A Week in Tokyo 42
Promise to write more photo articles once dannychoo.com is on Mirai Gaia which should happen just before the Tokyo Figure Show next month. In the meantime I'll make sure I at least do the A Week in Tokyo regularly or I'll loose track of my life - there is so much going on right now!
First up - driving past Aoki - a store that does recruit and business suits for men and women.
This page at Aoki has suits starting from 40,000 yen but I've seen them do much cheaper at 10,000 yen.
Fortunately I've been in jobs that don't involve me wearing suits - suits+Summer heat is a killer.
These folks are picking up the recyclable paper and cardboard. Rainy season is over and the hot Summer season begins. Gorgeous blue skies with moist sweltering heat.
Do like the new transformers movie designs but also like the old retro ones. I remember having this Soundwave back when I was a wee lad - but that one didn't play music like this one does via an SD card.
This Soundwave is heavily discounted from 10,000 yen to 3,000 yen at HobbyLink Japan. The Frenzy and Rumble headphones cost 3,800 yen also from HobbyLink Japan.
Cant relax to work with a dusty table so spend some time each morning dusting and polishing the tables.
Daughters play on the window sill while waiting for me to finish.
The new MacBook Pro has crashed a few times and am wondering if my Leopard image configs are funky. Since my PowerBook G4 back in 2005, I've been using the same image with my personal settings and wot not. Each time I get a new Mac I just clone the disk.
I'll probably wait until Snow Leopard to do a clean install. Not looking forward to the fun and games rebuilding my dev environment though.
Wonder how many more daughters I'll adopt this year ^^;
Getting a food ticket for some lunch. If you stick money in and nothing happens no matter what button you press, its probably because you didn't select whether you are going to eat in or take away. Or because you didn't put any money in ^^;
Today is Nagasaki Chanpon. Its ramen with bacon, bean sprouts and veggies in soup.
Dinner. Discovered a new Italian place called Popola Mama nearby.
Was a nice discovery and we'll go back often.
Wifeys dish.
My dish.
Folks who cant read Japanese can just point at the food in the window. If they don't have anything in the window or pictures of the dishes then close your eyes and just point at anything on the menu - this is what a former college used to do when he first arrived in Japan ^^;
For folks who have visited Japan, have you any interesting stories when ordering food? I remember another college from the US who didn't challenge himself and was content eating MC Dees for 5 days. He couldn't be bothered with trying to communicate what he wanted to eat in other local places.
First time I've seen a hole in a hamburber slice - at Mos Burger. Mos Burger ad below with the cute Suzuki Ami.
Yum. If I eat fast food during the day, will always make sure to get a diet of veggies, fish and brown rice during the evening.
At our other "office" taking in the views of the city. I think Yokohama is somewhere over there.
Right in the middle are the skyscrapers from Shinjuku.
And you may just be able to make out Tokyo Tower in the middle of the pic far in the distance. Its really nice coming up here to take a break.
A new bikini bottom for my daughters from doll seamstrees Chun! This is Mirai-chans bikini bottom and if you haven't seen the illustration then you can do so on the mascot page.
Also in the photo is a Dollfie sized ice cream and glasses that Volks gave me - they cost 6,000 yen alone @.@
Very sweet doodle of Mirai-chan from Chun.
Korean food for lunch.
At Harajuku with Good Smile coordinating my first Tokyo Figure Show. Will announce nitty gritty details soon - it will be between the 4th and 9th of August in Harajuku.
Never usually in at Seven Eleven at this time of night (9pm) and the place was filled with people looking for their evening dindins.
And this is what I got - used to eat this combination a lot when I was at Microsoft and it brought back memories!
Soumen and Hiya-Yakko Tofu.
Waiting for our lunch to arrive. This restaurant has labels from sake and other wines on the wall.
Passing by the hair gel stuff at the Chemist. Used to use this stuff a lot when younger but cant be bothered these days. Do you spend a lot of time doing up your hair? One often see boys looking at their reflection on the trains spiking up their hair.
Do try to get as much fresh fish as possible into the diet. This is what we normally order. Can you name them all?
Pietro Zuco and wifey at the office.
Pietro is an incredible Unix guru and photographer. Wifey speaks native English, Spanish, Japanese and is a lawyer too! A formidable couple. They go home with Drossel as a prezzie.
Condensation has been getting in under the balcony so the builders are here for a while to fix the problem by adding ventilation grills to let the air circulate. Scaffolding all over the place.
Discovered a ramen place that done lovely gyoza (fried dumplings).
Han Cha-han (half fried rice) with ramen.
Friday evening - on the way to Lazona to watch Harry Potter.
A gorgeous evening drive.
The bicycle park in front of Lazona.
This is the first time that we really walked around Lazona and discovered a few things.
Love Cold Stone! Also love the Cold Stone girls singing - this one had a Cold Stone boy though.
First discovery - the food court at Lazona has a load of decent grub. No need to go up to the expensive restaurants on the 4th floor who take years to prep food. This evening I had some Thai food and folks who follow my Twitter would have seen me post this just before I ordered.
Decent grub from most of the food stalls from about 700 yen.
Yukata for wifey? Need one for daughters too.
A must have for Japanpophiles - "Train Bank" or "Densha Ginko." Its a piggy bank which lights up and plays a station jingle when you put in money - the Chuo line train in the video below.
Yours for 82USD from Japan Trend Shop.
Many folks in Japan carry around portable ashtrays. Have only seen them in Japan and wondering if they have these in your neck of the woods too.
Get on a train and you will always see folks playing/mailing/browsing on their keitai (mobile phone). These films are used to cover the screen so that other people cant see your screen - you can only see if looking directly at it. Great for folks who want to look at 2D health material on the way to work.
If somebodies keitai screen comes into my field of vision, I look at something else as reading other people mails or what have you is rude. But I had a few colleagues at Microsoft who said that they *always* read other peoples mails on the train ^^;
Some puchi Zak. 15 in a box for about 1,500 yen.
It does get rather hot over here and fans are traditionally carried around by many. I have one but think I need a lucky Star fan.
In the toy department at Bic Camera. Am wondering what this Kamen Rider Decade henshin belt would look like as an additional to the armor.
Transformers galore. They even have some Binaltech and Alternity series.
...looking for a brush for my daughters...
Kawasaki Lazona is a nice place to visit for shopping, food and general entertainment.
Picking up the tickets for Harry Potter. 420-ish guesses so far as to where we sat - the current giveaway over at figure.fm. You still got until Monday to answer.
We previously watched Transformers at the IMAX but it wasn't in 3D. Today was our first time watching 3D at the IMAX and was stunned by the experience - truly amazing stuff! Do get a chance to see it in 3D IMAX if possible. Would have loved to watch the whole film in 3D but they only showed about 15 mins or so.
Have loved all the Harry Potter movies but this one was a bit too dark and gloomy for my tastes. The girl getting possessed part was scary and would have given kids nightmares! Still a good film though.
Another thing we discovered - there are a load of drink vending machines on the same floor as the cinema - pick up stuff from there instead unless you like paying an arm and a leg for cinema drinks.
This photo taken from the vending machine deck.
G.I Joe - out on the 7th August. Certainly want to see this.
Spent much of the week working on Figure.fm improvements. Now you have comment counts and a new "popular" tab.
We also launched the Otacool co branded official site with Kotobukiya.
