Japan Grad Trip 2013 day 5

Hello peoples! :)

Today was the second to last day we have in Japan, as we leave tomorrow :0 :)

We were supposed to meet each other in Jeff's room at 10:00, but I set my alarm for 10:00 instead of 9:30, so I was late due to my showering and dressing xD

But it was okay :)
We hung out for a while while I finished my blog for yesterday, and watched TV while we decided what to do.



[Above: view from Jeff and the other guy's window, a driving practice center with cars driving around in it, practicing]

We didn't know what to do, so we wandered off to find breakfast.
The other guys, Donald, Stuart, and Victor wanted to go to a Fish Market, Jeff was okay with anything, and I wanted to go to Akihabara to buy some Touhou music and games.

Well, I wanted to save money so I bought subway(wich I happen to love btw xD), and talked to Jeff about Akihabara. He decided he'd take me there and got a subway sandwhich as well.
Mine was tuna though :D yaaayyy xD <333

We sat down to eat some our brunch, and afterwords I went and took a picture with a gigantic otter thing loll:



Then we headed back to the Hotel to check up on things and to make sure everything goes well tomorrow.
Well it is a good thing we did split with the others and check, as apparently you need to reserve seats on the shuttle to the airport O_O
It costs 3000 Yen to make the journey, and we reserved 5 seats for us all.

Then we went back into the mall and saw a large gathering and realized one of the Japanese girl groups, idk if they are technically called idols or not, was going to perfom! :D

So we watched the performance of the three triplets.
The whole time this Japanese fanatic of the band was talking to Jeff in Japanese xD

Jeff was like Idk what this dude is saying, but he seems pretty happy and friendly.

Neither Jeff nor I knew the band xD
But we had front row viewing so we tried to be as fanatic as we could. :)

We weren't allowed to take photos so here is a photo when the stage was empty:





Afterwords we left and went to Bookoff so Jeff could look at CDs and so I could look at DVDS and games and stuff :)

I found a DVD I wanted, but Jeff convinced me that we could always come back later, and to save my money for later.
Which I did and agreed.

Anyway, afterwords we left and took the mtr to Akihabara.

It took a long time, but we made it eventually xD

The thing is that there were two stores I wanted to go to, the one that I found Touhou games and merch at yesterday, and the secondhand store where I saw a a different Touhou game yesterday.

However, Jeff said there was another secondhand store. :D
So we decided to go there first before the other ones, in case it had any of the same things I wanted but cheaper, etc etc.

The problem was, as we soon found out, we had left the map in the hotel @O@!
So we decided to wander around on our own in search of the place.
Jeff saw the Idol store that we went to yesterday and couldn't resist, so we went there first.



[Above: Me going for the sex-hair, just woke up look xD
Bored in the store lol]

After that we wandered around more, looking in other little stores.
I tried asking people where the store we were looking was "Do you know where Hard-off is?", and the results were disastrous.
One lady said no, and another thought I was asking her name, and then asking for the building she was working just outside of name, and eventually I just gave up and kept going xD

We couldn't find it :(
But instead we found a bunch of stores selling old games and old game consoles, models, and other varieties of things.

Eventually we went to the Touhou store and I decided to buy the game only and not the music too, because my funds were low and I wasn't sure if I'd like the music, and because I wanted to buy the game at the other store.

Afeter buying it Jeff led me to the secondhand store where the Touhou game I saw the other day was.
I wanted to see if a Japanese 7-eleven was different from an American and Hong Kong one, so we went into one next to the second hand store first.
The only major difference was the pokemon thing lol:




Then we went into the store, and to my horror the area where I had seen the game yesterday was cleared off! D:
And when I asked about what happened to the stuff, they brought me to the Touhou models, but no game. :(
Luckily I asked someone else who worked there, and they pointed me to the Touhou games they had, which led me to promptly buy the one I didn't have yet :)

After that we wandered around a bit more and we found one of those stores where individuals rent cubicles to sell their stuff in, and I found another Touhou game for cheap :D
(700 yen versus 1050 or 2100)











I found one of the ones I had already bought there too, cheaper as well, but oh well lol.

Japan seems to be very into Duffy, as I see him sold in all these little areas, and for quite expensive prices.
I think they are collector's items or rare or something lol.









After all that, we went to Shibuya.
We looked at a store there that sold CDs and stuff :)
Apparently they were also selling a DS TV thing idk lol.
Like, a DS game with antennas coming out of it xD
I think it receives 10 channels idk.
Lollll
I shoulda taken a photo @~@ idk
But the DVDS and games there were wayy overpriced.T^T

Afterwords we left and went to meet the other guys at the next station over: Ebisa. (iirc)
Then we went in search of food, found a barbeque that looked promising but seemed weird, and went in search of ramen.
(As per my suggestion ;P)

We found a ramen place that was supposedly excellent according to online, and it turns out it actually was excellent xD
The food I got was amazingly delicious :D








[Above: My delicious meal! :D]


[Above: we had to split the group within the Ramen restaurant because it was so crowded! lol]



[Above: The food was so good that I ate all of it and felt like I was going to explode, I drank so much broth xD (there is still a lil left in the bowl lin the pic)]]

After that we headed for the Tokyo tower, and we took photos and went inside the shopping area that had souvenirs for the tower.
(even though we didn't ride the tower... xD)













Donald and I were awe-struck by the majestic sight of the tower:
























After the Tokyo tower, we went back to the MTR.
Jeff and I headed home, and Donald and the others headed to somewhere else to walk around.

