Day 1!

I was in the process of explaining how important crepes are...

  So I decided even before we left that Day 1 would be  shopping day, I mostly decided this since JJ wouldn't be in Japan yet and that meant I wouldn't have to bore him with a day of only shopping. Turned out to be kinda annoying dragging everything I bought from city to city though! Next time I think I'll probably do it a little differently!

 Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden

We got lost in some cute streets on our way

 



 














 
  Carrenca foolishly decided to join me on my shopping day and ended up carrying around all of my bags of heavy STUFF. What a pal. We started the day by going to the Shinjuku Gyoen Park nearby the Shinjuku station. It took us a while of walking around the outside of the park but eventually we found the entrance completely on the other side of where we started!

Looks just like the one in Garden of Words!

  One of the biggest reasons I wanted to go to this specific park was the fact that it was featured in a movie I really enjoy, Garden of Words. We were even able to find the exact same bench from the film and ate a konbini(convenience store) breakfast while sitting on it. The garden itself was pretty large and very pretty, even if nothing was really in bloom this time of year. The cicadas had already started chirping this early in the morning and we even got a chance to see one up close! It was really cool, but very difficult to get pictures of.

  Afterwards we made the short walk over to Takeshita Dori in Harajuku. We approached from the back of the street but even then I knew exactly what I was looking at! It was very surreal finally being in a place that has had such an impact on my life.

AND THE SHOPPING BEGAN

First stop was Wego! These short crew socks are in right now with little designs just above the ankle so I bought a few which would come in handy for the hot-as-balls Japan. We only walked a short bit before we were at another place we needed to stop! An ice cream shop! We could smell it from far away and that was honestly enough, we were in Japan after all. It was called ザクザク. I had some of their soft serve (1st ice cream of the day) and Carrenca got the creampuff. They were both AMAZING.

  After fueling up on ice cream we hit a few more spots; Closet Child, Disney Store, Liz Lisa, Bodyline(lol), Sanrio, Spinn, Panama Boy, and Listen Flavor! I had such a great experience in Listen Flavor as well. The shop girl who helped me was very kind, patient and explained everything in the store to me. She even took my picture after I had purchased everything while I was leaving.

Udon; my favorite type of noodle tbh

Shortly after it was closer to lunch time and we found ourselves in a basement restaurant tucked under one of the shops on Takeshita Dori. We both ordered udon and some other sides and tucked ourselves into one of the small tables. Already we had lots of bags with us which made every space feel rather small. Lunch was great! One of my favorite things about Japan is how even the convenient food that is cheap is still pretty tasty.

  We stopped by a few more spots as we wandered out of Takeshita Dori and towards the rest of Harajuku. We went to Bubbles, where they had a pop-up shop called Nice To Meet Chuu upstairs! And then, after a bit more walking... we saw her; the Kawaii Monster Cafe! I didn't even care that we had recently eat, it was time to go go go! We arrived about 15 minutes before their next show and it wasn't too crowded as it was on a week day. I was really excited as they had a few special Halloween items on their menu and although I didn't end up ordering them, they were still really cool to see. Every single corner of the place was colorful and whimsical and just an overwhelming feast for the eyes. Even the bathroom was full of color! As I've said before, it looked like the Pon Pon Pon version of Kyary Pamyu Pamyu threw up inside of a restaurant and they just ran with it! We sat in the milk bottle section that just had bottles and animals drinking from them hanging from the ceiling. After a few minutes of sitting one of the girls came around and asked if we wanted to take picture with them after the show and of course I said absolutely! They give you a cute little placeholder candy stick as well which is another of those totally unnecessary and cute things that I love about kawaii culture. Then during the show as they were performing they came into the audience and picked someone out to dance with them on stage and amazingly they picked me! I was so excited and flattered and nervous to go up with them, but I did it anyway and it was a lot of fun!

So fucking magical.

The ice cream on the pancakes had a candy shell!

   After the show was over we ordered our food, we both ordered something with ice cream on it. And of course they both had silly monster-y names. (2nd ice cream of the day) It was so delicious and such a delightful whimsical experience, I do not regret it one bit.


Then we did a bit more shopping, going to La Foret and going up and down the many floors. One of my favorite stops there being Swimmer which was coming close to closing. I couldn't help myself and bought several things on sale there including some glass desert bowls with cute little strawberries on them. (luckily the made the trip home safely!) We also Walked by a Kiddy Land and popped inside to check out the floor with Sanrio. I bought a few more Gudetama items there as well. I wont lie, I loved being able to walk in almost every store and find Gudetama items, hes such a perfect egg. <3

  Then we made one last ice cream stop for the day at the Dominique Ansel Bakery! Some of their deserts have been floating around social media lately, namely the What-A-Melon soft serve! So naturally we had to get one. (3rd ice cream of the day!!)

What-A-Melon!

  After going back to the AirBnB to drop off all of our purchases for the day we decided to explore Shinjuku a bit as its very close to our AirBnB. We wandered in and out of a few different arcades seeing all sorts of cabinets I've never seen before, Pachinko machines and ufo catchers. Carrenca tried to win a cute figure out of one of the ufo catchers but even with the help of a European gaijin we weren't able to win anything.

