Yamanote Halloween train party
This gent in this video is wearing a Hello Kitty mask while enjoying a cigarette and a beer. He's one of many Japanese and gaijin who attended to last year's "Yamanote Halloween Train Party."
But this year's party, held on October 28th, has "ignited a huge anti-foreign backlash from the Japanese blogosphere," according to Japan Probe.
Some facts:
Here's an interesting letter of complaint about the unruly party:
- There were perhaps 200 to 250 foreigners present, most of them Caucasian. There was also a number of Japanese participants, most of them Japanese women.
- After getting on the train, the party-goers became drunk and loud, shouting in English and becoming aggressive towards a few Japanese.
- At some point, an idiot removed or disabled the lighting in the train car, forcing the train to make an emergency stop at Shinagawa station, where police forced everyone out of the train and tried to see what had gone wrong with the lights. It is unclear whether this put an end to the party, or if it continued afterwards.
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assuming i've read this right, this guy is saying that halloween is a holy christian day, and is deriding its corruption?
I'm on the fence on this one. While I am not a big fan of public drunken jackassery, espescially where other countries' bad opinions of the english speaking world are confirmed, I can understand how you can feel alienated abroad and want some echoes of home...like Halloween.
Plus, since when was Halloween a christian holiday?
Wish for love to the God quietly
If only all religious folks did so.......
Japanese people take holidays seriously. I had to explain to a roommate in San Francisco that Memorial Day is not a day when the spirits of the dead visit you.
KaosDevice, Halloween is the night before All Saints Day, which is a major annual religious observance. ("Halloween" is short for "All Hallows Eve.") Like Mardi Gras, which is the day before Ash Wednesday and the beginning of Lent, Halloween is not a holiday in the Christian calendar, but it definitely originated as a holiday celebrated by Christians.
Kaosdevice @2: Since when is public drunken asshattery a cure for home-sickness?
I can understand how you can feel alienated abroad and want some echoes of home...like Halloween.
Dude, Halloween is ALL OVER THE PLACE here in Tokyo.
Japanese people take holidays seriously.
Seriously commercial, perhaps, as the sales for Christmas, New Year's, Valentine's Day, White Day, and now Halloween demonstrate.
OMG how f'ing embarassing. I'm embarrased just watching and reading about this. Having lived as an American in Japan for over 6 years, its just depressing how stupid some people can act, and with no thought of how bad of an impression it makes on the locals. Stay Classy!
Sometimes I can understand the anti-foreigner sentiment. How many western English teachers with an inflated sense of entitlement can you put up with in one day? But another thing to understand is the growing trend in right wing nationalistic sentiment. Japan can be highly fascistic in many ways and ex-pats need to realize that not everyone will be accepting or accomodating to an outsider, particularly one that is drunk and obnoxious in their host country.
Nelson.C: I was talking about celebrating the holiday, not the drunken jackassery that resulted there from.
Teresa: I dig the christian connections of Haloween, but if could also be argued that it, like many holidays had older more pagan roots. Blah, blah I don't want to beat that dead horse any more then that but I do understand where you are coming from.
I dont know, drunken jackassery is kinda part of American partys, you can basically look at any major party/event all around the country at any time of the year and see it.
What I dont understand is why people are condemning it, sure it makes your culture look stupid over seas but get real, anyone who would judge a culture from one event I would flash my ass at too, I could easily judge the Japaneses from there cars covered in 13 year old anime girls, or how people act in Harajuku on Sundays, or a million other extreme examples, but I dont.
Kinda got off topic there, my bad, cant remember where I was going, so Ill end it here ^_^.
1) What a bunch of assholes. But a lot of gaijin are horrible and deserving of scorn, so I'm not really surprised. Whenever there's a big cry for gaijin rights, I'm the gaijin arguing that we don't deserve them (even though I think we do). The gaijin community can be pretty awful.
