Day 5 :
Good Morning! Woke up early as we are heading to the Tsukiji fish market for some fresh seafood feast!
Took the Marunouchi line ( dark red ) from Shinjuku-Sanchome...
... Transfer at Ginza station to Tsukiji station via Hibiya line ( grey ).
And from Tsukiji Station, Exit 2, walk straight for about 5 mins...
Here we are at the Tsukiji Fish market! The fish market is actually close on Sunday but the shops and restaurants around is still open so you can see a lot of people is there to have their seafood feast.
Most of the restaurant opens at 10am - 10.30am and we still have lots of time to choose which restaurant to have our brunch.
Sashimi lover will definitely go crazy here!
White strawberry!? My first time seeing it!
But the price of the white strawberry is crazy! 600¥ ( SG$7.30 ) for that 5 small strawberry?! Seriously???!!! Don't ask me the taste of it because I didn't spend that money for just 5 strawberry although I love strawberry a lot!
It's 9am plus only but the place is already flood with people.
Scallop and eel as our "appetizer" before we can get our seafood brunch! Yum yum!
People queuing up of egg roll. I guess it's quite famous there?
Crab! My favorite but I didn't get any because I'm going to have my brunch soon.
The scallop looks sooooooo good!
Knifes that chef use to cut sashimi can be found here!
Cat chilling around the fish market. Waiting for free fish?
The restaurant is not open yet but queues everywhere already! And we decided to try this Sushikuni as it was quite popular.
While they are queuing, I went around looking for cafe to get my daily coffee fixed but all the cafe is not open on Sunday!
While looking for the cafe, I caught a cat frowning and staring at me! Haha!
While walking around looking for coffee, happen to pass bu the air conditional fish market, Tsukiji Nippon Fish Port Market.
So I ended up buying from the vending machines at 100¥ ( SG$1.20 ). Different brands of
coffee to choose from so I tried the one that is from the Key Coffee cafe that I've
past by just now. Taste is ok, not too bad.
Walk back and they realise the menu of the restaurant doesn't suit me as the food on the menu are mostly sashimi and raw food.
So they suggest that we will go somewhere else which has cooked food.
And this restaurant call Hafu ( 築地青空三代目 Hafu ), has cooked seafood and it's already open so we
decided to go in and have a try on their food.
From their menu, the food looks good too.
There is daily special as well and the one that I wanted was one of the
daily special! Cheaper and with more type of fish and most importantly,
the fish is cooked!
Pearlie had sea urchin with salmon roe and sashimi at 2300¥ (SD$28 ).
Gemma Unnie had sea urchin, salmon roe rice at 2800¥ ( SG$34.10 ).
And lastly mine with 4 kind of cooked ( they call it 'burning' ) fish!
Don't ask me what fish is those cause I totally have no idea. Haha! Usual price for this set is 3000¥ ( SG$36.50 ) but I had it for 1800¥ ( SG$22 ) due to their daily special!
Bon Appetite!
Getting more and more crowded! People here are buying sashimi and the master will cut on the spot.
Head back to the apartment to gets Gemma unnie's luggage and also send
her off to the train station. Although it's a short gathering, we still
had a great time! Lots of fun and laughter. Look forward to the next
gathering with her in Korea in October! ( yes! I will be going korea in october! stay tune! )
After sending her, we walk over to the Shinjuku Gyoen national garden from the Shinjuku-Sanchome station, exit C5
Road closure so we can walk freely on the road!
Before we reach the national garden, we went to the 0101 mall to have a look first but nothing suit us.
Operating Hours : 11am - 9pm ( Monday to Saturday )
11am - 8.30pm ( Sunday )
Since nothing for us to buy, we head over to the Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden and to
realise there is a super long queue into the garden!! I over heard
someone saying in English that because the Sakura season is going to end
soon in a week time and everyone is here to catch the last grip of the
Sakura flowers!
Security check before going in. I read somewhere that alcohol is not
allow into the national garden. I guess they are checking for dangerous
weapon and also alcohol.
Bought the entrance tickets at 200¥ (SD$2.40)
The park is really big! And again you can see that everyone is having
their panic under the Sakura trees. This park is famous during Sakura
season because their have more different type of flower here.
