Okay so Christmas came and went. So did year 2011 end and 2012 start. Bye bunny, Hello Dragon etc ohyeah.
Also my mom and sisters came, were here two wonderful weeks and then left. Same with my friend who came a bit over a week ago and left today. As a souvenir she probably gave me a flu, I dunno. It's not cool to be sick now that this exchange is starting to end and I got to finish all the school work that been delayed/procrastined by myself/holidays/etc.
Just to start this few weeks of furious updates, telling about trips, living here, other things... Let me tell you about manga cafes. To me, they are those fancy little things that exist between all the flashy neon signs there are smaller ones that usually have a picture of a frog, Kaeru, or a golden fish, Manboo. You usually pay by the hour (8 hours is somewhere around 1400 yen), and you get a booth that has a big, comfy chair/cushioned floor, tv and a computer. They also have showers, toilet and a drink bar. Some places also have Playstation 2. The point of these cafes is of course manga (I've read only one manga when I've been in Manboo), just endless and EEEEEEEEENDLESS shelves of manga. Usually you can always find the most basic manga from every manga cafe and loads more. There's a lot of funny ones that you browse through and laugh at when you wait to get into the toilet. Isn't that nice?
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| Manga cafe from above and inside the box |
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| Loads of manga... sideways |
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| And the box. This is meant for one or two. |
The staff in these places lacks the knowledge of English but they are helpful to exhausted customers who usually come at around 1-3am to play games, roam the internet, read, watch tv or sleep. The last activity mentioned is the most popular one, I can assure that. You will have this horrible, tired feeling inside you, your body aches and your clothes smell like tobacco but HEY! You at least wake up inside, near toilets and the internet and you had the possibility to drink liquids that are non-alcoholic beverages all the time you were in there. Why I'm talking about manga cafes now when I should be talking about holiday stuff?
It's because I spent one night during Christmas/New Year's in those. Why? To do all these beautiful and fancy things guidebooks tell you about, you need one thing and one thing only: money and I did not possess this beautiful thing nor I saw need for it.
This Christmas/New Year’s would’ve been very different (but maybe less fun?). I would’ve just stay in funky hotel and had boring breakfast there, went only to tourist spots 24/7, eaten all the best foods around Tokyo without finding the best place…. you know, those materialistic things we’ve been so awfully accustomed to, just conditioned to be like that...
Next time it's going to be more about this funky Christmas C:
'Til next time!
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