Shinjuku Flea Market and Setagaya

 So, after all the typhoon scares and rain forecasting, it was sunny this morning. The rain really is coming in (you can see it on the radar), but it's a little slow. This worked in our favor because rain would have likely canceled the flea market at the Hanazono shrine that we visited yesterday.

Sunday at Ueno Station is a zoo, but we were at the metro station, which is a little less insane without the Shinkansen traffic. After a bakery stop for breakfast we went down several levels to the Ginza line, seeing some wild pandas along the way

Overpriced Ueno Panda merch

They do lean into the whole mascot thing here

The flea market was actually pretty cool. A bunch of vendors were there with various levels of quality, ranging from grandma's junk drawer got dumped into a box to some serious antiques. The prices reflected that, though things were still reasonably priced. We were given an assignment to try and find festive used happi for the taiko group, and at the last stand we found a pile of them and a bonus find.

A potpourri of happi

And...a shakuhachi?

The happi will need some work, but they were cheap to begin with and we got a free one thrown in. The shakuhachi...it is bamboo and a lot cheaper than the plastic ones online. Once I learn how to play it, we'll see what it sounds like.

After our purchases and now looking like homeless people carrying around clothing in a clear plastic bag, we set out for Setagaya to visit with Steve, a family friend whom we always seem to miss when we're here. He lives in Setagaya, so we met up for lunch and a house tour. We arrived at about 12:30, peak Sunday lunch time at the station. After checking out a few restaurants with long lines we got lucky at a Korean restaurant and got seated right away before the rush (there was quite a line by the time we left).

Bebim Bop all around

The food was good and we got to catch up with Steve, who we hadn't seen in quite a while. He travels, like, a lot. He has visited every country in the world. Literally all 196. Well, make that 197. There is a tiny island country off the wets coast of Africa, Cape Verde. He assumed it was owned by Portugal or some other European country like many other of the small islands chains in the area, but it's an independent country. So he managed to miss one, He'll be rectifying that this summer.

After lunch we walked a few blocks to his house, which he has owned for over 50 years. It's a pleasant, comfortable three story house surrounded by larger buildings that came later. During the pandemic, he decided to build his own Japanese garden.

And built his own little "mountain" at the back where his jizou sits

The mountain

We spent several hours talking and had a really nice time. Steve's had an interesting life that I won't go into here in case the authorities are reading this. So, with poor Steve only back from overseas for four days and still struggling with jet lag, he walked us back to the train station and we headed back to Asakusa.

Well, we tried. We had 6 stops on the Den-to-Toshin line to get back to Shibuya. Some electrical problems on one of the trains in the line causes a rather severe delay. Rather than 16 minutes, it took us almost 90 minutes to get back to Shibuya. And there was really no other train we could be on. It was only 5 miles, but with the rain and the bags of stuff we purchased, we didn't want to walk (though it was tempting).

Eventually we made it back to Shibuya where it was raining pretty hard and very busy. Our initial thought was to get some ice cream or something here, but it was now so late and busy, we just took the subway back to Asakusa. By now in was getting late and lunch had occurred almost 7 hours prior. So the battle of favorite foods was had and Ichiran won out. The Asakusa Ichiran is different in two ways: 1) It has regular table seating and not individual booths and 2) Due to the very high quantity of tourists they have a bunch of rules that include not taking unapproved videos. Practically everyone in the shop were foreign tourists, a very different vibe from the Ueno Station shop where it's half tourists and half locals. 

I'm off to learn how tot play shakuhachi and try not to get kicked out of our hotel while doing so, One full day left tomorrow!