I love Japan. Plain and simple. It is just an amazing place to be. I went in January for Tokyo Auto Salon and when I found out that Wekfest was going to do their first inaugural show there, I knew I had to go back. I’ll tell you guys more about Wekfest when we actually make it to that portion of coverage but for now, I’m gonna show you guys all the cool, random shit we did while we were out there for a week. Like my last trip, I went into it not really having anything planned other than the event itself. In Tokyo I was just going to fuck around for a couple of days until I went to Osaka. Tokyo was going to be more of a sight-seeing trip this time because I had some first-timers coming to me to Japan. They had never been to Japan, nor did they really have any idea of what Japan had to offer, so it was going to be interesting showing them around. I kinda of took them to the same spots that I had gone to before and then we were going to hit up some popular areas in Tokyo where they could shop. I could do anything in Japan really and it would be entertaining. It could just be walking around, eating, drinking, whatever. I just enjoy my time there. Everything about Japan is very different from life here in California. Don’t get me wrong, I love Cali but it is just refreshing to be in a place that is so different than the norm. I’ve become pretty comfortable with getting around Japan as well so the stress of getting lost is not something I need to worry about. At times the train system is still a bit confusing but I get the basics of it now. Even when we do get lost it isn’t that bad because we can always catch the right train a couple minutes later. Everything is so efficient in Japan that it is almost hard to get lost…

In January, I went with Ryan Basseri and Ryan Der from Rywire. They’ve gone the last couple of years with me but this time around, Der wouldn’t be making the trip since he’s saving up to go to Europe. Salem, who was originally supposed to go with me, got sick a couple days before we were scheduled to leave and ended up missing the entire trip altogether. He made sure to come along this time around and along came a couple of other friends of ours. The best part of going to Japan during this time is that it isn’t even remotely cold at all. You could literally walk around all day and night with just a t-shirt and shorts. Back in January, it was cold as fuck and it was just hard to stay out at night because of the weather. I had never been to Japan when it was warm like this but was looking forward to it because I could pack a lot lighter. I hate wearing jackets in general anyway so I was more than happy not to have to bring them…

I have more to say but I’ll just tell you as I go along in the coverage. It’s much easier to remember everything as I’m looking at the photos anyways. There are going to be a lot of parts like my last trip to Japan so please be patient and read through all of it. I always take a lot of pics but it usually involves stuff that I think is important to mention. Today, we’re going to take a look at some of our adventures in Harajuku, which is a huge shopping district in the Tokyo area. After that I got some photos of our dinner with Japanese import model Coco Komatsu as well as our visit the following day to Type One. Spoon Sports doesn’t have a whole lot to look at so I didn’t really bother exploring inside like last time. Type One has all the good shit so I spent most of my time there that day…

As always, I include all of the other stuff we did besides just the cars. I really enjoy eating different types of food so I always document the food stuff. Hope you guys enjoy it, if not, just scroll through, haha…

We arrived in Japan on Thursday night. It was pretty late in the evening so we didn’t do a whole lot so I really didn’t start covering what we did until that Friday when we explored Tokyo…

Ryan seated on the streets of Harajuku while the rest of guys were shopping…

Snapped a quick pic of this cafe racer in front of DKNY…

Our group for the first couple of days before we took off to Osaka…

All you sneaker and street wear fanatics should recognize this place; this is Undefeated and Supreme in Tokyo. The guys were over here for a while spending on kinds of money on stuff…

I was loving the weather in Japan this trip. It pretty much felt like Socal but just a tad bit more humid…

Ryan and my boy Dougie taking a break while the others were at the Nike store in Harajuku…

While we were in Harajuku, we ran into Coco Komatsu who was doing some shopping as well with her sister. She said she’d take us out to grab dinner later and so we met up in Shibuya to grab some Japanese style Chicken Sashimi. If you guys remember my last trip to Japan, we tried some of this as well. This is a different spot but the same style of raw chicken that we ate before. Since we had some newbies with us, it was the perfect time to introduce them to this Japanese delicacy….

No Japanese dinner is the same without tons of beer…

Even guys who don’t regularly drink beer were enjoying some nice cold ones…

Every restaurant that we ate at was also often filled with clouds of cigarette smoke. Funny because they have designated areas where you can smoke outdoors but patrons are free to smoke anywhere inside restaurants…

This was some soup dinner made out of a gelatin-based chicken broth. It had dumplings in it and when it heats up, it becomes a chicken soup…

It cooled down considerably at night so hot pot was kind of fitting…

Chicken Sashimi with green onions…

Armando Flores aka “Senior” trying the raw chicken for the first time….

