Tokyo Anime Fair 2010
The last week of March saw me off to Tokyo for the annual Tokyo International Anime Fair. You might remember I went last year as well as back in 2007. This year my buddy, Andrew, originally a fellow Reginan, now in Okinawa, came up to join me. Andrew is a fellow geek and big into anime, which is where he started learning, his now excellent, Japanese. Since this was his first time to the Fair and the first time we have had the chance to wander Tokyo together we went hardcore with three full-on days of geeking out. We started our marathon weekend Friday afternoon by visiting Ikebukuro, home of the main Animate store and Nakano Broadway, a five level shopping arcade packed full of an eclectic mix of anime, manga, figure, art, clothing, and other types of stores. Saturday was the centerpiece of the weekend with our trip to the Anime Fair at Tokyo Big 
Sight in Odaiba. On the way to the Fair we met (another) Andrew, formerly of Ontario, now in America, and his American brother-in-law, Nathan. They were over here for 10 days to sightsee and decided to check out the anime fair. After talking on the monorail and while standing in the huge line waiting to get in, we decided to attack the Fair as a group.
As the veteran of the group, I led them first to the Creator’s World area where we had a great time. The CW area features up and coming and independent anime creators. It is really cool being able to meet and talk to these people and see what they are creating. For those of you who remember my article about last year’s fair, the upcoming series that I thought looked super cool, Cat Sh!t One, is unfortunately still on hold. I got to talk to the creator of the series and he is still looking for a studio to back the project. So here’s hoping. After a few hours of collecting free stuff and fighting the crowds, we called it a day and headed our separate ways. It was cool randomly meeting some visitors and being able to play tour guide. My friend and I then ventured to Akihabara for our first round. After wandering around and absorbing the atmosphere, we went to a maid café. Previous times I have been to maid cafes I have gone during mid-afternoon. At that time most places are smoke free and don’t serve alcohol. After 5:00 or so, they allow smoking and serve alcohol, and the atmosphere changes from sugary sweet to a louder, more pub-like atmosphere. Sunday saw us again heading to Akihabara for more looking, shopping, and our second maid café. Although my friend had been in Tokyo before, he hadn’t had the chance to do Akihabara in depth. Wandering the streets and flowing through the crowds, it was fun to re-experience discovering the craziness of Akihabara through him. We both headed home on Monday, with heavier bags, emptier wallets and a few blisters.
We both headed home on Monday, with heavier bags, emptier wallets and a few blisters.
By Chris
May Holidays
- May 5 - Cinqo de Mayo (Mexico)
- May 3– Santa Cruzan Day (The Philippines)
- May 19– Shavuot (Jewish Holiday)
- May 31– Memorial Day (US)
Question of the Month
If you knew you could not fail, what would you do?
A Few Short Lesson / Activity Ideas For Pair Training Part 2
The following is a continuation of Jimmy’s Pair Training Activities from last month’s newsletter.
Activity: Riddles
Recommended Level: Intermediate & up
I found a website that provided tons of short riddles and answers which I sorted through and made up a short list of (again see FIA First Hand for the file under the Pair Training Forum). I tried my best to select riddles which I thought would be easy to understand and able to be solved by the members. This exercise was good in the sense that it forced members to think “outside-of-the-box” in English to solve the riddles. How I ran this activity was to explain to them a riddle, and then give them maybe 2 to 3 minutes to try and solve it. The main rule was that they could only ask me “yes” or “no” questions to try to get hints about the riddle. If they couldn’t solve it within the allotted time, I would then explain the answer to them, and then continue on to the next riddle. This exercise was rather difficult for some members, but it was also quite easy for a few. But overall, it was quite fun and interesting for them because it was something different to do and they had to use English to try to solve the problems. Here is the link to the riddles website http://riddles.com/all-kinds-of-riddles/riddles
Activity: Fear (Are you afraid of…?)
Recommended Level: All
This is an activity idea I found (and I’m sure most of have seen before) of a list of “Are you afraid of…?” questions, and I made it into a worksheet (please see the Pair Training Forum at FIA First Hand for the worksheet file). Using the worksheet, a member first answers “Yes” or “No” to the questions. Then in the next column, without sharing the answers, they try to guess the answer to the same questions of their pair training partner and then of their trainer. When everyone has completed answering the questions, take turns and go around asking the questions down the list to each member to determine if you guessed correctly or not of the person. Tally up the number of correct answers you get in the end to see how well you know the person. This activity took a little time in the beginning to get going, but once we started asking each other the questions to see if we guessed correctly or not, it got really interesting and funny to learn what each person is really afraid of and not afraid of. Also note, there are a lot of questions on the worksheet, so please adjust as needed for your class if using this worksheet.
Well, that’s it.
Again, please take a look at the FIA First Hand website under the Pair Training Forum for the files and worksheets to the above activities. Also, please add any comments or suggestions to these activity ideas. I would be glad to hear from you on how these activities could be improved or adjusted. Good luck and hope they work well for you!
By Jimmy
Ask Gundam Opinion Section
Editors Note: One of our avid FIA monthly readers wrote in to comment about last month’s submission from Concerned Gundam Fan about the validity of the Ask Gundam column.
Gundam is an anagram of dum nag. Anyone who is an avid fan of some person’s distorted imagination, who must’ve been bullied when he/ she, most likely a “he”, was a child, should take up pachinko or slot car racing rather than idolize some B-grade cartoon celluloid or plastic doll that costs an arm and a leg. A gargantuan figure of Gundam # whatever stands or rests somewhere idle in some non-descript location in Japan after it was on display for everyone to marvel at in Odaiba last summer, what was the point? I mean, it was a non-functioning giant lego-bot that probably produced a lot of environment- damaging Co2 in its production. I’m sure this lego-bot made the legions of Gundam fans ecstatic but for the rest of us a “ wow, what is it… why? response was in order. As for your queries, “I bet you don’t even know anything about the original Gundam”, Who was it’s pilot?; Who was the pilot’s rival?;
What was the name of the principality that fought against the federation?; Do you even know what F91 means? , I’ m sure the P & P Ask Gundam columnist gave some in-depth analysis to this superfluous questioning, then again I thinks not. Furthermore, addressing this statement “I have added a picture of the real Gundam F91 to this letter”, what is your concept of reality, Gundamblamsham fan?
Finally, please take this response to “Concerned Gundam Fan” in jest! - all hail Dumnag…er I mean um… Gundam
Cheers
Gundam, the action figure 91
Editors Note: The opinions expressed here are the views of the writer and do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of FIA or the P&P committee. That being said, we here at the P&P committee will have to check incoming mail much more closely from now on.
