A map to Akihabara (Kilala.nl (Cailin Coilleach)) by Cailin Coilleach

What a great find! A few weeks ago a reader of Akihabara Channel made a map with the most notable stores and cafes of Akihabara. Not only is this map very useful, it also clearly illustrates the sheer winnitude of Akiba ^_^

Thanks to this map I've also learned that I stuck mostly to the souther end of Akiba when I was there. There's a whole part to the north that I skipped out on! I know where I'm going next time I'm there ;)

Posted in: akihabara , akihabara channel , map , shopping , tokyo

Ghibli Museum in Mitaka, Tokyo (Kilala.nl (Cailin Coilleach)) by Cailin Coilleach

Pics for day ten.

I've been a fan of Studio Ghibli's films for years now. I well and truly love their work, ranking them very highly among our expansive DVD collection. Yesterday I finally got the chance to visit my Mekka: the Ghibli Museum, in Mitaka ^_^

The level of detail that has gone into the museum is awesome. Everything from the doorknobs and small decorations in the woodwork, to the doors, stained glass and the ceiling fan have all been custom made. When you step into the museum, you really do step into a slightly different (if happier) world.

The museum was a bit smaller than I expected it to be. I'd originally expected to hang around there for over two hours, but actually I was already done in an hour. Of course, that's also because I forgot to go and watch the movie that they were showing ;_; Then again, I could have easily tacked on half an hour extra, because I just couldn't stop gawking at the Bouncing Totoro display in the animation room.

This room starts you off with the old fashioned animation tools: the wheel with pictures and slots, that needs to be turned to see the animation. Where things get cool is when the guys at the museum make a giant wheel, with chara models from their movies! By putting a strobe light above it, you'll get to see a bouncing Totoro, a girl riding a monocycle, a cat-bat flying and so on. It's too cute! <3

One of the higher floors is home to the giant Catbus, in its own playroom. Imagine a Catbus, about 1.5m high and 2m x 6m, with kids crawling all over it :) I love it! I want one at home! It's a couch + bed in one ^_^

I'm not quite sure why, but two of the rooms focussed on the Three bears fairytale, showing books, pictures and a lifesize replica of their house. And with a lifesize house of course, there's also lifesize bears! :D I just -had- to stick around for a few minutes, just to wait for a kid to get scared by the 2.5m high Papa Bear.

Anywho... I can't even recollect everything that I've seen, so I'll just stop talking :) I am -very- happy that I "wasted" a whole day, just for an hour at the Ghibli museum. Unfortunately photography is not allowed inside the museum, so the gallery page only has pics of the outside. Luckily the have a beautiful book on sale (at around 20 euros) that has bunches of pictures and stories about the museum :)

Posted in: ghibli , ghibli museum , japan , museo d'arte ghibli , tokyo

Comiket #73 and going back to Osaka (Kilala.nl (Cailin Coilleach)) by Cailin Coilleach

Pictures for day 5.

I got up around 08:30 and took care of the hotel's checkout. Luckily I could store my backpack behind the front desk, because there was no chance in hell that I'd drag that huge thing around the whole day. Speaking of the hotel: I took my breakfast there (as opposed to getting a pizza pan from 711 again) and I have to say that I really like the classical, Japanese breakfast.

My plan was to visit the Tokyo Big Sight, to attend day 2 of Comiket #73. This day revolves around manga drawn for the female audience, which are usually the stories I like a lot. There's something about the characters and stories that is more attractive to me.

Comiket, for those not in the know, stands for Comic Market. It's a huge convention, focused completely on amateur and semi-pro comics. Over the course of three days, about 35.000 groups of artists sell their manga to over 500.000 visitors. The event is spread across four square kilometers of convention space, bound together by a few kiloms extra of hallways.

I wanted to visit Comiket at least once, just to see what it's all about. I'd heard a lot about it and it really is quite an important event for otaku in Japan. Of course, it also featured prominently in one of my favourite anime, Lucky Star. So far I'd only seen dutch doujinshi and this's made me very curious about how things are done in Japan. I'll discuss that a little more in-depth in the next blog post.

In the meantime, let me say that the Japanese are the masters of crowd control! At no point in time were the crowds forced to a standstill, there was no shouting and shoving and there were no accidents. In general, everyone was disciplined and well behaved :) It's amazing to seen about 10.000 people, crammed into a square kilometer, without any crap breaking out.

