Update: the VIDEO for this article is under JIJ TV “Tokyo Halloween” or if you prefer, you can watch the youtube video directly here . Enjoy! – Marcus

October 31, 2009.

A tall, leggy woman in pink lingerie outfit struts down the street. Behind her, gawkers with camera phones and Digital SLRs snap pictures, creating spots of blue flashes in the nighttime. Behind her, snapping video on a tiny handheld camera is another woman; covered artfully in tape so she appears to be wearing a skirt, leggings and a brassiere. They are impossible to ignore. Men nudge each other in the arms when they see them and ladies chuckle at the display. The two exhibitionists have a powerful mixture of sexual and extroverted body language. As people cheer them on as they walk to and fro, I come closer. I’ve been observing them from a distance of roughly fifty feet. I take a better look at the two, and laugh to myself. They are both men.

This is Halloween night in Roppongi, the “Gaijin Central” of Tokyo, Japan. Here, a lot of the foreigners who live here come to party, drink and meet cute Japanese girls. Each time I come to Roppongi I am surprised by the explosion of mixed couples I see.

It’s a little chilly, and I’m feeling a little stressed. Mainly because Japan is expensive, and sometimes in travelling I don’t really realize I overreach a little bit in my trips. A Viking walks past me and gives me the nod. I’m wearing a smooth silver mask which makes me appear to lack all emotion. I feel withdrawn and quiet, falling into character. People stare at me occasionally, and some Japanese girls say “Kowaii” (scary). I’m shooting video of the mayhem.

The stars of the strip are a set of power rangers who all seem to be basketball players in real life. A group consisting of Wolverine, Captain America and two Spidermen are doing the rounds, laughing it up with girls and guys as they snap pictures and flex fake muscles. There are men well over six feet in dresses and seven inch platform heels, girls in Rilakuma bear outfits and people wearing almost nothing at all. I like the noise around me, as I stand quietly in my mask. My outfit doesn’t attract attention, it wards it off. My calm, expressionless face is reminiscent of Mike Myers, Jason, or any number of masked psychotic killers. I film in peace.

I see Fred Flinstone and Wilma walking around as well. Every conceivable type of character is out and about. Men dressed like playboy bunnies, girls dressed a little more skanky than normal, old drunk men acting bizarre, a Disney character here or there. Near a popular Star Bucks, a guy with a black brief is holding massive dildo by his groin, as a girl eagerly holds it, smiling for the camera.
“That’s tasteful.” a tall man mutters as he walks past.

I see a poorly organized Darth Vader costume. The fellow is wearing the Darth Vader helmet and his chest piece, but a black jersey and blue jeans with black shoes with exceedingly white laces. Add to that a short stature and his Darth outfit was dead.

Further up the strip, a short man in a red loincloth is doing aerial splits by holding his right leg out and up with one hand while the other is around whomever wants to take a picture with him. An American guy in a dinosaur outfit is doing a jiggy dance by the sidewalk. Two short, attractive Japanese girls wearing skinny jeans with thongs visible walk past him. One of them rubs a hand sensually across his dinosaur chest. For a moment the guy stops his jiggy, and watches the girls cross the street. His friends appear. “Damn dude, let’s cross the street.” He says. The friend is wearing a similar costume, large and voluminous. It appears to be a horribly obese duck.

I go back down the strip and make a pit stop near the McDonalds. A set of very attractive women of mixed ethnicity are grabbing people with interesting outfits nad taking pictures. One girl is dressed like a dominatrix maid. The other looks exactly like Ashley Simpson, which doesn’t seem like an outfit. They stop Peter Pan (a woman), Winnie the Pooh (if he was a chill black dude), the Power Rangers (all seven of them) and a host of random individuals. One of the girls leans back comfortably on a rough-looking Japanese guy with a shaved head wearing a Jailbird outfit. They have specific and recognizable accents. I think they are from California.

Beside me, a girl says something to two men a few feet away. She screeches as she learns they are from Texas, her home town. She is African-American with a solid flair of uptown in her mannerisms. The guys from Texas are in town for a 15 hour layover before headed back to the states. They were previously in Thailand and China.

