What Tokyo's 'Tourist Trap' in Asakusa is really like

I'm not gonna lie, it's absolutely packed but I actually like this atmosphere. There's a lot of excitement in the air. Welcome to another beautiful day here in Tokyo. Today I have an exciting video for you because I'm going to take you down Nakamise-dori street here in Asakusa, one of Tokyo's tourist traps, almost touristy locations, but there's a reason for that. The first thing that you'll find when you approach the street is this giant lamp with lots of people taking photos and you can see why. It is quite an impressive sight to be honest. I mean I'm not gonna lie, I've got plenty of photos of myself with that lamp. There's another similar one on the other end of the street that's worth checking out. This street is absolutely a marvel for tourists because there are lots of little sweet shops, traditional goods, but it also is a mixture of tradition and modern because you'll also find some like pop culture, anime goods, pretty much anything that you might expect. Check it out, so much, so many interesting things. Some face masks, actually pretty good, buy one for 400, three for 1000. Might be a really good gift for your friends. Some bath bombs also for those of you interested in that sort of thing. And as you can see the street is just jam-packed with people, jam-packed with people. I guess people might say this is a tourist trap, but is it really a tourist trap? Just because it's popular doesn't make it a tourist trap in my opinion. There's a reason why people come here, it's incredibly picturesque, it's incredibly beautiful and you can spend loads of time just wandering the streets and looking at all the little stalls like I'm gonna be doing today. And tourists love to dress up with kimono, yukata, you're looking very beautiful, all of you, you're looking very nice. Yeah, can I put on video? Yeah, look, beautiful tourists, all of them here. Where are you from? France. France, bonjour! Hey, awesome! So, this is your first time in Tokyo? Yeah. Yeah, how do you like it? Yeah, it's fun. Love it. Yeah, enjoy, enjoy. Nice, also with a mask there. Look at cool. All right, let's carry on and see what there is. But this is what I love about this location, you know, first-timers usually come here and why not wear a kimono or yukata and enjoy your stroll here in Tokyo, I'd say. Check it out, guys, this is so stunning. 2000 yen. This is beautiful, good quality also actually, I must say. Lots of different styles, kimono, a bathrobe. I'm not very sure about, to be honest, I'm not very sure about this one personally. Some Japanese-like socks with, you know, the interesting style there. And I'm looking for some snacks. Check this out, very cool, beautiful. So, I'm going to look for some snacks because this place isn't just about souvenirs, but you can see that there are plenty of souvenirs around. Let's see, the very first snack to my left, what is it and will I get it? Let's check it out. All right, let's go, let's get some. Some mochi, I love mochi, by the way. Let's go. It says there you are not allowed to eat on this shopping street, which is very common, so a lot of these stores, most of these stores actually have an area where you can sit and eat and they even have their own trash cans or bins, which I'm going to show you. There, just for their stuff. Let's try this. Okay, this is good. It's kind of smaller than I expected because usually mochi is a little bit bigger, but these are tiny, tiny little mochis. Good taste. They bring one, two, three, four for 500 yen, which isn't too bad. Maybe a little bit too much for me because I want to try and eat more stuff, but I would give this a solid six and a half out of ten. I'm making a mess over myself and the adventure continues as we walk down this street. Let's see what else we can find, not just souvenirs, but also food stuff. I'm going to be having a feast and at the end I'm going to be having one of my favorite things, melon pan. You can look forward to it. I'm going to be showing you my favorite location and I'm also going to be showing you my favorite matcha place here in Asakusa, just around the corner. Just keep on watching. I found some soft rice crackers, so let's give some rice crackers a go, right? Let's go, let's see. So they have lots of... I'm going to have that one. That one looks good. Let's give this rice cracker a try. There were different varieties. In fact, inside they were selling some ice cream also and some other things, but this is what caught my attention and it was freshly being made. So itadakimasu, let's give it a go. Okay, crunch level 100 out of 10. Flavor level 7 out of 10. Overall, solid 7 out of 10 here. Not bad, pretty good. Very crunchy. I just wish it had a stronger glaze, to be honest. But let's carry on and I'm going to finish this off and figure out where I can throw it. Let's carry on with the video. Let's see what else there is down the street. This location is selling some dango, some mochi. Maybe I'll come back later because I just had some. These bags are really popular and make for some really, really good souvenirs. So if you're in this area and you want to buy some bags, these bags are really good. Awesome