Those of you who know me know that I don't mind killing a bit of time playing the odd video game. One of my favourite games is the Final Fantasy series of games and for quite a while I had been meaning to head to their official store which is located in the business district of Shinjuku. A little information about Shinjuku train station. It is officially the busiest train station in the world with an average of over 3 million passengers using the station each day. There are a total of 36 train platforms for the various train lines that use it and well over 200 exits. While I am more adept at finding my way around the station than I used to be, I still seem to find myself coming out of a different exit each time I use the station, and this is after I am sure I have got the right one!! I didn't take any photos of the station today, but will in the future for a different post.
So I made my way out of yet another exit, found my bearings and headed off in the direction of the square enix store. Oh, I forgot to tell you that it was raining again today, and it looked like the owner of this shop hadn't been told either!
About halfway to where I wanted to go, I passed on of Japan's famous Love Hotels.
You might see that in that second picture there are two prices. One is for a rest (3 hours) and the other is for a stay (overnight). These days, more and more, young Japanese people are living at home longer and as a result, it is not possible to bring a guy or girl home at night as Mum and Dad are sleeping on the other side of the paper thin wall. So these Love Hotels (and there are a huge number of them!) are scattered around the city. Basically the rest is if you just want to have a quickie with you boyfriend or girlfriend and the stay is if it is later at night, and you probably won't be finished in time to catch the last train home! Some of them are even set up with themed rooms (Alladin, and....well, have a look if you want to! http://loneleeplanet.com/2010/03/top-10-love-hotel-room-themes/
So I kept on walking and reached my destination. I discovered that the only day of the week that they are closed is on Thursday, and today was.......yep, you guessed it! So I turned around and started trudging back towards the station. Halfway back there I passed a place that myself, my brother Matty and friends Warren and Mark had found when we visited Japan in May 2011. Right next to a busy intersecton was another of Japan's Shinto shrines so I wandered in for a look.
As soon as I stepped into the shrine grounds, as if by magic, the road noise faded to barely a whisper. I don't know how or why that happens, but it does! I was telling one of my students today about this and she said "I know!! Why is that?"!! I wandered around for a little, became at peace with myself and headed back out into the mayhem!
Just around the corner I found myself in the Korean area of Tokyo. I had not seen so many bags stacked like this since the last lot of major flooding in Australia:
That is a lot of rice, even for Japan!!
I'll let you guess about this next one....
Those who guessed a Korean BBQ restaurant were correct!! (at least I think that is what it is...).
And finally, a $50 piece of fruit!
So eventually I made my way home vowing to return on a day off that is not a Thursday, and when I do, I will get some photos of Shinjuku station so you can get an idea of how busy it is.
I recently stumbled across a blog that is similar to mine. A girl from Canada who has moved to Japan. In the post that I was reading, she was lamenting that she will never have the same relationships with her friends back home again after having been gone for so long. This is true to an extent, even if it is only to a small extent, and is one of the things that I deliberated long and hard over before I moved to Japan. All of my friends are fantastically supportive and knew how much I wanted to return and were very supportive of my decision, but I still live with those regrets. Recently one of my closest friends had a milestone birthday and I was sitting in my room here in Tokyo having a beer or two for him and people at the party were posting photos on facebook as the party was happening. It made me feel a little closer to everyone, but at the same time, made me feel so much further away. I have also recently found out that one family member is about to go into hospital for pretty major (but routine they tell me) surgery. It is at moments like these that I start to double check with myself if I have made the right choice.
When I made the decision to follow my "life less normal", I knew that these situations would come around, and I knew that I would feel like this too, but I told myself that I was making the decision to return after having taken everything into account, which I had. It doesn't make times like this any easier, but I know that my friends will always be my friends and that I am only a 12 hour flight away if I ever need to get back home in a hurry.
Thanks for putting up with my ramblings, and I will see you again next week. Take care.
I had one last event for the cherry blossom season planned so on Saturday night after work I headed back over Rainbow Bridge to Odaiba again. This would be the last time the blossoms were still out in force and I was looking forward to it. As fate would have it, the weather turned out to be quite cold so we had our party indoors. My friend whose house we were at, Emiko, has four wonderful young kids. The oldest I had met when I lived here before (but had grown a lot taller by now!), and the three younger ones who I had not met before. The kids don't speak any English, and my Japanese is nearly non-existent, so Emiko and another friend Teruyo had to translate a lot for me. They were great kids and we all had a great time as you can see.
