Oakley Frogskins

I hadn't been having much luck finding a vintage pair at the recycle shops, and Yahoo Auctions wasn't the best place to find them either.

Unlike in America where they have sold out, it's not too hard to pick up a limited edition re-issue of Oakley Frogskins.

I got a rootbeer/fire iridium one for 17,850 yen at the Oakley store in Harajuku.

A little bit pricey, but they were the best pair of glasses I used to have, and putting these on brought back some memories. They still have a few other ones to choose from.

Neon yellow anyone?

Buying from the official store I'm sure I didn't buy a fake. Unfortunately there wasn't much sun at all to really see how good they were. I'm really hoping these don't give me a headache like the other Oakleys I bought and subsequently took back.

At another store they had a pair with clear see-through frames and purple lenses.

They weren't as dark as the ones I bought, but there was something about them I liked.

I was close to buying them as well, but I'm just going to see how I go with the ones I have, and if I REALLY want to blow some more money I'll go back for them.

They were about 2000 yen cheaper too.

I just wish they hadn't released these as a limited edition. I might have been able to get these for much less.

The other blue (cheap) sunglasses I bought from Donki (that's Don Quijote) recently were ok, but I wasn't 100% satisfied with them. Light and wind were leaking in from underneath making them less than perfect.

I'm finding Yahoo Auctions a bit disappointing lately.

You can't snipe at the end of auctions like on eBay. If you do a late bid, it just adds more time for someone to bid it up even higher. Those Japanese are real sneaky with their bidding too.

Unless you have a premium account you can't bid over 5000 yen, so although there's a lot of stuff I'd like to buy, the prices get inflated far too quick.

We had a big day today.

From Omotosando and Harajuku, to Daikanyama and Roppongi. We settled on TGI Fridays and a "World's Greatest Burger" for dinner. A little expensive (1,780 yen), but these are big burgers with a side of fries as well.

We stopped briefly in Akasaka Mitsuke for some coffee before finally going home.

At last a day off I could do something other than stay home because of rain.

Jimmy In Kiddy Land

Today on my day off I went to Aki.., NO, not there, Harajuku!

It's been a while since the last time, and I had a few things to do. Checking out my trip on Google Earth, it actually looks closer than Akihabara so it should take less effort. Going there by myself means that I actually take notice where I am and get to know Tokyo better.

Harajuku was packed with people. I walked slowly through Takeshita St and made my way to Kiddyland.

I could spend all day there. I started at the top floor with the Gundams, and made my way down each floor (yes, Hello Kitty, Moomin, Ghibli, and Gachapin levels).

From there I walked to the nearby MoMA (Museum of Modern Art) Store. This is the gf's favourite shop. A lot of the items look like works of art.

There is a very nice watch by Issey Miyake which seems to be a Seiko brand. At 45,150 yen I think I'll give it a miss for now. I'm still very happy with my recently rejuvenated Swiss Military watch.

Next door to the MoMA shop there is a temporary art space with interesting photos blown up to canvas size. It often changes and today's theme was "water".

From there I wanted to go to the UT store.

This is a Uniqlo shop that sells predominantly T-shirts.

The gimmick here is that the shirts are in cylinders lining the walls. It definitely makes the product look classy. If only the prints on the shirts lived up to the promise.

There weren't any designs that caught my interest. They actually looked like the cheap K-mart brand back home. Pity.

For cool shirts I recommend Hen-T in Shibuya. I mentioned it in a previous post. The shirts are better quality and the prints are pretty funny.

Next I checked out the Audi Forum Building.

Interesting huh?

Definitely a good example of modern architecture here in Japan. I had a look in the Audi showroom.

There was a bright orange TT roadster and the R8 supercar. Both very nice. No, I didn't buy any of them. Not today.While I was there I took a photo from the 7th floor in the elevator. Here you can see Meiji Jingu, the skyscrapers of Shinjuku and a bit of Harajuku down below.

Shortly after I made my way back to Yotsuya. From the lift I could see the military tower of Yotsuya to make a bee-line home before dark.

Yoyogi Park and Shibuya

Nothing special planned for today, but we did a big trip around the Harajuku and Shibuya areas without using the trains. 

