http://search.japantimes.co.jp/member/memb...l20030301a1.htm
A RL article but it points to a possibley interesting existance. Hard to imagine surviving after earth quakes, world war and Godzilla, but an interesting possibility.

What I liked better was the article on feng-sui on that website
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/fd2...20060618t2.html
One of it mentions the subway line that passes by a cemetary and the expert is saying how the spirits are riding along it and then giving this one area bad karma, especially because there is not a shrine there to counter it. Something fun for the Sixth World.

Not to 'counter' it so much as to provide direction. Sort like of the spirits are swept along to the new spot by the trains and since the old shrines and temples are gone, they cannot find their way home, so instead of staying on consecrated land they move in among the living and cause problems. The fact that the line does not have ridership certainly points to some sort of problem. Just investigating it could be a good run. Maybe a Japanocorp in the UCAS disturbs some NAN or white burial ground.

yeah, I just like using the terminology of 'countering'. I could also view it like a current that's building a static and the lack of temple to safely ground it. Kinda like that.

hehe, ancient indian burial ground... how many bad made for tv's are based on that? Still, it's a classic.

Neat! For a less conspiratorial item, check this out - huge underground flood control caverns beneath Tokyo:

http://tokyodv.com/videolog/tdv-reports/g-...gement-project/


The sound is natural. Amazing. Tokyo and its wonders never cease to amaze me, and I lived there for 16 years and still never saw it all.

That sound is freakin amazing.....wow, I want to go there just to hear it in person.

If you guys love this stuff, there should be some material in Corporate Enclaves that you'll like.

When will that be out?
My parents are Japanese so I enjoy seeing the very different news coverage in Japan.

I'm not positive when it will be out. It's almost done writing now, but there is still the art/layout/printing.

It is always socially acceptable for Toshiro Mifune to teabag you.

~J

Yeah, Toshiro Mifune and Beat Takeshi have pretty much free reign.

Beat Takeshi got free reign for anything, ever, the instant he made Sonatine.

And that's my official opinion.

Beat Takeshi used to do a pretty darn good job playing Japanese thugs (before his accident).

If you want to be depressed and suicidal, he's a decent writer/director.

But before you start giving him free teabag license - spend some time watching what a hack he is every night on Japanese TV - an endless stream of self-degradation and buffoonery - unreal that it's the same person - you might have to revoke his Toshiro Mifune status.

Is that like in Takeshi's Castle?

Haven't seen that. My wife used to watch it about 15 years back. Says he was somewhat more dignified back then.

A few years ago he was sitting on panels in late-night soft-porn shows, wearing giant-nipple-hats and officiating over giggling girls changing their clothes as fast as they could behind decidedly tiny curtains as the cameramen went in for lewd angles.

Nowadays he stands around a studio and announces "Unbelievable!" stories, which are generally crappy dramatizations of weird events stolen from other countries' "reality" shows and dubbed in Japanese.
For that, he sometimes dresses as a Catholic cardinal and dances around pointlessly like a cheerleader.

He also co-hosts some other variety shows. He always wears pajamas and a silly wig, and carries a big plastic sledge hammer to randomly hit guests over the head with. Otherwise, he lets the other hosts do all the work.

The inconsistency of the image doesn't matter to the Japanese people. They are very forgiving of anything anyone in the geinokai "art world" does. And it doesn't "bother" me either, but in my mind it sure disqualifies him from "God of Yakuza Cool" status that he has in the eyes of a lot of people.

For htose who don't get what I asked about, it's seen in this country as "MXC:Most Extreme Elimination Challenge."

check out the DVD boxed edition of the 1st season. it includes an episode with subtitles of the original Japanese. They are far more abusinve than in the american version."Vic" is actually the lord who's castle is unted attack from forces led by 'the captain" The winner, rarely there is one, who getsthrough all the leiminations wins 1million

I always felt the English commentary on MXC had a little MST3k to it. Maybe a little more What's Up Tiger Lily. Gotta say, though, I think Ninja Warrior (currently airing in the US on g4) is the superior show.

As far as undergrounds go, History Channel's Cities of the Underworld has some good stuff on it. All I've seen so far has been US and European cities-- Edinburgh, Paris, Naples, New York and Rome-- but maybe if they go another season they'll hit the Far East. I remember when I was stationed in Okinawa there was a cave system that ran all the way across the island (about five miles, Okinawa isn't very wide). I always wanted to take that tour and never got around to it.

Actually, now that I think about it, a Ninja Warrior-type show would be neat basis for a run.

The episode covering the Berlin one on Cities of the Underworld was a good one, seeing the extensive bunkers that the Third Reich had built. The one interesting one was the attempt to build a large freeway underground that's now under a park.

The other neat one was the one in Istanbul (which was once Constantinople), which they showed one of the cisterns. It's very reminiscient of that link earlier concerning the Tokyo water thingamabob.

the underworld serries was good on edinburgh and paris but I didn't like the New york one. They talked about lost subway stations but never showed them .That would have been more fun than another view of a secret basement below a hotel with an 'unknown' train in it- hint guys- take a look!

Heh, probably the so-called "lost" subway stations didn't look like much so they preferred to let the viewers' imaginations go to work.

What she is referring too are supposedly abandoned old stops that are no longer in use. On the episode, the only one of the serries I saw, the narrator said you can sometimes see them in the dark. Like in Ghost Buster's with the pneumatic transit system tunnel Dan Ackroyd finds.

Ghost Busters 2 to be exact but yeah. Don't look like much? dude in Edinburgh they had a disused tunnel that was just a stone tube- it was a WW2 bomb shelter that was forgotten until drilled into by contruction workers but they were pretty good at making it work. The 'secret' train car in the cellar below the Hotel just pissed me off. "No one knows..." yadda yadda yadda. Dude, it's freaking New York-take a freaking look!

More like those who cares knows about it, most though don't. If they do learn about it, they'll be like 'oh, that's cool... whatever.' Knowing that isn't a life changing experience, it's something that's there.

I think she means on the show they made a big deal about the train car, but if it was so mysterious they could have a look. If it is not, then why bother with it?

Right. there's so much in Manhattan but the show spent soo much time teasing you with a train car. I did like the stuff under Grand Central but maybe more on the tunnels leading off of the terminal.