In September of 2008, I (Steven) went to Tokyo. It was my second time going and it was really fun. Yeah, I'm a big anime geek and I love Asian cinema (Takashi Miike, Takeshi Kitano). I kept a diary of my travels. It's pretty long because I was quite detailed, but hopefully it will be entertaining. There are also several pictures and videos if all the words start to bore you.
Thursday, 9/18/08 9:15 AM, Atlanta, GA
Against the odds, I have made it to the gate with an hour to spare. I didn’t really pack until last night and I was up pretty late until this morning. I’ve had about 4 hours of sleep.
There aren’t many people here at the gate yet but I’m pretty sure it’s going to be a full flight. However, the lady across from me says we’re about to start boarding. I’m not really looking forward to the 14 hour flight, but I came prepared. I brought my PSP, DS, iPhone, 2 Anime Insiders and 1 Otaku USA magazine.
Overall, I have a good feeling about this trip. I’ve been studying the streets of Ikebukuro with Google Street View so I don’t think I’m going to get lost. I didn’t bring my laptop with me because I heard that TSA has been confiscating them more regularly. But, I wish I had’ve taken the chance. Typing all this up from hand-written notes is going to be a pain. Also, two nights ago I came up with an outline for my next novel. The 14 hour flight would’ve been a good time to get started on that.
Friday, 9/19/08 3:10 PM, Narita Tokyo Japan
Right now, I am at the station, in my seat on the Narita Express to Shinjuku. Outside the window, there are two workers mopping the 99% spot-free platform hoping to find and eradicate the other 1%. The flight was pretty uneventful. Fourteen hours of watching movies and playing video games. The food was very bland compared to the last time.
I have my bag beside me, a bottle of Pocari Sweat in my hand and Shinjuku/Ikebukuro in front of me. I am happy.
Saturday, 9/20/08 3:15 AM, Ikebukuro
The honeymoon is over. After the NEX, things quickly went south. I got off at Shinjuku Station and after a few minutes found my way to the train headed for Ikebukuro (Yamanote Line). Since I had a large piece of luggage in tow, I let other people on the train first. When I got on, there was exactly enough room for me and my luggage. Ikebukuro was only a few stops away. Once there, I had to fight my way through thousands of Japanese, all of whom seemed to be headed in the opposite direction of me.
When I found the West Exit gate, there was no one there to pass me through with the Japan Rail Pass, only unmanned ticket gates. I tried to just gaijin my way through one of the momentarily opened gates only to have the flaps close, a red light go off and some nasty alarm sound. Crap. All that and no one came to help. Then I saw some girl go up to a metal gate, calmly open it and let herself through. What a grand idea! I opened the latch and dragged my luggage into what looked like a quarantine area, then opened the next gate and let myself out.
Once I left the station through the West Exit, Ikebukuro greeted me and it looked exactly like I expected it to. Google Street View for the win. Take a right to the KFC, left to the main intersection, left at AMPM, arrive at Hotel Hanamiya. Once I saw the AMPM sign, I thought, “Time to get some money.” My ryokan only accepts cash and I had heard that to get the best exchange rates, I could just use my ATM card at any of the local combinis. As I drew near, I saw that all the lights were off, but the door was open and people were moving around in there – an ominous sign. I parked my bag outside and walked in to receive the usual Japanese greeting, “Irashaimase!”
“Ano…ATM wa doko desu ka?” I asked. One of the girls walked me over to the ATM and I couldn’t see a damn thing. “Taskute, kudasai,” I asked for help. The girl again walked over and helped me get started. The ATM didn’t like the flavor of my card so it spit it back out. I headed to my hotel without any money to pay for it, hoping to use only my gaijin skills to get a place to sleep. 
It was around 5:00 PM when I arrived at the hotel. The mama san of the ryokan met me at the door. In broken Japanese, I told her my name and she found me on the list. She can’t speak a word of English but she did mention “okane” (money). Crap.
I told her that I needed to find an ATM first. She let me check in and handed me a key – room 401. She then showed me to the elevator and bowed. I bowed back. Seeing this as a challenge, she bowed even lower. We repeated the process and I gave up when the elevator arrived.
When the door to the elevator opened, it was all I could do to stifle a laugh. This thing was impossibly tiny – just enough room for me and my luggage…or perhaps me, my luggage and 3 Japanese guys since they apparently have a negative surface area. I swear, when the US was researching stealth technology, they just strapped a pair of wings to a Japanese guy and tossed him into the air.
I opened the door to my room and looked around – there was a TV, a fridge, a hot tea maker with tea set, a table, a chair and a large, beautifully covered brick they call a bed. Also in the room is a private bathroom. All of this is delicately crammed into a 8’ x 12’ room. Seriously, other than the brick-bed, if the furniture were any smaller, I could put it in a dollhouse.
The air conditioner in the room has four settings. Off, by the transitive properties of Hades means that the room is slightly hotter than the Hell outside. The Low setting means it’s about the same as the Hell outside. The medium setting translates to “still hot” and finally, the High setting is absolutely freezing. This should be fun.
I turned the AC onto “freezing,” changed clothes and set out to find an ATM that would accept my card. Two Family Marts, a Lawson’s, a 7-11 and two other random ATM’s later, I gave up. They would all take Visa cards, but only if they were issued in Japan.
Gaijin with no money. Gaijin with no money feel bad. Gaijin with no money feel bad and…hungry! I realized that I had been up around 27 hours and hadn’t had any decent food yet. Thanks to Google Street View, I knew there was a katsudon place nearby. In Takadanobaba, I ate katsudon almost every day – wonderful stuff. So I went to the restaurant and tried ordering. Apparently I said something wrong because the guy behind the counter looked at me and said in English, “You don’t speak Japanese, do you?”