2) I have no idea where that guy could have gotten the idea that Halloween is a quiet holiday; there's all the kitschy noisemaking crap on sale here that you'd see in the States at Halloween.
3) Here, I'm a Japanese store owner: "We want the influx of Halloween cash, but not so much the attendant revelry."
4) The letter-writer is also an asshat. Drunk, unruly people on the Tokyo JR lines??? OMFG that never happens!!! The problem smells to me more like, "drunk, unruly foreign people on the Tokyo JR lines."
5) Hey, what else ya gonna do when you're a Nova "teacher" and your whole company goes down without telling you and you haven't been paid for 2 months and you don't have enough money to buy a ticket home and there are no other job openings for someone with no actual qualifications and you're stuck in Tokyo without a job?
Ah, the good old Yamanote Halloween Party. Basically, if you're a foreigner in Japan this is the one day in the year when it's sort of "traditional" to blow off some steam by getting drunk and partying in the subway. Usually, no harm is done and often it's enjoyed by well, not everyone, but quite many.
And on the next day, your head will hurt but you'll be the nice, well-behaved gaijin again. And you will ride home in the Yamanote surrounded by drunken Japanese who will either try to nap on your shoulder or grope you.
As for Halloween: so not christian. It's pagan New Year. Samhain. No connection to Christianity whatsoever. Of course I'll be interested if someone finds one. And I'll wish for my Gods quietly.
Kyle doth write:
"5) Hey, what else ya gonna do when you're a Nova "teacher" and your whole company goes down without telling you and you haven't been paid for 2 months and you don't have enough money to buy a ticket home and there are no other job openings for someone with no actual qualifications and you're stuck in Tokyo without a job?"
That sounds like a complete nightmare, is that something you dealt with? That kind of weird/unpleasant sort of experience needs to be documented thuroughly.
"but it definitely originated as a holiday celebrated by Christians."
except not really.
As much as I HATE to quite Wiki as a resource.
"The festival of All Saints, also sometimes known as All Saints' Day, All Hallows or Hallowmas ("hallows" meaning "saints," and "mas" meaning "Mass"), is a feast celebrated November 1 or the first Sunday after Pentecost in honour of all the saints, known and unknown. Halloween is the day preceding it, and is so named because it is "The Eve of All Hallows". All Saints is also a Christian formula invoking all the faithful saints and martyrs, known or unknown.
In the Christian West, All Saints' Day honours those who have attained the beatific vision in heaven, while the next day, All Souls' Day, commemorates the departed faithful who have not yet been purified and reached heaven."
it did originate from Christianity, but like many holidays, the apple is far from the tree.
But again...not really.
All saints day is just a cheap co-opting of previously celebrated pagan holidays. All saints day didn't even originate on NOV1. It was orginally in may co-opting a completely different pagan holidy. Just because the modern term "halloween" is derived from the attempted hi-jacking, it doesn't change that Samhain is what the holiday evolved from.
Christian history is all about creating, or moving previously existing feast days to overlap, and snuff out the local traditions.
Ok, imagine what the reaction would be like if a bunch of drunken, roudy Mexicans got dressed up in costumes and rode around on the New York subway system late at night, yelling obscenities in Spanish and "becoming aggressive."
@ #17:
Hmmm.. learn something every day, thanks for the info, always appreciate it.
On a side note, thats awesome that the Wiki post for Samhain has a picture of Sam Hain from "The Real Ghostbusters" cartoon at the bottom, loves that show.
woah d00d japanese people just rrlllyyyy need to lighten up a bit. put down the samurai sword for one second and be like "bushido party time". i came back to america from hong kong and i was like "oh real big party time" all the time who are these other ppl who are not like me?
