Kategori: Travels

During our last day in Tokyo we just hanged around Akihabara, because it is our favorite place, almost. We stumbled upon a Cat Café where you pay 200yen/10 minutes. I am highly allergic to cats, but I owned a cat once when I was in the Philippines. I wanted to go to a cat café, but not my boyfriend, because he didn’t want me to have a reaction. Given that it was 200 yen/10 minutes, I didn’t see any harm. I can survive inside a house for 30 minutes with a cat before I get my reaction.

It wasn’t until we were inside the café that we learned that we had to stay a minimum of 30 minutes. They give you wristbands that states what time you came.

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Vårens kuleste sneakers til henne

Just to be clear, just because it says café doesn’t mean we eat a meal here. There was a strictly no food or feeding of the cats. They actually have a lot of rules. First we had do remove our shoes, and wear indoor slippers. Then we had to disinfect our hands with antibac. Also one rule is to not pick up or carry any of the cats. We could pet them and take photos of them. Also we weren’t supposed to be so noisy, I think. Also, the cats looked healthy and well groomed.

We stayed there for exactly 30 minutes. I must admit 30 minutes went by quickly!

I did not get any allergic reactions at all! I actually find it weird that when I am in Asia, I am not allergic to cats, but when I am Norway I am highly allergic to them. I wonder why actually.

When I first visited Tokyo I wanted to go to the Robot Restaurant, however my brother and I didn’t have a lot of time. During my second visit to Tokyo I wanted to go there as well, however for some reason it went to my ”forgot to do list”. This year though I really wanted to experience it. My boyfriend was against it since it was weird and he has seen the weirdness through YouTube. I managed to change his mind after much convincing.

I booked our reservation around two or three weeks before our arrival. The entrance fee was 9000 Yen per person and meals were 1000 yen per person. Around 720 NOK per person with the meal.

We went there on a Friday on their latest show that started 9:45 PM. We were there about half an hour earlier though.

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20 bestselgere som garanterer nytelse

Payment was made at a place right in front of the restaurant. The walls were filled with pictures and signatures of known people who has visited the place. We could also borrow lockers for free!

This is the outside of the restaurant.

I had to take a photo, I am the one sitting on the red haired girl. That sounds so wrong.

We had to go down some stairs, and it was too much lights.

We were then lead to a waiting area. The waiting area reminded me of cruise boats. The velvet chairs and the live entertainers.

I think we sat there for 20 minutes before we were allowed to down to where the action is starting. On our tables our food was already there, also we sat at the front row.

The food we got was very good by the way, but kind of difficult to eat while watching an action packed show.

The meal we both ordered was grilled boneless short ribs. A little too difficult to see, that’s because when we could open our bento boxes, the show already started. You see we had to wait sometime before we could open our meal.

We had some breaks during the show. I think we got 15 minutes break about three times.

Anyways, here are some photos from the Robot Restaurant.

The show was very entertaining! The performers were great! It wasn’t as weird as I expected, but then again I have watched some Japanese shows, movies and anime where they can be as random as this show. It is still an experience though.

Also, when we were on our way to leave the place, like the last floor before the exit. We were met by women in bras and thongs, well they were standning at the door talking to some men. We found out a few minutes later when we were picking up our things from the locker that there is a strip club right beside Robot Restaurant, so that explains it .

Before coming to Japan, we booked a MariCar tour. MariCar is where you can go-kart in the streets of Tokyo. We wanted to try it last year, unfortunately my boyfriend did not have a licence that time nor did we have an international drivings permit.

This year though, both of us have a licence and we did a research on the requirements. We booked a tour to be done the day after we arrive in Tokyo. We booked it the day after our arrival so that we could see more of Tokyo or maybe see someting that interests us, and visit those places,

One of the requirements for MariCar is an International Drivers Permit. Without it, well you cannot drive. We fixed it here in Norway by going to KNA. KNA and NAF issues international drivers permit 🙂 For Japan it is the Geneva convention variant.

Our booking was for 2 PM and was to last for three hours.

