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Published: November 2nd 2007
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Lucky Bridge?
Bridge over the river at Nikko - we witnessed a fender bender here (no one hurt) and I found a bill worth $50 sitting on the sidewalk...lucky for me I guess By Jen:
Our visit to Japan was only a week long, and we spent it in Tokyo, with an overnight trip to the mountains in Nikko.
Our week in Tokyo was made all the better by our friend Scott (Scott and Andrew played together on the same ultimate team in Ottawa a couple of years ago) who sent us a fantastic email with "Scott's Top 10 Things To See & Do Around Tokyo". Scott has previously lived in Tokyo, and his advise was invaluable - thank you Scott! (We had met up with Scott while we were in Sydney, where he and his girlfriend are currently living and working).
Tokyo Highlights:
Visiting the electronics district in Akihabara, where we went to the Yodobashi camera store - 8 floors of electronics and other really cool stuff! We also visited the Sony building in Ginza where you could check out things that aren't even in stores yet.
Eating tasty food samples in the basement food halls of high end shopping malls in Ginza. In the basement of Mitsukoshi, one floor was filled with counter after counter of high end chocolates and sweets - I've never seen Andrew actually
Gin with a View
We enjoyed a couple of fine gin and tonics while we enjoyed this view overlooking the 'busiest intersection in the world'...you may recognize it from every movie ever filmed in Tokyo overwhelmed by the amount of sweets (for once, I was the one who had to say that we weren't leaving without buying something!). Then the next floor down, which was kind of like a very high end takeout food hall, had everything from sushi to kobe beef - at USD$500 per kg (for the good stuff), we didn't buy any kobe beef (next trip!).
Strolling around Kabukicho - Tokyo's red light district - at night. It was very safe with lots of good people watching. We were especially amused by the hotels in the area - they advertise two rates, one for "rest" (ie. 3 hours) and one for "stay" (ie. the night).
Shopping at the Tokyo Hands store. It's a chain with stores all over town, and each store is several floors selling virtually everything. We bought some Japanese saws for the boys in the hardware section and a soy sauce bottle in the kitchen section. It was similar to Ikea, but with more variety and with name brands - I could have spent hours in that store!
Having drinks at a window booth on the 5th floor while overlooking the busiest intersection in the world,
Nasty little guy
We always liked the various forms of the Japanese gaurdian statues, found in pairs at each temple entrance Scramble Kosaten, in Shibuya. It's the intersection that you always see in movies, and was really fun to watch while sipping a G&T!
Browsing the kitchen district in Asakusa. After much deliberation, Andrew finally settled on a Japanese kitchen knife - it's "chef" quality, and made specifically for right handed people to cut vegetables. From the looks of it you'd think one would need a license to use it!
It was very easy to order food at restaurants in Japan (even though English is not widely understood), as almost every restaurant has picture menus, or, you can just point to the plastic version of the dish in the restaurant front window - some of the plastic replicas are really good!
Walking around Harajuku where the cities weird and wonderful kids put themselves on display in some of the most bizarre outfits! They don't ask for any money, they're really just craving attention. Some perform, and one guy was even offering a free punch (to punch him, not us!).
Witnessing a traditional Japanese wedding in Yoyogi Park - the ceremonial outfits were impressive!
Spending two very painful hours watching traditional Japanese theatre at the Kabuki-Za theatre,
Garden Trail
At the Shoyoen gardens in Nikko - it was a nice bit of nature after a week of big city and that was only one scene (a whole show will last 4-5 hours). The funny thing was that half the theatre was asleep (and there weren't very many tourists).
Forcing ourselves to set an alarm and get up early enough to go to the fish market. We got there for 7 am when the wholesalers are selling to the markets and restaurants - you have to be there at 5 am to see the boats selling to the wholesalers! It was amazing that they actually let us walk though the market which is aisle upon narrow aisle of every kind of fish and seafood you could imagine (it's surely one of the largest fish markets in the world). We especially liked seeing the gigantic frozen tuna, which they cut with band saws right in the market. The tuna are so big, it's no wonder that a whole tuna will sell for USD$6-10 thousand!
Laughing to the point of tears while watching Andrew "exercise". Japan's new rage in exercise machines is called the 'joba', which means horse riding as the machine simulates riding a horse - it's supposed to develop your core muscles (?). Andrew just looked like Mr.
Japanese Wedding
We were lucky to be able to see a traditional Japanese wedding procession. Their wedding pictures are very sombre affairs - no one smiles in them! Bobble Head - don't worry, we have videos of it which I will be more than happy to show when we get home (I still giggle at the thought of it!).
The entire city is full of "pachinko" gambling halls - the machines are similar to slots and it's the fastest way to loss $10 that I've ever seen! I even got Andrew to flag one of the staff over cause I couldn't believe that our game was really over! (we only tried it once)
Our overnight trip to Nikko was well worth it, as the mountain scenery was a nice change from the city and the temples were beautiful.
And finally, the sushi!!! It was fresh and the pieces of fish were huge - incredible! We couldn't get enough of it (we even had a sushi breakfast at the fish market)!
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