Purikura

While Pejk and Jenny wandered the peaceful Yoyogi park, I hit the streets of Shibuya with our our freelance reporter Lisa Katayama. Lisa is working on a piece about a new generation of Japanese female artists who are playing with female archetypes – like the schoolgirl – in all kinds of fun and twisted ways. (More on that later.) Shibuya is a place where throngs of teenage girls flock after school, so we hit some hot spots with the girl culture expert Daisuke Okabe.

He took us to a ‘purikura’ arcade – a storefront filled with photo booths. But this ain’t your grandma’s photo booth – each one has a special theme, like ‘princess’ or ‘glitter.’ You pose in front of a green screen, then go to a computer where you can pimp out your pictures with all kinds of graphics and colors. After spending 5 minutes touching them up, you get a printout. They are microscopic! You’d think after all that effort you’d want a poster or a t-shirt, or at least a 5×7. But apparently, you aren’t cool unless you do this with your best friends at least once a week. We managed to get ours done without too many stares.

– Leital Molad