Streeter

Thats been an area thats always confused me... if a deposit is refundable, whats the point in the deposit? Obviously its Rezzs call to refund but I would have thought he would have every right to tell the guy to get farked?

I do the same thing except cheaper

well it started off being too low, no cat, too loud, wheels too far out. no emmissions, aero too large for s13 shakken specs, no rear seat, needed padding on the roll cage, tie rods, rear upper arms, air pod, and other stuff I cant remember... the real sh!t hit the fan when the car was still registered as a non turbo Qs but had a turbo engine. So basically its in the middle of being de-registered and re-registered as a "modified" s13 Qs with sr20det. Other issues that have made the process longer is that the registered owner is the guy I bought it off back in Kochi so there has been a paper work nightmares and also the the garage sorting the shakken (West aka Bai) has gone to America for drift demos till November 10th. Anyway with any luck and probably more money than Id like to imagine it will be on the road again in a week or so. They dont seem to mind turbo upgrades or intercoolers if you keep the polution gear etc... but you dont worry about that kinda junk till your shakken is due.

Yeah that was pretty embarrassing I used to take pride in saying I was from Australia and NOT american... guess Ill have to start saying Im from the South Pole or something <_<

If its anything like the drifting... its just moved somewhere else. I ask a few freinds about it, Ill let you know what I find out.

yeah 9-10k (maybe for an unregistered beat up Qs with an engine swap)minus shipping it to aus, getting someone to sell it for me, how ever much deregistering is here plus who knows what other hidden costs. Sounds like Id be lucky to come away with 5-6k change in which case Id be hard pressed to get a better car than I already have. Not to mention down time of having no car and all the potential f**kups along the way... I think Im just gonna take it up the arse and get another 2 years shakken on it.

yeah they drift at Mt Rokko but thats at Hyogo (sp?... Rezz ) there are also a few mountain spots closer to Osaka/South Osaka.

There are two other spots about 10 mins from Kamome, they are over the bridge towards ATC, they call it Kita. Also there is a fair bit of Touge drifting going on at the moment too.

well from the places Ive been and seen, yeah... maybe not as many cars getting out and about but still drift seems to be all over the place.

Ive been drifting my car for 2 years... the latest thing Ive been working on is touching gutters on entries so you dont wanna know what the car looks like now :lol:

Thats pretty much what happened to me. I left Aus to goto Osaka but got stationed in Kochi for about 8 months. (You dont get much more country than that) but just like the country in Aus there isnt much to do so surprise surprise the drifters there are some of the biggest nut cases there are. I miss Kochi a little, the garages were far more freindly and they really went out of their way to help me get setup. The scene is bigger in Osaka but lately Ive been wondering if thats a good thing or not. Also parking is ALOT more in big cities, dont forget crime either One other annoying thing is at track days its usually totally packed where as in the country the track days are not only cheaper but you get alot more time too. So getting "stuck" in a country town may not be such a bad thing.

shakken is like an aussie roadworthy test every 2 years... (my car is currently off the road cause of this RRRrr) and costs a furken fortune!! The cops are supposed to be cracking down on illegal cars lately but its nothing like Australia. IF you are unlucky enough to actually be stopped 90% of the time you are let off with a warning. Very occasionally they will write all of the defectable items down on a form and you have to repair/replace these items and present the car to the designated cop shop. Speeding is far more lenient here and 10-15kph is pretty much ok, atleast in Osaka anyway. The speed cameras are as big as a house and mounted above the road so you can see them about 2kms away. They dont even go off unless you are doing about 40-50kph over! LOL Drink driving is alot more harsh with big fines, about $3500 AUD, and a limit of 0.01% BAC or something (basically you are not allowed to drink and drive).

Im far from a mobile phone buff but I know 99% wont work apparently there are some vodaphone models that are international compatible?

Depends what you call dead. Up till summer last year everyone was going to the same place on Friday/Saturday night so you would have a huge amount of cars at the one place. Now its split over 5-6 places. So for the spectator I guess its not as good. But for someone who is participating it doesnt really make much difference, an actual bonus is that cops are less likely to break up a group of 10 cars Vs a group of 50-100.

^^ agreed and as stated you can move in to a place that you have organised before you get here but using the nova apartment for a month or two isnt going to kill you.

