A "last supper" for my last night in Japan

I spent my final day in Japan just chilling out in Tokyo, soaking in every last bit of Japanese culture I could. I actually spent the majority of the day trying to find a sports store that might carry a Hokkaido Nippon-ham Fighters jersey, which as you might expect was quite hard outside of Hokkaido, especially in Tokyo (since they have their own team). Not the way I envisioned my last full day in Japan to be, but at least it gave me something to do, as I had no idea what to do (though I did know I wanted to do as many "Japanese things" as possible). So it was a failed day long mission, but going to the suggested sport stores got me to see areas of Tokyo I had missed the first time I was there, including the Ueno area and the area around the Tokyo Dome (home to the Yomiuri Giants).

At Ameyayokocho, a shopping street filled with shops selling cheap clothes, sporting goods, and various foods, just south of the Ueno station. I spotted the coffee shop while walking along - the blue neon sign is what surprised me (1st photo; what's makes a coffee shop "Canadian" anyway?).


Stopping for lunch just outside Ueno station in a noodle shop. I had cold soba noodles with tempura. The tempura was especially good, a bit saltier than the tempura I've had before but it wasn't overly salty and it only enhanced the flavours.


Back in the Shibuya area. There was some big replica of a bowl of noodles outside of the mall Shibuya 109, which is where I went. Shibuya 109 sells only stuff for women, but one of the guys at the hostel recommended going there just to "sightsee" hahaha. Wasn't my thing though...dressing like a stripper seems to be the current trend among girls in Tokyo. Then I stopped for some ice cream at the Baskin Robbins there (which are so much better than the ones here - they have a whole menu of seasonal specials of flavours and combinations, as well as limited monthly flavours). I had the green tea ice cream special (I don't remember the name) - green tea ice cream, topped with whipped cream, mochi cubes dusted in matcha (green tea powder), a piece of chocolate, and a white ball that was like a mix of icing with mochi (I don't know what it was, it was sweet like icing and had a slight mochi texture) that was also dusted with matcha. Very good and worth the money!


Back in Takeshita-dori. I wanted to see the crazy fashion of Tokyo one last time. I guess I wasn't the only one since it was packed (as you can see in the 1st photo). I made a couple more food stops too (I wasn't kidding about loosening my budget for food in Japan)! I had a very cheesy (and small) cheeseburger at another burger chain in Japan called Lotteria (2nd and 3rd photos), then for a crepe at one of the many crepe stands in the alley (4th and 5th photos; it's the "thing" to do while doing some shopping in Takeshita-dori, and as you can see, there are more varieties than you could imagine, both sweet and savoury; I had no. 92, which had azuki paste, a few mochi balls, whipped cream, and a couple of green tea flavoured fish-shaped things with a texture I could best describe as a cross between jelly and tiramisu). Then I stopped for a quick cold coffee drink (a "Caffee Latte") from the convenie there - it was rich (it's supposed to be made with cream from Hokkaido) and had a sweetness and flavour similar to the Starbucks bottled coffee drinks (6th photo). And in a surprising failure at English translation in Tokyo, see if you can spot the 2 goofs on the signs that were hung along the alley.


At the Tokyo Dome area, as the sun started to set (the sun was going down at 6PM pretty much everyday I was in Japan), complete with a shopping walkway, an amusement park, and hotels. The sport store at the stadium actually had a couple Nippon-ham Fighter jerseys, but they were either blank or had the name of a player I didn't want (I was looking for a Tsuboi jersey). It ended up being the only shop I visited that actually even had Nippon-ham Fighter
jerseys.


My final dinner in Japan that could have been my final dinner ever(!) at Tettiri (a Tiger fugu specialty restaurant in Asakusa recommended by the hostel) - a light (yet pricey; the sashimi was almost 1000 yen alone and almost 750 yen for the drink) meal of fugu sashimi and hiresake (3rd photo; it's hot sake served with dried fins from the Tiger fugu...the server lit the sake on fire to roast the fins and then mixed it back into the sake). It was worth the money though just to try both. And I'm still alive! It's funny how things work out: the Kaminari-mon was the first site I visited on my first full day in Japan, and it was the last site I visited on my last full day in Japan, literally bringing my travels in Japan around in a full circle! For those that don't know, fugu is blowfish, and the meat could be potentially fatal to eat (the blowfish produces a highly potent toxin) if the meat is not cut properly from the blowfish. The meat itself is very chewy and didn't have too much flavour, but the lime, and the red paste (I don't know what it was) mixed into the soy sauce like wasabi gave the meat quite a flavour (it's supposed to enhance the flavour of the meat) - I mostly tasted the lime and the red paste that had a little heat to it. It looks like they gave me a lot of sashimi, but they are sliced very thin. The last photo is of a live Tiger fugu in a tank at the restaurant...to think that thing could have killed me haha.