How can we not welfie with the beautiful flowers?
So many beautiful flowers around the park!
As the season is going to end, we can see most of the Sakura flower has fallen onto the floor which also makes the garden so pinkish!
Saw an artist drawing the scenery that is right in front of us! Impressive! ( view will be even better if that high building is not there... )
It's selfie time!
Everywhere look so beautiful and peaceful!
Beautiful flower indeed!
A pond of Sakura petals! Beautiful things don't last long isn't it?
Bye Sakura! Till I see you again!
Anyway after a walk at the park, we head off to Shibuya again to shop as we didn't get any chance to shop the other day.
Went into Shibuya 109 but ended up didn't get anything as well.
Address : 2 Chome-29-1 Dōgenzaka, 渋谷区 Shibuya-ku, Tōkyō-to 150-0043, Japan
Operating Hours : 10am - 9pm
It's getting crowded!
Walk over to the Hachiko statue which is near the famous Shibuya
crossing. Wanted to take a picture of the statue is not easy! I have to
stand by there until the people walk away and snap it before the next
person walk toward it again.
Haha, here again at the Shibuya crossing! Impress by how many people is there on the road every time we were there!
Super Mario brothers on the road!! Not sure what is it for actually but it's so cute!
Ok time for dinner! Gemma Unnie said that there is a nice tonkatsu ( pork cutlet ) place
call the Tonkatsu Maisen and just nice that they have an outlet at the Tokyu Plaza which is the mall next to the Hachiko statue. The restaurant is located at level 9.
Operating Hours : 11am - 10.30pm ( last order at 10pm )
The sauce that they provide is so nice that I keep on pouring over my cutlet, cabbage and even my rice!
The big fat pork tonkatsu is really yummy!
I found one 24hr shopping place all the Don-Quijote and again there is a outlet at Shibuya and so we went there to have a look ( of course we don't just 'look' but we grab! Haha! ).
They basically sells everything! From food to cosmetic, to clothes and electronic products!
Bought quite a lot and we can get tax refund on the spot but they will seal
up all the products like this. We are not allow to open up during our
stay in Japan. Most of the drug stores does the tax refund on the spot
as well and they will all seal up the items like this. They will tell
you that tax refunded items are not allow to use or to consume before
leaving Japan. It's good in a sense that we can get back the cash back
on the spot but bad in the way that we will be not able to use and also pack neatly into
our luggage.
Anyway, glad that we found a place to shop at night ( shops in Japan really close too early... )! After a big shopping at Don-Quijote, time to head back!
Day 6 :
Woke up slightly later today cause we do not have tight schedule today.
Walk to Takashimaya time square wanting to have a look at their Bao Bao
Issey Miyaki but design is not that much for the counter here so we ended
up shopping at the tokyu hand.
Operating Hours : 10am - 8pm ( Sunday to Thursday )
10am - 8.30pm ( Friday and Saturday )
It's a huge outlet which consist of 8 level! Spend quite some time just to shop at tokyu hand.
Personalize tote bag! Artist will draw your request on the spot.
Look at the expiry date of the water! Year 2023!
And this tin of ritz biscuit expire in year 2021! Actually these food
are made to prepare for disaster so the life spend of the food are much
longer. It's my first time seeing this kind of food!
Had my daily coffee fix at Blue Bottle Coffee after shopping at the
Takashimaya. It's a walking distance from Takashimaya. Heard from Gemma
Unnie that this coffee is famous here and indeed a lot of people having
their coffee here.
Operating Hours : 8am - 10pm
The bistro showing how they do the drip coffee. The coffee smell so good!
Ice coffee on a cold day is the best!
It time for lunch and we decided to have the famous Ichiran Raman which is just walking distance from the blue bottle cafe.
As expected, there is a long queue outside the restaurant. The staff
told us the waiting time is 1 hr! Stunned but we decided to wait since
it's a must eat in Japan.
Operating Hours : 24Hrs
Finally we reach the door steps! The waiting time is shorter then 1hr actually but 45 mins is not short either! Haha! Hope it's all worth it.
