Now there are a lot of cities still on my wish list. Cities like Tokio, Rome, San Francisco, Bejing and Hong Kong are top contenders. Well that last city Hong Kong once had an area called the Kowloon Walled City. I’ve been fascinated with this place ever since I know it existed.

Places you don’t go to

My fascination for this place comes from the fact that there are some places in the world that you just wouldn’t visit as a traveler. Places like Northern Korea for instance. Or Vozrozhdeniya Island (Anthrax Island as it is romantically called), located in Kazakhstan.

Thank god for the internet. There is some information on visiting these kinds of places. There is, for instance, a great BBC documentary on Voz-island from the TV show “Going to Extremes”. And about North Korea there also is a documentary called The Vice Guide to North Korea on VBS.tv. And there is a series of stories on Gatling.com called Infiltrating North Korea. All highly recommended if you’re interested in these sort of extreme destinations.

Not that this are fun destinations to go to. Mostly they are sad places where suppression and poverty are part of life. Especially in Northern Korea. You don’t want to live over there, is my guess. But still, these parts of the world are fascinating because we know so little about them and the people who live there.

The City of Darkness

Back to Kowloon Walled City. Kowloon Walled City was a concentration of multi story houses, tightly knit together so it almost resembled one huge buiding. One moment, more then 30.000 people lived there on an area of 0.03 square kilometers! It was a mostly ungoverned area, which had a nickname: “City of Darkness”. Well, I think you’ll have an idea.

The architecture of the place is an example of urban anarchy, organically grown high-rise buildings, millions of antenna’s on the roof and chaotic electrical wiring everywhere.

The place was once practically ruled by triads and thus got a reputation of drugs, prostitution, gambling, DIY doctors and dentists. Picture that with the fact that there was barely any sunlight, so the tiny alleyways where lit by fluorescent lights. You got yourself a scene from a sci-fi cyberpunk novel.

It’s not strange that Kowloon Walled City appears in a lot of pop culture as an example of a lawless urban place. A few well known examples:

• Dreamcast game Shenmue II
• Robert Ludlum’s book The Bourne Supremacy
• The movie “Bloodsport” with Jean Claud Vandamme (check the Youtube clip!)

The people of the Walled City

What I find one of the most remarkable facts is that contrary to what you may believe, most residents of Kowloon Walled City where ordinary people just trying to live as well as they could. Working hard, helping each other, socialize on the rooftops or gathering at the cultural center (the Yamen) in the heart of the Walled City.

This is one of the great things about mankind, the ability to adapt to nearly every situation and trying to make the best of it. In  the 70’s, the Hong Kong police cracked down on the crimes and Triads and got help from many of the younger residents.

I would have never guessed so much positivity was hidden behind such grim appearance.

More interested in the rough side of the Walled City? There are a few accounts of westerners who lived there:

• Crack in the Wall, by Jackie Pullinger about treating drug addicts over there
• Gweilo, by Martin Booth which covers exploring the place as a kid in the 50’s

All and all, it’s a place that fascinates me. Something out of a sci-fi novel. Would you dare to go there if it still existed?

References

There is a great book (on my wishlist as of now) called City of Darkness, Life inside Kowloon Walled City by Lambot and Girard. With lots of photos, facts and history. Looks awesome!

A collection of stories, pictures, video’s and information about Kowloon Walled City, some things I found on the internet:

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kowloon_Walled_City
  (a great start with lots of other references!)
• http://www.doobybrain.com/2008/05/01/my-father-lived-in-kowloon-walled-city/
  (great pics)
• http://zeekeekee.wordpress.com/2009/05/05/kowloon-walled-city-something-out-of-a-science-fiction-story/
• http://coilhouse.net/2008/08/kowloon-walled-city-the-modern-pirate-utopia/
  (well written roundup on the place)
• http://blokink.wordpress.com/2009/11/16/kowloon-walled-city-words-with-stu-easton/
• http://web.archive.org/web/20020611050418/www.flex.co.jp/kowloon/story/index_e.html
  (incredibly awesome account of a Japanese ‘exploration’ of the Walled City, god bless the web archive!).
• http://weburbanist.com/2008/10/19/ghost-town-abandoned-city-examples-images/23-kowloon-walled-city-destroyed1/

Hopefully, you’ll find this place as fascinating as I do. I tried to give an overview of what is out there on the interwebs. There is even more interesting stuff to find. If you have an addition, share it in the comments!