A lot of Comiket's visitors come there with a plan. A few weeks before the event, their catalogue (about the size of a phonebook) is printed and people decided on which artists they really want to visit. This usually leads to big checklists, with exact "addresses" in the convention halls. It's all quite efficient :) Armed with checklists and shopping trolleys, these hardcore fans race across the festival, to ensure that they get everything they wanted.

I on the other hand went in there with only one plan: there is no plan :D

I'd decided for myself that I'd spend no more than Y10.000 (62 euros) and that I'd leave once I'd done so. Stats at the end of the Y10.000:
* I'd visited 1 row of clusters in 1 of the halls. This relates to about 1/12th of the whole con space.
* I'd spent about 3 hours circling that single row of clusters.
* 1 cluster consists of about 28 groups and one row of 15 clusters. This means I visited about 420 artists.
* I'd bought 23 doujinshi, ranging in price between Y100 (62 cents) and Y1200 (~7.5 euros).

Because my trip "home" was bound to be a long one, I'd decided to skip the rest of Comiket. I even skipped taking photos of all the cute/sexy/cool cosplayers.

Ah! A tip, if you're ever in Tokyo and have an hour or two of free time: ride the Yurikamome line back and forth, from Shimbashi station. This "train" (though it's more of a bus on a guided track) will take you past some awesome architecture, with the prettiest buildings in Tokyo. It'll also give you a great look at the Tokyo skyline, as seen from the bay.

Before heading to the Shinkansen, I'd lunch at Coco Ichibanya Curry, which is a chain of restaurants that I would heartily welcome in the NL. ^_^ Their curries are awesome, though I will never take anything about heat level 2. I think that my buddy Edmond (who usually puts tabasco on anything he eats) would stop around level 3. It's scary to think that things can go up to level 6. o_O;

The Shinkansen ride back to Shin-Osaka was comfortable, yet very busy. It was the day before New Year's and everyone was going back home for the holiday. Tokyo station was loaded with people and It was getting quite hard to move around. And yet again the Japanese shone in their displine! Travelers waiting for their trains were neatly lined up at the tracks and again there was no pushing or shoving. Very nice.

I got "home" around 20:30, had dinner (takeout udon noodles from 711) and had a chat with my roomies. Today (the 31st) I'll stick around Osaka and tonight I'll celebrate New Year's with some of them. Mostly, I'll be resting up a little bit :) the past five days have been very busy!

Posted in: comiket , comiket #73 , osaka , shinkansen , tokyo

Woot! (Wow, loot!) (Kilala.nl (Cailin Coilleach)) by Cailin Coilleach

As I mentioned earlier, I stopped by Trader2 this morning, in search of some specific items. One of the items on the list was a set of DVDs for Romeo X Juliet. By buying the original DVDs I can rationalize getting fansubbed versions of the series, just so I can understand the whole story. And as you can see from the picture, I've succeeded! :) I also managed to lay my hands on a semi-rare (yet uber-cheap) Cowboy Bebop DVD+book set.

Since Trader deals in secondhand goods, the prices of these DVDs were a lot better than their original price! Each DVD was knocked back from around Y6800 to about Y4000. That's less than the usual Trader discount, but that's probably because RxJ is a really new series. The Bebop DVD rang in at Y2400. In the end I was out about 76 euros for four DVDs. That's not bad, considering that none of this stuff will ever be available in the US or Europe.

I was astounded by the quality of the items, by the way. Japanese otaku really do keep their stuff in pristine condition! Two of the DVDs were still in their original celophane (inside the shop's wrapper), so someone'd been taking very good care of them :)

The item on the right, in the paper bag, is a gift I got for Marli-chan. I'm keeping this a bit of a surprise for her :p

I also got two of those phonebook sized manga, from Gamers. A little under 6 euros got me about 600 pages of reading pleasure! I really wish we could get manga this way in Europe! =_=; I'd love to take the books home with me, but I don't think I will, due to their weight. Then again, I may also just ship them home through the mail.

