Day Four, Tokyo: They don’t open until 11

I need to franchise a dessert waffle place. It is 10:13 p.m. local time.

… We got up at a decent time today. We didn’t head out to the fish market like usual and spent the first part of our morning catching up on what is going on at home and talking to friends online before looking for a place to eat. The problem is Japan isn’t known for eating out for breakfast. We walked around looking for a place to eat only to find plenty of closed restaurants at 9:30 a.m.

The only place open was a noodle house. The interesting thing about some noodle houses is that it’s part restaurant, part vending machine. There are no waiters really. You walk in and go to a vending machine, put money in and then push the button of what you want. A receipt comes out and you take it to the counter. The chef takes it and within a minute you have your meal.

We find the whole process interesting and efficient. Then again, making noodle soup isn’t a long process if everything is prepared.

We then walked around looking for shops and about 95 percent of them were closed. Again, they are closed until 11. It’s a good thing we didn’t need anything.

… We traveled to the Tokyo Dome to go to the Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame. Before we got there, we went into the store for the Yomiuri Giants. Yes I bought a Giants hat, learn to deal.

The first exhibit at the JHOF is a display for the trophy of the first World Baseball Classic. You learn the history of baseball in Japan; from the people who brought the game over to the country to the players. They are remembered with like their Major League counterparts, a bronze relief with a paragraph describing why they are in the HOF.

From there we went to the Tokyo Dome Town that included a roller coaster which I had to go on. Its opening drop was steep and I could have swore, more than a 90 degree drop. It was a fun ride.

… Our next stop took us to Ikebukuro. It was an interesting area. We walked by a Denny’s, but it was unlike any one in the States. I don’t recall seeing most of what was on that menu in the United States. We passed. I passed because it looked to strange and Diamond because you wouldn’t order sushi from Denny’s.

We walked into a mall and I ordered a Big Mac. For those that remembered, I wondered what a $12 Big Mac would taste like. Well it was more like $7 and it was really good. The Japanese are years ahead of us on almost everything.

After a trip to McDonald’s, we went up to the top of one of the mall’s towers where the aquarium and planetarium were. It made me wonder who in their right mind would but an aquarium on the top of a building, but who am I to judge.

… We headed back to the Tokyo Tower to take pictures. We were unable to get to the observation deck the day before so we tried again. The view of Tokyo was beautiful. You could see all sides of the town with a pretty good view. We could also see Mt. Fuji before it became too dark.

After taking pictures, we went back to the lobby and ate dinner and I again had chocolate waffles, delicious.

… Our day wasn’t as exciting as the other day. This day was just a thrown together day for the most part. It was needed too since we rested from walking. We came back to the hotel earlier than the last three nights and it feels really good to rest.

Plus we just saw Tommy Lee Jones star in a television commercial for a canned coffee. We’ve been seeing him on ads for that canned coffee on vending machines all over. Now it all comes together.

Here are some pictures

Day Three, Tokyo: Paging Dr. Scholls

My prediction for the trip should have been the same one Clubber Lang had for his second fight against Rocky Balboa in Rocky III: PAIN! It's 11:50 p.m. local time.

I may have spoken too soon about adjusting to time as the result of waking up at 4 a.m. So what do you do when that happens? You go back to the fish market.

So Diamond and I got up and out to see more. This time we went to the actual market that reminded me of the produce market in downtown Los Angeles where I spent three of my summers working for my brother-in-law. There were just rows and rows of seafood with buyers loading up carts. We had to watch out for moving gas carts as well as hand ones.

As we walked around, we found the fish auction. Big giant fish that I think was tuna being auctioned to bidders in hats with numbers on them.

After walking out we were looking for something to eat. Knowing Diamond, I knew he wanted fish, and sushi to be exact. So, to be fair I decided to have some. I bought this rice ball that had fish in it. I don’t know what kind, but I knew it did. We took our food back to the hotel room and after a while of thinking it over, I bit in to the fish center. I don’t care for the taste of fish and still don’t. So I ate as quickly as I could.

… We rested then got ready for the Imperial Palace. We took a taxi since we were sore from the walking we did the day before. It may have been one of the best investments we made that day.

Now we didn’t have reservations to get into the palace, but we were still able to walk on the outside and the East Gardens. It is a peaceful place and just wide open spaces. After spending the first day and a half in cramped areas, we saw nothing but just room and grass which was a nice change.

It was also at this point where pain was starting to set in. After walking pretty much nonstop, we were starting to feel pain in our feet. I was also getting it in my back while Diamond had it more on his legs. But we moved through with so much to do.

