Japan Trip June 2009 - stuff i bought

I didn't buy that much cuz i dont have any money.

drew my friend Hiroko on a bag on the subway


I finally got my little billiken from Osaka!  he was actually invented by an american but become popular in Japan and now is popular again.



in all it says "The God of things as they ought to be"  I like that.  Its good luck if you rub his feet.


bought these for my roomate.  one is diet pills and the other is collagen something.  they cost a lot more in china and there are a lot of fakes


from the ghibli museum store.  awesome windup totoro



There was a stained glass window like this at the museum.  this has a little paper window in the back so light can shine through.  my favorite scene from the movie.


this is the ticket you get when you go in the museum.  it is 3 frames from one of the 3 exclusive short movies they show there.  the rotate the periods the show the movies.  the short i saw was brilliant and awesome.  i wish i could see the other 2!


film from "Spirited Away" my favorite Miyazaki movie.  i was lucky to get one of the scene where the dustballs are collecting their little start candies.


a Daruma doll.  the story is he came from india, probbably introducing buddhism to japan and meditated so long that his arms and legs fell off.  you buy these with blank eyes.  you fill in one eye and set your goal, and when you achieve your goal you fill in the other eye.  you're supposed to place him up high and only have one.


the running shoes i got.  thank god.  my knee joints would probably explode if i kept running in the bricks i have below.  $30 at a used clothes store.  look brand new though


fake chinese non running shoes are even worse than fake chinese running shoes.

---

Lauren found her dream laptop. Find the PC that's right for you.

Japan Trip June 2009 - Day 7 Yuri and Ayako's Bday

went to Yoyogi Koen.  I've been reading this guys blog and every weekend it looks like there is some kind of crazy party here.  Just my luck this day happend to be the Bangladesh festival.  it was super unpopular.  there was just this japanese guy singing punk songs karaoke style on stage.



the park is still cool though.  lots of weirdos doing weird stuff and people chillin.


people within the lines of the smoking area near the train station.


waiting for Uuchi to come get me i drank one of these.  good stuff


Ayako left, Yuri right.  Uuchi , yuri's new hubby back.  it was their birthday.  i met them at FIT maybe 6 years ago.


Sayaka from FIT was there too but she got cut out of the bottom pic oops.


Akane was the pres of the Japanese association at FIT before Vivi.  the guy Reona is also from FIT.  he was a fine arts major.  Now he has his own jewlery design business.  he makes pretty awesome acrylic and enamel painted silver stuff.  His fine art work is pretty awesome too. 

http://www.reona.org/
http://www.rue-studio.com/


Uuchi is a copywriter.  he says that he works until 12 midnight a lot of days and that its normal.  everyone that cries about working so much should just think about these poor guys that work 12 to 16 hrs a day and have to work on saturdays and sometimes sundays too.  Thats him in the grass in the Asahi Shinbun paper.



he has all the food from this photoshoot.






every prefecture in Japan has a little mascot.  this is the mascot for some prefecture next to Kanto, the prefecture that Tokyo, Yokohama, and Chiba are in.


rooftop of yuri and uuchi's place near Maedaimei


at sushi again at a rotating sushi bar. spent about $10


powdered green tea.  gotta get some of this.


model of the gundam i saw at odaiba.  i think this one costs $1,575.


they have a magazine dedicated to bit torrent.  crazy.  if you dont know bit torrent is this downloading network where you can get awesome stuff.


i think this is from galaxy express 999.  i like how her lashes are so long that they took the time to draw them poking out of her blonde hair.  There is also an interesting social/phsycological reason why anime characters look caucasian.


in Nakano there are lots of cosplay shops.  cosplay is where you dress up in costume like your fav anime character or a nurse or maid or other weirdness.  more interesting social things here.



Met Ben and Miku for falafel real quick across from Temple University.  Temple has a huge school in tokyo.


forgot where this is but they are fishing.  i didnt think it looks like very much fun fishing out of a big tank basically.


Went to yokohama again this time except it was raining when we got there so we just turned around and went back.


there is a CD of the short diddies that play at the stations on i forget what line that is a best seller in Japan recently. 


went to the pink cow for a drink.  this place was in Lost in Translation.


a bag of quality beers and some hopposhu.



the "Giga Meat" pizza from dominos goes great with a bag full of beer.

---

Insert movie times and more without leaving Hotmail®. See how.

Japan Trip June 2009 - Tokyo Day 6 Double Yuko

I met another one of Vivi's friends in shibuya for lunch, Yuko.  i think the crosswalks are interesting in shibuya.  all traffic stops in all directions so people can cross and criss cross and jitterbug and all that.


This is Yuko.  I met her in New York when she came to visit vivi when we all lived on 52nd street together.  she teaches ballet amongst other things.  she just came back from a 3 month stay in NYC


This is also Yuko.  but she went to FIT and is studying illustration and is a senior now.  mini statue of liberty at Odaiba.  we were looking for the giant gundam that was rumored to be around there.



Lolita style girl on the train.  there are complex and interesting physcological reasons behind this and other japanese fetish and sex culture stuff.


finally found it.  i think yuko said it was 18 meters but doesnt it look bigger than that?  Mobile Suit Gundam was a super duper popular anime about these robotic suits that had human piolots in them.  i was never into it though.  but its pretty cool to see this life sized one.  i think its in conjunction with the 2016 tokyo olympic bid.



some perspective


Yuko.  FIT illustration senior student.  she is from Yokohama, 40 min from tokyo.  This is her website http://yyuko5.carbonmade.com/

---

Bing™ brings you maps, menus, and reviews organized in one place. Try it now.

---

Bing™ brings you maps, menus, and reviews organized in one place. Try it now.