Hey, look what I found out in Kayabachou -- world headquarters of the Kao Corporation. I still don't understand why their name is "Flower King" but their symbol is a moon, but I like the fact that their product range spans from detergent to pet care products to classy hair dye brands, as though they were still living out a century-old definition of the word "hygiene".

Also visited today: a vegan (I think) cafe in Omotesando called "Pure" (thanks Will) where the staff all wear their hair like Erykah Badu. A lot of people snicker at vegan restaurants, but speaking as an ex-vegan I can tell you that a vegan restaurant is far, far more likely to have tasty food than a regular one. Their clientele is about the pickiest eating demographic there is. They can't afford to fuck up a single avocado-based spread.

After that, I headed northeast to the combined Yayoi-Yumeji Museum in Bunkyou-ku to see me some pre-war pop culture. Early modern kimonos, influenced by Art Nouveau, which was in turn influenced by older Japanese ukiyo-e prints! Pictures of women gazing languidly out the window! ("These forlorn, listless women appear quite frequently in female-oriented commercial art of the era".)

One floor up was the collection of illustrations and promotional materials from melodramatic 家庭小説 ("domestic novels") of the Meiji and Taisho periods. Of course you had the old classics like 『金色夜叉』 ("The Golden Demon") and 『不如帰』 ("The Cuckoo"), but there were also a bunch I'd never heard of, like one called 『無花果』 ("The Fig") about a Japanese guy who marries an American, meets with a series of tragedies, and eventually converts to Catholicism. Heaven was represented on the poster as a sort of fairy kingdom ruled by Mary. The only sign of Jesus was a lion savagely tearing at the demons who were trying to pull the hero down to Hell. Unless maybe that was Mark.