Topic: Japan Filmwasters Meeting #1 - Date Set - Sunday, January 13.

[Skorj]

Hello everyone in Japan. We seem to have at least four members in Japan, so how about we try and host a filmwasters okonomiyaki, or yakitori-fest? Or similar anyway...

Not sure what sort of date will suit, but if you would like to send me an email, we might try for somewhere warm in the early new year? Ideas of course most welcome. ありがとう。　スコージ。

[akikana]

Sure, count me in. Went to a rather good (i.e. draft sapporo served) yakitori at the back of yoyogiuehara the other weekend. Tatami room and tables out the back so we could bring along a couple of pictures too.

[Ed Wenn]

Skj, if this comes off please take along a recording device of some sort and get some greeting from everyone so we can inlcude it in a subsequent podcast.

Hope you all have a good time.

[woodstove]

I'm definitely up for it. I'm up in Sendai, so I'd have to shink/bus it down, but it sounds fun. I'll be in Tokyo in March to visit some friends, so that might be best for me, but I could probably make it just about any weekend.

Perhaps we could sell/swap/give away some gear?

[akikana]

I'm happy to travel up north or we could always meet halfway - though perhaps somewhere a little more exotic than utsunomiya...?

[woodstove]

While we're on the topic, why is everyone in Japan? How long have you been here? Favorite places to shoot?

I work at a high school in Sendai, in your average JET teaching position. My wife and I have been here for about a year and a half now, and we're planning on staying until August of '09.

I've been on the look-out, recently, for abandoned buildings in Japan. One of my friends recently found a deserted youth hostel in Iwate-ken, with the doors all unlocked, and mushrooms growing on the carpet. So, that'll hopefully be one of my next shooting excursions.

[Skorj]

I've been on the look-out, recently, for abandoned buildings in Japan. One of my friends recently found a deserted youth hostel in Iwate-ken, with the doors all unlocked, and mushrooms growing on the carpet. So, that'll hopefully be one of my next shooting excursions.

I'm happy to travel up north or we could always meet halfway - though perhaps somewhere a little more exotic than utsunomiya...?

That sounds like a plan. I can drive. Maybe stopping in the hills for soba and some haikyo...

[akikana]

While we're on the topic, why is everyone in Japan? How long have you been here? Favorite places to shoot?

Working in banking for the last 10 years. The 'quieter' parts of Tokyo are always a pleasure to shoot. Okinawa in black and white is a good challenge (as is Kyoto in autumn). Aizu in the winter.

Keeping the momentum going here...can we pin down a date in January for this? we have the long weekend of  12th/13th/14th to play with. Whilst a car ride sounds fun would be more relaxing and quicker to take one of those bullet trains. If we could agree on Koriyama as a meeting venue and willing to spend a night we could do some 'townscapes' there and take the ban-etsu line out towards inawashiroko for some 'land/snow-scapes'.  Thoughts? Counter proposals?

[LT]

I'd love to go to Japan - to visit Hokkaido in the winter and do poor imitations of Kenna pictures (like the rest of my stuff that is ...

[Skorj]

we have the long weekend of  12th/13th/14th to play with.

Roll call please! How many does this date suit? Arigato! Skj.

[akikana]

12th and/or 13th are best for me.

[Skorj]

12th and/or 13th are best for me.

OK, let's see if we can get anyone else for this weekend too... Skj.

[beck]

Count me in. Okay, not really. But with the aide of mushrooms I can be. Har har. Seriously, sounds like good fun. You guys need to come to the eastern part of the US one day. I have plenty of room on the pull out couch. And I make excellent fritters.

[Skorj]

Some Tokyo photographers are meeting in Asakusa on Sunday, January 13:

Meet up at Asakusa around 10, and walk East towards
Kameido for some famous Kameido Gyoza?

It is a good walk and I did it earlier this year.
Plus, the gyoza are fantastic. All this shop serves is
gyoza and beer and is quite popular. I don't think
they have changed anything about the place since the
1970s.


Beer and gyoza float my fune, and the quiet walk through the back streets of Asakusa is bound to present much to photograph. We might get about six heads, and the form is to break up into ones and twos, so if you're a filmwaster; feel free to join us. Skorj.

[akikana]

Count me in.