TOKYO / Day One / Harajuku

 Happy Chuseok everyone! It's hard to believe this is my second Korean thanksgiving in the motherland. As with most family holidays, there has been a lot of eating, drinking, napping, bonding with cousins.. the usual. In between all these "festivities" I've found the time (aka a lucky distraction) to upload the first post from my trip to Tokyo! As I'm typing this up, my drunk uncles (x3) are trying to convince me to join them for some noraebang (karaoke) fun.

Aaand they were successful, which is why I'm finishing up this post two hours later than planned! Ha.

Here are the snaps from Jaimie and my first day of adventures in Tokyo :)

I hopped on the NEX train at Narita airport and got to Tokyo station in less than an hour

Jaimie was already in town, so we met up at our first Airbnb in Nakano to drop off our things and made our way to Harajuku. We planned to check it out on the day of my arrival, as I was told that every Sunday, circles of locals dress up to the gills in lolita/cosplay/harajuku gear and gather to strut their stuff. Why miss seeing the Harajuku girls and boys we all hear so much about? 

I saw ONE man dressed up as a lolita. And he wasn't even Japanese. What a let down! We must've been strolling on the wrong side of the neighbourhood. Luckily, Harajuku offers a lot more than folk dressed up as dolls, maids, gothic dolls, and gothic maids.

Cool shop stop number one: Vacant

They also had a small cafe, not pictured here.

Hair salons are called "Hair & Make"s here - most were labeled as such!

Funktique - sounds inviting right? We traveled up at least five flights of stairs to discover that it was closed! And Jaimie accidentally walked into someone's apartment instead haha

He totally caught me

Trees on roofs, a common sight

First meal in the city

A gift from my main girl. Perfect for all the Japanese coinage I'd accumulate during our trip.

We stepped into a cool looking two-level bar/restaurant housed in, well, a building resembling a house, with what seemed to be a private party on their terrace.

Next up, the hip neigbourhood of Shimokitazawa, where we got lost in a labyrinth of things, things, and more things (Village Vanguard), and found ourselves again with some vintage gems. xo