Day one….. Culture Shock!

Day one in Tokyo

“A Sun will Only Rise if it has Set the day Before”

The scurrying of feet on the wooden floor woke me up in a pool of my own sweat and then i made my first movement of the morning and the ice pick type feeling that was smashing through my skull was unbearable….. i think 6 beers and a 12 hour flight might have just about done one over on me!

Alex was waiting for me down stairs on her E-Reader and drinking coffee, i never really took her for a coffee drinker but she seemed to enjoy it, apparently i was supposed to think of things to do today but in my downfall of escaping from life i never quite got around to it, so she got me at me and then i pleaded with her to show me what i needed to see with tokyo as a tourist for a few days.

I never thought the train system would be so cheap but it is , its broken down into Zones a zone is about 120 Yen so less than $2NZD, I’m glad i had Alex with me because I don’t think i would have been able to manage on my own…. there was one point where Alex struggled with the map and we had to ask some nice Japanese man for help, I’m a bit concerned about navigating back to the Airport on my own at this stage…. but i have got this far so maybe it will all work out… I’m a firm believer that if it’d meant to be it is meant to be.

We walked up to a wee station and shot into Shibuya train terminal, there is an old Japanese tale about a dog called Hachiko, his owner was professor Ueno and every day he would ride the train with his dog Hachiko, for 2 years this went on and every day the dog would ride to Shibuya and then part ways, the dog would return again in the evening and wait for Ueno and make his return journey.

Tragically on 21st May 1925 Prof. Ueno had a heart attack and passed, for many years after the dog would sit and wait in Shibuya for Uneo to return but he never did. The statue was placed in recognition of “honoured Loyalty”.

After seeing the statue we trained upto Inokashira Japanese Gardens for a look and spent about an hour looking around what i would describe as a picturesque Japanese garden with Koi Fish, turtles , water, grass and shrubbery, Japanese culture seems to like to mix Concrete Jungle with a zen garden here and there…. probably a concept westerners wouldn’t understand but it seems to have its own balance in their society we stopped and took a picture at the lake in the middle with Gerald and then pushed on out of the 40 degree heat!

Lunch was an interesting experience, throughout all the streets there are little restaurants, most. Of them can only sit around 12-20 patrons and normally sit around a Grille or Buffet style setting and you pay a flat rate fee to eat, it is quite common to see lines of people outside waiting for a seat to become free, we found 11.55AM was ther perfect time to eat as people were either still commuting or still working so there is an inside trick if you ever have the desire to travel to Japan.

After that we pushed on to Tokyo Tower for a look , probably not a touch on the sky tower, however the view was spectacular and you end up around 250M in the air it was air conditioned which made it 10x better, on a clear day you can see all the way to Mt. Fuji which was barley Visable due to the haze and pollution, apparently you can only see it if has rained the night before and is cool the next day.

We strolled through the narrow walk ways littered with Japanese signage until we came across an amazing shrine which is filled with Hase Dera Staues, this is a modern shrine statue used throughout the shrines in tokyo, and Japan. they have red knitted hats that have been put on them to ward off disease and evil spirits in their after life. We didn’t go into the shrine but we did stop and take a few photos with the alpaca for good measure

HARAJUKU

Harajuku district is what was described as the Hipster shopping area, there were people with green, pink ,yellow and blue hair dressed up like Anime Characters there are streets of alternative clothing shops and Crepes, Alex spends a lot of time in Cat Cafes(yes cafes specifically dedicated to cats) to put it simple you pay around 7.20 NZD to spend 30 minutes petting cats…. and drinking insane soft drink flavours!… like melon sofa that looks like Carbonated Listerine!

People in japan usually live in very confined spaces and the chance of owning an animal is not viable so they have these animal cafes…i struggle with the fact that you have to pay to spend time with animals but i guess if you don’t know any better its just another quantum entanglement of Japanese life.

We got back to the accomodation around 6 pm for a quick drink of water and also spent some time with Ben having a quick cigarette… all while alex was giving me the evils from inside, the more i talk to the guy the more i respect him and what he is doing, he is what I would describe as lost but in a good way nothing phases him at all unless its 40 degrees outside…then you hear about it.

After cooling off and checking Alex into the Hostel we decided to go and get some Dinner…. Food is just so great, its always readily available and people seem to live a daily Metro Lifestyle, you only need to get to the next train stop and the next meal time. They done shop like we do in New Zealand, if they are hungry they can pop down to a local eatery of even the “Family Marts” (Convenience store chain) and they have an array of Drinks, Hot Food, Cold Food ,Weird Food, Not So weird food and then general living needs. Food can start from as little as 110 Yen so about 1 NZD, a meal might only cost you from a Family mart about $3-$7NZ depending on how hungry you are.

We didn’t go to family mart, we went for a walk in the out skirts of Shibuya until we came across what Alex said translated to a family run teppanyaki Bar, there was 7 people in there when we arrived, as we walked in the dimly lit and Smokey restaurant they all shouted hello at us in Japanese, we took a seat right in front of the grill and Alex deciphered the menu, Alex asked what i felt like and i just said just order as ill eat anything…. until i spied the beef liver on the grill and told her, anything but that!!!

We ended up with more food than we could handle but the one dish that stood out was the the Truffle Fries that were made in extremely small batches and had the perfect amount of crunch and also the perfect amount of oily goodness, so we ended up having of those!

On the way back we walked passed a shop called MEGA Mart…. and the only way to describe it is imagine JB HIFI, The Warehouse and pikachu all had acid and had a baby and you would end up with this store, it is 6 stories of WTF and it has everything and anything…… hammer Yes Please ….. Deodorant….YES PLEASE ….. Sex Toy…. YES PLEASE…. Game boy….. YES Please …… Weird dried shrimp …. YES PLEASE …. they literally had every base covered, and they didn’t label any thing nor did the tell you what each floor had , it was just a walk in and hope for the best!

Well its late so i think that’s enough Japanese culture for one day

I always think a quote is a nice way to end any piece of writing.

“Losing a job, losing a loved one or losing a house are the hardest things in life you go through…. and you have done the trifecta my friend”-Ben Burke 22 July 2017