TacoCat’s Travels #71 (Japan 2.0): Time Traveling and Sightseeing! 🗽

Hey Hive/Steemit!

If you didn't catch the last couple of posts, this series is about
our trip to Tokyo (again) way back in August 2016, when we went there
for a short international exchange program called Promoting Asian
Leadership (PAL) with Keio University! The program was a week long, but
we went there a few days ahead of time to explore and revisit our
favourite places.

So last week, we went on an exciting excursion to a very cool-looking building - the Fuji TV Headquarters!

We were then brought on a tour of the place where we visited the
HACHITAMA Spherical Observation Room, and a legit reality TV set!

It was actually super cool being on an actual set since we probably
won't be able to get that experience any other time in our lives. But I
guess the upside is that we won't have to endure the crazy hectic lives
of producers and newscasters either.

Anyway, I didn't get to finish the day in the last post since it was getting kinda long so here's the exciting conclusion!

8 August 2016. Sunday.

After the tour we were free to do what we want so Sean and I went
exploring Odaiba somemore! And since we've never been, we decided to go
check out Joypolis!

If you've never heard of it before, Joypolis is an amusement park
& a department store chain that was first opened in July 1994 in
Yokohama, Japan. Joypolis centers have since opened in several cities in
Japan and China with the parks featuring arcade games and amusement
rides based on Sega intellectual properties.

Tbh I had no idea what this building was but the SEGA logo drew me in and as a veteran gamer I had to check it out.

Turns out it's a large department store with an arcade of sorts and
some rides and attractions. But the first store we encountered was the
Coca Cola store (I was gonna write coke store but that's probably not a
good idea)!

We went in for a quick look and I saw this huuuuge Coke can!

But we were getting pretty hungry so we went to find something to snack on. And we found Taco Bell!

That was the first Taco Bell I've ever seen not just in Japan but in
my life, period. We don't have those in Singapore or in any of the other
countries I've visited. And since my IGN is TacoCat I was pretty
excited to try a legit taco.

The taco itself was pretty small even for 1 person, but it was
actually pretty tasty! The taco shell was kinda fragile though and I
wasn't sure how to eat it such that the filling didn't spill out. But it
was interesting experience that's for sure.

After that we were kinda satisfied for now so we took a walk around outside to enjoy the sunset.

And admire the Statue of Liberty!

Yes there is actually a Statue of Liberty in Tokyo! It was originally
erected in 1998 as a temporary tribute to Japan’s relationship with
France, but the statue was so popular she was made a permanent feature
in 2000. What's most interesting about the Odaiba Statue of Liberty is
that she is not the only one in Japan, she also has sisters in Shimoda
and Osaka.

I'm not sure about her sisters, but this particular Lady Liberty is 1/7th the size of the actual Statue in NYC!

It was cool seeing her irl though since I've never been to NY before
and have only ever seen her on TV shows. And I think what's special
about it is the view of her with Tokyo bay and the Rainbow bridge as the
backdrop, like this:

I wish I could've gotten that view with the sunset but alas the sun
was not in the right direction at the time. But it was still pretty
regardless.

We enjoyed a nice stroll around the observation deck, enjoying the
cool summer evening, before heading back inside to explore the real
Joypolis!

Located at the Decks shopping arcade, it offers three floors of arcade-style fun and even has an indoor roller coaster!

Actually now that I think about it I think we saw that we had to pay
to enter so we just left. Since we didn't know what there was inside
exactly and we didn't have much time left to enjoy it it didn't really
make much sense to pay.

But we did happen to find another very retro arcade!

I don't remember where this was exactly but it's probably nearby
Joypolis, and it was so cool! They had the retro tabletop arcade
machines and other old machines like from the 80s or so. I felt like I
just traveled back in time!

I definitely felt an air of nostalgia even though I don't recognise
most of the machines. I did see a few of them that I know though, like
Time Crisis!

They even had a giant version of the pirate game! I'm not sure how
this would work because I'm pretty sure him popping out of that huge
barrel would be a hazard so we didn't dare try it.

They even had a gift shop full of old cards and souvenirs and stuff.
We're both fans of old things like that and it was cool to see some
stuff we recognised.

And you know, play with props.

When we got done exploring the arcade, we went back out to the Decks and there was a pretty Christmas tree!

And a heart light installation!

Walking along the Decks we found another area that had old American style shops!

I guess they were mostly novelty souvenirs but it was still cool
seeing this kinda style. It's not normally something you'd see outside
of Disneyland.

They even had American diner-style restaurants and bars! You'd
typically only find those in Disneyland and Universal Studios that's for
sure.

After we looked around, we headed back out to enjoy the night view of the Statue of Liberty!

It was definitely a sight to behold. Sorry for the poor camera quality but I did my best.

After that we were getting tired from walking so we headed back
towards the station, where we saw the Fuji TV Headquarters again!

And man, at night it looks so much cooler! The entire building seems
to be covered by screens. And it's constantly moving; showing characters
like stick people running, and occasionally showing the time on the
entire building!

Sorry I couldn't get a full angle of the building because it's pretty huge, but the lights made it so pretty!

After admiring it for a bit, we took the train back to Tokyo Station and had dinner at our favourite gyudon place - Sukiya!

Sean decided to try a different don this time - one with unagi!

While I went with my usual cheese gyudon. Guaranteed to satisfy.

And satisfy it did! I was full after that meal, and after a long day of walking we headed back to the house for an early night.

That's all for now! Tune in next week where we celebrate Singapore's
birthday (and Sean's belated birthday) in the tallest tower in the
world!

Thanks for reading!

To find out more about me, check out my intro post here!

Check out my previous post in this series!

TacoCat’s Travels #70 (Japan 2.0): TV Stars for a Day! 📺

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