Gundam Cafe and etc.

 As I was talking about, I went to Tokyo last weekend, and had some fun. The weather was ideal for people to stroll, with the temperature around 23 degrees Celsius (73 Fahrenheit).

 I don't want to bore you with similar pics, but take a closer look. Every time I come to Akihabara, the ad on the GAMERS gets renewed. You can buy manga everywhere in Japan, but getting the one you really want at the GAMERS will give you more satisfaction. 

 One of the purposes we came to AKB was to have Ramen at this shop. The name was 雲林坊, which can be read as Yun Rin Bou. 

You can have the same Ramen as China at this restaurant. This was a Ramen called 担担麺, but compared to ordinary 担担麺 (Tan Tan Men), this didn't have soup at all. But it tasted nice all the more for the uniqueness. 

 We went to Ochanomizu as well, and on our way back we visited this coffee shop in AKB. The Kanji 庵 can be read as Iori. The meaning of 庵 is like "hut". 

 The interior was really classic. I liked it very much. 

 The main purpose of visiting Tokyo this time was to have some drink at Gundam Cafe. This was the mobile suit Zaku, which was standing at the entrance. 

Compare the pics with those robots (mobile suits) . You would see a little similarity between the robots and the dishes.  

 If you look up from the seats in the center of this cafe, you can see this relatively big figure. I saw some foreign people taking pics too. 

The cocktail I ordered was "Kira Yamato", which is the name of the hero in the anime Gundam Seed Destiny. The two coasters were designed after the robots of Gundam too. 

I had to drive back to my home after getting off the TX line, so the cocktail had no alcohol at all. But the Kira Yamato made me feel good like ordinary cocktails do to me. :)

Cafe de Shippona

I was thinking of visiting Tokyo last weekend, but I had something to do in my city, which kept me from going. I think I might go to the capital this weekend, but I'm not really sure. By the way, I went to a restaurant in my city last weekend that seemed a bit unique. 

 The name for this cafe is "Cafe de しっぽな". You can see the name written on the two places in the pic. I think しっぽな(Shippona) is a coined word, which would basically mean "tail". 

 There were so many figures and pictures of cat all over the restaurant. You'd think the owner of this cafe should be a cat person. 

 One example of the figures was this. This place seemed like one for girls, so I was a bit embarrassed. I could see many female customers. 

 And another thing was this. Do you like it? 

I ordered "A chicken cutlet set" for lunch. The left saucer was shaped like a cat again. The taste of the cutlet was much better than ordinary family restaurants. Next time I come here I should bring a woman to mitigate my embarrassment. ^^;

TomTom -2-

As I've shown in this blog, I'm still a huge fan of coffee. I introduced a coffee shop "TomTom" in this post before, but lately I found its new outlet in a neighboring city. So I went in there to see how good its coffee was.

There is a bookstore "Wondergoo" in front of this shop, and I used to visit it to browse books, but I didn't notice this coffee shop until recently. 

You'd relax to your heart's content in this coffee shop. I thought this shop was intended for adults, because one coffee was a bit more expensive than that of Doutor. 

There was something like this which entertained my eyes. The room was dimly lit, so you'd concentrate on reading for example.

I always decide how good the shop is by drinking its iced coffee. It was a bit bitter but with a little milk in it the taste got milder. Another thing I liked about this shop was each table was relatively big where I could put my bag, ipod, and what not. 

To tell you the truth I wanted to show you a new posting on Tokyo, but lately I've been unable to go to the capital because the weather has been unstable. I wish I could go there in next two weeks. 

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 :)