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Lamtarra…

This is located in Akihabara, it’s on the main drag, so you can’t miss it, it’s caddy-corner to the Club Sega.  This ended up being one of those oft referred to stories I tell about how Japan is REALLY weird sometimes.

So, at street level, Lamtarra looks like a shop that sells video games and “race queen” videos, really fluffy stuff, all cheesecake photos and nothing really odd.

I walked in first back in 2005 and jumped on the elevator.  Most of the other stores I’d been into up until that point had these same elevators, taking me up several floors to descend and find different kinds of merchandise.

Well, Lamtarra is PORN for floors 2-6.  And they’re not shy about this either.  I walked out onto the 6th floor to find a photography studio.  Photographer was on break smoking a cigarette.  This floor has since closed in 2011, but the freaky-ness doesn’t even begin until floor 5 anyway.

Basically take the worst fears of what you would ever think “there’s a PORN for that?”, and that’s on floor 5.  Nothing by what we, as Americans, would consider illegal, ie no kids, no snuff, but pretty much whatever else you can think of… EWWWWWW.  They sell it.

Floor 4 was a more ratcheted down floor, only selling BDSM and European stuff (all censored), floor 3 selling American stuff, and floor 2 selling JAV videos.  

I’m not exactly prude by any means, but there’s stuff in this store that would make me blush.  

The wife and I definitely had some “WOW.” moments in this store.  I recommend it if you’ve got a strong stomach. 

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I’m posting this because I promised more “PG-13” ish content, but this blog isn’t intended to be a NSFW blog.

Go google what a Tenga Egg is.  I’ll wait.  

Done?

Good.  Why would you get one of these?  I dunno, broken hands?  Arm falls off but… heck, I don’t know.  

This was in Nakano Broadway, and for 500¥, it was a bargain.  I guess.  If you’re into that sorta thing.  The pattern on the egg is what the inside texture of it is supposed to be.  That’s all I’m sayin’.  <_<;

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Digging back into the past!

This picture is from 2007, shot with a friend’s Sony A100 DSLR.  10MP was a lot back then.

This was taken in Kakunodate in Akita prefecture.  I’ll cover Kakunodate more in depth later, suffice to say, it’s off the beaten path.

What’s to note about this one is the shot of a “Snack Bar” way up here in a remote place like Kakunodate.  Japan is plenty rife with bars and hangouts for men, but snack bars in particular are set up as destinations for men to spend time with ladies.  It’s non-sexual, but it can apparently be rather suggestive depending on the location and how expensive of an alcohol you’re willing to buy.

Since these places are “conversational”, it’s usually limited to fluent/native Japanese speaking clientele only.