12/02/12 - Shinjuku Part 2 ~ Observatory Tower

Hi everyone!

Last Japan post I blogged about the Alice in Wonderland Cafe which you can read here if you haven't yet.

Today I'm going to blog about the rest of my day in Shinjuku~

After lunch at the Alice in Wonderland restaurant, our friend Saya took us around Shinjuku! I don't know much about Shinjuku since I don't hang around there much, and I always end up getting lost there so I left it up to Saya haha. Saya said she wanted to take us to a place where she used to go often when she was dating her boyfriend while she was still in university. It the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Office which you can go up and look at the Tokyo view..... for FREE!

First, I wanted to go visit the LOVE sign in Shinjuku. I actually walked past it the previous year when I was rushing to catch the bus to Osaka so I had no time to take photos in front of it, so I wanted to go there this time~






We finally made it! We actually didn't know where we were going lol.

Joanna & I!


Saya & I!

And us 3 together!



After that we walked to the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Office~




The big building that looks like it has 2 towers is the building~~




We went through the south observatory


At the top! You can walk around and look at Tokyo in all different angles!




This sign just explains what some of the more well-known buildings are


Joanna & I with Tokyo behind us! not a great photo though, too bright in the background :(





It was a super sunny day which was great, but made it hard to take photos cos of the glare on the windows.

They also sold some really cute souvenirs there!



Joanna wanted to visit a department store called "MYLORD" but Saya didn't know what she was talking about. I also had no idea since I don't go to Shinjuku often, but then eventually Saya was like "Oh, you mean Mi-Lord?" Japanese people have weird way of pronouncing some names, like the fashion brand that I mention a lot "INGNI", it's pronounced "Ingu" in Japanese :/




There weren't much in that department store. It's quite hard to get to, you have to navigate yourself through the maze in Shinjuku. The department store had shops that sold more Mori-kei clothing

We started walking around Shinjuku a bit more because we wanted to find a place to take Purikura!





Purikura!



We had to head back to Shinjuku station since Saya had to leave to meet someone else, and Joanna and I also had to go back to Ikebukuro to meet up with some friends.

There are a lot of cake shops in Shinjuku station!















So yummmmmmmm!

Bought our tickets~


And some last photos with Saya! it was really hard to take a photo in Shinjuku station, it's one of the busiest in Japan, there are always people everywhere!



I love the warning signs on the JR train, some of them just make no sense lol.



We headed back to Ikebukuro since we had plans to meet with one of my university friends who was studying abroad in Japan in Fukuoka. He had just finished studying and was heading over to Tokyo that day to spend his final days in Japan there and was the only day he had free.








He ended up coming around 1-2 hours later because his plane was delayed, and also it takes about an hour to get from Narita to Ikebukuro :( It was quite late so the only places we could get a spot to eat was at an Izakaya. I love Izakayas in Japan because it is pretty cheap, around $3-$5 a dish so you just order a lot to share! Drinks are super cheap too!