Let’s face it, TV in Japan has some comedic value but for me a lot of it is mind nummingly boring. If you’re fluent in Japanese you may benefit from a wider selection of programs than i do, although from what i’ve been told by people who are, it actually dissapoints you more to understand 100% what the show is about.
The one exception for me is sport, i do find alot of sport that interests me on Japanese TV, the Sumo, Baseball, Horse Racing, K1 and so on.
So, despite having E2 by Skyperfect i still find myself lacking some entertaining TV which leads me to download TV shows from the internet. Before coming to Japan i had no idea how this stuff really worked, also we were lacking the fat internet connection we have here so it wasn’t really an option back then.
How do i download tv shows? Using 2 things, a torrent search engine and then a torrent client that enables the p2p (peer to peer) sharing. Basically, it relies on each user having a piece of the file to be downloaded and sharing those pieces amongst each other until everyone has the complete download.
Firstly, find the torrent using a torrent search engine, i use isohunt. Once i’m at the Isohunt search page i enter the name of the show i want to download, in this case The Amazing Race.
Once you’ve found the episode you want it’s just a matter of saving that file to your system for opening later, or starting to download directly as i do.
It’s been long overdue but i finally made it to Meguro this weekend to have a geezer about the place as part of the series on the 29 stops on the JR Yamanote Line.
Unfortunately i didn’t make it to the parasite museum as planned, instead i covered a few kilometers around the west and then east sides of Meguro with a bite to eat in the middle.
Meguro is only a 1/6 dozen stops from home for me and lies in between previously visited stations, Ebisu and Gotanda
As always, proof i visited the station in question.
It looks just like any other station when you first come out of the station.
It’s a reasonbably quiet station though, in comparison to others close by.
Over the past week i’ve had a great mate of mine from Australia in town. Motts has made the most of his time here in Tokyo and has also managed to get a few days down to Kyoto mid week and a day in Nagoya Sunday for the Sumo.
Motts has been a massive supporter and regular reader of this site since it’s launch and it was great to show him somethings i love about Japan first hand. On the weekend It was too hot to do the next installment on the JR Yamanote Line although he was angling for it … instead we spent a lazy Saturday down at Shonan Beach, Enoshima.
Shonan Beach is about an hour away on the Odakyu line if you take the Limited Express Romance Car, the hour is made easy with a few cans of the local brew.
It was hands down, one of the best days i’ve had in Japan, sitting in a bar on the beach is something i’ve done in many many countries and Saturday was the first time i’d done it in Japan.
It’s a different side of Japan down that way, and the memories of past holidays in Ilha da Itaparica in Brazil and Jomtien Beach in Thailand came flooding back.
The beach isn’t exactly the golden sand of the Gold Coast and the water isn’t the bluest in the world, there’s also plenty of shite that’s been washed up on the shores.
