Somehow, despite only arriving two days ago, Sarah and I seemed to have adjusted to the time difference in Japan immediately. We woke up around 10:00 am on June 6th and got ready to visit one of our most anticipated destinations: Harajuku.
Having visited Harajuku several times in 2009, I had suggested a morning visit to Sarah before our trip. The notorious costumes and local fashion were not something that came more alive at night, and I quite liked the look of Harajuku in daylight. Sarah agreed, so we decided to check out Harajuku in the morning. It was just a short train ride away, one I remembered well from my trips there in 2009. Except this time around, we disembarked at a stop unfamiliar to me. The first thing we saw upon exiting the station was a big sign announcing Yoyogi Park's entrance. That was very strange to me. I'd been to Yoyogi Park in 2009, but never by way of Harajuku. And while Yoyogi and Harajuku are of course right next to each other, I was unsure of how Sarah and I had ended up in this new location.
Not that it mattered much beyond scrambling my sense of direction. We were, after all, most certainly in Harajuku. It would just be a new angle on a familiar sight. The sun was bright and warm yet again, and I felt very happy returning to another special place in my memories. We soon arrived upon a big, broad main street. The buildings on both sides were bedecked with advertisements for all kinds of products. It was almost disorienting to see K-Pop had made such a big impact here. I knew it was beloved in Japan, and I'd listened to plenty of it with my little sisters in the US. But in 2009 K-Pop was only just beginning its global expansion, and I'd not become familiar with it until 2012. Seeing it now was a reminder that times had changed, but not in a bad way. I had changed with the times too.
The first thing Sarah and I wanted to do in Harajuku was get some crepes. I'd raved to Sarah about the crepes, which were honestly my main reason for spending so much time in Harajuku back then. I always loved knowing that I could hop on the train and get myself a crepe in just a few minutes. So we peeked down several alleys as we walked down the main street. An unmistakeable pink kiosk caught our eye, and we ducked down the alley to see what crepes were on display. Unsurprisingly, they all looked irresistible. We began debating which ones would be the best to get before Sarah noticed the place didn't seem to be open yet. She checked her Yelp app and, sure enough, we would have to wait almost an hour before they were ready for business. We were sorely disappointed. However, Sarah and I suspected there might be other places that were already open. So we returned to the long street and kept pushing along. Our hunt for a crepe kiosk led us down another road that soon began curving off in all kinds of directions. We chose an alley that continued straight ahead and squeezed through down its narrow path. I was not accustomed to these claustrophobic spaces in Harajuku, but happening across them was part of the fun of having no set agenda.
To our left, we suddenly spotted a fountain outside what could have been a hotel. Called La Chateau de Fontaine, it was a more conspicuously Europhilic sight than I was used to seeing in Japan. Sarah also found it to be a jarring sight, yet as we considered it further, we concluded that (Western) European culture has a chicness to it which must mesh well with Japanese aesthetic sensibilities. Arriving not long after the 2016 election, we pondered if US American culture might be on the wane in Japan. Maybe Europe would be the object of Japan's exotic fantasies from now on.
A few more turns brought us out onto the famous Takeshita Street. I didn't know it at the time, but this was the street I had been remembering all along. We'd just approached it from more or less the opposite direction. As before, specialty shops fell over each other in a scramble to catch bypassers' eyes. We would soon be ready to look inside, but crepes were our first order of business. Fortunately, Takeshita Street has plenty of food vendors outside its storefronts. Sarah and I found a crepe shop, placed our orders, and took our place in line with groups of excitable children (whose presence was unexpected on a weekday). I'd ordered crepe with bananas, dulce de leche, and whipped cream in memory of all the wonderful crepes I'd eaten in 2009 and 2010. Sarah got one with ice cream and matcha, one of her favorite flavor combinations. She may have liked hers more than I liked mine; the crepe I got was a little too insubstantial, stuffed as it was with whipped cream. I was looking for something I could really sink my teeth into. But of course it was still very good.
We sat down in an alley to eat our crepes. In Japan, people rarely eat while walking, so we didn't want to flout that norm as foreigners. Plus it was fun to be tucked away together, enjoying our snack in relative private. After returning to Takeshita Street, Sarah noticed a store that looked familiar to her. It was Etude, a Korean beauty store whose popularity she'd noticed even back in the US. She suggested we go inside to look around. I agreed, thinking it could be a unique experience to share. The whole store was bathed in pleasing pastel pinks and greens. Even better, the speakers were playing exactly the kind of dance music I love hearing in trendy shopping spots. One song in particular sounded exceedingly pleasant to me in this cozy little space, and I jotted down the lyrics to look it up later. Only months later did I investigate, and to my enormous surprise, it was a song by Tinchy Stryder! Having brought several grime albums with me to enjoy in Japan, I was beyond pleased that I'd heard a grime song there unknowingly.
Of course, Take Me Back can't be called grime by most standards. But it's a product of that strange moment when grime was gaining mainstream exposure, when even Wiley and Dizzee were experimenting with major label studio production. The presence of Taio Cruz on Take Me Back should be a hint as to what kind of sound to expect. And I admit, I have quite a soft spot for that RedOne/Lady Gaga kind of electro style that seemed to get swallowed up by EDM-pop just a year or two later. I'd never listened to Tinchy's song before, but I can't imagine a better context for first hearing it than blissed out in a Harajuku Korean beauty store. The wait was more than worth it.
