Tokyo stuff part 2

AKB48
one of the most ubiquitous things in Tokyo is the mega girl group akb48 they are on everything. Advertisements for their own music their movies as well as them being in ads for almost everything else. They have their own stores and official cafes to sell their official merchandise. Despite the name there are actually more than 48 members in the band although only the top 8 actually feature on tv and in ads. The rest do the hard slog of daily performances and appearances, it's the only band in the world that could potentially be performing at 48 different venues on the same day. The top 8 members are chosen so Hana tells me via a huge idol type reality show where only the members of the band compete. I've since seen ads for it on tv here and it looks pretty full on. One girl was being taken to hospital I think!

Ad trucks.
Driving around the centre of Tokyo in shibuya harajuku and shinjuku are trucks which advertise a bands new single. The truck has the single jacket enlarged all over it and it blasts a 30 to 40 second sample of the song's chorus on repeat the entire time it's driving. Some suburbs in Tokyo also just play music out of loudspeakers in the street. In Ikebukuro it's top 40 j-pop and in koenji which is more out if the centre they were playing kind of light orchestral easy listening versions of moon river and other songs of it's ilk. Kind of nice, kind of annoying. Luckily its only on a few streets.

Tokyo is so amazing, I'm really sad to have to leave it. I feel both as though I've been here for a year and as though I've only been here for an hour. There is just do much to see and too explore and to do. It's such a visual city, such a friendly city, such a crazy city, such a clean city, such a futuristic city and such an ancient city. From a six story game arcade to an peaceful Shinto shrine in 100 meters.

Sayonara Tokyo, you definatley delivered.

Luci

Ikebukuro & Daikanyama & Halloween

Although we have to leave Tokyo tomorrow ( :( ), we have been having the best last few days. Yesterday we went to Ikebukuro, much like Akihabara but without so much of the seediness. We went to the enormous "Sunshine city" (think a massive corporation owned shopping plaza turned into its own underground city... like a westfield on steroids) and to the planetarium and aquarium within it. The planetarium was so cool - it was like we had been flung into deep space. We watched a spectacular film all in Japanese about space and our solar system. The aquarium was also amazing, the best thing being the two metre-tall Japanese spider crabs. Later that night we sat just outside the quieter, trendy Daikanyama train station drawing lipstick and eyeliner all over our faces, getting ready for a Halloween party and shocking a lot of salary-men coming home from work (see pictures). The party, hosted by Hana & Dan, was in a Peruvian restaurant (which served the best fried chicken - really, Japanese people can just do all kinds of food better than us (although Luci would like to add that they can NOT do coffee)). We were worried that there would only be Japanese speaking people at the party, but as soon as we sat down, Dan introduced us to some fellow australians, saying something along the lines of "and this guy here, he's from - what's the name of your band again?" Regurgitator, apparently. So we spent a lot of the night talking with Quan from Regurgitator, which was fantastic because Regurgitator was one of both mine and Luci's favourite childhood/early teenage years band, and his super nice girlfriend who is currently on student exchange in Tokyo and has inspired us to do the same once we begin uni (apparently the kind of subjects you can choose to do at a Japanese uni include learning to ride a bike and table tennis, so it really sounds quite easy + like a lot of fun). We actually met quite a few english speaking people from Australia, Canada and England, and it was quite nice for us both getting to talk to people other than just eachother for a while. This morning we are just heading back to our hostel in akakusa to sleep and then get ready to go and see a visual kei band (if you don't know what visual kei is, then you also don't know Luci, and you should go Google it immediately).
Also, because I love food, I have also posted a picture of the McDonald's burger I just ate, which is all normal and just like a egg-and-bacon mcmuffin - until you bite into it. The bun is actually two maple-syrup filled pikelets. It sounds gross.. but I actually think it's kinda amazing.

