August 11-14 (Sun-Wed) - Together in Tokyo

Sunday August 11:
I made last-minute preparations for my trip, then Kaori came over for breakfast. She drove me to the station and soon enough I was on a train bound for Tokyo! Well, for Maibara anyway. From there I caught a Shinkansen to Tokyo, and breathed in the Tokyo air for the — well, ok, not the first time. I was lucky enough to, entirely by accident, come out at the old station.

Then I navigated the subways to the right stop, only to be waylaid by a Google Maps failing. Oh well. I made it to the hotel and they even let me check in. I then kinda waited around, checking the clock and messages every two minutes, anxious to hear from my family. At last I’d had enough, and, knowing their plane had landed, I set off to meet them at a station. I was really happy to see them,

(even though there might be an earthquake the sign says)

and was glad to be able to lead them easily to the hotel.

For dinner we ate curry. Aside from what I’d made myself, this was my first time eating Japanese curry this visit to Japan. It was a hit with the family :)

Monday August 12:
We ate a breakfast composed of fun but not highly-nutritious breads, this popular yoghurt, (would you eat aloe?)

and milk tea, then we set off for our first adventure: The Meiji Shrine. 

Ok, so first we had to get there, and it was hot, then we sat around in the Harajuku station to get JR tickets for later on in the trip, then finally we went over to the park with the shrine. The entrance was definitely cool.

And there were all these sake barrels with elaborate designs.

We went through the cleansing process — properly, according to the posted instructions. (Get water in ladle, wash your left then right hand, put water in your left hand and rinse your mouth, then upturn the ladle so the rest of the water cleanses the handle. If I remember correctly.)

And we got to see a priestess.

But that’s all I can really say about the Meiji-jingu. The treasure house was only open on weekends and public holidays, which had not been clear to me, so aside from the main shrine (which you can’t go in anyway) the only thing to see was the park, which was big but meh, and the gardens... which weren’t really gardens. I was shocked they charged money for it, frankly. Even if flowers were blooming, it was not a real Japanese garden. I am a failure as a tour guide. However, we saw — for the first time ever — a tanuki:

So that was a pleasant surprise. See her yourself! YouTube.

After this, we foolishly decided to walk to Tokyo Tower. Did I mention it’s summer in Japan? This week is basically THE hottest week of the year, and Tokyo is probably the hottest city (on the main island). Also, in the city, restaurants close between dinner and lunch. Advice: Eat when you can, or you get cranky! And don’t walk a lot in the dead of summer.

But as we caught our first glimpse of the tower, 

a cool wind came down the streets, and the weather improved — to catch us in a downpour later in the evening :)

Tokyo Tower was a nice visit. We went up to the first observatory, and it wasn’t too crowded. We got pictures with Doraemon.

We fell through the precipice!

Or stepped on it anyway. 

And we sighted this interesting-looking temple. 

So when we left, we went to investigate, and it was just as cool up close.

Tokyo Tower memories.

Another interesting building.

We stopped for dinner just as the rain started, ate hamburgers and fries (pretty tasty), then dashed through the rain to the subway home. 

An adventurous first day, at any rate!

Tuesday August 13: 

After some confusion with the subway, around 11am we sighted the sleek blue-gray body of the Tokyo Skytree. 

Then we had to get a ticket to come back later (between 2:00 and 2:30) to get in line to get our tickets. What!! But I was actually pleased we would be able to get in at all, so in good spirits I led the family to Asakusa, the Sensouji temple. Open to the public, it was quite crowded, but a cool sight. 

Ari did a mikuji, which is a fortune-paper. She got good luck and took it home. (If you get poor luck, you can tie it to a pole in order to turn things around.)

On our way back we saw the Asahi (beer) building, which is pretty distinctive with its large golden root-thing,

and we stopped for lunch at a hole-in-the-wall ramen place. Yes, it’s summer and it’s too hot for ramen, but it was air-conditioned. The food was ok (the broth was good for Ani and I, both of us sick), but the owner was an old guy who was just delighted to have us in his shop. He made sure we drank plenty of water, and sent us with some paper fans to keep us cool. 

We arrived early for our spot in line to get tickets, and spent the time observing the informative digital panel.

See a few seconds live — well, in this movie.

Then at last we had purchased our tickets and ascended in the dark black (sadly not glass) elevator to a height of 350 meters. 

Here is the view from the Skytree 100 years ago.

After we’d wandered around the crowded main observatory for a while, we went up to the top!!

Well, to the top observatory, which reaches 450 meters.

The Tokyo Skytree is the tallest structure in Japan, the tallest tower in the world (barely) at 634 meters, and the second tallest structure in the world. 

You can’t exactly see a whole lot more from 450 meters, but the building is beautiful, and it wasn’t that crowded. You take a spiral ramp around, there were even chairs (!!), and there was a nice mirrored room where we were able to get a picture.

We enjoyed the rest, then pushed on... to Akihabara. This ‘Electric Town’ is a particular district of Tokyo well-known for its electronics... and otaku, or anime nerds. We saw only a couple cosplayers (costume-players), but several girls advertising for maid cafes (a cafe where you are served by cute girls dressed in a maid costume). It’s an interesting area.

That concluded our adventures for this day.

Wednesday August 14: 

Some stress in the morning resulting from a buggy reservation website that left me unable to tell if we were on the tour or not... turns out we weren’t anyway. So we viewed the grounds of the Imperial Palace, they were expansive and would have been much prettier if it hadn’t been so hot. But we found a rock, a ninja beetle, and who is this girl I see?

We picked up snacks and went back to our hotel to cool off and rest a bit — and to pack, since this was our last day in Tokyo. Then we set off in search of the Ginza district and the Kabukiza Theater.

Ok, it wasn’t that hard to find. I claimed the tickets in about 2 seconds, then we had an hour to spare before we could even go into the building (since we saw Part 3 of the day), so we went in search of dinner. You wouldn’t think this would be a chore — but sometimes it just is. However we did eat, and made it back to the theater with plenty of time to spare to get a couple headsets with English commentary. I would’ve been happy with a small pamphlet explaining the scenes, like you get for ballets, but Dad and Ari certainly benefitted from the commentary. I understood most of the play without it, which surprised me, as I’d heard kabuki was supposed to use old Japanese. Where did I hear that anyway? Somebody lied to me. 

Here’s the inside of the theater. Ari is pointing to the special walkway that allows the actors to engage the audience.

I swore I’d break the rules and take a picture of the production anyway... but I just couldn’t. There were staff standing all about (and I couldn’t figure out how to turn off my camera screen! grrrrr!). So here’s a picture of the brochure. Well, a brochure. We didn’t see that play.

The play we did see was An Edo Souvenir, or Bewitching Foxes and Badgers. It is a comedy about a married woman who falls in love with a priest, and gets the idea to kill her husband. She carries out her plan... only later the husband returns! And he’s not a ghost, he says. She and the priest and villagers reason the only way to deal with the situation is to try to kill him again. If he doesn’t die, he’s a ghost. If he does... well... So they take him out again... and again he returns.

I’ll just say there are many ghost stories in Japan. This is not one of them.

It was amusing and quite entertaining. The play is highly dramatized, the actors speak in loud exaggerated tones, and of course all the actors are men. 

We also saw a (supposcdly-connected) dance and song comedy called Bo Shibari (Tied to a Pole), where a master ties up his two retainers to keep them from stealing sake while he’s gone, but they manage it anyway. 

This was a nice way to end our stay in Tokyo. Onwards — Osaka!