Tokyo Bucket List: 20 Challenges For Your Next Trip

Tokyo Bucket List: 20 Challenges For Your Next Trip

Skip the usuals in Tokyo next time. Instead, challenge yourself to these 20 activities for a mix of crazy, exhilarating and downright disgusting time.

The fun, the crazy, the sick, the scary. All in one place – Tokyo. If you’re game for a mind-blowingly awesome time in Tokyo beyond the usual sightseeing spots and activities, this list will serve you well. The challenges only get increasingly bizarre! You can’t say you’ve been there done that until you’ve completed all 20 of these challenges. Here’s a dare: don’t come home until you’ve completed them all.

1. Jumbo gyoza food challenge  


Image credits: @ikukotonogi


Image Credits: onlyinjapan.tv

“Jumbo” is an understatement. You’re looking at 2.5kg of gyoza, or an equivalent of 100 regular ones! Finish it in 60 minutes or be ready to fork out a whopping 9600yen.

2. Hold your breath and try natto


Image credits: Hiroshi Yoshinaga

The durian of Japan, natto is well-loved by the locals but shunned away almost unanimously by foreigners. Challenge yourself to a bowl of steamed rice topped with these slimy fermented beans. Remember to hold your breath.

Watch this super hilarious (though slightly draggy) Natto Challenge.

3. Get naked in an Onsen

From all-night singing to getting naked – wow, that escalated quickly!? Well to be fair, we don’t mean naked out there on the busy intersection of the famed Shibuya crossing.


Image credits: macaronmagazine

Get naked and really really comfortable in Japanese public bath houses. It’s a good exposure (ha-ha) to traditional Japanese culture!

4. Go porn-shopping at the 7-storey sex shop

Grab some sex toys as souvenirs for yourself from M’s. Yes, here is where you get to buy the infamous life-size sex doll! You lose if you’re shy! Apparently, if you try on a costume and let the staff take a picture of you in it, you get 20% discount on your purchase. Don’t say we never share good lobang.

Here’s a sneak preview:

5. Make your own food samples

Some of you might have seen this viral video making its rounds on the internet last year. Why not get your hands down to making similar food replicas at Ganso Shokuhin Sample-ya? This is a fun family-friendly challenge that is perfect for kids too!

6. Enter Fuji Q’s haunted hospital, alone

What’s a challenge without some terror! We dare you to walk Fuji Q Highland’s most popular attraction, The Haunted Hospital, alone. FYI, it’s a one-hour long walk in a disused hospital that involves blood-soaked nurses, disfigured men in white, crawling zombies and plenty of screaming.

Here’s a funny teaser to put you at ease:

Well, not so funny if you’re in the position of the announcer!

7. Sing karaoke for the entire night


Image credits: Jimmy Alvarez

Sleep is for the weak! Stay awake and sing until your voice turns hoarse the next morning at 24-hour karaoke bars in Tokyo. They’ve got an endless database of English, Mandarin, Japanese and Korean songs for you to jam to, it won’t be difficult to keep your spirits up throughout the night.

8. Squirm as you eat at The Vibe Bar 

Inside this vibrator bar – yes, a vibrator bar – the elaborate decorations you’ll see are, unlike its name, nothing close to subtle. For a sneak-peak into what lies beyond the entrance (which is unmistakably a cervix), here’s a video:

“300 vibrators are waiting for you.”

9. Take lots of neoprints wearing a fancy costume

Image credits: Lee Shu Shien

Don’t forget the “V” sign, a kawaii expression and lots of cute stickers. Put your pride away ‘cause you be doing it the Japanese way! Cheese!

10. Visit Meguro Parasitological Museum


Image credits: Guilhem Vellut

Does the above image of parasites make you feel uncomfortable and sick in the stomach? Well, that’s the point of a challenge. For the record, the second floor houses a display of an 8.8m-long tapeworm extracted from a 40-year old man. Yikes.

11. Ride the world’s steepest roller coaster


Image credits: Wikipedia Commons

Featured in Guinness Book of World Records as the world’s steepest roller coaster, Takabisha is located about an hour away from central Tokyo in Fuji-Q Highland. Enjoy Mount Fuji in full glorious view before an almost-perpendicular free fall (121° to be exact!) that is sure to make your heart skip a beat! Get that thrill by watching this POV:

12. Stay in a themed love hotel


Image credits: Hotel Alpha In

For the fanciers of bondage, Hotel Alpha In is where your sexual fantasies come true. Take your pick from “Medical Style” rooms, “Shame Style” rooms, “Space Style” rooms and more. If you think you’re flexible, try the “All Purpose Style” room.

Also read: 7 Naughtiest, Kinkiest, Durrrtiest Hotels You Can Find in Asia

13. Get naughty in an S&M bar

If you think strip clubs are too tame, visit an S&M bar where the naughtiest actions take place. Merciless spanking, whipping, hot wax dripping, blood play and all kinds of torture – there’s no stopping of pain for pleasure. For the hard-core masochists, Jail S&M and Fetish Bar is where your nightlife will be redefined. It’s Fifty Shades of Grey with you as the protagonist.

14. Eat shirako (fish milt)


Image credits: Tokyo Times

In layman terms, it’s sperm sac. Have you got the balls (ha) to try this? Rule: no squirming while eating. Itadakimasu!

15. Slurp on ice-cream cone ramen


Image credits: Kishyoku

Japanese are definitely nothing short of experimental when it comes to food!

16. Let snails roam freely on your face


Image credits: NLab

Snail facial is all the rage now! But why resort to Tony Moly facial masks when you can have the real thing slithering down your cheeks? It doubles up as a facial massage too.

Also read: Eccentric Beauty Treatments Around the World: Semen, Poop and Snakes

17. Try nyotaimori


Image credits: Edith Soto

Nyotaimori (body sushi) involves eating sushi from a naked woman on the table. This dining experience, however, should not be assumed as a common tradition in Japan. It is hardly found in Tokyo (to the relief of feminists), but some reckon that you may chance upon such a service in Roppongi.

18. Real datsu-shitsu game (リアル脱室ゲーム)


Image credits: Super Escape

Put your nerves and wit to test with a real-life room escape game. The theme of the game ranges from prison to dungeon, but whatever the setting is, solve mysteries and obtain clues to get out as soon as you can!

19. Chew on meat sashimi


Image credits: yasa_

Oh yes, sashimi do not discriminate. Instead of raw fish, marry your soy sauce and wasabi with raw slices of pork, chicken, beef and… Wait for it… Horse meat. You might want to down two pints of beer before taking up this challenge. In case you’re wondering where you can get this acquired delicacy in Tokyo, here’s a place in Ebisu Yokocho called Niku Sushi,  literally “meat sushi”.

20. Venture into Japan’s suicide forest


Image credits: Patrik Ragnasson


Image credits: keio

The mention of Aokigahara alone would suffice in sending chills down a local’s spine. Outside the fringes of Tokyo at the foot of Mount Fuji is this suicide forest where dejected Japanese enter, get lost and eventually hang themselves. Scattered around the forest you’ll see skeletons, belongings of the dead and their spirits. For a better idea, watch this short documentary:

Think you’re game for them all? Then why wait?! Think you’d like to sit on these challenges for a while before deciding? Then don’t forget to bookmark this page for your future reference!

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Lee Shu Shien

Shu Shien is a nature lover who would trek far and wide in search of the most breathtaking sunflower fields, river gorges, caves and beaches Mother Earth has to offer. With her trusty Minolta and preference for printout maps over Google Maps, she travels for chance encounters and to seek the Great Perhaps.

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