Having set aside more time for rest this day, we headed off to Odaiba in the late morning feeling energised and refreshed. It was also yet another cold windy day, but at least the weather was really good and skies were clear.

It was the second time I visited Odaiba, but the previous time was four years ago, travelling with a tour group. Hence, there were still many things to look forward to, such as the DiverCity shopping mall which didn’t exist then, and taking the special Yurikamome train into the island. The Yurikamome works like the Japanese version of Singapore’s LRT system – driverless and short distances between stations. However, it has more cabins and a decent amount of seats unlike LRT trains.

Onboard the Yurikamome, looking out to the tracks.

The train at one point travels alongside cars, and goes directly under the Rainbow Bridge.

Getting off at Daiba station, our first stop would be AquaCity shopping mall, which I had visited before. I’m not sure if I remembered wrongly but the mall’s interior seems to have changed quite a bit since.

The facade of AquaCity Odaiba.

It was already 11.30am when we reached the place so we needed to find lunch. Upon reaching the mall’s entrance, we were handed a flyer advertising a buffet for an unbelievably affordable price. Etine got pretty excited and wanted to try, but seeing the price gave me doubts about the food quality so I brought this up, and we agreed to look for something else. I was feeling like having sashimi, but Etine really wanted to eat omurice, so we made an agreement that she’d choose what to have for lunch and I’d choose dinner.

We settled upon this omurice restaurant called Pomme no Ki, which turned out to be a pretty good choice. The omurice here was absolutely delectable! I regretted not choosing a bigger portion because it was so tasty I wanted more. You could pay 210 yen extra for a medium size (the regular size is called “small”), and 420 yen extra for the biggest size.

Curry doria.

This was also doria but I don’t remember what was inside.

Since it was an omurice restaurant, I stuck with eating omurice.

We still had room after gobbling down the rice, so we ordered the dessert we had been eyeing earlier. The ice cream parfaits didn’t disappoint, and it was very filling. Honestly, I don’t know where you could get such quality desserts in Singapore.

The assorted berries ice cream parfait Etine chose.

Blueberries, cheesecake, strawberry sauce and fresh cream over ice cream. My kind of parfait.

Stuffed with lunch, we were ready to start shopping. We spent quite a lot of time trying and buying clothes. In particular, I aimed for those Japanese brands I knew and you couldn’t find in Singapore. Bought quite few pieces of clothing in the end. I wanted to move on to DECKS, the shopping mall beside AquaCity, to check out Joypolis, the indoor amusement park, but in the end we took it out of the itinerary in order to accommodate more time for shopping.

After finally moving out of AquaCity, we crossed the road to the Fuji TV building. It was apparent that the building was a place that most tourists would just take photos of the exterior or at most probably only step in to look around, since the open-to-public areas here only sell merchandise of shows shown in Japan.

Being a pretty avid Japanese drama watcher, I roughly had in mind which dramas’ merchandise to look out for in F-Island, the name of the Fuji TV goods shop. F-Island is located on the 7th floor of the building, and there’s a long escalator on the exterior of the building that takes you directly outside the shop.

The Fuji TV building.

Escalator up to the seventh floor.

When at the open area outside the shop, I immediately looked for one of the J-drama posters I knew was up here, and it happened to be on the pillar closest to the shop. I got pretty excited and hung around taking a few photos even though the strong winds were killing all of us.

I was not alone in my excitement, since there were two women who spotted the poster and one of them squealed, telling the other she was very happy to see it. She then proceeded to snap a photo with her cellphone. Why the excitement for this particular late night drama? Because a Johnny’s Entertainment idol is starring in it, that’s why. It really was less about the drama and more about seeing this giant poster with him on it.

After enough photos, we went into the shop. This whole Fuji TV stop was mostly for me since Etine and her mum don’t really watch J-drama. After getting a few items off the shelves, we left the place as it was approaching evening light. Etine and I wanted to take photos of the giant Gundam outside DiverCity in daylight.

One of the many giant drama billboards on the pillars outside the shop.

Fuji TV drama goods on sale.

They were filming something on the ground floor outside the building as we left.

Needless to say, it was getting colder and breezier by the hour, so we walked pretty fast. Call me an inexperienced traveller, but I didn’t even know it could be this cold in spring. Of course we checked weather forecasts daily but knowing the temperature and actually feeling it is different. At some point I started trying to walk backwards instead, against the direction of the wind, so it would stop freezing up my face.

Upon reaching DiverCity, Etine’s mom looked around shops while Etine and I bypassed most of the shops. Our priority was making our way to the outside area, where we found the giant Gundam model and the Gundam Cafe.

We decided to go into the cafe first, where Etine happily bought a Haro Latte. I initially wanted to grab one as well but the price made me baulk. I’m not that big of a Gundam fan that it would justify me paying 380 yen for hot latte (but you know, 800 yen for a maid cafe latte is totally reasonable!).

It is pretty cute though.

After which, we went to take photos of the Gundam model in evening light. While waiting for it to become night, we went back into the mall to grab some Gindaco takoyaki (once again). When we were done we went back outside to take photos and it was just nice. The Gundam model looks a lot more imposing at night than in the day thanks to the lighting at the eyes and feet.

Gundam in daylight.

And at night, looking ready for battle.

Finally, we went back inside DiverCity to do shopping. However, the mall surprisingly had nothing much for us – the brands available were more upscale than the ones in AquaCity. We didn’t really find anything here to buy, so we were quickly done with the place. We decided to go towards Odaiba Kaihin Koen (Seaside Park).

We didn’t actually go down to the beach since it was already dark, and we admired the view from the open area outside AquaCity. There were some tourists around here taking photos too.

The view from Kaihin Koen. Tokyo Tower is visible, behind the bridge.

We were actually all kind of disappointed the famous Rainbow Bridge didn’t seem to be doing its rainbow light-ups often seen in postcards. Perhaps it was too early? It was dark, but only around 6pm when we were there looking out.

Since this was our last planned stop in Odaiba, we were about to go, when I spotted the Toys”R”Us sign outside AquaCity and remembered I wanted to visit it but had forgotten to earlier. It was for a lame reason that I wanted to check it out but anyway, I asked if we could make a quick stop at the mall. Etine and her mum were okay with it, so we went back in.

They continued to look at shops again, while I went to Toys”R”Us. When I was done and went back to find them, they were engrossed in trying and buying clothes again. We ended up spending another hour here before making our journey back.

On the train, I caught sight of a Kazoku Game (drama) poster at Shibuya station and quickly snapped a shot.

Reaching back at Shin-Okubo where our hotel was located, we went around the streets to find dinner. Unfortunately I’m not a fan of Korean food so there wasn’t really anything good there. Another unexciting end of day, but still Odaiba was pretty satisfying. In retrospect I wish we actually hadn’t set aside more time for sleeping and allocated more time for shopping, because we missed out Joypolis.

You cannot leave Okinawa until you’ve visited one of the island’s UNESCO World Heritage sites from the Ryukyu Kingdom. There are several throughout the island and the Zakimi Castle ruins is one of them.

The beauty in ruins.

Located on top of a hill, it dates back to the 15^th century and was declared as a World Heritage site in 2000. Within the past decades, the castle also played a role during World War II and the subsequent US occupation of Okinawa.

An intimate look at the walls that made up a castle.

It’s a picturesque place and the surrounding park around the national historic site gives you a sense of traveling back into time, without much signs of modernity in sight.

The surrounding park gives an added sense of serenity.

While it is interesting to visit a fully restored and reconstructed castle, such as the ever popular Shuri Castle, visiting a castle ruins like Zakimi can give you a closer look at the masonry work of the people of the Ryukyu Kingdom and also a deeper sense of authenticity.

Breathtaking view from the top.

The Yomitan Village History and Folklore Museum is also nearby the site if you’d like to soak in more history and culture.

Zakimi Castle
2975, Zakimi,Yomitan-Village, Okinawa

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After 3 days in Tokyo, we had a slight change of environment in the form of Yokohama. Having a bit of trouble finding the place to buy the special discounted Minatomirai Ticket due to wrongly understanding that it was not sold at Shibuya Station at all, our plans were delayed so during the day we had to cut short some places we intended to visit.

The Minatomirai Ticket included travel on the month-old Tokyu Toyoko Line, which apparently cuts short travel time from central Tokyo to Yokohama, and has been the cause for rise in visitorship to Yokohama. Because their website isn’t exactly clear, we exited at Yokohama station and re-entered before changing to the Minatomirai Line. Turns out it wasn’t needed and we could have just changed lines straight.

The sparkly clean trains of the Minatomirai Line.

Going to the furthest point on the Minatomirai Line, Motomachi-Chukagai Station was where our first stop of the day was. We went to Yokohama Chinatown, the biggest in Japan. Unfortunately, it had been raining on and off since we began the day, and of course walking the streets of Chinatown meant being outdoors most of the time.

Grey clouds looming above the entrance of Chinatown.

A giant panda entrance to a shop.

This was my first experience being in a Chinatown outside of my own country, and I must say it’s interesting to see the Chinese-ish architecture you don’t really see in Singapore’s. Perhaps a little on the exaggerated side but it adds to the atmosphere.

The vibrant streets are a mix of small clothes shops, souvenir shops, streetside dim sum stalls and Chinese food restaurants. We checked out a few shops, but didn’t stop by everything because it was a hassle opening and closing umbrellas. We also bought snacks from the streetside stalls. Since it was cold, piping hot meat buns were a delight.

Shop selling super random souvenirs. Leaf-holding frog figurine for 900 yen, anyone?

There are also a fair amount of men trying to get you to try hot chestnuts so you’ll buy them. I don’t eat chestnuts, so I avoided them all the way. Etine’s mum, however, was curious enough to try one, but this particular guy scolded her when she didn’t want to buy. Not sure if she was just unlucky, but anyone reading this might want to take note.

Although we were supposed to find lunch here, we kept buying dim sum, because everywhere we walked, there would be a streetside stall enticing us. The dim sum is not cheap, but I suppose it’s because it’s more of a rarity in Japan, and that Chinatown is essentially a tourist trap anyway. And apparently, many celebrities have visited Yokohama Chinatown before, so there are many places advertising photos of celebrities at their stalls.

Stall showing celebrities patronising. AKB48′s subunit no3b included.

After a fair bit of walking, we finally decided to settle down at a Shanghai cuisine eatery called Yan Tai, as they were having some price promotions. Living in Singapore, we basically eat Chinese food almost everyday, and this is Japan, so we went in there not really knowing what kind of standard to expect.

It turned out to be good decision to step in, as far as I’m concerned. I don’t know if I was hungry and it affected my judgement or anything, but I think it tasted better than a lot of the hawker centre fare I’ve been eating.

Congee. Looks normal but tastes pretty good.

Mapo toufu! This was really really delicious and had just the right amount of spice. Would go back for this.

I don’t really remember what this is… black pepper chicken or something?

Yan Tai’s specialty dumplings. Only 2 were left before I could take a photo… and it actually tasted so-so.

With this yummy meal, we left Chinatown, going back to the station to take the train to Minatomirai. We had intended to visit the Yokohama Marine Tower before leaving this area, but as mentioned earlier, due to delays we decided to forgo this.

Upon reaching Minatomirai, we found that it had stopped raining though the sky was still overcast. We headed towards Yokohama Landmark Square for some shopping, although I limited the time we had there for fear we would not have enough time to cover everything we wanted to.

The majority of our time in this shopping mall was spent at Pokemon Center, where a wide array of official Pokemon merchandise are sold. It was also the place with the most traffic in the entire mall, which says a lot about Pokemon’s popularity in Japan still.

Was excited to see the iconic Landmark Tower, regularly shown in one of my favourite dramas, RESCUE.

Entrance of Pokemon Center. Photography not allowed inside.

Thereafter, we were going to make our way towards Kishamichi Promenade, but spotted something we hadn’t come across while planning the trip (don’t ask us how that happened, I have no idea). There was an observatory on the 69th floor of the Landmark Tower called the Sky Garden. We debated for a while whether to go up, but eventually did. It costs only 1,000 yen for a spectacular 360 degree view of Yokohama, and what’s more, we didn’t have to queue. Tickets are purchased via machines.

The staff were also extremely polite while ushering us up, although they didn’t seem to speak any English. Of course, we possibly don’t look foreign enough, but we were actually going in the same time as this Caucasian family, and the staff continued speaking in Japanese.

I did at least manage to understand that the lift we were taking to the 69th floor was the fastest in all of Japan. There was a speed indicator in the lift showing the staggering speed we were going at. In no time at all, we were on the 69th floor, greeted with breathtaking views.

Inside the lift with the speed indicator and the sparkly, reflective ceiling.

Amazing view of Minatomirai from the Sky Garden.

Another view from the Sky Garden. Yokohama Stadium can be seen in the distance.

We spent about an hour in total taking photographs and admiring the view. Okay, it was mostly my fault actually. Etine and her mum were done looking around in half an hour so they spent the rest of the time sitting down and waiting for me. Meanwhile I was too absorbed in the views to notice that they were already bored, and even spent 100 yen on those payable telescope things.

By the time we were out of the place, I had caused our schedule to delay further, and so we struck out going to check out the Nippon Maru ship museum. It was something we had agreed to strike out if we were more interested in other things than a museum, and we were.

Snaking through the Sunday crowd and getting across the super long travelators, we finally reached Kishamichi Promenade, whereby we took more photos of the scenery while crossing it towards the Akarenga Souko (also known as the Red Brick Warehouses).

Kishamichi Promenade. Sky still looking ready to pour anytime.

Akarenga Souko, with a special flower exhibition for the Spring season. In front of this pretty sight however, was something that looked like a construction dumping ground.

The smaller block of Akarenga Souko was apparently an exhibition space so we didn’t spend time there. The bigger block was filled with stylish cafes and shops. It looked completely different from a 2003 variety show I randomly watched recently, but I guess the interior changed a lot since then.

None of us spent any money here, although it was really interesting to look around. There was one shop in particular, an omurice restaurant called Yokohama Tachibanatei, that attracted a crowd. We poked our heads through to see what people were looking at, and we discovered the kitchen had a glass window for people to view the preparation process of the omurice.

I can’t adequately describe how fascinating watching it was. We actually stuck around watching a few rounds of it. The chef obviously had a lot of experience and was able to flick the omelette from the pan perfectly onto the ketchup rice on a plate. Everyone who came by to watch were so amazed that there would be audible gasps of surprise. And the chef liked to show a victory sign to the crowd. You can actually watch the process in the video on their website, where they got featured in a Korean TV show (skip the very front part of the video).

Watching the chef cook up delicious-looking omurice.

Unfortunately since we were there at neither lunch nor dinner time, we passed on eating there. I would definitely want to go back and try it some time when I get the opportunity.

There’s also this balcony on the second floor of the warehouse, which faces the Japan Coast Guard Museum building. Of course, I took out my camera there ready to capture the scenery, but to my surprise, there was this police-looking guy who was standing in the area directly below the balcony calling out to me and telling me that photography was not allowed.

Then I noticed there were a whole bunch of police-looking people near him, seemingly discussing something. But it was still weird that photography is not allowed from an open balcony, and I wondered if it was just for that day because they were doing something sensitive. There were others on the balcony with us but they were taking photos of themselves against the interior rather than with the view.

Done with the Akarenga Souko, we decided to proceed towards the Cosmo World theme park, where we planned to take the Cosmo Clock 21 ferris wheel and try to catch the evening to night view. On the way there, it started raining again, and it was so cold that my feet were freezing up and it was starting to hurt while walking, so we hurried towards World Porters Mall first to get some warmth.

The exterior of World Porters Mall.

It seemed the section of the mall we were stuck navigating had like a outdoor concept though, and I didn’t want to stop to look at any shops because of the weather. At some point we saw a pretty big apparel store that Etine’s mum suggested we could walk through from one exit to the other just to warm up. And… well, let’s just say a lot of things caught our eyes in that shop because everything was so attractively priced and they were having a 20% off promotion (last day!) on top of it.

We got stuck in that store for probably more than an hour, so there went the plan for evening views from Cosmo Clock 21, but all of us bought stuff from there so no complaints. Plus I hadn’t really been buying stuff the last three days, so I couldn’t have been more glad to be able to spend some (exchange-rate-dropping, loss-making) yen.

When we reached Cosmo World it was already pretty dark. Quickly purchasing three tickets for the ferris wheel, we went to the 4th floor where a long queue for the attraction awaited us. Let me just mention that I regret not taking a photo of the ticket – I thought we would have it as a keepsake, but the staff just take it from you when you enter the ride. Also, like all theme park attractions, they take a photo of you before you go in, and then try to sell it to you after the ride.

Going up… cabin is actually roomy enough for 8, so the 3 of us moved around a lot.

The inner framework of the ferris wheel is pretty to look at too.

Night view of Queen’s Square.

In 15 minutes, we were back onto the ground. Since the theme park doesn’t have any admission fee, we didn’t desire to take any other rides. We were heading towards the exit when Etine got attracted to one of those throwing game stalls to get prizes. Without any luck, we walked back towards Queen’s Square to find a place for dinner.

After a lengthy debate over what to eat, we eventually settled for this food court that -get this- had McDonalds’, KFC and Subway all in one. Amazing. They were individual stalls but all shared the same dining area. There was also a western cuisine restaurant, named American House, inside the food court and that was where we settled for.

We were so tired from the day that we had forgotten to take photos of the food that we ordered until after we cleared our plates. Thanks to that, my memory is blurry of what we ordered, but I remember there was California Hamburg Steak, Chilli Cheese Hamburger and fries. And they looked and tasted good.

Then, it was time to call it a day and bid Yokohama farewell. And I thankfully remembered to take a photo of the Minatomirai Ticket before the train gantry sucked it away upon completion of a round trip.

Minatomirai Ticket.

Spotted at a train station on the way back – snapped a photo since AAA was on it!

We started off the next day waking up early, in order to pack up our stuff, check-out and move to our next hotel which was located one stop away from Shinjuku Station on the Yamanote Line. The initial plan was to take a taxi there since we had to carry all our luggage, but realising that we wouldn’t have to change train lines at all if we took one from Tokyo Station, we decide to save the money. Our hotel in Hatchobori did provide a free shuttle to Tokyo Station anyway, and most guests checking out took advantage of it.

Leaving our luggage at the reception of our next hotel, Shin-Okubo Sekitei, as it was not check-in time yet, we headed for the nearby branch of Gyoza no Ohsho to have lunch. Like its name suggests, it’s a shop known for its gyoza. We had a quick lunch here with all of us ordering sets that included gyoza, and it didn’t disappoint.

Here, I regret to inform that there won’t be any photos for today’s travel and food. We kept our cameras away in the luggage as Etine and I would be going for a concert right after, and didn’t want to risk any trouble with the bag check. We would also be splitting up from her mum, who would be doing her own shopping in Shin-Okubo and Shinjuku while we went for the concert.

The concert we would be going for was the opening day of AAA’s Eighth Wonder tour. For the uninitiated, their name stands for Attack All Around, and the group consists of 5 men and 2 women. They do a variety of genres in accordance with their name – what they’re attacking are actually genres. They’re also titled a “super performance group”, giving energetic dances and singing at the same time without lip-syncing. With their debut single BLOOD on FIRE, they won Best Newcomer at the Japan Record Award.

Lately they’ve been leaning towards a more electronic sound. Here’s their latest release.

So anyway, we made for concert venue, which was in Hachioji City, 1 hour away from central Tokyo. On the way there we started to feel kind of sleepy due to the long train ride after a filling meal. But the moment I got out of the train I regained my energy and started getting super excited because in Hachioji Station itself I could already spot other fans who were carrying AAA goods.

All along the station’s exit till Southern Sky Tower, there were a ton of fans decked out in AAA gear, ranging from official goods, self-made t-shirts, and cosplay outfits of the members’ costumes. There was also a dance cover group in the open area outside the shopping mall, but we didn’t stop to watch as we were freezing in the cold. The 9 – 11 degrees temperature was already cold, but adding were strong winds that happened to be blowing in that area. It was too much for my Singapore-bred self. I think Etine was able to put up with it a little better though.

Heeding the advice of online forums, we were there at the concert venue, Olympus Hall Hachioji (located on the 4th floor of Southern Sky Tower), at about 2pm. It was one hour later than intended due to several minor delays in the morning, but I’m glad we didn’t reach earlier because we ended up with too much free time.

AAA B2-size posters for sale on display.

