Bento Rockin' Beats

So, last weekend found me journeying a fair way up north to Toyama to catch up with good mate and fellow JETpat Mark and to witness the party celebrating the conclusion of the Bento Boys project he's spent the last half year cooking up with British ALT Rob. For the uninitiated, the Bento Boys is these two lads' attempt to channel the JET experience into a spoof hip hop act, crammed with in-jokes, wit, beats, samples and a great deal of gratuitous swearing.

So, having got up at 5AM, I made my way to Osaka, boarded a JR Highway Bus and tried doing my level best to get some sleep within the awkard confines of my seat. Considerably cheaper and more comfortable than the train it may be, but I personally find this route between A and B to be somewhat disorientating - it's a cliche that all Japanese cities look the same, but it's a fact that all Japanese service stations look IDENTICAL. Nodding off after pulling away from one, heavy waves of deja vu assault the groggy traveller upon pulling into the next one two hours later with the same buildings, the same shops and many of the same cars and buses visible in the parking lot.

Still, I got there in the end and hung around for a bit while the Bento Boys busied themselves with the preparations for the night's events. This was to be the playback of the album they'd recorded, pressed themselves and were going to be selling to the party's attendees with all the proceeds going to cha-ri-dee. In any event, after no small amount of wiring, hoiking speakers around, sweet-talking the venue's owner and a quick curry/lager combo to fortify their constitutions it was on with the show.

The playback went nicely, thundering through the small bar's speakers like no tomorrow while I chatted a while with one or two JETs I'd met before and a great many I hadn't, until the time came for the main event. As it was, despite the cramped confines and improvised amplification, Mark accquitted himself admirably, Bono-tastic shades and all, as can be seen above. For a representative sound sample of what went down, I direct the curious to their MySpace site, which unlike most of the things you can expect to find on there, really is worth your time - especially if you're currently, or have ever been, a participant on the JET Programme. All hail.

(Was that okay Mark? When can I get my 20 quid PR fee?)

Following the festivities, the assembled throng rapidly made their way to a nearby sports bar in order to catch the England game, the second time during this World Cup where I appear to have found myself in a communal match-viewing crowd completely by accident.

Okay, a quick word or two regarding my attitude towards football. I find it impossible to care about this game that touches the lives of so many in any meaningful sense whatsoever. When I find myself taking notice of anything to do with it, it's usually accompanied by the distinct sense of unease I feel when witnessing how otherwise perfectly normal, rational people become possessed of a wierd primal fury when watching 'their' team of eleven men kick an inflatable bag of wind around a large field against another team of eleven men with equally deranged 'fans'.

Given how unutterably tedious I find watching this futile display of athleticism, sponsorship and nationalist fervour spread out over the course of 90+ minutes, I hastily sought refuge at the bar, as far away from the big screen as possible where, happily for me, I got to enjoy several highly engrossing conversations with several other football (sorry, saaaa-ker) refuseniks. At the very moment that all that penalty business against Portugal was going on I was engaged in a highly illuminating tete a tete with a chap called Geoff about the current state of play within British politics. We only realised that England had lost when the entire bar suddenly went so eerily quiet that you could hear a pin drop. We then resumed our debate regarding the socialist credentials or otherwise of Gordon Brown several seconds later and were probably the only ones in the room talking for at least the next five minutes.

Being out here has denied me one small pleasure though - the sight of seeing legions of emotionally retarded men in Essex tearfully taking cross of St. George flags off of their cars and houses, their world shattered into a thousand fragments of bitterness and resentment over what Mooney, Wooney, whatever the hell his name is, did and how it's good that Deckham or Heckham or whoever he is has finally left. Schadenfreude isn't good, kids, but sometimes it can be fabulous...