Studio Ghibli Museum Day
Today we had booked ourselves tickets to go visit the Studio Ghibli Museum in Mitaka, these were booked in advance. The museum displays the work of Hayao Miyazaki and his Animation Studio. The tickets had to be booked back in the UK before we left as they only allow in 200 foreign visitors a day, not a big fan of that system and i’m sure many
As we were out late last night and the museum doesn’t open till 1.30, we decided to get some extra sleep and planned to leave later than we usually do. When I woke up, I was tired so decided to eat some of the snacks I had collected, Banana Sandwich Pocket and Banana KitKat Bar, I reviewed the KitKat in a previous post.
We all met up near midday to make our way to Mitaka. It was boiling, we could feel our skin burning as we stepped out of the sun, quickly back into the nearest area of shade or aircon, which was a mini mart. Cas and Penny got some bread/cake snacks for breakfast and I got Pocari Sweat.
Pocari Sweat is a sort of Japanese Energy Drink, well, it says Ion Supply Drink but i’m sure it’s similar. It’s clear like water and not fizzy, it tastes awful, like a medicine disolved into water. I only got and drank the drink for the free gift on the top, which is a gift for someone special. I’m never drinking this again, it’s really bad and makes me think there may be actual sweat in the drink…With Cas’ good navigational skills, we managed to get to the right station and platform for the express train to Mitaka. These trains are really handy, they skip all the small stops and just go to the biggest and most popular stations in half the time.
Randomly, I saw some cool billboards from the train. I was quick enough to get a picture of the Racoon drinking beer, because it was awesome. I also got a picture of Suica the Penguin playing My Sharona on guitar (he could be playing it!)
We arrived at Mitaka station, it’s quite far out of central station and has a nice happy feel to it. I’m not quite sure why, maybe it was something to do with the big summery and colourful banners hanging from the station ceiling.
One thing I really like about Japan is how lots of things have their own mascots, for instance, you have the Penguin for the Suica cards (used for transport, think London’s Oyster Card) and a Robot for the Pass-Mo (bus pass). Mikata seems to have it’s very own mascot, Poki the I-Don’t-Quite-Know-What! 
It’s easy to walk to the Museum and it’s clearly and nicely sign posted. The road runs along side a small stream and overhanding trees which provided us with vital shade, though it didn’t help much, we were still boiling.
Walking to the museum took us around 20 minutes, maybe not even that. It was a nice walk through the neighborhood, we passed lots of houses and walked along side the large park before reaching our destination.
The first little enterance to the museum area gives you your first glimpse at the interesting building from the side. The rounded building is mostly covered in trees and leaves which looks like something from a Ghibli animation. There’s also a giant Totoro to greet you. 
We walked around to the main enterance but it was closed, at the time we didn’t realise it wasn’t open until 1.30, good thing we were all so tired and had a lay in this morning, only 7 minutes to wait. We went and sat on a bench to play Dragon Quest while we waited, we all think the game is great so check it out.
The museum wasn’t too busy at this time, there were very few tourists. It surprises me that this place is still so popular with the locals, especially large groups of Japanese children. Sadly, there is a strict no photography rule in the museum with guards in each room, sorry guys.
When you get into the museum, you exchange your pass (from MyBus travel agents) you are given a ticket to the museum and a ticket to the mini film screening, this is actually a clipping of film from a Ghibli Animation, mine was from Totoro, Cas’ was from Ponyo and I forgot about Penny’s one, I think Laputa or Kiki’s Delivery Service. It’s nice to get a souvineer ticket like this rather than a paper one you’ll throw away.
There are three floors to the museum, we started on the first which has two rooms, the theatre and the traditional animation room, which is where we went first. I managed to get a sneaky picture of the painted ceiling at the enterance before being told to stop taking pictures.
The traditional animation room has some incredible 3D (uses models instead of drawsing) Zoetropes, I really wanted to get a video but the guard was watching me. This room also has a few old projectors hooked up showing short animations, there was one of an evolution race between two things which evolved from a cell all the way up to human, it was brilliant, very nicely animated.
