Shopping in Sapporo

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(Sept 9) Many of the more entertaining shops in Sapporo can be found in the Tanukikoji, a covered shopping arcade that extends for 8 blocks in the southeast quarter of the city.

Tanukikoji Arcade

Tanukikoji Arcade

A monk chants. Most people ignore him.

Arcade Monk

The “Little Spoon” sells somewhat overpriced ice cream.

Little Spoon

The shopkeepers would have you believe that this is what a tanuki looks like, but we know better, don’t we?

Store Tanuki

Japan has a lot of “100 Yen stores”, which are equivalent to American “dollar stores”. But there are also a lot of stores like this.

1050 Yen Store

I’m a little puzzled. Why 1050 Yen? Wouldn’t a round number like 1000 Yen be more appealing?

The name of this hotel is the “Hotel Dormy Inn.” This is the kind of thing that can happen if you mix languages.

Hotel Dormy Inn

Animated manikins try to lure customers into a curry shop.

Curry Manikins

It is common for inexpensive noodle shops to require you to place your order by purchasing tickets from a vending machine.

Noodle Shop Sign

The local baseball team is called the “Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters.” They are very popular and you can buy all sorts of memorabilia, including hand towels, purses and marimokkori figures.

Fighters Shoujo

Fighters Towels

Fighters Marimokkori

All sorts of noisy singing toys are for sale, some of them sound-activated.

Buy something or we’ll bite you!

Shop Bears

A number of shops sell used American clothing.

Real Monkey

Nudie Clothing

You thought that used clothing went to the poor, didn’t you? However some of it goes to Japan where it is sold at a substantial markup to trendy teenagers.

Presumably new American clothing would be even better, but that is hard to find and extremely expensive.

There are also several underground malls, which extend from the major subway stations and run on seemingly forever.

Underground Mall

I didn’t take many pictures of the underground malls because they are full of typical high-end stores that aren’t all that visually interesting.

Here’s a display of expensive handbags, sitting out in the open in the middle of a mall, apparently unguarded. You wouldn’t see that in New York!

Handbags

As in Tokyo, a typical department store will have an upscale food court in the basement.

Expensive Food Court

The prices aren’t as high as in Tokyo, but still aren’t cheap.

Expensive Food

Colorful Odori Park forms a long strip through the center of the city, with the landmark TV Tower at one end.

Odori Park

All posts from this trip.