The advice on forums said to be at a venue at least 3 hours before the doors open (4.30pm in our case), if you absolutely wanted to get your hands on goods. However, I guess this didn’t really apply to us as it was the first day of the tour and there’s less chance of things being sold out. So anyway when we got to the queue for buying goods, we got an official tour light stick and towel each, and I bought some a~panda keychains, the AAA mascot.

Other merchandise on display near the goods counter.

When we were done buying, we didn’t stick around the area since it was crowded with fans sitting around chatting. It was still 2 hours til the doors opened so we decided to walk around Southern Sky Tower, which was a shopping mall.

Most of the shops around were restaurants, but there was a supermarket and a 100-yen shop as well, so we spent our time in those. Etine ended up buying strawberries from the supermarket as they were cheap. Also, when we visited the washroom, it was filled with AAA fans who were there to change into their AAA cosplays.

Close to 4pm, we returned to the waiting area outside the hall. Finding an empty corner, we sat ourselves there. There were plenty of other fans around but none tried to talk to us, to which I was kind of sad, but then I didn’t approach anyone to chat either because I was afraid. Around 4.30pm, staff started shouting for people to form a queue to enter the place. Since there was no English spoken, I was only half-sure of what I had understood. Anyway, we joined the queue since there was nothing to lose (nothing to win either – the concert is ticketed seating).

This display was also near the counter, on the floor where staff checked tickets for entry to the concert hall.

We had to climb two floors of stairs after entering the place since our seats were on the third floor. Despite it being the third floor, the view we had was clear without any blockage. Props to Olympus Hall here – each row of seats are elevated so high that you had no possibility of being blocked by the front row unless you had a 2m-tall man in front of you.

When the hall started filling up, I noticed the Japanese fan beside me was holding a pair of binoculars… and that is when I realised how stupid we were to not foresee the usefulness of bringing binoculars when you’re seated this far from the stage. You can’t really see facial expressions from this distance.

It was not long before the lights switched off, squeals from the audience were heard, and colourful moving lights appeared on the screens that were on the stage itself. The thumping dramatic music at the beginning really got everybody into the mood and even Etine, who wasn’t a hardcore fan like I was, got excited.

Opening up with a totally new song which was very electronic-sounding, it set the pace for the concert. Most of the songs for the day’s setlist would be upbeat. The setlist consisted of songs from recent years (Still Love You, CALL, etc), most recently released singles (Miss you, PARTY IT UP), and new songs from their upcoming album. We were treated to a total of five new songs that would be in AAA’s upcoming album – this meant everyone in the audience on this day were the first fans to listen to these songs. After the encore there was also a medley of older songs that were fan favourites. Here’s one of them.

The MC portions were also enjoyable and you can witness how comfortable they are with the stage after 7 years since debuting. With my limited Japanese though it was still not easy catching what they were saying, and there were a few times where I was clueless when the audience laughed. I also tried explaining the parts I could, to Etine who totally didn’t understand anything.

During the encore MC, AAA also showed their appreciativeness to fans, and they specially asked for the lights on the third level to be turned on so they could see us and wave to us. Naturally, everyone on the third level waved back enthusiastically.

Being immersed in the music I like, watching the high-energy dances and entertaining skit, waving my light stick along with everyone in the audience to the rhythm, and swinging my towel to their song together with a friend, I could say that this was hands down one of the best times I’ve had in my life. Of course, there were many other songs I love that weren’t performed, but I was very satisfied with the show. Etine was also satisfied and ended up buying a~pandas because she became a bigger fan of one of the members.

The concert in total was about 2 and a half hours which was what I expected. 5pm is an early time to start a concert, but I think it was done in consideration of fans – it ended nicely at dinner time. Since we came all the way out to Hachioji, Etine suggested finding dinner in the area. The opposite side of Hachioji Station seemed to be quite a bustling place so we headed off to find food there.

Loot for the day, including Etine’s a~pandas and some flyers. Actually didn’t buy much.

On the way I spotted an electronics shop, so I quickly took a look inside to find the earphone model I had been searching for. And this time, I found it. Still 30 dollars cheaper than in Singapore, so I promptly bought it, then we continued on our journey for food. It was also raining at this time, so it became unbearably cold walking around the streets.

At one point we wandered into an alley with a sign that said “Lingerie Cafe” or something so I tried to stop Etine from going further into this alley. She, still a little blur, walked on a bit before spotting some dubious-looking men and turned back to me and said “Let’s go back to the main street.” Feeling a little scared of what else we could accidentally wander into, we in the end settled for…friendly old McDonalds’.

It’s not as disappointing as you might imagine. The McDonalds’ in Japan has a different menu from Singapore, and after trying the food, I’ve got to say the standard is so much better there. Etine ordered the ebi burger together with seaweed shaker fries. Except it wasn’t called “seaweed shaker” there. I first saw the photo so we mistakenly thought we could just ask for “seaweed shaker” and the staff gave us a confused look. Turns out, when I looked at the menu a second time, it was called “shaka-shaka potato”.

I ordered a teritama burger meal and it was really good. I wish it was available in Singapore too! We sat near a window where we stared back into the same dubious alley we had gotten out from. This time, I spotted even more dubious signs, and was glad we didn’t hang around in there long.

After we finished eating, we headed straight to the train station, since going back would take another hour and we didn’t want to be back too late.

Images and videos of AAA from avex trax/avex management inc.

Still reeling from the disappointment of missing the Tsukiji tuna auction in the morning, we took the train for tech gadget and anime paradise Akihabara, which would hopefully make the day better. Since it was still pretty early when we reached, there weren’t too many people.

Initially looking kind of sleepy, my friend, Etine, quickly perked up upon spotting a To Aru Kagaku no Railgun billboard poster in the distance. It was a little amusing. We headed for the Akihabara UDX building first as it was the closest to the station exit we had come out from. Etine, being an anime otaku, wanted to visit the Tokyo Anime Center in the building. We found out we were a little too early as the center hadn’t opened yet, so we loitered around until it did.

I’m a pretty casual anime watcher myself, but I gotta say I expected more than what we were greeted with, which was basically a bunch of flat TVs showing various anime, a small goods shop, and an exhibition for the hot anime of the moment, Kakumeiki Valvrave. Actually I didn’t know of the anime before, but seeing the number of seiyuus’ names I could recognise off the autograph board, I guess it’s quite a big production.

Those hexagonal shapes pieced together really remind me of Evangelion.

After looking through the place a bit, we went to the Tokyo Anime Center official shop which was a few floors down. This was much better, but still any anime shop around the vicinity could easily win it in terms of goods variety and amount. Etine ended up buying quite a lot of things anyway. We moved on to another anime shop, Animate, which was just around the corner in another building. Animate apparently spans 8 floors if I remember right, and we spent a fair deal of time in there. I still didn’t buy anything since nothing actually caught my eye.

By the time we were out of Animate, all of us had started to feel hungry. We didn’t have to decide what we wanted to eat this time, because we had it already planned in the itinerary, and it was the highlight of the day! @home cafe, one of the bigger maid cafes in the area, was our dining choice for the afternoon.

Once we were shown in to our seats by the cute maids, Etine and I became super excited. While I initially thought we would be the odd ones out, there were actually other female patrons in the shop. The maid serving us was named “Pyon” and she was really cute. My attention was mainly focused on Pyon, Etine was admiring every single maid in the cafe, while her mother didn’t look all that interested but it was understandable.

Etine ordered a banana milkshake while I ordered mocha latte for drinks, while her mum was fine with plain water. All of us ordered set meals as they were the most value-for-money on the menu. The drinks alone were already pretty expensive, because of the fanservice that comes with them. To be honest, I usually stay away from coffee on non-school days due to its particularly strong effects on me, but this was an exception.

Most expensive non-alcoholic drink I’ve bought. But the bunny drawing was worth the 700 yen.

My mocha latte came with the fanservice of the maid drawing with chocolate sauce on the foam of the coffee. I was asked to pick between cat, bear or bunny, and I chose bunny because the maid’s name was Pyon. With Etine’s banana milkshake, Pyon mixed the drink in a shaker, and while shaking it she required us to say the “magic words” along with her, which consisted of mostly cute-sounding onomatopoeic Japanese words, and then finally “Become delicious!”

The mocha latte tasted like any other coffee and the bunny was ruined within the first sip, so nothing special there. I also had a taste of the banana milkshake, and it was not bad but we both agreed it was a tad too sweet.

Following which, we were pretty much left alone for maybe 30 minutes. It took a long long long wait for the food to actually come. In the meantime we observed the neighbouring patrons playing games with the maids (chargeable). One of the maids spoke to us in broken English upon realising we weren’t local and asked where we were from. When the food finally came, it was another maid that served us because Pyon was taking a polaroid with another patron (chargeable). We were asked to pick a toothpick flag with a design we liked, so I picked a bear design because it was the cutest one. Etine ended up getting teased because she picked a flag that said “fujoshi” on it. Since Etine doesn’t really read or speak much Japanese she was a bit clueless.

Almost couldn’t bear to eat it.

So, after waiting that long for the food, how did it fare in the taste test? All 3 of us felt it tasted surprisingly good. It’s not that the food was amazing, but it was decent. And against our low expectations, it being a maid cafe (expecting a rip-off), it was good. Also, looking at the amount of different things on the plate and how detailed the decorations are, one can guess what took so long in the kitchen.

With our stomachs filled, we decided to pass on dessert and pay the bill. A pleasant surprise was that the entry fee was actually 300 yen for females instead of 600 yen. This wasn’t displayed on their website so I didn’t know beforehand. And then after we paid the bill, the maid presented to each of us a loyalty reward card of sorts where you’d get stamps for every visit after. It has a different front design for males and females.

We were asked how to write our names, and because it’s in English, the maid wrote it on tissue paper first to confirm with us. Then she proceeded to write our names in permanent ink in a really cute handwriting on the back of the card. It included titling us as “ojousama”s, a simple animal drawing beside the name, and a heart drawn into the visit date. All in all, it made our maid cafe experience a really good one and I’ll definitely return if I have the chance.

Making our way out of the DonQuijote building, we spotted a nail salon on the first floor, doing anime nail art and we were really interested in doing it (particularly so for me because they displayed Evangelion nail art). But we found out it would take 2 hours. Agreeing that it was too long (on hindsight, it wasn’t…), we passed it up and moved on. After walking around Akihabara a bit more and admiring the Gundam and AKB48 cafes from the exterior, we moved on to Tokyo Dome City (TDC).

The sky was overcast and it was cold so my photos dropped in quality as my hands were freezing.

It seemed we were there too early on a weekday as the place was pretty empty and the rides were hardly in operation since no one was taking them. I actually thought they were shut down or something because of bad weather. In the end we didn’t take anything since it felt really lame and no fun to take rides by ourselves. The star attraction of TDC, the Thunder Dolphin rollercoaster, had also been closed down for more than two years since the Tohoku Earthquake.

Workers seen on the Thunder Dolphin. One wonders what exactly they are repairing.

What do you do at TDC if not taking rides? Shopping, of course. We headed for LaQua, the shopping mall inside TDC. Here, we spent roughly two hours, including some time chilling at a green tea shop. There was also a CD shop where I found a rather rare Limited Edition of a CD I wanted to buy, but didn’t because I stupidly thought I would be able to find a Used version for less, in the coming days (spoiler: no such luck and am still kicking myself for this).

Although we had planned in our itinerary to spend the rest of the day here, it seemed we had already exhausted the place and didn’t know what else to do here. Then I remembered Etine was saying that she wished we had more time in Akihabara, so I proposed taking the train back there to continue shopping, since anyway from Akihabara we wouldn’t have to change train lines to go back to our hotel later on.

But before we could leave TDC, we stopped by MOMI&TOY’S to try their crepes. Definitely not disappointed. I never knew fresh cream could be this delicious!

Too yummy for words.

By the way, being a Japanese music fan and knowing Tokyo Dome, I didn’t neglect to take a closer look at the massive stadium since we were already at TDC. Of course you can’t walk into the stadium freely, but I looked around the outside area and took photos. Hopefully one day in the near future I’ll be able to attend a concert here!

Tokyo Dome’s gate guide.

After that, we made our way back to Suidobashi Station. We were dismayed to find the trains terribly packed. I had forgotten my own warnings to Etine prior to the trip to avoid taking the trains around 5 to 6pm as it would be rush hour. But with no choice since we were already there, we managed to squeeze into the second train that came.

By the time we reached Akihabara again, it was dark. This time, Etine’s mum decided to look at another mall in the area which had clothing stores, so we split ways until dinner. Keeping in mind many businesses in Japan close at 8pm, we quickened our footsteps, heading for Mandarake, another anime goods store. On the way, we passed by an Aoki suits store, with a big Kamenashi Kazuya endorsement poster displayed. Naturally, being a KAT-TUN fangirl, I paused to take a photo of it. However, stopping on a crowded sidewalk isn’t exactly the best idea, so I tried to take it quickly. Unfortunately no matter how many times I took the photo, there was bound to be someone walking into frame.

Hastily taken photo.

Mandarake was interesting to look at for the first few moments but due to the amount of things on display it was really cramped and I felt like I had a lack of oxygen. I guess it didn’t help being surrounded by anime figurines, something I’m not really interested in.

We walked around several electronics stores trying to look for a particular model of earphones which was on my to-buy list, because I was expecting it to sell for cheaper in Japan than in Singapore. Find it we did at a much much cheaper price, like about 30 dollars less, but the colour I wanted was out of stock. Sigh.

Afterwards we met back up with Etine’s mum at a Starbucks, wondering what to have for dinner. Finding that everything in the vicinity were expensive and it was late, we made the decision to go back to our hotel area and buy bentos from the nearby convenience store. A rather unexciting roundup to the day, but we were content with it since we were all tired from walking.

Hi, I’m Grace, yet another Singaporean obsessed with many things Japanese. I’ll be writing about my experience of my recent week-long trip to Japan on this site.

It’s been almost two years since I had last been to Japan. I’ve gone to Japan twice before, one in central Japan and the other in Hokkaido, but they were both on tour groups. This was the first time I was going on a free and easy trip so it was easily a lot more exciting.

Actually, I had been yearning for this trip for a really long time, and as a graduation trip of sorts, it was part of what spurred me on to finish my polytechnic education. My plan back then was to take a solo trip, but my parents wouldn’t hear of it since they couldn’t trust me to be all alone in another country. I then pulled along my best friend from poly who also loves Japan and I believed I would have no trouble travelling with.

However, my parents were still not convinced it would be okay, while my friend’s parents are also strict and didn’t allow her to travel with just friends. In the end it was settled that we would be travelling with her mum, which put both my parents and her parents to a better peace of mind. Not what I had in mind initially but it’s still better than travelling with my own family members.

The itinerary was still completely planned by my friend and I, so very skewed towards our interests, and her mum was like a kind of guardian throughout the trip who followed what we planned. There’s also days where we split up, for my friend and I to do our own things and her mum would go somewhere else to do her own things. Anyway, we’re both waiting for graduation so we were pretty free. It seemed like waiting for the trip to come took forever but it finally did.

Waiting to board the plane.

On my previous trips to Japan, I’ve taken both JAL and ANA. This time, we took Scoot, the low-cost carrier under Singapore Airlines which started operating in June last year, as the prices were attractive.

We heard quite a lot of things about Scoot both online and through word-of-mouth and so we knew what we were in for. The seats were normally comfortable as like any other airline, and leg space was considered pretty good for a budget carrier. There’s no leg rest and the headrest area is just flat which is a little uncomfortable. They also don’t turn off the lights in the cabin besides for take off and landing. A small exception was when we were flying there they did dim the lights for a couple hours at about 3am. Well, all these are probably how they entice people to buy their neck pillow, blanket and eyemask pack.

We also heard from friends who had taken Scoot, that no matter how hungry you get, to never purchase their hot meals on board, because they taste really bad and you will feel like throwing it away after eating a bit. So we duly noted their advice and steered clear of the plane food. On the going journey it’s not hard to endure hunger since it’s the wee hours of the morning, but if you think you’re gonna be hungry, you might want to sneak sweets or small snacks on board. They clearly state that they don’t allow outside food of course, so be careful if you do.

Our departure was delayed by some passenger who didn’t turn up for the flight, so in the end we were about half an hour behind our itinerary but it wasn’t that bad since our first day wasn’t packed. Flying to Narita Airport by Scoot is undoubtedly cheap, but you also fly for longer hours because there’s a transit at Taiwan’s Taoyuan Airport. You still take the same plane after the transit. To me transiting was a bit confusing, maybe because I had never been to Taoyuan Airport. The staff will direct those continuing on to Tokyo towards a counter to collect your transit card. You’ll have to go through scanning your handcarry bags once more and then wait for departure again. In case you get lost or anything, make sure you know Scoot in Mandarin is known as ku4 hang2 (酷航).

Transit card for use at Taoyuan Airport.

If you’re trying to catch sleep on the flight I recommend plugging in to music or wearing earplugs. Because the flight includes transiting, every single announcement they make on the plane comes in English, Mandarin and Japanese. It gets pretty annoying and longwinded and at some point I felt really pissed off. It wasn’t because I was trying to sleep but because the constant announcements were giving me a headache. Other than that it’s basically a smooth ride.

Anyway, upon reaching Narita Airport we headed to find lunch since we were famished from not eating anything on the flight. Since we wouldn’t be able to check-in to our hotel until 3pm, we ate at the airport in a slightly pricey udon and soba shop. The food was normally delicious.

Delicious tamagotoji udon.

Our original intention was to take the limousine bus to get to Tokyo Station. However, when we wanted to buy the tickets at the limousine bus counter, the kind counter staff referred us to a rival bus company, Keisei Bus, which was having a promotion – 900 yen to Tokyo Station. This was more than 3 times cheaper than taking the limousine bus so we were all pleasantly surprised and promptly bought the Keisei Bus tickets.

Roughly a little more than an hour later, we came to our stop at Tokyo Station. Here, we wasted quite a lot of time being lost trying to find the line that went to Hatchobori Station, just one stop away. Our hotel, Dormy Inn Tokyo Hatchobori, was located near Hatchobori Station. We underestimated the size of Tokyo Station for sure, but it didn’t help at all that the direction signs were confusing. We climbed up and down stairs with our luggage just trying to find the entrance to the correct line. I was quite frustrated by the time we found the train line. By the time we reached our hotel, it was already an hour past check-in time. We quickly put down our stuff in the hotel room.

Heading out again, we took the train towards Oshiage Station where the Tokyo Skytree was located. From joining the queue for tickets until we actually bought the tickets, the total time taken was around 25 minutes. We also learnt that there were strong winds and the Skytree would be closed the next day, while for the rest of this day the staff was restricting the number of people going up the lift at a time. Hence, it was another 35 minutes before we were able to take the lift up.

It’s so tall that when you look up, it looks like it’ll fall on you.

However, all the wait was certainly worth it when we saw the amazing view. We were lucky enough to catch the last of the day view and watch the city slowly light up as night fell. After spending ages snapping shots of the view, we finally decided to make our way back down. It was decided that we wouldn’t spend another 1000 yen to go up to the higher deck because the view would mostly be the same anyway, and we had already spent 2000 yen to come up to the lower deck.

Evening view from the Skytree.

Had a quick look through the Skytree shop located on the same level but there didn’t seem to be anything worth buying, so none of us bought anything. The strong winds were unfortunately still going on, so when we got to the lobby area, we were dismayed to find a long snaking queue for the lift down worse than the one we waited for when heading up.

Along the queue just a short distance before the lift, there was a glass floor feature. It took me a few minutes before I could bring myself to stand on it because it was kind of scary. My friend however didn’t waste any time and simply stood on it. I guess I’m weak. We took a few photos there then rejoined the queue for the lift. It was a total 40 minutes queuing before we finally took the lift down and got out.

The scary glass floor could use a little cleaning though.

Feeling cold and hungry, we went into Tokyo Solamachi just next to the Skytree. We couldn’t decide what to eat though, so we walked around. Then I remembered that I wanted to visit the official Rilakkuma store that was in this mall and so made my way there, while my companions looked at other shops. Finally, we regrouped and suddenly right in front of us we noticed there was a takoyaki shop in the form of Gindaco which looked darn good to us there and then.

So we ended up eating takoyaki… which didn’t turn out to be a bad decision and it tastes better than the Gindaco branch in Singapore. But okay, that was not really counted as dinner. We knew our hotel actually served free ramen at night so after the takoyaki we made our way back for the ramen. It was decent and definitely not what you would expect for something free.