souvenirs, highly recommended. Whenever I've got them for some of my friends and family, they actually ask me for more, believe it or not. You can also find them in Don Quijote. Also, loads of people wearing traditional gear. Westerners dressed up today for the occasion of just being a tourist. Beautiful. I like the great wave. Do we carry on walking? I feel like it's time for something sweet, so hopefully I can get something sweet. Oh, this looks interesting. The exit. What is it? Please order at the ticket vending machine. Doriyaki with sweet potato, doriyaki with butter or doriyaki with potato with butter, baked sweet potato, matcha soft serve. OK, let's have a doriyaki with butter. That one looks interesting here. There's doriyaki in the middle. Once again, it says, please refrain from eating whilst walking. Please eat near the shop. They want you to return your trash to the location where you bought it. So just remember that if you walk around, you might not find anywhere to throw away your trash. So it's actually better for you. Just do yourself a favor, eat it around the store and throw your trash at the store where you were eating. OK, my turn. So I think I'm going to put it to English and I'm going to choose a doriyaki with butter that looks interesting and 380 yen only. Check. I'm going to not pay. Actually, I can pay with my I.C. card and simple. And now I get my receipt. There we go. I love myself some doriyaki, so I haven't had some doriyaki on in this trip. It looks a little bit messier than I expected. One of the tips I would actually say is for you to bring some tissue or some napkins because they don't tend to give you napkins in these stores. It's so annoying. Anyway, itadakimasu. Let's see what rating I'm going to give this snack. I like it. If you are not a fan of red bean, then it's a no for you. If it's the first time having a red bean snack, then it might be a little bit of a surprising texture and flavor. But I love red bean and I would give this a. I think the doriyaki part is pretty good. The filling is a six and a half overall, a six and a half out of 10 here. So pretty good. Really good. Actually, I changed my mind. My mind has gone up to a seven out of 10. The butter combo with the red bean is pretty good. Makes a big difference. So what does it feel like right now? I'm not going to lie. It's absolutely packed. But I actually like this atmosphere. There's a lot of excitement in the air. You can see that there's a load of tourists here that have come for the very first time. And the buzz of excitement in these sort of shopping streets is very real. Regardless of how busy people might say it is, I still think it's worth a visit, especially the star, the main event, which we're going to come up to later on, is actually the temple, which we'll be able to see far ahead in the distance is the temple and the pagoda. And that is really the star event of this area, not just the stores and the food. Another great souvenir is chopsticks. You can't go wrong buying some chopsticks. They're quite cheap, depending on what you're looking for. All the way, 1,210 yen for these beautiful chopsticks here. And I actually like these ones, the silver ones with a little gold dot. 1,320 yen. Not too bad. You can also buy cheaper ones. You can buy packs of chopsticks to make for great souvenirs. But then again, a gift is a gift. Everybody likes a gift. It doesn't matter what you give them. At the end of the day, that's the reality, right? Some phone covers. Pretty cool. This one is beautiful here with the Inari and the Torii gate in the background. Some beautiful wooden ones also. Pretty neat, I have to say. Maybe not as a souvenir, but something for yourself. Some more snacks here. So in this case, you get a little tray down here and you'll fill up your tray with the snacks. They look... 150 yen, so it looks so good. So, so good. Everything is freshly made here. Wow. Freshly made. This is what is great about this location here, that you'll find everything fresh. I remember the first time that I came to this street. I was actually on a tour group and I was blown away. Back then, around 10 years ago, there were far less people. I would say there were probably half or a third of the people that there are today on the street. But I don't think that you need to worry about big crowds as long as your mindset is already set and you know that there's going to be a lot of people here. You might not be able to get the perfect pictures, but you'll definitely be able to get the perfect snacks. I've also bought plenty of socks for my friends in the past and family. Hey, this sushi sock looks pretty cute. Cute. Kawaii. And the eggs. It's beautiful. Some nice socks there. And remember I mentioned about like pop culture. Here we go. Some Dragon Ball Z blinds there. Oh my goodness, that looks so cool. There's a Star Wars crossover Asakusa gate going on there. Let's carry on. I think this is probably the halfway point. Some more bags and some scarves. I mean, it's not doesn't all have to be super touristy. Some of these umbrellas look pretty good over here also. You can see them there. They look very, very authentic, actually, you know, some umbrellas over here. Now, I don't know. I've been to other places like in the Inaka, the countryside of Japan that I would say you'd probably be able to get better umbrellas. Yeah. Hi. Hi from Taiwan. Yeah, great thing about walking around tourist places is that you find tourists you can talk to. You're a YouTuber? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I am a YouTuber. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Hello. Hello. Are you a YouTuber? No, no. Okay. Just enjoy making videos. I just enjoy the travel. Yes. Good luck. Have fun. Take care. Oh, and I was actually going to show you that if you get a little bit overwhelmed, apart from the fact that there's pretty cool swords. I know one of my subscribers who would absolutely love these swords. He usually wears a cowboy, so cowboy hat would be pretty cool to see him with one of these swords and a cowboy hat. But one of the things I was going to say, if you do feel a little bit overwhelmed, then don't fret because you can go down the side streets and there's a lot less people. So don't worry too much. Not only that, but the side streets, you'll also find some vendors and some street food with less people like over here. Check this. What do they have here? Some strawberry mochi. Daifuku. Some more rice crackers. I had a rice cracker earlier on, but here's a large variety. So from my experience of traveling all around Japan, this is quite a traditional style rice cracker place. You'll find in smaller towns and cities and locations, you'll find some rice crackers in display like this and you can go in and actually there'll be such a huge variety. It's actually quite crazy and impressive the amount of different rice crackers that they can come up with. Right, let's carry on. Let's see what's going on here. Ah, yuzu salt. It's good. That is good. That is good. I do recommend it. It's good. It's good. So I'm not going to lie. These are pretty good. Another interesting thing that I was going to mention is that depending on the time of the year, depending on the season, they actually change the overhanging sort of like branch plants. So now it's spring or coming into spring and the street is actually lined with these overhanging flowers. In New Year's, they change them to like a New Year, a special New Year like display. And then in autumn, they are changed to autumn leaves, if I remember right. So the pretty cool thing is that there's an intersection here on either. Behind me, there's another street lined with all sorts of stores. You start seeing some restaurants in that direction. The same in the opposite direction. Behind me, there's another street lined with all sorts of stores, souvenir stores and the Skytree, as you can see behind me. You can actually walk to the Skytree from here if you wanted to. It's quite a beautiful walk by a river. I'm not going to do that today. Maybe that's for a future video. So Nakamise Dori, where we are right now, this street is actually one of the oldest streets in Japan. It dates back to the 17th century and there's around 80 stores lining this street. That's not including all the stores in all the shotengais or the arcades and all the stores that are on the other streets. So you've got a lot to explore and discover in this area. Don't forget to explore and check out some of the beautiful traditional art that lines the end of the street, just as we are approaching the temple. And as we approach Sensoji Temple, the main attraction, the reason why this street even exists, there is a little bit, I think there's a little bit of a change in atmosphere. It's incredible how things are a little bit quieter now. People, although there's tons of people, people seem to be a little bit more respectful as we approach the beautiful lanterns and the smoke in the distance that I can see. Let's check out what there is down there. And let's not forget the beautiful pagoda that can make for some pretty impressive photos, although kind of hard to take a photo with so many people here. My top tip if you're coming here is come nice and early, although the stores will be closed. They probably won't open until 10 or 10.30. But if you want to get the street to yourself and get some incredible shots of the temples and the buildings, then come nice and early in the morning or later in the evening when the stores are closing. Maybe you can time it so that you can sort of explore, do a little bit of shopping and have a meal and then return to take some photos or video. Or you can plan it so that you can come in the morning, take some photos and videos with less people, have some breakfast or a coffee around the area and then return and check out the stores. Because it's worth checking out the stores and the street food for sure. All right. So, we are now very close to Senzoji Temple. Let's see what I'm seeing. All these people here, they're actually getting the Mikuji, which are their lucky charms. So, the way it works is you get like from a draw, you get a stick and you shake or you get like a contraption. You shake it and a stick comes out and that stick will have a number and the number will correspond to the fortune, whether it's a good one or a bad one or a middle one. If the fortune isn't that