In Singapore, the fabulous Marina Bay Sands rose out from reclaimed lands. Tokyo boasts of Odaiba, the artificial island that born out of land reclamation. Diver city Tokyo Plaza is a huge shopping mall located at Odaiba. The first iconic symbol that we saw was the giant fictional robot Gundam that stands robustly right outside the mall. We felt like dwarfs looking up at this fantastic structure.
The aunties in my tour group like shopping and they came here to buy pharmaceutical products. The retail pharmacy in the mall was packed with tourists especially those from Taiwan. We could differentiate them from the mainland Chinese by their Hokkein accent. One or two pharmacy cashiers could speak Mandarin and the tourist crowd gathered around her.
We spent almost half an hour here. While the rest were browsing the pharmaceutical shelves, I went around looking at some of the shops. One shop has Hello Kitty as the theme selling toys, apparel, etc. Another shop sells most items from Hokkaido and some of us bought and tasted the Hokkaido ice cream. The name of the Food Court is Tokyo Gourmet Stadium, what a funny name. If you label Singapore Food Court in the mall as Singapore Gourmet Stadium, I think most Singaporeans would feel awkward. I went into one gift shop and found that most gifts were made in China.
The aunties were very well satisfied with their adventure inside the retail pharmacy. At the end of the shopping spree, every aunty was carrying large bags of pharmaceutical goods. Japanese pharmaceutical products command prestigious reputation for being of superb quality standard though they are costly.