After having been to and written about a few of the more traditional areas of Tokyo recently, I decided to head to the breeding ground of Japanese teen Pop Culture, Harajuku. This is a shopping district with a lot of big brands having shops here, but also a lot of smaller shops catering to the cosplay (costume play) crowd. Rain had set in for the day, so I grabbed my umbrella and set off.
I got off the train and before heading to the shopping area I went the other side of the train line toward the park where I took the cherry blossom photos recently, Yoyogi Park. Just before the park entrance, there is an entrance to Tokyo's most famous shrine, Meiji shrine. Whereas temples are the worshipping places for the Buddhist religion, shrines are the worshipping places for the Japanese Shinto religion. The entrance to the shrine is marked by a huge wooden gateway.
From here you find yourself in one of those contrast situations that I have spoken about. Just behind you is bustling Tokyo with it's crowds, traffic and bursting trains. Once you step beyond this gate, you are transferred into a different world with the only reminder of where you are is the faint sounds of the trains coming and going from the station. The deeper you go into the shrine grounds, even those noises disappear and you are left with peaceful tranquillity.
The grounds of the shrine are, quite simply, amazing. The shrine itself is quite young by Japanese standards, having been built in 1921. The shrine is dedicated to Emperor Meiji and Empress Shoken. The emperor reigned from 1867 until his death in 1912. During this period, Japan underwent great change. The first national government was formed and Japan went through a period of industrialisation that allowed the country to become one of the world's great powers in a short period of time.
After walking through the outer grounds where all of the greenery is, you arrive at the shrine itself. The peacefulness that you experience walking through the grounds and around the shrine is so hard to put into words. I think the pictures do a better job than I can.
Reluctantly I walked back out the way I had come, and after walking back out through the front entrance, as tradition dictates, turned and bowed back in the direction of the shrine and made my way back into reality. The rain was continuing to fall, and the cloud cover was so low that some of the tall buildings were enveloped in the clouds.
I made my way to Takeshita street where some of the more interesting and quirky shops are. Due to the rain, at the start of the street, all I could see ahead of me was a sea of bobbing umbrellas!
This is the area that some famous fashion designers have been known to come to to draw inspiration form the fashion that the local teens wear here. Looking at some of the pictures here, you may wonder about that, but it is true!
You can find shops selling the most weird and wonderful fashion. Cute socks (and shark backpacks?), jackets, shoes, hats, all kinds of weird and wonderful shirts and tops, even spiderman has a shop here!
Walking down Takeshita street is absolutely a feast for the senses and any visit to Tokyo is not complete without visiting it.
Another reason I wanted to come to this area is that one of my housemates works at a hat shop here. A little walk from the above mentioned shopping street, it is located in an area that is home to all of the big fashion labels. The name of the shop is Harajuku Polka Dot (www.polcadot.com) and it is the hat shop of choice for Rock Music Royalty!! My housemate, Jinseul, was working one day when this foreign guy came in. Being that Jinseul is able to speak English well, she started chatting with him. She asked where he was from, the USA he answered. He then asked her if she knew the rock band, Van Halen. It was David Lee Roth!! Rock Music Royalty shopping for hats in her shop! I think he is married to a Japanese lady and lives in the neighbourhood. The funny thing is, he didn't come into the shop with bodyguards and personal helpers, he just rode up to the shop on his shopping bike like any normal person!
Here are a few photos of the shop.
Jinseul with the hat that David Lee Roth bought.
A nice shop that I will be going back to again. Thanks to Jinseul and Yuda-san for showing me around the shop.
Heading back towards Harajuku again in search for food, I stumbled upon this shop selling.......um.......Pandas and stuff..
I had the same expression on my face looking at him!!
I headed to a nearby Okonomiyaki (Japanese savoury pancake) restaurant that I had heard was pretty good and also that they had an English menu too. The restaurant name is Sakua Tei () and is well and truly hidden in the little back alleys of Harajuku. I managed to find it and ordered the spicy yaki. At this restaurant you cook the food yourself. It is fun, and also, I guess, if you mess up the cooking, you can't blame the restaurant!
Luckily for me, it tasted good! The inside of the restaurant is pretty interesting, with murals covering the walls, including instructions on how to cook it.
Really nice restaurant with friendly staff.
I headed back out into the rain, my shoes now well and truly soaked through, and made my way back home after another enjoyable day off in Tokyo.
That's it for this week. See you again next week.
