Tokyo

I saw a new Hollywood Trailer for a teenage car racing movie that was filmed in Tokyo. “No Translation Needed” said the trailer…haha. I recognized an ABC Mart building. I will watch this movie for sure just to see more Tokyo scenary.

Do you know of any good Tokyo/Japan movies out there besides Lost in Translation? I will have to re-watch LiT.

Tokyo…consumer capital?

Designer brands are sold at all the department stores and at least Omotesando Hills, Shibuya, Ginza, and Shinjuku. How do they afford it?

The Japanese are clean. Auto-pump soap, auto-on water, auto-flush toilets, hand drying by air-pressure – pushing water down to finger tips as you lift your hands out. When you go in a change room, you take your shoes off before stepping up into the change room. There is always a wet towel given before a meal. The store doors open automatically meaning less germs transferred via door knobs. People very often wear white mouth masks. However, they don’t cover their mouths when they cough. I got coughed on a lot. Worse yet, on arrival, one guy sneezed on me. I believe it’s because he didn’t have tissue paper, plus they don’t blow their nose in public, so that’s what I got on my arrival, but I was too happy to be there so it didn’t bother me.

All the receipts look uniform like they are from the same company – dark black ink, looks like the same font. They have these trays with plastic pins sticking up in them that make it easy to put down and pick up change – though they usually hand you the coins along with the receipt.

The workers – whether it be department store workers or outside workers dress in (cute,) colourful uniforms. Somtimes uniforms include hats.

The streets are always filled with people. When do they go home? At any time, there is a whole crowd of people waiting to cross a street. The walk in an organized way, foward – sticking to the left.

The women are concious about looking good. There are mirror stands scattered in the subway system. People are not ashamed to check how they look.

Vending machines cut down mom and pop convenience stores. AM PM, and 7-11 are around every corner. They have a coffee chain with a Starbucks like logo.

There are arcades(pachinko, toy clawing, video games) everywhere. Isn’t it pricey to play all the time?

They can sell a lot of toys from making sets of things. You feel like you want to collect them all or you are missing some if you only have a few. The sets may have the same theme (miniature furniture or types of food, or from the same Anime), the sets may be the same object but be different patterns or colours. Something else that makes you spend more is such miniatures may be in boxes so you never know which one you’ll get, and if you want to collect them all, you’ll have duplicates. If your friend collects them too, this perpetuates the idea that everyone needs to own it.

I think Tokyo = Quality. Hair accessories all look nice and are well made. Cheap souvenirs are well made, or you can say the souvenirs don’t cost too much. There aren’t many places that sell souvenirs. They don’t paster the word Tokyo on anything and make it a souvenir. In fact, few things have the word Tokyo on it. Souvenirs would be small items with kimono cloth patterns on it, lucky cats with a paw up, items with small plastic sushi on it, and post cards.

I enjoyed my 1 week visit to Tokyo, observing the differences on the surface, but I know there is a lot more to know about the Japanese people’s way of life.

http://www.style-arena.jp/english/

Good site to dispense exact subway routes, sorted by time and fare.

http://www.tokyo-subway.net/english/

Careful about which turnstile you pass through, especially at Ginza Station, because certain ones take your ticket and don’t allow you to use it for transferring. Stick to the turnstiles that everyone else is passing through – usually left.

Figuring the subway signs will be a bit of a trick. The arrow points to the next station number a train is going to.