Email sent to my family from Tokyo
I didn't really feel like writing two things, so I am just pasting this from an email I sent to my family today...
Ohio gozima! (good morning!)
I thought I would take a minute to write an email to everyone and say hello. I am in Tokyo now, having arrived here last night at about 9pm local time. The hostel here is quite nice. In Osaka it was much more homely, sliding doors and so forth, and much smaller, about 10 beds in all. This place is 4 floors tall, the top three with maybe 20 beds each. The bottom floor is a living room with couches and TV and a small kitchen, and there are 6 computers with internet access, plus wireless for laptops.
In Osaka we mainly walked around the Shinsaibashu area which is sortof the main shopping, eating, drinking, etc. area. Bars and places to eat are often REALLY small, maybe sometimes as few as 6 seats. Both nights in Osaka we would up at this small bar which had sortof a mutated American western theme (cowboys and whatnot) and a really large nice glass window with an etching of Sid Vicious of the Sex Pistols. That sortof inscrutable weirdness is ever present here.
I left Osaka Monday morning and headed to Kyoto. We tried to go sightseeing, but it was raining and the buses were confusing, so we didn’t actually see too much in the way of temples. We did manage to see Nijo castle which was a huge feudal-era fortress and palace. From there we took a bullet train to Tokyo.
Last night we checked into the hostel after trying to find it for about 2 hours, and immediately proceded to a nearby bar where the hostelers tend to hang out (in no small part due to the 1 free drink per day offered to people staying at my hostel). There I practically immediately was grabbed by about 6 Japanese men who proceeded to buy me drinks and try to converse with me about such topics as baseball and their “devil wives.” (http://www.babalonnexus.com/items/japan/IMG_1773.JPG) I taught them how to play rock, paper, scissors, but was completely unable to convey to them that it was normally played with only two people. So for about 30 minutes I played 6 way games where the loser would drink a big glass of some unknown liquor. After about 5 minutes the game had mutated and I didn’t really understand the rules anymore, but they seemed to be having fun so I didn’t try to correct them.
Later I went to a karaoke bar with a bunch of guys from the hostel, mostly Germans (http://www.babalonnexus.com/items/japan/IMG_1777.JPG). It was a lot of fun, but I learned quickly that Germans can’t sing worth a damn (myself included). And yes, the obligatory 99 Luft Ballons was performed.
Today we went to Shinjuku which is another big crazy shopping area (http://www.babalonnexus.com/items/japan/IMG_1782.JPG). Everyone here is extremely fashion conscious, and there are shops all over the place. I have definitely felt under dressed everywhere I have been. Most of the women wear these high heeled leather cowboyish boots that makes them walk a bit funny.
Anyhow that is a very brief and general summary of the trip so far. The pictures and my descriptions really don’t capture how crazy the place in so many ways. I am having a lot of fun though, and expect that to continue. I am checking email pretty regularly if you feel like writing me.
Hope everyone is doing well while I am gone!
Konichiwa!
-Fred