Day Five: Koishikawa Korakuen Gardens

Their shirts say 'run for peace.' That tipped us off.

On our way to the post office to get more money this morning (it is disappearing fast, and post office ATMs are one of the few places foreign bank cards work) we came across a team of runners doing a 'run for peace.' At first we didn't know what they were doing, because we just saw a van driving slowly, with a guy yelling stuff out of a loudspeaker attached to the roof, and a bunch of other guys running behind the van. Tokyo is full of announcements -- on the train, on the street, in the park, in the stores... announcements and little theme songs for everything. That and signs. The signage is remarkably good here. Case in point, we followed a series of signs (and earthquake evacuation maps, regularly posted!) to get to the Koishikawa Korakuen Gardens.

Signs are useful.

Bicycles in Iidabashi.

These are located within walking distance of the Iidabashi Station, but we would've had a tough time finding them, if it weren't for the signs and maps! The gardens are located near the Tokyo dome (a baseball stadium, home to large concerts and, presumably, baseball) which we could see on the horizon, alongside a huge rollercoaster (though we didn't visit either of these things.) The area is a student area, I think, because there are several universities there. It's quiet with lots of green space, and a relief after Shibuya and Akihabara burn-out on my part.

Confucian cobblestones.

Lion; part of what was a shrine.

 The Koishikawa Korakuen Gardens ("the gardens for enjoying power later on"), date back to 1629 (the Edo period), and were built by Mitsukuni, a counselor of the Imperial court, and a member of the Mito Tokugawa family (some important Japanese family in the Edo period. I don't really know anything about Japanese history.) Anyhoo, Mitsukuni really liked Confucian gardens and writings. The paving style he used is apparently Confucian. Also, the name of the garden comes from Confusion scholar Hanchuen's saying that "there is a need for those in power to worry about maintaining power first and then enjoy power later on." Those Edo period guys seemed to be really into power. They also built lovely gardens.

Lessons from a rice patty, fancy that!

The garden had a number of different Shinto shrines in it originally, but these were pretty much all destroyed, either by the Kanto earthquake (1923) or by air raids during WWII. (I know all of this because of signs! Japanese signs = awesome!) Now, there is just a stone platform where most of the shrines used to be. Some still have semi-broken statues as well.

I really liked the rice patty in the garden, because I got to see rice growing up close! It's actually quite pretty. I was also highly amused that they make school children plant and pick the rice, probably so that they also can learn about the "pain of farmers." This actually made me wonder whether there's any WWOOFing in Japan, because it would be super neat to learn about growing rice.

My favourite part of the gardens, however, was the lily pond, which had Koi swimming about in it.

The water lily pond was especially beautiful.

I asked some poor woman to operate my foreign camera.

After the gardens, we decided to seek out one of the veg restaurants we'd found on Happy Cow. It took us a while to find it, and again, we had to ask for directions because we haven't quite figured out how Japanese addresses work. A woman was kind enough to lead us there. Again, people going out of their way to help! We're doing a lot of bowing and domo arigato-ing.

Proof we found Loving Hut. Tiny delivery truck!

Unfortunately, when we went up to the restaurant, a branch of the vegan chain Loving Hut, (which was on the second floor; restaurants, like everything else here, are in high-rises) they told us they were closed :-(

The good news is, I had noticed an Indian restaurant on our way to find the Loving Hut, and so we made our way back there. Our waiter was from Nepal and spoke perfect English, which felt strange after days of communicating though an awkward Japanese/English/charades combination. The food was excellent (some of the best Indian we've had) and we didn't even have to think that much about ordering, because they had a vegetarian combination dinner, which we both had. The restaurant is part of a Japanese Indian food franchise of restaurants (called Mumbai) and we recommend it for vegetarians/vegans travelling in Japan.

Tomorrow, we are off to Kyoto! I am kind of glad we are coming back at the end of our trip because we have befriended the hostel staff (mostly Jon - they are helping him learn Japanese - one staffer even gives him homework!) and it will be good to see them again before we go.

Day Four: Shibuya and Harajuku

Jon in front of the river near our hostel.

