Return to Kanto

DAY 37(continued) - After leaving Hachioji I took the train to Oomori to go to Makiko's house. I wanted to leave my luggage at her place so I would have much more freedom to move around. When going to her house, I caught her walking on the street. We went back to her house where we chatted until noon. At this time I went to Nakano to meet Erika. She was going to show me the Mandarake here. The Mandarake here is much different from the Mandarake at Osaka. Here, Mandarake has shops all over a shopping center. Shopping for manga with Erika is very good because Erika is very knowledgable. She also has worked in a manga kiseten before. We ate lunch at Lotteria, then she had to leave for work. I did some more shopping at Ikebukuro before finally going to Asakusa to watch fireworks. I was supposed to meet Tomoe here, but I could not contact her mobile phone, as there was such a crowd. I ended up just watching it myself. Even after the firework display ended, I had to wait a very long time, spending a lot of time reading the manga I bought earlier in the day. I eventually was able to call Tomoe, but it would be so difficult to meet up with her, with all the crowd. Anyway, Tomoe would be leaving for Niigata this night. That night I stayed at Tomo's place. I had to wait for him to come home, as he also went out to watch fireworks that night.

Erika & I at Nakano's Mandrake

Eating at Lotteria

Fireworks at Asakusa

Night Flame

DAY 38 - I needed to go to Ryuhei's place in the morning to pick up some stuff that I left behind before going to Hokkaido. I was surprised to see Ryuhei's dark tan, which he had acquired while at baseball camp for his university team. I then headed for Shibuya to meet with my brother's friends, Tadashi, Naoko, Shimada, and Tomo. Tomo also brought some Taiwanese friends whom were sight-seeing. After lunch we all split up. Tadashi and Shimada however, tagged along with me to go to Mandarake. To my surprise, Tadashi also was looking for some manga. His former Hong Kong roomate had given him a want list of things to buy. After chatting ice coffee at McDonald's, I left for Ginza to meet up with Kumiko, Sachiko and Saori. I had met them almost a year earlier when they came to visit San Francisco. It was sort of funny seeing them because they were all shakai-jin now, and dressed very differently from the jeans and tennis shoes when they were students. We went to eat at some place called Living Bar, which seemed pretty high class. Saori left first because of a date. The rest of us went to karaoke at Big Echo!

Lunch!

Attempting Jojo Poses

Ko-Garu Model

Sony Building at Ginza

Karaoke at Big Echo

DAY 39 - I had tried to develop new ways to combat myself from oversleeping these days. After waking up I would open the door of my room. With the door open, I was hoping that the noise of the people outside would prevent me from falling back asleep. However, this method failed. Because of that I left Makiko's house quite late, and had to call Micchan to tell her that I would be late. that I would be late. Luckily Micchan was able to occupy herself with shopping before I finally arrived at Ikebukuro. Micchan showed me her university, St. Paul's University, which is better known as Rikkyo Daigaku . Micchan had just returned from a summer language program in Beijing so that was why I wasn't able to meet her when I first came to Tokyo. After lunch, I went to do some shopping at Akihabara. When evening came, I went to see Junichi and Yukako at Kurakuen Subway Station. We ate ramen and chatted outside for a while. After returning to Makiko's house, I chatted with her for a very long time. I also met her brother, Taka, who had just came back after studying for a year at a Texas high school.

Micchan & Rikkyo University

Tokyo Dome, Home of the Yomiuri Giants

Junichi Eating Ramen

Makiko Likes the Cookie Monster

Makiko's Brother, Taka (see the resemblence?)

DAY 40 - Bringing all my luggage, I went to Shinjuku in the morning. I was planning to use the coin lockers but unfortunately all of them were full! Erika suggested that I put them into her brother's car, and so we did. I met her brother, Fumi, who was planning to study cinema in America, and has just quit university in Japan. Also, the car Fumi was driving, was a Pontiac! Quite rare in Japan! All of us were going to Odaiba today. I had went to Odaiba during the night before, but never during the day. After arriving, Fumi treated us to spaghetti for lunch. We then went to SEGA Joypolis for quite a while. Around 7pm I needed to return to Shinjuku. Another OISP reunion! Junichi, Micchan, Yukako, James, Shinichi, and Takuya all came. We ate a little bit at Asian Kitchen but moved to a karaoke room to eat when Makiko and Udacchi came. When I called Chang Ki over the phone, Chang Ki was riding a boat back to Fukuoka! Shinichi and Takuya had to leave soon because of the last Shinkansen train, so we decided to call it a night. I was going to stay over at Micchan's house in Chiba tonight, which would be the best place because it is close to Narita. Junichi would also be following us because I needed help with luggage. Anyway, after the train doors closed and the train started moving, James began running after the train just like in the movies.

Erika, Fumi & I at Odaiba

Erika Jumping off a Train

Erika as the "Ring" Monster

Warren as the "Ring" Monster Attacking Erika

Ring

SEGA Joypolis

Takuya, Shinichi, Makiko, Junichi, Micchan, James, Yukako, I, Udacchi

DAY 40 - Chiba