Japunzel

Saturday we went back to Harajuku.

 

I realiized I missed a few things I had previously looked at. So I went to the Lolita store and bought myself a wonderful wig. It was pink and blue and looked like spun sugar made into curly tresses. It was not of this world.

 

The rest of the afternoon I chilled out at the hotel, being in Harajuku is very exhausting. There are like a million people and they all gather around the same million things in a very tiny space.

 We went out for dinner and then went out to a sky bar at the Park Hyatt Hotel. Among the clouds (okay, on 52nd floor, but close enough) we enjoyed the night skyline, sipping champagne drinks and pina coladas.

 

Sunday was nice. We started with a quick trip to Harajuku, me and my man were a bit late. We've been out very late every day and up early every day so sleep has been scarse except for occasional afternoon naps.

In Harajuku we went to a huge toy shop, where they had the cutest japanese toys I've seen so far (and that's saying alot). Half a floor was dediated to Star Wars and another to the wonderful movies of Studio Ghibli. I bought a few things for myself as well as some gifts for friends.

 

From Harajuku most of us went to a hipster area that none of us could remember the name of. There were lots of cute second hand stores and it was a pleasant place to walk around. We had lunch at an italian place and I had delicious cheese pizza with roasted walnuts and honey... In a store called Flamingo I bought a sparkling pair of earrings and looked at really cool stuff from the 70's.

 

In the evening we went out for slightly fancier sushi than previously. I had roughly the same as in previous sushi places; egg, eel and salmon. The tuna was appearantly very nice but I settled without. Tried chivebud sushi as well. All in all it was good but not much nicer than the cheap place. Maybe the atmosphere.

After the sushi we went to Goldengai again, this time we decided to try a lot of bars in one night. First one was Evi, and it was NOT nice. We paid more for drinking there with an unwelcoming owner than in that fancy sky bar. We moved on to a place called CoCon or something simililar. That night there was no cover charge and drinks were cheap. On top of that the staff was friendly and generous and let us come up with our own drinks. Then we met up with some of the people in a bar called Albatross. That place was decent too, despite cover charge.

 

Right now it's 2AM and I'm writing this in bed.

Tomorrow some people are going to a fish market at 5AM but I am not joining. Not very intrigued by fish in any shape or form, and I definately need my sleep.

Tomorrow we're also leaving Tokyo and getting on one of those levitating magnet trains to Kyoto. I'm really looking forward to seeing such a fantastic invention with my own eyes, and curious about Kyoto. Feels sad to leave Tokyo though.

 

Tomorrow I'll upload some pictures and make a Tokyo Top Five. Good night!

Long post! :D

 

So, I last left you talking about the maid café.

 

I was surprised to find out the served food and not just desserts and drinks. But it turned out it was just barely food. Firstly it was meat in everything. Food options were rice and chicken omelette, hamburger and something similar, like deep fried chicken. There was no way I was gonna eat that so I decided to have ice cream instead, and eat proper lunch after. The others told me the food wasn't very good either so I clearly didn't miss out.

 

The maids themselves were very cheery and not so good at english. Trying to ask for veggie food did not go well. Everytime a meal arrived they came up with a little "spell" that would make the food more delicious, like "Delicious, delicious, cute, cute, MEOW!" It was cute first but got old around the 7th time. Again, we were 11 people.

 

The best thing was maybe the drawings the maids did on the omelettes. Everyone got to wish for a favourite animal.

 

In the end I did not enjoy the maid café as much as I thought I would, it definitely wasn't price-worthy and I would never recommend eating food there, vegetarian or not. The ice cream was ok, but still pricey. The rest of the experienca wasn't very overwhelming either.

 

After that I went back to the hotel to nap before dinner. We went to a place that served okonomiyaki, which is like an omelette with various ingredients but usually kale and cheese. It was super delicious with cheese and egg!

On the table was a hot stove where we cooked the omelettes ourselves. Fun and tasty! It was "all you can eat", but it turned out to not be alot, these things are very filling.

 

 

After this we got a free dessert, a pastry filled with ice cream. Then we exploded and didn't do anything else that night.

 

I just have to summarize the past two days.

 

• Wednesday we were in Shibuya, another Tokyo prefecture. First thing we see is a little staue of a dog and lots of japanese people posing next to it. It was appearantly a dog that for 20 years followed its owner to the train station and then waited for him to come back. When the owner died, the dog went to the station and kept waiting for its owner to return.
  
  We then had breakfast at a Starbucks there, I had blueberry scone and tea and it was very ordinary. Then we went through an entire shopping mall just for girls, Shibuya 109, but I just bought some necklaces. The sizes are REALLy small here so shopping clothes is pretty hard.
  
  We had dinner at a real, albeit fast food, sushi place, where the sushi came on tiny plates on a treadmill. It was very nice but as they were short on vegetarian dishes I had seaweed soup and cooked salmon sushi. I will put up pictures of this later cause you'll definitely wanna see it.
  
  Then we went looking for an infamous bar street nearby our hotel: Golden Gai. We curiously and anxiously looked aroundat the low houses and decided on a place that explicitly said they welcome tourists. We had one great mojito each in that cozy place before rushing on to our next appointment.
  
  The hotel lobby helped us get a room reserved at a big karaoke place. It was great! We sat there for 2,5 hours singing and drinking cocktails and eating honeytoast, which is a very interesting concept. It's like half a loaf of really white bread, then you spray cream on it and place fruit and honey on top. Again, I will put up pictures, possibly later tonight.
  
