We woke up this morning to an overcast and grey Tokyo view and are going to bed to the sound of raindrops on the roof of our Japanese-style hostel in Kyoto and we're still happy! That is because today was a travel day therefore the best day possible for it to rain.
First stop, Shinagawa station to pick up our Japan Rail pass and reserve a seat on the bullet train from Tokyo to Kyoto. I have yet to decide if this is actually a cheap alternative to getting individual tickets or the Japanese reaction to the millions of questions that stupid tourists ask them, in English, about getting trains on this mildly confusing rail system. Better to make rail travel easy on almost all trains to the tourists for a price that won't make the locals jealous. Consider me cynical, but that does seem to be the rational response :)
Either way, for the next 7 days, we can easily jump on almost any Japan Rail (JR) train and travel anywhere in Japan quickly and very easily. Works for me!!
After going on to a hostel booking website last night and picking a place within our budget range that seemed to be reasonably central, we were pleasantly surprised to find, down a little backstreet of Kyoto, a lovely little Japanese-style hostel complete with matresses on the ground and bamboo mats. The very friendly staff were quick to explain the ropes and when we inquired about a tea ceremony, made the reservations for us quickly and easily. The hostel even included high speed, wireless internet access in our room which was included in the price. Sweet!
The tea ceremony was private (just Johan and myself with our lovely hostess) and we both got the chance to give it a go - I have to confess that Johan got more "excellents" than me though I'm not sure if it's because he did a better job, or if our host just fancied him. Either way, it was an interesting insight into the Japanese culture which has persisted throughout the ages, and a perfect indoor activity when it's pouring with rain outside!
Friday turned out to be a temple day in Tokyo. To be fair, there aren't that many temples that we could find in Tokyo, I think there are a few there, but not like some other places that I've been where you cannot sneeze for another temple...
Our first stop was Asakusa, which we had been told was a top place to visit if you only have a short amount of time in Tokyo. Can I hear "tourist trap"??? We followed a walking tour guide in a book that we had picked up at the Times Destinations show in London last year which unlike Nakamise Shopping Arcade is worth a visit.
However, at the end of the shopping street, the dedicated tourist is rewarded with the sight of the Asakusa Karinon Temple complex which is made up of a huge temple (currently being refurbished so we have no idea what it really looks like), a major shrine and a complex of other temple-like buildings with multiple Buddha and small-god shrines. As with all such buildings, I was struck by their beauty and a little jealous that these people had such an uplifting environment where they go to make their prayers known to their gods. Don't get me wrong here, I appreciate the freedom and flexibility of Christianity which allows us to pray to God in all situations and in any place, but sometimes if I'm praying to God on a bus or in a crowded canteen, I can't help wondering if I'm being irreverent...
The rest of the walk was a bit of a write-off as well so with a little trepidation we headed for Roppongi. I liked Roppongi, though not enough to take any pictures (sorry), it was a beautiful, modern construction complete with everything the dedicated ex-pat would want. After a coffee, it was off to Takeshita Dori street which was allegedly the favoured hangout of the teenage fashionistas and goth princesses. Clearly 1:30 pm was a little too early for them so it was off to the second religious place of the day - Meiji.
Now we were really lucky with the Meiji shrine. It was a beautiful but warm day which made the walk in the woods to reach the shrine particularly pleasant.
Along the way, there were several "gates" that the visitor had to pass through. To give you a idea of the size of some of these gates, here is one which shows me standing at the base of one of them. This one was made from "Japanese cedars" which were apparently donated by a pious Japanese person.
The shrine itself is not a religious place as perhaps you or I would consider. There was no god that was being worshiped in its complex, rather it commemorates one of the Emperors of Japan who ruled during the Meiji period from 1868 to 1912. Not so long ago!
The word Meiji means "enlightened rule" and this is how the Emperor saw himself. He ended the previously held feudalistic rule and ushered in a way whereby Japan started its move towards a democratic way of government where people of all classes could be involved in the governance of the country. Many of the policies and institutions that he set up are believed to be the springboard for much of Japans swift growth and modernisation, a feature of Tokyo which we have certainly observed.
At the shrine itself we were again very lucky. Friday it seems, is a very good day to get married as we saw not one, but two weddings taking place. At least we assumed that they were weddings... They were very beautiful though when we saw the help that the bride needed to get up stairs in her costume, we did wonder a bit about the practicality of those garments :) At least you don't have to wear them everyday anymore...!
