Tokyo Day 6: Snowy indoors day at the Loft

Today we had totally unexpected weather, it was snowing. It started as very heavy rain then it turned into chunky fakes of snow. I had kinda figured today would be an indoor activity day because there was rain in the forecast so I had already planned to go to Takashimaya, but that wasn't going to be an all day affair. SO, on my list for today aside from Takashimaya were Loft in Shibuya, and Yuzawaya in Shinjuku (in the Takashimaya building). Both truly amazing experiences.



I took the train into Shibuya around 2pm and got a little lost finding Loft because it's kinda tucked into a back street and it was hard holding the map in my freezing hand while the other held a shaky umbrella. When I final found it I was so relived to go into a warm dry place.



The ground floor at Loft is beyond amazing, it's like a stationery store on steroids. Every kinda notebook, calendar, diary, moleskein, washi tape, pens, stickers, you name it they had it in bucket fulls in every color of the rainbow. My mind almost exploded with sensory overload, everything was so kawaii, and useful to boot!




I absolutely loved these little boxes of alphabet stamps, but as mush as I loved the little wooden box ones, the fonts were nicer in the cardboard box set. There were so many stamps of every variety. Then there's the washi tape which has become my favorite I like that it can act as a little splash of fun on practically anything.



On the other floors they have housewares, party goods and such, much like Tokyu Hands but not as overpriced, and cooler. I loved their extensive collection of mugs, and of course I finally got to see some engrish at work, here are these to lovelies.



"flattely will get you know where"

In the kitchen section, there's a couple of aisles dedicated to just making lunch. The Japanese don't be live in a boring lunch so they have a million things to spruce up their daily lunches. Like these cute onigiri boxes. Then there's the food punch cut-outs, which you can cut little faces out of nori or other thin flat food to dress up your lunch. They have toothpicks of all sorts, with little animals, or country flags. Tiny bottles to add condiments to your lunch. It's a fun lunch in Japan!





In the bedding area, you can find a large stuffed creature to keep you warm on those lonely nights, like these sheep. All the adult sleeping animals are mega large, to accommodate a snuggle.




I was so sad when I saw the prices of these prints because Marini and Monteany are my favorite Japanese children's book illustrators and I would have loved to come home with one.



Japan has some of the prettiest umbrellas I've ever seen, this more stuff at the Loft.



Next stop dinner at Takashimaya restaurant park! I went looking for sushi, but they have everything, Tonkatsu places, crepes, thai food, whatever you like. I had the Nigiri set which came with a miso soup, a gelatinous tofu glue bowl, I ate some of it, didn't taste bad but the textured freaked me out, it was too mucous-y for me. The sushi was okay but I've had better, and I tried the eel since it was on my plate, I can still say I don't like it.





Next stop was an amazing surprise. I think I walked into heaven, at least crafters' heaven. Yuzawaya is located on the 11th floor of the Takashimaya building and, my oh my, I've never seen so much amazingness. It's a fabric, notions,crafting and art supply department store.






Since it's rainy and I know there will be more nights of staying home I figure I get some little craft projects to occupy my time , so I got these two cute felting projects at Yuzaway and some stationery supplies at Loft. I started the elephant, it's super time consuming.




On the way home I stopped in at the 7 Eleven and bought myself a beeru and a chocolate bar. I have to try these strawberry sandwiches that I keep seeing too, maybe tomorrow. I'm in for the night, with a movie, beeru, and felting mascot! Konbonwa!




Getting there:

Shibuya-Take the JR Yamanote Line, Tokyu Toyoko line, Keio Inokashira line, Tokyu Den-en-toshi line, Tokyo Metro Hanzomon Line, Tokyo metro Fukutoshine line, or the Metro Ginza Line to Shibuya. Exit the Hachiko Exit.

Loft-21-1 Udagawa-cho, Shibuya-KU (map below)


Shinjuku-Take the JR Yamanote,Chuo main, Chuo-Sobu, Shonan-Shinjuku or Saiko Lines. Or the Odakyu line, Keio Line and Keio New Line, Marunouchi Line, Toei Shinjuku or Toei Oedo lines. For Takashimaya, exit the New South Exit.

Takashimaya-n 5-24-2, Sendagaya, Shibuya-ku, Tokyo

Tokyo Day 5: We meet again Harajuku

I spent the whole day in Harajuku, which is completely exhausting on a Sunday because practically every young person in Tokyo is there to shop, to be seen, or just to watch. So it's the perfect place to just hang out and photograph people. My favorite part about Harajuku or more exact the kids the come to hang out in Harajuku, come dressed in outrageous costumes to hang out with their friends in a very touristy neighborhood (because of the shopping and the Meiji shrine), and they get pissed at people that try to take pictures of them.






I walked on Takeshita street in a sea of people, and I popped into the doggy clothing store, omg, they have the cutest things, I wish Francie liked wearing clothing. I also went into the Angels Nest harajuku, which is a store with just Super Dolfie dolls and all sorts of accessories, they were amazing but a little creepy because they are huge.



After a couple of hours of shooting and getting the evil eye from teenagers I was hungry so I went to Bio Ojiyan Cafe. The cafe is housed in the old Opatoca building which is really distinct in the middle of square box buildings. Opatoca was a sweet bakery chain. Bio Ojiyan's specialty is a type of Japanese Risotto made with what looks like barley, probably egg and dashi. These are just some guesses. There was also shredded scallion, sesame seeds, prociutto, some nori sheets, a tiny food colored frank carved into a flower, and a piece of sugary fried bread. I was stuffed and ready to move on.




I spent more time shooting people on Cat street then I headed into the new and temporary location of Kiddyland, a toy store that houses mostly character toys like Hello Kitty, Miffy,etc. It was probably worse than any other time I've been but Harajuku in general was insanely packed today.


