Tokyo trip
Sun. 18.November - Thurs. 29.November.2018
DAY 2 Tuesday, 20. November
I woke up around 07 in the morning, but rather than getting up right away, I turned on the TV to see if there was anything interesting on. They were still talking about the Nissan guy on most channels, but on one channel there was this program about a cat. I remember seeing this type of thing mentioned in a documentary years before, how some smaller, countryside train stations have cats as mascots for the station. Or if I remember it correctly, the cat actually has the title "station master" or something like that. The cat was wearing a cute, tiny conductor's cap! They followed the cat around and just filming the cat's daily life. When it was out on a walk, while it was being groomed, etc. I was quite nice and relaxing program to start your day with.
Yesterday, while we were at the convenience store, we forgot to buy anything to eat for breakfast since we were too tired to think ahead. So instead of going to the store again, we headed down to the teeny, tiny diner in the hotel lobby. I think they only had seating for max twenty people there, if the place had been full. The place was never full while we were there, but the staff would still ask people to wait outside until a table cleared. I guess maybe they don't like seat people at the same table with strangers. You can't help but to notice how the Japanese people eat their food and then leave and don't stay to hang around, or at least the Salarymans don't. The diner's clientele seemed mostly to consist of them.
The breakfast was a mix of Japanese and western food, or you were of course free to pick whatever you wanted, since it was a buffet. They had french toast, bacon, scrambled egg, fresh salad and fruits, and also miso soup, rice, different sorts of fish, beans and more I'm forgetting. This was the first time I tasted miso soup, I was unsure if I liked it or not, but once I got used to the taste, now I really like it! Also a very noticeable difference comparing this hotel breakfast to any Finnish hotel breakfast was the "portion" sizes. Everything was so tiny! For example, in the poster you can see that banana, cut to size and I suppose you were only allowed to take a few pieces, in a Finnish hotel you get to take the whole banana...
After breakfast and a quick detour through our room to get our stuff, we started walking to the train station from where we traveled to Okachimachi station. There were three stores in this area I wanted to visit. Now with the pocket WiFi it was easy-peasy to find our way around!
First place we visited was called Daiso, a 100 yen shop, where everything (unless priced otherwise) was only a hundred yen! They had a little bit of everything , but mostly kitchen and office stuff. This Daiso was a smaller one, later during the week when my Mom visited another Daiso on her own, she told me it was far bigger, on two floors! This Daiso shared the space on the top floor of the building with a candy shop and a cafe. Mom really loved Daiso and other 100 Yen shops, I really liked them too, but I mostly just browsed and didn't buy much. The only two things I bought from this Daiso was a Gudetama themed spoon and a protecting sleeve for my Pasmo card.
On our way out, I also went inside the candy shop, I think it was called Golden Store. I didn't buy much from there either, mostly because I knew the next two places we were heading for, would put a dent in my wallet. I bought a small bag of of rose flavored candy, a One Piece chocolate egg and, out of curiosity, some apple jello. We headed downstairs and exited the building. Before we continued our way, I popped open that apple jello and ate it. I read somewhere that the Japanese consider it to be rude if you're walking and eating at the same time, so that's why I took the chance to eat it now while there was also a trash can nearby. What they say about how hard it is to find a trash bin in Japan also turned out to be true. Jello seemed to be a popular dessert, in every food store we went to you were always able to find some sort of jello. While in Finland it is very rare to find any kind of ready made jello. The apple jello I had was okayish, not terrible, but neither that good that I would like to have another one. Before we continued on our way, we got curious what was in the basement level of the building, since there was such a traffic of people coming and going from there. So we went downstairs to have a look. It was a supermarket! We took a look around the place and they had so many things we wanted to try out. We decided to come back later to buy our evening meals here, once we were ready to head back to the hotel. This store became our favorite place in regards to buying food, no other store we visited could match it.
Our next destination was a shop called Hobby off, where they sell used goods, specifically toys and figures. I bought 24 things in total! Dragon Ball Z, Moomin, Godzilla, Dragon Quest, the Lion King and Pokémon! 24 may sound a lot, but most of them are tiny figures that are the size which fit inside a capsule of a Gachapon machine. The majority of them also cost less than 500 yen. I did make one big purchase in this store, that cost me 2160 yen. I found a big statue of the classic Sonic the Hedgehog (maybe 25 cm in height, not that huge actually), complete in box. This was November, with Christmas around the corner. As soon as I saw it, I knew I had to get it. Not for myself, though. My friend is a Sonic fan, and I knew that I wanted to find some Sonic stuff for him as a Christmas gift. I had imagined it would be easy to find as much Sonic merchandise I could carry, but strangely enough, it was very hard to come by. Later, during our stay, I saw this exact same statue twice (for a higher price, without the original box). So, this Sonic statue was size-wise my biggest purchase, but I did find something more expensive later on...