That’s it for now! Don’t be surprised if you see me write something on other quirky places in the near future.

As far as live wrestling goes: me and my friends R&J attend a few wXw shows each year. wXw is a great promotion, which brings in some awesome talent. (but I really should visit a dutch show again..)

So yeah, when Dragon Gate announced on wXw show they would host a show in Oberhausen, we almost immediately bought tickets. And waited in exitement for nearly six months.

When the day of the show was finaly there it was a Oberhausen road-trip like usual. Which is a lot of fun, luckily. We where constantly bringing up how weird it was going to be to see all the Dragon Gate wrestlers we’ve only known from TV. Erhm.. From torrents, because you can’t watch Dragon Gate on TV or DVD over here.

The show had a great attendance for wXw standards. A crowd of around 450 was surrounding the ring, and the atmosphere was good. There was great Dragon Gate merchandise for sale. A lot more then we expected. Normally japanese wrestlers bring just a few shirts but these guys brought calendars, loads of shirts, blocknotes, towels, DVD’s. Lots.

Young Bucks beat Tommy End & Mark Haskins

The Young Bucks tag-team was new for me. I’d never seen them wrestle, not even on tape. But they are a really cool tag-team. It’s cool that being true tag-teams is trendy these days. The Young Bucks are such a team, they look like a team and wrestle like a team.

Tommy End is the best wrestler from The Netherlands these days. He’s totally over with the wXw crowd and rightfully so. I’ve seen Haskins wrestling before in wXw and he’s a nice addition to this match-up.

The crowd was in this match from the beginning. Great work from all wrestlers to get the show kick started.

This was the only non-Dragon Gate match on the card, but there was enough speed and action in this one to set a good pace for the rest of the show. The Young Bucks really seemed to like the wild german crowd, banging on the mat in true wXw fashion.

***

Kagetora beat Bad Bones

I’ve read that this was considered a bit of a awkward booking, but I think it worked out great. Of course Kagetora is more used to smaller and quicker opponents. But in my perception Kagetora works the heavyweight roles in Dragon Gate as well.

But Bad Bones is of course a monster compared to Kagetora. So the size advantage was obviously played out. It was a decent match from both men, although I’ve seen Bad Bones in better matches. I’m a big fan of Kagetora, he has this Japanese bad boy aura. Cool to see that live!

**1/2

Susumu Yokusuka beat Dragon Kid, Masato Yoshino und El Generico

This was a match I really looked forward to. Dragon Kid is one of the Jr´s I allways marked for. He´s so innovative and awesome! And in a four way match, with Yoshino and Yokusuka, that´s living up to be a true Dragon Gate match.

Generico is the odd man in this bout, but he´s so incredibly over in wXw. I like him, but I´ve seen him a bit often. So he´s not so special. But when the wXw crowd starts dancing to his themesong, who can resist?

The match includes a fair bit of comedy, which I didn’t expect but works really well. Generico is a funny sight by default with his not-so-bronzed skin and red goat-tea sticking out his mask. The rest of the Japanese work the comedy spots nicely and believably.

My expectations of this match where incredibly high, but when I look back at it, It’s just a good match. It wasn’t the insane high-speed spotfest I expected. Maybe because of the comedy segments. I don’t know. But hey: I got to see a Dragon Rana. It’s an awesome sight.

***

CIMA beat “Lightning” Mike Quackenbush

This is a match that’s easily the MOTN for me. Like Dragon Kid, I’ve been a CIMA fan for years, so again a big mark-out moment for me to see his frogsplash / kneedrop. Quack is a lot in wXw and he’s just allways entertaining to watch. Plus, he works really well with lighter opponents. He doesn’t play the weight advantage but throws in an arsenal of his original submissions and reversals.