A bountiful day! ^_^

Posted in: akihabara , loot , shopping , tokyo , woot

Shopping in Tokyo (Kilala.nl (Cailin Coilleach)) by Cailin Coilleach

Pics for day 4

This morning I left for Akihabara around 08:30, ensuring that I got there before opening hours. That way I could take my time exploring the place, while not having to navigate the crowds of thousands. I'd a few shops in mind that I really wanted to visit, so I wanted to scope things out undisturbed :)

Akihabara has become quite legendary on teh Intarwebs, leading a lot of people to think that it's a huge place. While Akiba does indeed span about three dozen blocks, I really wouldn't call it huge. One can easily traverse most of its streets in under an hour. Only when you start shopping, do you spend a lot of time over there. And seriously: it's -very- easy to get carried away in Akiba ^_^

I spent about three hours, visiting the most obvious shops: Trader2, Gamers, Asobit Chara and Mediaworld Akiba. An easy listing of all these shops (and many more) can be found here, at Akiba Channel.

One thing that's definitely worth mentioning is Sega Gigo, one of the many arcades run by Sega. The lowest two floors have annoying (and -very- noisy Ufo Catcher machines, but the higher levels have some very cool stuff! 4F is home to ten Gundam P.O.D.s (clip on YouTube), which are Gundam simulators that you actually sit in. Nice ^_^

5F houses card based video games, of which I have no idea how they work :D One nice example is Gundam Card Builder, set in the Gundam 0083 universe (clip on YouTube). This website provides detailed explanation on how it works. Basically, it's a video game that you control using both a keyboard and trading cards (like Magic the Gathering). The cards represent characters and mecha, which you move across a flat surface. The way you move the cards determines the actions of the mecha in the game. Confusing, yet uber-cool. If I have some time (and money) left at the end of my trip, I may just go back to try my hand at the game a few times.

Once I'd spent enough (and couldn't walk anymore) I headed back to my hotel to rest a little. I'd already started on this blog post, when Safari crashed ;_;

EDIT: Damn! I just remembered that I forgot to buy a Comiket #73 catalogue. I wanted one as a souvenir ;_;

I left for Ikebukoro around 15:00, wanting to at least visit the observation deck at Sunshine City. However, I couldn't find the building, so I gave up around 17:30. How I managed to completely miss a forty storey building is beyond me =_=

Anywho: dinner at the Ikebukoro station was quite tasty! I worked up enough nerve to eat among the Japanese all by myself and hopped into one of those small ramen shops. The measly sum of Y340 (about two euros!) got me a big bowl of Udon noodles, with tempura kakiage. Oishi!

Posted in: akiba , akihabara , ikebukoro , shopping , tokyo

Going to Tokyo (Kilala.nl (Cailin Coilleach)) by Cailin Coilleach

Photos for day 3.

According to my planning, today would be my first day in Tokyo, starting off with a quick hunt for a watch made by Haruo Suekichi and finishing in Akihabara. I'd also meet up with Durf during the evening.

However, I decided to change all of my plans. I hitched a shinkansen ride to Tokyo at 11:20, arriving around noon. I hung around Tokyo's central station a little, to get my bearings, a Suica card and some more cash money. A leisurely metro ride to Yoyogi Uehara finally put me near the Yoyogi Tom's Studio store. "Near" being the proper word, since I managed to misread the map I had drawn myself. Joy! This led to me stomping around the wrong block of houses for about half an hour.

I stayed at the store for about an hour and then left for the hotel. I arrived around five and was welcomed by a rather charming young lady ^_^ The hotel room is not very big, but it's comfortable and comes with a nice bath. Not bad, for 7400 Yen per night! For my dutch friends: thats about 90 euros for -two- nights.

Since I'm rather tired and still feeling a bit ill, I've asked Durf to cancel our date. I hope I haven't caused him too much trouble. :/

Posted in: japan , shinkansen , tokyo , trip

Shopping for watches: Haruo Suekichi (Kilala.nl (Cailin Coilleach)) by Cailin Coilleach

Earlier this year I fell in love with the works of Haruo Suekichi, who makes some awesome watches. Back then I thought I'd have to travel to the northermost part of Honshu (Japan's main island), just to get a few of his watches. Luck would have it that this is not true and that his work can actually be bought in Tokyo!

After digging around a lot, using translation websites and with the awesome help of some of my friends, I've found the shop. My travel buddies are the best! :)

The shop is quite easily accessible, once you know where to find it :) If you look at the big picture, the shop's rather close to the Tokyo Big Sight (location of Comiket) and Akihabara. It's still about twenty to thirty kilometers, but hey :)

Posted in: haruo suekichi , shopping , steampunk , tokyo , watches