Higher Knowledge

In this modern world, the argument of who thought of what first is always going to exist. No matter what kind of revolutionary breakthrough comes through today, there is always going to be the guy in a shed somewhere who had thought of it yesterday. I suspect that this argument is even more so in a place like Tokyo, where I suspect that there are a lot of dream projects being forged in the smallest crevices of tiny apartments throughout the city.

No trip to Japan would be complete without some time with Yuichi. After all, this a man who has been a main subject in my artistic endeavors over the past 5 years. Hide was set to pick us up to day to visit the massive new Skytree across town and he told Masako that Yuchan (Yuichi) had come by the office and was very upset that nobody had called him over the weekend to come hang out with me. He had developed a new piece of technology and had one for me, but must discuss in private. Word had it that he had made some sort of camera. This was insanely intriguing.

We look like we are signed to sub pop in 94'

Hide, Yuka, Masako and I made the journey across town to the massively popular new Skytree. At Tokyo Tower you are able to go up 250 meters, but at Skytree you are able to go up a whopping 450 meters. It is the largest tower of it's kind on earth and it is massively popular. The lines were enormous, but they had a system where you could get a ticket to come back at a certain time and that would advance you to the front of the ticketing line, but from there it was easily another half hour to the first observation deck. This gave us some time for some great Katsu at the new enormous mall that is at the base of the towers. 

Green tea soda float

The elevator was big and fast and your ears pressurize quickly as you climb up. Once you are up there, it is all ooohs and aaahs.

Being a window washer at Skytree is not for the faint of heart

We were ambitious of course and thought that we would blast through sky tree in a couple hours, and meet Masako's cousin Shuhei over in Ginza to go pen shopping. At a certain point I told her we will need to postpone with him. Skytree is an all day affair at this point and after 6 hours we started on our way home. 

Skytree at night

When asked which I liked better, I had to say that Tokyo Tower was a lot easier because of the smaller tourist draw, but Skytree is amazing of course. To be honest, I'm a little towered out at this point. Let's get some pizza at that joint that we went to last time we were here.

This pizza had bison mozzarella on it

We got dropped off at Yuchan's lab and it turns out that he had made his own steadicam. That is not exactly a new thing, but his take on it was very cool and well made. Unfortunately, my cameras are all too heavy for this particular model but I took a couple home and they are a few mods away from working.

Yuchan's steadicam

Later that night when discussing Yuchan with Sudosan, he told us about a friend of his who claims to have invented many things before they came out commercially. I get the sense that there is a lot of bitterness because of this. A few of his inventions included the use of a motor istead of belt drive on the turntable, the car with an engine for each wheel and, one that he actually made himself at home, the sperm freezer. 

Yes, you did read that right………………..gotta love the Japanese.