Tim in Japan- part 1

It took forever and much whinging to get an entry out of Tim, but here it is- well, most of it anyway, he hasn't finished it yet....


The journey began at 5am in the morning at Heathrow, feeling knackered though excited I jumped onto my plane to Charles De Gaulle, France. Air France seemed very nice and as a non budget airline tried to force some food and drink down us before the end of the hour journey. From Charles De Gaulle I waited an hour before the 12.5 hours flight to Tokyo. The flight seemed to go on forever and the movies weren't that great but after trying not to die of boredom I eventually arrived in Japan on Monday morning, found a train reasonably easily to Shinjuku and was on my way. Looking forward to the adventure with a mixture of excitement and apprehension, for someone who normally plans everything down to the last detail, only have a hotel for 3 days and not knowing where and if Sanyu would be at the train station filled me up with the adrenaline I needed to keep awake for the last leg of the journey.

Arriving at the station I started to head towards the exit where I thought I was going to meet San. Tokyo station is big, very big on multiple floors and with multiple exits and so in no time at all I had absolutely no idea where I was. After about 20 minutes of walking around in circles I found a telephone and called San. She answered (thank god) and with the help of some kindly souls we met up at the right exit. I was so happy to see her I didn't even notice the barrier trying to hinder my exit and walked merrily through. After a quick hug we jumped onto the JR Line to try and find our hotel and after being redirected by a kind man who had been 'visiting' for the last 10 years we were on our way.

The hotel was a distance away from the centre of the city in what looked like a business park, even though the hotel was called Shinagawa Seaside there was no seaside to see, just impressive looking tower blocks and shopping centres. As the hotel wouldn't let us in until 2pm we found some food and caught up, around 2pm exactly we went back to the hotel found a room which was very nice, (they gave us a free upgrade) we slept the sleep of the truly knackered (San had also been travelling all night via the night bus).


The next couple of days were a bit of blur to be honest, I loved Tokyo, the mixture of old and new quite literally inches away was amazing and the amount of people were insane and even though they were lovely, you did get the feeling you could never really integrate and that even though on the outside they had changed and become more western, in the inside there was something so alien that I would never really understand it completely.



Crowds at Shinjuku Station, the equivalent of our Leicester Square, or New York's Times Square I think.

We visited some sites while we were in Tokyo, the Imperial Palace which had some beautiful grounds but I wasn't really sure whether we actually saw or got close to the palace itself. I took some pictures but had no real idea of what I was taking the pictures of.



A side view of part of the Imperial Palace which was heavily under armed guard.

The Sony store which fulfilled my nerd quota and even though Sanyu will probably deny it I think she enjoyed it as well, though more for the cool looking aquarium sitting outside than the cool technological toys inside.



Taken through the fishtank outside the Sony Building- which was a nice reminder of all the gadgetry I want but can't afford!

We spent quite a bit of time trying to get to the Tokyo Tower which we somehow missed (the thing is bigger than the Eiffel Tower so goodness knows how we missed it) but instead found a lovely restaurant which as it was my birthday was a nice way of spending the evening.
The food was lovely and the staff even though they did not understand a word we said was so sweet and helpful. To thank them I tried to leave a tip and even though my heart was in the right place, the poor girl was distraught with the left over money, the look of relief as we let her put it in the charity box was obvious. So strangely in a country where you are going to get the best service in the world is also the one country where you can't leave a tip, being a westerner who is used to feeling like a cheapskate if he doesn't leave 10% for average service this was the first of many culture differences I encountered.



Yes, that's right- horse, and apparently whale meat is tasty too...

Over the next couple of days we squeezed in a temple, which was beautiful, the Rainbow bridge which is a bridge ... sorry but apart from getting some nice pics with my beloved Tripod of the city I didn't really see the point and Tokyo Tower where I had a strange feeling of deja-vu, it is almost identical to the Canadian Tower, the views are different but you can see the inside were pinched or designed by the same people.



The Tokyo Tower in semi-silhouette.

My favourite part of Tokyo were the train journeys and the people watching, the tourist bits were great and I would have felt sad if I had missed them, but just sitting on the trains (which were clean, punctual and easy to use .. another culture shock from someone who has used British Rail for too long) watching the different types of people come on and off, the amount of people going from one part of the station to another like drone bees, all very orderly and all very polite, (though if you don't stand to the side of the train entrance or don't follow the crowd, they would just bump into you, not out of impoliteness, I just do not think they can comprehend your existence if you are not in the correct place at the correct time). This reminded me a little bit of Singapore which had arrows on the pavement to show which direction you should be walking.

I was sorry to leave when our 3 days were over, but thought we had a good taste of Tokyo and was looking forward to seeing San's home town and to see how she lived in this strange but lovely country, the night bus was a good cheap option so we went to buy our tickets ... they were full!!! ... Okay don't panic, we will just use the Bullet Train, I had been secretly wanting to have a go on one of these anyway and as I can't sleep on anything moving the idea of a 4 hour journey rather than an 8 hour journey was rather appealing to be honest ... but they were full too!! ... Okay so we have nowhere to sleep and no way of getting to San's house, so we sat in Tokyo station staring blankly at a map wondering where we were going to get a hotel at such short notice during one of the busiest holiday seasons in Japan (Oban)with our guide books open.

"Can I help" came a friendly cry from my left, I stopped my feverish flicking through my guide book and looked up at a young and friendly Japanese business man.

"Yeah if you can find us a hotel" I replied in rather a stroppy like matter, I was tired, I had nowhere to sleep and this guy was going to try and give me directions, I was not in the mood for fighting with the language barrier, I was hot, tired and just wanted to curl up in a corner.

"Not a problem" the guy took the guide book and started calling hotels, the look of shock must have been apparent on my face, I have been into travel agents who were less helpful. The look of shock started to turn into one of disappointment as every hotel he tried was full.. though our friendly guide found a hotel he used to work in which had a room and started taking us there. I repeat started taking us there, not gave directions but almost literally took us by the hand, through the subway to a nice, clean business hotel.

Once we were all booked in :"Can I ask you for something" the guy asked, arrrh now we are back into my charity, the guy wants money, something I can understand from the western world, people do not do anything nice without wanting something in return, I started fingering through the notes in my wallet to ensure I had something that wouldn't offend but wouldn't leave me bankrupt.


"Can I have your email addresses" the guy said, and my world turned upside down.
Hang on a second, someone had called around all the hotels in our book, found a hotel, took us to the hotel, organised getting us settled in and just wants an email address in return?! I vowed to email him the instant I found an internet connection which when I got to San's house I did. (Continued in next entry)