Thursday I woke up feeling quite a bit better and immediately started thinking of climbing Fuji. Until then, though, I had lots to see.
My loose itinerary for the day was a walk through the university area of Ochanomizu, a trip to Shibuya, and finally maybe some drinks and socializing in Roppongi Hills. First stop: lunch.
My goal was a place with rave reviews online that sells good Soba. I took the subway there and searched for maybe 20 minutes but could not find the place. I asked a man at one of the restaurants, thinking maybe it had changed names, but he pointed me to a building under construction. Remodel... all the recommended places are closed! I walked to a place nearby where lots of people were eating and got a decent meal of soba noodles for a good price. Everyone inside was smoking and seemed to know each other - maybe a local favorite for people working in all the nearby buildings.
After lunch I headed toward Ochanomizu. To get there I walked through the neighborhood which was far less busy than Shinjuku but not as nice as I was expecting. The university area was good - along a river and with lots of trees. There were cicadas all over Tokyo making a ton of noise. I found one very close in a tree and caught a nice video of it doin' its thang. Lots of empty shells around, too:
Right next to the medical school complex were two temples. They were way more beautiful than the others I'd seen, and with only a couple other tourists.
The shade was also nice as it was close to 90℉ outside and muggy. There were lots of signs but none in English
I'm not sure if there was an actual university nearby, but the medical and dental research facilities were cool to look at. I was hoping for a stroll through campus but oh well. I started walking North toward Korakuen as it looked like a good walk and there were supposed to be nice gardens somewhere.
On my way I passed the Tokyo dome, a big arena I'm assuming is their Civic Center. There were hundreds of teenagers and young adults (I think at least, it's hard for me to judge the age of Japanese people) wearing shirts that said "WILLPOLIS" and "Bump of Chicken", and a few that said "Ray". I asked a group of kids what it meant and they tried really hard to tell me: "It's 'Bump of Chicken'! You know!" Finally after a couple minutes of fruitless questions I said "Ohhhh, yeah, 'Bump of Chicken!'", smiled, and moved on thoroughly confused. They were happy to have helped me.
I still don't know what it all means, and I probably won't ever.
Next to the Tokyo Dome was a big amusement park called, appropriately, Tokyo Dome City. Roller coasters, a ferris wheel, the works. This area has a lot going on. Close by was my next destination: Koshikawa Korakuen Gardens, right in the middle of all this excitement. It was 4:20ish by now and they closed at 5, so I went quickly to complete the circuit in time.
The place was pretty cool, even if none of the flowers were blooming or anything else special. There were plenty of little shrines and memorials, a couple ponds, lots of birds, beautiful trees and lots of nice walkways.
Also interesting but a bit darker were the signs of places and things that used to exist but didn't anymore.
There were two reasons for this. First, the original gardens were much bigger, but the city needed space for urban development so appropriated a few acres of the gardens. The other reason for missing attractions was the bombings of Tokyo in 1945. In the USA we don't necessarily have these kind of tangible reminders, so it was disarming to see it so obviously.
After leaving the gardens I hopped on the subway and went to Shibuya because why not. There is an intersection you've seen in photos of Tokyo where hundreds of people are crossing a street from multiple directions. This happens in Shibuya - all of the lights in one particular intersection turn red at the same time and everyone crosses at once. What can't be captured in a photo is the fact this happens every five minutes, all day and night long. This is a picture of the crossing on a Thursday afternoon:
While walking around Shibuya, which was actually not terribly exciting, I walked past a McDonald's and thought, what the hell, let's see what they have.
I did this with Jesse in Hong Kong and we tried some really funky sandwiches. In Japan the weirdest thing I saw was the #8, or shrimp burger. It was a patty made of mixed/mashed shrimp... not very good. A different time I tried what I thought was BBQ chicken sandwich - this was actually an odd fish sandwich with a horrible sesame sauce. Yuck. I'm adventurous with food, but I think I'll leave McDonald's alone.
After Shibuya I went to Ace Inn and did laundry for only the second time on my trip. Sounds gross, but I wash my shirts and underwear every day in the sink or shower so it's not like I'm walking around smellimg like a dirty backpacker (eh, maybe a little...). Laundry gets real expensive, real fast if you do it in a machine every time. But sometimes, especially for cotton clothes, my towel and long pants, you just have to fork over the $8-$10 and get it all done at once. And ohhhhhh man does it feel good to have all clean and dry clothes once in a while.
While my clothes were being cleansed and sanitized, I went out to eat at a tempura restaurant which was unimpressive. I had a mix of fried things including mushrooms, scallops, prawns, eggplant, lotus root, and calamari. Ok, the food was awesome, but it wasn't much different than what we have back home. Maybe the USA does Japanese food very well. That, or we just know how to make the best fried food!
After dinner I stopped by the grocery store and picked up some bread, cheese, carrots and chicken to make sandwiches, and also a bag of peanuts. My goal for Friday was to wander Tokyo until evening, then catch a bus to Mt. Fuji and climb it overnight. I would need lots of energy for the climb, especially staying up all night, but the reward would be seeing the sunrise from the top of Japan.
Side note: fruit is expensive in Japan, wow. A single apple was $5, and oranges weren't much cheaper. A bunch of grapes was nearly $15!
I went back to Ace Inn and upstairs to the hostel lounge to make my sandwiches, which attracted the attention of just about everyone there. Secret to meeting people - sit by yourself in a public place and do something enthusiastically. A couple Japanese girls were awed by me taking Japanese ingredients and making sandwiches of them. I told the girls it was an Ashton thing, but that didn't quite seem to register.
After talking with Jack and Serge, two of the guys I had been hanging out with the past couple days, a few of us decided to head out to Kachekuriko in Shinjuku to see the Golden Gia, a crowded area with tiny lanes chock full of bars. It was a cool area, but with $5-10 entrance fees and $10-15 drinks the novelty quickly evaporated and was replaced with annoyance.
Even though the bars are open to 5:00 AM, we went back after just a couple hours and I went to bed early. Lots to do the next couple of days and no chance to rest!
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