Official Rilakkuma store in Tokyo Solamachi.

That isn’t the end of the day though. Back at the hotel we caught a few hours of sleep, and then woke up to head for Tsukiji Market as planned. However, we couldn’t find the ticket selling point for the tuna auction so it took some effort following people around. This was a bit of a failure in planning as we should have printed out a map or woke up even earlier. By the time we got to the place, we were told that tickets for the day had been sold out! It was a real disappointment, especially after waking up this early for it.

We thought about trying again the next day but then gave up the idea eventually as we would be even more exhausted without adequate sleep and the following day we had to wake early to change hotels. Unfortunately, for me at least, I don’t think I’ll ever get the chance to see the famous tuna auction at Tsukiji before the market moves to Toyosu in 2015.

Since we made the effort to come out anyway, we had sushi breakfast (the sushi we had was alright but not particularly worth mentioning to be honest) before heading back to the hotel again to catch a bit more shut-eye.

The Tsukiji Market shop area in the early early morning.

Being from Hong Kong, I have always envied Singapore because AKB48 actually went there and performed stages more than once. The most Hong Kong ever got was the 3-song “mini live” at the Genki Japan event, despite an appearance from Maeda Atsuko right after she announced plans to graduate. So I got my plane tickets in record time when Tokyo Auto Salon announced the AKB48 line-up, which included members like Kikuchi Ayaka and Kawaei Rina.

I arrived at Changi Airport at 5am on the morning of 4/12 and hurried over to Terminal 2 to meet up with other fans. After extensive “researching” on Google+ and twitter, we deducted that the girls would most likely take the red-eye ANA flight and land at around 6am. The girls started showing up at immigration around 6:30am. I have never been to an “airport event” before, so didn’t know what to expect.

Japanese passengers on the same flight seemed quite perplexed that AKB48 had overseas fans – many of them snapped pictures of us holding signs. The girls that have been here before (Maeda “Singapore Maeda” Ami, Sato Sumire, etc) probably told the first-timers about the airport fans, because they looked more elated and amused than surprised to see us. They pointed and waved at us on the way to baggage claim. We welcomed them with frantic photo-snapping amid loud cheers until they got into pre-arranged transports and left.

After meeting up with more people, including Mus, we headed to the Marina Bay Sands Expo Center, where TAS took place, to line up for the “Priority Passes”. These limited-quantity passes were handed out each day (in different colors to prevent abuse), and granted access to the mosh pit area of the stage. The announcement from TAS was a little vague in terms of what pass holders are entitled to, with regards to AKB48′s Meet and Greet event, so all the fans decided to do the safe thing by waiting in line. We walked the show for a bit after getting the passes, and you can see summaries of the show in the earlier post by Mus.

At 2pm there was a press conference for the media to meet AKB48 first for some Q&A – but since I was brand spanking new to the team, my name was not on the list and was not allowed in. Mus did go in and he took some excellent close-up photos of AKB48 members with my short telephoto lens.

We met up again in the mosh pit around 2:45pm. Some of the people in the pit have been waiting since 10am, right after they got the passes. At 3pm sharp, the opening ceremony started and AKB48 came on stage for ribbon-cutting. After all the formalities were done with, it was finally time to meet them!  They each said their names in quick succession, and then the mosh pit audience were ushered onto the stage for a high-five session with the members. I was a little disappointed but this was expected – a handshake session with all of them would probably take too long.

Fast forward to next morning – I crashed at a friend’s house and we left for the venue at 6:30am, because we want to secure Saturday’s mosh pit passes for the one-hour AKB48 concert in the evening. The line at 7am was already longer than Friday at 8am, but that was expected. Some people apparently stayed overnight, but that really wasn’t that surprising. When Kashiwagi Yuki came to Hong Kong for a handshake event, I lined up for 9 hours to get the ticket. I arrived at 6am and was number 499 in the line – the first person had been there since 4pm the day before.

Thankfully, not everyone was that desperate.

The girls came on stage at 4:30pm and did a repeat of the Meet-and-Greet session, for those that couldn’t make it on Friday. Afterwards most of the fans stayed in the pit to keep their spots near the front of the stage. There was another performance by a solo guitarist from 5pm to 6pm, but people hardly paid any attention to him. He was not bad at all, just had the misfortune of headlining for AKB48.  By 5:50pm the pit was full.  I ended up occupying the back-left corner with Mus and the Wotaroid crew.

This was my first “real” AKB48 live concert – it was everything I expected and then some. They sung and danced for one full hour, while we swung our glowsticks and MIXed for one full hour. The setlist was great, consisted of their most popular singles like Heavy Rotation, the must-have Aitakatta, newer songs like Gingham Check and So Long, and the full-spirited RIVER.

The lineup this time had both Stalwarts and new blood.

During the short MC in the middle, there was an emotional moment when it was Akimoto Sayaka’s turn to speak. She recently announced her plan to graduate from the group, and this was her last time in Singapore as an AKB48 member. She was a central figure in the earlier years of AKB48 and has been a pillar (both figuratively and literally) of the original Team K, as well as all of its reincarnations. She asked the fans to keep supporting her and it was met with loud cheers, followed by “Sayaka” calls.

The Wotaroid crew was also spectacular, doing their routines and getting everyone’s attention. Makes me want to learn the moves and join them next time.

Kikuchi Ayaka was cuter than initially expected.

After the concert ended, I headed back to the airport and hung around until my red-eye flight took me back to Hong Kong. We were guessing that the girls might go back to Japan on the same night, but our guesses were wrong this time. From their g+ posts, it looked like they went shopping and then had chili/pepper crabs again.  It was a great trip – A+++++, would go again.

For the rest of the photos from the press conference, visit us on Facebook!

There are many out there who might want to consider studying abroad when it comes time to plot higher education, as well as those at home in Singapore who are considering their options. As it stands, out of the many universities in Singapore there are really only a few that stand out. As the choice can often be confusing, here’s a brief summary of those on offer, followed by a focus on one university in particular: Singapore Management University.

There are four major universities in Singapore: the National University of Singapore (NUS), Nanyang Technological University (NTU), the Singapore Management University (SMU), and the Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD).

Of these, NUS is the oldest, and it boasts the largest range of curriculum, as well as student body. NTU is globally up-and-coming, the fasting rising in the global top 50 of universities (as such, it is also increasingly funded.) SUTD is the newest, distinguished by a unique East and West academic programme which builds on elements of technology, design, entrepreneurship, and management. Singapore Management University, meanwhile, is the most employable, with 96.6% of its graduates finding work within one month of (but usually before) graduation.

Singapore Management University

There are numerous advantages to studying at SMU. As mentioned, employability is almost guaranteed. The numerous and esteemed undergraduate programs on offer are certainly something to check out. SMU also takes pride in a different approach to teaching. Lectures are avoided in favour of seminar style tutoring, where students are encouraged to speak their mind, and debate is encouraged.

As a business and talent developer SMU takes pride in its students, and makes sure all are on the right track to career stardom. With six schools to choose from (including Business Management, Law, Social Science and Accountancy) you are assured of strong tuition, with leaders in academia there to help along the way.

SMU is located in Singapore’s city center.

For many, student life is as much as a draw as education. There are numerous co-curricular activities are supported mainly by student clubs, while bespoke excellence programmes – whether in the arts or sports – are supported by the Office of Student Life (OSL). Special interests, including debating, animal welfare advocacy and community service, are there to broaden students’ interests and allow them to play a much bigger role in society.

There’s also location, SMU is centrally located, right in downtown. Restaurants, bars and exciting attractions surround the campus, a great opportunity to chase up on culture.

The next admissions for undergraduate courses of SMU begin in October, so please check out the website and consider your future of higher education. SMU might be the choice for you.

Last year, we stumbled upon the AKB48 Cafe and Shop in Namba, Osaka. The shop occupies an impressive space right across the NMB48 Theater in the recently renovated NGK Building, and thus easily accessible to visiting fans of the 48 groups.

At least they don’t shove you here.

The shop section.

Rather than replace the existing NMB48 Shop, the AKB48 Cafe and Shop Namba carries a separate set of merchandise for the family’s other sister groups. When we last visited, the shop was stocked fully with the latest merchandise from AKB48 and SKE48.

Mingling around inside.

Now that the AKB48 Shop Harajuku has ceased operations, Namba’s shop easily outclasses the other AKB48 startups in Tokyo. The shop section at Namba is much larger and better equipped than even the AKB48 Cafe and Shop Akihabara. The place is also decorated with autographs of various 48 members and some of the AKB48 costumes are displayed in the center of the shop.

Walls were decorated with their signatures.

Oshima Yuko’s Beginner outfit.

The AKB48 Namba Cafe is decorated in the familiar tartan patterns but rather than an over the counter setting like in Akiba, the cafe section in Namba operates as a more humble fast food outlet. You have to place your order yourself at the counter and after a short wait, the food is brought over to your table.

The cafe.

There is a one hour time limit inside.

The menu at the cafe is typical fast food affair and hardly anything to rave about. However at this point I doubt anyone actually goes to an AKB48 Cafe for the food. Prices are also grossly inflated because of the AKB48 branding. The money goes towards reaffirming your brand loyalty and the 48 related programs that run on the televisions mounted at all corners.

Fast food style.

Member recommendations.

One plus though is that the cafe is very accessible when compared to Akiba’s, where there is usually a long queue. Even during this crowded evening, we didn’t have to wait for more than 10 minutes to enter. This is probably due to the fact that upon entry patrons are informed that everyone must order and that you have a limited amount of time to spend inside.

Some of the tables are autographed.

Their set meals came with 48 member coasters.

700 yen AKB48 cafe burger and drink set.

It should be worth noting that at least the Namba’s shop and cafe staff seemed friendlier and (if I might add) cuter than their Tokyo counterparts.

If you’re remotely interested in AKB48 and happen to be passing by Namba’s Nankai Dori, it wouldn’t hurt to take a look at the AKB48 Cafe and Shop Namba. But unless you happen to be a die hard fan though, I wouldn’t recommend eating there.

AKB48 Cafe and Shop Namba
1F, Namba Grand Kagetsu
Nanba Sennichimae 11-6
Osaka Chuo Ward
Osaka 542-0075

View Larger Map

For more information, you can check out the shop’s site in Japanese.

Much like the other group that uses the tagline ’3MCs, 1DJ’, Rhymeberry couldn’t be farther away from a group you expect to be doing rap. A group of 4 girls, all under the age of 15, they definitely don’t look like they fit anywhere near the vicinity of a dope rhyme. But nevertheless, these girls put on a great show and are fast gaining traction in a ruthless industry full of cutesy pop and frilly dresses.

A group that spawned from the usa☆usa shoujo club collective, Rhymeberry is made up of MCs MIRI, HIME and YUKA. The 3 MCs are supported by DJ HIKARU. While you might think that a U15 turntablist is a ridiculously rare find on its own, DJ HIKARU plays a role that’s not unlike that of a tsundere hype-man, rather than that of a DJ ― she spends most of her time on stage spinning a CD turntable that’s not really connected to anything.

Nevertheless, the group seems to have a dynamic that fits, and each of the girls brings something to the table that comes together to form an idol-voltron. While a hip-hop influence is not particularly uncommon in idol music, Rhymeberry is one of few to really tackle the genre of rap proper without sugarcoating it with idol-pop. Their catalog fits better alongside a record of Teriyaki Boyz than it does HALCALI.

Speaking of catalogs, Rhymeberry does not really have much of one. Their first single (a brother-con single titled HEY! BROTHER) was released in July last year and a double A-side is dropping at the end of this month. The group has a throwback sound, with their backing tracks sounding funky, bassy and organic. To quote a friend who heard them, Rhymeberry has “better instrumentals than actual rappers”.

The brilliant use of instrumentals combine very well with the girls’ own energy, serving to supplement rather than drown, and the girls themselves are very good at hyping out the crowd at their live performances. The call and response of rap translates really well to the idol fan crowd and it adds a lot of energy to their performances. While they’ve shared stages with other groups like lyrical school, the fans always seem to always seem more excited when Rhymberry comes on.

Rhymeberry is a refreshing take on an idol group, and it’ll be interesting to see where they go from here. The group is in fact so underground, they don’t really have an official page, and instead has an official Twitter account. They also seem to regularly upload live videos on their YouTube channel. Hip-hop heads should definitely check this fledgling group out, if only to pad their backpacker credentials.

I should had suspected something was amiss when the members of Fairies had started to introduce themselves with idol-y catchphrases the last time I had seen them. Last month, avex’s edgy R&B and hip hop dance group Fairies surprised us with the announcement of a new idol themed sub-unit, the group’s first.

Consisting of the group’s three youngest members, the group is formed by Fujita Miria, Shimomura Miki and Hayashida Mahiro, calling themselves M Three (Mスリー). Fairies’ 4th “M”, Ito Momoka is notably absent. Innuendos aside, I can think of at least one adhesive company that wouldn’t be too thrilled.

M Three’s first single Yumemiru Dancing Doll  (夢見るダンシングドール), due later this month on 27th March is a retro inspired, sickly sweet pop tune with visuals straight out of the 90s. Some avex humor or the Fairies’ attempt at breaking into the wota market? Whatever the case, M Three’s Yumemiru Dancing Doll appears to have replaced this season’s regular Fairies single.

Last week the unit uploaded their full video Yumemiru Dancing Doll online.

There’s also a surreal alternative dance shot version.

Tongue in cheek or selling out? You decide.

Fine weather today, which was great since it’d be my last day in Japan after nearly a month. The reality of things had already started to settle in last night while I was packing my luggage but still urged myself to make the best of the last day here.

Checked out of my room in the morning and proceeded to make my way downstairs to ask the building manager if I could leave my luggage in his custody. The flight back wasn’t until nearly midnight so I still had a full day ahead. Even just carrying the luggage downstairs, I could see how they’d be quite the problem. The two luggage bags were completely filled and then there was still a duffel bag and posters on hand.

Since I didn’t expect to return back till late in the evening and the building’s offices closed early, the elderly manager was really nice in offering to let me use the room for today at no extra charge so that I could store my things safely. Instead, I would help assist him in some manual labour, replacing one of the faulty wall mounted laundry dryers, which I gladly did. After that slight bit of delay and bringing my luggage back upstairs, I headed to the nearby Asakusa Station where I would meet up with Chisaki again this morning.

Asakusa side streets.

The itinerary this morning was to get our fill of whatever Japanesey food and snacks, and what better place to do that than Asakusa. We arrived at Asakusa in the morning, when it’s at its busiest, taking the side streets toward the far end. Chisaki wanted to introduce one of the snack shops she knew here which sold some giant melon-pan that she was raving about. We found it at the end of the lane, just to the right of Sensoji.

Hybrid cafe-restaurant.

The shop was a quaint one. A traditional soba shop, though it seems to have found greater success with its melon buns. According to her, if we had arrived any later they might had been sold out. We ordered one giant melon-pan each and proceeded to sit inside the shop. The furniture was really tiny inside, as if made for hobbits. The melon-pan turned out to be nice. It was really airy, so wasn’t too satiating despite its size.

Melon pan.

We spent some time after breakfast looking around the other snack shops around Asakusa but for the most part didn’t get much else to eat, since the melon-pan itself was quite enough.

Sensoji temple.

Sky Tree.

Chisaki wanted to get some senbei crackers though. Amusingly she visited this shop thinking that it sold some, but came back with ningyo-yaki instead. We did find some interestingly flavored senbei at another shop though and she ended up purchasing quite a bit from there.

Snack shops in Asakusa.

Ningyo-yaki.

The company was keen on trying some of the fantastic omurice that I recounted at Asakusa, so we planned on getting some later. It was still too early for lunch though so we spent the next hour or so walking around the extended area. While doing so, we coincidentally came across the grand opening for the Asakusa EKIMISE department store. Despite being its first day, it wasn’t too crowded, so we decided to take a look inside.

The Asakusa EKIMISE was sort of a rebranding of the Asakusa Matsuya that sits on top of the Tobu Asakusa station. While still primarily targeted towards housewives and older shoppers (there’s a giant crafts section and an entire floor dedicated to household appliances), the department store has incorporated a number of cheaper labels that ought to be popular with tourists. We found an ABC Mart inside as well as a clothing store selling gaudy Sukajan and dragon prints. Hardly your typical Japanese department store.

After a bit of window shopping, Chisaki ended up picking up a couple of bags one of which from a pretty nice outdoor style local label. They had some nice stuff there but didn’t pick up anything myself, even though it was really affordable. While she had only just begun her shopping, I had already spent way too much by now.

Main shopping street.

Eventually, we headed back to the Nakamise shopping street to get a still early lunch. The omurice at Asakusa Nobu is good enough to eat everyday.

Omurice.

Our next stop was to head over to Harajuku where Chisaki could do some clothing shopping, so we grabbed the metro over to Omotesando which was just a short distance away. There we passed by some fangirls going crazy over a boy band billboard, which was so popular there was a queue up to take a photo of it.

Omotesando.

It was real peaceful walking around Harajuku on a weekday afternoon, while most of their customers were still in school. Leisurely walked around Harajuku Street and Takeshita Dori, where we did quite a bit of window shopping, and some actual shopping in the case of my company.

The architecture there gets quite interesting when you get to Harajuku Street proper, where all the unique local labels are kept. Perhaps it was the lack of space (the area is shared with many residences), or just the usual Japanese shenanigans, but there were buildings built on buildings even. While not much of a fan of Harajuku fashion, it makes for an interesting place to live at.

Sticker shop.

Was pulled along to the official Johnny’s Entertainment shop here which our companion insisted was interesting. I guess it kind of was. It was a fairly large store, bigger than AKB48′s in fact. But sales of the goods here follow a more similar format to Hello! Project stores, you have to jot down the number for products you wish to buy and take it to the counter.

There wasn’t much for sale though, mostly just photo prints. Found lots of lone women inside browsing through the different sample photos of their products for sale. Unlike the AKB48 shop, which sees both male and female customers, one would definitely feel quite out of place here without female company or distinctly a tourist.

Interesting architecture.

Didn’t grab any crepes as originally planned since we were still quite full from lunch, but did eventually settle down for a break at the Choco Cro cafe. Throughout, we had a grade school girl beside us who was busy unboxing her loot from the nearby AKB48 shop. She first opened her packs of trading card game cards, then brought out her collection of photographs, while casually discussing AKB48 matters with her mother.

Choco Cro.

There was still a few hours left, so decided to head over to Shibuya, where we had better chances of getting something to eat later. Along the way we noticed that quite a number of people had gathered at Yoyogi Stadium for some sort of event. On closer look we would learn that Korean band Infinite was holding a concert here. Even though there were many stalls selling the same goods there were some pretty insane queues for merchandise.

Outside Yoyogi Stadium.

Not far off at the Marui shopping mall, we came across yet another event. It was mini-live to promote the second single release of the band Shikuramen.

Some sort of live.

We’d visit Midori Sushi one last time, coincidentally Chisaki had yet to have any sushi yet and the queue there this afternoon was negligible. Owing to the many meals we already had today though, didn’t eat too much. Midori is known for having rather large servings. Instead just split a set and a few pieces.

Midori Sushi.

Even though there was still quite a bit of time before the flight, decided to play it safe and leave early. So I bid farewell to today’s company and caught a train back to Suitengumae. Since I still had access to the apartment room, could stop to catch my breath before setting off.

The T-CAT terminal where I would catch a coach to Haneda Airport was really just a few blocks away. The difficult portion was in getting my luggage across the bridge. Thankfully it had wheelchair/bicycle friendly ramps. It was kind of steep and not particularly easy, but managed to get my luggage across.

There it was just a matter of purchasing a ticket for the next bus from a machine (800 yen) and then waiting it out. When the bus did finally arrive, there weren’t too many other passengers this weekday evening, just a couple of businessmen and one family. The trip there was smooth and took less than half an hour. Traveling by Haneda is indeed a lot more convenient than Narita.

Departure Lounge.

Learned the hard way last trip to get to the airport early. This time, I was a little too early, with a couple of hours to kill even after completing all the procedures. Thankfully there were desks and power outlets provided at the departure lounge so one could catch up on some internet use before the scheduled flight back.

The flight back was for the most part, uneventful. Though I did get a message on my screen at the start of the flight saying that I had won something. It turned out to be just a deck of playing cards. Annoyingly, while I had expected the seat beside myself to be empty (since Eri had forfeited her ticket), the airline staff had shifted someone else to her place at the last minute. So much for getting a window view.