This was our course. Photo borrowed from Maricar.com

We went to Shinagawa around 12 so that we may have a good margin. We actually got lost a bit and then had to take a detour to eat lunch. We arrived at the place around 1:45PM 😁

It wasn’t hard to find the place, since we had Google Maps as our guide, also we saw other people in costumes, so we followed them.

Also the entrance is full of go-karts 😜

Chosing a costume was a bit difficult, there were so many to chose from. I would also like to add that we were only three people driving, we thought we would be a big group. It was only I, my boyfriend and our guide Ryan (really nice guy). It was okay to be three people 🙂

Our MariCar tour was fun! We had some our pictures taken on some places. I drove on the wrong side of the road, since they drive the opposite side in Japan. Also you feel like a celebrity with people waving and taking photos at you, in full blown Yoshi costume! We had some breaks by the way!

Three hours went by so fast! It was fun and we did get to see places we visited afterwards.

We paid 16 000 YEN or around 1700NOK for two people! It is not that expensive and the experience is worth it! I think I would want to try it again. NExt time though I would maybe bring a GoPro that doesn’t get low on battery fast. I think my GoPro had low battery in the middle of a three hour tour, such a bummer.

For those who are interested just visit their site MariCar . You can also chose a different starting place, we just chose Shinagawa 😄

Here is my Maricar Video 🙂

If you walk along Takeshita Street in Harajuku, there are creperies on almost every corner. There are a lot of crepes to choose from and they are quite cheap.

Before we left for Tokyo I learned of Marion Crepes from Running Man. Running Man is a variety show from South Korea, but they did a segment where they were in South Korea. Through the show I learned that Marion Crepes is the oldest creperie in Harajuku.

Marion Crepes was fairly easy to spot. It is, if I am not mistaken the only blue creperie store among the many pink creperie stores.Not pictured, but in front of Marion Crepes is another creperie 😛

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Jakkene som får frem vårfølelsen

There are a lot of crepes to choose from, as I have mentioned earlier. So picking a crepe to try is kind of hard. Below is some of the varieties you can chose from. One thing I like about Japan is that you get a visualisation of their menu with their models.After looking at the menu for a few minutes, we decided on which crepes to try. My boyfriend chose the Brownie Crunch (no. 92) for 600 YEN, while I chose Green Tea Milk choco brownie (no. 88) for 500 YEN. Converted to Norwegian kroner they cost 44 NOK and 36 NOK! Now that’s cheap.

Here is the brownie crunch

While here is my Green tea milk choco brownie

Unfortunately, I didn’t get to taste the brownie crunch, but my boyfriend said it was delicious. My green tea milk choco brownie crepe was delicious!

I do recommend trying crepes when you’re in Harajuku 🙂

We decided to use AirBnb for this trip as we did last year. We used the same place as we did last year because we really liked the place. Checking in was quite easy, since our host just left the keys in the mailbox instead of having to meet us at the station.

We lived in Koiwa which was in Edogawa ward.

Here is our apartment.

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Jakkene som får frem vårfølelsen

This is the living roomWe got some welcome snacks from our hostHere is the kitchenHere is our bedroomHere is the toilet! Our toilet has these fancy Japanese buttons.This is the bathroom. The washing machine doubles as a dryer as well.This is the bathroom. The whole room is a bathroom. You can actually get the whole room wet. You’re supposed to shower first before entering the bath tub, hence why the shower head is not in the bath tub like they do in the west. The bathtub is quite small compared to it’s western counterparts. Also on the wall there are these buttons which regulates the temperature of the water. It is also throught this buttons you fill the tub with water, my boyfriend was the one filling the tub with water. I only know how to turn of the filling of the water. It also gives you an indication or alarm when to turn of the water. Also there is also a button thing in the kitchen, so you can turn off the water while on the kitchen.I forgot to mention maybe that we also got a pocket wi-fi. Our host left us with a pocket wi-fi. Pocket wi-fi’s are really handy in Japan. Free wi-fi from restaurants and such is quite a hassle if you ask me. We have to log in to this and that, but with pocket wi-fi you have wi-fi with you everywhere you go. The downside of it is you have to have a pocket charger with you in case it runs out of battery.

Also we had airconditioning in our apartment, which was great since it was quite hot in Japan when we were there.

I really want to go back to Japan already 😀