Exploration of Tokio

On my 3rd day in Tokio, I went for breakfast to the „February“ cafe in Oshiage. Normally, I am not a breakfast person and I usually skip it but that day was a Sunday and I felt like I deserved a treat: Café Latte + Avocado Toast with Salmon. 😋 Since I was already in the area, I went to the Tokyo Skytree which is the highest building in Tokyo. The views were nice but the amount of people visiting this sight and squeezing through the corridors were also quite impressive. 😅
After seeing Tokyo and its skyline 🏙️ from above, I went searching for the metro station. It took me approximately 15 min. to find it! This was the second time I was lost at Oshiage station 😩
Nevertheless, I took the metro to Akihabara eventually and immersed myself in a world of Gaming 🎮, Anime and Manga Comics - this is what that district is most famous for.
After dinner in a restaurant of the Yodobashi-Akiba buildings top floor, I went back to the guesthouse and spent the evening with learning Japanese together with the French-speakers there. 🤯 They are from Kongo 🇨🇩 and are here in Japan for the next 4 months to learn Japanese (and eventually get a job here, I guess). At 1 am of the next no I had enough and went to bed. 🛌

The next day I changed to another place in Shibuya (Tokio City Center). I wanted to experience a capsule hotel 🏨 and the guesthouse wasn’t exactly great. The guests and hosts were nice but there seemed to be no house rules in place. In addition, the rooms were quite clairaudient which forced everyone to stay up late (2am or later) - earplugs didn’t help me at all. I have probably slept 15 hours total in the 3 nights, that I was there. Furthermore the WiFi was overwhelmed with the 10+ visitors using it at the same time. Another minor issue was, that the shower 🚿 of the one and only bathroom was broken (only cold water) 🥶 for the last two days. So, I booked a capsule for 2 nights in a capsule hotel. Make no mistake - Hotels are really expensive here in Japan. I paid for the capsule hotel almost twice as much as for the bed 🛌 in the guesthouse (35,- EUR vs. 20,- EUR per night). At some point I will spend a few nights in a real hotel 🏨 room with my own private bathroom 🚽 again but I have already realized that this will be the exception to the rule for the next few weeks.
Anyways, when I arrived and dropped off my luggage at the hotel I walked around Shibuya and had sushi 🍣 for lunch.
Since check-in was only at 3 pm, I visited the Meiji shrine ⛩️ in the Yoyogi Park. The Meiji era was an important step in Japanese history. It was the time when Japan 🇯🇵 evolved from a feudal society to an industrial nation state. The Meiji Restoration has often been described as an event that opened Japan to the modern world. After all the word Meiji can be translated with „enlightened rule“. 👩‍⚖️ Judging by the descriptions on the sign post, the Japanese are still quite proud of this era; although I have read in some blog posts about newer more isolationist tendencies of the youth as well.
After visiting the shrine, I did some shopping 🛍️ in the well-known Takeshita Street in nearby Harajuku. This was also the place where I ate the mother of all crepes from the „Marion Crepes“ stand - this place seems to be an institution since there was a long line of people who had an appetite for sweets (like me). 😋
In the evening, I finally made my laundry. It was about time again 😅 In contrast to Indonesia, I had to wash and dry my clothes by myself in a laundromat nearby for approximately 5,- EURs and one hour waiting time. Then I went to one of the excellent restaurants in Shibuya for some Yakiniku (grilled beef) 🥩 and Yakitori (grilled chicken) 🐔 On my way back to the capsule hotel, I tested a few Pale Ale‘s and IPAs 🍺 of the local brewery „Ottotto“ - not too bad. 😊
Around midnight, I went to bed and I slept like a baby in my capsule 😴 😅

Today, was supposed to be a rainy and windy day. Therefore, I wanted to use my time here in Tokyo wisely, spend the day inside and see some museums 🏣 At least that was the plan when I left the hotel. My first destination - the „Miraikan“ (the National Museum of Emerging Science and Innovation) - probably would have been an interesting one but was closed on that day. So, I walked around instead and discovered a smaller version of the statue of liberty 🗽 as part of the „Odaiba Marine Park“ in front of the Rainbow bridge and the Tokyo skyline 🏙️ A couple hundred meters away was a more fitting sight for Japan 🇯🇵- a huge Unicorn Gundam statue 🤖 Around the world, there are only four official Gundam statues sanctioned by the Bandai Namco Group (it’s their intellectual property): in Tokyo, Yokohama, Fukuoka and Shanghai. Btw: Gundam is a franchise for a quite popular Japanese anime series - don’t believe this is my general knowledge. I had to look this all up (like many things these days 😆). Another weird thing in that area was the Unko Museum which exhibits aspects related to poop 💩 Yes, you read that right - but it is Unko KAWAII. Kawaii is the culture of cuteness 🥰 in Japan. Thus, it approaches the rather disgusting topic from a lovable angle and enjoys great popularity among the Japanese community. So much so that you can even buy merchandise for it. See the photo I made of the leaflet, to get an impression. 🥸
After lunch I drove to Ueno Park and visited the National Museum of Nature and Sience - at least one Museum that I visited that day. 😅 It’s a nice museum. They had many stuffed animals that looked deceptively real. And one of the more technically impressive exhibits was the SHINKAI 6500 research submarine that can dive with up to 3 persons to a depth of up to 6500 meters. Go check it out when you are in Tokyo. 😉
Around 5pm I took the train back to Shibuya and got a taste of the Tokyo rush hour (very crowded trains). Luckily, I had a seat 💺 for the whole 40 min. trip.
In the evening I planned my day trip to Mt. Fuji and my onwards travel to Hokkaido in coming days. 🗾 Initially I wanted to check out the Shinjuku Neighborhood for dinner & drinks 🍸 but planning and organizing (transportation and accommodation) for the next few days took simply too long and thus I stayed in Shibuya and ate some tasty Ramen 🍜 (Japanese noodle dish)Read more