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It seems that quite a number of people were fooled by Akaru’s April Fool’s post. Yeah well, don’t despair. Things like that happen. I myself was fooled by something else for more than one and a half years until I finally found out the truth just a couple of hours ago. So trust me, I know how it feels when you think you’re really stupid. Here’s the story, you’re gonna love it…

How many times did I write on this blog that I’m dying to hear Keito speak English one of these days? I don’t know, countless times probably. Turns out I’ve already heard him speak English over and over again. I just never knew it was him. And the great thing is: the first time I heard him speak English I was just a few meters away from him. Like, for real.

It was just three days ago when I wrote on this blog: “according to Wikipedia Keito officially entered Johnny’s on August 14th 2006. Daibouken started on August 15th.
Kamichan saw Daibouken on August 19th. Wow, if all that information is accurate I actually already saw Keito on stage in a concert once.”

Turns out, all that information is accurate indeed. And I have proof.

If you’re a long-time reader of my blog you’ve heard the story a thousand times how when I was in Tokyo for the very first time and I saw the Ya-Ya-yah show on TV I happened tp witness Ryosuke’s and Ryutaro’s first TV appearance in that Junior audition segment. Great story, always makes me very excited and 懐かしい and all. And now it seems that the last time I was in Tokyo… I witnessed one of Keito’s first appearances in a Johnny’s Jr. concert (it was his 8th to be exact, because Daibouken had already been running for a couple of days when I saw it).

Earlier tonight I was going through one of my old magazines, just for the fun of it, and I came across this page where they had baby photos of the Hey!Say!JUMP members. Except, they apparently didn’t have a baby photo of Keito at hand so they printed a picture of Keito when he was 13. And I was looking at that picture and there was Keito standing behind that old guy with the guitar who sang Midnight Train at the Daibouken concert in 2006. Next to the picture it said something about “his ‘rival’ dad, Okamoto Kenichi“, and I was all “Eeeeeehhh!?! What’sですよ！” And suddenly it all came together and made sense.

The thing is, Daibouken was almost two years ago, and I don’t have too many clear memories of it. But one of things I do remember very clearly is that guy with the guitar who sang Midnight Train, because even back then I thought he was very cool and even kinda funny. He didn’t only perform his song, he also plugged his upcoming play in Ginza or whatever it was and he was a bit like “You young folks probably won’t care too much, but tell your mothers about it, they’ll like it”. Something like that, and I thought that was really cute and, in a way, my kind of humour.

Here’s what I wrote in my blog on September 4th, 2006, two weeks after the concert: “After the MC there was this ojisan with a guitar and they sang Midnight Train together. I think the ojisan was the original singer of Midnight Train, but I don’t remember his name. ”

God, how embarrassing. What a n00b I was only two years ago.

Anyhow, here’s a little more of what I wrote about that Daibouken concert in 2006: “…it started with Yuto and this other kid whose name I can’t come up with for the love of God, and they were standing on boxes in the middle of the audience, and music started to play and Yuto and the other boy greeted the audience. Yuto did it in Japanese, and the other kid in English. I thought that was a very nice thing to do, being the only one who “Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls… thank you for coming to the great adventure of Johnny’s Jr.” possibly could have been aimed at, LOL. I have no idea why they greet their audience in English. Probably because it sounds good. I bet they’d never thought that doing so would actually make sense some day.”

Now it occurs to me that one other reason why they greeted their audience in English might of course have been: because they had somebody who could.

Yeah I know, having someone tell you about it is nothing compared to the real thing, so go ahead and listen to it with your own ears. You can (more or less) hear Keito speak for about 10 seconds, then Yuto takes over.

Yeah. So how do I know if that’s really Keito and not some other kid who happens to speak English (except that he sounds like Keito)? Because they spoke with him about an hour later in the MC corner. It’s basically Hikaru and some other guy interviewing Keito. Keito says that he can speak English because he’s been going to school in England. A little later he’s asked him how long he’s been speaking English and he says “four years”, and when he’s asked how old he is now and he says 13 somebody who seems to be exceptionally good at maths concludes that Keito must have started learning English when he was nine years old. Then they reveal that Keito is the son of Okamoto Kenichi and the audience is going “eeeeeeeh?!”, and finally Okamoto-otousan enters the stage, chats a little, and starts performing his song. End of story.

So why do I think all this is so exciting? I don’t know. Maybe because it’s what I love about being a collector. There’s always the chance that suddenly one day one of the things that keep piling up in your collection turns out to be a precious little gem and you never even knew. And I also love it because it’s the first Okaotome moment on record.

Anyway. Problem solved. Keito entered Johnny’s in 2006. I saw him. I heard him speak English. And I even liked his dad, even though I usually don’t like middle aged men all that much.

One question remains though: what else did I miss in the last four years of being in the Johnny’s fandom? O_O

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