The match had a great build-up and a very intense final minutes. The wrestlers kept everyone into this match and the finishing was believable after so much high-impact moves.

****

World-1 (Naruki Doi & BxB Hulk & Zack Sabre jr.) beat Real Hazard (Ryo Saito & Genki Horiguchi & Emil Sitoci)

This is an easy one for the crowd. Faces vs heels. Lovely!

BxB Hulk starts out with a cool trademark danceoff. And Real Hazard comes in swinging a blue crate. Nearly hit me, swinging it out of a curtain of smoke! Zack Sabre and Emil Sitoci are thrown in the mix. Very cool to see Sitoci, another Dutchman, wrestling with these Japanese stars. Zack Sabre totally fits in with BxB Hulk and Doi.

Genki Horiguchi has a lot of interaction with the crowd which is fun to watch. Highlight was when the crowd chants “F*ck you Genki” and Horiguchi shouts “F*ck you Germany” in response.

The match started like a classical tag-team with beatdowns on one opponent. But it developed in a great Dragon Gate style spotfest with some ridiculously fast moves. Doi is the star of this match with a great dropkick finish.

The crowd was totally in this match which gave it a great extra.

***1/2

wXw World Heavyweight Championship: Absolute Andy (C) beat Shingo

Shingo won the 21 carat gold tournament earlier this year and was totally over with the german fans. I was there the first night (the tournament has 3 nights) and Shingo was indeed awesome.

Andy is the champion and I think he rightfully is. Although technically not the best wXw champ ever, Andy is very over with the wXw crowd and can work a good match. He has a lot of charisma, but still looks like someone you can identify with. To me, that’s not a problem (even an opportunity) but I know some people don’t like wrestlers who look  little ‘normal’.

This match disappointed a bit, there was just not enough fire in both men. Afterwards I learned that Andy was dropped awkwardly on his head and Shingo was limping afterwards as well (or maybe he just sell really good). Shingo played the role of the quicker wrestler decently, but I just wasn’t into this. The crowd wasn’t as red hot as the match before, so main-event fatigue set in.

Not that it was bad. Hey, Shingo vs. Andy, it still rocks to see that live! But on DVD, maybe I’d skip it.. Just a decent main-event match.

**1/2

In the intermission and afterwards allmost every wrestler came to sell his stuff, take pictures and chat with the fans. Kagetora was tooting all over the place with Dragon Gate merchandise which was a funny sight. The Young Buck can also go into sales, when their wrestling days are over. Quite the salesmen!

Overall, one of the best wrestling events I’ve seen in a long time. Great atmosphere, awesome wrestling.

So I’m joining them. And it’s not that my personal websites won’t work or look horrible in IE6, I’m just not going to put effort in tweaking every little transparent PNG, margin or position. I’m done with it!

Maybe you’re wondering if I’m planning a “whoops you are using IE6, please upgrade!” message on this site. No I’m not. I firmly believe that most users who browse with IE6 do so because they can not update. Or simply don’t have any knowledge concerning upgrading browsers. A lot of big companies here in the Netherlands are using IE6 and users don’t have administrator rights on those computers.

Another fine article about dropping IE6 support (or not) is on the Digg blog.

Because Margriet’s design relies heavily on visual elements, I immediately thought of transparent PNG’s and absolute positioning. In all modern browsers it’s an easy job to do this. But of course Internet Explorer 6 demands a little tweaking.

I used the amazing supersleight javascript plugin to fix the most IE6 issues. But because of all the absolute positioned elements, it even required some manual PNG to GIF replacements via CSS.

All in all I’m quite satisfied with the results, and luckily Margriet is as well!

Oh, and did I tell you website is hosted with the lovely folks at HostingXS? I did now!

My first impressions are that Joomla is a very complete and extendible CMS. It also feels very mature. But the downsides are that I feel the template engine is a lot of work for a front end developer. Plus, and this is the biggest downfall, it’s kind of hard to learn for a client or a editor.

