Selfie taking hipsters are universal

31102016

Full day in shimotikazawa. This if very much the hipster neighborhood of Tokyo, not only is it full of Japanese trendy folks but it is full of young foreigners trekking the world.

We went to a cafe in the neighborhood that had baked goods, various pastries and buns with stuff on them (I got one with olive oil, Italian spices and zucchini) that would get tired real quick before you went on your way to your super cool programmer/internet journalist/etc job.

After that I had second breakfast, a donut covered in soft serve ice cream. Served by this very nice ancient lady, no judgment that I was eating ice cream donuts for breakfast, just a very nice old lady. Most Ice cream over here isn't as sweet, I think they use soy milk so it isn't as creamy or heavy as ours. And the donuts weren't as sugary either. Honestly it was a pretty appropriate breakfast.

We wandered around shimotikazawa and found a cat cafe. For 1440 yen we got to hang out in a room full of cats for 30 minutes. Laura took a bunch of cleratin so we wouldn't get kicked out and burned alive for sneezing without a mask on (everyone here wears a surgical mask when they feel a little sick as courtesy to everyone else).

The cats here look weird. I dunno if these were the broken cats that couldn't get adopted, but most were odd. There was a munchkin cat (I think is the PC term for them) with short little legs, and cats with smooshed in faces, and short stubby ears, and almost inside out ears I dunno.

One was big and fluffy and a huge asshole picking fights with other cats, one gray one was super nervous about everything and another gray one was very friendly. Even hopped onto Laura's lap.

I was not expecting head buts from this cat, but I was sitting the floor in front of laura, and anytime my head got close the cat reached for nuzzling.

Then we wandered around the area pooping into shops. There are a lot of vintage, used, and new clothing shops around, with a wide array of pricing; a used shop with every item 700 yen, next to a vintage shop with what appeared to be sweat pants for 18,000 yen.

Most of the shops were very small making maximum use of their space, be out a basement, a stairwell or multi storey building.

Laura bought a shirt, but Is hesitant to blow her clothes budget here when we are going to China and can find knock off everything for pennies.

We stopped for udon noodles, i got city, and she got noodles in a light broth. This place also had tempura fried stuff, I got a mass of onion, and laura got a slice of yam, and some other starchy vegetable.

The curry udon was so rich, this was my final meal of the day at 1645.

We did a little more wandering, checked out a drug store, got since crazy candy and then went home.

The candy was one of those make your own mini x. This was donuts, they had burgers, pizza, all kinds of stuff. You mix the powdered tapioca with water, and then the frosting with water and put it in the molds and then eat it. I dunno it reminded me very much of MRE milkshakes/pudding. Powdered food product that never goes bad with just add water instructions aren't my idea of a tasty treat.

After some lazing around laura needed for, cause she didn't have fantastic curry udon. We found a burger place, that was

take out OK

got a hot dog and promptly at it when we got home.

I fell asleep shortly there after, while she watched old Steve Irwin clips.