Bought the food ticket from the machine,
and the queue continues...
Wrote our order 1st so once we got our seat, we can pass it to the staff. Order form comes in English, Chinese, Korean and of course Japanese. When it's my turn, the English order form are all gone so I can only post a Chinese order form here.
From here, we can see which table is empty already.
2 section for the seats, first section will be just 1 row and second section
will be 2 row. Quite a small restaurant with not many seats and now I
understand why is the waiting time so long.
Finally got a seat and each individual will have a seat with a small
table n small window.
Pass my order to the ( hidden ) staff behind the window and
can't wait for my noodle!
Yeah my Raman is here!
Had a sip of soup and I totally have no regrets waiting for it!
If the noodle is not enough, you can still choose to add noodles but do not finish the soup.
Tada! All gone! Not even the soup left!
Saw this guy outside the train station and this is another "fashion" that we don't understand...
Anyway, had a wonderful Raman and time for some shopping to digest abit.
Heading to harajuku again for a more details shopping n more food I
guess? Haha!
Took a different line so we ended up exit at a different exit as the
other day but since we didn't walk here at all before so it's good for us as
well. This station looks like we are back to the olden days in the Japanese old movies.
Slowly we reached the high end side of the Harajuku area. More high end brands are located here.
Pass by a temple, not sure what temple is this but it looks very peaceful inside.
And slowly we got lost! Haha! We walked too far away from the station
and got lost a bit. Lucky we have internet to use the goggle map. Walk
through the residence area to find our way out.
While walking through the residence area, we saw some unique shops here.
And finally we found our way to Harajuku street!
Many unique shops here too!
There is even Stay Real here! A Taiwan brand owns by Taiwanese boy band celebrities, May Day's Ah Shin! But I guess buying in Taiwan will be cheaper?
And back to the Takeshita street ( the street that we came the other day ) which is just opposite Harajuku street.
I'm back for this again!
Yum yumm yummm!
This is sooooo good! Grab some cosmetic from
various drug store and off we go to meet my Japanese friend, Miyuki and
Mayuki for dinner.
Took the Yamamoto line to tokyo station.
They brought us to a building call Shin Marunonchi building for dinner.
As we told them that we have not try any soba for this trip so they make a reservation for this hand made soba restaurant call Ishizuki which is located at the 5th floor of Shin Marunonchi building.
Operating Hours : 11am - 11pm ( last order at 10pm )
11am - 10pm ( Public Holiday )
A small window next to the entrance to show how they make the soba.
Before food comes, photo first! Haha! It's good to have friends all over
the world so that we can have small meet up like this and also they can
bring us to places that only locals go.
By the way, did you notice the different way of putting our chopstick between the Japanese and Singaporean? Interesting!
They have English menu too.
Sashimi,
And duck meat ball for sides.
My Oyakotukejiru soba (cold buckwheat noodle serve with warm dipping sauce and chicken and egg).
Pearlie and Miyuki's Tensero soba ( cold buckwheat noodle serve with dipping sauce and tempura prawn ).
Mayuki's Sukura prawn cold soba. (not sure what is the actual name of this because I couldn't find it in the menu )
Beer bar near the soba restaurant.
After a good dinner, they bought us to the building near by call the
Kitte. Heard that the roof top there can over look the night view
of Tokyo station.
I wanted to get a pair of sneakers from Onitsuka Tiger and just nice that there is one outlet there so i went in to have a look but not much design to choose from.
Tada! The night view of the Tokyo station is spectacular! Beautiful indeed! ( unfiltered picture! )
We then went to Tully's cafe to continue with a tea and dessert session and that's the only cafe that open till a later time.
Operating Hours : 11am - 11pm ( Monday - Saturday )
11am - 10pm ( Sunday and Public Holiday )
Ordered two of the macha dessert and both was good but I prefer the ice cream more. Haha!
We do not live in the same country but yet we had lots of chit chatting over the tea and dessert!
Time to go back home. I'm glad that from one Japanese friend, I now have two instead! Look forward to the meet up with them the next time I come
to Tokyo again or if they are coming to Singapore!
