Tokyo: Part Four. Shinjuku and Ginza.

That picture above is of a random business in Ginza at night, which is an incredibly ritzy and upscale place. But we went there at night, and there was a whole day leading up to this, so I'm getting ahead of myself. First, we went to Shinjuku.... which incidentally, is also an incredibly ritzy and upscale place, but for teenagers and 20-somethings. We basically spent the entirety of our last full day in Tokyo cruising around places that we could never possibly afford to even eat something in. Then again, it's always interesting to see how the other side lives.

The main reason we went to Shinjuku was for the above store: Kiddy Land. It's a 7 story toy-store, and I wanted cute Japanese plush things something fierce. I was originally looking for a squished panda character called Tarepanda, but unfortunately for me he's 10 years old. Most Japanese in Shinjuku would sooner die than be seen with something that was out of fashion for 10 months, let alone 10 years. So, alas, Kiddyland had no Tarepanda merchandise whatsoever. However, it was still an amazing place, and I found other cute things to console me.

The above pictures are of a giant stuffed Yoshi that was about the size of a 3 year old child, and the 'Hello Kitty' section of the store. Keep in mind that is ONE section, of ONE floor of the store. All 6-7 stories of the store were packed full of cute things like this. It was amazing, and I bought lots of cute little Totoro things and a lego cockatiel, which is currently assembled in memory of my pet cockatiel Marley.




This was the best part of the whole freaking store. In the video above, one of the employees is demonstrating a toy car. On the wall. IT RUNS ON THE WALL!!!!! It's the car Spiderman would drive if he had one, and it makes me happy. I hope it makes you happy too, by proxy. :)




Kiddy Land actually doesn't fit in too well with the rest of Shinjuku. You might remember at the beginning of this post I mentioned that both Shinjuku and Ginza are areas for the financially well-endowed, except Shinjuku is more for 20-somethings. It's basically like the fashion district of New York. The Porshe-driven roads are lined with shops by Gucci, Louis Vitton, Versace, and other impossible to pronounce or spell designers. To illustrate this, the above movie is of a sculpture at the front of a random clothing store. You know you're in over your head financially when you see a modern-art whirlygig.




After puttering around Shinjuku for a while, looking at things we could never afford to buy and could never be fashion savvy enough to pull off wearing, we found somewhere to eat, and headed to Ginza. There was one big reason that we wanted to go to Ginza, and that was because the Sony Store is there. The video above is of the outside Christmas display they had, which was much prettier than the video would lead you to believe. The Sony Store is an eight story building, five of which are devoted solely to Sony products. The other three floors are random high-end shops that Sony graciously lets share space with them, and one of those stores sold foreign food. We walked out with Andes Mints, and were prodigiously happy. Yet that is only a small part of the experience; the main point of going to the Sony Store is to see the Sony things! Oh, and how many Sony things there were. There was one entire story devoted to nothing but TVs, one to video and photo cameras, one to the Playstation 3, one to home theater products, and another to random electronics like cell phones and music players. They had TVs that would turn themselves off when the built-in motion sensor saw no one was watching the TV, video cameras that would deliver a steady picture no matter how shaky your hands are, and photo cameras that professionals take on safari in Africa. The coolest thing about the Sony store is all the products are out and on display for your perusement and enjoyment. If you wanted to buy anything, they had sealed product hidden away that would magically appear as you presented your credit card. That $3,000 camera? Feel free to take pictures of your friends mouth as it hangs open in awe. That $12,000 TV? Feel free to go into a private room and watch a movie that thoroughly flexes it's HDness. The Playstation 3? Please, choose one of the many controllers and play what you wish. It was absolutely amazing, but very dangerous. Being able to play with the merchandise makes you realize how awesome the products are, and tempts you into buying one whether or not you can really afford it (or need it). Aaron almost walked out with the aforementioned $3,000 safari-worthy camera, credit card interest be damned. As for me, I almost took one of these home with me. It's a little mp3 robot that holds all your music, and rolls around on the floor and dances around in sync with whatever it's playing at the moment. I was honestly willing to part with a good $50-$100 for it. At $400, it stayed in the Sony store. Pity though, it really was quite cute.




And with that, we conclude our Tokyo trip. The last day was spent riding trains to get back home to Sannohe. It was an amazing trip, and we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. I can't wait to go back sometime, especially to see Akihabara, the game mecca. If you get the chance, do yourself a favor and visit the city sometime. Just make sure to bring money, and lots of it. You'll need it.