Behind me, Fred Flinstone is talking to a massive biker who speaks in an almost classic stereotypical jive. The man is a tall African-American in a huge biker jacket. He doesn’t seem like he’s wearing any costume, save a little face paint on his cheek, and I wonder who he is, and what he’s doing in Tokyo. On the street, two men in red jumpsuits sprint through moving traffic, causing cars to screech and blare their horns. It is completely wild.

Everyone has glassy eyes, and every club, bar and restaurant is filled to the brim with patrons. A man wearing a Dracula outfit walks past me.
“Fuck yeah! Mario and Luigi in the FUCKING BUILDING! “he says to a guy in a Mario costume in line. I roam some more, watching a set of Japanese nurses with blonde hair walk by in a stream of colour and giggles. I don’t know where everyone is going, but they are all walking very fast.

There are so many people it is hard to discern race or nationality. All I can see are bobbing heads and flashes of colour from the outfits. I pass Don Quixote, the place where I bought my mask, remembering a middle-eastern looking fellow that asked me if a man wearing a Witches’ hat was okay.

I like Halloween in big cities. It is such a raging ball of energy, watching people lose themselves in costume and drink. The crowd is so diverse it doesn’t even feel like Japan. With all the masks, elaborate outfits and foreigners, I feel like I’m in New York, though I’ve never been in New York for Halloween.

I’m meeting some friends at a bar near the strip, and as I walk down a small street to go to the bar, I see a set of people dancing. Barack Obama, Two Spider men, Captain America and Wolverine. A lady in a bunny outfit is grinding Captain America, and a guy in a Yellow Jumpsuit mysteriously starts humping a hazard cone.

I enter the bar, hearing the laughter of Roppongi fall silent as the door closes, and I chuckle, because I know the night isn’t over.

Update there is a video for this blog post available: Read the article, then view it here.  – Marcus 

Two Japanese girls are lying on either side of me. One, a cute girl named Wakana has a sleeping mask on her face, the other is in a bundle by my left arm. My head is spinning from drinking an entire bottle of Vodka but I’m smiling. I’m in a tent, in the mountains two hours from Hamamatsu, in Japan.

A week before, I was invited to the party by a tall bartender named Hachi. “It will be good man.” He said to me. I wasn’t sure what to think. At first Hachi asked me if I wanted to DJ for the event, then seemed to forget about me after I enquired if the DJs would be paid. Another guy, a young Japanese man I see at a bar I frequent, told me his friend was going.

“She is very cute, you will like her.” He said. I wasn’t sure. I still don’t have much faith in the Japanese girls I’ve been meeting, but I said okay. He told me this the day before the party, on Friday
night. She came to the bar later than night to see me (at the guy’s request) and she was wearing some kind of Kimono.

“I just came from work.” She said with a smile.

I smiled back and made light conversation with her. She was very cute, but generally Japanese women dressed in traditional clothing don’t do anything for me. I would need to see her later in A regular outfit. We decided to check out the party.

My routine in Hamamatsu had been cyclical. The stream of the same bars and clubs　wasn’t fun, or thrilling. Half the places I knew I already knew the people who　worked there and a couple of the regulars. Going out often felt saturated and required too much energy to socialize. A trip to the mountains with a fresh face seemed like a good idea.

I　rode my bike to Zaza city and parked. Their car, like most I’ve seen, was a compact cube-shaped vehicle. They looked small but were generally spacious. My mood was good, and when I came into the car, I heard dancehall reggae playing through the radio.

“It’sDJ Kenny.” Wakana said with a smile. I　chuckled. A DJ Kenny mixtape in a Japanese car in Japan always seemed weird. In　fact, anytime I’m at a reggae party and I’m the only Jamaican there, and I see　the Japanese girls scream “Bap! Bap! Bap!” when they like a song gives me chills.
Something about it doesn’t seem real. Thegirls are both very cute and genki,　and I fall into my routine of stories, jokes and fun conversation. We stop at　a  convenience store to grab some snacks for the trip. It’s an estimated　two hours from Hamamatsu to the party. On the way there, we stop at another　convenience store and I received a free coffee for a reason I still can’t　explain. We drive and talk about life, mostly about Jamaica and I constantly tease Wakana’s friend.

After　an hour or so, it becomes apparent that we are lost. We are on a road so narrow　it feels like being in a tunnel. We are surrounded by trees so big they block the sky and my phone has spotty service. Every few minutes, the girls stop the car and consult the GPS on their phones, but to no avail. I toss in my iphone for good measure and it doesn’t help.

