Uchihara Mall

This last Monday was pretty rainy, so Erica and I decided to take the train to the big mall in Uchihara. The train ride was only two stops away so it only cost us a couple bucks each way. The mall was bigger than any of the ones in St. Louis, and surprisingly had a ton of stores for both guys and girls. Until now, I've noticed far more girls' stores than boys' stores in Japanese "departo"s.

    In every big Japanese shopping area, there is always a hyper-pink arcade area that is only for girls full of Purikura, or roughly, photo booths. After taking a photo with your group of 5 or more girlfriends (or one super reluctant boyfriend), you get to use a touch-screen with a bunch of sticker and color options to make yourselves look glamorous. Most of them even have options to make your eyes bigger or your hair brighter. Afterwards, the device spits out a few tiny stickers that you can cut up and stick on your stuff. With how good digital cameras are these days, the whole thing seems really silly. I of course, did it anyway.... the secret to looking cute is to put cat ears on everything.

The food court was very asian, save for the McDonalds, Mr. Donut, and KFC that were there. I ate at a place called Pepper Lunch which serves you a steaming hot skillet of steak and vegetables that are cooked right there at the table.

Japan is into the "collect 'em all" mentality more than I ever could imagine. Each one of these machines costs $1-2 and drops out a little trinket for you to play with, and each machine has 5-10 different guys you have to collect from it, meaning that if you really like a show or a character, you have to keep dropping in money until you have all the little key-chains or trinkets that you want. Anyone who learned about Japan by playing Shenmue remembers the two machines from the arcade that you bought useless items from.... well in Japan there are way, way more than 2 machines.

I ended up buying a over-the-shoulder bag for when I go walking or biking around town. In the US this would be considered a purse, and I would be gay. For now I usually have big coat pockets, but in the Summer I will probably need more storage space for beer or something. 

The mall was fun but dangerous. I kept seeing useless stuff I wanted to buy, and everything in the mall seemed so much more expensive than what I've seen back home. The belt-buckle below cost around 25 bucks!