… After two days of seeing current culture we took a look back at somewhat current culture at the Tokyo Museum of Modern Art nearby. Some of the art was beautiful and interesting. There was a painting of Australian and British POWs resting while doing work with Japanese solider nearby.

… Our next stop was the Akihabara/Ueno area and we had a late lunch. For those that think Tokyo is an expensive city, it’s not really that bad. Well it’s not bad if you ramen. So far we’ve been averaging about 1000 yen, about $10, a meal and the ramen bowl I had for lunch was only 210.

Our only expenses as been food and transportation. I was estimating 10,000 yen a day but so far that seems way too much.

While in Ueno, I found one of the things I was looking for, a Mister Donut. It was by accident too. We were walking when I looked up and saw it there. It was a nice surprise and a very good donut.

… We had one more stop and that was Roppongi. It was a long trip and it was much needed since we were getting physically tired. I had noticed Diamond limping before he did. Moving after taking a break is a real struggle since it takes effort to get started.

When we arrived at Roppongi and got moving again, we looked for a place to eat and were at Roppongi Hills. Trying to find something to eat was a bit of a struggle. The first place we looked at was not open yet. Diamond found a sushi place with food on a conveyor belt and I didn’t want to stand in his way.

We got there and sat in the corner. I’m still not easy with eating raw fish, even after what I had earlier in the day. We tried to get something that I thought I would like, like salmon and tuna. Those plates came around and I wanted Diamond to go first with salmon. It might not have been the smartest move since there was wasabi in it and he was not expecting it. So he had a reaction to it which didn’t put me at ease since I’ve never had wasabi either.

I decided to do it and tried to power through the whole thing, but couldn’t. Then the wasabi hit me. I made it more of a disaster than it should have been in hindsight. Yes, I’ll admit sushi isn’t bad, but at the same time, I’m not going out for it either.

The cool thing about that place was that when he had the plates stacked, he was able to put a handheld computer over the plates that immediately calculated the price. It impressed us at least.

After getting out, we walked very painfully to the Tokyo Tower. After walking, resting and repeating that cycle several times we got there. Once we got there we walked into the cafeteria and I saw one of the greatest fusions of food: chocolate and waffles. Unfortunately, it was called Pinkdot and Diamond asked if that was the gayest thing I’ve ever done? Well I couldn’t help the name of the place honestly and I do love waffles and chocolate.

… Right now we are tired and sore. We hope we can feel better, but we’ll see.

Here are some pictures

Day Two, Tokyo: Fool me once …

Why do the news programs here have a camera on the anchor not reporting the story and showing him on screen? It's 10:23 p.m. here.

… I’ve had little trouble with adjusting to local time. Mainly because I stayed up late and got up after eight hours of sleep. Diamond, however, got up at 2 a.m. and it was partly my fault. I saw him fall asleep and just let him go. He would end up telling me later that I should have kept him up.

… When I awoke at 6 a.m. local time, I was actually ready to go. Our first excursion was a trip down to the nearby fish market. It is sort of like Fisherman’s Warf in San Francisco. I was hoping to bid on a delicious bass, but would find out that it was too late and the bidding was probably not open to the public.

We had breakfast there; a bowl of ramen which I thought was great. Then again, it is hard to screw up noodles and hot water. Although I know some that could.

… We walked back to the hotel and figured out quickly what to do next. We went to Shinjuku and after walking around – mostly because I got us lost – we made it to the Tokyo Metropolitan Government building. It has two 45 floor towers. We went up one tower than the other and also took pictures of course. Until that time, we had just seen commercial buildings, but looking out on the city we could actually see residential areas.

We later walked into a Pachinko Slot machine parlor. Basically, it’s like going to Dave & Buster’s but it takes no skill what so ever and with no understanding of what is going on. I spent 1,000 yen, or about $11 to learn that lesson.

We walked around and ended up in another community called Kabukicho. There we saw a bit of everything. From bowling to … I guess what you would call companion bars. All within a four block area. It has something for everyone I guess.

… I entered the subway for the next trip when I had a run in someone that reminded me of a co-worker. I was picked off rather easily speaking English and this gentleman came up to me to help, without really asking if I needed it. Sound familiar to some of you. Like an idiot, I told him where we were going and sure enough he pointed out where to go, even though I knew where I was going. He took 200 from Diamond as a “service fee” for his help. I immediately gave Diamond back 200 since it was my fault. He never took my change since snagged it before he had a chance. HAWGH!

