It has been a while since my last activity on this blog, because of a lot of wandering about in Tokyo and other activities of exploration. I also had no idea what to call this blog entry, so I chose the name you can see above. One could also have called it Interaction With Locals or Days Of Exploration, which actually sounds better, but I went with the bit more odd choice, as you can see.
Since the last blog entry, we experienced the first and only (until today - sort of) rainy day. It was puring down outside and all the drainage and sewage systems were overloaded. It was also quite warm at the same time, which made going out in rain suits a damp and sweaty experience. That day we mostly spent in the apartment, looking up this and that about Tokyo and living here.
In the evening we went out to get some fresh air and ended up in Uedo, which is a youthly area of the city. There we went around, looking for UFO-machines. This is a kind of hook, that you can move to a desired location, within a box filled with prizes, and then it goes down to grab something, which it hopefully holds on to while moving back over a slide, where the prize will be dropped into, providing the hook has a good enough hold of the prize. We had seen these before, when we went to Akihabara, a place pretty much designed for anime (Japanese cartoons) and manga (Japanese comics) nerds. Buildings with anime figures on several floors and arcade halls filled with these UFO-catchers as well as arcade games and slot machines.
Having seen how difficult it actually is to win something, we wanted to just see what strategies other people were using. After having seen what we deemed enough, we went home and started watching an anime called One Piece (a pirate show!) which is very, very entertaining. There is more than 400 episodes, each with a length of 20 minutes of effective storytelling and several movies, so enough Japanese humor for a long while. We also read up on UFO-catching strategies and decided to go try our luck some day.
That night I had some problems falling asleep and it turned out to be one of many, but I will come to that later. The next day we went to Shinjuku to get some shopping done. We mainly chose this area because we hadn't been there yet. I needed new shorts and I got to know that there was a big camera store in the area as well. Something I had been looking forward to see over here. We took the metro to the Shinjuku Station and started walking around. There were a lot of big malls and shopping centers but all of them were a teeny bit out of our price range. To see an example, have a look at the three melons below.
(Expensive melons: 10.000 yen, 8.000 yen and 5.000 yen)
I will let you calculate the price of them yourselves, as that will give you a bit of brain gymnastics, hopefully. When you have calculated the price, then have another look at the melons in large (that is done by clicking the actual image of the melons). They do have certain resemblances with very, very ordinary net melons, right? That is because THEY ARE! It is just ridiculous.
Anyways, we went on our way to find more reasonably priced shops to do our shopping. We also went into the big camera store (Bic Camera) but everything in there was about 30% more expensive than in Denmark, which is a bit odd, as they advertise being a discount shop. That was a huge disappointment to me, as I had hoped to maybe get some good deals on lenses over here. Seems I will have to wait until I get back home, unless it is because of Tokyo being slightly more expensive with commodities than elsewhere in Japan. Luckily the food is cheap! Well, not those melons above, though. Crazy.
So, we went on with our search for less expensive things. Below are some images, just to give you an idea of the neighborhood we were in.
We soon got ourselves into an area with a lot of arcade halls, meaning UFO-catchers. It didn't take long for any of us to decide that we wanted to try and win something. SO we went into one place and started looking for things we wanted to try our skills and luck with. Because of being very entertained by One Piece, the anime we started seeing, I wanted to try my luck with a figure of one of the characters from that show. It took 2500 yen to get it right, but I did it! As the only one of the three of us. I know it sounds ridiculous to spend that much on something that unimportant, but there is just something about those machines that makes it all worth it in the end. Below is a picture of me with the prize.
(As touristy as they get)
Now having tried and won, I wanted to push my luck even further and I spotted a teddy bear that I thought was worth a go. I had seen in one of the videos on how to win the prizes on youtube that if you spotted something really difficult to get (i.e. far from the slide where you were supposed to get it to) you could ask an employee of the place to put it in another spot. I did this and he actually put the teddy bear in a spot where it was almost impossible not to get into the slide. All I had to do was to push down on the bear's head and voilá - another prize for Esben! Having won again, my lust for the catchers had been satisfied, and we went out to get some dinner.
(The teddy bear I won!)
We wanted to go to Roppongi to check out the area, as we were going there the following day (Friday) to party with one of Annette's friends who is also living here. We had initially decided to try and find some food there, but then we came by a nice side alley with a lot of small restaurants in it and we decided to try and find something there.