The next place we were heading for was Yamashiroya toy store further down the street. While we were walking there, we took a small detour and went to look inside one of those Sega game centers that are everywhere. Aside from the arcade games and claw machines there was also a small selection of Gachapon machines. I bought my first gacha here, which was a cute, miniature Japanese school backpack or a randoseru as they are apparently called. I didn't get the color I wanted, but I was happy with it none the less.
Now at Yamashiroya toy store. Outside the store, they had a big selection of Gachapon machines. Here, I bought my second gacha from a machine with eeveelutions, I got Sylveon!
Also outside, there were these quite famous vending machines decorated with Marvel characters. I was slightly disappointed there wasn't Marvel themed drinks, there were only regular drinks you could find in any other vending machine.
Inside, Yamashiroya is seven floors packed with goodies. The spaces left for people to move around are very narrow so you have to be careful not to bump into anything or anyone. The whole store is also extremely loud. Imagine, they are playing music really loud and on top of that, playing commercials even louder and on top of that imagine every toy that is capable of producing any kind of sound is turned on. You almost wish you'd brought earplugs.
The top floor was dedicated to Kirby stuff. I'm not sure, but I got the impression this was only temporary, maybe they change this floor every month with a different theme. Something about this floor didn't seem as finished as the rest of the floors, as it wasn't even as fully packed as the rest. I don't really remember the layouts for the rest of the floors that well, one or two were dedicated to Gundam and other building stuff and there was also a floor for western pop culture stuff like Harry Potter, Marvel, Star Wars and so forth.
Oh, I didn't leave empty handed from here either. I bought 16 things from here in total, most of it was Pokémon, but also some Moomin and DBZ. This store was also the first one to ask me, if I wanted my purchases tax free or not. I should just have said no to avoid the wait and hassle while the clerk stamps the receipts to my passport. Even my mom didn't leave empty handed, but she settled with a Godzilla sticker.
Before we rounded back to the supermarket, we again took a detour through a Sega game station, but this time I tried my luck with a claw machine. Might have been some sort of kiddy version because it was so small, though. I had no luck with the first machine I tried, but I switched to a second one and I actually won, barely! The claw wasn't quite on top of the hole, when the item fell down, but it bounced off the wall and fell right in the hole and I got it! The prize was a small, cute little balancing penguin holding up a heart sign. I translated the sign later and I believe it says "Thank you". I also tried to look up what the penguin character is called and the conclusion I got is that it's called Rurutea (Lulutea?) or something like that.
We got us some food from the supermarket and took the train back to our hotel. Back in our room, I couldn't wait to try out some of the stuff I bought today.
First, the stuff from the candy store:
Rose candy. The candies are very soft and chewy. I was a little sceptical about the rose flavor, they smell like perfume, but the taste is really sweet! A small bag of these cost only 105 yen (about 0,85€?). I would buy these again!
One Piece chocolate egg. It looks like Kinder chocolate, but the taste is far from it. Very "floury" feel to it, i.e. very cheap, bad tasting chocolate. The surprise gift was a miniature bust of a One Piece character, out of the 16 characters to collect, I got Mihawk. Cost 213 yen, not that expensive, but the chocolate isn't worth it. And the mini character busts were relatively easy to find in any store that sold used figures.
From Yamashiroya toy store:
Dragon Ball Super snack pot and choco filled waffle. The waffle wasn't nothing special, not bad, but not really good either, just okay. I got a Son Goku sticker with it, the very same picture that is on the waffle's wrapping. I don't like how super deformed they made the characters, they're not chibiesque enough to be cute!
DBS snacks, or chips, whatever you want to call them. I can't specify what flavour they were supposed to be, but they smelled like a cup of noodles. Maybe they were just some regular non-spicy "grill" flavor. And the surprise gift I got was a cardboard coin with a picture of Trunks and on the flip side there was some sort of code, that, I'm guessing is for some sort of campaign or a mobile game maybe? The snacks were pretty good, but the portion size is laughably small, or I'm too used to the mega size bag of chips we have in Finland.
Lastly, bought from the supermarket, a strawberry daifukumochi. Texture wise, this isn't like anything I've ever eaten before. The pink "frosting" is very springy, or what's the word, elastic? Even a knife didn't cut through it very easily. The filling was sweet red bean paste, but honestly, I thought it didn't taste like anything, not sweet nor salty. All the sweetness I could taste came from the half raw strawberry in the middle. It took a while to get used to eating mochi, but now I kind of like it. As far as the flavors go, I think they are kind of bland, but I relly like the texture when you bite into one. Now I also understand why so many people nearly choke to death while eating these if you're not careful.
