Tokyo II

Day 256 – Robot seals, miniature cars and a big bang

This morning we had a sleep in and didn’t meet at the Parco Factory until 11am. The guide book made the Parco Factory sound like a free exhibition showing all kinds of design work. It turned out to be just one room, with the current exhibition being a collection of Rip Slyme, a Japanese pop band’s advertising, CD covers, tickets and merchandise. A TV station was there and asked to interview me (via Shouko) but I had to politely admit I knew nothing about Rip Slyme!!

There was a really cool bookshop in the same building though, so we managed entertain ourselves for a little while in there and Matt bought some more Murakami books.

The crossing outside Shibuya station – rivals Times Square!

On the way to Miraikan we had yummy stand up noodles at the station, something Shouko herself had never experienced as it was something generally only men did. We’re foreigners! What would we know?

Shouko’s part time job when she was at university was as a demonstrator at Miraikan and so as we purchased our tickets (from a vending machine of course!), she just needed to show her lifetime membership.

The Miraikan Building. Miraikan roughly translates to “future world”.

Miraikan is the National Museum of Emerging Science and Innovation and is broken into four main exhibition sections: Innovation and the Future, Information Science and Technology for Society, Life Science and the Earth Environment and Frontiers with hands on things and bilingual explanations for everything. We spent a long time in the ‘Frontiers’ bit as it was a lot of stuff we’d never seen before and there was probably a lot more in it given the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency offices were in the top floor of the building. It was a lot more ‘adult’ than Science World in Vancouver or Science Works at home too – I was struggling to understand parts of it!

Space toilet! There was an International Space Station Living Quarters replica you could go inside and see how an astronaut lives.

The inventor of the Post-It note got a guernsey!

And the guy who invented Velcro. The story goes that he was studying the burs stuck in his dogs fur and based the idea on that.

A representation about how the internet works…. I still think it’s freaky.

Me playing with Paro the baby robot seal. He responds to you petting him and calling his name and if you pinch him! After I had been playing with him a few minutes a little Japanese kid came up and punched him in the face! Paro didn’t like that!

Three hours later it was time for some ice cream, so we visited a nearby shopping mall and found us some cold stone. Across from the mall was a display with Toyota’s latest toys so we went in for a quick look. The future cars were quite disappointing, but if we ever get a second car, maybe we’ll get this:

We jumped back on the monorail and headed into Shimbashi which was on the way to where the fireworks would be showing later that night. We stopped in at one of those tiny restaurant/bars we had wanted to try and what seemed like an ancient husband and wife team served us up some delicious tapas style snacks to go with our beers. Matt and I just picked random characters on the wall and Shouko explained what they were and if she thought we would like them, ordered! We finally had some yakitori (skewered chicken), tai (sashimi), harumaki (light a toasted cheese spring roll), yakinasu (a marinated vegie), kiayako tofu (tofu blocks in a sauce), gindara tenaki (dried fish crackers??) and zousui (rice and fish broth – apparently the Japanese answer to chicken soup to cure a cold). Even Shouko was impressed with her “intuition” and announced she would be taking her friends back there.

The point of being back in Tokyo was to watch the Hanabi Taikai festival. A festival of fireworks held in the last weekend in July, just because Japanese people like fireworks. Many of the streets within view were closed off on one half where people had bought picnic blankets and eskies and were set up from around midday ready for the 7.30pm fireworks. The other half of the road was still blocked off from traffic, but open to walk and so you could walk a loop around the city and watch the fireworks as you go. As we didn’t want to sit and wait all day, we took the walk option which was a nice way to see the fireworks from different angels.

At the end of the fireworks we had to part ways with Shouko. We were off to Osaka in the morning and she needed a much deserved day off to prepare for her week ahead. Thanks again Shouko for spending time with us!!!

As our hotel was on the same line as Tokyo Disney we had been watching many people coming back on the train with Mickey ears and show bags. We could help but notice the vast majority were adults and not kids! Maybe next time.

Day 257 – Kids come in handy sometimes

This morning we headed over to Harajuku and very trendy area to visit the Design Festa Gallery and experience the last of the Japanese shopping crowds. It was amazing how many people were trying to fit down one little laneway, but given many of the shops were empty, I think it was more about being seen in that street rather than actually shopping there!

