i am back home from japan, sadly... I got home a few days ago but i was very very tired, i am still tired but its slowly getting better... But enough of that!! i have a lot lot lot to write abt!! i will organize by day, we started in tokyo then went to kyoto and then ended in osaka! i am not writing abt eveyrthing, my mom wanted to do lots of sightseeing stuff and those days i kinda just spaced out those days bc it was boringgg no one wants to read abt that... Just what i liked the most!!
080126 harajuku
i loved harajuku!! so many cute stores!! i was a little scared bc ive seen lots of ppl online saying that its rlly touristy now but there were plenty of cute shops! i went to 2 sanrio stores, some other stores idk the names of and i got a few keychains and stickers, blah... i rlly liked there was this one mall that had like 6 floors worth of different designer's stuff, and rlly fashionable stuff too! a big variety of jfashion, like lolita stuff they had btssb and ap, thats all i rlly remember tho.. sadly all the stuff in the stores i browsed was too expensive for me but maybe therell be a next time i get to go again :p Also besides shopping, harajuku is great to see fashionistas! there were so many fashionable ppl i felt a bit out of place bc by the time i got there it was 4pm and my bangs were all gross and i was sweaty... i didnt like all the animal cafes in harajuku tho and stuff like the capybara cafe which isnt an animal thats rlly domesticated i dont think r just odd to me Esp considering japan's infamy for animal welfare. but other than that yes harajuku is fun!
080226 shibuya and akihabara
shibuya was also great for shopping! my first stop here was a kokeshi doll store with stuff crafted by all different artists. There was a lot of cool stuff but the trad japanese style and also all the reds dont rlly fit my style so i was very happy to look esp bc i couldnt go to the yokohama doll museum... T_T. in shibuya i got to go to my first mandarake and it was one of the best locations i got to go to! they had a HUGE aisle of retro shoujo manga!! And also... omg ok get ready. JUNE MAGAZINES. They had 6 in stock and i got 4! i rlly only wanna get the keiko takemiya covers and 1 wasnt with her art, the other one was like the only june cover by her i dont like lol. um i wasnt rlly in shibuya for very long tho so i dont have anything else to say
akihabara i was a bit disappointed in, i knew it was like for guys but it is just. Shite kinda. the same games take over the merch aisles in every store, the same prize figures for sale in every store blahblahblah... But the mandarake here had a rlly big doll selection and even if they price them kinda high i liked being able to look. And THEN the bookoff here had a patalliro dvd set. Omg?? but it was 12500 yen for 5 dvds so i passed bc thats a crazy price to pay for dvds in a language i dont even know... i had already brought june magazines that was enough bl history for da day.
080326 yayoi museum and ikebukuro
the day started off with the yayoi museum! it's a reall nice art museum decicated to mostly works from the 1900s and showcasing some classic japanese art. it's also attached to the takehisa yumeji museum, dedicated to a japanese poet/artist who was very influential to japanese art. i didn't really know what to expect when going in but i knew some of yasuko aoike's works had been shown there before. Since it half shares a name with the much more famous yayoi kusama museum finding info was a bit tough lol. unfortunately no pictures were allowed so i have nothing to show... But this is a spot i would definitely recommend, it's very peaceful and not at all tourist-y which i like bc i feel like places that r big with tourists r bound to be bad and too crazy and ultimately not worth it lol
when i went there was an exhibit for My Birthday magazines, which still exist! but were mostly popular in the 80s/90s and were abt astrology and horoscopes and stuff like that. i was excited bc they were displaying stuff from the 80s-2000s and the covers from this era were SUPER classic shoujo style! they also featured a magazine that you could flip thru and see the actual pages. in a glass case there were some more page spreads featured and goods that came with the magazines. i dont rlly remember what exactly... i only remember this cute little device that was made for girls to predict how their relationship would be with the boy they like would go that day. so cute! this exhibit took up the first and second floors of the museum and also had some limited-time merch available in the shop. the third floor had some rlly pretty stuff too but idk who the artist was for that :(
the stuff in the yumeji museum was gorg as well. there was stuff from as early as 1904! there were also 8 illustration books of yumeji's works to flip through, alongside plenty of other paintings and wall scrolls and other mediums of art to check out. i didnt know this was part of the museum as well and i was rlly glad bc i got to find a new artist to enjoy!
