Where I'm At

Many of you know I'm "in Tokyo." Perhaps some of you don't know where Tokyo is in Japan. It's here:

The city of Tokyo is about 844.4 square miles. Let's narrow it down a bit. I'm in the Shinjuku ward, a very famous, popular area.

I don't live in the center of Shinjuku. The closest Yamanote Line (the train line that loops around Tokyo) to me is Takadanobaba. Here it is on a map you can interact with:

View Untitled in a larger map

As an amateur photographer, I really should set about photographing the place I live. But I'm quite busy, you see, with all these words and things.

Yesterday, I met up with a new friend from Singapore. She is doing a tour of the stations around the Yamanote loop. Takadanobaba was third on her list. In spite of knowing hardly any big attractions in the area, I offered to take her around. In exchange, I am going to post her pictures of the place. A good deal for both.

Here is the Takadanobaba station's edifice on the Waseda exit side:

There is a rotary in front of this exit where I always meet people who come to the station:

In the manga/anime Atom Boy, Mr. Boy was born in Takadanobaba. Thanks to this, there are absurdly huge murals under the elevated train tracks on the street level of Atom Boy and other famous anime characters.

Atom Boy is on your left when you exit, but on your right you can see the architectural beauty of the place I go for 100¥ stuff, called descriptively "Big Box":

To get to my dorm or the main campus of Waseda, you go straight up Waseda Dori (Waseda Street), so that is what we did next. Here is a moderately-priced second-run theater:

Here is my favorite ramen place, Oita Ramen, where you can get a big bowl for 650 yen and still order free refills of noodles:

Here is another shot taken outside Oita Ramen, looking up the street in the direction of my dorm:

Across from the Lawson, one minute from my dorm, is this amazing building that I've never been in but been thinking that it's a photography museum:

Just next to my local Lawson, a bizarrely-named restaurant:

Further down Waseda Dori, between my dorm and the campus entrance, are an excess of used bookstores.

A great Engrish name for a clothing store:

This may look like a generic shot of Waseda Dori, but the yellow and red signage highlights an amazing store. Called "Picasso," it is an offshoot of a large chain of stores called "Don Quixote." At Picasso, I can find cheap milk, yogurt, bread, instant meals, and snacks. They also sell clothes, dishes, computer stuff, games, sex toys, and novelty gifts. And they have an absurd theme song playing all the time.

Finally we come to the crossing that I turn left at, from Waseda Dori, to go down the hill to campus.

Waseda's Nishiwaseda Campus. This is one of the ways to get into it.

And here are various shots of classroom buildings and grounds.

We made our way to the center of campus, where Shigenobu Okuma the founder stands, scowling at the auditorium named for him.

The view he has of his auditorium:

The auditorium, closer:

There is a cafe and souvenir shop to the left of the auditorium.

There, they sell stuffed bears. The bear is the mascot because of the founder's name, Okuma. It's a play on the Japanese word for bear, kuma. Of course, the bear is scowling.

From campus, it is a short walk to an interesting spot: the oldest and nearly last streetcar in Tokyo.

In the other cities in Japan, streetcars are much more common. Tokyo is so well-irrigated with subways and trains, though, that the streetcars have slowly died out, except for the Toden Arakawa line. Waseda is one of the terminals. Here is the station:

And here is the little guy that services it:

And a bit more north of the tram/streetcar is the Kandagawa, the Kanda River. These cherry trees are almost ready to burst. (Expect more colorful photos of these soon.)

And here I am, on the bridge over the river. Hi!