Around 10 PM I was channel surfing the TV. They were still talking about the damn Nissan guy on most channels, but I was happy to find a channel that was showing good old Dragon Ball Z!And after DBZ ended, they showed a Gundam anime (not sure which one of them) followed by an episode of Tokyo Ghoul. To my disappointment, Tuesday evening's were pretty much the only time I saw anime on the TV.
a weird Dragon Ball commercial
DAY 3 Wednesday, 21. November
Our main goal for the day was getting to the Shibuya Disney store to buy our tickets to Tokyo Disneyland. Shibuya was pretty much on the other side of the map from our hotel location, so it took a 30 minute train ride to get there. Again, we messed up with picking the right exit, but now with Google Maps to help us, it didn't feel as such a big deal. We deliberately arrived in Shibuya a little early, before the Disney store even opened because while we were here, we also wanted to have a look at the famous Hachiko statue. Somehow, we managed to avoid the "Hachiko exit" which would have taken us directly to the statue from the station, we picked some other exit and wound up taking a longer route there.
But it was alright, while walking the street heading for the also famous Shibuya crossing I came across these Pikachu decorated vending machines! Unlike the Marvel one, these ones actually had Pikachu decorated bottles in it! I didn't know if the bottles contained juice or soda, but I bought one anyway. I was surprised/disappointed that instead of a Pikachu bottle I got a Psyduck one! The drink turned out to be mixed fruit/vegetable juice, which wasn't really to my liking to be honest.
People were being surprisingly polite, letting others taking their turns standing next to the statue to take photos. In my pictures of the statue, there seem to be very few people around , but I promise you that was not the case. People were also very generous in that regard that they let the folks who just wanted a picture of the statue take their time to do so. Nearby to the statue was also this beautiful mural I have rarely seen mentioned anywhere. Only here in Shibuya did we see these big posters advertising a big international horse galloping race that was about to happen the following weekend. We did actually consider going, because we've never seen a proper gallop race before (we don't have those in Finland), but realizing how it would mess up all other things we had planned, we decided best not to go.
After seeing Hachiko we started heading in the direction of the Disney store. On our way there, we also dropped in a store called Village Vanguard. I knew they were supposed to have a small selection of Moomin stuff I was interested in seeing. In regards of their Moomin stuff, I held on to my money, I didn't really find anything I liked or the ones I liked were too expensive/big. They also had a lot of Disney and other western pop culture stuff (Simpsons, Gremlins, etc.). I really wanted to buy an art book of Akira Toriyama's Dragon Quest illustrations, but the book was so big and heavy and I didn't want to carry it around with me for the rest of the day. I considered coming back for it later during the day, but ultimately didn't because I also considered how much weight it would add to my luggage at the end of our trip. I didn't leave empty handed though, my mom really wanted a "Maneki Neko" (the lucky cat waving its paw) for herself, so I bought one for her and for myself, I bought a Kingdom Hearts "sea salt ice cream" thingy and also a cool looking Amaterasu sticker from the game Ôkami.
Village Vanguard entrance
We were finally at the Disney store! Out of all the Disney store's I've visited this one was definitely the nicest looking and least crammed. There was actually room to move around! All of the rooms were nicely decorated and almost in every room they had these cute statues of various Disney characters. Since this was November, there were already a lot of Christmas themed stuff for sale, mainly those tree ornaments. We had a look around the whole store before getting in line on the third floor for our Disneyland tickets. The ticket counter was the busiest place in the store, but it was also very efficient, I didn't have to wait for long for my turn. Once I got our tickets, we still wandered the store for a while, but aside for the tickets I didn't buy anything else. I was hoping they'd had some Star Wars stuff for sale, but it was non existent. That was a little disappointing, but their Marvel selection was also small, so I guess they are more into the classic animated Disney than the newer stuff.
The next place we visited was this multi story Tokyu Hands store. I was looking for a specific thing and unfortunately I couldn't find it. But! I didn't leave empty handed! On the top floor where they had the Gundam/other miniature building section I found some Star Wars lightsaber chopsticks! I bought the Darth Maul variation, of course. This was also the first place where I was confused over the tax stuff. The price tag on the chopsticks said a 1000 yen, but at the register the price was actually 1290 yen. The clerk was very apologetic when he asked me for the missing 290 yen when I had just handed him a 1000 yen bill and I thought I was done. After that, I tried better to keep in mind the tax addition to save me and the person at the register further embarrassment in the following stores I shopped at.
We were getting tired and didn't explore Tokyu Hands fully, but a fun thing I noticed was that in the staircases between the floors they had hung up on the walls these manga spreads of Naruto and Bleach. Not sure why they were there, but it was cool to see them none the less.
