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Baby Rowan

Congratulations to old pal Rik Abel and Adrienne Copithorne on the birth of their new baby Rowan Alexander on March 19th, which coincidentally also happens to be Rik’s birthday. Hurrah!

Deep Kyoto is back!

It’s spring and time to bring Deep Kyoto out of hibernation with a new article on Cafe Proverbs [15:17], the new vegan phoenix that has risen from the ashes of Cafe Peace. I went down there at the end of last month and having mentioned my blog, was introduced to the owner, one Marre, a charming fellow and quite a Rennaisance man (that’s him on the right with his wife). While talking to Marre I was overheard by another customer, who was courteous enough to introduce himself as a reader of Deep Kyoto by the name of Thomas Bertrand. As it happens, Thomas also writes a blog on Kyoto by the name of la riviere aux canards (Kamogawa sounds awfully romantic in French, don’t it?) which he has been writing for a good three years now and as a result he has been employed by a French publisher to write a travel guide to the city. It just goes to show what’s possible if you stick at something… Anyway, his blog is worth a look if your French is up to it. Or like me, you could just look at the pretty pictures. LINK

The 12th Japanese Beer Tasting 2008

Paul Sparks held his twelfth and final (?) Japanese beer tasting at Chez Sparks in Ichigaya, Tokyo last Saturday evening, thus ending a long run of enjoyably exhausting parties that first began in Fukushima-ken back in 1995. 48 beers were tasted, blind taste-testings held, quizzes quizzed, buzzers buzzed and a heck of a lot of cheese was consumed. I love cheese with beer! As usual, my old friends Chris Cotter and Graham Chave were also present as well as a host of other regulars : drool-worthy Mayumi of Beer Bar Bitter, big Mark of the massive leather jacket, some newer good-characters such as Henry and Sean who I hadn’t met before and my team-mate Rei who was a total star in the quiz. And my team won! Amazing. I forgot to claim a prize in the end but I don’t really care, it was so much fun. And I got two taste tests right too (!) – correctly identifying four beers each time in a blind tasting. As Paul took pains to point out I’ve always been utter crap at these in the past so I was super pleased with myself on this occasion. I shall miss the annual beer tastings, they were a great event and a good opportunity to catch up with old friends, and I shall miss Paul too, one of my oldest friends in Japan (I first met him in a Tengu izakaya in Koriyama city back in 1997), he has gradually gained status over the years as one of my bestest (and most supportive) mates. He and his wife are moving back to Australia later this year so I think I a wee Lambe-tour of Australia may be on the cards in 2009! Anyway, a big お疲れ様 to Paul and Kaori, they obviously worked super hard to make the beer-tasting a really great night. Here’s some piccies (the one of big Mark making team-mates Rei and I look like hobbits is worth waiting for), there’s some commentary on most of the pics if you hover your mouse over them, or you can click on them for a closer look.

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UPDATE (March 21st): Just got a mail from Paul today which reads: Absolutely poptastic having you stay for a couple of nights. Sunday night was very natsukashii. Baeren’s winter ale Ursus, which is a weizen bock won with 14.2 points and Sankt Gallen’s barley wine came second with 14.1. Those points are out of 20. Paul told us on the night that Baeren’s future is in doubt however as there was an explosion at the factory recently during which the owner was killed, and prompting me upon tasting the beer to declare it “dead good”.

Holy Crap

I saw this video on the imminent collapse of the U.S. dollar today and thought “Holy Crap!”. “U.S. balance of payments deficits is so strong and irreversible, that we must accept that at some future date there will be a run against the dollar. Probably the kind of disorderly run that precipitates a global financial crisis.” Dr. Paul A Samuelson (Nobel Prize winner in economics) said that in 2005. Obviously some big changes lie ahead…

GOOD.

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Now I’m back in Kyoto and here’s a further update on Saturday night’s beer tasting party. (Scores were out of twenty).

1st >>> Harvest Moon Brown Ale (Chiba), 14.1 average score
2nd >>> Sagami Kolsch (Kanagawa), 13.6 (lower mean average)
3rd >>> Harvest Moon Schwarz (Chiba), 13.6

So, as these are the top-three tasting beers in Japan, you might want to track them down. Here’s a nice pint of Harvest Moon Brown Ale. Goes down smooth like liquid toffee.

Here’s a short video from the party finale:

And apropos of nothing there’s an excellent video of London’s Burning up here.

