Best Valentine's Gift Ever

[samurainoir]

My lovely spouse is working in Tokyo right now, and I have to admit I was feeling a bit down that she had to stay an extra week. But she sent me these pics yesterday, so it did cheer me up.

Toy Shopping is always hit or miss for her. To her credit, she always tries her best to find me something awesome.

She found one of my grail items yesterday at the Mandrake in Akihabara.


plus picked up these two as well.


I've never been to this location, but from her description it sounds unbelievable.


I was hoping she would have been able to hit the Hot Toys showroom over at Toy Sapiens in Shinjuku, but given that she is there every month now, I'm happy to wait for her next trip over.

[Brown Bear]

Really? My favorite Valentine's gift ever would involve Megan Fox and a box of little blue pills.

[palitoy]

Wow, way to go J!

[livnxxxl]

That was very nice of her to think of you while she is away. She is a great wife I am sure.

Of course we all know that Valentines Day just would not be Valentines Day without a KISS. In this case I suppose we will have to wait another month or so for the KISS figures to arrive. That would have been cool if they could have got them out in time for Valentines day though. At this point I am just grateful to see them being made in the 8 inch format period.

[toys2cool]

awesome bro

[Saroyan]

That is a good wife to have!!

[cjefferys]

Way to go Ed! You have a real keeper there, I don't think my wife would set foot inside a Mandarake store unless I drag her to one with me (which I often do, and to her credit, she agrees and translates a lot of stuff for me once we are inside the store, so I guess I got a keeper too ).

Oh yeah, the Akihabara Mandarake is awesome, but my favourite is still the first one I ever visited, in Shibuya. One huge, subterranean cave of toy goodness, I tend to luck out there the most. What Mandarakes have you been to? (I forget if I asked you that when we were talking last fall).

[jimsmegos]

That is so cool. To have a spouse that embraces ones geekdom is wonderful thing. My lovely wife got me some heart covered boxer shorts, a Dean Martin CD, Johnny Cash CD and a fun pack of M&M's and packaged them up all nice and neat in a Superman lunchbox.

[samurainoir]

Way to go Ed! You have a real keeper there, I don't think my wife would set foot inside a Mandarake store unless I drag her to one with me (which I often do, and to her credit, she agrees and translates a lot of stuff for me once we are inside the store, so I guess I got a keeper too ).

Oh yeah, the Akihabara Mandarake is awesome, but my favourite is still the first one I ever visited, in Shibuya. One huge, subterranean cave of toy goodness, I tend to luck out there the most. What Mandarakes have you been to? (I forget if I asked you that when we were talking last fall).

She doesn't speak much Japanese, so extra credit for venturing into these mazes for Otaku armed with only the phrase "Gatchaman".

I stumbled across the Shibuya one quite by accident, and was all pins and needles when I saw the stairs and started descending down looking at all the paintings of all the cool Japanese characters. Mind blowing place.


Then a friend of mine told me about the one out at Nakano which is just a huge mall of stores, including a few Mandarake's spread over the complex specializing in different stuff. It was at this one that I spent most of my budgeted Yen (mostly on Gatchaman stuff).




Trying to figure out the best time for me to go over as well this year... hopefully this summer. So much I want to do there. The Studio Ghibli Museum is pretty high on my list.

[Brazoo]

That's awesome!

[cjefferys]

Oh yeah, I went to the Nakano Broadway mall one time, tons of great stores there. If I remember correctly, one store was just for buying toys. I remember seeing a bunch of people lined up with bags full of toys and stuff they were going to sell to the store. I really wanted to hang around to see what they were getting rid off. I think the first Mandarake was there in Nakano.

Wow, your wife just knows a little Japanese? She definitely gets extra credit! I'm always a bit intimidated, with my limited Japanese, when I check out stores by myself over there, good for her!

Great pics (too bad Mandarake doesn't let you take photos inside. I know a couple people that almost got thrown out when they tried ). I remember hitting the Shibuya one for the first time. We got there early (after having a hell of a time finding the place) so it was closed. It looked like it was just a little store on the ground level. When it finally opened, and it turned out you had to go down a bunch of stairs to a huge cavern full of toys, manga, etc. I was in total awe, what an impact!

[4NDR01D]

Very cool Gatchaman robot.

[samurainoir]

Great pics (too bad Mandarake doesn't let you take photos inside. I know a couple people that almost got thrown out when they tried ).

It appears that she's going the full distance by taking stealthy iphone pics in the Mandarake as well!

I've been getting blurry pics with "do you have this/want this" messages on my phone.

I have been meaning to ask, were you ever able to end up buying anything via Yahoo Auctions Japan?

[cjefferys]

Nice! I remember my wife near panicking when I pulled out a camera in a Japanese Toys R Us for god's sake. Like they'd care. If I tried to pull a stunt like that in Mandarake, she'd have a heart attack. And she would never have the guts to do it. So I'd admire your wife's attitude.

I'm still trying to get my wife to sign up with Yahoo Auctions. Unfortunately, she's been a bit busy, but I have to depend on her complete co-operation and help in this endeavor, as the site is completely in Japanese, we'll have to use her Japanese based credit card, and her father's home address (Yahoo Japan's motto is basically "foreigners stay away" so we'll have to "trick" them into thinking she lives in Japan. No biggie, I've been tricking ebay for years in thinking that I live in the US. Same deal, as long as you have a legit mailing address and credit card to back you up ). Anyway, it will happen, but I'll have to wait a bit. She and the kids are going to Japan next month (unfortunately I can't make it this time ). I'll let you know when I finally get the Yahoo thing up and running.