Thursday was another uneventful day at work. I left work around 6pm and walked to the train station. When I got there, I discovered that the type of machine that I know how to buy tickets from was out of order. The working machines were much lower tech and didn't have any English on them... This is kind of a big deal, because you don't just buy any old ticket. You buy a ticket worth a certain amount of yen depending on how far you are going to go. For this leg of the trip I needed to buy a 160 yen ticket, so usually I push the 160 yen button, drop the money in and away I go. But these machines didn't have a button marked "160 yen." So I decided to just stand there and watch a few people use the machines.
Almost every person would walk up to the machine, drop their money in, and then hit the upper left button. I figured they all weren’t going the same distance, so the upper left button must be a “sell me a ticket worth the amount of money I just put in you” button. So, I went up to the machine, dropped in 160 yen, and sure enough the LED on the button lights up “160 yen.” Booya.
Once I got to Shinjuku, I only bought a 130 yen ticket because I planned to make a stop in Takadanobaba. Earlier in the day I searched online for English bookstores and found a store called The Blue Parrot that wasn’t too far from the Takadanobaba station. Yes, I bought a book before I left Hawaii (Ender’s Game, more on that once I get back) but it was SO good that I finished it by Wednesday morning! I hoped to find the sequel called Speaker of the Dead, but they didn’t have it… I browsed all of their fiction section and finally decided on Dune: House Atreides. I’ve kind of been avoiding this book for quite some time, but now I didn’t have much of a selection…
Walked back to the station and rode the train to Ikebukuro. There was a DS game I decided to import, so I went back to BIC cameras to see if they had it. I had to search for SO long because I knew the game in English characters (Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan) but it was labeled in Japanese characters. I knew this going in, but I figured I would recognize the game box… but all the games were on their sides, so only the titles on the box spines were showing! So, I pretty much had to pull each game out and look at the front of the box to find it!
Walked back to my hotel, read my new book, played my new game. Slept.
Friday was my last work day in Tokyo. Left before 7pm. I wanted to check out Akihabara, but I had all of my work equipment. So, I went back to Ikebukuro, dropped off my stuff, then went back to the station. The ride to Akihabara took about 20 minutes, and by the time I got there it was nearing 8pm. I looked around a bit, but was a little disappointed. Everyone said it was Otaku central, so I was hoping to find a bunch of super obsessed people dressed up like anime/videogame characters… but I only saw a few girls dressed up like English maids. And then everything started closing, so oh well.
