Exploring the abyss of weird

Pat (my neighbour and fellow teacher) went exploring in our area today. Since there really isn't anything interesting in our part of town we decided to head somewhere else.

We ended up in Ozone which is just one stop away. It's the site for the Nagoya Dome (a baseball stadium – baseball is huge here). The local team are the Dragons but for some reason their mascot seems to be a tan koala. I think I might have missed something there.

There's also a mega mall. And this mall was pretty huge. It was probably bigger than Chadstone but a lot less crowded and with a lot less people. It was pretty deserted actually. It was your average shopping centre with average stores but there were a few highlights.

There was a arcade called Romantic Street full of those skill testers where you use the claw to pick up and win stuff. But these were filled with mega-huge plush toys (the Japanese people here seem obsessed with Stitch from Lilo and Stitch), Dragon ball z figurines, Hello Kitty biscuits, Pooh Bear kitchen ware, Snacks, A sausage jerky thing, and in one of them you could win a box of ritz crackers. Um…people you can buy that stuff in convenience stores.

There was also a HMV and the cds weren't actually too expensive. In the HMV was a weird store called Village Vanguards that was full of weird kitsch things. There were star/heart shaped frying pans, so all the ladies can cook up a heart shaped omelette for their husband's bento lunch (gag). A kettle shaped like a giraffe and my personal favourite was the cocktail sausage cutters. They cut cocktail sausages into fun shapes like crabs and penguins to encourage kids to eat them (sigh).

Then Pat and I wandered downstairs where there was a travel agency offering trips to space. Seriously? There are men and women who study and train for years, undergoing extensive training programs to become astronauts and now they're just offering the priviledge up to anyone with enough money. Uh…I think I'll pass.

Then we hit the Jackpot of Japanese weirdness. There was a mega pet store. They had the usual mini-dog section with accompanying dog clothing range. But beyond the dogs was a crazy range of animals. There were the usual fish plus walls and walls of tropical fish: clown fish, puffer fish, albino walking fish and others I don't know the name of. There were the usual love birds and cockatiels, then some quails too. Lizards, toads, frogs, turtles, tortoises, snails, crabs, beetles all ranging from miniscule to massive. Then there was a badger, a fox, a sheep, ferrets, a 20kg rabbit, chinchillas, possums, and snakes. I went nuts. It was awful to see these animals kept in teeny tiny boxes but the fact they were being sold as pets drove me insane. I felt like there was going to be a dolphin around the next corner I turned. It was something I would never have believed if I hadn't seen it but I was pretty glad to get out of there.

I think I will continue to be surprised by Japan for a long while.