Ainori #310
Tuesday, April 25th, 2006Ainori is a popular reality show in Japan, aired on Fuji TV on Monday nights at 23:00.
In August 2005, I discovered that Ainori was not only popular in Japan, but also all over the world thanks to Bit Torrent technology. I decided to write a summary of each episode, and do a translation of the weekly photo captions from the official site. What do I get out of this? I get to improve my Japanese, I get more traffic to my blog, but above all, I get the satisfaction of knowing many non-Japanese speakers all over the world can appreciate a truly unique reality show. Enjoy, and don’t hesitate to post any comments or questions you may have.
Ainori #310
WARNING! THIS IS A …
Oh, what the hell, who am I kiddin’ here?



Peep-peep-peep! Ok, so we could all hear the sound of that huge dump truck with Izumi behind the wheel, backing up slowly since last week. Well, at least Alec gave it his best shot, with a somewhat obscure comparison with bath water temperature! He told Izumi that she was like hot bath water at 41°C (about 106°F), i.e. at first he’d thought he couldn’t possibly get in, but once he’d tried, he’d found it just perfect. Whatever…

Of course, Nintendo boy was in his own world until the end, truly believing he had a 70% chance of going back to Japan with Izumi. Upon being asked what he thought the remaining 30% entailed, he replied that maybe Izumi had an eye on Suuzan…

Needless to say, his heart practically stopped when she ended up saying: “I can’t go back to Japan”, on account that she had someone else on her mind. Of course, Izumi was talking about Tagamikun, but Alec really thought she was talking about Suuzan until the end…

Aftermath: he just sat there on his bags for a while, still unable to believe he had been dumped. Dudes, I can’t imagine how humiliating it must have been for him upon returning to Japan, and realizing that what he thought Izumi and Hisayon were feeling for him, and the alleged romance between Izumi and Suuzan, which precipitated his love declaration to Izumi was all the product of his imagination. Either he left Japan all together, or he got plastic surgery and started the “Ainori Victim Relocation Program”.

Another funny thing is that he said “un” (the Japanese version of “yeah”) an unbelievable 35 times during Izumi’s reply. It was excruciating! I was literally screaming “Shut up! Shut up!” at the TV screen. My wife was having quite a good time laughing at me… Ah well, so long, Alec. You really gave us some good times with your, ahem, lunacy.


In other news, the group has left Austria, and entered Liechtenstein, Ainori’s 66th country. However, for the first time (unless I’m mistakin’) in Ainori’s history, they just crossed that very small country and immediately went to Switzerland, Ainori’s 67th country. Boy, that was weird! The Swiss driver even looked like he was Alec’s replacement. Next week, a new male member will join the group, apparently a future lawyer, and Izumi getting pissed off again holds the promise of what seems like an unprecedented incident on Ainori…


