Ikebukuro seemed much much busier than the last time I was there, probably because it was Children's day. And it was raining. No big deal, it's not so heavy. We first head to the Sunshine City building. I mentioned that place in an earlier entry about it being the former site of the war criminals prison and gallows. It's very different now. Inside is a maze of shops and eateries and some kind of amusement park called Namba town (home of Ice Cream City which I'm told sells fish, squid and other random flavours of ice cream). I could have spent the day there and all my money but I'm still living somewhat on a budget so I'll add it to my list of places to go blow some cash on my last weekend in Japan. I don't know how long we were in there but probably at least an hour or so. We decided not to go to Nambatown on Children's Day as it was chocka and headed out, picking up an icecream on the way. I went for ゴーヤー (Goya) which is apparently Bitter Melon. None of us knew what it was so I had to try it. Looking on the wiki, I found that it's an ingredient rarely used on mainland Japan but when I delved a little deeper I discovered that Blue Seal, the shop we bought the ice cream at, is an Okinawan company and goya is a commonly used ingredient down there.
Next stop was the geeky part of town. I don't know if this area/street has a name but there were a few shops selling anime and manga goodies and unlike Akihabara these places were aimed at girls (ie, not so many boobs). We had a look around in K-Books which had some cute things and some random things that I can't imagine anyone would actually want to buy. Saw some cool costumes, many of which I would have loved if they weren't so expensive and me so huge. ;_; Then it was in to Animate which was pretty fun, shame there were so many people. Downstairs was the most interesting. They had Neon Genesis Evangelion curry, Street Fighter Soda, random tins of spaghetti, giant pudding makers (btw, I hope a certain someone hasn't forgotten about my giant cupcake tin....) and a host of odd shaped cookies. Katharina and I then lost Rosanna so took a quick tour of the upstairs floors looking for her and spotting a rather cool looking Ichigo from Bleach costume. It was for boys so it would fit me though the 10,000yen price tag is a touch on the steep side. Back down to the ground and we find our Swedish friend and make our escape.
The rain is getting worse by this point and we don't really know what we're doing so we take a stroll through the shops. Rosanna-san spots a few things she likes so goes to try them on and Katharina and I wait outside talking Twilight, bad t-shirt design and horrible blue chocolate waffer things. Once we are three again we attempt to get out of the rain by heading down to the underground shopping centre type thing. I mention that there's a food court with freebies so we wander around there getting to sample a few things which was cool. Not eating those baby fish though. Katharina and I tried some strange biscuit/cake thing but I'm pretty sure after struggling to eat it that they were display food. Not good.
After eating lots of free things we ran out of things to do so I suggested Harajuku. By the time we arrive the rain is really coming down and trying to get down Takeshite Street is chaos with all the umbrellas. I can't continue to walk around with no rain protection though so I duck in a discount store and buy a plastic mac for a bargain price of 105yen. It was very fetching. We duck in and out of stores along the street looking at odd clothes, cute and not so cute toys and lots and lots of Johnny's stuff. Can't beat semi-naked Pi haha! There was some pretty lame stuff there like the replica necklaces and tacky phone charms but I did spot one keyring that I liked but at 500yen, I decided not to bother until I've been back to Asakusa to take another look at what they have. Picked up some Miss Valentine earrings instead for nostaligia's sake.
And then it was time for purikura! I love these machines (so long as there's not 15 people in one). I don't know why they don't have them in the UK, they'd make so much money. Some blurry pictures below for you to take a look at.
Once all the shopping was done we go on the hunt for food. I think the intention was to look for a mos burger but we stumbled across an omurice restaurant called Apple Tree (I think). I was a little weary as I'd read that omurice usually has chicken in it but I figured I could eat the sauce and the egg and just not eat the rice on the inside. As it turns out there was no chicken in it at all and it was rather good, if a little too much for me. But in Japan you have to eat everything on your plate down to the last grain of rice. I was a little bit sick when I left but it was worth it for a tasty and pretty cheap meal. It was a pleasure to eat something that had actually vegetables in it and didn't taste like salt or sugar^^
Finally it was time for home. Well, nearly. Next to the omurice place was a cute shop that we call the Care Bear shop or the Popple Shop. When I was in Japan in 2007 I bought my super awesome Flintstones bag in there so I popped in to see if they had anything else cool and they did. Found me a fabo Looney Toons rucksack. It was 4000yen (£25) but it's cool and I do need a ruck sack for when I go on overnight trips.
And that was that. Back on the train, home, watch some tv (omg Barney....200 women and now 1) and some sleep.
Wednesday will be spent studying or pretending to study and back to school on Thursday.
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