One Piece Mugiwara Store – Anne Goes to Places

Kyushu, Day 11: Tenjin

When we returned to Tenjin, we went to PARCO to visit the Kimetsu no Yaiba Sweets Café which was open for a limited time. However, there was a long line and when we saw the mechanics to buy the Kimetsu no Yaiba-themed desserts, we just found it to be too expensive.

MARCH 14, 2020

For our first breakfast in the Airbnb, Hisako-obaasan cooked a gyudon-like meal with different veggies as side dish. She also served us fruits for dessert and prepared one of her high-quality green teas when she learned that I love drinking tea.

We spent this day just in Tenjin…

…but did a small detour to Hakata Station because C was finding a store selling Nintendo Switch. Inside the station, we passed by this bakery called Il Forno Del Mignon. Since the start of this trip, we would always get hungry because we could smell their pastries even a few hundred meters away. Unfortunately, there was always a long line. But during this day, there were no customers so we gave in and bought the plain croissant. We finally realized why there was a hype!

When we returned to Tenjin, we went to PARCO to visit the Kimetsu no Yaiba Sweets Café which was open for a limited time. However, there was a long line and when we saw the mechanics to buy the Kimetsu no Yaiba-themed desserts, we just found it to be too expensive. We went to One Piece Store instead, which was also in the same mall.

Still in PARCO, in B1F we found different restaurants for lunch. We went to KIWAMIYA, famous for Imari beef (from Saga) that you can cook on a heated stone. Even if there was a long line, it was moving quickly so we fell in line.

We ordered the hamburg steak (¥1,500) and extra garlic chips…

Best decision!!! We just had to deal with bit of pain from the oil while cooking. The place was quite cramped. So we could not stretch as much as we wanted to.

After that, we went looking for animate and Mandarake. Disappointed though because animate was under construction while Mandarake was a bit far. I wonder why there is no popular anime street or area in Fukuoka…

We ended up looking for a coffee shop to take a rest and we found MANU. The coffee was good and everyone in their staff was nice. When we paid for our orders before leaving, the guy behind the counter made a small talk with us.

For dinner, we went to one of the yatai stalls in Tenjin. Yatai literally means “shop stand” and this is a small, mobile food stall which opens up in the evening only. I saw a recommendation from Yoshke (The Poor Traveler) to go to TENJIN YATAI MUNE. Not sure if the stall changed its name because their menu says “Soh’s Tenjin Food Stall” but the food that they offered was still the same.

We ordered mentai tamagoyaki (¥800), dai-chan yaki (¥650), and yaki-ramen (¥800). The best ones here were the mentai tamagoyaki and yaki-ramen. The stall also had a policy that we have to order one drink each – not sure if this is the same for the other yatai in the area.

We wanted to return here for another dinner but with the few days left, we had other food places to try. Highly recommend this yatai though!

Japan, Day 5: One Piece Store and Osu

Got off at Kintetsu-Nagoya Station after the Ise-Shima daytrip and before reaching the exit of the building, one of the elevators grabbed my attention. THERE IS A ONE PIECE MUGIWARA STORE IN NAGOYA!!!

I was greeted by a big space dedicated to Roronoa Zoro, my favorite character! Apparently, November was his birthday month so they had that special space for him.

NOVEMBER 25, 2018

Got off at Kintetsu-Nagoya Station after the Ise-Shima daytrip and before reaching the exit of the building, one of the elevators grabbed my attention. THERE IS A ONE PIECE MUGIWARA STORE IN NAGOYA!!!

Of course, I got on the elevator and went to the paradise of One Piece goodies. I was greeted by a big space dedicated to Roronoa Zoro, my favorite character! Apparently, November was his birthday month so they had that special space for him.

After getting my fix of One Piece goodies, I went for a quick visit to BIC Camera to buy the newly-released TESCOM 2-way Steam Hair Iron TPW 2826 (2-in-1 hair straightener and curler). It was a quick trip

I initially wanted to eat in a kaitenzushi (conveyor belt sushi) restaurant but was reminded of Gaburi Chicken restaurant so dinner was in Osu area.

Ordered their specialty karaage and a platter of yakitori to pair with drinks that resembled Chu-hi. I liked their food as it is but it was also good to dip in Japanese mayo.

That dinner was the perfect way to cap my fifth day in Japan. I still had a bit of regret not being able to eat sushi but that can be easily fixed with a good Japanese resto in MNL.

Kansai, Day 7: Himeji – Osaka

Our 2nd daytrip was in Himeji, almost 2 hours away from Osaka by train. From Himeji Station, we rode the Himeji Castle Loop Bus which looked like an old-fashioned bus.

Our main stop here was the famous HIMEJI CASTLE (UNESCO), which is also known as “shirasagi-jo” or “white heron castle”. It was built by Toyotomi Hideyoshi in the 16th century and during our visit, a portion of the castle was undergoing restoration – goes to show how Japan highly values their history and puts great effort in preserving this.

MARCH 12, 2017

Our 2nd daytrip was in Himeji, almost 2 hours away from Osaka by train. From Himeji Station, we rode the Himeji Castle Loop Bus which looked like an old-fashioned bus.

Our main stop here was the famous HIMEJI CASTLE (UNESCO), which is also known as “shirasagi-jo” or “white heron castle”.

It was built by Toyotomi Hideyoshi in the 16th century and during our visit, a portion of the castle was undergoing restoration – goes to show how Japan highly values their history and puts great effort in preserving this.

