Posts under ‘Gadgets’

In the futuristic city of Odaiba across the Rainbow Bridge you will find the Mirakan or Emerging Science Museum. This interesting technology museum features some pretty incredible advances in science including their star exhibit Asimo, Honda’s humanoid robot. Asimo isn’t the only robot on display there are quiet a few including Mesci which can even guide people around the facility. Although most of the exhibits are in Japanese and very little English translations the exhibition Is easily understood by non Japanese speaking people with plenty of easy to understand displays and diagrams. Some of the exhibits include space travel including full size mock up of sections of the International Space Station, nano technology, health and transportation. The bullet train technology features heavily in the transport section with plenty of models and interactive displays for people of all ages to learn about emerging technologies and see what is in future in year to come.

GPS units are handy devices when traveling, you can even pick them up now for less than 200 bucks and it sure beats stuffing around with a range of paper maps. One other thing you can do with many of them is to record a tracklog and then copy that on to your PC and even import it into Google Earth to show off to your friends where you have been. If you want to know more on how to do this follow our brief tutorial after the jump. (Warning: computer tech content follows!)

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If you were an Iron Chef and wanted to deck out your kitchen stadium the best place to go for kitchen equipment would be Kappabashi in Tokyo. Kappabashi is Kitchen Town and it lies between Ueno and the electronics mecca of Asakusa. Here you can buy anything you would need to start up a kitchen from chopsticks, to uniforms to plates and saucers even those amazing plastic food models you see everywhere in Japan. There are hundreds of shops many specializing in different types of kitchen goods, for example Hashito sells chopsticks, and a shop called Tanaka sells lacquerware, and then there Kamata who sells knives. The plastic food shops are amazing, one good one is Maizuru, you can virtually find any type of food here all in resin, from noodles to steak, from sushi to eggs and even full seafood platters and buffets- the range is amazing- but they don’t come cheap some costing thousands of yen. But for the tourist there are some smaller affordable ones, and they have a good range of novelty fridge magnets and the like. The easiest way to visit Kappabashi is catch the Ginza line train and get off at Tawaramachi Station then its only a few blocks walk from exit 3. Most of the shops are open six days a week being closed on Sundays.

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Toyota is a city in Nagoya Japan and as the name suggests it is home to the worlds biggest automotive manufacturer Toyota. Dubbed the Motown of the Far East the city was once called Koromo. Toyota have a quiet a few museums in the greater Nagoya and are all worth a visit but the Toyota Exhibition Hall combined with a factory tour is a great day out and a chance to get up close to some cutting edge technology. One of the center’s newest exhibits are Toyota’s musical robots which were a hit at Nagoya’s World Expo. The exhibition hall is geared towards innovation and technology with many interactive exhibits featuring Hybrid engines, safety systems and futuristic vehicles. Read the rest of this entry »

Donkey Kong is one of the most loved of the video games and has survived over quarter of a century. Today the game is celebrated in a huge display at Berlin’s Computer Game Museum or computerspielemuseum. The huge scaffolding covers the front of the museum’s facade complete with barrels, ladders and of course everyone’s favorite ape Donkey Kong.
The museum itself is an amazing display of everything computerized it will keep the geek in you interested for hours, there’s lots of early computers and games from simple ping pong right up to the latest state of the art computer games and gadgets of the present.

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ASIMO the amazing walking robot built by Honda is one of the feature exhibits at the Miraikan Emerging Science Museum in Odaiba the futuristic city in Tokyo Japan. ASIMO or the ‘Advanced Step in Innovative MObility” robot is an incredible humanoid robot which can even walk up stairs. It is hoped that with constant upgrades one day the robot will be able to take visitors on guided tours around the museum.

The museum has an amazing array of technological feats, many of them Japanese, including robotics, interactive displays featuring the Linimo Maglev 300km plus train, space and mining exploration and plenty of hands on interactive educational entertainment for people of all ages.

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At this restaurant known as ‘s Baggers in Nurnberg Germany you wont find any waiters to take your order or to bring drinks to the table, instead you will find a touch screen computer and something that looks like a food rollercoaster that bring food directly to your table. When you get a table at this futuristic restaurant you make your order via the computer at your table, your meals is then prepared by humans (not robots) in the upstairs kitchen and sent on a ride to your table. The restaurant claims that the system cuts costs and improves efficiency making for an overall better dining experience. The food served is called Franconian Style which is an old German style of cooking the name baggers comes from a potato fritter style dish. Read the rest of this entry »

In Tokyo’s electronic town Akihabara you can pick up just about every conceivable gadget and gizmo including these novel USB sushi. Unfortunately they are made of plastic so don’t taste too good but are great to store your favourite data on. There are quite a few different varieties including tempura, hand rolls, sashimi and even dim sim and they also come in a range of sizes. They are quiet pricey expect to pay about 60,000 – 90,000 yen for them- expensive but fun. Read the rest of this entry »