Around The World In 80 Waves

Akihabara is known as Electric Town because of all the electrical and electronic goods which can be bought in the area.

It is also a centre for Anime and Manga fans in Tokyo. The graphic novels and cartoon adventures for a huge part of Japanese culture so the choices available are bewildering.

Walking around the are you cannot fail to notice the number of young women stood in the street dressed in French maid costumes, who are trying to entice customers into the Maid Cafes found here.

It is a particularly Japanese type of entertainment and I decide to check it out.

Due to my lack of any Japanese I can honestly say that I didn’t understand a word that was said to me from the second I was escorted into the place I visited, to the moment I emerged back on the street.

I had chosen the Maidreamin cafe and once escorted to my table gleaned enough from the menu that 2500 yen would get me a beer, some food and a few pictures, although of what I could not be sure. However it would have been strictly forbidden to take any of my own whilst in there.

Sat down with wide eyed wonder I watched the young girls doing dance routines more akin to Power Ranger style moves with more than just a hint of Hello Kitty thrown in for good measure as I ate the chicken placed in front of me. I was expected to learn a few moves myself, which I was expected to repeat with everybody else to generate more of an atmosphere in the cafe, which was only as big as an average lounge.

After sitting there for half an hour and nearing the end of my beer I was asked to join the girls on stage complete with the kitten ears that had been placed on my head as I walked in. My deal entitled me to the two pictures you see here to take home with me.

It is actually possible to buy albums so that you can collect pictures of all the girls rather like a Panini sticker album for football players or star wars films that I collected as a child. The bloke next to me had a worrying stack of them and was keen to improve on his burgeoning collection whilst visiting.

I am still at a loss to describe the experience which is not at all seedy, but to me at least felt rather creepy. The pictures may give you some idea of how baffled I was by it all.