japan - last day...

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people say that japan is where fashion happens first and that sooner or later the rest of the world will get to see what we should all be wearing. well, having completed a thorough investigation of numerous shops i can provide some fashion forward feedback.

this month we will be mostly wearing tartan - tartan high heels, puffa jackets and mini-skirts. hats have ears. berets with ears, trilbys with ears, bobble hats with ears. yes, ears. get with the ear programme. also making a feature are temporary lip tattoos - think rainbows, leopard print, and hundreds and thousands. unusually we can also look forward to decorative eye patches. don't worry though, the eye patches are perforated and vision is not impaired. fashion can be friendly.

shopping in japan isn't all about fashion. the food is incredible. in ginza (a super chic designer district which makes kensington look like slough - sorry slough) there are elegant fruit shops where a basket of 10 fruit can cost 21,000 yen. that's around 200 quid. and we are talking satsumas, and melons and pears. of course each fruit is perfect with perfect symmetry and no 'odd' markings or blemishes.

less perfect is the decidedly visceral fish market at tsukiji. not for the faint of fishy hearted, tsukiji sells fresh fish to the city every morning from million yen tuna to all kinds of unidentifiable shell fish that look like testicles of the sea (obviously marine biologists would argue that the sea doesn't actually have gonads but i have seen evidence to the contrary). fish guts and fish heads litter the floor, perfect tuna and salmon are cut in pristine slabs on counter tops, and lobster and crab try their hardest to escape various assortments of tanks, pots and pans.

after walking through the market i visited a local sushi bar. the bar only accomodated 8 people and was covered in hand drawn pictures of fish and hand written menus. the owner was an avid baseball fan and welcomed all diners as if we were his family. i was greeted with the darkest mug of green tea and a plate of raw salmon and tuna. the owner preceeded to tell me which bits of the fish i was eating from belly to back. i ate all of my pickles in one go to take my mind off it. my eyes were bigger than some of the dead fish in the market. still, he was very friendly - as were the other diners, a young thai boy with his father, a middle aged drunk who had not yet gone home, and an old japanese man with a wrinked face, no teeth and a mouth only big enough for a cigarette.

of course shopping can also be for an experience too. the day before yesterday i went to the cat cafe. generally japanese homes are small and working hours long. as such pet ownership is increasingly difficult. to compensate for this, cat cafes have begun to open where people can pay to spend time with cats without actually having to own one. on entering the cat cafe i was ushered into a sitting room with around 20 patrons and ten cats wandering around. there are cubby holes for cats to hide in, posts for them to scratch and shelves for them to climb. cat toys are handed out to customers to entice the cats towards them. if that was not odd enough in the corner was a huge cat shaped tv playing cat videos. of course some cats are 'on break' from being cuddled by customers, and they sleep in the rooms surrounding the sitting room which are variously themed as bedrooms and bathrooms. i am worried as at the time this was just amusing. now i am writing, it all sounds a bit suspicous. a bit like a lap dancing club where the 'dancers' are cats. the pdsa will no doubt arrest me when i get back but in my defence it was brilliant. i am bringing cat cafes to britain.

anyway, i fly to korea tomorrow. i will have to learn some korean words. stuff like 'hey - i know about fashion' and 'i'm innocent, the cat agreed.' i will have some time tonight in my capsule hotel. this time i am booked into a proper capsule hotel. i actually slept very well last night. the beds look like a cross between a mortuary slab and a rotissery oven. still i woke up neither dead or roasted. the ladies shared bathroom is stupidly located though. i have to go from the sixth floor to the basement, outside and go through the door next to the takeaway. this is becoming another dodgy story isn't it.....?

well, i have loved japan. the people are amazing. i definitely recommend it.

lots of love and take care. kxx

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