November 16, 2003
Design Festa
It's official. We're celebrities.
We'd (Matt, Martine and I) been at the Design Festa for maybe 10 minutes before three girls we'd never set eyes on, approached us.
One of the girls first hugged Matt (he didn't mind), then the lovely Noellie, turned to me and said, "Sorry to intrude, but I wanted to say I love your blog and I read it all the time." Uh-huh. Martine was off to the side thinking, "What about me, what about my site?"
Noellie then turned to Martine and said, "I absolutely love your photos!" Uh-huh. I'm off to the side thinking, "What about me, what about my photos???"
They then told us they were Celebrity Spotting. Well, bugger me with a chopstick. I hope they did better than us! Surreal. Sincerely.
At the Design Festa, everyone was a celebrity. It was the epicentre of all things alternative, arty, experimental, creative and just plain fuck-me weird. Painters, manga artists, computer animators, performers, disc-jockeys, butoh dancers, photographers, teenage cos-players, hopped-up pink girlie jesters and drag-queens all congregated at Tokyo Big Sight to give their own particular quirk some floor space. Fascinating stuff.
Some of the more interesting (read: strange) exhibits (though given that there were thousands of exhibitors, a mere thimble):
* a three foot high baby doll which nodded and had a foot long booger coming out of its nose;
* a "toilet cubicle" with pink poo in the toilet bowl which you were meant to pick up. The girl giggled, "Okashii, ne!" (strange, huh!) but of course, I thought she said "Okashi" (sweets) so I was about to eat it. God, what's wrong with me?;
* a life-size mannequin of a schoolgirl with her pants around her knees;
* a series of figurines depicting human sushi;
* some strange Duran Duran-esque performance art with a bloke taking "pictures" of the audience. Very "Girls on Film". Ah, takes me back.
The exhibit that most freaked me out though, was one of beautiful, but sinister, porcelain dolls. I went to take a photo of one auburn-haired doll, whose gaze was fixed to the front. The flash didn't work so I took another. As the flash went off, this little virginal pooka looked right up at me, I s.w.e.a.r t.o. g.o.d.
We showed the exhibitor the shots and she nodded in that very Japanese quasi-understanding way which said "Oh yes, I would imagine my little darling would do that. She doesn't like bright lights you see..."
Ass-crap if you ask me.