Apart from the gallery, (which was interesting, but quite small and probably not worth the hassle of getting over there), nearby was an organic all you can eat restaurant and we were dying for some vegetables. We had to wait in line with the hoards of others also recognising that Y1,260 is a good deal when one apple on a pedestal costs Y7,500 in the supermarket. The wait was made longer by the fact that a children’s centre was attached and so if you rocked up with a kid, you jumped to the front of the queue!

Our last Skinkansen ride over to Osaka was uneventful and we checked into our business hotel which was in the funky suburb of Shinsaibashi. We decided to try something different for dinner…. not! We had okonomiaki, the only thing different was it was a fancier one.

Kamakura

Day 255 - Just a great day out.

This morning we agreed to be on the 10.11 train from Kashiwa as Shouko would be able to get on at the next stop down the line and we could head out to the Kamakura area together. It was a great plan until we arrived at the station to find that there were two 10.11 trains, one being an express. We decided to go with the stopping all stations, as the express wouldn’t stop at Shouko’s station.

When Shouko didn’t get on the next stop up we realised we had no back up plan! We decided to get off at the next station that both trains would stop at and call. As we stepped out of the carriage, Shouko was about to step on!! So we all quickly jumped back on the train we were on. She had realised what had happened and also got off at the next station that both stopped at to change. It was very lucky because we hadn’t even looked up where we were going to meet there!

By the time we arrived in Kamakura, it was lunchtime and stinking hot. We took a walk up the main road Wakamiya-oji toward Enkaku-ji temple and stopped in at a Japanese curry house in a little alleyway on the way. Japanese curry wasn’t very hot, but tasty just the same, and added to our variety of food which has mainly consisted of sushi train and okonomiaki up to date.

Essentially, cross where ever you want!

Enkaku-ji is a Rinzai Zen temple founded in 1282 and was a place where monks prayed for soldiers who lost their lives defending Japan against the Kublai Khan. There was a small museum attached, but not even our translator could read the exhibits as the script was scribbley and written in ‘old language’, so we just had to admire the artefacts and layered kimonos instead.

Tubs of sake donated to the temple by local businessman.

On the way out I picked up an “Omikuji” (fortune card) and it was not a bad one, so I didn’t need to go back into the temple and tie it in a special area and pray for a better one.

A couple reads their Omikuji to each other.

After the Enkaku-ji we walked back toward the station on a parallel street through Komachi-dori, known for its shopping. Matt’s must-have item from Japan was a puzzle box, mine was a proper tea set and up until now I was losing hope of finding one I wanted in my price range. Still nothing in this strip, so we headed for the train to Kotoku-in temple to see Japan’s second largest Daibutsu (Buddha). The biggest was in Nara, which we had already seen.

Lucky for me, there was a little pottery shop on the path up to the temple and I finally found a cute little tea set! (Sorry forgot to take a photo before sending it home).

Sitting in the open air of the gardens, Daibutsu didn’t let us down and he was very impressive. He used to be sheltered in a giant wooden house but…

I thought it was very Zen that he would just sit there while a Tsunami washed away his house.

Some terrapins playing in a nearby pond.

On the way back to the train we stopped in at Hase Dera which was also very rewarding with views out to the beach, a beautiful garden and a funny little cave which had different small chambers where you could donate money in an honesty box, take a small figurine or plaque, write on the bottom your wish and then line it up with the others.

As the beach was close by, we took a short stroll down to sticky beak. I think we’ll save our swimming for the Philippines.

Hearing that I, in particular, had a bit of an obsession with okonomiaki, Shouko took us to a street full of okonomiaki restaurants! When I asked if she had a favourite she replied that she had never been to this street before, so when I asked her how we pick one (out of at least 30!) she replied “intuition”! Intuition basically involved looking through the window to see what we thought. Shouko’s intuition did good! The place was full, funky and delicious!

Kashiwa

Tonight we had decided to try something different accommodation wise and checked ourselves into Tokyo Kiba Hotel, a capsule hotel!  As we hadn’t stayed in one before, the lady at the front desk kindly showed us the ropes, all of which were mostly the same except that instead of having a room we were both in the dog house!

