Today was the day yesterday was supposed to be. Probably. Since I didn't rigidly in the first place, it's a little hard to make that statement unequivocally. But the broad strokes were there at least!

First, I made my way to Ueno Park along Shinobazu Pond, just as I had yesterday. Today, however, I noticed far fewer pedestrians hanging around and not nearly as many families. There were still people hanging out, but I think that's to be expected at any tourist destination. As I maade it to the main Ueno Park plaza area, I did get a little nervous because it seemed that there were a ton of student field trips going on.

Luckily, most of the student groups seemed to be heading to the zoo. Since I've already been to Ueno Zoo and am not a huge zoo person in the first place, I hoped that this would leave me unimpacted.

Once I made it to the Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum, I was relieved to see that the lines weren't wrapping all over the building like yesterday. There was still a line of like 15 people ahead me getting tickets but that took less than 5 minutes. Thanks to this, I was able to see the Van Gogh’s Home exhibit. Although a lot of exhbits at this museum are free, I don't think special exhibits usually are and this one cost ¥2,300 (~$15.50)

Flyer originally from the exhibition's Twitter: https://x.com/gogh2025_26/status/1966298212811288610/photo/1

The exhibit was in both Japanese and English, although the text on the plaques was really small. Since it was so crowded it was actually a bit hard for me to get close enough to comfortably read them. I can be partly 'blamed' for this since my vision isn't 20/20 even with correction (thanks astigmatism!) but I think also the text was just too small. I felt like maybe the plaques themselves had to be kept small so that they would be smaller than the art in some cases lol

Anyway, the exhibit was cool and started with section that showed some of the context and influences for Van Gogh's work, then went into Van Gogh's work itself. It also talked about the history of his work and places that were important to his art. I actually didn't realize how little I knew about Van Gogh before this! I was a little shocked that he picked up making art at 27 and was so prolific in only 10 years. I also didn't know about the circumstance of his death either. Pretty crazy stuff.

I've said it before, but I'm not super into art and usually don't get it. There were a few pieces that I liked, and I think most of them were more colorful pieces. I also felt like some of his pieces felt lonely. I also saw a Hiroshige ukiyo-e print that was cool, but I forgot to remember it's name! Apparently Van Gogh collected woodblock prints. It's kind of like he was a caveman equivalent of a weeb (just kidding, obviously)

Of Van Gogh's work that was on display, I think I liked "Self-Portrait as a Painter" (partially pictured in the flyer above) the most. It makes sense why it was chosen as the main campaign image. The exhibition didn't allow taking photos so I can't remember the exact wording but near the portrait was an anecdote that his sister-in-law felt that the portrait showed Vincent Van Gogh as resolute (and some other adjectives) but Van Gogh felt that he had captured himself as unkempt and sad (likely the same description as here). It then asked how we felt he was portrayed. Personally, I think I have to agree with Van Gogh on this one, maybe not for the unkempt part but for the sad part. To me in person, it almost looked like the painting's eyes were watering due to the lighting.

After leaving, I decided to have a quick late lunch at the cafe in Ueno Park.

At ¥2,430 for the pancakes and coffee, I think it's probably relatively more expensive than it could be but since it's already so popular due to its location, it could probably charge whatever it wanted. The pancakes were tasty! I ended up downing most of the coffee right before I was leaving which made me a little jittery and nervous

After eating, I decided to make my way to Nishi-Nippori station. For one, this let me recreate previous walks I've done, but in reverse. And secondly, Nishi-Nippori was basically the only station nearby that I knew offhand would let me take the train home without switching lines. Actually, regarding the first thing, historically walking from Yanaka to Uneo to Akihabara is the what I do on the first day of my yearly trip to Japan. Since I didn't do that this time, I wonder if I've somehow cursed myself? But actually maybe you have to do something three times to make it a tradition anyway, so I didn't really break with tradition?

Along the way I saw these cool statues

I also happened upon a vending machine selling my beloved Kochakaden Peach Tea. For some reason, it feels like it's been harder to find this year and only some of the Coca Cola vending machines have it. I haven't seen it in any convenience stores either. Actually I haven't seen my favorite Melon Milk anywhere either???

I walked about the area for a little bit, made my way through Yanaka Cemetary, and finally stopped at Suwa Shrine for a few minutes to watch some trains pass by

From the shrine's vantage point, you can clearly see both Nishi-Nippori and Nippori station. Although the latter is like 500m away. While we are talking about it, I was taking zoomed in pictures to see if I could see the signage on phone. One thing I hate these days is that when you are zoomed in for photos the phone tries to like use AI or some other tool to upscale the photos automatically, so then you end up with weird artifacts in the pciture. I would rather it was just blurry or grainy like phones used to do (or am I crazy???). I think that you can't turn it off directly but can shoot in RAW to get rid of that but shooting in RAW takes a lot of space and I don't ever color grading or anything so also doesn't seem super beneficial normally.

Once I was finished stewing about that, I walked around the Nishi-Nippori area for a bit before catching the train back towards my apartment!

For dinner today, trying out some 7/11 stuff!

Also, I went to Akihabara in the evening to break some larger bills and make change and play some crane games. I ended up blowing like ¥3,400 to try to get the figure in the photo below (I eventually gave up) . Part of it was that GiGO is now making plays ¥200, whereas you can still do ¥100 per play at game centers like Tokyo Leisureland or Akihabara Donki, so it feels a little scammy. But also, I don't have the best claw game skills.

My advice is that if you see a figure you ~really~ want, you should just make a note of where you saw it, check a few secondhand shops to see if it's there, or even order from somewhere like JP Mercari. For example, I was able to find the figure above at a random shop for ¥1,680 (~8 plays at GiGO) and I'm sure I could have found it cheaper at a secondhand shop not in Akihabara. I was able to find it on Mercari for just ¥1,050. Obviously buying online would require delivering while you are still in Japan or paying fees for a proxy service like Buyee, which would eat into the 'savings' (not to mention international shipping if you went that route).

I don't have luggage space anyway, but it would have been a nice surprise if I had won something quickly lol