaimaseeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee“, when you walk in. “Irasshaimase” is an honorific expression welcoming someone to the shop. The plain form of the word itself is “irassharu”, and is an exalted form of several verbs including kuru (to come), iku (to go), and iru(for animate objects to exist). You can skip to about 1:45 in the video to see what I mean.

Lolita, Zoku and the Western Confusion

Japanese fashions – not unsurprisingly – are really inventive, creative and categorised. In the west, we have the goth scene, which people sometimes mistake for the gothic lolita scene in Japan. In fact the goth scene in Japan is relatively small, and doesn’t have anything to do with the gothloli scene at all. The gothloli term is used to describe a fashion that’s not “gothic” per se, but rather cute and pretty Victorian style. Hair is worn in styles such as bangs, a fringe, ringlets etc – and with a head dress or top hat. Parasols, are often used, as are frills, lace and detailing. Pale skin is preferable, but not required. Generally clothes are black/white, with petticoats, knee-length stockings and ruffled Victorian blouses that are quite prim and proper. The Gothic Lolita Bible is important reading for fashion tips and clothing patterns – as with most other creative fashion scenes, customising or making clothing and accessories is common. There is a fashion scene; “ero-loli” (erotic lolita) but this isn’t gothloli, as this is generally more sexually provocative – at odds with the gothloli cuteness. Similarly, gothloli style is different from “sweet loli” style, which tends to turn up the cuteness a lot. Oh, and it’s perfectly ok if you want to wear lolita fashions if you’re a boy, but as long as you take steps to fit the feminine style; shaved/waxed legs, (tasteful) makeup, lipstick, and mascara.

Some different types of lolita fashion styles are; Ama Rori 甘ロ (Sweet Lolita), Hime Rori 姫ロリ / Ouji Rori 王子ロリ (Princess Lolita & Prince Lolita), Classical Kei Rorita クラシカル系ロリータ(Classical Lolita), Panku Rori パンクロリ(Punk Lolita), Ero Rori エロロリ(Erotic Lolita), Kantori Rorita カントリーロリータ (Country Lolita), Gosu Rori ゴスロリ (Gothic Lolita), Gero Rori グロロリ (Grotesque Lolita), Wa Rori 和ロリ (Kimono Lolita), Itai Rori 痛ロリ (Hurt Lolita) and huge amounts of other sub-sections, such as pirate, aunt and sumo lolita. Often these sub-sections are all placed under the “gothic lolita” category, but as you can see there are a lot of different lolita fashions. Also, often, Lolita fashion will be termed “cosplay”, but the serious lolita fashion follower who wears this fashion every day will tell you that they’re not cosplay.

Often Decora fashion is mistaken as lolita fashion too. Decora or Decora-chan is another street fashion, but uses colourful accessories, traditional Japanese clothing and plastic accessories – often pop-culture toys. This is sometimes incorrectly called “fruits” or “fruits-style” from Shoichi Aoki’s Fruits photographs, published in magazines, and a series of books.

One of the biggest differences in western and Japanese scenes are that generally Japanese fashions are based on visual identity rather than music/literature tastes. Of course someone is more likely to listen to punk music if they wear the Panku Lolita style, but what is “punk” in Japan is much more broad than in the UK. We’re just as bad for categorising music as Japanese are for visual kei (visual style) as there are defined and definite genres of music, but in Japan a band might have on their album a mix of j-pop “boy band” style and doom metal styles tracks. The desire to preclude types of music outside your own chosen genre doesn’t really exist in Japan. People are open minded, but this is because of the emphasis on visual identity. Much the same as most sub-cultures, it’s about identity and belonging to a “tribe”. Zoku (族) is the term meaning tribe or clan, and used to describe Japanese sub-cultural groups and phenomena such as; Bara-zoku “Rose tribe” (gay subculture), Dobunezumi-zoku “Sewer-rat tribe” (company employees in dull clothing), Hashi-nashi-zoku “Chopstickless” (foreign tourists who cannot use chopsticks), Shinkansen joso-zoku “Bullet train girl-tribe” (crossdressers), Hotaru-zoku “Firefly tribe” (smokers/office workers on their smoking break) and Sumaafu-zoku “Smurf tribe” (obscure Japanese specialty workers) along with countless more.