Living in Japan I feel a little bit worried when this kind of things happen: Japan is not like US or Europe, here you got a lot of more freedom but you need to understand that a lot of things even not being illegal (try to walk in a station with a beer in the US...) are not acceptable... here you need a little bit more self judgement that in many western countries (where it is less needed cause a lot of things are illegal so you need only to follow the law)... in Tokyo you can ride a train on acid or totally wasted and NO ONE will ever complain or care if you don't bother other people... in Shibuya you can legally buy many Alexander Shulgin creations or entertain yourself in mizu shobai (sex) shops... and there are places like Roppongi created exactly to have foreigners to let the "to blow off some steam" without trouble with police...
Anyway, when in Rome do as... people who can't understand this simple, and centuries old saying, shouldn't celebrate Halloween too much far away from their hometown (especially on the wrong date)...
Many schools in Osaka warned their English Teachers this year that the Osaka Halloween train party was being closely watched by the police, and they would be quick to arrest any Gaijin that were drinking or partying, so it didn't really happen. Really, I'm not surprised that this happened in Tokyo too, as the authorities are getting far more uptight about foreigners being loud, drunk etc. Especially now that there are 4,000 Nova teachers without a job, most of them in the Kansai area.
@Frankiez:
You nailed it. The cops won't bother you here unless you bother someone else. It's wonderful. Laws exist to solve problems, not as absolute declarations of morality. Somewhere along the line the US forgot that, and now cops walk around looking for lawbreakers. If no one is complaining, there's no reason to bother anyone.
That does lead to gaijin who just got off the boat to misunderstand the situation and totally abuse their newfound freedom. Japan is orderly because it wants to be, not because the police will tase you if you aren't. I think I did some stupid asshole gaijin things when I first lived here (approximately 100 years ago now), but once you realize when and where you can be crazy, you get the best of both worlds--Reasonably polite and comfortable interactions with strangers, and crazy drunken nonsense with other strangers at other times in other places.
It's a great place to live.
One great thing about BB is the decent quality of the comments, but can we please stop using the word gaijin?
Without getting into the etymology here, it's a sickening sloppy word that isn't terribly far off the N word in English. Most Western folk who use it fall into two categories 1) Non-fluent speakers of Japanese; 2) Residents of Japan who don't care about integrating.
Most of us who do speak the language and who do care about being accepted into society here (Japan) cringe when we hear it.
It's hard enough trying to make a life here in which one is treated as an equal and not as some mobile freak show, which - I guess - takes us back to the subject of this story! End of rant :-)
Seriously, those who took part in this and got out of hand are those at fault. It's not a matter of being uptight.
They were blocking normal use of a public system. I heard they were even blocking people from getting on the train if they didn't think they "looked good" - in other words, pulling cute girls on and kicking men out. There was destruction of property involved, and it was just general chaos.
They weren't partying in someone's house, or in a restaurant. They were on THE TRAIN. Sure, it's not uncommon for someone to be drunk on their way home. And there is even the occasional loud obnoxious old man. But not a whole train FULL of them, blocking the proper function of the train. What is the point of a train if people can't use it for transportation?
Anyone who thinks that Japan is out of line for being disgusted with this really needs to have a reality check. You honestly wouldn't mind if a bunch of people from outside your culture (doesn't matter what culture. The whole culture thing is only an issue to make the point that it isn't something you would be familiar with enough to join in or think was "cool". I know full well there are tons of people who will say "I'd join in!" if it's something they *are* familiar with) took over your only mode of transportation, and started tearing it up, harassing you, and getting violent?
Personally, I'm disgusted by the whole thing. Japan isn't a personal playground. I'd be fuming too if I was trying to get home and had to deal with this crap.
@25: First off, a big ONYD for comparing "gaijin" to "nigger"...they are in no way the same thing. At all. I'm a gaijin, you're a gaijin. Deal with it. You will never integrate into Japanese society. It doesn't work that way. You will always be the outsider. Embrace it and learn to live with it.