 As you might remember, Yoyogi Park is next to Harajuku. We saw the usual freaks hanging around the station there, including the "Bono" wannabe, "free hugs" people, and an old man dressed up strangely with a "second" head hat. 

 The things lonely people do to get some, or any kind of attention.

  Yoyogi Park always has a great atmosphere - A few DIY rocks bands busk on the footpath, and people having picnics. 

 The autumn leaves look quite good here too with the pretty colours. 

 One thing that really stood out in the park was watching the autumn leaves, in this video flying seemingly of their own accord. It looks like the hot air from the subway grill makes for a spectacular sight.

   

 From Yoyogi Park we went on our way to Shibuya stopping at Levain, the french bakery to get pumpkin bread and some yummy raisin scones that we ate there before moving on.

  We had a wander around Shibuya. For some reason we had a craving for Azuki icecream so we bought a Haagan Daaz Azuki Milk and Azuki Kinokuniya supermarket icecream. Strange, for a cold autumn day? maybe.. 

 Walking around we found a funny t-shirt place selling Red Bazooka shirts. Some really cool, strange ideas here. Gf liked the "Ping Pong dash" one. Basically it means ringing ("Pin Pon") a stranger's door bell, then running off. Ah, those crazy japanese huh? 

 Another strange thing we found in a store was a JR Yamanote and Chuo line clock and that - "JR East has begun selling a clock that plays those melodies you hear at various stations. Each station has its own melody which gets hammered into the subconscious of commuters." 

 If anyone's interested just what the train melodies on the Yamanote sound like click here. In particular find "Takadanobaba", the music will sound familiar. Apparently it is the home place of it's creator. Cool huh? 

 We made our way back to Yotsuya slowly but surely. I'm glad I wasn't by myself. Until I get some kind of GPS, my sense of direction isn't going to get any better around here.

Cheese Day

Today we went to Aoyama for Cheese Festa 2007 at Spiral. 

 We caught the train to Harajuku and walked from there, which wasn't very far away at all.

Along the way we walked past Kiddyland and got to see the amazing green dinosaur, Gachapin!

Apparently we weren't the only ones with the idea to go to a cheese sampling festival. The place was absolutely packed.

We were given four cheese coupons to try the cheeses for free but wine and other drinks had to be paid for. 

 

Any thoughts that Japanese people are polite and courteous was thrown out the window as many of them fought over getting their samples first like pigs at feeding time. 

  I like their slogan, "Have A Nice Day With Cheese'. 

 Even though we were given four cheese tickets each, we walked out and walked back in and picked up another four tickets. 

 If it's possible to overdose on cheese we did it. We sampled quite a few varieties from Spain, Netherlands, France, Italy and even Australia. 

 The one we liked best was the french Brie cheese. The worst was probably the Italian Gorgonzola, with a blue vein mouldy taste, it wasn't the best. 

 The most deserted sample table was the Japanese Camembert. Why would Japanese sample cheese they can get in their supermarket easily? 

 We caught the train from Harajuku to Shinjuku. The train was delayed for ages as there was some crazy person running along the tracks so they stopped all the Yamanote trains. 

 Gf bought a new saucepan at Tokyu Hands and I got a 105 yen pack of playing cards so I can learn magic tricks. A new teacher showed one of my students a trick which makes me want to do them. 

 It will probably end up in the same unused place as the yo-yo I got months ago. 

 We ate some spicy noodles, dumplings and rice for dinner in Shinjuku and decided to catch the train home instead of walking. We were both tired and it started raining. 

 A good, cheesy day.

UFO Catchers Are Go! (3 Times)

Gf insists that I say this. She gave me some delicious Sawoshika, an azuki cake. You can't really taste the azuki, but it was good.

Today we went to Harajuku and Shinjuku.

Gf said that last time we were there we only looked around the Meiji-jingu and Yoyogi Park area.

She wanted to show me the other side where there are a lot of trendy (and weird) shops, as well as the Ukiyo-e Ota Memorial Museum of Art.

As soon as we got out of the station we walked to the area where the japanese like to pose in their weird outfits.

There wasn't that many to look at this time either. There was a weird "performance artist" (I use that term VERY loosely), dancing strange and singing along with U2's "Vertigo", attracting the tourist's cameras.
We then made our way down Takeshita Street (yes, that name makes me giggle too). We got some free iced coffees from the Maccas you see on the left. The street was packed with people.

