Stuff I'm getting up to on my year abroad =]

Posts tagged ‘Harajuku’

A Bit of Fuji Q and Harajuku

One of the things I desperately wanted to do for my birthday in 2014 was go to an amazing theme park called Fuji Q. But of all the days that year… They closed the park on that one day! How mean eh?

We went a bit later anyway, and although it was far smaller a group than I planned, it was incredible. Bekah, Karen and I made our way to the park around 4.30am on May 14th (the journey was long and we didn’t want to miss a single ride). The best parts were the terrifying haunted house (they only chase you if you run…. We bloody ran), and the insane coaster called Eejanaika. I haven’t ever been so completely unsure if I’m upright or upside down! It is a must do for any thrill seekers. The best part, is that Mt. Fuji is right there; you are literally spinning upside down with a mountain about to fall on your head.

 

Obviously the next thing I did was karaoke with Marlene! And a few days later we went to Harajuku, bought some amazing wigs, and generally had an amazing time. I even tried beef tongue… so weir but tasty!

After such exciting days out, a good evening in with Michelle and pizza and FMA was well needed. We even took polaroids.

 

Shinjuku Park, Waffles, and Birthdays

I have always loved that Japan mixes old and new so much; with their super traditional shrines etc and then the most modern of mod cons. Shinjuku-Gyouen really demonstrates this. I guess it being a park in a big city it would naturally do so, but it makes for pretty pictures anyway! I went with a bunch of SOAS buddies on the 19th of April. Look how pretty it is!

After we’d had a nice long day hanging out in the park, I met a bunch of the TUFS lot and went for a good old Karaoke 😀

The next day I took a trip to Kichijouji with Sam and Michelle, to visit Michelle’s favourite waffle stand. They’re pretty awesome there; really tiny bar with tasty waffles and friendly owners. Link: https://tabelog.com/en/tokyo/A1320/A132001/13164007

So for my Japan year abroad birthday, what did I do? I spent time with some of the most wonderous humans in my life. I went with Sam and Marlene to Harajuku for a bit of shopping! I got some hugely thoughtful presents from my TUFS friends too. I felt very loved 🙂 And jacket potatoes for dinner!

That’s it for now; I’ll be back with zoo trips and karaoke soon 🙂

Touring Tokyo; The Mark and Rob Edition – Harajuku and the Penguin Bar

This was the last day of the whirlwind holiday Mark and Rob spent with me. Sad I know, but we did loads of funny things so all in all, a good conclusion to Touring Tokyo!

I wanted to take Mark and Rob around Harajuku for the crazyness, and to see the Meiji Shrine as it’s so big and pretty. So off we went, checked out the busy busy Takeshita street, munched some crepes, had a laugh in the condom shop and then headed to the shrine. Funny story of note; at the condom shop, I nearly bumped into someone coming out of the shop so I apologised and instead of just walking off, this incredibly smiley lady burst out laughing and said we should take a photo! I have no idea why, but it was a great moment in my life. Photo proof below 🙂

Next up was the Meiji Shrine; that giant one I went to with Mitch previously. It was just as pretty this time 🙂 We had a walk around, and had particular fun trying to get a good photo of us all sat on a bench using the self timer! Spoiler: None of them turned out properly!

After our naturey excursion, we headed to Asakusa quickly to get a fox mask for Rob’s nephew(?). It was pretty cool to see the crowded market at night, and no one tried to get us to buy shiny plastic coins for absurd amounts of money this time!

Next was Penguin Bar time! We met up with Bekah who also really wanted to come, and went to the Ikebukuro bar. Turns out that this place isn’t just a touristy thing, they actually serve quite high profile people who get private rooms and stuff. But they had us riff raff to deal with tonight! The whole experience was pretty awesome. You get your normal wet towel, but it’s penguin shaped!! So adorable. The food was yum too. But best of all, we got to feed the wee critters! I felt quite bad for them in their tiny tiny pen though. But I can’t really resist the pull of seeing cute animals up close >.<

Once we were finished at the Penguin Bar, we decided to try and find some fun nightlife to finish off with. I think we headed to Shinjuku, and just wandered around until we found somewhere to hang out. This ended up being a bar for a little while, where Rob had a beer the size of his head! Bekah had to head home after that, but Mark, Rob and I wondered around a bit more.

We almost ended up in a strip club, but decided against it at the last minute. The guy at the door had to check that it was ok to let me in (as I’m female), and asked me if I like boobs, seemingly as the entry criteria?! We ended up being taken to an almost empty club by a person who was advertising for his establishment, so we had a drink there for a moment or so. We moved on kinda quick and found another pretty empty club, but this one had a fuller dance floor. Rob had a lovely beer shower and made a random friend, while I danced (horribly badly; ugh I wish I didn’t try to move sometimes) with a very cool dude dressed in camo trousers. It was a good night and I got home after it was light!

