Things are changing for the gaijin

On Friday, a new and good friend of mine came into town. I met Alan in Hiroshima, when I was visiting there with my friends Josh and Shannon. He was checking into the same hostel as we were at the same time. Later, we saw him at the Atomic Bomb Dome, and after that we were pretty inseparable. We karaoke'd twice, once for about six hours. Alan is on a Asian tour, of sorts. He flew from London to Moscow, and caught the Trans-Siberian train from Moscow, though Mongolia, into China, and got a ferry from Shanghai to Japan, when we met him in Hiroshima. He's gotten to take something like 8 weeks off from work, and this is his last week in Japan.
I immediately liked Alan. I think he's a very honest and kind person, and he's really quite appreciative of the people who are helping him through his trip. Not only is it good for me to get to hang out with someone who has become a friend of mine, but it makes me happy to help him with his trip, and meet up with him in Tokyo like I did today. But, before all that...
He came in on Friday, and we went out to meet some other English teachers at a nearby bar, and then something wonderful happened! I started talking to Japanese people in English and Japanese! Enough to actually have a conversation. And the bar owner and all of his friends are fixed-gear fanatics! So, we started talking about bikes, and I told them that I used to have a fixed gear, which is a lie, but I DO know how to ride one, and I like them fine. They told me that they're excited to be my friend, and I taught them some really bad English, and I'm pretty pumped to see them again. I made friends! I feel like a kid in Junior high, who's new to town and just ate lunch with someone he has something in common with. It's a pretty nice feeling.
So, Friday was good. The guys even let me ride their fixed gears, though I was drunk and the toeclips were really small, so I played it careful and called it quits right away. And Alan and I got to do some discussing about our favorite horror movies, and picked strange cocktails for one another. A really good time, actually.
And Saturday, Nigel, Alan, S-Lan and I met with S-Lan's friend, Haruko. We went to an Italian restaurant, and absolutely stuffed ourselves full of all kinds of food. I think between the five of us, we ate four pizzas, two big salads, some risotto, and a piece of desert for everyone. And after that, we stopped at Haruko's on the way home. S-Lan's family was there, and they were all barbecuing, and I had a really amazing time. I really like that some things are universal. In Japan, dudes like to get drunk and grill all kinds of food and hang outside when it's nice, just like back home; only here they grill squid and some kind of weird, smelly fish called Sama.
Today, I met with Alan in Tokyo at Yoyogi park, which is like Tokyo's Central Park. It's really amazing. Because space is limited, there are bands all over the sidewalk playing and practicing - I saw maybe 15 today throughout the day. I really love how open everyone is. In America, I think people would be way too afraid of criticism to play out in the open like that, in lieu of practice space, but it just goes to show how laid-back Japan is about that kind of stuff.
One of the craziest things about today was that every Sunday, some dozen Japanese men dress up like greasers, and claim part of Yoyogi park to dance to Rockabilly music, and show off their pompadours. It was a cross between watching Grease on fastforward and the more melodic sections of a Guitar Wolf show. Definitely wish I had taken pictures.