Tokyo: Day Three

Finally! It's here! Day three of our Tokyo trip...back in May. We've been super busy, and that's going to continue for a while, but I'll try my best to post some more fun from the last few months.

I feel like we did a lot of really cool things when we were in Tokyo, but day three might just have been my favorite. We started the day walking to the train station to head to Ebisu, and came upon this sculpture. It's famous, and often used in T.V. dramas.

When we got to Ebisu, we stored our luggage in some coin lockers and headed to the Yebisu Beer Museum. The museum was pretty nice, but unlike the Asahi Brewery Tour in Nagoya, you have to pay for a guided tour and there is a 400 yen charge per beer "sample." Below you can see pictures from the museum, the tasting room, and the tokens used to purchase the samples.

As you can see Chad was pretty happy (especially in the middle picture on the left where he's being cradled by the Yebisu logo).

After a refreshing Irish Cream Stout from the beer museum, we left for Odaiba, an artificial island in Tokyo Bay. The island has a lot of shopping and many restaurants, as well as a great night view. One of the first things I saw after getting out of the driverless, computer-operated train connecting the island to Tokyo was the Statue of Liberty. Kind of strange we haven't been to New York to see the real one, but there we were, in Japan, looking at this:

We wandered around a bit before finding a yummy pizza restaurant in Decks, a shopping mall with a view of the Rainbow Bridge from outside many of the restaurants and shops.

Kanpai! Sangria and beer--Cheers!

Top-view of my sangria, a Basil Mozzarella pizza, and a Carbonara pizza. Can you see the egg on the Carbonara pizza in the middle? In the bottom picture, the waiter is popping the egg and scrambling it over the whole pizza. The pizza is served piping hot, so the egg cooks immediately. It's actually really delicious!

Lovely salad.

After our late lunch we explored Decks a little more, finding a place where you can practice to be a Ninja Warrior, and a neat floor completely made to look like it's from the 1950's. This floor was probably my favorite part of going to Odaiba because I really love everything about that time period.

1. Check out the "penny" candy store, with old-fashioned treats
ranging in prices all below 100 yen.
2. Canned sodas with vintage designs
3. A general shot of the area
4. Chad and Yasu battling it out, playing an old arcade game

There was also a haunted house, a screen showing old-time cartoons, palm readers, and several souvenir shops. There were both fortune tellers reading palms and electronic ones, like the one pictured below:

(You put your hand in its mouth)

There were also fortune machines. Yasu seemed to be having bad luck over the trip when it came to drawing positive messages from fortunes, so he tried this one:

It totally reminded me of Zoltar in the movie "Big." Yasu put in money, and the dragon pulled out his fortune, did a dance, and then dropped it for Yasu to retrieve. It was cool to watch, but Yasu read his fortune only to find out it hadn't changed!

On the bright side to Yasu's fortune troubles, when we left the 1950's floor, we got to see this great view of the Rainbow Bridge:

Made us miss Mackinac!

It was getting late and we still had to pick up our luggage from Ebisu before catching our night bus, so we decided to head back. When we got to Yebisu, we decided to grab dinner at a ramen restaurant called Chabuton. We were intrigued by the sign on the door advertising "Veggie Ramen." Isn't that ramen blasphemy? We decided to check it out--little did we know that some REALLY amazing ramen awaited us!

Dinner is served! Beer, gyoza, and--for me!--Veggie Ramen.

Chad was jealous of my Veggie Ramen, and no one can blame him. I ordered the egg, but the basic ramen doesn't include it. This was seriously the best ramen I've ever tried. So vegetable-rich, and so yummy! We were sure to ask the ramen chef for details: was there really absolutely NO meat involved? Even in the broth? Why haven't more ramen shops started serving Veggie Glory?

His answers? Yes, the ramen has no meat, even in the broth. It's a vegetable broth, and the ramen recipe took over 10 years for the restaurant to perfect (which may be why other restaurants haven't started serving it. Or it might be because people don't believe in ramen without meat).

I left feeling like I had made a huge discovery, only to leave it behind...possibly for all time. But wait! The restaurant is a chain! And it is not only located in Ebisu, but very near to our company's headquarters in Kanayama! Hurray! Accessible Chabuton! I don't know what could have made a better ending to our Tokyo trip.

(Well... actually, a shinkansen ride would have been nice instead of the night bus, but you get the point.)