The top floor has a Gift Shop, Café and Children’s Play Area, also it leads out to the rooftop garden. We decided to go out the roof first and had to pass through the Children’s play area, this is a giant Catbus (from Totoro) for the kids to play on. We were quite high up so had a nice view down onto the rest of the museum but it was so hot!
The second we stepped outside the sun and heat hit us hard. I think it was 38’ today, hottest it’s been since we were here. We didn’t plan to spend long outside here in the sun, it was even hotter at the top of the building. The rooftop garden is very small, the only reason to come out here is to see the giant iron robot statue from the film, Laputa.
We got a few pictures with that and then quickly walked around the tiny garden, I say garden but it’s actually a mini path around the statue area, not really worth burning in the heat for. On our way back down we could see into a nice little court yardy type area, the museum is a really nice building.
We hurried back into the building and were quickly cooled by the aircon. I’m really thankful Japan has aircon in pretty much every building. We headed to the gift shop, it was far too busy in there to look around properly so I didn’t bother, this didn’t stop Penny, she was in there a while and bought quite a lot of stuff. We then headed out on the balcony to the café.
Thankfully, there was plent of shade out on the balcony where the café was. We wanted to eat inside but it was far too busy so stuck with the hotdog and ice cream stand. There was not really anything else, which is a shame, the queue for the café was about half an hour long, the people waiting must have been really hungry to wait in the heat.
Cas and Penny got some drinks, I decided to get some ice cream. It was melon flavour and it was AMAZING. The cashier was quite friendly and spoke in english, he was talking to me and Penny while his assistant prepared my ice cream.
Randomly, I saw a cool little pig statue on the floor. I have no idea what it is but I think it’s a traditional Japanese thing rather than Ghibli, i’m sure i’ve seen these somewhere else before.
We went back inside and looked around the second floor. This floor shows the art process of the animation, so all the hand drawings and animation frames. It’s interesting to look at and walk around as the whole floor, broken into rooms, is decorated to look like the studios in which these films were traditionally made. You’re probably thinking a large office type place but no, it’s like a traditional home, bookcases and materials over messy desks. Again, really gutted there were guards preventing sneaky pics but managed to get one of a Mononoke stained glass window.
The last room of this floor is for children, it’s a small play area where you can queue up and run around wearing a Catbus plush thing, it’s hard to describe so Google for Catbus and think of one that you can hold over you. I wanted to try it, for a picture obviously…
The films show three times an hour, there is a queue to get into the small theatre so you’ll have to line up. We didn’t, we asked to go in to the full theatre as they allow people to sit on the steps when busy, saved ourselves a 20 minute queue! The film was good, it’s an extract from Totoro. The kids in the audience were going wild, it’s like they hadn’t seen it before. There was a round of applause at the end, I think Penny started it!
On the way out of the Museum there is a water pump, it’s nothing special but the kids seemed to enjoy it. I wanted to put my head under it but I don’t think it was allowed.
The museum isn’t very big, it’s only three floors with a few rooms you can look around in the whole place, it won’t take you more than an hour or two at most to fully explore so keep that in mind when planning your trip. We waited for the Catbus to take us back to Mikata station.
The small bus was crowded and had weak air conditioning, combine that with traffic and you have a pretty bad bus ride. After 15 minutes or so stuck in the tincan bus, we were free and arrived at the station on the market road.
The market road, a name i’m giving it. Is a local shopping area, not many big brand shops, mostly local family run businesses which get cheaper and cheaper as you walk down. There is also a shopping center here, Mitaka Center but we didn’t go in.
We were hungry so decided to walk around the area and try find somewhere to eat, we were all in the mood for Ramen so assumed we’d quickly find one, we are in Japan after all… WRONG! Just like Fish and Chip shops are quite rare in London, Ramen shops in places like this are very hard to find, we spent ages walking up and back down the road to find somewhere to eat.
