Yokohama Kaidashi Kikō (Japanese: ヨコハマ買い出し紀行) is a Japanese science fiction manga series written and illustrated by Hitoshi Ashinano. It was serialized in Kodansha's Monthly Afternoon magazine from June 1994 to February 2006, with a concluding postscript episode in July 2006, and collected in 14 tankōbon volumes. Parts of the story were adapted as two original video animation (OVA) anime series of two episodes each, Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou (OVA) and Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou: Quiet Country Cafe (OVA).
The series depicts the daily life of an android who runs a coffee shop some time after the Earth's ecology has collapsed called the Age of the Evening Calm. It is noted for its spare pen-and-ink drawing style, as well as its calm, meticulously paced stories and engaging characters. Yokohama Kaidashi Kikō won the 2007 Seiun Award for best science-fiction comic.
Manga
A total of 140 chapters were published in Japan by Kodansha in the seinen (aimed at younger adult men) manga magazine Monthly Afternoon between June 1994 to February 2006. The serial chapters were collected in 14 tankōbon volumes by Kodansha under the Afternoon KC imprint. In Q4 of 2009 Kodansha started a reprint of the tankōbon volumes. It is licensed in Korea under the title 카페 알파 (Café Alpha), in Indonesia by M&C Comics, in Taiwan by Tong Li Publishing, in France by Meian under the title Escale à Yokohama, and in North America by Seven Seas Entertainment.
First Edition
No.
Release Date
ISBN
Chapters
Description
1
18 August 1995
978-4-06-321050-7
1-7
Alpha Hatsuseno is an android that runs a coffee shop in place of her missing master. She befriends an unnamed elderly man and his grandson, Takahiro. The chapters in this volume cover Alpha's daily life in an episodic fashion: Takahiro meets the Misago, Alpha attempts to give watermelons to her customers, Alpha is hit by lightning, Alpha attends a party, Alpha and Takahiro see the first sunrise of the new year, and Alpha befriends an android named Kokone Takatsu.
