Insert coin. Receive rocker.

At a small concert hall I've been to a few times, there are pay lockers to store your belongings. The cost is quite high, 300 yen. But the Engrish spelling (rocker instead of locker) is just perfect!

Footwear? Sentenced? Kids in Jail?

 Shose literally translates to "sentenced" which means, perhaps, that children have been given jail time. Looking at the brand logo, maybe it's for jaywalking. Yes, they mean shoes. Does anyone proofread in Japan?

Here's the logo, teaching children to run around on the highway. "It is NOT dangerous to play on the street" ... is that the message we should teach Japanese children? Especially when the birth rate here is declining?

Just a little bit of fun Engrish for you for the day.

Another Fun Engrish Image

Found at Tokyu Hands in Ikebukuro a couple weeks ago:

 I've posted some Engrish (the name given to badly done English signage and shirts) in the past. And it's everywhere - street and store signs, warning posts and information boards, guide books, pamphlets, websites... There are plenty of home goods with English on it too, and some of it comes out quite strange.

Granted, this is French-based. I'm not sure about the spelling of coton, confortable, and the obviously-French-derived terms. They could be perfectly fine, and this could be a straight copy of an old container label.

But even if it is, do you know what a douche is? And I don't mean the shortened version of the slang "douche bag". Do you want this in your home, on your counter? I like the antique appearance of the container, and several of the other containers around it had other logos and printing from other old products that looked pretty cool. But, a douche... And yes, the literal translation from French to English of douche is shower - but does anyone say "I'm going to go douche" and mean the kind which involves cleaning the entire body?

In France, perhaps this is okay. But I'm not so sure this is anything authentically French. Do you use cotton balls to comfortably shower yourself?

Today Is Closed

Today is closed.

I'm not sure if tomorrow will happen or not either.

But we'll be waiting for you next time.

This sign was seen outside a bar in Shinkoshigaya a while back, though I think they just use the same sign every time they close because I remember seeing it at least a couple more times in the past few months. I recently found out there are a few foreign-run (British/Scottish) bars/pubs in the area, and I might visit them sometime in the near future.

It's been over a week since my last post, but I continue to go through busy times. Despite "not doing anything" this weekend, I did quite a lot of personal stuff - cleaning, errands, etc. And I just spent the last couple of hours or so sorting through the past year's photos so I can upload and post more about my travels. I hope to start that this week.

Saturday is a holiday here, so I'm taking a weekend trip to Matsumoto. I've been looking forward to it for the past two months (since returning from Sapporo)! We also have some changes at work - my foreign coworker of the past 18 months is leaving on Friday, though she'll be teaching at another school nearby in a couple weeks.

Anyway, for friends and family, things are rolling along here in some way or another...

Until next time!

Engrish on an Awesome Sign

I just spent the day with my friend Kenny. It was kind of a last minute deal; he emailed me last night about meeting up in Shinjuku for the afternoon.

It was a pretty good day. We did a bit of shopping (manly-style of course), had curry, played some video games (manly video games of course), went shopping somewhere else (in a manly way) and had dinner at the king of burgers. On the way back we explored a bit of the mall under the Sunshine 60 Building known as Sunshine City. There is an aquarium, small amusement park, and some stores that really aren't much worth most people's time. But I saw a sign which was just right for posting.

I'm posting via the Blogger app, so the photos are at the bottom. However, one photo shows that there is a great deal of kids' shose. I'm not sure what those are but it looked promising.

The best part of the sign was the Engrish-style logo suggesting that its okay to play in rush hour traffic. In fact, the text actually says "It is NOT dangerous to play on the street!"

Awesome. Truly awesome.