Sendai

Sendai is the capital city of Miyagi Prefecture, the largest city in the Tohoku region. Here it is on the map:

Apparently it is a castle town made famous by the eyepatch guy from Samurai Warriors. Sadly we didn't actually go to the castle. Well, we planned to but it was a big drama of:

• Rushing to the local train
• Seeing that its peak hour
• Everyone was packed into the trains like sardines-in-a-can
• Give up
• Rushing to the shinkansen/ bullet train instead
• See a huge long line to buy the tickets
• Calculated the price - Nope, not paying that!
• Give up & swallow our sadness 😢

We figured that the cherry blossom blooms have already ended, so it wouldn't be worth the suffering (1 hour in the sardine packed train).

Anyway it's this guy (not historically accurate):

Sendai Station is big! Lots of interconnected malls, restaurants and different modes of public transportation all mushed together. The station's East and West exit are connected with this looooong arcade, which made it easier to go back and forth on either side (which we had to do VERY often).

This guy is "Anpanman”, a children's superhero from the 70s based on a Japanese red bean snack.

Asian-sized escalators. Like seriously, you can see that my luggage barely fit.

The Japanese really love melon flavoured things. So does Steph, who keeps drinking them.

We checked out a book store. This random comic has cats just chilling out. Maybe it's from Tik Tok.

The Japanese are so zen that it even manifest in their pets.

Yodobashi store

We're at Yodobashi Camera… again. We somehow always end up going here whenever we're in Japan. The name isn't very clear, but they sell cameras. More importantly, cameras is like 5% of what they actually sell. You have the most insane range of things, from washing machines, to gacha (more on that later), video games, telescopes (!), metronomes (?!) and all the other stuff.

Basically JB Hifi but 5 floors of it.

Selfie lights make me look not a day older than 36! One day I'll be an influencer and I'll need one of these.

This is like the old Sony Aibo or a furby… but more cute than creepy. Remember this thing?

It comes to you when you physically beckon it or call out its name, make cute faces and sounds when you pat or stroke it, flaps its wings in happiness when you pick it up, and cries in complaint when you put it down. It was really popular - Everyone who walked past couldn't help playing with them.

Remember the gachapon machines from Narita airport? They were nothing compared to what Yodobashi has. There are about 8 rows of this.

We got sucked into buying some. Dammit! 😓

Ooh… Electronic saxophones 😮

They also have an entire range of Kumon Toys here. These were actually super awesome and educational. Now that we're going to have a baby, suddenly we're interested in this kinda stuff 😅

No, her hands aren't ginormous, the sandwich press is just tiny. Made for a small, single toasted sandwich, I guess?

There is some REALLY premium ricecookers here. These are going for about 850 dollars. It felt totally premium too. Tempting.

Thoughtful USEFUL things

Remember how I said that Japan is full of thoughtful/ considerate things that makes living here more convenient and/ or pleasant? Here are some more to add to the list:

These curtains in the hotel room blew me away. Don't you hate it whenever you try to shut your curtains, they juuuust don't quite come together? So that you get laser beams straight into your eyeballs when dawn breaks, because sunlight seeps through the crack?

Well, these curtains have OVERLAPPING tracks, so the right side of the curtain can overlap the left. Amazing!!! 🤯

The toilet at the hotel was pretty full on. In addition to the standard features (heated seat, bidet, fake flushing noises), it has an 'oscillate' function, that moves the position of the water stream back and forward instead of you having to do it yourself!

I suspect it has a 'self cleaning' feature as well. Confused yet amazed.

Their baths are next level too. You don't simply just turn the faucet on. Instead, you get to set how many litres you want your bath to be filled, as well as the ideal temperature, and it just... Does its own thing. No need to keep checking back and forth, stressing that the water will overflow otherwise.

I'm not sure if this contraption would come under the 'thoughtful and useful' or "thoughtful but useless” category. This is a device that only has one purpose - press-ironing trousers! I guess pants do become a wrinkly mess whenever they are transported in my luggage, no matter how many youtube tutorials I watch teaching me how to avoid it 😒

Just an example of the number of amenities that all of our accommodations have provided so far (although this particular one has extra skincare stuff for some reason). Our rooms always comes with full toiletry supplies, fridge, robes, slippers, shoe horn, kettle etc. Much more accommodating than the ones in HK or some AirBnbs who expect you to bring everything yourself, or charge you for towels!

Thoughtful things that are actually pretty useless

This turns your beer can into... a jug? 🧐

What was REALLY interesting is now they have these self-checkout things, that aren't self-checkout at all. Let me explain.

You basically put your items on the counter for the staff member to scan them. Then they just stand there idly while you insert money into the machine, fumbling around and dropping coins everywhere (happened to my friend). The staff member then hands you the receipt at the end.

It's so close to self-checkout, yet so far!

Here is another unnecessary feature found at some malls - A static pad to drain your static electricity before you interact with the touchscreens. They have this pad at petrol stations too, in case you woke up the wrong side of bed and suddenly have enough static electricity within you to create sparks.

I know I mention Japanese toilets a bunch (what, they're interesting, ok!) but here is a bag rack… So you can put your backpack, which is already on your back being inoffensive, next to the urinal instead. Of course anyone who pees standing up will know this

• No one will actually use it.

Because if they did, their bag would be covered in piss as the owner tries to aim their stream of urine and fails.

Another bag hanger, so you can accidentally splash water all over it as you wash your hands.

Food stuff

As always, our choice of food generally revolves around Steph's cravings and/or avoidance.

These crème caramel and strawberry milk-puddings from 7-11 were the only things she could stomach that morning. They were cheap and surprisingly really good! We came back to try their black coffee jelly with cream and coffee milk-pudding the next morning. Also tasty.

I've discovered my new favourite drink. Calpis Sour! Its basically alcoholic Calpis.

These food displays are actually so much better than boring paper menus. You can clearly see the portion and imagine the taste before you order it!

Sendai is famous for its "gyutan” or cow tongue. The thick cut one was pretty good. I'm still not sure what the mysterious white stuff was. It had the consistency of snot, but tasted a little… fishy? I think we'll stick with KBBQ ox tongue, thanks.

We went to at a random place. This place was weirdly empty for the ENTIRE time we were there. Sadly the food quantities were small. The food itself was surprisingly amazing, especially the...

Sea urchin carbonara! It was so weird...

Basically it came in this pot of cheesy... foam? Anyway the food was good so whatevs.

That just left us feeling more hungry! We passed Lotteria and got some fast food - Wasabi powdered chips, melon spider, fried mozzarella sticks, and a Demon Slayer kid's meal.