The entrance to Piss Alley

  We decided it was maybe time to eat again and went to somewhere called Omoide Yokocho or Memory Lane. However it has another more informal name; Piss Alley. Though to be honest I can't imagine that there is much actual piss anywhere considering the cleanliness of Japan. Either way it is a VERY small alley were there are all sorts of teeny tiny yakitori(grilled chicken on a stick) restaurants lining each side. Each restaurant holds maybe 8 people at most on the ground floor and maybe 10 more on the second level. We stopped at one and had a few different types of meat and cocktails made of green tea and sochu!  We soon realized that if we wanted to go to another place in Piss Alley we would need to wait a short while for our stomachs to settle so we went in the very large Donquijote just nearby and did MORE shopping. Not gonna lie, as I don't drink much I had a small buzz going on from my tea and bought even more gudetama stuff. This time; snacks! And something slightly more useful, a coin purse with gudetama on it; I ended up using it quite a lot. Then while walking around outside we passed a Taco Bar and the Robot Resturant! It just got me even more excited to go there once JJ arrived in Tokyo! The outside of the building was overwhelming on its own! Eventually we decided we were ready to have a bit more yakitori and moved on to another place in Piss Alley. The second one we found was much tastier then the first and the man cooking for us really seemed like he knew what he was doing. We even had yaki-onigiri which was amazing!

yaki onigiri

  Soon we noticed the chef was turning people away and we took this as a sign that we should probably head out too. When we got home I was SO TIRED. But I wanted to use one of my bathbombs and facemasks. After almost falling asleep in the tub several times I turned into bed after an amazingly long first day in Japan!

Day Zero

  Instead of calling the day we traveled to Japan at Day 1, lets just call it Day Zero, especially since most of the day was traveling and settling and in everything. Even better is the fact that both my coworker Carrenca and I decided to stay up all night in order to help ourselves sleep easier on the flight. So Day Zero felt like one incredibly long day! 😬
  The night was mostly spent watching youtube videos that I don't remember and drinking lots and lots of iced tea! I also remember struggling to download videos onto my ipad and after hours of tired struggling the solution was pretty easy. And that's why trying to work through the night is always worse then getting sleep.
  I even spent a short while that evening messaging our AirBnB host back and forth. One of the other member of our group arrived a day before us and our AirBnB host; Koichi wanted to meet with him. At some point in the evening he even sent me an adorable picture of them together.

Koichi and Pat

  Finally the morning rolled around and I took my last shower for the last several hours grabbed my efficiently packed suitcase and called a quick lyft to the airport!

Lets try not to die on this flight!

  I am really not a fan of flying so the next several hours were horrible but somehow manageable and although I stayed up all night I did not get as much sleep as I had hoped I would! At one point I did end up watching Kamikaze Girls which was one of the movies I struggled with for so long to get on my ipad. So worth it, that movie is amazing no matter how many times I watch it. 

Japan!

  One of the first things that was overwhelming for me upon landing were the toilets! Never in my life had I seen so many buttons for a single toilet.... though I guess they are more than toilets. Washing and drying options, the sound of trickling water coming from somewhere, heat control, and at least two different types of flushes, 大 and 小, for a BIG flush and a little flush.
  Getting through the rest of the airport was so painful, I just wanted to get to the fun already(!!), but after getting through foreign customs, picking up our bags, and getting to the train; the next obstacle was figuring out what train we needed. The train system poster looked like a bowl of noodles to be honest, just a mess of lines going everywhere. Luckily everything has English writing below the Japanese though so we managed and made it to our AirBnB safely!

only slightly more complicated then bart

  On our way from the station to our AirBnB I saw not only someone dressed in lolita fashion but someone else carrying an ita bag which made me quickly forget how tired I was; I needed to go shopping immediately.  😠

  I actually almost went out of the apartment with only the comfortable stretchy tights I wore for the plane, but one thing I had learned from the walk from the station to our place was how clean not only Japan is(It smelled AMAZING) but the people too! Everyone was dressed so nicely and not a single pair of yoga pants as far as the eye could see. So I changed into some real pants and THEN headed out to Angelic Pretty, Baby The Stars Shine Bright, Kera Shop, Emily Temple Cute, and Closet Child! It was really surreal passing these places I had only ever shopped online for in person. As silly as it sounds, it was pretty fucking magical.
  I ended up buying some old school socks from AP as well as the Magical Bat Cape. Then I picked up a Innocent World JSK and cardigan from Closet Child. Started filling up my stamp card too aww yeah.

  Afterwards I descided to meet back up with the group and we went out for a few drinks. At one point we even stopped into a Don Quijote near Shibuya crossing and I got an adorable Hachiko shaped taiyaki! And that was it, I was officially in love with cute Japanese snacks.

See that small step? That led to the bar we were in!

Hachiko <3

  Eventually I decided to head home since I was literally falling asleep standing up. And I needed lots of rest for my giant shopping day the next day!

This is actually the Donki in Shinjuku but don't tell anyone. :P

日本に行きましょう～！

One thing that people asked for the most about my trip to Japan was story's and pictures, so I decided to deliver in the form of a blog!
  I am pretty new to writing anything like this so I hope no one expects it to be too amazing, for the most part it will be an outline of what we did each day along with some photos and explanations. I hope everyone enjoys the blog as much as I enjoyed Japan!

ありがとうごさいました！

A special thanks to my mom who asked me to do this and who in fact runs her own really amazing blog called Fortunes Afloat!