Mural of Hachiko the dog in Shibuya.

Yesterday we went back to Shibuya and to Harajuku to do some more shopping. I wanted to see if I could get some shoes and clothes, since I figured it would be easier for me to find smaller sizes here than it is at home (I regularly buy kid's stuff at home!)

Yummy Indian food with giant nan!

Firstly, we went for lunch. We were determined to find an Indian place that we had seen on the list of vegetarian-friendly restaurants we got from the information booth at the airport. Jon was doing his best to navigate using the Japanese-only map our hostel staff printed out for us, and when we were standing on the sidewalk looking at it, a man came up to us and asked us if we needed help. He didn't speak much English, but we pointed to where we were trying to get to on the map, and indicated that we don't know very much Japanese and he led us all the way to the restaurant, which was not at all where we were. We have had many such experiences of people going out of their way to help us.

After lunch, we went exploring in the area around the restaurant. That area of Shibuya was the most diverse area of Tokyo I've been in. The majority of people in Japan are Japanese-born. There are very tight immigration laws. But in Shibuya, I was struck in particular by the number of black folks, all of whom seemed to be selling hip-hop clothing. I wondered if they were hired specifically to sell clothing in Japan, or if they had come to Japan for some other reason and just ended up making their living that way.

We explored some of the shops in that area (I bought a new hat!) and then we proceeded to Shibuya 109, a huge women's clothing department store (there is also a Shibuya 109 for men). On my way to Shibuya 109, I stopped in at a shoe store (Shibuya is full of shopping) and got two pairs of shoes. Shoes seem cheaper here, but clothing seems to be priced about the same. I actually told Jon to take me out of Shibuya 109 because I dropped a pile of money in a very short period of time! I rarely buy new clothes, but finding fashion I actually liked that fit me proved a fierce temptation. Particularly since the 1960s seems to be the 'in' thing in women's fashion right now, and I love the 60s! Lots of flowing dresses and flower-child skirts, round sunglasses, headbands and long flowing hair (often in the form of blonde wigs!). It was bizarre but lovely. Like at home, all of clothing store clerks were quite made-up and talked in really overly-enthusiastic I-want-to-sell-you-stuff voices, but I found I felt less awkward here about being a fashion reject because I figured they'd chalk my lack of fashion sense up to me being a foreigner. (Normally I find talking to store clerks intimidating.) One of the store clerks at a shop where I bought a dress told me she really liked my skin. It wasn't sure what to say to that, so I just said "arigato."

Arch over alt fashion street in Harajuku.

Fashion shop in Harajuku.

After Shibuya, we proceeded to Harajuku, because the guidebook said there would be used clothing stores in that area and I was curious to see them. I didn't find any used clothing stores but we did find a bunch of gothic, lolita and gothic lolita shops (these are all fashion subcultures popular in Japan). There were also quite a few goths and lolitas wandering about being hip and young. We didn't take many pictures there because there were lots of "no pictures signs" on shops. I guess they want you to buy the expensive clothes, not photograph them.

Our appetizer at the local food place.

Having no luck with second hand shops in Harajuku (fascinating though it was) we went back to Shibuya to find dinner. We decided to seek out a restaurant we had found on our first trip to Shibuya, which we thought would have vegetarian options, but which was closed when we were there before. When we got there, the staff (who had very limited English) seemed really unsure whether they had vegetarian options, but I think they really wanted our business so they came up with something. It was actually a pretty fancy restaurant, and if they hadn't already spent so much time trying to communicate with us, and hadn't already given us our warm towels (which most sit-down restaurants give you to clean your hands) we probably would have left. I am glad we stayed though, because it was actually kind of a neat place. They seemed to be (from what we could tell from the menu and manage to ask in bad Japanese) a restaurant specializing in local and slow food. They brought us a gas burner and we boiled our own tofu at our table, and then dipped it in two of three sauces (there was salt, miso-pesto butter and anchovy mayonnaise). We also got fresh veggies (cabbage, eggplant, carrot, some form of squash, okra, tomato) steamed and served with four other sauces (chili oil, cheese oil, salt and again, the avoided anchovy mayo). It was actually a quite delicious meal because the veggies were so fresh and sweet. Even Jon liked it, and he's pretty picky about veggies.

