Why did I go again? (1) My companion wanted to go. (2) I wanted her to go. (3) I didn't get to take any cosplay photo the previous day.
We arrived around 12:30. 1 hour made a difference. Although there seemed to be fewer people, it was still very crowded. I took her to the
Kaiyodo booth to buy the
Vignette Chan figurines, but the line up was so long, we couldn't see the end. So we looked around at other stuff first. She was interested in some of the
game booths and stayed to watch promo videos. I didn't want to watch but was stuck with her. (Better not get separated or it was impossible to find each other again.) At the end, she got the figurines after lining up for about 10 minutes only. Much better than I did.
Then we proceeded to the doujin area. No more FMA today. Sob sob sob... My companion's a One Piece fan and she bought a doujinshi. There were so many, it took her a while to decide which one to buy. (Aaargh I should have bought some FMA ones yesterday...)
Then... trouble came. I said I want to take
cosplay photos, hinting that we should go. She immediately spotted 3 FMA cosplayers near by and pushed me to take their photos! But, But! (1) Those people were clearly
busy shopping for doujinshi. (2) When there's a designated cosplay area, it's
rude to shoot photos elsewhere. (3) I didn't want to repeat yesterday's "
media pass" incident. So I refused, and at least told her (1) and (2). Perhaps I should have told her about (3), but I didn't think she can understand my personal experience.
She kept pressing on and on. Saying I should do it. Not a suggestion, but an order. Sorry, no written word can describe the situation, but she's been talking to me in a tone of voice like I'm
inferior. The lack of sleep had a hand too and I was
grumpy. Finally, the stress that had been building up for the past 6 days
erupted. Why do you act like a Japanese travel expert while you actually don't know as much as you advertise? You're too chicken to speak to the cab driver. You're an expert but you only "explore" things on eye-level. You make everything sound like it's for my own good, but it's actually for yours. Most of all, you speak to me in a totally different tone of voice when you need me. Otherwise, I'm just a waste of your time.No, no. I didn't say it out loud. But it was very tough to hold back. I simply
shut up. It was a bit late. Around 3, maybe 4? We went by the cosplay area without taking any photos. And then we went to
Nakano. All this time I didn't speak a word. The atmosphere was tense. We didn't start speaking to each other until
Mandarake. She needed my help to find some books. To be exact, she needed me to talk to the staff. Sigh... yeah, I was still mad at her. But I think she knew I was upset. So that was that.
Apparently she's been to the Nakano Broadway before. But "couldn't find the
otaku shops". Hmm... really...? The whole 2nd and 3rd floor are otaku shops. (That's what I meant by "exploring at eye-level".)
We spent too much time in Mandarake and were only able to look at the 3rd floor. We agreed to come back on another day.
On our way out, we had
takoyaki for dinner. My
exhaustion robbed whatever remaining brain I had, and I just couldn't calculate the price. (Not to mention the lost of
math ability from the
near-fatal accident 11 years ago.) I thought she knows about my difficulties. But she would still make
insensitive comments that makes me feel very, very bad.
Limited edition Pocky cake! Shaped like Pocky, with chocolate icing on the outside and dried fruit inside. It tastes nothing like Pocky but still pretty good. (Oops sorry, that's not my review, but someone else's. I do have a thing about Pocky, though.)
The brush is wafer and the tooth paste is chocolate sauce. Hahaha! What a way to clean your teeth!
The sake keg was broken open and everybody had sake. We were tired from the previous day so we didn't get up until almost noon and missed the party. Oh well. There were still some food left and that was our lunch.
An interesting service from glasses stores. There are self-serve glasses cleaning stations in front of a lot of stores. This one was inside the Sunshine City building.
Last time when we were at the Sunshine City building, we made sure it would be opened on the 1st. As many stores didn't, that was where we went. Department store were selling Fukubukuro, a "lucky bag" containing mystery items, but guaranteed to worth much more than the price tag. Personally, I think it's just a gimmick to get rid of unsold merchandise.
Personally, I'm not a BL fan. But it's the touristy thing to do. So I wouldn't mind visiting the stores. However! Mandarake was closed! Aaaaargh! Oh well, we went to K-books. Since I missed my chance to buy any FMA doujinshi at Comic Market, I wanted to buy one here. But, but!! All the books were bagged! Some of them displayed a photocopy of one page on the back, but that wasn't enough to accurately represent the book. It's like, you have to judge the book by it's cover, and it's difficult. I... couldn't decide. And then suddenly, I saw a book by one of my new friends at the FAM party! Hmm... doesn't seem like BL, but it wasn't cheap either, at almost 1000 yen. ($10.) I hesitated, hesitated, and hesitated. And then times up. We gotta move on. So I ended up buying nothing. Sob sob sob...
My companion bought a Hello Kitty Fukubukuro at Sanrio House. With the other toys she bought at Toysr'us, she ended up buying a doujin suit case too. We both had a pretty satisfying shopping day.
A huge keg of sake had been sitting at the hotel's lobby for a few days. It's for a new year ceremony. Apparently the keg would be broken and everybody drink the sake.
We went to Kichijoji again on the 31st. I took my companion to the awesome shoe store my Japanese friend introduced me to 2 years ago, where I bought a pair of black leather high-heel which has since been my favorite. My companion bought 2 pairs this time. Oh~ I wanted to buy at least a pair too! But I wasn't done with toys yet. Those shoes were so good, you'll buy it once you try it on. Expensive, though. But it's worth the money.
Then we revisited Kichijoji Loft for the Re-ment event. It was still going on. My companion bought some more. There were other interesting stuff, like the towel cakes. And the tarako suite.
It was Akihabara afterwards. The Radio Hall was a must-go. Too bad Kaiyodo was closed already. We bought a bunch of toys at Volks's 7th floor, mainly rental lockers. And I got the last MedicomToy Ed at their 4th floor show room. It was 10% off, but I later found out that was still quite a bit more expensive than Yodobashi Camera. (The cheapest is Amazon Japan. 9,999 yen. Everywhere is over 11,000) Then, a ground floor store that was filled with rental lockers. And Kotobukiya. Plenty of opened loose candy toys although slightly more expensive. I don't mind, when I don't want to buy a whole set.
Anyway, we got back at the hotel after dinner. The plan was to go to Asakusa to experience the local new year's eve atmosphere.
MC