Sharing a cramped corner of the plane with a random stranger for hours is hardly enjoyable. I find it difficult to sleep on flights, so tried watching some of the in-flight movies but there wasn’t anything particularly interesting. For all its action and effects, the new version of Total Recall turned out to be a major disappointment, since it ended with the hero actually dooming everyone instead of saving them.

The flight back.

Since it was a midnight flight, I’d only reach Singapore at about 6 AM the next morning. It’s a good thing I had taken the day off to unwind, and catch up on some much needed sleep.

Oddly, I wouldn’t have any trouble re-adapting to the normal everyday life back in Singapore. Perhaps it’d take a while before reality would set in, or more likely I had already been accustomed to the disappointment in returning back. Even at time I writing, there wasn’t any one time since where things would suddenly hit me. Instead the trouble of flying back was  probably the least fun part. Hopefully with a little work, there might come a time where I can visit Japan, without having to experience the pain of a return flight back.

Guess a part of me was glad to return to routine comforts in Singapore, after nearly a month of adventuring. And adventures we did have. The past 27 days have been a mixture of excitement and disappointments, though thankfully there ended up being more of the former. Part of the wonder of a large, culturally rich country like Japan is that regardless of how many times you visit, there’s always new things to discover. We’ve had many new and novel experiences in the past month, without neglecting old faves of course.

Something I realized during this stay in Japan, is that while, I live a pretty simple, content life in Singapore free of wants, I find myself always desiring many things while in Japan. Here, I actively want to visit new places, try out new foods and then there are all manner of interesting things to buy. To be honest, I’m not sure if it’s a good thing.

After yesterday, it was time to get away from things with a trip outside of the city. I was weighing between traveling to Chiba to visit a farm with alpacas or to return to Fujisawa to right the wrongs there. Coincidentally, Chisaki’s plans had fallen through too, so we decided to meet up in the morning for a journey over to the nearer little island of Enoshima.

Finally got my camera to work this morning after leaving the batteries out since yesterday and draining the internal backup battery. Leaving my apartment, I’d bump into a Caucasian tourist on the adjacent Fukagawa bridge, making hand movements he went “Picture! Picture”. Turns out he wanted me to help take a picture of him with the river in the background. After which he went “domo arigatou“.

Met up with Chisaki at the Shinjuku Odakyu Station in the morning to grab our round trip passes. A number of other tourists were headed over to the area today too, including a group of boys from Hong Kong. From there we caught the train to Fujisawa, before switching to the old coastal railway for Enoshima.

Inlet.

There was a causeway connecting the mainland to the island, so the last kilometer had to be covered by foot. Not too many people here since it was a weekday and the rest of the foreigners mostly continued onward towards Kamakura. It was mostly the elderly folks who had the free time to visit on such a day.

Long bridge connecting the mainland to the island.

Along the way, we spotted a familiar white peak in the distance. We were having fine weather and it was clear enough to make out Mount Fuji in the distance.

Mount Fuji in the distance.

We found this strange staue on the bridge. Amusingly, someone had put a pair of Crocs on the statue.

Someone put a pair of crocs on the statue.

After a short walk, we found ourselves at the entrance to Enoshima. The rest of the small island would have to be trekked uphill. There’s only one main path that loops around the entire island so it’s not really possible to get lost. Land-wise, Enoshima is about 1/4 the size of Singapore’s Sentosa and can be easily covered in full in just one day.

Front of Enoshima.

Uphill climb from here.

Just past the entrance, we came across an interesting senbei shop. Even if Chisaki were not a big fan of senbei, these were definitely worth a try. There was a queue for the shop’s tako senbei (octopus rice crackers). Rather than the usual round crackers, the senbei at the shop were made by pressure slabs of octopus in a high pressure iron press cooker. The result of which you can see below.

Senbei shop.

Not the usual kind.

Not far past the shops we came across the main shrine at Enoshima. Enoshima was one of the three islands in Japan where the goddess Benzaiten (Japanese for Saraswati) is said to reside. The shrine here was accordingly dedicated to her. As the goddess of music and arts among other things, her shrine here is apparently especially popular with artists and entertainers.

Enoshima Jinja Shrine.

Got some omikuji here. Chisaki had been running around different shrines and temples picking these up. If anything, I believe in making my own fortune so wasn’t too keen but she ended up paying for two anyways. We both got really good fortunes, so there was no harm in believing in it though. Regarding travels, it said it’d be good, though I ought to take note of fellow travelers. If only it had told me sooner.

Omikuji.

Past another flight of stairs up, we came across more buildings that were collectively part of the shrine. There was a full video crew here filming a local variety show with two unfamiliar faces. For some reason we’d come across people filming everywhere we went.

Tri-force.

Looking at a map of the island, we decided to head toward some caves on the other side of the island first. Here we passed by some cafes and the entrance to Enoshima Tower and the gardens that held it. Made a note to return later for that. There were a couple of really fat cats basking in the sun outside the tower gardens. The first of many that we’d run into today.

Rough map of the island. Not to scale.

Cat.

Another fat cat.

There a good number of shop houses that call Enoshima home. These are a pretty common sight in touristy areas and had come across some similar ones at Miyajma. Many of these have shops running out of the first floors selling souvenirs or refreshments. What makes these shophouses different from other souvenir shops is that they often serve as people’s houses too. If they are no customers, the owners can simply retreat upstairs to the comfort of their home. Would be quite nice to live under such conditions.

Old shophouses.

Enoshima Tower.

Due to how small it is, traveling around Enoshima is quite manageable. But since everything is built around the circumference of the hill, it requires quite a bit of stairs. To accommodate the typically older visitors to such places, sheltered escalators had actually been build beside some of the taller flights of stairs but you need a separate pass to use them. While walking through here we actually came across a mailman going about his deliveries. There was a post office back downhill near the entrance to the island.

Winding path.

Dragon shrine.

Here there was a shrine with a dragon perched on top. Benzaiten seems to have a certain association with dragons in Japan. There was also a forested path that split off from the main road, entered to take a look.

Forested area.

Split off from the main road.

The forested area was a garden of sorts, though it was ill kept during this time of the year. The main attraction here though was the Ryuren no Kane (Dragon Lovers Bell). A lot of locks had been hung on a fence here by couples, just like at Kobe Tower. It’s a popular European practice that had spread to Japan at some point (and hence Taiwan and Korea as well) that’s meant to signify enduring love. You could buy locks from the nearby souvenir shop that we had passed by, though others had brought their own.

I guess Benzaiten’s rocker chick image is ill suited for love, since it is believed that couples who visit Enoshima together would spur the jealously of the goddess and would break up soon after. Still, as with any other island getaway, Enoshima tends to be pretty popular with couples. In this case, the Ryuren no Kane is used to call upon the help of Benzaiten’s husband (who also happens to be a dragon in Japanese folklore) to help pacify Benzaiten.

The weight of this meaning has probably been lost in modern times, but couples still come to ring the lover’s bell together in hopes of a lasting relation.

Locks.

Ryuren no Kane.

The area around the bell also signified the highest point in Enoshima, beyond here it was a steep downhill descend toward where the caves were located. There were some really nice old restaurants and cafes just beside with an amazing view of the ocean, and we decided to return here later for lunch.

Hilltop.

Many locals had come to the southern coast of Enoshima to fish. During the low tide the rocks here are exposed and it is possible to fish from here. Others perched themselves on faraway rocks which had become cut off by the rising tides. I spent about 2 months traveling the entire coastal area of Port Phillip Bay in Australia some years back, and had always wanted to visit rocky coastal shores like this in Japan too so really enjoyed the experience.

Coast.

Chisaki seemed to be quite excited about it too and had come much better prepared for the terrain with her high platform shoes. Since the tide was still quite low, we managed to walk around below to take a look.

A number of the locals used these really long flexible poles that required just a slight flick to cast. Used to fish a lot when I was younger since my dad was a big enthusiast. Haven’t for years though, but it would definitely be an interesting experience. Pretty sure it’d be heaven for my father.

Lots of people fishing.

Some had been isolated by the high tide.

The entrance to the Iwaya Caves were right beside. Entrance is usually slightly pricey at 500 yen, but it’s subsidized (450 yen) if you have the Enoshima-Kamakura Free Pass, and completely free if you purchased the island’s Enopass. Still, it might be worth taking a look inside the tidal caves if you haven’t been to too many.

Iwaya Cave.

This wing was pitch dark.

The Iwaya caves serve as the birthplace for the Benzaiten shrine in Enoshima. People in the past must had drew analogies between caves and wombs, and thus the tendency to enshrine Benzaiten in caves.

Not too many pictures inside since it was really dark. Parts of the cave were dimly lit by modern lighting, but there are others that were almost totally pitch dark. To navigate these parts the staff there provide some candles. There were some rock statues and a tidal pool. Sitting in the pool was a slab with an old tanka poem by Yosano Akiko.

Tanka Poem.

Other parts were better lit.

The caves here are split into two parts, connected by an elevated walkway that had been build into the side of the bluffs. Stopping to take a look on the way back, an old lady would stop us here to ask if we had seen the sea turtle shaped rocks below, another of the island’s accidental attractions. Like at Kamakura, there were various kites/sea hawks circling the island, though they were much closer here than on the mainland.

Connection other side..

Turtle shaped rocks.

Birds of prey circling the island.

Nothing much in the second cave, except a more contemporary looking dragon statue. The second cave is dedicated to the dragon, but since that isn’t literal enough, a dragon statue had been placed here in more recent times. It seems they replace the statue with a new one every few years.

There were some signs warning of cave-ins here, which didn’t look too scary at that point. I would learn at the time of writing though that there had been a bunch of casualties here in the past.

Looks newer.

Returned uphill to one of the cliffside restaurants, opting to have lunch at this spacious open concept one. Most of the restaurants tables were laid out against the windows, allowing for some great views of the surrounding oceanfront.

Really nice restaurant.

Wonderful view.

We both had a serving of Enoshima’s speciality, Nama Shirasu Don (Raw Whitebait Rice). The one from this restaurant was especially attractive and came with a side of lovely crab miso soup. First time trying the dish. It’s definitely an acquired taste. Chisaki quite enjoyed it, while I found the overall fishiness quite overpowering. Each tiny fry has a full fish worth of fishiness concentrated into its tiny body. Thankfully, it’s served with wasabi and ginger to mask the taste.

Nama Shirasu Don.

Looks silly from a different perspective.

There were some interesting fortune dispensing capsule machines on each table at the restaurant. Chisaki took the opportunity to get more omikuji of course. You need to align your biographical data through levers on the mechanism and put in a coin to dispense a minuscule capsule that contained a tiny slip of paper with your fortune written on it.

More cats.

After the late lunch, all that was left was to visit the island’s tower. On the way, passed by even more cats. There are probably more stray cats here on this tiny island than the whole entire Tokyo. Judging from the various breeds, they were hardly native. It turns out that Enoshima is a popular place for people to abandon their cats.

Even more cats.

The Samuel Cocking Garden takes up the central spot in Enoshima, the Enoshima Lighthouse Observation Tower its centerpiece. Entrance to just the garden costs 200 yen, while a combined entrance with the tower costs 500 yen. Once again, entry is free if you get the island Enopass for 1,000 yen.

Tip: I didn’t know at the time since it isn’t publicized to foreigners, but if you’re just headed to Enoshima there’s a new combined Odakyu ticket which includes a round trip from Shinjuku to Enoshima, as well as an Enopass (which covers entry to the Iwaya Caves, Samuel Cocking Garden, Enoshima Tower and unlimited use of the island’s escalators) for just 1,940 yen. If you do not plan to visit Kamakura on the same day (I wouldn’t recommend it), this works out to be a bit of savings since the Kamakura-Enoshima Free Pass costs  1,430 yen alone.

While sizeable, there wasn’t much to see in the garden during this season. Instead we’d head onward to the tower first. At its base, we spotted a souvenir shop and took note to visit later. There were also lots of advertisements for Enoshima Aquarium back on the mainland. I would learn later that it was actually quite a well equipped aquarium but we didn’t have time to visit today. Perhaps another time.

Enoshima Samuel Cocking Garden.

If you’ve been following, then you’d know that I was quite the fan of towers so was quite excited to be here. Enoshima Tower isn’t particularly impressive when it comes to its size, it’s a mere 60 meters tall. But since it’s build at the pinnacle of Enoshima island, is sufficient for a nice view of Kamakura and the surrounding Sagami Bay. It’s also the only way you’re going to get a 360 degree view of the area.

Enoshima Lighthouse Observation Tower’s design is also quite exquisite. As the name suggests, its primary purpose is to serve as a lighthouse for the island. The grid pattern bears a certain resemblance to the similarly purposed Kobe Tower. Thanks to its unique design, the tower is now referred to as the Enoshima Sea Candle.

The causeway here.

Apart from the souvenir shop downstairs, there’s also a cafe on a terrace level of the tower. The first observation floor of the tower had many beautiful paintings of Enoshima on display. The paintings were labelled between 100,000 to 200,000 yen (SGD$1,400-$2,800) a piece. Not sure if these were the actual sale prices, or donation prices for adopting the paintings. If they were the former would had been quite the bargain as far as art pieces are concerned.

There were many amazing ones on display, but especially loved the ones on display by Kita Hideaki. According to a a description here, he was a background artist for various popular anime titles, including Nana and Death Note. There was something about his bold use of colors and perspective that was reminiscent of the Hildebrandt Brothers.

From Nana and Death Note’s background artist.

Atmospheric.

After spending some time on this floor, we realized that there was a staircase leadings upstairs for an open air observation area. Unhindered by windows, you can get a much better better view here.

Upstairs.

The sun was just starting to set at this time, though we didn’t stick around long enough to see it actually descend. We could get a clear view of the rest of island from here. Below, the tide had risen a bit more, with only a few left fishing on now isolated rocks.

Tide had risen further.

Some of the traditional shops below.

A while later, we returned back down. Distracted by a cat here, we forgot to check out the tourist shop however and had missed out on getting some souvenir medallions that we had spotted earlier. Would also learn much later that they had postcards featuring Kita’s artwork for sale too. He had a whole series featuring various views and locations of Enoshima. Would probably had grabbed a whole bunch.

Not sure if it should be drinking that.

Enoshima Lighthouse Observation Tower.

Spent a bit of time walking around the garden or what was left of it this Autumn. It was mostly bare, though they had crates of sprouts lined up ready for the next season.

We found a nice cafe at the edge of the garden with an overlooking view of the bay. It served some seriously tempting gourmet pancake waffles and seemed especially popular since it was packed with a ton of adult women. Chisaki and I wanted to give it a try too, but unfortunately they didn’t accept cards and both of us were out of cash, having forgotten to draw some before coming.

A lesson learned and tip when traveling to out of the way places like this is always to have physical cash on hand, since you can’t really expect them to accept credit cards, even if it’s a popular destination.

Preparing for the next season.

Leaving.

So while it was still too early to head back, we couldn’t get anything else to eat on the island without any cash. Instead, decided to make use of our free passes to take a train down to the Kamakura shopping district to see what we could do there.

The classic looking Enoshima Electric Railway.

Sunset.

While more shops were open today, even at this time many had already closed (or perhaps had never bothered to open on a weekday at all). While looking around, we bump into yet another film crew. I guess this is what it means to have so many different variety programs in Japan.

Itching for a snack, we stopped by a crepes cafe for a break.

Kamakura shopping streets.

Chisaki went with a chocolate crepe, while I got a choco-cinnamon one. Quite like cinnamon flavored stuff, though they’re rare to come by in Singapore. The crepes here were quite nice. Chisaki pointed out that the ones at Harajuku were better though, she still had some shopping to do there, so perhaps will try some tomorrow. The biggest draw to the crepes here was probably the fact that they actually had a sit in area to take shelter from the cold. While there were a number of restaurants lined up along the side alleys here, we were still quite full from the late lunch and recent snack to take dinner yet.

Crepes.

Just nice.

Instead, took the long journey back to Shinjuku, dozing off again thanks to the comfortable heated seats. Brought up yesterday’s festival and since it was on the way and Chisaki had yet to experience that, we’d pay a visit there again today.

Along the way, we’d pass by some of the first Christmas lighting to be set up in Tokyo. She was quite happy to take some pictures here since she would realize that this was where some band members had tweeted or blogged some photos not too long ago.

Giant One Piece Luffy on the Shinjuku Takashimaya Times Square building

Christmas illumination.

It was especially crowded today at the festival, more so than even yesterday such that we really had to squeeze through the crowds to get anywhere. Picked up some other food today and learned that the festival food actually wasn’t half bad, you just need to pick out the right stuff.

Back here.

The tried and true stuff are your safest bets. Take these giant takoyaki balls for example, which while hardly bite sized, were great. Each steaming hot piece of takoyaki came with a giant slab of octopus inside.

Takoyaki.

Huge.

Fighting our way through, would notice a few other shops that hadn’t seen yesterday. The grilled fish on a stick looked quite appetizing, a pity didn’t room for more.

Squeezing through.

Tempting.

Colorful.

Gave one of the dorayaki stands a go, though this turned out to be the one failed try today. The pancakes had probably been left on the grill for too long.

Cheese Dorayaki.

Came across this interesting okonomiyaki shop along the main road which looked exceptional. The servings were huge and the okonomiyaki was sinfully topped with bacon and eggs. It was also noticeable since the cook looked to be quite the diva.

He had a pretty intense aura and put a great deal of care to making the okonomiyaki at his own pace. Amusingly, a gyaru came along and tried to plead for one but he nonchalantly sent her to the back of the queue. You can see him in action below.

While serving putting the finishing touch of a strip of bacon on our okonomiyaki, the cook accidentally dropped the bacon back onto the grill. He cooly topped ours off with an extra piece of bacon. Lucky!

Needless to say, the okonomiyaki was about as awesome as you can imagine.

Okonomiyaki.

Didn’t stay out till too late since I still had to return back to the apartment to pack. This would be my last night in Japan, since will be flying back tomorrow.

Funny how before you know it, time really flies by. Will make full use of the remaining day left though. For starters, had made plans to meet up with Chisaki again to re-visit Asakusa and Harajuku again tomorrow morning.

For those wondering, today’s subtitle is just a nod to a classic by Seiko.

This afternoon, finally found time and suitable conditions to do some shopping. After discovering a whole new face to the neighborhood and a fulfilling lunch there, I’d head over to geek haven Nakano Broadway to pick up some previous missed items for Randy and myself, before spending the rest of the afternoon shopping in Shinjuku.

After last night’s disappointing dinner, I had took some time to search online for better dinning options nearby. Was craving for some fish, since had yet to have any since the first in Tokyo. After a bit of checking, discovered that there was a Sushizanmai within walking distance from the apartment, in the opposite direction of where I had gone yesterday. Waking up in the late morning, I thought I’d go catch a quick brunch before the shopping.

Silent Hill-esque.

This would be the first time walking toward this side of the neighborhood. Monzennakacho Station was the furthest subway station from our apartment so we had opted not to use it before. Turning around the corner from the apartment, I would discover an entire main road that while quite run down, was lined with a good number of market stalls and dining options. It looked much like a more humble, dilapidated Asakusa. Had we known about it earlier, our stay in Tokyo would had been made a lot more convenient.

Sushizanmai.

The Sushizanmai here was a small chain restaurant type establishment with mostly counter seats and just a couple of tables. It was run by a couple of chefs and a middle aged lady who handled the register and serving. According to one of the many food blogs Yan frequents, it was apparently one of the better chain restaurants in Japan as far as sushi goes. Sushizanmai’s original store calls the universally known Tsukiji Fish Market home.

Complementary salad appetizer.

A feast of different tuna cuts.

Decided to go with the rice bowl below which was being advertised outside the store. For just 1,000 yen (SGD$14) you get a generous mixture of different tuna cuts and rice. While the image below does not show so, they were the thickest pieces I’ve ever had. Needless to say, was satisfied. Will definitely give their other outlets a visit in the future.

@xdreamscape The chunks of tuna so thick I feel bad for the fish. — Supermerlion (@supermerlion) November 19, 2012

After, caught a train over to Nakano Broadway. Randy had finally decided that he wanted the set of Kamen Rider toys that he saw days ago here, so helped him picked them up. A set of 8 set him back about SGD$160. Still with fond memories of the past two days’ mini-lives, I picked up shop posters for HERO / Sweet Jewel and Beat Generation / No More Distance. The TRIO at Nakano Broadway stocks up on promo posters, the kind usually displayed whenever there are new music, movie, drama and or even product releases. The Fairies posters cost 1,500 yen each. Spotted a Sea A poster for 800 yen, which was surprising. Offered to purchase it for Randy, he declined.

