I picked up the keys for my new flat today – I’m only there for one month but that is now all paid for, leaving me with three grand to live on until my transfer comes from the UK (about 15 quid). I’ve not seen the place yet, but I’m sure there’ll be no problems. Its between Hiroo and Azabu-juban, so hopefully quite a nice area and with a number of ‘international’ supermarkets and things around.
Then this evening I went to see Kikko-chans play, in a small theatre above a petrol station in Akabane-bashi. You have to climb the fire escape from the car park at the back of the petrol station to get in.
The theatre is small, seating around 100 people, with uncomfortable chairs arranged in tiered rows. I sat in the back corner, knowing that I’m likely to be taller than most of the audience so not wanting to get in their way. It seems they’d rather oversold the tickets for the evening, and even once all the seats were filled more people were entering. They just dug out a bunch of kneeling mats and arranged chairs along the corridor across the highest tier.
I didn’t understand much of the play itself, Kikko-chan did give me a sheet explaining briefly in English what was going on, which helped but I had to remember as much as I could since I knew I wouldn’t be able to read once the performance had started.
The story seemed to centre around three intertwined love stories, with a mentally disturbed girl stirring up the relationships between these people. In some ways its refreshing to watch a play without understanding what is going on, it gives you a chance to watch characters other than the main focus of attention, so you get to pick up a whole bunch of subtleties about how the various people are interacting. Sadly they’re not worth much without the context you get from understanding the story.
All in all, worth going to, just to see a small theatre production here, but I suspect its unlikely to be worthwhile going to another, unless its a story I know already.