Tokyo Lights
Trip Start
Unknown
1
5
22
Trip End
Ongoing
Tokyo,
Japan
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
So far all the Japanese have been both polite and helpful. They also all expect me to speak or at least understand Japanese. I need a hat with "Gaijin" written on it!
We're staying in a newish backpacker's hostel. It's small and cosy with very nice staff who appear multilingual. The lady behind the counter even wished me "Selamat malam" when she found we had come from Malaysia. Left me feeling linguistically stunted.
Japanese cities are a nightmare for the technologically challenged and I count myself amongst them. After making a deposit in the hostel loo I was faced with the flushing issue. The facility had more buttons than my tv remote (yes I don't know what all the buttons on that do either!). Asking for help at reception was an option too humiliating to contemplate. After a melodic series of skyward jets of water, dribbles of some mysterious liquid and bursts of air (the loo not me) parallelled only by the singing fountain at Sentosa Island Singapore, I finally located a small lever which did the job. Thankfully the showers were rather more straightforward.
Food is not going to be a problem here. It's ubiquitous. In the oriental tradition there are little stalls selling snacks and a multitude of eateries. We had lunch for £1.50 each at a tiny ramen shop. It had a machine out front with the menu. You put your money in, picked your meal and presented the ticket to the chef indoors. Minutes later your bowl of steaming hot noodles arrives. Water is of course free. Accessibility of good food here is comparable to NYC. Dinner was take out Katsu and rice for M and pork stir fry on rice for me. I really need the veggies after all the banquet food in Malaysia.
We visited a department store with an amazing food basement. Rice stuffed squid was just one of a multitude of freshly made mouthwatering dishes on offer. All of it was pretty affordable too.
That made it difficult for M to lie to the cameras. Oh yes, his 15 minutes of fame will be on Japanese TV where he tries to explain that Tokyo is probably comparable to Western European cities except the food is more affordable and available in Japan.
The TV crew had made a bee-line for the conspicuous Gaijin who towered over the locals. We were in front of Sensoji Temple gate the major attraction in Kuramae. We dodged the chorus of ricksaw men (9000yen an hour!) and perused the little shops lining the approach to the temple. You want kimono, there was kimono; you want geta, there was geta, and wigs amongst the souvenir tat and arty postcards. We were after food. The Japanese filled doughnut was particularly good. No need for lunch after snacking our way to the temple. One voluntary donation later and we were entitled to clap our hands twice and pray at the altar. 100 yen would also have bought us fortunes but we passed that by. I don't really want to know the bad news before it happens. We explored the gardens with its fat Koi carp pool. It occurred to me that the Koi has been the only fish I have had no inclination to sample with a little soya sauce. The garden housed several minor shrines erected by well to do members of the community.
That was enough for a day. Back at home M took his second wife to bed.. the PSP. "There's just one move I can't pull off. It's the Guard Break move which unfortunately is an important move." Such was the pillow talk betwixt the two.
