Today I went to the end of the Oedo line, its an unusual line in-so-far-as it only has one end. It also remains underground for the entirity of the journey. I emerged into an area of many many huge blocks of flats. This reminded me a lot of Munich, the area around the olympic stadium and BMW factory there. Howcome there aren’t really areas like this in England, we have flats in the same way, but they always seem to turn into scummy areas. Maybe its just that these other places get more sun, or that I see them through rose tinted glasses or something.
A quick wander around the park, overshadowed by what appears to be a recycling plant, and then back to the shopping centre next to the station. The whole area is infested with children, they were everywhere, running around, stopping randomly, riding bicycles badly, being scared of the big lumbering foreigner, skateboarding, you name it.
Back toward the city centre and I stopped at Nerima (which I always turn into Nermia in my head), which seemed to be served by rather a lot of infrastruture for such a quiet place. A few shops and a big road, but it seemed to have three or four stations and a bus terminal and nearly as many taxis as Tokyo station itself.
Onto the Seibu Ikebukuro line, which for some inexplicable reason had a warning notice on the window depicting someone sitting with their knees wide apart and a huge exclamation mark on them – I assume it was warning that you shouldn’t sit like that, but I don’t read enough kanji to understand it.
At Ikebukuro I found another record shop with a sale – this one tucked away above the Loft. It was unexpected to find two Foetus CDs (including covers of I am the walrus and Elected) and 1000 Homo DJs for 1000 yen each.