On Saturday I spent the day in Kobe looking for jeans that would suit me, but for the most part it was all skinny jeans, skinny jeans and more skinny jeans. AHHHHH!!! Not good for me! So eventually I took a look at some of the shops websites (yes, the Japanese versions) before I went into the stores, so I could just look for what I wanted. For a couple of them, the websites said that the stores should have boot cut jeans, but when I went they told me that the store didn't have them. Disappointing. Or I would ask if they had boot cut jeans and they would say yes, but they would turn out to actually still be skinny jeans or non-full length jeans. Not good. When I finally did find some jeans that would actually work for me, they of course had the size one size bigger and one size smaller than my size, but was my size there? No, of course not. So frustrating!!!
Eventually I got to the point where I just needed a break, so I headed outside for some sunshine and fresh air. As I went outside, I could hear some music, so I decided to go check out what was going on. Turns out that there was a street live going on. This was a new band for me to hear -- their style is more of a kind of rock music --- with a drummer, bassist, guitarist and vocalist. While I'm not sure if I really like the vocalist's voice or not, I definitely enjoyed the music as it was really upbeat and was an awesome break from shopping. This band was called Wing of Wind... to check out what they sounded like, listen to the audio below...
If this video doesn't work, click here to listen.
On my way back to the area where I was staying, I ran into ヨシダヒロキ and FASE. They were waiting for a policeman to clear off so that they could start a street live that they'd planned for that evening. So of course, I had to stop and listen! They ended up singing from around 6pm until about 9pm. It was so much fun! I also met some of the older ladies as well as the lady who worked in the café from the last time that I saw these two do a joint street live in Kobe. As the weather was a little chilly, everyone was drinking the warm drinks from vending machines/convenience stores that you can buy here in Japan. In fact, one of the ladies bought a whole bag of a variety of them and shared them with ヨシダヒロキ, FASE, the other ladies, and even me too! So kind!! Actually, there had also been a mobile kind of doughnut stand that parked itself right next to the live setup (distraction technique?!) and the same lady who bought the drinks also bought a couple bags of those and passed them around as well (although I declined these). As he was getting ready to leave (FASE stayed and played music for a while longer) ヨシダさん told me he was doing another live in Osaka the next afternoon, and asked if I was going to come --- I told him it depended on if I could get my shopping done or not...
So the next day, I checked out and headed in to Osaka to try out my luck at shopping there. Initially I ended up having the same issues as I had in Kobe, but eventually I found the same store as the one that had jeans that would've worked for me, but just didn't have them in my size. The store in Osaka had one pair in my size!! YES!!! They're mine!! Not to mention I got 1,000 yen off (about $10), just for trying them on. Score! I managed to accomplish this feat with enough time to get some lunch and pick up a couple snacks for the bus ride home and even had a little bit of extra time to spare before ヨシダさん's Osaka live started that afternoon! Yay!! It turns out that this time he was doing the live together with マルシェ, who does percussion kind of things. It was also incredibly windy that day which made it feel really chilly and I can't even imagine how difficult it would be to play guitar like that (even I had my hands stuck well into the pockets of my coat!). Again, many people who were listening brought the two of them those little warm drinks every so often. They were scheduled to do this live from 1-4pm, and they did do it for the entire time, but around 3, you could really tell that they were starting to get really miserably cold and were ready to be done with it. がんばれ!!
Anyway, all in all, considering that the weekend started out so dismally depressing with the outlook of shopping, it turned absolutely amazing with the opportunity to hear and enjoy all kinds of awesome music!
