There were some good matches, but nothing on the level of Dragon
Gate. Match of the night was easily the main event tournament final
between Super Crazy and Shuji Kondo, who put on a great 20 minute,
Jr. Heavyweight style contest. The five minute Petey Williams opening
comedy tag gets the wooden spoon.
Korakuen Hall seems to be one of those buildings where, view-wise,
there’s not a bad seat in the house. I had really good seats for both
shows. I wouldn’t have traded being that close to Dragon Gate for the
world and still got a close-up view of All-Japan thanks to two matches
brawling their way through the public area directly behind my 10
th
row
seat! My arse reports that the All-Japan seat was significantly more
padded than the Dragon Gate one though.
Osaka
Osaka is a fishing city 600-odd miles south-west of Tokyo. Your options
to get there are either a ten-hour overnight bus ride or three hours on
the Shinkansen Bullet train. Your JR Pass doesn’t allow you on the
fastest Shinkansen, the Nozomi, but you can get the Hikari, which will
still whizz you through the Japanese countryside at 186mph. Make sure
you go to a JR office in one of the Tokyo stations to reserve a seat and
get your JR Pass stamped. Not doing this means you’re restricted to one
of the unreserved carriages smokers’ carriages and may not get a seat.
The Shinkansen is, like pretty much everything else in Japan, clean,
quiet and efficient. It left and arrived perfectly on time and even in
standard class, I got an airline-style tray table and a seat that reclined
further than my plane seat. If you get hungry or thirsty, there’s a
vending machine in every other carriage and nice lady comes around
with a trolley laden with coffee and snacks. I also recommend an iPod
loaded with your favourite wrestling themes to pass the time.
DG: Yamato spits
49 The online magazine for pro wrestling fans worldwide
thewrestlingpress.com
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