800 yen at TRIO. twitpic.com/c5iao6

— Supermerlion (@supermerlion) February 21, 2013

Got a message from Yan in the late afternoon urging for company to visit Tengu Izakaya. Had already been there once this trip so wasn’t that keen, but complied thinking that it’d be no harm and he’d promise to make it at my convenience anyways. Headed on down to Shinjuku to meet him for an early dinner since I ought to head back early to start packing for the return trip, and to see how much luggage space I had left, or was lacking.

Unexpectedly it’d be quite a few hours before he’d turn up, since it turned out that he was shopping elsewhere and was preoccupied with getting a pair of pants tailored. Spent some time looking around Takashimaya Times Square and then more than an hour at a nearby bookshop. Was tempted to buy quite a few of them, including a Kyary Pamyu Pamyu guide on hipster Tokyo, but managed to resist the urge. On hindsight, probably should had, since the pressure to purchase something eventually led to far worse decisions.

The additional time left to kill led to me to spend the next hour or two returning to Takashimya Times Square and Marui Mens. Failing to find the TK bag that I was looking for or a suitable wallet, ended up caving in and getting a random wallet and bag. Regretted the decisions almost immediately after.

Festival.

To prevent any more spending, decided to slowly make my way over to Tengu first. The entire street of Shinjuku Sanchome had been lined up with interesting festival stalls. The streets were packed with people coming in either direction to see the festivities and more huddled up outside the shops eating the foods that they had purchased there, was quite keen on getting some festival food myself since many seemed quite appetizing.

Would end up having to wait at Tengu for another one and a half hours after Yan’s stipulated arrival timing. To makes things worse he had gotten lost in Shinjuku. Eventually managed to find him. The Tengu that we was one of their washoku branches, so we had to search for a different branch, one that served the Western dishes he was craving. Found another outlet a few blocks away near the Seibu Station.

Tengu’s parma ham pizza.

Probably wasn’t in the best of moods by this point. Ordered just the usual raw ham pizza and diced steak, as well as a side of salad, since wanted to save up the space (and yen) to try out the festival food instead.

Diced steak.

After a quick and somewhat awkward dinner, we headed back toward the direction of the festival, squeezing our way through the tight crowds. Since it was just a narrow pedestrian pavement, the crowds put even weekend Harajuku to shame.

Catching goldfish.

There were a great number of food stands and a wide variety of street food and snacks available there. Many sold the usual festival food like yakisoba and okonomiyaki, while some more unique stands sold stuff like grilled “horumon” or intestines. Yan ended up getting a serving to try. It was tough and difficult to chew but would had been fine had it been warm, but was cold by the time he ate it. He also ended up getting a candy apple from one of the many shops that were selling them. Apart from the usual candied apples, they also sold mini ones and candied strawberries. We grabbed a pack of yakisoba to share, which was probably one of the better buys at the fair this evening.

Grilled intestines.

Candied apples.

Festival food.

After getting our snacks, we decided to squeeze in toward the main shrine, which was the cause of the festivities. The inner area was especially packed since seats had been set up inside some of the tents to serve barbecued seafood and oden. Looked good but was quite pricey so gave it a miss. Yan was still in budget savings mode, and I was feeling the pinch too after having spent about $400 earlier on the two accessories. Under different conditions or company would have loved to give the experience a try.

Squeezing through.

It seems the festivities were set up to celebrate two concurrent events in Japan, Shichi Go San and the Tori no Ichi festival. This was probably just one of the many shrines that had celebrations, but being located in central Shinjuku definitely drew in the crowds. Apart from the main entrance which we came from, festival tents had been lined up in the courtyard and along the other exits of Hanazono shrine.

Festival lighting.

People.

Stayed around for a while to observe the people while Yan went off to get more goshuin from this shrine. To celebrate Tori no Ichi, many visitors purchased these elaborately decorated bamboo rakes for good luck. They were sold by various flower companies, who had set up stands within the courtyard. Interestingly, the shop keepers would break out into musical number that involved chanting and slapping bamboo sticks together whenever someone purchased one of the rakes, to wish them good luck.

Bamboo rakes.

Amezaiku making.

When he was done, it was time to make out way out back to the main road to get more snacks. Passed by one elderly man making the amezaiku (the candied animals that we had previously seen in Odaiba) on the spot.

Really like squid, so was tempted by the numerous stalls selling grilled squid, though they were quite pricey at 300-500 yen a pop. Got one from one of the more popular stalls. Disappointingly, it didn’t taste much more than burnt even with the thick sauce. Might fare better earlier in the day when the grill is still clean.

Grilled squid.

Quite tasteless.

For dessert, thought that I’d get one of the chocolate coated bananas. Again, there were many stalls each with their own draw points. One of the stalls used hundreds and thousands for example, which were more favorable than conventional sprinkles. This old lady didn’t get too much business since he choco-bananas looked the plainest out of all. To make up for this, they were cheaper and she offered customers a second one free, if they could win her in a game of janken. After observing her patterns for a while, was pretty sure could take her on. Sure enough, got an additional one free which I passed to Yan.

Choco Banana.

You get an additional one if you won this seller in janken.

Before leaving, Yan grabbed a pack of Okonomiyaki to bring back to his hostel. The ones served here looked really good and were affordable to boot. It’s a pity that Singaporeans aren’t too fond of the dish and all the nice okonomiyaki stalls in Singapore have since closed down.

Okonomiyaki.

We parted ways here since I could catch the much nearer subway back to our apartment. The highlight for today was definitely lunch that and probably browsing at the bookstore. The sheer amount of magazines and mooks in Japanese bookstores are nothing short of impressive. And one can easily get lost in these multi-storey complexes for hours. I can foresee myself spending spending quite a bit of time at bookstores if I were to live here permanently. Being a book otaku ain’t that bad a thing right? I’m sure many Asian parents would be proud.

Slept in this morning before waking up to contemplate what was the best way to spend the afternoon. I still had shopping to do, yet wasn’t too keen on wrestling with the Sunday crowds. Somehow I found myself looking up the Fairies website again. They were having a Kanagawa live event this afternoon, the last to promote their White Angel single. Discovered that while it was quite a distance, there was a direct train there. This was enough to tip things in their favor. I hurried over to Suitengumae Station to catch a train over to where the event would be held.

Today’s Fairies’ live was at Tama Plaza in Utsukushigaoka, a suburb along the northern-west border of Yokohama. In Singapore terms, this was one of those “heartlands” malls. Fairies would be performing in the Kanagawa equivalent of Bukit Panjang Plaza. I would learn today that past Shibuya, the Tokoyo Metro Hanzomon trains continues onward to Kanagawa under the Tokyu Denentoshi label. The entire journey takes just under an hour.

Had originally thought that it’d be further away, and had I known it’d be this accessible, would had made plans to attend the event sooner. Yesterday’s event at Tokyo Dome City was quite enjoyable but the poor weather conditions left much to be desired. Thankfully, the heavy rains had subsided at some point this morning.

Clear skies.

Since I had left at the last minute, could hear the not so distant sounds of Fairies already performing as the train pulled up into Tama Plaza. Rushing toward the source of the music, the stage soon came into view. Had arrived a little too late to get a good spot. Still, managed to tip toe through to see the rest of the performance. Compared to Tokyo Dome City or even many other malls, today’s venue was quite a bit smaller. Thankfully, there didn’t seem to be too many people around.

Couple of songs into the first live.

After performing a bunch of their songs the they proceeded into another handshake event. While many fans crowded around the area to watch, hardly any were in line for the handshake this afternoon. It turned out that most weren’t willing to leave their spot, in fear of losing it.

I guess the right thing to do then was to get more copies of their single, which I ended up doing. There wasn’t any queue at the sales booth this time. Perhaps everyone had already spent their limit on the previous days. Had purchased two versions of their CD yesterday, so decided to get the third final version to complete things. Received only one handshake ticket this time and without thought picked out another random Miki picture.

Tama Plaza.

The handshake session ended up being a rather pleasant experience. Miki recognised me from yesterday and seemed quite amused to see me again. Mahiro was also a lot friendlier and more upbeat today. She had tied up her hair into two tiny buns and looked quite adorable too. She explained that it was in celebration of Mickey Mouse’s birthday today.

While the handshake session was underway, there would also be the occasional person picking up tickets at the booth, so while there wouldn’t be more than a dozen people in line at any point, there would be a steady number of fans coming through handshake line.

After my turn I headed upstairs to take a look around. Even before the first event had ended, many of the (especially) younger fans were already camping out for the next. About 50% of Fairies fans were young girls and another 25% their parents. The next largest audience today were teenage boys and random members of the public who had just chanced upon the event. Your typical wota  were surprisingly, the minority.

Didn’t take too many photos today. The camera’s buttons were still locked up from yesterday and would only shoot at all in Intelligent Auto. This coupled with the fact that focus and metering were still wonky (after having dropped the camera earlier this trip) made any photo taking quite difficult and would have a bit of trouble with video too.

Handshake session.

I managed to find a good spot on the second floor just beside the stage, alongside a couple of grade school girls and a trio of seemingly normal looking young adult women. Seeing the kids come back to their groups with rations from the nearby McDonalds, I cursed my lack of foresight to get some refreshments too first.

Didn’t dare leave the spot though. Despite there being another hour until the next show, almost the entire first floor and balcony was filled up by fans who had not left since the first live. A number, like the two little girls beside had even set up mats on the floor and were having a picnic. They killed the time by reviewing through footage from the first show that they had recorded on their camera. Thankfully, I had some cup noodles in the morning but a hot drink now would had been nice. The weather today had hit an all time low and there were strong winds blowing through the open square.

Found the best possible spot this time…at least for leaving room at noon…now just need to camp for one hour. twitter.com/supermerlion/s…

— Supermerlion (@supermerlion) November 18, 2012

Clad in the usual Shibuya fashion, one wouldn’t expect the three young women to be wota. But they were. At some point all three took out their photo albums full of Fairies pictures and began flipping through, one of them had a massive collection of pretty much every single photograph to date, save for a few. There weren’t that many pictures of Fairies in existence (on account of them only being around for a year), so she made up for that by having multiple copies of each and when that wasn’t enough filled up the remaining gaps with Tokyo Girls’ Style photos.

Trading photos.

Alas, it seems she was missing some and that wouldn’t do. Taking this opportunity between lives, the three banded together and started making their rounds. They approached several other Fairies fans whom they seemed acquainted with and attempted to convince them to trade some of the photos they were missing. They didn’t seem to have much luck though.

Apart from photo cards inside first press copies of their CDs, there are also pre-order bonuses and even specific photographs, the last of which is only available at such live events. Today’s event added 7 new photographs, one for each member. I would learn later that due to their scarcity these pictures go for as much as (if not more) than the CDs themselves on the secondary market. Theoretically, you could go for as many handshakes as you want and still make a profit (limited by the number of actual Fairies fans of course)

Oddly, there weren’t that many people going for the handshakes though. The Japanese are pretty thrifty, or perhaps Fairies were that unpopular.

Eventually the second live came around. Just before the performance started, they opened up the handshake area in front which was reserved for children and their parents. Some of the younger women had brought children that were way too young to be fans.

Out of four attempts, this was the one time that I managed to get a pretty good view. Fairies performed 5 songs (Tweet Dream, One Love, White Angel, Hero, Song For You) in total, which with the exception of White Angel, were mostly different from the first event. Needless to say, it was pretty awesome. The group has yet to release a song that I truly dislike. It seemed the crowd shared similar sentiments as myself in favoring many of their B-Sides, since they got the loudest cheers whenever one was performed. White Angel and Song For You would be stuck in my head for quite some time after.

After their performance Fairies hurried off to grab some jackets. They had come better prepared this time but ultimately the weather still won. It was getting cold, even for me since had only brought a thin blazer. A quick check revealed that it was currently 6 degrees. They were real cute about it though and laughed it off, while fidgeting on the spot between handshakes.

Rationalizing that it was a pretty good deal (it was), I bought another copy of White Angel’s event only edition for one final handshake ticket. For 1,000 yen you got the CD, a photo album and again one photograph of your choice. Considering how much they sold for, perhaps I should had put more thought into selecting them, but in the haste of things picked out one at random again.

Another handshake session.

Like in the first session, most of the fans just stood around watching the members. While there wasn’t anyone in queue after the first wave of fans, the entire handshake session dragged on for quite a while. The girls hung around even when there was no one in queue to make sure that everyone who did have a ticket did manage to use theirs, or for the occasional person to purchase another copy. A result was that those that did come later could spend just about as much time as they wanted.

In anticipation of the girls leaving, the fans formed a self policed line along the corridor to bid the girls farewell. I guess everyone had expected that they’d be returning up the same lift which they had come down from. Instead, to everyone’s surprise they left from a closer elevator. The fans dispersed quickly after that. If not for today’s live, the mall was pretty empty. Soon after one of the Fairies members shouted from upstairs which resultant in shrieks of “Rikako” and the younger, more energetic fans running upstairs.

Waiting for the members.

Even after the members had left, some of the staff stayed around and together with the fans began following a baseball game while the rest helped pack up the set. Japan were playing a friendly against Cuba this evening in preparation of the 3rd World Baseball Classic. Ran off to get a quick snack (more fried chicken) and a drink from the nearby Lawson before heading back to the apartment.

The staff and fans stayed around to catch a game.

The night was still early, though it did not make for the best weather to go out. Returned to the apartment to thaw out for a short while, whilst picking up a thicker jacket.I hoped to perhaps find something good for dinner nearby so spent the next half an hour or more walking around the entire neighborhood. Made an entire loop beginning at Kabayacho, continuing onward to Ningyocho and then to Suitengumae. All of this was in vain. Since the Nihonbashi area is mostly a business district, about everything closes here as soon as it gets dark.

The river beside the apartment.

Illuminated in the evening.

Not wanting to rely on convenience store food again, I ignored my own advice to stay clear of these sort of fast food places and settled for dinner at a 24 hour Sukiya inside of a petrol station.

The place was staffed by a couple of young Chinese women, since they were probably the only ones willing to work for minimal wage for this sort of hours. There was only one other unfortunate customer inside and he left with much of his food untouched. Another victim arrived later.

Last resort.

Bad.

I had some sort of shredded beef curry. Prices here were cheap, even less than what you’d spend at a combini, but the servings were sparse. As far as the curry went though, I’d recommend sticking to the convenience stores. At first the water from the jugs provided tasted like cigarettes, but on closer inspection turned out to be roasted barley tea that had been diluted beyond recognition. I returned to the hotel to cheer myself up with a little snack that had been kept around from Donki.

Dessert.

Today we celebrate the third year year since the Supermerlion went live. Amusingly, the start of Supermerlion’s 4th year coincides with the Lunar New Year festivities. Once again a big thanks to our viewers, your constant patronage have continued to motivate us when pouring the hundreds of hours into this site. For those interested, here’s a recap of the highlights and a quick report on the progress we’ve made over the last year.

For us at least, the last year seemed to fly by really quickly. Rather than growth, 2012 was a year of change for Supermerlion. The biggest of which was of course was last year’s decision to reduce focus on AKB48 content, our major traffic generator. We still report the most significant news but our distaste for re-reporting tabloids, in a year where the majority of 48 news were in fact scandals, meant losing a large chunk of potential viewership.

The past year, Supermerlion has indeed made steps, while small, to begin to diversify our content. AKB48 related articles, which had accounted for 65% of our viewership in 2011, now only account for 33% of our total viewership. Still, we’ve managed to match the previous year’s viewership of 700,000 and then some. While this shift in content may had hindered traffic in the short term, I genuinely believe that there is more purpose in representing a more diverse picture of Japanese culture.

Started and ended 2012 in Japan.

Our data seems to agree. The site now attracts an increased number of repeat and direct visitors, suggesting the growth of our own dedicated audience, albeit small. Extra thanks if you’re one of these people, you’re awesome.

People from the United States and Singapore still make up our largest audience. Thanks to the advent of JKT48, we had quite a bit of Indonesians dropping by for our introductory idol posts earlier in the year, though they’ve since moved on to dedicated sites. We enjoyed quite a bit of attention from Japan in 2012 too, thanks to being featured in a couple of newspaper articles there. The remaining visitors seem to come from Canada, Australia and South East Asia.

Russian viewers are definitely deserving of thanks too. Despite making up a small number, they’ve been some of the most vocally active online, with many citing our travel guides in their own journals. While this rarely leads to more than a couple of “hits”, it’s infinitely rewarding when you know that at least one person has found a use for a guide.

I personally also love when people actually put words to their photos (rather than throw them on Facebook en masse) and enjoy reading through other people’s encounters. It allows you to see a different take, empathize with their excitement and pick up things that would had otherwise been missed.

It can be interesting to see Japan through other people’s journals.

We like to think that the focus on quality content comes with certain pluses, such as the support of our sponsors. We’ve been able to continue running on super fast cloud servers, serving up all of these photos quickly to people all over the world, thanks to those guys. In 2012, we caught the attention of a number of companies, such as Design Tshirts Store graniph, who found value in our high quality audience. Partnering up with the famous Japanese fashion brand, we were able to give away t-shirts to our readers, no strings attached.

What you do see on Supermerlion is just a fraction of offers that we have been proposed. We go through a strict elimination process to bring only what is most relevant and unobtrusive to our viewers. We believe that this integrity brings mutual benefit to us and our partners. In 2012, we’ve continued to support local projects and managed to build up contacts with various industry players, which will definitely come in useful in the future.

Of course, there were various shortcomings on our end too. The biggest being the overall decrease in updates. We released only 187 new posts the last year, our least yet, for a total of 763 on the site. While part of this was due to penned articles being more substantial, much of it was due to increasingly tightening schedules, and video games. The past month has been especially tight, now that I’ve started taking a part time degree, in addition to the everyday running of the company.

Took a chunk out of our year.

Search traffic still accounts for the majority of our viewers. In recent months, I’ve finally fixed an architectural bug in our system that was preventing our newer images from appearing in Google Image Search, leading to a slight boost in visitors. Still, it’ll be a long time before we get around to actually labeling all the older pictures.

Supermerlion has largely failed to tap into social media as a means of spreading awareness. To date, social media accounts for only 5% of our visitors. We’ve managed to pretty much miss the quick rise and tumble of Tumblr and other image centric micro-blogging systems. Facebook continues to be our main means of updating users to new posts, though this has proven ineffective with their recent change of allowing only 20% of our actual subscribers to receive any particular update in their feed. Twitter is a possible alternative but it is a mostly personal account and most of our readers do not seem to appreciate the brutally honest commentary there.

The one exception to all this of course had been YouTube. Last year, the Supermerlion YouTube Channel has managed to attract another 2 million views, coming in just short of 3 million views in total. While most of this was again due to a single “viral” video, the message is clear, video will continue to remain an important medium. Accordingly, Mus’s photobook videos had been quite popular, and so have Daryl’s AKB48 videos, particularly (and amusingly) among Japanese audiences.

Part of our direction as such is including more video content in our articles in the future. Inevitably, with newer technology and improvements in internet speed, moving pictures will be the next step. Our biggest challenge then is the amount of work required to produce such content. Our experiment at STGCC suggested that the amount of effort required to create and edit video “reports” are hardly worth it. We still have a long ways to go technically and are still in the midst of trying to identify something manageable. As a side note, we’ve manage to catch the attention of Wondlan as another sponsor, who is generous enough to provide us with all the professional filming equipment we need.

Where will 2013 take us?

More things on the immediate to do list is for more up to date news and to branch out into covering Japanese video games, and to bring back quick previews of other Japanese novelty toys. While its something that has always been on mind, we also hope to cover more Singapore events and tourist attractions.

Finally, I hope to finally make good on the promise to give away free swag to our viewers. I’m still in the midst of sorting through the logistics of things but have accumulated a sizeable variety of loot, wota (like copies of past reviewed mooks and merchandise) or otherwise (Japanese Charms and souvenirs), though depending on feedback, we may have better stuff to give out.

We’ll probably start off small sometime soon to figure things out, then work toward some better giveaways later in the year. Things are still pretty sketchy at the moment but for the ease of contact we’ll probably use Facebook for the smaller giveaways and only feature bigger events on site. So do follow us over there for updates.

