Shopping in Tokyo

As the plane landed in Tokyo I saw the thick cloud of pollution covering the city and I wondered what I had got myself into. Once we were inside the airport my travel companion and I decided to check our lonely planet guide book so we could figure out where to go. We decided the best thing to do would be to find somewhere to spend the night, that way we would have somewhere to put our backpacks and not have to worry about carrying them everywhere.

We set out to explore the city. The first thing we noticed about the shops was the amount of Hello Kitty merchandise everywhere, things ranged from toasters to car seat covers and everyone of them was covered in the cute little hello kitty logo. We browsed through the biggest of the stores and tried on a ball gown that had a story of Hello Kitty and her friends printed on to it. Eventually we bought a necklace each and headed on our way.

The clothes and the attitude of the people here was so different from back home.

The streets of Tokyo are filled with young Japanese girls wearing extravagant dresses and make-up that make them look like they belong in an anime cartoon. The woman at the counter told us that the girls were dressed as Lolita’s. She said Lolita’s are a colony of girls who dress in Victorian style clothes to present themselves as cute or elegant and not to attract the attention of men. I admired their style but couldn’t imagine myself wearing that get-up.

Holly