Tokyo: Day Two

We lugged ourselves out of bed for day two of Tokyo--tired, but excited--and headed straight to Asakusa. We decided to wait for breakfast, but by the time we arrived in Asakusa it was nearly lunch time. There was a nice restaurant where Chad ate omuraisu, which is similar to how is sounds: an omelet with rice inside. I had a lovely obentou.

Next, we headed down the crowded streets to Asakusa Temple, one of the oldest temples in Tokyo.

Seeing the temple was well worth having to wade through the crowd. Pictures below include the gate to the shrine, Chad wafting away evil spirits with incense smoke, a pagoda, and some of the decorative work found inside the temple.

This was painted on the ceiling in the temple:

The gate to the shrine is called the "Thunder Gate," and it is guarded by the god of wind on the right, and the god of thunder on the left.

Before leaving Asakusa, we made two very important stops. First:

Taiyaki glory.

And second:

Afternoon Sangrias.

From Asakusa, we decided to leave Tokyo and go to Yokohama, Japan's second largest city. When we arrived, Chad was taken over by excitement and suddenly became part of Dragon Ball Z.

Then he got to use a big boy rocking chair!

Yokohama is famous for being one of the first ports in Japan to be opened to foreign trade, but it's also famous for its China town. You can bet that as soon as Chad recovered from his fireball throwing and rocking chair fun we headed toward the luring streets of Japan's largest China town.

Discovering Yokohama China Town

After an expensive dinner in the China Town (yeah, what? I thought Chinese food was cheap!), we went back to Shinjuku. Night had fallen, but we weren't finished yet!

Above you can see what happens when you enter a SMAP izakaya, and below you can see Shinjuku's awesome night lights and the side of a Tokyo cab.

Almost time for bed, but not without one final question:

Day Three coming soon!

Three Days in Tokyo

We've been busy little bees, flitting from one job to the next and trying to fit in little trips in the meantime. Sorry for the delay in posting, but I hope this post -- the first in a series of three on our trip to Tokyo -- eases any feelings of bitterness/anger/depression you may have been feeling. Because I know how important reading this must be to most of you ;-)

DAY ONE

Chad, Yasu and I took a night bus to Shinjuku and arrived at about 5:30 AM. That's right, 5:30. You probably remember what a chipper morning person I can be, so I'm sure you can imagine how (un)happy Yasu and Chad were as I forged into the city in search of coffee. Luckily it didn't take too long to find a cafe where we could eat breakfast and hang out for a couple hours while we waited for things to open up. We were also lucky that it was such a beautiful day and that we were surrounded by interesting buildings like this one:

After breakfast, we left to drop off our stuff at The Washington Hotel.

After stopping at the hotel, we were off to Harajuku -- making a quick stop at Meiji Shrine first. It was really tough to pick only a few pictures of Harajuku, but here is a peek at some of what we saw in the famous city:

It was super crowded, and mostly with teenage girls! There were some interesting sights (and people!), but my favorite part of Harajuku was a little restaurant tucked away called Blue Garden.

(Left to Right)
1. Chad and Yasu thinking about where to go after lunch
2. Salad from an awesome salad bar, and a 100 yen beer (about $1.00 USD)!
3. Pizza-in-a-Cup
4. Cool guys
5 & 6. Carubonara Raisu in a stone bowl (it continued cooking after it was brought to the table!)
7 & 8. Chad's Curry Rice dish -- so yummy!
9. Eating fondue
10. Yeah, did I mention fondue in #9? Because it was part of the salad bar. And it was amazing.
11. Once again, amazing.
12. Flowers to celebrate the restaurant's recent opening

After a really wonderful lunch, we headed to Yoyogi Park. We got to see some pretty interesting people around every corner, including dancing Elvises (Elvi?).

Pretty sure this was a man...

We thought this girl's look was pretty impressive:

This guy was a mime-rabbit:

And these guys were the two most interesting people in the park that day!

We had been walking for hours and it was quite hot, so we headed back for a nap and a shower (finally!) at our hotel. After a brief respite from Tokyo-overload, we headed out for a little shopping and dinner. Sorry to report that I've forgotten the name of the ramen restaurant we went to and where is is exactly, but I feel like you can still take some time to drool over its glory. Chad's ramen is pictured on the left in the middle, and he says it was the spiciest ramen he's ever eaten (see his picture directly below the ramen--he's sweating!). I ordered salt and butter ramen (pictured on the right in the middle). So healthy! ;-)

And so came the end of our first day. There was so much to take in, we couldn't imagine what lay in store for us on day two. Can you? We'll be posting soon to let you know!