I'm back from Roskilde, but was too busy having fun to take any pictures. And I spent last week recovering from some nasty fever/flu-like thing I managed to catch just before leaving. Hence no updates.

Now, I'm back, feeling slightly better and I'm getting a 3G iPhone. Now why on earth would I jump on this overpriced, hyped smart-phone which can do less than my current Windows Mobile phone and to top it off requires a special subscription to work at all?

Basically: Because it is hyped. I'm getting it for free as a company bonus, and since this wont be costing me a dime, I figured I might as well see what the hype is all about.

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Roskilde 2008 opens tomorrow, and I'll be going this year as well.

Due to someone deciding to get married in the middle of the festival, the crew will be a tad smaller than usual, but that ain't stopping me. Besides, I'm not even invited to the wedding :P

Anyway. I'll be 100% offline, but this year I'm bringing a camera so I might have some pictures when I get back.

So finally, at last, summer is here, or at least so it seems.

The usual routine has been escaping from the heat under my blanket in the morning, trough a cold bedroom, a equally unwelcoming living-room, into a bath-room with a unheated floor into a hot shower.

This being comforting escape from the cruel realities of Nordic winters, a suspense of reality, lasting as long enough for you to realize it's all an illusion and get on with your stuff.

While this has been the routine for quite some time now, finally the time has come for the switch.

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As I'm writing this, I'm sitting on the top floor of my Ikebukuro-hotel and just slacking off with a beer. Last night in Tokyo, and Sunday, tomorrow morning I'm heading home.

I'll leave the hotel around 9am local time, and if everything works out well I'll be back in my apartment in Oslo, Sunday, around midnight local Norwegian-time. This will be a helluva long flight with a 4 hour wait in Amsterdam. "Yay!"

From there on it's just trying to get some sleep, then straight back to work, early Monday morning.

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This post I'll make real quickly.

First pictures show some of the scenary in Yoyogi park, some shots from the Rose garden included.

Following ones show some of the wildlife here, even a turtle coming up from the water to gaze at a biker going by, resulting in him stopping up, gazing back. Until a evil-looking crow shows up, and the turtle decided it was time to head back into the water.

Second last is Sachi and her tiny dog, wearing silly glasses which she freely admitted actually being silly. She once bought them in Bali, broke them, and had a friend in Bali buy her some new ones :P

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I had a few slow days left in Tokyo, and my plan was indeed to take it slowly. Despite having been over half of Tokyo already, I still hadn't visited Harajuku and Yoyogi park. Possibly my number one favourite spot in Tokyo for days I have little or nothing to do.

When I arrived in Tokyo, weather being somewhat crummy, I had lots of plans. I now have a few days left with little or no plans, and it's actually sunny outside! Guess it's time to pay Yoyogi park and Harajuku a visit ;)

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This Wednesday, day after I had been out at Shibuya, picking up new, valuable Tokyo-skills, me and Eelco were to meet up at Takeshi's place and have a small party, like last year, hosted in our honour. Takeshi however usually opens his bar somewhat late, after closing down his barber-shop and getting some food and family time.

So despite getting up late, both me and Eelco has some time to kill before heading up to Monzen Nakachou, east-Tokyo. Eelco has business in Asakusa, and intentions about going to Ueno afterwards. It's a good day, and Ueno sounds fine to me. So far I haven't even been to Ueno park, so we agree to meet up there.

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While I had checked out some clubs at Ikebukuro and Roppongi last year, and with Shinjuku seemingly mostly having hostess-clubs, I had yet to try out the legendary Tokyo clubbing-district: Shibuya.

Last year, I kinda messed up here, and never found anything at all. This year I was more willing to resort to maps and going for specific places. Believe me when I say this helped!

My original destination was "Club Asia", which despite having a beyond cliché name, had a good reputation, if not being the most popular place among the non-Japanese crowd. Anyway: The music-profile of the club intrigued me, and I decided I wanted to have a look.

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After all my hotel woes around Japan, I decided to book a hotel in Tokyo before heading back. Well, at least I kinda remembered that would be a smart thing to do. About 20 minutes before I needed to check out from the hotel ;)

Checking out the Toyoko Inn at Shinjuku which I initially stayed at, they couldn't get me a room for my remaining time in Tokyo. After fooling around, 1 minute until I had to be in the lobby with the key, I had a reservation at Strix Hotel, Ikebukuro, Tokyo.

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Since something messed up, and since I did this the first time anyway, I'll repost this post as a mere irc-log. Besides me being lazy, it does show much of the enthusiasm I had right after the concert was done.

For the record, this was posted on irc, after I somehow had managed to get back to the hotel. Concert was 2 hours and 40 minutes long, I was drenched in sweat, and my jeans were glued to my legs, so just moving in stairs was hard. Especially when you were already exhausted.

I was in fact so exhausted that I emptied a bottle of Pocari Sweat (energy-drink) in less than 30 seconds.

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