Tokyo

Tokyo uniquely blends ultramodern neon-lite skyscrapers with traditional, historic temples and shrines making it fascinating city to explore. There is no shortage of restaurants or places to shop in the city or any of the nearby prefectures which are easily accessed by Japan's extensive railway transportation network. We arrived at Narita Airport mid-day and after making our way through the long immigration queue for entry, found our way to the attached train station to pick up our Narita Express train ticket for our hour train ride into town. We found Tokyo to be very safe and a culture of people looking out for others. In fact, as we were making our way to the train platform, I had taken off my coat and draped it over my suitcase and at some point it had fallen over without me noticing. A very friendly individual chased me down and returned it to me, which was great because we were there in winter and it was cold. Prior to arriving we had obtained the digital Suica card which made riding most of the railway lines very easy because we just had to tap our phones at the station gate for entry and exit and the amount was automatically deducted from our balance. Reloading the card was super simple and fast too. 

We stayed at the Westin Tokyo, located in the Ebisu neighbourhood and a short walk from Yebisu Garden Place which we discovered was a popular area for locals taking pictures or recording videos probably for social media. The trees lining the pedestrian boulevard were all beautifully lite up with white lights. Also on display here is a five metre tall, three metre wide chandelier called the Baccarat Eternal Lights adorned with 8500 crystal pieces and 250 lights. 

We arrived the day after Christmas and basically all Christmas decorations had already been removed and preparations underway to decorate for New Years. New Years is a big celebration but the focus is on spending it together with family instead of going out to party. We saw a lot of people out shopping the last couple days leading up to New Years and on New Years Eve itself it appeared a lot more people were traveling to be with their families. The Japanese people are a culture rich in traditional and for New Years will display a kadomatsu at the front of a house or store entrance. The kadomatsu, also known as a "gate pine" is meant to bring good fortune and luck for the coming year. Our hotel lobby was still decorated with a beautiful Christmas tree and a miniature winter village with miniature train running through and a moving gondola at the village's mountain. It was quite ornate with a lot of attention to detail spent, but by the second full day we were there, it was all taken down and preparations being made and decorations put up for New Years. The hotel was hosting a New Years celebration for guests and others and seeing as we were there to ring in the New Year and after discovering the real New Years tradition, we decided we would go to the hotel's celebration and enjoy the evening there. It was a black and silver themed masquerade. Going to the hotel's celebration ended up being much easier because we were just an elevator ride away from a very enjoyable celebration with a live band, endless flow of champagne, hors d'oeuvres, and a fake-cash casino where you could play blackjack or roulette. We had a lot of fun particularly playing roulette when at the end of the day you didn't have to worry about losing any money. Most everyone got the dress code memo but one of the tables next to us either didn't or decided to flamboyantly just because. Who knows...

We spent everyday exploring a different area of the city and some of the other surrounding prefectures. There are a lot of similarities in the different areas, namely tall skyscrapers, shopping centres, and lots of restaurants, but there are enough unique characteristics that make them different. Ginza is one such neighbourhood. Known as an upscale shopping area of Tokyo, there are numerous international luxury brand name stores here and where we found and shopped in the flagship and largest store for Uniqlo in the world. This store is situated in an impressive 12-storey building. Another very interesting shopping street is Takeshita Street, situated in the heart of Karajuku, which is a narrow pedestrian only street roughly 350-metres in length. It is lined with shops and restaurants on either side and is jam-packed with people. Wherever you go in Tokyo you will find vending machines selling anything and everything from beverages to random nicknacks and trinkets. While very handy if you need something, it also felt a bit wasteful with all the packing and fuelling a hyper consumerism society. 

Akihabara is known as the geek capital of the world and is known for it electronics retailers giving it the nickname of Akihabara Electric Town. Also very prevalent here are all the neon-lit anime displays on the exteriors of the buildings. We of course visited this area at night to really take in all the anime displays. It was in this district that we also had a very cheesy but unique experience. We read about these novelty themed cafes called Maid Cafes. In these cafes, the waitresses are dressed in maid costumes and treat the customers as "masters" and "mistresses" as if they were in a private home, rather than as cafe patrons. The cafes are not known for their food quality but rather for the unusual presentation and the cutesiness behaviour of the waitresses and them putting on a karaoke performance. It was an interesting, and definitely one and done, experience.

