My days. My nights. My life. Lived well.

OK, so yesterday (that would be Saturday in Japan), Rob and I decided to venture out to Akihabara (Electric Town). Akihabara is where all the camera, computer, video games, and electronics shops are. Obviously, being that we are gadget people who like to game, it was a great time. It has been rainy since we arrived, but the rain has been like drizzle. It’s beyond mist, but not quite rain. However, it rained all day. It really didn’t bother me until the end of the day.

So, the trip from the hotel to Akihabara goes like this. Walk downstairs, and take the pedestrian walkway through some shops, through a small station to the next bigger station- all without having to draw the umbrella. Get on the JR Rail train on the Yamamote line, and go about 4 or 5 stops and get off at Akihabara. Get off the train and be bombarded with signs for every shop and game soundtracks blaring out of video game stores and people standing outside of stores repeating the same pitches over and over for various products. Obviously, we couldn’t understand the pitches, but there were women and men doing them. After awhile, they just become like background noise. Here I am just out of the train station.

Here’s sleepy Japanese businessman on the train

The first shop we went into was called Gamers. And it lived up to its name. Games on DVD, computer disc, game soundtracks, Anime DVDs, and adult games. I had no idea there could be a whole floor of game soundtracks. Want to listen to the music from the Legend of Zelda in your car? Check. How about the music from every Metal Slug game? Check.  And of course my favorite I’ll probably go back for- the Dance Dance Revolution soundtracks.

Then it was off to one of the larger duty free shops- Laox. They had 7 floors of anything you could want from souvenirs to air conditioners to stereos and cameras. We also found a location of Ishimaru that had all jazz and classical music. Rob was in heaven. I even ended up with a couple CDs there. I bought a couple CDs by a vocalist named Lisa Ono, a tropical jazz band that sounds like a high school jazz band with Latin arrangements, and a bargain bin gamble by a woman named Yancy Korosi who plays Beatles music in a Windham Hill style. I know that people think the RIAA keeps CD prices to high in the states, but they should try being a music fan in Japan. Prices ranged from 2600-3900 yen (current exchange rate is about 122 yen per dollar).

After that it was lunch time, and somehow we ended up at an Italian restaurant where Rob had pizza and I had ginger pork.  We were starving; it was awesome.

We continued to shop for the rest of the afternoon.  Found a few things, felt soaked by the end of the day, and I was cashed, so we headed back to the hotel.  After walking in the rain all day, the best remedy seemed like Indian food- and it was.

We’re in this complex of buildings called Shiodome. There are tons of restaurants and shops, so it is really easy to do stuff without going outside which has been super nice in the rainy weather.  Well, there is a Tokyo branch of this New York Indiana restaurant called Bombay Club, so that is where we ate.  We had the set menu and a couple cocktails each (mmmmm….lychee liquor and Perrier).  First off, there was SO much food.  It was actually a little insane.  I couldn’t finish all of my food even though it was probably the best Indian meal I have ever eaten.  I really wanted to, but there was no room in my stomach.

After dinner, we were hotel bound.  Walking around for 8 hours in the rain really takes the pep out of your step and we needed to recharge, so it was off to bed to cap ff our first full day in Tokyo.

By the way, you’re supposed to sing the title of this post to the tune of “O Canada!”. LOL.

Rob made it back from picking up his bag at our house fine (it’s a good thing I’m anal about getting to the airport early and having time to spare) and we took a little Embraer to Toronto. Then at 2PM on Thursday, we boarded a 777 from Toronto to Tokyo. I knew it would be a long flight (12 hours 50 minutes), but I had no idea just how long. Rob was lucky and slept most of the way. I slept in small doses.  I thought I would totally collapse after they served dinner on the plane because my pre-trip ritual always involves staying up all night packing and finishing up laundry (Rob usually sleeps in the guest room on nights before we leave).   Air Canada is totally awesome! We had wonderful Business Class seats.  Each seat lies flat and is configurable in just about every way.  There are noise canceling headphones, a power port for plugging in your laptop (no internet), and an on-demand video system with movies and TV shows.  I think the longest flight I have taken up to this point was about 9 hours.

Rob ended up crashing after dinner and I watched The Namesake, Blades of Glory (twice because I fell asleep the first time about 15 minutes in), and The Hunt for Red October.  Plus I watched a couple TV shows like Top Gear and Transit (both shows about transport and automobiles).  For some reason I couldn’t sleep that much even though I was really tired.  But I may have slept more than I thought considering we were on the plane for 13 hours.  I am used to Euro flights where you take off, have dinner, sleep for 4 or 5 hours, wake up for breakfast, and land.  This is a full 6 hours more than a flight to London, so there was lots of time to kill.

The flight attendants thought we were so normal for newlyweds because she said a lot of newlyweds come on board with a sense of “this is our honeymoon” entitlement.  The way the seats are set up, you don’t really get to sit right next to each other because you have your own little pod, and apparently some people find it weird. I showed her are wedding pictures which I downloaded to my iPhone and the flight attendants just gushed! I already knew I loved my wedding pictures, but to see other people cream over them makes me love them even more!

We landed in the rain at Narita Airport around 3:50PM.  The walk from the gate to Immigration was REALLY long, but they had those little moving walkways so it was all good.  Rob left his travel pillow on the plane (the one he bought in Toronto), and we left it for gone when we realized it at Immigration because it was so far to go back.  It was our lucky day though (Friday the 13th) and someone brought it to baggage claim and held it up until we claimed it!  Yay!  The efficiency in this country is evident everywhere, from how quickly the lines move at Immigration to the baggage claim of the airport.  The baggage circulates on a rubber belt that is so quiet compared to most baggage claims in other airports.  And they don’t need those signs that say “check your claim tags, because many bags looks alike” because everyone here has hardside suitcases in a variety of colors.  If anything instead of the American standard of the black rolling bag, the most common suitcase here (and still not as proliferating the black rolling bags of home) are silver rolling hardside suitcases, but they even have a lot of variety in whether they are smooth or ridged or whatever.
After passing through customs, you enter the arrivals hallway and that’s where it really hits you that you are REALLY IN JAPAN.  I left Rob with the luggage cart for a few minutes while I went to the ATM, the Airport Limo desk, and the newsstand for some drinks.  Then we waited a bit for our bus, and it took about 90 minutes to get to our hotel.

We passed Tokyo Disneyland on our way here, and I noticed that some truck drivers had TVs on their dashes to watch while sitting in traffic.  Yet we didn’t see one accident. Huh.