Tokyo - Ginza

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Ginza is where most of the upmarket department stores and designer shops make their presence most visible. If you have been to any of the Japanese department stores outside of Japan then their home versions are much bigger than anything you have ever seen. For a city whose land prices are astronomical the department stores must certainly be extremely rich to occupy such vast expanses of prime retail property space. The good thing about them is that most of their top floors have affordable restaurants, and better still their basements have supermarkets and food stalls selling a bewildering choice of food for those on a tight budget.

At weekends parts of the streets of Ginza are pedestrainised which is great for wandering aimlessly from one department store to another. Also in Ginza is the Sony building which has all manner of latest technology from Sony; I must admit that the oled screens they have were small but impressive. The store assistants all looked disdainfully at my non-Sony camera hanging round my neck.

To the south of Ginza is the world famous Tsukiji fish market. Unfortunately they've changed the rules recently and members of the public are no longer allowed to witness the fish auction in the early hours of the morning. Instead you are now allowed between 9 a.m. and noon after the autions have been completed. All around Tsukiji are lots of (small) restaurants specialising in sea food.

But other than that I found Ginza to be pretty boring - it's a good thing I decided to stay at Shinjuku.

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Photos

Detail of design on kimono
Matsuya department store has a section of traditional Japanese clothing - expensive!