Furu Anime Panikku

A secondary school friend of mine (we shall name him J) whom I’ve been keeping some contact with is currently in Japan together with 2 other friends, and I’m so envious of them. Now before anyone goes “But you went to Japan just 2 months ago”, the weather then was similar to Singapore. I didn’t get to enjoy the chilling cold and snow, nor did I go skiing. While those guys are currently in Tokyo and are going to have a ball of a time skiing when they go over to Hokkaido next week, I’m stuck in tropical Singapore with my assignments. I’m sure many of you know the feeling.

Since I can’t be in Japan now, I can only post pictures of Japan

I’ve been to Japan with one of the guys 2 years ago, but he probably doesn’t know much except for a tiny bit of Akihabara. Besides him, the other 2 are totally clueless regarding where to go since they didn’t do much planning, and it doesn’t help that they can’t speak a word of Japanese other than 「日本語が話せません」 and 「セックスが好きです」. The latter was something he asked me to translate for him. Weird, I know.

According to J, they’ve only been in Ikebukuro (Their lodging area) and Akihabara (Only Gamers and the Radio Tower) for the past 2 days. That’s really slow, since they only buy mainstream stuff. None of the otakus goods such as doujins. I wonder what they’ve bought so far, and how much.

The area they are staying at

J describes how he’s seeing explicit content almost everywhere. It’s an eye-opener for him, since it’s the first time he has entered a 7-11 amply stocked with magazines banned in Singapore. When it comes to the 18+ sections, J’s the only one who enters, so I’ve told him about the legendary Tenga. I wonder if he’ll grab one, since he was sounded rather enthusiastic. The other 2 don’t have the guts to even though they are of age. And to think you have 15 and 16 year-olds trying to sneak in. Oh, the irony!

Anyway, since they had only 1 more day before leaving urban Tokyo for snowy Hokkaido, I only suggested the core spots that they should head to, namely Nakano Broadway, and revisiting Akihabara to cover the rest of it.

Meiji Shrine

Besides the otaku spots, I also mentioned Meiji Shrine in Yoyogi Park, since he was determined to visit a shrine for the very first time of his life. I’m not too sure if he’ll be getting there without getting lost though, since he remembers Harajuku as Harujuka.

Well, at least he seems to be having fun complaining about the small servings served in Japan and enjoying the cold. As for me, the only thing I can enjoy here is the aircon’s minimum temperature of 18 degrees celsius, which is a far cry from the sub-zero temperatures in the Hokkaido >_>

Darn it, I’m longing to go back to Japan in winter.