We're having a slow start today, because I totally crashed yesterday evening and stayed in, and Jon went out to the arcades in Akihabara. Today we're going to a museum and NOT shopping anymore!

Shibuya street view.

Harajuku street view.

Day Three: Akihabara

Buildings reflected in buildings in Akihabara.

Earthquake relief drive outside Akihabara station.

Yesterday, we went to Akihabara, the electronics/geek district of Tokyo, with Sarah and her partner Dan, who have been living here for a number of years, and who both speak Japanese. They have helped us out a bunch with learning useful phrases and important kanji (the ones that indicate meat!) so that we can find vegetarian options and know the best things to say to be polite! (Finding veg options has, unfortunately, been fairly difficult so far. Hoping to seek out some specifically vegetarian restaurants soon. Last night we got lucky and found a restaurant with a Bangladeshi waiter who spoke English and found us veg things on an entirely Japanese menu, but that was after a lot of wandering from place to place, being told there were no veg options).

Sarah and Dan eat donuts @ Mister Donut.

Strawberry and spinach!

We started off the day having breakfast as Mister Donut, which is sort of the Japanese version of Dunkin' Donuts. They have many strange and wonderful donut flavours including spinach, pumpkin and ginger chocolate. I got a spinach one to be adventurous, and a strawberry frosted one just in case the spinach one was gross. I don't know if it's because I put spinach in my smoothies (leafy greens make you strong like Popeye) and am used to the flavour or what, but I thought the spinach donut was delish! Jon didn't like it, but he liked my strawberry donut, which I did not like because I found the frosting very waxy in texture. Dan had a pumpkin donut and Sarah had a rice flour donut which had a nice chewy texture.

Akihabara (known as Akiba for short) was quite crowded, but I am starting to get used to the number of people (and getting umbrellas in the face). Jon had a number of things he particularly wanted to get, mainly merchandise related to his favourite anime (Japanese animated series). Since I am not nearly as involved in anime fandom, I mostly just wandered around in awe of just how many different anime and manga (comic books) series and characters there are! Jon managed to find a couple of figurines of his favourite characters, as well as a t-shirt and a cover for his iPhone. (Everyone accessorizes their phones here, with covers, charms, decals, etc.) We also went into a couple capsule toy shops. Capsule toys are small toys inside plastic balls, that you buy from vending machines, sort of like kinder surprise eggs, only without the chocolate coating, and there's way more variety. You can get key chains, cell phone decals, figurines and mini plastic food. I got a keychain with a little turtle that has a light in its mouth, which turns on when you squeeze it. It also oinks (or makes some sort of sound... maybe ribbits?) when you squeeze it. I also got a keychain from Neon genesis Evangelion, which is Jon's favourite anime series, and the only one I've seen. It has a picture of Kaoru, (one of the characters) on it, and when you squeeze it, it plays one of his sound-bites from the show.

Jon is trying to learn Japanese more seriously than I am, because he needs it for his work, so we also spent some time searching for an electronic Japanese/English dictionary and translator. With the help of Dan, he managed to find one that is a few years old, so it was discounted in price.

LED lights in a parts store.

In addition to shops selling electronic goods like cameras and computers, and shops selling otaku (geek) merchandise like figurines, there are also many shops which sell electronic parts. Apparently akiba started out originally as more of a parts market, though these are now less prominent. It's kind of neat to walk through parts stores, though, since they're rather maze- like and filled with curiosities.

The highlight of the day for me was that we went to a maid cafe. Maid cafes are very popular in Akiba. Some of them have different themes, but generally they're just bar-cafes where women in French maid costumes serve you, and there's often some element of narrative to it. The idea is that you enter into a magical or fantasy world where you get to have a tea party. Or beer. Maids from the cafes stand out on the sidewalk handing out flyers and encouraging potential guests to come inside.

