Monday, March 15, 2004

Last night I watched another K1 fighting tournament on TV and encountered my first ever viewing of the legendary Bob Sapp in action. This man is arguably the most popular lunatic in Japan, and last night I found out why. The fight, for some reason, only consisted of one single five minute round and from about three seconds after the start bell was tolled Bob was on the floor, spread eagled with his Mongolian opponent between his legs. He kept his head snuggled between Bob's gigantic tits. It was truly sublime to watch, and the sexual pose between the twenty odd stone (1 stone = 14 pounds) American beast and the Mongolian of half his size lasted the full five minutes. From time to time the two men punched each other, akwardly, in the head, and on an imaginative level it looked like one of those wierd and aggressive animal mating rituals. After the five minute round Bob got up to be announced the winner.

But of course, he's got to win because he's the coolest guy in Japan. I've heard criticism of Bob Sapp before because of his contribution to the false stereotyping of foreigners in Japan, but he's not the only one. I've met a lot of JETs (mostly guys) who revel in their stereotypes because they like the attention Japanese people (mostly Japanese girls) give them. And it isn't necessarily the responsibility of the foreigners themselves to dispel these stereotypes. Japanese people don't really have an easy time understanding individual diversity and perhaps rely on stereotypes more than people in other countries that I've been to. Then again, Japan is probably the most homogenous population I've ever known at first hand.

In other news, I went to physio again today and had the nurse hurt me again. Yesterday I moved akwardly and my arm went wobbly so I'm anxious about my x-ray tomorrow. I just hope the doc repeats what he said last week: "eito..., eito..., unto saa..., anou..., eito desu ne....... sutehburu".