Tokyo 2019 - Day 3, Akihabara

Hello everyone and welcome back to Tiro Finale for Day 3 of our Tokyo 2019 trip. After a tiring Day 2, we decided to take it easy for the third day by arranging a visit to what is possibly the best post-Wonder Festival locale, Akihabara. Not only is Akihabara a great way to unwind as we browse through the myriad of hobby stores at our own pace, it is also the perfect place to find Wonder Festival exclusive figures being re-sold at exorbitant rates. In a sense, it had almost become a tradition for me to visit Akihabara the day after every Wonder Festival.

Being no stranger to Akihabara, I decided to take a different route this time playing the role of the guide to the rest of our party. As a large majority of the hobby stores in Akibahara only opened at 10AM, this meant there was plenty of time for us to get a good night's rest and hearty breakfast before heading into the Electric City. The first few places we were scheduled to hit up were the lesser shopping venues but, places that were great to browse nonetheless. 

These included shops like Kotobukiya and Yodobashi Camera, both great places for hobby goods that I feel are often overlooked by visitors. The former (Kotobukiya) offers one of the best displays of hobby goods from a wide variety of manufacturers including Kotobukiya themselves. Surprisingly, it is also one of the very few places to actually get rare Kotobukiya merchandise too, many of which are often sold out elsewhere. Meanwhile, Yodobashi Camera is a fantastic place for more mainstream hobbies such as Gunpla or video games. If you had not experienced a Japanese video games department before, Yodobashi Camera is the prime place to take it all in with almost every game and accessory imaginable on sale. 

It was not until after lunch where we decided to hit up the more shopping heavy hobby stores, places where rare goods and real deals are more often than not going to successfully convince you to part ways with your hard earned cash. Stores such as Amiami, Mandarake and much of Akiba Culture Zone were best left to the latter part of the day. After all, you would not want to be bringing around a large bag of premium figures only for it to bump, or worse, fall down and have the box damaged right?

As one of our party members was still nursing a foot injury, we made sure to make regular stops and breaks. While this is not something that I normally do, I found it to be a very nice change of pace especially since I discovered many new stopover spots I never once realized existed despite my multiple visit to Akiba prior. One of which was the Fukishimaya Tasting Market, a small grocery store located at the ground floor of the UDX Crossfield Building. From the outside it may look just like any other grocery store but, the interior housed some rather unique artisanal offerings including these bottles of cider and lemonade made with spring water! The best part was the benches and tables outside for patrons of the market which proved to be a lovely break as we cooled down with some fizzy lemonade on a warm sunny day. 

As the sun began to set and the temperature began to cool down, the next best place to visit were the arcades. Because many of the hobby stores in Akiba close at 8PM, you should aim to complete most of your browsing and shopping by then. The way I do it is to make a quick round of all the main shops I intend to visit while make a list of anything in particular I would like to get. Only towards the end of the day, as I am about to leave, do I head to each particular store to pick up what I want. When the hobby shops are all closed then, would be the perfect time to hit the arcades as those are open up to 11PM. 

Whilst in the arcade, it was unsurprising to see a large number of the crane machines offering Love Live merchandise, especially Mega Jumbo Nesoberi(s). What did take me by surprise was the fact that half of the Love Live merchandise were actually those of the core 9 members of Muse! I am well aware that the 9th anniversary of Love Live is just around the corner but, I genuinely had not expected the original Love Live to have the pull it once commanded. The best part was, all the machines were arranged accordingly (as we can see with NozoEli above) and even Muse's logo had a lovely rainbow background.

After all that browsing, shopping and walking, it was finally time to settle down for dinner. Instead of going to my usual tried and tested places, I decided to veer off course to head to a popular Akiba establishment that you would probably be surprised knowing I had not visited before, Coco's. This particular chain in Akiba is perhaps one of the more popular ones among otakus having spawned multiple collaborations over with various series including Love Live. Being a family restaurant of course, the food was nothing much to write home about. Seeing as it was summer, there was actually kakigori (shaved ice) on the summer special menu and this was one particularly delightful treat that helped to close out the day. 

I think the true mark of a place that your truly love is one that you can visit over and over again without ever getting tired of. For me, Akihabara is just that place. While it is a pity that I would have to wait until the next year before returning once more, I already look forward to it especially in hopes of finding something new that I never knew was there before. With that, Day 3 of our Tokyo 2019 trip comes to a close. Day 4 is coming up and is actually a misnomer as we take a detour to Kyoto for the day. Stay tuned for that! Until then, thank you so much for reading and have yourself a wonderful day ahead!