Behind The Scenes Of Nekketsu BO-SO TV

"Celebrity in the making?"

my third aunt

in her e-mail sent to me

Posing in front of the monitor screen which shows the official logo of the show - Nekketsu BO-SO TV (熱血BO-SO TV).

If you were to tell me six years ago, before I stepped my foot for the first time on Japan, that I will appear in a Japanese variety show one day, I wouldn't have thought that is gonna turn a reality. But here I am, making a fortnightly appearance on Chiba TV as the representative of Chiba Kun Ambassadors. At the same time, I'm proud to say that I'm also able to introduce Malaysia on a foreign soil. Dear Minister of Tourism of Malaysia, I am here hinting you to award me with a Datukship. But if you wanna add some yen yen (￥￥) also I will be more than happy to accept it.

This week is my second time making an appearance in the show. Just like the first time, I only received the script late evening, a day before the show. I thought since I have had the experience once, I would not be as anxious as my first time. I just browsed through the script quickly and looked for my parts.

The many variety shows produced by Chiba TV, including the one I am joining on the bottom left (BO-SO TV), pasted on the wall of the main entrance.

VIP-like reception. Our names put on the door of the waiting room for the two Chiba Kun Ambassadors.

It was the same when Mr Kimura Akihide, the producer came into our dressing room to briefly explain the flow of the show. After looking through the script, I realised that we were gonna get to try on many kinds of food once again this week, which is of course a great news for me lol! If you wanna know what we had this week, then you gotta wait for my next entry.

This week, I decided to wear something different to the set. My senior, Crystal a.k.a. Kevin's mom gave me this beautiful pair of yukata recently and I thought it would be a nice idea to wear it to the show. Besides, my partner, Mi from China had planned to wear her kimono, so it would be very matching for the two Chiba Kun ambassadors.

However, the yukata was slightly short to match with my long arms and legs, that some of them commented that I look like a small kid from the downtown of Edo (江戸の下町からの子供) lol! Upon seeing the two of us when we stepped into the studio, Mr Happa commented that we looked more Japanese than Japanese. He told us we looked nothing like husband and wife haha wtf!

Satoe-san - the Mom and daughter helping me to put on my yukata the right way. She just ignored me camwhoring in front of the mirror and continued with her job. 
In fact, since she already knew I love to take photos, when I got into the make-up room this time, she asked me "Where's your camera?" lol! 
By the way, Mom said my yukata looks a little like the National Service uniform lol!

Gotta thank this two nice people for helping us to put on some light touches of make-up everytime before the show.

Now that I have gone twice in the show, I began to realise that it is not easy to produce a show, what's more a live show like this one. The number of backstage staffs actually exceeds the people who appear on screen. They are the ones who make sure the chairs and tables are on the right spot, the ones who would bring the food for tasting onto the set in between the commercial break, the ones who provide us with wet tissues to clean our lips during the show.

Not forgetting are the ones who put on make-ups for us so that we look good in front of the camera, the ones who hold the script as the presenter speaks, and of course the technical staffs including the cameramen, AV room people, director and producer. Without these people, it will be impossible for the show to run.

With the cute Nishiori-san (left) from the International Division of Chiba Prefectural Office, who accompanied the two Chiba Kun Ambassadors, 
and Kimura Kanako (木村佳那子), the announcer for Chiba TV who hails from Nagareyama city in Chiba.

Unari-kun, the official character for Narita city was the special guest this week.

With the manager (社長) of the Nekkestu BO-SO company, Mr Happa Ikki (八波一起), who sometimes can get really crazy during the show.

The show this week focused mainly on Narita city and that is why the mascot for Narita city's sightseeing - Unari-kun (うなりくん) made its rare appearance on the show. Its name comes from the combination of two words - "unari" (freshwater eel) and Narita, because Narita city is famous for its eels and Narita International Airport.

It is said that unari-kun came from a star called the Unari star far in the universe. As it flew into the Earth, it found the best airport in Narita and decided to land there. He later found that Narita city was such a wonderful place to be, that it made him forgotten to return to his homeland haha! By the way, sweet potatoes and lotus roots are among its favourite food.

Took a photo with the Deputy Mayor of Narita city, Mr Sekine Kenji (関根堅次).

I asked my Mom what does Unari-kun looks like. Her guesses were penguin and dolphin haha wtf! And my sister told me she thinks that it looks like the blue Twitter bird lol! But if there's a prize for the most imaginative guess, it will certainly go to Christopher, who commented: "Looks like a penguin with two giant toilet roll stuck under the wings".

That is one hell of a creative imagination, wasn't it?

Watching the 20-second introduction of the show on the monitor when the show kicks off. By the way, if you looked properly, you probably would notice the cardboard of Mr Morita Kensaku (森田健作), the Governor of Chiba Prefecture on the left. Unfortunately, he was absent again this week and they put his cardboard on his seat haha wtf!