This beautiful guest (right) is taking a photo while wearing a kimono and is a great example of your modorn Meiji Japanese person who embraces modernatity jet still hold on to the traditions of the Japanese people.
The rest of the shrine complex was also beautiful. We visited the gardens which were supposed to be awash with the colours of lilies and azaleas however September really isn't the month for gardens... Perhaps a few weeks earlier we would have caught some late summer flowers and in a few weeks time we would catch the autumnal bursts of colour but right now, everything was green. We had to be satisfied with these colourful fish...
What do you do when the jet-lag gets you up at 4am in Tokyo??
The short answer is : you find a fish market, then hang out at the imperial gardens (then head back to the hotel for a lunchtime nap). But that does not mean it was an uneventful day and the long story of it goes something like this...
Since we both failed to stay awake past 6pm last night, which is about when we expected to pass out, we woke up before the crack of dawn, after a solid 10 hour sleep. Being wide awake at 4 am in Tokyo has its advantagtes though as thats when the fishmarkets open! So of course we took advantage of the situation and made tracks for that. After some searching we found it, and on the way acquired a handful of other travellers who were also lost and looking for it. And it was quite interesting...
It was heaving, both with tourists and employees, and watching all the fishmongers was fascinating - they were all quite specialised at their tasks. You had the furrier boys who only pulled carts laden with the produce, the gutters who only gutted fish, so naturally you missed it if you blinked. Then there were the price-taggers who semed to only be restocking and pricing fish and of course the purhasers who inspect and buy fish at the auction. This was the piece-de-resistence (pardon my french) and watching the auctioneer shout prices like a machine-gun and hearing the bells indicating the imminent end of the auction was quite catching. Since this is the event most tourists come for, apparently we have become a nuicanse, so we are not allowed to roam freely anymore but instead we are put in a tiny area near the back overlooking the least interesting bit, the frozen tuna sales. Take a picture of the auctions outside of the 'tourist-pen' and you are quickly ushered inside by a man with a multi-lingual sign. This applies even if you have escaped the pen, as we quickly found out, but we did manage to escape it in the end and went hunting for the breakfast sushi stalls. But only after deciding that this little fellow we found earlier was indeed the ugliest fish around. Can anyone supply us with a name for it? We'd like to know.
After shadowing a group of Japanese looking tourists (revealed by their lack of wellingtons) we did find a little hole-in-the-wall that served sushi, and it was indeed straight from the market and very yummy. The only thing we lacked was a little elbow-room, but who can complain about that really, and of course coffee, which no breakfast is complete without, but Starbucks on the way to the Imperial palace, which was the next stop, fixed that.
It was about an hour or so of a walk to get to the Palace Imperial gardens, including the coffee break, through a virtually empty Tokyo, remember, after all these adventures it is still only 7 a.m!! Which we only realised by the fact that we were customers #2 and 3 at Starbucks this morning a full 5 minutes after they opened :). But even getting there at almost 8 the path to the Palace gardens was virtually empty, and strolling around them as the morning sun started to rise above the skyrises.
>>>Vaniah<< Johan has nodded off so I'm taking over. As he mentioned, the journey to the Imperial gardens was possibly better than the gardens themselves and very beautiful in the cloudless Tokyo morning sunshine. When we got to the entrance of the gardens, we were disappointed to find that they were closed, and only after a brief discussion amongst ourselved realised that it didn't open until 9am and it was indeed only 8:30! So we wandered off to amuse ourselves for half an hour but instead were previleged to find this guy enjoying the peace of the morning. I can assure you that we kept a respectful distance.
The gardens themselves were quite beautiful, I think though that they were designed to be enjoyed in the springtime when all the cherry and plum trees are in full bloom and the gardens become a sea of colour. On our visit however the predominant colour was green and without a guide to tell us the story behind the gardens, it was only a peaceful and lovely place.
The final big adventure of the day was lunch. By 11:30 we were both ravenous so determined not to spend more than we should we looked for a local lunchtime place and found this outside a place full of local Japanese businessmen...
