One of the highlights of the year was a trip to Tokyo to do some work with Casio on calculator design. I may have mentioned it, sorry if I went on about it too much! I only had one day of shopping so tried to visit all the best stores: Muji, Uniqlo, Atoya 12-floor stationery shop, Daiso, Don Quijote, BIC Camera and of course Family Mart. That last one is a "konbini" or convenience store, but offering so much more than a Costcutter in the UK.
In particular the must-have item (which of course I bought) is the Family Mart-branded socks. These even got a whole article on the BBC. Over 30 million pairs have been sold, and people will fill up suitcases with them to take home as gifts.
Japanese konbini make life a bit easier, with services such as Wi-Fi, bill payments, ticket reservations, ATMs, and scanners/printers, all in one place. The most famous are 7-Eleven, Lawson, and of course Family Mart. There are hundreds in each Tokyo neighbourhood, often 3 in a row. The top foods to buy there are onigiri which are rice packets with meat or veg filling, bento boxes, dorayaki pancakes with red bean filling, and fruit sandos, white bread sandwiches with a fruit and cream filling - delicious for brekafast!
Further reading:
One more photo: these are Tokyo Banana, a sponge cake with a banana paste filling, here in the guise of Pikachu:
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