Don’t believe Google or Instagram because the @ginzavampire cafe is, in fact, open on Mondays, and, let me tell you: 10/10, would do again.
They are so committed to the bit from the moment you walk in to the moment you walk out—our server gave us the deepest bow in the whole of Japan as the elevator doors shut—that you can’t help but be swept up in the pageantry. And the food is actually good! It’s not just a bit of food coloring and some skull stencils. Another equally goofy and dead serious experience in Japan ✔️ x
Bringing back old-school millennial cringestagram with more photos of our food: @isomarusuisan_official, @suzucafe_roppongi, @mamo.turkishrestaurant, and @freys_famous_pizzeria. x
And probably the cringiest thing we did was going to the Hard Rock Cafe in Tokyo, the only Hard Rock Cafe I’ve ever been to. It was literally a block from our hotel and reminded me so much of Beirut—that big symbol of the 1990s post-war reconstruction that I never walked into that eventually closed after 17 years and became a symbol of our economic collapse—that I thought it would be funny to fly all the way over here to try it out for the first time.
It was very funny and had Aerosmith-themed drinks, which was bittersweet because they remind me of that time too, but they’re also such a shitty band politically, but I had a glass anyway, because I was in such a good mood.
And “Dream On” started to play as we were getting ready to leave, so we lingered a bit to listen to it. Dream a little, I’ll dream on. Dream on. Dream on. You know the part. So I started to cry. Crying in the Hard Rock Cafe. A new level of cringe unlocked! Oh well. Sing for the laughter, sing for the tear. x
A Shinjuku morning.
A rare 35mm vertical in Shinjuku because how else are we to soak in this moment? That the Mode Gakuen Cocoon Tower (モード学園コクーンタワー) in the background which contains three vocational schools: a fashion school (Tokyo Mode Gakuen), an IT & design college (HAL Tokyo), and a medical college (Shuto Ikō), serving around 10,000 students. The architects had won a design competition and the building looks the way it does because the only stipulation was that the building had to be anything but rectangular.
I don’t like posting verticals on here because they’re always cropped, but I decided to lean into it this time by punching in hard on that whole cyberpunk situation we have here. The last slide shows a bit more from what Instagram chops off the top.
An afternoon in Shibuya, featuring the famous “Shibuya Scramble” and the (perhaps) equally famous MEGAドン.