Entries this day: sabinas-second-full-day-in-japan

sabinas second full day in japan

##01:59 Monday 06 August 2012

Lin chose to stay at home partially because Sabina wanted to go to a bug museum, er house, er shop in Nakano called Mushisha. We found a different bug shop on the same street, which was easier to find; I expect it's trying to get foot traffic of people who can't find Mushisha.

Sabina was all excited and begged me to let her buy one, but I was like, "you won't be able to take it to the US," and she's like, "well, will you take care of it for me after I leave?"

"I'm pretty sure Lin wouldn't..."

"It's really easy to take care of; they just eat jelly!"

Most of the bugs had little bug jello shots in their cages. I guess that's what bugs are into these days.

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Before that, we went back to the B1 level stage and saw some really sweet instruments, costumes, and amazing music performed by a gamelan from Bali. (I think it's a gamelan, and not a group called Gamelan.) Basically all the instruments were percussion, most of which were brass(?), either like xylophones or bells of various sizes from small bowls to gongs. Wow I want to get a CD of the music!

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Before that, we went to the top of the Metropolitan Government building in Shinjuku to the 45th floor observatory of the North tower. Sabina was like, "the city just goes forever!"

"yep"

She enjoyed the crazy stuff being sold in the souvenir shop, and I was like, "but wait look at these," and showed her the shinkansen-shaped chopsticks. i really wanted to buy some, but couldn't bear to spend that much on plastic sticks. She, being in vacation mode, was like, "these are so coool!!" and bought them. Nice.

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Before that, we saw some guys dressed like dragon-deer-bamboos, and carrying drums. Going to see them led us to a stage on the B1 level next to the street. We watched them perform, and then saw some really cool shaky wooden instruments being played. I volunteered to play one of them when it was time for audience participation. Fun times!

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Before that, we took the train from Kawasaki to Shinjuku.

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Before that, we were at home trying to figure out Sabina's schedule while Tariq and I worked on getting our app finished and submitted. Turns out one must turn off png compression. WTF would they make compression be on by default? I sure as heck didn't turn it on manually.

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After all of that, we took Sobu Line to Akihabara where we wandered around a bit. I was most intrigued by a physical version of the table flipping game.