great, you can actually place your fortune over here. You tie it up like these people and you just place it there. These are all the bad fortunes. It says here, only if you drew a bad fortune, please tie it to the rack. So, you can leave the bad fortune here and I guess you can try and get another fortune. Why not? Those are people here trying to get the fortunes. I wonder how many are good and how many are bad. If you come here around New Year's or the spring, you'll find that they put lots of stalls. There's a sort of festive atmosphere and you can get even more street food. You can cleanse yourself with the smoke. So, this is the main Sensoji Temple and you cannot really take any footage or any video up there, so I'm not going to do that. But you can actually go up and if you want to give an offering and do a prayer, that's what people are lining up for. But I'm going to take you now to one of my favorite macha locations. The atmosphere is so cool. Yeah, you know, people, like I mentioned, people might say that it's a tourist trap. I don't think it's a tourist trap. I think it's a touristy place. That's different. It's a different, whole different thing. You know, if you say it's a tourist, very touristy, but it's definitely worth checking out this place. I love it, you know. So, I'm going to take you now to one of my favorite macha places. Hopefully, there's a space because I really fancy having some macha. There's plenty of different macha locations in this area, so don't worry if this one's closed and you want to go to another one. Actually, this is a good example of what the sort of like food stalls look like when there are events going on. In New Year, there's probably triple the amount of stalls and the same in sakura season. You'll find a lot of different stalls on the other side of the temple too. There's loads of different areas to explore. It's not just about the main temple and the shopping street. There are lots of different areas to explore with ponds like this one here, you can see. Very beautiful. Incredibly beautiful. And hopefully, I'll be able to get myself some melon pan. All those people there are queuing up for melon pan, my favorite snack here. Specifically from this stall, I don't tend to queue up and line up for things, but I will queue up and I will line up for that melon pan. That's for sure. Hopefully, we'll go back to that after I get myself some macha. Let's go. The macha is actually just there. Hopefully, there's a place for me to sit and I can sit at the bar maybe. It's a macha cafe. It's become my favorite. Let's go, everyone. Let's go. Oh, there's someone that I don't know sitting there. Very cool. My favorite macha. Kanpai! Ah, so good. This is a solid 9 out of 10 for me. It's perfectly sweetened by sweet potato and then it's very different and I like it cold. Perfect. The only queue I will ever queue up. Apart from this, maybe one other place or two other places, but it's worth it. And the thing about this melon pan place is there are some other melon pan places. This, I think, is the best one. You need to have cash. You need to pay in cash. And the other thing I was going to say is that they do sell out rather quick at a certain point during the day, so you're better off getting here ASAP. Don't come too late in the day because they might be sold out. They have the fake looking, well, the plastic food there, but I must admit that the real thing looks so much better. Definitely will taste a lot better, right? No ¥10,000 bills, please. Only small bills. ¥1,000, it says there. So I'm just going to have one for ¥300. I'm not going to have a filling. I'm not going to have whipped cream because I always make a mess. Arigatou. Got it. Got it. Success. This smells so good. I already know it's going to be a 10 out of 10. Am I being biased? I don't know. It's nice and warm, especially on a nice cold day like today. It's nice and warm and it smells incredible. It's nice and crisp on the outside, but if I squeeze it, I can tell it's going to be nice and fluffy on the inside. Let's give it a bite. Can you see the fluffiness inside? The sugar, like, sort of exterior crispiness comes from the sweet sugar and inside tastes like... I would say it's like pure, pure air inside. It's so good. Okay, maybe a 9 out of 10. Let's just say now 9 out of... 9.5 out of 10. Sorry, 9.5 out of 10. Hey, it's my friend Drew. You don't like melon pan? I do, but just not this place. No? This place is the best for me. Yeah, I like that one. I don't like the other one. This goes to show it's all about preference, right? Either one, melon pan is always good. Yeah. So there you have it. We've walked around Asakusa. Is it a tourist trap? I don't think so. Is it popular? Absolutely. But there's a reason for it. It's a beautiful place and why shouldn't tourists visit locations like that, right? That's what I think. Just be aware that it's going to be packed. Enjoy yourself. Try every snack available and come on an empty stomach. I am a few minutes away from Asakusa, where it's nice and quiet, from the temple where it's nice and quiet. And as you can see, it's still quite easy to find quieter areas. On that note, stay positive and be happy gaijin. Bye.