Tokyo day seventeen

Off to the Shibuya district of Tokyo today to do a bit of people watching. Shibuya is a magnet for Tokyo teens and as such is lots of fun with loads going on. We left the metro station and immediately came face to face with the Hachiko crossing, the busiest pedestrian crossing in the world - the video above demonstrates how busy it can get (and bear in mind this is a very cold Sunday in January - imagine what it must be like in warmer weather when more people are out and about).

We strolled up Center Gai, where Tokyo fashion victims come to pose and show off and popped into HMV to browse their selection of English language magazines before wandering ro und the huge Tokyu Hands homeware store. There are apparently three main teen trends in Tokyo: Center Guys - who seem to have copied Jon Bon Jovi :( , Hime Gal - who are all huge sunglasses, designer dresses and dyed hair with Paris Hilton as a role model and Gothloli - a strange mix of victorian dresses, lace cuffs, hair bobbles and soft toys worn by girls from the suburbs. We also visited the Shibuya ranKing ranQueen store but disaster! They were out of F Cup Cookies and all other types of cookie too.

Chris has been pining for curry ever since he arrived and so we went to what our guidebook bills as the best curry restaurant in Tokyo, Dhaba India in posh Marunouchi. Not wanting to take chances with curry in another country we played it safe and ordered two of the mildest dishes on the menu - butter chicken and creamy lamb curry. While the lamb worked out fine the chicken had been marinated in nitric acid and served in lava sprinkled with gautemalan insanity pepper ie V HOT. But for all that it was fairly authentic curry restaurant and full of happy locals.

Chris additional: I just want to add a bit more about the curry (in case any of my curry loving friends are reading: - Luke I'm thinking of you here esp.). The curry house had several Indian diners in it (a good sign), the chicken contained bones (never experienced that before), the naan bread was very doughy and gooey in the middle but they had Kingfisher beer (Nic preferred the Japanese sapporo brand). It was southern Indian so the choice was quite limited in terms of the variety of curry and rice. The dishes themselves were nice (butter chicken was a bit over spiced) but the portions were too small. Overall, very nice but the best curry house in the best city in the world for food was not half as good as the excellent takeaway curry in my local village (Massala Express in Edlington).