This was also Chicken Sashimi but a different flavor…

The dumpling and chicken soup after it cooked in the hot pot…

Everyone says that they’re not down to try raw chicken, but when you’re in Japan, you kind of just live in the moment and are more willing to just do it…

One of the most entertaining parts of traveling abroad is breaking bread with your homies…

Horse Sashimi. I liked this particular dish more than the raw chicken but it seemed like the majority enjoyed the chicken more…

Coco pouring some Sake for us to take shots of…

Hospitality is always amazing in Japan so we were treated kindly with generous desserts like this which welcomed us to Japan…

Coco loves her Skittles and Dougie just happened to have a bag with him that he had brought over from the U.S. They don’t have Skittles readily available in Japan so she was super happy to have a bag…

Group photo taken by the waiter of the restaurant before we parted…

After dinner, we walked around Shibuya some more before eventually calling it a night. We had a long day ahead of us the following day so we wanted to make sure to get some rest….

The next day, we met up with Elissa Alva to grab some stand-up sushi inside the train station. It was pretty amazing as always but I didn’t bring my camera that morning. The rest of the guys showed up a little later and we explored Akihabara for a couple of hours before separating from the Wekfest group to head over to Spoon Sports. I wanted to check out Spoon because I wanted to see if the EG6 was done yet since it was near completion when I visited in January. Our usual contact wasn’t there when we arrived so we decided to head straight to Type One to look at the cars. We wanted to check out FEEL’S Twin Cam which was also in the area so we didn’t stay at Type One very long…

I was expecting to see the Spoon Sports EG6 Civic when I arrived but to my surprise, it was no longer there. Instead, they had another car there that I had never seen in person before; the Spoon Sports EK Civic…

I think I might have seen the Spoon EK one other time before only but it was really cool to see it in person. I was surprised that it ran a BYS front bumper because you don’t often see aftermarket aero on the traditional Spoon builds…

They probably just had the car there for display purposes since it had wheel jacks on it so it was easy to move around. Above in the storage area was the Spoon DC5R and the Spoon S2000 which I took detailed photos of during my last visit…

Custom hood scoop on the Spoon EK. I didn’t really want to ask them to open up stuff for me to look at since they looked pretty busy but you can catch a glimpse of the Spoon B-series motor through the vent…

Super rare EC Works side mirrors on the EK. This was the first time I’ve ever seen a set on an EK…

I love how clean Type One always is. It looked like you could eat off the floor if you wanted too…

Spoon Sports Monoblock brakes and their CR93 wheel in yellow…

Dual fuel filler pods on the rear hatch of the Civic…

…which feed fuel into a fuel cell inside the car…

Inside, a single Spoon kevlar seat is mounted in the cockpit…

Another rare piece, a Air Walker rear bumper for the Civic. Funny because these are super rare but I managed to see two the last two times I’ve been in Japan…

Parked by the front window of Type One was the Spoon Sports NSX, another car that I was happy to see for the first time. I believe this thing is coming over to the U.S. later this year….

Super rare Spoon Sports front bumper for the NSX…

Happy to say that I was one of the rare few to see the Spoon NSX prior to its eventual arrival to the U.S….

Bad ass carbon fiber dashboard of the NSX…

Spoon-built C32B motor in the NSX…

NSX-R engine scoop…

Spoon Sports steering and digital instrument display…

Mechanics working hard on a Spoon-prepped Super Taikyu Fit…

One more of the Spoon Sports NSX…

A K-swapped Honda Insight that they were working on….

That was pretty much a wrap on our visit to Spoon. I’m gonna close it out with a special photo that I captured while I was at Type One. I posted it on Instagram so I’ll let my caption from that post describe what you’re looking at…

“You will see my life through your eyes, as your life will be seen through mine. The son becomes the father and the father becomes the son…”

This was one of my favorite personal photos from my trip to Japan. For those that dont know, one of the people that accompanied me on my trip to Japan this time was my friend Armando Flores Sr., who is the father of our friend who passed on a couple years ago. I thought this was an incredibly strong photo because Senior was just quiet, crouching over and just taking in the moment of being at Type One, a place that his son, who was a fellow Honda enthusiast, never got to see for himself. I think there was a moment of both sadness as well as appreciation that he was able to be at a place that might have meant a lot to his son to see. The date of Wekfest Japan marked the 5-year anniversary of his untimely passing. I’m proud to have been there to capture the moment.

That’s a wrap for today. In my next update, I’m gonna show you guys the photos I captured from our visit to FEEL’S Twin Cam. Stay tuned and thanks for looking!!