Thursday Evening (2/28)

So, I went back to those little streets once everyone was getting off of work, and they were lined with people. It was a normal day, and yet it kinda seemed like a carnival or a convention. I went to a place called Yebisu, and had some spicy soba with onions (negi soba), and a Yebisu beer. Then I walked around some more and found a Club Sega Arcade



Ryan suggested that I visit a Club Sega, so I went in to see what it was like. Like most things I've seen here, it wasn't all that spacious, but it had 3 floors. The top floor was for games like tetris, soccer games, and an interesting card-based game called 「三国志大戦」 or "SanGokuShi TaiSen" which means something like "Tales of the Three Kingdoms : Great War". The game was a real-time strategy where the player would choose the cards they want out of their deck at the beginning, and then use those cards to position and direct things on the field of battle. Here's a page that has some pictures of the arcade machine. There was one guy that came in wearing a utility belt with decks of cards for this game in the various compartments of his belt.

Anyway, the bottom floor was for fighting games, and was labeled "Battle Arena". The middle floor was for things like crane games for getting prizes, and this, MarioKart Arcade 2



I had seen this before online, but had completely forgotten about it until now. I know how I'm going to spend my 100 yen coins now =) They've gotten a lot better at making arcade-goers want to part with their money. When you first sit down, it asks you if you have a card. I had no idea what it was talking about, so I said "no". Then I find out that you unlock courses, drivers, weapons, etc by winning various races. So I paid the extra 100 yen to get this



Which is where all your data is stored. I'm kinda glad that my commute home doesn't include the possibility of stopping by a club sega and dropping 10-15 bucks on unlocking more courses, etc. I'd be flat broke =)

Finally, I went to a coffee shop with the intention of just sitting there a while and reading. So far the two years of studying has been entirely useless. I haven't had any practice actually listening and speaking, and my vocabulary is too small to understand most things. Anyway, I ordered a drink in my standard manner, saying "caffe latte o kudasai", and then unsuccesfully trying to understand when they say what appears to be "is that for here or to go". Anyway, they figure I can't understand, and they start talking about me in terms that I'm somewhat familiar with .. and they weren't nice. That kinda pissed me off. Kind of a sour end to an otherwise nice day. I just wish I could speak well enough to respond to something like that without needing 5 minutes to figure out how to say it.