We’ve have a ton of things that we intend to do but actually getting them done can be difficult with our lack of manpower. Currently the only two regular remaining authors at Supermerlion tends to be Mus and myself. As such, our main goal at this point would be to maintain the previous year’s agenda. At the off chance that someone might be interested in contributing to a worthwhile cause, I’m going to leave a shout out to the public. For everyone else, we thank you for a great past year and your continual support.

Some might also realize that today is Kenkoku Kinen no Hi, Japan’s National Foundation Day!

Ignoring whatever possible overlap in market, avex had decided to schedule SUPER☆GiRLS and Fairies events in different places at the same time today. The original plan was to use up my SG tickets in Osaka and leave Tokyo’s SUPER☆GiRLS handshake up to Yan and Eri so that I’d have time for the Fairies live at Tokyo Dome City, but with our tickets arriving late and Eri’s early departure, I was stuck with six additional SUPER☆GiRLS handshake tickets.

Heavy showers that would last throughout the day.

I’d pass Yan three of these tickets, on top of another three that he had ordered. Wasn’t too keen on the SUPER☆GiRLS event this morning. Unlike the Osaka mini-live which actually had performances, today’s was strictly a handshake only session. Definitely wasn’t looking forward to the queues either.

It would also be raining for the entire day, and was feeling quite under the weather. Yesterday’s failed attempt at skating had also somehow left a large bruise on my ankle, which I would only realize after returning back.

Spent the morning between napping and waking up at intervals to finally settle my laundry. Had originally even intended to forfeit the three tickets I still had on hand but eventually mustered the energy to leave the apartment in the afternoon.

River that ran just outside the apartment.

Today’s SUPER☆GiRLS event was split into three sessions in the morning, afternoon and late afternoon. Each handshake ticket entitled you to a meet and greet with two members, which were paired up beforehand. You can always find out the pairings ahead of time at their official website to plan who you were going for.

By the afternoon, Yan was already done with all but one of his handshake tickets (for some reason he reserved one ticket for the last session but ended up wasting that later). Turns out there wasn’t nearly as many people at the handshake even as I thought and the lines there moved really quickly.

Realizing that I could be in and out of there in no time, decided to give the second session a shot. Maeshima Ami and Takana Mirei were paired together for this block, so it wouldn’t get more economical than that. The venue really wasn’t too far from the apartment either, slightly less than two stops away, so decided to travel there by foot. The umbrellas that we had purchased in Osaka, lugged to Nagoya, and now to Tokyo, had finally come in handy.

Could barely make out the tower.

Didn’t have trouble finding the venue. Thanks to the weather, most of the streets were empty. It turned out to be an office building, with the second floor having been converted to a small events space. By the time I had arrived the first session had just finished, so had to wait around until the next one started. There, I had to swap my tickets for time slot specific vouchers.

There were probably less than a hundred other people waiting around for the event. The SUPER☆GiRLS fans were all quite young (with a surprising number of women) but none of them look too friendly, so everyone ended up standing at various corners of the lobby, starring uncomfortably at each other. This was made more awkward by the little amount of space and the office tenants constantly passing through.

About 20 minutes before the intended timing, we were lead upstairs to a proper queue. The room was boarded off into two parts. In this first half, we were organized into one long queue. At the end of the queue, you would have to pass the staff member a handshake coupon to be granted access to the other half of the room, where you’d find individual shorter queues for the different member pairs.

Before the event started, the mass queue stretched to about two hundred people but would be quickly siphoned off into the individual lanes. Most attendees had just one or ticket tickets, so depending on who you were going for, each round didn’t take more than 5 to 10 minutes.

Handshake vouchers.

Of the three tickets I was holding on to, the first and last would go toward the Maeshima/Tanaka combo, while the second ticket would be used for the Kanou Kaede and Goto Aya lane instead. I would had easily spent all three tickets on Amita and Mirei had there been more things to say, but I rarely come to such events prepared.

Having just two members per lane compared to the three in Osaka turned out to be a boon. Instead of a continuous stream of fans, one would spend their time in each booth alone (leading to less confused members). There was also ample time to express quite a bit, such that I’d had trouble coming up with things to say.

Mirei was positioned first in the handshake booth. Both Amita and her were as jumpy as you’d expect of their age. Didn’t have anything to say, so took the opportunity to reintroduce myself. They appeared to remember me vaguely after mentioning Singapore such that they nodded in response to bringing up Osaka. Kanou Kaede was pleasant as usual. When compared to the previous experience, Goto Aya was in a surprisingly good mood today so didn’t regret using a ticket for the lane. On hearing that I was from Singapore she started a long rant about the Singapore Merlion while emoting a spewing motion.

Though I wasn’t quite what to say, the final handshake coupon was used again for the Mirei and Amita lane. Mirei seemed quite surprised to see me make a return, since few others had come around more than once (you could immediately come around after a handshake back into the individual queues at this point), replied that it was because she was so pretty. She laughed. Told Amita that I had came down last year to see them too, but wasn’t able to shake hands with them then, to which she answered “but you’re here now”. She finished off by asking me to come visit again next year.

Fairies.

With that done I made my way over to Tokyo Dome at Suidobashi for the Fairies event. The girls would be holding two mini-lives, each followed by a handshake session at LaQua this afternoon. Unfortunately, attending the SUPER☆GiRLS handshake session meant that I would miss the first Fairies live.

The event was set up to promote Fairies new single White Angel, which was interestingly their first non-double A-side. There were two ongoing queues at the event, one that lead up to the stage where Fairies were and another toward a booth that had been set up beside the stage to sell copies of the single on the spot. Each copy entitled you to a handshake voucher for all the members and a limited edition photograph. The handshakes for the first session was still underway.

Merchandise booth.

Got a message from Yan asking where I was at, and that he’ll come down too. He arrived soon enough. As before Yan offered to handle the camera while I queued up for the booth, which meant plenty of pictures of Fairies’ fans, and nearly none of Fairies themselves, save the one cropped out below. Fairies is especially interesting in that it is one group where the demographic of its target audience overlaps that of the members themselves.

Unlike other such events, both photography and video were allowed. All the staff requested was that flash was not used, so as not to distract the event. They had one person patrol the area with a no flash photography sign. The rest of the fans had certainly come prepared, with video equipment of all sorts.

The majority of Fairies’ audience.

Bought one copy of White Angel’s CD+DVD and their special event only edition, thinking that I’d get a couple tickets, one for the current event and another for the second live later. The event edition was especially worthwhile since apart from the CD, it also included a photo album, all for just 1,000 yen. In all honesty, would still had purchased their CDs even if there was no greeting session as payment for their performances. It would be quite sad if they were to perform for free wouldn’t it? I guess they were banking on more people thinking like that.

As mentioned above, any purchase also entitled you to a limited edition photograph of one of the members. You could pick out one of your liking from any of the available designs. There was one set of pictures, for each mini-live event that Fairies would perform. Today was the second last show, so you could pick from any of the past 5 photo sets. Yes, they weren’t random. Blows your mind. It is strange that even with all these benefits thought, that their sales figures aren’t doing too well.

Some of the customers stood there for the longest time deciding which photographs to choose, they weren’t urged to move on at all. In fact, Fairies staff seemed like the nicest I’ve ever met. Not wishing to hold up the queue myself, I simply picked out the two most recent Shimomura Miki photos. For some reason the person managing the booth even urged the staff there to pass me another 2 handshake tickets on top of the two I was already given.

Got in line.

With the tickets in hand, I ran off to find some shelter outside the fast food restaurants surrounding the venue. It was really coming down. Here I bumped into two young women, Fairies fans who were taking cover there too. Asking if I had gone for the handshake yet, they pointed out that I really had ought to join the other queue since it was about to end soon. Heeding their advice, I ran off to do so.

Incidentally, this round of handshakes with the members was pretty rushed. Amusing, rather than the typical men in suits, or the rude burly security guards you get at such events in Japan or Singapore accordingly, Fairies’ security staff consisted entirely out of women. The reason probably being that you didn’t want the women and children fans being manhandled, but the result was that you had again, the friendliest security staff ever. The one in charge even smiled and greeted fans as if she were one of the members herself.

Even if the age of the members were irrelevant, there is something especially surreal about meeting artistes for the first time. Most of the experience was a buzz, though I did make it a point to let Shimomura know I was a fan. Ito Momoka was overly zealous with her handshake and repeated thanks, while Hayashida Mahiro seemed to be pretty out there, I didn’t blame her. Despite the weather, all the members from Fairies were sporting shorts this afternoon.

While I had previous never paid any attention, Inoue Rikako stood out as being especially and genuinely friendly. It was no surprise that she had as many fans as she did among the crowd here today. Probably had the best impression of her today, apart from Miki of course.

Promoting their new single.

Returning to shelter, I found the two Fairies fans still there. After a bit of idle conversation, they introduced themselves as Miyuki and Kozue. Learning that I was a foreigner, they asked if I had any plans after the event and suggested that we met for dinner. We exchanged numbers and agreed to meet back at the spot after the event. Unbeknownst at this time, the two would lead to one of the most novel experiences in Japan.

Found Yan not far away and I took the time between shows to get something to eat from the adjacent bakery. Had yet to have lunch or breakfast. Yan was still in the process of saving money, so he got something to drink from a nearby supermarket instead.

Quick lunch.

Thanks to the weather, we didn’t feel any urgency to leave the spot and find a place to watch the live, such that by the time we actually did, there wouldn’t be any good spots left. The sea of umbrellas, meant that it would be impossible to catch a glimpse from the first floor, so we settled for a place on the second floor of LaQua instead.

It was immediately apparent why few people stood there, since the trees blocked nearly the entire view. This was further worsened by a man in front of us and his large umbrella. About midway through, he realized that he was blocking everyone else though, and folded it. He could had really just lifted it higher.

Terrible spot.

Given the poor conditions, a lot of the people gave up and left. It wasn’t any better on the ground, where you could see young fans who had arrived late scurrying about trying to find a possible vantage point, without much success. One strange man had the wise idea of boarding the adjacent merry-go-round to try to catch a better view. He looked disappointed after.

With the trees obscuring our entire view, couldn’t really make out much of what was happening. Their new single, White Angel was quite catchy indeed though, kind of like a Japanese version of Roly Poly.

At his request, passed Yan one of the remaining 3 handshake tickets for the next round. Didn’t know what I’d do with as many tickets anyway. Rather than hurry up the fans, we were actually given more time for the later session.

After, we found Miyuki and Kozue at the shelter. Both Miyuki and myself still had one more ticket to go each, so we went for yet another round. Chatting while in line, learned that she was a Miria fan among other things.

The second and third rounds with the members were pleasant. On hindsight, it would had been amusing to know what Miyuki had said to the members, you’d learn why later. When I came around with Yan, Miki saw me and remarked “second time”, she repeated and went “third time” for when I went with Miyuki. I guess that there were so few Fairies fans, much less non-loli fans that it would be easy to remember faces easily. Hope that the repetition wasn’t creepy though. In my defense, I had really only intended for 2 tickets.

Some time after it got dark, the festive lighting was turned on, causing a unanimous exclamation from the audience. It was quite beautiful indeed. I’ve always hoped to catch the Christmas illumination in Japan, but had always visited either too early or late.

One of my favorite pictures this trip came from my iPhone.

Met back up with Yan and Kozue at the shelter when we were done. The two suggested that we have dinner at the Kentucky Fried Chicken outlet just there, it should had been an omen of things to come. Having never step foot in a Japanese KFC before, the two recommended that we try the chicken wrap.

Upon inquiring, would learn that they frequented KFC pretty often. The two seemed pretty strapped for cash, though we rationalized it as symptomatic of students. Still, there were many awkward signs that should had pointed to something amiss, which I again presumed to be just typical of them being wota.

The first half hour of dinner seemed normal enough as we got to know each other better through small talk. The two were especially interested in where we were from, why we were in Japan and what we did. At the same time we learned that Miyuki worked for a railway company, while Kozue was still studying in university.

Things started to take a turn for the weird though when the topic of religion was brought up. Asking about our religious affiliations, I made the poor decision of replying that I was a free-thinker, since I didn’t know how to explain the concept of agnosticism in Japanese. That probably wouldn’t had been any better though.

The two explained that they were Buddhists. Now, as a disclaimer, I’ve got nothing against Buddhism in the original sense of the word. The Dalai Lama for example, makes some of the most sense. Miyuki went about on a long rant about how she used to lead a pretty depressing life due to her low grades in school, poor sociability and general negativity. She explained how turning to Buddhism had turned her life around and made her “happy”, a word she repeated many times.

KFC.

Personally, I’ve been into some dire situations in the past that would make even your average Korean and Chinese soaps look like a walk in the park, these were of course overcome with nothing short of resilience and lots of hard work. Still, without judging too much, one could empathize with how passionately she was describing them.

The two went on to say that they prayed for hours each day, for their happiness, and the happiness of Japan. Seems they were part of some sort of Buddhist community. At this point Miyuki took out a newspaper cutting from her bag (from among many others) to talk about her Buddhist “leader”. She was really enthusiastic about describing her religion and her leader. Kozue was probably the more socially conscious of the two, she noticed our disinterest, though was encouraged by Miyuki to help support her claims.

At some point they let loose the word “Kenshokai” slip. I took this opportunity to Google it on the spot. This of course lead immediately to descriptions of Nichiren Kenshokai as nothing short of an ultra-right wing charismatic Buddhist cult. Most worryingly of course were the links to violence and parallels to Aum Shinrikyo. It dawned on me as to what a situation we had actually gotten ourselves into. Definitely didn’t want to offend them in any way.

They explained that the reason why the world was in such a messed up state was because not enough people were praying. Part of me found amusement in the scenario in front of us but for the most part it was quite a unreal daze. I had expected the two to be perhaps a bit strange (in a wota way) but never would I fathom them to be cultist. Yan seemed to be the more aware one in this situation, since by his own accounts, he is already part of an equivalent cult in Singapore.

This meant that the two would spend most of their efforts trying to focus on converting me to their cause. Still, the two women explained that the religions in our country were “ineffective” and that only by praying with them, the rest of the world could be saved. The Kenshokai of course believed that was some sort of impending disaster in the world and their leader would eventually rise to lead the remnants of society.

Miyuki urged that we go pray with them. I laughed it off at first, but they were dead serious. They repeated “let’s go”, except this time with “now”.  Turned out that their cultist center was nearby. Thinking of the best way to turn down this offer, without offending them, I eventually settled on telling Miyuki that while I felt happy for her that she found happiness this way, I had my own beliefs.

She took it surprisingly well and Kozue had grown quite tired of backing her up at this point too, so eventually she gave up. She ended by saying that today she “planted the seeds of happiness” in us. We left awkwardly soon after.

Waving the two girls off as they indeed went to pray, or perhaps search for more victims, I breathed a sigh of relief. But this was minimal to the amount of confusion and amusement as to what had just happened. Looking back, I had regretted not asking for a photo at least. It would had been gold. In all my trips, this was the first time being invited to a Japanese cult.

It was storming more heavily now so more than ever such that we were getting quite drenched. I joked that perhaps the heavens was upset at our lack of faith. Thankfully, having stayed at Suidobashi for that two weeks back in 2010 meant that I’d be pretty familiar with the place, so we stuck to as much shelter as we could until the train station. Threw the camera into Yan’s bag, since as much as the camera claimed to be weather sealed, pretty sure the 50mm wasn’t.

There, we took a couple stops down to Akihabara where Yan was staying. He had somehow managed to leave his without an umbrella this day so had to borrow mine to get back to his hostel to pick up one. In the meantime, I looked around the Yodobashi Camera outlet beside the station.

Yan was interested in checking out the cameras there, so went to scout out some in advance. Apart from being a little too small for most hands, the Pentax Q10 was a particularly promising camera. As with just about any modern camera these days, the images were decent. But more importantly, the kit lens it came with had a pretty diverse range, managed to focus surprisingly quickly and the small size meant that it’d be great for travel.

Went he finally made his return, Yan seemed more keen on picking up an Olympus OM-D though, which was basically a E-P1 (with all its shortcomings) packed into a heavier body, thus negating its only plus. He explained that Takeuchi Miyu had recently purchased a Pen.

Instant udon.

We parted ways soon after. Albeit tiring, today had been an interesting day, with unexpected occurrences. Was glad to return to (what little) comforts of the apartment though, since had been drenched since earlier and despite hunger, wouldn’t be leaving again this evening. Thankfully, still had some supplies left over from Don Quijote.

Spent the rest of the evening all the way until the wee hours of the morning fiddling around with the camera. Somehow it had gotten unlocked while in Yan’s bag and beyond the master dial, none of the buttons were functioning now. There was also the possibility of the rain being the cause, though I feared the thought of that. Sadly, any efforts to overcome this were in vain. Definitely wrecking up on the damages this trip.

Today, Yan and I lucked into some tickets for an AKB48 theater show in the evening. I’d have the rest of the day free though. So in the meantime had made plans to meet up with Chisaki to head over once again to that wonderful man made island of Odaiba.

Catching the light rail over to Odaiba.

We were to meet up at Shimbashi Station first to catch the light rail over to Odaiba. She’d have some trouble with the morning rush hour crowd, so I’d have some time to take a look around the area first.

There was a flea market of sorts being held just beside the station where all the stands exclusively sold old books but beyond that Shimbashi was mostly just a terminal to Shiodome and the high rise office buildings that call it home.

Some sort of flea market.

She popped up soon enough and we’d make our way over. It’d be her first time visiting Odaiba. Apart from us, there were a few families and a good number of other tourists taking the Yurikamome over to Odaiba this morning.

I had decided to forgo taking out the camera again today since it’d be too much of a hassle, especially in the evening. Though it would seem that some of the most enjoyable days of the trip also tend to be the ones which were devoid of any bulky photographic equipment. Starting to believe that the best camera you can bring along would be a compact.

Kid sized.

Walking over to Venus Fort, it would be apparent that even now, we had arrived far too early as the malls on the island had yet to open. So we caught some breakfast at the only place that was open at this time, McDonalds.

Our decision to try out the other seasonal special, the Teriyaki McBurger turned out to be a bad one as it was quite unappetizing. Don’t do it.

Interestingly, the prices shown in Japanese McDonalds are for the default “M size” sets, you can actually opt to downsize your set (as we did in this case) to a happy meal-ish “S size” to save some yen, or if you’re not feeling too hungry.

Teriyaki McBurger.

After the shops opened, we spent some time looking around at Venus Fort before heading over to Diver City. While walking around the new mall, we came across a Round 1 Stadium complex occupying the top two floors of the building. Round 1 is a sports and entertainment center originating from Osaka. Some would have seen advertisements for it featuring the city’s poster girls NMB48.

The one here today was split into 4 parts, a gaming arcade, bowling center, karaoke lounge and “Spo-cha”, which combined popular indoor sports facilities together with some amusement center machines.

Round 1 Stadium.

Much like Sega Joypolis, you could pay a fixed fee at Round 1 Spo-Cha, for unlimited access of its facilities. 1,480 yen for 90 min, 1,880 yen for 180 min or just 2,180 yen for an entire day. At the recommendation of a friend, visiting this was one of the things on Chisaki’s to do list. We didn’t have that much time this afternoon but went with the 90 minute option. The staff at the entrance passed us some timed bracelets upon entry and informed us that payment would be settled later.

Spo-cho’s facilities turned out to be pretty robust. The front of the hall holds some older arcade machines, at least by Japanese standards. We spent perhaps a bit too much time messing around one of the machines there called Let’s Go Jungle!, before continuing to check out the sports areas.

There were billiard and ping pong tables, squash rooms and even a skating rink, while nearby some youths were playing at the indoor basketball and street soccer courts. Made a beeline for the batting center which Chisaki was most interested in, the amusing outcome of which can be seen below. Later, we also failed miserably at the indoor golf range and chipping area.

There was just a bit more time left and Chisaki was keen on having a go at the skating rink. There wasn’t too many people around Round 1 this weekday afternoon, so no one was using it.

Which was great, since unfortunately for her and embarrassing to say, I had never skated before in my life. Still I was urged to give it a go, and despite her best attempts to teach me the rudiments of skating, spent most of the time fumbling about. Eventually we were asked to leave, since some sort of children’s cycling contest had been scheduled on the rink. Felt a little bad after that she couldn’t get the free rein of the place.

