If You Find Yourself in Tokyo

Input
1

HERE ARE YOUR GENERAL TOKYO TIPS FOREVER

Go To the World Trade Building in Hamamatsucho
Get a drink/coffee outside of Hamamamatsucho station. Buy a 600 yen or so ticket. Get on the elevator. Sit down on a wonderful couch. Enjoy the best view of Tokyo because you can actually enjoy it. Others will say the free view from The Shinjuku Metropolitan Building or the pay viewings from Sunshine City, Tokyo Tower, or Sky Tree. This is the best one because there are couches and it is less crowded and you can just enjoy looking at the city and enjoying your drink. Read a book. It is a perfect place to relax.
UPDATE 2018: they fucking built another building right in from of the view of tokyo the fuckers. You can still see Tokyo Bay but that was half the reason to come here fuck.

Mikado in Takadanobaba
Assuming you can find Akihabara on a map you don’t need me telling you to go there. You do need me telling you to go to Mikado. Go out the one exit turn left past the traintracks and turn left again and walk south along the tracks. There it is play some god damn video games. Maybe there will be an old man street fighter tournament. There will definitely be some treasures to experience. Maybe plug in your headphones for an ideal shooting experience. Maybe you can make some friends and all play Darius Burst as it is meant to be.

Don’t do anything you wouldn’t do in your native country
This includes taking pictures of strangers or kids. I’ve done it before, but it is 2016. It is fucking weird and creepy. If you’re actively trying to not be a jerk-off you are going to be fine. Treat people like people.

If you have money to burn
You can get a helicopter ride from Narita to Shinjuku. This is on my bucket list because it probably rules if you don’t get airsick.

Shimo-Kitazawa
This area is incredibly confusing to walk around and even worse to describe where anything in it is. It’s home to used clothes, a huge Village Vanguard, cafes, and restaurants. There was a large threat for a while that it was going to gentrify and just start sucking. That hasn’t happened (yet). The used clothes stores are a mix of brand new shit for less than new but still stupidly expensive and stuff that was bulk bought from American Thrift Stores. Which if you’re a 110 pound 5’8" guy suddenly you can find stuff that fits. Also some of the used clothes will have a gothic lolita section and as a straight guy I get to admire the outfits and artistry without being a total creepo going in a real Lolita store.

Oedo Monogatari Onsen
This is in Odaiba. You cannot go if you have any tattoos. It is a public bathhouse so you’re gonna be nude around a bunch of your gender both young and old. It is kitschy. It is also kind of cool. It is the friendliest and easiest way to get the bathhouse experience without a local’s help in Tokyo. It’s also a decent bathhouse and relaxing. My prefered (insane) method is getting in the cold water until I can’t stand it and then getting in the hottest water. Repeat 3 or 4 times. Then go drink a Coke and eat some slightly-overpriced cafeteria ramen.

Ame-yoko
Ame-yoko south of Ueno Station is pretty cool. It is alive. It’s a food market. It actually has a foreigner element. It has very expensive jeans. Just walk around and see what you can.

Go to Ueno Park in the morning then head to ame-yoko and walk along the tracks and you will with a tiny bit of effort end up in Akiba! Woahhhhh. Video games.

I have deliberately left off this list Shibuya, Harajuku, Asakusa, Akihabara, Ginza and other places that occupy every internet list of things to do in Tokyo. I tried to give you stuff that is just slightly off the beaten path and is worthwhile. It feels weird to suggest any specific bar, restaurant, cafe because the city has so god damn many of them (also I don’t drink (lol)).

Now I don’t have to write this list every 3 months. (I will still send you my email list if you ask.)

Update 2018
Fuckkkkkk there are so many tourists in every main city of Tokyo now. Nakano, Shinjuku, Shibuya, Ginza, Harajuku are impossibly thick with them.

15 Likes
2

after I got a tat I was like ‘oh no I can’t go to baths oh wait I’m trans lol’

2 Likes
3

As a now more or less regular visitor, I like those suggestions!

4

Respect.

5

Rudie, send me your email list, please!

I’ve Privatemessaged you

6

Daytrips From Tokyo

Mount Takao - 50 minutes from shinjuku
Depending on the season it is crowded but in 2018 everything in Tokyo is too crowded! So who knows. It is a lovely easy hike up a mountain through a beautiful forest with streams and some little shrines.

image
27153E1A-638C-4984-9147-D8B566A6A5B7.jpeg4032×3024 1.23 MB

Enoshima - 90 minutes from Shinjuku
I went to it the first time this year and it’s great! You get black sand beaches and incredible view of Mount Fuji on a good day and a cool Island with a lighthouse and shrines and a shopping street and little cafes and too many people! I want to live here if it wasn’t clearly a deathtrap to anyone that has lived on the coast!

