Our final full day in Tokyo began with Phil & I taking the Keisei Line train to the Oshieage (Sky Tree Mae) train station. At our local Aoto train station, both of us used the ticketing machines to load another 1,000 yen onto our IC cards that we primarily use to pay for train fares, and occasionally drinks from vending machines. At that point in time I had no Japanese bills left, and Phil was down to 7,000 yen. I had the equivalent of about $5 in coins in the coin purse in my pocket. I had $300 in US currency with me that I anticipated exchanging for Japanese yen at the Sky Tree Mall.
From the underground Oshieage Station, we entered the Tokyo Solamachi mall and had to take escalators up three or four floors just to reach ground level. Directories informed us that the Chiba Institute of Technology’s standing exhibit was on the 8th floor. One specific piece of the exhibit, the life-sized Macross VF-25F Gerwalk, was the reason I’d wanted to come to the Sky Tree Mall. The Valkyrie is immediately to the right upon entering the exhibit room. We circled the rest of the room, which offered replicas and exhibits of robotics technology used to gather meteorite samples. One exhibit allowed visitors to touch a piece of meteorite.
Phil & I politely skipped the other rooms of the exhibit because our time was limited.
We took the escalators back down to the fourth floor that offered Japanese souvenirs and an assortment of character shops. We passed by the Marvel, Medicom Toy, and Pokemon shops. At the Kirby’s Café Shop Phil purchased a bag of dry Kirby pasta as a gift for a Kirby fan back home.
At the Jump Shop Phil purchased two Dragon Ball Daima blind-box figures and a Haikyuu plastic fan for friends back in Florida.
At the Sengoku Damashii store, a gift shop devoted to “samurai spirit,” Phil selected a pair of small paper lantern magnets at 550 yen each. When he took them to the cashier, the lady politely inquired of Phil why he chose the small magnets when the similar but much larger ones next to the cash register were the same price. Phil explained that he was worried that their size would cause them to be easily knocked off the refrigerator door; thus smaller three-dimensional magnets were preferable.
On the fourth floor, we were amazed by the Asakusa Amezaiku Ameshin shop that sold candies that resembled ceramic and glass figurines. We also gawked a bit at the unique Japanese-ness of the Ganso Shokuhin Sample-ya shop that specializes in plastic replicas of food.
We stepped out onto the balcony to poke our heads into the beautifully decorated Donguri Republic store, one of Tokyo’s several Studio Ghibli specialty stores.
We also popped into the Daiso store where I purchased four shikishi frames at 200 yen each, some resealable plastic bags and packing tape to prepare for the journey home, and the only A5 size document case I could find in the store, for storing some of my doujinshi purchases. Phil paid for the lot because I had practically no cash on hand.
I was certain that such a tourist-centric spot as the Sky Tree Mall would have at least one currency exchange counter, but seeming the mall did not. So Phil & I headed out of the mall, back into the Oshieage train station.
There, we figured that if we could reach ground level, we might spot a currency exchange store. So we trekked through the nearest exit, which ended up taking us through a series of lengthy tunnels before releasing us into sunlight on a road with practically no businesses. We ended up walking around the station exterior in search of a nearby currency exchange vendor that turned out to be a mere ATM machine inside a supermarket.
So we walked the pedestrian bridge across the Kitajukken River then over another block to find a branch of Mizuho Bank. But a sign posted inside the bank informed us that this branch didn’t offer currency exchange. We walked down the block to the crosswalk, crossed the street, and entered the Mitsubishi Bank. The guard by the door informed us that this bank branch also didn’t offer currency exchange. I stuck my head into the Mizuho Bank building next door to the Mitsubishi Bank to realize that the building housed financial planning management, not conventional banking services.
With our last day ebbing away, I announced that I’d simply continue on to Nakano Broadway where I knew there was a currency exchange counter. Phil took our Daiso purchases and headed back to our home base.
I got onto a Chuo-Sobu line train and practically fell asleep in exhaustion. A half-hour later I realized that I’d been riding a train going in the direction opposite of where I wanted to go. So I got off the train then stepped onto the line going in the opposite direction. Eventually I reached Nakano.
Phil dropped off our purchases then took a train northward to Shimabata. At this time, the Shibamata Taishakuten shrine was open and functioning, so Phil purchased the two 700-yen shrine charms that he’d been unable to purchase the prior Tuesday when the shrine wasn’t yet open for business.
He also located the small, neighborhood walking path that he’d seen and fallen in love with in a random YouTube video.