Hadn’t been paying attention to the time so we ended up leaving about 15 minutes later than the allocated time and were charged a couple hundred yen extra. Given the opportunity, it would be best to go for the day pass at Round 1. Just a couple of hours at any single sporting or games facility in Singapore would cost pretty much the same price. The Japanese kids really have it good.

While leaving the place we were actually given some coupons to be redeemed at the amusement center part of Round 1 downstairs. The one free go at a catcher machine and 10 medal game token coupons took the form of larger than usual plastic boards so we guessed that they were meant to be redeemed immediately.

Coupons for downstairs.

Taking them downstairs, we each received a plastic cup containing a measly 10 medals. For the catcher machine we had to flag down a staff member after choosing a machine that we wanted. Spent both tries on a machine with Arpakasso but the claws were rigged to have no grabbing strength at all.

For the medals, it seemed that we could only use them at the coin pushers or slot machines in the arcade. To use them for the slot machines, you’d first need to pay the usual price for a game and the medals served as additional ammo, whereas there was no fee involved in the pushers so we went with that.

Japanese medal games or coin pushers definitely blow traditional impressions out of the water, especially when the only common comparison outside of the country these days are the rudimentary simulators inspired by it on smart phones. A spectacular example would had been the giant Monster Hunter themed medal game we saw here this afternoon which consisted of 6 large medal machines interconnected to form a giant medal complex full.

A 32 inch TV at each segment replaced mechanical slots as a bonus mechanism for the machine and displayed a 3D visuals of the player’s battle with the game’s creatures. Should one hit the jackpot, the entire pusher platform would tilt over, relinquishing all medals in the machine to the player.

Where all the slot and coin machines were.

Though I’ve been into gaming parlors before and a division of my company actually develops pachinko games, this was the first time trying out such medal machines in Japan. It was actually quite fun and could definitely feel the addictivity involved. While we did win a few medals here and there, ended up spending our medals pretty quickly at a Super Mario Brothers themed coin pusher game which was the easiest to comprehend.

Amusingly, while finishing up our coins at the pusher, a Japanese couple came along and offered us their medals as they were about to leave. They passed us an entire bucket full of coins. They must had gotten lucky earlier. While the house rate is something like 100 yen for 5 medals, in actual practice they are worth far less (if not nearly nothing), as medals cannot be converted back to cash (legally at least). Even among the slot machines, we had seen medals being left in the payout tray unclaimed.

With a whole bucket full of coins and not much time, we ended up being pretty imprudent with the medals. Japanese gaming machines tend to payout really often (though in negligible amounts) so losing all the medals would not be as simple a task as one would think. Still, somehow we managed to finish up all of the coins that were given to us within about half an hour.

Personally felt a little bad for losing the couple’s coins so easily but we had fun. Chisaki especially, who excitedly started tossing in multiple coins at a time. I guess one could draw parallels to this with how good someone actually is with money. But her strategy seemed to work out pretty well. As fast as she worked through the coins, she also ended up winning them at a better rate.

Back here again.

Passed by the life sized Gundam statue outside Diver City on the way out. Chisaki needed to get some Gundam themed goods for someone back in Singapore, but had already picked them up at Akihabara beforehand so there wasn’t much to do here other than take some touristy shots before heading back to mainland Tokyo.

There were search around Shiodome in hopes of finding somewhere we could get a quick dinner but didn’t find anything we could possible go for given the limited time left, so opted to skip dinner instead. We saw a couple of local snapping photos of the courtyard here, at first wondering why, though we eventually remembered it as the ground level of the NTV headquarters. It should be familiar to those who’ve seen older episodes of a certain AKB48 variety show.

Below NTV’s headquarters.

I’d be heading over to Akihabara next to meet up with Yan. Similarly my company for the afternoon had a band concert to attend to in the evening. But first she’d actually be heading over to Haneda Airport to pick up a friend who was flying in and the two would then rush over to the live house.

There would still be time before Yan would arrive at Akihabara, so I spent the time getting a snack over at the Mister Donut overlooking the main street there. Tried some of their special Christmas edition pon de ring, while ironically observing the crowds in Akihabara from the cafe’s second floor. It was really just a regular chocolate frosted pon de ring with a platic star stuck in.

Light snack.

Met up with Yan who had been shopping before heading over to the Don Quijote building to get our tickets. The AKB48 staff there were quite unfriendly, especially when considering the standards that we had become accustomed to these past weeks.

We would be attending a Team A “waiting stage” performance, which was simply a mix of old AKB48 songs. It would look like producer Akimoto Yasushi had been far too busy counting his money to write any new theater songs for the past couple of years. Today’s show also happened to be the birthday celebration for member Kasai Tomomi.

Over in Japan, it has become traditional at AKB48 shows that the most hardcore of fans form an alliance (or birthday committee as they like to call it)  to purchase flowers and glow sticks in celebration of their favorite member’s birthday show. Taking a look around the theater level, Yan spotted the flower stand promptly rushed forward to take some photographs.

Flower stand.

This wouldn’t had be an issue, were the birthday committee members not in the midst of already taking photographs with the flowers at the same time themselves. Everyone gave him and sadly through association, myself shocked, perhaps even disgusted stares as he suddenly squeezed between the posing committee members and the flower stand.

Somehow Yan had managed to anger the entire committee even before the show had started. One of them, a fierce looking young woman in a tokko fuku (biker gang outfit) who looked like Shinahama Saemi. Guess we were not getting any free glow sticks.

Kebab shop.

There was still time before the show started to get some dinner. Yan wanted to try out a kebab restaurant that he had taken note of so we went in search of that. We found the small run down shop not too far away. Apart from serving kebabs off the stand, they also sold kebab dishes, such as rice bowls. Decided to try that. The meats turned out to be tasteless, trumping even Rakeru at being the worst dining experience this trip.

Terrible.

Probably our worst meal.

After dinner, we looked around a few adjacent anime themed shops to see if we could get glow sticks cheaper than at Donki, but when that wasn’t possible, picked up one light stick each below the theater. It turns out that the Japanese people weren’t that petty and we ended up receiving additional glow sticks from the birthday committee after all, along with instructions as to which songs to use them for. Making our purchase obsolete. We were to break the pink one for “Junai no Crescendo” and the white one during “Sakura no Hanabiratachi”.

We were holding enpou tickets so were given seats at the last sitting row in the theater. Being second to enter though I managed to get the seat aligned directly center to the stage, which turned out to be a really good seat. Since I would learn later that the performers (particularly those in the center) would basically look at me as a marker of sorts. The only downside to this was that we had a particularly large wota behind us, who seemed to emit heat and odor like a radiator.

Today’s theater performance was lackluster at best. All of the popular Team A members were absent from today’s performance but even then, I wondered if the show would had been saved. Despite featuring many familiar, popular songs old songs, nearly all of the members performing today looked as if they had better things to do elsewhere. Many were simply going through the motions. Some even looked downright miserable.

The only exceptions to this were the research student Oshima Ryoka and NMB48′s Kotani Riho who was here as a transfer member.  The two danced energetically and engaged the audience whenever possible, even going so far as to lead the MCs. Unsurprisingly, they got the loudest cheers out of the crowd, even more so than the birthday girl herself.

Kasai Tomomi’s birthday stage.

At the end of the show, the girls popped up with a birthday cake, Kasai acted surprised and everyone started crying, you know, the typical AKB48 birthday celebration. What did come as a surprise though was the sudden appearance of Miyazawa Sae with a birthday message for Tomomi. Seems she was in town for a television show later at night and spared some time between her busy schedule to appear for this. This was probably the most genuine gesture this evening.

As customary of AKB48 shows, there was a quick high touch session after show theater performance. As expected, we were pushed through pretty quickly but didn’t expect to say anything more than greetings or thank you to the members. It turned out to be a far more disappointing experience though since at least half of the members weren’t even bothered with this part either. They’d simply stick out their hands, while continuing to chat among themselves.

Needless to say, today was kind of the last straw for me as far as AKB48 was concerned. After a year of unimaginative releases, distasteful publicity stunts and even less pleasant scandals, I was hoping to revitalize a little bit of interest through the live. Sadly, the members had already reached a level of disillusion or contentment that they no longer found motivation to perform the basics of their job.

Sure, theaters might not be as glamorous as performing at arenas, or nearly as profitable as the hundreds of advertisements you’ll see AKB48 in these days but still it showed a serve lack of professionalism, even, or particularly among the group’s older members.

Overall, today still ended up being quite an enjoyable day though, if only because of the first half. Spending nearly 2 hours at an amusement center might not be atypical of your usual holiday, but it was still a novel experience. Definitely envy Japanese kids in having all these entertainment options at their disposal.

That evening.

After coming across last week’s episode of Shibuya Deep A while channel surfing (in part due to Yamada Nana being on the show) had taken note to catch this week’s which featured Okunaka Makoto. This also turned out to be the show which Miyazawa Sae was appearing in.

Shibuya Deep A is a late night quiz variety show where subjective questions are posed to viewers and you could provide live feedback using your television remote. The hosts and celebrities appearing in the show competed to guess what the majority would answer. Played along, it was really quite entertaining. Today’s topic was on relationships.

The later segments of the show even allowed viewers to log into their website online to suggest questions. The guests picked out questions from those suggested in real time to answer. This sort of interactivity isn’t exactly new to television, but the show has certainly made good use of newer technology to make it a lot more accessible.

Without any concrete plans, this Thursday was effectively a free day. Which was great since I was coming down with a fever since last night. After 3 weeks of uninterrupted excursions and very little rest, I was approaching a limit. Being the only one willing to check up on logistics in advance of setting out each day meant an overall less time for sleep.

Unfortunately, Yan had insisted that we visit Kamakura today, and despite objections, I eventually complied. Perhaps the sickness had affected my ability to make rational decisions.

Shinjuku Odakyu Station.

Met up with Yan over at Shinjuku, where we purchased the Odakyu Enoshima Kamakura Free Pass. Just like the Hakone counterpart, it provides a round trip to the Kamakura area and covers all transport within the area. You end up saving quite a bit.

Breakfast from Kimuraya.

There wasn’t enough time to catch a proper breakfast so I picked up some bread from a Kimuraya outlet in the basement of the department store below. Like their buns we tried at Ginza, it turned out to be lackluster.

Kamakura coast.

The train dropped us off at Fujisawa and from there we’d make a decision on where in Kamakura to head next. The rest of the area would have to be covered by a smaller rail that ran parallel to the coast. It provided some scenic views of the famous Kamakura beaches and coast.

Unfortunately, when it came to where to go next, both of us had conflicting opinions. I wanted to visit Enoshima, while Yan wanted to hit up all the Buddhist temples around the area. Was in no condition to argue, so went along with that.

Trolley car.

Did manage to convince him to at least hit up the Tsurugaoka Hachimangu, the main shrine in Kamakura, otherwise it’d be like going to Kyoto and not visiting Kiyomizudera. Yan decided that we visit the Buddhist temples first, then visit the shrine last, should we had the time. The day was indeed starting to mirror the bad tasting experience in Kyoto last year.

今日ロリコンの友達といっしょうに鎌倉行きます twitter.com/supermerlion/s…

— Supermerlion (@supermerlion) November 15, 2012

Yan offered to handle my camera this afternoon, so most of today’s photos would come from him instead. On one hand it takes a lot longer to process the images, thus explaining why this post has taken nearly as long to finish. On the other, you get lots of “loli” photos for the rest of the day courtesy of him. It looked like all the classes from one big grade school were all having a field trip around Kamakura this same day.

Lots of kids.

One big school perhaps.

最初は大仏 twitter.com/supermerlion/s…

— Supermerlion (@supermerlion) November 15, 2012

The first temple we’d visit would be Kotokuin, which was famous for the Kamakura Daibutsu, or Great Buddha of Kamakura. The Kamakura Buddha is the second largest bronze Buddha statue in Japan after Todaiji’s. It’s probably the more popular and well known of the two statues among tourists though, thanks to Kamakura being more accessible from Tokyo. Like the temples in Kyoto, this comes with the downside of it feeling a lot more commercialized.

At what age do they stop wearing these silly hats?

Popular Kamakura Daibutsu.

Closer look.

Entry to Kotokuin is 200 yen. It’s cheaper than most other Buddhist temples since there is very little of interest here other than just the statue itself. The courtyard at the entrance where the Daibutsu was held made up the majority of the temple grounds itself, with a amulet office, souvenir shop and restrooms around its perimeter.

Throngs of school kids.

Introduced Yan to goshuin at the amulet office. These were the special calligraphy and stamp that you can get at almost any major temple or shrine in Japan. While Japanese Charms represent handy little blessings that you can give out to friends and family, goshuin sort of represent a blessing that you can collect for oneself.

Again, most temples and shrines sell goshuinchou, the stamp books to begin your collection with. They cost approximately 1,000 yen each. With this book, you can visit the goshuin office (usually just beside the amulet/charm office) to make a donation and ask for the temple’s stamp.

It costs between 300-500 yen to get a stamp. Bigger temples or shrines may employ someone specialized for this task. But the calligraphers often double as the charms sellers too.

Goshuin office.

Stamp book.

Yan ended up getting his first book and stamp from Kotokuin this afternoon. In the meantime, I took the opportunity to chill beside the Daibutsu statue for a while, while finishing up the remainder of my breakfast/lunch. The rest of the benches were mostly families and old people, who were eating ice cream that they had gotten from the temple shop.

Some of the children from the school were being restless. It was quite interesting to observe their behavior. The tinier girls got along better with the boys, while this tall girl was completely being ignored. Her efforts to mingle were passed off as being “annoying” by the rest. Even among children, there were senbatsu.

Danish, also from Kimuraya.

Wooden carvings, seemed to be their local specialty.

We backtracked towards the station where Hasedera Temple, another of the main Buddhist temples was located. Hasedera covers a hillside area of land and follows a pretty similar layout to Tenryuji. It’s much smaller, but has the advantage of its main building being located up on the hill. Entrance was affordable, at just 300 yen. We got our tickets from the vending machine up front, and proceeded up.

Hasedera Temple.

Ticket vending machine.

Small temple garden.

On the way up.

There’s was a small building midway up dedicated to the Jizo Bodhisattva. Accordingly, this part of the temple was dedicated to issues relating to children and childbirth. There were ema specialized for safe delivery.

Ema for safe delivery.

As with other such temples, we’d find hundreds of tiny Jizo statues here. If the internet were any indication, most seem to think of Jizo statues as the temple equivalent of Gundam figurines. The foreign tourists, Yan included busily snapped up photos of them.

Personally, I tend to avoid the statues, as they depress me. The statues represent children who have died in their infancy or during childbirth, so they’re very much gravestones more than anything.

Jizo statues.

The main temple halls were located at the top of the hill. Here there were halls dedicated to the Seven Lucky Gods, Amitabha Buddha and the Goddess of Mercy. The last of which was the largest of the three, with a giant wooden Kannon statue in the center of the hall.

Main halls.

More stamps.

Waited around while Yan went to collect more stamps from the temple. There was a veranda outside which provided a pretty nice view of the surrounding Kamakura area. A rest stop just beside sold temple branded drinks and ice cream. A warning sign told visitors to take note of diving birds. There were sea hawks hovering all around the coastal Kamakura city.

View of the surrounding district.

It’s not Japan, unless their are chibi versions.

Returning to the entrance of the temple we found the entrance to a cave just beside. The small winding cave served as a shrine dedicated to the Japanese goddess Benzaiten. Various deities had been carved into the cave walls itself.

Underground cave.

Benten kutsu cave.

We found the Benzaiten statue in a separate chamber of the cave. It was smaller than the rest of the cave, such that you had to bend over just to stay inside. There were hundreds of tiny clay Benzaiten statues inside.

Power cables had been laid inside the temple to provide some lighting inside. Past visitors had scribbled down their names and date of visit here. You’d think less people would consider vandalizing a place of worship a good idea, but it seems to be quite commonplace.

Hundreds of mini Benzaiten statues.

People vandalized the insides.

With that, we had covered Hasedera Temple. Back outside, we took a break at another souvenir shop by the entrance. Apart from omiyage snacks, it also sold temple branded ice cream and even cider. Yan had seen it earlier and was keen on trying some. Contrary to the name, the cider here referred neither to the apple or alcoholic drinks but a generic soda water.

I took the opportunity to get the temple’s ice pop, in strawberry milk flavor. It was mostly just milk, with a couple of frozen strawberry chips. It’s an amusing experience, eating ice cream in the cold, since no matter how long one takes, it doesn’t melt.

Harmony cider.

Holy ice cream.

I observed a middle-aged couple pass by while sitting outside the shop with the ice cream. Looking at the steam buns sold there, the lady commented excitedly to her husband that it looked delicious. It’s quite amazing how Japanese ladies manage to maintain their charms even at old age.

An elderly woman came over to initiate some idle banter. It’s probably rare to see adults of our age at such places. She asked where we had been to, then if we had seen the other nearby temples and the Tsurugaoka Hachimangu Shrine, to which I replied that we were on our way there now. The woman then broke off into a monologue about the other temples and shrines in the area. Agreeing politely, I excused ourselves on account of really having to make our way to the shrine.

We returned to Hase Station to catch a train to Kamakura for the shrine. Passing by another Buddhist temple along the way, Yan suggested visiting it but we somehow managed to avoid that.

Tsurugaoka Hachimangu Shrine.

Between the train to Kamakura Station and walking, it’d take us about another half an hour to reach Tsurugaoka Hachimangu. By this time, the sun had started to set. A few people were making their way there but for the most part, people were already making their way out. We didn’t spend much time at Tsurugaoka Hachimangu and there were hardly any pictures. Guess Yan didn’t care for shrines nearly as much as temples.

One of Japan’s most important shrines.

On the way out we passed by another smaller shrine within the area dedicated to the Seven Lucky Gods. Guess they were really popular in Kamakura. It was surrounded by a lake that had been infested by some sort of invasive plant. The entire lake was filled with these black weeds. Efforts were being carried out to remove them. A group of workers were hauling them out en mass and a water filter was placed at another corner but they seemed to be fighting a losing battle.

Infested.

Removing the plants.

We returned to Dankazura and the shopping streets before Tsurugaoka Hachimangu to take a look at what they had to offer there. Apart from restaurants and a few omiyage stores, most of the shops had already closed by this hour. There we found a pickle shop, which we entered promptly. One of the things on Yan’s itinerary was to get up more Japanese pickles, something he had been keen on ever since trying the ones from Ryoanji in Kyoto.

Unfortunately, most of the pickles don’t last very long. I had the nice lady at the shop recommend us some that did. In addition to those, Yan ended up grabbing some that expired quickly which he’d have to consume during his stay.

Most shops closed early.

We also came across a snack shop called Mameya that specialized in beans and nuts. There was a constant crowd gathered around since the shop offered free samples. It was especially popular with the middle-aged and elderly women. One of them even pointed out some faves to me. Yan ended up getting a whole bunch from there, while I walked away with a pack of their limited special: apple bits wrapped and baked in a ground nut shell.

Snack shop.

Limited edition flavor.

Found a really nice Studio Ghibli shop at the entrance to the shopping streets. The homely shop was split into two parts, with half of it dedicated to Kiki’s Delivery Service and the other for My Neightbor Totoro. Accordingly, it carried a wide variety of merchandise for these two franchises. While it was tempting, I had already done my Ghibli shopping yesterday, so didn’t get anything else.

There were commemorative Kiki and Totoro inked stamps exclusive to the shop here, though once again I had trouble finding anything to stamp them on. One of the things I ought to had done years ago before all these trips should had been getting a physical travel journal of sorts.

Nice Ghibli shop.

While there were a number of promising restaurants all around Kamakura, Yan wasn’t too keen on them on account of having already spent a significant amount on temple stamps and snacks today. We eventually settled for trying what looked like a newly opened conveyer belt sushi restaurant not far from the Ghibli shop.

Chain conveyer sushi restaurant.

It turned out to be a pretty bad idea, since while affordable, the sushi here was pretty terrible. Most of the cuts had seen their rounds of the conveyer. Even the custom orders tended to be tasteless and not very fresh. Goes to show, that you can get terrible sushi, even in Japan.

Ended up eating just a half dozen plates to counter the hunger of not having had a proper meal thus far today. I’d get something more substantial from a convenience store on the way back to the apartment.

Not recommended.

