The whirlwind continues!
The last two posts covered my trip from the port in Yokohama to Tokyo, then an entire day’s activities in what I had expected to be a much smaller city than it was… That adventure led me to decide to spend another day in Tokyo, rather than move on to Kyoto overnight.
The morning of my second full day in Tokyo is still a bit blurry, both from the night before and from the fact that I had to completely switch traveling groups and hotels. By the time I had packed up my hotel room, traveled 2 subways, and settled into a new room, it was already 1pm in the afternoon. Not ideal.
My new group decided to walk to the Tsukiji Fish Market for lunch, which is famous for its daily shipments of human-sized tuna and the like. Since I had such a long trip to their hotel, I was supposed to meet them at a restaurant at the market. I set out from the hotel with exact directions via subway but no restaurant name or particular destination in mind. And, given that it was a beautifully sunny day, I decided to walk the last bit.
Sounds harmless, right?
HA!
At first the walk was leisurely, and I stumbled across a couple Shinto shrines and a temple or two. It was actually pretty peaceful to have a few moments alone. As you can imagine, there isn’t a ton of personal time on a ship with 1000 other people.
After walking around for over an hour, the tiniest bit of panic started to set in. I was tired, hungry, nervous, and wasting time (or doing what felt like wasting time) in a completely foreign city all alone.
Take a moment and try to remember the last time you tried to meet up with friends without using the telephone. You basically get to a point where you can no longer do anything but stand in the same spot and hope that someone finds you.
Again, not ideal.
I’ll spare you the dramatic details, but after several frantic text messages and one very expensive phone call, this was my reward:
YUM!
The sushi was great, but the company was even more welcome. After that I learned to always keep at least one person in sight if you don’t want to spend the entire day by yourself. Damn roaming charges.
After lunch, we raided through the fish market, which dies down a bit in the afternoon. We weren’t just wandering aimlessly again, but rather, this time we were in search of one special item: horse sushi.
I’ll repeat that then pause for effect.
Horse.
Sushi.
Whatever you just uttered, is exactly what I was thinking. But guess what, I actually ate it. And, even better, I’m still here to write about it!
Don’t let this facial expression scare you—we all made it out alive. I got mine seared for good measure, just in case there was any funny business going on with the horse from that particular shipment. I still haven’t decided exactly what it tasted like… definitely not chicken, I can say that much! Probably only a once in a lifetime adventure for this girl, but at least I can say I did it!
While we were in the fish market on this hunt, I also had the good fortune of being able to check one huge bucket item off the list: Japanese celebrity status!
I heard from a friend who had visited Japan, that Japanese directors and film artists are always at a loss for Western-looking extras in movies and TV shows. Because of this, they will usually pull tourists off the street and throw them into films. Thus, my goal in Japan was to haphazardly stumble into some sort of movie production and become famous. Simple enough.
I actually got kinda close!
The picture is difficult to make out, but it all happened too fast to document. A man, apparently a very famous man, was walking through the market filming some sort of local television show episode and pulled myself and three of my friends into the shot.
It was hilarious!
There was a lot of confusion exchanged back and forth, but the moment my friend yelled ‘arigato!’ all barriers were broken. The entire crowd cracked up and they were on their way just as fast as they had come by.
Life moment!
After we left the fish market, we headed back to the center of town for Imperial Fail #2 (please refer to ‘No Ja-plans’ if you haven’t caught up on my number of foreign failures just yet). This time the gardens were actually open, but still no luck getting inside the walls. At least we got a couple more pictures this time too! Will have to figure out the Emperor’s birthday for my next visit.
This particular failure left my spirits a bit broken, but I had one more place on my list and hoped that this one might actually come through. Senso-ji Temple had been vouched for both by 1000 Places and my new Canadian travel guide, Shane, so I had high hopes.
Senso-ji did not disappoint.
In fact, I was so excited when we got there that I actually skipped to the site. Everyone made fun of me. It was worth it.
Senso-ji is a Buddhist temple located in Asakusa, the northeastern neighborhood of Tokyo. The grounds include a gorgeous gate at the opening of a road with a long stretch of shops and stores dated back to the 18th century. They sell just about everything you could imagine and are littered with tourists and locals alike.
Well, mostly tourists.
We just couldn’t help it!
At the end of the road stands the actual temple as well as a large Shinto shrine.
I have to say, they were absolutely stunning at night. I think that we were there at the perfect time of day.
We snapped about a million pictures and took turns at the omikuji stalls finding out our fortunes. This was definitely my favorite site in Japan. It only took one book, one Canadian, and one Texan to find, but it was totally worth it!
Win!
After we had purchased even more random crap we didn’t need and satisfied ourselves with amazing fortunes of happiness and prosperity, we made quick stops at a noodle bar for dinner and the Tokyo Skytree for pictures. Then we traveled back to the hotel to get ready for yet another night out in Tokyo. One of the boys in the group had a friend living in the area, so we decided to see how local college kids do their thing in the big city.
I think out of the 100… yes, 100… pictures I took that evening, only a handle have been deemed fit for public viewing.
Enjoy!
I’ll say this much.
TEQUILA means the same thing in every language: a good time.
I decided to come home on the early side (4am, fyi) but others stayed out. Some even went straight from the bar back to the fish market, which is apparently at its most lively between 6 and 8am. I can’t imagine that freshly caught fish smell and drinking all night mix well, but I heard it was a definitely an experience nonetheless.
The next morning we got up (slowly) and made our way to Kyoto via the Shinkansen or bullet train as it’s better known. Saying goodbye to Tokyo was hard, but doing so at 180 miles per hour made it that much easier.
One of the girls had downloaded the Bachelor, so I’m caught up through the 2nd episode… so don’t you dare spill any details in the comments! Your rights as a reader will be severely restricted if you do!
We even got a better shot of Mt. Fuji before arriving in Kyoto.
All in all, Tokyo was a pretty incredible experience. It wasn’t the ‘foreign Asia’ I was expecting, so I think it was probably the best introduction to international ports for this trip. Everything from here on out will get increasing less comfortable, so I’m very thankful for this one smooth transition.
Our time in Kyoto was so different that I have to set it aside for its own posting. I might actually get all 5 days in Japan in less than 5 posts after all!
(Pause for clapping and merriment.)
Check back soon for Kyoto and overall Japanese impressions. I’m still processing a lot of what happened there, but I truly loved it—I know that for certain.
Question of the Day: How do you deal with being ‘lost’?
No comments:
Post a Comment