Shibuya is a must see in Tokyo. Famous for the Shibuya crossing, it is also a major commercial and finance centre and is a centre for youth fashion and culture. Also found here are two of the busiest railway stations in the world, Shinjuku Station and Shibuya Station. But what most tourists come here for is to experience Shibuya Crossing, a popular pedestrian scramble crossing which stops vehicles in all directions so pedestrians an inundate the entire intersection and cross whichever direction they need. It's common to see people rush into the street to take pictures or video the experience of crossing with thousands of others making the intersection always crowded. The volume of people is pretty constant at all hours of the day, making this the busiest pedestrian intersection in the world with as many as 3000 pedestrians crossing the intersection with each green light. Near Shibuya Crossing and down one of the side streets is where we dined at Genki Sushi Co. Now before anyone gets too excited here and starts to think that I now eat sushi, that's just crazy thought. I was pleasantly surprised to learn that there is a plethora of food options available in Japan for a non-seafood/fish eater. Genki Sushi Co. is one of those restaurants where you order your individual dishes on a little computer at your seat and then it gets freshly made and delivered via conveyor belt directly to you. To my pleasant surprise I was able to order quite a few dishes here like ramen, edamame, and the very traditional chicken fingers. On the topic of food, Japan also has a lot of very tasty curry dishes and obviously Kobe steak is popular. Monjayaki, shorten to monja, is Japanese pancake like dish that is cooked on a hot griddle at your table and eaten straight from the griddle with a small spatula. Monja comes in many different flavours and various different ingredients but its base consists of finely chopped cabbage and vegetables. The longer the mixture cooks on the griddle the more it becomes crispy and even that much more tasty. 

The district of Asakusa still retains more of a traditionally Japanese atmosphere and is where Senso-ji temple, the oldest temple in Tokyo, originally built in 645 AD is located. The temple was destroyed in World War II and later rebuilt to symbolize the rebirth and peace of the Japanese people. The outer entrance gate leading to the street leading to the temple features a giant paper lantern and four statues representing Buddhist gods on either side. Many Japanese visit Senso-ji temple dressed in the traditional kimono. Leading from the outer gate to the temple's second gate is a 200 metre shopping street filled with souvenir shops and eateries selling traditional dishes and sweets. Adjacent to the temple's main building is the Asakusa Shrine which was built in 1649. The second gate houses two guardian deities of the Buddha statues on either side of the gate. The temple grounds feature a quiet immaculately manicured garden.

Tokyo Tower is an Eiffel Tower inspired lattice tower and operates as a communications and observation tower. We had a lovely view of the tower from our hotel room and at night it was lite up with orange lights. At 333 metres, it is second tallest structure in Japan and is painted white and orange. A fairly quick elevator ride brings you to the main observation deck which gives you a unobstructed 360 view of the city. You can choose to walk up the tower as well. We chose the elevator up and the stairs down. 

One thing we noticed as we explored the various areas of Tokyo was no signs of homelessness. Originally thinking that perhaps it wasn't a problem as it is in other major world cities, we discovered as we explored the government office district one morning that this area seemed to be where the homeless population was located. Walking through this area still felt very safe, no one was aggressive or even openly begging. The Tokyo Metropolitan Government towers have an observatory open to the public and is free. The south observatory was open when we visited and it sits at 202 metres. On a very clear day, which was when we visited, you get an amazing view of Mt. Fuji in the distance. The trip here and the 15 minute wait in the queue for the elevator was well worth it just for that, let alone seeing the entire city from the tower's vantage point. 

As we discovered, Tokyo is filled with many unique experiences. One other unique experience we had was teamLab Planets which is an immersive museum where you become one with the artwork exhibits in the various rooms. One such exhibit is a room filled with knee-high water you walk through and as you move you see illuminated fish "swimming" around you. Another exhibit is filled with fresh flowers hanging from the ceiling which are lower towards you as you sit on the ground. Another room was a maze of giant white balls that changed colour with touch and triggered all other balls nearby to change as well. This was really a unique and cool experience.  

Japan is known for regular seismic activity and has pretty much experienced an earthquake of relative magnitude every year since 2001. While we were travelling back on the train to the airport all of a sudden everyone's phones lite up with an emergency alert notifying us of an earthquake that had just hit. Thankfully for us, the earthquake was centred on the Noto peninsula on the other side of Japan and did not have a direct impact on us or our travels, but at a 7.5 magnitude the earthquake caused significant damage from the initial shaking and then following tsunami. Over 200 souls were lost making it one of the deadliest earthquakes in modern history. The earthquake was felt all the way in Nagano, about 200km away from Noto and where we had visited just a few days prior. We are blessed that we were not in the area, but felt horrible for those directly impacted. 

Spending a week in Tokyo gave us a good glimpse of what the city has to offer, though it felt as though we only scratched the surface. This is definitely a destination to come back to visit again.