Kawasaki - 45 Minutes from Shinjuku
It’s a giant mall/shopping town but it home to WAREHOUSE the Kowloon Themed Arcade that is just as cool as you think it is. Also in one of the malls you can play Mario Kart VR and it is also great! And less tourists and more locals for a different flavor of very crowded shopping city.

Nokogiriyama - 3 hours from Shinjuku
Look this is in the middle of nowhere Chiba. The train there runs once an hour or you can travel past Yokohama and take a ferry across Tokyo bay there. But it is 100% worth it. It is one of the best things I’ve ever done. There are a lot of cool things there but the main thing is you travel around a mountain path for an hour to get to a really fucking big buddha.

image

5 Likes
7

Rudie’s Hot Takes on the main tourist spots in 2018

Shibuya - every tourist gotta take a vlog crossing Shibuya crossing and I want to tackle every one. Tower Records is cool!

Harajuku - It’s just too crowded!

Shinjuku - The Metropoltian free observation is alright.

Kabukicho - 10 years ago this place was marked in red on maps and now it is the friendliest red light district. Lots of sex shops your Aunt can ignore while going to the Robot Restaurant.

Ueno - Going from Ueno Park in the morning down Ame-yoko to Akiba is a pretty cool one day of Tokyo gotta say.

Asakusa - The shops are way better than i remember them being. The temple isn’t my favorite.

Akiba - is healthier now than it was. But the Game shops are being canabalized by tourists. If you are coming for that you are seeing a shadow of it’s former glory. If you are coming for anime and maid cafes and nerd shit it’s pretty good. Visit Natsuge in Dark Akiba (open only on weekends).

Tokyo Station - is hell to navigate and cool to look at.

Odaiba - Joyopolis is overpriced but right next door is Odaiba Ichome in the mall which is a cool kitschy Edo period thing with a retro arcade and a takoyaki food court. And just like everywhere else Shopping!

Ginza - Unless you have very high end fashion taste there is very little reason to go here.

BONUS: Yokohama Station has an El Torito on top of a building so you can have cheap Mexican Food and look out across Kanto. I love it. It was built for me!

7 Likes
8

This list is really excellent, it makes me want to go back to Tokyo. I am by no means a Tokyo expert but I want to add a few minor things that I found particularly worth doing in Tokyo.

Nakano Broadway is an Otaku Warren and an essentially repulsive place, but the architecture of the arcade* leading from Nakano Station to the mall is pretty spectacular and worth seeing as a cultural experience. The mall itself is like an anime-based episode of hoarders.

Koenji is just down the line from Nakano, and offers a much more charming and twee sightseeing journey. Might make a good palate cleanser.

Jimbocho station is surrounded by venerable bookstores. I would say it’s worth doing some window shopping even if you can’t read Japanese. It has a real nice feel to it.

*Not a video arcade. Like a giant glass covered walkway thing.

2 Likes
9

One of the bookstores in Jimbocho is known for double duty as a pretty great curry restaurant. I believe it even got a reference in Persona 5! Don’t remember the name though because I last went there 6 years ago.

4 Likes
10

it’s now 2019 and i found myself in tokyo for two weeks with no plans, so thanks for all of this

11

Hey sup wat up

12

Whoa hey yeah this thread is good I will go to these places thanks! Also hey maybe we should hang out while dedede is here (if youd like!!)

13

id be up for meeting people if they’re around :slight_smile:

14

Have you tried the new Densha De Go in the arcades yet? I gave it a shot when I was in Tokyo last year, but had no idea what I was doing. I think I accidentally quit out to the main screen before even starting a train and lost my money :stampstampstamp:

15

It may be very important to go to Shin-Okubo on a weekend and battle for pavement space with potato-munching teen couples getting their Kool Korea on

1 Like
16

I want to make “For me It was Tuesday” but tomorrow is Tuesday and I’m in shin-okubo and oh god the city has changed so much in the last three years and I just want to hang a sign that says “Stay Home We’re Full”.

1 Like
17

I last went to Japan with my dad in 2012 after I finished my minor in Japanese language. The trains alone were worth it. It was wonderful, even during the third week of December.

I suspect visiting now would be significantly more difficult now that I have barely elementary verbal and like 100 kanji left. My partner and brother have never been and would like to. Is this an advisable international group trip? I was pretty stressed out translating and navigating for my dad but it might actually be less stressful now that I won’t give the impression of better Japanese than I have.

18

I haven’t played it yet! I definitely will soon though. Its high on my list of things to do

19

And what if I find myself in Osaka, huh? What then???

(I’m actually going to Osaka in two weeks)

20

Based off my brief Osaka experience.

  • Kyoto is like 40 minutes away
  • Took a dump in Osaka Castle
  • Umeda Sky Building is dope
3 Likes