Thursday, July 17, 2008

Tokyo Postcard



Well, I went to Tokyo last week and, really, I need to learn how to be a tourist. I only brought my camera out a few times. It's so hard to take pictures when you're trying to eat evey kind of ethnic food that you can't find in Korea. I think I ate Japanese food twice in Tokyo. I did have American, Indian and Vietnamese food, though. Anyway, it was a great trip and holy crap Japan is clean. You could almost lick the sidewalks without any fear.


This is what you get when you show up to your flight really late: a business class upgrade and more legroom than you know what to do with. Flying business class has ruined me. I refuse to fly coach ever again. What will I do without my hot towel, my reading materials or...


...salmon salads? I wanted to ask them to just fly around a little longer, it's such a short flight between Seoul and Tokyo.


Here's Mina and me in our comlimentary hotel pajamas. Our hotel room was so small, seriously, about the size of a walk-in closet. Good thing my apartment in Seould is tiny; I am used to curling up when I sleep.


Shiloh and I went walking around Tokyo and we found this Japanese gate thing (I never did buy a guideboook, so I will be referring to this as a 'Japanese gate thing' for lack of a better name.)


Here's me at a Japanese shrine thing (Meji-chingu I think?? I told you I need tourism lessons) P.s. Do I only own one shirt? Scroll down to my Busan pictures, I'm always wearing this Guarana Power shirt. I don't know why.


Here's Shiloh and me at the shrine thing again.


And here's the shrine thing alone in case the green shirt was distracting.


The shrine thing comes with a turtle. I bet it's a special Japanese shrine turtle. I'm not looking it up.


You know me, I always have to take cold skyline pictures. This is of the downtown area near City Hall.


We wanted to go to the palace that we saw on a big cartoon map in the hotel. We didn't find the palace per se, but we did find this stunning view. All the other people taking pictures of this were like: isn't there some palace around here or something?


Never did find that palace, but I think you have to swim across this moat. Which is likely full of shrine turtles.


Here are the famous Salarymen of Japan in the midst of a 70-hour work day.


I also LOVE to go in towers (again, see my Busan pictures if you don't believe me) This is Tokyo tower. Again, located on the big cartoon map in the hotel. It's some meters high.


Here's the view from the tower. 32 million people out there. This is a view of Shinjuku and Roppongi. How did I get so smart? There was a little placard that said what everything was.


They twisted my arm to sing a karaoke song. Of course, I sang about 20. This is a duet with Mina. All the bars could seat about 6 people and only served Korean soju.


Here's the bartender of the best bar in town. Don't remember his name, don't remember the bar's name. You should check it out if you're ever in town.


If you spend long enough in a gay bar, someone WILL find a wig. This is the owner of the little bar with the wig. And, my friend Stephen whom I met in Seoul, but who lives in Tokyo.

I hope you're not too overloaded with cultural factoids. No one is ever going to hire me to be a travel writer.