Tokyo! Day 02 - 24/12

After a nice long sleep I awoke on day two ready for a traditional western fatty breakfast still feeling the hurt that Denny's had left me, and I didn't care how long I had to travel to get it. This is how we ended up an hour long queue in front of Eggs n' Things in Harajuku. This is the Japanese branch of a popular breakfast house in Hawaii that serves pancakes, waffles and crepes. After months of half-assed Japanese cereal we were willing to join the line in the freezing cold for and hour with the intention of more than making up for this hindrance with our order. We opted for seating anywhere as we were starving and didn't really care if we were placed outside on the verandah under the braziers, but luckily when it was our turn we were shown inside to a table with two comfy couches. We checked out the other patron's meals and the six inch mountain of whipped cream that sat atop of the pancakes and waffles and the three sauce dispensers with sweet coconut, maple, and strawberry syrup that sat on every table. I ordered blueberry waffles and a plate of banana crepes to share between us while Maggie ordered blueberry pancakes and a side of bacon. We realised a flaw in our plan to make up for the long wait in food when the mountains of food were placed around us. I ate everything included some of Maggie's share and by the end I felt like I was about to vomit. But we got our waits worth and that's all that matters. You may have noticed the underlying theme of this trip is value.

From Harajuku we took several escalators down to the very deep subway to Ryogoku. Ryogoku used to be near the centre of Edo (Tokyo) in the Edo Period but after the city expanded into the neighbouring countryside the centre shifted towards the newer areas like Shinjuku and Shibuya, so Ryogoku is seen as the historical area of Tokyo and is home to the Edo-Tokyo Museum. I had only heard about this museum from an anime that explained the different areas to Tokyo (the scenario being the subway stations of Tokyo were personified as good looking guys that kidnap girls on their otherworldly train to help them solve their problems in life by taking them around their area of Tokyo explaining things along the way. Oh Japan. Other things I learned from this episode, the raid of the 47 Ronin, soon to be a movie starring Keanu Reeves, took place here and it is the birthplace of Okita Souji of the Shinsengumi. Education +!) and I was surprised I didn't see much advertising or hype about it on the touristy websites, because it was a really good museum! It had a lot of hands on things and massive scale models of the towns of Edo. Also there were several volunteer history buffs who could speak English walking around explaining things. One of the funny things I saw here was an American dad and his young Japanese kids walking around and I overheard their conversation as the dad said “That's some amazing yoro~i (armour)” with the kids looking incredulously at their dad saying “Dad, it's not yoro~i, it's yoroi.” Damn you long vowels. All foreigners have that trouble.

(left)  A replica of the Nihonbashi, the bridge that led into Edo.
(right)  Geta (wooden clogs) for wading in rivers.

A model of Ryogoku in the Edo Period.

Mini-putt. Showa style.

Kago are tiny!!

We stayed here until closing time, picked up some rice cracker senbei as omiyage for the BoE peeps back at home and I bought a cloth printed with a procession of cats in kimono travelling with a cart and singing. We headed back to Shibuya and met up with Steph, Janelle and newcomer Emilio who was also a university friend of Maggie and Steph. We went to dinner at an American chain called T.G.I. Friday's where I had some roast chicken and veg and we all revelled in the taste of western food, if only for an hour. We wanted to do karaoke and sought out Shidax in Shibuya thinking it would be some nice cheap entertainment. Boy were we wrong! It costs over $15 an hour per person and we ended up staying several hours so it was an expensive night out but fun. And I have a new karaoke song I can rock out to.

Nice syncing to the TV ladies!

On the way back to the hotel at 11 pm we heard a ruckous at the famous Shibuya crossing (the busiest intersection in the world – an absolute biarch of a thing to cross during the evening rush hour, we had to go through it everyday and you just get pummelled). This ruckous was caused by a group of 20 or so punks and their girls dressed in Santa and reindeer costumes, some with Christmas trees attached to the backs of their bikes ripping up and down the crossing doing burnouts and tricks on their bikes and generally making a lot of noise. They got our approval and as we took pictures of them they played for the camera and yelled out greetings in English to us. The police were nowhere to be seen.

Vroooom!

The famous statue of Hachiko outside Shibuya Station,
now complete with a tambourine.