As with everything, it seems on the face of it that the Japanese fashion scene is something otherworldly and strange, but of course it’s just belonging to a group – something which we all do.

The world is tilting…

I arrived back late UK time on Friday, and went straight out to Tech Noir. It was a really good night, although again I drank too much and felt horrible on Saturday. I think it was a lot to do with the jet lag though, as I’d not slept for 34 hours, and then ended up going to bed about lunchtime Tokyo time. I slept on the sofa at Emma’s during the afternoon a bit, and couldn’t really even face the Japanese food we’d got.

While I was in Tokyo, I bought a PSP as I found a shop selling them for about £40 in Nakano. I got Monster Hunter Portable for it and played that on the way back, although it’s the Japanese version and I had to try to translate the kanji, but it’s a great game. Yesterday I bought a few more games for it; Loco Roco (ロコロコ Rokoroko), Lumines II and Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords. I’ve blogged in another blog about Puzzle Quest, but Loco Roco and Lumines II are brilliant games too! Lumines II is like Tetris on crack, with an amazing soundtrack, and Loco Roco is just the strangest, cutest, weirdest and best game I’ve ever played. In the game you use the L and R buttons to tilt the world, moving a little blob (Loco Roco) around the world using gravity and little jumps to pick up berries, but you also need to find “Mui Muis” and “pickories”, while avoiding the spikey “burrs” and “Moja” that eat Loco Roco. You can also use the circle button to split the big Loco Roco into loads of little ones to fit into little gaps.

There are also mini-games such as Mui Mui Crane where you use a arcade crane to pick up Loco Rocos and Chuppa Chuppa where you control a “Chuppa” and launch Loco Rocos to another Chuppa and that one launches it too.

It’s just so addictive, and last night when I went to bed, I could see tilting worlds and jelly-like Loco Rocos jumping about. Like all great games, Loco Roco is really simple, although gets really difficult at higher levels. It’s control mechanism is simple, but brilliant. Also the game designers have put in the ability to edit worlds, and even using the underlying signal architecture, see the Crazy Secrets in Loco Roco.

Strangely the tilting world metaphor is quite apt too, as my world does seem to have tilted recently…

In 8 Hours, 38 Minutes…

I will be heading to the airport to leave Japan. It seems like I’ve just arrived, but also that I’ve been here for a long while. I’ve made the most of my visit I think, and seen a lot of Tokyo, but I still ran out of time and missed lots that I wanted to see. Two weeks just isn’t long enough…

There is a lot I will miss about Tokyo; the vending machines, iced coffee in little cans, Mild Seven cigarettes, gothic fashion shops, Harajuku, Akihabara, Shinjuku, the weather (ok, well sometimes it’s a bit warm, but I’d rather be warm than cold – and I was really quite sick of the weather in the UK), the bum-washing toilets…lots really.

My case is packed, which was pretty much empty when I arrived, but it’s full now and really quite heavy. I’ve got my crappy gifts for people (honestly, don’t expect anything actually “good”), and my clothes for the trip are laid out ready. My iPod is charged, PSP is charged, and I have a couple of books in my hand luggage. In retrospect, I’m sad about leaving Japan – but I’ll be back soon…

Sayonara – the word used in Japanese to say goodbye – means; “If it must be so”…

Well, sayonara Nihon… arigato gosai masu!

Kill Bill and the earth moved!

Yesterday I was in Marunouchi, which is pretty much the center of Tokyo in the Chiyoda ward. Imagine an area comprised of a load of insurance company buildings, and you’ve pretty much got it. The area is just next to Ginza, which is just north of where I am at the moment. It’s strange that over the past couple of weeks I’ve got a really good idea of the geography (or is that topography) of Tokyo. Each time I visit an area, it fits into the surrounding places like a jigsaw. The weirdest thing is when I’m in a completely different area, but realise that I’ve arrived in somewhere I know really well, and another bit of the puzzle clunks into place. It’s really weird that I knew nothing about Tokyo two weeks ago, but now I can find my way around pretty well.

