Tokyo, Days 2 & 3

Good morning! I’m wearing my hotel robe, eating cold dipping noodles from 7/11 and drinking canned Boss coffee. Quickly learning the ways of the Tokyo tourist.

We spent all day yesterday walking around Shibuya. It’s quite hot and humid so we mostly hopped between department stores. When I travel, I tend to find myself more excited by the differences in everyday things than any particular tourist sights. I seek out the junk food, the cleaning products, small trinkets and printed ads. And Japan has a lot to give there.

So far I’ve acquired a cool clear umbrella, a bunch of funny cards and various gacha toys.

My best find is this gacha toy that’s an anthropomorphized gacha machine.

Side note – the eink.cam autofocus works surprisingly well for these close up shots, but because there’s no viewfinder the framing can be a bit awkward. I’m still commited to the idea of no viewfinder though! The simplicity and surprise of the current setup are too nice to give up.

We got tired of walking in the late afternoon and looked for a cafe where we can stop to recharge. The closest one was themed after the Sanrio character Pompompurin.

I don’t think I’m the target demographic for this, but the themed chairs were really cute! I ordered this iced mocha with a little guy inside:

Chia said this was Pompompurin’s best friend, a hamster named Muffin. He was made of white chocolate and promptly consumed.

The cafe was on the second floor and we had a clear view of the real dogs in the shiba inu cafe on the other side of the street.

Today we’re going to Akihabara to look for vintage electronics and niche anime goods. I want a new film camera but don’t find anything too interesting.

All the stores have these intense fluorescent lights that make my photos look super white. I’ve found that the reduced palette of eink.cam seems to amplify light and dark environments, making even mundane lighting situations appear somewhat dramatic.