I don't have any pictures to post from the maid cafe because you are not allowed to take pictures inside. (Their website is here). This is because they make their money by charging you for everything, including getting your picture taken with a maid of your choice. We have pictures of us with the maid who served us, Mai-mai, but they are polaroids (which Mai-mai decorated for us with colourful pen). When you go into the shop you generally buy a 'set,' which includes food, drink and a photo or other merchandise. We all bought the set that included a dessert, drink and photo. We got animal parfaits (Sarah and I got ones made with green tea ice cream that looked like turtles, and Jon and Dan got ones made with chocolate ice cream that looked like bears). They were layered with ice cream (decorated with cookies and candies for the animals' features) corn flakes (surprisingly good with ice cream) fruit, and chocolate sauce. I needed lactaid big time!

When your maid cafe experience starts, you have to invoke the magic of the place (and it is indeed magic-looking... or at least very cute. It was like being in a forest of lit-up pillars topped with starts and hearts, a disco-ball in the center of the room, and bubble-gum pop and Disney themes playing over the loud speaker). To invoke the magic the maid gets you all to say the magic words (something involving sparkles and cute) and then blow out an electric candle. When your food comes, you have to do a magic spell with your maid to make the food delicious (and magical).

The maids also dance. They sell you glow sticks that you wave around in time to the music while they dance and lip synch on the stage underneath the disco ball. One maid lip synched to a song by AKB48 (the popular girl band I mentioned in my last post) while two other maids headbanged and frolicked around the staged, and a few others encouraged the audience to wave their glow sticks. As odd as all this sounds, it really was a lot of fun, like being a kid again!

Later on that day, Jon and I ran into two of the maids from our cafe, and they greeted us excitedly. They seemed as enthusiastic in real life as in their jobs! It's not hard to be recognized around here, because there aren't many foreigners about.

We also went out to a little ramen place with Sarah and Dan yesterday. It was really delicious. While we were there we watched Japanese reality TV, which is really confusing if you don't know what's happening, but Sarah and Dan translated some of it for us. I also used my first squat toilet there, which was easier than peeing in the bush! Most of the toilets in Japan are very fancy, with a range of features from heated seats, to seats that automatically lift up for men, to warm water spray for extra cleanliness, and warm air to dry you off. Most also make some sort of flushing or bird call noise to cover up the sound of you using the bathroom, to give you extra privacy.

Us with a drag troupe in Akihabara Station. Lovely folks!

First Full Day in Japan

 Post by Jon; Photos by Phebe (so far).

We set out for our first day in Japan on a sleepy note, Phebe because of a mixture of jet-lag, prior fatigue, and an uncomfortable feather pillow, myself because of the sense that it was going to be Christmas morning for the next few weeks. After getting in touch with our Canadian-born contact, Sarah, we decided to head down to the local coffee shop, "Doutor," in search of breakfast while we waited for her to meet us at our hostel.

Me beside our hostel sign. I can't figure out how to rotate pictures.

The shop itself was loaded with all kinds of delectable sweets and coffee-related goodies. I managed to read the signs listed next to things and picked up a chocolate-orange flavored muffin, whereas Phebe picked something like a cross between a danish and a croissant with bits of chocolate throughout and chocolate chips on top. She decisively ordered by pointing and with the help of the staff, whereas I continued to show off my limited Japanese by proudly announcing "good morning! One muffin and an American-style coffee [kohi amerikajin] please!". I am sure I sound way too pleased with myself, and inevitably someone then asks me something else and I must resort to pointing and my "actually, I don't speak that much Japanese yet" face/gesture.

For those interested, an American-style coffee tastes like McDonald's coffee. What is even more interesting is that there apparently isn't anything that would be referred to as a "hohi nihonjin" [japanese coffee], unless you count the wide selection of sweetened coffees available in the numerous vending machines around town. We went back to the hostel and ate our food while watching a Japanese game show on TV. I saw my first Japanese iPhone ad, interesting because Apple has recently been trying to break into the country. They may be succeeding, as I've seen many people with 4G phones similar to mine.

I had been under the wrong impression that Japan didn't have as many sweets as North America, an impression that I've been all too happy to alter. However, since part of my Japanese trip expectation was to lose my excess winter weight, I'm now torn between another muffin for breakfast tomorrow and a healthier rice ball available in the local convenience store. I had also expected that we would be doing more walking, but for practical reasons we need to take the JR above-ground transport to get anywhere.

