City Spotlight: Kawasaki (part 2)

Okay, so we covered the department stores in the last post. What else?

Left side

So, you're in Kawasaki station. If you head left from the ticket gates, you'll come toward Muza and LaZona.

Kawasaki Muza is Kawasaki's concert hall. Kawasaki prides itself on being a bit of a hub of entertainment, and has three movie theatres. Muza has a variety of concerts, including free shows; check their website for more info.

Muza

Near Muza is Nishi-guchi-dori, the street that runs back between Muza and LaZona. I recommend Inje, the Peruvian restaurant, and An An, a chain yakiniku restaurant with cheap drinks which is open all night, I think.

Right side

However, the other side of the station is of more interest generally. Once you go out, and across the taxi bay (you can go underground, through Azalea), you'll get to Kawasaki's restaurant and entertainment area.

Gin-ryu-gai is a partly undercover pedestrian street. It has a lot of drugstores and karaoke places (why that combination, I'm not quite sure). Off Gin-ryu-gai are lots of side streets which are full of restaurants. After dark, some of them become a bit dodgy; Kawasaki is famous for having a kind of red light district, hostess clubs, that kind of thing.

Entrance to Gin-ryu-gai

My picks in this area are... I forget the street name. On Gin-ryu-gai, take the side street where there is a First Kitchen on the corner, walk for about three minutes, and on your right will be an Indian restaurant called Tandoor, and almost next door, an Italian restaurant called Mona Lisa. They are my recommendations, though honestly, I like everything. ^_^

If you are coming from the station, go right on Gin-ryu-gai, and across the road you'll come across La Citadella, which is also near Saikaya department store. This is a small 'Italian town', which is decked out to look Italian, and hosts some quite good Italian restaurants. It's a good place to sit outside; there are a few restaurants with outdoor terraces, and a movie theatre, CineCitta. Club Citta and a few bars are also in the vicinity.

La Citadella

There's also a public fountain which goes off rather dramatically at one-hour intervals (on the weekends, there's often live music there, and I amuse myself by imagining if the scheduled fountain suddenly went off while they were playing ^_^).

Near the entrance to La Citadella are a bunch of pachinko parlours (bleagh), but in that area there is also a cat cafe. (This cat cafe has 30 or more cats you can look at and play with.) You may see the cafe staff advertising it around Citadella's entrance. I've been there about six times. ^^;;;

Oh yes, there's a library near Kawasaki station too. If you leave the station but turn left before you go into Azalea - you will see the RiverK building (pronounced, bizarrely 'ribaark') - it's a very tall and nice-looking building, with escalators that are partly outdoors. If you take the elevator to the 4th floor, you will find the library. ^_^