Choo-choo Shu-shu-po-po

American locomotives go choo-choo and Japanese locomotives go shu-shu-po-po. I very well can’t have a blog about kids’ stuff without featuring anything on train sets. Keiji would never hear of such a thing. It’s a bit of an understatement to say he loves trains. And it seems this holds true for every young boy I’ve met in Tokyo.  There are so many different train sets to choose from. Keiji’s first train set encounter was at a toyshop a where there was a Thomas the Tank Engine wooden set on display. Since then he has been a big Thomas fan. So on his 2nd birthday his grandparents gave him his very own Thomas & Friends wooden train set. That soon snowballed into additional trains, tracks and accessories. Here I’ve seen that the Tomy sets with the blue tracks are quite popular. I suppose it’s because the trains are replicas of all the real trains that run throughout Japan which we see on a daily basis. Once we arrived here Keiji also immediately got drawn to all shinkansen and densha the first time we took the trains. I still like the wooden sets for young kids. They’re just classic and I think they are good even for children as young as 1 1/2 years of age since the wooden pieces connect quite easily. Another nice thing with wooden sets is that most most of the differnt brands are all compatible with each other- the Thomas wooden set fits with the Brio sets and also the Imaginarium sets. And if you need extra tracks and are on a budget…some of the Dasio 100 yen shops have wooden track pieces and those can fit with the tracks as well. But the 100 yen tracks are a bit irregular and sometimes it’s a bit of a tight fit with the other tracks. Some shops in Tokyo where you can find shinkansen and Thomas trains and sets are Toys R Us, Akachan Honpo, Bic Camera, Yodobashi Camera, Kiddyland and Hakuhinkan Toy Park (pictured above).