Not been there, but I bought the t-shirt anyway.

(Pictured: impossible lies)

You know what's been annoying me recently. The seemingly endless amount of guys who go around in t-shirts with OSAKA 07 and NAGOYA 12 on them. Do they think they are part of a Japanese sports team? Having passed two years of actual adult life in Japan and having visited most of the places that these t-shirts name I can't help but feel a great of annoyance. It's such a feeble trend. I quite want to ask them to name which island of Japan the city is on, or if they've ever been there. See, they don't know. They don't know why they're even wearing that shirt. Probably, they even own a pink shirt for going out in. Of course, they don't like pink, and they'd never say if you asked them "Hey dude, what's your favourite colour?"- "Pink!" That would lose them a few dozen masculinity points, and even where I come from earn them a 'kick-in'. Why are they so popular then? Why do people mindlessly follow trends? A few years ago Top Shop started a 'Rock Chick' fad that lasted a couple of months, whereby girls would become 'Rock Chicks' by buying a Motorhead (sorry, don't know how to get an umlaut on this keyboard) t-shirt and maybe a dog collar or something. I remember being surprised and delighted that so many pretty girls seemed to be into Motorhead, and then immediately dejected and sick when I realised that it was all a commercial sham and these foolish girls didn't actually know who Motorhead were. I wanted to grab them and scream in their faces, spittle arcing out of my mouth in slimy threads: "MOTORHEAD IS NOT FOR YOU! MOTORHEAD BELONGS TO UGLY, HAIRY BOYS! LEMMY HAS WARTS! REAL FUCKING WARTS! THEY DON'T EVEN ALLOW HIM ON THE TELLY ANYMORE, SO HOW THE FUCK DO YOU EXPECT ME TO BELIEVE YOU'VE EVER HEARD OF HIM! NOT ON TOP OF THE FUCKING POPS THAT'S FOR SURE!" Then, probably after someone had bailed me and I'd been forced to apologise to everyone involved, the girls would abandon the t-shirts in favour of some other stupid fad, big surprise there. Anyway, that's sort of how I feel about the OSAKA and NAGOYA t-shirts. Being that my knowledge of the places is so intimate, I just feel sad that these poseurs are wearing them, unaware of what they might mean to other people. How would you feel if some douche was walking around with YOUR hometown written across his chest because it had somehow become fashionable? Getting status by associating himself with YOUR background, YOUR personal history, YOUR heritage, or whatever? Could you find in your heart to say "Hey, nice KDY t-shirt, even though you're from Derbyshire." Maybe. But there's an equal chance you'd go Eazy fucking E and bash the twunt's head in with a rock.