My last full day in Tokyo had arrived. I’m sorry I didn’t have a chance to catch up with more people, but today it was all business.

First stop, back to Aoyama for another spin around the Yuriten, (photos can be found on the Yuriten photoset on Facebook) The lighting made it a little difficult to get some of the pictures, as it does. What makes it easy to see, makes it hard to photograph. ^_^; I arrived before it opened, and was able to do a quick headcount, the ratio was 30/70 women to men, with a surprising age range in the women. The men all looked young to me, which means nothing, everyone does, now. ^_^ Every box of the next round of Lucky Boxes will have Yuriten goods, you can be sure.

Every day at the Yuriten, there is different signed art by the participants on the table at the end. Today’s, as you can see included this image, is by Canno.

Because my next stop after Aoyama was Harajuku, I decided to walk. It was a very pleasant 20 minute amble through back streets full of galleries and clothes stores.

As I headed down toward Harajuku, the stores shifted not-at-all-subtlely from art and fashion to fashion as art. (On the way to Aoyama that morning, I was on the train standing next to a young lady who was clearly dressed up for the location. She was trying to see the train map, but she couldn’t from her seat; I could see that Harajuku was next and said “tsugi” We both laughed. )

My first stop was Kiddyland, where I was on a mission for my wife. But legitimately, they always have surprising items, this time they had a bunch of Sailor Moon and Card Captor Sakura goods. Picked  up some stuff there, and headed over to Laforet where I spend too much time and money. (And sang along with the music. Can you imagine working in the Sailor Moon store? You’d be so goddamned sick of the Sailor Star Song, or Otome no Policy or whathaveyou, with them playing on an endless loop.)

So, there are two Sailor Moon stores in Laforet. on Floor .5. (This is not a typo – it’s a half floor between the basement and Floor 1. Take the elevator to Floor 1 and walk down the stairs to Floor .5.) One store is high end fashion items, purses for $450 kind of thing and gashopon, because of course, and across the hall is the goods store. 

The goods store has some exclusives, including a series of little teeny senshi dolls that looked like felt outfits on corks. They were both adorable and awful and I fought myself for while and opted to not get them. 

There were a ton of Uranus x Neptune goods, incluing 3 new phone case designs. I didn’t get those, either, but did get a phone charger with this design.

I took Takeshitadori back up to the train station. Have I mentioned that it’s Golden Week? Unsurprisingly, there was a crowd. It wasn’t the worst crowd I’d ever seen, but it was the touristy-est crowd I’d ever seen.

Dropped my stuff off a the hotel and decided to have one, long, lingering walk around Ikebukuro. I went down to Otome Road for the first time this trip. There’s nothing there for me at this point, but I like to experience it anyway. 

I like that I don’t recognize most of the series advertised here or in Akihabara. I don’t play the games, don’t listen to the drama CDs, so they all seem strange and familiar at once. The cafe this time, for instance, was themed for a series called “Hypnosis Microphone” which I have never heard of – I could look of course, but at the moment, don’t know if it’s a game, a book, or what – that Animate expects is popular enough to support a cafe.

Fun, huh? ^_^

(Update: I looked it up, ヒプノシスマイク -Division Rap Battle- is a series of “rap battle” CDs voiced by male seiyuu. Huh, that’s a new one on me. Like Catcher in the Rhyme by voice actors on CD.)

I stopped in Uniqlo and was very thankful there were no Rose of Versailles t-shirts, as I’ve really spent too much already. ^_^; Then over to Tokyu Hands to do some shopping for the wife. And finally Animate, where I managed to find one of the last two books on my list, and had one more spin around Yurimate. I wrestled with myself over getting a ticket to Kase-san, to get the postcards, but I just couldn’t. I only want the images for my screensaver anyway.

This morning I had a quick walk around looking for Pokemon (why are the ones I don’t have so far away?!?) and food and now I am wrestling with packing everything. My poor suitcase.

Thank you Uchida-san, Kawamoto-san and Morishima-sensei, Simona, Laura, Jotaro and James! I had an absolute blast. Mata ne, Tokyo. And, thank you all for joining me on this adventure!