Jan 28. Up early again to have what's become a 6 monthly tradition,...Breakfast with Glenn!
This is the latest special product of local patissiere, Chef Shibata, simply titled, Chocolate Bar.
2 versions are available, this one is caramel, the other is a passion fruit flavor filled bar.
A picture tells a thousand words. Simply add the title, "Oh Yea!!" to the above pic and you've got all the explanation you need. I'd be happy to have one of these a day except for the price...
At 650 Yen (850 for take out) or about $6.50 per bar, you can see why Chef Shibata is smiling!
Jan 26 was Australia Day, and after a Steering Committee meeting of the Australia New Zealand Chamber of Commerce (ANZCCJ) Central Japan chapter, we all, in a moment of patriotism, went off to Australian themed bar Red Rock for drinkies!
With the ANZCCJ team at Nagoya's Australian themed, American owned bar, Red Rock.
One of Japan's top bands, the team from Love Psychadelico joined me for a chat on my new Sunday program, "Chris Cross Sunday" recently on RADIO-i. We talekd about how their music and lives had changed since their debut 10 years ago, and about their new album Albert Kinney, on sale now.
Oh, look who's on TWITTER, it's that big twit from the radio,..... http://twitter.com/DJ_ChrisGlenn
The latest PRESS magazine is out featuring the RADIO-i DJ team on the front,.....
...And on the back advertising Japanese mobile phone company, DoCoMo is ...Me AGAIN!
Jan 18, At the launch party for a new "Andy Garcia" wine label at eatery, Gens' Bar in Nagoya. Also in attendance, former Sumo Yokozuna, Akebono (easily identified as the Jolly Green Giant) , TV personality and rock star, Hashimoto George, the wine maker, Andy Garcia, Gen's Bar owner's wife and the MC....
In the Recording Booth at TV CITY Studios for the current series of P-Kan TV's look back on historical buildings in the local area...The scripts were all in Japanese, and poorly written, which meant for a long, hard day... The scripts kept changing during recording, with 3 directors all trying to do the same series,...gets confusing! The series can be seen Monday mornings on Tokai TV's (Channel 1) P-Kan TV...
Sunday 17....The first edition of Chris Cross Sunday (CCS) went to air on RADIO-i...the weekly fax/e-mail message theme was, your favourite Japanese historical character, and why.... We got a good response, and for the first show, things went relatively smoothly.
Sat Jan 16,...At Nagoya's Cinema 109, one of just 4 IMAX theaters in Japan to see AVATAR in 3D...If I had some bling I'd look like a white Puff Daddy in those specs!
What can I say but,...WOW! WOW!! WOW!!! (3D blog) The effects were brilliant, the 3D vision was clear and fantastic, the story was interesting, and the messages were bluntly put. How interesting and refreshing to see a movie where instead of humans being the victims of alien attackers, the boot was on the other foot. I wonder if Director James Cameron invited George B. and Dick C. to a special screening of this, ....just to sink the boot in...?!
Thurs. Jan 14....A freezing cold day! I was in Oogaki, about 35Km north of Nagoya for the latest recording of the TV programme, Fureai Cooking (Thursday evenings on Channel 1, Tokai TV) It was snowing heavily all day, and the Kitchen Studio just wouldn't warm up....The crew all kept their coats and jackets on, while I was wearing only a thin shirt....
It wasn't all bad, tho', as this time, one of the 4 shoots we did involved one of my all time favorite health foods, chocolate cake!
Chocolate cake contains eggs, milk, gluten, some flour, this one even had soy in it,...all healthy things, and if it makes you feel good, well, it must be good for you! This makes me feel pretty good! Here's to more sweet recipes on Fureai Cooking!
Tues Jan 12. At Kinjo Women's University, giving a talk on the radio industry and on being a DJ. It was rough, having to sit looking and chatting to 30 cute, radio interested young ladies,...
After the talk, some of the students gave short presentations of their radio style and personas, and had me critique their work and give them pointers on better performances...
Some were DJ oriented, others were interested in work in production and direction....
To wrap things up, I did a song and dance routine,...nah, only kidding, I gave a them all a few last minute tips on what is required to work effectively in the radio industry....
Those that stuck around till the end got together for a group shot...Ah, how nice to be young again...
After last weeks trip to Guam, I think I may have gotten a little too much sun,...in fact, I'm peeling like a snake all over.... Check out the forehead, cheeks and nose,...
You think this is bad, you ought to see my shoulders and back,...it's coming off in sheets! Most unsexy indeed! The worrying thing is, as the skin peels off, the newly acquired suntan seems to be peeling off with it,...
Mon Jan 11 from 9:50am, check out Nagoya's Channel 1, Tokai TV for P-Kan TV,...
Then from 4pm on Monday, I'll be on Radio-i for the re-launch show, and again from 9pm for the first edition of Across The Music,...
Went to visit the studios of Guam's Radio TEN-FOUR, 104.3FM ....
The station was small, simple, but effective, typical foreign (ie,non-Japanese) styled radio, a one-man show, all computer based operation playing mostly 70's and 80's hits...
It seems to be the most popular radio station, as almost everywhere we went, in shops, taxis, busses, malls and in passing cars, ...almost everyone was listening to Ten Four!
I checked out all the stations available on Guam, but for me, the best was 104.3FM,... I didn't turn the TV on at all during my stay here, just the radio,... I guess once it's in your blood....
Jan 4, aboard Continental for the flight to Guam,...looking forward to escaping the cold of Japan, seeking some sun-rays, reading a book, in-between a few work related activities....
Bought a book, Miyamoto Musashi, His Life and Writings to read,...Musashi is one of my heroes, so I intend settling down on a beach or hotel balcony to relax and read....
Went to visit Two Lovers Point, which turned out to be a bit of a disappointment,...didn't find any lovers, and it turns out it was a suicide leap point long ago, a Guam version of Romeo and Juliet,..There weren't any re-enactments either, and it costs $5 to walk up the few steps to this lookout point... And to top things off, you're not allowed to make the jump yourself!
Had dinner at the Guam Planet Hollywood.... Like most places in Guam, it was FREEZING inside, like summer-time Japan, Guam tends to have the air-conditioning on Too High!!
2 shot of me and Terminator, Arnie,... Can you tell which one is which? I'm the one in the glass case...
Looking for interesting things to cover for programs etc, I saw in a Japanese tourist magazine that there is a museum dedicated to Yokoi Shoichi, the Japanese soldier who emerged from the jungle 28 years after the war had ended, just a few kilometers from Tumon. Yokoi was from the Nagoya area, and so we thought it would make a great story with local contents. On the way to this museum, I looked at the surrounding jungle and thought about how Yokoi must have lived...what he must have gone through during those 28 long and lonely years...and how he must have felt once discovering he had held out for far too long....
At last, we arrived, and out front was this rather impressive sign with a number of sponsors listed below....
..and next to a sign requesting $5 entry fee, a photo of the man from Nagoya who didn't know the war had ended, and continued to fight alone until 1972,... long after peace had been made....and who died only a couple of years ago, having lived out the remaining of his life quietly at home with his wife.
However, the museum had closed down about 2 months ago, and the area was vacant bar the small explanation panels below where the photos and artifacts should have been.
...and at the end of this empty museum, amongst dust covered glass cases that once housed Yokoi's belongings and items, was a recreation of the underground cave the Japanese sergeant called home for 28 years of solitude. On closer inspection, it turns out his cave is not even in this northern region of the island where this museum was, but in the south!