But the wonderful folks of Roos van Nijmegen have had no problems editing the website. So maybe I’m just over concerned. Time will tell!

I’m working on an article where I give a writeup of some of my CMS experiences (textpattern, wordpress, joomla, plone). But, it’s not really finished yet.

For now, I’m just glad the Roos van Nijmegen site is done.

Oh, and in may, Myrthe and me moved to our new apartment here in Nijmegen. It was a lot of work but turned out really lovely. This is our first “real” house for just the two of us!

On my job at Mediamaal I’ve been the only webdeveloper this year. Previous year there was the two of us. So, lots and lots of work.

Next to my dayjob, I’ve been helping out friends and acquaintances with web related things. Some designing, some developing. It generally was a lot of fun. Below, I’ll give you a quick glimpse of what I produced. As always: please share your thoughts, comments and critique!

First of all, I designed a logo, business cards and a website for LeerlingBuddy. A innovative small startup in home schooling. Check out the business cards below.

The website has a clean, open and fresh feel to it. Click the screenshot below for a large image or visit the online website

An other acquaintance I helped is Bor Boomverzorging. It’s a small tree maintainance company. The logo was allready designed by someone else and I worked it out in business cards, envelopes, website and more.

Check out the website screenshot or visit the online website

And even then there’s at least three more websites I’ve been working on!

This (DutchWrestling) website is going to receive a mayor overhaul. Plus, I’m developing a site for a children’s books writer. And last but not least I’ve been redesigning for a psychoanalysis association, check out the screenshot below.

Please take note that this is design only. Content is still fictional (and borrowed from a well designed psychoanalysis website). Hopefully the site will be finished soon.

So, there’s been lots and lots of going on last 10 months. I’ll keep you posted more frequently from now on!

And actually, he is right. This is quite unique! The way I am fascinated by the crazy aspects of other cultures, this bike thing is pretty weird too. Be sure to also read the comments on the Digg page because they are interesting as well.

In every (bigger) city in The Netherlands, everywhere you look, there are bikes. People use them for transport on short or distances in and around town. And yes, most of them have huge chain-locks, and generator-powered bicycle lights on which the American is in awe about.

I think it’s because of our small but crowded country, and our love for cheap ways of transport that the bike’s the Dutch vehicle of choice. As a kid you learn to ride your bike and you will ride it until you’re about 75 years old (or older depending on your vitality). It’s completely normal. In big cities bikes get stolen all the time, hence the huge locks. Therefore a lot of people have an old bike for city use and a ‘fancy’ bike for longer distances and trips.

I myself have a fancy touring bike, one old bike in the city I work and one bike in the city I live. I’m a big fan of crossing cities per bike and especially in combination with the public transport system it’s a great way to get around. By the way: don’t believe Dutch people who say our public transport sucks, it’s not true. The Dutch just make a sport out of it to complain about it.

Altogether, it’s great to see other people fascinated with something you are so accustomed to. It’s good to realize that after all we are not so different, we are all just humble humans.

So, i got the website almost finished, and went to test under various browsers on Windows and Mac. Firefox, Opera, Safari, IE6 and IE7.. And that’s where it went wrong.

IE7 cut of lines at the baseline of each font. So, for example, the bottoms of the g and p weren’t showing.

I tried everything, because I thought something went wrong with the height of a block-level element. Nothing worked.

Until I saw the declaration line-height: 1; in my CSS. I changed it to 1em, and poof all my troubles where gone…

Isn’t that strange?

It puzzles me, because webdesign guru’s like Eric Meyer and Roger Johanson wrote about it. I couldn’t find any info on IE7 specific and line-height.

Hopefully this bit of experience comes in handy some times on one of your future CSS endeavors!

It was the Korakuen Hall show from april 1st. And it was pretty good. We had a lot of fun watching it. My friends (Rutger and Judith) never watched a NOAH show before but they really liked the action. They also really dug the old guys like Momota and Taue. And of course they rock!