I circled the third and fourth floors of Nakano Broadway in vain, searching for the Genkinya Currency Exchange counter. Eventually I found it on the second floor. I changed $300 US dollars at a very favorable rate of 147.70. I went to the Apple Symphony store on the fourth floor, expecting to purchase a Cream Lemon production cell that I thought was 9,900 yen. I found that I’d misremembered the price, as it was slightly more expensive at 11,100 yen. Continuing to flip through the portfolio, I found another vintage production cell and genga of a topless woman. This cell was priced at only 6,600 yen. I’m pretty certain that this cel is not actually from the Cream Lemon series but rather some other H OVA from the era. I decided that I preferred the image and the value of the second cel and purchased it instead of the 11,100 Cream Lemon cel.
I went to 2D Gallery intending to purchase the 4,400 cel with background of Mint from Galaxy Angel that the store had in its display case. But upon closer look, I realized that the cel was cheap because it had damage along the bottom of its image. Someone framing the cel could easily crop the damage to be invisible. But if I were to purchase the cel, I’d always know that its bottom was damaged, regardless of whether or not I could see the damage. So I passed on purchasing the cel.
I made another run-through of the male doujinshi store on the second floor. I found and purchased four inexpensive comics that caught my eye.
Just outside of the Nakano Broadway gate, I stopped at a luggage store to purchase a half-dozen kitschy Japan tourism refrigerator magnets.
I left Nakano and stopped off in Shinjuku. I took the East exit from the station, which was supposed to place me closest to the city’s primary Kinokuniya bookstore. The density of the city repeatedly confused Google Maps, however, so I took much longer to finally find the store than I’d anticipated. On the eighth floor, I found multiple copies of the Dirty Pair Illustrations archive book. Despite already owning one copy, I wanted to purchase a second. So I did so.
I took the train back to Aoto Station uneventfully. At the station’s candy store, I purchased two additional bags of Japanese flavored Kit-Kat candies to share with my co-workers back home. At the Daiso store I purchased four more A5 size plastic cases to store doujinshi, a pair of large document cases in which to store and protect our production cel purchases, a pair of large clasp-lid plastic boxes, another two cans of Kimetsu no Yaiba canned coffee, and three 200-yen lap blankets to use a cushioning material in my luggage. I reached our Aoto rental home just past 7pm.
Near exactly an hour later Phil & I met Jon in the Yotsuya train station. Jon led us to the nearby Indian restaurant Bistro Hitsujiya. In izakaya-style, we ordered several plates of lamb curry, lamb kebabs, and marsala chicken. The bill for three of us totalled 8,800 yen.
We then walked several blocks to the basement bar True Blue, an intimately-sized, dimly lit jazz bar that played the 1995 movie Waterworld on repeat on a muted corner television. Mixed drinks ranged from 1,100 to 1,600 yen. Phil & I also ordered two small 500-yen squares of the master’s own dark chocolate surrounded by rich milk chocolate. I had one drink. Jon & Phil had two each. Our bill was 9,500 yen.
In order to reach home before the last trains stopped running, we parted with Jon and reached home at midnight, just after stopping at the local 24-hour Lawsons convenience store so I could purchase two bottles of C.C. Lemon. Phil went straight to sleep. I typed up this blog post then prepared to walk to the nearby Don Quixote store, primarily to use up the 495 yen we had left in 1-yen, 5-yen, and 10-yen coins that weren’t worth the weight and effort of bringing back to the United States.
I typed up my events for the day for the AnimeNation Blog then, at 2am, walked up the road to the Don Quixote store intending to attempt to spend our remaining small change. I seriously considered purchasing the turtle & deer powder male supplements, but the packages are not quite as cute as the one for the horse, and at 999-yen each, I decided that the remaining two weren’t worth that much to me. So I ended up buying less than I expected. I purchased a package of three hand towels for 199-yen. The following day I used two of them while packing my trunk for the flight home. And I bought two or three additional cans of beverages with anime labels. Then, just to spend more, I picked a 1,000-yen DonKi mystery box of random prize figures (which I still haven’t gotten around to opening). To my surprise, when I included all of my 100-yen coins, the cashier machine told me that I’d overpaid by 250-yen and gave me change. So I managed to get rid of all of Phil & my one-yen, five-yen, and ten-yen coins, I thought.
Walked back to the house and set the bag, the large DonKi bag cost me an additional 19-yen, on the doorstep. Then I walked next door to the 7-11. Earlier in our stay, I’d noticed that the store had a selection of Street Fighter VI Red Bull promotional trading cards, but I wasn’t certain how to claim them. I figured that at 3 in the morning, the store would be dead enough that I could struggle to understand the cashier and purchase enough cans of Street Fighter VI Red Bull to get the free cards depicting Chun-Li and Juri. But to my dismay, the cards were no longer available. The special edition cans were, though, so I bought one each of the remaining Ryu and Chun-Li Red Bull cans at 198-yen each. By that time I had two 5,000 yen bills and a small pocket of change left.
