It is the illumination of Roppongi Keyakizaka. The night walk was very nice. Canon EOS R5 Canon RF35mm F1.8 MACRO IS STM Black Mist No.05 Filter

【In the Urban Forest】

Beautifully illuminated rainbow bridge during christmas. The photo was taken from Tokyo Tower.

Was shopping the other day in Nihonbashi and saw this akabeko and thought it was really cute so I decided to take a photo of it. The name was quite funny to me as well. Instead of the usual "akabeko" this was a "nemubeko," or "tired-beko" basically, and you can see how the eyes are actually half way shut instead of the normally wide-open eyes, giving it the tired look lol. I've always wanted to try an akabeko experience as I love traditional Japanese crafts and akabeko in particular seem really fun to make. I've read a few posts in another places of people trying akabeko workshops and having a really fun time. I haven't used papier mache since I was a kid either so it'd probably be a nostalgic experience for sure. If I do try an akabeko workshop, I think I'll make a "nemubeko" as well lol

The majestic view of Tokyo tower during winter illumination in Keyakizaki avenue.

Group attendance at school on a snowy day. Colorful rain gear was shining in the snowy landscape.

Asakusa Nakamise on New Year's Day. Every year, it is crowded with many first-time visitors.

The winter morning sun shone in the park where the first snow fell, and the long shadows of the trees were very beautiful.

Stopped by Saizeriya for lunch and got a cod roe and shrimp doria (たらこと海老のドリア). Saizeriya is always a great place to stop by for lunch as it's generally quick and cheap. It was a set meal so it came with a soup and salad as well, but I forgot to to photos of those. The soup was a sort of consommé soup and was nothing special, but it tasted good and was all-you-can-drink so that was pretty nice. I ended up getting a few cups of it. The shrimp and cod doria was great and I love the nori on top - plentiful and tastes great. The best part is all of this was only ¥500 so it's really reasonable, as you'd expect of Saizeriya. Just thought I'd share this today, nothing too special

Was in Kanda the other day for an errand and stopped by this place called "Soba Dokoro Kameya" (そば処 かめや) outside of Kanda Station. It says "立食い" which means "standing noodles," but I didn't actually see any places to stand and eat so maybe it just meant that it was simple and quick like a standing noodle shop. I've never actually experienced what it's like to eat at a standing noodle restaurant (and actually stand while eating) but I think I prefer sitting anyways. I like to relax when I eat so I suppose that's why, but I should at least try it once, who knows, I might like it. Anyways, the place seems really affordable. I ordered the Ten Tama Soba since it was the most popular dish and it tasted great. The soup was really good and the egg was perfectly cooked. The texture of the noodles was also perfect. It's definitely a place to check out if your in the Kanda area and looking for some noodles. I think they may only be open during the morning and night, but I went around 4pm so maybe they close around that time to prepare for dinner.

Visited a Chinese restaurant in Akabane called Maraeki (麻辣駅, Malaeki?) over the weekend and got some spicy Szechuan noodles (四川風麻辣麺). The photo looked really good and they had tan tan noodles as well but I wanted to try something different. Unfortunately, I was not the biggest fan of the flavor. I think the noodles were great, and the bok choy tasted good as well, but for me the soup wasn't exactly what I was expecting. That being said I don't think it's that the flavor was bad, just that it simply wasn't for me. I enjoy spicy ramen, and the "麻辣" part of the name is "mala," apparently a spicy, numbing sauce made of Sichuanese peppercorn, chili pepper, and other ingredients simmered in oil. I went in not knowing this and paid the price I suppose. The noodles weren't actually that spicy in my opinion, but like I said, the flavor just wasn't for me. I think for anyone who enjoys Chinese food though it's a great place as it's quite affordable and the other dishes we ordered (fried rice and xiaolongbao (steamed buns)), although not pictured here, tasted great.

Recent black-and-white photos

Went to やなか珈琲 and bought some coffee beans this weekend. I did not know why the beans were green, but it seems it’s because they have not been roasted yet and they roast them after they are ordered. I came back to the shop in 20 minutes and they had turned brown from being roasted and smelled really good. I tried ブルボン from Brazil and they taste really good! They have many kinds of beans so I wanna try different kinds next time and also sit down for a cup of coffee in the shop itself☕️

A nice Christmas tree I found near Akabane Station. I'm pretty excited for the holidays. I like the romantic format of Christmas in Japan much more than I do the spending time with family version in America. There's something about the cold weather that makes it feel romantic spending time together with the person special to you. Another great thing about this time of year is all of the buffets! I love going to the buffets and trying all the different food. It's a much different style than the U.S. too which is fun. I can't say I don't miss eating a nice Christmas ham or turkey with some stuffing (basically the same as thanksgiving lol), but what's awesome about the buffets is they always have some sort of prime rib or king crab, one really special item that everyone lines up for lol. One thing I miss is the holiday portion of Christmas back in America, but the New Years holiday in Japan more than makes up for it. Also the illuminations in Japan are always awesome. Places like Ginza, Tokyo Station, etc. always have incredibly beautiful showings. Didn't get to go to any last year, but this year I'm hoping to be able to visit at least one!

