Shopping in Tokyo
Collection of photos - some from a few months ago and some from yesterday. Taking a look at daily shopping in Tokyo.
First up is Shinjuku. Particularly strong with department stores and electronic outlets. Lots of food and apparel too. If you are looking for figures then check out the Sakuraya Hobby Kan near CitiBank East Exit. They also have Kinokuniya with a foreign books section although I do recommend Amazon Japan for really cheap English language books.
Some character toothbrushes at a chemist. Included are Kamen Rider and Puricure.
Pokemon Soy sauce instant noodles - folks here are taught to eat it from an early age ^^;
Folks who care about their health can find lots of material in many book stores. Hmmmm. Cream...
At the Nike store looking for some trainers.
I'll never forget the visit to this store. The sofa we sat on was bouncy. When I sat down, My Canon SLR that was on the other side of the sofa bounced in the air and landed lens first on the floor! Luckily the sigma had a lens cap. Was a bit dented but no permanent damage.
The girls in the corner started to giggle when I went over to take pics of their apple pies.
And after walking around shopping, its time to treat the stomach to some traditional Japanese food.
At the shopping complex Lazona. Customers are greeted with the do-not rules.
At the electronics store Bic Camera.
Huge TV screens. These are going for over 1,000,000 yen but you can negotiate on the price - especially if you have a print out of an online store that has a cheaper price.
Ryan has a tough time deciding exactly how much of the store he wants to take back to the US ^^;
Know exactly how he felt though. As a visitor to Japan many moons ago, it pained me that I could only take back a certain amount and was envious of folks who lived here who could get the stuff anytime.
Figma galore.
Konami's Busou Shinki series which I never got into. Nice designs but don't really like the shiny plastic.
A load of Macross Frontier Itasha model cars.
Some Tutukki Bako by Bandai - a clock with a hole in the side - stick your finger in the hole and have hours of fun poking things.
Eemma gives us a review below. If you are interested then Japan Trend Shop has them on sale and ships internationally from Japan at 51 USD.
Some Japanese traditional mascots - the Daruma and Maneki Neko. They bob from side to side forever until our Sun burns out.
How about starting your day by shooting at something? No I'm not talking about health care but about this product called Gun O'clock that will wake you up at your desired time - you have to shoot at the target to turn it off! Great PV Video below. Also available from Japan Trend Shop for 66 USD. Berry SUKIRI!
Tamagocchi lives! I remember owning one of these back in the UK. Paid something like 20 pounds for it - and this was like 16 years ago.
Some kids playing with the toys out on display.
Walking around Lazona.
Not particularly keen on the choice of casual shoes over here and end up buying a few when I'm overseas in the UK or US - love the shoes at Aldo which we don't have here ToT.
Kaldi is having a sale this week - everything 10% off with many items at 50% off.
I take advantage of the sale and pick up more than the usual - walnuts, Jalapeno and Chai Tea.
A quick bite to eat before continuing shopping.
These days, I hardly spend any moolah on my hobbies as samples just turn up - whether I like the items or not ^^;
For most of the shopping that I do do however, I get online - mainly from Amazon. Picked up two more Slick Cases for my daughters - 2,496 yen each.
One of the most interesting products I've seen - a small tank where a Kabuto Prawn will grow just by adding water.
Here are the instructions on the back and here is a photo of what it looks like after a month! The egg thats included in the set hatches after 1 to 3 days. Anybody interested in owning one?
The Dyson hoovers have gotten really small - saw the commercials for these and thought "I want one." I do a lot of hoovering and a smaller Dyson would have been nice as the big one is getting annoying now. The commercials show some chap holding the Dyson in his hand like this photo - but the one on display does not have a motor in it.
I looked on the floor where there was a working one and despite being smaller than the standard Dyson, it was just as heavy!
Lately, there have been many washing machines being produced that are western style with the drum spinning on the horizontal axis - door on the side of the machine...
...But traditionally have mainly been like the three on the left of the photo with the drum spinning on the vertical axis. The western style ones make more sense for machines that also dry the clothes too as garnments can tumble around.
Example of a Hitachi fridge.
The fridges these days come with features such as instant freezing - you can stick a hot dish in the freezer compartment and it will instantly freeze it for you. Not sure how "instant" it is though.
Speaking of fridge - how about the one below? I think shes comes with the fridge.
Picking up some drinks. Love Milo - drunk it a lot as a kid when visiting Malaysia.
Frankfurter galore.
Here is a tip to get cheap food in Japan. Find out what time your local supermarket closes and go 20 mins before closing time. You will see stickers like these stuck onto mainly fressh food stuff that need to be sold on that day.
These ones are 20% off but some are discounted for more and if you wait for longer then sometimes they discount the food even more - but you risk not being able to get it because there are others lurking around waiting to nab the best deals.
In the UK and US we had huge trolleys to push around groceries. While you can find large trolleys at places like Costco, most supermarkets will have mini trolleys to push around the narrow lanes.
In order to gain the trust in consumers, many food stuffs like vegetables have photos of the farmer (with family in some cases) next to the produce.
Yukijirushi is a dairy brand in Japan. Many years ago, they got into a bit of bother with a few of their tanks containing rotten milk or something that they sold to consumers. As you can imagine, this hit their business really hard. In an attempt to clean up their image, they launched a brand called MegMilk which had a young cool image and tasted rather nice. While it did have the Yukijirushi logo printed in a small corner, many people didn't know it was made by Yukijirushi.
Ham galore. Back in London, they sold packs which had something like 30 slices at Sainsburys and Tescos for a couple of pounds. The best they can manage here is a pack of about 15 slices for twice the price.
Our shopping for the evening.
While some places bag everything for you, most just place the groceries back in the baskets and one moves over to the packing tables where one can find rubber bands, string, tape and cloth to pack up.
Time to dash this lot into the fridge.
Our loot for the evening cost 5,385 yen. Still do the bulk of our shopping at Costco though.
Fridge need tidying ^^; This fridge has hinges on either side which means you can open it from both sides.
Mum back in the UK wipes everything that she bought but we've just been sticking stuff straight into the fridge. Does your household wipe stuff before it gets refrigerated?
Its not usually this messy ^^;
After dindins its time for some Mango pudding.