The museum, (700 yen, and not covered by the GRUTT pass) was small but pretty interesting. We looked at the works of Hokusai, Hiroshige, and Toyokuni Ⅲ. The most famous probably being the "36 views of Mt Fuji" by Hokusai.

After that we went to La Fée Délice, a french crêpe restaurant. I had vanilla and lemon, and gf had a chocolate and banana crêpe. Probably a little expensive (950 yen), but it kept us from being hungry for a while.

Walking back to the station I noticed at the KDDI Designing studio, signs saying "free internet" so we hopped online for a few minutes, surprised that I had access to my email. (The Sony Building internet access is restricted).

The gf was a bit annoyed that I wanted to go back up Takeshita-dori to look for a small umbrella and a t-shirt I saw.

We caught the next Yamanote line train to Shinjuku. We looked at a few clothing shops that made gf much happier. So much so, she was happy for me to go to the UFO catcher arcades. It's a good thing she did. This turned out to be my lucky night.


We saw a catcher with penguins. The gf handed me 500 yen pleading for me to win it for her. I actually thought I wouldn't be able to get it, but unbelieveably I got it first go (100 yen!).


We moved onto the next arcade and I saw a dog hovering over the shute so I asked gf if I should try for it. It was only 100 yen and she said yes, so yet again on my first try I got this as well!


At the NEXT arcade I finally found a Super Mario machine and had my mind set on a mushroom. There was another character there, so gf asked the staff if they put the mushroom in a better position. I won this first go too(200 yen). On the video my phone memory ran out, so unfortunately you can't see the toy drop but here's a pic to prove I got it (and the other toys).

One thing most people aren't aware of, is that if you ask the staff to move the toys, or put it in a better position they are happy to do it. They will even give you advice (in japanese though), how to best play to win it!

I was definitely on a roll. I almost wanted to keep going until I actually lost, but (wisely) I quit while I was ahead and walked home with a noticeable spring to my step.

On the way back I bought a small, black fold-up umbrella for 500 yen. For some reason he gave me a discount from 520 yen. Looks like my luck has yet to end.

Harajuku, Meiji-Jingu & Krispy Kreme, Shinjuku!

As usual we slept in till around midday, but I was happy to go around sightseeing. 

 First we caught the train to Harajuku. Unfortunately we didn't see the colourful, creatively dressed fashion victims I had seen in books. Instead there were many punk looking rejects and a guy in a dress. 

What a disappointment.

We went around the corner to the Meiji-Jingu Shrine which was cool. Here I am at the first Torii gate to the shrine. There were another two or three getting closer to it, but once you see one Torii gate you kind of seen them all. Well, it's the only picture I took, so this is it.

   

 We washed our hands and mouths before entering the shrine. Here I'm trying to get gf to tell me what this place is called. 

 

I'm trying my best "cool" pursed lips pose. This is from inside the shrine area. There were a LOT of tourists here. This is pretty much the first time I have seen more foreigners than japanese.  

 I'm trying to tell gf to say, "Hi, to the video" but she keeps on saying just "Hi". I think it's cute.

 

Next, we went to Yoyogi Park to chill and saw Rockabilly dancers, actual bands with mini amps and picnicers. This would be a nice place to bring my guitar and for us to have a picnic also. Gf and I looking over the fountains. 

 

From Yoyogi Park we walked towards Shibuya to her favourite french bakery that was about 10-15 minutes away and got some pasteries. I mentioned to gf that I saw a girl on a train with a Krispy Kreme donut box and she knew there was one in Shinjuku. 

 So.. Next stop Shinjuku! 

  This is a part of the lineup for the Krispy Kreme shop you can see on the left hand side of the photo. Along the right side of the bridge you see here is the line. The lineup continues along the front of the shop as well. This is a 2 hour line! We went later on, only waiting 30 minutes. They gave us a free donut in line. I bought a dozen donuts to which gf said "Really?!"

  Before we went home I wanted to take a picture of the lights of Shinjuku. Even after walking through the seedy streets of Kabukichō, I couldn't find the ideal place for the perfect photo, but this is an example.