Straight Outta Ikebukuro

Last week was really rough at work, lots of stress hurrying to finish and clean up a mess of a project, it kinda felt like being in a bar that's always closing for the whole time. But some new great material came out of that and I will probably share some of that at some point as well.

But this post is about the ghetto area in which I live. Last Saturday Dr. Y came over to my place since we needed to work and the office had some reconstruction work and since he's a family man with a small baby it's difficult for him to work at home. Anyway, that's beside the point, he's very easy and fun to work with so that was no problem at all.

We're happily working our poor asses away in my crib when he hears a message blasted out in the streets outside from a car driving around the neighborhood. The message basically talks about how you should be careful if you see strange people and to not walk alone in the area as a woman. I hadn't really reacted to that before since I assumed that it was some kind of standard thing everywhere in Tokyo. But he had never heard a message like that in the nice area he lives in and was really surprised.

Granted, the area I live in, called Ikebukuro, is very close to the "water business" as the sex/drinking/entertainment district is called here in Japan. Everyday on my way too and from the train I pass through that area and there are some sketchy people around.

So what's the point of this long winded and pointless post you might ask yourself? Well, it's simple; I'm gangsta. That was all I wanted to say.