After about a 30 minutes ride on the Keisei Skyliner, I eventually reached Nippori station. After exiting the station I was heavily greeted by all the normal sights and sounds of an urban Japanese neighborhood. Signs of restaurants and small shops were scattered all over the place and I quickly became excited about the whole situation of being in Japan, but keeping my mind on track, I opened up my maps app and started walking towards the home I will be staying in. The first thing I noticed on the walk was that there technically aren't any sidewalks. You just kind of walk on the side of the road, but since Japanese cars are quite compact they don't take up so much space on the roads. This small detail was something that really amused me since sidewalks in the US are now huge to me. I think within 15-20 minutes, I reached my home in East Nippori (I'm using AirBnB since it is a cheap alternative to stay abroad). I quickly found my room thanks to my host, Aoi-san. When I opened the door to my room my expectations were met and it was as small as I expected. I have simple shared amenities such as a shower, sink/mirror and a washer so I feel pretty set for normal hitori-gurashi (living alone) life. Anticipating everything outside of my home I quickly got my stuff settled in and headed out towards Nippori station once more to go anywhere I still can.
The time was about 6:00 PM.
I bought a Suica at the station and loaded 10000 yen on to the card and rode the Yamanote line towards Akihabara since it is only about 2 stations away from Nippori station. To be honest, I'm not quite sure if going to Akihabara was the best choice because I once I walked out of the station, I got blasted with culture shock and everything I knew up to now was irrelevant. Where am I? Is this really a dream? Signs and advertisements were plastered all over buildings and so many people were all over the place in and out of buildings. At that moment, I really thought that I wasn't living in reality. It had only been half a day since I was in North America and where I was now was completely different to anything I have ever experienced before. Starting to make my way around, I kept a beaming smile on my face as I absorbed everything around me into my conciousness. I really couldn't believe anything I saw. It didn't make sense that I was pretty much in the utopia that my high school self would have cherished so much (I guess you could say I was more of an otaku when I was a high schooler and middle schooler). I started walking in and out of buildings, taking elevators and escalators up and down to see everything. So many anime related goods and things could be seen from any spot in Akihabara. I immediately recognized stores like Don Quixote, Mandarake, Card Kingdom and many others once I saw the signs. It truly was intense shock to me as these kinds of stores do not exist at all in North America (except for Hawaii, they got like one of each store luckily). I spent the next 4 hours just taking it all in. I knew I'd regret it later but because of the way I felt at that moment I couldn't even break out my phone just take some simple pictures of my surroundings. If I were sane, I'd probably have bought tons of goods and took many pictures of everything but my current self couldn't buy anything or take pictures of anything due to the pure amusement of my mind being shocked by the vast quantity of stores and people. I didn't even get something to eat even though I haven't eaten since the plane ride! At this point I started to assume that the rest of Tokyo was going to be insane. This one night of day zero really made me transcend to another level. I could feel the limits of imagination and reality starting to mesh together become one, as it seems very achievable in a place like Tokyo. After I knew enough was enough and the feeling of exhaustion became apparent, I decided to head home and finally get some rest. Day Zero was insane.
This was what I first saw after walking out of Akiba station (I uploaded it vertically, but its on its side...)
Recently released MG Psycho Zaku (Gundam Thunderbolt) at Yodobashi Camera. I really don't know what to do about my gunpla situation...
I'm not really into Nanoha but this EK hatch was executed quite well
I expected there to be a few itasha in Akiba, this Honda Beat was a nice surprise