  After leaving the karaoke place in high spirits we went back to the cozy bar in Golden Gai with the mindset on staying for an hour or so. But then we met some other people there, an american and his japanese friend and we didn't leave until much later.

• Thursday meant going to Akihabara, a part of town known for their game arcades, vending machines and electonic shops. Indeed, the signs in the subway indicated "Electric Town Exit". We had breakfast there at a tiny café where you ordered and paid by pushing buttons and a machine (preferred paying method was the subway card, very useful!).
  
  After spending some time in the arcade I felt I was done, so I had some more tea at the café. I hoped for veggie burger for lunch, but we had lunch plans at a maid café. Which I will tell you about later....

I gotta run, I'm off to a prison themed restaurant..!

 

After the shrine visit this afternoon we went home and rested a bit.

We had seats reserved at "Robot Restaurant", a theme restaurant that seemed out of this world. We had however been warned that we should eat beforehand.

So we went to just a place near the hotel that seemed nice. I very much enjoy the slight panic in the waiter's eyes when we say there are 11 of us. Cause they always work it out. Tonight we got a little room to ourselves and even though it was an izakaya (more like a bar with food service), there was so many vegetarian dishes to choose from. I had edamame beans, grilled rice balls, grilled tofu that melted in my mouth and fried rice...

 

Then we hurried to the Robot place and ..wow, we were not prepared. First we were shown into a lounge with psychadelic lights and all shiny surfaces where a band played smooth music while seemingly dressed up as Daft Punk in all metal armor.

 

 

 

And then we went down 5 floors into a sub-basement where we took our seats and were served bento boxes, I got a vegetarian version. Not much to write home about, but it looks neat.

And then started the show, with dancers, drummers, all influenced by either robots or japanese tradition.

 

 

Ending this post with flying bunny mural here in Shinjuku.

So! Didn't have much time to write yesterday since we landed in Tokyo so late, but we didn't do much more than go out for a walk and a curry. Japanese curry is nothing like indian curry, it's brown and to my disappointment with small bits of meat (still a vegetarian).

The flight was pretty smooth except I was stuck between two swedish 50 year old men who kept comparing everything to Bangkok. We were offered a lot of drinks and got a piece of turkish delight as well.

 

We live in the Sjinjuku prefecture which is the entertainment area as I understand it. But we also suspect it's the home of the red light district. It's not quite as red as the Amsterdam red light district however. I've seen no women on obvious display. Just doors with explicit pictures leading to basements and a suspicious amount of massage parlors. After wandering around a few blocks we went back to sleep. 

 

Today we met up in the hotel lobby at 9, and headed out for breakfast. Somehow it was decided that we should head to the Harajuku prefecture. Decision making becomes very interesting when you're 11 friends. We stopped at the first place there but it was perfect. We paid for breakfast service, meaning an expensive drink (tea for me!) and a free toast with boiled egg. The toast was to everyones surprise gargantual. I added a yoghurt and breakfast was done.

 

 

Next to the café was a purikura, a special kind of photo booth where friends go to take perfect pictures together. It heavily edits the photos automatically to give everyone perfect skin with clear shiny big eyes. And then you can personalize them. We spent probably an hour down there and I defenitely need to do that again.

 

 

Then we split up and walked down Takeshita street and it was filled with adorable shops, all with unique clothes and accessories, some rather extreme, some very average. I was happy I didn't bring more money or I would not have much left. 

 

 

After two hours of shopping we found a chinese place and I think we all had noodle soup. It was exactly what I needed. All the impressions are very exhausting and I'm still a bit jetlagged.

 

Then we spent some time walking in Yoyogi park, and visited the Meiji shrine, the biggest in Tokyo. I'll update with pictures later tonight, hopefully before we go to dinner and watch the robot show!

Leaving in 10 minutes. So nervous!

 

I only realized this morning what I'm about to do. I just hope the other 10 people I'm travelling with (all friends) are more mentally prepared. Personally I enjoy denying it until the last minute. Gives me less resefeber.

So first plane goes from Copenhagen to Turkey (where I spent a week a few years ago) and from there on to Tokyo. Half the group lands in Beijing instead. I'm not sure who's got the better deal, but sources say Turkish airlines are very generous with drinks on long flights. Ah, well.

See ya on the other side!

So right now I should be on a plane going fast east. I'm not. I'm still stuck in Sweden, because the pilots at Lufthansa are on a strike. We knew this might happen and we have been booked on new flights, leaving Sunday afternoon instead. Fingers crossed.

At least I got a new hair cut, so I got that going for me which is nice. I'll put up a picture or two when I've stopped freaking out. Or tomorrow. Whichever comes first.

 

Kanye West - All falls down

Yes... This blog has not only survived more than 3 years, it just came ablaze.

In three days, on Saturday morning, I'm off. First flight goes to Frankfurt, and from there I head east to the land of the rising sun, Japan. I'm away for three weeks and since I'm pretty sure I won't be able to accurately tell people what it was like once I get home, I started this up again.

Glad to be back, glad to have you back. To keep y'all readers coming, have a picture of my adorable cat.

 

Now I should really start on that packing business, leaving town tomorrow so tonight's my last chance. And then comes the million dollar question. What books and how many do I bring??