28 October 2018
Nakano not Nagano
Exploring the sites and sounds of the Nakano Broadway
As suggested above, I was many hours too early to check into the hotel however the new trainee on the desk greeted me with 'I hope you are an English speaker because I am a trainee and need to practice, good morning sir, how are you today?'.
She was actually a very good English speaker but also very nervous, and extremely disappointed that my room was not ready despite basically no room in the history of the Japanese hotel industry every being ready until exactly 3pm.
After some frantic concern about my health and wellbeing, she charged around from the counter and attached tags to my bags with an elaborate system of knots and then physically tied them to a hand rail on the wall, before telling me 'I will take special attention to ensure your bags are very safe under my care'. She then held the bow as I backed away slowly to start my day.
At first I thought I might just hang around Ueno, a part of Tokyo I am very familiar with and like a lot, but then I decided the subway station was the best chance for a bathroom after a gallon of coffee, so I found a random station and headed down.
The map suggested I could go direct to Nakano, famous for its broadway and collection of toys favored by obese people with facial hair that seems to grow in sporadic patterns. Excellent! I had been there once before, on my trip when I decided to fly to Japan for a weekend, today I had more time to spend, except I got off at the wrong station and then had to walk a couple of kilometres to get there.
Here is Ueno. Cloudy today. I messed with the white balance of this photo slightly as I am still learning about my new camera. This is one of my favourite areas of Tokyo, its a great collection of food, dodgy African guys selling fake sneakers, electronics shops, traditional shops selling wax stamp seals required if you want to send a fax, pawn stores, porn stores and the occasional store that does not appear to be selling anything at all, those are too exclusive for me to dare enter.
On my walk to Nakano (not Nagano, thats a long walk), I passed this excellent sign that features a random fish to help you accept that your only method of escape during an earthquake will be closed down. This photo is a huge crop, I dont need a zoom.
I managed to find a random temple along the way. This is not hard to do in Japan. I have no idea what kind this is or what it is called. It has lots of fancy cars parked on the gravel to prevent westerners from taking photos that make Japan look like a temple filled blissful paradise instead of a Porsche Panamera parking lot. The orange witches hat makes this a truly fantastic photo.
Here is Lord Rayden from Mortal Kombat. I cut the top off his bo staff with my poor framing.
Behind the temple is a cemetery. I dont know if it is ok to take photos of them or not, so I did. Nice light. This is my second best cemetery in Asia photo, I took a better one a the fishing village in Tainan, Taiwan. Actually I thought about that a bit more, I also took a good one in Hong Kong. So this is the worst cemetery photo I ever took.
They also have these cool series of Buddhas or whatever wearing their red jockey caps. Entire mountains have been vandalised with these things.
If I had of got off at the correct station I would never have got a free sumo lesson. I looked a bit weird being the only fully grown man participating with these kids, but the instructors didnt seem to mind. Or did they? They were yelling, possibly at me, I couldnt tell.
What I do know is that I absolutely DESTROYED the 8 year old girl that challenged me.
They all bowed down before me.
Here is the main street running through Nakano. So colorful. The sun was coming out from behind the clouds.
Nearby was a market selling dolphin chunks on skewers. Quite salty, I think they must have soaked the flesh in sea water.
Next up we have a local performance of the Japanese epic, Our great nation shall rise again and wipe all other nations off the face of the earth. I got sidetracked here, but as I was typing this the imperial army went past my hotel with a cavalcade of 10 armored cars flying huge rising sun flags with much MUCH louder loud speakers than I have ever heard before.
This is the actual Nakano Broadway, it is much like the other covered shopping streets of Japan. I have no doubt I will photograph more of them before this trip is over.
Further proof I was at Nakano, not Nagano.
I remember this store from the last time I was here. An entire store dedicated to secondhand headphones, including in ear monitors. An amazingly unhygienic concept, but one I approve of. They let you try them! They even supply moist disinfectant tissues which are completely ineffective but everyone gets to pretend they are safe from the dreaded ear rot.
The second hand watch shop goes on and on forever. If you like watches, come here.
I am not going to Kyoto on this trip, and I dont need to. Torii gates smack bang in Nakano. Very low, I hit my head on each one. What is inside this height limited archway you may ask? Secondhand manga girl action figures showing their panties. Just like in Kyoto.
The creepiest photo of the day is the doll spare parts shop. Much like the other stores it goes on and on forever.
I tried for some artistic blurring. Not bad.
Nakano is 4 levels of 100 shops per level of stuff like this. Most of it secondhand. Theres secondhand electronics and camera shops too. If you want to buy something interesting, go here.
On the return journey I decided to get off at the station before Ueno, my hotel is in between the stations. This provided me with another nice view.
I like colors. So I found some colorful flowers to take a photo of and see what my colors look like. Quite colorful I think. Do you also like colors?
My tiny hotel. Its an APA. I stayed here before. It is fine. Also very cheap. I like short sentences.
And now photo of the day! The view if I lean out of the emergency exit from my 12th floor hotel room is very excellent. Very very excellent. I can keep an eye on the new imperial army from here.