Christmas Anecdote

On Christmas Day Girlfriend dragged me (almost literally kicking and screaming) to Tokyo DisneySea in Urayasu, Chiba Prefecture. Tokyo DisneySea opened five years ago right next-door to Tokyo DisneyLand, and I guess now it's only a matter of time before they open Tokyo DisneyEarthWind&Fire.

Anyway, the current ninki #1 attraction at Tokyo DisneySea is Tower of Terror (or, as I like to call it, "Tower of Homeland Security"). In this ride, patrons enjoy the rambunctious up-and-down movements of a cursed elevator from hell. I was under the impression that Tower of Terror was a ride that just drops you a few stories. Actually, it turns out that Tower of Terror shakes you up and down like a big tourist martini before flinging you down at an unnatural velocity.

Girlfriend and I had the following conversation before we went to experience the big martini shake for ourselves:

ME: We better go to the bathroom before we ride that thing.

GIRLFRIEND: Yeah.

ME: Otherwise it's going to be like the Tower of Pee-Your-Pants.

GIRLFRIEND: Yeah. Tower of Shit.

ME: That's gross.

If you're interested in the rambunctious up-and-down movements of real-life cursed elevators from hell, be sure to check out Schindler. One of their elevators, in a very Chakushin Ari/Final Destination moment, decapitated a Japanese teenager in June of 2006. They are also responsible for the chronically malfunctioning elevators in downtown Minneapolis's Foshay Tower, where I worked for almost a year before I moved to Japan. The running joke at Foshay was that the ghost of the building's financier and namesake, Wilbur Foshay, was haunting the elevators and causing them to make alarming movements while the doors were open.

Who ya gonna call?

Technorati: Tower of Terror / Schindler Elevator / Foshay Tower