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Japan 2008: Day 03: May 01

01-May-08

this time we woke up around 730… 😛
had breakfast in the small cafe beside our hostel
it’s run by an old couple, was a really nice place!

we decided to walk to Ueno station, and got severely sidetracked by Asakusa markets so we arrived at Ueno at noon. our feet are especially aching today… ouch. There were lots of shrines and small temples. Michelle and I did a fortune thing at a nearby shrine and we both got bad luck T_T… although it’s very common apparently, was still pretty saddening :P. we were told to tie the fortune slip onto the wires and it would be ‘taken care of’… Since it’s approaching national holidays / golden week, there were lots of people out. but wasn’t tooo crowded.

At Ueno, we visited the Tokyo National Museum where we saw a LOT of stuff about Japanese History and art stuffs. Several buddha statues and Jap artifacts about their art. It was actually pretty interesting, and i took several pictures. Since we didnt have a guide, we got through the main building within an hour and a half… the other buildings dealt with chinese and korean art and more jap cultural stuff so we decided to skip them and head over to…

The University Art Museum where they were exhibiting the Bauhaus experience, dessau. I actually spent a lot of time looking at the artwork, i felt like such an art student, the place was packed with them… since it was held on an art university campus. some pretty crazy characters in there… interesting hairdos and clothes… anyways. Since it was Bauhaus stuff, i actually recognized several of the pieces from school! Like the cradle, blue circle, red rectangles, and yellow triangles. The art was pretty fascinating too! I wish we were allowed to take pictures… My favourite thing at the exhibit was the 3D work with cardboard and paper, very very very crazy and intricate paper sculptures made out of a single sheet, cut and bent to create forms. so nice.

Then we headed towards Ueno Park, we decided to the skip the zoo cause… it’s just a zoo…
Just walking through the large areas, very nice environment with many many trees.
evil crows all around, more shrines, and very few cherry blossoms left falling. I think we were a couple weeks too late to see them. We just kept walking and walking, bumping into small shrines along the way, our destination was pretty… meh. actually, ueno park was pretty meh. o well. was still good.

afterwards, we went to eat at a sushi rotating thing… mmmm unagi so good. it adds up though. 130Â¥ for two pieces of it… still good though. we had a lot of walking today so we came back to the hostel a lot earlier to rest. karaoke tonight? we’ll see.


a huge whale statue outside of the tokyo natural museum of… stuff


a wall panel painting in the tokyo national museum, i sorta didnt care for the name and artist…. oops?

where to tmr…? ginza?
o. our cellphones have no signal here at all… so…
relying on internet T_T

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Japan 2008: Day 02: April 30

30-Apr-08

woke up at like 630 (we slept pretty early the night before)
apparently they turn off the wireless at 12. and on at 7. pretty crappy too.
but they provide 4 pcs in the shared area upstairs.
headed towards the edo-tokyo museum, south of us, we got a bit… lost, but eventually found it with an hour to spare (before it opened at 930)
went to a little bakery (saint etoile) to have some breakfast
they heated up the bread and we ate it there 😀 was pretty good

anyways, went up to the edo-tokyo museum and it was basically a historical place about the japanese culture and the transition from edo to tokyo.
we had a nice tour guide guy who told us some stories about the stuff and led us through most of the place.
the main thing i remember was the ‘pinetree hallway’ that was part of the imperial palace. it was about some young warlord that was in trouble and asked help from the senior advisor, but did not bribe him enough, so he didnt get help. he knelt, head to the floor in the hallway to ask for it, but out of anger, attacked the senior advisor and left a scar on his face. he was then sentenced to the honourable suicide (i forgot what it is in jap). the warlord’s retainer dwindled down to 42 loyal samurai who went to get justice against the corrupted advisor and killed him. the 42 were also sentenced to the suicide. whee. it was actually pretty interesting and had to keep myself from buying more stuff. i gotta buy a carp kite-type thingy!

we head towards the free sumo museum which was a……. disappointment, pretty empty. but it was directly beside the edo-tokyo, so whatever. then went into the garden that was pretty nice. a couple of ladies asked me to take a picture with her phone… i pressed the wrong button and i was like… ano……. :S lol. she wasnt sure what i was talking about and was like, o, it’s okay, it’s okay. but the other lady was funnier and i eventually learnt how to take the pic 😛 that was interesting, and probably the most jap i spoke to someone. the park had a large lake in the middle with random rocks and grassy areas, was pretty nice. the lake had large carp and a bunch of turtles! whee… and we headed back to the hostel.

went down to akihabara. bought a buncha (not that much) crap at the tokyo anime center, and other random stores. there was one big store that was full of glass cases that were full of random anime/etc items that you took a paper around and wrote down the case, item, price, and quantity, crazy stuff if u saw it urself :P… bought stuffs and stuffs. ended up at dinner. ama… somethin, really nice. went we first went in the lady said some stuff and we were pretty lost at what the hell she was saying. although we thought we had to leave or some shit, we just had to take our shoes off – -;… there were shoe lockers! pretty cool. was like a… group-type eating place. pretty expensive compared to our 4 dollar ramen the night before. the dessert was really good though 😛

aaaaand we headed back. 1045. we’re tired.

went down for a drink or two. we met this guy named ben the other day (the only other day) and we sat around just talking about a bunch of stuff. leon’s pretty crazy eh? lol doesn’t seem like it from ysdn days.


pic from the edo-museum


doraemon and astro boy to greet us at the tokyo anime center

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Japan 2008: Day 01: April 29 – flight & first night

29-Apr-08

no line ups at 9am apparently… lol
got there -early- and started reading the chronicles of narnia,
finished ‘the lion, the witch, and the wardrobe’ that in the middle of the flight.
actually had to do some emergency POD work in the terminal, had lotsa time so it was okay

air canada had movies and shit on demand, so that was pretty cool
watched ‘i am legend’, ‘golden compass’, ‘southbound (jap)’, ‘pleasantville…’
fed lotsa food, two ‘meals’, cup noodle, sandwiches

felt pretty unreal still, as if it was a dream, i’m actually going to japan?!
crazy. and i’m staying for like… a month? insane.
haven’t been on a plane since… vancouver, in elementary school, and that wasn’t that long
this one was like… several hours. i cant even count it – -; 11? 12? 13? iuno.
started reading ‘prince caspian’ but… stopped, got tired-ish. meh.

finally landed, walked a long long long way to the passport thing
finger prints and picture, fast. baggage was found pretty fast too.

the next hurdle… buying a stupid subway ticket.
leon went up to the person and that was really really easy… lol
then was sorta unsure about if we were on the right train and stuff… but made it to asakusa station fine.
but got a little bit lost trying to find the hostel.

hostel was like.. completely empty when we got there, apparently the check-in was next door.
some guy from montreal named something that sounded like leon was checking in at the same time as leon, haha…
in room 2E and it’s two bunk beds. showers are shared, washrooms are on the 3rd floors along with a collection of dvds, 4 computers, and a kitchen area. they had prison break and 24 and.. stuff 😛

went out to find food. sorta… intimidating… lol.
we got some ramen, was like 460Â¥ nice and cheap
walked around the area for a while, got semi-intended-lost and back
leon and michelle went to shower… i need to get a towel >_>…
leon’s back. towels are 300Â¥ apparently. lol

feels like i’m stuck in a crazy japanese show with no subtitles.
ahhhhhhhhh!

gomen ne, sumimasen~
jaa, mata ashita.


Golf course!


View from the window of our room

just went to buy a towel, 300Â¥.
i walked in on some crazy ‘cheers’ thing and was caught between people and the desk… pretty cool 😛 buncha white ppl downstairs o.o

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