The Tosa-ben Musical performances and certain people who like to tap dance by themselves

Sorry for the lack of posts lately! Though i plan on catching up with what ive been doing the pass few weeks. Towards the end of last month we, the Genki Seinenkai, made up of other JETs throughout Kochi finally performed the musical that we had only been rehearsing from early february. The first weekend was the most nerve-wracking as we had our first performance in front of a live audience, and it just so happened to be near where i live so many people came down to visit. Even Mika came along to support everyone, and had enough patience to sit through 3 performances (although i did see her having a little snooze during one of the scenes). Everyone did a top job considering we were hungover on the Sunday especially! The next weekend was the most tiring (22-23rd April) and ive only recovered from it coz of Golden Week. We caught a bus the night before and toured through western Kochi on Saturday, and had some surprisingly big audiences thanks to doug and dans great PR work (well done boys). Then on Sunday, we still had another 3 performances to do, the last being in Kochi City (and the most important). We all ganbare'd and managed to get quite a good reaction out of the audience. Kochi City's performance was probably the most nerve-wracking coz there were heaps of people there. But we managed to pull it off quite well and have some fun along the way. All in all, it was great to finally finish and it made most of us forget about the gruelling hours and weekends we had all lost to genki! I made a lot of new friends out of this experience, travelled around Kochi and surprised myself that i had actually taken part in a musical. All in all, we estimated that we raised about $5000 to go towards the international exchange program for Kochi Prefecture's kids to be able to study abroad. Knowing that made it all worthwhile........(i know it sounds cheesy....blow me)! hehe
To embarass myself even more, here are some pics i stole from andrew's website (sorry mate).
Though im sure it wont be as embarassing as when i see myself on TV this week dancing like a bastard and getting interviewed in japanese.

Here are the 7 Samurai of Yamauchi Antony ( from left to right: Happy, Grumpy, Doc (me), Sneezy, Bashful, Dopey, and Sleepy). So the Japanese could understand what we were we all wore a sign on our costumes saying what what our names meant. Mine was Teacher/ Doctor.

Oh no!!! Grumpy's Choking on a piece of mochi. Whatever shall we do?

I know! Lets suck it out with a vacuum cleaner! Brilliant writing!!

Mr Dan Lochman as Nagabana (translation: long nose) and the other star of the show, our the camel!

Kneeling in front of one of the Lords of Japan about to receive Kochi Prefecture. This bit actually caned my legs. Its simple! I cant sit like that. Japan must like pain or something.

Me getting the attention of an old granny and asking her if she knew of any architects that could build Kochi Castle.

See it wasnt really an old granny but Pak-san, one of the extras.

A sword fight against Dopey who was so stupid he forgot his sword. comedy. this was actually part of a dance we had to do called 'Samurai Soul'.

The two main characters Yamauchi Antony and Chiyopatra. Honestly, theres nothing sexual about this but she actually wasnt supposed to do this......she only did it for fun on our last performance in Kochi City.

A few of the samurai and i listening into someones conversation, just before Antony would propose to Chiyopatra.

Yes, there i am in the red shirt dancing like a bastard to 'Walk Like an Egyptian'.

The whole cast at the finale! YOO HOO!!!

Here's a closer look of our final finale in Kochi City!

I couldnt help but put this foto in. Can you see the Japanese guy in normal clothing? He was a volunteer who helped us with our Japanese pronunciation. Unfortunately, nobody can stand this guy and we have nicknamed him the TAP DANCING FUCK!!! To explain, he always came to our rehearsals and would bring a huge tray full of shit into the gym, including his pair of tap shoes, with which he would wear and practise dancing by himself while we reahearsed. It was so fucking annoying! I swear he wore those shoes anywhere. He even tried hip hop dancing along with the girls in his tap shoes which was comedy! He alos took it upon himself to ballroom dance with an imaginary person as well. Six words people: HE IS A TAP DANCING FUCK!!!! (apologies for the language there but its true)