Continued from 2013 Tokyo Trip Day 13: Ikebukuro and Ginza

No thanks (thanks?) to some withdrawal-related woes, we were let off early from work to settle it with the nearest branch of our affiliated bank. What was supposed to take an hour ended up taking just half that, so I used the thirty extra minutes to commute to Odaiba and visit a very handsome, if overly tall fella ❤

When we visited the 1:1 Gundam RX-78 in Odaiba last year, it was surrounded by protective fencing meant to keep away creepy fangirls like me. This year though — with the mini theme park Gundam Front in full swing, the fencing has been taken out and you can ogle the Gundam for as hard and as long as you like.

As if staring up the Gundam’s skirts wasn’t enough, you can also bring him home from the Gundam Front souvenir shop and the Diver City Gundam Cafe. This is the third Gundam Cafe I’ve been to — making a complete circuit of all three branches in Tokyo 😀 Each cafe has slightly different offerings on the souvenirs front so it’s a good idea to visit all three if you can 🙂

Aside from the 1:1 Gundam, there are plenty of things to do or see (or, if you have a girlfriend, distract with) in Odaiba. There is Palette Town and Venus Fort, which is home to several outlet stores as well as the famous Odaiba Ferris wheel. Tickets are at about JPY 1000 per person, or JPY 3000 if you want to reserve the entire car.

Diver City in particular has a collection of souvenir shops that has few rivals. Not only does it feature a massive collection of specialty sweets, chocolate, and other foodstuffs to take back home, they go as far as acquire the really fun, strange, hilarious goods from other places. Spotted there were several different kinds of Kitkat, a local version of Hokkaido’s Shiroi Koibito called Shiroi Odaiba, and Akihabara’s breast-enlarging “oppai purin” pudding. Delicious.

Continued in 2013 Tokyo Trip Day 18: Meiji Shrine