Swarms of surgical masks amidst columns of bright lights and video advertisements plastered up the side of buildings.
We're in Tokyo baby.
Our journey began on Monday morning, when Victoria arrived by Uber-drawn-chariot and whisked us away to the airport.
The domestic airport.
Did you know you can get a free bus from the domestic to the international terminal? The busdriver was very nice.
So our journey began again at the correct airport terminal. We were hours early so it was all good, but we felt a bit worried for the rest of the trip seeing as we screwed up pretty bad already and we hadn't even left the country yet.
We arrived in Tokyo fairly late at night, and had to get 2 trains to our AirBnB. I think we did pretty well all things considered. We didn't even get horribly lost. We managed to find our place and check ourselves in via the ol key-in-the-mail-box trick. This was around 11pm. We wandered across the road to a convienence store to get some snacks and milk for tea - anyone who knows me knows that I don't travel anywhere without my own leaf tea and strainer. This trip is no exception. And before you laugh too hard, Victoria is just as bad - she brought a ziplock bag of oats. For porridge. How ancient are we right? Heaven forbid we can't get a cup of tea and porridge in the morning. And just as well we did, as true to form I came down with a cold immediately. Tea fixes everything.
Tuesday was a wash out. It was ball-freezing cold and pissing down rain all day. We thought we could check out the indoor shopping malls during this time, which we did, but there is all that space in between the front door and the train station and then the train station and the shops and then all the space in between each group of shops. So it's not as much of an indoor activity as one might think. We decided to walk to the big shopping mall at Shinjuku (took us about 20odd mins in the rain). We had to stop and consult our map several times to make sure we were going the right way (well Victoria did, there was no point in me looking at the map. It's all just a jumble of meaningless lines to me). We passed through a network of side streets jam packed with colourful shops, food places, and many shops that looked interesting but we had no idea what they were. There were quite a few groups of people around, laughing and goofing around, a couple of them reeking of booze. One time we'd stopped to check the map, leisurely to get out of the rain, and as we're securing our hoods and zips in preparation to head back into the down pour we notice we're standing in front of a wall of pictures of ladies with descriptions underneath. Odd. Almost looks like a brothel. We round the corner and there's a big wall of pretty looking men and all the windows blacked out. The redlight district. Victoria - you took us to the friggin red light district!
Oh, speaking of which, there is a bar called Vibe. Google it. We're thinking of going.... *shriek*
Wednesday was more successful and less debaucherous. We walked down to Yoyogi park and saw a shrine, by accident, in search of the Cherry Blossoms. Shine was meh. Ruined by that scafolding that they cover in a picture of what it should look like were it not covered in scafolding. Blossoms were awesome. The crows here are quite large, and Victoria thought they sounded Japanese in their cawing. I told her she was just being racist. Ofcourse they are Japanese and sound as such.
For lunch we decided two things - we wanted Ramen, and we wanted to try somewhere that was actually Japanese (we'd already been to Starbucks about 3 times). We were walking down a main road, and glanced down a side street. Inbetween a bunch of shops was a stairway leading up to a restaurant. We could see people sitting in the window, and the sign on the street promised bowls of Ramen, dumplings, and something that looked like a lunch special. Feeling gutzy, we decided to do it! Yeah! Let's eat the shit out of this authentic meal! So we hiked up the stairs and went inside. Smoke. People were smoking inside. Ah, that's right, they still do that here. No, no, we're good, we're staying here. We got a table and the nice lady brought us some menus. Thankfully there was some english under the japanese. We decided on 'special' Ramen, and a bowl of dumplings to share. The food was delicous, of course. We left (after Victoria slopped Ramen on her shirt, haha!) and at the bottom of the stairs we were all 'we did it! It wasn't that hard! We even said hello and thank you and managed to pay with the right money and everything! We're amazing!!'. We turned to leave and saw a big sign for the restaurant that we didn't see before that said 'Foreigner welcome, English Menu available'. Oh. Riiiight. We couldn't figure out how come no one else was paying at the end of their meal like we did. It all made sense now. There was a vending machine where you select your meal at the front door. You pay the machine, get the meal ticket, and give that to the staff. Effectively the machine takes the place of the waitstaff. Isaac and I experienced this when we were here previously. Victoria and I looked at each other. Oh. Ooooh. We didn't really have an authentic Japanese experience did we. They were just so damn polite that they sheltered us. Like a vigin on our first time that thought heavy petting was the whole shebang. Thanks? I guess.
We then jumped on the train and went to Akihabara (Electric City). This place is full of electronic stores, arcades, and shops selling models and anime stuff. It was awesome!!! You probably don't know or care, but when Isaac and I were here in 2007, he won me a Snoopy from a skill tester in one of the big Sega arcades. Grand romantic gesture and show of prety peacock feathers (if he were a peacock). So I did him proud and won not one, but TWO, TWO mother-fing toys from skill testers. A Picachu and a Turnip. Victoria helped with the Picachu (she invested a few hunnit yen and knocked it a bit further into the winning spot), so being the absolute solid gold gentleman I am, I gave it to her. But the turnip I won for Isaac as my own peacock feather mating display. I've called him Turnip Turnip, and he'll travel strapped to my pack until I can give him to his rightful owner. If that's not love, I don't know what is.
Incidently today is Kezize's 11 year anniversary. That's 1/3 of our lives. The best third, I might add. By far.
So I'm doing the only thing that feels right, and getting my best friend liqured up and we're going out for a romantic dinner. She might even let me hold her hand and call her Isaac for a little while if I play my cards right. Wish me luck!
Tomorrow - Mt Fuji.
(more pics coming, just need to post this pronto so I can get Toria liquored up)
