Akihabara - Discover the Otaku Culture & Experience the Maid Cafe
Description
Akihabara is not only Anime and Mangas. We have many other threads of OTAKU and Akihabara is one that caters to so many of them. While the focus is of course the Anime and Mangas, figurines, dolls, cosplay, trading cards and the 2.5 dimensional world that this consists, we will be look deeper and explore the backstreets of Akihabara and check out the Akiba food culture, game consoles, pop culture snacks, cosplay, purikura, arcade games & more. Should time allow, we may visit other otaku spots to help you get a bigger picture of the otaku world. We may visit one of the top three shrines of EDO Tokyo to give you a glimpse of the historical and traditional culture aspect apart of the pop culture available here in Akihabara Wednesday may give you an opportunity to see the one and only Maid Cafe Theatre performed by actual maids cafe maids and only available from Vas Tours. Note that the traveler must reserve well beforehand as tickets are difficult to go. Let us know.
Tour Options
Itinerary
We will see crane machines and experience purikura machines
We will visit a popular spot for seeing and buying old video games and consoles
We will see several genres of amine and maybe we will be lucky enough to see the AKB48 Hall
We will learn the origins/roots of the Akihabara otaku culture.
We will see more of the origins of the Akihabara Electronic area and see for yourselves what is was in the past.
See junk street, mandarake and rashinban just to mention a few. see the food that is catered and potentially get some snack foods to fill your hungry tummy.
We will visit cosplay and anime theme store for you to decide what you may want to buy and try in the land of the otakus!
Let’s check out the Japanese Trading Card Games that wins the hearts of the young teens and above.
We will visiting the Number ONE maid Cafe chain in Akihabara. Experience the fantasy world of the maid cafes and see for yourselves what it is.
We will be walking from location to destination so will be spending just about 30 minutes on transiting.
OPTIONAL TOUR - Wednesday only Maid theatrical show - see a hour show performed by active maid currently working in the real maid cafes. Something that takes maids to the next level. Reservations must be made at least 4 days prior to your tour. Prices start from 4000 ten plus tax
Highlights
What's included
Traveller Ratings
Important Information
- Infants and small children can ride in a pram or stroller
- Service animals allowed
- Public transportation options are available nearby
- Infants are required to sit on an adult’s lap
- Travelers should have at least a moderate level of physical fitness
Reviews(7)
Word was that Akihabara is a complicated and difficult to navigate. If you have the pin pointed to specific store you want to go. Then it’s easy. We wanted to deep dive and understand the history and how Akihabara came to be and see what there is to see from the viewpoint of the locals. Many of the tours listed looked very similar on what they were offering but this one seemed to be more insightful and so it was. Max our guide took us on a tour on a three dimensional as many of the hidden store are not openly listed nor even on the ground or even the second floor. Given the wide range of interests, max made sure we covered the many genres that is classified under the Japanese sub culture or otaku. Strongly recommend if you to learn Akihabara and the underlying culture on top of learning to navigate the streets of Akihabara what you might want to be able to do after your tour.
Our tour guide was incredibly knowledgeable and so accommodating to our family. He went out of his way to understand the interests of our kids and to support them during the tour. It was a great experience.
I wasn’t expecting a sweet older lady for an Akihabara tour but that seems to be the case for many of the tours I applied for in Tokyo. But when it came to explaining the different kinds of “otaku” available in Akihabara I came to understand I was much more fortunate to have a more experienced lady as my guide, Naka-san. So much more than that of mangas and animae. Whether you are a pop culture fan or not, you will find a well balanced tour that the entire family will be able to enjoy. I could not have had such a nicer experience without her.
Two old ladies as guides for anime otaku fans and they didn’t know about anything related to this topic, only a small Wikipedia history of the area. I Booked specifically for the maid cafe show a month in advance and was told just as the tour started it was cancelled! We were sat in the back with these two sitting facing us blocking the view from seeing any of the maids and were translating everything our maid was saying even though she seemed to know English. Plus anywhere I walked while looking in the shops, the leader creepily followed me the whole time in silence, it was weird and I ended up leaving the tour an hour early.
It is a pity that the guest strongly believes that otaku is just anime. The tours clearly specifies that this is an introduction to otaku culture and anime is just one fraction of that. This is not a private tour and it is difficult to cater to just one obsession; we were told by another guest that he was a Vocaloid otaku and another a game otaku hence we need to be neutral and cater to the entire group. Ultimately the other guests comments were that they were surprised to learn that there are actually 12 otakus and glad that they now know. True the theatre was canceled and we believe that was a very unfortunate incident but that was due to mechanical issues on the theatre side hence a force majeur; completely out of our control. We politely explained the situation, gave the guest back his money worth of ticket and confirmed if he would like to proceed with the tour in which he did. According to the guide The maid was having trouble speaking in English and was just showing a pocket translator and saying nothing thus interpreted into English. We have spoken to the maid cafe that this not acceptable and expect this not to happen in the future. We see an abbyss in cultural misinterpretation and it seem apparent that the guest did not like having an older professional guide “waiting” on the guest ready to be answering any questions was not to his appeal. Yes, the guide should have recognized that the guest was uncomfortable. However, without the will to communicate concerns due to age, it becomes very difficult for the guides to provide services. We apologies for sending in guides that were not to liking.
The tour guide was very informative and efficient. She explained everything I needed to know about Manga and Animate and the stores we visited we would have never gone on our own. The maid cafe experience was great and thankfully we have her as an interpreter so that we can have an immersive experience. The maid show was excellent and I highly recommend it. It is however only available on Wednesday's tour .
The best part was going to the back alley and off the beaten track locations. The free drinks were good. My son and nephew appreciated the opportunity to shop.
My guest from the US is a big fan of Japanese games and anime, so he was like very excited about retro games and lots of figures. Many shops that the guide showed him seemed have fit his interest. He was impressed with the story about old Akihabara and entertained at a maid cafe. He was like, "I've never casted spells on my juice!" when he came back. Thanks for the fun tour!!
