Finding cheap clothing in Tokyo and after work

May 13, 2008 - Finally my search ended for cheap warm clothing yesterday when I went to the Harajuku area, which is the centre of the teen culture in Japan. Right beside is the Omotesando area, which is the chic centre of fashion and design and home to boutiques of luxury fashion designers such as Channel, Louis Vitton, etc. ... places I wouldn't dare going in unless you were appropriately dressed in high fashion and had a bank account to match. I've been wondering where to find reasonably priced casual clothing as it's been unseasonably cool here and damp, and I didn't have much on hand as it usually quite warm. I thought this would be easy being such a consumer and fashion-conscious society, but there have been a few challenges... finding casual clothing, finding the right demographic area as apparently different areas in Tokyo are known for different ages groups such as pre-teens, teens, young 20s, etc., finding something that won't break the bank, because it's supposed to be warm now there have been limited places selling any kind of coat or thing that you would consider putting on to keep you warm, and well, comfortable would be a nice thing as well. Was I asking for too much?

I strolled into the Harajuku area and I was not the only one above the average age, in the early 20s, and actually I felt more comfortable than in the other areas when I found a large Gap department store, stores such as Adidas, and then I found the mecca of high quality low priced items at Kinji, a very large used clothing store for men and women. I should have known that a used clothing store would be a good place as the Japanese are crazy for high fashion and name brands, buy lots of clothing and treat their clothing like everything else, with a lot of respect and care. So, through all the specific areas for teens and teens themselves in colourful creative fashions that you could tell that they put together themselves with pride, I did manage to find rows of designer jackets and coats in perfect condition and you could even find "larger" sizes over a size 6. So, la voila, for 1200 yen or $12 I had a very nice designer comfortable warm jacket. It's definitely the place I would go if I needed warm clothing, like I did, or lost my luggage, or other, as you can find some interesting inexpensive things to add to your collection. And, then I went into the Gap which had a large sale on and bought some more things to keep me warm. So, the emperor has warm clothes and now I'm sure that the weather will turn warm and nice as that's the way it goes, doesn't it? But the journey was fun...

In the evening, I went to work in the kitchen with Yuki and her new kitchen employee at Veggie Paradise. I got to make a few things, observe the kitchen in action and continue to practice my Japanese. I'm going to be great at speaking Japanese eventually, especially in the food area. People from other sectors, forget it, but food, well, that's my specialty. Actually, this will be a good motivator to studying more Japanese as I need to translate some of the recipes I am finding into English and this will be quite the task going through all the kanji characters in particular. But food is a wonderful motivator isn't it?!

Like most kitchens in the world, we relaxed afterwards with the staff having snacks and drinks in the restaurant, and like everywhere else it's amazing what you find out when you speak to people. One server was off to Kyoto for 10 days for a Vispassana meditation retreat, his first one, and we spoke about this. This was his last night before taking the overnight bus to Kyoto. I have only been on a silent meditation retreat for a few days and have yet to take the plunge to do a longer retreat so I am impressed by anyone who has done this as I know it's very tough and exhilirating as well.