Blogs from Chiyoda, Tokyo, Japan, Asia

24 hours in Japan and I'm so glad to share its been lovely. I am traveling with a colleague/ friend and we were able to book a direct flight from Dallas to Tokyo. After a brief stint hunkered down in the DFW bathroom to hide from a possible tornado, we made it on flight and over here. These long flights are getting tougher and tougher! We have been using the monorail to get around the city and have visited the Shibuya scramble - apparently the biggest crossing in the world, walked around the city a bit and had Ichiban style Ramen. Many restaurants here run on a vending machine type system which makes it all very easy. The Ichiban style was interesting because you go into these small cramped spaces and sit up against a partition ... read more

At 9am we were met in the lobby of the hotel by our tour guide for the day Mr Kiyoshi Mori for a sightseeing tour around Tokyo emphasising Japanese history and culture. Mr Mori sat with us for a few moments with a map of Tokyo showing us where we would be going today. We set off in a taxi for the Hama-Riku Gardens. En route we passed various parks and green family spaces. The population of Japan is 126 million of which about 13 million are within Tokyo and 36 million in its greater metropolitan area. However, the population started to decline in 2011 and this is expected to decline to 107 million by 2040. Unemployment is running at 3% and so workers are difficult to find. As a result the government recently passed a ... read more

Issy gets a call from reception at the hotel to tell us that because we've made a complaint about the hotel on one of the well known booking sites, they are giving us a free session at the hotel's fitness centre. They tell her that the voucher will be delivered to our room in a few minutes. She sounds very excited, and tells me that she will be using the voucher to get a foot scrub. I tell her that this all sounds great, except that we haven't made any complaints on any hotel booking sites, and can't see why we would, as the service and facilities at the hotel have all been excellent. We start to worry that someone might be impersonating us. We wonder why they might do this, if we're the ones who ... read more

Tym razem w samolocie nie udało się nam zasnąć ani na chwilę. No dobra może na 10 minutek. Trudno powiedzieć czy powodem była wczesna pora wylotu, czy mała ilość miejsca. W zasadzie w Dreamlinerze miejsca na nogi jest tak mało, że aby zmieścić i wyprostować nogi musiałem udawać ofiarę wypadku komunikacyjnego, przejechanego przez fotel sąsiada, siedzącgo przede mną. Tak wiem, moje skarpetki wystawały sod jego siedzenia, ale były totalnie neutralne pod względem wonnym. Nikomu nie zespułem podróży. Co można jeszcze napisać o samolotach LOTu? Jedzenie mają nienajgorsze, poziom skwaszenia min pań stwardess mieści się w normie wschodnioeuropejskiej. Jednak bardzo pozytywnym zaskoczeniem było to, że przynajmniej jedna z nich mówiła po japońsku. Pewnie dlatego lubią oni (japończycy) latać naszą linią bo stanowili ok 40% objętości foteli. Nieco gorzej sprawa si... read more

Hello my fellow travellers! I slept like dead during the night, though before falling asleep my feet did indeed get licked by one of the dogs, but I didn't mind, it reminded me of one of my parents' dogs who used to do that and whom I was very fond of. This day started easy with me and Ryosuke taking a walk together with the dogs, it's something that I promised I would help him with as a thanks for letting me stay with him and I'm enjoying every second of it as his dogs are very nice. On the walk I also visited the small local shrine Mukōjima Akiba Jinja. After the walk me and Ryosuke split up and I headed to the metro to go to Chiyoda. From Tōkyō Eki, the main station, it's ... read more