We only had to venture across the road to the nearest sushi train and spent the remainder of the night watching movies in our box and watching as mostly other travellers, and not suited businessmen as previously thought, trickled in and crawled into their box.  It was at good option as at Y4,000, that’s a bit under half the cost of a standard business hotel.

Day 254 – Sleepy shopping and photo booth fun

This morning we checked out of our box and moved our things out to Kashiwa, about an hour on the train north east of Tokyo, to near where Shouko was living with her brother.  She had managed to get two days off work to hang out with us, but not easily.  The poor thing had been at work until 5am prior to meeting us!

We met in the lobby of our hotel at midday and headed out to Shouko’s local shopping mall for a look around and some lunch.  After a couple of hours walking around Shouko looked knackered, so we suggested she went home for some more sleep and we met up later for dinner.

Vegemite was $11 in Canada, here a more reasonable $5.

At about 8pm we met up again for sushi train and finally were able to order some of the more interesting stuff you have to order specially that doesn’t come on the ordinary train.

Each one of those white strips is a fishy!

Fish roe marinated in something lemony.

After sushi train we went for a stroll around the area and had some photo fun in one of those funky photo booths were there’s a full body blue screen, a range of scenery and you can graffiti on the pictures before they are printed!  What happened to ordinary old black and white and pulling fun faces?  After that we wandered into a $2 shop type place that must have sold absolutely everything imaginable.  It was called something that sounded like “Donkey” and is apparently a bit of an institution.  Tired again, we all hit the sack reasonable early, ready for our day trip tomorrow.

Hakone

From Shin-Fuji we caught the Shinkansen to Odawara, as close as we could get to the Hakone region using our Japan Rail Passes.  From there we bought yet another pricey ticket called the Hakone Free Pass which let us ride the variety of trains, buses, gondolas, funiculars and ships that traverse the area.  As we were tired from the morning’s mountain climbing and keen to get to our hotel we opted for a relatively tame train and bus combination.

We’d had even more trouble than usual finding reasonably priced accommodation and had ended up at the Hakone Palace Hotel, an aging hulk of a hotel perched on a hilltop overlooking the main lake.  Our room was spacious but dated, to get internet access I had to go borrow a modem from the front desk!

Once we’d settled in we caught the bus a couple of stops down into the nearby town of Togendai on the lake shore.  There were a couple of restaurants but they were all a bit overpriced, so we hopped back on the bus to explore further up the road.  In Sengoku we went into a fancy bottle shop looking for a miso beer I’d seen in Nagoya, instead we came out with a chocolate beer, it was interesting but not fantastic.

Eventually we found ourselves some dinner so we could go back to the hotel and collapse exhausted.

The Hakone regions is renowned for its views of Mt Fuji, this is all we saw for three days, clouds. 

Day 252 – Finally time some Matt shopping time

This morning we caught a pirate ship across the lake to do some sightseeing and shop for a puzzle box.  You think I’m kidding:

OK, so maybe it’s a mock pirate ship, there’s a fleet of three that ferry passengers around the lake, like so many things in Japan, strange.

Ever since briefly playing with a family friend’s puzzle box many years ago I’ve wanted one of my own.  As Hakone is the home of the himitsu (Japanese puzzle box) I got to do some shopping while Erin busied herself admiring the other nice parquetry work.

We hadn’t been able to find another vending machine selling the huge Asahi tins, so I had to settle for grabbing a picture with the range in a bottle shop.  The littlest member of the family is 135ml, the largest 2L!

Mmmm, “Cookies and Cream” maybe?

The weather really hadn’t improved and it was becoming clear the Mt Fuji was not going to miraculously come into view.  So we got ourselves some noodles from 7-Eleven to cook up in our hotel room and headed back across the lake for another early night.

    

Day 253 – Norimono (modes of transport)

So this morning it was back on the bus and down to the gondola station, from where we took two gondolas over the mountain range behind the hotel.  Then it was down a funicular, onto a switchback train and eventually onto the Shinkansen back to Tokyo.  Along the way we stopped for gyoza, Erin’s “Ebi” (prawn) were especially delicious, my mouth is watering just typing this!

One last look back from the gondola at where Mt Fuji should be.

The schematic on the inside of the gondola was about as close as we came to seeing it.

The sulphur mine beneath the gondola.