We didn’t do much today, so
there’s not a great deal to write about, but I wanted to make a mention
of seeing Tadashi and his friends again, since our first visit with them
didn’t go so smoothly with the heat. We (Me, Nicky and Erin) met them
in Shinjuku to go to an Izakaya. After a couple of hours of trying to
explain weird English expressions (jack of all trades, working like a
dog, the graveyard shift, etc), we went to a purikura booth nearby to
take some pictures together.
For those that are unaware of what is
the Purikura Culture of Japan, basically it is like American photo
booths, except that after the picture is taken, several different
alterations and “decorating” can be done. A lot of booths offer skin
whitening (to remove blemishes), eye enlargement (to decrease the
Japanese “slanted eyes” complex) and hair color filters (if you want
pink or green hair). There are also hundreds of pens, stamps, borders,
backgrounds and sparkles you can add in to make the picture one of a
kind. Nicky and I have been making an effort to get Purikura done with
all of our friends while we’re here, and I have a small book that I plan
to fill up completely by the time my study abroad is over. It’s usually
a lot of fun, though I personally think the eye enlargement is kind of
strange, as it hasn’t worked terribly well on my Japanese friends’ eyes
at all... haha.
Here’s some of the purikura we took
tonight (notice Nobu’s eyes in the center one... the machine only
recognized one eye for enlargement!):