Miss Neko in Japan ♥ Kobe & Osaka: Swankiss, Angelic Pretty & more

Hi there (^-^)v ~♪

It's been quite a while since my last entry, that's because

last month finally one of my biggest dreams came true.

I went to Japan ♥

I went there for 3 weeks and I gathered

lots of beautiful pictures and experiences I'd love to share with you.

I am very thankful that I'm able to say
I've not only seen Japan trough the eyes of a tourist.
As most of my dear readers might know I study Japanese language
and culture at University in Düsseldorf, Germany.

So I can communicate quite decently and was of course
prepared for a lot of things concerning this different culture and society.

Moreover I was lucky enough to have friends who brought
me to places you couldn't have seen as a tourist.

Nevertheless I was still utterly overwhelmed and stunned

when I was suddenly facing this country I had dreamt of for so long
and it became so very real right in front of my eyes.
This experience truly shaped me and changed my way of thinking essentially.

I'm happy I can now share this unique experience with you.
I will split my journey in several blog entries as there is so much to tell.

Short summary of my trip :

I flew to Osaka together with my friend Wiebke who will be

studying in Japan for 1 year. When we arrived in Japan we drove to our 

hotel in Kobe and explored the city for 4 days.

During that time we also went to Osaka (America Mura) again.

On the 5th day I drove to Kyoto by train on my own.

There I met my dear and missed friend Bea ♥ who has been living

in Japan since almost 1 year. I stayed 1 week in Kyoto with her.

After that we went to Tokyo together.

Our hotel was in Ōtsuka, it was very close to the station and
we could use the famous Yamanote line there.

We could also easily walk to Ikebukuro.
We stayed in Tokyo about 10 days and then I had to fly home
to Düsseldorf as my next semester will be starting in October.
Aside from that I also missed my boyfriend Valentin insanely much.
I had never been away from him for so long and now I know
I never want to be apart from him for such a long time again.

The next time I'll be going to Japan it will be together with him ♥

Let's begin ! \(^-^)/
♥ Swankiss store in Osaka :

After Wiebke and I arrived in Kobe we explored the town a little bit.

We woke up very early every day (me at 4 a.m.) to have enough time
to see everything. One day we met 2 lovely girls from our University
who have already been studying in Kobe for some months.
We all went to America Mura in Osaka together ♥
There we also went to the 株式会社OPA  shopping mall.

Inside of the mall I coincidentally found a Swan Kiss store !

I almost cried 'cause I was so happy. This was the first really sweet
and 'kawaii' store I had seen in Japan. It truly looked like a microcosm
pressed in between all the other more elegant and plain stores.
The music of the store contributed to this sweet feeling I got.

They played cute electro versions of famous disney songs.
Like this one :

At the store I met Tomomi one of the cute staff girls ♥
She was very sweet and I'm glad we could take a picture together.
Later on I also bought the hair accessory she's wering here *-*
I'm really inspired to try out some new things now.
I also bought the white dress the doll on the picture below wears.
Stay tuned for outfit pictures ~♪

I just couldn't resist and got me this big heart shaped handbag, too :

~♥~

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The pretty shopping bags :

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My outfit for that day :

Dress: Blondie used clothing  ( only 5€ *o* )

Necklace: Sweet Spirits
Flower crown: Primark

I was inspired by Swan Kiss and Cult Party Kei fashion.
I wanted to go for a fairy like look. Innocent and pale ~
Like a creature from a fairytale, you find at a lake.
Japan really influenced my taste in fashion once again very deeply.
I'd rather not be one certain "type" of fashion.

I am my very own creation and I get a great sense of freedom to be able
to create things after the image I have in mind.
For me fashion is much more than just clothing.
When I dress up I want to create an artificial character
like a painter creates a painting.
But paradoxically it is also still my very authentic self that
I'm expressing through my creation. ♫

With a staff girl of Blondie (ブロンディ) in Kobe :

I really love stores like this one. It was really tiny but stuffed
with lots of great clothes. Like a treasure box !
I found my white fairy dress there and my friend Wiebke found
2 dresses by Liz Lisa for me *o* And I got everything for less than 10€ ♥

Like I said I explored Kobe together with my friend Wiebke.
Our hotel was in Sannomiya 三宮
starting there we went to see the Ikuta Shrine on the 2nd day.

Ikuta Shrine :

~♥~

Here's a great video of the scenery :

Omamori (お守り) = Lucky charms you could buy at the shrine :

~♥~

~♥~

I also met Shrine Maidens (Miko 巫女) *-*
But I didn't want to bother them by asking to take a photo,
also I didn't think it would have been appropriate.

The bus stop right in front of our hotel :

Sannomiya :

One morning we found this awesome Purikura store ! ♥
It's a whole store full with Puri machines, it even had 2 floors.
Later on I went to some game centers to find out that
sometimes there are even many floors only with Puri machines *o*
I took a ton of Puris during my stay =D

~♥~

This one was really special to me as it was connected to some
egg magazine models who are a great inspitation to me ♥

~♥~

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At most of these Puri stores you can also rent a Cosplay outfit.
There are chairs in front of mirrors where you can do your make-up and hair.