Went to a restaurant called "Taraku" (寿司たらく尾久駅前店) near Oku Station that I've passed many times. It's name says it's the Oku Station branch so I suppose it must be a chain restaurant, not sure how many there are though. The place was quite nice and they had single-person counter seats as well as table seats. The tempura set meal was ~1000 yen and again I got another discount using the PayPay app so it only cost me about ~700 yen. It's a pretty nice place though and they seem to have a bunch of different set meals as well as seafood bowls and other stuff like that. Definitely a place to drop by if you're in the mood for sushi, tempura, or whatever kind of sushi you're thinking of. They have a lot of takeout items as well and I think they do delivery as well, so they're probably on the Uber Eats and Menu apps as well but I haven't given them a look yet. The potato salad and miso soup tasted great as well. Tsukemono is always good so there was no difference here either lol. Everything tasted great. Definitely recommend checking it out!

Went to a restaurant in Shinagawa called Ogasawara Shoten. They had some really tasty yakiniku and the drinks were really cheap as well. I ended up getting some sort of kalbi set, I don't remember the name but you can see what it came with in the picture lol. The yakiniku tasted great but the grill was a little too hot at first so I had to turn the heat down. I had to flip my meat over really fast to make sure it didn't burn at first ?. It was a fun experience though. After I got it turned down though I had a nice relaxing meal. The miso soup was nice as well (it all tasted great to be honest) and afterwards they had a free coffee service which was a nice way to end lunch. They had a pay pay campaign going on as well, so I got a nice discount for using it. Really handy app

Went to Shinjuku Station the other day and took of photo of the giant metal sculpture while I was there. I've only passed it a few times since it was erected during the pandemic, but my curiosity finally got the best of me, and I had some extra time anyways so I snapped a quick shot of it. I did a little research on it and it was apparently made by the famous arist Tomokazu Matsuyama and the theme of theme for lack of a better word is to greet visitors with surprise and bewilderment. It's pretty interesting and looks different from every angle as well. If you look at the right side of the photo (it's kind of cut off) you can see it holding a flower with its arm outstretched. The name of it is Hanao-san, and while I'm not sure of the origin behind the name it has certainly piqued my interest...

I took these photos last week at Shinagawa Station. They were having a small lacquerware exhibition sort of thing and were selling goods from I suppose Naraijuku as is written on the cloth, but I don't remember if there was anything else to the setup. They had a lot of really cool lacquerware pieces though and I managed to pick up a couple of spoons and some extra chopsticks. I would have liked to buy more, but unfortunately am not in the need for much tableware at the moment lol. They also had some traditional children's toys and I was considering getting a Jacob's Ladder since I hadn't seen one in years, but decided to pass lol. The Wagasa on the top of the stall were also for sale too. Only ¥1500 and they're handmade! It was a cool exhibit though, I'm not sure if it was just a one day thing or if they're still going for a while but definitely drop by if you're at Shinagawa Station and see it open.

We went to a small restaurant in Meguro called "Meguro Flat" over the holiday and had a really nice lunch together. The place had a nice atmosphere and seemed very multicultural. There were newspapers on the walls in some other languages (I'm not sure what languages, but they were Latin based at least) and posters of wines from different countries and the menu was interesting as well. If I remember correctly, jerk chicken is a local specialty of Jamaica and I've never had the chance to try it before, but this place was offering it so I decided to order it. It tasted really nice and the salad that came with it was refreshing. There was also a spoonful of mashed potatoes on the side with the pickled carrots and the place also offers all-you-can-eat bread! I love bread so that was a plus. My girlfriend ordered an assorted platter and the cream in the middle went really well with the bread so we got another free basket to eat it with lol. Incidentally, I look like I'm posing for the camera, but I was actually just admiring the atmosphere of the restaurant lol. Anyways, it's a nice place, so anyone visiting Meguro or looking for something to do should check it out. It's like a ~5 min walk from the station. I think the nighttime menu might be different as well, but I'm not certain of that.

