Friday, January 15, 2021

Happy New Year! Calendars, a Japanese Tradition!

Friends, I hope that 2021 is a much better year for all of us than 2020, both collectively and individually.

So at the moment I am working on something on my car, but not quite ready to post yet. But soon!

Meanwhile, I want to share a Japanese tradition... at the end of the year, companies send important customers and clients their next year corporate calendar.  These calendars are usually made to be as non-offensive as possible, with landscape sceneries and oil paintings as a common motif.  Hence, usually the ones I get from my insurance companies and banks are opened and then quietly put in a corner/trash... useful, but boring, I guess.

Some companies, however, choose to be a bit more interesting. It used to be Japan Airlines, for example, would pick 12 gorgeous flight attendants from among the ranks of their global staff, and have one (always female) pose in front of some nice scenery. Miss January, Miss June, etc.  It has likely been toned down a bit but I see that JAL still maintains some of that tradition. Although yes the ones with their different airplanes are cool too. I guess.

Anyway, as you can tell I have never been one for calendars, especially the ones from banks and insurance companies.  Until now, when I got a follow up package from Hannah at Trust Kikaku (on behalf of the mysterious M) which included TWO CAR-THEMED 2021 Calendars! 

Here is the first one - from Fujitsubo, the famed exhaust manufacturer. Blake Jones from Speedhunters did a nice write up a couple years ago of what these guys are all about.  Indeed, the first exhaust I had my car (before it served as the R33 jig for the Tomei Expreme Ti titanium exhaust) was a Fujitsubo Super Legalis R, upon recommendations from the guys at Nissan Prince Tokyo Motorsports when they were still located in Shinagawa.  It was steel and heavy, but it sure sounded mature compared to the race car loud Tomei!


The second calendar came in this cardboard tube.  This being Japan of course:


Yep, it has perforations in two places so you don't have to use a knife or scissors to open the tube. No accidents!


WOW, simply WOW! I heard that these are really hard to get, so I am super happy with this. Beats nature scenes and fine art, anytime! (Let's not talk about the flight attendants...:). Everyone knows HKS, but just in case, here is Dino's latest post on what HKS is up to.

The Fujitsubo calendar also came with a plastic clip on mount, so I immediately put that on the wall above the wall in my office:

Uh yeah, all Nissan Skyline stuff... on the other hand when taking Zoom/Teams calls for work, always good to have a Nissan background!

As for the HKS calendar, looking for a good home now. Maybe the garage, or maybe a bedroom. 

Again, thanks to M and Hannah for these very nice gifts! I feel very lucky and hope you both have a great 2021!!

5 comments:

Jason said...

Hi there Aki I've been following your blog for a while now
I have a question regarding the mine's stage II engine
Does mine's make the stage II engine like the one in their R34 GTR demo car with the same internals for their customers or do they differ?

Aki said...

Hi Jason,

Thanks for reading my blog, and your question! Well... I haven't really been able to get this confirmed, but I am pretty sure the internals of their demo car are different, if only because they are trying different things out. However, their crate engines certainly do reflect the outcome of their research from their demo car.

Jason said...

Thanks Last question does the engine come with the HKS 2530 turbos?

Aki said...

No prob. At the time when my car's engine was being built, the 2530 or GTSS were the only options. I seem to recall them telling me the demo car had the 2530s. The secret really is in the proper balancing of the internals, lightweight and forged materials, etc. They even told me not to use any after market dampers because it would also dampen response. I guess if properly balanced and built you don't need one...

Jason said...

Thanks so much again