We witnessed some hard clotheslines, and some technical wrestling. There wasn’t really a super-match-up on the card but it was all fairly good. The main event had Akiyama and Rikio win the GHC Tag-team titles from Yone and Morishima which stood out as the best match.

We only skipped about one match, because all the other matches where interesting enough to watch completely. I think I’d rate the entire show ***1/2.

After that I checked out a band that played just around the corner. But after they finished and I drank a few beers with my friends it was quickly to bed because the next day it would be wXw in Oberhausen!

When I woke up I still had tons of things to take care of and as a result of that I totally lost track of time. So I managed to arrive half an hour late to our meeting point. Totally ashamed of course… But luckily Rutger, Judith and Tom where cool and we took off for Oberhausen Germany.

Rutger made a special soundtrack to play in the car which consisted of dark-metal, Johnny Cash, NOFX, Metal I never even heard of, Shakira, psychobilly, heavy-metal, Otto Orgel (check him out… amazing), Queen, and many more…. It was hilarious!

We got in Oberhausen smoothly after about an hour and 15 minutes. The Turbinenhalle (means something like “turbine hall”) where the event took place was an old factory turned into a disco. Great location. It was an afternoon-show because the WWE was having a show in Oberhausen too that evening.

The building was atmospheric for a wrestling show although the hall was quite huge. But it was quite dark and had this wrestling-feel to it. I think there where 150 people in attendance. And in typical wXw style they where all standing around the ring, banging with their hands on the mat.

Emil Sitoci vs El Generico

The show kicked off with Emil Sitoci vs. El Generico. Sitoci is pretty much the best wrestler from Holland and El Generico is a Canadian who wrestles in the US indy scene.

This was a really great match to start off with. It had a lot off fast paced action. Sitoci played a big heel and Generico was the fan favorite. Very nice match. In the end there was an exchange of yakuza kicks and Sitoci gave Generico a pretty big one. Sitoci wins in true heel fashion after a kick to the family jewels.

Considering the amount of WWE fans in the audience (and there could’ve been many more) this was a great match to start off with. Nice job by both men.

Street-fight: Absolute Andy & Steve Douglas vs Murat Bosporus & Thumbtack Jack

Next on the card was a street-fight. First off the teams do very funny promo’s and then the action gets right under way. How much I like Andy and Murat, this match was not very good. It was decent, but Andy and Murat can do so much better, technically.

And for wXw standards the “street-fight” part was pretty tame. But  the effort was all over. Thumbtack Jack (who made his wXw return) did an insane dive from about 3 meters of scaffold to the concrete, where Steve Douglas was flat out, landing mostly on his face. Ouch!

The match ends with a half-nelson suplex by Douglas through a board (can’t really call it a table). Okay match, could’ve been better but that’s not really the wrestler’s fault.

Diego Latino vs Cheerleader Melissa

Short comedy match with funny promo by Latino. Melissa destroys him in minutes.

Tengkwa vs Cheerleader Melissa vs Payday Patterson

My favourite dutch wrestler Tengkwa took on Cheerleader Melissa and Payday Patterson. I saw Melissa on GSW Internetianal Impact I and although I don’t like women’s wrestling, this gal impressed me. Great performer and she isn’t afraid to take some big blows. But she can dish out as well. As would Patterson experience.

Patterson was unknown to me but he’s from the USA and apparently does a lot of comedy. He was funny as hell. And when he was “dancing” with Melissa and tries to kiss her, she hits him on his nose. And immediately the blood starts flowing. A comedy worker with blood all over his face. Very strange sight.

Afterwards I learned he broke his nose there… Wow.

Patterson proved he can also wrestle a good match. Because this match was hard-hitting and full of action. Melissa dished out a vertabreaker (ouch!) and Tengkwa showed some of his big moves as well. There where some near falls where both Patterson and Melissa kick out “matrix style”. You’ve got to see to believe!

Tengkwa wins with a great submission. I like wins by submission here. It’s done so little and when it’s done it’s often poorly executed. This one was great. Fast and painful. Like a submission is supposed to be.

