Japan Tour 3… (Part 3)

The last part of this blog trilogy, and I thought I’d talk about a few things that weren’t necessarily wrestling related.

One of the biggest things I take away from these trips is the friendships and acquaintances made. Some people I may never see again, and a few, I will always make time for, no matter where either of us are.

I want firstly talk about a few people who made this trip easier in times where I found things tough.

First up, the chap I mentioned in the first 2 blogs, Greg. Greg had come over from Singapore, purely to train. First of all, I really admired that about him. 3 month (I think) trip, uprooted everything to go and learn.I met Greg within the first few days of my trip, and at times, I probably would’ve gone batshit mental had he not been there. I don’t mind admitting at times I found a few things really irritating, and in my head they were bigger issues than they were in reality. Things like taking putting my shoes on, to walk 4 metres to them take them off. The pleasantries of leaving and entering a room. I got over those fairly quickly once I’d Sussed that I was being a massive dick, but fair pay to Greg, he listened to me moan and let me get it out of my system. At times it was great to have a native English speaker around so I could actually relax without having an ordeal to explain simple things, when the confidence in using Japanese became minimal. All in all, Greg is fucking great, and I’m glad he was around on this trip.

Emi Sakura, Sayaka Obihiro & Aasa. I should probably include all of the Gatoh Move girls, but these three were huge on this trip. Emi as always is the mother figure. Her wrestling skills and knowledge are second to none, especially when it comes to detail, and storytelling in matches. Despite being extremely busy, working until 5/6am in the morning, she would always greet you with a smile and not only ask, but ensure that you were ok.

Aasa was the new trainee to GTMV, having moved from Osaka to Tokyo to train specifically with Sakura-San. Again, I admired that, and she was again, always upbeat. When I arrived soaking wet on my first day she gave me a towel and made me a hot coffee, which helped haha. I ended up spending a fair bit of time around her, and tried to help put her at ease in the lead up to her debut match, which was at the Korakuen Hall show. She did great btw, and her hard work in and out of training really inspired me to want to sort myself out once I got home. I hope she continues with wrestling for a long time to come.

Finally, Obi.. Obi is bad ass. Shes pretty much Sakura-San’s second in command, and she works hard. Like really hard. I always look forward to seeing Obi, and the last few days I was there, it was cool to see her relax somewhat. Also, she makes THE best chanko going. No exceptions.

Mass Takanashi, man I love Masa. If there’s any dude I look forward to seeing when I go to Japan, it’s Masa. I had the pleasure of going to his home and meeting his family this time round, which I felt incredibly honoured about. Masa loves a good beer, and his food. Additionally, he’s one of the most well rounded pro wrestlers I’ve ever had the pleasure to work with, and I always feel like I level up when I wrestle him. I absolutely need to get him over to the UK so people can see what I mean.

Frankly I could go on for paragraph after paragraph about the people who made this trip better, but I don’t want to get self indulgent. I havent mentioned people like Pumi, P-Nutz & Golem, DJ Nira, Onizuka-San, many others. Including Baki, king of shopping

Rest assured I’m greatful to all who played a part in my trip. Cheers!

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Back to normal with the blog next week! Yay, I hear you yell!

 

Japan Tour 3… (Part 2)

Picking up from where we left off before, having just got back from the Maebashi show, we had a couple of days of not much. A bit of training, but mostly we had to be out of the way whilst meetings etc were ongoing, so myself, Greg and the Thai contingent took to amusing ourselves. Eating. Hanging around Akihabara (I love Akihabara). Drinking any of the variety of beers, hi-balls and cocktails available in cans from the local store. I can recommend the following: Asahi, Sapporo, Green Label, Souyoubi No Neko, Chu-Hi and Strong Zero.

