Life in Japan - Pictures galore !! Arcades, Temples, Rainy days, etc

Driving behind a chrome truck IS really cool but you have to be careful not to become mesmerized by looking in to it for too long.

I don't know if there is a rule about how much chrome you can have on a Japanese vehicle but I do hate it when idiots in those stupid shitty 3 cylinder small cars add chrome because they are that small and shitty the light from the sun or your headlights at night just reflex back at you dazzling you. Right dumb arse twats those people are. The trucks are fine because they are high up so it doesn't bother drivers.

Yakumo

 

<-- wishes chrome vehicles were the bane of my existence instead of big for trucks and other bullshit.

When I worked at a Ford dealership (IT), I realized how many damn useless big trucks were sold in comparison to other vehicles here. I guess I do live in Kansas, which is only a state removed from Texas (sorry Texas). It always made me really happy to hear the internet sales staff (where my office was) talking to farmers who lived miles away and actually needed a truck with dualies to tow their equipment instead of just some schmuck who needed to compensate for something.
Side story: Local aero company Boeing (now Spirit) has a surplus shop and once I parked in the lot next to a FULL SIZE Dodge truck that decided to take up two spaces.
And had two full-size poodles in the front seat.

HAH

Anyways.
I figured I'd ask: is it actually difficult to drive a... "normal sized" car in Japan, as opposed to the many compacts and such that I certainly see around? Maybe just the residential nooks and crannies can get a bit technical. My friend Luke has an older Skyline and his street is pretty damn narrow. Yield!!!

 

If by normal sized car you mean European or Japanese normal then no. Not a problem at all. People just buy those little shiity box things because tax, insurance and MOT fees are so cheap. My Imprezza cost me only 1 million yen. My wife's Mitsubishi EK Wagon (3 cylinder little boxy crap) cost the same. OK, her car was brand new and mine was an 8 month old ex-display with 1200km on the clock that looked and smelt brand new, but really it's a no brainier to which car you'd buy. Saying that, many Japanese guys just have no real interest in cars which is probably why they drive like shit and buy crappy "family" cars or little turdy box cars then add a load of body kits and so on until they look really stupid.

As you can tell, I'm not a fan of small box cars, people carriers when most Japanese only have 1 or 2 kids. Why the hell do you need a people carrier? I like my sports saloons / sedans like Impreza, Evo, M series BMW, Audi and so on.

Yakumo

 

I'm off my face at the moment as they say back home in the Uk after drinking 1.5 liters of chuhai (Sake) but I'll concentrate to bring you these pictures.

Today I found a very cool area on a mountain while taking the car for a good work out. These places are probably bomb shelters from the 2nd world war. The "homes" were carved in to the actual mountain side.!

Pictures taken with amy piss poor 2mega pixel camera phone. Actually I'm surprised they turned out because inside was so dark.

THE HOMES


THE DARK TUNNEL - My mate bet me 10'000 yen to walk to the end and take a picture to prove it. Fuck that!


INSIDE THE HOME


yakumo

 

Me again. Nothing better than being out of yeh head on drink :lol: Anyway, I forgot to post a few pictures of an old closed down arcade I "visted" a few weeks back. Nothing at all of interest apart from a load of crap but wait, what's that. WOW, a G-LOC arcade cab!!. I'm seriously planning on renting a truck to take it home. Problem is that I have nowhere to store it




Yakumo

 

Today I was very lucky to have permission to enter private Mitsubishi grounds situated in Choufu, Shimonoseki. These grounds are only open to the highest positioned people within the company so the likes of me being able to enter is quite rare. So I took the chance to grab a video and a few pictures while I was there. I doubt I'll ever be able to enter again.

These mini towers are all over the place. They represent dead members of the family that originally owned the land.


This is the side entrance to the "mansion".


A sneaky shot from within the building. This shows one of the main bedroom quarters from the outside.


These lanterns light up the hallways. When I was there though none were on giving the place a right creapy feel.


This is the main dinning hall. This is still used today when the big wigs of Mitsubishi get together to blow some cash on booze and food.


An outside view of the dinning area.


Within the grounds are the remains of what was going to be a British style house. This was built over 100 years ago however during construction the owner of the land of that time had some bad luck which cost him a lot of money. Construction of the building had to be stopped half way though. Originally the entire outer section of the house was completed but has fallen down throughout time.


Another view of the British house.


The entire area is surrounded in beautiful trees.



Yakumo

 

these mitsubishi pictures are astounding, i love autumn. and the gloc arcade is quite fun & unusual to see there

 

cool. and now please explain us, why you had permission to enter the rare ground?

next stage, mitsubishis gunkanjima

 

As you may or may not know, my wife works for Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (the section that makes ships) in the foreign travel section. Mitsubishi wanted to use our son's picture in their promotion paper so we had to go to this closed off private area that Mitsubishi own for the pictures to be taken. In the whole place was myself, wife, son and some guy from Mitsubishi who was taking the photos. It was quite a thing to be in such a massive privately owned area and to be able to roam around as I pleased. Inside that mansion was quite creapy though due to there being no lights. Thank God it was so bright outside.

Yakumo

 

wow..very nice. the lil' gets some celebrity touch gongrats.

btw. I just visited mitsubishi heavy ind. today. the sagamihara plant

 

I bet you are one of the very first gaijins who were allowed to see the holy halls of mother Mitsubishi

 

Yakumo is making me get in touch with my feminine side.

 

Well if you ever go down to the Hikoshima plant here in Shimonoseki then let me know :thumbsup:

:lol: possible I guess or at least the first who wasn't employed by the company.

why is that then? I wouldn't mind touching a feminine's side :dance:

 

Brilliant photos, the Autumn colours are very nice.

 

yeah.. momiji @ its most beautifulness

 

I'll upload the video of the private Mitsubishi land if anyone is interested in seeing it.

 

I'm certainly interested, but whether that justifies any work required...

 

Hmm, it will be a pain in the arse to convert the m2ts files to flash video so I'll proabaly do them in the future when I have a batch to do. Normally I just down sample them to DVD format. Would do a direct BlueRay copy if I had a Blue Ray burner.

Yakumo

 

Been a long time since i put anything up here - some random stuff from my iphone cam:

Hmm Skyscraper i love you

Dark Train

From the office

Shine

Slime

 

hey, that i-phone camera isn't too bad. I heard lots of bad things about it but it seems to be decent for a phone camera.

Yakumo