After that insanity and buying a couple of Hello Kitty Rement boxes I parked myself on Cat Street for sunset light and shot some more film.








Time to go home to get ready for dinner with a new friend. I took some of the back streets to get to the train station to avoid the crowds and enjoy some of the tiny quieter blocks. But I had to eventually get back onto Omotesando-dori, and I went for a quick peek at Meiji Square where all the Lolita's and other kids hang out. It was pretty empty except for a group of gaijin lolitas and a crazy drunk with a sign that read "ask permission to take picture", regarding the girls and he would shove it in the face of anyone who dared to take a picture. I took several anyway, posed pictures are no fun. I got to my train station and as my train pulled out I saw a pigeon get trapped on the electric wires desperately trying to get out and as it released itself and flew away, a million lights and alarms went off in the station and the trains all came to an abrupt stop. Platform guards ran back and for on the platform freaking out not knowing what set the alarm off, I knew but I don't speak Japanese to tell them it was a poor bird stuck on wire.

Dinner. I met, Jennifer, a friend of a friend, for dinner at Iwao Izakaya,in Shibuya, it was totally decent and the staff was nice including Hawaiian guy named Robert who helped translating the menu for us. Getting in the restaurant was interesteing because the door was about 3.5-4 feet in height so you really had to bend to clear your head. We had a few beers, some tuna sashimi that was like butter, steamed thin slices of pork and a delicious Japanese fried rice with ginger, shiso, scallions, and ground chicken. It was really nice making a new friend in Tokyo and not having to sit alone for dinner, and Jennifer saved me because she was kind enough to bring me a hairdryer and frying pan!

Tokyo Day 4: Margo under the train

-A Walk in Yutenji and a sneak peek at Gakugeidaigaku.

Today I made my way from neighborhood into the two neighboring areas, Yutenji and Gakugeidaigaku, mostly Yutenji. It's a sweet neighborhood where people were really friendly, one woman made a huge effort to speak to me to find out why it was so interesting to me to photograph Yutenji. Luckily, I have a million apps on my phone to get me through a baby conversation. I was able to tell her "I'm an artist and I live in nakameguro for one month", not that smoothly though, nor with that much sentence structure. Yutenji has a two main shopping streets, one runs parallel to the train.





This is the street I found Margo, a tiny adorable restaurant, run by one woman. Again, I was lucky that her English was amazing and she was able to run the lunch set menu down to me. I settled on the pancakes, that came with two teeny-tiny saugages, a tomato quarter, a slice of daikon radish, three potato slices, a smear of what seemed to be mustard seeds in a vinegar, and a teeny carafe of syrup. The pancakes were just plain pancakes with a slab of butter, but the sausage and tomato were heavenly. The tomato might be the most delicious tomato I've ever had, it actually tasted like fruit which is what we have been told tomatoes are. The set came with english tea served in a beautiful glass cup with a stone bowl filled with finely ground brown sugar with a small wooden spoon to serve. The most amazing thing about Margo aside from the decor and food, is that the owner is the wait staff and cook all by herself, and she's lovely to boot.






I spent the rest of the afternoon in Yutenji just walking the streets and hanging out at busy spots like the train station getting shots of people. I sat in front of a supermarket for about half an hour, people kept looking at me funny, but I shot them anyway.





When I was done in Yutenji I meandered along the streets near the tracks so I wouldn't lose my way while I headed into Gakugeidaigaku (yes, it's a mouthful). I realized I must be in Gakugeidaigaku because I was nearing the next train station along the Tokyu Toyoko line. I stopped in this really cute store called modern pets has nothing to do with real pets, they basically remade Dream Pets which is are stuffed animals from the 60's, they also carry all sorts of Astroboy stuff. I picked up to tiny creatures super cute.






These two tinies came home with me, so kawaii!

I made an attempt to go to a gallery opening this eve but I was unsuccessful. After taking three different trains and getting on two wrong trains, and navigating some dark alleys the place was closed! The gallery is in Ryogoku(pronounced Yogoku) which where the Edo Museum is so I got to see the building it's pretty impressive looks like a giant spaceship. All that traveling took 2.5 hrs! I got back to my hood and went to a delicious izakaya, Kushiwakamaru, that basically makes yakitori of all sorts and serves mega size beers. I had a quart of beer, I kid you not. As an appetizer they brought out a bowl full of pureed daikon radish with teeny fish sprinkle on top, I tried it, it tasted as bad as it sounds. For dinner, I ordered entirely too much, because I was basing it on the size of yakitori we get in NYC, but it's all mega size at this place. I ordered two screws of beef with peppers, two chicken with scallion, one scallop with salsa, two asparagus with bacon. Let's just say, I would like to stick a finger down my throat because I ate so much. This place is super gaijin friendly the whole menu is translated into English and you will see plenty of gaijin faces. It's really busy and you have to put your name on a list because people come form all over to eat here, it's suppose to be the best yakitori place in town.









Getting there:
Margo Cafe in Yutenji- Take the Toyku Toyoko line to the Yutenji station.

When you get out of the station make a left at the KFC at the corner, walk down the Terra Shopping Center to the end right before you hit the train overpass. Margo is right across from the train overpass and it's the last little store at the end of the shopping strip. About a 5 mins walk from station.

Kushiwakamaru in Nakameguro- Take the Toyku Toyoko line or the Hibiya line to the Nakameguro station. As soon as you get out of the station cross to the opposite side of the street, make a left. Then make a right at the next corner, and one more left at the next corner. The building says YAKITORI in the front. Put your name down on the list and number in your party and take a seat.