All the down time was in the lead up to the Korakuen Hall show. I was determined to start this day off right, so a chest,back and shoulder workout went down a treat here. Then it was off to Suidobashi for a lunchtime start. Ring job, set up, and all the other stuff that happens before shows. My opponent today was ‘Peruwan’. I’d only ever seen him perform once before, and that was on my first trip here in 2013. I think his gimmick is something like Dhalsim from the street fighter video games. His style was described as ‘yoga style’. By this point in the trip, my confidence in using Japanese was virtually zero, and Peruwan spoke next to no English, so putting this match together was an experience. We managed to stick something together thanks to one of the refs helping us by acting as an interpreter. The match itself was ok, although I haven’t yet been able to watch it back. Received feedback from a few of the guys on the event, good and bad, which was always useful. Advice is always good, and there were many experienced guys on the show, so this advice was super useful. I watched the remainder of the event from the side of the hall. Highlights included a fantastic match between Masa Takanashi and Madoka,  and an awesome tag match between Emi Sakura & Kotori vs Tsukasa Fujimoto &  Yuka. No ring pack down, straight back to Ichigaya, to settle down, and have another clutch of beers.

The next day was free so I hung around Shibuya for a few hours and checked out a Basara show in Shinjuku. This show was excellent, but was unfortunately the only show I got to watch during my stay.

The next day was a half off day as we had a group bbq (more on this in p3), after that it was back to get ready for a long trip to Osaka.

This trip to Osaka was much more fun than the last time I went. I hadn’t just got off a plane this time probably helped. Osaka was also the last stop of the tour for Thai team ‘Bad Company’ and Greg, as they would fly to Hong Kong for a show afterwards. Anyhow, my match was against Thai rookie ‘Paksa’. This was also my 15th defence of the Pro Wrestling4U G6 championship, so I wanted a good match. We did alright I think, but us being 2 New faces to the Osaka audience probably counted against us. Didn’t quite get the reactions I’d hoped for at points in the match. Still, a learning experience, even after getting a deadleg from the first kick of the match. Ha!

Bus ride back was smooth, felt like it went fast, probaly helped by a good few hours sleep. Also, Japanese service station food is fantastic. Like, really fantastic. Also, the service station coffee vending machines serve the best coffee, this side of a barista.

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Next day was my last match, it was another ichigaya event. 6 person tag match. Myself teaming with Riho and Hikaru Shida vs Kotori, Masa Takanashi and EK Baki. This was great fun, I really enjoyed putting together a creative match between the various members of the match. Of note, I used to be a huge fan of Shida when I first started out, and managed to keep a decent relationship with her since I first met her in 2011, so it was pretty cool to have a good chat with her on a strictly professional level.

After the show we all had a bloody good piss up that went on to 6 the next morning, which was when 2 more Thai guys left us. Paksa, and Gatoh Move Thailand manager, pr, Booker, everything else – Pumi. Pumi is something of the unsung hero of Gatoh Move, and someone who has helped my career as much as people like Stixx, Emi Sakura and Masa Takanashi. I don’t think people are greatful enough towards him at times. He opened up a lot of doors for me in my career so far, for which I’m very greatful .

Seems like a good point to finish up part 2 of the blog. The last part comes on Wednesday.

 

 

Japan Tour 3… (part 1)

Sometimes, its really difficult to know where to start when I sit to write these things. Normally, I’ll do blogs that are pretty much ‘bite-sized’, but today I’ve given myself the task of attempting to capture a 16 day experience, that was full of memories, and life altering moments. Never one to do things by halves am I..?

Alas, we’ll go right back to the start. Previous visits to Japan, I’ve always gone into with great enthusiasm and almost a naive innocence, of sorts. With this being my third visit, I went over feeling as though I could look after myself a bit better than previous. I’d learnt a basic Japanese, I knew how to get around most areas of Tokyo and I was confident in how to at least make a good impression when it came to ‘conducting business’ in Japan. Of course, all of that went to shit as soon as I attempted to put it into practice.

