Tokyo Two

I finally arrived in Tokyo, after a long restless bus ride, at about 6 am. I disembarked to frigid air that I haven't felt in at least a year. I half walked/half ran to the subway station and went back to the Asakusa hostel. I was exhausted and freezing, but I couldn't check into my room until the afternoon; I sat in Starbucks reading for half the day and then snuck back in and fell asleep on the couch in the common room--hah. The next day, I ventured around the city and went to purchase a new camera at the store, Yodobashi, which is known for good and cheap electronics, since mine decided to die on Christmas day. I got a new Cannon w/ a free 2 gig card for around $185--not bad. I was supposed to go out to a club called "Pop It" with some Japanese women that I met on the Santa pub crawl, but I found out about the death of a friend of mine, Eric Rego, so, needless to say, I didn't really feel like partying. I went to bed at 6pm and stayed there for a very very long time.

I wanted to lie around all day, but I had to leave at 11 am because I didn't have that night booked due to no vacancy. I walked around Omatesando and through Yoyogi park before meeting up with Bradon and Garret, whom I had met in Auckland. It was nice to see some familiar faces! I met them at the hostel, along with two of their friends from California, Matt and Todd, and we wondered around Shinjuku and into a few bars before going back to their hostel. The boys snuck me into their place because I actually didn't have any accommodation for the evening and was probably going to end up sleeping in a McDonalds. They were in a capsule hostel, which is basically beds in pods on top of each other. They are pretty big, though, there was enough room for two of us to lie down comfortably without even touching. The next day I checked back in to my hostel and met back up with the boys and another one of their friends from high school who is studying Japanese in Tokyo, Jen, and went to do some karaoke! We rented a room with neon and black lights and sang our sober hearts out for a few hours. Karaoke is huge here; however, I find it interesting that everyone rents out a room and sings with their friends rather than in an open room on stage like what I'm used to seeing. I think I just like public humiliation :) After Karaoke we wondered around the brightly lit area of Shinjuku for a little while watching people and I won a little carton of Haagen Daaz in a vending machine before heading home.

The next day I met up with the boys and we took a day trip to Hakone where you can see Mt. Fuji. It's basically a full day of public transportation with phenomenal views. We took the subway, bus, pirate ship (seriously) through lake Ashi, three cable cars, and then back. When we got back to Tokyo we were all starving and craving sushi so we asked a random local security guard if he could point us in the right direction. We went to a Kaiten sushi restaurant which is extremely popular and pretty cheap. We had to stand outside in a line for over a half hour before we could get seats. Well worth the wait, though. Each plate is color coded, representing the price, and you can take whatever you want or ask the chefs, who are on the other side of the conveyor belt, to make whichever roll you wish. Some of the highlights were flying fish, whale, and live prawn. I had a massive stack of plates and spent about 30 dollars on the entire meal--not bad for sushi in Japan! Afterwards, we headed to Jen's place where she was graciously letting us stay for a few nights. We got there around one in the morning and I passed out on the floor while they reminisced about hight school. She lives with a host family but has her own apartment. They made us lunch the next day of tuna and tofu sushi before I had to run out and grab my belongings, as well as my Visa for India! I met back up with everyone around 10:30 pm in order to celebrate New Year's eve. We planned on going to a club but en-route, Bradon and I ended up talking to some random people and lost everyone else. We spent a while trying to find them and when we finally did, half of the group was in the club, but one of the guys couldn't get in because he was too drunk. We ended up taking turns sitting with him in Starbucks until everyone was done partying--I spent my new years drinking a hot cocoa :(. The next day we went to the Park Hyatt Hotel bar, which was in Lost in Translation, in order to have a few cocktails and see the ridiculous view of Tokyo it has to offer. Afterwards, Garrett and I ended up going back to Jen's place while everyone else went out. I gathered all of my belongings and headed towards the airport since my flight was going to leave in the morning. I figured I'd just sleep there and save myself the hassle of traveling on a timeline in the morning. The train was two stops from the airport when I hear "final destination" over the intercom and everyone gets out. I tell the workers that I need to get to the airport and they tell me to take a cab. What??? Grr. I go to the cab and he holds his arms up in a big "X" and tells me it's closed. Closed? I didn't know airports closed! I ended up having to sleep in McDonalds for six hours until the subway started back up again and I could head out for my flight. What an ending to my stay in Japan!


FOOD CORNER

At the sushi restaurant Garret and I decided to be little daredevils and try live prawn. The chef shows us the crawly creatures so we can take a few photos before chopping off and frying up their heads for us to munch on. He then takes the tail meat and puts it on a chunk of sticky rice and hands it over to us. The tail is STILL MOVING. The waitress then tells us to pour a little soy sauce on it. After doing so the meet starts twitching, and I don't mean a little slight movement; the tail was having intense spasms to the point that I was wondering if it was going to roll itself off of the rice. The tail was expanding and contracting and flicking from left to right. It took about five minutes to finally put the piece in my mouth, but I'm so glad I did it! I was so fresh (obviously) and flavorful; like nothing I've ever tasted.

Taste: 5
Aftertaste:1

AKWARD MOMENT

Jen ran to McDonalds to grab us some food on New Year's Eve while sitting in Starbucks with our too-drunk friend. We couldn't bring the food inside so I came out a stood outside munching on some fries while she went back in to babysit. While standing outside I started getting random high fives from drunk tourists celebrating. A group of guys stopped and started talking to me, mostly with slightly vulgar complements concerning my looks and my bum. I tried to eat as quickly as I could so I could get away while Jen and Bradon just observed, laughing, from inside...