Japan

After a good night's sleep, we wake again around 07:00 to have breakfast around 07:30 and start exploring the city at 08:00. Things work out well and whilst we enjoy our bowl of cereals, we test the Japanese yoghurt and milk from Hokkaido cows. It tastes different than in Belgium but not bad at all.

Strengthened with a good breakfast, we set out for the same subway station in the vicinity of our hotel. We start to know the route to get there in the most efficient manner. Cross the road over here, take the overpass over there. The first few days, taking the subway and trains proved more difficult than anticipated. In fact, it's not that complicated, but it's all just way bigger than in Europe. Finding the right exit can be a bit overwhelming as it's not uncommon to walk for a few hundreds of meters underground before hitting the surface again. For example: take exit 18A can leave you with some walking distance. Luckily, the corridors aren't all grey and dark. On the contrary, they're often large halls with stores inside. Ranging from clothing stores to restaurants. Once you get the hang of it, you're not losing any time to get on the right subway.

We take the subway line in the direction of Shibuya district. This section of town is known for its fashion and culture. But you also find the world-famous Shibuya-scramble crossing here; the pedestrian crossing where up to 3000 people can cross each time the light turns green.

In the vicinity of the train station, there's the famous statue of Hachi the dog. We used Google Maps to locate the statue, and to try and get us to take the most convenient exit. However, there were a lot of construction works going on in the station and despite some specific signs to the famous spot, we had some issues finding it. Finally, our eye catches the famous dog in a little tranquil park-like spot. It's easy to overlook as well in the vastness of its surroundings.

After having greeted our four-legged friend, we inspect the Shibuya-crossing itself which is also just a stone throw away from the station itself. I think rush hour has just passed and it's rather calm at the crossing. We've read that there's a good viewpoint from the Starbucks store across the road. We locate the Starbucks logo rather quickly, but finding the entrance to the place turns out slightly more difficult. We have to enter what looks like a car showroom in order to enter the building, and then make our way up to the correct floor. The American brand is well established here in Japan. We often joked about "probably there will be a Starbucks just around the corner..." and more often than not that was in fact the case.
We order a refreshing drink and keep a good watch on the crossing. From time to time there's a bigger bunch of people crossing. It's fun to watch, and I can imagine that during rush hour this must be impressive. Having finished our ice coffee, we start exploring the streets in the vicinity.
There are lots of stores in the neighborhood and once again we're sure we're only seeing a part of it. Some stores are on a higher floor that is less visible from the street. Tokyo really is city of different levels.

We make a little detour around "love hill" where there are a lot of little hotels that offer rooms ranging from a few hours to the entire night. The advertisement is sometimes a bit weird as you can even upgrade your room with a television and/or shower.

We continue our walk along electronic stores, luna park like stores and comic stores. Every now and then we're amazed by the things you can buy here. Entire stores that look like a luna park that you'd only find at a fare in Belgium embody over here sometimes up to 4 floors of a building.

We leave the neighborhood at the Miyashita Park. Not a park at ground level, no no, on the top floor of large construction. On top there's even a small climbing area, skate park, tennis court,...
It's starting to become very hot in the direct sun, and the rooftop doesn't provide much shade, so after having walked back and forth, we head back down to street level and take a little break. Whilst we're having a sip of our water bottle, a group dressed up in funny costumes and driving a Mario Kart pass by on the street.

Having refreshed a bit, we continue to the north and enter the Harajuku district which is well known for 3 things: the omotesando, takeshita dori and yoyogi park.
The omotesando is referred to as 'The Champs Elysées" of Tokyo. It's a wide lane with trees on either side and with fancy stores like Louis Vuitton, Hilfiger, Hugo Boss, etc.
In the beginning of the street there are two artful buildings: Paramount and Tokyu Plaza. They have a lot of glass in their architecture and despite Tokyu Plaza being almost entirely rebranded by Starbucks, it still provides some nice pictures. Especially if you go up the escalators of the Tokyu Plaza.
We quickly stop at a Seven Eleven store to buy a bento box: a little on the go meal box that we plan to eat later on in the park.

From the fancy stores we head to Takeshita Dori, a little street marked by metal arches on either end and the place for teenager and teenager stuff. Candy in every color of the rainbow, clothes, little toys and dolls, and of course: luna parks. It's amazing to just walk through this street. You can almost hear girls giggling.

From the busy streets and blazing sun, we seek shelter in yoyogi park. A large park with on the one side a shrine and large thick trees and on the other side a more grassy like section. We start looking for a place to eat our bento box, but there are very few benches and there are no-eating signs at the entrance of the park. Luckily, there's a restaurant/store with a terrace in the park and we find a free chair on their terrace to eat our meal.
For those questioning the quality of the meals bought in convenience stores: they're actually very good! You get a proper meal for a decent price. They provide you with chopsticks and a napkin. It's a perfect way to have lunch!