@24: I don't know where you live in Japan, but where I live the cops are even bigger a-holes than American cops. My friend parked his car in someone's private parking space (by accident) only to have the owner of said space essentially dismantling his car with a bat. He complained to the police and their answer was "What would you do if someone parked in your parking space?" And let's not even get started on what they tell women with rape accusations in Japan...
I have two things to say about this whole thing:
1. Yes, foreigners act like idiots sometimes in Japan. But remember, large groups of people often act like idiots in cities. This is soccer hooliganism in Europe, this is rioting after the Red Sox (win or) lose in Boston. This happens EVERYWHERE. It's too many stressed out drunk people blowing off steam. It's not just a symptom of foreigners in Japan.
2. Japanese people are overly xenophobic. All the bad stuff that happens in Japan isn't the fault of foreigners. I mean they sell child porn in most book stores in Japan (yes, I do consider the 9 year old bathing suit model magazines child porn...what do you think the person who's buying it is doing with it when they take it home?) And I can't count the number of times some drunken JAPANESE idiot has disturbed my peace and quiet (on a train, in a bar, in a convenience store, while out to dinner with the girlfriend, etc). So don't "poor mild-mannered Japan" me. They know how to cause a ruckus too.
The lesson is, this isn't about poorly behaved foreigners, it's about poorly behaved PEOPLE. And it's about both the Japanese and foreign people who can't see that distinction.
@27 if you live in Tokyo you know the value of a parking place (a parking place costs like a garden in a US city), and you know that you don't park in others people private parkings... if someone parks in your garden in the US what are you allowed to legally do?!
But of course I will never condone violence against a car!
> 1. Yes, foreigners act like idiots sometimes in Japan. But remember, large groups of people often act like idiots in cities. This happens EVERYWHERE.
(ever attend a large gathering of people in Japan?) basically you are motivating the japanese xenophoby...
> 2.Japanese people are overly xenophobic. All the bad stuff that happens in Japan isn't the fault of foreigners.
Damn Japs: they even attacked us in Pearl Harbour!!!
Your life in Japan seems overly affected by an army of zombielike drunk salariman that are harrassing you and your girlfriend wherever you are... better go back to a safer place like USA!!
Anyway: Have a great Halloween (maybe not on Yamanote and possibily on the right date)!!!
ps I'm really sorry for NOVA teachers but moving to japan to work for a Yakuza owned company is not the smartest choice...
"Gaijin" very literally means "Person from the outside" aka "not a Japanese person".
And that's what I am, and as far as I'm guessing, you too. It's not "nigger" or "jap" or "kraut" (which is what I am, actually). "Gaijin" is pretty neutral. There are far worse words.
I agree - especially after reading 2ch and Japanprobe lately - that some Japanese are highly xenophobic, which can be explained somewhat if you consider Japan was closed to the world until about 200 years ago.
I'm not so much bothered about the party and the fact that Japanese can be rather annoying too - at the very end of it all we are all just human beings and it's our nature to annoy our fellow humans from time to time.
Frankiez: please, do yourself a favour and read a bit about Shintaro Ishihara (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shintaro_Ishihara) who has just been elected governor of Tokyo. Again.
After blaiming all the crimes on foreigners and declaring stuff like "Women over 40 have no reason to live".
Have you ever watched Japanese TV? How can you say there's no xenophobia in Japan?
But I forgot - there are so many gaijin in Japan who don't want to see any fault in the land of their dreams.
Wake up.
It's just a place, not nirvana.
Wow! Judging a place by the governor?!
Are you asking to judge USA from BUSH speeches or a Terminator elected as governor?!
It's not Nirvana at all but here I feel safer and more free since police/potician have way less (bad) influence of society that in USA and Europe... I feel everyone should live where they feel confortable...
torieazu, gomenne...
Oh wow, so, when did BoingBoing become Letsjapan.org? We've got NOVA news AND Japan/Gaijin bashing!!!