Managed to stop by Ueno Zoo the other day for a little bit and while I didn't get to see much of the animals because we were short on time, we did get to see a few of the attractions around the park. The first one is "Sala Thai" a gift from the Thai Government to mark the 120th anniversary of diplomatic relations between Thailand and Japan, as written on the plaque. The second one is the five-story pagoda of the former Kanei-ji Temple. The pagoda was built in 1631 and rebuilt in 1639. Besides that are just some photos of the scenery around the park, and you can see some of the autumn colors on the trees and even in Shinobazu Pond. We also managed to get some tasty lunch. This looks like steak but it was actually like a pork-steak cutlet type of thing. It tasted great though. Hopefully I'll have some more time to actually see the animals next time I go lol It's was registered as an Important Cultural Property in 1911.

Some more photos from the Shinagawa Aquarium since I wasn't able to post them all yesterday. I have a lot of pictures of jellyfish but it's so hard to take good photos of them, and it's the same for fish as well. A lot of them are just too small and so the photos came out blurry. Anyways, these are some of the better ones I was able to take. I really liked how the iguana was just chillin on the branch and warming himself up with the UV lamp. I haven't seen an iguana in a long time. I was happy I was able to take some decent photos of the sharks as well. I'm not exactly sure what types of sharks they are but they're still really cool to see. The smaller one seemed like he was tired and when I first passed him and he was sleeping in the back of the tank but when I came by again he was at the front moving around slowly. I was pretty happy with the stingray photo as well, and I'm not sure what the long stingray-looking animal was, but it was interesting. It might not be a type of stingray at all, I'm not sure because it was my first time seeing it, but it kind of looked similar I thought besides the tail area. Penguins are always cool too. I like the emperor penguins. Their hair always reminds me of Boris Johnson's? Then just a couple pictures from the dolphin show area. I got a nice melon soda float and then there's a picture of a dolphin listening to his trainer's instructions lol. Thought it was cute

Went to the Shinagawa Aquarium for the first time last weekend. It was my girlfriend's sister's birthday and so we made reservations for a restaurant and bought tickets to the aquarium in advance. We ate at Grill & Bar AW55, they had an all-you-can-eat salad bar, a drink bar with different types of flavored water, and some soup as well. All of it tasted really good, I really liked the Bolognese pasta, but the salad and soup both tasted delicious as well. After eating we went to the aquarium and it was really awesome, I liked seeing the jellyfish (as always) but the dolphin shows were really awesome as well. We actually stayed long enough to see the afternoon show and the night show, both with different themes. On top of that, we unintentionally got to participate in a wedding?. It was totally unexpected, they even did a special show with the dolphins to celebrate it. It was quite the spectacle to see. After enjoying the aquarium we went to get some dinner and found this hole-in-the-wall yakiniku restaurant that was unfortunately going out of business, probably due to the pandemic. Luckily for us, all drinks were 100 yen... Between the 3 of us we ended up ordering like 25 different drinks I think, we started with a round of beers that each would normally cost 600 yen, for just 100 yen, and after that we ordered a bunch of different meats and just drank every different type of drink on the menu lol. I was trying everything; plum wine, sours, beers.. we were a little drunk on the way out of the restaurant but we ended the night with some cake around 11pm still! All in all, it was a total blast.

Went to a place called Menya Tenno (麺屋天王) between Oji Station, Tabata Station and Oji Station (Tokyo Sakura Tram) and ordered some miso ramen. Before the pandemic I went there once or twice and it was great both times, but I decided to revisit for the first time in a while. I think it was just as good or maybe even better than before, but it's definitely tasty. I remember the last time I went I ordered the standard thin noodles since that's what the stores specializes in, but this time I figured I'd try the thick noodles and see what it was like. I couldn't really compare the two since it'd been so long since I went to this ramen shop but I remember the last time tasted great and this time tasted great as well, so I don't think the thickness of the noodles changes the quality in any way. The chashu is also really good as well, I added that as a topping for ¥200. I can't remember if I ordered gyoza the last time I went, but I ordered them this time and they tasted delicious, better gyoza than most ramen restaurants I've been to in my honest opinion, and they're nice and juicy as well. I tried to take a photogenic angle of the gyoza but it was difficult with the lack of space?. I did my best though! Anyways, it's a tasty ramen shop, so I definitely recommend it to anyone in the area!

Went to a soba restaurant in Ueno called Rengyoku-an (蓮玉庵) over the weekend and ordered same really tasty tempura and soba. I ordered the Tempura Seiro Soba (天せいろそば) and it was a bit pricey at 1750 yen but it tasted great. What I really liked about the restaurant though (besides the food), was the atmosphere of the place. It had a bunch of really awesome art hanging on the walls that was reminiscent of Edo Period art and I'm a pretty big fan of that so it was really enjoyable. The inside of the building was grey but it was very stylish. I'm not sure what the walls were made of, but it seemed to be some sort of granite and the coloring of the seats was also in a similar fashion but very tasteful. I definitely want to go back here again and try some more of their dishes! It's pretty close to Okachimachi Station so it's pretty easy to drop in for lunch.

