The night before I made the trek back to Nagoya and now early today I'm hopping on a train and heading back to Tokyo. About a 2 hour trip or so. My cousin again tells me to meet them in Harajuku around noonish. Harajuku is a pretty big shopping district in Tokyo so I was excited to see what it was all about.
I arrive about 11 or so and start walking around checking the place out. Pretty cool although I didn't see a whole lot of stores except for a gigantic GAP. I found an alley and it looked like a long street of shops but more along the lines of mom and pop shops. So I took a walk around and it wasn't long before I was bombarded with Africans telling me to come into their stores and try on the clothes in their store. 1. I don't trust black guys in foreign countries and 2. Kevin said stay away from all the Africans in Japan as most are crooks or hustlers. So I kindly decline all 7000 of their invitations. No negro I do not want to try on your FUBU jeans.
I make my way all the way down the alleyway into one of the main streets and have a look. Ahh, here we go. All the shopping is here apparently with huge department stores and even some familiar brands sprinkled about. I call my cousin to see where their at, their gonna be a little late. Like 3 hours late. I'm on my own for awhile. I decided to tackle some lunch before I explore. I had many conversations with myself today as I was solo for most of it. And this was the first.
Brain - dude, your in Japan and your gonna eat mcdonalds?
Gene - i heard they have a few different things like a teriyaki burger and stuff
Brain - dont do it.. look ramen right across the way
Gene - come onnn....
Brain - dont do ittt
I had no idea what to order so I pointed to something that I thought might have been something different. It wasn't. Well technically it was. I ended up ordering a quarter pounder but the one in Japan has lettuce in tomato in it. What did it taste like? It tasted like a quarter pounder with lettuce and tomato in it. I wrap up lunch and walk back towards the main street through 50 more africans. I get to the main street and hang a right. I walk for a second and then..
Brain - dooooode, the new cowboys stadium is in Japan?
Gene - .... holy crap
Brain - its huuuuggeee, who plays here?
Gene - dude... thats a freakin forever 21....
Brain - daaaaaaaaaaaaaamn
I continue past the monstrosity and come to some department store. Looks pretty poppin so I walk inside to check it out. Hey not too shabby. Japan department stores are a little different. There is only like 4-8 stores per floor but there are like 8-12 floors. So you just keep taking escalators up and down. I explore a little bit and I hear something...
Gene - is that...?
Brain - is what? what are you talking about?
Gene - shush, listen...
Brain - ok I'm leaving, your crazy
I make my way to the sound I'm hearing. I speed up as a I get closer to the sound. I need to be sure. Is it? I round the corner and I run into a teen girl accesorry shop or something. "...she wears high heels I wear sneakers shes cheer captain and IMM on the bleachers.. " YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS. I was right. Taylor Swift in Japan! I hang out jamming to the song as 15 year olds shop for eye make up and the like.
I end up at some store called "Moussy Extreme." They only sell girls clothes and their stuff is pretty cool. I'm looking at some stuff and I can feel the employees eyes on me. And the eyes can speak. They are saying "does this retarded foreigner know he is shopping for girls clothing?" This happened quite often on my trip actually. I stress out once again on how to obtain the correct size on something. After a little bit I was like forget it and I just left.
Around 3 oclock rolls around and its time to meet my cousin up. I tell her to meet me in front of the gigantic space ship Forever 21. I get there first and I'm chillin on the rail and I see this dude walk by. I mean you always hear that Japanese fashion was a little bit ahead of the curve but this?? Let me paint a picture for you. For those of you who know my uncle picture him with some long hair and a busted tan. Long hair dont care. If you don't know him then think of an older man.. say 58 years old. Short. Like 5'1 or something. Ok so this dude is walking by me. Lets start at the top. He is wearing a red plaid buttton up shirt. Looks a little feminine but no big deal. You go to the next article and he has a pink cloth belt on. What was the belt actually on though? It was on a pair of denim SHORT SHORTS. Like mid thigh length. But I guess that wasn't AS bad since he was wearing PANTIE HOSE all the way up. To top it off. PINK CROCS for his shoes. And it didnt even match his belt. Oh and he had a back pack on too. I couldn't not stare. Was so stunned I couldn't even get to my camera in time before he disappeared into the horizon never to be seen again.
Gene - That was the shit
Brain - That was beyond the shit
Gene/Brain - Worrdd...
I finally meet up with dear cousin and we walk around the city some. Her hubby also had a cousin that llived there so he was showing us around. My cousin had a hair appointment so we take her to that and the boys go off on their own after dropping them off. We shop around some but we really we go food hunting. The first thing we tried was this thing called "takoyaki" which is like..octopus balls. I mean not like... octopus balls. Not like the testicles of an octopus but they made this like... ball of gooey goodness. Ok bad choice of words. IT WAS like this rice mixture and they stuck a piece of octopus in the middle. Anyways it was delicious. We wander some more and wander right into another restaurant. Gyoza this time which are Japanese dumplings. One of my favorite foods and it too was awesome. We finish that and head towards the hair salon. I was informed that Harajuku was known for their crepes. So I decided to give one a try. I went to look at their menu which is actually a case of all their crepes made out of wax so you can see what it looks like. Dude, the craziest crepes you have ever seen. I order the one with a cheesecake inside of it. A CHEESECAKE. INSIDE. MY CREPE. It was pretty good too. We finish that and we are pretty stuffed. My cousin gets done with her hair cut and meets us up. Ready for dinner guys?!..... Uh... its getting late. I'm gonna catch a train back to Nagoya guys. Say my goodbyes and I'm off.
I get to the station and hop on a train. Little did I know there were 3 different lines. Theres the Nozomi which is the fastest one and least amount of stops. But my rail pass doesnt allow me to get on that train. Theres the Hikari line which only has a few stops so it takes about 2 hours to get back to Nagoya. And theres the Kodama line, which I got on, and it stops at every single stop on the way to Nagoya. Took me a little over 3 hours to get back. That sucked. Effing Kodama line I swear...
Get back pretty tired called it a night and went to sleep.
p.s. i found dr pepper in tokyo. i think the japanese version only has 20 of the 23 flavors that we have. curious.
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