Go Shiozaki & Atsushi Aoki vs Ares & Marc Roudin

Finally, the Japanese wrestlers (which I mostly came for) in action. When the hometown of Shiozaki was announced it was fun to see Shiozaki and Aoki giggle about the pronunciation. Language is a funny thing.

This match was great. It went on for 35 minutes, and I love such long matches. This one had good basic wrestling and dominating by both teams. Ares has the best facial expressions in the world. Seriously.

Aoki has that typical “young Japanese” look and Shiozaki looked like a heavyweight in this match. Shiozaki carried most of the match with his charisma and talent. I think he can become a big star in the future.

The match built up to a sequence of big moves where all wrestlers took each others offense. The match ended with Shiozaki who gave Roudin some big hits and his finisher. It looked perfectly credible and a great way to end this match. Totally cool.

Davey Richards vs Bad Bones

Bad Bones is ICWA European champ and that means quite something here in Europe. And Davey Richards was the USA star for this show. Although I must admit I didn’t know him, that’s how little USA wrestling I watch.

The match was very stiff. It had an elbow from Richards on Bones where he first asked the crowd to be silent. And then…. thunk… elbow smash. Incredible….

This match was a true main-event to this show. It had great action from two muscular athletes. And again, someone bleeds from the nose. This time Bad Bones (which is an awful name by the way).

At the end the momentum turns a few times with both wrestlers hitting near falls. Bad Bones delivers a mighty spear but eventually it’s Richards who wins by submission.

After the match the contestants who are in the “16 carat gold tournament” and the “king of europe tournament” come down the ring for some teaser-action. Sitoci, Richards, El Generico, Bad Bones and Shiozaki show that these are going to be great shows.

In the end Generico gets his revenge and drop Sitoci hard with his brainbuster on the turnbuckle.

It had been a while since I’d seen a live show but it was really fun. We had a fun road-trip, the weather was nice and sunny, and the wrestling was great. I hope wXw keeps having these great shows. And then I think I should do this more often…

The pictures in this writing where all taken by Judith, so props to her!

The first promotion I ever watched was New Japan. I was a twelve year old kid back then and I have always had a soft spot for this promotion. These days I like to watch anything as long as it’s good -quality wrestling, but it’s a nice thing that the first complete show I watch in one year is actually one from New Japan.

I’ll review every match of this show and for every match I’ll give a rating. In the end I’ll give my opinion about the show in general. The rating is in the old-school rating format. This means I can give five stars, one star means awful and five means excellent. 1/2 or for instance 3/4 can also be awarded. So **1/2 means that I awarded two and a halve stars.

Oh, and before we start off with the first match: you should know that this review obviously contains spoilers and results!

Yujiro & Tetsuya Naito vs. Takashi Uwano & Mitsuhide Hirasawa

This match is all about the basics. It starts off with some basic mat-work. Then some typical tag-team style singling out the opponent (Naito gets most of the damage here). And even when the higher impact moves come in, they are basic. It’s hard hitting, but very basic. I like it. It’s better when the basics are done right than that all the poorly built-up flippetyflop action you see so much.

The match ends quite sudden when Yujiro hits a slow but mean looking german suplex on Hirasawa. This is really nice to get the show going, nothing too special but absolutely not dull.

Rating: ***

Tiger Mask, El Samurai, Dick Togo & TAKA Michinoku vs. Jushin Thunder Liger, Jado, Gedo & Shuji Kondo

Most of these wrestler belong to my list of favorite light-heavyweights of all time. It even includes my favorite wrestler ever: Jushin Liger. So I’m a happy camper.

The match starts well well balanced with Liger and Tiger Mask but soon the highflying is all over the place. This is also New Japan, and I love it! But it isn’t all highflying chaos in this match, it flows back and forth between the heels (the CTU, Liger and friends) and the good-guys.

But when the action gets more interesting Shuji Kondo is mistakenly hit by Liger (multiple times) which is actually quite funny to watch. Then Kondo and his companion “Brother” Yashi turn against the rest of the CTU which is the beginning of the end of this match. To bad, because I would have loved it to go on.