Marunouchi also has the Imperial Palace, and the Imperial Palace gardens, which are really lovely – although it was so hot again that I couldn’t walk around them too much. It’d be nice to go back again, but when it’s less than a million degrees. Cherry blossom season is supposed to be the best time to see the area, and there is a walk all the way through the park which takes quite a while. I did have lunch in a fantastic place called Aroyna Tabeta, which was braised pork with rice. The restaurant is in half of a railway arch, and really quirky. It’s authentic and reasonably priced Thai street food, and well worth a visit if you’re around there. It’s right next to the Tokyo International Forum, under the railway arches [3-7-11 Maranouchi, Chiyoda-ku].

After that, dinner was in a restaurant called Gonpachi in Nishi-Azabu, next to Roppongi. The place is a Japanese restaurant, but inside it’s design is really fantastic. I recognised the place immediately, and apparently it was the inspiration for the restaurant in Kill Bill, where the big fight scene happened. I had tempura, some beef and chazuke, along with a load of other small dishes. Along with a few Shochu drinks, it was a great meal. Afterwards I met some people and we went to Gaspanic, a club in Roppongi. It’s a lunatic place, where the women are agressive, and if you stop drinking, you have to leave. Even the staff check your drink, and if it’s too low; you either have to buy another, or leave. It’s a truely mad place! (^ ^)

Speaking of drinking – there are three important Japanese drinks; nihonshu, shochu and awamori. “Sake” is another name for nihonshu, which is brewed from rice and fermented. This is about 20 percent alcohol. It’s served warm or cold, but it’s generally the cheap stuff that’s served warm. Daiginjo is the really good nihonshu, but it’s expensive. Shochu and awamori are both distilled, so much stronger – about 50 percent. Shochu is made with rice too, but it’s sometimes made from barley or sweet potato. If it’s distilled once, it’s honkaku shochu, although it’s often distilled multiple times for a drink to mix with fruit juice. Shochu is a really nice drink mixed with juice, although by itself it smells evil! I woke up about 4am after only sleeping for a couple of hours (I’ll explain why in a sec) and took some headace tablets, as I’d had some Asahi beer too (^ ^). Awamori is distilled too, but made with imported Thai long grain rice, and comes from Okinawa. Okinawans drink it with ice and water.

The reason I woke up last night about 4am, was that I was aware that something was happening. The air conditioning was on, and making it’s usual sound, but it felt like I was sleeping weirdly and could hear my heart beating in my ear. I realised that I was wobbling slightly in bed, and a vaigue though passed through my mind. I heard from a friend this morning that it was an earthquake of 4.5 on the Richter scale. So I’ve experienced my first Japanese earthquake!! (^o^)

Today I’m going to fly around Shinjuku, Akihabara and Shibuya – although it’s so hot again today that I might come back before going to Shibuya and have a shower and cool down. I want to head to a sushi place in Shibuya that I’ve heard is really good.

Japan’s Newest Idol

As I’ve been in the south and west of Tokyo a fair bit recently, I thought I’d go north and east today; up to Ueno and Asakusa (“a-sak-sa”). In the 1600’s, Ueno used to be the adminitrative capital of Edo, which was to become Tokyo, and used to have 36 temples in the area to help ward off evil spirits. I visited Ueno Koen (park) which was Tokyo’s first park, but in 1868 it was the site of the Battle of Ueno between supporters of the Meiji government, and Tokugawa shogun warriors.

Ameyoko is the street market sprawling around the streets surrounding the station. “Ame” used to refer to sweets, so the name meant “confectioners’ alley”, but during the second world war this was the area to get black market goods, mostly from US soldiers, so the “Ame” became synonymous with Americans. There are a huge amount of sweet stalls, but also loads of shops selling all manner of goods “inspired by” other designers.

After Ueno, I visited Asakusa, and the Kannon Temple (Senso-ji), right at the end of a long arcade of covered tourist shops. By and large, they all sell tourist crap, but I bought a bean jam bun from one of the stalls, which was lovely. Just at the gate of the temple, I was interviewed for Fuji TV – so I must now be famous in Japan (^ ^). I reckon I’ll become an idol – so I’m waiting for the phone to start ringing soon! (^_-)-*

It was a bit of a tourist day today, and I have to admit I find the usual tourist things really boring. I’d much rather be experiencing the “real” culture of a place. If this sounds snobbish, I don’t mean it to be – just that I like different things.

