Around the world in 106 days: Japan: Day 3- Tokyo

Hey Everyone! I am half way done with China! We spend 2 days in Shanghai, now we are on the ship in transit to Hong Kong! I will be there on Thursday. It is so quiet on the ship with only 160 people onboard! We get treated a little more special too such as movies with popcorn and 3 course dinners served to us J Today I slept in pretty late and now I am catching up on my blog and school.

Jan 29^th

We had an early wakeup call to head over to the Fish Market. It was about 20 minutes away by subway, it wasn’t very hard to find. The thing about the fish market is that the auction begins at 5am but it not open to the public, then begin cutting tuna at 7am which some people can get into and then it ends around 9am. We got to the fish market at around 7am to try and see the tuna cutting but it wasn’t open for the public so on the outside of the market to the more public section, which was overall still pretty amazing to see everyone’s fresh fish and produce up for sale to the public. We had herd that it was strawberry season in Japan and to go buy some so we decided to split a package 3 ways. It was literally 600yen (6.50USD), but these fresh strawberries were the best ones I have ever had. They were all perfect every single one, juicy and fresh. Thinking about it makes my mouth water. We only spent about an hour at the market before heading back to the hostel so we could rest up more before we had to check out.

Since our overnight bus to Kyoto was not until almost 11pm, we took our time leaving the hostel because we would have a lot of time in Tokyo and we didn’t have a lot of things planned to see. So we ended up hanging out at the Hostel until around 12:30, ran into a fellow SASer and he joined us as we decided to walk to the Asakusa shopping district. When we got there we were overwhelmed with the beauty of the shopping district. We split up, made a spot to meet in an hour and went off. Me and Angela decided to go to the back and then work our way up to the front. We bought all of our souvenirs here for really good prices and also took some pictures as a Buddha statue. While she was getting a picture of me and random guy came up and joined into the picture, I was hesitant because I didn’t want him to ask me for money haha. But he was cool and it seemed like he just wanted to be in my picture! The shopping area was so pretty, hanging from the small area were (fake) cheery blossom branches but they made it so colorful and welcoming. After we decided we wanted to go see the imperial palace. But on the way at a subway station we were told that it was closed and because of the outside gates there was not much to see by fellow SASers who had just been there. It’s so cool to run into people you can recognize in the middle of a foreign country. It’s comforting especially when you’re a minority.

So after hearing that we headed to our next destination which was Harajuku street. This street, although it was very touristy, it is the central spot for most “fashinistas”, girls who are really into the latest fashion. Lots of girls were walking around in their trendy outfits and stuff. We went to a Japanese “dollar store” and bought a few more souvenirs! It was nice to get some stuff for really cheap such as magnets and chopsticks J by this time we were pretty hungry for dinner, so we found a tempura noodle restaurant. I got a potato thing friend with tempura and ramen. Ramen in Japan is not the same as in the USA, it is thicker, fresh and usually served with a dry meat placed into the broth. Overall it was alright, different. Not something I would get again. I found it hard to eat because chopsticks and noodles don’t work well together. But overall I had fun trying!

We continued shopping and found some really interesting stores, such as an American store with all American products, things like coke, Disney and more. It was cool to see what kind of USA products are seen as “cool”. But at the same time everyone really valued their Japanese heritage. Everyone I met was so proud to be from Japan! They also liked Americans which I was surprised because I guess I just assumed everyone hated us. Everyone we ran into was also so willing to help us out! some even going out of their way. For me the way people treated me while I was in japan really made me want to make sure that when I get back to the USA, if I am put in that situation I should make sure I do the best I can to help because what I have learned is that the biggest impression you get on a country is really based on the people you meet. After Harajuku street we headed to Tokyo station to make sure we were in the area of our bus, so we wouldn’t miss it. We ended up at a nearby McDonalds with about 20 other SASers who also were taking an overnight bus, we sat and had a bite to eat while enjoying their plugs and then headed to our bus stop at 10:30. The overnight bus was fairly big, had lots of leg room, the seat went back far and had a thing you could pull over your head to shade out any extra light. It felt like sleeping in a small recliner, which was pretty good for a bus.