We eventually found one quite close to the station, it was almost empty inside and was one of the ones where you bought a ticket, we didn’t know what things were so me and Cas just went for the first thing on the menu and Penny got something else.
The bowl of Ramen that me and Cas ordered was pretty damn good and that’s coming from someone who doesn’t like Noodles. It was in beefy flavoured soupy water and had some sort of meat in it. Penny’s was just noodles and a bowl of horrible fishy ocean water soup, she didn’t eat it. Cas also got some Gyoza.
Full of Ramen, we made our way back down market street towards the station. It wasn’t a long walk from where we were, there was quite a few shops and little restaurants on our way. Randomly, I saw a cool monkey sign, it was just sitting outside a restaurant waiting for me to take a picture and blog about it. I’m loving all these cool hand made signs, why can’t we have any of these back in London?
It wasn’t long before Penny disappeared into a shop, it was a stationary / arts and crafts shop.
These shops are really cool because they sell random interesting things, like puzzle games, toys and gadgets. While looking around Cas spotted some traditional Nintendo Hanafuda Cards. I have no idea what they are or how to play the game, still cool to see them as they started making them 100 years ago.
We spent quite a while in this shop, quite suprising as it’s mostly stationary as you can see in this picture. Can you spot the Green Demon (Mame Shiba) it’s still very popular in Japan.
Back at the station, we hopped the train to Hibya, we planned to go to the cinema to see the new Ghibli film, Karigurashi no Arrietty, which only just came out. The cinema was only a short walk from Hibya station under my expert, never-fail, navigational skills.
Watching a film in the UK at the cinema is expensive, like £9 a ticket, right? Well, due to a crappy conversion rate on the Japanese Yen, it would have cost us about £17 to see this film. We didn’t go, it’s a shame but no way were we paying that, each!
We arrived at the Electric Town part of Akihabara with all the game and geeky shops. We were both on the look out for some games, Penny wanted Ouendan 2 and Slither Link on the DS and I wanted Pop’n’Music on the PSP. We started our search in Book Off and had the best of luck, we both found our games at good prices, Penny’s was reduced at the till to £5!We continued to look around shops in the area, I didn’t take many pictures as we were just browsing, we’ll be going back to Akihabara to explore it properly later this week.
There are loads of arcades in Akihabara so I decided to pop into one while Penny had a look around some more shops. I decided to check out Tatio Station on Electric Avenue. 
Tatio Station is a decent arcade and has a good dedicated music games floor, complete with Drum Mania XG which I sunk many coins into, i’m getting good at it now!
On our way back to the station, we passed Aso-Bit-City, one of the better shops in the area, it has actually moved location from where I remembered it so it was nice to find it again. There was a sale box outside with 5 items for 1000 yen. That’s when I saw it… The Green Demon! (Mame Shiba) I bought 4 of them and a random book to make the fifth item as there were only 4.
You may be thinking, why am I calling this thing the Green Demon? We’ll it’s because it’s truely terrifying yet incredibly cute at the same time. The last time I went to Japan, this thing, Mame Shiba was new, there were promotional videos that were just creepy and made me buy into it against my will.
That was my mistake, not asking for the sauce, turns out it was the Lemon Sauce that makes it Lemony, I just got chicken in a bun. It was still good but lacked the dreamy Lemon Sauce to make it perfect. I’ll try it again next time!I went back to the hotel to rest and later met back up with Cas and Penny when they came to my room with Ice Lollies! These are Garu Garu Grape lollies and we’re very refreshing, nice and cold with a strong grape taste, thanks Cas and Penny!
We had an early night as we were quite worn out from the constant beating from the sun during the day and then the heat that hung around in the evening.It was a nice day but far too hot to be doing much other than staying in somewhere nicely air conditioned. The museum was very interesting but we all assumed it would have been a bigger musem but it was packed full of charm, something most museums seem to lack.If you go to Japan and have even the slightest of interest in Animation or even just want something to see. Get yourself some tickets to the Ghibli museum and have a little wander around the market street in Mikata, it can be done in about 2/3 hours giving you the rest of the day for other things. 