The weather today though was so hot! Just unbelievably hot and humid. I thought I was going to pass out at one point, walking down the street – so I stopped at a small Japanese restaurant and had some food. Miso soup, pickles, onigiri rice balls and some watercress salad.

Tomorrow I’m going to complete the sub-centers of central Tokyo by visiting Maranouchi, which is the location of the imperial palace and where Edo castle used to be. As it’s the Odon festival at the moment, I’ve heard it’s open to visitors. The area also has the Tokyo Stock Exchange and the Pokemon building – so it’s got it going on (^ ^) Beforehand, I’m going to head to the Tsukiji fish market for the freshest sushi in Tokyo!

Baby, the Stars Shine Bright in Shinjuku

Staying in the spirit of just going to places I like now, I was in Shinjuku again today. To be honest, I woke up at about 9:30 and felt so dead I didn’t think I’d bother going for breakfast, but I went down anyway. Although I walk a lot at home, I really don’t do this amount of walking and definitely not in loads of heat. I think yesterday was quite a hot day too as most of it was spent outside, and not in air-conditioned trains/buildings. After breakfast I checked mail etc, then went back to my room and had some sleep. After lunchtime, I wandered down to Shinjuku as I wanted to pop into Kinokinuya Books, and into my new favorite store; Marui, although you’ll notice it from the big 0101 logo on the modern building. I’m really enjoying knowing where things are now though, and with the help of the most useful book you can buy coming to Tokyo; the Tokyo Metropolitan Atlas, I’m finding places ok. Lots of people say that Tokyo is a nightmare to find places in, and it is true that a lot of places are very small, and you can find them only if you can read the kanji on a little sign outside telling you that’s it’s on the 5F or down a tiny staircase into the basement. Normally people think Tokyo is hard to navigate, but it’s generally because maps are mostly shit.

Japan uses a good system for addresses, which is a series of three numbers, and a district. For example, Onejuku’s address is: 3-18-1 Shinjuku, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo. So the “Tokyo” part is easy to understand, that it’s the city. Next comes Shinjuku-ku, which is the ‘ward’. The next part is an area in that ward, sometimes called a “cho”; like Kabuki-cho for example. The three numbers at first look a bit weird, but they’re (from left to right); the sub-area, or “chome” (“ko-may”), the city block, then the building number in the city block. So the address is the 1st building in the 18th block of the 3rd chome in Shinjuku in the Shinjuku ward. See – it’s easy! (^ ^). Most of the buildings have these numbers on them if you look hard enough, but the best part about getting a Tokyo Metropolitan Atlas is that it shows all of the block and building numbers on there. Don’t worry about looking like a tourist with a map, lots of Japanese need maps to get around – it’s a huge place! One way Japanese find where they’re going is to phone ahead and get the shop etc to fax them a map.

Anyway – enough of the Tokyo city planning (although there often doesn’t seem to be much planning at all sometimes).

Marui have a few different buildings in Shinjuku, like 0101 Young, 0101 Men, but I headed to Onejuku as it has a load of floors of gothic, gothic lolita, punk and other fashions. I have to admit I was totally blown away by the gothic fashions. I even own a bunch of clothes in that style, but I was really stunned at how gorgeous some of the clothes were. I just stood open-mouthed at them all, and wandered around probably the most amazing clothes shop in the world….in my opinion of course. Some come here to go to Gucci, Prada, Lois Vuitton etc – this is my designer shopping! The 5F is Gothic & Mode, 6F is Punk & Rock, 7F is Punk & Gothic and 8F is Lolita style. The gothic & mode and lolita concessions are my very favorite. I just love the clothes so much. In fact so much so, that I’m going to get my sewing machine out when I get home as I’m so enthused by it all. I have so many ideas now, but the problem is that I won’t have a load of stores like on Takashite Dori to get all the accessories etc. You can check out the floor guide, but here is a English Google translated version (although auto-translations sometimes are a little weird of course). Marui carries brands such as; Baby the Stars Shine Bright, Metamorphosis, No Future, Peace Now and my very very very very fave; Moi-Même-Moitié (the fashion label of one of my heroes – Mana, singer of Malice Mizer) [official Mana site link]. I think I’m going to *have* to buy something from M-M-M…just because I do (^ ^).