What was interesting for me during our visit was whichever area we were in the castle grounds, we could always clearly see the castle. Before going to the main keep, we explored the other areas nearby including a long passageway.

Inside the main keep, we climbed 6 floors. This was not the only challenge as the staircases were narrow and steep so if you have kids with you, better be careful in climbing those stairs. At the topmost floor, there was a small shrine where the local visitors all paid respect and prayed for a short while. Aside from this, we were also able to see the spectacular view of the city and the maze-like layout of the castle.

Fish ornaments placed on the roof are believed to protect the castle from fire

Before leaving, I was trying to look for a magnet that had its cute “mascot” as the design. Unfortunately, there was none so I decided to just buy the coin-like souvenir with しろまる姫 (Shiromaru-hime).

We went to KOKOEN GARDEN afterwards, which was just a few blocks away from the castle. The ticket we bought included admission for the castle and this garden. We were lucky because there were some flowers that had already bloomed but I bet that it would look even better during springtime.

We were supposed to visit Mount Shosha but given the time we finished the garden, we decided to go back to Osaka so that we still had time to visit ONE PIECE MUGIWARA STORE. I only bought two small boxes of keychain with random characters since I could not find any Zoro goodie that I liked. I was sooo lucky that one of the boxes had Zoro in his Film Gold costume! (Note that a few days after this, M told me that Den-den Town stores were better since he was able to buy the ship that was out-of-stock in OP Mugiwara Store.)

Since we did not have the energy to go far from our Airbnb, we bought dinner at MCDONALD’S and tried some of the sakura-themed items. I had the fries and soda for this but I bought a regular cheeseburger. The fries was yummy at first but I found it to be too salty later on. I guess I shouldn’t have poured all the powder… The sakura float tasted like medicine so good thing I bought an apple-flavored alcohol beverage, which was a good pair with my food.

This is for the French fries to make it “sakura fries”; package says “sakura ebi shio” which translates to sakura shrimp salt

Next day’s adventure is Nara (including deer), yay!

LINKS TO OTHER KANSAI REGION / JAPAN 2017 POSTS:

Japan, Day 0-1: Kyoto (Higashiyama Area)

Japan, Day 2: Kyoto (Arashiyama)

Japan, Day 3: Kyoto (Fushimi, Northern Higashiyama)

Japan, Day 4: Kyoto (Central & Downtown)

Japan, Day 5: Kyoto >> Osaka

Japan, Day 6: Kobe >> Osaka

Japan, Day 8: Nara >> Osaka

Japan, Day 9: Universal Studios

Japan, Day 10 (AM): Ise-shima

Japan, Day 10 (PM): Ise-shima

Japan, Day 11: Osaka

Tokyo, Day 5: Akihabara and Revisiting Shibuya

We went straight to Akihabara, and Mark and I were in pure bliss because we were in the popular anime place! We visited the big DONKI (DON QUIJOTE) store first to buy all sorts of pasalubong, mainly food (instant noodles + chocolates). After that, we headed to RADIO KAIKAN and went crazy at each floor. We were not allowed to take pictures, especially in areas of action figures. T.T

JANUARY 18, 2016

We were greeted in the morning by the first snowfall in Tokyo for 2016. Toshi-san’s prediction that we would be able to experience it was right on mark. We were not able to witness the actual snowfall but seeing that much of snow was already enough to make me happy. The last time I saw snow was back in January 2014, which was also my first time to see it.

Thick snow covering the roofs of every house and building

We started the day quite late, leaving the lodging at past 1PM. We had our late lunch in the food court of SOLAMACHI, and I picked the store which sells Japanese curry dish.

We went straight to Akihabara, and Mark and I were in pure bliss because we were in the popular anime place! We visited the big DONKI (DON QUIJOTE) store first to buy all sorts of pasalubong, mainly food (instant noodles + chocolates). After that, we headed to RADIO KAIKAN and went crazy at each floor. We were not allowed to take pictures, especially in areas of action figures. T.T The place has all sorts of merchandise for anime lovers — manga, action figures, CD copies of the shows, drawing guides, OST CDs, etc.

I wished we could have stayed longer so that we could visit more anime/manga places in Akiba. *sigh* We went to Shibuya afterwards to do some more shopping…

Our first stop was TOKYU HANDS, which has 7 floors and per floor, it has 3 sections (A, B, C). The place sells all sorts of items — ballpens, friction pens & highlighters, brush pens, postcards, stationery, bags & wallets, cosmetics, etc. Shopaholics will definitely love this place!

I was excited and itching to go to our next destination, which was recommended by Mark since he absolutely loves the same show to… ONE PIECE MUGIWARA STORE in Parco Shibuya. YAAAYYY!!! Good thing it was just walking distance from Tokyu Hands. So happy to see huge figures of Zoro, Luffy, and Chopper outside the store. I splurged on the One Piece gachapon machines outside, and bought some more keychains inside the store. I also bought a Perona cellphone audio jack, but I AM SO SAD TO SAY THAT I LOST IT HERE IN MNL. 😥

We went to look for ICHIRAN after our shopping trip for One Piece goodies…

There was a line but we decided to stay since it seemed like we would not wait that long. We ended up sitting in separate cubicles so we were able to experience eating alone.

It was interesting how we ordered our ramen — we were asked to “create” our ramen using a vendo machine, which would let out a small paper slip after you paid for it. Then, the waiter would hand out a paper so that you can check your preferences when it comes to flavor, richness, garlic, sliced pork, green onions, original red sauce, and noodle texture. This part resembles the way Ramen Nagi in MNL does things so it was familiar to me at that point.