A variety pack of mochi cream desserts I picked up at the Mochi Cream shop in one of the basements of the malls next to Tokyo station (I bought it before dinner and ate it after as a celebration of my last night in Japan). It was quite pricey, but like I said, I loosened up my food budget. They're not really daifukus, and it's not ice cream but fresh cream (with a consistency very close to ice cream, especially since you need to store them in the fridge, but it was better than ice cream in my opinion). 7 came in the box, and it was surprisingly very filling (it's a good thing I ate a very light dinner). In the order shown, the flavours that came in the pack (it was a pre-packed special) were green tea, blueberry, chocolate, sweet potato, banana, raspberry white chocolate, and coffee.


I had the chance to go out with some other backpackers that night to the clubs in Roppongi, but they were planning on staying out the whole night and not return to the hostel until the morning when the subway re-opened. For some reason, I felt way too tired to even attempt that (plus it would've been quite expensive), so I decided just to chill out at the hostel with some other backpackers and enjoy Japanese game shows on TV one last time. As you can tell, I made a point of trying some last snacks (from the 7-11 a few seconds walk from the hostel), including Sapporo Classic (which I thought they didn't export outside Hokkaido?) and Yebisu Premium Ale Malt (which I didn't try before), and a bag of banana chips (half chocolate coated) and potato sticks (you'd expect them to be salty right? well I was, but they ended up having a sweet coating!). It was all great (and the snacks were pretty good despite being a little too sweet all together). At the end of the night, I was actually glad I just got to chill out with good snacks and conversation and some pretty funny TV, instead of trying to nurse a hangover/all-nighter combo before my 5 hour flight back to Hong Kong the next day.

I had an afternoon flight on the 10th (Sunday), so I decided to grab some breakfast and do a rushed trip on the subway (which I tried soak up for one last time!) to Harajuku to see if I could catch a glimpse of the weekly cosplay gathering at Harajuku. I was told they showed up on Sunday afternoon, but I was hoping there would be a few that morning to at least make my trip there worth it...well Tokyo let me down again for one last time hahaha. So I headed back to the hostel, checked out and picked up my bags, picked up a snack for the long train ride to the airport, and I was off to Narita. To be honest, I was actually a bit sad that morning, knowing it would be my last time in Japan.

My last breakfast in Japan. This is not what I typically ate except for the fruit and veggie juice (I usually just had a bun); I had a bowl of tempura udon, a carton of fruit and veggie juice, and a Starbucks Kyoto matcha latte.


At Harajuku. As you can tell, there was no one in cosplay there yet, and I only had 5 minutes to hang around there to see if anyone would come (I was planning on just snapping a few quick photos if there were people already there). The closest thing I saw to cosplay was a girl who was crossing the street outside the train station that had a big hat on with different flowers on it, which doesn't really count as cosplay (2nd photo).


My snack on the train ride to the airport, consisting of the Aquarius energy drink (the most common energy drink brand in Japan, at least as I saw it) and a typical Japanese snack, an onigiri (a triangle-shaped rice ball with some filling inside, wrapped in a dry seaweed sheet).


In the Narita airport.


My last meal in Japan! Another case of "everything works out for a reason." I had a few coins left, and a few bills left, which I didn't want to break (since you can't change the coins at the banks outside Japan to another currency). I had a 500 yen coin, and a couple smaller value coins (less than 100 yen). I needed to grab some food for lunch since my flight wasn't until a little later in the afternoon, and I passed by a restaurant that was having a set meal special that cost exactly 500 yen (so I was able to use up that considerably valuable coin)! It wasn't much (obviously, especially considering I'm eating in the airport), just a small bowl of chicken and mushrooms over rice, miso soup, and some pickled cucumbers, but it was enough to hold me over until my meal on the flight.


Walking around the airport.


My plane out of Japan.


Even as I was about to leave, Japan found ways to continue to amuse me! The Japanese ground crew were doing stretches, with everyone in a large circle doing the same stretch at the same time in the same intervals. It was very amusing to watch (I doubt our ground crews do anything like this).


One last photo in Japan (the board in the back says Hong Kong in Chinese).


The bottle of very nice sake I picked up in one of the basement shops in Daimaru, next to Tokyo station. I forgot to buy a bottle before I left Hokkaido (which I've been told makes some of the best sake in Japan), but I managed to find exactly what I was looking for in Tokyo! It was a bottle of Otokoyama (said to be the best sake producer in Hokkaido) Junmai Daiginjo (the highest class of sake). Luckily I had the help of the only lady who worked there who could speak English to help me find it. As you can tell, I paid quite a bit for it (obviously) - 5,069 yen (which is about $62 CDN).


The set of sake serving bottle and cups which I bought at the gift shop in the airport (I completely forgot to buy a set in Tokyo); how could I buy a nice bottle of sake and not have the proper utensils to enjoy it? It was a pretty reasonable price though (I remember it being around $12 CDN).