Anyway, it's all well and good to point out Japanese xenophobia, but really, events like this only go to enhance it. Thank god they made sure that these people were mostly Caucasians; a large group of drunken southeast Asians, or Africans, or any other ethnicity, would have resulted in an international incident.
Question: did any of you actually read that Japan Probe article? The backlash started BEFORE the event. People were threatening to "stab all the foreigners" to prevent the party from happening...
Yeah, Japanese people are all smiles and sunshine.
@Teapunk:
FrankieZ appears to be a disgusting comment troll. Do not feed him.
But yeah, I definitely sit better with your interpretation of "gaijin." I could care less if someone calls me a "gaijin" or a "gaikokujin." It's like saying "foreigner" or "foreign person" in English. One is slightly more rude, but neither is anywhere near a racial slur.
1) Here's who doesn't like the word "gaijin": old-school gaijin who read about the word before they came and were dead-set against it and continue to rail against it because they have a victim complex. --That and kooks like Debito Arudou (although his legal guides can be a lifesaver). I have a degree in Japanese, have taught university Japanese in the US, do a lot of the Japanese-English translation for my current university department, have a Japanese family, and prefer Japanese food to Western food. And you know what? I'm still a gaijin. I will always be a gaijin. Even if I do a damn fool thing like become a citizen, I will still, forever, be a gaijin. And I'm okay with that, and with the word. I am an outsider, and even though that sometimes sucks, it has its perks as well.
2) Japanese xenophobia really does exist, of course, but I just don't buy the argument that it's a huge problem. I only get upset when it's a gross distortion of facts, such as when some idiot politician cites foreign crime statistics that include the crime of forgetting to update your gaijin card when you move house. Or when asshats on TV say ridiculous, ignorant things. But that's life. Minorities in the US put up with this shit all the time; you can too.
3) I've had a few run-ins with the cops, and they confirm what I said (so does the story of the car): They don't do much. And I'm suggesting that's a good thing. If you're in grave physical danger, I think they'll be right there helping you. Hell, if you're drunk and fall down on the sidewalk, they'll help you up and help you get home. And they won't be dicks about it. But if they don't see an actively dangerous situation, they opt to just stay out of it. I think that's nice.
4) Japan isn't a magical wonderland. I've said so on these very forums a couple times. It's just a place. With people. But every time I start getting fed up and I go back to the US for a few weeks, it's about 45 minutes after the plane hits the tarmac in the US before I'm like, "My GOD Americans are awful." And by the time it's time to come home, I'm swearing never to return to the US again. Things are clean; people are polite; mass transit works; food doesn't make you feel gross. It's a nice place to live. Not super-great, but nice. That's all.
@ darrell
Wow! I'm Disgusting... arigatou ne... you really know how to communicate: you must be a really nice eigo sensei!
@34:
Yeah, those are pretty much my thoughts about Japan in a nutshell. Except I think the police in my neck of the woods are still kinda dick-ish...but that could just be a local thing.
But I liked your last point the most. Japan is not a magical wonderland. Neither is the US. No place is perfect.
I spent nine years living and working in Japan before the internet became ubiquitous ("In my day, if you lived outside Tokyo, the nearest dialup was long-distance, and..."). The Yamanote Line Halloween party had been going on for a while (and granted it's a lot bigger now than it was then), but I never heard the kind of hostility coming out of Japan Probe, letsjapan, etc. What a disappointment it must be to have your Japan experience ruined by a bunch of chest-beating Internet Tough Guys spewing anti-gaijin drek from the anonymous safety of their laptops. And it's a shame folks who want to visit Japan will interpret Japan as a hostile country because of this.
It's also interesting to see the same old arguments going on this thread that have been heating up the mailing lists since 1994. ("Other foreigners suck," "The word, 'gaijin' is racist," etc.) Sure takes me back... ;-)
Hello everyone! I am Japanese. Sorry my poor english.I have read generally everyone's arguments and am impressed. The thing I want to say is simple. Don't have a party by Hundreds of people in a PUBLIC transportation organization.