I also realised that Playstation 3’s are about ¥60,000 (about £250), which is almost half the price in the UK – so I think I might look into getting one. Just have to check if it’ll be ok to use in the UK though. Let me know if you know about that kind of thing…flyingjelly1 at gmail dot com…..thankyew…

Nakameguro again… Harajuku again…

It’s true that Tokyo is an expensive city, but it’s relative really. My tastes happen to be cheaper “regular” type eating places, like kaiten sushi, ramen bars, bento and izakaya places. The things I like to buy are manga art books, music, stationary/pencils, manga, t-shirts and strange stuff such as from ranKing ranQueen. I brought a fair amount of money with me, and people warned me that I would probably run out quite quickly, so take more than I thought I’d need. I brought about £300 in currency for the first few days, and a load in travellers’ cheques, to change when I needed to. So far I’ve been here for a week, and only just got through my currency.

Today though I’ve managed to spend a load of money in one. In Nakameguro yesterday I saw a messenger bag, and thought about it overnight. I decided to go back and get it today. I spent far too much on it, and it’s my most expensive bag – but it’s really very cool. It’s made of recycled rubber inner tubes and car seatbelts, and decorated with puncture repair kit patches. They suggest you apply your own patches too to make it more individual.

Speaking of spending money. I went into Loveless in Aoyama yesterday evening, and it’s probably my favorite shop so far. The entrance is a staircase down into the basement, looking like a cave entrance. You arrive in a dark, but airy shop with loud music playing and an assortment of really cool things around; clothes, interior decor objects, music, books etc – it even has a bar along one wall of the shop, but I wasn’t sure if that was for real or not – it looks really cool though. Downstairs from this floor is another floor carrying some amazing clothes – all with amazing price tags. The staff in there were very nice, very cool and very very cute! (^ ^) They do a free style magazine with purchases, and this issue featured photography by a few different photographers, one of which is a Flickr contact – it’s a small art world! I bought a really ostentatious green wooly hat with a huuuge bobble, and a Loveless party CD.

As it’s Sunday today, I’ve spent the day in Harajuku, threading my way through the hoards of tourists crowding around the cosplay people on the bridge. What you don’t see in the photographs of the Harajuku people are the millions of people around them taking photographs. People tend to sit around in the shade at the end of the bridge, and around them is a moving wall of people taking photographs.

Maybe tomorrow I’ll do the traditional culture thing, but I’m enjoying the pop culture a lot. I did want to go to Tsukiji fish market – but that’s a really early start, and I’m now used to the time change, so I’ve fallen into my normal sleeping patterns of about 2am to 10am. That’s 6pm until 2am UK time if you’re texting or phoning.. (^_-)-*

It seems like so long ago that I arrived here, but I thought today for the first time about going back home. Other than seeing my lovely friends, that thought fills me with dread…

I really like it here.

Nakameguro is the place to be…

Nakameguro is stop number one on the Hibiya line in central Tokyo, but it just so happens to be a really up-and-coming place, with a load of art, galleries, shops etc. Thanks to slightly cheaper rent than other areas, it’s attracted artists and musicians, and has real character.

Just outside of the station is the Meguro river, and along this concrete-sided, tree-lined waterway; Aodabai, there are a sprinkling of izakaya restaurants, cafes, boutiques interior design places and galleries. These places are run by entrepreneurs, which is a real change to a lot of Tokyo, where big name brands dominate. Nakameguro is quite a sleepy place – compared to the madness that is other parts of Tokyo, but it has a lot going on. I’d say the perfect place to live. It’s a short metro ride from the Hibiya interchange, and only one stop from the JR Yamanote line. Cow Books also has a small shop there, which was a really lovely little place, packed with neatly ordered vintage books, complete with a lovely “book smell” – even though it’s a modern place. Around the top of the walls inside runs a LED matrix with the phrase; “Books give me a life to live” which scrolls around the top of the bookshelves. It’s a gorgeous place! Purveyor of geek fashion; Frapbois and punk style Metal Burger both have places there too.

