It’s been a few days since I’ve had a chance to update the blog so I’ll write a few entries now. This is the first and is about my last day in Tokyo.
Myself and my dad went down to Akihabara to see if we could find any robots and some manga I was looking for in the morning. We went straight to Yodobashi, not being able to resist the nine stories of electronic goods. After buying some Coji-coji (as I was instructed to), a book to teach otaku english (with example sentences based on role-playing games and anime) and an omiyage for my sister, we got some more gachagacha (slot machines that drop out toys) and started looking for robots. One accidental entry to a pornoshop later, we came across a few maids on the street asking people to come inside to their shop. So we did, and I ended up buying a Haruhi (bunny version!) figure which changes colour when you touch it. I think the idea is to give fanboys a reason to try to touch every nook and cranny of their most desired character.
Anyway, photos with these meido-san (maids) were from 1000 to 1400¥ so I decided to pass on that and move on. I’d already given them ¥3,800 for the figure so they were pretty happy. They weren’t too cute anyway. I asked where a proper meido-kissa (maid cafe) was and was directed down the street to 「メイドルカフェ」. This is “Meidoru Cafe”. The explanation I got was Meido + Idoru = Meido. That is, Maid + Idol = Maidol. For anyone who doesn’t know, an idol is a celebrity known for appearing on chat-shows, releasing the odd single, opening shops and appearing at various shows. Think Paris Hilton!Anyway, I totally fell in love with Ayame, our waitress. These places are a bit expensive, but to be honest you’d pay the same in any overpriced cafe in Limerick so it wasn’t so bad. I had a cold milk and my dad had hot-cakes (small hot pancake-like things with chocolate syrup and whipped cream) and coffee. I asked about the last page of the menu which listed “services” provided by the maids. These were everything from a picture with the maid (bought), with an extra comment if you like (bought), to a game of Tekken on the PS2 (bought, plus the extra ¥315 to allow me pick her over another staff member) or a game of Popup Pirate. Though her explanation (including sound-effects and hand motions) of how Popup Pirate works was heart-wrenchingly adorable, I decided to stick with Tekken. She won.
I got to talk to her a bit and brought up some various fairly obscure parts of Japanese culture and she really seemed to be enjoying herself. But of course she was, because she was being paid to! A guy down the end of the cafe was showing the figures he bought that day to one of the maids who was doing an excellent job of feigning interest too. At least my one told me she didn’t actually like anime when I asked, which means it’s possible she wasn’t just lying in everything she said!
At one stage she dimmed the lights and went onto a kind of stage at the top of the cafe and addressed the cafe.
“Ok everyone! Welcome to Maidol Cafe! Now we’re going to play our special game of Rock-Paper-Scissors and see who wins the special prize! Is everyone ready to learn our dance? Hands up! First raise your left hand in a fist. This is your hopes! Then raise your right fist. This one is your dreams! Now clap them over your head, bring them together and look through them like a telescope… one more time as hopes and dreams and Rock-Paper-Scissors!”
She looked around the room and said, “I have paper so anyone with rock put your hands down and we’ll try again! Here we go again!” （あいこでしょっ！）
After a couple more rounds, only one guy was left and he had beaten her every time, so she thanked everyone, congratulated him, and gave him a couple of sweets and a note. I would’ve killed to be that guy 
It’s a good think Yuki-sensei taught us Japanese rock-paper-scissors (jan-ken-pon) in class or else I would’ve been totally lost! And anime opening theme lyrics really help with words like hopes (kibou) and dreams (yume). Those songs don’t really even have any other lyrics except “blue sky” (aoi sora), “battle” (tatakau) and “destiny” (unmei).
Finally I got a photo with her and she wrote a note on it (that was an extra ¥125 I think). What a babe.
Next we continued our hunt for robots and eventually were directed to a small place called Robotto Oukoku, or “Robot Kingdom”. This is the same place that Patrick Macias went into in the Robots episode of Tokyo Eye. Speaking of Patrick Macias, I also saw the fat guy in the pikachu suit he blogged about. I was with the girls from Gunma and they started shouting, getting excited. I immediately recognised him from the site (how could I not?).
So after looking around Robotto Oukoku for a while, we came back to the hotel. After uploading a few images to flickr I met Daisuke, my friend from Waseda who was studying English in Limerick 2 years ago now. He asked if I wanted to eat Okonomiyaki, which I was very strictly instructed to do by my Japanese friends in Ireland before I left, so I jumped at the chance. We took a train to Yurakucho (有楽町) and went to the top floor in Bic Camera. The restaurant was full until 9 (and this was around 6pm) so we decided to try somewhere else. We went downstairs to a bookshop and looked at some Tokyo food guides and found that Yodobashi in Akiba also has an Okonomiyaki place so we took the Yamanote line from Yurakucho to Akihabara station on my advice ^_^
Okonomiyaki was great. We had one with meat and leeks and other with shrimp. The staff came to our table (which had a big metal sheet with a gas heater under it) and put the ingredients on. They came back every few minute to flip it, then finally put on mayonnaise, “sauce” (I asked what kind of sauce it was and was told it’s just ‘sauce’), and chopped leeks. It was actually edible, to my surprise! After that we had some yaki-soba (roasted noodles) and that wasn’t as edible but still not too bad.After buying some manga and a couple of CDs (YUI’s new one and Daisuke’s recommendation of FUNKY MONKEY BABYS one and only album) we both headed home.
Myself and my dad watched a dubbed episode of Monk before going to sleep.