I forgot to post this photo as it wasn't at Asukayama Park, but it was on the way. As we were walking to Asukayama Park we looked over the side of this bridge and I saw this small little garden and just thought it was really nice. To the right of the garden there's a small French bistro that looked like a nice quiet place to grab a bite to eat but it wasn't open at the time. I was curious so I did a little research about the place and it turns out the chef used to work at the Imperial Hotel for more than 20 years. It makes sense too, because I looked at some of the food they serve at this bistro and it looks pretty darn good. I'd love to stop by when it's open. Hopefully next time I'm in the area!

The last of the photos that I took at Asukayama Park. The first one was a nice statue of Shibusawa Eiichi and the second and third were taken at a shrine inside the park. I had to do a little bit of research to learn more about the shrine, but I was already quite sure it was an Inari Shrine because of the fox statues, but apparently it's called (I believe) Kabuto Inari Shrine Ruins (兜稲荷社跡), although I could be wrong about the reading for the first kanji. I liked that the shrine had a really small wooden shrine of what I believe was what the original shrine actually looked like, and the stone lanterns were aesthetically pleasing as well. I foolishly forgot to take a picture of the torii gate unfortunately... The last two photos are the statue of Shibusawa Eichi (which took us forever to find lol) and the plaque below it. I can only make out a few characters that are written on the plaque but there's another plaque on the back of the pedestal (which I forgot to take a picture of), so if you're visiting the park be sure to look at that if you're struggling to read it as well lol.

Some more photos from Asukayama Park! The first monument is a bit difficult for me to read so I had to do a bit of research, but it seems to be a commemorative monument signifying the planting of various trees throughout the park to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Meiji Restoration, and as such, was constructed in 1968, so it's about 50 years old, probably one of the newer monuments of its kind within the park. When I was walking back around the area I saw the dance stage from a different angle and managed to take a photo of the participants through a nice gap in the trees. There were a lot more participants this time so I stopped and watched it for a little while again. At the other end of the park I found this statue of a woman which is actually a statue of the "Goddess of peace" and it was erected in 1974 to wish for world peace and happiness. Even cooler, it was erected by the famous sculptor Seibo Kitamura who erected the "Peace Statue" at Peace Memorial Park in Nagasaki. Really cool to see his works all the way in Tokyo as well!

Some more photos I took at Asukayama Park the other day. I really liked this statue of Avalokitesvara, as I felt like it was really well crafted. I included the description to this monument as it's hard to read what is carved onto the stone and it's written in older Japanese too so my friends couldn't even read it lol. I think it has something to do with a poem about cherry blossoms although I could be wrong about that. It's pretty cool seeing the older Japanese from hundreds of years ago though. Even if I can't read it it's interesting to see how the Japanese language itself has evolved throughout the years. I'll be posting more photos of this place tomorrow as well!

Went to Asukayama Park near Oji Station yesterday. I've passed by the area many times and seen the gondola leading to the top but never knew what was up there until now. It's a really big park dedicated to Shibusawa Eiichi, known as the father of capitalism in Japan. The park has a bunch of monuments and cultural properties to check out so I managed to take a lot of photos and I'll be uploading them over the next few days. I chose a good day to go it seems too, as there was an event going on. It involved some traditional dances (I think from the Oji area), and it involved some sort of sash that kind of reminded me of a kimono obi, but I'm not sure exactly what it is. They had a taiko drum as well but it seems I didn't make it in time to watch them playing, I only heard it in the distance when I was walking to the park. I thought it was really cool seeing all the different monuments though. Many of them were several hundred years old and the Japanese on them was also and older form, so it was hard for me to read a lot of them lol. It was a really enjoyable experience though, so I'll upload some more photos tomorrow!

Some photos I took while passing through the area. Lit up trees ready for Christmas near Toyocho Station! I also spotted these pandas around a Christmas tree at Ueno Station as well and thought it was cute. It's funny how fast Halloween ends and almost immediately we start to see Christmas decorations lol. It's not dissimilar with the US though. Every time Halloween ends it's like someone flips a switch and suddenly all of the Halloween decorations become Christmas decorations. Speaking of Halloween though, I actually saw children trick or treating in the streets this year which was really nice considering all the restrictions over the past 2 years. It also seems like the culture of Halloween has started to become a bigger part of Japanese culture over the last 5 years or so. I still love that Christmas is a dating holiday in Japan though. It feels like a romantic holiday anyways, I think it's better this way personally.