A race is not a problem.
There is my earnest wish. Would you see this site?
Attention, big pictures.
Samurai Dave: The Roving Ronin Report
http://samuraidave.wordpress.com/
Movie only is here.
The Tokyo Yamanote Halloween Train 2007 Video ≪ Samurai Dave: The Roving Ronin Report
http://samuraidave.wordpress.com/2007/10/30/the-tokyo-yamanote-halloween-train-2007-video/
There is also some Asians' photographs. It looks happily. However, He seems to want to hide something for me. Please let me know your comment.
If opposed to this plan, please spread this to your acquaintances and tell it that it stops.
I need your help by all means. Thank you!
Yes the word Halloween is Christian when some pope usurped a popular pagan holiday by calling it "ALL Hallows Eve" but it is NOT a Christian holiday. It was like our Memorial Day when people paid tribute to the dead. It was thought to be the time when the veil between the two worlds was thinnest and people could commune with loved ones who had passed away. The Celts believed in it so strongly it was a high holiday. The indigenous tribes of Mexico also believe it is when the veil is thinnest and their ancestors can hear them (a belief from way before the Christian Spaniards came) and so The Day of the Dead is a popular holiday when relatives sweep graves and place sugar candies on the graves. So American tendency to dress up like witches, skeletons, ghouls and ghosts is in keeping with our ancient pagan, Celtic & Mexican traditions not anything Christian at all.
@38:
Yes, it is a public transportation system. Looking at those videos, I'd be fully in favor of arresting those people. That behavior is inexcusable and reflects very poorly (and--worse still--fairly) on the gaijin community.
Having attended the event three years in a row - I was on the uninterrupted Halloween Train that started in Ikebukuro - I have to say the criticism is just mountains out of molehills.
The Halloween Train happens once a year on one train mainly for one hour. And even that one train is not completely taken over so it's just half-a-train if even that.
The last two years the Halloween Train made it's loop, most people got off at Shinjuku and a few rode it further to their station or to Ebisu then went to Roppongi.
People mainly just talk, drink, shout station names, climb up in the rarely used luggage rack, and run from door to door at the stations. Despite the Hello Kitty in the Video - no one smokes and neither did he. As you can see in the video, it's not lit and there's a distinct absence of smoke.
Last year the lights were even turned off in one carriage but the train wasn't stopped. The Halloween Train this year that was unescorted by police wasn't stopped.
I blame the Shinjuku Halloween Train fiasco on two things:
1) The overreaction of the xenophobes from sites such as 2ch.net who called partiers terrorists and hijackers. Some of them threatened to do some physical act of violence. The police were probably more worried of them than the partiers because rightwingers have a history of erratic violent behavior. Meanwhile the Halloween Train has been going over for more than 20 years. Last year we had cops in our carriage who got off after one loop even though there were still partiers on board! So apparently last year, the event wasn't so much of a concern to shut down a train but this year after the 2ch.net reaction....
2) The Nova situation. I understand there were a number of Nova teachers on the Shinjuku Halloween Train so its understandable (though not excusable) for them to be in a steam-venting mood.
The two years before neither of these factors existed.
As for the participation, my experience has been almost half of them were in fact Japanese. You can see a number of them in my videos both guys and girls. I don't beleive that bit about kicking men off thing. Anyone who wanted to come in, came in and we often shared our drinks with them. One salaryman in 2005 exactly rode a full loop and went off to Roppongi with some of the partiers.
The commuters in my observation did 1 of 3 things;
1) Ignored us completely
2) looked on in amusement and sometimes took pictures
3) joined in
I only saw one angry old woman but she probably doesn't like the harajuku people either.
What bugs me is listening to people rabbit on about something they've only heard of secondhand or seen in a youtube clip.
Main thing the Halloween Train is open party for just having a bit of mischievous fun:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OIpAUDG6nyY