The positive thing is that we get to see Dick Togo’s senton (the man just rules) in the finishing. In the aftermath Liger and Tiger Mask both almost get unmasked which in my opinion wasn’t a really good thing.

Rating: **3/4

Riki Choshu & Takashi Iizuka vs. Toru Yano & Tomohiro Ishii

When I started watching wrestling more than ten years ago, Choshu already was a seasoned veteran. And now he’s still competing in the stiff competition of New Japan. Respect!

The match is o.k, nothing more, but Choshu is the absolute highlight for me. He isn’t afraid to take some bumps (unlike other legends in the business) and still throws in an amazing hard-hitting lariat. Wow!

Yano and Ishii don’t really get to play out their bad guy role in this match, and Choshu just takes a few bumps and delivers some mean looking clotheslines. Iizuka finishes the match with a cross-arm breaker in quite sudden fashion. Nothing special,  but watching Choshu in action is always fun.

Rating: **

Manabu Nakanishi vs. Shiro Koshinaka

Again a real veteran in action. Although I’m not very familiar with Koshinaka, he does ring a bell. Nakanishi is a more recent New Japan star and: man, is he a power house or what? As soon as the match starts you notice how much heat there is between the two. They really hit it off!

The match has a nice build-up and the action is hard-hitting and stiff. The head buts they give each other probably hurt like hell but look kind of stupid actually. But apart from that, this is a typical strong-style matchup.

When Koshinaka starts flying in with his 80’s style hip attacks, Nakanishi sells them like he is supposed to. And this way Koshinaka comes out on top.

Decent match, the fact the crowd gets more in to this one (due to the charisma of both men) gives it just that little more.

Rating: ***

Shinsuke Nakamura vs. Togi Makabe

This match puts bad boy Togi Makabe from the GBH faction agains Nakamura who many see as the future of puroresu. And I think ‘many’ are right, Nakamura is going to be one of the best. He already is awesome. It’s hard to describe but this man just has ‘it’. He captivates.

In typical Nakamura fashion, Shinsuke gets dominated for most of the time and only hits a few offensive kicks and moves. But slowly Nakamura gets more and more offense in and the match becomes more attractive. But Nakamura’s variety of moves proves to be too much for Makabe and Nakamura wins quite easily.

Nakamura needs a more high profile opponent to make his matches more interesting. I guess that’ll be just a matter of time.

Rating: ***

Hiroyoshi Tenzan & TARU vs. Masahiro Chono & Milano Collection A.T.

Wow, Milano Collection A.T. just has the coolest fake dog he walks to the ring. And TARU’s mask is awesome. It makes Tenzan’s mask look a little dumb. But Tenzan doesn’t need that, he probably is the MVP New Japan has had around last years. And there’s Chono… Yeah, I don’t like Chono, never have actually. But still this match looks promising on paper.

The match evolves as the heels Tenzan and TARU decide to tear Milano Collection apart. Milano takes a very nasty looking heel kick to the family jewels and barely kicks out of a 3 count. Ouch! Well, he does get the crowd to support him… (for those who aren’t familiar with puroresu: the Japanese audience is usually very quiet)

And he deserves the suport because he uses some great moves. For instance: he ties Tenzan to the bottom ropes in innovative fashion – see to believe – and he ducks a lariat in true ‘matrix’ style. Cool!

When the hot tag is made, the match becomes more fast paced and has a lot of momentum-turns and near falls. In the end the GBH faction helps Tenzan and TARU to win and Chono get’s pounded on a bit until Nakamura cleans house for the save.

Fun match, Chono was o.k, Tenzan good as always and Milano did most of the work, and he did well. Only downside was TARU. He looks impressive but isn’t anywhere near impressive inside the ring. Nevertheless still a good, solid matchup.

Rating: ***1/2

IWGP Jr. Heavyweight Title: Minoru (c) vs. Wataru Inoue

The IWGP Jr. Heavyweight title is one of my favorite competitions in the world. I think Minoru is a really good champ and Inoue is a great challenger. A promising match!

