Japan!


Welcome to Japan! What a trip last week! After doing 3 yrs of Japanese in High School, I have always wanted to go to Japan since! So it was exciting that when my day job said I needed to go there last week for a conference, I was already packed and out the door before they finished their sentence!

So yeah, last week I flew to Japan for work, but was able to have some time to check out the Akihabara Electric town for a few hours. Have to say it was the mecha of anima, manga and gaming. I got a few comments from some of my colleagues in the workshop that they had "outgrown" that part of Japanese Culture, but it had brought back fond memories of their youth. Though I suspect that they were slightly jealous that they couldn't just head down there on the weekend themselves though in reality.


So after a short subway ride down there, which was surprisingly easy to navigate, I came into Electric town to check it all out.





Plenty of gaming stores exist here, and it was quite interesting to see what was available. I just wish that I had more time, or money or both to be here, and could also understand if some of the games would work on my consoles back home. There were quite a few that even in Japanese would be a lot of fun to play and I know that we will never see them in Europe/North America anytime soon.






Only place I really spent any money was at the Anima figurine flea market store thingy.. where people rent boxes, put in their unwanted figurines, and stick a price to them. It was always super busy ( I went back several times before buying something! ) and when I did pick something up it was super easy. Kind of like Ikea where you take a piece of paper, right down the codes, and price, and then pick it up later. Except here a store employee would then walk around with you to pick out the items you wanted.


Later in the evening I headed off to Tamiya HQ and got to see some of the club members there tuning their race cars for the upcoming Tamiya Grand Prix event ( can't remember the date, but these guys were quite serious in their work here! ).

After this is was pretty much all work unfortunately. But an upside was that each night we were treating to a really nice night out for dinner with our Japanese counterparts. Below are some of the foods that we got, and all of it was really really good! Cannot wait for another workshop or something to happen in Japan, and if that doesn't happen soonish, then I might just have to fly out on my own dime cause there is so much that I did not get to see or do while there! Cheers and enjoy!















A nice welcome message from my colleagues while out for dinner on the last night! And that was ice cream, with pineapple, oranges and beans. Great stuff!


Oh and a Turkish kebab place.. which was run by Turks! I think they were surprised when I responded to them in Turkish when they tried to get us to go into their place for some late night doner!

Comments

  1. You lucky, LUCKY man!
    One day I will get there too and visit the origins of the ryu I study(ied) and hopefully Shibuya :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Paradox0n! Yes, lucky and unlucky as I was unable to do much more than the couple of hours of sight seeing ( oh and eating sooooo much! ). Hope to go back more for vacation next time and see more of Japan!

      Delete
  2. Looks like fun :) Never had the chance to go to Japan. What is that frightening thing in the lower left corner of the ironman photo? looks like a nude person fused with a motorcycle (which itself might be made out of something that Swampthing might be very angry to have had removed!) with a speedometer implanted into the back of it's head? odd and just might give me nightmares ;)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It was ;)
      And as far as I can see, it is something really messed up. Then again, so was going into the basements of any of the stores in Electric town.. this was safe in comparison! Be thankful I didn't take photos of them!

      Delete
  3. Hola
    Tío que ENVIDIA
    Pásalo bien y disfruta
    un saludo

    ReplyDelete
  4. I would love to go to Japan! My wife would hate me as I would want to do like you and go to that gaming zone and she would want to go see other sites! Well, I would also...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I wish I could have gone to see more of Tokyo, but you know.. work and stuff got in the way. Next time I hope to have more time there and can explore it a lot more. Was really cool from the parts that I saw!

      Delete
  5. Replies
    1. I have more photos to share with you then to make it more than tiny bit ;)

      Delete
  6. Great looking models, great looking food, I would love to visit Japan, is it still very expensive?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Very expensive Fran. I am just lucky it was work footing most of the bill there. Went with 80k Yen for 3 days, came back with 3k :( And I did no real spending for myself while there.. But well worth it though!

      Delete
  7. I'm more than a bit jealous myself. My daughter grew up with Anime and Manga. She's 21 now and she still plays the games and watches the movies. She would geek out in a place like that. The amount of money we would spend getting things imported for her was obscene. She's fluent in Japanese and she speaks it so well that when she speaks German, she speaks it with a Japanese accent.

    Wonderful pics!!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks Anne! I wish I was fluent in Japanese ( or German for that matter! ). My Japanese was very rusty ( having not spoken it since high school some 15 yrs ago! ) but I got along well enough while there. Am sure if I had more time ( and money! ) I would go bonkers in a lot more of the places around there. Definitely a place to visit for her then if she is that gonzo about Anime and Manga!

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular Posts