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Okubo Elementary's Secret?
honestly the "scary" stuff is mostly made up by kids, but the school itself has a real history. Okubo Elementary was around during the war, and the grounds used to be way bigger. there's an old bomb shelter entrance behind the gym, half hidden by weeds. former students from way back know about it, but the school keeps it locked and doesn't really talk about it. not ghostly, just eerie in a "this is actually a relic" way.
if you want local color, skip the playground and walk two blocks north to the small shrine, Hikawa. the old guys who tend it will chat if you're polite, and they'll tell you about the neighborhood pre-Olympics, when it was all wooden houses and tofu shops. the playground's fine for a photo but the real stories live a short walk away.
The conference hotel crowd usually misses this, but the real draw around Okubo Elementary isn't the playground at all, it's the old neighborhood map posted on the fence near the main gate. It's faded and half-torn, but it shows the area as it was in the 1950s, with the school marked as a much bigger plot and a few sento bathhouses that are long gone. Former students say the map was drawn by a retired teacher who used to walk the same route every day, and if you compare it to the modern street layout, you'll notice the school's current gym sits right on what used to be a small garden that belonged to a tofu maker's family. The family's grave is still at the small cemetery about ten minutes east on Shin-okubo's back streets, and the old guy who tends the plot sometimes leaves a cucumber out in summer for the kappa legend, though he'll deny it if you ask. That's the kind of layered history you won't find in any guidebook, and it's a better story than the climbing frames.
Probably not a scary ghost story, more like... urban legends kids make up. Think along the lines of "if you swing on the highest swing at sunset, you'll see a kappa," or something about a weirdly shaped tree being a yokai's hiding spot. Nothing official, you know? Old playgrounds in Japan often do have that slightly unsettling charm though, so maybe the photos aren't exaggerating. You might find some older folks near the school who'd remember some playground gossip, worth a try! It's all part of the fun, right? Enjoy @Tokyo!
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Where can I find crispy, pan-fried bacon similar to a certain international style?
if u have a costco membership the kirkland thick cut is the move, 4 packs of 500g for around 2500 yen and it crisps up proper in a cold pan. for smaller runs, precce in azabudai hills & the basement at isetan shinjuku both carry imported US & danish brands in the chilled case, just read the label for "thick cut" or "smoked" and not "loin". also worth knowing japanese bacon is often wet-cured so pat it dry before frying or it steams instead of crisping
kaldi coffee farm is hit or miss but their smoked bacon from denmark shows up pretty regular, the 200g pack runs about 600 yen. what actually works better for me is asking the butcher counter at peacock or life to slice the block bacon thick, like 5mm, they do it for free and it crisps way better than the pre-packed stuff. also fwiw cheap bacon crisps faster, the fatty supermarket kind at 300 yen a pack works fine if u cook it from cold in a dry pan and pour off the fat as it renders.
tbh the gyomu super store brand bacon is surprisingly decent for crisping up, its not thick cut but if you cook it low and slow it gets pretty crunchy. the key is the dry cure vs wet cure thing, wet cure steams. also check hanamasa if you have one nearby, they sell big packs of american style bacon thats actually smoked and firm.