Japan Day 3

4.8.2025

See day 2 of the trip

3.12 Wednesday

Since the previous day ended up with my being really fatigued, I just wanted to take it easy today, and evaluate my energy to see what I was able to do today without tiring myself out for the next days.

When travelling, I always worry that downtime “looks bad”, makes my trips “boring”, or is “a waste of time”. However, since I’m just travelling alone, I tried very hard to make sure to take care of myself during this trip, even if I don’t seem to end up as fun as other people. It’s a bit hard to remember this because it’s so natural to compare your trips to how others do theirs.

Since I was a little gloomy about being tired so early in my trip, I decided to cheer myself up by trying a cute chai cafe that jume recommended to me: uRn.chAi&TeA EBISU

It was just perfect for this day I spent a bit of time here just recharging. The cafe’s music selection is so calming, so peaceful! Honestly, vibes were 100% what I needed to rest up.

Yes, this is where I took out my ipad to prepare a bit of blog posts and relax a bit! This cafe has a loft area which is very cute!

I ordered their chai matcha and a hot sando of their seasonal flavour: sakura mochi The hot sando was so, so delicious. I still think about it sometimes Although by the second half of it, it started to become too sweet for me!

As I stayed at the cafe, it ended up being super rainy (despite the original weather report saying it wouldn’t rain on this trip), which made me really thankful I picked up an spontaneous umbrella the previous day, and of course those Evelyn boots

I was a bit bummed since I wanted to go to a park to recharge but with rain, it’s just not super great, so I decided to do some indoor shopping. I went to Lumine EST in Shinjuku, which I wish now that I went to multiple times because Shinjuku has a bunch of cute shops! Did some shopping at evelyn (surprise!) and a random Tabio (I had to try out the Nudey54 tights that Sarah was raving about!)

Forgot to take a worn pic of the skirt…

I was super happy to find these colourways of the top and the dress since they’re sold out online. It doesn’t show up well after my editing LOL but the top is grey (blueish) and the dress is pale purple-pink The Lumine EST location of evelyn allows you to do tax-free while the 109 location doesn’t, so I’d recommend shopping here if you can specifically for evelyn.

For the top, I’m super happy with it because I was afraid the sheer lace part would be itchy, but it’s not! It’s not like… the softest haha but it’s definitely passable for me I really liked a similar design from mellfy memory’s previous collection, but since I don’t have experience wearing MM I didn’t want to risk ordering a full price item and having it not fit. Thankfully, evelyn came out with this similar design (cheaper too) so I can match this style with my closet now

Tabio had a bunch of cute Chiikawa socks! I love seeing collabs, though I didn’t buy any

It was still pouring rain like crazy… I left Shinjuku area since I was intending to save my clothes shopping to be done w/ the girls and ended up trying to shop around at Harajuku. This was probably the biggest waste of time during my trip LOL I should’ve just stayed in Shinjuku I visited Closet Child, but they had such a tiny selection and a lot of pieces were lined up in the back for online order only (?), and I didn’t really suit most of the other stores in Harajuku so it was just kind of a big energy black hole in my day.

At this time, I realised I just really needed to de-stimulate from all the crowds, so I walked back to Shibuya.

I ended up going back to Tokyu Hands to pick up the chiikawa &honey set that I had seen/passed on the previous day though (after thinking about it) and got a few more cute things, so that made me happy!

For dinner, I just wanted something warm, simple, and local after all that rain, so I found a vegan ramen option at Jikasei MENSHO. It’s an order-by-tablet ramen place which is great for solo eaters.

It was alright honestly! Sometimes vegan options are really oily, especially if it’s a dish like ramen that typically gives me heartburn. It was the soupy warm dish I needed, but I think taste-wise it was just okay - just made me realise I don’t think ramen is really for me

These were the buys I got from Lumine - an OP, a top, and a skirt from evelyn; two tights and a pair of pink socks from Tabio It was kind of hard to tell what colour to pick for the tights so I tried to go lighter with their “ecru beige”. I figured I’d try it out before seeing if I wanted more since Tabio’s a bit pricier than other options like tutuanna!

I also got a capsule ball boy for my manz.

Also some konbini desserts! I don’t know why but i LOVE that mint ice cream and eat it every time I come to Japan. It’s just like, a normal mint chocolate chip, but somehow I love it