Blogs from Akihabara, Tokyo, Japan, Asia

We left the hotel and walked to the metro station to go to the fish market, on the way past, we walked by a little vending machine that sold hats for cats, they were hilarious. Bear ears, bunny ears and a hat that looked like a boiled sweet, obviously, I had to get one! Molly the cat is going to be SO impressed when I get home!! When we arrived in the area where the fish market is, we walked into a tiny walkway lined with market stalls with household goods, veggies, fish and meat. The market was very busy despite the later time, Michie took us to a stall to try a local cake, round and heavy with a choice of filling with chocolate, custard, soya beans, black sesame and many more, because I’ve been ... read more

Today we ventured to Akihabara (one of our main reasons for coming to Japan). Akihabara or 'electric city' is a suburb of Tokyo fil with arcades and alleyways selling electronic goods. There are multi- storey buildings sellling nothing but video games and merchandise. As soon as we stepped off the train we knew exactly where to go: a tall blue building labelled 'SEGA.' There were six storeys of arcades and claw machines. Why so many bloody claw machines? Seriously, they are everywhere. After playing playing some prettying cool games, even beating someone in a challenge we moved onto the next building. Here, we stepped into a gigantic pod containing a huge screen and controls. The instructions of the game were in Japanese, but to the best of my understanding, you were supposed to be a human ... read more

Op 2 november ben ik naar Akihabara, een stuk van Tokyo dat bekend staat om manga en anime toestanden, de fish market, Odaiba en Roppongi Hills. De avond ervoor had ik in het hostel een zeker Marc (nog een duitser) en Roberto 'everything here is sjiiiiit' de italiaan leren kennen. Zij vroegen ons wat we de dag erop gepland hadden en vroegen of ze mee mochten. We zijn pas laat in de voormiddag naar 'the fish market' geweest wat eigenlijk te laat was. Je moet er, om de tonijn veiling mee te maken, aanwezig zijn om 5 uur in de ochtend maar dat was mij toch te vroeg. Na een half uurtje hadden we het daar wel gezien en zijn we naar Akihabara getrokken. Daar vind je niet alleen allerhande elektronica maar ook jonge vrouwen die ... read more

Everyone take a deep breath. It's going to be okay. We took the train the 30-40 odd minutes to Sanrio Puroland yesterday (Hello Kitty Land to the likes of you and me). I know a lot of you (caveat: mostly not Aisha's friends) were quite excited about it. But the thing is, guys - IT WAS CLOSED. I KNOW! But see what we said up the top? It's going to be okay. So our 'last' full day in Tokyo turned out to be probably our most hectic so far; and also, in hindsight, a total misnomer. After discovering that the Kawaiiest Place on Earth (open every day) was freaking closed that day and the next for a repaint job, we were Sad Pandas (in fairness, Tess was actually the sad panda while Aisha was kind of ... read more

On my second day in Japan, I decided to do a major shopping trip and explore as much as I could of Tokyo for my last full day here. My first stop was Akihabara the technology district of geekdom where one can buy all the types of gadgets, computers, and cameras straight from the innovators of Japan. Akihabara is also the place where many otaku (anime geeks) go to get their fix on. Every street was filled with electronic stores hawking their wares, shops with cute anime figures and games everywhere, and also maid cafes. Stores are tiny, cramped six to seven story tall buildings bursting to the limit with merchandise. I never realized I was claustrophobic until I encountered Akihabara. My main goal in Akihabara was to just look around but I found myself ... read more