Miss Kimura, who acts as the translator for Unarikun as we welcomed the mascot onto the set.

Super close-up shot on the two Chiba Kun Ambassadors. I feel I'm getting better in locating which camera to look at after two appearances on the show haha!

Everyone's mouth was wide open as we were introduced to something that looked super tantalising and delicious.

From what I saw during the rehearsal and live show, although the hosts and guest looked like they are having fun and talk crazy stuff during the show, they get really serious once the recorded material videos are played, or when commercial breaks comes in. It is during this very short breaks that they sometimes change their costumes, or rearrange their seating position before the next segment starts.

Looking at how precisely the time management is kept, where not even a couple of seconds is allowed to be wasted, is just something very amazing. Even though the camera will roll in less than ten seconds for example, they never panicked and looked super composed as ever.

However, usually during the live show, there will be some parts where what they talk is not in the script. These spontaneous conversations are usually filled with humour that it makes even the technical staffs behind the camera laugh together with us.

 

That guy standing on the right is the director, whose job is to hold the script for the hosts. So far, I've never seen him flipping the wrong page for the hosts.

Something interesting as we watched the video of one of the segments in the show.

The director (right), who holds the place card to give us the cue of 45 seconds until the end of the show.

As the end of the show, everyone were invited to the set and do the usual chant of "Nekketsu BO-SO TV!"

 

By the way, there is a good news that I would like to share here. I received an e-mail from Mr Ishizaki from the International Division Affairs Department of Chiba Prefectural Office several days ago. In the e-mail, he told me that they would like to request me to appear twice again on the same show in July. You wanna know why? They felt that I have the talent to be a geinoujin and I just need to brush up my skills on several areas, and it will be perfect.

Hahaha! No-lar, I was just kidding on the last part (^.^;b

~ to be continued ~

Tales From The Office

"Do you have lots of orang utan in Malaysia?"

my senior's image

on Malaysia

Do you know what is the most chi kek thing at my department? I think I have mentioned in previous entries before this that I am (temporarily) assigned at the helpdesk department, which mean our main task is to solve various problem users face while using their computers. If you know me well enough, it is kinda of a ironic thing for a noob in technology field like me (according to Datin Merah Jambu) to be doing this now haha! 

To be honest, I never thought I would be employed into this department. First of all, to be in this department would mean that it will requires a lot of conversation session with the users, mainly in Japanese. I guess the reason they put me here is because they probably find that my voice is too sexy, and my talent will be wasted if I am assigned into a different department lol wtf!

This gadget is my new phobia. I call it telephobia haha!

So, back to the chi kek thing, it is the phone-call war. There are currently five of us there and whenever a call comes in, everyone will be rushing to answer the call. It is as if whoever who gets to answer the call first will be given a one-year bonus haha! And these seniors are really fast when they pick up the phone - in less than 0.345 seconds! However, as they want to have me to practise dealing with phone calls, they have decided to slow down their pace and allow me to pick up the phone nowadays.

There is a reason why they make sure that they answer a call almost immediately, i.e. not allowing the phone to ring more than the first beep. It is because it is something courteous to be shown to the customer, not wanting to keep the customer waiting. If the phone rings more than eight times, it will automatically go into the voice message.

Too bad that it is a totally different thing when you call a government department or some companies in Malaysia, where they either will ignore your call, or make you wait like forever, that you can literally go the the market to grab some vegetables, go for some light groceries at the supermarket, have a meal, take a short nap and get back to the call only to find out that they are still not back yet.

This is a three-day collection of snacks and cookies from the people at office.

The calls will start ringing early in the morning, the moment the clock strikes nine. Another period when the calls come in a lot is late evening, usually the last thirty minutes before five. Those are the times when it can get really busy that we can't leave our seat even if we got a real emergency to attend in the toilet. Sometimes, the questions the user ask is quite cute. There was one time there is this customer, who asked me, "Hello, I'm XXX from ZZZ company, and I am in real trouble and I really, really need you help, prueaseeee!! The icons on my desktop has shrink and can you tell me how to make them return to their normal size?"

I digress.

It seems like a culture in the Japanese office to distribute okashi (snacks and sweets) among the colleagues, especially when they go on a business trip and come back with souvenirs. In Japan, giving souvenirs to your colleagues at work, or friends when you visit their house is considered an important custom, where failing to do that will create an unpleasant image on yourself. 

Often there are snacks and sweet given around the office almost everyday, even thought sometimes, they just distribute them around for fun. Maybe they long to be a Santa during the Christmas off-season. The distribution is so often that I believe if I were to collect them, I can open an omiyage (souvenir) museum in less than a year from now haha!

My current on-site base in Roppongi, Tokyo.

