Hello community, I have returned from Japan! I've actually been back for a week, but I've been so ridiculously jet lagged.. Oh my gosh, it was amazing! There was so much to do and so much good food and so much awesome stuff to buy. If any of you follow my Pokemon Instagram, I'm sure you've seen some of the cool merch I saw already! I definitely dropped (at least)a paycheck's worth on Pokemon and anime figurines... -___-;; I was in Japan for 8 days before heading to Taiwan to see the family for 2 days where I also found some unexpected Enteis! Please click the cut for (a lot of) pictures from my trip! I was also lucky enough to meet up with two community members and hang out together, so that was really fun!!
Sylveon came with me, of course~ I also brought an Entei Pokedoll, although for the most part, I was way too excited about everything to take pictures with them. xD
On the first day, my mom and I were super jetlagged and ended up waking up around 5AM.. With nothing else to do, we bought some tickets for the subway and headed off to the first destination on our tourist guidebook.. Tokyo Skytree, which is the tallest structure in Japan! Turns out that there's a really big mall inside and one of the stores boasts a really impressive display of anime merchandise (Kuroko no Basuke, Precure, Detective Conan, Attack on Titan, YowaPedal, Natsume Yuujinchou, Evangelion, Doraemon and more!) including Pokemon!!
There were a lot of Tomy figures, Tomy plush, a few Pitapoke and Kids! There was also a whole wall of Tokyo Pokemon goods (third picture) that are also sold in gift stores across Tokyo. There was also a huge line of different gachapon machines, and they had Pokemon stickers, squishy figures and zukans! They also had some mega evolution gacha straps that i forgot to take a picture of;; They also had some stationary things and Pokemon themed snacks like mochi and crackers. I actually didn't end up buying any Pokemon merch at this store, since I was so overwhelmed by it all HAHAHA. I only bought a Detective Conan blind box figure..
One of the things I really wanted to do in Japan was play Pokemon Tretta! I'm still not really sure how you play since it was all in Japanese, but it was lots of fun! The basic premise is that you battle Pokemon (one game is 100Y) and at the end of the battle, you throw Pokeballs at them and if you catch them, you can choose one Pokemon to keep and that's the Pokemon that comes out on your Tretta chip! I was super lucky in that the first Pokemon I got was Emolga, one of my all time favourites! *u* It's actually pretty hard, since (I think) all the attacks are random. If you don't have any tretta to play with, you can choose to use random Pokemon for your team!
Oh man, this is what I was the most excited about.. *u* I've wanted to visit a real Pokemon Center ever since I started collecting Pokemon and turns out that this one was just about 10 minutes away via subway or JR... So therefore, I went three times in the span of 8 days. My mom thought I was crazy. -__-;; But trust me, it's as great as you think it is, haha!
So from reaaally far away, you can see the bright POKEMON sign! I got super excited when I spotted it!
When you first walk in, you see these big statues of some of the Pokemon as well as a round display of featured items! There were Pokemon fan magazines, mega evolution Tomy figures and some plush (on the back, where you can't see it :c). Each wall is covered with stuff and there are a few displays on the floor as well!
Tomy figures! They had both the kind in the first picture with the yellow backing and the round base as well as the newer kind with the black backing! I got an Entei and Luxray, which I was super excited about since they're pretty old! The second picture has a few bags/pouches that they had and the third shows all different sorts of cookies! There were a bunch others that I didn't get to photograph. I really wanted to buy a tin, but I was afraid it wouldn't fit in my luggage... There were also loads of plush! Pokedolls, Tomy, Pokemon Center, Pokemon Time, 1:1, DX... They were all so cute!
Gah, cuteness galore! I'm super sad because I hesitated to buy an Ampharos and by my second visit, they were all sold out.. ;u; I did get an Eevee though, and a Pichu for my little brother! *U* Check out that cute stationary in the third picture.. There was also a separate section for Pokemon stationary (notebooks, tape, pencils, pens, erasers, stamps, stickers, etc.) which was really neat. cute stationary is my weakness.. I ended up buying a pen, some erasers, and a notebook!
