zomg tokyo! day 5
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livejournal,
tokyo
Since the world didn't end, here's day 5!
Day 5 (10 September)
If you looked at the time stamps for my posts about days 3 and 4, you probably figured out what we did yesterday morning. For those that ignore such things, I stayed in bed, alternating between typing and playing Secret Agent Clank on my trusty PSP 1001.
Around 1330, we finally got our lazy butts out of the room, where we headed across the street to the market under Mitsukoshi. Very. Bad. Idea. Matt has an iron stomach, and even he described the results as, "my stomach is tied in a slipknot." But we went to Sengaku-ji anyway.
The legendary 47 ronin are buried in Sengaku-ji, having committed both murder and seppuku to defend both their master's and their own honor and loyalaty. While the events surrounding the place are quite exciting, the graveyard itself is rather serene and the air is filled with the scent of burning incense. Visually, the modern stone railings and walkways provide quite the contrast to the centuries old tombstones.
Still in pain, we wobbled back onto the subway for Ginza, round two. Thankfully, everything was open for business upon our midafternoon arrival. Our first destination was the Sony Building, where we taught it the lesson that it is not okay to be closed. Or we just walked in the front door where we were greeted politely by no less than three employees. After much drooling over the Cybershot DSC-T77, we made our way through the various displays urging us to buy every Sony device imaginable. We nearly bought a silver PS3 DualShock 3 controller, but for various undefined reasons it was left behind. A sleek USB Memory Stick reader did hitch a ride, however, since a certain necessary cable was omitted during packing.
By the time we left, with a brochure extolling the features of the T77, our stomachs had returned to their original configurations and were demanding food. Food was slightly delayed so we could purchase photoalbums at Itoya since we had no idea when the shop would close. Having some semblance of understanding of what 1-5-13 Ginza means, we headed off to find Sakata, an udon and soba restaurant regarded as one of the best in Tokyo. While we did managed to find the address all by ourselves (okay, Matt did most of the finding), we couldn't find the restaurant for the life of us. After much swearing at the guide book where I found the address, an employee who worked in the same building told us that the restaurant had moved. More swearing ensued. Various alternate plans were considered. Finally, we settled on venturing to the Apple store a couple blocks away to ask the internet where we should eat. The internet basically told us to get lost, so we enlisted an employee for assistance. He pointed us in the direction of udon that actually existed. We never reached the restaurant, mostly because Kirin City+ jumped out from behind a building and called our names. I had the Brau Miester, while Matt chose Kirin Black. Some ridiculously small servings of spaghetti and steak rounded out the meal.
Needless to say, we were still hungry as we exited the subway at Mitsukoshimae, where, lo and behold, stood an am/pm! Just like in America, the Japanese ones do not accept credit cards, but they do accept Pasmo, the Tokyo Metro version of New York's MetroCard. After paying in coins, we went upstairs for the evening with our goodies to retire for the evening.
Day 5 (10 September)
If you looked at the time stamps for my posts about days 3 and 4, you probably figured out what we did yesterday morning. For those that ignore such things, I stayed in bed, alternating between typing and playing Secret Agent Clank on my trusty PSP 1001.
Around 1330, we finally got our lazy butts out of the room, where we headed across the street to the market under Mitsukoshi. Very. Bad. Idea. Matt has an iron stomach, and even he described the results as, "my stomach is tied in a slipknot." But we went to Sengaku-ji anyway.
The legendary 47 ronin are buried in Sengaku-ji, having committed both murder and seppuku to defend both their master's and their own honor and loyalaty. While the events surrounding the place are quite exciting, the graveyard itself is rather serene and the air is filled with the scent of burning incense. Visually, the modern stone railings and walkways provide quite the contrast to the centuries old tombstones.
Still in pain, we wobbled back onto the subway for Ginza, round two. Thankfully, everything was open for business upon our midafternoon arrival. Our first destination was the Sony Building, where we taught it the lesson that it is not okay to be closed. Or we just walked in the front door where we were greeted politely by no less than three employees. After much drooling over the Cybershot DSC-T77, we made our way through the various displays urging us to buy every Sony device imaginable. We nearly bought a silver PS3 DualShock 3 controller, but for various undefined reasons it was left behind. A sleek USB Memory Stick reader did hitch a ride, however, since a certain necessary cable was omitted during packing.
By the time we left, with a brochure extolling the features of the T77, our stomachs had returned to their original configurations and were demanding food. Food was slightly delayed so we could purchase photoalbums at Itoya since we had no idea when the shop would close. Having some semblance of understanding of what 1-5-13 Ginza means, we headed off to find Sakata, an udon and soba restaurant regarded as one of the best in Tokyo. While we did managed to find the address all by ourselves (okay, Matt did most of the finding), we couldn't find the restaurant for the life of us. After much swearing at the guide book where I found the address, an employee who worked in the same building told us that the restaurant had moved. More swearing ensued. Various alternate plans were considered. Finally, we settled on venturing to the Apple store a couple blocks away to ask the internet where we should eat. The internet basically told us to get lost, so we enlisted an employee for assistance. He pointed us in the direction of udon that actually existed. We never reached the restaurant, mostly because Kirin City+ jumped out from behind a building and called our names. I had the Brau Miester, while Matt chose Kirin Black. Some ridiculously small servings of spaghetti and steak rounded out the meal.
Needless to say, we were still hungry as we exited the subway at Mitsukoshimae, where, lo and behold, stood an am/pm! Just like in America, the Japanese ones do not accept credit cards, but they do accept Pasmo, the Tokyo Metro version of New York's MetroCard. After paying in coins, we went upstairs for the evening with our goodies to retire for the evening.
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