Sayonara until Kyoto
Annika
(Luci also promises to post real soon)

Electric Town

We were finally able to fully experience the truly wacky, weird side of Japanese culture with our visit to Akihabara on Thursday night. We visited the "electric town" side of akihabara once again, and at night time it is even crazier - just overwhelming with all it's flashing lights, spruikers and loud noises. After visiting a 7-floor Sega arcade and playing lots of dance dance revolution, we were persuaded by the army of girls (and drag queens) dressed as maids spruiking all over the streets to visit a Maid cafe for some dinner. I don't think it's actually possible to give you an accurate picture of the weirdness of a maid cafe in a simple blogpost, suffice to say that we were referred to as "Master" and "Senorita", and that the person next to us ordering a cocktail prompted the lights to dim and the maids to begin a 5 minute choreographed song and dance routine just to shake the cocktail. We ordered for dinner bizzare animal shaped parfaits (for which we had to do a little dance and song for before we were allowed to eat) and for most of our time there sat in bewildered and amused silence. After that strange experience, we wandered into a 6-level late night variety store filled with nothing but junk you wouldn't need, from a butt-shaped pen holder to a hello kitty humidifier. If you can imagine it, and you know you don't need it, it was in this store. So anyway, we of course both bought something, and then said goodbye to akihabara for the night, although not before passing by a huge AKB48 themed cafe, restaurant and shop (more about the phenomena that is AKB48 to come).

Still cannot get our photos from the camera to the computer sorry, so here are some more photobooth photos which I took photos of on my mobile. (We do do much more than take photobooth photos, just by the way, its just that these are the best pictures I have on my mobile camera)

Lots of love to you all
Annika

Tokyo stuff

Men in uniform
Everywhere in Tokyo there are people in elaborate uniforms. At first it seemed like there were police everywhere but in fact they are just government employees or private employees. Often you will see a person in a full officers coat and officers hat complete with ceremonial shoulder rope and sewn on crests and white gloves and their only job is to wave cars in and out if a carpark. Also there will be not one but three people employed to this. In Tokyo there is always a man or women dressed like a French army officer from the 1st world war who's sole job it is to help people use the ticket machines or stand outside a construction site.

Speedy food
The food in tokyo always comes extremely quickly. Even in a fancy cafe we have never waited more than ten minutes for food and at cheap places it often comes much quicker!

Subway etiquette
The subway in Tokyo is huge, literally hundreds of times the size of the Sydney subway and every train is packed with commuters. To avoid the trains being a madhouse a kind of code of politeness is observed on the train. People don't talk very loudly if at all and people look at either the floor or the advertisements on the ceiling at first this seemed bizarre but soon you get used to it. Anyone who is sick wears a face mask and you can't talk on your mobile phone. ( in fact talking on your mobile is considered rude in many places in japan including shops and restaurants).

From Luci

Asakusa, Akihabara and Disneyland

These are just photos off my phone from the last few days. We haven't figured out how to get photos from my camera onto the computer yet, and we have lots more/nicer photos than these, but for the time being we though we would just upload these 'uns. Also, Katoomba: stop being on fire!! We hope that everyone is okay and safe!! Much love - Anni (and Luci says hi too)

Photo 1, 2 & 3: Our home town on a sunny afternoon. We walk over this gorgeous bridge everyday from our hostel to the subway. Even the giant golden sperm building looks particularly beautiful as it catches the afternoon light.

Photo 4, 5, 6, 7 & 8: at a games arcade in akihabara. Akihabara is the craziest town full of anime and manga and games arcades (like the 6 level Sega games arcade) and pachinko palours and tonnes of seedy sexualised plastic anime figures and cheap electronics and maid cafes and endless tiny alleyways of electronica that made us feel like we were Deckard in Bladerunner.

Photo 9: Tokyo disneysea! We went last night, to try and avoid the crowds, but it was still pretty crowded. Still, we managed to get on 4 rides & Luci lost his roller-coaster virginity on a loop-de-loop high speed steel coaster that was themed as an ancient incan sacrifice tower or something like that. It was pretty fun.
Photo 10: taken while waiting in a queue for 40 minutes for another queue which eventually got us on a rollercoaster called "journey to the centre of the earth". Even in the queues, the detail they put into the theme of the ride is just ridiculous. This photo shows juat part of a whole 19th century explorers lab built inside a massive fake volcano (which spewed MASSIVE fireballs every 5 minutes.

