Electric Pig

Golden week fell usefully during the week this year, at the end of April/beginning of May. This year I was desperate for it to start so that I could go out and about, and enjoy the pleasures of Tokyo in the spring sunshine. So, of course, as soon as the holidays started, I was hit by a vicious, probably-transmitted-by-filthy-hormonal-teenage-students cold, and couldn’t speak, let alone leave my week for the whole week.

I recovered by the last Sunday of Golden Week, the first day we had had during the holiday when the weather was not beautiful sunlight and instead was pissing with rain. Annoyed, I went into Shibuya to buy some records to feed the black-crack cravings and popped into Blister comics, one of Tokyo’s better foreign comics stores to see the display of every Star Wars Kubrick figure ever released which they have on at the moment. As it was Children’s Day, they also had this little beauty on display. Traditionally on Children’s Day, Koinoburi (Carp) Kites are flown from houses to represent the members of the household, and grandparents often give young boys model suits of Samuai armour. These are supposed to represent the transition from childhood to adulthood. Although basically pointless, they look pretty cool, but are almost always obscenely expensive. This one, however, is one that I would certainly approve of giving to my sons, if I had and...and a snip at only 188000 yen – about 800 pounds. Click the pic to see more...