Umbrella rack outside coffee shop with removable reusable "umbrella condoms." One of many designs.

One thing about Tokyo: everyone uses umbrellas. As we left the hostel, one of the owners showed us the "take an umbrella, leave an umbrella" bucket. Phebe happily took one, whereas I, without thinking, refused given that I don't use one at home. Of course, once we arrived in Shibuya (a major commercial district in Tokyo), I quickly realized that I looked like a foolishly-wet gaijin without one. For $4, I now have a clear plastic umbrella and fit in with the umbrella-toting crowds. As we navigated the Shibuya sidewalks, there were lots of "sumi masen" ("excuse me") and "gomen nasai" ("sorry") heard as umbrellas bumped into each other and got caught up. Most stores have umbrella storage racks, and a few have plastic sleeves available for carrying your umbrella around the store. I managed to jam one of the "sleeve machines" when we stopped for (Japanese-Italian) lunch, and has to be rescued by the manager.

Shibuya crossing = umbrella madness!

Shibuya is quite famous among foreigners who follow Japan. It's home to some of the most famous shopping in Tokyo, as well as the Shibuya crossing---a massive intersection that is the Japanese equivalent of Dundas Square in Toronto. There was the famous giant billboards several stories up in the air, as well as the giant screens plasted to the sides of buildings. There was also the famous statue of Hachiko, a dog who apparently waited until death for its philosopher human to return to it. As our companion Sarah pointed out, the statue is a popular meeting spot. However, we managed to get up close to take some photos. We also took a breather inside a small restaurant located on the third floor of a building, the vertical equivalent of a strip mall. We snacked on salted soy beans and a mango juice and cold coffee float, respectively. We learned that when you eat at a Japanese restaurant, tips are not necessary (people don't rely on them) and you don't need to wait to pay the bill. You simply head to the front when you are ready.

Akiba48 is an all-girl pop group, hugely popular here.

Less unique to Japan was the Japanese branch of American record store Tower Records. Lady Gaga is clearly the pop star of the day too, for her new album and was everywhere. There was lots of other stuff as well, and with Sarah's help I was able to inquire about some soundtracks that I was trying to locate. CDs are expensive here, but I didn't pay more (and probably less) than it would cost to import them to Canada.


After our very late lunch Phebe and I both decided that we were crashing. Parting ways with Sarah with a promise to meet up tomorrow, we navigated back through the train lines to return to our hostel. We took a nap before then heading back out to look for nearby supper. We found it at another Italian restaurant with very helpful staff. Supper was a mixed legume and vegetable salad, bread with garlic pesto, and gorgonzola penne. So far it has been difficult to find food that is both vegetarian and dairy-free, but we're hoping to work on that in the coming days. We had limited ourselves considerably by looking for supper so late, so we had to accept what we could find.

The restaurant was fancier than our lunch stop, and the very polite server managed to communicate that we were expected to buy a cheese appetizer as well as significant drinks (Phebe went with Perrier, and I went with beer). This meant that this meal was our costliest yet, but when we did the math, we realized that we paying no more than we would for a reputable Italian place in Toronto. I tried my hand at telling the server that we very much appreciated all her patience and help, but seemed to fail at that. I settled for a big "thank you very much," which she seemed to appreciate. It's a restaurant I wouldn't hesitate to which I wouldn't hesitate to return if we needed something familiar. 

Restaurants advertise their fare using displays of plastic food.

 With regard to beer, the night we got here I had tried Asahi from the hostel vending machine. It was a good and reliable flavor, as I remembered from home. Tonight I had Sapporo beer, which is also a favorite from home. There's a brand here called Kirin which I haven't yet tried, though I hope to do so soon. There's also more specialty flavors, porters and the like, but I haven't yet seen them for sale. Perhaps most interesting is that beer sizes are much more varied here. My beer with dinner was the perfect small size to accompany food.

