Day 01: Tokyo
29 October 2006
Today, we went on a Tokyo Morning Tour. We didn’t have breakfast because we didn’t know where we could find food. We were picked up from the hotel and gathered with others. It took about an hour to finally start the tour. Our first stop was Tokyo Tower. There was nothing special about this tower apart from it looks like Eiffel Tower and lighter than it, there was nothing much to see. We only spent 20 minutes there.
After that, we went to Meiji Shrine. It was really beautiful there. Meiji Shrine is a Shindo shrine. People go there for wedding and birth celebration. It’s mainly to do with “during life” where Buddhism is about “after-life”. The walk was nice, we were lucky to witness a lot of Japanese ladies in kimonos and men in kimonos because there were a few events on. There were small kids in kimonos too. They were very cute. I should have bought a doll from the shrine but we had to hurry back to the bus.
We went for a short ride and then to the East Imperial Garden. The garden was beautiful. The trees were very beautifully shaped and maintained. We just strolled around the garden for about 30 minutes.
Our last stop was Ginza District, one of the busiest shopping districts in Tokyo. I didn’t buy anything. The weather was hot and humid, so I got tired and sleepy. I didn’t have the energy to shop. I wanted to check out some bags but I will when I didn’t have a schedule to follow. For lunch, we had this very unique lunch in Ginza. You get a set lunch with five kebab sticks, sticky rice, misou soup and salad. You put the kebab sticks into an oil cooker in the middle of the table, deep fry it for one minute. So, it’s a DIY lunch. The lunch was quite nice. The nicest thing about it was the waitor knew English very well. I think he had studied in Australia before. So, it was easy for us.
Dinner, we had ramen (Chinese noodle soup) at a nearby restaurant to our hotel. The ramen was OK, a bit salty for me. Then, we went for a stroll near our hotel (our hotel is in a shopping mall). I bought a watch. I didn’t plan to buy a watch but the watch is a Japan exclusive. I couldn’t resist. The watch is all in Japanese hiragana characters. I paid about $115 for it. It’s worth every penny of it considering it’s Japan exclusive.
