tokyo new year

dec. 29, 2009

went to dk house to arrange for housing during interim break.

explored shinjuku for an hour or so, going into various stores like kinokuniya, etc.

***

dec. 30, 2009

met up with jamie, her friends melissa and hannah in harajuku. had usual kabob roll set at cafeteria.

met up with fox, twins mike and scott, and dan. went shopping in harajuku. went into idol shops, clothing stores, etc. in gothic lolita store, body line, saw swedish girl from tokyo decadance halloween by coincidence. everyone had crepes, except for me because i was too full from lunch. went to kiddy land and did some more shopping.

jamie obsessing over how the lead singer of her beloved german band rammstein cut a hole in his face and thread a led light through it to make his mouth glow ( www.visit-x.com/rammstein ).


***

dec. 31, 2009

met up with jamie at shinjuku. went with her to akihabara to meet up with friends.

ate cheap lunch. jamie and friends had soba noodles in various forms. i'm not such a soba fan (except for yakisoba), so i had curry.

then, ran around akihabara shopping. jamie's friends bought a bunch of presents for friends and family. lots of strange shops in akihabara, especially porn shops. jamie keeps telling me that there's a seven story sex toy shop somewhere in akihabara. only in akihabara.

found really cute off-the-beaten-track cafe. had 40s (maybe earlier) vintage wooden interior. had iced cocoa with vanilla soft ice cream in it. spent some time chatting. discovered hannah loves yamada takayuki ( www.youtube.com/watch?v=bxWg0y… ), who is't that well-known, so had a long conversation about him.

went home and had a little nap before meeting up again in shibuya for dinner. ate at italian food place because 90 minute sweets places closed. had to wait for dinner a bit. people watching and laughing with hannah. ran into dan, who we always run into randomly in shibuya. had seafood pizza at restaurant, somehow hit the spot.

made our way to harajuku, where we karaoke-ed for an hour.

later, met up with mike and scott. headed over to meiji shrine. incredibly crowded, lots of police helping move things along. mike and scott really loud and obnoxious american behavior, but somewhat entertaining. had countdown and brought in the new year!

***

jan. 1, 2010

police directed crowd into shrine. everyone throwing money for good luck, some coins ended up down melissa and hannah's cleavage.

finally made it out of shrine. mike and scott went home. decided to return to karaoke. crepe stands still open, so ate crepes. had really tasty ice cream caramel nut cream crepe. saw group of guys in strange costumes and cute white shiba inu that looked like otousan from softbank commercials while we ate. then, went to 7/11 to buy snacks to sneak into karaoke.

did karaoke for 2 hours. sang really silly songs, like lady gaga's bad romance ( www.youtube.com/watch?v=qrO4YZ… ), eminem's slim shady, and christina aguilera's genie in a bottle. i sang lots of l'arc~en~ciel songs, like p'unk~en~ciel's holiday/new year song called i wish ( www.youtube.com/watch?v=EW42IZ… ) and l'arc's forbidden lover ( www.youtube.com/watch?v=mIsKHN… ). staff at karaoke place not very nice, kicked us out a few minutes early.

on way out of karaoke, ran into jamie's spaniards, who just came from meiji shrine and were planning on karaoke-ing.

ended up hanging out in mcdonalds for a few hours, sipping coffee. melissa and hannah left early. jamie and i stayed a while longer.

went to sleep around eight in the morning. slept until 5 in the afternoon.

later, met up with jamie and friends in shibuya. friends running a bit late, so me and jamie hung out in first kitchen, drinking maccha lattes.

tried 90 minute sweets place again, but both closed. ended up at really good curry place. had crab croquette curry. can make costume curry with various levels of spicy-ness. jamie very happy to get very spicy food for once. want to go back and get hayashi rice there sometime.

afterwards, had taiyaki fish waffles for dessert. jamie got sweet potato flavor while the rest of us got caramel almond flavor. ate on the way over to tower records.

ran around tower records for a while. discovered section with rakugo recordings and books. must go back to find a good rakugo book. melissa bought merry live concert dvd that has footage of gara breaking his back on stage. i ended up buying another magazine with lots of nice photographs of the cast of "nodame cantabile," i couldn't resist. they had a glass case with one of ueno juri's (nodame) costumes, she is so tiny (clip of ueno juri, tamaki hiroshi, and eiji wentz forced to act silly: www.youtube.com/watch?v=cLL5b_… )!!

***

jan. 2, 2010

met up with jamie and friends in shibuya at hachiko.

trip to yokohama. friends bought special train pass that includes roundtrip from shibuya to yokohama and unlimited access to local yokohama line for about 8 dollars.

went to yokohama's chinatown. realized that i have been to at least four different chinatowns (d.c., new york, vancouver, and yokohama). walked down busy street, eating sweet steamed buns. jamie got steamed bun with panda face on outside and maccha green tea filling on the inside. found cute shop with products from all over the world, hippy-ish store, jamie and friends said it was just like madison. ate dim sum sesame balls (must go back with jamie to get real dim sum meal). jamie bought omiyage chinese cakes for host family.

went to minato mirai station to harbor. went on cosmo clock 21 ferris wheel, my third time. woman in another car waving to us, we waved back. had a good laugh on the farris wheel.

ate dinner at kaiten conveyer belt sushi. tasty as usual. had really good aji mackerel. jamie spent 25 dollars on sushi!

had a good laugh on train ride home about bad roommates. hannah couldn't stop laughing about story of sydney's first roommate. what was her name, chelsea?