After our lunch, we head further into the park to see the Meiji Shrine. Just before entering the main shrine, there's a garden area that has a lot of iris flowers in it. Because the flowers are at full bloom in June, we decide to have a look in the garden. It's beautiful and tranquil. A pond, a teahouse, the flowers.

Meiji Shrine itself is also very spectacular. Large wooden gates and buildings and huge tori gates to welcome you to the shrine grounds. We can see a little part of a ceremony that's being held and stroll around some sacred trees that have many wooden plaques hanging around it with people's wishes or gratitude.

We exit the shrine and realize that we've still got a major section of the day ahead of us. Our feet are getting tired already, so we decide to take a prolonged break in the grass and shade. It feels good to lay down and relax!

Having refilled our energy levels, we continue our day to the last district of the day: shinjuku. We enter the area from the south via Gyoen Park. A smaller, but entirely different, park than Yoyogi. It's gorgeous with the tall skyscrapers sticking out behind and extremely well maintained. We can see gardeners working and even the walkways are free of leaves or branches. In the park are three tea houses and we manage to find one that's still open. For the first time, we enjoy a matcha tea inside the tatami floored section of the tea house at little tables.

Around closing time of the park, we leave Gyoen and decide to go for dinner near the skyscraper area of the neighborhood. The famous Metropolitan Government Office has a free top floor we can visit with an amazing view over the city. But first: dinner! In order to get there, we need to pass through Shinjuku station: the busiest train station in the world with a dazzling 3,2 million people passing through each day! It's very impressive to see such a maze and infrastructure and yet experience so little mayhem.

Tonight, we want to try some other classical Japanese dish. Without really knowing what to expect, we enter a restaurant that offers shabu shabu and sukiyaki. It turns out to be a rather fancy restaurant, and right from the start we feel a bit uncomfortable because we enter with our tourist outfit in shorts and all sweaty from the day. We're guided to our table that has its own gas supply right into the table. The waiter tries his best to help us make a selection and prepares the table. A lot of tools are brought to the table: cooking materials, but also a lot of small bowls with vegetables, meat, rice, noodles and eggs.
Shabu-shabu is a dish that's prepared in a copper pot over a gas stove. They boil a broth and add the vegetables, and meat to it. Stir it a bit with the chopsticks and eat it in your plate. The sukiyaki is a pan on a gas stove where they fry the meat and vegetables. Then you have to dip it in a raw egg and eat it on your plate. We were very lucky that the waiter performed some sort of table cooking for us because it's a whole ordeal to understand what's going on and at the same time requires great skill and accurracy with the chopsticks. Not the level that we currently have.
Despite feeling like utter noobs at the table, the meal is delicious and we're grateful for having the opportunity to do and see this.

When we exit the restaurant, it's dark outside, perfect for the last part of our day.
We find the entrance to the Metropolitan Government Office and take the elevator to the top floor. It's a spectacular view over the city at night. Because of the reflection in the windows its rather difficult to take pictures, but we go around twice and enjoy the many little lights as far as the eye can see.

When we're back on the street, we notice a group of people watching something on a square nearby. There's music as well, so we decide to make a brief stop. On one of the sides of the skyscraper, there's an immense light spectacle. The music fitted so well with the experience. Very nice to watch!

Lastly, it's now time for the real banger of Tokyo: kabukicho. The nightlife area of Tokyo with all its neon lights. It's already late in the evening, but the crowd around shinjuku station has only grown. We can almost follow-the-flow to the kabukicho area and is overall hard to miss. The famous red neon gate welcomes us to one of the many streets filled with nightlife. We're already pretty tired at this point, so no crazy stuff for us anymore but we enjoy the atmosphere and neon lights. It gives a Las Vegas vibe.
In the middle of the street, there are some girls all dressed up in special costumes for cosplay. We had to do some research on what's exactly the concept of it all, but hey, it's Japan: anything is possible here. You can - for example - pay a girl dressed as your favorite game character to join you for a couple of hours and have a drink together or go and play some games in a luna park.

Just before we head back to the hotel, we walk through the tiny alleys just behind the kabukicho area: Golden Gai. It's a small area with tiny tiny alleys but packed with small bars. They usually only have place up to 5 (max 10) people. Sometimes you have to pay a small seating fee, but they are generally known to be very cozy bars. If we weren't longing for our beds, we would have stopped here for another drink.

Just before midnight, we arrive back in our hotel room. For the second time in a row with more than 30.000 steps (or 21km) later and having seen a world of different stuff, we drop on our beds and fall asleep. Tomorrow, we leave the city of Tokyo behind and travel inland to the Alp region. Czytaj więcej