It's a Food Trip in Tokyo

I mentioned a couple of things I ate in Tokyo, including that fun meal at the Vampire Cafe. Here's a few other things. Seasonal label of Oi Ocha Green Tea. I buy Oi Ocha in the US too. Making sure I was hydrated in that hot weather was important. Glad I did well with that. 

Only bag of Calbee chips I bought, near the start of my trip. Forerunner of the "everything is lemon flavor" of that time of the year. These actually were good. 

I did get some things from Boulangere Asanoya, including those cute little pies. This was their lemon bread, which was also good. 

I found Halloween KitKats at the local konbini! Since I had not tried pudding KitKats before, I went for it.

Cute little packaging. The flavor wasn't bad, but the chestnut KitKats were better.

My one super overly sweet treat. Konbini chocolate crepe. Fresh crepes at stands are better but this was okay. 

Mostly I ate this. Salads, along with nigiri sushi. I think my sushi craving was because I needed salt and protein, but didn't want heavy food. It's great that many konbini have decent sushi for not a lot of money. 

 A few things that made it home with me. Barely. Curry from both Hiroshima TAU and Marui One Annex Shinjuku. More of that Hiroshima lemon and orange flavored black tea, along with a lemon jam and lemon juice. They didn't have the setouchi lemon juice that I usually get.

 As for the curry, the one on the left was from Hiroshima TAU. Hiroshima oysters and seasoned with Hiroshima brand Lemosco, a lemon hot sauce, this was one hot curry. I was a little disappointed that there weren't more oysters. I ended up saving part of this and reheating it with shrimp the next day. 

The other was Tochigi Prefecture Lemon Milk Curry from Marui One Annex regional antenna shop. It's on the first floor and they always have interesting food from all over Japan. It's a good place to get stuff to take home for gifts. I was a little hesitant about this since it said it was a milk curry, but it was actually good! Chicken with a nice balance of lemon. I'd eat this again if I can find it. But it's difficult because the US prevents imports of curry with meat in it, unless there is major testing first. 

And sake from Hiroshima TAU. It's a nice sake shop on the second floor. I bought that sake I like along with a bottle of something a little special. 

From Sempuku Brewery in Hiroshima, this is another of their sake for the anime movie "In this Corner of the World". It's their Chisaku Momiji ginjo sake made with maple yeast. It was a lovely sake, very nice smooth flavor.

Besides food, I did get a couple of concert related items. This Közi photobook was available at the Deep Sanctuary VI MALICE MIZER 25th Anniversary Event. I picked it up for someone but of course I flipped through it. Really nice art photography of the musician and artist Közi. I recommend it for his fans. 

It came with a post card of Közi so now I have a set of him with Mana. Sadly no Yu~ki post card was available. So I don't have a complete set of MALICE MIZER members. 

Since the MALICE MIZER shirts were not available at the show, and the ones I ordered are suppose to ship very soon (yeah having to pay shipping for something which should have been at the concert, not the best thing), I ended up getting one of the new Moi dix Mois dolman shirts. Pardon the not so lovely hotel room bathroom door.

It's bigger and lighter weight than the other dolman shirts that I have. It's good for hot weather wearing. 

I wasn't planning on buying a tote bag, but the blue of the new Moi dix Mois tote was really appealing to me. It ended up being a good thing, made it easier to carry stuff after I fell at the concert. It's bigger than my other snap Moi dix Mois tote, so that is also nice. And there are the picks I bought at ESP Museum. The new Közi and Mana MALICE MIZER picks created for the 25th Anniversary. I bought extra so I could add them to my Moi dix Mois key chain, which now has four different Mana picks.

So that is probably it for my recent trip posts. However there are a few related things I want to write about. Including the new MALICE MIZER costumes and maybe a translation or two. So that may happen very soon.

And the Trip Back to Oregon

My short trip to Tokyo was over and I took the N'EX train back to Narita. It's a good way to go. By buying a round trip ticket, I saved money too. So I bought a few things to enjoy on my way to the airport and on the flight back. These almond cookies were rather good. They went well with this Salty Litchi drink. Someone had a bottle in a photo and it was at the local konbini so I thought I would try it. Well first it was to have something cold to put on my injured right leg the night I fell. The bottle is a good shape for that. The drink was interesting. I thought it would taste salty but it really didn't.

I found these at the same konbini. Chestnut KitKats and they were pretty good. I think I ate these on the plane.

This Hiroshima lemon cake was also enjoyed on the plane. I was walking back through Ikebukuro Station after returning from Venus Fort and there were booths in front of one of the department stores. I could not resist buying a few treats for the trip home, this being one of them. Like I mentioned before, a lot of lemon flavored foods this time around. I learned on the flight there that while Hawaiian Air is not a bad airline, the food left a bit to be desired, especially since they do not give you a choice at meals. So I made sure to have a couple things to eat.

Since it was dark on the ride to Narita and then the flight to Hawaii, I didn't take photos. I also didn't take photos in the airport in Hawaii since I did that previously. And there wasn't much time in between flights since getting to customs was a very long walk, followed by another long walk to the departure gates. Finally we boarded our plane bound to Portland, Oregon. Hoping we would beat Hurricane Olivia which was headed directly to Hawaii.

 Well, we sat in the plane at the gate for at least a half hour, due to inbound planes flying around Hurricane Olivia. On the same flight path our plane needed to take to get to Oregon. So I took a few photos of the U.S. Air Force planes that were landing.

Finally we were taking off. The sky was getting darker but Olivia wasn't near Hawaii yet. Still stormy weather was being sent towards us thanks to Olivia. My trip was book ended by these storms.

Honolulu and Diamond Head in the distance. 

Not as sunny as the day I first arrived. Still warm. 

Aloha Honolulu. Still the color of that water, beautiful. 

Goodbye Hawaii. 

A very long sunset off in the distance while we flew into another night. Going back in time. 

Finally arriving at Portland International Airport. Where there is a Lego version of our beloved Multnomah Waterfall. 

Complete with little visitors.

I still have a few things I want to post about from this trip so this isn't the last post. Next up will be a few food things.

Return to Venue Fort

Eight years ago I first visited Venus Fort. It does not look like much on the outside. 

This time I entered through the History Garage. Not intentionally. But still it was fun to see those retro automobiles. 

And the vintage pseudo store fronts. Although not that retro, seeing that there are recent reproduction Barbie dolls in there.

In between all this is a portable shrine. 

Near the retro gas station. 

 What I came to see was this.

 The interior of Venus Fort.

While not as lit up as it was at Christmas eight years ago, 

The interior design is still impressive. With a definite Italian feel, it reminds me a lot of The Venetian in Las Vegas. 

Including the ceilings.

Which are painted like the sky to give you the feeling you are walking through a medieval town. 

In fact they even go from twilight 

to dawn and back again. 

It was nice to see that Cobara-Hetta was still there. I ate lunch here eight years ago. 

Under this beautiful yet not real sky. 

 And next to this gorgeous fountain. Next time, I will have to do that again.

There are six statues of goddesses at the fountain. 

It's a lovely place to spend time at on a hot muggy day. Which is why I had thought of stopping at Venus Fort in the first place during this trip. But then I realized, like most of the other places I went to, there was a connection. To the musician Mana.