Espurr Wanted promo!! Everything was still available and I was super torn, because I don't collect Espurr/Meowstic.. I almost walked away with a bunch of Espurr stuff, but in the end, I decided on just the Pokepuff plush, because I already had a full basket of other things. ;u; I'm trying reaaally hard not to just collect Pokemon that I think are cute, which is pretty difficult for me haha. I already have too many collections! Must resist!! Also, the cutout of Professor Sycamore was available to take pictures with WHICH I WAS REALLY REALLY HAPPY ABOUT (I thought I would miss it!) so I snapped a really dorky shot of me with him hahaha. I was so embarrassed to ask my mom to take the photo for me.. xD They also had white lab coats you could borrow for the photo, but I didn't realize until my second visit, haha!
Pokemon candies! They had all sorts of stuff like the Pokemon gum strips, juice, the Ensky blind packaged badges, the bromides.. Not pictured are Pokemon seaweed, wafer cookies (THESE WERE DELICIOUS), soda sticks, furikake, curry, ramen, VS cards and those blind packaged Pokeball candies with the stamps inside. I was suuper lucky because I bought a Masterball for my brother and opened it (I was curious!) to find the purple Sylveon stamper!! I was too nervous to test my luck on anything else, so I didn't buy a regular Pokeball one for the red variant haha. Actually, after that, my luck with blind packaged stuff totally fell through. xD I opened up a few more other blind packaged things but didn't get anything I wanted to keep.. (Psst, they'll be up for sale later!)
Also, I'm not really a TCG fan, but they had some awesome card sleeves and stuff for sale! They had a bunch of booster packs and some trainer kits of TCG. On your way out, there are three machines where you insert a 100Y coin for those pressed pennies! They had 9 designs available~ They come out suuuper shiny (and suuuper hot.. Almost burned my fingers!
Here's a close-up of some of the Pokemon food I bought! As a super food lover, this was one of the most exciting parts of my trip HAHAHA.. I got a looot more food during my second and third trips to the PC. I'm pretty sure like, 1/2 of the Pokemon stuff I bought ended up being food....;;;;; The Pokemon ramen has little Pokemon pieces in it!
I had the awesome opportunity to meet up with two community members while I was in Japan! On Saturday, I met up with the lovely caddieneko who surprised me with some Pokemon snacks! We had a lot of fun shopping and we ate some delicious takoyaki too! At the end of the day, we ran around Akihabara trying to find a good purikura booth haha! We had planned on taking pictures with our Pokemon (Sylveon for me, Flareon for her), but the countdown started before we were ready. We barely had time to brush our hair! xD It's okay though, because the filters made us look suuuper nice. Man, I wish my skin was that nice in reality..
So, we ended up going to Nakano Broadway and Akihabara. Nakano Broadway is basically a used toy mall. There are lots of places selling second hand collectibles and stuff which is really neat! I bought a bunch of anime gachapon figures, and of course, a bunch of Pokemon. I was mostly on the look-out for Enteis this time and I was not disappointed! *u* Akihabara has a looot of electronics and arcades and because we were sort of pressed for time, we didn't really have a chance to do much, but we went to a few stores and I bought some fun things. I actually didn't take many pictures while we were shopping, so here are some pictures of my gets from that day as well as my first visit to the Pokemon center!
Ahhh, I got the Sylveon soccer ball!! *u* It's super squishy and soft~ The tag art is adorable! o; I also found some Enteis like the pearly keychain figure and the movie pin MIP, which I was super stoked about. I also couldn't resist getting another Sylveon MPC.. ;u; It's just way too cute! I also played Ichiban Kuji at the Pokemon Center! It's 500Y a go and I was aiming for the Sylveon lotto plush, but I ended up drawing one of the lowest prizes;; I'm still happy with my cute Eevee strap though! Some of the stuff in this picture is for my brother, like the gummies, ramen and towel.