Good point, Ive been in Osaka for nearly 2 years and havent seen any drags... mostly due to the fact I couldnt care less about it though with my car off the road for a while thanks to shakken it might be time to go have a look though. If you find out where and when let me know. If its anything like the drifting though it may be a bit dead at the moment. The street racers here seem to be a little soft when it comes to cops and are easily scared off.

depending on where you get stationed. The easiest way would be to speak to the other teachers at your school, generally there will be atleast one or two not staying in Nova apartments and they can point you in the right direction. That will cut down on alot of looking around. In Osaka its a piece of piss, with many apartments not requiring key money etc... although most need to be furnished which still can cost a fair bit initially.

Id agree with Rezz on the people "using" their cars more here... interesting thing though is that Im doing roughly half the Kms in my silvia here than what I did in my 180 in Melbourne although I am practicing nearly twice as much. Main reason being to get anywhere thats far away requires really nasty expressway fees. It obviously depends on the person and what they are doing but unless you are seriously loaded you are hard pressed to clock up the number of kms here that you can easily accumulate in Aus.

oops is the fact that I have studied for a total of 2 hours showing? bleh just like the japanese I speak to, you know what I mean I forgot MOS burger... good stuff, just too small and too pricey.

Im supremely lazy. I just got a job through nova working 5pm-9pm mon-fri. I get about $2400 AUD clear a month... a little more would be nice but Im loving the 4 hour days LOL Nova is pretty crap as far as conditions and how dispensible the company makes you feel, but the pay is ok and the work is easy. Nova baby sit you through everything, although being nova they totally rip you off where they can. So I stayed in a Nova apartment for about 2 months and then organised and moved into my own place (bigger and cheaper) I also send the odd car part back home for some extra pocket money.

yeah aussies get a really easy time with licenses. If you have a full aussie license its roughly 4000 yen and a day of stuffing around to get your japanese license. Only test is an eye test. I came here a bit over 2 years ago with zero japanese, hooked up with a chick in 4 days that spoke a little english so I used her as my translator. 2 weeks later I had found a drift store and negotiated a price on an s13. (My primary goal to moving to Japan was to drift) Yes its sounds like a totally retarded plan but after 2 years Im still having the time of my life. I think a good attitude and confidence have alot to do with getting things sorted. Both that I have little of LOL so it cant be THAT hard? I actually went back to aus for a 1 week trip just last week. I was missing Japan before the plane had even left the ground at Kansai. Surprisingly I hated Australia the whole time I was there, I forgot how bad the drivers where, how rude some people can be and how small even Melbourne and Sydney are. So my one week in Aus has added atleast another 4-5 years stay here. (moving back to Aus is something Id like to hear from Rezz about cause I had trouble being back for just 7 days! LOL) That said though I can easily see its not for everyone but I gotta say my only regret about moving to Japan is that I didnt do it 5 years earlier!

yakiniku and bikuri donkey is where its at. I also miss Kushinbo which is a convenience store on Shikoku that also serves cheap albento box meals, the chicken nanban is kickarse. Osaka`s chicken nanban is just wrong (yes at all 9,000,000 albento shops) for desert Rikuro cheesechake is 500 yen for a whole cake and so fresh its hot, also ichigo daif*ku is good. Im starting to get hungry now!

I dunno... car shows are errrm car shows. If you ask me cars are meant to be driven and seeing all these cool cars just sitting there doing bugger all is as bad as a hot stripper you cant f*ck. Maybe Im missing the point but I think track days/comps are where its at

fear the gaijin!! LOL nah the cops have been taking video footage and catching up with ppl later on. So alot of ppl have been scared off cause of that. I just hide my plates and (touch wood) have never recieved a letter/phone call... If you ask me I think Japanese drifters need a taste of some Aussie cops to toughen them up a bit!! edit: actually most of the guys out there are very interested in foriegners drifting on their home turf and Ive made most of my freinds here through street drifting... only a few get competitve about it.

This will be difficult, Ive experienced first hand trying to give tips to freinds and as my Japanese is sketchy it becomes very difficult to tell them what they are doing wrong or what they should be doing. Im yet to meet a single good driver that can speak english at all Getting a ride may not be that hard but getting any kind of lesson where communication is needed is gonna be pretty hard. Dont be discouraged though, I came here to drift for 6months to a year originally and that was over 2 years ago and I have no plans of heading home yet Unfortunately the street scene has died here over the past 6 months (atleast in Osaka) but there are still many cars making the rounds in the mountains... I havent seen a 300+ car street drift meet for a while though