Inoue takes advantage of Minoru’s injured shoulder, and damages it even more. Minoru really sell it, and Inoue gets a lot of close falls and near submissions on Minoru. But eventually Minoru gets some momentum back, mainly because of some devastating kicks to the face and release german suplexes.

The momentum shifts a few times between Inoue and Minoru, making it exiting to watch. Minoru hits some backdrops landing Inoue on his head. Nasty! The finish is great with a submission that’s totally in line with the story of the match.

I would have loved it when the match went on for a little while. But still this was a great defense from Minoru.

Rating: ***1/2

Kurt Angle & Yuji Nagata vs. Giant Bernard & Travis Tomko

When Kurt Angle left the WWE I immediately said, I hope he’ll wrestle in Japan some day, New Japan or NOAH would be great. And now, he’s wrestling for New Japan. Great news!

But this match… I don’t know, why wouldn’t you book Angle in an exiting one on one match against a Japanese superstar. Why is Angle wrestling two gajins (westerners)? And why oh why Bernard and Tomko?

Although I know Japanese people love big, white, slow, fierce looking wrestlers; but I don’t. And although Bernard and Tomko play their role as big men not bad at all. It still is a big mismatch. Just pit Angle against Nagata one on one and it could be a hell of a match.

So you’ll probably understand I didn’t expect much of this match. But overall the action wasn’t that bad. The build-up was just lacking. And that’s what I most of the time like about Angle. He knows how to build up a match. Apart from some dominating by Tomko and Bernard all Angle did was some of his signature moves.

Nagata was solid, but also didn’t shine here. But wow, is he immensely popular these days! The crowd has there really cool (and small) Nagata signs they hold up. Looks great!

What struck me most about this match was the Japanese crowd chanting “USA, USA”. That is soooo weird!

On beforehand this match was a let down. It wasn’t as bad as many say, but it wasn’t good either. Please make Angle come back in a one on one match!

Rating: **1/2

IWGP Heavyweight Title: Hiroshi Tanahashi (c) vs. Koji Kanemoto

The match between these young main-eventers starts off with some fast, well balanced mat wrestling. It builds up slowly an both wrestlers gain some and lose some. Nice slow but intelligent build-up.

After this, the match evolves in a real strong style encounter. Hard hitting, stiff action with a lot of kicks and punches. It evolves some spots with boot scrapes which is probably one of my favorite moves ever. Sophisticated but oh, so brutal!

And the match gets more and more intense. And although New Japan portraits Kanemoto as a junior heavyweight, he’s giving Tanahashi a hell of a fight! The crowd gets really into the match and starts counting along with the near-falls. A sound so familiar for high profile matches in Japan.

The more intense the action gets, the more the crowd rallies behind Kanemoto and both Kanemoto as Tanahashi pull out all stops in a hard fought battle. The crowd is eating it up, as am I!

In the end, Tanahashi manages to win this close encounter and retains his IWGP Title. “This match was really good” is all I can think about. It really had everything a IWGP title defense needs. Solid build-up, stiff kicks and intense action. The climax of the match had a lot of signature moves and close falls. Just the way I like it. By far the best match on the card.

It’s nice to see New Japan taking steps into the future with a main event like this. These two young superstars put on a great match!

Rating: ****

Overall

The entire card was filled with solid, but somewhat mediocre wrestling. Some matches where a little better then the other. There was a nice mixture of veterans, youngsters, juniors and superstars on the card.

Tenzan & TARU vs. Chono & Milano Collection AT and Minoru vs. Inoue where the better matches. The main event was the highlight, it was so much better then the rest of the card. But hey, it’s better to have an outstanding main event than a disappointing one right?

Overall I would rate this show: *** . Good show but not too spectacular. But I’m definitely going to check out NJPW’s next big event, this show’s main event made me hungry for more.

Hope you liked this bit of pro-wrestling review! If you want to see more of these, drop me a line in my e-mail or comments.