My name's Ren, and I'm the founder of Senspace, a Web3 product studio building fun, onchain toys with our local creative community in Tokyo. Copped in Tokyo is a content series chronicling the stories behind the merch and knick knacks that I collect in my every day life.
This is a special edition article created for Senspace's newest initiative, /ball launching right now! /ball is based off of Gashapon, a Japanese capsule toy game found all over Japan. Played by kids and collectors alike, this game created in the 1960's is now a national pastime, attracting tourists from around the world to play. There was always the one toy that you want, and though you know the likelihood of you getting that rare toy is painfully low, you keep pulling and pulling until you've spent several hundred more yen than intended trying to get it (just the thing I need after $TICKER!).
You'll find the widest array of toys that you could possibly imagine at some of the larger Gasha arcades, from famous IPs like Mario Brothers to Pikachu, to random plastic toy animals, food items, guns, panties, love hotel keys and much much more. If you want to see this in action, I highly recommend checking out Kasper a.k.a. Gachamaster's Drakula account.
We've reimagined this game digitally with a new name, "What's in the Ball?"
For our first collection of items, we made a series of digital toys inspired by items that you'd find in a "Konbini" or the Japanese convenience store.
As some of you may know, the Konbini is the heart and soul of Japan. You'll find them in every town or city, big or small, most are open 24 hours, and you can live a good and healthy life, purely by buying things at the Konbini. There's an ever-changing variety of prepared foods and snacks, drinks, fresh fruit and vegetables, meat, and dairy products along with stationary, clothing, household cleaning products, toiletries and much much more. You can send and receive packages at the konbini, print things, pay bills, and get a printed copy of your social security card: it's almost like having a Walmart Super Store within every few city blocks but in a very compact, highly curated setup.
Also, on the right night in Tokyo, post up in front of a Lawson and you'll have a banger of a party after 30 minutes or so from people posting up in front of the Konbini with you.
I will tip all my $DEGEN to anyone who can recreate this bop when they're in Tokyo.
Maybe you can be a convenience star one day too....
Japanese-American rapper, Miyachi and producer, Matt Cab even made a whole track inspired by popular Konbini, Family Mart called "Famima Rap," (Famima is shorthand for Family Mart) with a beat made entirely from items bought at Famima and a soulful rendition of the jingle that plays when you enter the store.
Definitely worth checking that out here.
Famima Rap by Miyachi (Prod. Matt Cab)
Making of the Record (This is wild!!!!)
Now onto the three items featured in our first round of toys for "The Ball."
1) Kinoko no Yama
Coco Shrooms, our riff on Japanese favorite "Kinoko no Yama" is the first item for this round. You can often find Kinoko no Yama at Asian food stores in the states, where they're sometimes referred to as "Choco Shrooms." They were always one of my favorite snacks growing up and their name translates to mushroom mountain. The name makes them sound like a combination between a Disney theme park and a trippy techno festival, but I assure you, they taste really freaking good.
The cookies do not actually have any mushrooms in them (the trippy or the normal kind), nor do they taste like mushrooms. The stem (the cookie) tastes likes a very light butter cookie that's a perfect compliment to the chocolate cap, without overpowering it.
Considering their size, it's easy to pop them in your mouth over and over again and forget what you're doing, until your three-quarters of the way through the box. On the front of the box it says "for a quick breather," and these cute little mushrooms truly are the perfect snack for a quick pick me up.
What they don't tell you do on the box is this:
This was a trick I learned in middle school. Not particularly useful in any reasonable context, but fun fact: the bottom of the stem of a Kinoko no Yama chocolate mushroom is slightly fatter than the middle making it the perfect item to stick in your nose as the fat end helps hold the mushroom in place and prevent in from falling out. You don't have to do this if you don't want to, but just thought I'd let you all know this was an option.
I won't tell you if I ate the mushroom afterwards or not.
2) Sea Chicken Onigiri
The soft bread sandwiches, including egg salad, tuna, and fruit-filled are what typically get the attention from travelers to Japan, but you can't sleep on the onigiri. An onigiri is a rice ball wrapped in nori (Japanese seaweed) and is the PB&J/paper bag lunch sandwich of Japan. Every kid in Japan grew up getting them made by mom or grandma, and they can be filled with pretty much anything that you could possibly want from Omurice, pork & kimchi, salmon, tuna, spam, shrimp, cod roe and much much more (I know some of these things may sound gnarly, but trust me, they're good)!
In the adult world, the onigiri is the working person's staple. For ¥100-200 Japanese yen (around $0.65-1.30 at today's exchange rate), you can get your fill with one and if you're feeling extra hungry there's absolutely no judgment if you get two. In the morning or lunch time, you'll see salarymen lined up at the Konbini holding their onigiri in one hand and canned coffee in the other, ready to power through a day at Sony, Hitachi, Fujitsu, Toshiba or whatever company made your TV in the early 2000's.
The tuna mayo onigiri is one of the most popular, with its combination of creamy and saltiness, without sitting too heavy in your stomach. It's also typically one of the cheaper onigiris due to its simple nature and you can cut more calories than the omurice or the pork and kimchi onigiris that are pictured in the konbini aisle below.
Fun fact: canned tuna is actually "Sea chicken" as opposed to chicken of the sea in Japanese, but the name for canned tuna in Japanese actual comes from America lol.
The instructions to unwrap are written on the onigiri and you're good to go in seconds but, please note: eating this on the go is a no go in Japan. So if you don't want to be the ugly American, Frenchman, or wherever you're from, sit down and eat this, and don't eat it while sitting in a crowded train car.
People won't like you for it.
3) Famichiki
In the words of Miyachi in Famima Rap, "Thought of Famichiki, got me feeling horny." This shit is that good. It's definitely terrible for you and you don't want to eat more than one in one day for an extended period of time, or you'll probably be making your version of the movie "Super Size Me." It's a Shibuya club kids favorite to eat before going out, especially as you can eat it while standing in front of the Konbini and it has just enough fattiness and juiciness to help soak up the highballs you'll be pounding later.
Famichiki comes in several flavors: regular, soy sauce, spicy and other seasonal flavors depending on when you're at the Famima and they're all amazing, but I like sticking with the classic, regular flavor.
And there we have it, the inspiration behind the first three items in THE BALL. Maybe there'll be a restock at some point? Who knows? You'll just have to keep spinning & winning to find out.
Happy spinning Ballers!
I'm out.