To the other side of the station, there are small alleys containing lots of tiny restaurants, with paper lanterns hanging, and also a maze of small shopping streets that were coned off to cars today. Just off these shopping streets are small houses, packed into a residential area.

Tomorrow is Sunday, so I’m off to Harajuku again, although not before a quick trip back to Nakameguro for another look around the Aodabai shops… (^ ^)

Ikebukuro, is coming like a ghost town (and Nakano)

There is a large building in Ikebukuro called the Sunshine 60 Building – part of the Sunshine City Complex, housing shops, restaurants, an observatory, an aquarium, a ghost theme park and lots of offices etc. Apparently it was one of the first big shopping/entertainment centers, but it’s since been eclipsed by the other complexes such as Roppongi Hills et al. I went to have a look at it, though not really for the shopping, but I’d heard there was a strange ghost theme park on the 2nd and 3rd floors, that does really good gyoza, called Namjaland (with something to do with Namco I understand).

Eventually I found the place, and paid my ¥300, and went in. It’s a really compac, and decidedly Japanese and strange place. It does have a really good area, designed to look like an old-time Japanese street packed with gyoza (japanese dumpling) vendors. Completely authentic apart from the laminated menus and piped in music (^ ^). The gyoza was really good though, and I went back for some more. I tried some vegetable and some prawn – although I couldn’t decipher any others, so stuck with that. This floor holds the ghost town, but also Ice Cream World – which does have every flavour of ice cream you can imagine. There was some completely black ice cream, but I didn’t go so far as to try that, as nobody spoke english, and I couldn’t understand what it was. It might’ve been licorice – although just as well it could’ve been something entirely more hideous!

I did try some bean ice cream, some apple ice cream (which was very nice), some ice cream made with “deep sea water” (which was vanilla as far as I could tell”), and….and I’m not joking here…roast chicken wing ice cream! …and yes, it was foul!

…sorry (^ ^)

After this strange experience, I visited the area’s Animate shop which sells manga and anime, and picked up another really good art book. I’ve bought a bit too many manga and art books since I’ve been here, and I suspect my case will be a nightmare on the way back! Still, I got some issues of Bleach which I have the English versions too. Then I had a walk down Sunshine Dori, in the – yep – sunshine (^ ^)

Ikebukuro is the third biggest sub-center of Tokyo behind Shinjuku and Shibuya, although it’s got a bit of an un-cool reputation. It isn’t as wild as Shinjuku or Shibuya, but it seems a pleasant place. A little further from the center of Tokyo, it has a lot residential streets on the west side of the station, although it feels a bit vanilla. Sort of a cross between Ginza and Shinjuku, but not either of them. I wanted to go on the “chin chin densha” (ding ding tram), which winds it’s way around the residential areas, but I ran out of time really and I wanted to go to Nakano before it was too late in the evening.

Getting to Nakano about 7pm, I headed through Nakano broadway, which is a fantastic, long covered corridor of shops with small alleys leading off at regular intervals to small restaurants and fruit stalls etc. Of course the ubiquitous vending machines can be found down these long alleys too.

My real reason for going there was to go to Mandarake, as it’s apparently a big store there. I picked up a few more manga books I was after, and also bought a cast iron Japanese tea pot, some green tea and a cup from a great little shop. I managed to ask him how much things were, and understand what he was saying – along with asking for directions to Mandarake, I wasn’t doing too bad really.. It’s just as well, as really not many people speak English. Apparently, most have learned English, but only really at school and haven’t had much practice – so consequently they don’t really like to speak it in case they get it wrong or offend. Also, this is their country, so it’s only right that visitors make some kind of effort…in my opinion of course.

As it’s the weekend tomorrow, most places will be heaving. I’m going to visit Harajuku on Sunday again as I’d like to go back to the bridge, but I think I’ll leave Takashite Dori and Cat Street for during the week. I’m also planning to check out a maid cafe in Akihabara, but there is absolutely no chance you’ll get in at weekends without at least a couple of hours wait. Another thing for next week I think.

I’d like to check out Naka-meguro too, which I might do tomorrow. It’s an area south of Shibuya, and quite an up-and-coming place. It’s relatively cheap to rent there, and that’s attracted a lot of artists, musicians etc. There is even a street art gallery there, so I’m quite interested to see what it’s like.