Ginza and the search of Doraemon

Ginza and the search of Doraemon

Those who have kids know who Doraemon is and how much kids love him. Those who are not aware of this Japanese anime, basically Doraemon is an intelligent robotic cat, which travels back in time from the 22nd century to help a pre-teen boy named Nobita. Cartoons based on computer animation are very popular in Japan. Japanese kids grow up watching cartoons and reading the graphical, full of action story books.

I was on tour to Tokyo along with one of my colleague. His niece who adores Doraemon, who probably haven’t missed any of his episodes, and must have DVD’s at home to enjoy whenever she wants, insisted that he should get her Doraemon toy as a gift.

We initially thought since Doraemon is so popular we would get wide choice to buy from any store. For first few days, whenever we got the chance we entered into shopping areas. Since Japan is an expensive place so you need to weigh your options before you splurge. We explored everything a man could possibly buy however we could not locate Doraemon anywhere. Since we were not familiar Japanese language we didn’t enter into conversation with shopkeepers.

While we were on our last lap of the tour we realized to speed up the search of Doraemon. We check with hotel manager who didn’t know much about Doraemon, was surprised to know Japanese cartoon is popular in India, and advised us to visit Ginza, of course as last option.

According to wiki, Ginza (銀座?) is a district of Chūō, Tokyo, located south of Yaesu and Kyōbashi, west of Tsukiji, east of Yūrakuchō and Uchisaiwaichō, and north of Shinbashi. In short, Ginza is a place towards south and you can reach in 20 minutes from anywhere in Tokyo. The moment we entered Ginza area we realized it’s a mistake. Ginza is upmarket shopping destination and you get all expensive branded stuff in the retail outlets and malls spread out in that area. We checked in branded retail toys shops including Disney however could not trace Doraemon.

The last chance I thought could be airport shopping arcade. Guess what we were disappointed at the airport. I spoke to quite a few people and surprised to know that they aren’t even aware of such cartoon character. The only conclusion I could draw is probably the Doraemon era is over and country, people, kids have moved to more animated and action oriented cartoon characters. It’s like chandrakantha or Vikram-vetal kind of comic book series which not many kids of this generation would know that it existed some years ago in India.