What an epic day! I have been trying to find the right words to describe what we did but calling it retail therapy just doesn’t quite cut it. Is there a word where you attend deep and insightful therapy sessions that cure your soul but then somehow drive you right through healthy and out the other side to a mental state that borders somewhere between trying to run over rainbow shitting unicorns with a lawnmower and just skipping merrily down the corridors of the institution into your own happily padded cell wearing a very fashionable jacket tied in the back.
We took a drive on the highway down towards the base of Mt Fuji, where some enterprising geniuses have set up an epic shopping Mecca the size of a small village. And they bestowed upon it the name of Gotenba Outlet Park. Almost every top brand under the sun is represented here, Armani, Gucci, Prada and lots of other names I can barely even afford to spell in case they ask me for blog royalties or something. But also lots of Japanese brands and other foreign brands like Nike, and Samsonite at really discounted prices that it’s hard to turn down.
Naoko and I made 5 purchases each and two combined buys, it took us 8 hours to get round the whole place and go back to pick up stuff we put on hold to think about for a bit. I think I tried on about 7 pairs of shoes at Nike before picking a pair. At less than $70 I couldn’t walk away without getting a pair. The only problem with outlets is that the reason the prices are good is because you don’t get the choice of everything, and sometimes size choices are very limited. Being Japan it’s hard to buy shoes in a size 11 at the best of times so I was very limited from the start. Sixes though.
Other than the mad mass amounts of retail the day also included a long but fun drive from Shounandai to Fuji Yama. Japanese roads are often narrow and crazy without footpaths you end up with cars, bicycles, scooters, and pedestrians all sharing the same space in both directions, roads that would often be labelled one way in other parts of the world. I think the phrase threading the needle came to mind a few times as large trucks felt like they were about to brush by and brush us off the road. Japanese sensibility extends to road use as well in most cases, you never get cut off and people stay in their lanes at all times. It’s all left side driving just like NZ and the give way rules are now the same too seeing as we changed ours. The only road use where this doesn’t hold true is speed limits. The sign posted speed is seen as an advisory and in reality you should be travelling at whatever speed is best possible to keep up with the flow of traffic. That means on the usual 80 kph highways you have little old ladies and long haul trucks on the left lane doing 80, the middle lane doing the usual 100 we are use to at home, and then the right side lane doing upwards of 150 or more at times.
Following distances also seem to be a road use lesson everyone in this country skipped. Nothing like having some crazy car less than a couple of yards from your bumper when you’re on the highway doing 100. Seriously one guy got so close I couldn’t actually see his headlights anymore.
The other interesting thing on these roads are the flashy delivery trucks! In this country there’s not always an opportunity to stand out and be unique but a particular group of truckers have taken to polishing up their trucks, painting them up in funky colours and sometimes even attaching bling to them. It’s an entertaining sight! You’ve also never seen cleaner trucks than on the roads in Japan.
On the way home I got to experience a hilarious first just round the corner from our place when Naoko spotted that someone had built a drive-thru Tacoyaki stand. A tacoyaki is a round fried (yaki) dough stuffed with a bit of taco (octopus) all up about the size of a golf ball and covered in sauce, mayonnaise, bonito flakes, and sprinkled seaweed. Delicious, and drive-thru made to order! Great stuff. Do you think we could get the McDonald’s in Newtown replaced with one of these?
Great day but an exhausting one too, so I’ll leave you with a picture of the epic natural wonder that is Fuji Yama sticking out through the clouds, looking like it’s just at the other end of the bridge separating the East and West shopping villages.
Oyasumi!
