Arashi Exhibition Journey - more like a journey into racism and exclusion.

[kerrol]

Okay, I was staying in Japan,planning to return to Australia in late August. I really, really wanted to go to the Arashi exhibition because... der... I've been an Arashi fan for over 12 years

Comments

[mcfib29]

Hello. I hit the exhibition last August, I showed my FC card, QR code & passport when the staff saw that my passport is not Japanese she asked me something & i said what? I can't understand so the girl called another staff. Then she asked me if I have cash card or credit card so I showed them all my debit cards (I don't have credit card) & they said ok & gave me the goods pricelist. I was nervous at that time cause I thought I can't get inside, maybe they just really want to check if it's really you who hit the ballot. I watched waku2x at Tokyo Dome & I got inside smoothly that's why I'm confident I can get inside the exhibition same. I also watched 5x20 at Kyocera during Jun's bday, i thought about what happened in exhibition while queuing maybe they'll be strict & felt nervous, thankfully same as Tokyo I got in smoothly. I'm glad you saw the exhibition.

[kerrol]

It must've been fun being at the Jun's bday concert. I've been to a heap of concerts and never had an issue so I thought the exhibition would be fine.

[bemyluckystar]

First, thank you for sharing. I'm sure everyone in the international fan community appreciates you taking the time to write out your experience. We live a tough life as intl fans and any experiences shared are appreciated. Second, I'm sorry your time there wasn't full of joy for you, as it should have been. Having an ID with your FC address has always been part of the rules, but when it comes to concerts, there are so many people do deal with not doing a deep check has become the norm. So as long as you have some kind of ID with names that match, you're in. With the smaller crowds at the exhibition, there's room and time to deep check. As others have said, I also think that it partly depends on who is checking people in. We stick out as sore thumbs as international fans in Japan, making it easy for staff to pick and choose who to deep check.

Did they tell you what they were looking for on your credit card(s)? All that's on there is your name and you mentioned they got 3 cards off you. And what finally did it for them to let you go

[kerrol]

I think just the fact that I had a bunch of cards in my wallet all with the same name was enough to convince them. Maybe you'd borrow one form of ID if you had a resale ticket but not a bunch of cards. When I realised that, I pulled out a heap of cards including my Australian drivers licence so they could see the name was the same on everything.

It's strange to me because I would never under any circumstances loan someone my passport. I get nervous enough just if I have to send it away to get a visa for some countries!

[anonymous]

Sorry to hear what you had to go through. I went at the end of August and was almost denied access. I presented my FC membership card, my foreign passport, and FC envelopes (with the Japanese address registered with my FC membership). The staff said the FC envelopes could not prove that I actually live in Japan, and asked me for other proof. I said the address was my relative's home, and not my own home, so it was not possible to have other proof linking me with that address. The staff then asked me whether I had a residence card (在留カード, the residence card for foreigners who reside in Japan); I said no as my passport actually allowed me automatic 6 months' visa whenever I enter Japan, so I did not require a residence card to live in Japan. She then asked me to contact my relative by phone (apparently she wanted to speak to my relative over the phone to get verification of what I said); I did message the owner of the address but I also told her that I did not have a phone (only had wifi) so I asked to use her own phone. She

[kerrol]

One of the things that really gets me angry in Japan is being asked to phone! It's so frustrating. I can't phone because you can only get a data plan on a tourist visa unless you pay $$$. I have a Japanese skype number now at least so can use that.

I am glad they didn't ask me to call my friend because she was out of the country at the time.

I think they just say there is going to be issues with the concerts but in reality, with 50,000 people being ID checked, they aren't going to be too strict.

[kurikuribebi]

I found your entry randomly, hope you don't mind me commenting. Sorry to hear you had that experience, but I can't say I'm surprised -- it's not like racism is dead in Japan. It's still very much alive, though most people aren't so blatantly obvious about it, and handle it in a passive aggressive way. A friend of mine some years back wanted to get in to a VK concert, and despite showing her residence card, the security wanted more proof of her actually living where she did. Eventually my friend ended up calling her boss to vouch for her

[kerrol]

Thanks for commenting.

Everyone knows that there's been a huge resale ticket problem for years. I feel like Johnnys have wanted to be seen to be doing something about the problem without actually doing anything that costs them money. Like sending out an email saying please don't resell tickets is going to stop anyone.

Now with Arashi going on hiatus, it's become a bigger problem because obviously fans are going to get a lot more fired up about not hitting for tickets. So yeah, they try to do this "foreigners are coming here and rorting the system" thing instead of trying to fix the real problem because they don't want to mess with that "Japanese people obey the rules" mindset. But if you look at how many tickets are sold through sites like Ticket Japan where you can't have a seller's account without a Japanese bank account.

I'm glad they're actually doing ID checks to stop ticket resales but I think they need to be a lot smarter about the whole process.