Then after the museum was ikebukuro!! first thing in ikebukuro i went to a vegan cafe called ain soph. they had rlly good pancakes and the ice cream was so good i wish i got more :p and the flan was ok. then after that was shopping on otome road!!
but tbh, maybe its changed but i feel like it didnt live up to the hype that ive seen it get from other ppl especially for bl goods. to understand first u must know there r like 6 kbooks on this street alone all dedicated to diff things. the most notable one in ikebukuro is the yaoi dungeon but it isnt even all yaoi despite the name its like half otome half bl. the floor above is all shounen (minus black butler) too which is so ew... And whoever invented character tax must feel so proud when they walk in here bc it was a regular occurence for popular otome lis to have badges at 5000 yen or MORE. Wtf. I was a little disappointed too bc i saw a tiktok abt this location a while ago and it showed soo much n+c merch but there were like maybe 3 columns of it when i went. altho its summer so everyones out maybe there was just low stock idk... i still got 2 badges tho, one of youji and one of naitou ^_^ across the street is a location for shoujo goods which even had rov or rgu?? Not a lot so i didnt get anything bc i didnt like what they had but still crazy... mainly cardcaptor sakura and sailor moon. The mandarake here also would be great if youre a big fan of bl doujins and they even had some goods but no june magazines, idk was it crazy for me to think the store with the biggest bl doujin collection in the world would have the og bl magazine too or... also a good retro shoujo collection but i walked out with nothing
080826 kyoto intl. manga museum
Despite the name the most exciting part of the museum isnt rlly that its a museum, instead more of a library!! they have TONS of old shoujos even in original prints! the museum itself is located in a building that was formerly an elementary school, they have some rooms abt the school's history but who cares abt that lolzzz
there r lots of different places to read manga throughout. first theres a children's room which books obvs for children, here i looked thru a book of classic fairytales like cinderella and snow white illustrated by macoto takahashi, so pretty!! there was also an original copy of the first vol of sugar sugar rune, so cute!! then the hallways were lined with different bookshelves labeled a thru e/f (i forget which) but im not sure what they meant, they definitely werent for manga title or author name tho... from what i saw a was all shounen and b to d was all shoujo. i didnt rlly look too hard bc i cant read kanji and i was with other ppl sooo i didnt have the fortune of just looking at pretty pictures all day T_T from what i saw it was mostly 70s-2000s with lots of works by major y24 authors like yumiko oshima and yukari ichijo. so cool! also some 90s/2000s shoujo but im not so educated on that era sozzzzz...
and then a big room full of award-winning works! and here i got to see.... ORIGINAL PRINT KAZEKI KYAAAA OMG im still in awe that i got to hold such important bl history in my own hands.. And ofc one of my fav mangas oat too... i got to see a lot of other works i like in this room like banana fish, nana, eroica, patalliro (!!), poe, peach girl, etc etc.. !! SO COOL!! for the most part the full series were there expect for patalliro which only went up to like vol15 i believe. I didnt notice keiko takemiya won so many manga awards until i got here either, i feel like a fake fan but i dont rlly focus on her works outside of her bl.. Sorry miss takemiya... maybe ill open my heart to scifi and try terra one day. then the center of the room had different parts abt manga history and related stuff like genres and magazines blah blah... They had quite a few classic shoujo magazines including one with gilbert on the cover but sadly they were all wrapped in plastic so i assumed that meant no looking :(
the third floor was a special exhibit dedicated to autobio manga! and lucky for me classic shoujo was also a part of this! including stuff by yumiko oshima again and yukari ichijo too i think? Yes classic shoujo mangakas were part of the very early history of starting autobio manga. Who knew! there were also some absolutely gorg works by moyoco anno on this floor but unforch no photos were allowed :(
i dont wanna make a seperate entry for the day before this but i had excellent tofu hot pot. I tried to have tofu hot pot again this day but i think they used peanut sauce in one of the side dishes bc eating it gave me an itchy throat and 20 minutes later i threw up the entire meal which happens to me when i eat my allergens so sadly i was restricted from eating out the rest of the trip unless it was like stuff that couldnt POSSIBLT ever have peanuts like. Plain rice or mochi... my mom was way too scared...