Since a fortnight ago, I was assigned to a new project together with Sato and Samitha. We now no longer work from our office in Akihabara, but the customer's main headquarters in Roppongi. When I started working, I never know that I will be put to work at such classy places. Lets see, since I started working in April, my base has moved from Tokyo to Ginza, and now Roppongi. I wonder where would the next assignment take me to *hehe*

As for now, we will stay here until the end of July and after that, the project will take us to places outside Tokyo, where the furthest one will be in Fukuoka in Kyushu. I hope I get that assignment as I miss Hakata ramen so much lol! However, there is one place called Sasayama in Hyogo Prefecture where there is basically nothing but mountains around the town, and none of us wants to go there. Lets wait and see who will be the 'lucky' ones to be selected lol!

The open space for meetings and lunch on the 16th floor.



Magnificent view of Tokyo a day after the typhoon.

There have been several funny incidents happened so far at this new place and one of them was the toilet tragedy. The lights in the toilet are basically turned on automatically when the sensor senses a person walks into the toilet. After a certain period of time, the lights will be turned off. So, one of us (not me though) was having his sweet time doing his business inside the toilet. As he was sitting down without much movement made, the lights went off and the toilet turned totally dark! So dark that he can't even see anything, not even himself.

What a wonderful situation right? And here is another problem. The sensor was located at the entrance to the toilet and there is no way for him to turn it on no matter how much he moves, because the sensor would not be able to sense his movement, unless he walks out. But the toilet was so dark he couldn't even see properly to put on his pants. The only thing he can do is to hope for someone to walk into the toilet for the light to be turned on. Lucky him that someone eventually walked in; otherwise he told us he was already planning to call one of us to rescue him from the toilet lol!

Went to this wonderful restaurant called Gonpachi to have dinner together last Friday.

Another incident happened today when I was doing a practice session with my senior. From next coming Monday onwards, we would go to the users' office to collect the old PC from the users and exchange them with new PCs. So, as a preparation, we did some practice sessions to familiarise ourselves with the procedures and everything, where our seniors took the role as the users. 

Then came the silly moment. As my senior entered the password for the new PC, some error message appeared. You see, there are a few rules for the password setting; i.e. only digits and no alphabets or characters are allowed, simple combination of digits will not be accepted, etc. So, after confirming with my senior, whether or not he had followed those password setting rules, the same error still appeared. To confirm if he didn't make any mistakes when he key in the password, I undertook a "smart" troubleshooting method. Guess what I did?

Yuzu mojito (柚モヒート), which contains yuzu lime juice, fresh mint, sake and soda.

A combination of several sumiyaki charcoal grill (炭焼き).

Hot chocolate cake and sesame ice cream (left) and kuzumochi and kinako ice cream (right).

I asked him this: "Can you please let me know the password you have just key in?"

Everyone in the room, including my senior couldn't hold himself and burst out laughing loudly lol! Coming to think about it, it was a damn stupid question from me to ask the user, right? Password is meant to be a secret pin and it will defeat its purpose if it is revealed to other people. I don;t even know what on Earth was I thinking by asking the user for his password haha wtf! It is fortunate that it happened during the practice session, and not the real thing; otherwise I would be making a fool of myself in front of the users lol!

3S & 1C (Samitha, Suzuki, Sato and Calvin). The four kudaranai members haha! Why? Because whatever that comes out from our mouth is mostly full of craps lol!



As usual, our self-taken group photo outside the restaurant.

This place, called Gonpachi (権八) in Nishi Azabu (西麻布) was introduced by Samitha as he has several Sri Lankan friends working at the restaurant. Gonpachi is an izakaya-style restaurant, located in the trendy district of Roppongi in Tokyo. Gonpachi is the place that inspired the Lucy Liu sequence in Kill Bill (think Charlie Brown and the Crazy 88). This restaurant has had people like Lady Gaga, Leona Lewis, Stevie Wonder, John Key, and also footballers like Zinedine Zidane and Edgar Davis dining here in the past.

Though the menu isn't authentically Japanese (the avocado tempura was not bad though), the decor is undeniably Edo. Overall, Gonpachi is an enjoyable, befitting its atmosphere and appeal to the Westerners.

The newbies in the company.

Pardon me for the continous spamming of our group photo. This was after the welcoming party dinner in Akihabara on Thursday night.

Just a couple of days ago, there was a welcoming ceremony for the four of us, held by our supervisors and seniors in our company. Our big boss however, was absent as he was in Singapore at the moment. It was a crazy two-hour nomikai session, where we were of course thrown with questions which were kinda hard to answer, as usual lol! I was even asked to sing the national anthem Negaraku haha wtf! Damn random right?

But guess what was the question of the night from my senior? When I told her I'm from Malaysia, she asked me this: "Hmmm, I don't know much about Malaysia, but is there a lot of orang utan in Malaysia? My aunt, who saw that, told me to reply her like this: "oh yes... tell your senior - when we malaysians are bored-we climb trees n sing song-lenggang kangkung" haha wtf!