I woke up feeling better. My throat was mostly okay by that point.

Soon I was up and heading off.

My first destination for the day was the Square Enix office in Shinjuku.
Well, it was actually Artnia, the Square Enix Café behind the Square Enix office.

I arrived at the office around 10:30 A.M.
It looked pretty modern.
It was stylish.

All there is to say about it really.

A few minutes later I was at Artnia.
Unfortunately it was not open yet.

I had a quick wander and came across 天台寺門宗大聖院 (Tendai Terakado Zong Daisho, if Google is translating correctly).
It was a nice and modest temple area.
It was also the last place I prayed at during the trip.

After spending a little while there, I headed back, and wouldn’t you know it, Artnia was open.

I looked at all the merchandise they had and whilst I was interested in a lot of it, I decided not to buy anything.

There was another room that had Final Fantasy merchandise only, as well as a few storyboards on display.

To eat, I had small pancakes and a strawberry parfait.

It took a while for the food to arrive, but it was worth the wait.
There was a harmonious blend of flavours, etc. etc…
The parfait was delicious.
Really delicious.
Incredibly so.

I headed back to the hostel before heading to my next destination.
I checked upstairs to see if Gabe was there so I could get his half of the cost of the hostel booking.
I also confirmed his printing of the tickets for TGS (Tokyo Game Show), something we were going to on our last full day in Tokyo.

Once I was done I headed off to Ikebukuro as my next destination was the Pokémon Centre Sunshine City.
It was something I wanted to check out as it, like Square Enix, were parts of my childhood and on the rare occasion are still parts of my adulthood.

It took me a bit of time to find the Pokémon Centre, despite having some fairly clear instructions as I went the wrong way in Sunshine City, but once I was there, I was there.

There in line for somewhere around an hour, that is.

It could have been less.
It could have been more.
I don’t know.

All I know is that time folded onto itself and I was pulled into some other reality where lines never end.

After living an eternity beyond an eternity, I found myself at the front of the line and participated in some lottery thing.
I won a charm of Pikachu in a Snorlax suit.

Soon after walking in, I saw that there were other entrances into the Pokémon Centre and realised I lined up only for the lottery.

I may have received a prize, but I was not the winner.

I didn’t spend much time perusing the aisles as I was able to locate what I wanted fairly quickly.

Then I went to the counter to pay and walked out feeling merry and rambunctious.
When I say that, what I actually mean is that I joined the line to the counters.
It went around the inside wall of the centre and was only twenty minutes long, thankfully.

Once I was in the line, I decided to change one of the things I was going to purchase with something else.

I’m so happy that I was able to do it whilst in line.

Eventually I reached the counter and paid for my items.
The person who served me gave me some extra stuff for free.

Aside from stopping for a brief moment to take a photo, I left Sunshine City as quickly as I could.
On my way out I looked for the heaviest thing I could listen to.
I chose Napalm Death as soon as I saw them come up and put on one of their songs on repeat (“Smash a Single Digit” for those who are wondering).
It calmed me down.
Napalm Death were less intense than the Pokémon Centre.

I headed back to the hostel to drop my purchased items off before heading out to Akihabara again.
Whilst in Asaukusabashi, I found myself feeling a bit down.
I was still angry with Gabe and, seeing as the trip was nearly over, I wanted a few more days than I had.

I knew I had to return to Australia sooner or later and it’s not that I didn’t want to.

I felt I didn’t have enough time to do everything I wanted to do and felt I could have benefited from a few extra days.
I was also not looking forward to going back to my job and I don’t think I was looking forward to being away from family again.

My mood did pick up after a few hours, but there certainly was a lingering sadness for the remainder of my time in Japan.

Whilst in Akihabara, I went through a street behind the main one and did some shopping there.
I was able to see plenty of things I didn’t see in other parts of Akihabara, so I was pretty pleased.

I made another stop in Asakusabashi before heading off to Asakusa for food and a wander.
Once I was there, I recognised it immediately as being the place I was in when on the first hunt for dinner whilst staying at the Juyoh Hotel.

I had a nice curry and a bowl of noodles for dinner, then spent some time looking around, but I felt a bit detached as I was lost in my thoughts more than I usually am.

After I felt I’d spent enough time in Asakusa, I headed back to Asakusabashi to get some shut-eye.

I left early in the morning as I was expecting the line to get into TGS to be massive.
I gave myself around two hours before it started to allow me the time to get something to eat, get there and line up.

I arrived about thirty minutes early and got in eleven minutes after it started.
Quite frankly, I’m very happy with the time it took as the line to get in was absolutely massive.

I had a quick look around, seeing a a picture disc edition of the Final Fantasy VII soundtrack(I thought it was cool, yet silly), and participated in a lottery (I won tissues[amaaaaaaaaaazing]), before lining up for Square Enix merchandise.

It was another line ride around an hour, but as there was stuff happening around me, it wasn’t too bad.

Once I was done there, I grabbed something to eat, wandered a bit more, then headed to another hall.

I think I ended up in the presentation hall.