081226 hiroshima peace memorial
i only got an hr here but Gosh what a heartbreaking museum... i was hyperfixated on the atomic bombings of hiroshima and nagasaki a yr ago so ive wanted to go here for a while but it was way too upsetting for me seeing all the items left behind in the bombings, reading ppl's experiences, hearing ppl recall so clearly what happened even several decades later... they also had a lot abt nuclear weapons themselves and progress with that and what's being done to prevent future nuclear warfare so i got to learn abt that since i never rlly researched that kinda stuff b4.
before the museum i also saw the children's peace monument which was rlly moving to me esp hearing all the history behind it... Omg im tearing up writing this... they had sm other things on the walk to the museum but i was on a timed tour i had no time to see them all im so sad. and on the bus back at the end of the day we drove by some of the trees that survived the bombing but i was asleep so i didnt get to see them like wtf my mom or sister shouldve woken me up im a little mad but theres nothing i can do
081326 umeda
the final day :( But lLuckily it got to be one full of shopping and i found lots and lots of stuff!! there was a rlly cool mandarake here i think it mustve been smth else before it became a store since the walls had a sort of rocky texture, there was a dinosaur fossil reproduction on one of the floors and the lighting was shite lol. There was an EXCELLENT supply of dolls here with soo many liccas and four pullips which is more than i saw at any other store in my trip. Which isnt a lot but still. AND a huge amount of classic shoujo all sorted by author which was sooo helpful. Here i got 2 june dx editions, 2 keiko takemiya mangas, a licca doll, and a mixed lot box of a bunch of different hello kitty goods!
i finally got to go to kinokuniya too! the day before i left for japan there was an announcement for the release of a new moto hagio artbook featuring sketches from heart of thomas and a cruel god's reign along with some other short works/oneshots she made from the 70s-2000s. So after 2 weeks of waiting i finally got to get it!! its very beautiful, i still need to take pictures of the pages to share on tumblr...
My general thoughts! ofc this wont apply to all of japan. But my biggest issue here was im not a big fan of the obsession with being polite and professional. like not like ppl should be Rude but idk do we rlly have to bow at everyone??? it just feels superficial esp when youll just get judged for being a foreigner anyways... Like gen the attitude towards foreigners just gets out of hand sometimes, ik tourists do tend to be disrespectful of other countries and the locals but i literally went in an elevator once and the family that was in there all turned around to face the wall like thats just rude.
for vegan food and honestly just vegetarian food in general japan is also severely lacking in that. For vegetarians ur options at like 90% of restauraunts r gonna end up being rice or french fries... for a country with major buddhist tourist spots i would expect more options bc buddhism literally deals with being kind and not harming others! kyoto was the best for vegan options bc lots of places had tofu available but theres also kind of an issue in japan (not that ive thoroughly researched just what i noticed while i was there) with understanding dietary restrictions, like one place had a vegan menu but that one of the items on there had an egg allergy warning -_- and also, many places just not listing allergens at all on the menu. I was a little scared to try many things bc of language barriers if i couldnt communicate like no peanuts or milk AT ALL i could get so ill... if i go again i would try and learn beginner level japanese for this, i just never made an effort bc it was a surprise trip i was too lazy lol
ah this is kinda all just complaining, i feel bad T_T but just like in the us, anime and pop culture in general in japan is also very male-centered and prioritizes shounen or other things that mainly target men like hoyoslop. shoujo sections in stores were very small if they were present. The best you'd find was that most secondhand goods stores had enstars stuff and animates had bl but that was abt all u could rely on for finding stuff made for girls... even in ikebukuro there was a secondhand goods store selling all shounen :/ Like youd never find a store in akihabara selling all shoujo goods!! Ugh. its so unfair.
well i think my experience was affected a lot by going with other ppl who literally wanted to do the most boring tourist trap stuff ever so like half the things i wanted to do i couldnt.. i missed out on koenji, the yokohama doll museum, nakano broadway... in favor of going to all these different shrines like they all look the same youve seen one youve seen them all already
But i dont wanna just complain bc theres sm cool stuff too!! i loved secondhand shopping for merch ans goods irl it was rlly fun, and lots of cool stores in general with stuff i could never find at home. jfashion is so fun too and browsing lolita stores felt like being in a human-sized dollhouse hehe and even just seeing what ppl wear it was super fun!
if i could go again what i would do fly into tokyo and take the bullet train to osaka maybe like 2/3 thru my trip. In tokyo id go to harajuku, ikebukuro, koenji, nakano, shibuya.. go to the yayoi museum again.. go to the artist galleries i didnt have time go.. I would go to yokohama bc its kinda nearby i rlly want to go to the doll museum, maybe the art museum there too i wanted to go the marie antoinette exhibit but obvs that wont be there still SOBBBB and maybe see what else is in yokohama too. Then in osaka go back to umeda, nakazakicho, and denden town and then i go back home.