And that was pretty much the conclusion of the holiday! Mark and Rob came in the evening to visit my campus the next day, about 6pm or so. It was dark so I couldn’t show them much but it was nice to have them over. I don’t think I could have entertained any earlier though; I was very tired from being out all night! A good way to finish off the week. And with their flight home imminent, this concludes the Touring Tokyo chronicles with Mark and Rob 🙂

Shopping and Birthdays

A trip to Harajuku always seems to turn up something fun, and this was no exception! Sam and I planned to do some shopping for the day after waking up niiiiiiice and late. Namely for a specific type of mechanical pencil, and my cousin’s birthday presents.

We had a great time; Harajuku is filled with people and odd little (and big) shops so there’s always something fun! We pretty much dived in and out of all the shops and we both got what we needed and a few extra treats 🙂 Sam even bought me a present, bless him ❤ Have some photos!

We really explored Harajuku that day, it was great to go to a lot of shops I hadn’t been in before! And meeting meerkats was just awesome.

Later that night my friend Marlene had a surprise birthday thing planned for her so that was the rest of the evening! I got a little confused with the plans though as it got rearranged so many times so I ended up at her room and got ‘invited’ to a cafe with her and Michael, but I managed to sneak down the stairs and join the surprise group while they took the lift so it all worked out in the end >.< Basically, her boyfriend had organised us all via a Facebook group to take her to the PC room, show her a video he’d made for her of loads of friends saying lovely things and then we went out to a cafe for dinner. It was great fun! I got to hang out with people I don’t usually even though I see them a lot so it was a great evening. Michael and I both ordered hot chocolates and after they finally came (for some reason she only made one thing at a time, and very slowly at that!) everyone at the table could smell the cheese she had put on my drink….. that was supposed to be cream! She was happy to fix it for us but that was a very funny and very odd moment! Crackers anyone??

The Mitch Chronicles Part 2 – The 20th to the 23rd

After a long night’s sleep, the next day started with lessons for me! I hadn’t finished term yet so I was up and out for two classes, but when I got back we decided that we’d go to Akihabara that night! We wanted to check out the cool Monster Hunter shop that I’d found before as Mitch is a huge fan; it took us a while but we eventually got there! We also got some mega cool art prints from a little shop we got pulled into by the sales people! They are those moving ones, but they change between 4 different seasons and have super zoomy-feeling effects so I was happy to buy them, mostly because they were above and beyond the simple ones I have seen before!

Anyway, we also went back into M’s tower; that super 7 storey sex shop; as I couldn’t let him miss out on such a treat 😉

So on the Saturday (21st) I had a football match which Bekah and Mitch came to watch; thanks for supporting me through my appalling bout of flapping about near the ball guys!! The evening was much better with a bit of KFC and a quick trip to Kichijouji to have a poke about. The day after was less exciting; I had to finish a presentation, but we did go out to Musashi-sakai and I found out it had a lot more to it than I first realised! It has all the family restaurants and a couple of good book and media shops that I never knew about. That’s one of the things Mitch is really good at; opening my eyes a bit!

However, The 23rd is the first properly exciting day that we had together in Japanland…. We went to Meiji Shrine in Harajuku!! Now for those that don’t know, this shrine is one of the most important in Japan; built for the Meiji Emperor (the one who got Japan into all this modern lark) in the early 1900s. It’s absolutely massive and has millions of visitor every year! I’ll quickly explain our day and then stick up a load of photos so you can just enjoy its beauty through photos instead of my rambling!

We got there with enough time to do the whole shrine and still have daylight for some later exploration which was ace. So we headed in and were immediately amazed! The scale of it was amazing and the last of the autumn colours were clinging on, making a few patches stand out in their beauty. We knew that the shrine itself was free so we also wanted to do the garden which was the enormous sum of 500 yen (about £3). It was worth every yenny! We love gardens so it was great to go. I should mention the place was practically empty; not only was it a Monday, but it was also not a season for pretty leaves or flowers and it was freezing so we were very pleased at not having to wade through any crowds! So here you are, have a bunch of photos 🙂

When we had wondered to our satisfaction, we came out and wanted to go around Harajuku for a bit so we went left out of the shrine and into new territory. It was a great adventure; there was a huge park! We had a poke around and found a bird sanctuary, a musician, some great graffiti and piles of leaves 😀 It seems that people like to practise stuff in parks in Japan; there were loads of people practising all sorts; music, plays, comedy and just playing games too.

After the park we went for a walk around the main shopping bit, we found some great cars, some silly shops and a few presents!

And after we got home we decided to do one of the cool, make-it-yourself sweet kits!! We made rainbow gummies 😀

Next comes Christmas!!

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