Taking the train back to Shinjuku, I thought I’d actually try doing something that I wanted to this day. One of the things on hand was trying to find the flat Takeo Kikuchi shoulder bag that the rest of us had previously encountered in Nagoya, since lugging around my current one together with a camera was starting to become quite a hassle. Unfortunately, by the time we’d arrive in Shinjuku most of the department stores were already refusing entry.

We did manage to take a look around a Shinjuku Marui and Marui Mens which closed later than the rest though. While there were some nice designs, we didn’t find the one I was looking for, nor anything that would match the requirements. Would have to head back empty handed once again.

Since it was his last day in Japan, we’ll finally be fulfilling Randy’s dream of visiting Ueno Zoo this morning. Ueno Zoo is the biggest of its kind in Tokyo and entry comes at the cost of only 600 yen (SGD$8.70). It’s also conveniently located smack in the middle of Ueno Park, it’s kind of like if Mandai Zoo were located in Bishan Park instead. It’s also one of the few zoo with giant pandas on display, which Randy was most looking forward to.

Before that though, Randy had to drop by Akihabara to get something for a friend back home so I headed over to Ueno first. Ueno has one of the nicest train terminals in Tokyo. There found Chisaki just outside of the train station. She had visited her school earlier in the morning but had the rest of the day free so would be joining us for the rest of the day.

We had some time to kill before Randy arrived, so we took a look at the multi-story toy and novelty shop at the entrance before walking around the streets at Ameyoko Market for a while. Randy had yet to satisfying his tempura don craving yet, so we spent the time waiting for him to also scout for a such a place.

Interestingly, we ran into a bunch of people filming some sort of tokusatsu in the middle of Ameyoko, just beside the Mister Donut outlet here. There were a large number of staff surrounding the film set, re-routing people and stopping them from taking any photographs.

Pretty sure it wasn’t Kamen Rider Wizard. The monster costumes were a lot more elaborate and grittier. Didn’t manage to get a close look but one actress here kind of looked like Rio. We ran into an assistant producer who looked really familiar though.

Chain restaurant.

Randy arrived slightly over an hour later and we visited Tenya, a chain restaurant type near the entrance to the street. Tried their tempura udon, while Randy and Chisaki went with a tendon and soba set that was on special. I’ve had mixed experiences with such places, but food here was decent today. I suspect timing plays a role in the quality of food at such places but fortunately our lunch seemed to had been recently prepared.  Prices were affordable, between 500-700 yen.

Tempura udon.

Tempura don with soba.

After lunch, it was time to head over to Ueno Park for the zoo. It was really only just across the road. The park itself is pretty big and contains a greater concentration of shrines and temples than just about anywhere else in Tokyo, it’s also a really popular spot for autumn colors and cherry blossom viewing. Needless to say, its a very popular spot among tourists and thanks to the zoo, local families too, especially during weekends.

We stopped by the Bentendo Temple along the way for a quick look. It’s particularly notable for being located in the center of the lake adjoining the zoo. Unlike my previous visits during Spring and Winter, the plants in the lake actually looked alive this time of the year.

Bentendo Temple.

Pond.

Incense here too.

Autumn colors were finally setting in in the rest of the park. Unfortunately it’s still a bit too early but still quite a nice sight. We had visited Japan a little too early once again this year. I always end up coming too early for seasons and return again at a later date, but at the same time the seasons seem to be pushed back further each year.

Autumn colors were finally setting in.

We found the zoo and purchased our tickets from the vending machine outside. It randomly dispenses tickets featuring one of the park’s animals. This would be the first time at the zoo for Randy, while Chisaki had an interesting trauma here during her previous visit.

Stopping at the entrance for a while, a young Japanese family asked if Chisaki could help them take a picture with the panda statue there. For some reason, she gets asked that a lot.

Lots of families and children.

It’s not Japanese unless there are plenty of peace signs.

The zoo is pretty clear that the giant pandas are its highlight. There are a good many other panda statues around the area, and the giant panda enclosure is located right next to the entrance of the zoo. Such is their popularity that there’s always a queue to view the pandas. Or rather the entire viewing process is a queue itself and as a result, it can be difficult to get a close up look of the creatures.

For once the bears were awake and active. Both of them made their rounds of their respective enclosures. Everyone was busy snapping up photos. Our own photos today were courtesy of the 50mm. While I had some trouble early on compositing with it, was starting to enjoy it quite much. It takes a lot of weight off the heavy camera and the pictures appear a lot sharper and more vibrant, at least by Canon standards. It’s no wonder that people call it a standard.

Pandas were awake today.

Like someone painted stripes on the bear.

In a stark contrast to our previous visit, amazingly, almost every animal we’ll come across today would be wide awake. Having lively animals adds a lot to one’s zoo experience, but there’s still is the matter of most enclosures only containing lone inhibitants.

We made the usual rounds of the zoo, while at the same time keeping our eyes open for the gorillas and the other bears which Randy was most excited for.

Depressed monkey.

Somehow unsettling.

Perhaps it was feeding time which explained the levels of activity today.

We came across an enclosure for Japanese macaques. Randy commented that the ones here looked more similar to those in Kyoto, in comparison to Nagoya Monkey Park’s feral inhabitants. A zoo keeper, who’d look at home in EXILE brought a bunch of leafy branches to hook up to poles inside the enclosure. The monkey’s were quite well mannered and with the exception of one or two naughty ones, they waited for him to finish setting up the branches before lunching.

Feeding the Japanese monkeys.

Casually made our way over to the second half of the zoo, which is separated from the first by a short walk and an overhead bridge. This is the side that is built around the pond at Bentendo Temple. There’s a mini aerial tramway that connects the two parts together, but is mostly just a novelty for children. Still, some adults manage to cram their way in.

Short walk to the second half.

The main highlight of this half is definitely the farm animals and petting zoo at the entrance of the zone. It was fast approaching public feeding hour where you could feed the goats and sheep there personally, so it was a good time to stop by.

Again, rather than sitting down basking in the afternoon sun (there was none), the goats and sheep were scurrying around for leaves. The chickens seemed to be mostly in hiding somewhere, though one guy managed to catch one.

Petting zoo.

I can never trust goats again.

— Supermerlion (@supermerlion) November 14, 2012

One of the most amusing experiences here was when we tailed a young goat that was steadfast in its attempts to scavenge fallen leaves on the ground. It attacked anyone who attempted to pat it, so all of us became victims to the goat. For its diminutive size it actually packed quite a punch. Thankfully, its horns had not fully formed yet.

When we were about to leave, a little kid also came by to try to pat the goat and was soon sent running away.

Chisaki ran around chasing sheep for a while since she wanted to hug one. After successfully doing so, a few other Japanese kids who were all padded up in their tiny jackets came to do the same. The sheep was pretty oblivious to its surroundings and very much more interested in eating. At some point, the sheep chanced upon the unfriendly goat that we had encountered earlier and he rammed into the poor sheep due to a dispute with some leaves.

Chasing sheep.

Alpaca was being boring again.

While you’re free to touch the other farm animals, most of them tend to be a little anti-social, preferring to stick inside their enclosures. There was a young woman there camped at the alpaca stable but it didn’t come over. I’ve always wanted to visit a proper farm in Japan (hopefully with alpacas) but could never find the chance or right company to do so.

The feeding session came around and they started to give out bundles of fresh grass to the visitors. Unfortunately, it also started to rain at about the same time. It was moderate at first so the eager families didn’t let it stop them, but soon escalated to a full downpour, cancelling the feeding session. We waited a while beneath a shelter here for the rain to subside and it passed by quite quickly.

Feeding session was interrupted by rain.

Back tracking a little, we went over to see the red panda, which hangs around the trees near the overhead bridge here. It’s one of the most adorable creatures at the zoo (at least in my opinion) and would probably make a great pet, were it not a threatened species of course. Though they are related to raccoon, the red pandas are sized and behave most similarly to cats.

The red panda wouldn’t keep still today, so the rest had a hard time taking photos. It almost seemed like it was making a conscious effort to avoid them.

Lesser red panda wouldn’t keep still.

Penguins swimming about.

Crowded flamingo enclosure.

The rest of the zoo was mostly the usual popular animals you’d expect from a proper zoo. The enclosures at the second half do seem better equipped though, if not the opposite extreme to the previous enclosures. The enclosures featuring small animals can get pretty crowded.

Maybe due to the earlier rain or feeding time, but the larger animals were nowhere to be seen as they’d been led into indoor holding areas this afternoon. Thankfully, the sheltered areas to view the animals were accessible. After a look around here and the nearby vivarium, the rest of the animals were eventually led back out to their enclosures.

The animals were moved into indoor shelters.

Reptiles and amphibians on display at the vivarium.

Elephant show.

We struggled between whether to get some souvenir plushes toys at a gift shop, but came out empty handed. The zoo seemed to had refreshed its panda plush design, such that some of them were actually quite nice

The sun had already started to set by the time we had finished with the zoo and returned to the entrance. There we walked into a street performer wrapping up a juggling routine. He had attracted a large crowd of watchers. At the end of it, the rest felt obliged into donating.

Randy was to only catch the 9PM flight back to Singapore so there was still a bit of time till then. Since it was nearby, we decided to give the Tokyo Sky Tree one more try.

Sun beginning to set.

Street performer.

The Sky Tree was indeed a lot bigger up close. There was also full shopping mall built around the bottom of the tower, and the tower base itself was split up into multiple parts. There were different queuing wings for public and tour groups and a shop below selling souvenir goods for the various television stations involved in the project.

Heading over to the public wing, a convention hall like area, we eventually found the queue up the tower but it was so massive that there was no clear indication as to how far it stretched or where it even ended. I headed to a nearby information counter to ask for an estimate, to which they gave an average waiting time of 3 hours.

We didn’t really have that amount of time to spare, so once more it looks like the Sky Tree would have to wait.

Tokyo Sky Tree.

Instead, we took a look around the souvenir store at Sky Tree’s base and the shops around the adjacent mall. To cater to the crowds, there were quite a few dining options there. Beyond that, it was mostly more omiyage shops. The second floor of the mall housed a wide collection of Japanese snacks, much like you’d find in department store basements.

Randy debilitated between getting a few different desserts here, eventually settling for a jumbo sized cream puff, or “shuu cream” as it’s called in Japan.

Shopping mall at its base.

Radio show below the tower.

Apart from the tower itself, the development also apparently included an aquarium and planetarium as part of the attractions here. Will need to take a look at those some other time too. The Sky Tree certainly hopes to one up the competition when it comes to date-like spots in Tokyo but it’ll be a while before the queues there start clearing up to reasonable levels though.

Caught an early dinner to kill time. We ended up returning to a Kua Aina outlet that had passed by at the entrance to the Solamichi mall. Randy ordered another of their avocado burgers, while I decided to give their sandwiches a try for a change. Chisaki went with a sandwich too despite protests that she really ought to had tried their burgers on her first visit.

Kua Aina’s.

Decided to try their sandwiches.

The toasted B.L.T and avocado sandwich was decent, if not a little too heavy than what I’d enjoy for a sandwich. A pro tip, stick to the burgers. The price different between the two are pretty negligible and largely depends on what type of burger or sandwich you order. The sandwiches might be popular with the female customers though who might want the illusion of a healthier option.

In other news, Randy’s cream puff turned out to be a disappointment.

Giant cream puff.

On the way out, the rest spotted a Studio Ghibli shop on the balcony of the building. After all the trouble of searching for such a shop in Akihabara, we’d just walk straight into one this evening. There was a large, possibly life sized Totoro plush peering creepily out of the entrance to the shop.

Studio Ghibli shop.

Life sized Totoro?

The shop carried an extensive range of Studio Ghibli branded products, namely from their classic faves like Totoro and Kiki’s Delivery Service (Majo no takkyubin), though there are also a number of articles from their more recent mainstream successes like Spirited Away.

Had been wanting to get this plush of Jiji (the cat from Kiki’s) in a metal cage, which had been seeing at various shop so far. Was going to grab one today but then got distracted by a more elaborate porcelain wind up music version of it, which I ended up getting instead. Wonder if it was a wise decision since I’m not sure where to put that now though, whereas you could pretty much throw the plush version anywhere and it wouldn’t matter.

After this, it was just a matter of returning to our apartment earlier than usual, where Randy picked up his luggage and made for the nearby T-CAT terminal, Haneda Airport, and then Singapore.

At the very least today would be an interesting day. We’ve made plans to meet our Japanese friend over at Shinjuku in the afternoon. From there she lead the way through some winding side streets bringing us to a cheap Shabu Shabu restaurant that she frequented.

Randy had been craving for more beef ever since the yakiniku and sukiyaki buffets during the last days at Osaka and Nagoya respectively. Hence lunch here. It was also the only time where our friend would be free, as her job requires her to perform nearly every evening.

Lunch would be buffet style too. Cuts were ala carte but you could help yourself quite the wide variety of vegetables and sides. The food here turned out to be pretty awesome, and surprisingly affordable for Tokyo too, about 2,000 yen if I remember correctly. Didn’t jot down the name of the place though but it’d be worth a second visit. Of course, the lunch was made all the more enjoyable thanks to the company.

Shabushabu.

Once again, hardly any pictures this day since didn’t want to lug around the camera. Even then, was too occupied to remember taking anything more than these sparse few shots with the crummy iPhone camera. Randy and our friend both had some shopping to attend to, so we had a pretty busy afternoon, frantically running from shop to shop.

First up Randy needed to get a dress for a friend back in Singapore and he decided to request assistance from our friendly idol. After enquiring if it was for a woman or girl (it was the later), she brought us over to a nearby department store in Shinjuku. When asked if she shopped at such places, to which she laughed and said that the fashion was too young for her. She was wearing a classic lolita dress today.

It took a while, since she was pretty meticulous about it but after considering the tropical weather, she eventually narrowed it down to just a couple of pieces. Randy eventually picked up a frilly chiffon blouse from Liz Lisa. He’d get quite a few stares while lugging the floral paper bag around the rest of the day. The friend joked that he looked cute.

There was yet another birthday concert this evening, so our friend had to grab a present before that. This proved to be quite a difficult task, since she wasn’t really familiar with this other person. This would be further worsened by the fact that we’d be heading over to Harajuku next. Randy had made plans to meet an acquaintance there who had just flew in to Japan this morning. It’d be difficult to do any real shopping over at Harajuku.

We’d meet up with Chisaki, whom I had previously been acquainted through AKB48′s presence in Singapore. Turns out she was a friend of Geri’s though. She had been in Harajuku since earlier, visiting the Meiji Shrine and picking up souvenirs for le parfait prince among others. Ironically, we caught Chisaki on her way out from the AKB48 Official Shop Harajuku.

Perhaps it was the long flight, but she didn’t seem to be in the most chatty of moods this afternoon. Our friend asked if Randy’s Liz Lisa dress was for her, it wasn’t. Still, being the most familiar, left Randy to entertain Chisaki while rushing from shop to shop with our friend to search for the present. She wasn’t quite sure what to get, so was looking for something on the safe side. We’d hit up all of the novelty and gift stores around Takeshidori and Jingumae as well as a department store or two.

Eventually, the 4 of us were pulled into a shop selling natural body products. We had an amusing experience there where the shop assistance invited us to try out their new product, some mineral bath salts. After introducing all the different scents, she got us to each choose a flavor and proceeded to scrub our hands. It did seem to make quite a noticeable difference. Our friend ended up getting a pack, and with that the present was fulfilled. Our hands would remain scented for the rest of the day.

There wasn’t much time left before the concert. But she brought us to a nearby toy shop selling mostly plushes and character goods for one final look. Never knew that there was such a multi-storey shop in Harajuku. She was quite apologetic that we had to follow her around for shopping this afternoon. But there wasn’t any reason to be. You could say that it was like fulfilling a dream, shopping with a Japanese idol, while she went kawaii, kawaii at all sorts of things.

At Tengu Izakaya.

The friend headed off for her performance, while the rest of us went off for dinner. Since it was Chisaki’s first day in Japan thought we’d have something good. Remembered a nearby Tengu outlet, so thought I’d introduce them to the chain izakaya.

The diced beef steak and pizza at Tengu are sinful necessary orders for each visit. Chisaki was craving for some curry rice too but unfortunately they were all sold out on rice dishes. Still, they enjoyed food so much that everyone ended up forgetting to take any pictures after the first couple of dishes were served.

Rejuvenated, Chisaki livened up during dinner. Seems she was here in Japan mostly to apply for a language school and hit up some indie band concerts. She was quite the otaku when it came to those. Her involvement with BABYMETAL over at the Anime Festival Asia had prevented her from flying any earlier.

Our tenor in Japan had prevented us from attending this year’s convention. Interestingly, I’d learn much later that in my absence my young brother had worked there as a butler.

Diced beef!

We spent some time walking around Loft and the surrounding Shibuya area after dinner. While walking through a narrow dark alley we actually passed by 4 somewhat familiar looking faces. Up to now, we’ve run into a good many Singaporeans whilst in Japan. Sensing something amiss, we turned around to see them staring back at us. That lasted quite a while until someone realized who they were.

What are the chances of bumping into these 4 people in the entire Japan.

— Supermerlion (@supermerlion) November 13, 2012

The odds were pretty astronomical but we had just bumped into the 4 girls from Sea A in this side street in Shibuya. The bunch of them had just flew over to Tokyo today too after wrapping up work at the Anime Festival Asia 2012 .

I guess they were as surprised, since they were at a lost of words too. We exchanged formalities and a couple of them did make some conversation but for the most part we were more taken aback by the surreal encounter than anything. This unexpected event ended up being the highlight of the day for Randy though.

I think the most amusing part about meeting SeaA though…is that even irl…they stand in the same formation as profile…

— Supermerlion (@supermerlion) November 13, 2012

Takeo Kikuchi flagship store!

Without much of a plan for the rest of the evening, we checked to see if the rest had any other commitments that could be fulfilled nearby. It turned out that while Chisaki didn’t quite know her way around the city, she had printed a whole stack of notes containing maps of all the places she had to visit.

Looking through, we actually found one such place within walking distance at Meiji Dori. Apparently it was some sort of local clothing label which one of her favorite band members frequented. Didn’t ring a bell, but since there was a map, I didn’t have too much trouble finding it. She wanted to get something there as a souvenir for her manager.

Along the way, we passed by a Takeo Kikuchi outlet, which would had been amazing were it not still under construction. It’d only open the day I’d be arriving in Singapore. The streets that we passed by housed all sorts of local labels, some familiar but many more not. Would had been most interesting to shop here, but most of the shops were already closing or closed by this hour.

Design Tshirts Store graniph.

Thankfully, though it took slightly longer than expected due to a confusion with the shop name, we managed to reach the store, “subsciety” while it was still open. It was past closing time, but another customer had held up the shop. Peering in, we checked if it was fine that we shopped here, but the staff was friendly about it.

Randy and myself were employed into helping search for a suitable gift. We were both acquainted to Chisaki’s manager so did have a vague idea as to the type of clothing he’d wear. I picked out one shirt, but she was more inclined towards getting a tee since the shirts were a good couple hundred dollars each. The shop carries a lot of suitable shirts but we had a hard time finding any nice tees.

After a long while with no results, one of the female shop assistants came over to help. She revealed that she spoke perfect English and asked if Chisaki was a ONE OK ROCK fan. To our revelation, that turned out to be the case.

I had tried listening to some of ONE OK ROCK’s music in the past, to little effect. I understand that they’re pretty hyped up over in Japan these days. But having never been limited to just Japanese music, I’m in agreement with writer Mus that they hardly bring anything new to the table than what English bands have already been providing. Hopefully, their popularity might help introduce fans to a wider range of bands in the future though.

In any case, I guess the shop sees this situation a lot, since the shop assistant then promptly pointed out a bunch of designs that the band’s main singer, the former Johnny’s “Taka” also owned. Both Chisaki and her manager were fans of his. Amusingly, the staff picked out the same shirt that I had chosen earlier as one of his favorite designs, so we went with that.

Didn’t stay around the city much longer after that. Randy would be leaving Singapore tomorrow, so we had a long day ahead. We did look around in search of a possible bakery or cafe for some cake though. He was craving for some pastry and while it remained unmentioned, up to now, we hadn’t had the opportunity to properly celebrate his birthday. But unfortunately, there weren’t any still open at this time.

Instead, we headed back to the station, entering by an amusement center along the way back at Randy’s whim. He was holding onto the hope that perhaps some his sudden bout of post-birthday luck would carry onto the catcher machines here. That wasn’t the case. Still, all things considered, there had been no shortage of positive experiences this day.