So there was actually one thing that I missed from Sweden, and that thing was candy.
The Japanese had quite a lot of candy, it’s not really that. But almost all their candy tasted very unnatural, it was all chemical tastes and the chocolate wasn’t really to my taste either, and of course you can’t really find real liquorice (you can’t find that in most of the world).
But the one thing I missed the most about Swedish candy was this:
Buying candy by the weight is something I rarely see outside of Sweden, but I love this! You can choose to buy as many pieces as you want from as many different kinds as you want and you only pay for how much all of the candy weighs. This is something I’m having a hard time seeing Japan take on because of their “fear” of unpackaged things and need for sterile cleanliness. But it’s really awesome because you can customize what you buy and you don’t need to buy a whole lot of packages of different things.
I’ve always known about japanese figures and I’ve seen them a bunch of times. But most (read almost all) have some quite significant sexual tendencies, that is — they’re always half-naked.
The thing is that I’ve always thought people bought them for their half-nakedness and the sexual thing about them. But after reading a lot of Danny Choos’ blog about Japan and a bit of how figures play into the Otaku culture I’ve changed my mind.
So it kind of hit me and I’ve really come around to liking figures a lot — maybe not as much as Danny Choo or some other nerds around Akihabara, but I certainly am a nerd and as such it felt very wrong to go home without a proper figure in my bag!
So I went out today to find something cool and I think I hit the jackpot, cool and cheap!
50% off! Its a really good-sized high detail figure, so I’m really happy :)
Some images when it’s assembled:
And a final image with its proper base (which I think is supposed to look like snow or something) and the other clothes I got with it, plus the book and CD that I really haven’t checked what it is yet.
Today I found the worlds greatest T-shirt store in Harajuku. It’s called Beams and it’s beyond awesome. I didn’t take any pictures inside I’m afraid, but they had the coolest T-shirts I’ve ever seen and the prices were between 2800 and 5000 yen, which is awesomely good. You can barely find a mediocre T-shirt in Sweden for 5000 yen.
This is the bag I got from them, it’s extra big because I was carrying around another bag from UNI QLO and they were kind enough to give me this bigger one so I could put the UNI QLO bag inside it as well.
This is the t-shirt I bought.
Today I went on a bit of a shopping spree, so I came home with 6 t-shirts. (^_^)
Without any delay, here’s a collage of all the T-shirts I’ve bought so far. (The one in the upper right corner is Emmas, the other ones are mine)
They are all awesomely awesome and for a fraction of the price I would pay at home for this quality.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again — Japanese bookstores kick ass!
Here’s why:
There are tons of magazines and literature on every imaginable subject, you could literally walk into a Japanese bookstore and ask to become a master at ___ and the clerk will happily guide you to an entire shelf full of stuff on the subject of ___.
The image above for example are really thick magazines filled with every piece of information you could possibly want about pens, different kinds of pens, fountain pens. They have tests on different kinds of ink, which ink holds the best while moist and so forth. Information about new pens, about antique pens and their ink. It’s insane!
But that’s not it. I found this one magazine which just makes me want to be able to read Japanese that much more!
It’s a magazine about Mad-Science, this specific edition covered atomic, chemical and biological warfare. It shows detailed articles on crazy science and whack plans, it goes through potential biological weapons and weapons used in the past.
Click for larger versions.
As you can see, it covers stuff pretty well, down to chemical compounds and pretty advanced shit about how it affects the brainstem (I assume).
But wait, theres more!
Theres a shelf full of magazines containing every bit of information you could ever want on guns. One of which details everything about every gun ever used in a hollywood movie.
Here’s a shelf full of magazines about watches, everything from latest fashion to one full magazine all about Rolex watches and their every detail.
They even have Match Lectures in magainze format, including a CD with the spoken lectures so you can listen to the lectures and follow along in the magazine.
One thing I really love about Japanese books (not magazines this time) is that they’re really small. Most books you seem to buy in three parts, where the cost of all three books is about equal to the cost of one pocket-book in Sweden (even a little less usually).
They fit perfectly in the hand and don’t weigh anything! There’s no need to carry around the whole book, you don’t read a whole book that fast anyway. You only need one part at a time. Perfect.
As you can see, one can easily waste away quite a few hours in these stores, even if you can’t read Japanese. And if you can, you just want to read everything! I’m starting to understand the whole culture of standing in the store and reading. You couldn’t possibly afford to buy everything you want to read.
I’m quite pleased with the selection of alcoholic drinks in Japan, their beer is really good and they have everything you would have at home.
The kind of drinking I’m not satisfied with in Japan is the kind of “stopping at a vending machine to get a drink when your thirsty” or “getting some nice soda to go with your food” drinking.
Japan doesn’t have Sprite, at all, and Sprite is totally my favorite soda. They have Coke but they use some other kind of sweetener here so it tastes like crap to be honest. So during my visit here I’ve been hunting for a Sprite replacement, someone must have thought of the idea to bring Sprite to Japan.
The closest I’ve gotten so far is this:
It was sprite with some lemony (or something) twist, pretty OK, but quite hard to find.
The most disgusting thing I’ve come across, that basically just tasted like dishwashing liquid was this:
Japanese people have a strange sense of taste :P
What I find most disturbing is their various Jelly drinks, like these:
The first one – the energy drink equivalent to one riceball tastes just lemon, but had a very strange and not good aftertaste of.. well, rice!
The jelly fanta tasted very good, but it feels just like drinking old milk that is so old that it has started to form lumps in it.
What I do like about the japanese assortment of drinks is this:
They have a huge selection of vitamin water, vitamin drinks, protein water, mineral water and kinds of shizzle like that. It’s pretty awesome, especially when I have a cold like this.
Another quick food/drink related notes:
I didn’t know Coca Cola made bottled water, but apparently they do, and in a couple of other countries. I LOHAS is usually the cheapest water you can buy too! I suppose that’s another good think about the selection, water is always available, but sometimes you want something with taste.
And while I’m whining, this is something that really bothers me:
They individually wrap everything here, this is a single piece of gum from a well-packaged packet of gum. The cheese we buy, every single slice is individually wrapped with plastic. Japan seems very environmentally friendly and you see commercials everywhere with how “green” everything is and they sort all their garbage very carefully, to see that they waste so much packaging material is just weird.
