Under the railroad bridge

Hi, it is "Respect-for-the-Aged-Day" today, so I have enough time to update my blog. I went to Tokyo last Saturday, and as I had expected, there were lots of people throughout the capital as people were going to have the three-day weekends.

My friend wanted to drop off at Okachimachi station to buy tennis goods, so we walked from there to Akihabara, when we saw this shopping mall under the railroad bridge. As you can see, it seemed very new, and I found out that it was built just last year. The mall has its own name, "2k540 AKI-OKA ARTISAN".

 I could see many cute shops that sold things like this. 

 As the name "ARTISAN" suggests, many of the shops seemed to be run by people specializing in making artifacts.  

 Would you include Miku in the category of the artifact? As you can see this figurine was in the showcase for people to take pics. 

 As I was walking along the mall, I found this chic coffee shop "Yanaka". The seats in there were all occupied. 

So we were seated on this deck just in front of the shop. It was a mildly hot day, so this iced coffee tasted really nice. It had the strong bitterness I was expecting of.  

 As I was strolling about Akihabara, I saw this pachinko ad truck that featured AKB48. I read an article where a famous music producer said this group's popularity would last for another 5 years. Well, I don't think so. 

 And I came to this restaurant, "Pizza Salvatore" for dinner. My friend's iphone worked very well for us to get here. 

 As it was still warm around 6pm, we dined at this table. 

The name for this pizza was "Diabola". I guessed the name had something to do with devil, because it included many kinds of spice that would energize you like hell.

We came back to Akihbara. The Hatsune Miku ad was for a karaoke bar. It was very impressive to see the Miku lit up in the center of Akihabara in the night. 

I often have unpleasant days as you would, but I want to show you mostly the fun part of Japan in this blog :)

Cheapest Ramen

I went to Akihabara to eat Ramen that many people online said to be very good.

 This Ramen shop "Kimura" was about a 10 minutes' walk from the station. Kimura is one of the most commonly used family names in Japan. I had a few friends whose names were Kimura. 

The taste of this Ramen was relatively good, but what was amazing was the price was only 530 yen, or 6.3 dollars (5.3 Euros). As you can see it had enough volume to make me satisfied. As I waited at the table, people came one after another.  

The last two pics of mine are additional ones. My friend wanted to buy cleaning liquid for his contact lens, so we came to Ikebukuro where almost anything is available.

Ikebukuro can be written as 池袋, and Akihabara is 秋葉原. You can see how far the two stations are from each other by looking at the pic above. A one-way ticket from Akihabara to Ikebukuro is 190 yen. 

And I saw this ad truck on my way back to Ikebukuro station. It was advertising the website E☆エブリスタ where you can upload your own works like novels, manga. And basically you don't have to pay for the works available on the website. 

It started to feel cool in the morning and evening over here. I'm now waiting for leaves to turn yellow :)

Yokohama -2-

This is a sequel of the last post. I'd like to show you some more pics taken in Yokohama.

Some people overseas might know we're currently having a territorial dispute with China. This visit was before we started to have the problem, so Chinese people were friendly and we could take a look around this town very comfortably. Having said that, I still think the Chinese in this area would be kind to us. 

Do you know the chestnuts that taste really sweet? These chestnuts are called "Tenshin Amaguri", and its origin is China. But we can buy similar products at convenience stores as well.  

 I left the Chinatown and came near to Tokyo Bay. This building was right before the station we got off, and its name was "Yokohama Kaikou Memorial Museum". Kaikou means "opening of the port". 

 If you walk from the station for 15 minutes, you can visit this "Yokohama Red Brick Warehouse". Its outside look is oldish, but you can buy lots of fashionable things inside of it. 

We had coffee at this shop in the warehouse "Chez Madu". It is a coffee chain that has only 4 outlets in Japan. It was selling doughnuts as well which you can see on the left. 

I don't remember what this coffee was, but I think it was a cafe latte. I'd say this tasted better than Starbucks, but I'd prefer inexpensive coffee that Veloce serves. 

Some people know I'm a music freak, and I reserved a Korn live dvd that is going to be released next month. And I'm going to see Nickelback in December! What do you expect for after the summer ends?

Yokohama -1-

This is the first time I say this, but I lived in Yokohama of Kanagawa prefecture before I moved to Ibaraki. I usually don't remember the times when I was there, but since it is such a nice city, I see it on TV from time to time. During Obon (the summer vacation of Japan), I came to the China town of Yokohama to enjoy the atmosphere.

It takes only 40 minutes or less from Tokyo station to Yokohama. This is "The Minatomirai 21  line", and it takes you to the China town. As you can see, this station was built recently, in 2004.  

 It was really hot like 35 degrees when I got here. This is one of the gates of the China town. There were so many people who I thought came to eat Chinese food. 

Have you ever tried the sharks' fin soup? This restaurant specializes in it. Since there are several same restaurants in this China town, it would be hard for you to miss this.  

Dumplings. The prices ranged from 400 to 500 yen.  I wasn't sure if she was Chinese or Japanese.

I went to Taiwan last year, and saw many times the commercial for this energy drink on Taiwanese TV. So I tried this for the first time. But it tasted like odd Pepsi.  黒松 would mean "Black pine". 

My friend said he wanted to have lunch at this restaurant. Looking back, I think this was a good choice. 

This dish is called "刀削麺"(Toushoumen), and the noodles are basically cut off a wheat lump. It was cool like water but the taste was spicy. 

There was something like a shrine in the center of the town. Precisely it must not be a shrine, but western people wouldn't be able to distinguish it from Chinese temples, which is the case with me too. 

I want to show you more pics of Yokohama later!