Photo 11: just chilling with ma new friend outside a pachinko palour in asakusa.

Photo 12: the beautiful Buddhist temple just 10 minutes from our hostel and the rows of markets (nakemisa street) leading up to it

Photo 13: mmm. Ouiishi. (That means delicious in Japanese)

Photo 14: wandering through the Buddhist temple in asakusa late at night

Photobooths and shima-kitazawa

These photos were taken in a "boyfriends" Halloween themed photobooth in shima-kitazawa (where we went last night). When we got off the train, I declared shima-kitazawa the Katoomba of Tokyo, because it is an artsy, grungey part of Tokyo with lots of graffitti, bars, buskers and drunk people. But really, it's kinda a lot cooler (soz Katoomba, ily really) and is crammed with probably almost hundreds of tiny, amazingly styled vintage stores and seedy little bars. We went to a bar called 440 to watch Hana and some other artists play a "live" (what they call gigs in japan) which was really good. We also had our first McDonald's experience in japan; we expected everything on the menu to be more or less the same as in Australia, but its actually really different and we got these chocolate triangle pies, and saved the wrapper, so when we are back we can take it to Australian McDonald's and ask them "why the hell don't you have this on the menu??!". Today we are off to harujuku to look at some crazy young kids who dress up in cosplay on Sundays and stand on harajuku bridge so that should be interesting. And then Disneyland tomorrow!! + hopefully lucis first rollercoaster experience! Hope you're all peachy keen in aus. Love from annika :)

So. Japan.

Wow. Where do I even start? I guess I'll begin from the beginning.

To anyone who has flown all the way to Europe this year, I tip my hat to you, because our comparitively short 9 hour jetstar flight was INCREDIBLY BORING. Anyway, we finally touched down in Japan at 7pm on Monday night, extremely tired and excited. We were worried though, because I was bringing tonnes of medication into the country, that we'd have problems at customs. But no, all the people in customs were just super friendly, and this cute little woman waved us right through without checking our bags; all she seemed concerned about was if we had a friend to stay with and that we knew where we were going. Then, expecting to be completely overwhelmed and confused by Narita airport and Japan in general, we were pleasantly surprised: Japan's airport also made SO much more sense than any Australian airport we'd ever been to. Everything was labelled and structured properly and so helpful. Although, I was quite bewildered by the first high-tech Japanese toilet I went into - why anyone needs the option to play a flushing song while they flush their toilet is beyond me.

So on to Kichijoji. We stayed here with Luci's friend Hana and her boyfriend (Canadian) Dan for 2 days. It's an incredibly cute but busy little town with endless streets and backstreets of clothes shopping, Pachinko parlors, arcade games, incredible food places and the cutest little bars that we've ever been in. Our first bar experience was in a 6-person-maximum bar up the steepest staircase above the shops on this tiny backstreet. Luci and I were in awe, it was by far the coolest bar we'd ever been in. The owner was really lovely and got us to try all this traditional Japanese food, including raw onion with miso paste (which, Mum and Dad if you are reading this, I want ALL the time when I get back home). The shopping is just incredible as well, and so so CHEAP that I almost cried in the first few stores I went in. I bought lots of clothes and then we said goodbye to Hana and Dan (who, by the way, were completely lovely) and went on to our hostel in Asakusa.

We couldn't believe that anywhere could be as cool as Kichijoji, but Asakusa definitely proved us wrong. We spent the first night wandering night markets and ended up at a gorgeous Buddhist shrine. We then ate some Korean for dinner and Coconut Milk gelato. Our strategy so far with eating out is to just go into a place, point to some random item on the menu, and it's always been delicious. All the food here is just so amazing that every day we wonder why we don't eat these things in Australia. Ahhh well. The next day we went to Ueno, and explored the National Science Museum in Ueno park, and although it's more made for kids, it was still so cool. We went in this 360 degree movie room which played a movie about the Big Bang and the Universe and basically couldn't speak after we came out because it was so beautiful and well made, even though we couldn't understand much about it because it was all in Japanese. Then we went to the famous Ueno Amayayokocho (Black) Markets (not an illegal black market, it's just what it's called) underneath a train line. There were just SO many shops, and SO much crap the people were selling (good stuff too though), it was very overwhelming. You could spend WEEKS discovering all the markets and stores in that place.