(The side alley with restaurants)
We eventually found a place that served okonomiyaki, a kind of pancake with a lot of different fill - mainly seafood. It was a quite nice place, in the manner of being full of local people and having some strange, interesting smells coming from the kitchen. The okonomiyaki was small but excellent. Tasted a lot like an omelet with tuna in it, but somehow also of more. Hard to really describe.
(Inside the restaurant)
We then ventured out into the now dark city to find the station that had the right trains going to Roppongi. On the way there we saw a couple of strange, but awesome things. A pretty customized scooter and a giant Hello Kitty figure.
(The scooter)
(The Hello Kitty figure)
(A shot of a street in the night time)
After being amused by the few sights, we took the subway to Roppongi and found ourselves some Japanese people in a bar called Gas Panic. First, we went by a place called Tokyo Sports Bar, which is owned by a Welsh man who warned us against sake, where we had a beer before going to the other bar. It was all very fun and it got quite a bit more late than expected for Caspar and I. We took a taxi home and went to bed around 6 in the morning.
(A blurry picture of the Japanese people we found)
When Caspar and I woke up the next day, Annette had gone out shopping with her friend and Caspar and I decided to go out in our back yard to get rid of some of our hang-overs. We sat down at the same stones in the water as last time and Caspar started playing a bit of guitar. We were the only ones who were there, until a couple of young folks came and sat down with us. A Japanese guy and a Chinese girl. I had just been sitting and taken photos up until then, which you can see below.
(The Japanese and Chinese)
The two young folks were tourists and had traveled all around Japan in two months. We talked a little about Denmark and music and then they left. Caspar and I then walked around for a little while and he could strap his amplifier to his pants and walk while playing. It looked like this:
He got several compliments for his playing while we walked around the university grounds which was quite cool. We walked by a football arena in the middle of the university area and next to it was a dojo to practice katana fighting. It was very interesting to see the training in the dojo, but I didn't want to disturb the people by taking photos, so I took a few from the outside.
(I liked the colors in this one)
(The football field)
(Caspar at a random place, playing)
(The katana dojo)
(A practicing student)
After that, we went home to change for the night out. Sadly, I have no more pictures for the blog, so the rest will be plain ol' text, but as the days have been somewhat quiet, there is not much to tell about.
There was, of course, the evening of party, which was, for the most part, one long walk from place to place in Roppongi. Well, first of all we needed to locate Annette's friend, who were waiting at the Roppongi Hills gate. The only problem was that there were several of those, so we walked from metro station to metro station to find the one she was sitting at. Finally we found her and could start the evening of fun. The only problem was to find out where we wanted to go.
We only knew of the Gas Panic and the Tokyo Sports Bar, so we chose to go to the Sports Bar first. There were not many people at that place, so we decided to go elsewhere. We then found out that most places has a cover charge (entry fee) of two to three thousand yen and that the drinks were about 1000 yen.
Pondering a bit about our situation and the outrageous prices, we decided to head for a 7-Eleven to get some drinks from there (they are quite cheap here). After having had a refreshing beverage we decided to venture on.
The whole night just went by with walking from place to place and finding everything to be to expensive. I did, however, get to see the famous restaurant of the fight in Kill Bill Vol. 1 between Uma Thurman and the Crazy 88. That was quite interesting.
When it got light and the subways started to go again, we decided to head home again after a long night of walking. It was quite a disappointment, but now we know how not to do it again.
The following day, Saturday, we slept long, and Caspar and I went down to Tokyo Dome around evening time to get some fresh air. We ended up going home to watch some more One Piece and having something to eat.
Sunday we went out to Harajuku, where a lot of Japanese people dress up in costumes, but we got out of the door a bit late, so all the costume wearing people had gone home. We then decided to see if we could walk home, but we gave up after an hour and a half, realizing we had only gotten as far as one stop on the subway.
That night I had difficulties sleeping because my brain kept thinking about home and my Lady D. It had been the same the night before. All in all I have had 5 hours of sleep the last two nights. It is strange how I feel home sick. I usually don't have this feeling when travelling, but I guess it is because of the long term form of this thing. As soon as I get more goals and an everyday life up and running, I am sure it will go away a bit again, but right now I do miss all of you back home.
I will try and get some sleep now. I am very tired and it is almost 3 am.
Until next time, take care!
Esben.
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