Sometimes they even have hair straighteners and curling irons.
You can easily spend a lot of time there ~♥

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With Wiebke ♥

This is one of my favourite Puri machines ♥ Gyza

These machines always also play their own music and this one
played Skrillex ! I just love EDM & Dubstep ~♥ \(^-^)/

~♥~

When we were in Osaka I also happend to find this
Angelic Pretty store ♥

I could have looked around there for hours, everything they 

have is so lovely. I decided to get this bow necklace :3

As you can see we did quite some shopping ;3

One day we went to a Daiso in Kobe. It's one of my favourite shops
as they have so many cute & practical things.
You find there stores all over Japan.
They also have an online store : Daiso online
Almost everything they sell costs 1€ ♥ (in the actual stores in Japan)
I got this for 20 € :

~♥~

I'm especially happy they sold so many great lashes as they are way too expensive in the regular stores in my opinion.
I don't want to spend 8 € for only 2 pair of lashes....
And I can assure you the quality of these lashes is great ♥
I use Daiso lashes since about a year and am very pleased with them
and the glue.  All the lashes on the photo didn't even cost 1 € each.
Lot's of Daiso lashes look exactly like some Dolly Wink lashes
and their quality is equal, I don't want to waste any money on brand names.
~♥~

Just what I needed :
A case for used lashes ( I use them numerous times ) ♥

I also got some of these ♥

In a regular store. 
There you can see the Dolly Wink lashes. 7,50 € for only 2 lashes !

The Daiso lashes :

Daiso :

Found these cute hair dyes at a Family Mart :

I also found a really funny advertising in a Drugstore in Kobe.
 At first I thought the bear on the poster is
all dirty and this is shower gel to clean it and make it all white again.
But then I realized this is hair remover cream ! :D
It says : "Kotoshi wa moja to Sayonara !!"
meaning: This year say bye bye to the hairiness !!
もじゃもじゃ (the hairy font) means shaggy hair xDD
Then I thought oww the poor bear it will be cold like this ;_;
What is this even ??! :D
I guess you shouldn't try to understand Japanese advertising.

In that Drugstore I bought some Japanese make-up.
It's really good but too dark for me  ;_;  I already took the lightest shade
they had. It works when I use my own pouder
but I'm thinking of selling it again, anyone interested ?
I only used it once so far.

I asked a Japanese woman who worked in that Drugstore what make-up
she uses as she looked really pretty and pale.
And she told me she used Coffret D'or. But now I guess her face only
appeared really pale to me in comparison to the rest of her body and other people there. It does look ok with my natural skin tone but I prefere to use some shades lighter. I had a really nice talk with the saleswoman
as she asked me and my friend why our Japanese was so good etc.
and we told her a little about us. When we were about to leave
the woman gave me this cute sailor bag as a gift :

In Kobe we also went to Nankin-machi - China town ♥

~♥~

It was really great and especially to the delight of Wiebke
we found a store that sold K-pop merchandise ♥
Of course we also saw many many vending machines -
jidouhanbaiki 自動販売機  on our way ♥

I tried this Grape Fanta once but mostly I drank cold green tea,
without sugar of course. I really like the bitter taste.
It's reviving when it's so hot.

Ufo catcher in a game center in Kobe :

Sannomiya, Kobe :

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We also found a little shrine in Kobe.
There I prayed for something very important to me.
It was the first shrine in Japan I prayed at. I'll never forget that place.
It was really peaceful ♥

When you enter a shrine you need to respect a certain set of rules.
For example you first clean your hands and mouth as a symbolic act.
See all the rules here : manners at a Japanese Shrine
Luckily I knew what to do due to my studies and
because some of my Senpai told me before ^^

~♥~

~♥~

In Osaka :

 2NE1 Jeremy Scott shoes *O*
Oh gosh I want a pair in white so badly ♥

A really cool store in America Mura ♥

I love caps ! ♥

It's like tumblr. vomitted all over this place ;D I loved it ♥

Osaka :

Kyary Pamyu Pamyu ♥

You could eat crabs in some of the restaurants...
(I'm vegetarian by the way and had an unexpected hard time to find food
that is not cold salad or expensive.)
This one moved it's eyes and legs, I thought it looked cute ^^

~♥~

At my last day in Kobe I went to see the Kobe University :

The 2 girls of my University I mentioned earlier were so kind to
spend the day with me and show me around *-*
Thank you so much again ! ♥

Lunchtime at the mensa :

The university looked really pretty and it's surroundings were
truly beautiful. There was lots of nature and it was a
really sunny day. The whole time it felt like summer ^-^
On the way to the dorms of the students there were many
of these yellow spiders. We also heared the beautiful sound of
cicadas most of the time ~♫

On the balcony of the dorm in Kobe :

I just love Japanese nature ♥

The way from university to the dorm :

Like I said finding food was sometimes quite difficult for me.
One thing I could enjoy was Veggie Okonomiyaki ♥
It's one of my favourite foods, but sadly you cannot eat it very often
as you'd gain quite some weight from it...

Mine is the bottom left one ♥

Some Konbini food I liked to eat ♪

I also passed by lots and lots of Pachinko halls.
They seemed to be everywhere in the cities. It's japanese gambling
and comes with quite a shady reputation (at least in my eyes).
The famous band AKB48 of course also has it's own Pachinko machines...
I saw these posters quite a lot. I really like some of their songs
but I must admit this has lowered my opinion of this
for-profit group further more. I can't overlook the fact
that these created, fictional idols that are presented to be innocent
are only made for marketing and their target audience are (old) men.
They have so many clearly lascivious poses and messages
I cant close my eyes to the hypocrisy of their system.
Nevertheless I still try to enjoy some of their music without thinking to
much about this. I'm sorry if I offended the opinion of some of you
but due to some of my courses at University I had to deal
with this topic (Idols) before and it kinda took my
rose-colored glasses away ;)

Neko's music :

Well, this were my first 5 days in Japan ~♥
I hope you enjoyed reading !
Tell me what you liked and what you'd like to know
about my journey and Japan.
I will blog about Kyoto and Tokyo very soon !
I guess I have quite a lot of blog entries to write now ♥
I still have tons of pictures and things I experienced to share with you :3
See you next time (^-^)v nyan ♫