Jeff and I stopped back at the local Bookoff that we stopped at first earlier in the day, and I bought the DVD I wanted to earlier.
All in all, my spoils were excellent :D

We went back to the room and checked out our results:




[My war spoils :P]

After that the other guys eventually showed up, I packed all my souvenirs, and we hung out for a while.
Then I went down to the local 'FamilyMart' with Donald, Stuart, and Victor.
They got food, but we already had dinner so I got an ice cream that turned out to be really tasty! ^u^





Then I headed back to my flat, after chilling with the guys while they ate their food for a while, and then (after locating my phone), I went over to the other guys flat.

There I began work on this blog post, and we alll watched TV.
We watched pro-wrestling, which was totally fake and scripted but was really fun to watch anyway.

Except for the creepy Japanese version of the above that we found shortly thereafter o_o












Jeff thought that it was actually a comedy show rather than an actual serious wrestling show, and I have to agree with him xD

Anyway, it is late now so I must be off to bed :)
I'll add more and fix this up tomorrow.
But I'll publish it for now anyway just in case ;)

Thanks for reading! :D
Good Night / Morning thing! :)
Love,

~James D.

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Japan Gad Trip 2013 day 4! :D

Hello everyone! :)

This marks the fourth day of our trip in Japan, complete! :D

Today I awoke at 9:00 a..m, showered, got ready, and headed over to the other guys flat.
There I finished my blog from yesterday and posted it, while waiting for the other guys to get ready and decide what we were doing.
They were watching TV, soccer I think.

We then went out in search of breakfast, and could not find anything.
But right before we entered the MTR and gave up all hope, I spotted a restaurant that sold breakfast until 11 a.m.

Well, it was 10:50 so we rushed inside and I ordered some egg and rice set that was delicious! :D
My chopstick skills have been increasing a lot lately xD ;)
The benefits of living in Asia with Asian friends I suppose ;p




After eating Jeff took me to the citibank atm to withdraw some cash, and we all headed into the mtr.
There we decided to split up, and Jeff and I headed off to Akihabara street. (A really manga/anime centric area of Japan)

We were able to sit and talk about pokemon and stuff while on the train ride, because it takes forever to get to Akihabara from where we are. (okay just like 30 - 19 minutes)

Eventually we made it though! :D :



And then we exited the mtr and wandered around entering stores and looking at things to buy.

Within a short span of time I found a stack of Tohou things I wanted to buy.
(Tohou is a very hard video game with aweseome music that is hard to come by, and they had some of the games and all the music I wanted too I think)



[Above:Tohou project section of one of the first stores we checked out]

Jeff advised me not to spend so much early on in our day of shopping, so I left them there and went out to look elsewhere.

Jeff found a crane machine and won himself and me each a little anime card thing, which was cool :D

Then we went and looked around in more stores, and I kept asking if they had the things I wanted and sometimes it was yes, other times no.

We found a really cool building with many different floors of manga, anime, art books, idol pictures (which Jeff loves), and all sorts of other things.

I found some of the things I was looking for there, and bought some art books and stuff :)








[Above: Jeff and me in the store looking around]

I even found a collection of really expensive Duffys, even some weird black one and a magical one:










After shopping there for quite a while, Jeff and I left and went for lunch in the AKB48 cafe.
(AKB48 is a girl-band singer group in Japan that is national status or something, they are idols and Jeff adores them)
Jeff and I both got the steak and rice combo;








The little cafe had televisions all over that were playing videos of various performances of AKB48 throughout its existence.
Jeff ordered a drink and it came with a collectible coaster that he really liked, so he offered to and did buy me a drink so he could get another one of the coasters.

He got me an orange juice, and it came with a straw twisted in the sahpe of an 8, representing AKB48 I guess.



[Above: Jeff taking a photo of the 8 shaped straw.]

After that we went back out and shopped some more, and found a toy store with really good prices for things. (apparently it was a secondhand store)

They also had a touhou game, but it was expensive lol




[Above: tiny shopping cart in second hand store lol]

After that we went to a Japanese Idol store, for C-ute I think, and they are rivals for AKB48 lol

I sat and watched their music vids while Jeff shopped around.
It took forever xD
I swear he was trying to hit me with a Tsunami of Idolness xD

Well anyway, after that we had 4 minutes to make it to the meeting spot so we ran like hell :P

I had wanted to get Touhou products from the earlier store we found, but we didnt have time. :/

We met up with the guys and decided to go to the AKB48 cafe again for dinner xD

















So I got Ice cream this time :P
(I didnt really like the menu very much loll, I ate the only thing I liked for lunch)
The ice cream was delicious though :D
So good that I forgot to get a photo of it first xD:




Oh and all the idol performances play in screens in the cafe:









After that we split up and Jeff took me back to the touhou shop so I could get the things I had wanted to xD
But my funds were low, so I settled on getting two of the games :)

Then we headed back to where our hotel was, and Jeff got sucked in by all the crane machines @0@
So we wandered around in there for a while, and I resisted spending any money for a while but at the last moment (after we left and had entered 3 crane buildings) I gave up and spent 200 Yen
But I at least got 1 thing from the machines, so that is okay.
Then Jeff saw me and was like okay, time to go xD

So we went back to the hotel.
We showed each other our war spoils, and started packing.

However, the other guys didnt show up.
We began to get really worried, and wondered if they had missed the last train...

We went down to the lobby for wifi, because the other guys had the wifi with them and we needed to contact them.
Well we wandered and waited in the lobby.
And eventually they responded to our texts and told us that they were on their way on the last train.

So we went back to our hotel room and chilled.
They showed up, and we chilled for a while.

Idr exactly what happened, but I ended up writing a lot of this blog and went to sleep cuz it was 2 a.m. loll

But yeah, that was my day :)
Thanks for reading! ^u^

Love,

~James D.


(p.s. it was hard to write my blog last night because we were watching anime :P xD

















lol so yah, thanks for reading :) )

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPortal Mini