Its funny, I told myself that this time in Japan, there would be no time wasted – that I would be out early every morning and stay out late every night. Unfortunately, my body had different ideas, and after being on my feet for 10 hours every day, I didn’t get out as early as I had hoped. Although, Saturday I blamed that on Jetlag…

View pictures from Friday and Saturday here

So Saturday We decided to meet up with Matt Alt at Nakano Broadway. Nakano is a little area outside Tokyo that has a big enclosed shopping street that has a mall at the end. The Nakano Broadway mall is ground zero for toy nerds, and Otaku in general.

We started out by taking a stroll through the streets of Ebisu, taking the scenic route to the station. We took the JR Yamanote to the Chuo line to Nakano. We made a brief stop in Shinjuku to look at the hachiko statue, but realized our mistake quickly – hachiko is at Shibuya.

We were to meet matt at 1:30, but we were very early, so we wandered around the mall. Lots of food and clothing stores, a Mcdonalds, A few arcades. I played a customary game of Street fighter at one, and got my ass handed to me once again. It must have been the controller, I couldn’t get ken’s sho-ryu-ken off to save my life. Just outside The Broadway part of the mall to the left is a little vintage toy store – I found a few things there, then it was back to the station to meet Matt.

He arrived on time, and we proceeded into the heart of Nakano Broadway. This is basically 4 floors of toy stores, game stores, hentai, poster shops, DVDs, videos and games. Basically - paradise.

I knew about Mandarake’s no picture taking policy, so I decided to get a few shots in from the hall, figuring it was a public place. No such luck – an employee of Mandarake actually came out into the hall and asked me to delete the photos from the camera. Of course I didn’t, but I thought it was still odd.. The stores in Nakano were sensory overload. Mandarake continues to be the king of recently used goods, with some great scores. Other shops were cool as well, and there is an increasing trend towards consignment shops over straight up dealers. After some wandering, we caught lunch at this small shop that looked to be run by an old guy and his wife. I got a Katsu-don bowl (pork cutlet over rice with egg), and it was awesome.

After finishing with Mandarake, we decided to go to Koenji, to visit a few more stores, - specifically Godzilla-ya and Thrash out. Godzilla-ya was a mess, but great. Found a few great deals there as well. Found a loose Reideen tin for $200, but it was quite beat up – I passed on it.

Next, we got back on the train and went to Matt’s stomping ground, Kichijoji. We went to Wave Be-J, which was an expensive but well-stocked new toy store, and then found a little consignment shop in a back alley with some spectacular deals. Bought a couple things. The guy there was really nice, and I showed him pictures of my collection.

Now it was time to drink. Matt brought us to this smoky, old school Yakitori joint on the edge of Inokashira Park called Iseya. This place was OLD – grime on the walls, sit on the floor, old school. I freakin loved it. Apparently its been in business over 100 years. Matt seemed embarrassed by it, but it’s just the kind of place I love. We welcomed the chance to sit and rest our feet.

From there we moved on to an okinawan restaurant where we ate and talked toy – we broke out the tron toys there.

Lastly, we were walked around the back alleys of kichijoji and saw a sign in Japanese that roughly translated said “If you are fucking stupid and want to pay $4 for a beer come up.” How could we resist? We went up stairs and found a bar with maybe 4 seats in it. The tree of us sat down, ordered beers, and struck up an awesome conversation with the bartender, with Matt translating for us. The bartender was amazed that these gaijin were so into these characters he grew up with. Another guy came by who happened to be a game programmer, and we talked with him for a while. Unfortunately, at this point the night was getting long, and Matt had to leave. A full first day, ending in a drunken stupor, carrying bags of toys.

Oh, and at some point during the night, we did drunken purikura (picture club)