I was thinking, “Well, I can approximate the word for ‘asshole’.” But, he really was trying to be friendly so he took the rest of my order in English. He continued small talk with me as he cooked my dinner. Once my meal was ready, it looked delicious – breaded pork fried and covered with a fried egg and nori. It was OK but I really prefer the thinner meat at Takadanobaba. I got back to the room a little after 7:00 PM, watched the TV a bit and went to sleep for the night. This morning, I am going to call my bank back home for help. Right now, I am not happy.
Lesson learned: Bring yen
Saturday, 9/20/08 11:50 PM, Ikebukuro
Today was exhausting. I woke up obscenely early so I could call my bank back home before they closed. The girl told me that my card should work and suggested that I go to a bank or find a Western Union. I called the number on my Citi card next. Since I don’t have a PIN number, they told me to find a Citibank and provide two forms of identification to get cash.
Next, I walked to the internet café I spotted the night before. There, I signed up for a membership card and used the internet for an hour, checking email and finding out where the nearest Citibank was – Metropolitan Plaza, 9F, Ikebukuro. Since they didn’t open until 9:00 AM, it was time for breakfast.
Luckily, the Denny’s is open 24 hours. I ordered what I can only assume is their version of a Grand Slam breakfast – grilled fish, nori, rice, miso soup and natto. I asked the waitress about the natto, making sure that’s what it was because I was actually eager to try it. She said something in the affirmative and then started listing other foods. I wasn’t sure what she was going on about, but stopped her when she got to “carrot.” As it turns out, she replaced the natto with shredded and pickled carrots. Overall it wasn’t bad – a warm meal for under $8. I also had my first ever bubble tea there. Think blueberry iced coffee with pea-sized spheres in the bottom of it. Once sucked through the oversized straw, the spheres, or “bubbles,” had a slight blueberry taste and the consistency of a marshmallow.
Around 10:00 AM, I made my way to the Metropolitan Plaza. As it turns out, the bank doesn’t do money transactions on the weekend. So, I decided to go shopping at Otome Road, the small section off of Ikebukuro Station’s East Exit famous for its anime goods. I was starting to get really thirsty so I went to a Wendy’s and ordered some green drink with cream on top by point at a menu. The drink was some kind of melon flavor and the white stuff on top turned out to be ice cream. Both parts were welcomed. They were also selling some hamburger with meat sauce and sliced eggplant on it. Yum… At the front of Wendy’s, they had gachapon machines. I bought a few Code Geass gachapons, netting both Lelouch and Suzaku. 
Mandarake was easy enough to find but there were so many girls in there that I could barely move. However, I still managed to come away with plenty of doujinshis. After Mandarake, even though it had only been a few blocks since my hybrid desert drink, I already needed more water. I went to the AMPM next to Mandarake and almost grabbed a bottle of Evian when I thought of Bill Murray in “Lost in Translation” saying, “For good times, make it Suntory times.” So, I grabbed a bottle of Suntory water along with a few sticks of Umaibou, which turned out to be delicious. Think Cheese Puffs but longer, slightly crunchier and in awesome flavors. My favorites were “Sarami” (salami) and “Corn Potage” (cream corn flavored).
Animate was just across the street and down a bit from Mandarake. It was 9 stories of anime and manga Heaven. The most popular animes appear to be Gurren Lagann, Code Geass, Tetsuwan Birdy Decode (the entire 9th floor was dedicated to this anime with several pieces of original artwork and a mini theater playing clips), D. Gray-man, Bleach, Neon Genesis Evangelion (still!) and Full Metal Alchemist (still). I bought some Gurren Lagann, Code Geass and Bleach merchandise along with some Lycee trading cards. Since I bought the Code Geass and Gurren Lagann stuff, I earned a bonus – Code Geass stickers and a Gurren Lagann card of Simon.
When I left Animate, I was greeted by the strangest sight – Japanese people were stopped dead in their tracks, in total silence, staring at something. Across the street was the Sunshine 60 Building, the entrance of which is multi-leveled. Japanese people were stopped on each level as well, staring silently. It was like a scene from Alfred Hitchcock’s “The Birds” just before they attacked. “Crap. Am I going to die now?” I pondered. Then I saw two policemen pick something up off the ground. That something turned out to be an angry, young Japanese fellow. He shouted what I can only assume were foul obscenities as he struggled to break free from their grip. They shoved him into the back of a tiny police car and I decided it was time to get the Hell out of there, quickly dropping by Lashinbang and K Books.
I stopped at Wendy’s again for lunch. Their large drink is the size of a medium in the US and it costs about $2. Best of all, there are no free refills. If they were to see an Extra Biggie sized drink, they would shit themselves and ask how I could afford it. After lunch, I stopped by the Hello Kitty store and bought a few things for my nieces.
On my way back to the ryokan, I noticed a shop selling bowls – decent souvenirs, I figured. There were two aisles in the tiny shop and both had so much crap in the floor that some spots were barely wider than my foot.
As I walked back to the ryokan, although I was happy with my purchases, I couldn’t help but feel a little defeated – both physically and mentally. All I wanted to do was turn on the TV, curl up with a bottle of Suntory and crash.
At 10:00 PM, I was awoken by the sound of a doorbell. I didn’t answer. About an hour later, I left to go find some dinner. As I was leaving, the owner caught me and was waving around a credit card form. I gladly turned over my credit card while she called it in. I signed the receipt and shouted, “Yatta!” This took a lot of weight off my mind.
Dinner was Denny’s again. I know, I know. I’m in Japan so why am I eating at places like Denny’s and Wendy’s? Well first off, they’re not exactly like their American counterparts and secondly, and most importantly, they’re just plain convenient.
Lesson learned: Stay hydrated.