Exiting Takeshita Street, we emerged onto a main street that I recognized from 2009. This was where I'd walked when I wasn't scouring the area for crepes. It looked beautiful on this sunlit day, and I knew instinctively that coming here in the morning was the right choice. Sarah and I stopped briefly in ToyLand, a place we'd both visited during our separate stays in Japan, before careening down some new alleyways. I very much liked the idea of exploring Harajuku on a gorgeous day like this. We passed by many stylish buildings, leading us to ponder what it must cost to live in Harajuku. I opined that it must be like living in one of New York's trendier neighborhoods, but I felt attracted to the view nonetheless.
It was nearly 2:00 in the afternoon before we decided to pick a spot for lunch. We began surveying the neighborhood, but one location called out to us with gusto. Covered in vibrant paintings amidst the surrounding steel and concrete, this shop was irresistibly eye-catching. Sarah and I took a closer look at a sign out front and found that the place was called 3&W1, and that it specialized in burgers, beer, and fries. We could hardly pass up the chance to eat at such an idiosyncratic restaurant, so we investigated the menu placed out front. Upon selecting our burgers, we placed our orders with the chef and walked up the stairs to a nearly-empty second floor. Only one other couple was having lunch in this small, secluded space. Sarah and I sat by the window and admired the alleyway view spread out before us. I felt almost as if I were inside a pair of binoculars, gazing out upon distant sights.
Sarah had selected an avocado burger, and I got one with tomato curry sauce on it. They were both excellent, as were the thin and crunchy fries that accompanied them. We felt lucky that we'd chosen this place out of all the options available to us in Harajuku. Outside, we drifted back to Takeshita Street. We were very happy with our Harajuku morning and ready to go back to Shinjuku. As we hiked up the inclined street, I suddenly began to suspect where we were heading. Harajuku Station came into view beyond the colorful entrance gate, and at last I understood. Here was where I'd always gotten off the train, and this was the Harajuku I knew. We'd come all this way back to the spot I knew best, and now it was time to double back again, this time to Shinjuku.
Lots of pictures, I know! Harajuku was one of the most visually appealing districts we visited. Surrounded by trees, lit up by the morning sun, this cluster of modest buildings felt very cozy to me. I'm not surprised I entertained the idea of living here for a few minutes. Despite its outsized reputation for fashion, Harajuku feels comfortingly small to me.
Anyhow, I don't have many pictures of the next two places we visited. That's because both of them were somewhat misbegotten trips, albeit for different reasons. After a break at the Shinjuku AirBnb, I suggested to Sarah that we venture out by train to an unfamiliar Station. The night of our arrival, I'd looked out from the Moto-Yawata stop and been entranced by the view. I bookmarked the name in memory in case we had some spare time during our Shinjuku stay.
The sun was beginning to set as we rode out to Moto-Yawata. I was swarmed by fantasies of glowing neon streets, technicolor billboards, and hidden holes in the wall where we might get our dinner. Tokyo's most famous districts suck up a lot of attention, but I was sure there would be other areas that could be just as fun to visit.
We arrived at Moto-Yawata Station and got off the train. Not knowing the area at all, Sarah and I walked along the center road in search of places to visit. It all seemed smaller than I'd imagined from the train window. Needing food, we entered a local mart called Kitchen Origin (apologies for the blurry picture, it's the only one I got). I think we were just hoping for some packaged food, but it turned out that Kitchen Origin sells buffet-style takeout containers. Sarah was especially relieved to discover this option after all the meat we'd been eating in Tokyo. Here we could pick out our portions and food items as we pleased. I assembled a light meal of tofu, vegetables, and fruit covered in cream. Sarah constructed something similar for herself. We sat down on benches outside Moto-Yawata Station and ate our dinner contentedly in this small urban outpost. At this point, Sarah and I both knew there wouldn't be much else to do in Moto-Yawata. We would have to move on not long after we finished our meals. It seemed that I had fallen in love with an image, unaware of the reality obscured behind what I thought was an indexical representation. A very cinephilic mistake to make.
Not that we didn't enjoy our excursion in Moto-Yawata. It was pleasant to walk in such a placid little area of Tokyo for a change. But with only four days to spend in Tokyo, we had to be judicious about our time. Akihabara was our other night-time destination, and it was a substantial ride away from Moto-Yawata. We re-entered the train and let it take us to yet another new area. Somehow, I had never thought to visit Akihabara when I lived in Japan. Even my father, not exactly the adventurous type himself, had encouraged me to go back then. But I didn't feel much attraction to its reputation as a gathering place for the technologically-obsessed. I was mostly content with Shinjuku and its immediate surroundings.
Since then, DEMPAGUMI.inc had elicited some curiosity in me about what Akihabara might be like. I wondered how the district had informed their hyperactive techno-maximal style, and if it might have a similarly exhilarating effect on me. I felt more open to the possibility in 2017 than I had in 2009. It was after sunset by the time we arrived, and by then we were worn out. In attempting to stretch our stamina across an entire day, Sarah and I had over-exerted ourselves. We soon realized that yesterday's nap was what had given us the energy to voyage from Shinjuku to Tokyo Station and back again. It was early in the night of June 6th, but we were already exhausted. Our weary legs carried us reluctantly through Akihabara, weaving in and out of its seedier stores. The electronic exteriors were impressive, and indeed I used a lot of the videos I took for my Japan travel video. Yet we couldn't muster up much enthusiasm to get closer to Akihabara's exuberant core, wherever that might be. If DEMPAGUMI.inc had been affected profoundly by their experiences here, Sarah and I were not going to be so lucky ourselves. It couldn't have been much later than 10:00 pm before we tapped out and returned to Shinjuku. We needed sleep more than we wanted to decipher Akihabara's allure. If/When we return, it'll be because we know better what we want out of the experience next time.
