A Day in Shibuya...

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Hi everyone!

We are currently in Michigan now....just relaxing and waiting for our VISA numbers before heading over to S. Korea. We're not exactly sure of the date that we leave now, as this whole VISA process is taking a lot longer than expected, but we'll be sure to let everyone know as soon as we know! In the meantime, here are our last couple of blogs from Japan that we've been delaying... Enjoy!

These pictures are from one of our last days in Japan, when we spent the day in Shibuya. We headed over later in the afternoon, and after enjoying a conveyor-belt sushi lunch and spending a few hours in a "love hotel," we met up with some of our friends for dinner. We had been highly anticipating this dinner, as we were going to "LOCK UP" - A prison-themed restaurant where you dine in a jail cell on the floor! Sounds great, right?? Well, we had heard a lot of interesting things about this place, and so we decided we just had to try it for ourselves!

Right away, we were not disappointed. As we began to walk down the stairs to this restaurant (the actual restaurant was on the basement floor), we heard a lot of loud noises and people screaming! This was surprising to all of us because we were not aware that this restaurant was meant to be scary, but instead, thought it would be funny. In the end I guess some parts were funny, but I actually found myself screaming a lot more than laughing!

When we reached the restaurant, we had to walk thru what was almost like a "mini-haunted house". Monsters were popping up everywhere and the floor was made of many different materials, which sometimes caused us to lose our balance! When we finally reached the hostess stand, Larry was handcuffed and we were all led to our table in a jail cell - complete with bars on the door!! There we sat on the floor around a low, wooden table and awaited our "inmate" to come and take our order.

Without a doubt, the best part of this restaurant though began when the lights instantly went out in the middle of our meal! Next, some scary blacklights and a strobe light came on, along with a siren, and a Japanese voice over the speakers exclaiming "The monsters have escaped! The monsters have escaped!" At this point we were all scared (well, all the girls anyway) and huddled together in the corner. We heard some screams in other cells and knew something was happening... I was pinching Larry's arm so hard that he had marks on it for days! Finally, a man dressed in a monster costume with a mask and everything came into our stall. I guess writing about it now, it doesn't sound all that scary...but at the time, we screamed and screamed as the monster basically came up to us and said "boo!" Haha!!

Afterwards, we were all still so scared that we were going to be caught offguard, like be in the bathroom the next time the monsters came out, that we were all on edge! Again, a very funny and memorable evening!

Love,
Larry & Melanie

JAPANESE FOR THE DAY: "Donna riyu de kokuso sareru no deska?" - What am I accused of?

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