Showanomachi 昭和の町

23rd December 2012

A colleague told me about a place where many stuffs from Showa Era (昭和時代) is exhibited, well I am not a history buff, so I didn't feel like going. Then, me and my friends (SK, Ari and CY) wanted to go to the Beppu Winter Hanabi, however, it's at night and we would have the whole day free. So, after much discussions, we decided to stop by at Showanomachi 昭和の町 to kill time.

We reached Showanomachi quite early, the parking lot was still very empty. Wow, we were early birdies. We bought ticket to enter the place, one ticket costs 600 yen, not so cheap, but not so expensive too. Well, as the name suggested, this area is full of stuffs, memorabilias from the Showa Era. Some are really alien to us, some still existed in our childhood. Hahaha, good things last forever, or at least a very long time.

One of the examples is the Ultraman ♥! In a toys corner, there are many figurines, the most recognizable one is Ultraman and the monsters. I grew up watching all these Ultraman shows! Looking back now, the story is quite silly, since Ultraman can only be on the form for 5 minutes (not sure about the duration though), after fighting for a while, the "heart" starts to blink, means that Ultraman have to finish off the monster as soon as possible, somehow Ultraman always make it! LOL! Just knew that Ultraman is still going strong, a neighbour kid is following the series now. Wow!

Miniature Ultraman 

Other than that, many other figurines are exhibited there. I didn't recognize most of it though. After I posted the photo on FB, some friends commented that they watched this or that when they were small. 

Toys from Showa Era

Toys from Showa Era

stuffs from Showa Era

Apart from figurines, there are many old movie posters and vinyl records. There are many posters for monsters movie too, the percentage is quite high. Posters of Star Wars, Bruce Lee, Beatles, etc are available too. 

Movie posters and Music albums from Showa Era

stuffs from Showa Era

I took many photos. Then, it occurred to me that I wanted to take the fireworks photo later that night. So, controlled myself to preserve the battery life. After satisfying ourselves with all the memorabilia, we exited the exhibition area, saw a movie poster for "Always 三丁目の夕日". It's a very recent popular movie, the story is centre around few families during the Showa Era, the theme is 'Hope'. I still remember a scene where Koyuki admiring the imaginary ring on her finger given by her suitor because he couldn't afford a real ring, however Koyuki feels happy and content with that alone. Well, although all of the characters in that movie is not well off, everybody has hopes for tomorrow. A very good movie!

Movie poster of Always 三丁目の夕日

Then, we moved to other exhibits. One of the exhibits is a typical house from Showa Era. Hahaha, the antique television, rice cooker (my house still using a similar design rice cooker though), radio, kitchen, living room, etc, minus the computer and internet. I love technology, I couldn't go back to a time where internet is non-existent. 

Showa Era - interior of a house

Showa Era - interior of a house

There's an example of classroom too. I guess it's still around the same nowadays, except maybe the only difference is individual desk for each student now, students in Showa Era had to share desk.

A classroom during Showa Era

After house, classroom, of course there's automobiles. Some of the car designs were cute, however it would look so out of place in today's road. 

Japanese cars from Showa Era

Japanese Automobile from Showa Era

We visited almost all of the attractions in Showanomachi. Then, we walked around the town. We stumbled upon a shop where it sells cameras, old coins, old money, etc. The most special things was that there's a stack of fake money which the shop claims was 1億円. Hahaha!

antiques and fake money

There are other shops with the theme from Showa Era too. Kind of special! Me and my friends left with gigabytes of photo. Well, I am glad that I visited the place, it's quite educational (^^♪ !