After exiting Tokyu Hands we walked down the street looking for a convenience store to buy some lunch. We came across this building site with a wall around it. The wall was covered with panels from the Akira manga. Most of the panels pictured explosions and ruins, so fitting, I guess? We found us a convenience store and took a lunch break. While taking a break, I came to think of how much more street art I've been seeing here in Shibuya than the other places we've been so far. The graffiti I took a picture of was in an alley across the street from the konbini.
official art vs. street art
The next place I wanted to go was Shibuya Mandarake store. While searching for the place, we came across a Can★Do, which is another 100-yen shop, and my mom really wanted to go in and have a look. I didn't find anything special in here, I came close to buying some really cute sticker sheets, but decided not to, since I suspected I was going to spend a whole lot at Mandarake. The only thing I left with was some Gegege no Kitaro noodles I was going to eat once we retired to our hotel for the evening.
Engrish at Can★Do
We finally got to Mandarake, which was on the basement level and smelled like one too (seriously, the place really had a funky smell to it). I first had a look at their figure section, and while I was there I overheard a couple speaking Swedish. I wanted to say something to them, like "nice, to hear someone speaking Swedish for a change", but I didn't because I thought they might think of me as some eavesdropping weirdo. Understanding what people are saying is a thing you don't realize you'll miss. Hearing a language you recognize, always creates this happy moment like, "hey, I understood that!" when you otherwise feel like you're in a bubble of your own because you can't understand what's being said around you. Between some shelves, I found a couple of boxes of plushies, I dug around them and found a really cute Mew and a Jolteon plush. I considered buying them both, but ultimately I chose Jolteon over Mew because it was still in a sealed bag with its original tag. I took a look at the trading card section and drooled over one cabinet with Dragon Ball Heroes cards, but some of those cards were way too expensive. Some part of my brain keeps telling me I can't spend the equality of 50€ on one single card, no matter how rare it is. I really wanted that Kuriza card, but it was not meant to be.
This is where the fun begins! I moved over to the doujinshi (for women) section of the store. Since I can't read Japanese I had a real hard time finding what I was looking for. I don't think the series were categorized in alphabetic order, maybe by popularity or by their publisher (like Shonen Jump-series being its own category maybe?). I was looking for DBZ doujinshi's but couldn't find them directly, I wasn't looking for Naruto doujin's but it had so many shelves reserved for it, it was always easy to find. And once I found Naruto, from there I found the shelf with Death Note doujinshis and while I was browsing them I recognized Vegeta's spiky hair and pink shirt on one of the spines of the comic books and discovered the Dragon Ball section all on my own! I cherry picked out the comics that had nice looking covers and /or character that I like, because that is pretty much the only thing you can do since you aren't allowed to open the plastic pockets and look inside what the comics are actually about. The only indicators you can base your judgement on is the cover and the price of the Doujin (and if there is an R18 label, but that wasn't always that noticeable). The covers can be very misleading most of the time. About the price, I have read that if the price is high on the comic it is either because the artist is very popular or because it's porn, "the higher the price, the dirtier it is" or something like that. So, I tried to stick within the low and middle price range to avoid the dirtier stuff (and now in retrospect, I can say this strategy worked, mostly, except when I deliberately made a few exceptions). After Dragon Ball I tried to look for Star Wars, but I pretty soon gave up on that and asked the clerk where I could find it. And by "ask" I mean I pointed at the written down question I had in my notebook and showed them a picture of Star Wars. It worked! They showed me where I could find them! The selection was considerably smaller than the others I had looked at, but still it was there! I left Mandarake without any figures, but I found for myself a cute Jolteon plush and four doujinshi of both Star Wars and Dragonball Z and two Death Note ones.
It was getting late so, we started heading back to the station, but once again, on our way there, we took a detour through a Sega game center.I tried one of those bigger claw machines a couple of times and tried to win a Dragon Ball GT figure, but with no success. This place also had Gachapon machines outside, I got two different cat hats for the shits and giggles, one in the shape of a candy wrapper and the other one was a pear. I'm sure our cat will hate them.
We took the train back to Kanda, but instead of going directly to the hotel, we looked up on Google a food store nearby that was slightly bigger than a standard convenience store. They had a little bit better selection of items, but still nothing compared to the great store we visited in Okachimachi.
Back at the hotel, and after our evening dinner, I opened the doujins I bought today and had a look at what I got. I was successful at picking out pretty harmless ones, some of them were confusing more than anything, but still had nice art styles. Out of the 10 that I bought, I'd say only one of them was a dud. It was a Star Wars one, the cover looked nice and all, but the art style on the inside didn't really appeal to me, and since I can't read Japanese, so based on the visual storytelling alone, I got very little out of it. It was fun opening these, because they are like blind bags, you don't know what you're getting.
Shibuya in the evening
to be continued....