Greetings from Chez Sparks. Last night was a very merry occasion, here in Ichigaya. 44 different Japanese beers, were tasted and adjudicated upon, taste test competitions held and (particularly enjoyable) quizzes were quizzed. And the elected favorite beer for 2007 (drum-roll please)…

Harvest Moon Brown Ale !!

That`s a very tasty micro-brew from Chiba prefecture which Paul and I will be renewing our aquaintance with a little later at Mayumi’s bar where she has it (wonder of wonders!) on tap.

Here is a very intense Clash performing I Fought The Law. Almost as good as Beretta.

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Apologies for late bloggage – I have been a bit down. Not due to any seasonal affective disorder or out like that but simply and predictably due to work. The work which disappoints and ceaselessly crushes the soul. However, I won’t go on about that. This is a place for happy things.

Since I last wrote, many things have happened. Old Fukushima buddy Paul Sparks (now in Tokyo) has informed me that there will be yet another Beer Tasting (BT11 I believe) this year on March 10th (which had me rubbing my hands together and cackling with glee). Young Kenta-kun (formerly brother-in-rock and bass player in the legendary machine-gun-rock-band Beretta) has been in touch to tell me that he finally has a girlfriend (which had me and several choirs of angels breathing huge sighs of relief – Congratulations Kenty!). And that lanky northern git Jonathan Bond has been in touch after an interval of maybe 5 years to inform me that:

…Borough market is London’s oldest market. It was established onthe south bank of　the Thames when the Romans built the firstLondon Bridge and people have been trading on this site for over2000 years. it’s a beautiful undercover food marketand a truly wonderful part of London’s history.Some bright spark has decided to expand the railway line runningthrough the roof of the market, which will also involve knockingdown 23 of the beautiful listed and unlisted buildings in theclosely surrounding area.

They already have planning permission, but are waiting fundingand there is a strong local campaign to put a stop to it.

If you know and love the market in its present state, please signthe petition to prevent this from happening. The plans, photographsand the petition are on the following site: http://www.sabmac.co.uk

Which had me wondering why people in high places never seem to value the things that are quite obviously the most important. It also had me wondering why I didn’t get a proper, personal message from old Bondy, to which he tersely (but quite fairly) replied:

After about five years of circulars from you I thought I’d start getting my own back .

So that told me.

Saturday night, HJ and I went to see our friend Motoko singing a wee bit of Mozart at the Kyoto Culture Museum. Philippe was also due to read some poetry by Paul Verlaine, which he was quite nervous about so I suggested filming the event and putting it on youtube. He then offered several words of encouragement, (something about my being born out of wedlock), so I took lots of pictures and a video and you can see the results below. Enjoy!

These are mostly pictures of Motoko’s performance. But there’s a couple of choice shots of Philippe stressing out:

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And now watch Philippe Goulier reading Verlaine to a crowd of uncomprehending Japanese:

Anyone see Japan play Australia last night? I tuned in for the last (and most important) 15 minutes and what a funny game eh? I especially liked the scenes after the match of the delighted dancing Aussie fans and the speechless Japanese. Today, at school, I kept accidentally dropping the name “Australia” into different contexts. Tee-hee.

Last week, (Monday June 5th) Hyon Joo, Yu Gyong and I went up to Hiezan and had a lovely day. Here’s a picture of me looking gay among the poppies at the Hiezan Garden Museum.

I’ve been meaning to get up to Hiezan for the last two years but have somehow never managed it – until now. Anyway, last week the weather was perfect. You can see more pictures of flowers and temples and other recent stuff (sakura and so forth) if you click to my Flickr site here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/46253270@N00/sets/72157594164482825/

As it turns out that’ll be the last Monday I have off for a while as there’s been a major upheaval at my main place of work. Leilani has had to quit her full-time job so she can go home to New Zealand and look after her sick mum. As a result, my hours have increased from 12 to 19 a week… and though I’m a lot busier, it does mean a big increase in my monthly wage. And I still finish no later than 2 o’clock (and sometimes 12). It’s a shame to see Leilani go but good news for my bank balance.

Here are some pictures you won’t see on my Flickr site of Paul Spark’s 10th Beer tasting party held last Saturday at his Tokyo pad. Once again Mr. Sparks excelled himself, getting all the beers, keeping us all fed and well imbibed and funtertaining us with his impossible quizzes. Sadly he was so busy running in and out of the kitchen I didn’t get any pictures of HIM. Still, thanks for another good night Paul!

Below, left to right: Graham Chave, My Clam, and Chris Cotter.
We’s tasting the beers, innit.
Graham looking coy…

True Chave comes out and finds new uses for chocolate “Pocky” sticks.