There　were a few dangerous moments as well. Once we had to turn the car on a narrow　road, with the back of the car near a fifty foot precipice. Each time I felt the half a second period between the touch and release of the car brakes, I saw us in the car, falling through the darkness until we hit something solid with a sickening crunch. After a few more wrongs turns and wasted time, we end up near where we started. The girls are determined to find the party.Being on a main road after traveling through the claustrophobic mountain roads was a relief. A street light was like a bottle of water after a long run. We drive for a few more minutes, and the consensus if we are “probably” going in the right direction. We left Hamamatsu at eight-thirty. It was now past eleven o’ clock. A huge dam comes into view and I marvel at it. I probably marveled more because out of boredom I opened my bottle of Vodka I purchased for the party and started chasing it with soda. In the nighttime, the dam was a gigantic looming structure. A powerful monolith of man’s will and desire. It was between two mountains, way up here and very old. The section of the dam that connects
to the road forms a bridge between the two mountains. On our side, near the entryway of the bridge is a parked car. Near it, are a man and two boys. The boys have what look like small fish nets in their hands. They are a few feet in front of their father, walking around in the darkness. Wakana asks him directions and he gives us a good idea of where to go. When I ask her what the
boys were doing, she said they were collecting bugs.

 A　larger, more modern road comes into view and we cheer because we’ve found whereto go. After several hours, a few near misses on the mountain roads and one DJ　Kenny CD on repeat the whole time, we were on the way to the party. It was still at least forty-five minutes away, and I spent some of the time watching the vegetation go by the car in a dark green blur, or asking the ladies questions about their lives. Eventually we saw a few horribly made signs that indicated where the party was.

The　roads became somewhat narrow again, but nowhere as frightening at the roads we　were on earlier. After going up a stretch of hill that revealed the night sky　and moon to us, we saw several parked cars in the darkness, and bodies moving　in the distance on a large field. We had found the mountain party.

The party was on a large open field, where a lodge was built. From what I could see, there wasn’t any gate, any guard or anyone collecting money for that matter. It was about twelve thirty by now, and the party was in full swing. We walked in, our bags of drinks in tow. A bonfire blazed about thirty feet from where I was standing, with Japanese guys with shaggy hair and baggy jeans dancing around it. I turned a corner to see a sea of familiar faces, all residents of
Hamamatsu.

“Hey!”the voices chanted in chorus.

 Everyonewas drunk, high or both already. Several tents were setup and I proceeded to　erect the tent that Wakana, I and her friend would sleep in later. After　setting it up, (with the help of two or three drunk people) the drinking started.Thisis where things get a little fuzzy. I certainly remember chatting to an English girl I know, who seemed to reprimand me for being nicely dressed and coming to　the party with two Japanese girls. There was some conversation with a friend or　two from Hamamatsu, but it most likely involved nothing worth remembering. Then　I danced with two rave cones beside the bonfire, fueled by liquid confidence.　Then as the night progressed, everyone started playing the drums and drinking　beer at the same time. Somewhere, I could smell marijuana smoke, but I wasn’t　sure where it was coming from. After the drum fest, there was more drinking,　spotty conversation and obvious sexual innuendo. I tried to make a move with　one of my girls, who told me she had a boyfriend.

Day　broke and the sun started to rise and some genius decided we should all play early morning soccer. Drunk, shirtless and filming at the same time, I fall on my first pass, slashing my elbow but not feeling much pain because of the alcohol in my system. I hail up a few DJs and some people who are still dancing by the bonfire and eat some rice from a huge bowl near the drum area. People
are settling down and things are getting quiet.

This　is when I retreat to the tent, and make myself cozy with the two girls. Once I zipped up the tent, the pounding of the music outside became a dull throb.Later,driving down the mountain, I c could really see where I was. Ancient trees swaying in a morning breeze numbering in the tens of thousands were all around me. I could see far away, the lines of other mountains in the distance.

I saw small hill towns and old railway cars, little groves with brooks and gushing rivers
and tons of vegetation. I was still tired and a bit hung over, but it was a good time. I stepped groggily out of the car when I got back to Hamamatsu, giving both ladies a weak but smiley faced goodbye. I found my bike, and started riding home, laughing at the fact that I was raving dancing only hours
before, in my purple shirt, with a bonfire blazing behind me.