The idea seemed to be that you order and pay for you food using the machine, then go inside where it's been prepared for you and pick it up. Of course, it's all in Japanese however some of the buttons have helpful pictures on them. After randomly pressing a few buttons a note was printed. Afraid that we had mistakenly ordered half the menu, we went inside and signaled panic to the chef. He then came outside and helpfully showed us how it worked. Phew! Btw, if you'd like to know the secret, e-mail us and we will be happy to reveal all :)
After a final random meeting with a very pleasant Englishman who gave us some suggestions of places in Tokyo to visit, we headed back to the hotel to have a nap before meeting up with some friends tonight. And here we are...
As I'm typing this, I am in our hotel room on the 36th floor of our hotel in Japan looking at a spectactular view and listening to the Japanese children program on TV (yes, they are the same here too).
So, first impressions of Japan are a bit blurry based of course on the fact that we haven't slept for more hours than is civilised which means that we are fighting to stay awake. All the same, I think that we have managed alot today:
1. Made our way from the airport to our hotel 2. Bought what we thought was a refreshing local drink - big mistake! Words cannot describe what this drink (see picture as warning) tastes like. We can think of one which begins with V and ends with E... Note to self, water is a much safer option here. 3. Successfully found, ate and paid for a meal at a Japanese buffet (we where the only non-Japanese people there). 4. Used the loo - a real adventure in Japan 5. Negotiated the Tokyo public transport system successfully, including buying the correct ticket and getting off at the correct stop...
The verdict... Tokyo is indeed a very modern, beautiful city with all the mod cons that you would want (and some that come as a bit of a surprise), and definately somewhere that I could live for a while. But like all modern, capital cities, I suspect that Tokyo is just a picture of Tokyo and not Japan. So I will enjoy Tokyo for what it is and be careful to remember that there is a whole Japan out there which will hold it's own unique charms and surprises.
Tomorrow is a day of flying, it will take only an hour to get from Stockholm to Helsinki where we change planes and then we have another 9 and a half to go before we reach our destination of Tokyo. Actually, 11 1/2 hours gets you to Narita airport and then you have another hour's travelling to go before you get to Tokyo... or according to our hotel's website, 66 minutes if you take the airport limousine bus and 67 if you take the train. Can't argue with that kind of precision... makes you want to keep your stopwatch handy though :)
Our stuff in the flat has been moved to the attic (again) and our bags are all packed so we have nothing else to do but listen to soft rock music and surf all the places that we would like to go to.
There is always a strange feeling the night before you embark on something big/ life changing/ in unchartered territory, an anticipation mixed with a nervousness. A twinge of anxiety that something will happen a just the last minute and your one chance will be swept away. I don't know why I feel this way, maybe I'm a natural pessimist (though I've never though of myself as one) or maybe I don't feel like I have done anything to deserve something this special... Who knows... I guess the way forward is to commit it to God and then go to sleep :)
What a beautiful day to get married and start our new life together. Thank you to everyone who was able to make it to the wedding and we can't wait to see some of the pictures that you have taken and hear the stories of the things that happened while we weren't around. Like the one about the coast guard - I'm sure that there are more...
Well, it's been four days now and we have been so busy with lots of final stuff that it hasn't really sunk in that we are now Mr and Mrs but I'm sure that once I start hearing Mrs Elmström a few times then it will feel official. Today I created a new e-mail address for myself, full marks to anyone who can guess what it is :)
We also have 5 more days before we leave for our big trip. Officially it has already started however I think that we will really start to feel that it has started when we get on the plane headed for Japan... Can't wait!!!
I know that many of you were not able to make it to the wedding so we've put together a few photos that were taken on the day to give you an idea of what the day was like.
If you'd like to see a few pictures from the wedding please click on the photo below.
We woke up this morning to an overcast and grey Tokyo view and are going to bed to the sound of raindrops on the roof of our Japanese-style hostel in Kyoto and we're still happy! That is because today was a travel day therefore the best day possible for it to rain.
After going on to a hostel booking website last night and picking a place within our budget range that seemed to be reasonably central, we were pleasantly surprised to find, down a little backstreet of Kyoto, a lovely little Japanese-style hostel complete with matresses on the ground and bamboo mats. The very friendly staff were quick to explain the ropes and when we inquired about a tea ceremony, made the reservations for us quickly and easily. The hostel even included high speed, wireless internet access in our room which was included in the price. Sweet!