… We traveled down to Harajuku to go to the Meiji Shrine which called for a walk into a deep wooded area with a clear path. There we saw a huge 10 sided wall of prayers with people from all over the world on 3x5 inch blocks. The prayers were also stacked 10 deep to, so you can just imagine the number.

We walked down to Shibuya were we became a part of one of the biggest crosswalks I’ve ever been in; people from five different corners going.

After that, we went to go have dinner. We had another run with someone and me learning from what happened earlier, I spoke in Spanish to him, which confused him. After dinner then I had a taste of home by stopping off at a Cold Stone Creamery.

… We walked around the community when we saw a mall called Shibuya 109. Diamond saw a sign that said 109 restaurants and was surprised this building had so many places to eat. We went up to the top floor, the eighth, and found out that it was nothing like he had thought. It was stores for females, teenagers to be exact. Diamond has read in a tour book about a mall that was like that, but had forgotten the name until it was too late.

One of the stores was called titty&Co. If I could have gotten a picture of it without seeming creepier than I already am, I would have done it. I tried to sneak a photo but unfortunately I had left the flash on, so I’m sure that did it.

Not so far from that place was another Shibuya 109-2 and on the outside it said male clothes. I was skeptical but Diamond thought it had to be different and it made sense to have a separate mall for males.

The answer is, NOPE. I knew it was more of the same immediately when the two stores on the first floor were Hello Kitty and a Barbie clothing store, actual size. But we went to the top again and were faced with the facts.

… We got home and were tired. Tomorrow we are going to try and get to the Imperial Palace. Unfortunately we couldn’t get in since we didn’t know to make reservations until it was too late. But we are in for some more walking.

Pictures are here

Day One, Tokyo: 12 hours in a time warp

Even though it is Sunday Night in Tokyo, it does not give me super powers to tell you what NFL games to pick. It's 9:25 a.m. here.

… After getting three hours of sleep, I took off for Tokyo at 7 a.m. Saturday by getting a ride to Los Angeles International Airport. I met my friend Diamond and we boarded out plane at 10 a.m. From the time the door was sealed until it was opened again, 12 hours had passed and it was a new day.

The strange thing is that it hardly felt like 12 hours. I don’t want to say the time flew by, but what I will say is that the service on our Korean Air flight was so good, it help make time not drag as much. The other thing that helped was that the plane was dark and the blinds were closed.

We departed Los Angeles and went up the coast until we got to Monterey, then made our turn to Japan. During the flight there was a monitor that came up after movies and short specials letting us know everything about our flight. I can say at 5:13 p.m. PDT we crossed into tomorrow.

I wished I had received more sleep, but probably got maybe an hour. It wasn’t so much for a lack of trying, but it was about a matter of comfort. I figured foolishly that with a lack of sleep I would be able to on the plane. I was wrong. Diamond was able to sleep much better than me, but I think it is because he does it for a living covering the Dodgers.

One of Diamond’s favorite things to do on the flight was to listen to the music on the plane, especially to this one station about soundtracks. It’s not so much he liked listening to the songs, he just found the American DJ hysterical. What happens is that after a set of songs, a female DJ speaks then another in a different language then the American DJ and what he said sounds silly. Diamond said he could imagine a female saying that, but not a man.

… After we got to our hotel, we walked around the area and were immediately over taken by all the sights. I don’t think I’ve ever been in a town that was so bright before at night. Just looking down the main streets in the Ginza area of Tokyo was just a bit much for two people that just spent 12 hours on a plane and a 90 minute shuttle ride to the hotel.

We walked into the Sony Showroom and immediately saw things that we could never afford, but were so cool. We feel we have a pretty good idea of what is coming soon to showrooms to you in the United States.

We went out to dinner at what is could be compared to a bar and grill. The only thing is that we may or may not know the proper procedure to order. We felt we waited for a long time for a waiter to come by after our drink orders. We didn’t know whether to call one over or just wait. Finally we decided to wave one over.

While waiting for out food, I made an observation about my first time out of the United States. For the first time I felt isolated when it comes to conversations in restaurants. I was surrounded, as you would expect, by locals enjoying their food and I heard myself talk and it was standing out since the background noise wasn’t English but Japanese. It’s just a strange perspective I have.

… Currently we are watching Japanese television and the show has a female traveling around Asia eating random food. I have no idea what she is eating – whether be animal, mineral or vegetable – and I really don’t want to know. It’s just best that way.

Pictures are here.