Here are some Pokemon UFO catcher machines that we saw in Nakano Broadway! There were also some in Akihabara, but I wasn't allowed to take pictures;;;; Oops! I'm really sad that I didn't end up having a chance to play any of them before I left Japan. :c I did play some alpaca and anime ones though, so I came home with a few prizes. *u*
On my last day in Japan, I got to meet killmeneko who is super awesome!! Sadly, we didn't get to do purikura, but it was still loads of fun hanging out with her. We also ended up going to Akihabara and Nakano Broadway but I was totally ok with it since they're so much fun.. *___* We also had some really delicious chicken sandwiches at McDonalds that they don't have in America! Gah, please start selling these magical sandwiches here... I managed to snag the last two I<3E keychain plush I needed to complete my set for a really great price! I also picked up some things that I had been on the fence about when I went with caddieneko, so that was great haha. (I also totally didn't get ANY pictures from that day, oops! Too focused on Pokemon merch..)
Oh my god, this is such a terrible picture but.. @__@;; My gets from hanging out with Sarah! I don't usually collect clearfiles, but these were too cute to pass up! I also got the two N figures, which I've wanted for an embarrassingly long time. Those two as well as the Shinx were things I debated when I was with caddieneko, but Sarah pressured me into buying them HAHAHA. ;D We also had a lot of fun going through the pan stickers and ended up buying a whole bunch. Look at all the Enteis I got! I also got one of the Sylveons I was missing and a few other lovelies~
Also, quick question to anybody who owns a Houndoom Kid, but mine is really green? Like, you can't really see it in this picture but in person, he's kinda green and his horns and stuff are kinda purple.. Is this.. Normal..?
My trip to Japan was not entirely Pokemon merchandise related.. I did some tourist-y things too! My original plan was to take pictures of Entei and Sylveon, my two travel buddies, at all the cool spots, but most of the time, I was so excited that I forgot HAHAHA;;; But there are a few! (And by few, I mean... Only.. A few..)
First off, here's Entei on the plane, very disappointed with the airline dinner.. It was pretty awful. orz;; I almost didn't want to eat it, but I was staaarving.
Here is Sylveon at the Fuji Shibazakura festival! It's a flower festival where a loooot of pink/purple flowers bloom near the base of Mt. Fuji, and it's absolutely gorgeous.. *__* I'm really lucky to have seen it in person! I got some great shots of Mt. Fuji too! Entei came with us too, but I thought Sylveon went better with the pink theme, haha.
We also made it to the observation deck of Mori Tower in Roppongi Hills, which gives you an awesome view of Tokyo! We had this delicious puff ice cream dessert there and Sylveon got to enjoy some as well.. *u* Gosh, it was so good.. I ate almost the whole thing by myself alskdjfhaslkfh.
First off, I wanted to share some really cute custom gets I got! With the exception of the giant Luxray, these all arrived when I was in Japan so I came back to a bunch of packages! Ahh, I'm so happy with everything!! Luxray is one of my all time favourites, although it's really hard to collect him since he doesn't have a lot of merch. He's only got two official plush and I'm definitely a plush collector haha, so I've decided to focus my customs on him for now!
Next off, we have the entirety of my Pokemon gets from Japan!
Ahh, some of these were purchased in Taiwan! The Taipei Underground Mall is pretty much the Taiwanese Nakano Broadway, so I got to buy some neat Enteis! There was a LOT of stuff actually, especially newer stuff (Eeveelution figure straps, UFO plushes, etc) but the majority of it wasn't for Pokemon I collect so I (thankfully) saved money.
SO MUCH STUFF! I'm still working on updating my collection site with individual pictures haha, but you guys can expect them soon! *u*
Also, sorry to everybody waiting on replies from me! I've pretty much spent the week sleeping or at work;; I have shipped all XY dice stuff for people who have paid and will get to updating shipping status on Paypal soon.. I am still waiting for payment from raz2b and noibatcutie!
Lastly, please come check out my updated sales! I have slashed prices on a bunch of items. There are a few new things like a Vaporeon MPC, an XY promotional poster, Pokemon candy and more! I also have some neat Sylveon items coming up for auction in a while, so please keep your eyes open for that. *u*