Maybe I’m getting old all of a sudden, but Japan feels like the oddest place I’ve been. It’s so distinctly ultra-developed but nonwestern; it’s unlike anything I’ve seen before. Yeah, there’s Starbucks, McDonald’s, and all the other globalized shit here, too, but development doesn’t equal westernization, as it seems to most everywhere else I’ve been.
I pay for another night at the pod, more out of slightly hungover laziness than desire to spend another night in its womblike, plastic embrace. I was excited for Japan sword, Tokyo’s one-stop samurai sword shop. This was misplaced but not unfounded: I thought I’d be picking up a badass wall decoration for a pre-imposed maximum of $200, but instead I’m learning about works of art, some of which were forged in the 1200s and cost over 20 MILLION yen (>$150,000). Fun fact of stupid bureaucrats: machine-made samurai steel blades cannot be sold within Japan, as they’re considered weapons. However, hand-forged blades, which are actually harder and just as sharp, are considered works of art and a-OK. Definitely an expensive wall decoration to consider if I ever have large amounts to waste/”invest” in art.
Sony’s store, in the posh Ginza district, is more an advertisement to live a Sony life than an actual retail establishment. Forget about price and a bevy of incompatible formats...
Akihabara, aka “Electric Town,” is special in geekdom: it’s the neighborhood to get the latest electronics in a country renown for its gadgets. It’s by no means a bargain, but it is interesting to see. Big, bulky cell phones have a variety of cool features like screens that flip every which way, fingerprint readers, legit MP3 players, and other things it’ll probably take a year to get in the U.S. And lots of anime, even a coffee shop called Cos Cha with waitresses dressed like characters and tiny desks as seats, like in an old-school or cartoon classroom.
Akihabara’s so cool that I get to sumo right too late: people walking out from the last match as I went to buy a ticket in. no matter: I’ll try again to see the big diapers tomorrow.
Shibuya’s basically an area of town that’s a big mall. I’m not sure there’s anything besides shops, restaurants, bars, and arcodes there. I try all but the bars, with a strange sell-all called Tokyu Hands, tasty sashimi (=raw fish; I think it’s different from sushi in that sushi has rice or whatever attached to it), and a few shooting videogames in the smoky, multi-story, anime-infested zoos that are Japanese arcades.
I know it’s about time to take a break from my break by how engrossed I am with the imported books at Tower Records. I will always love traveling intensely, but it isn’t always balanced or easy.