So I appear to be in one of my regular Japan phases - watching Lost In Translation, reading Murakami, watching Tony Takitini. I guess I should be listening to Japanese music as well, but I've lost track of what's going on musically in Japan at the moment. Maybe I'll dig out some old CD's from Cornelius, Pizzicato 5 or Roundtable.

I've been trying to work out what started my fascination with the culture of Japan, I'm convinced that it started with a TV series in the 1970's. Thanks to a bit of web research, I think that the programme was called Shirley's World. My memory is of Shirley MacLaine playing a photographer in Japan, in my head the whole series was set in Japan, from what I've been able to find out it doesn't sound as though that was the case, in fact it was probably only 1 of the programmes in a 17 show run. Anyway, it obviously made a deep and last impression on me. I also realised the other day that another, earlier encounter with Japan had lodged itself in the deep recesses of my memory.

I was flicking through a book the other evening and noticed a reference to the 1964 Tokyo Olympics. Over recent years I've always said that my first memory was of my father getting rather excited during the Manchester United 1968 European Cup victory, but upon seeing that reference to 1964, I suddenly remembered watching grainy black and white highlights of those Olympics. So Tokyo and Japan have both obviously been on my mind for a very long time.