Now I’m back home and can upload pics from my Sony, here are some more pictures from January 2nd – the day the New Years lucky bags go on sale in Japan.

The excellent site Tokyo Fashion has already done 3 fab articles with loads of photos on Fukubukuro here, here and here.

As for me, I went to Marui One first, as I wanted to get gothic gear. I was there about 10.30 but there was no queue out the door or anything. It was only when I got inside that I saw masses of people looking at the sales and the various bags. Here’s a quick pic I took on my way out:

I was there primarily for the shopping, not to take pictures, so there weren’t that many. After all, I had THREE major centres to hit! I passed Studio Alta around midday also, and there weren’t too many girls out the front, although it was very crowded inside. Many had the rolling pink floral cases by Liz Lisa, I noticed.

Had I but known, I should’ve just stayed there, as between Alta and Lumine Est, most of the major gal brands are covered, and I wouldn’t have been swept along in the seething mass of people that was Shibuya 109. But, to Shibuya I went.

It didn’t look too bad from far away…

But you could only see the madness when you got up close!

Everywhere were people jostling, clutching multiple lucky bags…some TV company was even filming it, as you can just see here…

You can see the familiar brand names Cecil McBee, Vanquish, Ank Rouge, Rose FanFan, JSG, and one that might be Manalove…everywhere girls were opening their packs and swapping with girlfriends nearby (as items are not always the same, even in bags from the same brand).  I took these pics as I was carried along by the crowd. Once inside it was little better; again the crowd just surged along taking you with it like a raging torrent, and you had to try to get out of the crowd to enter a shop you liked. One – Emoda – had quite a queue to even get in the store, such was its popularity. And then there were the queues at the tills.

I decided just to buy particular pieces I liked rather than lucky bags, as I’d already bought 2 naoto bags in the morning, and the ones where I could see the contents, were not that appealing to me.

I then went to Harajuku, visiting La Foret for the the gothic punk underground floors, before proceeding along the street past Forever 21, where you can see girls spruiking the bags outside:

Here’s what they sounded like: Girls at Harajuku Forever 21 spruiking lucky bags

And here’s how slow it was walking in the crowd from La Foret to Takeshita Street: Harajuku on fukubukuro day, Jan 2

Takeshita Street was, of course, crowded to the max as well:

SO great were the crowds out that day, that as I was waiting for the Yamanote line train back to Shinjuku, a very strange thing happened: the  trains stopped to let people OFF on the other side, but wouldn’t let people ON.  This just doesn’t happen on a normal day, no matter how busy. Two trains passed in this way, and I despaired of ever getting home, when a third train finally arrived and actually opened its doors to the ravening hordes. PHEW!