Arriving later in the day to Haneda airport, I was pretty confident I could make my own way from there to my hotel in Jimbocho. Well, I did great, until I misread the train map, and could only get as close as Ochanomizu. The next station along. Jimbocho was on the subway. Eurgh. After asking directions in Japanese, well, of course, the station guard thought I was proficient, and gave me a good couple of minutes worth of directions. Not wanting to be impolite, I said thanks, and wandered out of the station thinking of how lost I was. A daft stroll around in frustration, I eventually headed back to the station, and jumped into a taxi. To Jimbocho station. You know, instead of asking to go to the hotel.Idiot. Anyway, I found a police box, and asked again, in Japanese for directions. Luckily, I think the policeman saw my frustration, and gave me perfect directions in English.  Needless to say, that cold Asahi beer and shower after check-in went down a treat.

The next day I headed to the dojo in Ichigaya in the pouring rain, to meet up with Emi Sakura, who was super busy with media stuff in the leadup to next weeks Korakuen show. A coffee made by Sakura-san’s new trainee ‘Aasa’ went down a treat here. I fumbled my way back to Jimbocho (on the subway!) to grab some lunch and a shower before heading back to Ichigaya for training.

This was pretty much my pattern for the first few days. Training, training, training. Man, I loved training in Japan. There was never any real time to get fed up, or feel like you’d already learned something, because more often than not, there was a twist, or a change, and there was always improvements to be made. This is the training I love, because as good as people being positive in training is, I feel it often creates complacency and people think they know everything. I always feel like I can, and should improve, and that is why I love training here.Also, this first week, the training group was small – myself, Aasa, another newer trainee and Jpop idol Maki Onizuka, and a chap called Greg (more about Greg in a bit). We’d occasionally have Riho or Sayaka Obihiro join in. The smaller group allowed us to get some real detailed feedback which is always useful.

The second week saw less training , as this was a busy show week, kicking off as the Thai group arrived, first show was in Ichigaya, and my first match was a triple threat match, involving Sakura-san, and Sawasdee Kamen. This was a fun little match, and afterwards, during the ‘shop’ time (where all the merch selling takes place), I got a lot of great feedback from the fans in attendance about my new look. Excellent. Time for a few beers before an early start the next day.
6am start. Yay! I woke up craving a McDonalds breakfast, more specifically, the coffee, only to discover it didn’t open til 7, when the bus was due to leave. Meh! Iced coffee and Monster instead.
So this show was a 3 hour bus ride, to Maebashi, in Gunma prefecture. Hometown of Gatoh Move wrestler ‘Kotori’. Fun show again here, and the Sailor Moon costumes first outing, immediately gained some attention. The interval saw a number of kids come and speak to me over at the merch tables, which was pretty ace. The match on this show was a tag match, in which I teamed with Thai ‘Super rookie’ Paksa, against my Korakuen opponent last year Choun Shiryu and Kubo of the BASARA promotion. Shiryu is super smooth, I think last year I didn’t fully appreciate quite how good he is. Also, in the brief intereractions during the match, Kubo is an excellent wrestler who I’d quite like to lock up with again.
The crowd was fantastic here, 300 in, mostly whom hadn’t really seen live pro wrestling before, but they were there for everything. Responded exactly how you’d want a wrestling audience to, which was great to experience.
Notably, Kotori’s hometime reception was a fantastic thing to experience and be a part of. Wrestling can be very emotional at times here, and this show was definitely one of those moments. Wonderful stuff.
Couple of days off after this show, before we prepped for the Korakuen Hall show, 3 days later. I’ll cover that, and the proceeding events in the next blog. This one will end up being a novel otherwise! This will probably end up being a 3 part blog, as I’ll try to cover the main talking points of the wrestling etc, and then I want to cover the more personable aspects of the tour.
For now, cheers for reading, your support has been fantastic over the past few weeks especially, I’ve had some great feeback. Thanks!

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Song of the Week

Its baaaack! I bought this cd last week in Japan, and well, its ace (except for one song), so yeah. LOVE IT!