Tomorrow we meet back up with Sarah and venture into Akihabara. According to our guidebook, it was originally a black market for electronic goods, whereas now it's a shopping district for all things geeky. It's a good thing that we've located an international bank machine just a few doors down from our hostel. As a last note, the same guidebook seems to imply that we can haggle, but given how people have treated us so far, that seems incredibly inappropriate. Sarah confirmed this for me, suggesting that trying to haggle would be incredibly rude given that people are trained to go out of their way for you with regard to customer service. As someone who worked retail for years, I can imagine I would be extremely annoyed if I helped someone only to have them try and argue with me about a price I don't control.

Pictures for this post are to come once I find a USB cord for my camera, as I forgot mine!

From Phebe: I added some pictures from my camera this morning (Saturday). Hopefully tonight Jon will have a cord and I will try to figure out how to rotate photos (thinking it would help to put them in a photo storing site and rotate them there since there is no feature to do so in blogger!)

Our Arrival in Japan

In Japan, they love to use cute cartoon characters to illustrate things.

They really like sineage in Japan. Everything is very well-marked,  generally in English as well as Japanese, which is quite a boon to gaijin (foreigners) like us! I was amused by many of the signs at the airport, where we arrived around 3 pm local time (2 am at home!)

Animal quarantine sign at Narita Airport.

We also found the staff at the airport tourist information booth to be very helpful. They gave us a gift of a paper crane too, to thank us for visiting Japan. We wish we'd brought small gifts with us to give to people. On my very first trip overseas, to Switzerland, my mum bought me a bunch of small Canadian flag lapel pins to give away. I wish I'd remembered her advice to always bring gifts because people have been so kind to us already, and I wish we had a better way of showing thanks for the extra effort.

Speeding by a rice field.

Everything is looking a bit fuzzy right now after not much sleep on the plane, on the heels of several nights of poor sleep back home. But despite the tiredness/jet lag, the 1.5 hour trip from Narita to our hostel near Akihabara (a district of Tokyo) was beautiful. I was struck by the contrast of big rice fields (which I'd never seen before today) and urban sprawl along our route into the city. Despite all its flashy neon signs and tall buildings, it seems this region is also quite verdant, which we noticed even from the sky as we were landing.

 Our hostel room is probably the nicest hostel room I've stayed in, since it comes with our own bathroom (complete with a tub & shower in compact mini versions - the tub is made for sitting in, not lying down) as well as a mini fridge/freezer, a kettle, a desk, a TV and free wi-fi. Not bad indeed!

After having much-needed showers, Jon and I ventured out to find some food, since we hadn't eaten anything since our last plane meal. Many of the restaurants in the area were already closed, or didn't have any vegetarian (bejiterian) meals, but we finally found one that had an English menu and some veggie options. We had a nice meal of miso-seaweed soup, some sort of salty battered medium-firm tofu blocks in broth, and some cheese spring rolls. The waitress (who spoke some English) was very patient with us, and even corrected my terrible pronunciation when I tried to tell her "gochiso-sama deshita" (meaning "it was a real feast" - the polite thing to say when you finish a meal). She also complied with my request to keep the window open even though the air conditioning was on. I felt like I was being super picky, particularly since they're still trying to conserve energy--the airport was under a brown-out. Unfortunately, however, it seems that in most restaurants, smoking is allowed anywhere and I don't tolerate smoke well. I'm going to have to start asking ahead of time whether there is a non-smoking section, or whether we can open a window (which made it tolerable) since I don't know that every restaurant will be as accommodating as that one was!

As we left the restaurant, a businessman waved at me and said "bye-bye!" I think I was a bit of a novelty. Earlier today, one of the women at the tourist info booth told me the ring in the top of my right ear is really cute. Other than that, most people seem to be just ignoring us unless we look really confused or ask for help directly. A woman who helped us find our hostel (very nice of her) told us there have been fewer tourists since the earthquake.

We're back at the hostel now, and going to go to bed soon. Jon is enjoying a beer from a vending machine in the lobby (I think he is more excited by the prolificness of the vending machines here than anything else).

Looking forward to our first full day tomorrow!

 Jon and I in our matching hotel bathrobes.