Shinjuki City

It finally stopped raining yesterday and it was a beautiful sunny day. My plan for the day was to head over on the subway to Shinjuku city. It served two purposes. We will be leaving from Shinjuku station when we take the train to Matsumoto on Thursday. I wanted to get our tickets that I had bought online printed off which could only be done at the station and I wanted to case the place out so I knew what platform I was going to etc. and to ensure that we didn't get lost. I am really glad that I planned this stop as it took easily an hour to get this all shorted out. It would have been very stressful doing this all on Thursday without missing our train.

After that I headed over to the Tokyo Municipal museum which is a very tall skyscraper allowing free access to their observation platform on the 44 floor. There was a bit of a line up but it moved quickly and in less than half an hour I was admiring the city from very high up. Better than a bird's eye view. The most notable sight was a honeycomb building. After that I proceeded to walk to the Shinjuku National Garden. I love walking around Japanese gardens and it offered some respite from the busy urban area. Very large garden with a fine Japanese garden but not the best that I have been to. The world has done a very good job perfecting the Japanese garden. After wandering around the garden and a picnic lunch I had bought from 7 11 I wandered around the skyscraper city of Shinjuku taking in some of the high end shopping areas that had all of the luxury chains such Louis Vuitton. It wasn't as peaceful as the garden.

When I grew up in the 70s, cheaply made English dubbed Godzilla movies were the rage. I think watching these movies has affected my impression of Japan. Some thing were correct such as the wonderful uniforms worn by all of their government workers and the bowing. The Japanese love bowing. I think we should adopt this practice in Canada. The women all talk in high pitched voices just like in the movies. I did get a chuckle when I came across a Godzilla overlooking a skyscraper. The Japanese are still fostering the Godzilla craze. The other interesting thing was a large billboard of a three D cat which was pretty neat. It was fun walking around taking in the sights and the Japanese vibe.

My good colleague Brinda had suggested looking into getting new glasses when I was in Japan. They are supposedly much cheaper than Canada. The chain known for a fast turn around time is known as JSIN. I am staying across the street from a mall with a JSiN store so I headed over to the mall around 2:30 on my return from Shinjuku with my prescription. I had done a little research ahead of time and learned that with stronger prescriptions and astigmatisms that I have the cost and turn around time increases. It was a public holiday in Japan and the mall was packed with shoppers as was the glass shop. When I finally got the attention of a sales clerk after a very long wait, I was told that no one spoke English in the store. Trying to go through the process of buying progressive glasses with a bad prescription wasn't going to work. I wasn't part of their business model. I wasn't even sure that I liked any of their glasses. I cut my losses and left without a new pair of glasses. Maybe if the store had been dead quiet it would have worked.

Today I was up early so headed off the Asusuka to check out a series of temples and shrines known as Sensoji, Japan's oldest Buddhist temple from 600 AD however it looked more modern. It draws 30 million tourists and pilgrims a year so getting their early without many tourists made it much more of an enjoyable experience. I was finished at the temple by eight so I walked along the Sumida river down to the Edo Tokyo museum. As it didn't open until 9:30, I chilled out in a coffee shop before heading over to the museum. It was very busy mainly with Japanese people rather than tourists. It is a history museum of Tokyo and it had both life sized buildings and scale models which were kind of neat. I find going to a museum in Japan can be a frustrating experience. Because they are all so polite, they just stand in line and patiently wait if someone ahead of them is taking more time with a painting or object. This results in long lineups because they will never pass anyone. I just went to the second floor and started looking at the exhibits there literally by myself as all the Japanese were backed up on the 1st floor. Crazy. These museums just contain so much information that one could have spent the whole day at the museum and still not read anything. I lasted for an hour.

I went souvenir shopping after the museum. I wandered back towards the Sensoji and back to the tourist area checking out some antique stores but they were closed. Today is a holiday in Japan so it isn't really clear what is opened and what is closed. I kept walking as there was a shop that sold Japanese woodprints which I really love. The shop sold woodprints of famous woodprints. The owner and other artists would make woodprints of more famous historic woodprints as they weren't under any copyright protection and reprint them. The owner was in fact a Canadian who had moved to Japan in 1986 and had carved the wood that they use for printing many of the prints. They were all so beautiful but I only had space for a small one that would fit into my carry on luggage.

I headed back to my Air BnB. It wasn't far but I was flagging so took a bus. After a rest I headed out to a bakery about 15 minutes from us to stock up on some food for breakfast and for lunch on the train when we head out to Matsamuto tomorrow. I asked the shopkeeper what her favourite sweet item in the shop was and she picked out this one packaged dessert. In Japan one shouldn't walk around eating so I ate it in the store. It was a bun with a slab of butter and smooth slightly sweetened red bean paste pushed into it. Of all the desserts in the shop, this was her favourite. Crazy. I walked back to our Air BnB in the rain stopping at a supermarket to buy some Sushi for supper.

I just received an update from Cheryl and she has finally landed in Tokyo which is great news. Nothing like a typhoon to interrupt one's holiday.Read more