Super Akihabara

We visited Akihabara to take a look at Tokyo's techno central -- but really, we went there for our late lunch and to escape the hustle and bustle of the playground called, Harajuku. Lunch was good at Seizeria, a Western style resto with good food at a good price.

Max ordered the carbonara while D and I shared the pasta and pizza. Best of all, drinks were refillable from Colas to juices to beer to cappuccinos!

Spinach and garlic pasta

After that, we entered one of the area's biggest stores, Yodobashi Camera, and Ivy and I ultimately got hooked on all the photo paper choices that were available, from Y300 for a pack of 50 sheets 4x6 to Y12,000 for a pack of 12 sheets A3 photopaper! It's a photographer's dream to have these many choices and so readily available! Not only do they have paper, they sell photo matting of different sizes, wedding albums, portfolio albums and so on, and so forth. Everything I might think I need (but don't have the money to buy hehe).

I also got to hold and try some Canon lenses i would never have imagined of even seeing for real.

But the best surprise of the night was something that involved the Nintendo DS.

Earlier we saw this small group of four young men and a lady by the side of the street with a sign that reads something like "Pokemon Challenge". They were just standing there, looking down at their DS-es, clustered behind a beat up cardboard invitation. So we thought that was a bit out of the box but paid them no mind.

Then, before leaving for the Ueno station, we saw a cordoned off part of the side walk beside the mall with a huge Dragon Quest IX banner hanging on one of the mall's pillar. There was a large group of about 40 people -- boys, men in suits, women, etc. -- standing, sitting, leaning or in whatever position they might find comfortable but just staring (playing) with their Nintendo DS consoles. No idle chatter, no girlish giggles nor boys kidding around. This was serious business. It's a quest!

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