Gifts and Wrapping
 

Visiting my old high school exchange student who I havent seen in 15 years week in a few days. Can't wait!

I bought three gifts:

Gourment buckeye candies (peanutbutter and chocolate)
Gourment pecan cakes I know he likes
2004 Canadien Ice Wine I have had int he cellar for a while

My quesiton is- I know you are not supposed to wrap stuff (especially alcohol) before boarding the plane. Is there a place I can get the stuff wrapped after we arrive?

We wont get to our hotel (in Ueno) until 8 or 9 pm, and we meet my friend the next mornining...

Any ideas?

Thanks

Hi.

Looks like there are gift shops that can offer wrapping service without gift purchase. They are in Shibuya and Shinjuku.

Tsutsumu Company Limited

darn, those look to close too early for me...

(1) Buy some attractive bags in your home country and put the gifts in them.
(2) Wrap them and pack them. It's unlikely that you will be asked to unwrap them.
(3) Learn to wrap them furoshiki-style

Pack the gifts unwrapped. Take along some gift bags and tissue paper. Pack when you arrive at destination. That's what I do when I travel with gifts.

Is there a class that teaches Japanese department-store-style wrapping? I would be quite interested ...
(Yeah - I'm sure there are YouTube tutorials, but for klutzes like me, a real human tutor would be required).

Should you have some chutzpah....Take the gifts to a department store....purchase something at said department store....get said purchase wrapped and all your other purchases too.....

A good number of years ago, I was in a similar situation. In my case, I had forgotten to buy something and was meeting someone the night of my arrival in Tokyo. I just picked up something at the Duty-Free before departure. I was flying NH HNL-NRT in Biz (they had no F on the plane), and I asked the FA if she knew when the Tsutsumu Store in Shibuya closed (I was hoping that it was something that other passengers may have asked about in the past). She had heard of it, but didn't know the closing time. A few minutes later, she came back and asked me if I was fine with her wrapping it with some tissue paper she found on board. I was very happy, and thankful to her for her gesture. Needless to say, the wrapping job was beautiful (even though the paper had ANA written all over it). I doubt they would do that these days, but if your flying F on JAL or ANA, it wouldn't hurt to ask.

On a side note, I have used Tsutsumu in Shibuya in the past, and they do very good work.