Luci wants to write now so he's going to write about the next day after Ueno.


Hey everybody :) Tokyo is so amazing. you could literally explore it for the rest of your life. So many different suburbs each with their own unique character and crammed with so many amazing tucked away boutiques, bars, eateries and shrines. We are leaving out a lot in these blog posts because we couldn't possibly describe it all. I'm sure we will have so many fun and wacky stories when we get back.

The day after our trip the amazing Ueno were the chaos of the Ameyayokocho markets was amazingly juxtaposed with the peace and tranquility of Ueno park. (Tokyo's largest park) We headed to Shibuya.
Shibuya is a huge shopping district right in the middle of Tokyo where skyscrapers covered by neon signs and TV screens surround the world's busiest pedestrian crossing. After crossing over we went into the famous department store : Shibuya 109 and the into its brother building 109 men's. These two were an incredible, fun and overwhelming experience in the art of capitalism. A tiny tower each level crammed with super stylish ultra competitive Tokyo clothes stores, each one boasting super friendly ultra stylish shop girls and each one blasting a different mash up of the latest top 40 j-pop and western hits.

Next we went into Shibuya's famous tower records a mufti layered record store in a cool 60's building where i found a whole section devoted to visual kei. After buying a single and taking a stack of free posters while Annika discovered some great j-hip hop we headed out of Shibuya to the next suburb of Harajuku. In Harajuku we spent the night shopping on world famous Takeshita dori (dori meaning street). We both found some great stuff especially in the 390 yen store, think a 2 dollar shop but much more fashionable. We also tried to Japanese fusion food classics, Japanese pasta and Japanese crepes both of which were delicious. Harajuku is also famous for yoyogi park which we think we may return to on Sunday to see all the cos players posing on the bridge in their crazy outfits and explore another of Tokyo's beautiful parks. Although it seems like no park could top the happy tranquility of Kichijoji park.

Today we are off to another little suburb of Tokyo to see a gig of Hana's.

So many tiny things and huge things are totally different in Japan but i cant explain them all here our I will never get out of the hostel this morning! I Just cant wait to see you all and describe all Japan's crazy quirks and ingenious little differences.

Speak to you all soon, hope all is well is Aus.

Love Luci and Anni

Konbanwa Tokyo!

So after being awake for almost 24 hours me an Annika have arrived in tokyo! (last night). Being so high on lack of sleep and driving into the very middle of tokyo in shibuya was aboslutley surreal and amazing. I am still only just processing all the things i saw! Tokyo is a huge crowded tiny light filled megalopolis which makes sydney look like a tiny country town. It is so big in scale and every detail is so small and amazing. Luckily we managed to meet up with Hana soon after we got off the bus. She is so lovely and just how i remeber, her boyfriend dan is also really nice and they have let us stay in their super cute little flat in kichijoji which is such a great part of Tokyo. This city is so incredible i know it would take lifetimes to see it all.
Hope all is well in Australia
Luci

Bye bye big blue

We're off to Japan TOMORROW. Luci is practically peeing his pants in excitement. We're staying in sydney tonight and will be off early in the morning. I just had to upload these beautiful romantic farewell photos, taken last night when we said goodbye to Katoomba and our lovely friends.

Bonnie and Clare romantically waving goodbye at the train station

 (and posing like Japanese girls I think? Japanese girls with creepy eyeballs)

Luci saying bye bye to Oskar

We've also for some reason decided that our official travel song is the Matilda song! (here)

Sayonara Big Blue! We'll miss you!