Soon after being in there I was able to play Zodiac: Orcanon Odyssey.
It was fun to play and I’m looking forward to seeing how it develops.

I spent a bit of time looking at different things and seeing a few different presentations.

Next to the Sony stage was a wall that had the creature from The Last Guardian animated on it.
Whilst in that area, I periodically went past the stage as I didn’t want to miss any presentation of it as it’s a game I am interested in.

Whilst waiting, I went to the Capcom area to see if I could play Monster Hunter Stories, another game I’m interested in.

If there’s anything I’ve learned, it’s that Capcom need to use staff who know how to manage two fucking lines for one fucking booth.

It took around ninety minutes to move about eleven metres in the line I was in.
The other one? The longest someone had to wait was usually however long it took for someone to finish playing the demo.

This is, in my opinion, terrible management.
There was another staff member who would periodically come up to the one managing the lines and was seemingly asking about people moving through them.
I think.

It became so frustrating that eventually I said to myself, “Fuck this”, and left the line.

Oh.

This series on my non-adventure in Japan contains expletives, such as the word “fuck” and some of its many wonderful and flavoursome variations.
As such, if you are offended by the words, “fuck”, “shit”, or the highly callous phrase “Tonare al lavoro”, then please consider this a warning for anything related to my trip in Japan that you read beyond this point.

I spent some more time wandering around and hoping I hadn’t missed a presentation for The Last Guardian.

Eventually I came across a booth for Springloaded Games, a Singaporean company.
They were promoting their game known as The Last Vikings.
I can say that I enjoyed it a lot.
It seems fairly straightforward but fun.
I suggest buying it with everything you have.

Now you see, you can’t buy that kind of promotion.

On a serious note, I do think it is worth giving a go.

What I enjoyed most was having a conversation with one of the staff promoting the game.
We talked about being in Japan and doing stuff whilst in Japan, as well as The Last Vikings.
It was a really nice conversation to have, especially after what seemed to be line mismanagement (fie on you Capcom).

Once I was done, I headed to the Sony stage for their last presentation for the day.
I was hoping they had saved The Last Guardian for the end.

I cannot begin to tell you just how disappointed I was when it was a presentation for Bloodborne: the Old Hunters, because I wasn’t disappointed at all.

I enjoyed what was shown, despite not being overly interested in playing it.

After that, everyone started leaving.
I thought to myself “oh well” as I turned to leave.

I looked at the wall with the creature from The Last Guardian on it as I walked past and noticed that there was a small area behind it that was dedicated entirely to the game.

It was easier to leave than I thought it would be.
There was a line to get a train ticket at 海浜幕張駅(Kaihin-Makuhari Station, the station I used to get to and from TGS), but it moved faster than I expected.

Once I dropped all the stuff I had picked up at TGS, I headed back into Akihabara one last time to do some more exchanging of monetary objects for goods.

Then, on the way back to the hostel, I had my last dinner in Japan.
I had a burger and onion rings with a smoothie as it was easy to get.

Getting to sleep was not as easy.

Shortly after getting into bed I could feel a shaking.
After a few minutes I asked someone if they could feel it to.
They told me it was an earthquake.

Well, so long as I knew.

It didn’t seem to eventuate into anything more than tremors, but as it was my first earthquake that I was entirely aware of experiencing (there had been a short discussion with either Tim regarding possibly experiencing one whilst in Osaka), and due to it happening throughout the whole night, I was a bit worried.

In the hallway outside the dorms were three people talking.
One of them was an Australian talking about how good Sydney is.

I was getting annoyed as they were talking quite loudly and I found their conversation to be painful to listen to as I was tired and grouchy.

As I needed to use the toilet, I went.

Whilst I was washing my hands and brushing my teeth, they were still talking.

I need to correct myself here.

It was mostly the Australian talking. The other two weren’t doing as much in that regard.

When I heard him talk about Bondi Beach being awesome and how it was a good surf beach, I had to do say something.
Well, I didn’t, but I did anyway.

I immediately told him that Bondi was a terrible beach for surfing.
He responded in defense of Bondi saying something along the lines of “No way Bondi is a terrible beach”.
I said there were better beaches for surfing up north and down south.
He responded by saying that he didn’t surf and just watches.
I walked away and said there was no point in talking to him then.

I may not know much about surfing, but as he didn’t know much about surfing… something.

Just before I went back into my room, I made sure to say that a club he was talking about was sleazy and a place you’d only go to for one-night stand.

There was an awkward silence, then an awkward laugh that was followed by one of the other people awkwardly saying they might be interested in a one-night stand.

I don’t think I cared enough to not be a jerk at that point.

I tried to get to sleep but the tremors kept me awake.

After a while, Gabe came back from wherever he was and went to sleep pretty quickly.

It was at this point the snoring began.
It was incredibly loud.
I’ve heard him snore before and it isn’t exactly quiet, but this was something that was hard and merciless.

The remaining hours I was awake for were very long as the tremors and Gabe’s snoring danced in passionate unison, relenting only for brief moments before diving right back into the thick of it.