Back from the Land of the Rising Sun, we saved some of the best pics for last. These give a good GHOST in the SHELL feel of our trip.
An alley in Akihabara.

Another Akihabara alley. The men in the foreground give this view interest.

An Akihabara crosswalk.

Main drag in Shinjuku.

An alley in Shinjuku.

We had quite an adventure in Chiba yesterday. We decided to randomly hop off the train on the way to last hotel. We wanted to see "everday life" in Japan. Everyday life didn't want to see us.

Chiba is what we wanted. and because of that there wasn't the tourist hand-holding we found in Tokyo proper. We were stared at quite a bit and Chiba-ites weren't interested in helping out a couple of backpacking gaijin. The monoculture really showed. Were we far enough from Tokyo to be unfamiliar, yet close enough to be a bother? Would the landscape become more amiable in areas further out and less traveled? Only more travel will tell.

At least the train went underground.


To let everyone know, we're planning closing presentations with thoughts and scenery we haven't had a chance to convey.

Shinjuku was cool. Being Sunday morning, there were quite a few drunks and lots of guitars on the street. Crows gave the grittiest part of Tokyo we've seen yet an eerie feel. We kicked it till midday and then headed for Harujuku. To be up front, the cosplay was underwhelming. Lots of tourists taking pictures of melancholy girls. Pikachu was cool though. As was bland's beard sensei.

Our adventures continued as we found a furry supply store.

bland then proceeded to get bent on some kind O2.

Finally, we hit up Taitoland when we came back home to Akihabara. dual played the fantastic (for obvious reasons) 1996 shooter, Sengoku Ace II.

This pic is for bland's wife. Up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B, A, Start.

Actually, getting to Odaiba is really easy - with a little luck. Odaiba is where every Power Ranger fight was ever filmed. We hit the big ferris wheel first. We took in the skyline and contemplated man's existence.

Toyotaland was pretty cool. Dig the "people mover" and dual's next ride.

One of us was going to try a burger with an egg on it, and bland won that honor.

We're off to Shinjuku and Harujuku today. Cosplay babes, here we come!

We arrived in Akihabara from Ginza and wanted to dump our backpacks _bad_. Thankfully, the Capsule Inn allowed us to check in during cleaning hours. Unencumbered, we traipsed around Electric Town and found ample amounts of pron. Lots and lots of anime, manga and "action figure" pron. Daaammn.
bland chillin' before we leave Ginza.

The toilets in our hotel were to die for. The three buttons on the controller are for the in-built bidet. One for the trunk, one for the "front," as in not applicable to either of us, and the STOP button... You WILL need that one, as the jet had impeccable aim.

bland poned the local Taiko Drum Master. There was even a small audience gathered towards the end chanting, "Go, gaijin! Go, gaijin! Go!"

Here's dual in front of his favorite store.

We finally found the Linux Café, which has nothing to do with Linux anymore apparently, and enjoyed a smallish 2600 meeting. Four total in attendance - two expats and us. We spoke more of Japanese culture than technology. Good guys, good meeting.

A pictorial run-down of yesterday's adventure.
bland has a thing for vending machines for some reason.

This one is for dual's dad.

dual's lappy at Apple Store Ginza.

A new pic for bland's Ginza GDM theme. And this time he's in it!

The pachinko parlor where ¥1000 yen disappeared. The flash on their site is really cool.

And finally, dual chillin' Nihon style.

We made it to Tokyo and it's surprisingly easy to get around. When you know where you're going. Pics forthcoming. In other news, bland has found that there is a very common myth going around America. bland is 6'3" tall and everyone laughed and laughed that he would be "Easy to see with all the short Japanese people." This is FALSE! There was a MAD-HOT chick who was every bit as tall as me... uh, him. My "mantastic" beard has drawn far more stares than my height.

Thanks to our new friend, Chris, our itinerary has improved.
N of 7/06: Ginza, Tokyo Dome
D of 7/07: Akihabara, 2600 Meeting
N of 7/07: Capsule hotel
D of 7/08: Odaiba
N of 7/08: ?
D of 7/09: Harujuku
N of 7/09: ?
D of 7/10: Nikko
N of 7/10: Airport hotel
D of 7/11: Travel
Here's a map of our destinations. Just look for the red squares.

Whether it's because of Off The Hook or not, hackers have a thing for trains. bland and I are no different. Riding Japan Railways was a definite highlight of our trip. As bland says, complex systems in general intrigue hackers.
Here's one of our JR passes.

Here's a wanted poster at Narita station.


Here are a couple of phone cards - a KDDI Super World Card and an NTT card.

Here's a KDDI Super World Card phone at Narita International.


Here's a great page that summarizes telephone service in Japan:
http://www.jnto.go.jp/eng/arrange/essential/telephone.html
And you gotta love Perl...
Number::Phone::JP - Validate Japanese phone numbers

Check the pics...
The ultimate bank of pay phones at Ueno Station.

We had some time to kill in Shinjuku before anything opened, so bland and I hit a 24-hour cyber cafe. Until bland found the "switch-to-English" key, using their boxes was an adventure.

Will they never stop!?


A couple of notes and a couple of pics...
Toll-free, or freedial, calls are 0120 numbers.
KDDI phone cards are assuredly more reasonable (and private) than AT&T credit card calling. Bought a couple of ¥1000 cards at am/pm. Hit up an NTT gray phone, dial 0055, then 81#cardnumber# (# is pronounced sharp here). Sound quality is great at a little less than ¥50 per minute.
Big fake pay phone at Sega Ripoffolis.

Saw this on a scooter in Odaiba. Could mean anything.


Really the only thing we've done so far is place a credit card call through AT&T - 005-39-111. Hello, NSA!
This is the first pay phone we encountered.

bland checking out dial tone.