This was the second day of our Japan trip, and I was so excited about it. Our hotel was 10 minutes from Ikebukuro, so any trips we made we went through Ikebukuro station. We first made our trip to Shinjuku, an area I was familiar with since I worked part time job in West Shinjuku many many years ago. It was still my favorite place to hang out, too. We first heads out to The Tokyo Metropolitan Government building. The building has a nice architecture to it, it was not crowded unlike most of tourist attractions in Tokyo, and most important of all, it was free. They have observation deck on the 45th level, nice souvenir shops, and a Tokyo tourist guide booth which provides maps, suggestions on where to go, discount vouchers, and other useful informations. And I did I mention I LOVE maps?


We went to Shinjuku I-Land Tower to see the LOVE sculpture which is based on Robert Indiana's artwork that you can find in several places all over the globe.


We were super hungry by that time, so I decided to just run down the stairs to eat at the Restaurant I used to work my part time job in; Jembatan Merah Shinjuku. But when I went there... it was not there anymore. WHAT. It was such a shock remembering I still ate there with my ex-bosses at the end of 2012, not two years ago. I never in a million years thought that it would be gone one day. I thought it would be there for eternity, exactly as it is in my memory of my first Japan experiences.

We ended up eating in a small Tenya store in the underground passing of West Shinjuku, and I was glad my brother loved the cuisine. It was good!


We moved to Harajuku by train, visited Omotesando and Takeshita-doori. I FOUND A SHOP FULL OF K-POP STUFF. They were in bad quality with pics stolen from the interwebs, but it was enough to get me excited. We shopped at 100 yen store in Takeshita-doori, and then made our way to Shibuya by foot. Shibuya was as crowded as ever!




We went back to Shinjuku by train because I supposedly meet my friends at an Indian restaurant in East Shinjuku. But I didn't have any means of communications and they never came. So it was only the three of us again, eating Indian cuisine and entertained by a weird belly dance show. That probably was the most expensive meal I have ever had by choice in Japan (we're cheapskates when it comes to food haha).

Shinjuku was so crowded we couldn't deal with it anymore. We traveled to Ikebukuro and then home to Tokiwadai area and ended our day earlier than we thought we would.